Appendix

According to those things which have been said, it is permitted to expedite the following questions.

I. You will ask, first: whether, apart from the consent of both, marriage can, by the absolute power of God, subsist. The reason for doubting is that the essence of marriage consists in the mutual obligation, or mutual power of one over the other, whose cause is consent; but certainly God can supply the force of the secondary cause and transfer the power of one into the other: therefore. But although God can confer upon one dominion over another without the consent of the latter, He does not seem to be able to do this with regard to marriage. For let this mutual power be posited apart from the consent of both; I ask: when the man and the woman come together, does each spouse approach the other with marital affection, approving and willing this mutual obligation and power, or not? If they are united without marital affection, therefore they are united with fornicatory affection, not approaching one another as his own or her own; moreover that affection is intrinsically evil (as we have already proved): but God cannot give power for an intrinsically evil act. Nor should you say that it is not evil, since God has given the power over the body; for from this power divinely made there follows only that the man can approach the woman as his own, and the woman likewise the man as her own, which is to be united with marital affection, willing or approving the mutual obligation. Therefore it is necessary that, when they come together, antecedently at least by an antecedence of nature, each should will that mutual obligation and power; but this is mutual consent into the marriage itself. Therefore. Wherefore consent must be said to be of the essence of marriage.

II. You will ask, secondly: whether the marriage of unbelievers, when both are baptized, becomes a sacrament. I answer: the marriage of baptized persons is a sacrament; but, once baptism has been received, the preceding marriage, persevering, is the marriage of baptized persons: therefore. Nor is the necessary consent lacking; for by the very fact that they will to be baptized they consent at least implicitly to that indissolubility of the bond which is proper to the marriage of baptized persons; for a ratified marriage is indissoluble by a special reason on account of its signification. But those consenting to that indissolubility consent also to the bond; wherefore the consent of each, made explicit by that external sign which is the reception of baptism, is the new matter and the new form of the sacrament, while it comes to be. Cf. Sanchez, L. II. D. 9.

III. Question III. Whether the marriage of a faithful person with an unbeliever, when it is valid, is a sacrament effecting grace at least in the faithful person. The question is not concerning signification alone, but concerning the efficiency of grace. Sanchez answers in the same place, D. 8: "It must be said that on neither side is it a sacrament, because marriage in both spouses is one sacrament numerically, just as it is one marriage numerically: therefore if in one it is not a sacrament, neither will it be in the other." And indeed, according to the opinion of Gregory XIII, in a letter given January 25, 1585, these marriages do not seem ratified; for he says, speaking of marriages formerly contracted by both parties while unbelievers, but afterwards when one had been converted: "we, therefore, considering that conjugal unions of this sort contracted among unbelievers are indeed true, but nevertheless are not to be deemed so ratified that, when necessity counsels it, they cannot be dissolved, etc."; but marriage as a sacrament is ratified.

But the contrary opinion also seems probable. And first, indeed, no repugnance appears. For there is one contract, which is the cause of grace; but it effects grace in him who is capable of it. Now it is not repugnant that one should receive grace and the other not; nor is it repugnant that an unbeliever be an extraordinary minister of some sacrament, as is clear in baptism: therefore it is not repugnant that both administer the sacrament, and yet that it be efficacious of grace only with respect to the faithful person. Indeed, secondly, if the faithful person were deprived of sacramental grace in this case, it is not sufficiently clear why the Church in the first centuries, and here and there at intervals also in the latest centuries (cf. Perrone, de Matrim. L. II. Sect. I. c. 7. a. 2. p. 334), permitted conjugal unions of this sort with so great a loss to the faithful. Thirdly, and most especially, if the marriage of a faithful person with an unbeliever is a pure natural contract, it will be subject not to the laws of the Church, but to civil laws; and then indeed it will be able to be prohibited by the Church for the faithful person, on account of the right which she herself has over the person of the faithful; but it is not sufficiently understood why the Church alone could invalidate it. For, as Pius VI bears witness, the reason why the Church alone can invalidate is this, namely, because the contract is a sacrament; if therefore that contract is purely natural, it will not be able to be invalidated by the Church alone. And indeed (supposing those things which we shall say concerning the power of princes in the last chapter), why will the prince not be able to invalidate a purely natural contract, which is altogether equal to that which would be made among unbelievers? But now it is not safe to deny that the Church alone can invalidate this contract; for it is certain that all the diriment impediments which now exist, among which this one also is found, have their force from the Church; and when in the last centuries, in certain missions, she granted the faculty for these marriages, she introduced no mention of the secular power, according to whose norm action would have to be taken, although she accurately expressed all the necessary conditions. Cf. Perrone, l. c. But Gregory XIII does not deny that this marriage is ratified, namely after one of the spouses has been converted; indeed he implicitly affirms it, but denies that it is so ratified, etc.