or defect in the institution, but through the levity, rashness, avarice, or overmastering appetite of one or both of the parties, who marry in haste, or from the impulse of unworthy motives, when the law counsels deliberation and demands pure affection. If a general proclamation were issued to morrow, with the sanction of all our civil and ecclesiastical authorities, authorizing every married couple to obtain a divorce by merely applying for it within two months, and, in default of such asking, to remain undivorced ever afterward, we do not believe one couple in ten would apply for divorce. But let it be understood that marriages would hereafter be sanctioned and honored, binding the parties to regard each other as husband and wife only so long as should be mutually agreeable, and leaving them at perfect liberty to dissolve this tie and form new ones at pleasure, and we believe marriages would be contracted and dissolved with a facility and levity now unimagined. Every innocent young maiden would be sought in marriage by those who now plot her ruin without marriage, and the facility of divorce would cover the arts and the designs of the libertine with all the panoply of honorable and pure affection. How many have already fallen victims to the sophistry that the ceremony of marriage is of no importance, the affection being the essential matter? How many are every day exposed to this sophistry? Marriage indissoluble may be an imperfect test of honorable and pure affection,- -as all things human are imperfect, but it is the best the State can devise; and its overthrow would result in a general profligacy and corruption such as this country has never known and few of our people can adequately imagine.

We are inflexibly opposed, therefore, to any extension of the privileges of divorce now accorded by our laws; but we are not opposed to the discussion of the subject. On the contrary, we deem such discussion vitally necessary and already too long neglected. The free trade sophistry respecting marriage is already on every libertine's tongue; it has overrun the whole country in the yellow-covered literature which is as abundant as the frogs of Egypt and a great deal more pernicious. It is high time that the press, the pulpit, and every other avenue to the public mind, were alive to this subject, presenting, reiterating, and enforcing the argument in favor of the sanctity, integrity, and perpetuity of marriage.

IV.

EXTRACT OF REPLY OF MR. JAMES TO THE OBSERVER.

To Mr. Greeley:

I do not see that Mr. Andrews's queries need detain us. The numerous fallacies and misconceptions on which they are grounded either suggest their own correction to the observant reader or else stand fully corrected in my replies to the "Observer" and yourself. Besides, the entire "indifference" which Mr. Andrews professes as to any possible issue of the discussion between the "Observer" and myself gives a decided shade of impropriety to his interference in it. I value my time and thoughts much too highly to bestow them upon those who can afford to be indifferent to them; and, accordingly, I shall hold myself excused if I confine my attention to yourself and the "Observer."

V.

MR. GREELEY'S COMMENTS.

We do, indeed, believe that most parties are now as happy and contented in their marriage relations as their own natures will allow; because we believe that marriages are now contracted with a very general understanding that they are practically indissoluble; that nothing short of death or the deep demoralization and lasting infamy of one of the parties can ever dissolve them. But let it be understood that marriages may be dissolved whenever the parties are tired of each other, and we can conceive no essential modification of our present system which will not amount practically to this,—and we believe more false than true marriages would be contracted; because libertines would resort to marriage as a cloak for their lecherous designs, which the legal penalties of bigamy and adultery now compel them to pursue by a more circuitous and less shaded path. Apprise sensualists that they may at any time be rid of the obligations of marriage by simply dishonoring them, and if Mr. James does not intend this, we cannot understand him, and thousands would incur those obligations with deliberate intent to throw them off whenever they should be found irksome, as, with their appetites, they are morally certain soon to become. We insist, then, that what Mr. James intends or contemplates may be ever so innocent and practically just without at all discharging his proposition of the responsibility of such use as the carnal and unprincipled would inevitably make of it. And this use we determine by the ruin they are now too often enabled to effect through the influence of the sophism that the ceremony of marriage is of no account where the essential marriage of heart and soul has already taken place. We determine it also by the demoralization and degeneracy of the Romans, especially the Patricians, following closely on the heels of the liberty of divorce accorded by their laws in the last days of the republic. We find, also, that the most flagrant social disorders were diffused and aggravated in France by the liberty of divorce accorded during the frenzy of the first Revolution. In short, we believe this liberty always did create or immensely inflame such disorders wherever it has been legalized, and we think it always must do so; at least until the human race shall have been very differently trained and developed from aught the world has yet seen. If there ever shall come a time when the whole race shall profoundly realize that lewdness, with all transgression of the laws of God, is a ruin

ous mistake, destructive of the happiness of the transgressor, there will then be no need of human laws or penalties, and they may be dispensed with altogether. But so long as there shall exist a social necessity for interdicting and punishing murder,

which we reckon will be rather longer than either Mr. James's or our writings will continue to be read, so long we believe there will be a necessity for punishing seduction and adultery and forbidding divorce.

We contend that Mr. James's liberty of divorce, no matter what his intent may be, or what hedges he might seek to set about it, would practically open to the licentious and fickle a prospect of ridding themselves of the obligations of marriage at pleasure, — would say to them, "Get married, if that will subserve the ends of today; and you may get unmarried again tomorrow, or as soon as you shall think proper." And we regard Mr. Andrews's queries and well-understood position as most significant and pertinent, pointing, as they do, to a still larger (or looser) liberty than Mr. James contemplates. Once admit divorce on Mr. James's basis, and it will be utterly impossible to confine it within his limits.

Our own conviction and argument decidedly favor "indissoluble marriage,” any existing law to the contrary notwithstanding. But for the express words of Christ, which seem to admit adultery as a valid ground of divorce, we should stand distinctly on the Roman Catholic ground of no divorce except by death. As it is, we do not object to divorce for the one flagrant and gross violation of the marriage covenant, though we should oppose even that, if it did not seem to be upheld by the personal authority of Christ. Beyond it we are inflexible.

VI.

NOTICE BY MR. GREELEY.

We acknowledge the receipt of Mrs. E. OAKES SMITH'S promised exposition of her views on the divorce question, which we shall publish soon. But we have had one much longer on hand from Mr. S. P. AN DREWS, which we shall print first, though we consider its doctrines eminently detestable, while Mrs. Smith's conclusions are just, though her way of looking at the question differs somewhat from

ours.

The world is full of perilous fallacies and sophisms respecting marriage and divorce, which, we are confident, are mischievous only because they burrow in darkness and are permitted to do their deadly work unopposed. Let them be exposed to the light of discussion, and they will, they must, be divested of their baneful power. We hope to do our share toward this consummation.