Newspapers / Eastern Courier (Hertford, N.C.) / March 27, 1895, edition 1 / Page 6
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rev; dr. taliage. The Eminent Brooklyn. Divine's Sun day Sermon. Subject: "Wholesale Divorces." Text: "What, therefore, God hath joined together let not man put asunder." Matthew xix., 6. 'That there are hundreds and thousands 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 is a skeleton in the hallway and a skeleton in all the apartments. "Unhappily married" are two words de scriptive of many a homestead. It needs no orthodox minister to prove to a badly mated pair that there is a hell. They are there now. Sometimes a grand and gracious woman will fce thus incarcerated, and her life will be a . cruciflxiion, as was the case with Mrs. Sigour liey, the great poetess and the great soul. Sometimes a consecrated man will be united to a fury, as was John Wesley, or united to a .vixens, as was John Milton. Sometimes, and generally, both parties are" to blame, and Thomas Carlyle was an intolerable scold, and his wife smoked and swore, and Froude, the historian, pulled aside the curtain from the lifelong squabble at Craigenputtock and Five, Cheyne Row. Some say that for the alleviation of all these domestic disorders of wLich we hear . easy divorce is a good prescription. God sometimes authorizes divorce as certainly as He authorizes marriage. I have just as much regard for one-lawfully divorced as I have for one lawfully married. But you know and I know that wholesale divorce is one of our National scourges. I am not surprised at this when 1 think of the influences which have been abroad militating against the mar riage relation. For many years the 'platforms of the coun tryrrang with talk about a free love millen nium. There were meetings of this kind held in the Cooper Institute, New York; Fremont Temple, Boston, and all over the land. Some of the women who were most promi nent in that movement have since been dis tinguished for great promiscuosity of affection.- Popular thems for such occasions were the tyranny of 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 Jong tongue, everlastingly at war with God ; because they were created women, while on the platform sat meek men with soft accent and cowed demeanor, apologetic for mascu linity, and holding the parasols while the termagant orators went on preaching the doctrine of free love. ! That campaign of about twenty years set more devils into the marriage relation than will be exorcised in the next fifty. Men and .Women went home from such meetings so permanently confused as to who were their jwives and husbands that they never got out of their perplexity, and the criminal and the civil courts tried to disentangle - the "Iliad" of woes, and this one got alimony, and'that one got a limited divorce, and this mother 'kept the children on condition that the fatber ecu Id sometimes come and look at them, and these went into poorhouses, and those went into an insane asylum, and those went into dissolute public life, and all went i to destruction. The mightiest war ever made against the that free love campaign, sometimes under one name and sometimes under another. Another influence that has warred upon the marriage relation has been polygamy in Utah. That was a stereotyped 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 mortifica tion and yet the whole body not be sickened as to have these Territories poiygamized and yet the body of the Nation not feel the putre faction. Hear it, good men and women of America, that so long ago as 1S62 a law was passerby Congress forbidding polygamy in the .territories and in all the places where they had jurisdiction. Twenty-four years passed along and five administrations befora the first brick was knocked from that for tress of libertinism. , T6!7 Eew resident in his inaugural tickled that monster with the straw of con demnation, and every Congress stultified it eel r In proposing some plan 'that would not Work.; rolygany stood more intrenched, and more brazen, and more puissant, and tnore braggart, and j more infernal. James Buchannan. a much abused man of his dy did more for the extirpation of this villainy than most of the subsequent administra tions. Mr. Buchanan sent out an army, and although it was halted in its work still he accomplished more than some of the admin istrations which did nothing but talk, talk, talk.