North Carolina Newspapers

DIVORCE QUESTION OR. TALMAGE DISCOURSES ON AN URGENT DIFFICULTY. Domestic Disorder a Subject. oMfav tionnl Importance Unit ormlty of Divorce Lam In the VarIou State Sntnreated.- Vr' -'-V Copyright, Louis Klopsch. 1S99.3 Washington, Sept. 17. Dr. Talmage !n this discourse discusses a question of national importance, which is con fessedly as difficult asJt is'urgent. The text is Matthew xlx, 6, "What there tore God hath joined together let not an put asunder." That there are hundreds and thou sands of Infelicitous -homes In America no one -will, doubt If there were only one skeleton In the closet, that might be locked up and abandoned, but in many a home there Js a skeleton In the hallway and a skeleton In all the apart ments. "Unhappily married" are two r words descriptive, of many a home stead. It needs no orthodox minister to prove toa badly mated pair that there is a helL Theyare there now. some times a grand and gracious woman will be thus Incarcerated, and her life will be a crucifixion, s was the case with Mrs. Slgourney, the great poetess and the great soul. Sometimes a consecrat- ed man will be united to a fury, as was . John Wesley, or united to a vixen, as was John Milton. Sometimes and gen erally both parties are to blame, and Thomas Carlyle is an intolerable grum Taler, and his wife has a pungent retort always ready, and- Froude, J the hlsto- n. oil n1r ?n trnth. has to pull aside the curtain from the lifelong squabble at Craigenputtock. and 5 Cheyne row. j Domestic Disorders. T "-j Some say that for the alleviation of all these domestic disorders of which . -- i wc ueur easy uivuiye-ia a. ,w i -EcriptiOn. God sometimes authorizes divorce as certainly as he authorizes marriage. I have just as much regard for one lawfully divorced as i nave ior one lawfully married; But you know one of our national scourges. I am not surprised at this when I think of the . . . i i j m lUliUcilV.tT9 V UUVC uccu av&vruu u...- tatlng against the marriage . relation. For many years the platforms of the country rang with talk about a free love millennium. There were meetings of this kind held in the Academy of Music, Brooklyn; Cooper Institute, New Va1? FTwfn rkr 4-&rr nla TCi-tatlTl CI TlH fill J. Ul IV f iCiAJIiV) XVDlVUj mmx over the land Some of the women who were most prominent in that move ment have since been distinguished for great promlscuosity of affection. Popu lar themes for such occasions were ,the tyranny or man, the oppression of the marriage relation, women's rights and the affinities. Prominent speakers were women with short curls and short dress and very long tongue, everlast ingly at war with God because they were created women, while on the plat- m a. UL - A. xurui kui met; is. uieu wiiu un hclcui and cowed demeanor, apologetic for masculinity and holding the parasols while the termagant orators went on preaching the gospel of free love. That campaign of about 20 years set more devils into the marriage relation; than will be exorcised in the next 50. Men and women went home from such meetings so permanently confused as "to who were their wives and husbands that they never got out of the perplex ity, and the criminal and the civil, courts tried to disentangle the Iliad of woes, and the one got alimony, and that one got a limited divorce, and this mother kept the children on condition that the father could sometimes come and look at them, and these went nto poorhouses, and those went Into an Insane asylum, and those went Into dls- euiuie puuuc iue, uuu ait weni io ue struction. The mightiest war ever made against the marriage Institution was that free love campaign, some times under one name and sometimes under another, Suppress Polrgamj. Another influence that has warred upon the marriage relation has been polygamy in Utah. That is a stereo typ d caricature of the marriage relation and has poisoned the whole land. You might as well think that you can have an arm in a state of mortification and jet the whole body not be sickened as to have any territories or states poly g amized and yet the body of the nation not feel the putrefaction. Hear it, good men and women of America, that so long ago as 18G2 a law was passed by congress forbidding polygamy in the territories and in all the places where they had jurisdiction. "Thirty-seven years have passed along and nine ad ministrations, yet not until the passage of the Edmunds law In 1882 was any active policy of polygamic suppression adopted. Armed with all