doubts and trials, that the great want, the great need, which holds them together, is not going to fade away into thin air, but is going to become stronger and more indefeasible as the years go on. There falls a sweet, an irresistible, trust over their relation to each other, which consecrates as it were the double life, making both feel that nothing can now divide; and robbing each of all desire to remain, when death has indeed (or at least in outer semblance) removed the other.* It is curious that the early Church Service had "Till death us depart"--but in 1661 this was altered to "Till death us do part." So perfect and gracious a union--even if not always realised--is still, I say, the _bonâ fide_ desire of most of those who have ever thought about such matters. It obviously yields far more and more enduring joy and satisfaction in life than any number of frivolous relationships. It commends itself to the common sense, so to speak, of the modern mind--and does not require, for its proof, the artificial authority of Church and State. At the same time it is equally evident--and a child could understand this--that it requires some rational forbearance and self-control for its realisation, and it is quite intelligible too, as already said, that there _may_ be cases in which a little outside pressure, of social opinion, or even actual law, may be helpful for the supplementing or re-inforcement of the weak personal self-control of those concerned. The modern Monogamic Marriage however, certified and sanctioned by Church and State, though apparently directed to this ideal, has for the most part fallen short of it. For in constituting--as in a vast number of cases--a union resting on _nothing_ but the outside pressure of Church and State, it constituted a thing obviously and by its nature bad and degrading; while in its more successful instances by a too great exclusiveness it has condemned itself to a fatal narrowness and stuffiness.