d my
young body, and hast therefore brought my honor and salvation into
danger. There is no glory to God between us two. Grant me to cohabit
secretly with thy brother or nearest friend, and thou shalt have the
name, _so that thy property come not to strange heirs; and allow thyself
to be, in turn, willingly deceived by me, as thou did deceive me without
thy will_." The husband, Luther goes on to show, is in duty bound to
grant the request. "If he declines, then has she the right to run away
from him to another, and to woo elsewhere. Conversely, if a woman
declines to exercise the conjugal duty, her husband has the right to
cohabit with another, only he should tell her so beforehand."[49] It
will be seen that these are wonderfully radical, and, in the eyes of our
days, so rich in hypocritical prudery, even downright "immoral" views,
that the great Reformer develops. Luther, however, expressed only that
which, at the time, was the popular view.[50]

The passages quoted from the writings and addresses of Luther on
marriage, are of special importance for the reason that these views are
in strong contradiction with those that prevail to-day in the Church. In
the struggle that it latterly has had to conduct with the clerical
fraternity, the Social Democracy can appeal with full right to Luther,
who takes on the question of marriage a stand free from all prejudice.

Luther and all the Reformers went even further in the marriage question,
true enough, only for opportunist reasons, and out of complaisance
towards the Princes whose strong support and permanent friendship they
sought to secure and keep to the Reformation. The friendly Duke of
Hessen, Philip I, had, besides his legitimate wife, a sweetheart,
willing to yield to his wishes, but only under the condition that he
marry her. It was a thorny problem. A divorce from the wife, in the
absence of convincing reasons, would give great scandal; on the other
hand, a marriage with two women at a time was an unheard of thing with a
Christian Prince of modern days; it would give rise to no less a
scandal. All this notwithstanding, Philip, in his passion, decided in
favor of the latter step. The point was now to establish that the act
did no violence to the Bible, and to secure the approval of the
Reformers, especially of Luther and Melanchthon. The negotiations, set
on foot by the Duke, began first with Butzer, who declared himself in
favor of the plan, and promised to win over Lu