himself, and dies.--Nothing is more striking than the contrast between the dull, grave arguments advanced by the wise official editor, and Napoleon's own words caught on the wing, at the moment, vibrating and teeming with illustrations and imagery.[1163] Apropos of divorce, the principle of which he wishes to maintain: "Consult, now, national manners and customs. Adultery is no phenomenon; it is common enough--une affaire de canapé... There must be some curb on women who commit adultery for trinkets, poetry, Apollo, and the muses, etc." But if divorce be allowed for incompatibility of temper you undermine marriage; the fragility of the bond will be apparent the moment the obligation is contracted; "it is just as if a man said to himself, 'I am going to marry until I feel different.'" Nullity of marriage must not be too often allowed; once a marriage is made it is a serious matter to undo it. "Suppose that, in marrying my cousin just arrived from the Indies, I wed an adventuress. She bears me children, and I then discover she is not my cousin--is that marriage valid? Does not public morality demand that it should be so considered? There has been a mutual exchange of hearts, of transpiration." On the right of children to be supported and fed although of age, he says: "Will you allow a father to drive a girl of fifteen out of his house? A father worth 60,000 francs a year might say to his son, 'You are stout and fat; go and turn plowman.' The children of a rich father, or of one in good circumstances, are always entitled to the paternal porridge. Strike out their right to be fed, and you compel children to murder their parents." As to adoption: "You regard this as law-makers and not as statesmen. It is not a civil contract nor a judicial contract. The analysis (of the jurist) leads to vicious results. Man is governed by imagination only; without imagination he is a brute. It is not for five cents a day, simply to distinguish himself, that a man consents to be killed; if you want to electrify him touch his heart. A notary, who is paid a fee of twelve francs for his services, cannot do that. It requires some other process, a legislative act. Adoption, what is that? An imitation by which society tries to counterfeit nature. It is a new kind of sacrament.... Society ordains that the bones and blood of one being shall be changed into the bones and blood of another. It is the greatest of all legal acts. It gives the sentiments of a son to one who never had them, and reciprocally those of a parent. Where ought this to originate? From on high, like a clap of thunder!"