The Institution, Ends and Goods of Marriage

I. Institution of matrimony. God Almighty instituted matrimony, insofar as it is merely a contract, in the very creation of male and female. For he willed, as is clear even from the very capacity and inclination of male and female for generating, that the human race be preserved and propagated, and this fittingly, that is, in such a way that provision is of itself made for the preservation and education of offspring. But this does not happen fittingly except through those who are joined by the matrimonial bond. In addition, God also promulgated by positive law matrimony, instituted in creation itself and promulgated through the light of reason, namely through the mouth of Adam, who, led by divine instinct, declared: "This now is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken from man. Wherefore a man shall leave his father and mother, and shall cling to his wife; and they shall be two in one flesh."¹ Finally, God himself, after he had already instituted matrimony, solemnly signified that it is ordered to propagating the human race: "Increase and multiply."²

Concerning the institution of matrimony insofar as it is a sacrament, see n. 729.

Note. Insofar as God wills that the human race be propagated through matrimony, and to that end communicated to human nature the capacity and inclination for generating, matrimony is customarily called an office of nature.

¹ Gen. 2:23-24.

² Gen. 1:28.

II. Ends of matrimony. The primary end of matrimony is the procreation and education of offspring; the secondary end is mutual aid and the remedy of concupiscence (canon 1013, § 1). The assigned ends are the intrinsic ends of matrimony, to which several extrinsic ends can be added, which can be intended by the contracting parties. Therefore:

1. The intrinsic ends are:

a) Procreation and education of offspring; these constitute the principal end. Education, however, is understood as education both according to the body and according to the soul, and in the worship of God (St. Thomas, Supplement, q. 59, a. 2; n. 701).¹

b) Mutual aid, which is a secondary end together with the end to be assigned under c).

c) The remedy of concupiscence, or its mastery. The Apostle assigns this end in these words: "But because of fornication, let each man have his own wife";² and: "For it is better to marry than to burn."³ Matrimony attains this end both by quieting concupiscence through conjugal acts, and, insofar as it is a sacrament, by the power of sacramental grace, by which spouses use matrimony rightly and guard against illicit things both in and outside matrimony.⁴

2. Multiple extrinsic ends are licitly intended by contracting parties, for example heirs to be left, splendor of family,⁵ peace to be established, health of body, etc. (St. Alphonsus VI, 881-883).

¹ Encyclical Casti connubii, December 31, 1930 (A.A.S. 1930, p. 144).

² 1 Cor. 7:2.

³ 1 Cor. 7:9.

⁴ Buys, Nederlandsche Katholieke Stemmen, 1930, pp. 326 and 333.

⁵ Cf. Roman Catechism, q. 13.

III. Goods of matrimony. A threefold good of matrimony is customarily assigned, and is also assigned by Pius XI,¹ namely:

1. The good of offspring, which consists in the conception, birth, and education of offspring both as to the body and as to the soul, and, as to the soul, both spiritual and religious (St. Thomas, Supplement, q. 59, a. 2).

2. The good of faith or fidelity, which is situated in this: that the debt is neither denied to the consort nor permitted to anyone else, and that not even to the consort is granted what, as contrary to divine laws and most alien from conjugal fidelity, can never be granted.

3. The good of the sacrament, by which are denoted both the indissolubility of the bond and the elevation of the matrimonial contract into an efficacious sign of grace.

¹ Encyclical Casti connubii (A.A.S. 1930, p. 543).

IV. Honesty of matrimony; concerning which note:

1. Matrimony is objectively honorable. This is clear first from the fact that God instituted it, Christ raised it to the dignity of a sacrament, and Sacred Scripture commends it.¹ It is clear next from the fact that it is the single means of fittingly obtaining the propagation of the human race willed by God (n. 714); likewise from the fact that matrimony is ordered "not only to propagating the human race, but to begetting offspring for the Church, citizens of the saints and members of the household of God; namely, that a people might be procreated and educated for the worship and religion of the true God and of Christ our Savior."²

Corollary. All who are capable of matrimony can contract matrimony, unless they are prohibited by law (canon 1035). This also holds concerning those who can procreate only miserable offspring. "It is certainly not lawful," says Pius XI, "to burden with grave fault those men, otherwise capable of matrimony, who, even after all care and diligence have been employed, are conjectured to beget only defective offspring, if they contract marriage, although often matrimony must be dissuaded for them."³

Nor can the aforesaid persons of themselves, at least practically, be accused of light fault; for with regard to offspring, it is always better for the offspring to be thus than not to be;⁴ and with regard to the inconveniences that will arise for society and family, it is not established that the most valid right of contracting matrimony does not prevail over the avoidance of those inconveniences. Add that even those of whom we speak, by procreating offspring, however miserable, conduce to the good of the species (vol. I, n. 740). This is confirmed by the practice of the Church, which in no way keeps the said persons from matrimony (St. Thomas, Supplement, q. 64, a. 1, ad 4; St. Alphonsus VI, 951).

Whether the State can forbid matrimony to some will be explained under V.

2. Matrimony, although it is objectively honorable, does not oblige individual persons, because only that precept obliges individual persons which of itself and first regards the good of individuals. But the precept of matrimony of itself and first does not regard the good of individuals, but the good of the multitude or species (St. Thomas, Contra Gentiles, book 3, ch. 137; II-II, q. 152, a. 2). Accidentally there can be an obligation, for example if someone has procreated offspring from some woman.

There are those who judge that the law of matrimony was imposed on the human race; this does not please others, because one cannot grasp a precept which does not oblige determinate persons and cannot be fulfilled by the community as such. Moreover, God can reach, and does reach, the willed end without a precept, that is, the propagation of the human race, namely by implanting in human nature the capacity and vehement inclination for generating.

Objection. From the fact that some power is conferred on man, an obligation of using it is rightly deduced. But the generative power is conferred on individual persons.

Response. The major, besides the fact that it must be distinguished in multiple ways, certainly is to be denied if it is a question of a power conferred for the good of the species, because it suffices that many use it. "Namely, from divine providence," says St. Thomas, "those things are given to man which are necessary for the whole species, and yet it is not necessary that every man use each one of them. For the industry of building and the power for fighting have been given to man, and yet it is not necessary that all be builders or soldiers. Similarly, although the power of generating and those things which are ordered to its act have been provided for man by God, nevertheless it is not necessary that every man intend the act of generation" (Contra Gentiles, book 3, ch. 136).

3. Matrimony, however honorable it is, nevertheless must be placed after virginity and chaste celibacy; likewise chaste widowhood after second nuptials.

The former has been proved and vindicated against objections in the treatise on the offices of clerics (vol. I, n. 1168); the latter is clear from canon 1142, and rests on the same principles.⁵

¹ 1 Cor. 7:9, 28, 36, 39; 1 Tim. 4:1-3; 5:14; Eph. 5:22-23; Heb. 13:4.

² Encyclical of Leo XIII, Arcanum, February 10, 1880; Encyclical of Pius XI, Casti connubii, December 31, 1930 (A.A.S. 1930, p. 544).

³ Encyclical Casti connubii (A.A.S. 1930, p. 565).

⁴ Cf. our little work On the Virtue of Chastity and the Opposed Vices, n. 98.

⁵ Cf. our little work On the Virtue of Chastity and the Opposed Vices, nn. 18-19.

V. That the governance of matrimony may be distinctly explained, two things must be distinguished: 1° the marriages of baptized persons and of non-baptized persons; 2° the bond itself, namely its validity and liceity, and its effects, set forth in n. 724.

1. Marriages of baptized persons. The marriage of baptized persons is governed not only by divine law, but also by canon law (canon 1016), and not by civil law. This is clear both from innumerable ecclesiastical documents,¹ and from the fact that the marriage of baptized persons is a sacrament. But the governance of the sacraments belongs to the Church alone.

Corollary I. The Church can establish diriment and impedient impediments (canons 1016, 1038), and by her own right treat cases which regard the bond, that is, its validity and liceity, its inseparable effects, likewise its separable ecclesiastical effects (canon 1960), and, if they are treated incidentally and accessorily, even merely civil effects (canon 1961).

Corollary II. The civil State is bound to recognize the rights of the Church and the things established by her. But it cannot, with regard to the marriages of baptized persons, establish diriment or prohibitive impediments; nor treat cases which regard the bond of those marriages, their inseparable effects, and their separable ecclesiastical effects. It is competent, however, concerning the merely civil effects of matrimony (canon 1016), and concerning cases about those same effects, if they are treated principally (canon 1961). Likewise it can, not by reason of matrimony considered in itself, but for the sake of protecting social order, prescribe certain formalities, for example the registration of marriage in the registers of civil status, and punish by civil penalties, for example monetary fines or the withdrawal of certain merely civil effects, spouses who have neglected those formalities; nevertheless it cannot establish conditions without whose fulfillment matrimony by baptized persons cannot be entered.

Corollary III. The civil legislator cannot simply forbid matrimony to any baptized person. This follows from the things said above. Yet he can require that, for example, those bound to military service abstain from matrimony for a time; nor by this is there conceded to the civil State a faculty of establishing impediments properly so called, or impediments directly impeding matrimony. For such a disposition cannot be made by reason of matrimony itself, but so that social order may be provided for; hence one who transgresses these things does not sin against religion, as does one who does not observe ecclesiastical statutes. Besides this, the civil State can sometimes indirectly keep someone from matrimony, for example by casting a guilty person into prison.

Corollary IV. Of itself there is no obligation of observing civil laws which exceed the power of the civil legislator. Accidentally, however, there is commonly such an obligation, namely so that disturbance and damages otherwise going to follow for the spouses and offspring may be forestalled.

2. Marriages of non-baptized persons. The marriage of non-baptized persons is governed not only by divine law, but also by civil law, and not by ecclesiastical law. This is clear both from the documents to be assigned in Corollary I, and from the fact that the common good requires that the matrimonial contract be governed by positive human law. But the governance of the matrimonial contract entered by non-baptized persons does not belong to the Church, because she lacks power over non-baptized persons. Therefore it remains that it belongs to the civil legislator, and not to the Church. Let him beware, however, lest he exceed the limits of his power, for example by simply forbidding matrimony to some, etc., matters which we shall set forth more fully in the corollaries.

Corollary I. The civil legislator can, much more probably, establish impediments, both prohibitive ones properly so called and diriment ones, between non-baptized persons; likewise he can treat cases regarding those marriages.² For, first, the public good seems to require that laws looking to this be able to be enacted. But besides civil rulers no competent legislator can be assigned who would be able to frame such laws.

The major is clear: a) from the fact that the Church herself judged such laws necessary with regard to the marriages of her subjects; b) from the common practice of peoples somewhat cultivated;³ c) from the fact that it is especially fitting that some marriages be illicit and invalid which, considered under natural law alone, would be valid, for example marriages entered before marriageable age or without any public form.

The minor follows first from the fact that the competent legislator is not the Church, to whom infidels are not subject; nor another religious authority, since such an authority does not exist, or at least is not legitimate. Therefore it remains that we say that the said power belongs to the civil legislator. A second argument is drawn from the solutions of the Holy Office⁴ and of the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda Fide.⁵ The power set forth is usually called devolutive, because power over matrimony, as being a sacred thing, belongs of itself to the religious power alone.

Corollary II. The civil legislator cannot absolutely forbid matrimony to a non-baptized person who is capable of matrimony, for example for reasons called eugenic.⁶ So Leo XIII⁷ and Pius XI.⁸ The reason is that the right of contracting matrimony is older than the State itself, and therefore must rather be protected by the State, as being destined for the good of citizens, but cannot be extinguished by it. Add that human authority cannot directly impede the good of the species, that is, enact a law with the end that procreation be impeded. But if the prohibition has place, practically it is made for that end. The major is drawn from the fact that the good of the species is not subordinated to the end of the civil State.

Corollary III. The civil legislator cannot render anyone, even a non-baptized person, incapable of matrimony, for example by the means assigned in note 6. So Pius XI⁹ and the Holy Office.¹⁰ Add the reasons just brought forward in Corollary II. Add that neither can public authority directly mutilate an innocent person (vol. I, n. 740).¹¹

But insofar as the civil legislator can deprive a criminal, as punishment, of the generative faculty, this has been set forth in vol. I, n. 742.

Corollary IV. The civil legislator cannot, as we think, prescribe a medical inspection to be carried out before nuptials, unless a grave abuse would counsel it. For a matter which is an impediment to liberty in this matter, and so intimately affects an individual affair, ought not to be imposed except for a most grave cause, practically for a true abuse. But a true abuse - I am not speaking of particular cases - will not easily have place, nor will it easily be established. Hence these things should be left to parents, or even to those about to marry, who, if they please, can request the testimony of an approved physician.

¹ Cf. Council of Trent, session 24, canons 3, 4, 9, 12; constitution of Pius VI Auctorem fidei; Syllabus of Pius IX, propositions 68-70, 74; constitution of Leo XIII Arcanum.

² Cf. Resemans, De competentia civili.

³ Cf. Esmein, Le Mariage, I, p. 343.

⁴ October 29, 1739; September 20, 1854.

⁵ October 8, 1631; June 26, 1820.

⁶ The eugenic system intends the improvement of the race, and, to obtain that end, promotes laws which forbid matrimony to some or render them incapable of generating, for example through vasectomy in men, tubectomy or salpingectomy in women, etc.

⁷ Encyclical Rerum novarum, May 15, 1891.

⁸ Encyclical Casti connubii (A.A.S. 1930, p. 564).

⁹ Encyclical Casti connubii (A.A.S. 1930, pp. 564 and 565).

¹⁰ March 31, 1931.

¹¹ Encyclical Casti connubii, loc. cit.

All the blessings of the institution of marriage are included in these three, which are at the same time sources of obligations: children, conjugal fidelity, sacramental character. This doctrine of St. Augustine¹ has been adopted by the Church. He says:² The blessing of conjugal fidelity regards the obligation on the part of the husband and wife to abstain from all sexual relations outside of wedlock; the blessing of children regards the duty on the part of the married couple to receive them with love, to look after their temporal wants with solicitude, and to educate them with religious care; the blessing of the sacrament regards the duty of the parties to live together and forbids the one who departs from the common life, whether it be he or she, from forming a new union, even for the sake of children.

¹ De bono conjugali, chapter 24, number 32; Latin Patrology, 40, 394.

² De Genesi ad litteram, Book IX. chapter 7, number 12; Latin Patrology, 34, 397.

Because every duty which is imposed on us, since it is ordained by God who created us for happiness, has the aspect of a blessing to be enjoyed, and leads to happiness.

Marriage was instituted first of all for the due propagation of the human race.

Because propagation of any sort would satisfy neither the dignity of the parents, nor the education of the children, nor the interests of society.

Because it might be the work solely of animal passion, whereas man’s dignity requires in all his free actions intervention and even control by his superior or spiritual part.

Because it might leave paternity uncertain, it might be the fruit of transient unions, and it would then afford for the education of the children neither the security nor the continuity nor the unity which are needed.

Because the citizen is no better than the man of whom he is made; and a promiscuous propagation of mankind, by compromising the right formation of men, would expose society to the risk of being in want of that which it needs most, virtuous citizens who are devoted to their country.

by requiring in advance of the corporal union a First, sincere affection uniting the souls; secondly, by providing for education by means of the stability of the union; finally, by creating through the fusion of two persons a common principle of vigilance, tenderness and care, by which the children benefit from the qualities of both sexes harmoniously combined. “Man and woman together constitute the principle which is destined to transmit and develop human life.”¹

¹ Dermine, work cited, p. 44.

Such a death is an accidental misfortune. Sad though it be, it does not entirely destroy the unity in duality which was realized in the marriage. The surviving spouse is guided in his life and in his task of education by the remembrance of the lessons and counsels of the departed one, and by all that the deceased has left him. He knows the counsels and wishes of the deceased partner, and tries to conform to them; and thus the education of a legitimate child is never the work of one parent alone.

The Creator of the human race Himself [says the Encyclical] who in His goodness wished to use men as His

helpers in the propagation of life, taught this when, instituting marriage in Paradise, He said to our first parents, and through them to all future spouses, “Increase and multiply, and fill the earth,” as St. Augustine¹ admirably deduces from the words of the holy Apostle St. Paul to Timothy when he says, “The Apostle himself is therefore a witness that marriage is for the sake of generation: ‘I wish,’ he says, ‘young girls to marry.’ And, as if someone said to him, ‘Why?’ he immediately adds, ‘to beget children, to be mothers of families.’”² We prove it from the fact that the faculty of reproduction brings together intimately persons of different sexes; also because apart from this power of reproduction the institution of marriage would be inconceivable; because the right use of that power is a safeguard of the other blessings of marriage; and because the right propagation of mankind closely concerns the good of society as a whole.

¹ De bono conjugali, c. 24, n. 32; PL, 40, 394.

² Pp. 24-25.

Yes, a great blessing. In the first place what an honor it is for man to be associated with the creative work of God, to bring forth a king of visible creation, to prepare one of the elect for Heaven, to furnish to the Church a son, in whom, once he will have been regenerated by baptism, Jesus Christ will dwell! What happiness to survive, as it were, one’s self in the persons of dear ones who love you, and thus obtain even on earth a kind of perpetual memory! Besides, the child cements the union of the parents; in the little quarrels which are almost inevitable he is the conciliating element; because he requires good example he is an educative factor, and makes the work of mutual upbuilding easier for the parents. The sacrifices he demands are compensated for by satisfactions of a higher order; the cares he requires make him the more beloved. The human mind is unable to imagine or to taste this dignity, or to appreciate that feeling of pride in being the father or the mother of a child of men and a child of God. Even then they will not appreciate it when they see the look in the eyes of their child in whom shines the immortal soul; or when afterward they reflect that that soul is the breath of God, that the Son of God died for that child, that enriched as he is with the gift of sanctifying grace, he is more like a God than a man, that he is destined to live forever *De bono conjugali chapter 24. number 32, Latin Patrology. 40, 394. *Pp. 24-25.

and when, thereupon they exclaim: “This is my child! He owes his existence to me! Without me he would not be there, and would never come to be!”¹ If a true Christian mother weighs well these things, she will indeed understand with a sense of deep consolation that of her the words of Our Saviour were spoken: “A woman . . . when she hath brought forth the child remembereth no more the anguish, for joy that a man is born into the world”; and proving herself superior to all the pains and cares and solicitudes of her maternal office with a more just and holy joy than that of the Roman matron, the mother of the Gracchi,² she will rejoice in the Lord, crowned as it were with the glory of her offspring. Both husband and wife, however, receiving these children with joy and gratitude from the hand of God, will regard them as a talent committed to their charge by God, not only to be employed for their own advantage or for that of an earthly commonwealth, but to be restored to God with interest on the day of reckoning.³ “Such,” says St. Augustine whom the Encyclical cites, “is the law of marriage, which sets off the glory of fecundity while it puts a brake to the shameful disorder of incontinence.”⁴

¹ Schilgen, work cited, p. 11.

² The Encyclical here recalls an event of Roman history. Whilst other matrons were displaying their jewels to their hearts’ content, the mother of the Gracchi presented her two sons, saying: “These are my jewels.”

³ P. 26.

⁴ De Gen. ad. lit., Book IX, chapter 7, number 12; Latin Patrology, 34, 397.

Not at all; it is completed only by the right education of the child. In giving them this little being who is entirely incapable of providing for himself, nature, in a general way, designates the parents as those who must provide for him: physically, by the mother’s milk and the means of subsistence; morally, by the education of the mind and heart which begins immediately and lasts continuously, thanks to the constant influence which the common life exerts on those who share it. The parents have an inviolable right to fulfil this mission of education with which nature has entrusted them, and in view of which they have been instilled with a love which nothing can replace.

Since this twofold duty entrusted to the parents for the good of their children is of such high dignity and of such great importance, every use of the faculty given by God for the procreation of new life is the right and the privilege of the marriage state alone, by the law of God and of nature, and must be confined absolutely within the sacred limits of that state.¹ Certainly, outside of marriage, education is deprived of the double guaranty which a lawful union provides: the guaranty of its duration by the perpetual bond which attaches the parents to each other; the guaranty of prudence by the intimacy which gives to education the resource of a common principle rich with the complementary qualities of both sexes.

¹ P. 27.

Conjugal fidelity includes the loyal fulfilment of all the obligations involved in the matrimonial contract: the principal obligations imposed by the Divine natural law, as well as secondary stipulations freely agreed upon by the parties.

The Divine natural law imposes both negative and positive duties.

The negative duties oblige one to refuse to any person but the lawful partner the intercourse which is permitted in wedlock, and consequently to exclude voluntary thoughts and desires for other persons; also to refuse even to the lawful partner whatever is forbidden in wedlock itself.

It is to be understood in the sense in which approved authorities explain it in treatises of moral theology. Even St. Augustine distinguished between such a use of marriage as a high spiritual point of view rendered altogether virtuous;

a use which is less to be commended, considering its motive, but permissible especially to the party who condescends to the weakness of the other; and finally such a use as is gravely sinful, or in the very manner of its exercise strictly abusive, which admits of no formal cooperation;¹ although material cooperation may in certain cases be allowed.²

¹ By formal cooperation one partakes in the bad intention of the principal actor; this community of intention is excluded in purely material cooperation. In the latter, one, for other reasons, either performs an act in itself good or indifferent, or abstains from some act, where the act or the abstention, as the case may be, was in fact helpful to the guilty party. MDe bono conjugali, chapter 6, number 6; Latin Patrology. 40. 377.

² De bono conjugali, c. 6, n. 6; PL, 40, 377.

Not in the least. It is simply a question of understanding them rightly and applying them prudently.

Because the marriage contract is not of a purely private nature; it has from God its laws which are unchangeable by the parties to the marriage. Thus the Holy See condemned the assertion that the consent of the other party could reduce the guilt of adultery to that of simple fornication.¹ Moreover, these laws of God sanction an order of mutual relations which is for the good of the parties. The partner who violates that order does an injury to the other party, which is manifestly contrary to conjugal fidelity, since that demands mutual helpfulness.

¹ Innocent XI (September 24, 1665) Prop. 50, Denzinger-Bannwart, n. 1200.

Exactly so. As was said above, in number 17, Catholic tradition so interprets the words which Our Lord quotes with confirming approval from Adam: “They shall be two [not more than two] in one flesh.”

Yes; thanks to this severity the relations between husband and wife bear the fresh and delicious imprint of chastity. That mutual familiar intercourse between the spouses themselves, if the blessing of conjugal faith is to shine with becoming splendor, must be distinguished by chastity in such wise that husband and wife must bear themselves in all things in conformity with the law of God and of nature, and endeavor always to follow the will of their most wise and holy Creator with the greatest reverence towards the work of God.¹

¹ P. 28.

The great positive duty is that of mutual love inspired by charity. The marriage bond sets up between the spouses an intimacy which no other surpasses or even equals; the marriage would never have been entered upon without the mutual affection which was necessary for the parties to give themselves to each other. Conjugal love has in Christian marriage a sort of noble primacy. For matrimonial faith demands that husband and wife be joined in an especially holy and pure love, not as adulterers love each other, but as Christ loved the Church. This precept the Apostle laid down when he said: “Husbands, love your wives as Christ also loved the Church,” which of a truth He embraced with a boundless love, not for the sake of His own advantage, but seeking only the good of His spouse.¹

¹ P. 28.

Charity is a love which is forgetful of self: “Charity seeketh not her own” (I Cor. xiii, 5). It is a love which is not content with words: “Let us not love in word, nor in tongue, but in deed and in truth” (I John iii, 18). It is a love which has its source in God, ends in Him, and tends to lead to Him those that He loves. Charity should, therefore, manifest itself by mutual benevolence, readiness to help in every necessity or difficulty; also by activity of mutual upbuilding, and reciprocal

influence for good according to the qualities allotted to each party, an office which is called in Christian tradition the work of edification according to the Gospel.

It excludes any abasement of one of the spouses, any degrading subjection or servitude; but, far from excluding all subordination, it rather requires it for the sake of order and harmony; only it must see to it that this subordination is suave and gentle.

