I Forbid the Banns! — page 118: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

108 “T FORBID THE BANNS!” lead you to believe that the hands must be manacled as well, otherwise there is no union? ”’ “My dear Bertha, to tell you the honest truth, I have never given the subject more thana casual thought. Where there is no love I have always felt that marriage is worse than mockery.” ‘“ And when God has given his best gift of love to a man and a woman he has made them one—this is a marriage that is not a mockery ;-and I do not mean to be one of those people who go to the priest or to his civil equivalent to have this spiritual bond transformed into a pair of iron manacles.”’ “But, my love, if people who have no spiritual bond uniting them choose to make a mockery of marriage, that cannot be regarded as a reason why marriage should not be accepted in its proper spirit by those who have been joined in soul by love—such love as ours, dearest ?” ‘Cannot you see, Julian, that you are now confusing the true idea of marriage with the idea of the ceremony known to the world as marriage?”’ ‘‘ Perhaps Lam,”’ said he thoughtfully. The fact was that he had become suddenly thoughtful, not upon the delicate distinctions which the girl seemed to be able to draw, but upon quite another matter. “Yes,” she continued ; “I do think that you fail to see that for us to go to the church and to ask the priest to join us in what is indeed a holy bond, would be equivalent to an acknowledgment that God had not joined us in that holy bond, the moment we loved one another.”’ ‘““My God! Bertha, do you mean to say that we should live together as man and wife without going through any ceremony ?”’ cried Charlton. “Ceremony?” said she after a pause, during which her face was suffused with a lovely blush. ‘Ceremony? O Julian, I am ashamed of you!” EONNIELIOO KS (EO)