Question I

GRATIAN. That there is a marriage between them is proved in this manner. Wedlock or marriage is the union of a man and a woman maintaining an indivisible manner of life. Likewise, the consent of both makes marriage. Therefore, because these two were joined so as to preserve an indivisible manner of life, and because each consented to the other, they are to be called spouses.

§ 1. To these things it is answered thus: Consent is the perception of two or more persons directed to the same thing. But one who errs does not perceive; therefore that person does not consent, that is, does not perceive together with others. But this woman erred; therefore she did not consent. Accordingly, she is not to be called a spouse, because the consent of both, without which there can be no marriage, was not present there. For just as one who is ordained by a man whom he thinks to be a bishop, but who is still a layman, errs and is not called ordained—indeed, he must still be ordained by a bishop—so this woman, erring, has been joined to no one in marriage; indeed, she must still be joined.

§ 2. To this it is said: not every error voids consent. For one who takes as wife a woman whom he thinks to be a virgin, or one who takes a prostitute whom he thinks to be chaste, each errs, because the one considers a corrupted woman to be a virgin and the other reckons a prostitute chaste. Are they therefore to be said not to have consented to them? Or will each man be given the faculty of putting each woman away and taking another? It is true that not every error excludes consent. But one error concerns person, another fortune, another condition, another quality. Error of person is when this man is thought to be Virgil, but he is Plato. Error of fortune is when one who is poor is thought to be rich, or conversely. Error of condition is when one who is a slave is thought to be free. Error of quality is when one who is evil is thought to be good. Error of fortune and quality does not exclude consent to marriage. But error of person and condition does not admit consent to marriage. For if someone were to make an agreement that he would sell a field to Marcellus, and afterward Paul were to come, saying that he was Marcellus, and purchase the field from him, did that man agree upon the price with Paul, or is he to be said to have sold the field to him? Likewise, if someone promised that he would sell me gold, but offered me orichalcum in place of gold and thus deceived me, would I be said to have consented to the orichalcum? I never wished to buy orichalcum, and therefore I never consented to it, because consent belongs only to the will. Therefore, just as error concerning the material excludes consent here, so also does error of person in marriage. For she consented not to this man, but to the man whom she thought this man to be.

§ 3. But it is objected: Jacob had not consented to Leah, but to Rachel; indeed, he had served seven years for Rachel. Therefore, when Leah was substituted for Rachel without his knowledge, there was no marriage between them, if error of person excludes consent, because, as was said, he had consented not to Leah but to Rachel. To these things it is answered thus: One consent precedes and another follows. Consent precedes when, before carnal union, each consents to an indivisible manner of life; it follows when, after concubinary or fornicatory intercourse, they consent to the same thing. Therefore, preceding consent did not make Jacob and Leah spouses, but subsequent consent did. Yet from the first intercourse they are not judged fornicators, since he knew her with marital affection and she rendered him his due with wifely affection, thinking herself joined to him by right through the law of firstborn daughters and her father’s commands.

§ 4. That error of person excuses some persons is proved by that authority in which the wife’s sister, with both sister and husband unaware, is reported to have gone into the wife’s bed and to have been known by her sister’s husband. Although she is judged to remain perpetually without hope of marriage, nevertheless the man who knew her through ignorance is excused. This is also proved in another way. The devil sometimes transforms himself into an angel of light, and the error is not dangerous if he is then believed to be good when he feigns himself good. Therefore, if he were then to ask some simple person whether that person wished to be a participant in his blessedness, and the person answered that he wished to pass into fellowship with him, would he be said to have consented to fellowship in diabolical damnation, or rather to participation in eternal glory? Likewise, if one of the heretics, under the name of Augustine, Ambrose, or Jerome, presented himself to some Catholic and called him to imitate his faith, if the Catholic gave assent, to the judgment of whose faith would he be said to have consented? Not to the sect of the heretics, but to the integrity of the Catholic faith which that heretic falsely claimed to have. Therefore, because this person, deceived by error, consented not to this man but to the man whom he falsely claimed to be, it is evident that she was not his spouse.

§ 5. Error of fortune and quality does not exclude consent. For example, if someone consented to the prelacy of a church which he thought to be rich, but it was less wealthy, although he was deceived by an error of fortune, he could not renounce the prelacy he had accepted. Similarly, a woman who marries a poor man, thinking him rich, cannot renounce her former condition, although she erred. Error of quality likewise does not exclude consent. For example, if someone bought a field or vineyard which he thought to be exceedingly fruitful, although he erred as to the quality of the things by buying a less fertile property, he nevertheless cannot rescind the sale. Similarly, one who takes as wife a prostitute or a corrupted woman whom he thinks to be chaste or a virgin cannot put her away and take another.