But the husband may not so
love you. He may rule you with the rod of iron. What can you do? Be
divorced? God forbids it, save for crime. Will you say that you are
free,--that you will go where you please, do as you please? Why, ye dear
wives, your husbands may forbid. And listen, you cannot leave New York,
nor your palaces, any more than your shanties. No; you cannot leave your
parlor, nor your bedchamber, nor your couch, if your husband commands you
to stay there! What can you do? Will you run away, with your stick and
your bundle? He can advertise you!! What can you do? You can, and I fear
some of you do, wish him, from the bottom of your hearts, at the bottom of
the Hudson. Or, in your self-will, you will do just as you please. (Great
laughter.)
[A word on the subject of divorce. One of your standing denunciations on
the South is the terrible laxity of the marriage vow among the slaves.
Well, sir, what does your Boston Dr. Nehemiah Adams say? He says, after
giving eighty, sixty, and the like number of applications for divorce, and
nearly all granted at individual quarterly courts in New England,--he says
he is not sure but that the marriage relation is as enduring among _the
slaves in the South_ as it is among white people in New England. I only
give what Dr. Adams says. I would fain vindicate the marriage relation
from this rebuke.
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