Because if nature had not established a hierarchical order domestic society would begin with anarchy, and authority which did not rest on a natural title would make submission more painful and less welcome. Nature herself designates the husband as the superior by giving him strength of body and a fatherhood which does not interfere with his duties in the maintenance and government of the family. Besides having a natural ability which is usually greater, the man has by nature a taste for government and leadership; whereas the woman, physically less robust, naturally leans upon him, and is besides normally impeded by the inconvenient consequences of motherhood. By supernatural revelation, the Apostle derives this hierarchy from the mysterious origin of woman: “For the man is not of the woman, but the woman of the man” (I Cor. xi, 8).

Not at all. It is limited to the exterior acts of family life which may be reasonably demanded. The wife keeps the independence of a human person; she remains free in her personal conduct, in her practises of piety, in her goings and comings, with due consideration for the conjugal pact and the order of the house and family; she preserves the right to demand of the husband whatever her quality as wife and mother entitles her to, for she, too, has charge of the education of the children. Finally, as the husband and wife were equal in giving themselves each to the other, so they remain equal in regard to the right which flows from

this mutual self-surrender. Besides, the subordination of the wife admits of a certain variation according to circumstances of time, place, and persons. Incapacity on the part of the husband confers upon the wife by a natural devolution the right to replace him in the government of the house. State laws, and the ante-nuptial agreement, if any, may modify the property rights of the wife. There will, therefore, be,even as a regular thing, cases of independence and cases of equality; besides there are exceptional cases.

It may be somewhat diminished or intensified; but, since it is founded in the natural order it can never be entirely abolished nor go beyond certain limits. It is intended to last as long as the family itself.

The Encyclical reminds us that if the husband is the head of the family, the wife is the heart.¹ As the former has the primacy of government, the latter may and should claim for herself the primacy of love. As Leo XIII observes (Encyclical “Arcanum”): “Divine charity should never cease to be the norm of their respective rights.”

¹ See the beautiful reflections of Dermine, work cited, pp. 41-43 on these reciprocal parts of the husband and wife.

Marriage may also be defined as a “total community of life.”

Certainly not, since it began and sprang from that mutual giving of self, and at the same time is its crown and glory.

First, because the spouses can in their union make this their chief purpose. Secondly, because the community of life between the spouses—our second definition of marriage—is providentially directed by God to this last end, which, being the supreme end of man, occupies the first place in the Divine Will.

Absolutely not, because such relations are intrinsically vicious, wrong, and the circumstances mentioned, being merely accidental and extrinsic, cannot alter this. Besides, such a moral disorder could never conduce to perfection nor even serve the purposes of true love, for true love is partly founded on mutual respect, which moral disorder must necessarily weaken. This truth is confirmed by the experience of anthropologists and public officials. Improper relations break up homes.

It means two things: indissolubility of the conjugal bond and the elevation of marriage to the dignity of a Sacrament of the New Law.

Because in classical Latin usage, sacramentum is used to designate an obligatory bond, a consecration, a binding promise.

Yes, every validly contracted marriage is indissoluble, as far as the parties are concerned, and even as far as any human power is concerned.

That is the teaching of the Church, based on these words of Our Lord: “What God hath joined together, let no man put asunder” (St. Matth. xix, 6).

Because God, the Author of order and of the law, can in His wisdom, for the sake of a higher good, make exceptions.

He has made none for marriage contracted between two Christians or baptized persons, which was afterward consummated by the use of the rights of wedlock. But He has given to the Sovereign Pontiff the power to dissolve, for grave reasons, marriage which has not been consummated. The tradition and practice of the Church make this power certain. Moreover, we know through St. Paul that a marriage which has been contracted between two unbaptized persons, may, after the baptism of one of them, be dissolved in favor of the Faith. If the spouse who has not been baptized refuses to cohabit with the party who has been converted to Christianity, under conditions which are acceptable to the latter, the Christian party can marry a Catholic, and from the time of this new marriage the former marriage is dissolved, and the unbaptized party is also free from the bond. Lastly, according to an opinion which is enjoying more and more credit, a marriage which has been consummated while it was not a Sacrament, can, like a Christian marriage which has never been consummated, be dissolved by the Sovereign Pontiff for grave reasons.

Yes, but as we saw in Number 15, Christ revoked this indulgence, which, as He said, had been accorded to the Jewish people because of the hardness of their hearts.

In Other Words, How Does Even Such a Marriage Come to be Beyond the Power of the Sovereign Pontiff? The ultimate reason for this inflexibility may be found in the mystical signification of Christian marriage. According

to St Paul (Ephes. v, 32), marriage between Christians reproduces the perfect union which exists forever between Christ and His Church. Now this reproduction is achieved in its perfection in marriage between baptized persons, which has been consummated. Common sense teaches us that by the use of the conjugal right marriage receives a sort of completion; something irreparable has taken place; the affective and verbal self-surrender has been supplemented by an actual physical one which justifies the expression, very significant in itself, of “consummated marriage.” It is consummated, we may say, in the physical order, and it is also consummated in the symbolical and mystical order, in which it represents the indefectible union between Christ and His Church. In a perfect representation of this union, the indefectibility of the union must have its own symbol; and it has it in the absolutely indissoluble marriage. Such is the reasonable explanation which we offer, as the Sovereign Pontiff says, with respect, as a help to grasp the meaning of that indissolubility which we know with certainty from the teaching of the Church.

On the contrary, this indissolubility is a great blessing for the institution of marriage. By removing the fear of a breach, it makes way for that full intimacy which is the joy of the home; it secures to each of the partners the peaceful possession of the other through good times and bad times; it prevents disagreements from growing into bitterness; it is a bulwark against temptations by making dreams of criminal indulgence impossible of realization; it is an assurance to the spouses that through charms that pass away and temporal goods that disappoint the heart, their union is designed to lead them to that higher end which is attained only in the next life. To the children, this indissolubility is a pledge of care and right education. It is often hard enough for children who have lost father or mother, to see a person who has been an utter stranger to them lawfully take the place of the parent whose loss they feel. Moral rectitude in the family, of which indissolubility is one of the safeguards, is as beneficial to society as it is to the individuals who practise it. No doubt some marriages

are unhappy, often through the fault or imprudence of those who suffer from them. But is that a reason for disturbing the right order of all marriages, for compromising and lessening the happiness of every conjugal union, and so multiplying those very misfortunes which it is thought to remedy?

103. The matter manifestly demands that we first demonstrate the natural institution of matrimony; once this notion has been acquired, we shall gather without difficulty what conjugal chastity commands, demands, and counsels.

The demonstration, however, demands that we consider and weigh several things together. For it is effected by comparing the requirements of the good which nature wishes to be secure with the facts, that is, whither natural propensities tend and what they effect; and what individual and common needs we experience.

104. - The origin of matrimony from nature. These things are manifest to natural reason. The good of human offspring, which is of the greatest importance to the good of the human race and therefore, at the command of nature, must be preserved, demands that an infant be born not from promiscuous intercourse, but of parents who have come together into a sacred unity, so that by the common solicitude of both parents it may be led perfectly to human life. For it comes forth from the mother's womb so wholly defenseless and lacking in counsel that it would immediately perish unless provision were made for it affectionately by general protection and minute attention. The father will give rather the protection, the mother chiefly the patient and minute cares, and both will give love. Then for several years the infant, child, adolescent, and young adult must be aided and directed in every manner; in this variety and succession of needs, now the mother, now the father, can furnish more useful work, yet in such a manner that each acts less well alone than when they are joined, so that a certain fitting tempering of the qualities of each sex is most greatly to be desired. This, moreover, will exist most happily if both parents, just as they were one principle of generation, so also become one principle of education.

But in turn, while man considers himself, he feels a great propensity toward the other sex, by which he is directed not only toward carnal conjunction with it, but toward a more complete union of persons ¹. As we said in no. 61, carnal conjunction is the symbol and material expression of this union, in the same manner as bodily pleasure figures the fuller happiness of persons whereby they have completed one another.

¹ Compare nos. 2 and 61.

If we now compare this good of offspring with these inclinations, do we not observe that there proceeds from nature an institution by which two persons complete one another and are made, as it were, one; and that, once this unity has been effected or this bond admitted, but not before, they will legitimately generate offspring? Ribbing writes aptly: "Founded upon the distinction of the sexes, matrimony constitutes the union of one man and one woman into one personality" ².

² "Founded upon the distinction of the sexes, marriage is the union of one man and one woman into one personality" (Sexuelle Ethik, in Moll, Handbuch, etc., p. 927).

105. - The unity and stability of matrimony. 1. The morally equal number in which each sex exists also proves, to say the least, that it is among the desires of nature that one man with one woman contract this bond. For only a few more powerful men will be able to practice polygamy without killing the other men or reducing them to abject servitude.

What of the fact that this unity, this full and mutual communication which love affects, is not properly made except between two persons; what of the fact that this "exclusivism," or this jealousy, indicated above in no. 40 among the marks of love, which shuts others out from this intimate union, itself commends monogamy? Again Ribbing writes very well, op. cit.: "In sexual life one cannot hand oneself over to another except under the condition that one himself acquire the other."

2. The stability, and even perpetuity, of matrimony is required on account of the offspring itself. For for a long time both parents, insofar as they have been fashioned into one, are necessary to the offspring; but they are always useful.

Moreover, children are bound by a perpetual duty of piety toward their parents, insofar as, having been made one, they generated and nourished them: they will perform this duty with difficulty if they find their parents divided by another marriage, as if made strangers to them. By a certain spontaneous estimation, a parent who, having spurned the prior bond, has attempted to admit another is judged to have done an injury to the spouse. But if both have entered a new matrimonial contract, they appear both guilty and victims of mutual injury.

Nor is the force of this argument diminished because it happens to the institution of matrimony that many marriages remain sterile.

For, since it is manifest that provision was made primarily through matrimony for the due multiplication of human beings, nature established its inviolable order concerning matrimony according to those things which this primary end required. And at the first intuition of common sense it is perceived that there cannot be different laws for a fecund marriage and for an infertile marriage: we all perceive what a path would be opened through this distinction of laws to the inventions of unbridled lust.

Add now that, through matrimony, after it has been consummated, the spouses have come together, as it were, into one human being, and that a mysterious communication of qualities has been effected ³.

³ Compare the cited dissertation of Dr. Desplats in the work L'Honnêteté conjugale (Mercier, Desplats, Vermeersch), or Matrimonio e Maltusianismo (Marconsini).

Wherefore, according to the testimony of St. Paul ⁴, the wife must be loved by the husband as a part of himself. The sayings which are likewise commonly repeated agree, in which a husband calls his wife half of himself; in which love is described as the egoism of two persons (un égoïsme à deux). Does there not belong of itself to that composite being the firmness of a singular human being, so that it is dissolved only by death?

⁴ Ephesians 5:28, 29, 31.

Moreover, consider what the mutual handing over of bodies has effected. Through it, it has come about that each person lost something of his own person and at the same time acquired something of the person of the other. This mutual handing over cannot be rendered void by a contrary restitution. This appears especially in the woman, who has irreparably lost her integrity through carnal intercourse. But it is also true in the man: he too cannot recover that which he communicated to the other. Nor can there be a valid renunciation or abdication here, since the matter concerns a part of a human person, but man does not possess that complete ownership of the person or of a bodily part of the person which would be required for alienation. Therefore, as long as that which one spouse acquired belongs to a living person, whose body must remain inviolate, that spouse cannot, as it were, transfer it together with himself or herself to another spouse. Only after death, when the soul has put aside the body, can this be done without injury to another ⁵.

⁵ It is useful to hear Kant himself concerning this matter. In sexual intercourse, since one uses the members and faculties of the other, a person hands himself or herself over as though a thing. But this is opposed to the inviolable possession of one's own person, unless one recovers from the person of the other that which the other yields from his or her own person, and thus, as it were, reintegrates one's own person. But this is not obtained except by matrimony, in which mutual possession of the body is handed over for life. (Rechtslehre, Das Eherecht.)

Therefore, considering nature alone, it is now established that matrimony, at least after offspring has been conceived, indeed already after the unity has been completed or consummated through the perfect use of marriage, has been withdrawn from the will of the spouses, so that it is intrinsically indissoluble.

Indeed, it seems that a marriage of this kind cannot be dissolved by any human authority. For this dissolution is opposed to the necessary relations between parents and children, and contains a certain partial disposition of the human person: but no human power can break or directly impede the necessary relations of persons, nor can it dispose directly of the human person.

106. - But before the marriage has been consummated, or before both spouses have been made one flesh, can it be dissolved by mutual consent? Speaking not of the sacrament of matrimony but of that which is a mere contract, it seems to us that an indissolubility which takes its beginning from consent itself can be demonstrated with difficulty by natural reason alone. For until the spouses have been made one flesh, you would say that nothing irreparable has been done; a perfect restitution of the bodies remains possible. Thus, in a related argument, the material element of virginity is lost irreparably through the completed carnal act; but the formal element, or the purpose of virginity, if it has been revoked, even sinfully, can be restored by a new purpose according to the doctrine of St. Thomas. Compare below, no. 142, where virginity is treated.

Indeed, concerning the marriage of Christians itself it was long doubted in the Church whether, before copulation, it was perfect and indissoluble. And the Bolognese school, with Gratian (in Cause XVII, q. 2) and Master Roland (who afterwards became Alexander III), against the Parisian school defended the so-called "copula theory," according to which, before consummation, matrimony was neither a sacrament nor indissoluble. Freisen at one time favored this theory even in our own days ⁶. The fruit of the controversy was that the dissolution of a ratified and non-consummated marriage, both through solemn religious profession and through a dispensation granted by the Apostolic See for a just cause, became certain doctrine of the Church, confirmed by canon 1119 of the Code itself. This matter is treated in the Summa of St. Thomas, Supplementum, III, q. 42, art. 4.

⁶ In the first edition of his Historia Iuris Matrimonialis, written in German. Compare De Smet, De sponsalibus, etc., no. 98.

107. - The intervention of public power. Among all nations it has been perceived how great an importance the conjugal union has for the common good in human society, so that everywhere there exist written laws or customs concerning the right contracting of matrimony. Rightly and deservedly, therefore, the competent public authority claims for itself no small part in the ordering of this institution. Matrimony cannot, therefore, be regarded as a merely private covenant of two persons. Compare Ribbing, op. cit.

108. - The religious nature of matrimony. We have not yet considered the matter adequately. How great an office they exercise, with how great dignity do those persons seem to be increased who give a new rational creature to the world! Yet the spouses could not effect this unless, while they use the powers received from God and form the body, God should create and infuse the spiritual soul. Therefore, a properly divine action inserts itself into the human action, concurs in a special manner with it, and cooperates with it. Shall we call profane this production which is mingled with divine and human cooperation? Shall we call profane the very institution in which alone human beings are generated legitimately? Do we not rather all perceive that there is something mysterious and sacred in the sexual union of human beings? "Both the monuments of antiquity and the morals and institutions of those peoples who had advanced further toward civilization and had excelled in a more exquisite knowledge of law and equity testify," says Leo XIII; "it is established that it had been formed and anticipated in the minds of all of them that, when they thought about matrimony, the form of a thing joined with religion and sanctity occurred to them" ⁷.

⁷ Arcanum divinae sapientiae, February 10, 1880.

History also establishes that the protection of religion was needed so that matrimony might actually obtain its firmness and inviolability as required by the natural law itself.

What, therefore, will the competent public power be? It certainly belongs to the desires of nature that religious power assume the more important parts in governing matrimony, so that all the essentials of matrimony may be defined, declared, and sanctioned by sacred authority.

But where a social authority occupied with sacred matters is lacking, the public power itself will care for religious matters identically. I say identically, because then it manages this province not formally insofar as it is placed over civil matters, but insofar as, by reason of being more universal, it administers and provides for common matters.

Natural reason itself, therefore, shows all these marks to be present in matrimony.

Usefulness. It is something principal to know accurately what matrimony is, or that state on account of which the virtue of chastity can be said to exist, and in which alone the appetite that is ruled by chastity finds its legitimate satisfaction.

I. Ends of matrimony. 1. The sexual conjunction to which man is borne with such great force must have its lawful use. But it will have it in the state or condition in which, in the manner which human nature requires, provision is made for the birth of men, or for the multiplication of the human race: for this is the manifest end why the faculty of generating and the appetite itself exist. Moreover that state is matrimony. In it, by a moral and loving mingling of two persons, one principle not only of generation but also of long-lasting education and perpetual vigilance is prepared for offspring, if any is to be. This unity is strengthened by a perpetual bond which, by the persuasive unitive force of mutual love, has been freely contracted, and, for the baptized, is supernaturally consecrated by the sacrament itself. Nor, without that necessity of human offspring, would the perpetual and indissoluble firmness of matrimony be well explained; although love itself inclines toward a perpetual and complete donation or communication of itself.

Wherefore the very generation of offspring is demonstrated to be the primary end of the institution of matrimony, although this destination is less immediate and less manifest than when there is question of the sexual function itself.

This is corroborated by the oracles of ancient wisdom. St. Thomas proves this said by the Philosopher: "Male and female are joined in human beings not only on account of the necessity of generation, as in the other living beings, but also on account of domestic life, in which there are certain works of man and woman"¹. And this other definition: "Matrimony is the consortium of common life and the communication of divine and human law"². With this agrees the definition of Roman law: "The conjunction of man and woman, containing an undivided custom of life": concerning which definition interpreters observe this, that the end of generation is attached by no express words. Nor have there been lacking, in the earlier age, those who thought that a certain matrimony could take place between a man and a woman without the handing over of bodies for generative acts.

To the point Palmieri³: "Offspring is the primary end of matrimonial copulation, although not the only one, I concede. It is the end of the matrimonial bond itself, distinguish: immediate, I deny; mediate, I subdistinguish: it is the only end or essential to the essence of matrimony, I deny; it is some end, indeed also primary, I concede."

2. For indeed, through the satisfaction which it offers to insolent concupiscence, matrimony provides for the honorable life of both spouses. For this reason it is said to be as a remedy of concupiscence.

3. At the same time, on account of the proper qualities of each sex, both spouses mutually complete and perfect each other. Hence a third, secondary end of matrimony is added: mutual help.

These three ends can be called the ends of the work. The first end can be called generic, or of the genus, insofar as it is immediately related to the good of the species; the second and third ends are immediately individual or personal.

4. Love, by which persons are as it were mingled, the proper qualities and inclinations by which one sex completes the other, the necessity or usefulness of instituting offspring, which unity demands the powers of each parent, all these things impel spouses to live together in a stable and more universal manner. Hence a conjugal society is spontaneously entered, from which a domestic society flowers, so that both can be called most natural. Cultivated nations, especially of the West, obeying that invitation and impulse of nature, already before Christ was born understood that a certain more general friendship and communion of life pertained to the perfect nature of matrimony, and accommodated the civil regime to this. Since this domestic society prepares the way for political society, and increases it with very many goods, it adds to matrimony an end formally social.

¹ Summa theologica, 3 p. q. 41, art. 1, c.

² Ibid. q. 44, art. 3, 4°.

³ De matrimonio, thesis III.

II. Twofold nature. Therefore matrimony can be taken more strictly and more broadly. Matrimony strictly taken, in fieri, or as a contract, can be described: "A contract and sacrament among the baptized, by which a man and woman mutually and legitimately hand over their bodies to acts by which provision is made of itself for the multiplication of the human race." In facto esse, or as a state, matrimony designates the very conjunction or bond induced by the contract. Matrimony taken more widely is defined by Roman law: "The conjunction of man and woman, containing an undivided custom of life" (Inst. L. 1, t. 9).

— The order of relations, to be preserved between spouses, is adapted to the requirements of the primary end. And this observance of order also serves the second and third end wonderfully.

Nevertheless, in weighing the obligations of spouses, the broader nature by which matrimony is conceived among us, beyond the manner in which it always and everywhere ought to have existed, is not to be passed over.

1. The venereal appetite, which exists on account of the propagation of the human race, obtains its legitimate satisfaction in the state in which provision is made for the due birth of men, that is, in matrimony.

Therefore the primary end of matrimony, but not the immediate or only end, is the due propagation of the human race. There are added the end of calming concupiscence; of mutual help; and, especially among cultivated nations, the formally social end of constituting domestic society.

2. Matrimony accepted more strictly in fieri, or as a contract, and among the baptized as a sacrament, has as its object the handing over of bodies for acts by which provision is made of itself for the due propagation of the human race; in facto esse, or as a state, it denotes the bond induced by that contract, and which obtains a special firmness from the sacrament.

Taken more broadly, it is the conjunction of man and woman, containing an undivided custom of life (Inst. L. I, t. 9).

Relations between spouses must be required according to the primary end, with any contrariety excluded. In weighing mutual obligations, the broader nature of matrimony cannot be neglected.

I. Conjugal copulation is that which per se is apt for generation; for this three things are required: intromission into the female genital canal, effusion of semen within the female genital canal, retention of semen by the woman, so namely that it can be drawn into the uterus.¹ Hence he sins gravely who knowingly and willingly does not preserve one of these three things or voluntarily exposes himself to the proximate danger of this.

¹ The hypothesis which some have posited concerning a woman who would not be able to retain semen seems in no way to be attended to; for naturally it cannot happen that she reject all the semen once received.

Hence:

a. Although conception absolutely can occur without intromission, by pouring out semen at the mouth of the female genital canal, because it is not impossible for sperm to enter by its own vital motion and by the attraction of the uterus, nevertheless, because this is altogether rare and per accidens, it does not suffice for copulation such as nature instituted, nor is it an honorable mode of perfecting copulation even if it is done for a good end, for example to avoid the contagion of disease; rather, it is gravely illicit. For then in reality no copulation is present, but only two simultaneous pollutions.

b. Yet to effect slight intromission into the female genital canal suffices, although one acting thus can sin by affection, at least venially, if without proportionate cause he acts in this way, of which certainly the sole fear of procreating offspring is not one, as if someone wishes in this way to avoid conception or render it notably more difficult, and wishes to avoid the mode more apt for generation;² mortally, if he thinks and intends that generation is thus totally impeded.

² This at minimum must be concluded from the response of the Holy Office, November 23-December 1, 1922, approving the decree of the bishops of the Netherlands. The question concerned copulation, as they say, half-completed, which was considered by several confessors as an apt remedy to be proposed to onanists. Now the bishops of the Netherlands condemned that practice of confessors who advised or permitted inveterate onanists half-completed copulation so that they would no longer sin gravely; moreover, this was gravely scandalous and rather was apt to prepare the way to onanism. The bishops, however, sought the approval of the Holy Office, which gave the following response:

A proportionate cause, for example, is if the woman, recently from childbirth or infirm in the sexual parts, cannot suffer perfect coitus.

c. Nevertheless it would not suffice to effect slight intromission at the external pudendum and deposit semen between the lips, because thus it would be deposited only at the mouth, in no way in the female genital canal itself; and thus it would not be copulation.

d. Since intromission into the female genital canal is an essential condition altogether required, therefore he who certainly could not effect intromission and perfect the act in the due mode is in reality impotent. But if impotence is doubtful, a married person could attempt copulation in this way as long as there is some hope of intromission and of arriving at perfect copulation; otherwise, if there is no hope, because the mere possibility of generation does not suffice, but a probable possibility of copulation is required.

II. Every carnal copulation of itself apt for generation is also per se licit, provided it is instituted on account of a right end; hence it is necessary that on the part of the one acting the end be conformed to the end of the work.

But the one proper and principal end from the nature of the work is the generation of offspring, to which two secondary ends are joined, but merely subordinated in such a way that they are true means by which the principal end is more securely obtained: the enjoyment of pleasure or the calming of concupiscence, and mutual solace, or mutual love to be fostered and preserved.

Hence spouses can seek copulation either on account of the principal end, or also on account of a secondary end, but insofar as of itself it is subordinated to and serves the principal end.

