Remote atavism of the ravishment of the female, holy words of inspired prophets, imperiousness of feudatories, avarice of usurers, transports of love and heroism of hearts, have all left something of their own upon the altar of matrimony. But before the sacrament was finished and the priest sent up the fumes of his incense, animal man came leering and saying: “This is my affair. I am the sole and true priest of this rite. I am the only minister of this religion.” And mixing the divine and human vows on the altar with his hairy hands—perhaps, too, with his tail—he formed a chaos of things most opposite, from the highest to the lowest, from the most sublime to the most ignoble. And this, then, is marriage. To curse this love sanctified by vows is useless, to suppress it is impossible, to substitute something better is absurd (at least for the present), and nothing remains but to accept it as the least evil of sexual unions, and to ameliorate it gradually, prudently, and wisely. _By free choice on both sides, enlightened by reason._ _By the guarantee of divorce._ ⁂ Neither the prince nor the proletariate needs this book of mine. The first marries worse than any citizen in his kingdom, for dynastic reasons, without love or sympathy. With him it is first the throne, then the family; first the alliance of his colours, and then if there is room, the kisses of love. It is true he may console himself with the vulgar and easily won embraces of a pandering Venus; he may also take advantage of one of the most ridiculous remnants of the Middle Ages, the morganatic marriage. In all cases the ministers, deputies, nay, even journalists provide him with a wife. The art of taking a wife is for him, therefore, _nonsense_. The proletariate, more fortunate than the prince, may choose the woman it loves, and in its choice may take advantage of the counsels of those who have loved and sinned much. But it does not read books, for they cost too much; and when by law its individuality is cancelled from the statistics of the illiterate, it has no time to read, for the tyranny of bread oppresses it. Therefore I write for neither prince nor proletariate, but for all that human multitude who live and move between the extreme poles of modern society and who constitute the true nerve of the nation. In what way do all these millions of males and females combine? In different ways, but amongst them marriage is the only legal foundation of the family permitted by morality and approved by religion. All others are contraband, moving on cross-roads either alone or in company, but all, in one way or the other, defrauding nature, with an eternal envy for those who have honestly paid custom dues on entering the city.