DIVORCE
Marriage, considered by society as a necessary mode of union, is a contract governed by law.
In the eyes of Roman Catholics, marriage being a sacrament, which renders it indissoluble, divorce does not exist. According to this principle we must accept as a sacrament an earthly tie which touches more nearly on material than on spiritual questions. But it seems strange that the Church of Rome should teach men, by the voice of her servants, that human perfection consists in the acceptance of all the sacraments, and then forbid marriage—which would be, from a practical point of view, the most useful to them—to her representatives. In so doing, the Church creates an illogical exception to her imperious rule.
“From the psychological point of view,” says Dr. Toulouse, “marriage is the union, first through passion, then through sympathy, of two beings; from the social point of view, it represents a mutual effort towards reproduction.
“The union of feeling between two beings has not been too highly exalted by the poets. It manifests in the highest degree that selection which purifies the instinct of sex.
“This selection is in itself a proof of the free will which works—with restraining effect—on the tyranny of passion. Again, the woman, in giving herself to one only, demonstrates in the most striking manner that she belongs to, and can dispose of, herself.
“Sex freedom, then, which is a condition of evolution, is manifested most clearly in a marriage entered upon willingly by both parties. But the corollary to this is, that divorce should also be possible simply at the wish of both.”
Let us study divorce from the point of view of its utility. Divorce offers an advantage in preventing marriage from being regarded as an endless chain, a crushing yoke, or a prison deliberately chosen as a livelihood. It means, in fact, that people need not be tightly bound together who cannot bear so to live; it would put an end to what is sometimes extreme mental suffering, abolish dangers which sometimes lead to murder; in a word, it means escape from “the sentimental and emotional results of the indissolubility of marriage.”