Indeed copulation can also be exacted by either spouse, and indeed from justice, so that per se and generally the partner is bound to render it; wherefore it is called the conjugal debt, concerning which the Apostle speaks, I Cor. VII, 3-5. Hence for rendering copulation, the legitimate end is to render to the partner what is owed to him or her from justice; yet this end always supposes the primary end of the act itself or work, namely the generation of offspring.

III. Corollaries. From this the following conclusions follow:

1. He who exercises copulation sins if he positively excludes the primary end, and indeed gravely if he intends to impede it, or employs means for this.

2. Therefore he who, in perfecting copulation, intends only or chiefly a secondary end, for example pleasure, in such a way that the principal end is positively excluded or postponed, sins venially; for it is an inversion of order, namely the inordinate use of a licit thing. Compare proposition 9 condemned by Innocent XI.³

³ "The work of marriage exercised on account of pleasure alone is altogether without all fault and venial defect." Compare Saint Thomas, Supplement, q. 49, a. 5 and 6.

3. Yet he who explicitly intends a secondary end, for example the calming of concupiscence, and only abstracts from the primary end, acts licitly, because he implicitly intends the principal end toward which, from its nature, the act tends, which, the whole of what it is, exists only for generation.

4. Likewise he who intends to avoid incontinence in himself or in the consort: for he acts directly from a motive of virtue for preserving continence. On the contrary, he who seeks pleasure alone acts directly from love of pleasure. Nor does it stand in the way that the danger of incontinence implies defect of virtue and therefore sin: this defect is evil, but rather is presupposed to the copulation; yet, this defect standing, to provide an apt remedy to it by conjugal copulation rightly exercised is not evil but good.

5. Nor does he sin who, on account of poverty, infirm health, or another honorable end, by an inefficacious desire only wishes that offspring not be conceived, provided he uses no illegitimate means for impeding generation, nor positively excludes it in the act, and the act posited is apt for generation.

6. But he sins, and indeed mortally, who with an adulterous mind approaches his own spouse, thinking of another person as present, or desiring to have copulation with that person; not, however, he who, without depraved affection, while thinking of another person, adorns his own wife with the beauty of another so that he may excite himself to the conjugal act, although this is dangerous. In a similar mode one must speak for the wife thinking of another man or of his qualities or vigor.

7. The use of marriage is licit also for the sterile and the old, even if sterility is certain, provided they can perfect the act or have hope of perfecting it, because the act by its nature is ordered to generation, and if generation does not follow, this happens per accidens. Hence the Church blesses their marriages.

8. Likewise the conjugal act is licit even if it is foreseen that from fertilization the woman will suffer abortion or will bring forth dead offspring into the light, because such an effect occurs per accidens and can be permitted on account of some honorable end of the act itself.

1. • I. Definition.

a) The same name "matrimony" designates two things, connected indeed, since one is the cause of the other, but truly diverse. For it is necessary to distinguish matrimony in fieri and matrimony in facto esse, which differ from one another as a transitory action differs from the permanent effect which that action produces.

b) Matrimony in fieri is an entirely singular contract, and at least in some manner sacred,¹ by which a man and a woman legitimately hand over to each other the exclusive and perpetual right over the body, in order to acts of themselves apt for generation.

¹ Leo XIII, Arcanum, 10 February 1880.

Matrimony in facto esse is the perpetual bond produced from the matrimonial contract, which joins the man and the woman into one society of life for fulfilling conjugal offices.

c) Those definitions are valid for every matrimony. But our Savior has raised the matrimony of the baptized to the dignity of a sacrament of the New Law, so that it is unlawful to distinguish in Christian matrimony the contract and the sacrament as two things; rather, the contract itself is the sacrament.

2. • II. Essence of matrimony.

a) Although the mutual right to carnal union is the formal object of matrimonial consent, nevertheless the union itself as exercised does not in any way pertain to the essence of matrimony. For there was a true matrimony between Adam and Eve while they were still dwelling in Paradise; likewise there was a true matrimony of the Blessed Virgin Mary with St. Joseph; and nevertheless in neither case did carnal union intervene.

Moreover this is the perpetual and certain doctrine of the Fathers and Theologians.

b) The essence of matrimony in fieri consists in mutual consent outwardly manifested, by which a man and a woman mutually hand over and accept the mutual, exclusive, and perpetual right over the body, in order to acts of themselves apt for generation.

If such a right is not conferred, there is no matrimony, since that right is the formal object in the matrimonial contract.

c) The essence of matrimony in facto esse, or the matrimonial state, consists in the perpetual obligation of the spouses to render mutually to each other the offices which are owed from the legitimate matrimonial contract.

3. • III. Division of matrimony.

Matrimony can be distinguished in many ways:

a) Into legitimate, ratified, ratified and consummated.

That is called legitimate which is "matrimony validly celebrated between non-baptized persons" (can. 1015, § 3).

That is called ratified which is "a valid matrimony of baptized persons... if it has not yet been completed by consummation" (can. 1015, § 1).

"Ratified and consummated, if between the spouses there has taken place the conjugal act, to which by its nature the matrimonial contract is ordered and by which the spouses become one flesh" (ibid.).

b) Into public, secret, and clandestine.

It is public when it is celebrated in the face of the Church and in the form established by the Church, whether for the ordinary case or for extraordinary cases.

Secret matrimony, or matrimony of conscience, is indeed celebrated in the form prescribed by the Church, but is kept hidden, with the proclamations and registration in the parish books omitted.

627. Nominal definition. The ancient authors derive the name of matrimony from mater and munio, as though matrimonium were the same as matris munium, the duty of a mother, because a woman enters matrimony in order that she may become a mother. Now matrimony took its name from the mother, but not from the father, because the principal end of matrimony is offspring, whose generation imposes so many duties upon the mother; whence it is beautifully said: "To the mother an infant is burdensome before birth, painful in birth, and laborious after birth."³⁵ St. Thomas gives still other explanations of this name.³⁶ Besides the name of matrimony, other words are also employed to signify the same reality, namely:

a) Conjugium, because two spouses are bound, as it were, under one yoke.³⁷

b) Consortium, because two spouses have a common lot and condition.³⁸

c) Nuptiae or connubium, because according to the ancient rite (which among certain peoples is observed to this day), brides entering marriage covered themselves with a veil for the sake of modesty and subjection.³⁹ Yet nuptiae sometimes specially signified the solemnities and festivities joined to the matrimonial contract, or even conjugal intercourse itself.⁴⁰ Concina beautifully explains these diverse names.⁴¹

³⁵ c. 2, X 3, 33. Cf. Roman Catechism, p. 2, c. 8, q. 2.

³⁶ Suppl., q. 44, a. 2.

³⁷ Cf. Roman Catechism, loc. cit.

³⁸ l. 1, D. De ritu nuptiarum 22, 2.

³⁹ Cf. Roman Catechism, loc. cit.

⁴⁰ c. 4, X 4, 11.

⁴¹ De matrimonio, c. 1.

628. Real definition. Several authors, distinguishing two elements in marriage, namely, contract and sacrament, first give a definition of the contract and afterward add a definition of the sacrament of marriage. But because in the New Law Christ elevated the matrimonial contract itself of Christians to the dignity of a sacrament without changing the original nature of marriage, Leo XIII therefore defines that "in Christian marriage the contract is not separable from the sacrament, and consequently a true and legitimate contract cannot exist without being by that very fact a sacrament."⁴² Lugo already taught the same:⁴³ "Christ did not will to alter the conditions of that contract, but to elevate it as it was, so that whenever it was valid under the aspect of a contract, among the baptized it would also possess the character of a sacrament." Therefore it appears superfluous in Moral Theology to give one definition of the contract and another of the sacrament of marriage. Thus marriage can be described by one true classical definition:⁴⁴ the marital union of a man and a woman between legitimate persons, retaining an undivided manner of life. Among the baptized, a union of this kind, by the institution of Christ, is a true sacrament signifying and causing supernatural grace ex opere operato; among the non-baptized, however, such a union is indeed not a sacrament, but nevertheless, "since it has God as its author and was even from the beginning a certain foreshadowing of the Incarnation of the Word of God, there is therefore in it something sacred and religious, not adventitious but innate, not received from men but implanted by nature, ... and it is sacred by its own force, its own nature, and of its own accord."⁴⁵

⁴² Encyclical Arcanum, February 10, 1880. Similar things follow from the propositions condemned in the Syllabus of Pius IX, prop. 66: "The sacrament of marriage is nothing but something accessory to the contract and separable from it"; prop. 73: "By force of a merely civil contract there can exist among Christians a marriage in the true sense, and it is false either that the contract of marriage between Christians is always a sacrament, or that the contract is null if the sacrament is excluded" (Denz., nn. 1766, 1773). The Code of Canon Law, c. 1012, asserts the same.

⁴³ De iure et iustitia, disp. 32, n. 392.

⁴⁴ This definition is deservedly called classical, for it is taken almost word for word from Roman law (Inst., l. 1, c. 9); from St. Augustine in Gratian (c. 3, C. 27, q. 2); from Gregory IX (c. 2, X 3, 33); from several Scholastics of the thirteenth century, among whom St. Thomas is eminent (Suppl., q. 44, a. 3); from the Roman Catechism, p. 2, c. 8, q. 3.

⁴⁵ Encyclical Arcanum.

629. The definition is explained. It is called 1. a union, which word, if taken actively, that is, for the transient act itself of internal and external consent by which a man and a woman promise conjugal fidelity to each other, is marriage in fieri; but if it is taken as though passively, that is, for the effect produced or for the state of life arisen from the aforesaid manifested consent, it signifies marriage in facto esse, namely, the bond of marriage. Christian marriage in fieri has the character of a sacrament, but not marriage in facto esse.⁴⁶

It is called 2. marital, in order that the proper end of that union be signified. For a man and a woman are joined to lead a legitimate marital life, but not for the sake of lust, friendship, secular business, etc. The secondary ends of those marrying will be discussed below.

It is called 3. of a man and a woman, but not of men and women, in order that monogamy be signified and both polygamy and polyandry be excluded.

It is called 4. between legitimate persons, in order to express that certain persons impeded by law (natural or positive) cannot enter a valid or licit marriage, or that impediments of marriage exist.

It is called 5. retaining an undivided manner of life, in order that the indissolubility of marriage be indicated. Certain ancient Glossators (for example, Roland, Bernard of Pavia, and Tancred)⁴⁷ understood under this undivided manner or society of life, less correctly, carnal intercourse itself, although it can truly be said that this society includes a mutual right, and one that is exclusive and of itself perpetual, to the body of the other spouse in order to the generation of offspring.

By this undivided manner or society of life there are further demanded (but only as integral parts) the following three things:

a) community of domestic life, that is, of dwelling, bed, and table;

b) union of souls through charity and a common purpose in acting;

c) at least some community of temporal goods.

These will be treated more fully below.

⁴⁶ Cf. Billuart, De matrimonio, diss. 1, a. 1.

⁴⁷ Cf. Freisen, Geschichte des kanonischen Eherechtes, § 3.

684. "A threefold good of matrimony is assigned: The first is offspring to be received and educated for the worship of God. The second is fidelity, which one spouse ought to preserve toward the other. The third is the indivisibility of matrimony, because it signifies the indivisible conjunction of Christ and the Church." Thus the Council of Florence in the Decree for the Armenians;³⁵³ all of which is taken almost word for word from St. Thomas.³⁵⁴ This enumeration of the threefold matrimonial good seems first to have been employed by St. Augustine, who says: "Therefore the whole good of nuptials ... is offspring, fidelity, sacrament,"³⁵⁵ and after him by very many canonists and theologians. The Roman Catechism, however, admonishes:³⁵⁶ "The faithful are to be taught that there are three goods of matrimony: offspring, fidelity, sacrament; by the compensation of these, those inconveniences which the Apostle indicates in these words, 'Nevertheless, such shall have tribulation of the flesh,'³⁵⁷ are alleviated, and it is brought about that bodily unions which outside matrimony would deservedly be condemned are joined with honorableness." - These three goods must indeed be present in every matrimony, and therefore also in the legitimate matrimony of unbelievers. Yet they are present in a much more perfect manner in the matrimony of Christians, to which they are so intimately joined that without them Christian matrimony is altogether unable to subsist.³⁵⁸

³⁵³ Denz., n. 702.

³⁵⁴ Contra Gent., l. 4, c. 78.

³⁵⁵ Found in c. 10, C. 28, q. 2; cf. also De Gen. ad litt., l. 9, c. 7.

³⁵⁶ P. 1, c. 8, q. 21.

³⁵⁷ 1 Cor. 7:28.

³⁵⁸ Cf. St. Thomas, Suppl., q. 49, a. 2, ad 2; Gihr, Sakramentenlehre, § 56.

685. Note. Every action which gravely harms even one of these goods is a mortal sin.

The Angelic Doctor discusses these matrimonial goods most excellently throughout question 49 of the Supplement, where he also proves how fittingly these goods were joined to matrimony by God. The argument can be briefly summarized in this manner: No wise man sustains any loss unless he receives compensation in some equal or better good. But in matrimony several losses and several harms and inconveniences occur. Therefore....

The first harm which occurs is lust, and from it there results a detriment to the use of reason. For experience establishes that lust is not lulled by carnal acts, but rather is increased and becomes as it were a second nature. Likewise, it is established that reason is blunted by lust, and this to such a degree that during the lustful act itself the use of reason is not rarely lost entirely. To compensate for these harms, the good of offspring was conferred upon matrimony by the Creator. Through the generation of children the human race is propagated and God is perpetually worshiped. Hence St. Paul says: "She [the woman] shall be saved through childbearing."³⁵⁹

The second harm is the troublesome solicitude of pleasing the other spouse and providing for the affairs of the family; and, especially for the woman, the burdens of childbirth. This harm is compensated by the good of fidelity, by which one spouse is bound to render the conjugal debt to the other and cannot be joined to another person. Hence the Apostle Paul says: "The woman hath not power of her own body, but the man. And in like manner the man also hath not power of his own body, but the woman."³⁶⁰

The third harm is a certain perpetual servitude by which the husband is obligated to the wife and the wife to the husband. This harm is compensated by the good of the sacrament, that is, by the indissoluble bond by which the spouses represent the salutary conjunction of Christ with the Church and are bound to love one another as Christ loved the Church. - Now the individual goods must be treated individually.

³⁵⁹ 1 Tim. 2:15.

³⁶⁰ 1 Cor. 7:4.

686. 1. The good of offspring is the proximate end of matrimony; hence matrimony is null from the beginning if the right to the generation of offspring is excluded by those contracting, or even if carnal intercourse is indeed exercised, but with an explicit stipulation that the generation of offspring be avoided. The good of offspring is indeed a great good for the spouses, since children begotten are the glory and crown of their parents, but it also imposes grave obligations upon them, the transgression of which can easily become a mortal sin. St. Augustine³⁶¹ beautifully comprises these obligations in this one phrase: "That [the offspring] may be lovingly received, kindly nourished, religiously educated." The Code of Canon Law, c. 1113, gravely establishes: "Parents are bound by a most grave obligation to care according to their means for the religious and moral, as well as the physical and civil, education of the offspring, and also to provide for their temporal good." Therefore obligations of this kind are fittingly divided into a) those with respect to the body and b) those with respect to the soul.

a) With respect to the body, the good of offspring demands that, from the beginning of conception, parents not only avoid all things which are gravely harmful to the offspring, but also procure good physical education and nourishment.

Cf. those things which were said more extensively concerning this matter above, II, n. 588. - Both in the Decree of Gratian³⁶² and in the Roman Ritual,³⁶³ parents are gravely admonished not to place the infant with themselves in bed, because of the great danger of suffocation. The transgression of this law is a reserved sin in some dioceses.

b) With respect to the soul, or with respect to spiritual good, parents are bound first of all to take care that the offspring born is freed from original sin as soon as possible by the laver of baptism. Hence parents sin if, without a most urgent cause, they delay the baptism of the offspring excessively.³⁶⁴ The greatest sin against both the bodily and the spiritual good of conceived offspring is directly willed abortion, since together with bodily life it removes the possibility of baptism and consequently also of eternal life.³⁶⁵ Good religious and moral education, concerning which there was discussion above, II, n. 589, also pertains to the spiritual good of the offspring.

³⁶¹ De Gen. ad litt., l. 9, c. 7.

³⁶² C. 2, C. 2, q. 1.

³⁶³ Tit. 2, c. 2, n. 32.

³⁶⁴ Cf. above in the treatise on baptism, n. 126.

³⁶⁵ Cf. the penalties against those procuring abortion above, II, n. 142.

687. 2. The good of fidelity includes two things: the conjugal debt and conjugal fidelity. There will be a special discussion of the conjugal debt in the following chapter. Conjugal fidelity is a great good of matrimony, and the more holily it is preserved, the greater the happiness which customarily exists between spouses. The violation of conjugal fidelity, however, which is committed through adultery and all acts connected with it, is a grave sin of injustice. In the Old Testament adulterers were punished with the penalty of death: "If any man sleep with the wife of another, let them both die, to wit, the adulterer and the adulteress: and thou shalt take away the evil out of Israel."³⁶⁶ In the New Testament, however, it is said: "Neither adulterers ... shall possess the kingdom of God."³⁶⁷ Even if the husband has given consent for the wife to have intercourse with another man, nevertheless this act is true adultery, as is evident from proposition 50 condemned by Innocent XI, already cited above, II, n. 703. The reason is that the husband cannot alienate his right over the wife, since matrimony requires this fidelity of spouses by both divine and natural law. For just as a man does not have free and perfect dominion over the members of his own body - he cannot, for example, licitly cut off a healthy member from himself - so, by parity, the husband does not have free dominion over his wife and cannot cede her to another.

Christ Himself most strongly inculcates fidelity upon spouses, deterring them not only from evil external acts, but also from an evil internal desire: "You have heard that it was said to them of old: Thou shalt not commit adultery. But I say to you, that whosoever shall look on a woman to lust after her, hath already committed adultery with her in his heart."³⁶⁸

There are authors, for example, Sanchez,³⁶⁹ the Salamancans,³⁷⁰ and St. Alphonsus,³⁷¹ who teach that not only adultery properly so called is against conjugal fidelity, but also sodomy with one's own wife, so that spouses perpetrating sodomy with one another commit true adultery, because in sodomy neither spouse preserves his or her body chastely for the other. Whatever may be said of this opinion, a sodomitical spouse must say in confession whether the sin was committed with his or her own spouse or with another person; because otherwise the confessor cannot render a correct judgment.

³⁶⁶ Deut. 22:22.

³⁶⁷ 1 Cor. 6:9.

³⁶⁸ Matt. 5:27 f.

³⁶⁹ De matrim. sacr., l. 9, disp. 18, n. 4.

³⁷⁰ Theol. mor., tr. 26, c. 5, n. 15.

³⁷¹ Theol. mor., l. 3, n. 446.

688. Scholion. On conjugal jealousy. It will not be beside the point to say a few words about conjugal jealousy,³⁷² which was called by the ancients "the solicitude and suspicion of one who loves," and which not only opposes the good of fidelity, but is also accustomed to cause enormous harms and dire quarrels in conjugal life. This conjugal jealousy can indeed arise without any fault and become, as it were, a "fixed idea." A jealous spouse (who is often of a melancholic temperament) suspects everywhere and in all the actions of the other spouse, if not complete infidelity, nevertheless signs of diminished love toward himself or herself and undue love toward another person. Sometimes, however, conjugal jealousy arises from the fault of the other spouse, who neglects his or her consort and is in fact excessively affected toward another person. If conjugal jealousy is not immediately extinguished and opposed with all one's strength, the life of both spouses becomes truly intolerable; indeed, not rarely homicide or suicide follows from it. The best remedy against conjugal jealousy is a candid and open manner of speaking and acting always employed between spouses, without any circumlocutions and secrets. As a rule it is to be counseled: Neither spouse should conceal anything from the other spouse in his or her private life (the matter is otherwise with professional life, as they say, or with a secret entrusted to one).³⁷³

³⁷² German Eifersucht, French jalousie, English jealousy.

³⁷³ Cf. Rive, Die Ehe, 364.

689. 3. The good of the sacrament is both the sacramental grace of Christian matrimony and especially the indissoluble bond, which indeed is stricter in Christian matrimony than in the matrimony of pagans. For if Christian matrimony signifies the conjunction of Christ with the Church, which is indelible, since Christ will never separate Himself from the Church, it is also necessary that the bond of conjunction between Christian spouses can never be broken. But so that this holy society may more easily be preserved without complaint, the duties of the husband and wife described by St. Paul³⁷⁴ and by the prince of the apostles, St. Peter,³⁷⁵ are to be kept before one's eyes:

Duties of the husband. The office of the husband is to treat his wife generously and honorably. In this matter it is necessary to remember that Eve was called a companion by Adam, who said: "The woman whom thou gavest me to be my companion."³⁷⁶ For this reason certain Fathers teach that Eve was formed not from the feet, but from the side of the man; just as she was also not fashioned from the head of Adam, so that she might understand that she was not the mistress of the man, but rather subject to him. Moreover, it becomes the man always to be occupied in the pursuit of some honorable matter, both that he may supply those things which are necessary for sustaining the family and that he may not languish in inactive idleness, from which almost all vices take their beginning; and then rightly to order the family, to correct the morals of all his subjects, and to keep each one in his duty.

The duties of the wife are clearly enumerated by the prince of the apostles, who says: "Let wives be subject to their husbands: that if any believe not the word, they may be won without the word by the conversation of the wives, considering your chaste conversation with fear. Whose adorning let it not be the outward plaiting of the hair, or the wearing of gold, or the putting on of apparel; but the hidden man of the heart in the incorruptibility of a quiet and modest spirit, which is rich in the sight of God. For after this manner heretofore the holy women also, who trusted in God, adorned themselves, being in subjection to their own husbands. As Sara obeyed Abraham, calling him lord: whose daughters you are, doing well, and not fearing any disturbance."³⁷⁷ Let their principal endeavor also be to educate the children in the worship of religion and the exercise of good morals and diligently to care for domestic affairs. Let them willingly keep themselves at home unless necessity compels them to go out, and let them never dare to do this without at least the implicit permission of the husband. Then, in that in which the marital conjunction principally consists, let them always remember that after God no one is to be loved more than the husband, and no one is to be esteemed more highly than he, to whom it is also necessary to accommodate themselves and submit with the greatest alacrity of spirit in all matters which are not opposed to Christian piety.³⁷⁸

The good of the sacrament not only prohibits the dissolution of matrimony as regards the bond, but also separation as regards bed and dwelling, unless, however, there are causes enumerated above, n. 679 ff.

³⁷⁴ Eph. 5:22; Col. 3:18; 1 Tim. 5:14.

³⁷⁵ 1 Pet. 3:1 ff.

³⁷⁶ Gen. 3:12.

³⁷⁷ 1 Pet. 3:1 ff.

³⁷⁸ Roman Catechism, P. 1, c. 8, q. 23.

1974. Matrimony, "that it might respond more aptly to the most wise counsels of God, either from the beginning bore before itself chiefly two properties, and these especially noble, as though deeply impressed and engraved, namely unity and perpetuity."⁴ Concerning these two properties one must now treat.

The UNITY of matrimony, which is also called monogamy, is situated in the conjunction of one man with one woman. To unity is opposed polygamy, which is twofold: 1. simultaneous, when one man joins several wives to himself in matrimony at the same time, and this is called simply polygamy; or when one woman marries several men at the same time, and it is commonly called polyandry or polyviry; 2. successive, when after the death of the spouse, the surviving party hastens to new nuptials.

