§ 1. On the Naturalists

116. This is common to the naturalists, that they declare war on either all matrimony or at least perpetual matrimony, because it imposes a yoke to be borne even by the unwilling. Therefore, they wish that in place of a "marriage of compulsion" (Zwangsehe), or a marriage whose firmness is derived from compulsion and whose use, when it is exercised by spouses without love, they mark with baseness, there should succeed a union which draws its origin and happy firmness from free love, that is, love immune from juridical necessity: they claim that this is consonant with nature, that this is demanded by the present, or at least imminent, age of the human race and will be secured.

Secondary wishes are added to these essential wishes. Thus several desire that the covenant of sexual life, withdrawn from every public government, be placed altogether among private matters. Ellen Key, a sufficiently noted woman of Scandinavia, also devised "moral adultery." For it happens that two persons whom love no longer joins nevertheless ought, for just causes, for example philanthropic ones, to preserve a common external cohabitation. Then, this woman says, let legitimate permission be given to each, so that one may generate from another woman and the other may bear a child by another man: this "legitimate" intercourse with one who is not a spouse is adorned with the name of moral adultery.

117. These deliriums, which are at once vain and futile but pernicious to morals, must be refuted and reproved as abominable contrivances and endeavors against nature itself. And indeed:

1. At the suggestion of nature, man seeks in promises which induce a moral necessity a protection against his own or another's inconstancy, which even the angels possessed in the perfection of their will; and, when it seems to concern the public good, those promises are sanctioned by law itself.

Thus, in social life, military oaths, magistracies, the offices of rulers and of others occur; if these could be admitted and renounced at pleasure, civil life would be at an end. Without moral necessity and the legal sanction of covenants, what mutual fidelity will subsist, and what great or long-lasting work could be undertaken prudently? Yet ought not the "naturalists," if they are consistent with themselves, to repudiate every covenant as odious servitude?

Can they give a reason why in matrimony alone the firm bond of union should be cast aside, when nature herself demands one so intimate that it attains to a certain unity of two persons ¹? What, on the contrary, do we observe? Passions have a part in this union which are most prompt to promise and yet are shown to be most inconstant; there, between the nobler and the inferior appetites, conflict is most frequent; there, in domestic society, man at the same time hopes for himself a tranquil enjoyment toward which he is so greatly inclined. But take away the force of promises and the support of a juridical bond: from even a brief observation of the present nature of men, it is perceived that the door to mutual confidence is closed to most, while it is opened wide to suspicions, jealousies, and quarrels which make life anxious and troubled and often extinguish love, far from favoring it. Nowhere else, therefore, are promises so natural; nowhere is their efficacy more necessary.

¹ Compare what was said above, nos. 61 and 104, concerning the nature of matrimony.

2. At the suggestion of nature, besides the impulse of passion, the very intention of a nobler affection and the irreparable harm which a deflowered woman suffers move men to enter perpetual covenants of marriage. Nor does the lustful desire by which not a few unbelieving women hold a perpetual bond in hatred render doubtful this inclination of better persons toward perpetual marriages, or the lamentable condition which divorces create for many women.

3. At the suggestion, indeed at the command, of nature, the husband ought to be the guardian and protector both of the wife and of their common offspring; this offspring must be nourished jointly by both parents ². And it is so evident that free loves are contrary to offspring, whether to be begotten or to be educated, that some naturalists preserve a profound silence concerning offspring, while others wish the good of offspring to be preserved by inept devices.

² Compare what we said above, nos. 104-106, concerning matrimony.

4. What of the fact that a firm purpose and a bond of law have very great power over the very force and stability of the affections? We are taught this by the psychological observation of human nature, so that the naturalists depart so far from nature that those who preach marriages founded on love alone diminish love itself in marriages.

Nor can they themselves boast of the new age which they wish to foreshadow. For that kind of union which rested upon no bond of law was admitted long ago in Roman law under the name of concubinage. In the society then greatly corrupted it existed together with marriage, and it was often practiced for this purpose, that an inequality of social condition might be preserved between those united. Wherefore an institution of this kind is not only opposed to good morals but is also insufficiently consonant with the democratic spirit of present institutions.

But, they object in this way, perpetual servitudes are repugnant to present laws. Moreover, the civil sanctions of religious vows have been suppressed: why should the legal servitude of matrimony be preserved as a vestige of a former age?

Response. Honorable spouses would consider it insulting for the name of servitude to be given to a covenant which they entered of their own accord with pure and free affection and from which they by no means wish to withdraw. Moreover, the name of servitude is not suited to every obligation or bond, but only to one which is imposed on an unwilling person, which is displeasing in itself, and which of itself yields entirely to the benefit of another.

Nor does the comparison limp only slightly in which the vows of religious, which are pronounced with a supernatural intention and do not constitute any institution necessary to the natural society of men, are compared with the matrimonial covenant, which is natural and, as the principle or first beginning, founds every other human society, and which also, since it is often sought for the sake of pleasure, stands in much greater need of the protection of an external law.

Although the expediency of laws by which religious profession is treated unfavorably is very doubtful.

118. - Yet there is no error which does not contain something true and useful. We can borrow this lesson from the naturalists: a matrimonial covenant is to be positively approved only between those persons whom sincere love has already joined spiritually.