Laws vary to suit the generations, but each
generation must obey its own, or confusion will ensue. A deed should
be judged by its fruits; it may even be innocent in itself, yet if its
fruits are evil the doer in a sense is guilty.
Thus in some countries to mention the name of your mother-in-law entails
the most unpleasant consequences on that intimate relation. Nobody can
say that to name the lady is a thing wicked in itself; yet the man who,
knowing the penalties which will ensue, allows himself, even in a fit of
passion against that relative, to violate the custom and mention her by
name is doubtless an offender. Thus, too, the result of an entanglement
between a woman and a man already married generally means unhappiness
and hurt to all concerned, more especially to the women, whose prospects
are perhaps irretrievably injured thereby. It is useless to point to
the example of the patriarchs, some foreign royal families, and many
respectable Turks; it is useless to plead that the love is deep and
holy love, for which a man or woman might well live and die, or to show
extenuating circumstances in the fact of loneliness, need of sympathy,
and that the existing marriage is a hollow sham.
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