1975. Principles. I. SIMULTANEOUS POLYANDRY is prohibited, by the consent of all, by the NATURAL law itself. - For it is directly opposed to the generation and education of offspring: to generation indeed, since a woman knowing several men at the same time generally remains barren; but to education, since the father of such offspring, if perhaps it is born, is uncertain. And hence it is that prostitution, to which polyandry is reduced, has at every time been held as infamous and flagitious.⁵

1976. II. SIMULTANEOUS POLYGAMY is prohibited in the New Law by DIVINE right. - For Christ expressly taught: "Whoever shall have put away his wife and married another, commits adultery against her" (Mark 10:11). But now, if he is an adulterer who, having put away his wife, marries another, much more will he be an adulterer who does this while retaining the former. Hence Trent (sess. 24, can. 2): "If anyone shall have said that it is licit for Christians to have several wives at the same time, and that this is prohibited by no divine law: let him be anathema." - Wherefore, if some infidel, having several wives, is admitted to Baptism, he must retain only one, namely her whom he validly joined to himself in the first place, or any one of the others who is willing to embrace the Christian faith; unless the Pope has otherwise determined or permitted, according to what is to be said n. 1980.⁶

As regards the natural law, Theologians, led by St. Thomas,⁷ hold that polygamy is not contrary to the primary end of matrimony; and therefore that it is not intrinsically evil, nor absolutely prohibited by the precepts of nature; yet that it is opposed to the secondary ends of marriage, of which sort are peace, tranquility, mutual services, etc.; and therefore that it is contrary to the secondary law of nature, in which God alone can dispense. And indeed, after the flood, for just causes, moderate polygamy was granted to the Patriarchs and to the Israelite people. Indeed the more common opinion teaches that the same dispensation was extended to the Gentiles. But from the beginning it was not so (Matt. 19:8); and Christ the Lord restored the law of matrimony, whether for Christians or for Gentiles, to its primeval integrity.

1977. III. SUCCESSIVE polygamy has never been prohibited; and therefore second and later nuptials are LICIT, both for the man and for the woman, even under the evangelical law. - This is clear from the authority and practice of the Church, and also from the words of Paul the Apostle (1 Cor. 7:39): "The woman is bound by the law as long as her husband lives; but if her husband sleeps, she is freed; let her marry whom she will, only in the Lord." Recalling these words, Eugene IV in the decree for the Jacobites declared: "not only second, but third and fourth and further nuptials, if some impediment does not stand in the way, can be contracted licitly."

Nevertheless, the Church of God has always followed widowhood with special honor, nor has she ever held second nuptials as honorable as first nuptials, since the union of Christ with the one Church is represented less perfectly through them (cf. n. 1937).

Note. From the modern Codes, a WIDOW cannot enter matrimony unless ten months have elapsed from the death of the prior husband, or she has given birth: nevertheless this prohibition does not have the force of invalidating civil matrimony.⁸

1978. The INDISSOLUBILITY of matrimony is one thing as regards the bond, another as regards bed and cohabitation. The former belongs to the essence of matrimony, the latter to the offices of spouses. Here only the former must be treated.

Principles. I. Matrimony duly entered into is so indissoluble that it can NEVER be DISSOLVED through divorce as regards the bond. It is of faith from Trent (sess. 24, can. 5 and 7). For "the perpetual and indissoluble bond of matrimony the first parent of the human race, by the instinct of the divine Spirit, pronounced, when he said: This now is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh: wherefore a man shall leave his father and mother, and shall adhere to his wife, and they shall be two in one flesh."⁹ But the "firmness" of this bond, "pronounced by Adam so long before, Christ the Lord confirmed by these words: What therefore God has joined, let not man separate."¹⁰

To the Hebrews indeed, by divine dispensation, the faculty of a bill of repudiation was made, by which the bond of matrimony, in certain circumstances, could be dissolved (Deut. c. 24); but "Jesus Christ restored it to its primeval state, namely to indissolubility, not by establishing a new law, but only by removing the old indulgence, or dispensation conceded over the aforesaid indissolubility."¹¹

But this indissolubility arises from NATURAL LAW itself, at least secondary, because it is necessary for the education of offspring that parents perpetually devote themselves to its good. Thus most commonly the Authors, led by St. Thomas.¹² It is also clear from condemned proposition 67 of the Syllabus: "By the law of nature the bond of matrimony is not indissoluble, and in various cases divorce properly so called can be sanctioned by civil authority." - Hence, "what a mass of evil DIVORCES contain in themselves, it scarcely needs to be said. For by reason of them marital covenants are made changeable, mutual benevolence is weakened, pernicious incentives are supplied to infidelity; harm is done to the protection and instruction of children; occasion is furnished for tearing apart domestic societies; seeds of discords among families are scattered; the dignity of women is diminished and depressed, who come into danger lest, after they have served the lust of men, they be held as abandoned."¹³

But, although matrimony of itself is indissoluble, nevertheless in certain cases it admits dissolution of the bond; wherefore diverse degrees of indissolubility can be distinguished, as will be clear from what is soon to be said.

1979. II. Matrimony of the faithful RATIFIED and CONSUMMATED can never by any reason be dissolved as regards the bond, except THROUGH THE DEATH of either spouse. - Concerning this especially that word of the Apostle avails: "The woman is bound by the law as long as her husband lives." And Our Most Holy Lord Pope LEO XIII defined: "To dissolve the bond of marriage between Christians ratified and consummated is in the power of no one."¹⁴ The practice of the Church is added, which has never dispensed in matrimony of this sort.

1980. III. Legitimate matrimony of INFIDELS, even if it has been consummated, CAN BE DISSOLVED as regards the bond, in the case which they call that of the Apostle: namely if, with one spouse converted to the faith, the other refuses to be converted, or at least does not wish to cohabit without contumely of the Creator. - It is a privilege conceded by Christ the Lord in favor of the faith, as is clear from the testimony of Paul saying: "But if the infidel departs, let him depart; for the brother or sister is not subject to servitude in such cases" (1 Cor. 7:15).

Various things on this point occur to be OBSERVED:

1. From a threefold cause the convert can pass to other nuptials: 1) if the infidel refuses to dwell with him; 2) if he wishes to dwell, but not except with injury of the Creator, e.g. by retaining concubines;¹⁵ 3) if he wishes to draw him into mortal sin.¹⁶ But the convert can enjoy this privilege, even if the infidel spouse consented to cohabit peacefully for some time, indeed for many years, and afterward, with will changed, no longer wishes to do this. Thus from the Decree of the Holy Office, 5 Aug. 1759.¹⁷

2. The convert to the faith cannot use the aforesaid privilege unless there precedes an interpellation of the infidel spouse, whether he wishes to be converted to the faith, or at least to cohabit without contumely of the Creator.¹⁸ - This twofold interpellation, which must be made after Baptism, is required not only that new nuptials can be entered into licitly, but also validly: thus from the declaration of the S. C. de Propaganda Fide, 5 March 1816.¹⁹ But if interpellation is impossible or of the greatest difficulty, the Supreme Pontiff customarily grants an Indult, so that, it having been omitted, the convert can contract a new matrimony.²⁰ But indults of this sort, conceded either for various infidel regions or to Apostolic Vicars for a certain number of cases, cannot be extended to other regions or to other cases, unless recourse has been made to the Holy See.²¹ The Church then dispenses from the rigor of the interpellation, so that the convert is bound only to interpellate the infidel spouse whether he wishes to be converted to the faith; the other being omitted, namely whether at least he wishes to cohabit peacefully.²² This dispensation is more easily conceded in those places where a law prevails forbidding the faithful to cohabit with infidels, since then there is given a presumption of law concerning the danger of perversion to be undergone (cf. n. 448).

3. The bond of marriage is dissolved only then when the convert contracts a new matrimony. This is clear from the Decree of the Holy Office, 5 Aug. 1759.²³ Hence 1) if the infidel, after hearing the interpellation and giving a negative response, afterward embraces the faith before the other converted spouse has contracted new nuptials, the matrimony can no longer be dissolved by force of the Pauline privilege, but becomes altogether ratified. 2) If the first convert meanwhile has received sacred Orders, he cannot return to the spouse now converted, because the use of matrimony is no longer licit to him; for, after the negative response was received, he used his right by choosing a new state. But neither can the second convert enter a new marriage, because the first matrimony endures: unless the spouse has emitted solemn vows, as will be said below (n. 1981).

IT IS ASKED. Whether the Supreme Pontiff CAN DISPENSE over matrimony entered in infidelity, when ONE PARTY or BOTH are converted to the faith?

Resp. Dist. 1. If the matrimony after the Baptism of both has been consummated, it has become altogether indissoluble, and therefore a dispensation cannot be given.

2. If the matrimony has never been consummated, the Pope can dispense, as in ratified matrimony of Christians, concerning which we shall speak soon. - 3. If the matrimony was consummated only in infidelity, it is disputed. Some, among whom is St. Alphonsus,¹ whom we follow, affirm it, and they seek the reason from the Constitution Romani Pontificis issued by St. Pius V,² and from the Constitution Quoniam saepe contingit of Gregory XIII;³ through which Constitutions the aforesaid Pontiffs are said to have dispensed over such a matrimony.⁴ Others, however, deny it, from the fact that they judge the said Constitutions must be understood of dispensation from interpellation to be made, but not from the bond of marriage.⁵

Note. Only the baptized can enjoy the Pauline privilege, but not catechumens.⁶ Nor can that faithful person enjoy it who, after obtaining pontifical dispensation over the impediment of disparity of cult, contracted matrimony with an infidel, even if this one does not wish to cohabit peacefully. S. C. Off., 4 July 1855.⁷ But whether the privilege is to be extended to those who, by receiving Baptism validly, pass to some Christian sect, but not to the Catholic Church, is freely disputed.

1981. IV. Matrimony RATIFIED, but NOT CONSUMMATED, is dissolved by the very fact THROUGH SOLEMN PROFESSION of Religion by either spouse. - It is of faith from Trent (sess. 24, can. 6), affirming that this privilege was conceded by Christ the Lord in favor of the Religious State. Nevertheless Profession would be illicit "if matrimony were necessary for legitimating offspring, or for repairing scandal or the honor of the bride; for then the man could not become a Religious by leaving the bride, who on account of infamy would no longer be able to enter nuptials."⁸

But that the spouses may be able to use the aforesaid privilege, there is conceded to them a two-month period from the celebration of matrimony, within which time they are not bound to render the conjugal debt. And indeed each spouse can enjoy this concession, although he does not have the mind of entering Religion: for he uses his own right. But if, after the two-month period has already passed and the matrimony has not been consummated, one, with the other contradicting, embraces the religious state and emits vows: his profession is indeed illicit, but not invalid; wherefore in this case also the bond of matrimony is dissolved. - Nevertheless he would sin who, the counterpart not having been forewarned, should enter matrimony wishing to enter Religion; for besides other inconveniences which can most easily arise from such a manner of acting, the abandoned spouse would be bound to wait for his solemn profession until she should again enjoy the liberty of marrying.⁹

For the rest, this case is very rare, especially because civil laws, in many places, impede spouses from having recourse to the use of the privilege.

1982. V. Matrimony RATIFIED, but NOT CONSUMMATED, can, on account of a most grave cause, be dissolved through Pontifical DISPENSATION. - Thus commonly today Theologians and Canonists. This is clear especially from the continued practice of several centuries, at least after Martin V;¹⁰ nor in our times are examples of a dispensation of this sort rare.¹¹

The Supreme Pontiff remits the cause for dispensing to the S. Congregation of the Council to be weighed; and for the most part a cause is judged to be present, if the matrimony is likely invalid, without however its nullity being able to be sufficiently proved, and if otherwise it is plainly established that it was not consummated.¹²

1549. - The unity of Matrimony is placed in this, that Matrimony is the conjunction of one man with one woman.

1° It is certain that polyandry conflicts with the natural law, because it is adverse to the principal ends of Matrimony, namely the generation of offspring and its good education. - Thus all.

2° It is certain that simultaneous polygamy is prohibited and void in every case, at least by the positive divine law of the new law, as is clear from Luke¹: Everyone who dismisses his wife and marries another commits adultery. It is likewise clear from Trent.²

3° It is certain that second nuptials and further ones are licit both for the man and for the woman, even under the Evangelical law. This is clear from the authority and practice of the Church, and also from Sacred Scripture³: A woman is bound to the law for so long a time as her husband lives; but if her husband shall have fallen asleep, she is freed: let her marry whom she wishes, only in the Lord.

A twofold firmness of Matrimony is distinguished: for one regards the bond, the other the bed.

1550. - Matrimony is indissoluble, i.e. once Matrimony has been contracted, divorce as regards the bond cannot be made, at least by positive divine law. It is of faith. It is proved: 1° from the words of Christ⁴: Therefore now they are not two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined, let not man separate. 2° From the words of the divine Paul⁵: But to those who are joined in Matrimony I command, not I, but the Lord, that the wife not depart from the husband; but if she departs, that she remain unmarried, or be reconciled to her husband. And let not the man dismiss his wife. 3° From Trent.¹ Cf. n. 456. 9°, and n. 1053. q. 2°.

1551. - Nevertheless a threefold case is to be excepted; for:

1° Ratified and non-consummated Matrimony of Christians can be dissolved, for a most grave cause, by dispensation of the Pope, from power divinely conceded to him. This is clear from this, that the Supreme Pontiffs have already very many times used this power, as can be seen in the illustrious Feije.² Nevertheless dispensation is not granted unless full proof is exhibited to the Holy See that the Matrimony has not been consummated, and sufficient causes are alleged. - The Acta³ hand down what particular causes today are held sufficient. But the consent of the other party is not needed. - Non-consummation is to be proved judicially, yet only summarily. On this matter the Collectanea juris missionis⁴ will usefully be consulted.

2° Ratified and non-consummated Matrimony of the faithful can be dissolved by solemn religious profession⁵ of one spouse entering Religion within the first two months, and this from a special privilege conceded by Christ and declared by the Church.⁶ Cf. also the things to be said in this number under 3°. 9.

I said: within the first two months. Namely, that the spouses may deliberate concerning the use of this privilege, the two months after the nuptials are conceded to them by the Law itself⁷ (it can be prolonged by the judge, the cause being known), during which time they are not obliged to render the debt, provided nevertheless that Matrimony perhaps is not necessary for repairing scandal or the honor of the bride.⁸ - Fornication had between the betrothed persons before the celebration of Matrimony does not impede this privilege, if nothing else obstructs. - Nevertheless he sins in kind who contracts Matrimony with the intention of entering Religion, without warning the other party.⁹

See several other things pertaining here, if you like, in the illustrious Feije.

3° Even consummated Matrimony of infidels¹ can be dissolved from divine concession when one of the spouses is converted to the Christian Faith² through the reception of Baptism, and the other, having been interrogated, refuses peacefully to cohabit with that one, or does not cohabit except with injury of the Creator and contempt of the Christian Religion, or applies an attempt to pervert the faithful party. This is deduced from the Declaration of Innocent III.³ But this divine concession is drawn from the words of the Apostle⁴: If any brother has an unbelieving wife, and she consents to dwell with him, let him not dismiss her; ... but if the unbeliever departs, let him depart; for a brother or sister is not subject to servitude in such things: but God has called us in peace.

Many decrees and decisions⁵ of the Supreme Pontiffs and of the Sacred Congregations exist on this matter. From these with the theologians we conclude:

1. (a) When, after true Matrimony entered in the infidelity of each party, one party or each is converted and baptized, the Matrimony remains valid, and there is no need of new consent. - (b) If there was not a true Matrimony between them, the converted person can enter Matrimony either with that same person, but first baptized and (as regards liceity) Catholic, or with any other baptized and Catholic person, with mutual consent first offered and with those things observed which elsewhere we shall set forth concerning clandestinity.

2. If an infidel has several women, or respectively men, then either after conversion he does not remember which one he first took, and he can, mutual consent first having been offered in due form, retain one of those with whom he truly wished to be joined in Matrimony; or he remembers which one he first took, in which case apply to this one what was said under 1. (a). Yet in this hypothesis there can be place for the case of the Apostle. - But if an infidel, having several women, entered true Matrimony with none, after conversion he can contract with any baptized and Catholic woman, with mutual consent having been offered in due form.

3. When one party has been converted and baptized, the unbelieving one is to be interrogated whether that one wishes either also to be converted to the Faith, or at least to cohabit without contumely of the Creator. If the unbelieving one refuses to do either, or after cohabitation changes mind, or departs without fault of the faithful one (such as, e.g., adultery of this person after Baptism would be [see under 6]), this faithful one will be able to enter a new Matrimony. - But that the unbelieving person can truly be said to wish to cohabit without contumely of the Creator, it is necessary that he not draw the converted party to mortal sin; that he desist from concubinage in which, e.g., he was already living before the conversion of the other party; that he not bring troubles upon the Religion of the converted person or the Catholic education of offspring, etc.¹

But Matrimony entered in infidelity is not dissolved except at the very moment in which another valid Matrimony is contracted.

4. The faithful party cannot, without dispensation, validly enter a new Matrimony except with a party already baptized; otherwise there would be present the diriment impediment of disparity of cult, from which Bishops, by force of faculties Form D. n. 3 (T. I. p. LXXIV.), cannot dispense, and the Holy See does not dispense except for most grave causes.² Besides, that a new Matrimony be licitly entered, it must be contracted with a Catholic woman. By dispensation, indeed, it could licitly be contracted with a non-Catholic, but concerning this dispensation also what was said around disparity of cult is valid.

But when a faithful person by dispensation has contracted Matrimony with an infidel, and that one thereafter refuses to cohabit peacefully and without contumely of the Creator, Kenrick³ thinks that there is place for the case of the Apostle; but the contrary is certain from the Holy Office, June 14, 1708; August 1, 1759, to 4; year 1854, Dub. II, to 2; August 21, 1878.

5. The interrogation of the infidel:

a) Is altogether necessary (even if in reality it could not be made or would be useless), and that one's response, with a competent term fixed for the same, must be had, so that one can proceed to new nuptials, unless dispensation has been made by the Holy See, or among us, in the case set out p. LXX. 11, by the Bishop. Yet Bishops will be permitted to use this faculty only according to the norm of the Brief Populis of Gregory XIII. In this case it suffices to interrogate concerning the will of conversion.¹

b) It is to be made: in the presence of two witnesses; by the converted person himself or by another in his name, with the Ordinary intervening; the purpose of the converted person being notified (in the case in which the unbelieving person is going to refuse both conversion and cohabitation without injury of the Creator) either of passing to other nuptials, or, if this is the person's intention, of entering Religion, receiving Sacred Orders, or living in celibacy.²

c) Dispensation from the interrogation can be obtained from the Holy See as often as the unbelieving person, after being interrogated, has not responded within the time prefixed, or cannot be interrogated; for instance because it is unknown where that one is living, whether still alive, or because it is judged morally impossible that due interrogation should reach that one, or because from the interrogation most grave inconveniences are feared. But concerning these things it must be clear by summary process, the omission of which nevertheless renders the nuptials only illicit, if it is clear to the delegate for dispensing concerning the circumstances rendering interrogation impossible or difficult or useless.³

d) If a new Matrimony with a faithful person, the interrogation having been omitted or the response not having been received, had been celebrated without permission of the Holy See, this See alone could define whether one may remain in it.⁴

e) The interrogation is to be made (or dispensation from it sought) after Baptism,⁵ and it cannot be made before Baptism except for a grave cause and with previous permission of the Holy See.⁶

6. The privilege of the Faith remains to the converted party, even if because of adultery or another criminal cause posited by that party before conversion, the unbelieving one denies cohabitation; for crimes committed before Baptism can never be objected.

But adultery committed in infidelity by the party who, having been interrogated, wishes indeed to cohabit without injury of the Creator, but not to be converted, does not furnish to the converted person the faculty of a new marriage; nevertheless, in that case this converted person is not held to cohabit with the unbeliever, although asking pardon, as will be clear from things to be said n. 1552. III. under 3°.¹

7. After a new Matrimony has been entered by the faithful person, the unbelieving party, if thereafter also converted, can contract Matrimony with another Catholic. - But whether, if the person remains an unbeliever, he can enter a new Matrimony with another, even an unbeliever, is disputed.² "Today," says Feije, "the common doctrine is that in this case the unbeliever enters Matrimony with another unbeliever both validly and licitly."

8. But if the faithful person has not entered a new Matrimony, the unbelieving one invalidly marries another, nor can Baptism be conferred upon that one if afterwards converted, unless, with adulterous bonds cast off, the person has separated from the new party. Holy Office, January 23, 1805. And this is true even if this new party also is converted, and the prior spouse consents.

9. The converted person who has not entered a new Matrimony cannot after the conversion of the other party enter Matrimony with another; indeed from charity³ he is held to return to the other party if otherwise this person's conversion would be endangered. Is he also held from justice? It is disputed.⁴

But what if the other party is converted after the party first converted has either professed Religion, or received Sacred Orders, or even only vowed perpetual chastity?

Resp. Without pontifical dispensation, or, if among us there were question of only the simple vow of chastity, without dispensation of the Bishop, he cannot return to the other party.

Note. - If among us one of the three cases occurs in which, according to the things said in this number, Matrimony can be dissolved, prudence will require that, before the free party pass to other nuptials, civil divorce be obtained. (6), p. 394.

1552. Principles. - I. By reason of the Matrimonial bond spouses are held to cohabit together and to lead a social life. The reason is drawn from the very definition of Matrimony.¹

II. Nevertheless divorce, or separation from bed or habitation, can be made for grave causes, while the conjugal bond remains nonetheless, so that neither party can enter another Matrimony before the death of the other. This is declared by Trent.²

III. Causes giving honor to a divorce of this kind are: mutual consent, grave danger of soul or body, and adultery or heresy of either party (concerning which see n. 1521. 10°); you will understand these causes thus for practice.

1° Mutual consent: namely, each spouse together can renounce his or her proper right as regards the bed, whether for a time or perpetually, provided that, mature deliberation and long experience having been premitted, it is clear that the danger of incontinence is absent, and they are separated from bed. Likewise they can be separated even as regards habitation, whether for a time on account of business, or perpetually on account of a desire for a more perfect life; this desire can be fulfilled in two ways, namely either by the reception of Sacred Orders (concerning which mode see n. 1521. 10°), or by entrance into Religion. Concerning this note that it is necessary that the other party also enter a monastery and there emit regular profession, unless perhaps already of advanced age and immune from every suspicion of incontinence; for then it suffices if the person bind himself or herself by perpetual simple vow of chastity (before an ecclesiastical Superior and witnesses). Except if pontifical dispensation frees from this vow.³

Can spouses by mutual consent enter a Congregation in which only simple vows, yet of themselves perpetual, are emitted? - I think that, prudence being observed in individual cases, nothing obstructs; for even while remaining in the world both can vow continence.

2° Grave danger of soul, if danger of perversion in one from the cause of the other is present; or of body, if danger of life or mutilation is imminent, or if cohabitation on the part of one toward the other is made so troublesome that it is rendered morally impossible. This would happen if a spouse were compelled to suffer relatively grave or frequent cruelties, or if the wife were expelled without cause.⁴

3° Adultery of either party, namely such that it is: 1° morally¹ certain; 2° voluntary, and not perpetrated from violence inflicted;² 3° not condoned either expressly or implicitly, e.g. by the conjugal act, or by other signs, exhibited by the innocent party knowing and remembering the adultery (for the internal forum, with the mind of condoning);³ 4° not mutual, because then compensation would exist;⁴ 5° as St. Alphonsus thinks more probably, consummated;⁵ 6° committed without the consent of the other party.⁶ - This is clear from the words of Christ⁷: He who shall dismiss his wife, except for the cause of fornication, makes her commit adultery, etc. But what is licit for the man ought by the same reason to be licit also for the woman.

Observe from the more common and at least extrinsically more probable opinion of the Doctors that under the name of adultery here comes any division of the flesh, even if it does not have the character of adultery properly so called, of which kind is sodomy and bestiality.⁸

1553. Questions. - Quaer. 1° Is a man, when the adultery of his wife is known, held to dismiss her?

Resp. 1° It is certain that he is not held by reason of adultery, because divorce was conceded in favor of the innocent party, not for his punishment. - Thus commonly.⁹

Resp. 2° Sometimes the man can be held to dismiss an adulterous wife by reason of fraternal correction or avoiding scandal, and say the same of the wife, if founded hope of amendment is present and the husband can be dismissed without grave inconvenience; but this former case is rare, both because other means can be employed for correcting the wife or avoiding scandal, and because grave scandal or another grave inconvenience to be feared from separation can excuse. Besides, the wife cast out would be exposed to greater danger, at least for the most part. But the latter case will be most rare.¹⁰

Quaer. 2° Once divorce has been made, can the innocent party compel the other to return to himself or herself?

