"I was brought up in the Unitarian faith. Like most American men, I
believe in the power of the individual to work out his own salvation."
"But what message have you for a world of sinners?" asked the rector,
trenchantly.
"I appreciate the force of your criticism. I am conscious that the
weakness of Unitarianism--of individual liberty of conscience--is its
coldness, that it does not constantly hold out to the degenerate soul
the lure of a new spiritual birth. It is for this reason largely that
your Church and the Catholic Church have gained fresh converts in this
country and this city. Moreover, those churches have promoted among us
picturesqueness, color, and sentiment. But, on the other hand, their
spirit is autocratic if not aristocratic, and in their love for the
pomp of the ages, in their fealty to the so-called vested rights of
civilization, they have little sympathy with the rational, every-day
reasoning of republican democracy."
Mr. Prentiss pursed his lips. There was no offence in the speaker's
manner or tone which would justify a rebuke; on the contrary, they both
suggested that he was trying to speak dispassionately. But the
conclusions stirred the rector's blood, and he tightened his folded
arms.
"You seem to forget that the spirit of Christian philanthropy, of the
loving brotherhood of man, is the controlling emotional force in the
Episcopal--yes, in the Roman Church to-day. You yourself are familiar,
for example, with the work of my Mr. Starkworth in the Church of the
Redeemer."
"Yes. But neither Church has compassion on the misery of common
humanity when to relieve it would conflict with the hard and fast
letter of church law. That is where--and notably in this matter of
recognizing divorce--the other Protestant churches, the Presbyterian,
the Methodist and the Baptist, have been more tolerant. They have
refused to insist that it is for the benefit of mankind that, under all
circumstances, men and women unhappily married should remain in durance
vile without the possibility of escape, or, having escaped, should be
condemned by precept to celibacy for the rest of their lives. And
these are sects whose creed is based on the essential sinfulness of
human nature."
The rector glowered at Gordon for a moment from under his brows. "Then
where will you draw the line?" This was Mr. Prentiss's trump card. It
expressed his utter weariness with what he regarded as the foul system
of conflicting and irresponsible legislation, unceasingly and
scandalously availed of.
"That brings us to your second proposition!" exclaimed Gordon. "As to
whether the State is faithless to its duty. Have you a copy of the
public laws, Mr. Prentiss?"
"Assuredly." The rector strode across the room and taking down two
large volumes from the book-shelf presented them to his visitor. It
gratified him to demonstrate by this practical test the broadness of
his humanity.
"Do you happen to know the causes for which divorce is granted in this
State?"
Mr. Prentiss hesitated. Evidently he had no exact information on the
subject, which at this juncture was disconcerting. "For far too many
causes; I am sure of that," he replied, stoutly.
"I will read them to you. 'Impotence; adultery; desertion for three
years; sentence for felony for two years; confirmed habits of
intoxication; extreme cruelty; grossly and wantonly refusing to support
wife.'"
The rector listened alertly, hoping to be able to pounce on some
conspicuously insufficient provision. Since this did not appear he
made a sweeping assertion. "They are all inadequate in my opinion
except unfaithfulness to the marriage vow, and I often doubt the wisdom
of making an exception there. I am by no means sure that the Roman
Church is not right in its refusal to admit the validity of divorce for
any cause whatever."
"But what has been the course of history since the Roman Church
promulgated its canon at the Council of Trent more than three hundred
years ago? The cause of common sense and justice as represented by the
State has, in spite of the fierce opposition of the clergy, won victory
after victory, until the institution of marriage has been placed under
the control of the secular law on most of the Continent of Europe, and
the right to divorce and the right to remarry widely recognized--for
instance in France, Germany, Switzerland, Norway, Denmark. In France
it's a criminal offence for a priest to perform the religious ceremony
of marriage until after the civil ceremony."
"Yes, and it was France which during the days of the revolution
permitted divorce at the mere option of either party. And there are
signs that we are rapidly imitating that same barbaric laxity in the
United States, and in this community."
"And if it were, would it be so much more barbarous a condition than
the conservatism of the English law of Church and State, which grants
divorce to the man whose wife has been guilty of adultery, but
withholds it from a woman unless her husband has been guilty of cruel
and abusive treatment into the bargain?"
The rector was touched on another sensitive point. He put out the palm
of his hand. "I fail to see the relevancy of your comparison, Mr.
Perry. However, the American Episcopal Church is not responsible for
the flaws in the details of the English establishment. The two are
harmonious and their aims are identical, but we do not follow blindly."
