CHAP. VIII.
Of Superstition, more especially relating to the Subjects treated in this Book.
WHEN man fell from God by disobedience, in striving to make himself wiser than God had made him, and that by means which God had forbidden, he lost that image of knowledge and wisdom in which he was originally created. (Comp. Gen. i. 26. Col. iii. 10.) The only means of any restoration to this, must be by revelation; for as man by transgression had brought darkness into his soul, as well as guilt, this could never have been removed by any powers of the human will or understanding; He alone who created the material light, could dispel the clouds in which the human mind was involved, and cause once more the light of the knowledge of the glory of God to shine into the desolate and benighted heart of man. Nothing could have discovered any traces of the divine mind and will, but those gracious declarations of them, for which fallen man stands solely indebted to the free and gratuitous interposition of divine mercy and goodness. For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? Even so the things of God none (οὐδεις) knoweth—but the Spirit of God. 1 Cor. ii. 11.—Who hath known the mind of the Lord, and who hath been His counsellor? Rom. xi. 34.—My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are my ways your ways, saith the Lord; for as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts. Is. lv. 8, 9.—Canst thou by searching find out God, canst thou find out the Almighty to perfection? It is as high as heaven, what canst thou do?—deeper than hell, what canst thou know? Job. xi. 7, 8.
This is giving us fair warning of our deplorable ignorance with respect to God and His will and ways.—Still—vain man would be wise, though man be born like a wild ass's colt. Job xi. 12. His imagination will set to work; and though he be assured that all scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine—therefore is to teach us;—for reproof (προς ἐλεγχον)—for reproof or conviction of sin and error—and therefore to set them before us in their true light;—for correction—ἐπανορθωσιν—for setting right and amending that which is wrong;—for instruction—(παιδειαν—institution—discipline) in righteousness; and all this that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works, and thus be made wise unto salvation (see 2 Tim. iii. 16, 17.)—yet, such is the pride, such the folly of man, he will not be satisfied with what God hath revealed, but would fain make some discoveries of his own concerning God and religion, which, rather than part with, he will even make the criteria and standards of truth; will endeavour to reconcile his own inventions with God's revelations; and if this be too hard, the next experiment is to accommodate the divine revelations to his own inventions. There are no popular systems of religion and worship, where this is not to be found. This was the plan of the Babel-builders of old time, and ever since it has been, as they were, scattered over the face of the whole earth. Gen. xi. 8. The Heathen, who had the volume of nature open to them for their instruction (Rom. i. 19, 20.) became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened—professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the truth of God into a lye, &c. ver. 22, 25. The Jews, with the written volume of divine revelation before them, set their imaginations to work, trying to find out some holier and better way to walk and to please God than they found there—till they were as much lost to the teachings of God's word, as the Heathen were to the teachings of the outward creation—till, as Isaiah, lx. 2. expresseth it—darkness covered the earth, and gross darkness the people.—The Christian churches began very early to tread in the same steps, and to invent schemes of holiness and purity with respect to manners—of mortification and austerity with regard to discipline, and not sparing of the body (Col. ii. 23.)—of rites and ceremonies with regard to worship—of human wisdom and science with respect to doctrine—till they even (before two centuries were elapsed) vied with Babel itself; and whoever can read Dr. Mosheim's account of the early ages of Christianity, without thinking it as great a miracle as any recorded in the gospels, that they should ever reach us at all, but more especially in the pure state in which they are among us, will appear to have a talent at accounting for things by second causes, beyond the capacity of any writer I yet have met with. Why Heathens, Jews, and Christians, should act so uniformly towards those revelations which God at sundry times and in divers manners (Heb. i. 1.) hath vouchsafed them, is all accounted for on one simple principle—Prov. xxvii. 19. As in water face answereth to face—so doth the heart of man to man. Hence it is, that through all ages of the church, those who have invented systems for others, have constantly been mixing the peculiarities of some or other which they have had invented for them:—there is therefore no security to be found from error, until a man is really and truly
Nullius addictus jurare in verba magistri.
Hor.
Friend to all sects—but blindly sworn to none.
Francis.
The Apostle, 1 Thess. v. 21. says, Try—prove—examine—δοκιμαζετε—assay, as refiners do metals, all things; hold fast that which is good.—Beloved, saith 1 John iv. 1. Believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God, because many false prophets are gone out into the world. But how is this trial to be made?—Not by the poor ineffectual fire of human wisdom—but by putting what we hear or read into the furnace of divine truth, by searching the scriptures, comparing spiritual things with spiritual, and whatsoever will abide this, we may believe to be true; for God's truth, like His children that we read of Dan. iii. 27. the more it is tried, the more evidently will it appear to be his peculiar care, and the more glorious will it come forth.
His having raised up men from time to time in all ages of the church, who dared thus to examine into the truth for themselves, and then to attack the superstition of the day in which they lived, is to be reckoned among the foremost of those second causes, by which the truth hath been preserved to us. Yet much remains to be done, and surely none, who call themselves the real friends of mankind, can help wishing for the day, when those shackles which have been fixed upon the consciences of men by priestcraft, bigotry, and vulgar error, shall all drop off, and when men shall be bound, in all their actions towards Heaven and each other, by the ties of justice, mercy, and the love of God—Matt. xxiii. 3. Luke xi. 42.—when whole hecatombs of seduced, ruined, and deserted females shall cease to pass through the fire of men's lust to Moloch, and to be offered at the shrine of prostitution.
Fable tells us, that seven noble Athenians were annually given to be devoured by the monster Minotaur; that this inhuman custom prevailed until Theseus slew the devourer:—we may say of our present system of laws, relative to the commerce of the sexes,
——————mutato nomine de te
Fabula narratur———
Change but the name, the fable's told of thee.
only with this difference, that seven victims satisfied the Cretan monster, but not seventy—nor seven hundred—nor seven thousand seduced virgins are sufficient to complete the quota which is annually furnished, by the female sex, of sacrifices to the monster Prostitution. So it has long been, and so it still must be, until a restoration of God's most holy and beneficent law shall take place among us.
Superstition is the offspring of human pride and ignorance: as these are to be found in the nature of every child of fallen Adam; so, as these are more or less subdued by the power of divine truth, superstition will less or more bear its sway in religious matters.
By superstition, I would be understood to mean—a devotion which has no foundation in the revealed will of God, and either rests in the imagination of the party, or owes its sanction to some mis-interpretation or ill-understanding of the revelation itself. Under the former head, we may rank the various superstitions of those nations on whom the light of God's revelation, as contained in the Bible, hath not yet arisen. Under the latter we may include many strange and indefensible opinions, which are maintained as so many inviolable truths, even among those who are blessed with the oracles of God, and who profess to believe them. The church of Rome abounds in this sort of superstition, insomuch that she will plead the wisdom of God, as revealed in His word, for the maintenance of absurdities too palpable and gross to conceal themselves from the discovery of our outward senses; yet believed, or professed to be believed, by whole nations of professing Christians, who are taught to look no farther than the authority of the church, and to submit their understandings and consciences to the dominion of men like themselves. A melancholy proof this of the superstition and folly to which we are exposed, when once we can yield our assent to popular opinion, without giving ourselves the trouble to search the scriptures, as the Bereans did (Acts xvii. 11.) and to enquire for ourselves whether these things are so.
Free enquiry, when exercised with an honest desire to know and to do the will of God, is not only the privilege, but also the duty of every reasonable creature. To believe a proposition because it has the sanction of popular opinion, worldly customs, and human laws, may as well land us in Popery as in Protestantism, or in Heathenism as in Christianity, or in any thing else which it is the fashion to believe in the country where our lot is cast. Brethren, saith Paul, (1 Cor. xiv. 20.) be not children in understanding, but in understanding be men. Saith 1 Pet. iii. 15. Be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you—that is, a scriptural, wise, and solid reason. But how can this be done, unless we acquaint ourselves with some better foundation of our hope, than the bare ipse dixit, the mere "say so," of any man, or all men put together?
One of the worst properties of superstition is, that, when it becomes inveterate, when grown old by long custom and usage, having descended from father to son, from generation to generation, it is as difficult to eradicate it out of the body politic, as to expel a long-fixed chronical disease out of the natural body. In some instances, perhaps in most, nothing but dissolution itself can effect it. The Pope's supremacy and infallibility—the doctrines of masses for the quick and dead—indulgences—five of the seven sacraments—the celibacy of priests—transubstantiation—the adoration of the host—the worship of images and relics—praying to the Virgin Mary—the invention of purgatory—and other most sacred superstitions, are so ingrafted into the very constitution of the Romish church, that they can never be destroyed, without destroying that political fabric, which they call the church, itself. This actually happened at the Reformation—these things being abolished, there was an end so far of the church of Rome.
When we reflect on the superstition with regard to marriage, which has so long reigned in the Christian church, and is as much interwoven with our laws, as the other superstitions before mentioned once were, we may perhaps fear that this can never be destroyed, without destroying the whole fabric of those laws which support it.
Still superstition is superstition, however venerated or dignified; and every man who endeavours to detect it, and to destroy its mischievous supremacy over the minds of men, is equally a friend to religion and to mankind. The zealots on the side of the superstition will make an heavy cry against the detector, as the Papists did against the Reformers, or as the Ephesians did against Paul when he attacked their great Diana, whom all Asia and the world worshipped, (Acts xix. 26, 27.) by teaching, that they are no Gods which be made by hands. But our glorious Reformers, knowing that they had the truth of God on their side, boldly pushed on, as Paul on the same principle had done before them; nothing could prevail on them to be silent in the important cause which they had undertaken, until, happily for themselves, and for succeeding generations, they found the force of that saying—Magna est veritas & prævalebit.—Great is the truth, and will prevail.
I would not be understood as giving the name of superstition to every circumstance of worship and religion which is not to be found in the Bible. Let all things be done decently and in order, is the direction of an inspired Apostle, 1 Cor. xiv. 40. Many things may be observed and used for these purposes, not only innocently, but with much expediency; and while they are looked upon only in this light, they ought to have due reverence, and to be submitted to for the Lord's sake. 1 Pet. ii. 13. But when once certain appendages of human invention, are put in the place of, or made to supersede the obligation of divine institutions, there they erect themselves into superstitions, and, so far from claiming reverence, deserve contempt and abhorrence, more especially when they are attended with ruin, destruction, and desolation to thousands, whom the law of God was formed to protect and to preserve.
I have before compared the divine institution of marriage to those other divine institutions of baptism and the Lord's supper, as equally ordained of God, therefore equally exempt from the controul of man, with respect to its essence and obligation in God's sight. Laws which men may make to alter or change these, are to be considered as ipso facto null and void with regard to the conscience, otherwise the ordinances of Heaven might in time become no ordinances at all. Though the Pope has banished the cup from the administration of the Lord's supper, and thus abolished one half of the divine institution with respect to the laity, yet this cannot make the least alteration as to the essence and obligation of the thing itself in God's sight; the entire sacrament remains just where Christ left it, though man has put asunder what God hath joined together. So is it with the ordinance of marriage—those who are joined together by that ordinance by which they are pronounced one flesh, are so, and must remain so by virtue of the divine command, though all the legislative bodies on earth were to meet together, and make a law to put them asunder.
Superstition says otherwise.—It has long taught us to tread the ordinance of God under foot, to vacate its obligation, to destroy its efficacy, to deny its validity; and marriage is now supposed to consist in a human ceremony, administered by a fellow-creature, and that on such terms and conditions, as the fancy and imagination of mankind have first invented and then imposed.
Marriage was instituted, and its one ordinance appointed, thousands of years before there were buildings called churches or chapels—steeples—bells—Popish priests—or mass-books. It is, as instituted by the God of nature, simply one and the same throughout all ages and generations, therefore one and the same as to its import, validity, and obligation, in the sight of God.