Resp. 1° Affirmatively, if there is question of non-juridical separation, because this is not strengthened by sentence of the judge.

Resp. 2° Affirmatively, more probably, even in the very case of juridical separation. The reason is because the sentence of juridical separation is borne in favor of the innocent party, and therefore does not take away the right of recalling the other; nor for this is a new sentence of the judge needed. Nevertheless an adulterous woman is not to be compelled to return as often as she can reasonably fear that she will be treated harshly, bitterly, or even cruelly.¹

Nevertheless one must observe:

1) Although after divorce juridically made, according to the common doctrine, the innocent party can, even against the will of the adulterous party, enter Religion or receive Sacred Orders, nevertheless this is not conceded to the adulterer dismissed; who therefore can neither enter Religion nor be initiated in Sacred Orders unless the innocent party either expressly consents, or has already assumed an irrevocable state; and if the adulterer were to enter Religion, he could be recalled by the innocent party even after profession.² Nevertheless St. Alphonsus³ admonishes that tacit consent also suffices for this, namely if the innocent party knows this and does not contradict when he or she can; nevertheless in the case he or she is not held either to enter Religion or to bind himself or herself by a vow of chastity. St. Alphonsus concedes this very thing to the guilty party when the innocent party, having been asked, was unwilling to admit reconciliation, or even if the innocent party has not recalled the guilty party after two years have already elapsed.⁴

2) "If divorce has been made by civil authority" as regards the bond, "the spouses renewing domestic intercourse, without new nuptials, will be liable to the penalties of adultery. But this can be asked: whether, for escaping the penalties of the law and recovering rights, it is licit to give consent again to Matrimony. It seems licit before the priest to refer to consent once given, so that he can testify concerning the Matrimony; but the consent itself must not be renewed, since it is the form of the Sacrament; for the rest, words can be used in a broad sense for satisfying the law. While care is employed that civil testimony be had concerning the Matrimony, caution must be taken that no sacred rites be performed again, or that anything be done by which favor is given to the error of a bond dissolved." Thus Kenrick.⁵

Quaer. 3° Once juridical separation has been made on account of adultery, is the innocent spouse held to return to the other party recalling him or her, if he or she afterwards has also fallen?

Resp. Negatively, more probably. The reason is because the first adulterer, by the sentence of the judge, was already entirely stripped of every right toward the innocent party.¹

Quaer. 4° Can divorce be made by private authority?

Resp. 1° Affirmatively as regards the bed, if a grave cause underlies, as was said above; and specifically by reason of adultery, even occult adultery, because the rights of Matrimony can be denied perpetually to the unfaithful spouse.

Resp. 2° As regards habitation: 1° affirmatively, by reason of adultery, even if the crime is occult (at least more probably, if the adultery is on the part of the woman), because Christ, by permitting divorce for this cause, did not distinguish between public and private adultery. But for this it is required that the crime be certain, and that scandal not intervene from the separation which cannot be otherwise repaired.² - Yet several say that divorce is not licit on account of occult adultery; because it is not licit to injure the fame of the adulterer by making manifest, even tacitly, a secret crime. 2° Affirmatively also, by reason of danger either of soul or of body, provided the danger is in delay, or the innocent party cannot litigate, or approach the judge, or easily prove the cause.³ But in practice it is expedient that the counsel of a prudent man, especially of the confessor, be sought. But the confessor ought to proceed very cautiously in this matter. Let him beware lest too easily he believe the complaints of wives against husbands; and let him strive to restrain them, and avert them, insofar as it can be done, from divorce. - Besides, diocesan statutes, if there are any, are to be observed. - "Nor do I think those spouses should be disturbed," says Müller, Th. Mor. III. § 227. n. 4, "who have been separated by civil authority only, if they are in good faith; for scarcely any fruit of admonition is to be hoped for."

S. Th., Suppl., q. 41, a. 3-4; q. 49, a. 4-5; II-II, q. 152, a. 2 and 4; q. 153, a. 2; I-II, q. 34, a. 1, ad 1; c. Gent. III, 126.

762. State of the question. - Several held matrimony and conjugal intercourse as illicit. Thus in the first centuries the Encratites, Saturninus, Marcion, the Montanists and Ascetics, and the Manichaeans, who, addicted to the tenets of the Gnostics, condemned human marriages for this reason, that they judged the human body to be from an evil principle. Likewise afterward the Albigensians.

On the contrary, in the fourth century Helvidius, Jovinian, Vigilantius considered matrimony equal in merits to virginity and perfect continence. Thus also Luther¹ and Calvin, indeed many innovators also repeatedly said that nuptials were better than virginity.

¹ Earlier Luther had acknowledged the excellence of virginity (before 1520); afterward, having changed his opinion, he said that matrimony was necessary and asserted the impossibility of virginal continence, a miracle being excluded.

On the contrary Catholic doctrine holds that matrimony is licit and honorable, yet to be placed after virginity.

763. Thesis I. Matrimony in itself is licit and honorable, as having been instituted by God unto an honorable end. - It is of faith from the Lateran Council II, can. 23, and from the Lateran Council IV, and the profession of faith of Innocent III.

It is proved: 1. From revelation:

a) indirectly: No sin is of precept. But the matrimonial act is in precept, according to Gen. I, 28 and I Cor. VII, 3: "Let the husband render the debt to his wife..." Therefore it is not a sin.

b) directly: That is good and laudable which God instituted, Christ confirmed, and the Apostles commended. But God instituted matrimony (Gen. I, 27; II, 18, 23; Mt. XIX, 6; Council of Trent, sess. 24), Christ confirmed it (Jn. II and Mt. XIX, 4 sq.), the Apostles commended it (Heb. XIII, 4; I Cor. VII, 3, 38; I Tim. IV, 1-3; V, 14; cf. Eph. V, 22-32). Therefore.

This the Fathers expressly affirmed and defended, so that they inveighed sharply against the ancient heretics: Irenaeus passim; Clement of Alexandria, Strom. 3; Tertullian, against Marcion; Jerome, against Jovinian; Augustine, On the Good of Marriage; On Nuptials; against Eustathius the Ascetic and the Eustathians, the Synod of Gangra, fourth century; against the Priscillianists, the Synod of Braga, sixth century; finally the Lateran Council II, can. 23, holds as heretics those who condemn the covenants of lawful nuptials.

2. By reason: The conjugal act is the one means of propagating the human race. Therefore if God wills the propagation of the human race, he wills the conjugal act, which consequently is licit of itself. Hence St. Thomas, q. 41, a. 3:

"Supposing that corporeal nature has been instituted by the good God, it is impossible to say that those things which pertain to the preservation of corporeal nature, and to which nature inclines, are universally evil; and therefore, since there is an inclination of nature to the procreation of offspring, through which the nature of the species is preserved, it is impossible to say that the act by which offspring is procreated is universally illicit, and that the mean of virtue cannot be found in it. - Unless it be posited, according to the madness of certain men, that corruptible things were created by an evil god; from which perhaps that opinion is derived... and therefore it is a most wicked heresy."

To condemn the conjugal act is to condemn nature and the author of nature; but if the conjugal act is licit, so also is matrimony, which is essentially ordered to it.

764. Corollaries. - Since matrimony is legitimate, hence:

1. No one can prohibit the propagation of the human race.

2. The conjugal act is also meritorious, provided that it be done from a motive of virtue (for example, to render the debt from justice, for offspring unto the worship of God from religion), and with the due conditions being given, of which the chief is that it be done from charity.

3. The use of matrimony is not illicit because of original sin, whose true cause is not the use of matrimony but the will of Adam: per se the use of matrimony is for the procreation of children; that original sin is also transmitted at the same time is accidental. And "that turpitude of concupiscence, which always accompanies the matrimonial act, is not the turpitude of fault, but of punishment arising from the first sin" (a. 3, ad 3). But if the intensity of delight takes away the use of reason, nevertheless it does not take away the order of reason, because the matrimonial act is pre-ordained by reason (ad 6).

765. Thesis II. Matrimony is to be placed after virginity and celibacy preserved from a motive of virtue. - It is of faith against Jovinian and the Innovators from the Council of Trent, sess. 24, can. 10.

It is proved: 1. Christ, both by example, because he preserved virginity and chose a virgin mother, and by word commended virginity as a work of counsel, Mt. XIX, 10 sq.; likewise the Apostle, I Cor. VII, 1-40.

2. The Fathers, such as Tertullian against Marcion, Cyprian, Ambrose, Chrysostom, Gregory Nazianzen, Gregory of Nyssa, Jerome, Augustine, praise virginity. And Pope Siricius condemned Jovinian.

3. Virginity excels matrimony, "both 1) because the divine good is more excellent than human good; and 2) because the good of the soul is preferred to the good of the body; and also 3) because the good of the contemplative life is preferred to the good of the active life. But virginity is ordered 1) to the good of the soul, 2) according to the contemplative life, 3) which is to think on the things that are of God; but marriage is ordered 1) to the good of the body, which is the corporeal multiplication of the human race, and 2) pertains to the active life, 3) because a man and woman living in matrimony necessarily have to think on the things that are of the world, as is clear through the Apostle, I Cor. VII, 33-34. Whence undoubtedly virginity is to be preferred to conjugal continence," II-II, q. 152, a. 4.

It is confirmed: a) To abstain from certain lower things in order to take counsel for a higher good is good: thus from bodily delight on account of the contemplation of truth.

b) Matrimony of itself renders man less apt for serving God, because the proper act of matrimony befits man according to the lower portion by which he is similar to brute animals, and which in him does not obey reason and has the greatest shame joined to it.

c) Virginity removes one from the solicitude of the world and elevates one above earthly things, so that man can more freely be at leisure for God.

766. Observations. - 1. Ignominy is in matrimony without offspring, not in abstention from matrimony.

2. The common good is to be preferred to private good, if they are of the same order.

3. The comparison is not instituted between persons, or between their perfection, or in such adjuncts, but between states.

767. It is objected: 1. The common good is greater than private good. But marriage is ordered to the common good, virginity to private good. Therefore marriage is more excellent.

Resp. I distinguish the major: if the private good is of the same order, I concede; if of a diverse and superior order, I deny. And I distinguish the minor: Virginity is for private good, partly, I concede; solely, I deny, for it contributes to the common good. Namely, in matrimony a corporeal good is regarded, in virginity a spiritual and divine good.

2. If it is good that one person contain himself, it will be better that many and all do so.

Resp. I distinguish: according to the good of the individual, I concede; according to the good of the species, I deny. Namely, the common good requires variety of states and of goods, and also lower offices.

S. Th., Suppl., q. 41, a. 1; q. 44, a. 1; q. 42, a. 2; a. 3, ad 4; q. 48; q. 49, a. 2, ad 1; q. 65, a. 1; q. 67, a. 1, ad 2; c. Gent. III, 122.

768. Notions. The end of matrimony properly is intrinsic and essential, or of the work, to which by its nature matrimony has been instituted, is ordered, and per se tends; - from this can be distinguished the extrinsic and accidental end, or the end of the one acting, which the one acting intends or which is intended and adjoined by those contracting.

The intrinsic end of the work, one is primary or principal, another secondary, which is essentially subordinated and consequent to the primary: it supposes the primary, for it is not an end except dependently upon that principal end, and a means to the primary end so that it may be obtained more securely and certainly, so that matrimony cannot be ordered to the secondary end unless the ordination to the primary end is preserved.¹

¹ Cf. there can be consulted: Dr. Biot, Les buts du mariage, and Rud. Geis, Katholische Sexualethik.

769. Principle I. The ends of matrimony, on the part of the work, intrinsic or essential, are three: one primary, the procreation and education of offspring, two secondary, mutual solace and assistance, and the enjoyment of delight calming concupiscence (can. 1013, § 1).

1. The essential and primary end of the work, or that to which matrimony by its nature is primarily and principally ordered, is the propagation of the human species, the procreation and education of offspring; otherwise it would be another society, not matrimony. This is clear from what was said above about the natural origin of matrimony, and from Sacred Scripture: "Increase and multiply," says God, Gen. I, 28; "I will therefore that the younger marry, bear children, be mothers of families," says Paul concerning younger widows, I Tim. V, 14. Cf. Tob. VI, 22; VIII, 9; I Tim. II, 15.

Hence one who entirely excluded the primary end would exclude matrimony, and the matrimony would be null.

2. The essential but secondary end of the work is also an end which, by the nature of the thing, must be obtained, but only secondarily and dependently upon the primary end; whence matrimony also is per se ordered to that end, not however as to an independent end which could be intended independently from the primary, but rather as a means by which the primary end may be obtained better of itself. Now the secondary end of matrimony is twofold:

a) Solace and mutual assistance which, with God and nature disposing, spouses find in matrimony, insofar as from it cohabitation necessary for educating offspring becomes more pleasant and the burdens of common life and of old age press less (Prov. XXXI, 10-12; Eccli. XXVI, 1-2; Eph. V, 22, 25). Hence, when the first man had been created, God said: "It is not good for man to be alone; let us make him a help like unto himself" (Gen. II, 18); hence also nature itself has put diverse inclinations and faculties into the diverse sexes, which complete themselves in the matrimonial state.

b) The enjoyment of delight and the calming of concupiscence is attached to the use of marriage so that the end of generation may be obtained more securely and certainly. Concupiscence in the state of fallen nature is not contained within the limits of reason except with difficulty, but it excites less to illicit things if licit things in order to the primary end are conceded to it in matrimony. And thus matrimony has been made a remedy of concupiscence. Whence the Apostle: "But because of fornication let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband...; but if they do not contain themselves, let them marry: for it is better to marry than to burn" (I Cor. VII, 2 and 9).

On the ends of matrimony let Augustine be read, On the Good of Marriage, c. 2-5.

There are several goods of Marriage, and they are intrinsic to it; each of these also, taken separately, can be an end why marriage is contracted, although one among them is the primary end.

I. Since we have received the definition of marriage from the common concept of men, it was lawful for us to state it without a clear and distinct knowledge of its end or ends; nevertheless this knowledge is necessary so that the τὸ τί ἦν εἶναι, the "what-it-was-to-be," of Marriage may be perceived more fully and more evidently. Therefore here we shall discuss the ends of marriage.

II. By the end of marriage we understand the end of the work, to which in itself it is ordered and which by its very constitution it can produce; and if this is intended by the one positing the work, it will also be the end of the worker, although this latter has a wider extension. But since only that which is good has the account of an end, the end of Marriage will be a certain good which marriage itself is naturally fitted to produce in itself and to procure for those entering it. Now that good which first strikes the eyes of all is offspring, by which the continuation and propagation of the human family is obtained, and the suitable education of that same offspring; this indeed must be added, for offspring alone is also the effect of a fornicatory union. In this matter it must be observed, first, that the generation of offspring is indeed an end of marriage appointed by nature, yet to be obtained through marital copulation, which is always free to the spouses and is not always efficacious; second, that the proper act of marriage is that very carnal copulation for which power is obtained through marriage, whether offspring follows from it or not. This we have already suggested (Th. I, III), and below it will be declared more fully; for the present we anticipate it lest false concepts creep upon the incautious reader. Third, in order that offspring be rightly received and further educated, the copulation must be between persons mutually obligated, that is, spouses. This for the present we can suppose, since we shall demonstrate it afterward (Th. VI).

Offspring, however, is not the only good of marriage. "Offspring," says Augustine, On the Good of Marriage, chapter 1, "is one honorable fruit, not of the conjunction of male and female," that is, not of marriage, "but of lying together. For there could have been in each sex, even without such mingling, a certain friendly and genuine conjunction, one ruling, the other obeying." And indeed, besides the good of offspring, another good is found in the marital bond itself and is proper to it. This is the very union of the two, man and woman, namely friendship, communication of works, and mutual service and help. This friendship is not that which can also be had among the rest, but is proper to marriage; for it is founded on mutual power over the body of the other, by which it comes about, therefore, that it is also closer and more enduring. "It is asked why marriage is a good," Augustine says in the same place, chapter 3. He answers: "because it seems to me to be so not on account of the procreation of children alone, but also on account of the natural society itself in the diverse sex. Otherwise it would no longer be called marriage among the aged, especially if they had either lost children or had by no means begotten them." From these words, as we now observe, you understand that when Augustine says that marriages are to be entered into for the sake of procreating alone, as in Against Faustus, book XV, chapter 7, he has directly before his eyes the use of marriage and a marriage entered into with the intention of carnal copulation; he excludes, namely, an end situated in the fulfilling of lust, which indeed is an end different from the remedy of concupiscence, of which presently, the intention of which is at least implicitly joined with the intention of offspring. And indeed this friendship, or, as St. Thomas says, the indivisible conjunction of souls between spouses who from obligation preserve faith with one another, is that good which the definition of marriage handed down in law chiefly commends, making explicit mention of it alone. For this reason the same Augustine, in the same work, chapter 9, distinguishes both certain goods to be sought in themselves, such as wisdom, health, and friendship, and goods to be sought on account of another, such as learning on account of wisdom, food and drink on account of health, marriage and lying together on account of friendship; although, as the same author observes, friendship toward others is also obtained in another way, and indeed can also be more perfect without Marriage.

These two goods of marriage would have had place not only in the present state of fallen nature, but also in the state of integral nature; for they are absolute, supposing only the essence of marriage and its legitimate use. But, once the infirmity of vitiated nature through concupiscence is supposed, or the state of pure nature is supposed, another good arises for those contracting marriage from that mutual obligation and power over the body of the other. There arises, namely, the moral good which is the restraining of concupiscence within the limits of honesty. This restraining is situated in this: that concupiscence is indeed indulged, but only with that person who has power over the body of the other, to whom fidelity is owed in marriage, and in that manner which is proportioned to generation; so that the act is legitimate and even owed. From this it comes about that, the ardor of concupiscence being calmed, the soul does not run out toward illicit things and sin is avoided. "Marriages also have this good," Augustine says in the same place, chapters 3 and 5, "that carnal or youthful incontinence, even if it is vicious, is reduced to the honesty of propagating offspring (cf. Treatise on God the Creator, etc., Thesis XLIV), so that conjugal copulation makes something good out of the evil of lust... For this reason there are nuptials, that that concupiscence, reduced to a lawful bond, might not float about deformed and dissolved, having from itself the unrestrainable infirmity of the flesh, but from nuptials the indissoluble society of fidelity." "Nuptials are good," says Gennadius, On Ecclesiastical Dogmas, chapter 53, "but for the sake of children and under the pretext of restraining fornication." The Apostle teaches that this is a good of marriage, 1 Cor. VII, 2: "Let those who do not contain themselves," that is, who cannot contain themselves, "marry. On account of fornication," namely to be avoided, "let each man have his own wife and each woman her own husband."

Isidore embraces these ends when he says, Etymologies, book IX, chapter 7: "A wife is taken for three causes: the first is for the sake of offspring, concerning which see Genesis I, 28; the second for the sake of help, concerning which see Genesis II, 18; the third for the sake of incontinence; whence the Apostle says that he who does not contain himself should marry."

Besides these, Augustine enumerates another good, which is Sacrament: under this name a twofold thing is understood, namely cause and effect. The cause is the very character of sacrament situated in the signification of a certain mystery and in the efficacy of grace, as will be demonstrated in its own place; the effect is the indissolubility of the bond. "Whom does it not make attentive," says Augustine, "what so great a firmness of the conjugal bond means? I think it could by no means have had such force unless a certain sacrament of some greater reality from this weak mortality of men were applied, which, even when men desert it and desire to dissolve it, remains unshaken for them unto punishment... Nor, nevertheless, except in the city of our God, on his holy mountain, is there such a case with a wife," ibid., chapter 7. That Augustine distinguishes the effect, that is, indissolubility, from the cause of sacrament is clear both from these words themselves and from the fact that, although he has said that the sacrament exists only in the Church of Christ, nevertheless he also finds the indissolubility of the bond before the law of Christ and places sacrament there, as in the marriage of the Blessed Virgin and St. Joseph. "For every good of nuptials was fulfilled in those parents of Christ. We recognize offspring, Jesus Christ; fidelity, because there was no adultery; sacrament, because there was no divorce," On Nuptials and Concupiscence, book I, chapter 11. The very indissolubility of the bond, namely, is called sacrament by Augustine, because in the New Law it is chiefly from the sacrament; and that this is a good, namely a perfection of the conjugal bond, is evident.

III. All the goods of marriage enumerated thus far can be brought back to those three which Augustine frequently proclaims, and with him the whole School: offspring, fidelity, sacrament. Concerning offspring there is nothing further we need say. Fidelity formally embraces the second of those mentioned in the preceding number, and the third at least causally; for fidelity, both in habit and in act, is the very friendly society of the spouses, the communication of works, and mutual service and help. But fidelity, situated in the rendering of the debt, furnishes a remedy for the concupiscence of each or of either, so that by the very fact that fidelity is furnished, the remedy is applied. Sacrament says the indissoluble unity of the two, besides sanctifying grace.

IV. Since these are the goods of Marriage, they will also be the ends on account of which marriage can be entered into. Concerning these goods, now setting aside sacramental sanctification, observe that each separately is sought according to the ordination of nature. And indeed with regard to offspring there is no difficulty, since it is a good, and the natural distinction and conjunction of the sexes itself is ordered to the procreation of offspring. But familiar friendship itself, or the society of man and woman through marriage, even when abstraction is made from the obtaining of offspring, is a good which is sought according to the ordination of nature. For that must be said to be sought according to the ordination of nature whose principles are all in nature itself, and the use of whose principles has an end which the natural law itself most highly approves. But the principles of the mutual obligation and power of man and woman over the body of the other, by which marriage is constituted, are certainly in nature itself. From the very institution of nature, the capacity for certain duties and offices which are useful, or even necessary, for human living together is different in each sex. The use of these principles, that is, the mutual obligation and power over the body of the other contracted by man and woman, and the communication of works resting on this obligation and power, begets a special stable friendship and security of mutual service and help. Natural law most highly approves this end, for, while it approves friendship generally among men, it distributes diverse offices useful to both for the fostering of friendship between man and woman. But once these are posited, the essence of marriage is had, whose essence consists "in a certain indivisible conjunction of souls, by which one of the spouses is bound indivisibly to preserve fidelity to the other" (III, q. XXIX, a. 2).

The third good also, that is, the remedy of concupiscence, is sought separately in marriage according to the ordination of nature. For he acts according to the ordination of nature who, for attaining that which the natural law itself approves, uses that which from nature itself has the account of a means to this end. But the natural law approves the restraining of concupiscence; and marriage, conferring the right of using and imposing the duty of rendering, is by this very fact, and therefore from the very institution of nature, a suitable means to this end. Therefore.

V. You will say that each argument supposes that nature, making man and woman suitable for marital union, has not necessarily and uniquely ordered that union to the procreation of offspring, or has not commanded that marriage be entered into with this intention alone. Yet this supposition would have to be demonstrated in order to prove that one or the other of these two latter ends can be sought while abstraction is made from the first.

I answer that this supposition is not hard to demonstrate. And as regards the third end, which is the remedy of concupiscence, it is certain that when some thing or some work can conduce to several honorable ends, in order that you may honestly employ it according to natural law itself, it is not necessary that you intend all the ends, or the primary one if there is such among them, but it is enough that you intend some one of these ends and do nothing against the others; for thus your action will be good from its object and end. Cf. the moral theologians. But if this is not necessary, natural law being considered, it is certain that the same is not prescribed by nature. Thus, for example, there can be a manifold end of fasting: the honor of God, the expiation of your sins, the obtaining of some spiritual or temporal benefit for yourself or for others; by whichever of these ends you act, you act rightly, while the others follow in themselves, if they are intrinsic ends. In the same way, you contract Marriage on account of the remedy of concupiscence and intend this in its use; nevertheless you do not impede generation, and you receive the offspring which God may have given. And observe that the mingling of the sexes in itself is not evil, since it is from the very institution of nature; but wandering mingling among the unmarried is evil, and much more with those persons who are obligated to another. Therefore, in order that this evil, into which man would be borne because of concupiscence, may be avoided, that state is chosen in which the mingling of flesh is lawful and honorable.

