ual relationship, but around the child which is the outcome of that
relationship. In so far as marriage is an inviolable public contract it
will be of such a nature that it will be capable of automatically covering
with its protection every child that is born into the world, so that every
child may possess a legal mother and a legal father. On the one side,
therefore, marriage is tending to become less stringent; on the other side
it is tending to become more stringent. On the personal side it is a
sacred and intimate relationship with which the State has no concern; on
the social side it is the assumption of the responsible public sponsorship
of a new member of the State. Some among us are working to further one of
these aspects of marriage, some to further the other aspect. Both are
indispensable to establish a perfect harmony. It is necessary to hold the
two aspects of marriage apart, in order to do equal justice to the
individual and to society, but in so far as marriage approaches its ideal
state those two aspects become one.

We have now completed the discussion of marriage as it presents itself to
the modern man born in what in mediaeval days was called Christendom. It is
not an easy subject to discuss. It is indeed a very difficult subject, and
only after many years is it possible to detect the main drift of its
apparently opposing and confused currents when one is oneself in the midst
of them. To an Englishman it is, perhaps, peculiarly difficult, for the
Englishman is nothing if not insular; in that fact lie whatever virtues he
possesses, as well as their reverse sides.[374]

Yet it is worth while to attempt to climb to a height from which we can
view the stream of social tendency in its true proportions and estimate
its direction. It is necessary to do so if we value our mental peace in an
age when men's minds are agitated by many petty movements which have
nothing to do with their great temporal interests, to say nothing of their
eternal interests. When we have attained a wide vision of the solid
biological facts of life, when we have grasped the great historical
streams of tradition,--which together make up the map of human
affairs,--we can face serenely the little social transitions which take
place in our own age, as they have taken place in every age.

FOOTNOTES:

[312] Rosenthal, of Breslau, from the legal side, goes so far as to argue
("Grundfragen des Eheproblems," _Die Neue Generation_, Dec., 190