or other countries'
experiences; and the Church is preaching one thing, and the State
another, the Majority report taking a certain view, and the Minority a
different one--and we are all at sea, and the supreme issue of it all
seems to be fogged.

An enormous section of the public, and almost all women it would seem,
are of opinion that divorce should be granted for the same reason to
women as it is now to men. But surely those who hold this view cannot
understand that fundamental difference in the instincts of the sexes
which I tried to show as forcibly as I could in my former articles
upon Marriage. Infidelity in man cannot be nearly such a degradation
to his own soul as infidelity in woman must be to hers, because he is
following natural impulses and she is following grafted ones. A woman
must feel degraded in her body and soul when she gives herself to _two
men_ at the same time, a husband and a lover; but a man, when he
strays, if it has any moral effect upon him at all, probably merely
feels some twinges on account of breaking his word, and the fear of
being found out. The actual infidelity cannot degrade him as much as
it generally degrades a woman, and may be only the yielding to strong
temptation at a given moment, and have no bearing upon the kind home
treatment he accords his wife and children, or the tenor of his
domestic life. The eventuality of what this law would bring should be
looked at squarely. And it is rather a pitiful picture to think of the
entire happiness of a home being upset because a wife, without
judgment or the faculty of making deductions, discovering a single
instance of illicit behaviour in her husband, sees fit to, and is
enabled by law, to divorce him. It may be argued that the fear of this
would make him mend his ways; but did fear ever curb strong natural
instincts for long?--instincts as strong as hunger, or thirst, or
desire to sleep? Fear could only curb such for a time, and then
intelligence would suggest some new and cunning method of deceit, so
as to obtain the desired end. The only possible way to ensure fidelity
in a man is by influencing him to _wish_ to remain faithful, either by
fond love for the woman or deep religious conviction or moral opinion
that not to do so would degrade his soul. The accomplishment of this
end would seem to be either in the hands of the woman or in the
teaching of the Church--and cannot be brought about by law. Law can
only punish offenders; it c