Aye! but how
can he stretch out his hand? In the society in which they both move
there is but one way in which she can be his--the way sanctioned by
society, blessed by the church. Society and the church will bless and
smile upon any union: the decrepit old man with the blooming child; the
drunkard and adulterer with the pure young girl; the avaricious youth
with the doting old woman. Marriage purifies, sanctifies, hallows
sensuality, greed, any, every base motive. To love as God made you free
to love, unfettered, and with a true heart, is a crime; to live
together full of hatred, loathing, and revolt, is to perform a sacred
duty once you have tied yourself up in church. This was Vansittart's
theory. Marriage to him was only another word for satiety, weariness,
restraint, tyranny. He had never seen what he called a happy marriage,
though he had observed many which the world crowned with that adjective,
and he had sworn a thousand oaths that he would never subject himself to
that miserable awakening which inevitably follows the temporary sleep of
mind and reason, and the short dream of passion which makes a man bind
himself with shackles.
Philip paced his room for hours, fighting the hardest battle he had ever
fought. It was the first time he had ever been tempted to marry--tempted
beyond endurance.
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