[49] For the sake of completeness we must also mention marriage for political reasons as contracted in the highest circles. In these marriages the right is also silently conceded to the man to follow his own inclinations outside of his marriage. There was a time when rulers considered it good form, a sort of royal attribute, to have at least one mistress. Thus, according to Sherr, King Frederick William I. of Prussia, otherwise noted for his temperate life, maintained an intimate relation with the wife of a general. It is well known that King August of Poland and Saxony had almost 300 illegitimate children, and that King Victor Emanuel of Italy left 32 illegitimate children. In the picturesquely situated little capital of a German principality there still stood not many years ago about a dozen beautiful villas that had been erected by the ruler for his abdicated mistresses. One might write volumes on this subject; in fact, an extensive collection of books exists that deal mainly with these piquant occurrences. In view of these facts it is indeed very necessary that sycophantical historians should strive to present the various fathers and mothers of their countries as models of domestic virtue, as faithful husbands and devoted mothers. The augurs are not yet extinct, they fatten, as in the days of Rome, upon the ignorance of the masses.
[CHAPTER IX.
Disruption of the Family.]
[1.—Increase of Divorce.]
The part played by church and state in this sort of “sacred marriage” is not a worthy one. The state official or the officiating clergyman whose task it is to perform the marriage ceremony, never pauses to consider by what methods the couple he is about to join in wedlock have been brought together. It may be quite evident, that the two are in no wise mated either in regard to their ages or in regard to physical and mental qualities; the bride may, for instance, be twenty and the groom seventy, or vice versa; the bride may be beautiful and full of vitality, the groom may be old, cross and inflicted with infirmities, it makes no difference to the representative of state and church. The marriage is consecrated, and the consecration is most solemn in character where the monetary reward for this “holy function” is most generous. But when such a marriage turns out to be an exceedingly unhappy one, as could have been foreseen by anybody, and frequently was foreseen by the unfortunate victim itself—the woman generally being the victim—and when one or the other party then seeks separation, both church and state place the greatest difficulties in their way. Yet neither church nor state questioned in advance whether love and moral sentiments, or shameless, coarse egotism brought about the union. Moral revulsion is not considered sufficient cause for separation; obvious proofs are demanded, proofs that will degrade one or the other party in public opinion, to make divorce possible. That the Catholic Church does not permit divorce at all, except by special permission from the pope, which is very hard to obtain, makes conditions particularly unfavorable among the Catholic population. The German code of civil law has also made divorce much more difficult. Thus divorce by mutual consent, that had been permitted by Prussian law, was abolished. Many divorces had been granted under this law, some for more serious reasons that were concealed out of regard for the guilty party. In Berlin, for instance, there were 5,623 divorces from 1886 until 1892; 1,400 of these, approximately 25 per cent., were granted upon mutual consent. In many cases divorce is granted only then, when the party seeking divorce does so within six months after discovery of the cause for divorce. According to Prussian law, the time limit is one year. Take, for example, that a young wife discovers soon after her marriage, that she is tied to a man who is no husband to her at all. It is asking a great deal that she should determine on divorce within six months, a step that requires a considerable amount of moral strength. To justify the increased difficulty in divorce, the following argument is advanced: “Only by making divorce increasingly difficult, can the advancing disruption of the family be counteracted and the family bonds be strengthened.” This argument is a contradiction in itself. A disrupted marriage is not made bearable by forcing husband and wife to continue living together in spite of their inward estrangement and mutual aversion. A condition of this sort, maintained by law, is profoundly immoral. The result is that in a large number of cases adultery is made a cause for divorce, since this cause cannot be ignored by the law; neither the state nor society are improved by this process. It must also be regarded as a concession to the Catholic Church, that in many cases separation takes the place of divorce which was formerly not the case according to civil law. It is no longer considered a cause for divorce, when through the fault of the one party, a marriage remains childless. The new German code of civil law contains the following paragraph: “The religious duties in regard to marriage are not touched upon in the rules laid down in this paragraph.” This likewise is a concession to the church. It is merely ornamental in character, but it is characteristic of the spirit still prevailing in Germany at the beginning of the twentieth century. For our purposes the admission is important, that divorce was made more difficult to counteract the advancing disruption of the family.