- At last, but nk until it had poisoned gratioos, polygamy has received its death- Polygamy in Utah warred against the marriage-relation throughout the land. It wai Impossible to have such an awful sewer of Iniquity sending up its miasma, which was wafted by the winds North, South, East and West, without the whole land (being affected by it. j : Another influence that has warred against the marriage relation in this country has been a pustulous literature, with its millions of sheets every week choked with stories of domestic wrongs and infidelities -and massa cres and outrages, until it is a wonder to me that there are any decencies or any common sense left on the subject of marriage. One half of the newsstands of all our cities reek ing with the filth. J"Now" say some, "we admit all these evils, and the only way to cjear them out or correct them is by easy divorce." Well, be fore 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 others, in every State it is easy. The State of Illinois, through its Leg islature, recites a long list of proper causes for divorce and then closes np by giving to the courts the right to maV. the decree of divorce In any case where they deem it ex pedient. After that you are not surprised at the announcement that in one county of the State of Illinois, in one year, ther were 833 divorces. If you want to know how easy It is, you have only to look over the records of the States. In the city of San Francisco 333 divorces in one year, and in twenty years In New England 20,000. Is that not easy enough? . If the same ratio continue the ratio of multiplied divorce and multiplied causes of divorce we are not far from the time when our courts will have to set apart whole days for application, and all you will have to prove against a man will be that he left his newspaper in the middle of the floor; and all you will have to prove against a woman will be that her husband's overcoat is buttonless. Causes of divorce double in a few years doubled in France, doubled in England and doubled in the United States. To show you how very easy it is I have to tell you that in Western Reserve, Ohio, the proportion of divorces to marriages celebrated is one to eleven, in Rhode Island is one to thirteen, in Vermont one to fourteen. Is not that easy enough? I want you to notice that frequency of divorce always goes along with the disso luteness of society. Rome for 500 years had not one case of divorce. Those were her j days of glory and virtue. Then the reign of j vice Degan, ana divorce Decame epidemic, it I you want to know how rapidly the empire . went down, ask Gibbon. ! What we want in this country and in all lands is that divorce be made more and more and more difficult. Then people be fore they enter that relation will be per eauded that there will probably be no escape from it except through tho door of the sep ulcher. Then they will pause on the verge of that relation until they are fully satisfied that it is best, and that it is right, and that it is happiest. Then we shall have no more marriage in fuD. Then men and women will not enter the relation with the idea it is only a trial trip, and if they do not like it they can get out at the first landing. Then this whole question will be taken cut of the friv olous into the tremendous, and there will be no more joking about the blossoms in a ; bride s hair than about the cypress on a coffin. What we want is that the Congress of the United States change the National Constitu tion 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 is it now? If a party in the marriage relation gets dissatisfied, it is only necessary to move to another State to achieve libera tion from the domestic tie, and divorce is effected so easy that the first one party knows of it is by seeing in the newspaper that Rev. Dr. Somebody on March 17, 1895, introduced Jn a new marriage relation a member of the household who went off on a pleasure excur sion to Newport or a business excursion to Chicago Married at the bride's house. No cards. There are States of the Union which practically put a premium upon the disin tegration of the marriage relation, while there are other States; like our own New York State, that had for a long time the pre-eminent idiocy of making marriage lawful at twelve and fourteen years of age. The Congress of the United States needs to move for a change of the National Constitu tion and to appoint a committee not made up of single gentlemen, but of men of fami lies, and their families in Washington who shall prepare a good, honest, righteous, com prehensive, uniform law that will control everything from Sandy Hook to the Golden Horn. That will put an end to broken ties In marriages. That will send divorce law yers into a decent business. That will set people agitated for many years on the ques tion of how shall they get away from each other to planning how they can adjust them selves to the more or less unfavorable circum stances. More difficult-divorce will put an estoppel to a great extent upon marriage as a finan cial speculation. There are men who go in to the relation just as they go into Wall street to purchase shares. Tho'f emal e to be invited Into the partnership of wedlock is utterly unattractive and in disposition a suppressed Vesuvius. Everybody knows it but this mas culine candidate for matrimonial orders, through the commercial 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 