the rifing or fetting of the fun and moon. Errors in philofophy cannot change these-errors in divinity cannot affect the other; therefore that which conftituted a marriage at the beginning, will conftitute it to the end, though every legislature upon earth were to combine in a law to make it null and void.

I am now led to speak of a law, which I cannot mention, or even think of, but with indignation, I mean 26 Geo. II. c. 33. intitled An Act to prevent Clandestine Marriages. -This law feems to me, and I am by no means fingular * in my opinion of it, to go farther than any other upon the subject ever went, by ftriking in the very terms of it at the Divine inftitution, fo as to render it null and void to all intents and purposes whatsoever, if certain circumstances invented by the human legiflature are not complied with.

As

* I have been credibly informed, that the late Duke of Bedford attempted an abolition of the Marriage-act, and that he loft a motion made in the House of Lords for that purpose but by one voice. -My informant was prefent,at the time.

+ Among the Romans, the Papian law declared those marriages illegal which had been prohibited, and yet only fubjected them to a penalty; but a fenatus confultum, made at the inftance of the Emperor M. Antoninus, declared them void; there then no longer fubfifted any fuch thing as a marriage, wife, dowry, or husband. See Montefquieu, Spirit of Laws, Book xxvi. c. 13. By this it appears, that the heathenifm of our Marriage-act is by no means unprecedented. To this another precedent may be added from the Popish council of Trent, where, after many long arguments pro and con, clandef

As far as this law was meant to prevent clandeftine marriages, from which, as the preamble fets forth, " great mischiefs and inconveniences have arifen"-it was within the jurifdiction of the legislature to enact it; that is to fay, fo far as the matter related to marriage in the light of a civil contract; but when it makes the marriage null and void to all intents and purposes whatsoever, so as to release the parties from the bond of marriage, with refpect to each other in the fight of GOD (for nothing lefs can be understood by those words) it puts afunder those whom GOD bath joined together, and amounts to a repeal of the law and ordinance of THE MOST HIGH; for, by this act, parties who are actually married in the fight of God, and in

tine marriages were at laft decreed to be null and void. However, this was by no means done unanimously, many diffented, and thought that the church had no authority in the matter, it being a divine, not an human ordinance, and, according to a faying of Pope Innocent III. "not to be diffolved by any power of man." When

the day came for giving their voices for the decree (Nov. 11, 1563) Cardinal Varmienfe would not be prefent, thinking the church had no authority in the matter, and faying that if he were prefent, he should be forced to declare, for the fatisfaction of his own confcience, that "the fynod had no power to make that "decree." Cardinal Morone faid, that it pleafed him, if it pleased the Pope. Simoneta faid, it did not please him, but referred himself to the Pope. Of the others, fiftyfix did abfolutely deny, and all the reft did approve it. See Brent. Hift. of Coun. of Trent, fol. 671, 783. However, they declared clandeftine marriages to have been true and lawful, fo long as the church did not difallow them, and anathematized him who did not hold them for fuch. Ib. 784. What trifling with God's law and men's confciences!

their own confciences, are fet free from each other-the man may abandon his wife, the wife leave her husband, and marry another man. Let not the bufband put away his wife, 1 Cor. vii. 11.-and Let not the wife depart from her husband, but and if she depart, let her remain unmarried, ver. 10, 11.-have now no place, where the inftitution of GoD is only concerned; for it is not the ordinance of GOD, but complying with the terms of an act of parliament, which makes a marriage, and which faid terms are not one * of them found in the Bible as conftituting marriage in the fight of GOD. If after the words "fuch marriage fhall be null and void," there had been added, "as touching and concern

ing fuch or fuch civil rights, privileges,

*It must be allowed that Sect. 10, which concerns the marriage of infants under age, without confent of parents and guardians, has fome authority from the fcriptures, but it goes too far ;-the fcriptures give a power to the father of a woman, being in her father's houfe in her youth, to vacate any vow the made without her father's knowledge or confent (Numb. xxx. 4, 5.) and of course any betrothment or efpoufal which fhe had entered into, per verba de futuro, or de præfenti, but could not vacate an actual marriage, the act which conftituted this, was irrevocably gone and paft, and had transferred all dominion over the woman, into the hands of the husband. See before vol. i. p. 26. It is to be obferved, that the power over vows was confined to fathers only, and this only in the cafe of daughters-or to husbands in the cafe of wives, which laft fuperfeded all authority which could be derived elfewhere. See Numb. xxx. 6, 7, 16. Gen. iii. 16. latter part, Gen. ii. 24. Pope Paul IV, made a conftitution, ann. 1557, that marriages made by fons before the age of thirty, and of daughters before the

age

"" or immunities, given to married perfons by any law, ftatute, or custom of this “realm,” this might have fallen within the line of human jurifdiction; but to affect the divine inftitution itself, fo as to make that null and void which God hath ratified by faying-they fhall be one flesh, is a facrilegious attempt to repeal the law of Heaven, juft as much fo as interfering with any other ordinance of God, as to its validity, unless administered according to act of parliament.

The Popes of Rome have made very free with the laws of GoD, even to the ftriking. the second commandment out of the Decalogue, because it bore a little too hard on the idolatry of the church of Rome; but inftead of one, we have ftruck out many of GOD's commandments-viz. Gen. ii. 24. Exod. xxii. 16. Deut. xxii. 28, 29. because clandeftine marriages bore hard upon the pride and ambition of the nobility and gentry. But to return to the main point

age of twenty-five, without confent of father, or of him in whose power they were, fhould be void. Brent. Hift. Counc. Trent, 407. The fame Pope fent a monitorie to Dame Joan of Arragon, wife of Afcanius Columna, that she should not marry any of her daughters without his leave, or if he did, the matrimony, though confummated, fhould be void. Ib. 749. Our law feems to quadrate exactly with this papal monitorie, in affuming a power to vacate marriages, which are not made by leave of the parliament, even though confummated. Pope Paul's monitorie was a bold encroachment on the divine prerogative, but that of the British parliament was much more fo;-the first refpected the individuals of a single family-the latter thofe of a whole nation.

To

To illuftrate what has been faid on the fubject of intermeddling with GoD's ordinances, let us fuppofe a cafe-Baptism is a divine ordinance, ordained, both as to the fign and thing fignified, by CHRIST according to the prophecies of the Old Teftament. The words by which this ordinance was set forth, are to be found Matt. xxviii. 29. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghoft. This is the whole ordinance of baptifm, and our church rightly declaresCan. xxx.-that "when the minifter, dip

9

ping the infant in water, or laying water 66 upon the face of it, hath pronounced these "words-I baptize thee in the name, &c. "the infant is fully and perfectly baptized, "fo as the fign of the cross being afterwards "ufed, doth nothing add to the perfection "and virtue of baptifm; nor, being omitted, "doth detract* any thing from the effect "and substance of it."-Now let us fuppofe that minifters should fcruple to use the fign of the cross in baptifm, that this should grow fo general, as almost to amount to an abolition of the ceremony; this being complained of to the higher powers, they enact a law for the restoration of it, in which is the following claufe-" And be it further enacted by the

Why is this?-Because the ordinance of baptifm is fimply that which GOD hath made it. For the fame reafon, marriage is fimply that which God hath made it. Therefore no additions of man's invention, or the want of them, can affect the marriage union (any more than the baptifm) in God's fight.

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authority