Human beings then remain chained to one another for lifetime against their will. One party becomes a slave to the other and is forced in fulfillment of “matrimonial duties,” to endure intimate embraces that perhaps seem more loathsome than harsh words and ill treatment. Rightly Mantegazza says: “There is no greater torture than to suffer the caresses of an unloved person....”[50] Is such marriage not worse than prostitution? Even the prostitute has a certain degree of liberty of withdrawing from her abominable trade, and if she is not the inmate of a public brothel, she may refuse herself to a man she does not wish for some reason or other. But a woman sold in marriage must endure the embraces of her husband, even though she have a hundred reasons to hate and despise him.
If the marriage has been contracted from the outset and by mutual understanding, as a mere marriage of convenience, matters are not quite as bad. Mutual obligations are considered and a bearable mode of life is found. Scandal is avoided, especially out of consideration for the children, where such exist; and yet it must be said that the children are the ones to suffer most when their parents lead a cold, indifferent life, devoid of love, even if it does not deteriorate into a life of open hostility. More frequently yet an agreement is accomplished to avoid material loss. Usually the husband’s misbehavior is the cause of trouble in marriage; that may be seen from the divorce cases. When a man remains dissatisfied with his marriage his domineering position enables him to find compensation elsewhere. The woman is far less inclined to go astray, firstly because physiological reasons make a transgression much more dangerous in her case, and secondly because when she is the one to break the marital vow, it is considered a crime that society will not condone. The woman alone—be she wife, widow or maiden—has “fallen”; the man, when he commits the same sin, has, at the worst, behaved with impropriety. The same action then is judged by entirely different standards, according to whether it has been committed by a man or by a woman, and the women themselves are often most bitter and unmerciful in their condemnation of a “fallen” sister.[51]
As a rule, women will seek divorce only in cases of flagrant infidelity or gross ill-treatment, because they are in a dependent position and are obliged to regard marriage as a means of subsistence; also because the social position of a divorced woman is not an enviable one. She is regarded and treated more or less as a cipher. If in spite of all this women constitute the majority of plaintives in divorce cases, this goes to prove what moral tortures they must endure. In France, even before the introduction of the new divorce laws, by far the most proceedings for separation were instituted by women. Until 1884 a woman in France could sue for divorce only in case her husband brought the woman with whom he maintained an intimate relation into the domicile of his wife against her will. Thus proceedings for separation were instituted annually by:
| Women. | Men. | |
|---|---|---|
| 1856–1861 | 1,729 | 184 |
| 1861–1866 | 2,135 | 260 |
| 1866–1871 | 2,591 | 330 |
| 1901–1905 | 2,368 | 591 |
Not only were the majority of proceedings instituted by women, the figures also show that their number steadily increased. By information gathered from reliable sources it may be seen, that elsewhere also the greater number of actions for divorce and separation are instituted by women, as the following table shows:[52]
| DIVORCES. | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| During the years. | Husbands. | Wives. | Husbands and wives. | |
| Austria | 1893–1897 | 4.4 | 5.0 | 90.6 |
| Roumania | 1891–1895 | 30.6 | 68.9 | 0.5 |
| Switzerland | 1895–1899 | 26.4 | 45.4 | 8.2 |
| France | 1895–1899 | 40.0 | 59.1 | .. |
| Baden | 1895–1899 | 36.0 | 59.1 | 4.9 |
| England & Wales | 1895–1899 | 60.4 | 39.6 | .. |
| Scotland | 1898–1899 | 43.3 | 56.7 | .. |
| SEPARATIONS. | ||||
| Austria | 1897–1899 | 4.9 | 16.6 | 78.5 |
| France | 1895–1899 | 15.9 | 84.1 | .. |
| England & Wales | 1895–1899 | 3.0 | 97.0 | .. |
| Scotland | 1898–1899 | .. | 100. | .. |