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God hath ordained
marriage, amongst other good means, for the benefit of man’s natural and
spiritual life, in an individual society, as the lawyers speak, between
one man and one woman: and hath blessed it along with this prerogative,
that by it, in lawful order, our kind should be preserved, and posterity
propagated. And though the
Lord has sometimes suffered, and that almost unreproved by the prophets,
other bodily conjunctions, than between the proper husband and wife, and
altogether unpunished by the magistrate: and withal showed the effect of
his powerful providence, as still he doth, so far, as for the procreating
of children in that disorder: yet did he never approve of any other, or
exempt the same from guilt of sin, in the court of conscience; and seldom
from manifest signs of his displeasure; as experience, and the Scriptures
teach.
Not only heathen poets, which were more tolerable, but also wanton
Christians, have nick-named women, necessary evils [Menander]; but with as
much shame to men, as wrong to women, and to God’s singular ordinance
withal. When the Lord amongst
all the good creatures which he had made, could find none fit and good
enough for the man; he made the woman of a rib of him, and for a help unto
him, Gen. ii.20,21; neither is she, since the creation, more degenerated
than he, from the primitive goodness.
Besides, if the woman be a necessary evil, how evil is the man, for
whom she is necessary.
Some have said, and that, in their own and others’ judgment, both
wittily and devoutly, that marriage fills the earth, and virginity heaven:
but others have better answered, How should heaven be full, if the earth
were empty? I add, that,
because Christ hath said, that the children of the regeneration neither
marry wives, nor are married, but are like the angels in heaven, Matt.
xxii.3; many, whilst they would, by preposterous imitation, become like
the angels in heaven, have in truth become liker the devils in hell: for
they also neither marry wives, nor are married.
But this is, indeed, the very dregs of Popery, to place special
piety in things either evil, or indifferent, at the best; as is abstinence
from marriage, and the marriage bed; which is no more a virtue, than
abstinence from wine, or other pleasing natural things.
Both marriage and wine are of God, and good in themselves; either
of them may in their abuse prejudice the natural or spiritual life:
neither of them is unlawful, no not for them which simply need them not:
which also not to need, argues bodily strength in the one, but a kind of
weakness in the other.
The ancient heathen used to place Mercury by Venus, to show what need the
affections of marriage have of the rule of reason and wisdom, to order
them [Plutarch]. Neither, in
truth, is there anything wherein persons more need and less use reason,
and true discretion, than in their marriage choice: in which the most are
unreasonably transported by one affection or other.
And if he moralized well, who made this a reason, why God cast Adam
into a heavy sleep, whilst he prepared and made him a wife of one of his
ribs, Gen. ii.21; that the affections ought to sleep about this work, and
the reason to wake; how do they miss, whose manner is to have their
affections only waking, or working, in this business, whilst their reason,
and conscience also, are fast asleep!
I have always thought, that good men crossed with ill wives, or
good wives with ill husbands, are ordinarily least to be pitied of any
others in misery; considering how willfully, and presumptuously, for the
most part, they tempt God in their choice. I add, herewithal, that there is no one particular, in which
men and women betray, whether their hearts be set upon worldly riches and
honors, or sensual pleasures, on the one side; or, on the other side, upon
the nourishing and promoting of virtue and godliness, both in themselves
and their posterity, than in their choice this way.
When the sons of God take for wives the daughters of men, giants
are born, Gen. vi.2; and all monstrous confusion followeth, first in the
family, and after in church and commonwealth.
But when the sons of God take the daughters of God to wives, and
the daughters of God are taken by the sons of God, there is an equal yoke,
for the persons themselves to draw in with comfort, and the right course
taken for the leaving of a holy seed behind them.
Some marry by their eyes, as did those sons of God formerly mentioned, and
therein, follow favor, which is deceitful, and beauty which is a vain
thing, Prov. xxxi.30; others by their fingers, as minding what the woman
is worth, in the world’s sense [Erasmus]; others by the ear, as
specially respecting their wives’ title, and high birth; and so, many
times, get themselves so many lords and masters over them, as she hath
friends. But they that
specially respect virtue and godliness, which being attended by the other
handmaids, as Esther by her seven maids, Esther ii.9, is the more
beautiful and desirable, they marry not only the daughters of such or such
men, but the daughters of God himself.
