I Forbid the Banns! — page 252: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

242 ‘7 FORBID THE BANNS!” your cigar; I have no wish to discuss with you a point which cannot be appreciated except by those who have studied it in all its bearings, with a mind altogether free from prejudice.” ‘“T have no desire to discuss it either, Mr. Charlton ; but I know what men and women are, and I know that men are mostly scoundrels, so far as women are concerned, and that women are mostly fools so far as men are concerned. Matters are bad enough even with the civil contract of marriage protecting society from the scoundrelism of man and from the folly of women; what it would be if that fad of my wife’s niece became common, I can guess.” “Tt strikes me, Mr. Hardy, that your reference to a fad scarcely comes gracefully from you.” -“ You believe me to be an old fool, I suppose ?”’ ‘‘T believe you to be the secretary and founder of the Carnisolist Society—that is what you call it, I think.” ‘‘ Never mind the Carnisolist Society, sir; we must all live. I know that you both think that you are superior to the majority of the men and women in the world—that the laws which may be good enough for them, keeping them square and so forth, are not for you—that you will be a law unto yourselves, and set up as the pioneers of a new and select faith—a faith that will reform the world; but I know that the hearts of human beings are very human—even of the most select human beings; and I know that your new reli- gion will break down under the first strain that is put on it. If you love that young woman truly, I pity you when you see her surrounded by attractive men—or, perhaps, by the side of one attractive man—and you feel that she is your wife only so long as it pleases herto beso. I pity her, too, when she sees you in the midst of a number of attractive women—or, perhaps, by the side of one particularly attrac- tive woman—and she feels that you are bound to her by no CONNIE IONOLKS (€(0)