The particular laws which it pleased the Almighty to ordain for the honour of his own moral government, and for the peace, welfare, and good order of society in general, as well as for the protection and defence of the individuals which compose it, were clearly revealed by God at Mount Sinai, and committed to writing by Moses. These laws can never alter, much less give way to the superstitious inventions of men, but stand on record and bear their testimony against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, notwithstanding a Popish indulgence, or the sanction of an act of parliament to the contrary. These laws declare, that if any man be found lying with a woman betrothed or married to an husband, it is adultery in both, and both must die—but if with a virgin not betrothed, she shall be his wife—he may not put her away all his days—because he hath humbled her. The reason here given is very plain and conclusive, but with us it is no reason at all, we (practically at least) read the law thus—she shall not be his wife—he may put her away when he pleases, though he has humbled her—unless a certain human being called a priest—reads out of a service-book a certain form of words, called a form of solemnization of matrimony—in a certain place, called a parish church or chapel, and all this in compliance with a certain human law made for that purpose.—The whole is dependent on the humour of the parties, for if either be base or wicked enough to depart from their engagement before God, and to refuse a compliance with the outward ceremony, no legal restraint is laid on their total departure from each other; they may utterly divorce each other for ever—and this, though God's law positively forbids it, in words clear and plain as if written with a sun-beam.
Notwithstanding what is above observed, that which was, still is, and ever will be, the Divine mind and will upon the subject of marriage, and of that ordinance by which it is effected in the sight of God. No outward ceremony could add to its obligation, and accordingly we find no trace of any such thing in the scripture; the ceremonial appointment of the paying the fifty shekels to the damsel's father, seems to be the only outward recognition of the contract which appears under the law of Moses; but not a vestige do we find of the interference of priests, or rites and ceremonies of matrimony being any part of the temple service. The Jews indeed in after times invented many rites and ceremonies upon the occasion; but as none of these are to be found in holy writ, they cannot be supposed in the least essential to the ordinance of marriage. It appears from some passages of scripture, as John ii. 1. Matt. xxii. 2, &c. that it was usual for the parties to call their friends and neighbours together, and to make a feast or entertainment on the occasion; but this was no more a part of the marriage, than the king's coronation-dinner is a part of his title to the crown; nor can any human ceremony add any more to the validity of a marriage in the sight of God, than the coronation itself does to the king's right to the throne of these realms: this indeed is a solemn recognition, a public notification of something which existed before, but does not in the least add to its validity in the sight of God. If a king of England was to die before his coronation, he would die as really king of England as if he had survived that ceremony, and the crown would equally descend to the heir apparent.—So a man and a woman joined together according to God's ordinance, though they died before any outward human ceremony, would die just as much husband and wife in God's account, as if all the services which men ever invented had been red over them. This in every case—no prior engagement on the man's side was pleadable in bar of the divine law; its obligation affected all men alike, nothing could vacate or set it aside more with respect to one man than another. The words of the law, as hath been before shewn at large, do not authorize any exception, and where any is made, it is not God but man that makes it, but with no more authority than the cup is denied to the Popish laity in the Lord's supper—this wants scripture for its warrant, and so doth the other.—In short, human authority militates against the word of God—The prophets prophesy falsly, (saith Jer. v. 31.) and the priests bear rule by their means—and the people love to have it so.—No doubt, while they can gratify their passions without the least obligation to protect or provide for as their wives, the virgins they debauch, they will love the superstition which indulges them, and hate the law which restrains them—they will contend for the rule of priests in the affair of marriage, and believe that without their interference, there can be no marriage allowed, or divorce forbidden.
How this superstition should first arise in the Christian church, is very accountable from the propensity of the human mind towards inventions of its own in religious matters. The children of Adam are very apt to tread in the steps of their first parents, and to be wise above what is commanded. It flatters the pride of the heart, when some scheme of seeming piety is invented, which bids fair to set the projector, in his own opinion at least, above the level of more scriptural professors. We should never have heard of works of supererogation, if there were not a much higher gratification of human pride, and self-conceit, in thinking we do over and above what God hath commanded, than in walking by the plain written rule of God's word. We have but to read the histories of the Popish saints, and we shall find some uncommanded heights of mortification, bear a price beyond all the scriptural self-denial which is to be met with—an hair shirt—a girdle with iron spikes in it—macerating the body by austere fasting—or lacerating the flesh with whips and scourges—together with other uncommanded insances of the ἀφειδεια σωματος, which the Apostle mentions—Col. ii. 23.—will set a Popish ascetic into a state of spiritual pride little short of madness:—the cell—the cloyster—the abstaining from meats, which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving, of them which believe and know the truth (1 Tim. iii. 4.); but above all—forbidding to marry (ver. 3.) though rendering millions of men and women useless in their generation, and, as far as in them lies, destroyers of the human species, contrary to the primary decree of Heaven, Gen. i. 28.—all these are looked upon as the heights of purity and religious perfection.
These things were foreseen and foretold by that Spirit which knoweth what is in man—see Tim. iv. 1, &c.—The apostles were scarcely cold in their graves, when these seducing spirits, transforming themselves into angels of light, began to work. One grand design of Satan, in all that he does, is the destruction of the human race; hence we may account for those plans of celibacy which make such a figure in the history of the Christian church. Dr. William Cave, a celebrated historian of primitive Christianity, in ch. v. tells us, that "the Christians of those times were so far from breaking in upon unchaste embraces, that they frequently abstained even from lawful pleasures, and kept themselves even from the honourable and undefiled bed, never marrying all their life. We are, says Octavius, chaste in our speech, and chaste in our bodies, and very many of us, though we do not boast of it, do inviolably preserve a perpetual virginity; and are so far from any extravagant desires after incestuous mixtures, that many stand at a distance from the most chaste and modest embraces. Thus Justin Martyr tells the emperors, that, among the Christians, there were a great many of either sex, who for sixty or seventy years had kept themselves single and uncorrupt, and he wished that the like could be shewn in all other sorts of men." Here was a foundation laid for people in after times to combine themselves into distinct societies, to consider marriage as a less pure state than celibacy, and therefore to bind themselves under vows of perpetual chastity, as they called it. Indeed so early as the second century, there were a set of people who called marriage "a carnal thing, and unlawful for Christians under the gospel."
Those zealots among the primitive fathers and Christians, who thought "marriage for once allowable, yet held it in a second instance inexcusable." Dr. Cave, in a very commendable zeal for the virtues of these people, throws the best veil he can over their follies, and makes the best excuse he can invent for them.—"Indeed it cannot be denied," says he, "but that many of the ancient fathers—Tertullian, Cyprian, Hierom, and others, did inveigh against second marriages with too much bitterness and severity, violently pressing many passages in scripture to serve the cause, straining the string many times till it cracked again, and not sticking to censure and condemn second marriages as little better than adultery. Hear what one of their apologists says to it:—Amongst us, every man remains as he was born, or engages himself in one only marriage; for as for second marriages, they are but a more plausible or decorous kind of adultery, our Lord assuring us, that whosoever putteth away his wife, and taketh another, committeth adultery:—which text, as also another of like importance, how perversely he interprets, and impertinently applies to his purpose, I am not willing to remember."
However absurd such an interpretation of the above scripture may appear to us, because we are not involved in all the superstition of those days, yet it is not more so than interpreting the words as some of our more modern commentators do, to condemn polygamy.—Putting away a wife by a bill of divorcement, and marrying another, is at least as good a phrase for putting a dead woman under ground, and marrying a second, as for taking two wives together, or for keeping a living one, and taking another to her.
St. Jerome (as he is called) who lived in the 4th, and in the beginning of the 5th century, actually wrote against marriage, and numbers it among those things which are per se mala ac vitiosa—"evil and vicious in themselves."—See Beza on 1 Cor. vii. 1. No wonder that this sour monk of Palestine should inveigh so bitterly as he did against second marriages of all sorts.
It has been remarked, that of all the praisers of virginity, Jerome seems to have performed his part the best; who calls Eustochium the nun his lady, because she was the spouse of his Lord, and reminds the mother of this lady, that she had the honour to be God's mother-in-law—Socrus Dei. Jortin, Rem. on Eccl. Hist. vol. ii. p. 170.
Some of Jerome's interpretations of scripture are too curious to be omitted—He says, that the clean animals in Noah's ark, signified virgins; and the unclean, those who married. He calls virgins—the vessels made unto honour—and the married—the vessels made unto dishonour (see Rom. ix. 21.); he expounds the fruit which encreased an hundred-fold (see Mark iv. 20.) of virgins—the sixty-fold, of widows—the thirty-fold, of the married—excluding every where those who have married more than once; of whom he says—Certe in bona terra non oriuntur, sed in vepribus & spinis voluptatum—"they certainly do not spring up in good ground, but among the briars and thorns of pleasures." Glassius."
Ambrose, Prefect and afterwards bishop of Milan, who also lived in the 4th century, was a violent declaimer in favour of virginity, and, in a treatise on that subject, he exhorts "girls to enter into nunneries, though against the will of their parents." Jortin, ib. 176.
The progress of superstition in this 4th century, and the erroneous notions which prevailed, excited the zeal of many to stem the torrent. The most eminent of these worthy opposers was Jovinian, an Italian monk; who, towards the conclusion of this century, taught first at Rome, and then at Milan, that "those who passed their days in unsociable celibacy, were not more acceptable in the eyes of God, than those who lived virtuously in the bonds of marriage." These and other judicious opinions, which many began to adopt, were first condemned by the church of Rome, and afterwards by Ambrose, in a council held at Milan, anno 390. The emperor Honorius seconded these authoritative proceedings by the violence of the secular arm—answered the judicious reasonings of Jovinian by the terror of coercive and penal laws—and banished this pretended heretic to the island Boa. Jovinian published his opinions in a book, against which Jerome, in the following century, wrote a most bitter and abusive treatise, which is still extant. See Mosheim, Edit. Maclaine, vol. i. 203, 204.
In the beginning of the 5th century arose Vigilantius, a man remarkable for his learning and eloquence, who was born in Gaul, and went from thence into Spain, where he performed the functions of a presbyter. This man, honouring God's word above the traditions and superstitions of those times, boldly stept forth, and bore his testimony against the opinions and manners of the reigning demagogues, and especially on the subjects of celibacy and marriage, together with the ridiculous austerities of a monastic life. There were, among the Gallic and Spanish bishops, several that sided with Vigilantius; but Jerome, the great monk of the age, assailed this bold reformer with such bitterness and fury, that nothing but his silence could preserve his life, from the intemperate rage of bigotry and superstition. And the name of good Vigilantius remains still in the list of heretics; which is acknowledged to be authentic by those, who without any regard to their own judgment, or the declarations of scripture, followed blindly the decisions of antiquity. See Mosheim, vol. i. 255, 256.
