A CHRISTIAN LIFE.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XV, Issue 4743, 11 August 1890, Page 4

A CHRISTIAN LIFE.

TOLSTOI'S DEFENCE OF HIS NEW BOOK. MABRIAGE SHOULD NOT BE SANCTIONED. New Toes, June 23. Tolstoi, the {trait and eccentric novelist, baa written to a friend in this country n defence of the morals in bia new book, "The Kreatzar Sonata," la whicb he •ays:—"My views on the question may be succinctly stated as follows: Without entering into details, i: will be generally admitted that I am accurate in saying that many peop!e> condone In yonng men a conns of conduct wi:h regard to the other sex which Is incompatible with strict morality, and that this dissoluteness is pardoned generally. Both ptrents and the Government, la coistqaecc* <>f it is view, may be said to wick at profligacy, sad even In the last resort to encourage Its practice. " I am of the opinion that this la not right. It Is not possible that the health of one class shoald necessitate the ruin of another, and in consequence it Is onr firH duty to tarn a deaf car to such an essentially immoral doctrine, no muter how strongly society may have established or protected it. " Moreover, It needs to be folly recognised that men are rightly lo be held responsible for tho consequences of their acts, and that these are no longer to be visited upon woman alone. It follows from this that it is tie doiy of men who do not wish to live a life of infamy to practice inch continence in reipect to all woman as they would were the female society In which they move made op exclusively of their owo mothers and sisters. A more rational mode of life should be adopted, which would include abstinence from alcoholic drinks, from excess in eating, and from flash me.it, on the oce bind and recourse to physical labor on the other.

In tha second place, I think that of lata years, through various reason) into which I need not enter, conjugal Infidelity has became mare common and is considered leas reprehensible. "la the third place, I am of tbo opinion that another consequence of the false light In which ' falling in love' and what It lead* to are viewed in onr asciety Is that the birth of children has lost its pristine significance, and that modem marriages are conceived less and leas from the point of view of a family. "Io the fourth place, 1 am of opinion that the children who are In oar society are an obstacle to oar enjoyment—an unlocky accident, as it were—and aro educated not with a view to the problems which they will one day be cilicd upon to face and to solve, hot solely with an eye to the pleasure which they may be made to yield to their parents. The consequence is that the children of human beings are brought up for all the world like the young of aoimtla. " In the fifth place, I am of tho opinion that, owing to the exaggerated and erroneous significance* attributed by our society to lore and to the idealised states that accompany and succeed it, the beat energies of onr men and women are drawn forth and exhausted during the moat promising period cf life—these of man In the work of looking for, cbooaiog and winning the moa". desirable objects of love, for which purpose lying and fraud are held to be quite excusable ; thosp of women and girls in alluring men and decaying them Into liaisocs or marriage by the most questionable means conceivable, as an instance of which the present fashions in evening dress may bo cited. lam opinion that this is not right. The truth is that the whole aff»ir h-ss besn exalted by poels and romatcs to an undue prominence, and that love in its various developments is not a fitting object to consume the best energies of men.

" Not only to form a Ulalaon, bat even to contract marriage, Is, from a Christian point of view, not a progress, but a fall. Lore and all states tLat accompany and follow it, however we may try in prose and Terse to prove the contrary, never do and never can facilitate the attainment of an aim worthy of men, bnt always it more difficolt. "How abous the hnman raco if we admit that celibacy is better and nobler than marriage? Evidently the bnunn race will come loan end, bnt if the logical conclusion cf tbe argument ia that the haman race Till became extlact, tbo reasanlog is wrong. To that I reply that the argument is not mine ; I did not invent It. That it is incumbent on mankind so to strive, and that celibacy ia preferable t» marriage, are truths revoked by Christ 1000 years ago, set forth in onr catechisms and professed by us aa followers of Christ.

"Chastity and celibacy, it is urged, cannot constitute tho ideal cf humanity, became chastity wonld annihilate tho race which strove to realise it, and humanity cannot set up as its ideal its own annihilation. It may be pointed out in reply that only that is true the ideal of which being unattainable admits of inSolte graduation in degrees or proximity. Even if we snppose the Christian ideal of perfect chastity realised, what then 1 We should merely find ourselves fsca to face on tbe one hand with a familiar teaching of religion, one of whose dogmas Is that the world will have an end, and. on tbe other, of socalled science, which informs 03 that the son ia gradually losing its heat, the result of which will in time be the extinction of tho hnman race. Such a thing as a Christian marriage never was and never could be. Christ did not marry nor did he establish marriage ; neither did his disciples marry. A Christian cannot view tho marriage relation otherwise than as a deviation from the doctrine of Christ—as a sin. This is clearly laid down In Matthew v., 28, and the ceremony called Christian marriage does not alter ita character one jot. A Christian will never, therefore, desire marriage, bat will always avoid it. If the light of troth dawns upon a Christian when he Is already married, or if, being a Christian, from weakness he enters Into the marital relations with the ceremonies of tbe Caurcb, or without them, be has no alternative than to abide with bis wife and to aspire together with her to free themselves from their sin. This is tbe Christian view of marriage, and there cannot bo any other for the man who honestly endeavors to shape his life in accordance <tisb tbe teachings of Christ.