Third Essay
THAT WHICH IS WANTING:
A CHAPTER WHICH ADVOCATES FREE DIVORCE
"That which is crooked cannot be made straight: and that which is wanting cannot be numbered."—Ecc. i. 15.
I
I am well aware that there will be many among my readers who, having gone so far in my book and agreed more or less with my point of view, must here fall into disagreement with me. This essay upholding free divorce, and the three that follow, the first one recommending regulation and firm action in suppressing prostitution as the only way to stay the spread of venereal diseases; the second essay on the illegitimately born child, where I differ in one important matter from the accepted view of what is chiefly needed to protect these unhappy children; and, even more, the proposal I make in the last essay, where I plead for an open recognition of honorable sexual partnerships outside of marriage—this half of my book will be disapproved of, very probably disliked, and my views more or less violently disputed. It will be said that what I advocate now is in direct opposition to my ideal of marriage being a religious duty, which demands the consecration of women to the service of the family and the home. This, however, is not so: if I have been understood at all, it should be evident that the opposition is not there.
I care little for our existing and chaotic forms of morality; what I desire is to create a new reality, the value of which consists in that it provides wider possibilities of decent and honorable conduct. We have to brave moral danger in trying to attain a higher moral reality. To me what seems the first necessity is to face things as they are, and not to go on eternally pretending that our world is what it is not.
Our vague-minded lax society has to pull itself together, has to reconsider and administer and formulate a more helpful system of regulations; has to learn to express again its united will in some better way than "go as you please," or fail. What is wanted is a new honesty to create standards of conduct, which will fix the every day indispensable duties, that, after all, make up the total of life. We have but a choice between the danger of falling deeper into confusion and dishonesty or the danger of awakening to a clearer and more difficult consciousness. Now, I do not believe it is moral to regulate life by fear, considering only the desire to remain undisturbed of those who are decayed and petrified. I do not know if I make my meaning clear. As our habit, we ignore or minimize all sex difficulties as much as we can; we hesitate and compromise and bungle over every reform because we are afraid of what may happen if we probe down to the real bottom of what needs to be done. We have neither the courage of our bodies or of our souls. This is why so often our attitude becomes false and our thoughts entangled, so that our moral life is corrupt with concealments and deceptions. Now, I am not content with the compromise which sanctions every form of sexual sin so long as the conventions are respected and the sin hidden—all the rottenness going on beneath the respectable structure of our society. I want as far as is possible to emancipate our lives from such slavery; to make less easy the hypocrisy which law and custom sanction; to gain freedom from a sham morality and the pretense of a righteousness that we do not maintain. It is a necessary step, for me at least, on the way to any kind of improvement. More and more I am convinced that we shall have to make a violent and very conscious effort to get clear of dishonesty.