the power of government and '-having an army at their disposal, the first brick had not till then been knocked from that for tress of libertinism. Every new presi dent in his inaugural tickled that mon- imu uic ouiiw ui cuuuemnaiion, and every congress stultified .itself In proposing some plan that would not work. Polygamy stood in Utah, and In other of the territories more intrench ed, more brazen, more puissant, more braggart and more internal than at any time in its history. James Buchanan, a much abused man of his day, did nore for the extirpation of this vil lainy than all the subsequent adminis trations dared to do up to 18S2. Mr. Buchanan sent out an army, and. al though it was halted in Its work, still be accomplished more than the subse- quent administrations, which did nothing but talk, talk, talk. Even at this late day- and with the Edmunds act in force the evil has not been wholly extirpated. Polygamy in Utah, though outlawed, Is still practiced in secret. It has warred against the mar riage relation throughout the land. It Is Impossible to have such an awful lewer of Iniquity sending up its mias ma, which is wafted by the winds north,, south; east and west, without the whole land being affected by it. i ;.- Divorce Easy y Another Influence that has warred against the marriage relation In this country has been a pustulous litera ture, with its millions of sheets every week choked with stories of .domestic wrongs and infidelities and massacres and outrages until it is a wonder to me that there are any dencencles or any common sense left on the subject of marriage. One-half of the newsstands f our great cities reek with the filth, j "Now," say some, "we admit all these evils, and the only way to clear them out or tor correct them Is by easy divorce." ,Well,. before we yield to that cry let us find out how easy it Is now. I have looked over the laws of all the states, and I find that, while In some states 'it is easier than' In oth ers, in every state it is easy. The state of Illinois, through Its legislature, re cites a long list of proper causes for divorce and' then closes up by giving to the courts the right to make, a de cree of divorce in any case where they deem it expedient. After that you are not , surprised at the announcement that In one year there were 833 di vorces. If you want to know how easy, it is, you- have only to look? over the records of the states In Massachu setts, COO divorces In one year; In Maine, 478 In one year; In Connecticut, 401 divorces, in one year; in the city of, San Francisco, 333 divorces in one year; in New England in one year, 2,113 di vorces, and in 20 years in New Eng gland, 20,000. Is that not easy enough? If the same ratio continues, the ratio of multiplied j divorce and multiplied causes of divorce, we are not far from the time when our courts wil have to set apart whole days for application, and all you will have to prove against a man will be that he left his slippers In the middle of the floor, and all you will have to prove against a woman will be that her husband's ove: -coat was buttonless. Causes of divorce doubled ina' few years doubled in France, doubled In England and dou bled in the United States. To show how very easy it is, I have to tell you that in Western Reserve. Ohio, the pro portion of divorces to marriages cele brated was in one year 1. to 11; 'in Rhode Island, i to 3; in Vermont, 1 to 14. Is not that easy enough? Society Dissolute. . I want you to notice that frequency of divorce always goes along with the dissoluteness of society. Rome for 500 years i had not one case of divorce. Those were her days of glory and virtue. Then the reign of vice began, and divorce became epidemic. If you want to know how rapidly the empire went down, ask Gibbon. Do you know how the reign of terror was introduced in France? By 20,000 cases of divorce In one year in Paris. What we want in this country and in all lands is that divorce be made more and more diffi cult. Then people before they enter that relation will -be persuaded that there will probably be no escape from it except through the door of the sepul cher, then theywlll pause on the verge of that relation until they are fully sat isfied that it Is best and that it is right and that It is happiest, then we shall have no more marriages in fun, then men and women will not enter the rela tion with the idea It is only a trial trip and if they do notHke It they can get out at the first landing, then this whole question will be taken out of the frivo lous Into the tremendous, and there will be nomore joking about the blos soms in a bride's hair than about the cypress on a coffin. 