CHAPTER XXX
MONOGAMY AND POLYGYNY
In this survey I have noted a present-day monogamic trend in the races of the East. The movement may not be widespread, nor readily recognisable in the more stationary nations practising polygamy, but it undoubtedly manifests itself among the newer Eastern spirits.[1] It would be rash to infer from this slight indication of changing opinion that plural marriage will entirely disappear in the future. Perhaps we may assume that, with the spread of discontent among the cultured women of the East, polygamy will lessen very gradually.
The polygynous impulse will scarcely wane and disappear in a few generations, even if we grant that it is likely to vanish altogether in the course of human evolution. None of the cultivated dominant nations of the world have up to the present lived down the in-
- ↑ Mrs. Ethel Snowden ("The Feminist Movement") states that "the educated and advanced women of Turkey demand prohibition of polygamy, the right to choose a husband, and higher education. The freeing of Turkish women is only a matter of time."
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