"Yet the American Episcopal Church follows its English parent and the
Roman Catholic in maintaining that the woman whose husband is an
inveterate drunkard, is convicted of murder or embezzlement, kicks and
beats her shamefully, or deserts her utterly in cold blood, is guilty
of a crime against heaven and against society if she breaks the bond
and marries again. Progressive democracy in the person of the State is
more lenient, more merciful. It refuses to believe that one
relentless, arbitrary rule is adapted to the exigencies of human
society. It insists that each case should be judged on its merits, and
both relief afforded and fresh happiness permitted when justice so
demands. Think of the many poor creatures in the lower ranks condemned
by your inexorable doctrine to miserable, lonely lives, who might
otherwise be happy!"
Mr. Prentiss's brow contracted as though he were a little troubled by
the appeal to his sympathy with the toiling mass. "One wearies of this
ever-lasting demand for happiness in this life," he murmured. "Was
Christ happy? They are free to disregard the authority of the Church
if they see fit," he added. "I for one should not feel justified in
refusing the communion to a divorced woman who had remarried."
"But the Catholic Church would and does uniformly; and the high church
party in your own church would disapprove of your leniency. The vital
point is that both churches and you yourself brand those who disobey as
spiritually impure, or at least inferior, a stigma which appalls the
best women. And so they are held as in a cruel vice, so you have held
her who was to be my wife."
The reversion to the personal equation reminded the rector that this
was no academic discussion.
"You have not answered my question yet. Where will you draw the line?
Granting for the moment--which I by no means agree to--that gross
habits of intoxication, felony, or absolute desertion are valid grounds
for breaking the nuptial bond, let me cite the law to you in turn, Mr.
Perry." Thereupon Mr. Prentiss stepped to the shelves again, and
running through the pages of a book, discovered presently the data of
which he was in search. "What do you think of these reasons?" he asked
in a scorching tone. "American grounds of divorce: 'When it shall be
made to appear, to the satisfaction and conviction of the court, that
the parties cannot live in peace and union together, and that their
welfare requires a separation,' Utah; 'Voluntarily living separate for
one year,' Wisconsin; 'For any cause that permanently destroys the
happiness of the petitioner and defeats the purposes of the marriage
relation,' Connecticut; 'For any cause in the discretion of the court,'
Kentucky; 'Whenever the judge who hears the cause decrees the case to
be within the reason of the law, within the general mischief the law
intended to remedy, or within what it may be presumed would have been
provided against by the legislature establishing the foregoing cause of
divorce, had it foreseen the specific case and found language to meet
it without including cases not within the same reason, he shall grant
the divorce,' Arizona; and in a host of States, 'One year's absence
without reasonable cause.'"
"I told you that you seemed to have a good case," said Gordon, smiling.
"But I do not think that you understand the facts, understand the real
nature of the abuse, for I heartily agree that an abuse exists even
from the standpoint of those who maintain that divorce should be
granted on the slenderest grounds. As to the extracts which you have
just read, I judge that the book is not a recent publication."
"I have reason to believe that it is authoritative."
"Undoubtedly it was so at the time. But several of the provisions in
question have been repealed and are no longer law."
"Ah," said the rector. "But you cannot deny that it is still the law
that a man and woman may be married in one jurisdiction and adjudged
guilty of adultery or bigamy in another; that the marriage tie is
broken daily on the most frivolous grounds and with the most indecent
haste; and that there is wide and revolting discrepancy between the
statutes of the several United States."
Gordon nodded. "I cannot deny the substantial accuracy of the
indictment."
"Well, sir, how do you justify it? Is not civil society neglecting its
duty?"
"I do not justify the defects in some of the legal machinery, and to
this extent I agree that society is derelict. But what I wish to make
clear is that nearly all the legal grounds for divorce in the several
states are just and reasonable--substantially the same as in this
State--and that the abuses against which they afford relief are such as
render the relation of husband and wife intolerable. There are a few
vague and lax exceptions such as you have cited, but they are fast
disappearing. The real and the salient evil lies in the looseness of
administration sanctioned in some jurisdictions, by means of which
collusive divorces are obtained by pretended residents, and close
scrutiny of the facts is avoided by the courts. To permit legal
domicile to be acquired by a residence of three months, as in Dakota,
is a flagrant invitation to fraud; but that and kindred abuses are
defects in the police power, and have only a collateral bearing on the
main issue between us, which is whether democracy can ever be induced
to reconsider its decision that it is for the best interests of human
nature that the innocent wife or husband, to whom a cruel wrong has
been done, should be free to break the bond and marry again. There is
the real question, Mr. Prentiss. You as a churchman--a foreign
churchman I still claim--demand that the woman whose life has been
blighted by a husband's brutality, sentenced for heinous crime,
abandonment, or degrading abuse of liquor should remain his wife to the
end, though he has killed every spark of love in her soul. The Church
will never be able to convince the American people or modern democracy
that this is spiritual or just."