A woman that feareth the Lord, she shall so be praised, Prov.
xxxi.30; and the man so blessed, that marrieth her.
We say, in wiving and thriving take counsel of all the world, and so men
had need. But in this
business affection so far overrules reason in the most, as they could
willingly make their choice without the counsel of their nearest and
wisest friends. Herein,
therefore, friends should be officious and forth-putting, and that both in
love of their friends, and for their own sakes also; who, so oft as their
friend marries, makes an adventure, and the same full of danger, whether
they shall not wholly or in a great measure, lose their friend, which is
often seen. Herein, parents specially must both preserve the right which
God and nature hath given them, and do the duty which the one and the
other hath laid upon them; as accounting their children theirs, most of
all other things, whom if they this way bestow conveniently and in due
time, they provide well both for them and themselves: for them, in
preventing two dangerous evils, uncleanness and unfit matching: for
themselves, according to the saying of Democritus, that he who gets a good
husband to his daughter, finds another son: as he loseth his daughter,
that gets an ill one.
The virtue of the wife is the husband’s ornament, so is the husband’s
the wife’s, much more. And
therefore Philon’s wife, being demanded why she alone went so plainly
appareled, made answer, that her husband’s virtues were ornament
sufficient for her [Stobaeus]. If
her practice were a rule, and that husbands’ virtues were to be measured
by their wives’ homeliness in attire; either fewer husbands would be
thought virtuous than are, or more wives found soberly appareled than are.
After goodness, fitness in marriage is most to be regarded: and that so
much that, as for a pair of gloves or yoke of oxen, two alike, though
meaner, both are them are fitter and better for use, than if the one were
more excellent; so in this marriage pair and yoke, the woman best
qualified is not always the best wife for every man; nor every man the
best qualified, the fittest husband for every woman: but two more alike,
though both meaner, sort better usually.
And according to this, Pittacus, being demanded by a friend what
kind of wife he should marry, answered: one fit for him [Laertius].
Fitness of years is requisite, that an old head be not set upon
young shoulders; nor the contrary, which is worse: fitness in estate, lest
the excelling person despise the other, or draw him to a course above his
reach: fitness for course of life and disposition unto it, the dislike
whereof, in either by other, breeds many discontentments.
Lastly, agreement of affection and inclination, what may be, to all
good persons and things. Only,
it is good, if the one be too fiery hot and suddenly moved, that the other
can cast on the more cold water of forbearance.
But now, seeing there is seldom or never found such conformity
between man and wife, but that differences will arise and be seen, and so
the one must give way, and apply unto the other; this, God and nature
layeth upon the woman, rather than upon the man; although the man should
not too much look for it, nor use all his authority, ordinarily at least,
which none but fools will do. Gen. iii.16; 1 Cor. xi.3-7, xiv.34; 1 Tim.
ii.11; Esther i.20-22. As the glass, saith one, though never so rich of gold and
pearl, if it represent not the face of him that looks into it, is not to
be regarded; so neither is the wife, how well endowed soever otherwise,
except she frame and compose herself, what may be, unto her husband, in
conformity of manners.
Many common graces and good things are requisite both for husband and
wife: but more especially the Lord requires in the man love and wisdom;
and in the woman subjection. Eph.
v.22-25. The love of the husband to his wife must be like Christ’s
to his church; holy for quality, and great for quantity, both intensively
and extensively. Her person,
and whatsoever is good in her he must love fervently; mending or bearing,
if not intolerable, what is amiss: by the former of which two he makes her
the better, and himself by the latter [Gellius].
And if her failings and faults be great, he by being inured to bear
them patiently, is the fitter to converse quietly and patiently with other
perverse persons abroad; as Socrates said, he was, by bearing the daily
home-brawlings of Xanthippe. Neither
sufficeth it, that the husband walk with his wife as a man of love, but
before her also as a man of understanding, 1 Pet. iii.7; which God hath
therefore afforded him, and means of obtaining it, above the woman, that
he might guide and go before her, as a fellow heir of eternal life with
him. It is monstrous, if the
head stand where the feet should be : and double pity, when a Nabal and
Abigail are matched together. Yea,
experience teacheth how inconvenient it is, if the woman have but a little
more understanding (though he be not wholly without), than her husband
hath.