Jerome's Epistle against Vigilantius is a curiosity in its kind, and may be found in the collection printed at Tournay, duodecimo, p. 601. He sets out with observing how many "monsters have appeared in the world, such as Centaurs, Syrens, Cerberus, the Chimera, Geryon, &c." At last Vigilantius is introduced as one of the greatest monsters of all, "who," he tells us, "with an unclean spirit fights against the Spirit of Christ; for that he calls continency, heresy—and chastity, the seminary of lust."—In short, the poor man had written on the behalf of marriage, and plainly saw what must be the end of the pretended schemes of chastity, which the monks had espoused. But Jerome proceeds—"Proh nefas! Episcopos sui sceleris dicitur habere consortes, si tamen Episcopi nominandi sunt, qui non ordinant Diaconos, nisi prius uxores duxerint, nulli cælibi credentes pudicitiam, & nisi prægnantes viderint uxores clericorum, infantesque de ulnis matrum vagientes, Christi sacramenta non tribuunt. Quid facient orientis ecclesiæ? Quid Ægypti & sedis apostolicæ, quæ, aut virgines clericos accipiunt, aut continentes, aut, si uxores habuerint mariti esse desistunt? Hoc docuit Dormitantius libidini fræna permittens, & naturalem carnis ardorem, qui in adolescentia plerumque fervescit, suis hortatibus duplicans, immo extinguens coitu fœminarum: ut nihil sit quo distemus a porcis, quo differamus a brutis animantibus, quo ab equis de quibus scriptum est—Equi insanientes in feminas facti sunt mihi: unusquisque in uxorem proximi sui hinniebat. Jer. v. 8. Hoc est quod loquitur per David Spiritus Sanctus—Nolite fieri sicut equus & mulus quibus non est intellectus & rursum de Dormitantio & sociis ejus—In chamo & freno maxillas eorum constringe, qui non approximant ad te."—"O abominable shame! he (Vigilantius) is said to have bishops partners of his wickedness, if such are to be called bishops, who do not ordain deacons unless they first be married—believing there is no chastity in a single man; and unless they see the wives of the clergy pregnant, and infants crying in the arms of their mothers, they do not commit to them the power of administering the sacraments of Christ.
"What must the Eastern churches do? What those of Ægypt and of the apostolical see—(i. e. Rome)—who receive clergy that are virgins, or continent, or who, if they have wives, cease from being husbands?
"Thus taught Dormitantius" (N. B.—a silly pun on the name of Vigilantius) "giving the reins to licentiousness; and doubling, by his exhortations, the natural ardor of the flesh, which usually grows warm in youth, yea, even extinguishing it by intercourse with women. So that there may be nothing in which we should be distinguished from swine, or in which we should differ from brute beasts, and even the horses—concerning which it is written—Raging for women, they are become to me as horses; every one neighed after his neighbour's wife. Jer. v. 8. This is what the Holy Spirit speaks by David—Be ye not like to horse or mule, which have no understanding—and again, concerning Dormitantius and his fellows—Constrain their jaw-bones with a bit and a bridle, lest they approach unto thee." Ps. xxxii. 9.
The reader has here a sample of the spirit of those times with regard to marriage, particularly of the clergy; likewise of the candour, fairness, and good manners, with which those were treated, who dared, like Vigilantius, to step forth in the cause of scripture, common sense, and truth, against superstition, folly, and error; also of the ridiculous abuse and perversion of scripture, in order to maintain the reigning superstition. Lastly, we may observe, in what Jerome says, about "the bishops refusing to ordain deacons unless their wives were with child," &c. that a little lying and scandal was esteemed of singular use. See before, vol. i. p. 285. n.
It should seem that the severity with regard to second marriages was afterwards relaxed, as to the laity at least; but a third was prohibited by several councils; and the emperor Leo, in the 9th century, published an edict, subjecting those who married thrice, to the penalties which had been decreed against them by the antient councils. However, this emperor was fairly caught in his own snare; for when he wanted to revoke that edict in his own case, the clergy would not suffer it.
The emperor Leo, who reigned at Constantinople, married four times, for which the then Patriarch excommunicated him. He begged to be restored, but in vain; upon which he deposed Nicolaus Mysticus, who had excommunicated him, from the patriarchate, confined him to a monastry, and placed one Enthymius Syncellus in his room. This occasioned a schism in the church, some of the clergy siding with Nicolaus, some with Enthymius. Though Enthymius restored Leo to the communion of the faithful, yet he resolutely opposed him, when, by the advice of the senate, he was about to publish an edict, declaring it lawful to marry a fourth time. Nor would the clergy suffer the emperor to revoke his former edict against those who married thrice. See Ant. Univ. Hist. vol. xvii. p. 79. See a full account of this matter in Du Pin, Eccl. Hist. Eng. Trans. vol. iii. p. 1, 2.
By all this we may learn, how early the mystery of iniquity began to work, in a combination of church and state, against the prerogative of Heaven, with respect to marriage, by men taking upon themselves to decide upon the lawfulness or unlawfulness of marriages, either independently on the scriptures, or in total opposition to them; likewise to misinterpret and misapply them to justify their proceedings.
But to return to the primitive Christians. Had these people attended properly to the scriptures, instead of the workings of their own imaginations, they would not have been led into a disparagement of marriage, either when entered into in one or more instances. As to marriage itself, it was instituted when man stood in the likeness and image of God, in a state of much higher purity and holiness than any can now know on this side heaven; therefore it must have been in all respects consistent with such a state. One of the two persons recorded in scripture to have been translated into heaven, that he should not see death (Heb. xi. 5.) was a married man; nor did he keep himself "from the honourable and undefiled bed;" for it is said, Gen. v. 22. And Enoch walked with God, after he begat Methusaleh, 300 years, and begat sons and daughters.
As to second marriages, the calling them "adultery and whoredom," was a monstrous superstition, amounting to a denial of the scriptures, which absolutely allowed them as lawful and good, even on the woman's side. Thus Paul, in allusion to the law of Moses, Rom. vii. 3. So then if while her husband liveth she be married to another man, she shall be called an adulteress; but if her husband be dead, she is free from that law, so that she is no adulteress, though he be married to another man. And again—The wife is bound by the law as long as her husband liveth; but if her husband be dead, she is at liberty to be married to whom she will, &c. 2 Cor. vi. 14. Comp. 1 Tim. v. 14.
So that we see what little dependence is to be placed on primitive fathers and Christians, or indeed on any thing else but the written word of God itself—compared with itself—explained by itself. The truth we come at by these means is sure and stedfast, and may safely be relied upon, though all the world should agree to think otherwise.
Dr. Cave, who, as was observed, has endeavoured to soften the absurdities of these good folks as much as possible, says, p. 90. "Though the fathers and antient councils were thus severe in this case (of second marriages) yet the rigour of their censure will be much abated, if what some tell us be true, that many of their passages are not levelled against successive marriages, but against having two wives at the same time; for, as a learned man has observed, there were three sorts of digamy: 1. A man's having two wives at once: 2. When, the former wife being dead, he married a second time: 3. When a man on slight cause put away his wife by a bill of divorce, and married another."—With regard to this last, it certainly could not be inveighed against too severely; for it is contrary to the very institution of marriage, that a man should put away his wife for any cause, except for fornication; as Christ proves to the multitudes, Matt. v. 32. and to the Pharisees, Matt. xix. 4, 5, 6.
As to the two first, namely, "a man's having two wives at once, and a man's marrying a second after the death of his first," however Dr. Cave, or any other of their apologists may endeavour to "abate the asperity of their censures," they both were esteemed by the antient Christians and primitive fathers equally unlawful; which is not to be wondered at, when marriage itself was so much spoken against, as a state of less purity and perfection than celibacy, consequently the more and the oftener a man engaged in marriage, the more impure he must be. But the truth is, that there is no impurity whatsoever in marriage, though often or but once entered into. Abraham, who had more wives than one at a time, is not recorded as less pure than Isaac, who appears to have had but one; nor is Isaac said to be more pure than his son Jacob, who had four; we read of them all in an equal state of glory in the kingdom of heaven, Matt. viii. 11. but of no reproof on God's part, or sorrow or repentance on their part, on account of their different situations while on earth.
The superstition of its being sinful to have two wives in succession, remained a great while in the church; however the Protestant reformation helped us to the stat. of Edw. VI. (see before vol. i. p. 199) which dissipated men's fears upon that subject; but with respect to having two wives at a time, we are still taught to look upon it in as horrible a light, as the primitive Christians did on having a second after the death of the first. This superstition has been so uniformly and successfully kept alive, that the reprobation of polygamy in the Christian church (our western part of it at least) is as universal, as the belief of transubstantiation or purgatory was before the Protestant reformation. In short, the superstition is inveterate, we may almost be said to suck it in with our mother's milk; it fastens upon us in our very infancy, it grows up with us we know not how to get rid of it, nor ever shall, till, as at the above glorious period, men will dare to search, think, and judge for themselves, and thus emancipate their understandings from the slavery of vulgar prejudice and popular opinion.
The Statute de Bigamis, 4 Edw. I. c. 5. ousted a man of his clergy, if he had been twice married—the 1 Jac. c. 11. would hang a man that has two wives, but for the benefit of clergy; and no doubt these laws have, in their several days, served to strengthen the cause of superstition, by annexing public infamy, as well as punishment, to the supposed crimes of bigamy and polygamy. With regard to adultery, or with respect to the seduction and debauchery of virgins, and then abandoning them, the adulterer or seducer may be found in what is called the best companies; be treated with civility, and even respect; while the polygamist is arrested for felony—sent to prison—tried before a court of criminal judicature—rendered infamous for life, and, thanks to the benefit of the clergy, that he is not dragged to a gibbet, and put to death!
The foundation of all this is, the wisdom of man exalting itself against the wisdom of God; hence it is that men devise laws which are contrary to the law of God; and the opposition which superstition has taught us to make to nature, reason, and scripture, obtains the sanction of vulgar opinion on the side of falshood and error. That superstition should lead men to reject the law of God, to make void the commandments of God, through their traditions, under a notion of greater sanctity, is not at all surprizing, when the pride and ignorance of the human heart are duly considered. The instances which are recorded of it, concerning the Pharisees of old time, are written for our instruction and admonition: the severity with which Christ treated them on this account, ought to stand as a warning to us, lest we also come into the same condemnation.
Among the various instances which we find of this in the New Testament, there is not a more striking one, nor one more illustrative of what I have been saying, than that which appears Mark vii. 9–14. where our Lord convicts the Pharisees of a rejection of the fifth commandment, in favour of a superstition of their own, which, though it had a better foundation than most of their traditions, with respect to the act itself (see 2 Kings xii. 9.) yet, as they abused it, it became a direct contrariety to the express and positive law of God. Christ tells them in plain terms as much, ver. 9. Full well do ye reject the commmandment of God, that you may keep your own traditions. When Jehoiada the high-priest ordered a chest to receive the money, through an hole in the lid, which the people gave towards the repairs of the temple, he did well—and those who gave of their substance for this purpose did also well;—but when in after time these gifts were preferred before the relief of a sick, necessitous, and aged parent, whom the fifth commandment enjoined them to honour—with their substance doubtless, as well as in all other respects—then they did ill, by preferring the observance of an human tradition, before the express injunction of the divine law.
To appoint an outward means of recognizing a marriage, and not leave people to take one another's words (as the saying is) is very proper, and, in this mixed state of things, necessary for the good of the whole; but to put the ceremony in the place of God's institution—to declare a marriage null and void without it, to all intents and purposes whatsoever—to set the parties free from the obligation which they are under towards God and each other by the divine command—is as direct a breach of the command of God in this respect, as the Pharisees were guilty of in the other, and our Lord's reproof of the Pharisees equally belongs to us—we certainly make void the law of God through our traditions, and teach for doctrines the commandments of men.
There is no avoiding superstition, neither is there any deliverance from being led by it into thinking we do the will of God, when we are only doing the will of man, and that in contrariety to the divine will, while, like those of old, our fear towards God is taught us by the precepts of men. Is. xxix. 13. and while, like dead fish with the stream, we are carried down with the tide of vulgar error and popular opinion.—Ye do err, not knowing the scripture.—Search the scriptures—was the advice of Him who spake as never man spake. When we are wise enough to follow this counsel, worldly systems and human inventions may, and will suffer in our opinion, and we may be led to grieve at the folly and superstition which are to be found in them; but we shall be overpaid for any uneasiness of this sort, by the pleasure we must receive, in beholding the beauty, harmony, and order that are to be found in the word of God. We shall then see, that the misery and destruction of so many of our defenceless fellow-creatures, in the points before complained of, are owing to the rejection of that divine system of justice, mercy, and truth, which, if observed in all its parts, has so wisely and amply provided for their protection and preservation.