"And yet a man who has been prohibited by the courts of New York from
marrying again has merely to step into New Jersey and his marriage
there will be recognized and upheld by the courts of New York. But
that you will probably describe as another instance of defect in the
police power. The line which you draw is evidently that which any
particular body of people--sovereign states I believe they call
them--sees fit to establish. The logical outcome of such a theory can
only be social chaos. The sanctity of the home is fundamentally
imperilled thereby."
"And yet," said Gordon, "the family life of the American people
compares favorably with that of any nation in affection, morality, and
happiness. More than three-fourths of the applicants for divorce in
the United States are women. They have thrown off the yoke of docile
suffering which the convention of the centuries has fastened upon them."
"Some of them," interposed the rector with spirited incisiveness. "The
shallow, the self-indulgent, the indelicate, the earthly minded. There
are many who are still true to the behests of the spirit," he added
significantly. It was doubtless an agreeable reflection to him that
the one woman in the world for his antagonist was among the faithful.
"On the contrary, I believe that their number is made up largely of the
intelligent, the earnest, and the vitally endowed. Democracy maintains
that it is no worse for children to be educated where love or legal
freedom exists than where there is thinly concealed hate, contempt, or
indifference."
It was obvious that neither had been or would be convinced by the
other's argument. Probably each had been well aware of this from the
first. Gordon had come warm with what he regarded as the unwarranted
injustice of the clergyman's successful interference, unable to credit
the belief that it would not be withdrawn when the case was coolly laid
before him. On his part Mr. Prentiss had listened indulgently, certain
of the deep-rooted quality of his convictions, but willing to hear the
opposite side stated by a trained antagonist. He had been glad of an
opportunity to elucidate the Church's attitude, and had not been
without hopes of making cogent to this censor of different faith the
civilizing righteousness of the ecclesiastical stand, or at any
rate--which would be in the line of progress--the demoralizing
insufficiency of the current secular reasons for divorce. Apparently
he had failed in both, and moreover had encountered a disposition
toward obnoxious radicalism which was disturbing.
"Then I am to presume that you, and so far as you are at liberty to
speak for them, the American people" (Mr. Prentiss could be subtly
biting when the occasion demanded), "sanction practically
indiscriminate divorce?"
Gordon disregarded the sarcastic note. The bare question itself was
sufficiently interesting.
"It is true, as you suggested just now, that the American people have
gone further in that direction than any other except the French. In
France, after the latitude of optional divorce palled, divorce was
abolished and was never authorized again, as you may remember, until
very recently--1884. In the exuberance of our enthusiasm for personal
liberty the legislators in some of our states--especially those of the
most recent origin, have shown an inclination to pass laws which
justify your conclusion. But there is at present a reaction. The
people have become disgusted with the licentious shuffling on and off
of the marriage tie by the profligate element of the fashionable rich
through temporary residence and collusive proceedings in other states.
You and I have a recent flagrant instance in this city in mind. Every
good citizen abhors such behavior, Mr. Prentiss. But the public
conscience has become aroused, and steps are being taken to reform what
I termed the defects in the police power, partly by amendment of the
loose provisions by some of the offending states, and partly by
provisions in other states, challenging the jurisdictional validity of
foreign divorces granted to their own citizens on paltry grounds. It
is a misfortune that a national divorce law is only among the remote
possibilities. And yet, can there be any doubt that any uniform law
which the American people would consent to adopt would necessarily
include every one of the grounds already law in this State, and which
the Church labels as inadequate?"
Mr. Prentiss twisted in his chair. "If the Church were satisfied that
the State was sincere, a reasonable compromise might not be impossible.
Some of our thoughtful clergy have been feeling their way toward this."
Gordon shook his head. "But even your Church would yield so little;
and the Roman Catholic nothing at all. Would you consent to divorce
for gross drunkenness or conviction for felony?"
"If so, what becomes of the spiritual obligation that one takes the
other for better or for worse? Shall a woman desert her husband in
misery? Is long-suffering devotion to become antiquated?"
"As an obligation, yes. If she loves him still, she will cling to him.
But if their natures are totally at variance, if she has been cruelly
wronged and disappointed by his conduct, she should have the right to
leave him and to wed again. The world of men and women has ceased to
believe that individual happiness should be sacrificed until death to
the cruel or degenerate vices of another."
"The doctrine of selfish individualism," murmured the rector.
