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Selected Messages Book 2
nothing in the Word of God that would require her to separate from
him. As you have asked my advice I will freely give it to you.—
Letter
50, 1895
.
Counsel to a Young Woman Who Contemplated Marrying a
Divorced Man
[
In this case Brother L had left his wife and family and had journeyed
to a distant land, trusting the wife’s father to provide for their support.
His wife in time sued for divorce on the grounds of desertion. Before
the divorce was granted he began to place his affection on the young
lady to whom this message is addressed.—Compilers
.]
The Provoking Party has No Right to Remarry
I have been considering your case in connection with L, and I have
no other counsel to give than I have given. I consider that you have no
moral right to marry L; he has no moral right to marry you. He left
his wife after giving her great provocation. He left her whom he had
vowed before God to love and cherish while both should live. Before
ever she obtained her divorce, when she was his lawful wife, he left
her for three years, and then left her in heart, and expressed his love
to you. The matter has been negotiated largely between you and a
married man while he was legally bound to the wife he married, who
has had two children by him.
[341]
I see not a particle of leniency in the Scriptures given either of
you to contract marriage, although his wife is divorced. From the
provocation he has given her, it was largely his own course of action
that has brought this result, and I cannot see in any more favorable
light his having a legal right to link his interest with yours or you to
link your interest with his....
I am astonished that you should for a moment give thought to
such a thing, and place your affections on a married man who had left
his wife and children under such circumstances. I advise you to lay
your thoughts and plans regarding this matter just as they are before
our responsible brethren, that you may receive their counsel, and let
them show you from the law of God the error into which you have
fallen. You have both broken the law even in thinking that you might