As superstition blinds the conscience, and misleads the judgment, so it hardens the heart, and renders it unimpressible by the calls of pity and compassion—cruelty will triumph over mercy, and the most horrid barbarities pass for the fruits of heavenly zeal—The time cometh, when whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth God service. John xvi. 2.
Tantum religio potuit suadere malorum!
Virg.
Such dreadful ills from superstition spring!
The history of Popery furnishes us with numberless examples of this: let the reader take the following from Dr. Gedde's Tracts, vol. i. p. 412, 413; where, speaking of the execution of heretics at an auto de fe in Portugal, he describes the delight with which the crowd of spectators behold the torments which are administered on the occasion to the poor sufferers, and then adds—"That the reader may not think, that this inhuman joy may be the effect of a natural cruelty, that is in those people's disposition, and not of the spirit of their religion, he may rest assured that all public malefactors, besides heretics, have their violent deaths no where more tenderly lamented than among the same people, and even when there is nothing in their deaths that appears inhuman or cruel."
By the way, what a state of infatuation must we be in, to open the door again for the admission of Popery into this country, by repealing any part of those salutary laws which were made for its exclusion! One should think that this country had suffered enough from the spirit and temper above described, to make us dread every step which can lead to their re-admission. To suppose, what many profess to believe, that Popery is not now just what it was in Queen Mary's days, is to suppose that Popery is not Popery; which is an absurdity as great as to imagine that a thing is not itself.—But I should ask the reader's pardon for digressing from the main point before us; which I trust I shall easily obtain, when he considers how naturally a writer on superstition is led to the mention of Popery, which is no other than a confluence of every species of it.
As for the Popish laity, the scriptures are taken out of their hands, and they are left at the mercy of their priests (who are generally as ignorant as themselves) for the interpretation of their creed; this chiefly consists in human tradition, and detached parts of the scripture, explained or translated as the church pleases, and made to prove any thing, or every thing, or nothing, as may best serve the purposes of superstition and priestcraft, and maintain their absolute dominion over the understandings and consciences of mankind. The Protestant church of England has distinguished herself for her moderation, arrogating to herself no absolute dominion in matters of faith over the consciences of her children. She withholds no part of the scripture either from their eyes or ears—puts the Bible into their hands, that they may search for themselves, and orders her ministers daily to read portions of it to the people, that those who cannot read, may hear the things of God, and judge for themselves. She tells us plainly in her Articles, that, "Holy scripture containeth all things necessary to salvation, so that whatsoever is not red therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man that it should be believed as an article of faith, or be thought requisite or necessary to salvation." Art. 6.—And again, Art. 20. "The church hath authority to decree rites and ceremonies, and authority in matters of faith; and yet it is not lawful for the church to ordain any thing that is contrary to God's word written, neither may it so expound one place of scripture that it be repugnant to another. Wherefore, though the church be a witness and keeper of holy writ, yet, as it ought not to decree any thing against the same, so, besides the same, ought it not to inforce any thing to be believed for necessity of salvation."
A more unreserved caveat against superstition cannot easily be penned, nor is it in the power of language to form a more ample licence for free-enquiry; if therefore what has been said in the foregoing pages, should be a means of obviating the first, and this by promoting the other, I shall think myself well paid for the pains I have taken.
As to the superstition of imagining that a church-service makes the marriage, and that without it no marriage is valid or binding, or lawful before God, it is as unscriptural and absurd, as it is mischievous and ruinous to the weaker sex. There is not the least trace of such a thing either in the Old or New Testaments; marriage, with respect to itself, and as between the parties, stood entirely upon the simple institution of God, before priests or service-books existed; therefore nothing can be of the essence of it, but what God appointed at the beginning. When, therefore, it is said—Isaac brought her into his mother's tent, and took Rebekah, and she became his wife (Gen. xxiv. 67.) and when Laban took Leah his daughter, and brought her to Jacob, and he went in unto her—and when Laban gave him Rachel his daughter to wife also, and he went in also unto Rachel—these women severally became the absolute unalienable property of their husbands, they became one flesh with them, and what God had thus joined together, no man could put asunder. Thus the matter stood on the simple ordinance of God, and thus, as in God's sight, it must stand for ever. The Jews, and all other nations, have ever looked upon marriage as an occasion of festivity and rejoicing, and various rites and ceremonies have been invented upon the occasion; so there have been with respect to baptism and the Lord's supper: but these, like all other ordinances of God, stand just where they did, and owe their whole importance and validity to God's appointment, and are neither added to nor diminished in these respects by any rites or ceremonies which men have invented to say otherwise is rank superstition.
Whether the primitive Christians had their marriages with each other solemnized by a minister of the church, is a disputed point among learned men, Mr. Selden, in his Ux. Heb. l. ii. c. 29, says—"it was sometimes so done, at the desire of the contracting parties, but they were under no obligation by law so to do, nor did any general custom prevail, so as to make it a general practice."—However, whether this was so or not, signifies not a rush, as there is nothing in the word of God to warrant it.
Archdeacon Reynolds, in his Historical Essay on the Government of the Church of England, helps us to find out how this custom came into the western churches, p. 70. "Contracts of marriage, with all its incidents, were long considered as rights of secular concern, and in the tenth century the laws of the empire allowed the validity of marriages which were made without sacerdotal benediction, or the intervention of the offices of the church. But in the twelfth century Peter Lombard discovered the institution of seven sacraments in the mystical expression of the seven spirits of God, which he understood as an assurance of the seven-fold operation of the Spirit in baptism—the supper of the Lord—confirmation—penance—orders—matrimony—and extreme unction; and the church of Rome soon countenanced his doctrine. This brought marriage, which was originally of civil jurisdiction, under spiritual cognizance." A little higher, the learned author observes—"The key to the contradictory provisions about marriage, was, that the court of Rome was desirous to have the scales of domestic peace in the Pope's hand, that the legitimacy of children, and the succession of families, should depend upon his favour, that his holiness might separate whom no man ought to put asunder, or perpetuate conjunctions which reason and religion forbid."
This was opposed by the Albigenses , those early reformers, who taught, that "the consent of a willing couple, without the formality of sacerdotal benediction, made a lawful marriage."—This was the doctrine which they taught in the territory of the Count of Thoulouse, and propagated here about 1175.
The Lollards afterwards declaimed against celibacy, the use of the seven sacraments, and laid it down as sound doctrine, that "if a man and woman came together with an intention to live in wedlock, this intention is sufficient, without passing through the forms of the church."—This certainly was sound doctrine, because agreeable to the word of God; where no other ceremony appears to have intervened, in order to constitute a lawful marriage before God.
Mr. Jacob, in his Law Dictionary, tit. Marriage, observes, that "before the time of Pope Innocent III. there was no solemnization of marriage in the church; but the man came to the house where the woman inhabited, and led her home to his own house; which was all the ceremony then used." See Lilly Abr. tit. Bar. and Femme, p. 225. Moor 170.
The learned and accurate Judge Blackstone—Comm. vol. i. p. 439. quarto edit.—observes, that—"It is held to be essential to a marriage, that it be performed by a person in orders; though the intervention of a priest to solemnize this contract is merely juris positivi, and not juris naturalis aut divini: it being said that Pope Innocent the third was the first who ordained the celebration of marriage in the church, before which it was totally a civil contract." I do not cite these authorities to establish any article of faith upon the subject, but merely as historical facts, and to shew how far superstition must prevail among us, when it is seriously believed, that no obligation of marriage is lawful, binding, or valid, in the sight of God, that does not owe its perfection to a ceremony which never existed till the days of a Pope of Rome, whose pride and ambition led him to ordain it. When once Peter Lombard had found out that marriage was a sacrament, the administration of it by the hands of a priest followed of course; the belief of its absolute nullity, without this, was gradually received by the people, grew into an article of faith, and superstition has continued it amongst us to this very hour. The clergy, by this means, became possessed of a fresh source of power and wealth; for, what with the fees, or offerings as they were more gently termed, for marriage itself, that is, for performing the ceremony, the publication of banns, dispensations, and licences, it has proved a sort of philosopher's stone.
Still the ordinance of God was seen to be independent on all this, and to set it aside entirely, was then too hard even for Rome itself (though we have lived to see it done in this enlightened age by a British parliament); therefore the laws of the empire held, as our ecclesiastical laws do to this day, that such a coming together on a previous contract, antecedently to the ceremony, was a marriage de facto , or in fact, but not de jure—was not a lawful marriage, as to civil purposes—till the priest had executed that office which the Pope had assigned him, on the strength of Peter Lombard's monstrous interpretation of—"the seven Spirits of God."
In order to preserve and increase such an acquisition of power and wealth to the church, a stop was to be put to private contracts, which could bring in nothing to the men of the craft; therefore the absolute necessity of publication of banns was instituted in the beginning of the 13th century, and also various inventions in order to legitimate the issue of concubinary parents, as they called all those who came together only according to the ordinance of God; one of which may serve as a sample of the rest. "The ceremony was, that the parents, with the spurious issue between them, had a cloak or coverlid cast over them, while the priest was performing the mass or office of matrimony, and as soon as that was ended, the fruitful mother was delivered of a lusty infant under coverture and in matrimony." Reynolds, 71. Those who could believe that this ridiculous farce could make any difference, either in the fate of the parents, or in that of the child, before God, may also believe that a man and woman who come together according to the ordinance of God, are the more man and wife in God's sight, after a priest has said mass, or red over a ceremony, than they were before—both these opinions are equally abhorrent from the truth of the scripture, one being no more to be proved thereby than the other. The Popish council of Trent put the finishing stroke to the whole plan, by solemnly and piously cursing "all who should condemn the benedictions and other ceremonies, or that should deny matrimonial causes to belong to ecclesiastical judges."
We have now seen the birth, parentage, and education of marriage-ceremony, as depending on ecclesiastical establishment, and of men's taking upon themselves to interfere with the authority and validity of the divine ordinance of marriage, which simply consists in the union of the male and female, and God's pronouncing them one flesh; thus is God said to join them together, and therefore it is, that no want of a human ceremony can ever put them asunder. This is truly and properly the marriage-contract, or rather the very marriage itself—betrothment may precede it, espousals may go before it; but whether they do or not, this is, as it ever was, and ever will be, marriage in the sight of God. All beyond this is matter of ceremony, decency, and prudence; I do not pretend to dispute the expediency of such things; they are, and may, and must be binding, as to the dowries of wives—the legitimation of children in a civil view—their inheriting estates and honours, and in such-like cases but with respect to God's institution, it remains as and where it did, and so must remain, without any possibility of receiving the least alteration, or being at all subject to the disposal or inventions of priestcraft and superstition. Therefore it continues a truth indelibly written in the oracles of God, that where parties come together under promise and intention of marriage, such promise and intention can never be retracted by the parties themselves, nor dissolved by any power on earth, without doing violence to the express and positive law of God. Nay I will go farther, and say, that though there be no promise or intention of marriage, yet if a man entice a virgin, or, without previous enticement, meet with her, and humble her, she shall for that reason be his wife; he may not put her away all his days. Comp. Exod. xxii. 16. Deut. xxii. 28, 29. Were these truths as indelibly received, written, and believed within the conscience as they ought to be—
"So many of the sex would not, in vain,
"Of faithless men, and broken vows, complain."
A man would no more dare to seduce a virgin, and then abandon her, than he would dare to murder her? as he would be convinced that the law of God as really forbids the former as it does the latter. If these holy commandments were, as they ought to be, the law of the land, the magistrate, as in Israel, would have such power of coërcion in every case, as would render the designs of villainy, and the machinations of treachery, abortive.
'Till this happy time arrives, we may lament, but cannot remedy, the dreadful evils which attend seduction and dereliction, and, in the pathetic words of the Preacher, say—So I returned, and considered all the oppressions that are done under the sun; and behold the tears of such as were oppressed, and they had no comforter; and on the side of the oppressor there was power; but they (the oppressed) had no comforter. Eccl. iv. 1.