In the wife is specially required a reverend subjection in all lawful
things to her husband. Eph.
v.22, &c. Lawful, I mean,
for her to obey in, yea though not lawful for him to require of her.
He ought to give honor to the wife, as to the weaker vessel, 1 Pet.
iii.7: but now, if he pass the bounds of wisdom and kindness; yet must not
she shake off the bond of submission, but must bear patiently the burden,
which God hath laid upon the daughters of Eve.
The woman in innocency was to be subject to the man: but this
should have been without all wrong on his part, or grief on hers.
But she being first in transgression, 1 Tim. ii.14, hath brought
herself under another subjection, and the same to her, grievous; and in
regard of her husband, often unjust; but in regard of God, always most
just; who hath ordained that her desire should be subject to her husband,
Gen. iii.16, who by her seduction became subject to sin.
And, albeit, many proud women think it a matter of scorn and
disgrace, thus to humble themselves to God and their husbands; and even
glory in the contrary: yet therein they but glory in their shame, and in
their husbands’ shame also. And
whilst they refuse a cross, choose a sin of rebellion, both against God
and their husbands: which shall not escape unpunished from God; though
many fond husbands nourish them therein, and by pampering and puffing them
up by delicate fare, costly apparel and idleness, teach them to despise
both them, themselves, and all others.
Marriage hath divers ends that make it convenient; and one, that makes it
necessary, for the most; which is the preventing of that most foul and
filthy sin of adultery. And
this brand it deserves in special manner; seeing, he who coupleth himself
with a harlot becomes one body with her, 2 Cor. vi.16: which cannot be
said of him that consorts with a thief or murderer or drunkard in their
sins: as also, for that such a one sins against his own body.
Not that he sins not against his own soul too; or that all others
sinning, sin not against both body and soul; but in regard of that special
blot and blemish wherewith this sin stains the body; which never after can
be wiped off, though the guilt of the sin may be repentance. “He that committeth adultery lacketh understanding; getteth
a wound, and dishonor, and his reproach shall not be wiped away,” saith
Solomon. Prov. vi.32.
As marriage is a medicine against uncleanness; so adultery is the disease
of marriage, and divorce the medicine of adultery; though not properly for
the curing of the guilty, but for the easing of the innocent: which remedy
he may, but is not simply bound to use, as some are the former.
Some have said, that he who conceals the faults of his wife this
way, becomes a patron of her filthiness [Chrysostom]: but this is rightly
restrained by other to certain cases.
The divorce for adultery both under and before the law was to be
made by the magistrate’s sword. Gen.
xxxviii.24; Lev. xx.10. Where
that is not drawn, the innocent may use this remedy against the peccant,
as directly violating the marriage bond; which other sins, though greater
otherwise, do not. In other cases, divorce, though much used amongst the Jews,
was never approved the Lord in the court of heaven, as no sin, but
permitted only in civil courts, without bodily punishment, Matt. xix.6-9;
and only the giving of the bill commanded, and that for the advantage of
the divorced, and to testify, that the husband had so freed the wife, as
he might not require her after returning unto him, though he would
[Josephus]. This permission unto the Jews being only for the hardness of
their hearts, may justly by the magistrate be denied to Christians, whose
hearts should be more softened by the blood of Christ [Pareus].
As a man may surfeit at his own table or be drunken with his own drink; so
may he play the adulterer with his own wife [Jerome], both by inordinate
affection and action. For
howsoever the marriage bed cover much inordinateness this way: yet must
modesty be observed by the married [Calvin], lest the bed which is
honorable, and undefiled, Heb. xiii.4, in its right use, become by abuse
hateful, and filthy in God’s sight.
It hath been by some well observed, that divers of the patriarchs
conversed with many wives, whom they took out of a singular desire of a
plentiful progeny, more chastely, than many others did and do with their
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