PHI LOS 0 P H Y . - Classic Works of Apologetics Online

216 Of Divorce.
leased from their subsisting engagements. Suppose
the husband to have once preferred his wife to all
other women, the duration ofe this p:eference cannot
be trusted to. Possession makes t! great difference:
and there is no other security · against the invitations
of novelty, than the known impossibility of obtaining
the object. Did the cause, which brings the
sexes together, hold them together by the same force
with which it first attract~d them to each other, or
could the woman t~ restored to her personal integrity,
and to all the advantclges of her virgin estate;
the power of divorce might be deposited in the
hands of the husband, with less danger of abuse or
inconveniency. But constituted as mankind are,
and injured as the repudiated \life generally must
be, it is necessary to add a stability to the condition
of married women, more secure than the continuance
of their husband's affection; and to supply to
!,«th sides, by a sense of duty and obligation, what
satiety has impaired of pas"ion and of per"onal at ..
tachment. Upon the whole, the power of divorce
is evidently and greatly to the disadvantage of the
\VOmal1; and thf;! only question appears to be, whether
the real and pernlanent happiness of oue half of
the species should be surrendered to the cclprice and
vO!.Jotuousness of the other?
\V e have c'onsidered divorces as depending upDn
the will of the husband, becau[\e that j~
the way in
\vh::ch they have actually obtained in many parts of
th:? world: but the same objections apply, in a great
dec~ree, to divorce~ by mutual consellt; especially
wIlen we consider the indelicate situation, and small
pro~pect of happiness, which remains to the party,
"Nl1o oppo,ed his or her dissent to the liberty and
desire of the other.
rl'lle law of J1aturc a(itnit~ ()f· an e:~ception in fa-,
vour of the injured part:', in ca.~es
of adultery, of
ob~tinate deserti()n, of ,ltten1pt~ 111)on life, ,of otltrageous
cruelty, of incurable madness. aud, perhaps,