As regards the second end which we have mentioned, besides the principle just brought forward, which is valid here also, it is certain further that when by nature itself or by law you have a right to some act without which the right can exist, it is lawful for you, while retaining the right, always to omit the act, and indeed, after acquiring that right, to obligate yourself to the omission of the act, especially if this omission induces greater moral perfection; and finally, you can undertake the very obligation of omitting the act when you acquire the right, if that right, even with the omission of that act, can be useful for other uses and ends. For then that obligation excludes not the right, but only some exercise of it. Thus, therefore, they act who enter marriage only on account of domestic society, not wishing to mingle carnally; and therefore, just as it is lawful after marriage has been entered for spouses to agree upon perpetual continence, so also it is lawful before, without this agreement harming the truth of the power handed over, since this power also generates other rights and obligations, whose use will be available. But since this power mutually handed over, or this conjugal bond, is one indivisible thing, although several rights and offices sprout forth from it, if it can remain for producing some effect, it must remain whole. But concerning this matter, in which the difficulty is not slight, we shall treat expressly in the following thesis.

You will say: if there were no procreation of offspring, marriage would not have been instituted. I answer: if only the actual procreation of offspring were not had, I deny; if it were not possible, I distinguish. If it were not possible only from some positive law of God not willing to form the organism of offspring in the womb of the woman or to create souls, again I deny. If the procreation of offspring were not possible because it were impossible in itself that offspring be generated from the mingling of flesh, let it pass. I say, let it pass; for, once this hypothesis were made, we would be living in an altogether different order, nor would there be, I think, a distinction between male and female, who are the subject of marriage. But even if, unless the procreation of offspring were possible in itself, marriage would not have been instituted, it is not rightly gathered that now it is to be entered into on account of the procreation of children alone. For it not rarely happens that something which would not have been instituted unless some determinate end existed, nevertheless, after it has been instituted, since it can conduce also to other ends or produce other goods, can be employed on account of them, with those alone directly intended, provided nothing is done against that end which would be primary. On this matter consult the moral theologians. For example, if society did not exist, social authority would not have been instituted; nevertheless, once this authority has been instituted, if it conduces the one holding it to other honorable ends, it can be sought on account of those ends, provided the good of society is not excluded.

VI. Here, however, the question offers itself whether among the ends enumerated there is one that is primary. Before the answer, the notion of primary end - we are speaking of the end of the work - must be held. For we do not call that end primary apart from whose intention the means cannot be employed; this is not really a primary end, but the only end. But a primary end allows other ends with itself. The primary end of nature is that for the attaining of which some work is adapted by nature before her other works; therefore it is not the same as the immediate end, or that which necessarily follows from the thing or work. For it suffices, when all the ends of the thing or work are compared together, that one be before the others, on account of which the work is chiefly instituted by nature, so that it may be called the primary end. This indeed does not prevent another end from being honestly intended primarily by the intention of the worker, provided that nothing is done against that first end. Now, if you consider the use of marriage in conjugal copulation, its primary end, intended by nature, is certainly the procreation of offspring; for this copulation itself is the means, and the only means, although from several contingent causes it is not always efficacious. But also if marriage itself is considered in itself, although domestic society with all the goods accompanying it is something more necessary and immediately consequent upon it, nevertheless this could in itself also be obtained without the matrimonial bond. But the remedy of concupiscence cannot be the primary end, unless by the intention of the worker, since marriage and its use could perfectly have been had without it, as would have happened in the state of innocence. You will say: the primary end can never be excluded; but, as will be proved in the following thesis, the procreation of offspring can be excluded; therefore. I answer: it can never be excluded by the agent, that is, in the very use of the thing which is destined by nature to that end, I concede; it cannot be excluded when the very use of the thing is excluded, I distinguish: if that is the only and necessary end, I concede; if it is not such, I deny.

It remains, therefore, that the goods enumerated are both ends on account of which it is lawful to enter marriage, and that each separately enjoys this prerogative of an end. Cf. Sanchez, On Marriage, book II, disputation XXIX.

VII. You will ask whether the good of sacrament can be the final cause of contracting marriage. I do not see why this should be denied, since it is some good in itself, of the kind that all sacraments are, and is the more excellent good in marriage; but every good in itself can be an end. Nevertheless one may doubt whether he would act prudently who, led by love of the sacrament alone, wished to enter marriage. For if he neither needs the remedy of concupiscence nor domestic friendship and the assistance of the other sex, nor cares to have offspring, it is not clear why he should not rather choose celibacy and the state of virginity; for although he will not gain the good of sacramental grace, he will gain more abundant grace from the work of the worker and will please God more.

VIII. From what has been said it becomes sufficiently manifest that goods of this kind, of which we have spoken thus far, are goods intrinsic to marriage: either from the nature of the thing, as the first three are, and also sacrament insofar as it says indissoluble unity; or from the institution of God, as sacrament properly so called, whose account will be declared in the following Chapter. That those former goods are intrinsic to marriage is evident; for they either constitute its essence, or are its natural end, or are a property especially fitting to its nature.

From this two things follow. First, since all the constitutive elements of marriage are good, and the last, which is sacrament, is also a cause of supernatural sanctity, it is evident that marriage is an honorable and holy state, and that those who undertake that state act honorably and holily in itself.

Second, by the aforesaid goods marriage is made honorable not extrinsically, as if by an honorableness acceding from without, as if marriage itself in itself were either evil or indifferent; on the contrary, since it is intrinsically constituted by these goods, it is intrinsically good and holy.

It is also customary to say that Marriage is excused by the same goods. This indeed is to be understood not of Marriage itself, but of its act, which is carnal mingling. Namely, in the conjugal act there occurs the loss of some good: namely the loss of virginity, and a certain clouding of reason because of the vehemence of passion, by which reason is in some manner absorbed; also the tribulation of the flesh, which spouses must sustain. But no wise and prudent man would incur the loss of some good except with some compensation of another good; and this good, and indeed a manifold good, although in another order, obtains in marriage. But the act of mingling is again excused not by something extrinsic, but intrinsic; for it is intrinsic to that act that it is owed from the fidelity given to the other, and therefore is an act of justice; that it brings a remedy of concupiscence and receives offspring. For this reason marriage "does not need these goods as certain exterior things for making it honorable, but as causing in it the honorableness which belongs to it according to itself" (In IV, dist. XXXI, q. 1, a. 1, ad 2).

IX. St. Thomas asks (ibid., a. 3, ql. 1) which of the three goods, which are fidelity, offspring, and sacrament, is more principal. Now the holy Doctor observes that something is called more principal in two ways: either because it is more essential, or because it is more worthy. If what is more worthy is sought, then in every way Sacrament is more principal, because it pertains to marriage insofar as this looks to the order of grace, while the others look to marriage insofar as it is a certain office of nature. But if what is more essential is sought, then a distinction must be made; because fidelity and offspring can be considered in two ways. In one way, in themselves, that is, in act, and thus they pertain to the use of marriage, through which both offspring is produced and the conjugal agreement is preserved. But the indivisibility which Sacrament imports pertains to marriage itself according to itself; because from the very fact that through the conjugal agreement the spouses hand over to one another power over themselves in perpetuity, it follows that they cannot be separated; and thence it is that marriage is never found without inseparability, but is found without fidelity and offspring, because the being of a thing does not depend upon its use. And according to this, Sacrament, that is, the indissolubility of the bond, is more essential to marriage than fidelity and offspring. In another way, fidelity and offspring can be considered according as they are in their principles, so that for offspring the intention of offspring is taken, and for fidelity the duty of preserving fidelity; without these, marriage also cannot exist, because these are caused in marriage from the conjugal agreement itself, so that if anything contrary to them were expressed in the consent, it would not be true marriage. And taking fidelity and offspring in this way, it is clear that offspring is the most essential thing in marriage, fidelity second, and Sacrament third; just as also for man the being of nature is more essential than the being of grace, although the being of grace is more worthy.

As regards the last part of St. Thomas's discussion, namely that offspring is that which is most essential in marriage, observe that this is exactly the same as what we have said here in n. VI. For the holy Doctor has regard to intention, "so that for offspring the intention of offspring is taken." Moreover, if the intention of nature is considered, this is more essential, because it is the primary end; if the intention of the one contracting marriage is considered, note that St. Thomas considers marriage with its use, or with copulation. For the contrary to offspring which is expressed in consent, from which St. Thomas draws his argument, is not a lack of intention of having offspring, but is the intention of avoiding offspring through abuse of the conjugal act (Th. following). But again, as we have said, in the use of marriage the primary end is offspring.

Although the use of marriage is good, nevertheless the state of virginity and celibacy is preferable to it.

I. There is Canon 10 of the Council of Trent, session XXIV: If anyone shall say that the conjugal state is to be preferred to the state of virginity or celibacy, and that it is not better and more blessed to remain in virginity or celibacy than to be joined in marriage: let him be anathema. This is the doctrine to be defended. We suppose not only that marriage is good, but that the use of marriage through carnal copulation is good, that is, an act honorable and holy in itself. For the comparison is not properly instituted between virginity and celibacy on the one side, and marriage simply on the other, since with marriage virginity and the perfection of celibacy can consist; rather, the comparison is with marriage exercising itself through the mingling of flesh, or conjugal copulation. There is no need, beyond the things said in Thesis II, to bring forward other things to prove that this use of marriage is a good act. For from what was said there it is clear that this act was instituted by nature for the best end, which is offspring, and that it is moreover an act of justice in rendering the debt; God himself approved it when he said to the first parents: "Increase and multiply" (Gen. I, 28; IX, 1).

This being supposed, therefore, the comparison is instituted between Marriage exercising itself through carnal mingling and virginity or celibacy. Moreover, it must again be observed that the Tridentine Fathers make a comparison between states, that is, not between the persons who live in these states, or between the perfections with which those persons can be endowed from their own virtue, but between states, that is, between those things which belong to each state from its own nature. But a state is a condition in itself immovable and perpetual of men obligated to certain works or offices. Since the comparison is made between states, hence again it is not made between those things which can be accidental to the account of state, of which sort would be some consecration. Besides, it must be observed that the celibacy of which there is speech is not, so to speak, negative celibacy, namely the mere lack of the conjugal bond, with which an immoral and wicked life can be joined, but positive celibacy, in which, namely, someone alien to nuptials resolves from the soul to lead a life exempt from the pleasures of the flesh. Finally, it must be considered that the comparison is made not by reason of just any goodness, but of moral perfection, which man obtains on account of this or that state; and this moral perfection is the supreme good which man can attain in this life, to which therefore the rest must be subordinated, and on account of which it cannot happen that he is impeded from helping others; indeed, in itself, it is necessary that he exist as more apt for procuring the true good for others. But this moral perfection is that blessedness which man can attain in this life, the beginning and pledge of future blessedness.

II. Therefore for the Tridentine Fathers the question concerned perfection and blessedness, to which state each belongs more. But the Fathers teach, according to the perpetual tradition of the Church, that, when account is taken of perfection and of true blessedness according to God, the state of virginity and celibacy is to be preferred to the state of marriage. That this is true is easily demonstrated. For it is clear, first, from the doctrine of the Apostle, 1 Cor. VII. The Apostle affirms that it is good (καλόν) for a man not to touch a woman (v. 1); that it is good (καλόν) for the unmarried and widows if they remain in that state, that is, without nuptials, as the Apostle himself remained (v. 8). Nevertheless he adds that if they do not contain themselves, that is, if they cannot contain themselves, they should marry, giving the reason that it is better to marry than to burn (v. 9), that is, to be overcome by the temptation of concupiscence, not merely to be tempted; for he who remains chaste when placed in the fire of temptation is not burned, that is, consumed by fire, but purified. Here there is speech of moral goodness. Therefore the unmarried state is called good simply; the married state is called good on account of avoiding incontinence, namely lest one sin; and since this is the least moral goodness, the unmarried state will be good on account of something more. The former state is good in itself and desirable; the other is good on account of a certain native infirmity of soul, lest something worse happen. Therefore comparison by reason of goodness is instituted between each state, and the appellation "good" made of the state of unmarried women or unmarried men has a comparative force, so that it is the same as "better," according to the custom of the Hebrews. But do not infer from those things which the Apostle here says about the state of married women that it is good only on account of the end of avoiding incontinence; for from the Apostle himself it is clear that it is good on account of other ends, for example, on account of the procreation of children (cf. 1 Tim. V, 14). But the very fact that here the Apostle mentions this one end alone, among the several goods which are in marriage, confirms what we say: that the Apostle, having regard to moral goodness or perfection, prefers virginity to marriage. For if the Apostle is said, when he wrote these things, to have had before his eyes only the moral perfection of those whom he was addressing, and to have wished to commend each state to them from this moral perfection which each person can find in it, and therefore to have spoken to them as though answering the question:

As regards the moral perfection which someone can acquire in either state, which excels, virginity or nuptials? If, I say, you conceive the matter thus, you plainly understand why the Apostle mentions this one good alone out of the many which are in marriage: namely the restraining of concupiscence, lest it break out into sins. For the other goods were altogether ἀδιάφορα to this question. For since moral perfection is situated in this, that we live according to the spirit and not according to the flesh (Rom. VIII, 12), it was necessary to compare each state according to this, if the question was which is morally more perfect. But with this question set aside, there was no reason why the other goods of Marriage, not only physical but also moral, should be passed over in silence. Therefore by reason of moral good the Apostle compares virginity with marriage so that he prefers it to marriage. This indeed is openly declared at the end of the discourse (v. 40): "she will be more blessed if she remains thus," that is, unmarried. Hence it is that abstinence from the conjugal act is called by the same Apostle sanctity, which is not asserted of those who use marriage: "The unmarried woman thinks of the things that are the Lord's, that she may be holy in body and spirit; but she who is married thinks of the things that are of the world, how she may please her husband" (v. 34). And on account of this excellence of virginity, it is the object of counsel (v. 25): that is, it is not merely counseled, not commanded, because it is an indifferent thing, not necessary, which is also true of marriage; but because it contains a more eminent perfection than can generally be exacted from all. For this is the account of the evangelical counsels. This moreover is clear when the words of Christ in Matthew XIX, 10-12 are compared, in which Christ, commending the excellence of the gift of virginity, asserts that it is not given to all, but to those to whom God wills. Read Chrysostom on both places. But there is no need for us to observe that in the Apostle's discourse Marriage is considered insofar as it is exercised through copulation; for thus it contributes to the remedy of concupiscence, and thus it is true that the married woman thinks of the things that are of the world.

III. But, they say, marriage is called by the Apostle honorable in all (τίμιον ἐν πᾶσι; Heb. XIII, 4), but virginity never is. Besides, virginity itself is commended by the same Apostle not in itself, but by reason of another: "I think," he says, "that this is good on account of the present necessity" (1 Cor. VII, 26). I answer to the first: those words of the Apostle contain an exhortation rather than praise, that the honor owed to nuptials be shown by spouses in all their acts, and that nothing be done which would dishonor Christian nuptials, as used to happen among the Gentiles. For the rest, even if nuptials are honorable, it does not follow that virginity is not more honorable; and this, although not in as many words, the Apostle nevertheless signified when he preferred it to marriage. I answer to the second: those words of the Apostle do not pertain to giving the reason why virginity is good, but to presenting a certain persuasive reason for his counsel concerning preserving virginity, or to making souls more inclined to embrace that counsel, arguing also from the present necessity or from the present inconveniences of marriage, as he declares below. Therefore it is a commendation of virginity drawn not from the object, but from a certain condition of the subject: that outside it man is liable to more tribulations of the flesh. But this is not the same as saying that this is the only cause why virginity is good.

IV. It is clear, second, from the doctrine of the Fathers against Jovinian: read Jerome against the same, read also Ambrose On Virginity and Augustine On Holy Virginity. The Church professed this doctrine from her cradle; she has always held virgins in the greatest honor and has followed them with a certain singular reverence. Surely there would have been no reason for this special esteem if she had judged virginity equal to nuptials or inferior.

It is clear, third, from intrinsic reason. For that state in which the spirit is preferred to the flesh, in which the goods proper to man insofar as he is rational are procured, in which the virtues most difficult because of the impediment of concupiscence are exercised, in which the most noble end, which is the union of the soul with God, can in itself be more fully obtained, and in which therefore generosity and greatness of soul shine forth, is more perfect and more blessed than that state in which one gives work to animal desires and procures those things which are also common to brute beasts, in which satisfaction is made to concupiscence, although within due limits, and in which it is not permitted in a special way to be free for God alone. But such is the case; therefore. The argument of the Apostle in the cited place, vv. 32-35, returns to this. Augustine brings forward another reason in the book On Holy Virginity, chapter 2, whose force a Christian man cannot fail to feel: "Since the whole Church herself is a virgin betrothed to one man, Christ, as the Apostle says, how worthy of honor are her members, who guard even in the flesh itself what the whole Church guards in faith, who imitate the mother of her husband and Lord? For the Church too is both mother and virgin. For whose integrity do we consult, if she is not a virgin? Or whose offspring do we address, if she is not a mother? Mary corporally bore the Head of this body; the Church spiritually bears the members of that Head. In each, virginity does not impede fecundity; in each, fecundity does not take away virginity. Therefore, since the whole Church is holy both in body and spirit, and yet the whole is not virgin in body, but in spirit, how much holier is she in those members in whom she is virgin in body and spirit?"

V. But that marriage is a sacrament indeed makes it the case that grace is conferred upon spouses ex opere operato, and that the necessary actual graces are given for the operations of their state; but it does not make their operations more perfect than those which are proper to the other state, nor does it prevent sanctifying grace, and the same grace more abundantly, from being acquired by virgins ex opere operantis. But the perfection and blessedness of a state is situated in the perfection of its proper acts and in the very possession of grace, not in the mode by which that grace is acquired.

VI. But those things which Augustine piously and subtly discusses concerning the perfection of married persons in the Old Testament, even of those who spread children among several wives, to whom he does not dare to prefer the continence of Christians (On the Good of Marriage, chapter XIX ff.), these things, first, do not regard all indiscriminately, but those Patriarchs, and those like them if there were any, whose sanctity is commended to us in the Scriptures; for he openly names them, and it easily appears that Augustine always directs his mind to them. Second, according to Augustine, the perfection of the Patriarchs using marriage, not less than the perfection of the continent in the New Law, is nevertheless not the perfection proper to the state, but the perfection of the person (cf. chapter XXIII), which perfection in those men the use of marriage did not impede; because, as he supposes, they applied themselves to children not from any lust but from the sole will of propagating the people, or worshippers of God, and therefore from a will moved by charity, and that indeed in that age in which the people of God, God so disposing, was to be propagated by carnal generation. Therefore, according to the same Augustine, they bore a soul prepared for continence and would actually have embraced it if they had believed that, in that age, it was more expedient for them. Therefore, comparing their continence in preparation of soul and in true desire for it with the actual continence of Christians, Augustine does not dare to prefer these to those. But third, you see that the reason for the excellence of the Patriarchs is finally placed by Augustine in continence, which, as he supposes, they had in vow; and therefore, from this very discussion of Augustine, continence in itself excels the use of marriage.

You will say: abstinence from marriage deprives of the greatest good, that is, the increase of peoples; therefore it is certainly not better than the use of marriage.

I answer: abstinence deprives the man himself who abstains of the greatest good: I deny; for his greatest good is not offspring. It deprives others: I subdistinguish; with injury, I deny (see following, n. 74); apart from injury, I again subdistinguish: namely, when a disposition suitable in itself has even been obtained for procuring for the community goods more excellent than a simple increase, I concede; when the increase of the community is impeded, I again subdistinguish: an increase useful and desirable, I deny, for as long as natural inclination in general exercises its force, that will never be lacking; a possible increase, I again subdistinguish: one that would for the most part be harmful, and can be compensated by better goods through the said abstinence, I concede; otherwise, I deny. Cf. the following thesis.

Marriage can be considered in two ways, namely as contract and as sacrament. Considered as contract, it is a covenant by which a man and a woman legitimately hand over to each other dominion over their bodies in order to acts apt of themselves for the generation of offspring, and oblige themselves to an undivided society of life. But considered as sacrament it is defined: a sacrament of the New Law conferring grace for sanctifying the legitimate union of man and woman and for piously receiving and holy educating offspring.

§ 1. The primary end of Marriage is the procreation and education of offspring; the secondary end is mutual assistance and the remedy of concupiscence (Can. 1013).

Marriage is divided in many ways, for it is:

1°. In fieri or in facto esse. - Marriage in fieri is said to be the actual contract itself, which is perfected by the mutual consent of man and woman. But the continuing wedlock in the bond which comes from the matrimonial contract is called in facto esse.

2°. § 1. A valid marriage of the baptized is called ratified, if it has not yet been completed by consummation; ratified and consummated, if between the spouses there has taken place the conjugal act to which by its nature the matrimonial contract is ordered and by which the spouses become one flesh.

§ 2. Once marriage has been celebrated, if the spouses have cohabited together, consummation is presumed until the contrary is proved.

§ 3. A marriage validly celebrated between non-baptized persons is called legitimate.

§ 4. An invalid marriage is called putative if it has been celebrated in good faith by at least one party, until each party becomes certain of its nullity (Can. 1015).

I say 1°. Marriage of Christians celebrated by a legitimate rite is a true sacrament, properly so called, of the New Law. It is established from Trent, sess. 24, can. 1, where it is said: "If anyone shall say that Marriage is not truly and properly one of the seven sacraments of the Evangelical Law instituted by Christ the Lord, but invented by men in the Church, and that it does not confer grace, let him be anathema."

And from Canon 1012:

§ 1. Christ the Lord raised the matrimonial contract itself between the baptized to the dignity of a sacrament.

§ 2. Wherefore, among the baptized there cannot exist a valid matrimonial contract without its being by that very fact a sacrament (Can. 1012).

I say 2°. § 1. The consent of the parties, legitimately manifested between persons capable by law, makes marriage; and this consent cannot be supplied by any human power.

§ 2. Matrimonial consent is an act of the will by which each party hands over and accepts the right over the body, perpetual and exclusive, in order to acts apt of themselves for the generation of offspring (Can. 1081).

C. 1, C. xxvii, q. 2: Intercourse does not make Marriage, but the will; C. 2, ibid.: Let the consent alone of those whose conjunctions are at issue suffice according to the laws. If this consent alone should perhaps be lacking in nuptials, all other things, even when celebrated with intercourse itself, are frustrated.

Every bilateral contract is constituted by the consent of parties capable of entering this contract. But marriage is a bilateral contract. Therefore marriage too is constituted by the consent of parties capable of entering it. Hence Eugene IV in the const. Exultate Deo: "The seventh is the Sacrament of Marriage, which is the sign of the conjunction of Christ and the Church according to the Apostle saying: this sacrament is great in Christ and in the Church. The efficient cause of marriage regularly is mutual consent, expressed by words concerning the present." And the error of the Armenians is condemned: "Also that among the Armenians there is no certain form of words expressing matrimonial consent between husband and wife; indeed many are compelled by parents and friends to come to the Church so that marriage may be made between them, and although one or both say that they do not wish to be matrimonially joined to each other, nevertheless marriage is made between them in the face of the Church." Thus Benedict XII to the Armenians, in the year 1341.

Besides, just as no contract can exist without consent, so neither can Marriage. Moreover, consent in every bilateral contract is an act of the will by which each party hands over and accepts that right which is proper to the contract. But the right proper to the matrimonial contract is the perpetual and exclusive right over the body in order to acts apt for generation. Therefore consent in marriage is an act of the will by which each party hands over and accepts a perpetual and exclusive right over the body in order to acts apt for generation. Consent must be mutual, perfectly deliberate, and manifested by external signs. The reason is that Marriage is a contract or covenant between a man and a woman, inducing a most grave obligation.

