And
though of course nobody expects them to do anything so impossible
and so unwholesome, yet the law that regulates their relations,
and the public opinion that regulates that law, is actually
founded on the assumption that the marriage vow is not only
feasible but beautiful and holy, and that if they are false to it,
they deserve no sympathy and no relief. If all married people
really lived together, no doubt the mere force of facts would make
an end to this inhuman nonsense in a month, if not sooner; but it
is very seldom brought to that test. The typical British husband
sees much less of his wife than he does of his business partner,
his fellow clerk, or whoever works beside him day by day. Man and
wife do not as a rule, live together: they only breakfast
together, dine together, and sleep in the same room. In most cases
the woman knows nothing of the man's working life and he knows
nothing of her working life (he calls it her home life). It is
remarkable that the very people who romance most absurdly about
the closeness and sacredness of the marriage tie are also those
who are most convinced that the man's sphere and the woman's
sphere are so entirely separate that only in their leisure moments
can they ever be together.
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