before the old man will die, and whether he can stand the refractory temper until he does die, and then he enters the relation, for he savs "If I cannot stand it, then through the divorce law I'll back out." That process is going on all the time, ana men enter the relation with out any moral principle, without any affec tion.and it is as much a matter of stock spec ulation as anything that transpired yesterday in Union Pacific, Illinois Central or Dela ware and Lackawanna. . Now, suppose a man understood, as be 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 would say to himself, "Rather than a Caribbean whirl wind with a whole fleet of shipping in its arms give me a zephyr off fields of sunshine and gardens of peace." Rigorous divorce law will also hinder wo men from the fatal mistake of marrying men to reform them. If a young man by twenty five years of age or thirty years of age have the.habit of strong drink fixed on him, he is as certainly bound for a drunkard's grave aa that a train starting out from Grand Central Depot at 8 o'clock to-morrow morning is bound for Albany. The train may not reach Albany, for it may be thrown off 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 probability is that the train that starts to-morrow morning Riao ciocK ior AiDany win get there, and the probability is that the young , man who has the habit of strong drink fixed on him before twenty-five or thirty years of age will arrive at a drunkard's grave. She know3 he drinks, although he tries to hide it by chew ing cloves. Everybody knows he drinks. Barents warn: neignoors and mends warn. She will marry him; she will reform him. If she is unsuccessful in the experiment, why, men tne divorce law will emancipate ner be cause nabitual drunkenness is a cause for di vorce in Indiana, Kentucky. Florida, Con necticut 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 city, I will show you the homes of the women who married men to reform them. In one case out of 10,000 it may be a successful experiment. 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." A rigorous divorce la will also do much to hinder hasty and inconsiderate mar riages. Under the impression that one can be easily released people enter the relation without inquiry and without reflection. Romance and impulse rule the day. Per haps the only ground for the marriage com pact is that she likes his 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 prepara tion for life. A woman that could not raake a loaf of bread to save her life will swear to cherish and obey. A Christian will marry an atheist, and that always makes con joined wretchedness, for if a man does not believe there is a God he is neither to b? 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 hove!. . By the wreck of 10,000 homes, by the holo caust of 10,000 sacrificed men and women, by the hearthstone of tho family, which ia the cornerstone of the State, and in the name of that God who hath set up the family institution, and who hath made the break ing of the martial oath the most appalling of all perjuries, I implore the Congress oi 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. Let me say to the hundreds of young peo ple in this house this alternoon, before you give your heart and hand in holy alliance use all cautions. Inquire outside as to habits, explore the disposition, scrutinize the taste question the ancestry and find out the am bitions. Do not take the heroes and the heroines of cheap novels for a model. Do not put your lifetime happiness in the keep ing of a man who has a reputation for being a little loose in morals or in the keeping of a woman who dresses fast. Remember that while good looks are a kindly gift of God' wrinkles or accident may despoil them. Re member that Byron was no more celebrated ' for his beauty than for his depravity. Re- J member that Absalom's hair was not more ! splendid thai his habits were despicable, Hear ir. hear it! The only foundation for happy marriage that has ever been or ever will be is good character. j Ask God whom !you shall marry if you marry at all. 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 blossoms clear on down to the jast farewell at that gate where Isaac and Rebecca. Abraham and Sarah, Adam and Eve parted! And let me say to-you who are in this re lation, if you make one man or woman hap py, 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 dispo sition you make up your mind that your marriage was a mistake patiently bear and forbear, remembering that life at the longest is short, and that for those who have been i badly mated in this world death will give quick and immediate bill of divorcement written in letters of green grass on quiet graves. And perhaps, my brother, my sis ter, perhaps you may appreciate each other ucucrm ueayen man you nave appreciated each other on earth. In the "Farm Ballads" our American poet puts into the lip3 of a