and the blessing sealeth, the angels report, the Father ratifieth? for not even on earth do sons marry rightly and lawfully without the consent of their fathers. What an union is that of two believers, of one hope, one vow, one discipline, the same service! Both brethren, both fellow-servants! No distinction of spirit, as of flesh, but really twain in one flesh! Where the flesh is one, one also is the spirit. Together they pray, together fall down, and together pass their fasts; teaching one another, 'exhorting one another,' waiting on one another. Both are together in the Church of God, together in the feast of God, together in straits, in persecutions, in refreshments. Neither hideth from the other, neither shunneth the other, neither is a burden to the other. Freely the sick is visited, the needy supported. Alms without torture, sacrifice without scruple, daily diligence without hindrance! no stealthy signing, no hurried salutation, no silent benediction! Psalms and hymns resound between the two, and they provoke one another which shall sing the best to his God. Such things Christ seeing and hearing rejoiceth. To them He sendeth His peace. Where His are, there is

Himself also, there also the evil one is not "

Nor does this principle stop at checking marriage with the immoral or the irreligious. It equally forbids union with the heretic or the schismatic. True that such as are with

out God judgeth, and not we. But if we are so ignorant of their state before God, so distinct from them as not to be subject to the same judgment, shall we go and unite ourselves with them so as to be one flesh? Is there not something especially sinful and revolting in the thought, that when the unity of marriage is the type, the counterpart, and, we may piously believe, the result of the perfect unity between Christ and His Church, that His members should dream of contracting the one unity with those who break the other 5 ? And truly they who do act so un

Tertullian to his wife, B. ii. § viii. Lib. of Fathers. The "oblation" is the holy communion administered at marriage by the early Christians. Allusion is made, also, to the Christian customs of signing the cross, saluting the brethren, and blessing food, which would be concealed by the wife from an unbelieving husband, but joyfully observed by both if both were Christians. 5 Eph. v. 23-33.

gratefully punish themselves. Christ's holy ordinance of marriage avenges itself. There can be no earthly unity where the heavenly unity has been so despised. Persons thus joined cannot pray together without disguising God's truth before God. There is no real oneness in such devotion, nothing which fulfils the Apostle's rule, and claims the promise hidden in it, "Dwell . . . as being heirs together of the grace of life, that your prayers be not hindered "." How shall the children of such a marriage be brought to love both parents, and yet to love the truth? How shall they who are united in such a marriage endure at the hour of death not to communicate together, and to follow their dead with a strange service, and to a grave amongst aliens? Let Christians, then, marry "only in the Lord:" only those who are one with them in His faith and fear; only those with whom they can kneel together; together cement their union with the Holy Communion of Him in Whom and by Whom they are made one; together bring their children to the one Lord, one faith, one baptism;" together

66

6 1 Pet. iii. 7.

lie down in the grave; together rise up, when the Bridegroom cometh, and the marriage of the Church is prepared.

(For devotions upon this subject see Appendix.)

CHAPTER II.

PREPARATION FOR MARRIAGE.

THE period preceding marriage is with the world a time of preparation, but not of religious preparation. Temporal arrangements are being made, and the minds of most men extend very little beyond them. Women, indeed, who have more heart in all matters, show it also in this. They think seriously and sadly of the great change of life which is approaching; of a home to be left, a father's long-used guidance, a mother's tried and most tender love, and the cheerful affection of brothers and sisters. They think also of their new responsibilities, and of the trials before them. Few go beyond this. Of those who do so, still fewer adopt any systematic or thorough preparation for their new duties. and temptations.

Yet surely, if we except such occasions as those of Confirmation and the First Communion,