But
whether they hesitate or act the result is always the same. In a
real marriage of sentiment the wife or husband cannot be
supplanted by halves; and such a marriage will break very soon
under the strain of polygyny or polyandry. What we want at present
is a sufficiently clear teaching of this fact to ensure that
prompt and decisive action shall always be taken in such cases
without any false shame of seeming conventional (a shame to
which people capable of such real marriage are specially
susceptible), and a rational divorce law to enable the
marriage to be dissolved and the parties honorably resorted
and recoupled without disgrace and scandal if that should prove
the proper solution.
It must be repeated here that no law, however stringent, can
prevent polygamy among groups of people who choose to live loosely
and be monogamous only in appearance. But such cases are not now
under consideration. Also, affectionate husbands like Samuel
Pepys, and affectionate wives of the corresponding temperaments
may, it appears, engage in transient casual adventures out of
doors without breaking up their home life. But within doors that
home life may be regarded as naturally monogamous. It does not
need to be protected against polygamy: it protects itself.
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