Page:The rights of women and the sexual relations.djvu/304

288 do not love each other ought not to be united, or where they are united, they ought again to be separated; a man and woman who love each other ought not to be kept apart, and they need no external force to remain together. This is the simple statement of what I understand by freedom in love, which is the only means of securing what has now become so rare — a true marriage and a happy family life. Let him who does not agree with me have the courage to postulate the opposite and declare, that those who do not love each other ought to be united, and to be kept together by force, those who love each other ought to be separated and to be kept apart by force — both in the interest of humanity and human happiness!

Although no man in sound mind dares to make such a demand, it seems, in practice, to be the guiding principle almost everywhere. If all the considerations, whose slaves men are nowadays, would suddenly drop for only a period of twenty-four hours, not ten of the so-called marriages would exist next day. For married people and their progeny the consequences of the existing relationships of force and prostitution are truly appalling. But this same society, especially the male portion of it, never wearies of pronouncing their anathemas on freedom in love. "Free love' is a word of terror, but free prostitution has become a social institution, which is approved inside and outside of marriage by a legal license. And shall I tell you why men