As to the superstition which condemns polygamy, and persuades men to believe that our Saviour called it adultery—as it is the parent of an error fatal to the female sex, insomuch that if a man already married entices a virgin, &c. he is to think himself bound to abandon her, contrary to the positive command of God—I must, in this place, say something more on that subject.
This species of superstition is like that which among the primitive Christians and fathers of the church, was held in high esteem and veneration, and which reprobated "second marriages as little better than adultery," without all foundation whatsoever from the scripture, when rightly understood. The Old Testament often mentions polygamy, but never, as has been fully proved, with the least mark of disapprobation or disallowance—though often practised, and this openly and avowedly, by those whom the New Testament sets forth as examples of faith and holiness (Heb. vi. 12. Heb. xi. throughout, with Heb. xii. 1.) yet never in any one single instance condemned. Laws are made for its regulation, to establish the inheritableness of the issue, to prevent partiality in the disposal of the polygamist's effects among the children which he might have by two wives, and to forbid his forsaking or even slighting a first wife, if he took a second to her. The New Testament never mentions it at all, either as good or bad, with respect to itself: therefore our laws against it, or opinions about it, can no more make it sinful, than the silly notions of the primitive Christians and fathers, could make it "little better than adultery" for a man to marry a second wife after the death of his first, or than the laws of Rome can make it sinful to deny five of Peter Lombard's seven sacraments, or in a priest to marry at all. It is not in the power of men to invent sins, and then charge them upon the consciences of their fellow-mortals to their condemnation before God:—the assuming this, is a part of that spiritual wickedness in heavenly things, (Eph. vi. 12.) which has long distinguished the mother of harlots and abominations of the earth. Rev. xvii. 5. It may be looked upon as one striking evidence of the Pope's being the man of sin, described 2 Thess. ii. 3, 4. for it is opposing and exalting himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; it is, as God, sitting in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God.———How shall I curse whom God hath not cursed? Or how shall I defy whom the Lord hath not defied?—was the saying of a man that had his eyes open. Numb. xxii. 31. xxiii. 8. xxiv. 4; but those whose eyes are blinded by superstition, or fast closed by prejudice, will take upon themselves to do what Balaam, daring and wicked as he was, would not presume to do. The answer which he gave to Balak's messengers, when they importuned him to come and curse Israel, was a good precedent for us to follow, whensoever we deliver our opinion on the lawfulness or unlawfulness of any actions of men, where conscience towards God is immediately concerned; and indeed it ought to be the language of all our laws, both of church and state—"If Balak would give me his house full of silver and gold, I cannot go beyond the commandment of the Lord, to do either good or bad of my own mind; but what the Lord saith, that will I speak." Compare Numb. xxii. 5, 6. with xxiv. 13. However, we are assured that the curse causeless, shall not come. Prov. xxvi. 22. Therefore though a man should be burnt at a stake for denying five of the Popish sacraments, and by us be reckoned a martyr and a saint; or another be hanged for having two wives at a time, and be accounted a very great sinner; yet the curse of the Papists could not injure the first, nor the bad opinion of Papists and Protestants united, in the least affect the second. Both would fall by the hand of superstition—both testify the horrors of its ascendency over the minds of men—both stand or fall to his own master. Rom. xiv. 4.
On the contrary, let us remember, that there is a curse which is not causeless, and therefore will come—no canons either of the ancient or modern Christians—no human laws, inventions, customs, or opinions will keep it off, or soften its rigour; for it is written in the New Testament as well as in the Old Testament—Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them. The man who takes a virgin into his possession, and then forsakes and abandons her, let his own situation be what it may (the law makes no difference) will find, that nothing can vacate the obligation of the divine commands, Exod. xxii. 16. (comp. Deut. xxii. 28, 29.) which declare that he shall surely endow her to be his wife. The words מהר ימהרנה are an emphatical reduplication—dotando dotabit—endowing he shall endow her—which expresses the positive certainty that it shall and must be so: like Gen. ii. 17. מות תמות—moriendo morieris—dying thou shalt die; which we, according to our idiom, well translate—thou shalt surely die. We may give much the same reason for the reduplication of the words in these passages, as Joseph gave for the doubling Pharaoh's dream, Gen. xli. 32.—For that the dream was doubled unto Pharaoh twice, it is because the thing is established by God, and God will shortly bring it to pass. Equally plain and certain, and even more explicit, is that of Deut. xxii. 29. First, we have the command itself—She shall be his wife: Secondly, the reason—Because he hath humbled her: Thirdly, the indissolubility of the positive obligation arising therefrom—He may not put her away all his days. To reconcile these things, which are written in the law, with our opinions and systems of matrimony, is impossible; these laws are evidently explanatory of the primary law of marriage, ours contradictory thereto; for no contradiction can be more apparent, than that which arises between a law, commanding marriage on the simple terms of the original institution—because he has humbled her—and thus become one flesh—and a law prohibiting marriage but on complicated terms of human invention, and even making void, to all intents and purposes whatsoever, the obligation which results merely from the divine command. When we farther consider this to be the case, in a country where the people profess a belief of the Bible, and who read these laws over in the public congregations of the established church once in every year, we surely ought to lament the reign of superstition in the consciences of men, who pray to God to write His laws in their hearts, and yet contentedly live under and embrace a system as opposite to those laws, as light to darkness. How can we cast a stone at the Papists, for striking the second commandment out of the Decalogue, while we ourselves strike these commandments out of the book of the law? May not they say to us—Ye hypocrites, first cast the beams out of your own eyes, and then shall ye see clearly to pull out the motes which are in our eyes?
By these laws no man can take a virgin, and then abandon her; by our laws a man may take an hundred, and abandon them all:—By the first, therefore, prostitution is impossible—by the second it is a natural consequence; for by the one it never can happen, by the other it does, and must happen every day.
Hence it follows, that the seduction of virgins by single men, who afterwards put them away because they will not marry them publicly—and by married men, who cannot if they would—may be looked upon as the two flood-gates of female ruin and misery: nothing can ever put a stop to their destructive deluge, but the abrogation of superstitious laws and customs, and the restoration of the divine plan of security and protection, which is so clearly revealed, so positively commanded, by the God of heaven.
Perhaps some will be ready to say, that, "if virgins will deliver up their persons to men without the ceremony first past, but more especially to married men, where they know the ceremony cannot pass, do they not deserve to suffer?" Reader, if thou hast found this severe question presenting itself to thine imagination, as, if thou art one of those who are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight, (Is. v. 21.) trusting in thyself that thou art righteous, &c. (Luke xviii. 9.) it may have done more than once, in the perusal of these pages—let me advise thee to lay down my book, and take up a better; turn to John viii. 3. and read attentively to ver. 12.—consider deeply that short history which is recorded there, weigh well the circumstances, mark the characters, apply what is said ver. 7. to thyself, and if thou findest thyself inclinable to retire with those Scribes and Pharisees, leaving the objects of thy contempt and bitter scorn to the mercies, the tender mercies of the God who made them, knowing that thou thyself art also in the same condemnation—well: if otherwise, let me ask thee—Is thine eye evil because God is good? (Matt. xx. 15.) If He who knoweth whereof we are made hath graciously provided against the sad and ruinous consequences of human frailty, even as to this world, by enacting positive laws in order to prevent them, where they must fall the heaviest, and of course most need prevention, is it for thee to find fault with so gracious a dispensation, not considering that thou thyself art a monument of the like mercy? For if God had said concerning thee, what I suppose thee to have been saying concerning others; had He made no provision in His providence that thou mightest escape the consequences of thine own frailty, where hadst thou now been?—not censuring and condemning others, but thyself condemned to irretrievable misery, involved in inextricable ruin!—Make not then thyself wiser and holier than God; but lament the ravages of lust, seduction, and prostitution; let thine eyes (like the Psalmist's) gush out with water, because men keep not God's law. Ps. cxix. 136. Prayer-Book translation.
I say not this as allowing it possible for human laws, customs, and opinions, to make any thing sinful, which God's law hath not made so; sin is the transgression of the law—where there is no law there is no transgression—nor is sin imputed where there is no law. Thus speak the scriptures, as we have before observed; but if superstition binds heavy burdens, and grievous to be borne, and lays them upon men's shoulders, the conscience must groan under the pressure, till the weary and heavy laden are released, by the friendly and beneficent hand of divine truth. To say that a virgin, who delivers herself into the possession of the man of her choice, with an intent to become his wife, sins in so doing, unless an outward ceremony of man's device be first performed, is to say what the Bible has no where said: all that God says in such a case is, that they shall be one flesh, and that she shall be the man's wife—he may not put her away all his days. So that all contrivances which hinder the operation of this law, are not only so many snares laid for the conscience, which may enthrall and bring it into subjection to the pride and arrogance of man, but are big with every mischief which the divine law was enacted to prevent.
The infamy, which, by this means, is stamped on such an act, has occasioned the murder of as many infants by the hands of their mothers, in this Christian country, as were probably sacrificed to Moloch in the same space of territory, by the hands of the heathen priests.
If, in consonance with the divine law, such an act was deemed to create an indisoluble union between the parties, and the public recognition of it was to be inforced in every instance, as under the law of Moses, this mark of infamy would be removed, and, together with it, one of the most horrid of all temptations to one of the most unnatural and dreadful of all crimes.
When Tamar is arguing with the incestuous Amnon against his unhallowed attempt upon her chastity (2 Sam. xiii.) she might well say—"And I, whither shall I cause my shame to go?" for such an act was directly against the positive law of God, Lev. xviii. 9.—but where is the authority from scripture to stamp the infamy of whoredom on the exercise of that right, with which every woman is invested by the God of nature, for the propagation and continuance of the human species; I mean, that of bestowing her person on the man of her choice? Having once done this, if she goes to another (living the first) she is נאפת—an adulteress; if the falls into the practice of promiscuous intercourse, going from one man to another, as lust, or gain, or hire, may prompt, she is an harlot, or whore, in the true sense of the word זונה or πορνη, and under the law would have been put to death—but in the other case, we have no more scripture authority to call her an whore, or to stamp the least infamy upon her, than the pious people at Bourdeaux had for stoning a certain young lady of quality to death, for being suspected to have fasted on a Sunday. See Comm. on Essay on Crimes and Punishments, chap. iii. All these things originated from the ambition and avarice of the clergy in the middle ages; who, to lay the rest of the world under contribution in the business of marriage, as well as in many other particulars, made it into a sacrament, obscured the real nature and essence of it, and wrested it out of the hands of the civil power, as to the outward and public recognition of it, to secure it to themselves; after which a man and woman could not marry but for the emolument of the church. A new-married couple were not suffered to cohabit for a given time, unless they paid the church for a dispensation, nay, a man was not allowed christian burial, unless he bequeathed something to the church.—In short, a man "could neither come into the world, continue in it, nor go out of it," as a late writer has well observed, "without being laid under contribution by the clergy." See Alex. Hist. of Women, vol. ii. 259.
Were our laws what they ought to be, were they founded on the basis of the divine law, they would come in aid of female distress; they would rescue the poor deserted object of the man's ingratitude and barbarity, from that unauthorized reproach, which is found so fatally intolerable by the weakness of the female mind; and lay the whole infamy and inconvenience, whatever these might be, on the guilty betrayer of an undeserved affection.
