scornful
sonnet concerning the reception of his book is well known.)

Milton insists that in the conventional Christian marriage
exclusive importance is attached to carnal connection. So long as
that connection is possible, no matter what antipathy may exist
between the couple, no matter how mistaken they may have been
"through any error, concealment, or misadventure," no matter if
it is impossible for them to "live in any union or contentment
all their days," yet the marriage still holds good, the two must
"fadge together" (op. cit., Bk. i). It is the Canon law, he says,
which is at fault, "doubtless by the policy of the devil," for
the Canon law leads to licentiousness (op. cit.). It is, he
argues, the absence of reasonable liberty which causes license,
and it is the men who desire to retain the privileges of license
who oppose the introduction of reasonable liberty.

The just ground for divorce is "indisposition, unfitness, or
contrariety of mind, arising from a cause in nature unchangeable,
hindering, and ever likely to hinder, the main benefits of
conjugal society, which are solace and peace." Without the "deep
and serious verity" of mutual love, wedlock is "nothing but the
empty husks of a mere outside matrimony," a mere hypocrisy, and
must be dissolved (op. cit.).

Milton goes beyond the usual Puritan standpoint, and not only
rejects courts and magistrates, but approves of self-divorce; for
divorce cannot rightly belong to any civil or earthly power,
since "ofttimes the causes of seeking divorce reside so deeply in
the radical and innocent affections of nature, as is not within
the diocese of law to tamper with." He adds that, for the
prevention of injustice, special points may be referred to the
magistrate, who should not, however, in any case, be able to
forbid divorce (op. cit., Bk. ii, Ch. XXI). Speaking from a
standpoint which we have not even yet attained, he protests
against the absurdity of "authorizing a judicial court to toss
about and divulge the unaccountable and secret reason of
disaffection between man and wife."

In modern times Hinton was accustomed to compare the marriage law
to the law of the Sabbath as broken by Jesus. We find exactly the
same comparison in Milton. The Sabbath, he believes, was made for
God. "Yet when the good of man comes