I say 3°. § 1. The internal consent of the mind is always presumed to be conformable to the words or signs employed in celebrating marriage.

§ 2. But if either party or each party by a positive act of the will excludes marriage itself, or every right to the conjugal act, or some essential property of marriage, he contracts invalidly (Can. 1086).

No one is to be judged to have said what he did not think in mind. The judge must take words according to their common signification; and even if the betrothed man proves that he had previously protested that he would not do the things which he says, nor wished to be understood according to the words, because he was going to speak fictitiously, he could recede from that will and express true consent into marriage; indeed he also seems to have acted thus according to that which he publicly did. Hence he is not believed, because interpretation must be made against him who employs deceit. Certainly in the forum of conscience one can believe him who accuses himself of fictitious consent; but in the external forum it is a question of administering justice according to assertions. Truly difficult is the proof of fictitious consent.

He enters a contract invalidly who excludes it by a positive act. Therefore he who by a positive act excludes every right to the conjugal act does not have matrimonial consent; but he who does not have matrimonial consent does not enter a valid marriage. He who by a positive act excludes the unity of marriage does not hand over and accept an exclusive right over the body; but such a one does not have matrimonial consent. He who by a positive act of the will also excludes indissolubility does not hand over and accept a perpetual right; but he who does not hand over a perpetual right does not have matrimonial consent.

I say 4°. Marriage enjoys the favor of law; wherefore in doubt one must stand for the validity of marriage, until the contrary is proved, with the prescription of Can. 1127 preserved (Can. 1014).¹

The marriage of the baptized is ruled not only by divine law, but also by canon law, with the competence of civil power preserved concerning the merely civil effects of the same marriage (Can. 1016).

¹ Cf. Addenda, p. 1129, n. 89.

Question 1. Must consent be expressed in words?

Resp. § 2. The betrothed are to express matrimonial consent in words; nor is it licit for them to employ equivalent signs, if they are able to speak (Can. 1088).

Words are to be employed for liceity; for the paragraph does not speak about validity.

Question 2. Does consent through a procurator suffice?

Resp. Affirmatively, provided the required conditions are present, because marriage has the whole nature of a contract; but any contract can be made through a procurator. Hence Canon 1088, § 1: For contracting marriage validly it is necessary that the contracting parties be present either by themselves or through a procurator; and the Roman Ritual, tit. VII, c. 2, n. 2: "Nor does the consent of one suffice, but it must be of both, and expressed by some visible sign, whether it is made by themselves or through a procurator." Personal presence now seems to be required except in the case of a procurator duly employed. But the conditions are declared in the following canon:

§ 1. With diocesan statutes added upon this matter remaining firm, in order that marriage through a procurator be entered validly, there is required a special mandate for contracting with a certain person, signed by the mandator and either by the pastor or Ordinary of the place in which the mandate is made, or by a priest delegated by either, or by at least two witnesses.

§ 2. If the mandator does not know how to write, this is to be noted in the mandate itself, and another witness is to be added who himself also signs the writing; otherwise the mandate is invalid.

§ 3. If, before the procurator has contracted in the name of the mandator, this latter has revoked the mandate or has fallen into insanity, the marriage is invalid, although either the procurator or the other contracting party was ignorant of these things.

§ 4. In order that the marriage be valid, the procurator must perform his office himself in person (Can. 1089).

Question 3. Is Marriage entered under a condition valid?

Resp. It is certain that it is valid if the condition is concerning the past or concerning the present and is verified. The reason is that that conditioned consent immediately passes into absolute consent, and therefore nothing is lacking to the value of the sacrament. But if an honorable and possible condition concerning the future is added, then certainly the Marriage is not perfected until the condition is fulfilled; because the contract must transfer the mutual right over bodies concerning the present. But once the condition has been fulfilled, the Marriage is valid; since a conditioned contract, once the condition has been fulfilled, passes into absolute, and by that very fact is valid by reason of the sacrament, because among Christians the contract of Marriage cannot be separated from the sacrament. - Although Marriage is firm even if the condition is fulfilled while the contracting parties are ignorant, nevertheless they themselves cannot use marriage before receiving knowledge of this fulfillment; otherwise at least in will and intention they would commit fornication. - Cf. S. Alphonsus, n. 890; Baller. note (a) and (b), p. 719.

Question 4. Is marriage entered under a condition concerning a necessary or impossible or immoral future thing, but not against the substance of marriage, valid?

Resp. The marriage is valid, because such a condition is held as not added. - Cf. Can. 1092.

A condition once placed and not revoked:

1°. If it is concerning the future and is necessary or impossible or immoral, but not against the substance of marriage, let it be held as not added (Can. 1092).

Consent concerning a necessary future thing is held in law as equivalent to consent concerning the present; and hence, by the addition of a condition concerning a necessary future thing, marriage is neither suspended nor vitiated, but immediately begins to be valid as if it had been contracted purely and without any condition; for example, I contract with you if tomorrow the sun rises.

In the same way the contract is not suspended if it is concerning an impossible thing; for unless certain indications to the contrary are present, in so grave an affair the contracting parties are deemed truly and seriously to wish to do something and not playfully. And thus in the chapter which is called notable and much allegable, Gregory IX says: "If conditions against the substance of wedlock are inserted, if one says to the other: I contract with you if you avoid the generation of offspring, or until I find another more worthy in honor or resources; or if for gain you hand yourself over to adultery; the matrimonial contract, however favorable it may be, lacks effect. Although other conditions placed in marriage, if they were immoral or impossible, ought on account of its favor to be held as not added." C. 7, X, IV, 5.

Question 5. Is marriage entered under an immoral condition against the substance of marriage valid?

Resp. Negatively; thus the new Code decrees the matter: A condition once placed and not revoked, if it is concerning the future against the substance of marriage, renders it invalid (Can. 1092, 2°).

Because then consent in the substance of the contract, which is altogether required, is not had. Consent into a perpetual and exclusive right is not had; therefore neither consent into marriage. Therefore, when contracting is done truly with a condition against the essence of wedlock, certainly the marriage is null; as when by heretics a formula is employed under that explicit condition that this marriage can be dissolved in the case of adultery, then it can no longer happen that error concerning marriage has been absorbed by the general will of contracting according to the intention of Christ. For marriages between co-parties, say heretical ones, can be valid with a concomitant error concerning its indissolubility, when, as very often happens, the will of contracting marriage according to the intention of Christ prevails, and that error is absorbed in this intention. But if it is certainly established that a condition has been added to the substance of marriage, and especially to indissolubility or perpetuity, such nuptials are invalid. Cf. S. Off., 18 Dec. 1872; 9 Dec. 1874; 2 Oct. 1860; 29 Nov. 1882.

It will have to be investigated whether a condition contrary to the perpetuity and indissolubility of the conjugal bond, in some manner, directly or indirectly, explicitly or implicitly, was brought into the pact by the contracting parties, or whether the marriage was contracted with a depraved will of not consenting to a perpetual bond.

Question 6. Is it licit to enter marriage through an interpreter?

Resp. Marriage can also be contracted through an interpreter (Can. 1090).

Just as in other contracts a notary and witnesses can be sufficiently informed through an interpreter, so in this case the pastor and witnesses are informed concerning consent through an interpreter.

Question 7. Is consent presumed to persevere?

Resp. Even if marriage has been entered invalidly by reason of an impediment, the consent given is presumed to persevere until its revocation has been established (Can. 1093).

Question 8. Is it licit for a pastor to assist at a marriage to be contracted through a procurator or interpreter without the permission of the Ordinary?

Resp. The pastor is not to assist at a marriage to be contracted through a procurator or through an interpreter, unless there is a just cause and it is in no way licit to doubt the authenticity of the mandate or the trustworthiness of the interpreter, and, if time allows, the permission of the Ordinary has been had (Can. 1091).

The reason for this canon is clear from the necessity of driving away every error in so grave a matter. Therefore the pastor, before he assists, must be certain concerning the just cause of this manner of contracting, concerning the authenticity of the mandate, and concerning the trustworthiness of the interpreter; nor ought he to assist without the permission of the Ordinary.

Question 9. What is that which the contracting parties must not be ignorant of?

Resp. § 1. In order that matrimonial consent can be had, it is necessary that the contracting parties at least not be ignorant that marriage is a permanent society between a man and a woman for procreating children.

§ 2. This ignorance is not presumed after puberty (Can. 1082).

For without an act of the will no consent is possible; but there is no desire of a thing unknown, nothing willed unless known; and therefore, in order that there can be consent, the one consenting must not be ignorant of that into which he consents. Thus Pirhing, book IV, title 1, sect. 1, n. 85, places among the things necessary for wedlock knowledge or the judgment of discretion, by which one understands what he does.

By law sufficient discretion is presumed in those who have arrived at puberty.

Is the expression of affection, or the cultivation of affection, distinct from the “pleasure” condemned by Innocent XI? It is argued that there is a kind of expression of affection unique to the conjugal act, and that the social and psychological goods obtained by the couple for themselves through the act, such as the “gentle association” spoken of by St. Thomas, are sufficient for excusing the act.¹²⁸ Clearly, one’s selfless desire for another’s good, and the desire to strengthen such love as a couple, are not reducible to “pleasure,” are they? ¹²⁸ Note that we are concerned here with a “final cause” – that which the act is done for the sake of, rather than an “efficient cause,” that which impels one towards the act.

This question has become urgent only somewhat recently. As previously noted, Fr. Gury seems to be the first moralist to propose that the expression of affection suffices as a motive for the use of marriage, in the second edition (1852) of his once extremely popular manual. This proposal seems to coincide somewhat with the decline in marriage seen as a publicly oriented reality and more as a personal reality driven by the quest for self-fulfillment in romantic love, as briefly explored in the Introduction. However, this topic is for the study of historians.

While it is certainly possible to read Innocent XI’s condemnation in such a way as to make room for the thesis that “affection” is distinct from pleasure, this does not seem to be a fair or realistic reading. Perhaps a satisfying solution to the solam voluptatem debate is still a long way off. It is difficult to hold the position I am proposing, as it very much sits in between simpler solutions, namely, the mainstream doctrine of today one the one hand which says at least implicitly that affective goods are not “pleasure” and therefore can excuse the marriage act, and the Augustinian-Thomistic line on the other which says that there is sin even in requesting the debt without the intention to procreate. However, it may in fact help the case: very frequently, Catholic truth is found in between the simple claims. The solutions which I can propose are the following.

First: Perhaps there is an analogy with the relief of concupiscence. The conjugal act is to be used to show or increase mutual affection only when there is no other way to show one’s affection or increase mutual affection. This is arguably a circumstance which does not obtain in any real case. However, that is not so clear, and taking this approach is probably the best way to adopt something approximating the current mainstream doctrine as proposed by nearly all contemporary literature. Those who will write against this book’s argument ought to begin with this line of attack, no doubt going on to say something like, “It is impossible to express marital love properly without the conjugal act, and the use of marriage gives the increase and of affection requisite for a healthy relationship, as laid down in the first section of Gaudium et Spes §51.” My response to that argument is a question: Did Joseph and Mary love each other as spouses? Yes, they did, and their marriage is the exemplar of human marriage after the Fall.¹²⁹ The objection might be strengthened by considering the proportion between the loss of reason and the obtaining of the affective goods proper to a healthy marriage – could such a pursuit be proportionate, the way sleep-inducing anesthesia is proportionate to the good pursued in a necessary surgery which would be unbearably painful otherwise? The problem with this is threefold. First, such affective goods be effectively pursued in other ways in the majority of cases, provided one’s spouse is cooperative; second, the frequency of this kind of use of marriage inclines one to abuse such a structure; third, there is no strict causal relationship (sometimes the act might even cause the opposite of what is intended). I conclude that the analogy with the relief of concupiscence fails. ¹²⁹ Of course, their marriage was not sacramental properly speaking, and Christ and the Church are the true exemplar cause of Matrimony (by analogy) – the point is simply that there was never a greater human marriage after the Fall than between Mary and Joseph.

Second: A further solution is proposed by Sasserath and was referenced already. It is that “pleasure alone” is immoral as an end because it inverts the order of the act’s interior hierarchy of ends, while not perverting the act in its exterior structure as does unnatural vice. The physical pleasures of the conjugal act exist to motivate procreation. Here, “pleasure alone” is understood as “physical pleasure being sought, absent the intention for reasonably needful relief of concupiscence, and absent the intention of procreation.” Other goods could be pursued in the act in this understanding of “pleasure alone.” It follows that any affective/social goods which are dependent upon the pleasures being pursued, which would certainly include the affective goods under consideration but could also include honor, reconciliation, etc., are dependent upon an inversion of the interior structure of the conjugal act in relation to the will – it is to use the act to obtain pleasure which causes social goods, rather than to use pleasure to complete the act which will also cause social goods. Social goods are totally exterior to the act and thus are in an accidental relationship to it, however causally strong that relationship might be.¹³⁰ It could be replied that the relief of concupiscence is just as much an inversion of the act as the pursuit of pleasure is, which means that either we must revert to the Augustinian-Thomistic position or else abandon Sasserath’s argument. However, we have already treated of pleasure sought as a means of relieving concupiscence above. While it is in fact the same pleasure in the man which leads to the completion of the act and which constitutes at least the physical dimension of “positive pleasure,” the relation to the will is diverse, as in one case it is willed instrumentally for the sake of completion of an integral conjugal act (the physical ending of the act by delivering male gametes), and in the other it is willed for its own sake apart from completion except insofar as the “act” or process of completion itself constitutes the same pleasure. (Pleasure in the woman is physically irrelevant to the achievement of anything other than the relief of concupiscence in her, so pleasure sought by her is either for the relief of concupiscence or for some other good extrinsic to the act, as it is never for procreation per se.) ¹³⁰ Today’s unwitting proponents of the idea that any “honest” extrinsic goods would suffice to excuse the marriage act of themselves will find support in the argument made about the same question by Anthony of the Holy Spirit (see Directorii Confessariorum [1680], Tract XI, Disp. IX, sec. 1). They will want to show that “affective goods” (i.e. bonding, expressing affection, etc.) are rightly considered “honest goods.” However, I believe this approach is mistaken, as such affective goods can be pursued in other ways and do not necessarily follow, and therefore they lack sufficient proportion with the act to justify of themselves the inhibition of reason. I note also that there is a somewhat undefended assertion in St. Alphonsus’s gloss on Busembaum, as quoted above, namely, that the motives which are lawful for one to contract marriage will also make the marriage act itself lawful; he does not prove this in the section he himself cites (§882), which concerns lawful motives for contracting marriage, and he seems not to address directly Busembaum’s clear contradiction of this very same principle with respect to health. (Busembaum is supported by Fr. Francis Silvius [d. 1649], who argues against the “proportionality” between the marriage act and health [see his commentary on ST, Suppl. q. 49, art. 6; Conclusion 6], as Fr. Leonard Gaudé quotes in a footnote on §881 in the 1953 edition of De Matrimonio [Tomus Quartus, p. 61]: “licet finis intentus sit bonus, et medium quod eligunt sit sibi licitum, non est tamen proportio medii ad finem.” I extend this to all honest extrinsic motives.) However, especially since Busembaum does not forbid the intention of extrinsic goods other than health “alone,” but he does not explain why. In any case, this is a significant opening for those who wish to argue that honest extrinsic goods are sufficient to excuse the marriage act (such as perhaps “affection,” “bonding,” etc. – which are not considered at all by St. Alphonsus, it must be noted, least of all as pursued during infertility chosen on account of avoiding conception.) Or else, perhaps I simply do not understand St. Alphonsus’s argument. The most relevant part of §882 reads: “Ad rationem autem contrariae sententiae, nempe quod sit deordinatio eligere finem secundarium prae primario: respondetur quod deordinatio quidem esset, si ordinaretur finis primarius ad secundarium; sed non, si ex duobus finibus licitis secundarius prae primario eligatur. Hujusmodi tamen fines intrinseci accidentales (vel procreandae prolis vel vitandae incontinentiae), ut honesti sint, oportet ut referantur ad Deum . . .” Other honest extrinsic ends also render the contraction of marriage lawful, and seemingly by extension its act, for St. Alphonsus, though he expressly excludes “pleasure,” which is a dishonest end (see §883) and thus casts doubt on the lawfulness of using “pleasure” for the sake of obtaining honest extrinsic ends, so the relationship between “pleasure” and affective goods must be considered. (There is also an appeal in §883 to extrinsic goods not merely as final causes but as efficient causes in view of adopting the proper motives necessary for contracting marriage, a point which must be considered as well.) A clear definition of honest goods is not given, nor is it evident St. Alphonsus would consider all “affective goods” as being honest insofar as they would be reducible even to psychological pleasure (though he would undoubtedly consider authentic love between spouses to be an honest good). All this is to say that there is a puzzle to explore. My own thesis stays as close to St. Thomas as I think reasonably possible – this is one of the principal goals of this work. It seems that a demonstration that any motive which makes contracting marriage morally upright will make the marriage act morally upright in use would suffice to show that affective goods excuse the marriage act, as affective goods would seem lawful to motivate the marriage contract, and this would be the best way to argue that they are honest goods.

Here it is perhaps helpful to put forward some clarification of terminology. My proposal for a coherent and useful distinction between primary-secondary ends and intrinsic-extrinsic goods regards a spectrum and a binary way of viewing the relation of conjugal acts to what might be obtained by them. Health is not a primary good of any conjugal act because it has no essential relationship to the sexual faculty, but it is a secondary good because of the way the body is constituted – it is the sort of thing which follows from the act, on account of its design, but this will actually occur depending on various factors that are not directly related to the well-functioning of the sexual faculty. In fact, only procreation is a primary good of the marriage act. The more factors apart from the well-functioning of the sexual faculty are required, the more secondary an end is (i.e., the relief of concupiscence is less secondary than health which is less secondary than honor). When there is no meaningful relationship between the act and an end except due to the will of either the man or the woman subsequent to the act (i.e. to obtain information, to make money, etc.) or is otherwise totally alien to the nature of conjugal acts within a rightly ordered social context (which the act is designed to be annexed to in the broader scheme of things), the end is no longer secondary but is per accidens. Intrinsic goods, in my synthesis and proposal (and not necessarily tracking any one particular authority), are goods which are necessary for or are by nature concomitant with the act’s completion (pleasure in the man in view of completion, pleasure in the woman), which flow from the former necessarily (namely, the relief of concupiscence), and which constitute the fundamental purpose of the act (its primary end, procreation). Extrinsic goods are everything else which might be obtained from a sexual act, whether willed or unwilled.^{131 131} We also read in the authors of “honest” and “dishonest” goods – this language, in my opinion, perhaps ought to be abandoned; while it attempts to clarify the sort of goods which can lawfully be pursued, it tends to obfuscate the issue because “pleasure” is considered “dishonest” and yet is itself a good thing, unlike “vanity” (which would be a dishonest good, including in contracting marriage). One might even say the same of the intrinsic-extrinsic distinction. (St. Alphonsus speaks of honest and dishonest goods in marriage, as well as goods which are intrinsic-essential, intrinsic-accidental – which are, in fact, children and relief of concupiscence – and extrinsic-accidental. See De Matrimonio, §882-3 etc.) The intrinsic-extrinsic distinction might also be coherently described as being a spectrum of how the act relates to goods which flow from it as they actually ought to be pursued according to the design of the act and its proper role in married life vis-à-vis society. Then health is more intrinsic than honor, and honor is more intrinsic than money. In this case health would arguably be more intrinsic than bonding because it flows more necessarily from the act, but it would be more secondary than bonding because it is less of the sort of thing which ought to be pursued by means of the act.

Third: Yet another part of the solution is to read Innocent XI’s condemnation in a fuller context; everything but delighting in one’s last end is done for more than its own sake. Therefore, we must look for a reasonable way to see sexual pleasure as a proximate end, as it is not fair to think that Innocent XI means pleasure “as a last end” – clearly, this would not only be venial sin but mortal sin. Therefore, what Innocent XI must have in mind is pleasure sought “now.” Therefore, the question to be asked is not, “Is this act being done for the sake of pleasure alone,” but rather, “Is this act being done on account of the pleasure contained in the act without the pursuit of any other intrinsic goods?” This is a much more reasonable reading of the Pontiff’s words than the “loophole hermeneutic” employed by any number of casuists (especially the Spanish, over and against the French who had pushed for the proposition’s condemnation).

Fourth: It can be replied that the affective goods are simply the same as the “pleasure” which Innocent XI is referring to. It is just the case that the couple wants to experience each other’s bodies and have erotic feelings and emotional catharsis. Even with the explicit intention to use such acts for the sake of cultivating a healthier domestic life in the long run, what the couple wants right now, as the object of their act, is this pleasant experience as pleasant, not only physically but also psychologically, emotionally, and socially. This argument, when coupled with the third argument, forms quite a plausible and clear picture of the basic moral structure of the marital act as pleasure-seeking in the teaching of Innocent XI.

One of these arguments alone may not suffice, but taken together I think they form a strong presumption in favor of the conclusion that affective or social goods do not of themselves suffice to excuse the conjugal act, should one wish to stay faithful to the teaching of Innocent XI on the matter – which one ought.

However, a final objection occurs. It could be argued that the principle of totality excuses the use of marriage for social goods. This is to say that the momentary inhibition of reason is worth what is gained for one’s overall good, like the use of anesthesia in view of a lifesaving surgery which would be excruciatingly painful and even impossible without being put under. This is a very powerful objection, but it faces several serious problems. First, it finds no support before modern authors (and the modern authors do not describe things in these terms anyway). Second, there is not a strict causal relationship between conjugal acts and the social goods which follow even when explicitly sought, such as there is between anesthesia and insensitivity to pain, so there seems to be a kind of “mismatch” or lack of proportion; such goods can be obtained in other ways and ought to be, and sometimes the intention “backfires.” Third, following upon the second point, we see many couples who are rather sexually active, even within the bounds of nature, and yet are quite miserable. Fourth, social and rational goods themselves are simply more delightful and yet are impossible to delight in properly when one’s reason is suspended, and yet one is purporting to pursue them in a better way while not actually needing the relief of concupiscence which is distracting the mind; other means ought to be used, such as conversation, prayer, service, and other mutual recreation. Finally, in connection with the fourth point, the proposal does not accord with the basic logic of the ascetical life, which is built upon human nature – to use pleasures to the point of losing one’s ability to rejoice in the love of God with one’s rational faculties is to do something which tends toward drawing one’s affect away from Him, even in conjugal acts which do not actually offend Him; this last point is why celibacy is recommended for those who are able to embrace it. The evangelical counsel of chastity is a weapon with which to fight against the flesh and its desires most perfectly, for those who are strong enough to lift the sword.¹³² Needlessly indulging in the most intense pleasures which the body can experience, to the point of incapacity for rational action whereby we can elicit acts of faith, hope, and love for God, is harmful for one’s pursuit of spiritual perfection, especially when done habitually over a long period of time.^{133 132} The sources of sin are the world, the flesh, and the Devil; they tempt by the concupiscence of the eyes, concupiscence of the flesh, and the pride of life; the habits which dispose one for conquering them are the evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity, and obedience; the acts which fit the habits are the penances of almsgiving, fasting, and prayer. All are called to live this pattern of life according to one’s state, and gradually living this pattern more perfectly helps us to love God more perfectly over time. ¹³³ See ST Supp., q. 41, a. 3, ad. 2.

It must be reiterated – as the point can be missed in the all distinctions, objections, and puzzles – that the main question here regards “sexual recreation,” that is, the use of conjugal acts not done for the three purposes listed above by St. Alphonsus: to pay the debt, to procreate (even with a virtual intention), and to relieve concupiscence not otherwise reasonably relieved. The word “recreation” should not be misconstrued as meaning “for pleasure alone” but also for the sake of any other good if the three excusing motives are all lacking. We are only concerned with the couple who do not presently intend to have a child, or with individual husbands and wives who do not intend to have a child.