I have before said something on Deut. xxii. 21; but on farther consideration of that passage, am convinced that the woman who is said to play the whore in her father's house, cannot mean that her crime consisted in giving her person to a man, without a marriage-ceremony red over her by a priest—for no such thing existed in Israel as the interference of priests in marriage—nor was there any religious ceremony whatsoever upon the occasion—the only thing which looks like an outward ceremony, is the payment of the מהר or dower, into the hands of the father of the virgin—but even the want of this ceremony did not annul the marriage, or render the woman criminal, as appears from the case of the seduced virgin, Exod. xxii. 16. who is not commanded to be put to death, as the woman is in the other case, and as every whore of the daughters of Israel was. Therefore, in order to render the scripture consistent with itself, we must suppose that the woman was a betrothed virgin, who, between her betrothment and her marriage with the man who found her not a maid, had given her person to another; this in deceit of both—concealing her betrothment from the one, and her defilement from the other—thus playing the whore, and subjecting herself to the law concerning betrothed damsels, who, if they suffered themselves to be violated, were to be stoned to death, (comp. ver. 23, 24.) where the man that lay with her was also to suffer the same punishment—but as the man is not mentioned in this light, ver. 21. we must suppose that he was deceived, and had done it ignorantly, therefore innocently; for with regard to capital punishment, nemo est reus nisi mens sit rea. It is to be remarked, in support of the above interpretation, that the virgins, Exod. xxii. 16. and Deut. xxii. 28. have the addition of not betrothed.
Since I wrote the above, I have looked into Bishop Patrick, and am not a little satisfied with the interpretation above given of Deut. xxii. 21. as I find it so exactly harmonizes with the sentiments of that learned prelate. His comment is as follows———
"And the men of her city shall stone her with stones till she die.] This was the punishment of such adulteresses, except only of a priest's daughter, who, if she was guilty of this crime, was burnt alive, Lev. xxi 9.—and it plainly shews he speaks here of a woman corrupted between the time of her espousals, and her husband's compleating the marriage; otherwise he could not have had this capital action against her, &c. And this Maimonides saith in Seder Zeraim, that from Moses to his time, it was never doubted the woman he here speaks of was one that proved false to her husband, after she was contracted to him."
The Bishop, in one part of his note, seems to call it "simple fornication, if the virgin was entirely single and disengaged; which proves how prejudice will affect the minds even of learned and judicious persons; for fornication, or whoredom—זנה—whether simple or compound, was death to the woman who was guilty of it; which is a conclusive proof, that the virgins mentioned Exod. xxii. 16. and Deut. xxii. 28, 29. were not guilty of either, and, of course, that none under the same predicament ought to be infamously styled whores, and driven to the desperation of destroying themselves or their children, or both, or be driven out of all civil society, to be vagabonds on the face of the earth; but they should be invested, by the laws of the land, with the undoubted right with which the laws of God invest them, and thus preserved to their friends, the public, and themselves.
As for conscience, or that faculty of judging and determining on our own actions, and thus excusing or accusing ourselves, Rom. ii. 15.—it is a sort of judge, on whose determinations the happiness or misery of the human mind must greatly depend, not only with respect to this world, but with respect also to that which is to come—For if our heart condemn us, God is greater than our heart, and knoweth all things—if our heart condemn us not, then have we confidence towards God. 1 John iii. 20, 21.—Of what serious importance must it then be, that the decisions and determinations of this awful tribunal should be founded on the clearest and most incontrovertible evidence? In this respect it may be said to have an advantage over all other courts of judicature which we are acquainted with, and that is, in having access to testimony which cannot lye nor deceive, to records of eternal truth, delivered to us, as it were, under the seal of Heaven itself. Now let us suppose a judge seated on the bench—a criminal at the bar—the jury sworn—the witnesses on both sides summoned, and prepared to give their testimony—his Lordship stops all proceedings with—"Gentlemen, I will proceed no farther, I will have none of these witnesses examined; the case of the prisoner at the bar is sufficiently related in an article of such a news-paper, clearly stated in such a pamphlet, and you must acquit or condemn him according to these."—I believe the judge who could act thus, would be deemed very unfit to be entrusted with the lives and properties of his fellow-subjects.—In this judge we see a lively emblem of a mistaken, mis-led, blinded conscience, which suffers itself to decide on the lawfulness or unlawfulness of any thing before God, and in His sight, from the maxims, prejudices, laws, customs, and vulgar errors of fallible men, and not from the infallible written testimony of God's most holy word.—It is the Spirit that beareth witness, because the Spirit is truth. 1 John v. 6. The not being possessed of this authentic testimony of the mind and will of God, or not adverting to it, so as to make it the one rule of our judgment in matters pertaining to the conscience, puts the blind Heathen and the ignorant Christian upon a level. We are told in history, that when the Carthaginians were defeated by Agathocles, tyrant of Sicily, they imputed their misfortune to the anger of Saturn, who was one of their tutelar deities, and this anger they imagined to have arisen from a neglect which they had been guilty of towards him, with regard to the sacrifices which were offered him. In antient times it was usual to sacrifice children of the most noble families to him, but for some years past, in these sacrifices, they had substituted children of mean extraction, secretly bought and bred up for that purpose, in the room of those nobly born. This they now considered as a departure from the religion of their forefathers, and consequently were conscious of having given their Deity just cause of offence. To expiate the guilt of so horrid an impiety, a sacrifice of 200 children of the first rank was made to the bloody God; and above 300 other persons, in a sense of their dreadful neglect, voluntarily offered themselves as victims, to pacify, by the effusion of their blood, the wrath of this Deity. See Univ. Hist. vol. xvii. p. 447, 448. Such were the determinations of conscience, when without revelation.
When we consider the behaviour of the Portugueze, which we have seen mentioned before (p. .) or reflect on the rivers of Protestant blood which were poured forth at Paris in 1572, or in Ireland in 1641, by the hands of the Papists—and all for conscience sake—we have but to compare the Christian who does not advert to his Bible, with the Carthaginian who had no Bible, and we shall find a like cause producing like effects, though certainly the one is more inexcusable than the other. Yet in both cases it must be said—A deceived heart hath turned him aside, that he cannot deliver his soul, nor say, Is there not a lye in my right hand? Is. xliv. 20.
For my own part, I am perfectly convinced, that there is nothing so absurd, so wicked, or so foolish, which the human mind is not capable of being persuaded of, in religious matters especially, when once it delivers itself up to the dictates of superstition; for saying this I appeal to those histories of the globe which have accurately set forth the various religions, manners, customs, opinions, and laws of its inhabitants. There is one use to be made of these things, which is, to be thankful to the Bestower of every good gift, who is the Fountain of all Wisdom, that He hath been graciously pleased to cast our lot under the illumination of the holy scriptures; that He hath given us His word, which is truth, to guide us into all truth. This should awaken in us a jealousy over ourselves—knowing the liableness of the human mind to be deceived—which should lead us to try and examine whatever is objected to our belief, or recommended to our practice, by the unerring rule of God's revelation.
Could this have been done at Carthage, no children had been sacrificed to Saturn—had this been done by the Papists in France and Ireland, no massacres of Protestants had disgraced the Christian name—and were it now done among us as it ought to be, no brothels would teem with harlots—no streets swarm with prostitutes—no wretched infants be butchered by the hands of their more wretched mothers;—the honour of the married wife would be secured, the ruin of the seduced virgin be prevented. Adultery and whoredom would no longer dare to face the light, but be consigned to those realms of darkness from whence they came. On the other hand, while we are taught to believe that sinful which God has commanded—that lawful which God has forbidden, we are as fatally under the power of superstition, not only as the Papists, but as the very Heathen themselves; nothing can really and truly distinguish us from either, but an unreserved adherence to those commandments, which in so many instances we have made of none effect by our traditions.
When we lay no obligation on the man who seduces a virgin, to marry her, we make void the law of God, which positively declares He shall—when we permit the man to put her away, and deprive her of that recourse to justice which the law of God affords her, we vacate the divine law—when, in the case of a man already married, we divorce a virgin, which he has seduced, entirely from him, forbidding him (and this under pain of death, 1 Jac. chap. 11.) to do her that justice which the divine law as positively commands, as in the case of a single man—we command what God forbids, and forbid what God commands.
In short, our superstition and the superstition of Rome go hand in hand; and, however we may be shocked at that monstrous position, which is mentioned by the Reverend Mr. Porteous, in his masterly and excellent sermon on Toleration (lately preached and published in Scotland, on account of the Popish bill) that "If the Pope was to command a thing to be done, and Jesus Christ was to forbid it, yet the Pope must be obeyed"—this is not more really horrid, in sense, though perhaps it may in sound, than saying—where human laws command things which are inconsistent with or opposite to the law of God, yet they are to be obeyed. Few would be so daring as to say this, but it is practically declared throughout our whole system, as relative to the commerce of the sexes.
As to polygamy—which is certainly one link in the chain of God's dispensations, as so absolutely necessary to prevent, in many cases, the desertion and prostitution of women, as well as to preserve men from vice and profligacy, under various circumstances of unavoidable difficulties and temptations, which necessary separation may render them liable to (see before, vol. i. p. 175–177.) the causes of which may fall short of being grounds for utter divorce—it is, considered in itself, one of the last things which a man should think of, who wishes and aims at the happiness of a domestic life. The weight and burden of a double family, the distractions which most probably must be the effect of jealousy between the women, each envying the other her share in the husband's affections, must be productive of disputes, quarrels, and perpetual disquiet. We see this to have been the case even amongst the best people, who were polygamists.—What were Abraham's trials, which arose from his connection with Hagar?—What those of Jacob, from the jealousy and discontent of Leah and Rachel? So Elkanah suffered not a little at the treatment which his favourite Hannah received from her rival Peninnah—and indeed it is so much in the nature of things, that matters should fall out alike in all times, where there are the same causes to produce the same effects, that one should imagine most men, who consulted the peace, quiet, and comfort of themselves and families, would subscribe to Horace's
Felices ter & amplius
Quos irrupta tenet copula; nec malis
Divulsas querimoniis,
Suprema citius solvet amor die.
Thrice happy they, in pure delights,
Whom love with mutual bonds unites;
Unbroken by complaints or strife,
Ev'n to the latest hours of life.
Francis.
It is most readily to be allowed, that such people can have nothing to do with polygamy, except it be to abhor and execrate the very thought of it.
The expediency or inexpediency of a thing, and its lawfulness or unlawfulness, are, however, very different considerations; all things are lawful for me, saith the Apostle (1 Cor. vi. 12. x. 23.) but all things are not expedient.—The inexpediency of polygamy in most cases is self-evident, but in no case can its unlawfulness be made to appear from the law of God;—as to the law of man, it can no more make it sinful, than it can make marriage itself sinful. A clerk who married in the reign of Hen. VIII. when this was made felony without benefit of clergy, was no more a sinner in the sight of God, than the clerk who married in the reign of Edw. VI. when the marriages of priests were declared to be as lawful as those of other men. So a man who has two wives is no more a sinner now, than he would have been in the days of the Patriarchs, or of the Jewish theocracy—God's law was the rule of conscience then, and no other ought to be so now; men can no more make sins, than they can forgive sins—the Lord is our judge—the Lord is our lawgiver—the Lord is our king. Is. xxxiii. 22. Every attempt, therefore, to make things sinful which his law hath not made so, however it may appear under the specious guise of piety and purity, and be recommended to our belief and practice by the teaching and example of men like ourselves, it is no other than Satan transformed into an angel of light, and availing himself of the weakness and superstition of the human mind, to make us believe a lye.
In some cases polygamy is not only lawful, but expedient.—For instance—a man marries a woman, with whom he cohabits, and after a few years, or even months, she falls into raving madness—proper help is sought to, but in vain—it appears to be constitutional, from a family disorder—she is confined in a madhouse—pronounced incurable. In such a case as this, no one end of marriage can possibly be answered to the husband. Other cases might be put of equal difficulty with respect to him—in all which, the expediency of taking another wife is self-evident, and from nothing more than its being God's own appointed remedy against the sad consequences of lust—If they cannot contain, let them marry, it is better to marry than to burn. 1 Cor. vii. 9. To say that a married Jew, under such circumstances, might have applied this remedy under the law, but a Christian cannot under the gospel, is to place us under a worse bondage than the Jews were, when under the yoke which neither they nor their fathers could bear. Acts xv. 10. Common sense, reason, nature, here coincide with scripture in the reprobation of such an idea. The man may be forced into whoredom, and he shall be free; but if he marry he shall be deemed a felon, and suffer death as such, says the pious statute of 1 Jac. c. 11.