1 What we want is that the congress of the , United States move for the changing of the national constitution so that a law can be passed which shall be uniform all over the country and what shall be right in one state shall be right in all the states and what Is wrong in one state will be wrong in all the states. How la it now? If a party In the marriage relation gets dissatis fied, it is only necessary to move to an other state to achieve liberation from the domestic tie, and divorce is effected so easily that the, first one party knows of It is by seeing lt In the newspaper that Rev. Dr. Somebody a few days or weeks afterward introduced into a new marriage relation a member of the household who went off on a pleasure excursion to Newport or a business ex cursion to Chicago. Married at the bride 8 house; no cards. There are states of the- Union which practicany put a premium upon the disintegration of the marriage relation, while there are other states, like the state of New York, which has the pre-eminent idiocy of making marriage lawful at 12 and 14 years of age. Change the Constitution. j ' The congress of the United States needs to move for, a change of the na tional constitution and then to appoint a commlttee--not made up of single gentlemen, but of men of families, and their families In Washington who shall prepare a good, honest, righteous, comprehensive uniform law that will control everything from Sandy Hook to the Golden Gate. That will put an end to brokerages in marriage. That will send divorce lawyers into a decent business. That will set people agitat ed for many years on the question of how they shall get away from each other to planning how they can "adjust themselves to the more or less unfavor able circumstances. -More dllflcult divorce will put an es toppal to a great extent upon marriage as a - financial speculation. There are men who go into the relation just as they go into Wall street to purchase shares. The female to be invited into the partnership of wedlock is utterly unattractive and in disposition a sup pressed Vesuvius. Everybody knows it, but this masculine candidate for matrimonial orders, through the com mercial agency or through the county records, finds out how -much estate Is to be Inherited, and he calculates it. He thinks out how long It will be be fore the old man will die and whether he can stand the refractory temper un til he does die, and then he enters the relation, for he says, , "If I cannot stand It, then through the'dlvorce law I wllfback out." That process Is going on all the time, and men enter into the relation without any moral principle, without any affection, and It- is as much a matter of stock speculation as anything that was transacted yester day ' In Union Pacific,' Wabash and Delaware and Iackawanna. Now, sup pose a man understood, as he ought to understand, that if he goes into that relation there is no possibility of his getting out or no probability. He would be more slow to put his neck" . In the yoke. He should say to himself, "Rath er than a Caribbean whirlwind with a whole fleet of shipping In its arms, give me a zephyr off fields of sunshine and gardens of peace." Rlcorous Latts. Rigorous dLvorce law will also hinder women from the fatal mistake of mar rying men to reform them. If a young man, by 25 years of age or SO years of age have the habit of strong drink fixed on him, he is as certainly bound for a drunkard's grave as that a train starting out from the Grand Central depot at 8 o'clock tomorrow morning is bound for Albany. The train may not reach Albany, for It may be thrown from the track. The young man may not reach a drunkard's., grave, for something may throw him off the Iron track of evil habit. But the proba bility Is that the train that starts to morrow morning at 8 o'clock for Al bany will get there, and 'the proba bility is that the young man who has the habit of strong drink fixed on him before 25 or 30 years of age "will ar-. rive at a drunkard's grave. She knows he drinks, although he tries to hide It by chewing cloves. 1 Everybody knows he "drinks. 