repentant husband after a life of married perturbation these ur gestive words: . . And when she dies I wish that she would bo laid by me, And lying together in silence perhaps we will agree, And if ever we meet in heaven I would not think it queer If we love each other better because we quar reled here. And let me say to tnose of you who are in happy mamed union avoid first quarrel have no unexplained correspondence th former admirers; cultivate no suspiciWin ten Sf tCmper do wSrtind li Jt neighbors; do not let any of those gad-abouts of society unload in your hoS s856 of gab "ttle tattled 3 5dU ZUZ hts; learn how to alo- bo aevinsn that you will not make un ft ?rmberihat the worst domestic misfortu?!; est domestic misfortunes and the wide re- ui , ass nave started from little misunderstandings that were allowed to go on and go on until home and respectabUf ity and rehgioaand immortal soul wSr down in the crash crash! " 7 And, fellow citizens as well as fellow Chria- thing thattwars on the marriage state. Blessed institution! ! Iostead of?wo armfS fight the battle of life, four; iiteld TtwS eye to scrutinize the path of life, four; in stead of two shoulders to lift the burdea life, four. Twice the enerr, t wto the courage, twice the holy ambition, twice th probability of worldly success, ' twice tht crospecls of heaven.; Into the matrimonial bower God fetches two souls. Outside that bower room for all contentions, and all biek ' erings, and all controversies, but inside the bower there is room for only one truest th angel of love. Let that angel stand at the floral doorway of this Edenio bower with drawn sword to hew down the worst foe of that bower easy divorce. And foraeverv paradise lost may there bo a paradise k gained. And alter we quit our homo here may we have a brighter home in heaven at the windows of which this moment are' fa- miliar f npa vrofihinn tr . j uur arrival md wondering why so long we tarry. i . A BAYOU TRAGEDY. The "'Skeeters Carried Off His 01 Woman" lie Still Mourns. As we sat on the depot platform in the evening, smoking and talking and Slapping at the mosquitoes which came ut of the swamp 'opposite in a perfect ud, says the Detroit Free Press, the ($4 man with the clay pipe and rabbit skin cap took advantage of a pause in the conversation to say: "Talkln' 'bout 'skeeters, but you on ter live down on: a Mississippi river bayou to know what 'skeeters is." "You've lived there?" queried one of the crowd. j . "I've lived thar, an' it was downthar that my bumble home was broke ud J ind I was left desolate by the 'skeet- rs. it's a matter l' don't often talk about, fur it makes me powerful lone some and downhearted." ' ; "What did tbe mosquitoes do?" j "Carried off myiole woman.". "You don't say?f ' "That's what they , did, gentlemen, and I don't never expect to be happy; agin. That was in the summer of 1879, when we had a big overflow, andi 'skeeters was powerful bad. We just had to stay right in the cabin and fight fur our lives: We finally got out o'i whisky and cornmeal, and I was obleeged to go over to Pendersville to git some. J left the ole woman feelin' all right atfd cheerful, but when I cum back she- was she was " "Wasn't she there?" was asked, as he did not finish. "No; she . had disappeared! Them 'skeeters had busted the door open and carried her off, and. from that day to this I hev never sot eyes on her!" "Sure it was the mosquitoes?" "Of course; What else could it be?" . "Why, she might have gone out and got lost in the woods or fallen into the bayou and been drowned, or been bit ten by a snake and died in the swamp. Or again she might have concluded that, she had had enough of that coun try and skipped out" "Do you think so, stranger?" anxious ly queried the, old man. "Why, certainly. Didn't you around any?" j "Not a bit I jest found her cone and thought the 'skeeters had took ber and then I cum away a brokenhearted man. Mebbe I was mistaken "about it It was fifteen years ago, and do yoa think it would be any use to go down and look around for her now?" "Not a bit" "I thought notj I thought the best way was to keep right on mournin' and grievin' fur her and feelin' that tear was no more happiness fur me in this woeful world. Pore old Julia. How you must hev fit! and suffered. any of you folks happen to have match in your pockets? Smokin' seem to sorter ease my breakin' heart!" Primus Dalton's sight has become strangely affected, poor fellow. He sees everything double. Secundos By Jove! Im glad you mentioned it I Qwe him a pound, and I'll tender him this half sov. Tit-Bits. look A black down grows under tbe feath ers of many birds at the approach or winter, because down Is the best non conductor and black tbe warmest color.
Eastern Courier (Hertford, N.C.)
Standardized title groups preceding, succeeding, and alternate titles together.
March 27, 1895, edition 1
6
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