In closing this chapter I note that while one will perhaps find many papal writings which indicate the value of conjugal acts in relation to affection, I do not believe one will find a magisterial text contradicting the position which I have herein proposed.

I. St. Augustine, Book 1 On Adulterous Marriages, to Pollentius, says: I know not whether the question concerning marriages be not the most obscure and most implicated. Nor do I dare to profess that I have as yet unfolded all its recesses either in this work or in another, or that I am now able, though it press to be explained. In the time of Augustine heretics, in our age not a few Moralists, have by diverse ways obscured this tract.

II. The conjunction of male with female the ancients called matrimonium rather than patrimonium, because it belongs to the woman to bear, to nourish, and to educate offspring. Nuptiae also is called matrimonium from nubendo; and conubium, and conjugium from the common yoke to which both man and woman are subjected.

III. Matrimony is regarded in three ways: 1. As a natural contract; 2. As a civil contract; 3. As a sacrament of the new law. Absolutely it is described as the marital conjunction of a man and a woman between lawful persons, retaining an undivided companionship of life. But it is added, as it is a sacrament divinely instituted, a sign of the conjunction of Christ with the Church, having the promise of grace for uniting the souls of the spouses, and for educating offspring piously and holily in the Christian faith. Lastly matrimony is threefold: legitimate, ratified, and consummated. Legitimate is that which is by the law of nations, contracted according to the norm of the civil laws, such as is that even of unbelievers. Ratified is that which is perfected according to the laws of the Church, and which is approved by the Church. Consummated is when the spouses are mingled together by carnal copulation.

IV. It coalesces out of several things: 1. Mutual consent; 2. An external promise; 3. A reciprocal delivery of bodies; 4. Thence results a perpetual bond; 5. The mutual obligation of rendering the debt; 6. The right which each has in the other; 7. Carnal copulation.

V. All Catholics deny that the essence of matrimony is set in carnal copulation. Between Adam and Eve there was true matrimony before their commixture. True was the matrimony of the Patriarch Joseph with the Blessed Virgin, all carnal copulation being utterly excluded.

VI. The mutual consent of the contracting parties is the efficient cause of matrimony. The Encratites, Marcionites, Manichees, and Priscillianists denied matrimony to be honourable and good. But the holy Scriptures and all Catholics execrate the error of those ravers. Since indeed matrimony was instituted by natural and divine right. The precept of contracting matrimony regards not individuals but the multitude.

VII. QUESTION I. Whether in the old law matrimony was a sacrament? ANSWER. The character of a sacrament can be regarded in two ways: 1. In the broader signification, according as in whatsoever manner it is called a sign of a sacred thing; 2. Inasmuch as it is a practical and efficacious sign of sanctifying grace. The common opinion of theologians denies that matrimony before the coming of Christ was a true sacrament. But that in the broader signification it was a sacrament, all concede, since, instituted in the state of innocence itself, it was a sign of the conjunction of Christ with the Church. This now is bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh. … Wherefore a man shall leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they shall be two in one flesh. Genesis 2.

VIII. QUESTION II. Is matrimony in the evangelical law a true sacrament? ANSWER. Hus, Luther, Calvin, and the Protestants deny it; but it is of faith that it is a true sacrament, St. Paul saying, Ephesians 5: For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and they shall be two in one flesh. This is a great sacrament; but I speak in Christ and in the Church. There is added the perpetual tradition of the Church, whose documents I have given in Vol. X, Book 2, dissertation 1, chapter 4.

IX. QUESTION III. Whether matrimony celebrated between absent faithful through a proctor be a true sacrament? ANSWER. Soto, Isambert, Gotti, Tournely, and very many others affirm it. Victoria, Cano, Cajetan, Catharinus, Vanroy, and others deny it. This second opinion is to me the more probable. For no sacrament is celebrated between the absent. Nor do these words I join you together, and so forth, require the contracting parties present any less than those other words I absolve thee require a present penitent. The use of absolution given to one absent Clement VIII condemned. Tournely answers that absolution given to one absent is not against the nature of the sacrament, and could be given, did not the prohibition of Clement VIII stand in the way. This answer seems futile. Did Clement VIII condemn the aforesaid opinion at his own arbitrary pleasure? He condemned it because these words I absolve thee require a present penitent. Valid therefore will be a matrimony entered upon between absent parties through a proctor in the character of a natural and civil contract; but that it is not a true sacrament is to me the more probable.

X. The matrimony of unbelievers after the promulgation of the evangelical law is not a sacrament. Similarly the matrimony of a believer with an unbeliever is not a sacrament, as seems to me the more probable. If unbelieving spouses be converted to the faith, their matrimony does not become a sacrament according to the more probable opinion: because a later intention cannot bring it about that a contract entered upon, which was not a sacrament, should afterwards become one.

XI. Marriages of Catholics with heretics are altogether unlawful, as all theologians confess. But no law declares them invalid.

1. Marriage is defined by the Canonists: the union of male and female, involving their living together in undivided intercourse. In the present order of Providence, the marriage contract between baptized persons is a sacrament, under the superintendence of the Church, the fertile theme of canonists and theologians. As philosophers, we deal with marriage as it would be, were there no sacraments, no Church, and no Incarnation, present or to come. This is marriage in the order of pure nature.

2. It is natural to all animals to propagate their kind, natural therefore also to man; and being natural, it is so far forth also a good thing, unless we are to say with the Manicheans, that the whole of corporeal nature is an evil creation. Nay, so urgent is the natural appetite here, that we must argue the existence, not of a mere permission, but of an exigency of nature, and consequent command of God (Ethics, c. vi., s. ii., nn. 11, 12, p. 122), for the propagation of the human species. Besides, there is in the individual the duty of self-preservation, therefore likewise in the race. Again, the old cannot subsist at all without the support of the young, nor lead a cheerful existence without their company. Imagine a world with no youth in it, a winter without a spring!

3. There is this difference between self-preservation and the preservation of the race, that if a man will not eat, none can eat for him; but if one man omit the propagation of his kind, another can take it up. There are many things necessary for the good of mankind, which are not to be done by every individual. Not all are to be soldiers, nor all builders, though houses are needful, and sometimes war. Nor is it desirable that the human race should be multiplied to its utmost capacity. It is enough here to mention without discussing the teaching of Malthus, how population presses on the means of subsistence, the latter increasing in an arithmetical, the former in a geometrical ratio. Without going the whole way with Malthus, modern economical writers are commonly a little Malthusian, and shrink from giving to all and each of their species the word to "increase and multiply."

4. But, it will be said, sickly and consumptive subjects, and still more those who have any tendency to madness, may well be excused from having children; so too may they be excused whose poverty cannot keep a family; excused too is the inveterate drunkard, and all habitual criminals, by the principle of heredity, lest they transmit to posterity an evil bodily predisposition; but the healthy and the virtuous, men sound of mind and limb, of life unspotted, and in circumstances easy, the flower of the race,—none of these surely should omit to raise up others to wear his lineaments: we want such men multiplied. I answer, on natural grounds alone: You may counsel, but you cannot compel, either by positive law or ethical precept, any man or woman to seek to have children. You surely will not breed men by selection, like cattle, as Plato proposed. The union of the sexes, especially the married union, is an act to be of all others the most entirely free, spontaneous, uncommanded, and unconstrained. It should be a union of intense mutual love. But a man may not meet with any woman that he can love with passion; or, meeting such, he may not be able to win her. Nor, considering the indeterminateness of points of health, capacity, and character, could any certain list be drawn up of persons bound to have issue. Thus the utmost that can be argued is a counsel in this direction, a counsel that mankind ordinarily are ready enough to comply with. But if any one of seeming aptitude excuses himself on the score of finding no partner to his liking, or of a desire to travel, or of study, or still more, of devotion—and why should not a man, ever of natural piety, go out into solitude, like St. Antony, to hold communion with his Maker?—all these excuses must be taken. It is lawful then in the state of mere nature, upon any one of many sufficient grounds, to stand aside and relinquish to your neighbour the privilege and responsibility of giving increase to the human family.

5. But if it is no one individual's duty to propagate his kind, how is it that we have laid down that there is such a duty? For the duty is incumbent upon them that alone can do it, and it can only be done by individuals. The answer rests on a distinction between proximate and remote duty. The propagation of the race is the remote duty of every individual, but at present the proximate, duty of none. A remote duty is a duty not now pressing but which would have to be performed in a certain contingency, which contingency happening, the duty becomes proximate. If there appeared a danger of our race dying out, the survivors would be beholden, especially those in power, to take steps for its continuance. Rewards might then be held out, like the jus trium liberorum instituted at Rome by Augustus; and if necessary, penalties inflicted on celibacy. In this one extreme case the matrimonial union might be made matter of legal constraint. But when will such constraint become necessary?

6. The continuance of the human race must be wrought out by man and woman standing in that abiding and exclusive relation to one another, which constitutes the state of marriage. Nature abhors promiscuity, or free love. It is the delight of writers who use, perhaps abuse, Darwin's name, to picture primitive mankind as all living in this infrabestial state. But "the state supposed is suicidal, and instead of allowing the expansion of the human race, would have produced infertility, and probably disease, and at best only allowed the existing numbers to maintain, under the most favourable circumstances, a precarious existence. To suppose, therefore, that the whole human race for any considerable time were without regular marriage, is physiologically impossible. They could never have survived it." (Devas, Studies of Family Life, § 101.)

7. Even if the alleged promiscuity ever did prevail—and it may have obtained to some extent in certain degraded portions of humanity—its prevalence was not its justification. The practice cannot have been befitting in any stage of the evolution of human society. As in all things we suppose our readers to have understanding, we leave it to them to think out this matter for themselves. Suffice it here to put forward two grand advantages gained and ends achieved, which are called by theologians "the goods of marriage."

8. The first good of marriage is the offspring that is born of it. Nature wills, not only the being, but the well-being of this offspring, and that both in the physical and in the moral order. Very important for the physical health of the child it is, that it be born of parents whose animal propensities are under some restraint; such restraint the bond of marriage implies. Then, in the moral order, the child requires to be educated with love, a love that shall be guided by wisdom, and supported by firmness. Love, wisdom, and firmness, they are the attributes of both parents; but love is especially looked for from the mother, wisdom and firmness from the father. And, what is important, both have an interest in the child such as no other human being can take. We are speaking of the normal father or mother, not of many worthless parents that actually are; for, as Aristotle often lays it down, we must not judge of a thing from its bad specimens. No doubt, the State could establish public nurseries and infant schools, and provide a staff of nurses and governesses, more scientific educators than even the normal parent; but who, that has not been most unhappy in his origin, would wish his own infancy to have been reared in such a place? What certificated stranger can supply for a mother's love?

9. The second good of marriage is the mutual faith of the partners. Plato never made a greater mistake than when he wrote that "the female sex differs from the male in mankind only in this, that the one bears children, while the other begets them;" and consequently that "no occupation of social life belongs to a woman because she is a woman, or to a man because he is a man, but capacities are equally distributed in both sexes, and woman naturally bears her share in all occupations, and man his share, only that in all woman is weaker than man." (Republic, 454 D; 455 D.) Over against this we must set Aristotle's correction: "Cohabitation among human kind is not for the mere raising of children, but also for the purposes of a partnership in life: for from the first the offices of man and woman are distinct and different: thus they mutually supply for one another, putting their several advantages into the common stock." (Ar., Eth., VIII., xii. 7.) Elsewhere he sets forth these several offices in detail: "The nature of both partners, man and woman, has been prearranged by a divine dispensation in view of their partnership: for they differ by not having their faculties available all to the same effect, but some even to opposite effects, though combining to a common end: for God made the one sex stronger and the other weaker, that the one for fear may be the more careful, and the other for courage the more capable of self-defence; and that the one may forage abroad, while the other keeps house: and for work the one is made competent for sedentary employments, but too delicate for an out-door life, while the other makes a poor figure at keeping still, but is vigorous and robust in movement; and touching children, the generation is special, but the improvement of the children is the joint labour of both parents, for it belongs to the one to nurture, to the other to chastise." (Ar., Econ., i. 3.)

These passages are enough to suggest more than they actually contain, of two orders of qualities arranged antithetically one over against another in man and woman, so that the one existence becomes complementary to the other, and the two conjoined form one perfect human life. This life-communion, called by divines fides, or mutual faith, is then the second good fruit of marriage. Indeed it is the more characteristically human good, offspring being rather related to the animal side of our nature. But as animal and rational elements make one human being, so do offspring and mutual faith constitute the adequate good of that human union of the sexes, which we call marriage.

10. Whatever good there is in marriage, connections formed by either party beyond the marriage-bed, are agents of confusion to the undoing of all that good and the practical dissolution of the marriage.

Readings.—Contra Gentes, iii., 122; ib., iii., 126; ib., iii., 136; Devas, Studies of Family Life, §§ 90-101, where he disposes of the proof of primitive promiscuity, drawn from the fact that in early societies kinship is traced and property claimed only through the mother.

1. Both man and woman are by nature incapable of a second marriage, while their former marriage endures. No woman can have two husbands at the same time, which is polyandry; and no man can have two wives at the same time, which is polygamy. The second marriage attempted is not only illicit, but invalid: it is no contract, no marriage at all, and all cohabitation with the second partner is sheer adultery. This is a great deal more than saying that polyandry and polygamy are unlawful.

2. That is by nature no marriage, which is inconsistent with the natural ends of marriage, offspring and mutual faith. But polyandry is thus inconsistent with the good of offspring, and polygamy with mutual faith. It is not meant that polyandry makes the birth of children impossible. But nature is solicitous, not for the mere birth, but for the rearing and good estate of the child born. Now a child born fatherless is in an ill plight for its future education. Posthumous children in lawful wedlock are born fatherless: that is a calamity: but what shall we think of an institution which makes that calamity to the child sure always to occur? Such an institution is polyandry. For in it no man can ever know his own child, except by likeness, and likeness in a baby face is largely as you choose to fancy it. Again, is the polyandrous wife to be, or not to be, the head of the family? If not, the family—for it ought to be one family, where there is one mother—will have as many heads as she has husbands, a pretty specimen of a house divided against itself. If she is to be the head, that is a perversion of the natural order of predominance between the sexes. In any case, polyandry is little better than promiscuity: it is fatal to the family and, fatal to the race; and children born of it are born out of marriage.

3. Against polygamy the case in natural law is not quite so strong as against polyandry. Still it is a strong case enough in the interest of the wife. The words spoken by the bride to the bridegroom in the marriage rite of ancient Rome, Ubi tu Caius, ego Caia, "Where you are master, I am mistress," declare the relation of mutual faith as it should be, namely, a relation of equality, with some advantage, preference, and pre-eminence allowed to the husband, yet not so great advantage as to leave him free where she is straitly bound, and reduce her to the servile level of one in a row of minions to his passion and sharers of his divided affections. Polygamy in all ages has meant the lowering of womankind:

He will hold thee—
Something better than his dog, a little dearer than his horse

At its strongest, the love of man for woman, where polygamy obtains, is a flame of passion, that quickly spends itself on one object, and then passes to another; not a rational, enduring, human affection. It is also a fact, that the increase of the race is not greater in polygamy than in monogamy. Thus, as a practice that runs strongly counter to one of the great purposes of marriage, and is, to say the least, no help to the other, and carries with it the humiliation of the female sex, polygamy is justly argued to be abhorrent to nature.

4. It is beside the purpose of this work to enter into the questions of morality that arise out of Holy Scripture, considered as an inspired record of the actions of the Saints. But the polygamy of the patriarchs of old so readily occurs to mind, that it is worth while to mention four conceivable explanations, if only to indicate which is and which is not reconcilable with our philosophy. The first explanation would be, that polygamy is not against the natural law, but only against the positive divine law, which was derogated from in this instance. We have made it out to be against the natural law. The second explanation would be that God gave the patriarchs a dispensation, strictly so called, from this point of the natural law. We have maintained that God cannot, strictly speaking, dispense from one jot or tittle of natural law. (Ethics, c. viii., s. iii., nn. 1-3, p. 147.)¹⁹ A third explanation would be founded on the words of St. Paul to the Athenians (Acts xvii. 30), about "God overlooking the times of this ignorance." This would suppose that mankind, beginning in monogamy, from passion and ignorance lapsed quickly into polygamy: that the patriarchs in good faith conformed to the practice of their time; and that God, in their case as with the rest of mankind, awaited His own destined hour for the light of better knowledge to break upon the earth. A fourth explanation would be this. God by His supreme dominion can dissolve any marriage. By the same dominative power He can infringe and partially make void any marriage contract without entirely undoing it. The marriage contract, existing in its fulness and integrity, is a bar to any second similar contract, as we have proved. But what, on this theory, the Lord God did with the marriages of the patriarchs was this: He partially unravelled and undid the contract, so as to leave room for a second contract, and a third, each having the bare essentials of a marriage, but none of them the full integrity.

But, for the author's final view, see Appendix.

Readings.—Contra Gent., iii., 124; Suarez, De Legibus, II., xv., 28. ¹⁹ Dispensatio is the Latin for [Greek: oikonomia], and in this case means an "economy" of law, in the sense that God did not press the marriage law beyond the capacity of the subject (Matt. xix. 7,8). See my Newman Index, s.v. Economy. The schoolmen missed this meaning, and took dispensatio in the canonical sense.

1. This section is pointed not so much against a separation—which may take place by mutual consent, or without that, by grievous infidelity or cruelty of one party—as against a divorce a vinculo, which is a dissolution of a marriage in the lifetime of the parties, enabling each of them validly and lawfully to contract with some other. The unity of marriage is more essential than its indissolubility. Nature is more against polygamy than against divorce. Even Henry VIII. stuck at polygamy. In the present arrangement, a divorce a vinculo is obtainable in three cases. First, when of two unbaptized persons, man and wife, the one is converted, and the unconverted party refuses to live peaceably in wedlock, the convert may marry again, and thereupon also the other party. So the Church understands St. Paul, I Cor. vii. 13, 15. Again, the Pope can grant a divorce a vinculo in the marriage of baptized persons before cohabitation. Such a marriage in that stage is also dissolved by the profession of one of the parties in a religious order. Beyond these three cases, the Catholic Church allows neither the lawfulness nor the validity of any divorce a vinculo by whomsoever given to whatsoever parties.

2. It is ours to investigate the lie of the law of nature, having due regard to the points marked, antecedently to our search, by the definition of infallible authority. Nothing can be done in the Church against the law of nature: since therefore divorce a vinculo is sometimes recognized in the Church, it may be contended that marriage is not by nature absolutely indissoluble. On the other hand, it is a proposition censured by Pius IX. in the Syllabus, n. 67: "By the law of nature the bond of marriage is not indissoluble." Thus it appears we must teach that marriage is naturally indissoluble, still not absolutely so, just as a safe is justly advertised as fire-proof, when it will resist any conflagration that is likely to occur, though it would be consumed in a blast-furnace or in a volcano. So marriage is indissoluble, if it holds good for all ordinary contingencies, for all difficulties that may be fairly reckoned with and regarded as not quite improbable, for every posture of affairs that the contracting parties before their union need at all consider. Or, if the three cases of divorce actually allowed are to be traced to the dominative power of God (Ethics, c. vii., n. 2, p. 129), we may teach that marriage is by nature absolutely indissoluble, and that divorce is as much against the law of nature as the killing of an innocent man, excepting in the case of God's dominion being employed to quash the contract or the right to life. But against this latter view is to be set the consideration, that God is manifestly averse to using His dominative power to overturn natural ordinances. He does not hand the innocent over to death except in the due course of physical nature: why then should He ever put forth His power against the marriage-tie, unless it be that nature herself in certain cases postulates its severance? But if such is ever nature's petition, the universal and unconditional permanence of the marriage-tie cannot be a requisition of nature, nor is divorce absolutely excluded by natural law.

3. Thomas Sanchez, than whom there is no greater authority on this subject, records his opinion that "a certain inseparability is of the nature of marriage," but that "absolute indissolubility does not attach to marriage by the law of nature." He adds: "if we consider marriage as it is an office of nature for the propagation of the race, it is hard to render a reason why for the wife's barrenness the husband should not be allowed to put her away, or marry another." (De Matrimonio, I. ii., d. 13, n. 7.) We proceed to prove that "a certain inseparability is of the nature of marriage," so that marriage may truly be said to be indissoluble by the law of nature. Whether this natural indissolubility is absolute, and holds for every conceivable contingency, the student must judge by the proofs.

4. If a divorce a vinculo were a visible object on the matrimonial horizon, the parties would be strongly encouraged thereby to form illicit connections, in the expectation of shortly having any one of them they chose ratified and sanctified by marriage. Marriage would be entered upon lightly, as a thing easily done and readily undone, a state of things not very far in advance of promiscuity. Between married persons little wounds would fester, trifling sores would be angered into ulcers: any petty strife might lead to a fresh contract, made in haste and repented of with speed: then fond, vain regrets for the former partnership. Affinity would be a loose bond of friendship between families; and after divorce it would turn to enmity. The fair but weaker sex would suffer the more by this as by all other matrimonial perversions: for the man has not so much difficulty in lighting upon another love, but the woman—she illustrates the Greek proverb of a fallen estate:

Mighty was Miletus in the bygone days of yore.

The divorced wife offers fewer attractions than the widow.

5. It is well to bear in mind that, at least by the positive ordinance of God in the present order of His Providence, the marriage of baptized persons, after cohabitation, is absolutely indissoluble; and no marriage can be dissolved except in the three cases specified. (n. 1.)

Readings.—Leo XIII., Encyclical on Christian Marriage, Arcanum divina sapientia; St. Thomas, Contra Gent., iii, 123.

200. The form of society most ancient and most necessary for the human race is the family or domestic society. It originates in marriage, which is defined to be: The union of a man and a woman, involving their living together in undivided intercourse. Marriage is the institution of the Creator Himself. He made woman to be man's companion, not his slave — "A help like unto himself" (Gen. ii. 18). The qualities of the two sexes were not to be identical, but to be similar and supplementary; wisdom, strength, and firmness predominating on the one side, deference and tenderness on the other; while mutual love and fidelity were to join both parties in the one indissoluble union of wedlock: "Wherefore a man shall leave his father and mother and shall cleave to his wife, and they shall be two in one flesh" (Gen. ii. 24).

201. The primary ends of marriage are the generation and education of children, whereby the human race is perpetuated and elevated to a becoming standard of intellectual and moral excellence.

1. This perpetuation of the race is evidently intended by the Creator, who not only bade our first parents "increase and multiply and fill the earth" (Gen. i. 28), but He also implanted in the natures of men and women such inclinations and needs that this design can never be frustrated.

2. Yet it is not necessary for this purpose that every one shall enter the state of marriage; but exceptions in this matter may be expedient, even apart from supernatural considerations.

The intellectual and moral elevation of mankind is far more important than its numerical increase. This principle has been acted upon by countless heroes of all times, who have sacrificed their lives in youth or vigorous manhood for the advance of truth and science, for the honor and liberty of their country, or for the spread of civilization. An army is highly benefited by the presence of magnanimous leaders; mankind likewise is elevated by the example of intrepid souls, and particularly of those who sacrifice for a great religious motive the pleasures and comforts of marriage and lead a life of perpetual continency. In this career, the most perfect among the sons of men has set Himself as the pattern, and millions have followed His example. However much the low-minded and sensual may sneer at such a practice or deny the possibility of its long continuance, the experience of God's saints and innumerable chosen souls makes it manifest that such a life is possible, and, with special supernatural graces, comparatively easy.

202. The secondary end of marriage is the direct good of the contracting parties, their peace, mutual love, and union of mind and heart. This condition of things results partly from similarity of tastes and dispositions; but it depends chiefly upon the practice of the social virtues, especially of an enduring conjugal love, by which each party is prompted to further the happiness of the other. Yet in its primary and secondary ends, marriage is subordinate to the last end of man, his everlasting beatitude.