7 1 Parents warn; neighbors and friends warn; She will marry him; she will reform him. . If she Is unsuc cessful in the experiment, .why, then, the jUvorce law will , emancipate her, because habitual drunkenness is a cause for divorce In Indiana, Ken tucky, Florida, Connecticut and nearly all the states. So the poor thing goes to the altar of , sacrifice.. If you will show me the poverty struck streets in any cityfvLwill show you the .homes of the women who married men to re form .them. In one "case out of ten thousand it may be a successful experi ment I never saw the successful ex periment. But have a rigorous divorce law, and that woman will say, "If . I am affianced to that man, it is for life, and If now. In the ardor of his young love and I the prize to be won, he will not give up his cups, when he has won the prize surely he will not give up his cups." And so that woman will say to the man: "No, sir; you are already married to the club, and you are mar ried to that evil habit, and so you are married twice, and you are a bigamist. Go!" ' ' Hasty Sfarrlaires. A rigorous divorce law will also do much to hinder hasty and Inconsid erate marriages. Under the Impres sion that one can be easily released people enter the relation without In quiry and without reflection. Romance and impulse rule the day. Perhaps the only ground for the marriage compact is that she likes bis looks, and he ad mires the graceful way she passes around the ice cream at the picnic! It is all they know about each other. It is all' the preparation for life. A man not able to pay his own board bill, with not' a dollar in his possession, will stand at the altar and take the loving hand and say, "With all my worldly goods I thee endow." A wo man that could not make a -loaf of bread .to save her life will swear to love and keep him in sickness and in health. A Christian will marry an atheist, and that always niakesr con joined wretchedness, for if a man does not believe there is a God he is neither to be trusted with a dollar nor with your lifelong happiness. Having read much about love in a cottage people brought up in ease will go and starve In a hovel. Runaway matches and elopements, nine hundred and ninety nine out of a thousand of which mean death and hell, multiplying -on all hands. You see them in every day's newspapers. - Our ministers in some regions have no defense such as they have in other regions where the banns must be pre viously published and an officer of the law must give a certificate that all Is right, so clergymen are left defense less and unite those who ought never to ; be united. Perhaps they are too young, or perhaps they are standing already In some domestic compact. By the wreck t)f ten thousand homes, by the holocaust of ten thousand sacri ficed men and women, by the hearth stone of the family, which . Is the cor nerstone of the state, and in the name of that God who hath set up the fam ily institution and who hath made the breaking of the marital oath the most appalling of all perjuries, I implore the congress of the United States, to make some righteous, uniform law for all the states and from ocean to ocean on this subject of marriage and divorce. ' .Warning? to the Yonngr. Let me say to all young people, be fore you give your heart and hand In holy alliance, use all caution. Inquire outside as to habits, explore the dispo sition, scrutinize the taste, question the ancestry and find out the ambi tions. Do not take the heroes and the heroines of jheap novels for a mod el. Do not put your- lifetime happi ness in the keeping of a man who has a reputation of being a little loose in morals or in the keeping of a woman who dresses immodestly. Remember that, while good looks are a kindly gift of God, wrinkles or accident may despoil them. Remember that Byron was no more celebrated for his beauty than for his depravity. Remember that Absalom's hair was not more splendid than his habits were despica ble. Hear it! Hear it! The only foun dation for happy marriage that ever RAIIEIII i This Knife? Ml ,$mv w m This Suit of Clothes I jPRS-HOPklNS) j I jU'- MAKE LISTEN! HAKE OP y -. - Boys' Clothes la the best made and the best known of any. brand of boys' clothing that has ever been given to the boys of this section. 1 t ' ' We are going to make ithem1 more popular by Inducing new trade and to induce this trade we propose to give one of the handsome knives shown in this advertisement absolutely free with every suit of Boys' Clothes ihat we sell, commencing from this date and to continue until further advised. Ages 4 to 16. mmi mmii, mm mi j 300 SOUTH ELM ST., GREENSBORO. J STROUD has been or ever wilL be is good char acter. Ask the counsel of father and moth er in this most important step of your life. They are good advisers. They are the best friends you ever had. They made more sacrifices for you than any one else ever did, and they will do more today for your .happi ness than any other people. Ask them, and, above all, ask God. I used to smile at John Brown of Haddington because, when he was about to offer his hand and heart in marriage to one who .v became bis lifelong companion, he opened the conversation by saying; "Let us pray."