hildren are born both the
practical needs and moral values are different. A marriage that becomes
creative cannot be broken without grave disaster; for all creative
things are eternal. What, then, must be done? Frankly, I know of no one
workable plan, and I can suggest nothing except that in all cases the
welfare of the children should be taken as the standard to which the
desire of the parents should be subordinate.

You see, if we accept this standard of the child's good as the one
thing of importance, we shall have great changes to make in our thought
and in our action. I must follow this a little, though it takes me away
from the main line of my argument, but I want to make quite plain the
failure in our attitude. Perhaps on no other aspect of this question is
greater nonsense talked than on this one of the effect of divorce on
children. It is said so universally that it is better for the marriage
to be broken than for children to live in a home in which the parents
have ceased to love each other. I am not sure that this is true, the
child's values are often very different from our adult values. Only just
now I am reading "Joan and Peter," by Mr. Wells, and I am amazed at the
levity with which he makes his characters treat this serious subject.
You will remember the situation, almost at the opening of the book.
Dolly, Peter's mother and the adopted-mother of Joan, has discovered
that Arthur, her husband, has been unfaithful to their marriage. She is
considering whether she will remain or will go to Africa with her
cousin, Oswald Sydenham, who has for long loved her. These are the
passages of which I wish to speak: "Then, least personal and selfish
thought of all, was the question of Joan and Peter. What would happen to
them?" Dolly goes over the details of the situation, her certainty that
Arthur would allow her the custody of the children, then the passage
ends with this remarkable statement: _Oswald would be as good a father
as Arthur. The children weighed on neither side._ A little later Oswald
speaks on the same matter of the children's future. Dolly has asked him,
"But what of Peter and Joan?" He answers, _Leave them to nurses for a
year or so, and then bring them out to the sun._

Now, to some people that sort of talk sounds all very well on paper, but
as Mr. Wells and everyone ought to know, it is damnably different in
practice. Shaw, Wells, Cannan, Beresford, and other writers have, in my
opinion, done imme