Brighouse & Rastrick Gazette. — 1890-06-07 (Brighouse, West Yorkshire, England)

MARRIAGE.  (CONTINUED,)  A man is commanded to love his wife, not wives. From first to last nature and revelation alike enencourage only monogamy. The text condemns. (1) Polygamy. Polygamy commenced as early as tbe days of Lameck, and the world has never been without it since, especially in eastern countries. In the east people had a great and to us most wonderful passion for children, and if a wife threatened to be barren she was usually the first (as was Sarah) to suggest the husband having children for her by a slave. The child was supposed to be hers, and her instinct of motherhoo I overbore everything else, Men also wished large families in order to defend the borne or to increase the family wealth. In those days it generally happened that the husband never saw the wife's face even before their marriage. Marriages were arranged not by the parties, but for the parties, hence the temptation to have wives or concubines in future years after the husbands own taste, Even then the first wife was regarded as chief. The others held not the position of concubine in our sense of the term, for the secondary wives were really wives with the status of wives, and were not like the kept mistresses of modern society. They were openly married, and were openly recognised, and their rights respected. Abraham had but one wife at a time. What he did to Hagar, he did at his wife's request and for her sake. None of the parties were conscious of doing any wrong in the transaction, but though no one exceeded their rights, vet the acfon brought trouble only to all parties concerned in it. A violation of God's moral order, however innocently done, always brings trouble. Jacob desired but one wife. He protested against two being thrust upon him, and though perfectly innocent, yet the wrong done him produced much domestic trouble in after years. David and Solomon had several wives, but we Pee how nearly all their sorrow came from the harem. Man is not fitted for polygamy, and no nation that adopts it can prosper. Mormons in part adopt polygamy, but this custom has brought on them nearly all their trouble, and embroiled them with governments and peoples. It has only been a curse to them, though their polygamy is as open as that of the east. They have wives, and not a wife and a conoubine.—(2) Polyandry, This custom never was so general as polygamy, for men have always cherished the notion that their wives were their own personality, their own goods, property, and chattels, whereas polyandry seems to imply that the men are the goods and chattels of the wife, She was mistress, and they were her property. No man of spirit could endure the idea of having bat a share of a wife, though several have done so in this country, as well as in others. The ous'om, though unnatural and unsoriptural, is not so bad is that of women accepting the guilty friendship of several men, and keeping open door for them. The latter undermines the peace and the purity of many homes.—(3) Bigamy. Some men with their eyes open commit bigamy. They will marry a seoond wife when they know that the first is alive. Many in that way have two homes, waich they visit at more or less regular intervals. Some women so far forget what is due to themselves as to consent to such an arrengement,—(4) Libertinism. Many couples are living together wbo never have been married, and who do not inter' 1 to marry. That rolatontio life never did answer, though some distinguished people have tried it. Making a lioencions convenience of a woman is no way to raise either the sex or raise ourselves. That many people are ill-mated, and that many marriages are unhappy, is an argument not against marriage Itself, but against all hasty, ill-considered, and judged marriages. Be careful whom you choose as a wife, but having chosen her, have respect enough for her and yourself, for God and for man, to marry her. Any other course is the sheerest selfishness, whatever other name we may be pleased to give it, It means misery and slavery to the woman; it generally ends in the suicide of the mother, and the murder of the children, or in their being thrown on the parish. God tuts done all that can be done to enhance marriage in the eyes of the people. He makes it lovely, and He asks us to enter into that state in the name of our best interests.