The case of a married woman under such circumstances is very different, because the law positively forbids any second union with another man, living her husband. See Rom. vii. 3. But then let it be remembered, that if the privileges of women are circumscribed by a stricter rule than those of the men, so are their passions; these are usually as much weaker than the passions of men, as their bodily strength is weaker than the strength of men. I now speak of women as to their natural state, not as corrupted and debauched in their minds by the adventitious circumstances of bad education, and led astray by bad example. If girls, as soon as they can read, are to have amorous romances and novels put into their hands, perhaps obscene and filthy books, where less disguise is used than in the former—if they are taught to relish the lewdness of the stage, and to mix in the diversions of public assemblies, where men (like Milton's toad at the ear of Eve) make it their business to defile the purity of female minds by very impure conversation—it is no wonder that the rule which I have laid down, should be found liable to many exceptions; but I have no doubt of its being subscribed to by every man, whose happy lot it is to have married a sober, truly-modest woman. Were it otherwise—did the passions of the weaker sex equal the passions of men—had not Providence most graciously ordained a considerable disparity, as one means of maintaining the subordination which women are under the whole world must be thrown into confusion. We may easily judge of what consequences must ensue, by taking a survey of the distraction of those families, where the natural balance has been destroyed.
With regard to superstition, it takes so many shapes, and appears in so many forms, that one may say—
Quo teneam vultus mutantem Protea nodo?Hor.
———while it changes thus, what chains can bind
These various forms; this Proteus of the mind?
Francis.
Still it is uniform in leading men from truth to falshood—in usurping an empire over the human mind, which is inimical to God's glory, to the reverence we owe His commandments, as well as to the solid peace, comfort, and happiness of mankind. Whether therefore superstition appears in the shape of a brazen image of an old man at Carthage, receiving infants into his arms, and letting them drop through into a pit of fire—or of an old man, made of flesh and blood, at Rome, commanding people to renounce the evidence of their outward senses—or of a primitive father of the Christian church, declaring against marriage as "unlawful under the gospel," and that all second marriages are only a more specious and decorous kind of adultery" or of a grave and learned English statesman, enacting a law to put those asunder whom God hath joined together—or of a reverend divine, whether Popish or Protestant, maintaining that certain moral actions which God allowed, and in some cases commanded under the law, are sinful under the gospel—superstition is still the minister of Satan, who is the God of this world, (2 Cor. iv. 4.) carrying on his grand design to destroy the human species; nor is there so probable a way of effecting this, as in interfering with those wise regulations which the Most High hath made for the preservation of the female sex, as may appear from much that has been said, but from more which will be said in the conclusion of this treatise.
It is greatly to be lamented, that superstition has found its advocates, not only among the designing and weak, but even among the learned, and wise, and pious part of mankind; many melancholy instances of this stand upon record, not only in the annals of Popish, but of Protestant literature. Here I find myself constrained to animadvert on some passages of the two sermons before mentioned,—with a few strictures on which, I shall conclude this chapter.
The learned and pious author seems, in a note at the bottom of one of the pages, to insinuate that no marriage is valid in the sight of God, where the "ceremony doth not pass through the hands of a priest; who," he tells us, "acts in God's stead."—Where is scripture-proof for this? No where—There is not a single instance of such a thing either in the Old or New Testament; neither the priests nor Levites under the law, nor the apostles and other ministers under the gospel, appear to have interfered in any one instance, nor is such a thing given in commission to any of them. Their several offices are most minutely set forth in all the duties of them, but not a word about their marrying people; I am therefore apt to think, that the maxim—de non apparentibus & non existentibus eadem est ratio—is very applicable on this occasion. If such a thing had been, we must have met with it, when the administration of the public ordinances by the hands of the priests and Levites was fixed under the Old Testament, to whom it was death to add to, or diminish from, the settled institutions of God. As for the passages in Gen. i. and ii. on which our author rests so much of his doctrine, particularly, God's bringing the woman to the man and blessing them, and therefore priests are to do the same—he might with equal strength of argument say, that because we are told, Gen. iii. 21. Unto Adam and his wife did the Lord God make coats of skins, and cloathed them, therefore we are only to wear skins, and those are to be put on by a priest.
However, if this author's doctrine be true, I defy him to shew the record of one single lawful marriage (that of Adam and Eve not excepted) throughout the whole Bible; for there is not one mentioned in which a priest appears to have been concerned: quite the contrary; the simplicity of the primary institution is uniformly preserved throughout the whole, and probably would have been so still, if Pope Innocent the IIId had not thrown marriage into the hands of the priests, on Peter Lombard's finding it out to be a sacrament. This was the origin of so universally bringing an human ceremony into the place of a divine institution, and of course involving millions of the weaker sex in ruin and destruction, by supposing God's ordinance not binding, as in His sight, without the interference of human invention.
Drawing any acts of God into precedents, without His authority so to do, may appear to be very pious, but is in fact very profane, seeing that this cannot easily be done, without adding to, or diminishing from, what He hath expressly commanded. This is a rock on which our author's scheme must split; for he maintains that—"'Tis not the form of words, which this or that church may make use of in a matrimonial ceremony, that constitutes the marriage" (i. e. in the sight of God; for as to the civil contract, they certainly constitute this)—which is very true; but not so what follows—"but it is the act of joining together, and pronouncing them one in the name of God, by one that is commissioned to act in His name."—In the first place, no such commission, with respect to marriage, ever did exist, nor, without a new revelation, ever can, as the smallest trace of such a thing is not to be found in that revelation which we are already possessed of. Secondly, The Bible, gives a very different account of the matter; for the express and positive command, Deut. xxii. 29. saith—She shall be his wife; not "because a priest joins them together, or pronounces them one in the name of God," but תחת אשר ענה—because he hath humbled her. Quòd eam compressit. Mont. Here then is the act of marriage itself, by which they become one flesh; therefore he may not put her away all his days. Such is the positive precept of God—and yet it is to be supposed of no validity whatsoever, unless ratified by some ordinance of human contrivance—such I must call the intervention of a priest, till I can find it in the scripture.—Without this, saith our author—"they both live in an habitual state of fornication and whoredom."—If so, what are we to think of the patriarchs and others whom we read of in the Old Testament, and whose marriages are particularly related? Isaac and Rebekah, for instance? All we read of their marriage is—that, Isaac brought her into his mother's tent, and took Rebekah, and she became his wife. Gen. xxiv. 67. So Jacob and Leah—And it came to pass in the evening, that he (Laban) took Leah his daughter, and brought her to him (Jacob) and he went in unto her.—Going in unto a woman is equivalent to ענה—humbling her, or lying with her. Comp. Gen. xvi. 2. xxx. 3. 2 Sam. xvi. 21. with 2 Sam. xii. 11. 2 Sam. xx. 3. 1 Chron. ii. 21. So in the case of Jacob and Rachel—And he (Laban) gave him Rachel his daughter to wife also, and he (Jacob) went in also unto Rachel. See Gen. xxix. 23, 28, 30. So Boaz and Ruth, ch. iv. 13. Many more instances might be cited; but I humbly conceive these are very sufficient, to prove, that a marriage may be valid in the sight of God, where there is no church—chapel—priest—or outward ceremony administered by a priest; if not, then I will agree that these good folks lived in "an habitual state of whoredom and fornication." But, by the leave of this learned author, and with all due deference to "Dr. Hickes's excellent treatise on the Christian priesthood," there is other insuperable difficulty in this same priestly scheme of marriage; which is, that however the Jews might have found such a person under the Mosaical dispensation, I am afraid, after that was at an end, if people had staid till they could have found a priest to marry them, they never could have married at all, but must have contented themselves with living single, or "in an habitual state of whoredom and fornication"—because, under the Christian dispensation, we read of no such officer in the church. We read of ἀποστολοι—men sent immediately by Christ to teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost—therefore eminently styled—apostles. We likewise find one added to their original number, whose commission, received immediately from Christ himself, runs in these remarkable words, (Acts xxvi. 17, 18.) To the Gentiles I send thee, to open their eyes, to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance among them which are sanctified by faith that is in Me. In all this there is not a word about priesthood or marriage. We likewise read of Ἐπισκοποι, overseers, which we call bishops—of Πρεσβυτεροι, elders—Διακονοι, deacons;—but in all that is said about them (and their several offices are very particularly mentioned, as well as their characters and qualifications) not the least hint appears of their interference in the affair of matrimony. See Eph. iv. 11, 12. For any man, or set of men, to tell us that they are commissioned from God, to do a thing, which is not so much as mentioned in any commission which they can produce from the scripture, as ever having been given to any man upon earth, may charitably be supposed an imposition on their own understandings; but when forced on the belief of others, it is an insult on the understandings of the rest of the world. It is even worse still, for it is acting with the consciences of men, as the old prophet in Bethel acted towards the man of God who came out of Judah to Jeroboam; it is lying to them in the name of the Lord. See 1 Kings xiii. 18.
As for a priest, there is not, nor can there be, such a minister or officer of the Christian church. For every priest (whether high-priest or other, compare Heb. v. 1. with Heb. x. 11.) taken from among men, is ordained for men in things pertaining to God, that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins; and by reason hereof he ought, as for the people, so also for himself, to offer for sins. And every priest standeth daily ministring and offering the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins—But this man (Christ Jesus) after He had offered one sacrifice for sins, for ever sat down on the right hand of God—for by one offering He hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified. Of course, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, (Heb. x. 26. latter part) no more order of priesthood among men. The truth is, that the whole priesthood under the law centered in Christ under the gospel; He is in reality what the former was in type and figure.—The Levitical priesthood, with every circumstance relative thereto, was a figure for the time then present, (Heb. ix. 9.) The Holy Ghost thus signifying, that the way into the holiest of all was not yet made manifest, while as the first tabernacle was yet standing, ver. 8. But Christ being come, an high-priest of good things to come, &c. now once in the end of the world hath appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. See Heb. ix. 11, &c. To imagine, therefore, that He appointed an order of men to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins (which is the scripture-definition of the priest's office) besides having no warrant from the scripture, is to imagine Christ's one sacrifice of Himself imperfect, and to stand in need of something else to make it effectual—this runs us directly into what the church of England [Art. 31.] very properly styles the blasphemous fables and dangerous "deceits" of the sacrifice of the Popish mass, wherein a man professes to offer Christ over again, and very consistently styles himself a Priest!
In one sense, every Christian believer is a priest; that is to say, in the spiritual sense described, 1 Pet. ii. 5. Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. So St. John, (Rev. i. 5, 6.) Unto Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and His Father, to Him be glory and dominion, &c. The appellation of kings, as well as that of priests, equally belongs to all Christian believers alike, but to no outward order, or particular set of men among them, in any exclusive sense whatsoever.