- But I have seen so many shipwrecks on the sea! of mat rimony 1 have made up my mind that John Brown of Haddington was right A union formed in prayer will be a happy union, though sickness pale the cheek and poverty empty the bread tray and death open the small graves and all the path of life be strewn with thorns, from the marriage altar, with Its wedding march and orange blos soms, clear on down to the last fare well at that gate where Isaac, and Re becca, Abraham and Sarah, Adam and Eve, parted. And let me say to you who are. in this relation, if you make one man or woman happy you have not lived In vain. Christ says that what he is to the church you ought to be to each other, and if sometimes, through difference of opinion' or difference ' of disposition,' you make up your mind that your marriage was a mistake pa tiently bear and forbear, remembering that there is a glory in the patient en durance of a sad yoke. Life at the longest is short, and for those who have been badly mated Inthis world death will give quick and final bill of divorcement written In letters of green grass on quiet graves. And perhaps, my brother, my sister, perhaps you may appreciate each other better in heaven than you have appreciated each other on earth. ! A Divine Institution. In the "Farm Ballads" our Ameri can poet puts Into the Hps, of a re pentant husband, after a life of mar ried perturbation, these suggestive "words: - And when the die I wish that she would be laid by me, I i And, lying together in silence, perhaps we will agree, - -. I And if erer we meet in hearen I would not think it queer If w love each other better because we quarreled . here. : ' ' v , 1 And let me say to those of you who are in happy married union, avoid first quarrels; have no unexplained corre spondence 'with former admirers; cul tivate no. suspicions; in a moment of bad temper- do not rush out and tell the neighbors; do not let any! of' those gadabouts of society unload in your house their baggage of gab and tittle tattle; do not make it an invariable rule to stand on your rightsr learn how to apologize; do not be so proud or so strbborn or so devilish that you will not make up. Remember that the worst domestic misfortunes and most scandalous divorce cases started from little , infelicltes. The whole piled up train of ten rail cars telescoped and smashed at the t foot of an embank ment 100 feet down came to) that ca tastrophe by getting two or three Inch es off the track. Some of the greatest domestic misfortunes and the widest resounding divorce cases have started from little misunderstandings that were allowed to go on and go on until home and respectability and ; religion and immortal soul went down in the crash. : rJ j Fellow citizens as well as fellow Christians, let us have a divine rage against anything that wars on the mar riage state. Blessed institution! In stead of two arms to fight the battle of life, four; instead of two eyes to scrutinize the path of life, four: in- r - j -. steaa of two shoulders to lift the bur den of life, four; twice the energy, twice the courage, twice the holy am bition, twice the probability of world ly success, twice .the prospects of heaven. Into that matrimonial bower God fetches two souls. Outside the bower, room for all contentions, and all bickerings, and all controversies, but inside that bower there is room for only one guest the angel of love. Let that angel stand at the floral doorway of this Edenic bower with drawn sword to hew down the worst foe of that. bower easy divorce. And for ev ery paradise lost may there be' a para dise regained. And after we quit our home here may we have a brighter home in heaven, at the windows of which, this moment, are familiar faces watching for our arrival and wonder ing why so long we tarry. - A Flower of Woe. Was ever anything more charged with the pathetic irony of Jife and death than the following? A young pri vate of the Third Alpine regiment has come to a violent end under particular ly sad circumstances at Vlllar Pellice, In the Maritime