"A man of great vital force is united to a woman of evenly-balanced
organization. The husband, in the exercise of what he is pleased to
term his 'marital rights,' places his wife, in a short time, on the
nervous, delicate, sickly list. In the blindness and ignorance of his
animal nature, he requires prompt obedience to his desires; and,
ignorant of the law of right in this direction, thinking that it is
her duty to accede to his wishes, though fulfilling them with a sore
and troubled heart, she allows him passively, never lovingly, to
exercise daily and weekly, month in and month out, the low and beastly
of his nature, and eventually, slowly but surely, to kill her. And this
man, who has as surely committed murder as has the convicted assassin,
lures to his net and takes unto him another wife, to repeat the same
programme of legalized prostitution on his part, and sickness and
premature death on her part."
Prof. Gerrish, in a little work from which we take the liberty to quote,
speaks as follows on this subject:--
"One man reckless of his duty to the community, marries young, with
means and prospects inadequate to support the family which is so sure
to come ere long. His ostensible excuse is love; his real reason the
gratification of his carnal instincts. Another man, in exactly similar
circumstances, but too conscientious to assume responsibilities which
he cannot carry, and in which failure must compromise the comfort and
tax the purses of people from whom he has no right to extort luxuries,
forbears to marry; but, feeling the passions of his sex, and being
imbued with the prevalent errors on such matters, resorts for relief
to unlawful coition. At the wedding of the former, pious friends
assemble with their presents and congratulations, and bid the legalized
prostitution Godspeed. Love shields the crime, all the more easily
because so many of the rejoicing guests have sinned in precisely the
same way. The other man has no festival gathering.... Society applauds
the first and frowns on the second; but, to my mind, the difference
between them is not markedly in favor of the former."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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