Romayne took up the second paper, looked at it, and threw it back again on the table with an expression of disgust.
“You told me just now,” he said, “that I was married to the wife of another man. And there is the judge’s decision, releasing Miss Eyrecourt from her marriage to Mr. Winterfield. May I ask you to explain yourself?”
“Certainly. Let me first remind you that you owe religious allegiance to the principles which the Church has asserted, for centuries past, with all the authority of its divine institution. You admit that?”
“I admit it.”
“Now, listen! In our church, Romayne, marriage is even more than a religious institution—it is a sacrament. We acknowledge no human laws which profane that sacrament. Take two examples of what I say. When the great Napoleon was at the height of his power, Pius the Seventh refused to acknowledge the validity of the Emperor’s second marriage to Maria Louisa—while Josephine was living, divorced by the French Senate. Again, in the face of the Royal Marriage Act, the Church sanctioned the marriage of Mrs. Fitzherbert to George the Fourth, and still declares, in justice to her memory, that she was the king’s lawful wife. In one word, marriage, to be marriage at all, must be the object of a purely religious celebration—and, this condition complied with, marriage is only to be dissolved by death. You remember what I told you of Mr. Winterfield?”
“Yes. His first marriage took place before the registrar.”
“In plain English, Romayne, Mr. Winterfield and the woman-rider in the circus pronounced a formula of words before a layman in an office. That is not only no marriage, it is a blasphemous profanation of a holy rite. Acts of Parliament which sanction such proceedings are acts of infidelity. The Church declares it, in defense of religion.”
“I understand you,” said Romayne. “Mr. Winterfield’s marriage at Brussels—”
“Which the English law,” Father Benwell interposed, “declares to be annulled by the marriage before the registrar, stands good, nevertheless, by the higher law of the Church. Mr. Winterfield is Miss Eyrecourt’s husband, as long as they both live. An ordained priest performed the ceremony in a consecrated building—and Protestant marriages, so celebrated, are marriages acknowledged by the Catholic Church. Under those circumstances, the ceremony which afterward united you to Miss Eyrecourt—though neither you nor the clergyman were to blame—was a mere mockery. Need I to say any more? Shall I leave you for a while by yourself?”
“No! I don’t know what I may think, I don’t know what I may do, if you leave me by myself.”