She
would take a thousandth share, if necessary, in a husband who was
a man in a thousand, rather than have some comparatively weedy
weakling all to herself. It is the comparatively weedy weakling,
left mateless by polygyny, who objects. Thus, it was not the women
of Salt Lake City nor even of America who attacked Mormon
polygyny. It was the men. And very naturally. On the other hand,
women object to polyandry, because polyandry enables the best
women to monopolize all the men, just as polygyny enables the best
men to monopolize all the women. That is why all our ordinary men
and women are unanimous in defence of monogamy, the men because it
excludes polygyny, and the women because it excludes polyandry.
The women, left to themselves, would tolerate polygyny. The men,
left to themselves, would tolerate polyandry. But polygyny would
condemn a great many men, and polyandry a great many women, to the
celibacy of neglect. Hence the resistance any attempt to establish
unlimited polygyny always provokes, not from the best people, but
from the mediocrities and the inferiors. If we could get rid of
our inferiors and screw up our average quality until mediocrity
ceased to be a reproach, thus making every man reasonably eligible
as a father and every woman reasonably desirable as a mother,
polygyny and polyandry would immediately fall into sincere
disrepute, because monogamy is so much more convenient and
economical that nobody would want to share a husband or a wife if
he (or she) could have a sufficiently good one all to himself (or
herself).
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