The marriage of convention has done its natural
office in sapping the morals of France, till breach of the marriage
vow has become one of the chief topics of its daily wit, one of the
acknowledged traits of its manners, and a favorite--in these modern
times we might say the favorite--subject of its works of fiction. From
the time of Moliere, himself an agonized sufferer behind his comic
mask from the infidelities of a wife he was not able to cease to love,
through memoirs, novels, dramas, and the volleyed squibs of the press,
one fact stares us in the face as one of so common occurrence, that
men, if they have not ceased to suffer in heart and morals from its
poisonous action, have yet learned to bear with a shrug and a careless
laugh that marks its frequency. Understand, we do not say that the
French are the most deeply stained with vice of all nations. We do not
think them so. There are others where there is as much, but there is
none where it is so openly acknowledged in literature, and therefore
there is none whose literature alone is so likely to deprave
inexperienced minds, by familiarizing them with wickedness before they
have known the lure and the shock of passion.
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