If, then, as has been shown in the fact that only counterpartal unions are real, eternal and spiritually indissoluble; and that only true mates can thus unite, and when thus united have no desire to wander, what becomes of our ideas of sexual infidelity?
Since the very law of the Cosmos has seen to it that we cannot be untrue to the only one who seemingly has a right to our fidelity in the sex relation and since this union can become general only by freeing love from bondage, what becomes of the laboriously built up ethics of our social intercourse?
Are they to be abandoned as of no value?
We can almost hear the storm of protest which the righteous reader may feel in duty bound to let loose at such a suggestion, if for no other reason than that protest is the accepted way of proving one's own virtuous tendencies.
In the early seventies, a woman named Virginia Woodhull brought down upon her defenseless head the un-Christian-like abuse of the Christian public by announcing a doctrine which seems to have been nothing more dreadful than that of an equal standard of morality for men and women. The poor woman died broken-hearted, it is said; and yet nothing that we can unearth regarding her personal life and habits would seem to have warranted the cruel gibes that were hurled at her. The dear old lady lived a most continent, even ascetic life.
But the world has made rapid strides since that time, and we trust that the urgent need of something reasonable and feasible upon the sex question will inspire the reader to an unprejudiced review of this chapter. We would that it were possible to supply a modicum of understanding with each copy of this volume; but since it is not, we must take our chance with the average. Let us reason together:
Expediency is the mother of morality in social organizations, which have, of necessity, unstable, ever-changing standards. These standards represent, for some, ideals yet to be attained; while for others they become mere mileposts on the path of Evolution. The individual reaches, and then passes, an accepted ideal; gradually when a sufficient number, constituting a majority, have reached this ideal, it ceases to be a standard for the social organization, and another ideal is substituted.
The laws of the cave-man called for self-restraint exercised toward his own immediate clan, and this necessity for self-restraint was based upon nothing higher than the law of self-preservation; but gradually the sphere widened; from clan to nation. So do our ethical and moral standards enlarge. Traditional concepts are not necessarily wrong, but they are almost sure to be inadequate to evolving Mankind.
Formerly, sexual morality consisted of the reservation of the person of a sister to the use of her brothers. Any infringement upon this moral code was punished by death to the woman and to her out-clannish lover.
And we have today an analogous example, although we are glad to say, it is not the highest standard; still, if one's husband or wife violates the marriage vows, it is more condonable, if the co-respondent be of the wealthy class; and in monarchies it is accounted an honor to have been selected as the king's favorite.