"Mrs. Stuart informed me that you made that cry the basis of your
objection. I agree with you that individualism has in many directions
been given too free scope, and that modern social science is right in
demanding that it should be curbed for the common good. But only when
it is for the common good, Mr. Prentiss. Divorce and remarriage are in
many instances necessary for the welfare of humanity, for the
protection and relief of the suffering and virtuous and the joyous
refreshment of maimed, tired lives."
"And how liable they are to become tired with such easy avenues of
escape!" Mr. Prentiss hastened to exclaim. "So long as remarriage is
stigmatized as a lapse from spiritual grace, young couples will be
patient and long-suffering. The truest love is often the fruit of
mutual forbearance during the early years of wedlock. It is only one
step from what you demand to divorce for general incompatibility. I
have yet to hear you disclaim belief that this would be for the common
good, Mr. Perry." Mr. Prentiss rolled out the phrase "general
incompatibility" with fierce gusto, as though he were scornfully
revelling in its felicity as an epitome of his opponent's theory
carried to its logical conclusion. He had been sparring for wind,
waiting for an opening as it were, and feeling that he had found it, he
forced the fighting.
"It is difficult to forecast what is to be the future evolution of the
divorce problem," answered Gordon, reflectively. "On one side is the
security of the home, as you have indicated, on the other the claims of
justice and happiness. Just now respectable society stands a little
aghast--and no wonder--at the scandalous lack of reverence for the
marriage tie shown by our new plutocracy----"
"Godless people!" interjected the rector.
"And will doubtless mend its fences for the time being so as to refuse
divorce except for genuine tangible wrongs, such as those we have
discussed. But if you ask me whether I believe that in the end general
incompatibility--meaning thereby total lack of sympathy between husband
and wife--will be recognized by human society as a valid and beneficial
ground, my answer is that the social drift is that way. It will depend
on the attitude of the women. They constitute by far the majority of
the applicants for divorce, as you know. If they become convinced that
it will not be for the welfare and happiness of themselves and their
children to remain tied to men utterly uncongenial, the State probably
will give them their liberty. But one thing is certain," he added,
"the Church will never be able to fasten again upon the world its
arbitrary standard."
Gordon rose as he finished. He felt that the interview was at an end,
a drawn battle so far as change of opinion was concerned. But he had
chosen to complete his bird's-eye glimpse of the possible future with a
definite and pointed prediction.
Mr. Prentiss had listened with astonishment to the speculative
suggestion. He had expected a disavowal of the license embodied in his
taunt, and a floundering attempt at limitation which he hoped would
involve his adversary in an intellectual quicksand. Up to this point
he had fancied Gordon, though he had disagreed with him. But now, as
he also rose, he manifested a shade of haughtiness, as though he were
dismissing someone who had come perilously near landing himself outside
the pale of the respect which one man owes another of the same class.
Ignoring the assertion as to the decay of the Church's power, he said:
"Such an evolution as you predict, sir, would undermine the structure
of human society."
"It would be more or less revolutionary, certainly," answered Gordon,
blandly. The possibility seemed not to have proper terrors for him,
which was puzzling to the clergyman, who was loth to regard this
well-appearing young man as a sympathizer with radical social
doctrines. He stared at Gordon a moment.
"So long as women are as pure and spiritual minded as Mrs. Stuart the
laxity which you seem to invite will be out of the question."
Here was an unequivocal reminder to Gordon of the real fruitlessness of
his interview. It was in effect a challenge; and he accepted it as
such.
"She will yet become my wife."
Mr. Prentiss shook his head. "I have known her longer than you," he
asserted proudly.
For a moment there was silence. Issue had been joined in these two
sentences, and further speech was superfluous. It was Gordon who
relieved the tension, which seemed almost hostile, by putting out his
hand.
"Mr. Prentiss," he said, "we disagree utterly, but that is no reason
surely why we should not part with amicable respect for each other's
differences of opinion? I know you are actuated solely by the desire
to accomplish what you believe to be right."
The manly appeal was instantly reciprocated. The clergyman grasped the
outstretched hand and shook it firmly. To agree to disagree gracefully
was in keeping with his theories as to the proper attitude of men of
affairs.
"Mr. Perry," he said, "I am glad to have made your acquaintance.
Believe me, I grieve that the church in my person must stand between
you and happiness. If any matter at any time arises where you think I
could be of public service, do not hesitate to consult me. I am well
aware that we both are laborers in the same vineyard."
Considering that their theological views were nearly as divergent as
the poles, and that they were battling for a woman's soul, this was
eminently conciliatory and rational on either side.