Alps. In trying to reach some edelweiss for his fiancee, a beautiful girl living in a. neighboring valley, he lost his balance and. fell down a precipice. He was to have been married in October. Now, for the sake of that one "white flower of . honor," he is buried In August! now' she will hate the beautiful waxlike bloom which grows on the Llgurian precipices until time has dried her tears, when the memory will become swept and sacred to her heart of the lover who, unlike so many of modern days.gave his life away for her bright eyes and for the badge of duty and devotion.' London Telegraph. . Kmrer! Aniwer. . President Kruger recently refused an Introduction to a well known English man, who thereupon sent back word that he must see Oom Paul; that he was ho ordinary person, and that he ra8, in fact, a member of the house of lords. The servant went away and re turned with the message, The presi dent says he cannot see you and adds that he Is a cattle herder." - Killed 55 8nakei at Oct u-v The following trus story the Concord Times: "Mr w j flmot h;3 townihiM that he and his ion, while n ting a mowing machine, kil'ei" snakes with one lick of the chinn'n Wen if a TU ki.j. . uo uiaue letLV the head of a large rnoccaia,f.: xeei jong, ana as large is the It yath vi a man s leg. . inside t snake were 54 other inikevrq inz in size from It t ... inches long. Mr. Sims mi moccasin was the largest mt ever saw." : I SWAMP-ROOT I notrecoirmoif: everything: buj hare kMlcfj, l:e i LlatMer irAil e a 1 1 fan Mil ln fi. w. ady yon need. At dru arristit in fiff rr a dollar BiZPA. Yon tnnr-hat i.mi,!. .r( this wondcrfal new discovery tv mi.l !:, pamphlet telling all about it. ' Auarew ur. Aiimer & Co.. iHnfhnit..J : CLARELIONT C0LLE6I TOS OZELS AND YOTOTO.. f. -lIICKO.fi V, '.C Noted health resort. I'ure munii;B water. Ten whooU in one. t htrttA state. 1100 Piano Riven to lct muMr n " Home comforts. Faenltrof II rB:" and women:' Stmlpntu fmm ne kiri'rK em state, aUo Innn (jnnxla. 'V.'t't'n Northern states. UeafonaMe rate-. Catalogue. 8. T HATTON, A. M-f Southern Railway A WONDEBFUL OUREIOP DIAE- , BHOEA. A Prominent . Virginia Editor Had Almost Giyen Up, but Was Brought Back to Perfect Health by Cham berlain's Colio, Cholera and Diar rhoea Bemedy Bead His Editorial. From the Times, HillsTille, Va. 1 I suffered with diarrhoea for a long time and thought I was past being cured. I had spent much time and money and suffered so much misery that I bad almost de cided to give up all hopes of re covery and await the result, but noticing the advertisement of Chamberlain's Colic, Cholera and Diarrhoea Remedy and also some testimonials stating how some won derful cures had been wrought by this remedy, I decided to try it. After taking a few doses I was en tirely well of that trouble, and i wish to say further to my readers and fellow-sufferers that I am a bale and hearty man today and feel as well as I ever did in my life. O. R. Moore. Sold by C.E.Hol- ton, Druggist. Mrs. Lula Jenkins, of Indiana, has filed three suits in the United States court to recover damages for the lynching of her husband in 1897. IN EfTKCTJDKtEMKKR -1 This condensed schedule is l"l!t formation and is subject to claf notice to the public. ' TraJnaleaTeGreenabbro,N.C.: ; 7 :05 a. m.-No. 87 daily. '"'1? V western Limited for tbarlotte, mlngbam, Memphis, VoatfOtntrf. Orleans and all poiDU south ara Connect at Charlotte for Cof Sarannan. JacLsonnlle andTkn'M;, Pullman Sleeper New Vrifk ! New York to Merot.his: New Dining .Car and Vestibule t w to Atlanta. . 1X1 a. m-No. 11 dailr. f-r Cb f and ail joints onth. S'VU-V, Asbeyule. Knoxrilleand tha nan sleeper New York to . Jf 8 :10 a. m.-No. 8 daily, tor it.?' .llP,m.-No.3fidanv. a-tej Mail for aaniDgf'n. -v. .)n.B ir.y Ncrth. Carries towJkvy"li Koora Buffet Seej'-N;?rrVr,f.u:!;sB : .inrtsirtnTiiif! uj n .--irf' sleeping Car on jioniaj -; v Southern l'aciflc. San ra0c.-o r Jf Mail for Charlotte. A H ' Sooth jind Southwest, n fwColuinWa-A-";;; tuffet hieeier e- ;-rk u fork to Jackmvil!. . I ' r- ,..; n ' mm; Charlotte to Avrj . w i:eeir Wetlnes-lay Ua-r-ns lisco, . , -tr- I . 1 V . ' . . t SouthwesU-rn I-""11'! t Uir" t-int North. V'v'- W.k Washington and e u.;te ' 6:45 i. m.-No. 7 points. ' , . .,"5, :10a.m.-N.;!f:;?r.e and local point'- ,.i i--; for Tarboro. Norfolk a i yl c;,r. , . t.M;;.l.- No. Wleavwiim-'';;: " ,...r:- k Kaleigh. Ool.l.U.ro nn- - J I and xxnntu em-u loaonot. win ana io First MHrtion io f m . rrrr aMnirers Wtwt-' achiluleJtoau.,