The pride and insolence of churchmen began very early to work, and to aim at that dominion over the consciences of men, which has been brought to so thorough a perfection by the Popes of Rome, though so formally renounced by an holy apostle—2 Cor. i. 24. The first step to making men do what the clergy pleased, was to make them believe as they pleased.—So early as the second century, "the Christian doctors had the good fortune to persuade the people, that the ministers of the Christian church succeeded to the character, rights, and privileges of the Jewish priesthood, and this persuasion was a new source of honours and profit to the sacred order. This notion was propagated with industry some time after the reign of Adrian. Accordingly the bishops considered themselves as invested with a rank and character similar to those of the high-priest among the Jews, while the presbyters represented the priests, and the deacons the levites." Mosheim, vol. i. p. 88, 101. Thus did they "extend the limits of their authority, turn their influence into dominion, their counsels into laws, and openly asserted, at length, that Christ had impowered them to prescribe to His people authoritative rules of faith and manners." Ib. 88. The history of the church still shews us, how superstition enlisted on the side of church power, resisted the authority of scripture-evidence, "made the observance of human rites and ceremonies necessary to the attainment of salvation." Ib. 296.—till, in the 12th century, Pope Innocent the third turned marriage into a sacrament, and threw it into the hands of priests, on whose administration of certain human rites and ceremonies, its validity before God was supposed to depend; so that parties joined together otherwise than by this means, were deemed to live in "an habitual state of whoredom and fornication."
When I think on these things, I can hardly, with any degree of gravity, transcribe what our author lays down as an axiom, "That neither the woman can give herself to the man, nor can her father or friend give her to him immediately, but the hands of the priest only." The Rubric says, that the minister, receiving the woman at her father's or friend's hands, shall cause the man with his right hand to take the woman by her right hand, and say after him," &c. This is a very decent and harmless part of the ceremony—but when we are told, that "the woman can neither give herself, nor the man take her, but at the hands of the priest only," we are, I suppose, to understand this to be so essential to marriage, that, without it, it is not valid in the sight of God. Here is something very serious indeed; for what must become of people who do not use this ceremony? are they to be deemed to live in an habitual state of whoredom and fornication?" The Quakers, for instance?—they must all, who marry among them, be lost eternally—for fornicators and whoremongers have no inheritance in the kingdom of God. 1 Cor. vi. 9. So that this gentleman's notions, like the Pope's bulls, carry an anathema wherever they are departed from. To invent a scheme, for which there is not a tittle of evidence from the Bible, and then positively assert it to be the only one by which marriage can be lawfully contracted, was worthy the haughtiness of a Pope, but not quite so becoming the decent humility of a Protestant divine; more especially when the Bible is by no means silent on the subject of marriage, but furnishes us with a stream of evidence concerning it, which evidently runs in another channel.
When we are commanded to be followers of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises (Heb. vi. 12.) we can hardly suppose that God would set before us, for our imitation, a people who "lived in an habitual state of whoredom and fornication," and yet we do not find one single instance of their marrying according to our author's plan; they certainly could and did "receive their wives from the hands of the fathers or friends, and not from the hands of a priest" at all. Jacob received Leah immediately from her father Laban; thus he afterwards received Rachel. Isaac is no where said to receive Rebekah, nor Abram to receive Sarai "by the hands of a priest." Nor does this appear to have been the case, either before or after the giving of the law, in the Old Testament; neither is there the smallest trace of it throughout the New Testament. So that all this learned author's discourse about priests and marriages, stands on no better foundation than the Pharisees traditions, which were invented by one set of men, handed down from them to another, and believed by the superstitious and ignorant of succeeding generations, till they gained an authority in some cases equal to, in others above, the written word of God.
Our author very truly says in a note—"It was therefore death under the law of Moses, for any stranger, that is, one who was not of the priestly order, to invade the priestly office (Numb. xviii. 7.) which was actually and dreadfully executed upon self-sufficient Corah and his deistical company (Numb. xvi. 3. and 32.) nay, so very sacred was the office of the priesthood, that even kings themselves were immediately and signally punished by God himself, for usurping it under the law of Moses, as we may read (2 Chr. xxvi. 18, 19, 20.) in the case of king Uzziah."
Here I would observe, that, if it was so penal to usurp the priesthood under the law of Moses, which priesthood was only typical of the priesthood of Christ, may it not be worth the while of this author to consider what it must be to usurp the priesthood of Christ itself? The apostle shews, Heb. vii. that the typical priesthood passed in succession from one man to another, therefore there was always an order of men called of God, and appointed to that office; for no man could take that honour to himself, but he that is called of God, as was Aaron. Heb. v. 4. The same apostle points out a very remarkable difference with respect to the priesthood of Christ which is, that it all resides in Him, and cannot pass to any one else. They truly were many priests, because they were not suffered to continue by reason of death; but this man, because He continueth ever, hath—ἀπαράβατον Ἱεροσύνην—a priesthood which cannot pass from Him to any other. This is a truth of the last importance, for our salvation depends upon it, as may be gathered from the words of the next verse (see Heb. vii. 23, 24, 25.) When therefore persons assume an office, which is no where said in the New Testament to belong to any but the Great High-Priest, who is the glorious antitype of the whole Jewish priesthood, and when they mean any thing by the "Christian priesthood" but the priesthood of Christ himself, which is ἀπαράβατος, impassable from Him to any, may we not reasonably doubt, whether "Corah and his deistical company were the only self-sufficient invaders of the priestly office?" This doubt will be soon cleared up, if what is said Heb. vii. viii. ix. x. touching the difference between the priesthood under the law of Moses, and the priesthood of Jesus Christ under the oath of Jehovah, be duly considered and attended to.
But our author proceeds—"Is it not in conformity to God's bringing the first woman to the first man, that the minister, who acts in God's stead in our ceremony, gives the woman to the man, and afterwards joins them in God's name, not his own, when he says—"Those whom God hath joined together (not I) let not man put asunder."—You see that neither the woman can give herself to the man, nor can her father or friend give her to him immediately, but by the hands of the priest only, who receiving her, as our Rubric says, from them, gives her to the man; which shews, that the compilers of our matrimonial form were better apprized of the divine institution of marriage, as well as of the sacred importance of the priest's office, than some among us at present seem to be."
If our compilers of the marriage ceremony, meant to repreesnt what was done in Paradise, at the first institution of marriage, they have acquitted themselves very aukwardly, for there is not a single circumstance alike.
As to the "minister's acting in God's stead"—I do not find that God did any thing but bring her to the man, whereas with us the man brings the woman to church, and sets her before the minister—nor did God speak on the occasion—whereas the minister reads a long ceremony, attended with many circumstances which are entirely the invention of the compilers—therefore the "minister's acting in God's stead" without being commanded so to do, either by precept or example from God's book, is, if very closely attended to, and examined upon the footing of scripture, not quite so like what passed in Paradise, as what was transacted on a certain occasion which our author has mentioned, concerning certain "self-sufficient intruders" into an office which did not belong to them, not being especially appointed thereunto by God himself. If the state chuses that the civil contract, which is to give the security which it requires for the marriage of the parties, should pass through the hands of a minister in a church, in the presence of the congregation, a decent proper ceremony compiled for that purpose is certainly expedient—but when we are told of a divine institution—the importance of the priest's office—his acting in God's stead, and in God's name—we must require plain scripture-proof for all this; but more especially when we are informed, that all this must be complied with on pain and peril of eternal damnation; for that must be the consequence of living in "an habitual state of whoredom and fornication," which our author hath peremptorily declared to be the case of all, who are not pronounced man and wife by the "mouth of a priest."
I should not have said so much on this author's doctrines upon the subject of marriage, were they not embraced so senerally among us; they have, since Pope Innocent the IIId. laid the foundation of them, by throwing marriage into the hands of ecclesiastics, been growing in credit, till at length it became, among the generality, almost established as an article of faith, and now confirmed by act of parliament, 26 Geo. II. c. 33. that, "where there is no ceremony performed by a priest (and this under certain conditions of human invention) there is no marriage ," consequently the divine institution, with all its weight of obligation, is entirely vacated and set aside, nor can the scripture be brought, with its due authority, to rescue those from destruction and perdition, who have a right to its protection. How subservient this human marriage-scheme has been made, by the father of lyes, to the interests of his kingdom, in the promotion and increase of whoredom and prostitution, I need not be at much pains to prove; the eyes and ears of every man who walks the streets of our metropolis after sun-set, will be very sufficient judges of the matter from their own observation.
I will now shut up my remarks on our learned author, with citing entirely a very awful passage, which he has transcribed partially at the conclusion of his two discourses. I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, if any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book. And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book. Comp. Rev. xxii. 18, 19. with Deut. iv. 2.
"The church of England, though she does not consider marriage as a sacrament, yet looks upon it as an institution so sacred, that it ought always to be celebrated by an ecclesiastical person. And by several canons of our church it is declared, to be no less than prostituting one's daughter, to give her in marriage without the blessing of a priest. But marriages without this sanction are not therefore null and void. For, though the positive law of man ordains marriage to be made by a priest, that law only makes marriages otherwise solemnized irregular, but does not dissolve them." Broughton Hist. Lib. tit. Marriage. This passage in Mr. Broughton is confirmed by authorities cited in the margin of his book; and serves to prove the sentiments of the church of England, with regard to marriage, antecedently to the marriage-act—the passing of which has overturned every part of the divine institution, as being of any obligation merely in itself, so that marriage is now more like a creature of the state than an ordinance of Heaven.
However, it does appear, that though the church of England made some canons in very early days which savoured of superstition, yet she has uniformly maintained so far the honour of the divine institution, that an irregularity (even the want of a priest) in the administration of the ceremony which was to attend the solemnization of it, did not vacate the obligation of the thing itself. See before p. 49, 50.
To conclude—If superstition consists in believing certain religious tenets which have no foundation or warrant from the scripture, as well as in setting up human tradition as a rule of faith and practice in religious matters—if heresy consists in adhering to certain positions and doctrines as so many religious truths, which are inconsistent with, and in many respects opposite to the mind and will of God, as revealed in the scripture—I will leave it to the discretion of the reader to determine, under which of the two he will rank the following positions, which are deducible from the systems of law and divinity in this kingdom.
That a man can seduce a virgin, and lie with her, and yet she not be his wife in the sight of God, and the man not be compellable to make her so in the face of the world.
That no union is binding on the parties, unless authorized by human laws.
That a man and woman may divorce each other, so as that the woman may marry again to another—if not joined by act of parliament.
That polygamy, though allowed of God under the Old Testament, was forbidden by Jesus Christ under the New Testament, and is therefore sinful, and if so, damnable.
That where a man has two wives of his own, he shall be deemed a felon, and suffer death as such—but if he debauch ever so many wives of other men he shall be free.
That it is a greater crime to be a polygamist in one instance, than to be a whoremonger in an hundred .
That it is more criminal to marry two wives, than to defile and then abandon ever so many virgins.
That human laws, maxims, customs, inventions, and prejudices, are to supersede the obligation of the divine law.
That Jesus Christ has taught a more pure and perfect system of morals than is contained in the law of the Old Testament.
That therefore men are to govern themselves by some precepts of Christ, not by the moral law of the Old Testament. See vol. i. p. 303, 327.
I could almost here adopt the words of the Marquis of Beccaria, in his ingenious Essay on Crimes and Punishments, and say of such positions as these, as he does of certain modes of prosecution—"What a labyrinth of absurdities! absurdities, which" (it is to be hoped) "will appear incredible to happier posterity. The philosopher only will be able to read in the nature of man, the possibility of there ever having been such a system!"
When the reader has revolved the above positions, and perhaps others which may incidentally arise from them, within his mind, he will most likely begin to see, farther than he did before, into that mystery of iniquity, which, mixing its baleful influence in the corrupt minds of men, transfuses itself as well into their religious, as into their worldly systems; and renders both, as far as they are connected with each other, either independent on, inconsistent with, or opposite to, the plan of the divine government; and these in more respects than we are apt to imagine, till we examine into, and seriously consider the subject, on the footing of the divine law itself; and weigh the importance of the law, as well as of our obedience to it, by that holy jealousy over it, which the great Law-giver Himself hath manifested in His word. This jealousy of God over His laws, as a necessary appendage to the preceding pages, shall be the subject of the next chapter.
References:
Uncharted Knowledge
Wisdom From Previous Realities
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