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<DATE>5-1-07</DATE>
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<NAME>John Latta</NAME>
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<FRONT>
<DIV1 TYPE="title page">
<PB REF="1" MS="y">
<P>Tetrachordon: EXPOSITIONS UPON The foure chief places in Scripture, which treat of Mariage, or nullities in Mariage.</P>
<P>On Gen. 1. 27. 28. compar'd and explain'd by Gen. 2. 18. 23. 24.</P>
<P>Deut. 24. 1. 2.</P>
<P>Matth. 5. 31. 32. with Matth. 19. from the 3^d. v. to the 11^t^h.</P>
<P>1 Cor. 7. from the 10^t^h to the 16^t^h.</P>
<P>Wherin the Doctrine and Di&s;cipline of Divorce, as was lately publi&s;h'd, is confirm'd by explanation of Scrip|ture, by te&s;timony of ancient Fathers, of civill lawes in the Primitive Church, of famou&s;e&s;t Reformed Divines, And la&s;tly, by an intended Act of the Parlament and Church of England in the la&s;t yeare of EDVVARD the &s;ixth.</P>
<P>By the former Author <HI>J. M.</HI></P>
<Q><L><GAP DESC="foreign"></L>
<L><GAP DESC="foreign"></L>
<L><GAP DESC="foreign">,</L>
<L><GAP DESC="foreign">.</L> <BIBL>Euripid. Medea.</BIBL></Q>
<P><HI>LONDON:</HI> Printed in the yeare 1645.</P>
</DIV1>
<DIV1 TYPE="to the reader">
<PB REF="2">
<PB REF="2">
<HEAD>To the PARLAMENT.</HEAD>
<P><HI>_THat which I knew to be the part of a good Magi&s;trate, aiming at true liberty through the right information of religious and civil life, and that which I &s;aw, and was partaker, of your Vows and &s;olemne Cov'nants, Parla|ment of England, your actions al&s;o manife&s;tly tending to exalt the truth, and to depre&s;&s;e the tyranny of error, and ill cu&s;tome, with more con&s;tancy and prowe&s;&s;e then ever yet any, &s;ince that Parlament which put the fir&s;t Scepter of this Kingdom into his hand whom God and extraordinary vertue made thir Monarch, were the cau&s;es that mov'd me, one el&s;e not placing much in the eminence of a dedication, to pre&s;ent your high notice with a Di&s;cour&s;e, con&s;cious to it &s;elf of nothing more then of diligence, and firm affection to the publick good. And tbat ye took it &s;o as wi&s;e and impartial men, obtaining &s;o great power and digni|tie, are wont to accept, in matters both doubtfull and important, what they think offer'd them well meant, and from a rational ability, I had no le&s;&s;e then to per&s;wade me. And on that per&s;wa&s;ton am return'd, as to a famous and free Port, my &s;elf al&s;o bound by more then a</HI> maritime <HI>Law, to expo&s;e as freely what fraughtage I conceave to bring of no trifles. For although it be generally known, how and by whom ye have been in&s;tigated to a hard cen&s;ure of that former book entitl'd, The Doctrine, and Di&s;eipline of Di|vorce, an opinion held by &s;ome of the be&s;t among reformed Writers without &s;candal or confutement, though now thought new and dangerous by &s;ome of our &s;evere</HI> Gno&s;tics, <HI>who&s;e little reading, and le&s;&s;e meditating holds ever with harde&s;t ob&s;tinacy tbat which it took up with ea&s;ie&s;t credulity, I do not find yet that ought, for the furious ineitements which have been u&s;ed, hath i&s;&s;u'd by your appointment, that might give the lea&s;t interruption or di&s;repute either to the Author, or to the Book. Which he who will be better advis'd then to call your neglect, or connivence at a thing imagin'd &s;o peri|lous, can attribute it to nothing more ju&s;tly, then to the deep and quiet &s;treame of your direct and calme deliberations; that gave not way either to the fervent ra&s;hne&s;&s;e, or the immaterial gravity of tho&s;e who ceas'd not to exa&s;perate without cau&s;e. For which uprightne&s;&s;e and incorrupt refu|&s;all of what ye were incens'd to, Lords and Commons, (though it were don to ju&s;tice, not to me, and was a peculiar demon&s;tration how farre your waies are different from the ra&s;h vulgar) be&s;ides tbo&s;e allegiances of oath and
<PB REF="3">
duty, which are my publie debt to your public labours, I have yet a &s;tore of gratitude laid up, which cannot be exhau&s;ted; and &s;uch thanks perhaps they may live to be, as &s;hall more then whi&s;per to the next ages. Yet that the Author may be known to ground him&s;elf upon his own innocence, and the merit of his cau&s;e, not upon the favour of a diver&s;ion, or a delay to any ju&s;t cen&s;ure, but wi&s;hes rather he might &s;ee tho&s;e his detracters at any fair mee|ting, as learned debatements are privileg'd with a due freedome under equall Moderators, I &s;hall here briefly &s;ingle one of them (becau&s;e he hath oblig'd me to it) who I per&s;wade me having &s;car&s;e read the book, nor know|ing him who writ it, or at lea&s;t faining the latter, bath not forborn to &s;can|dalize him, unconferr'd with, unadmoni&s;ht, undealt with by any Pa&s;torly or brotherly convincement, in the mo&s;t open and invective manner, and at the mo&s;t bitter opportunity that drift or &s;et de&s;igne could have invented. And this, when as the Canon Law, though commonly mo&s;t favouring the boldne&s;&s;e of their Prie&s;ts, puni&s;hes the naming or traducing of any per&s;on in the Pulpit, was by him made no &s;cruple. If I &s;hall therfore take licence by the right of nature, and that liberty wherin I was born, to defend my &s;elf publicly again&s;t a printed Calumny, and do willingly appeal to tho&s;e Judges to whom I am accus'd, it can be no immoderate, or unallowable cour&s;e of &s;eeking &s;o ju&s;t and needfull reparations. Which I had don long &s;ince, had not the&s;e employments, which are now vi&s;ible, deferr'd me. It was preacht before ye, Lords and Commons, in Augu&s;t la&s;t upon a &s;pecial day of humiliation, that</HI> there was a wicked Book abroad, <HI>and ye were taxt of &s;in that it was yet</HI> uncen&s;ur'd, the book de&s;erving to be burnt, <HI>and</HI> impudence <HI>al&s;o was charg'd upon the Author, who dur&s;t</HI> &s;et his name to it, and dedicate it to your &s;elves. <HI>Fir&s;t, Lords and Com|mons, I pray to that God, before whom ye then were pro&s;trate, &s;o to forgive ye tho&s;e omi&s;&s;ions and tre&s;pa&s;&s;es, which ye de&s;ire mo&s;t &s;hould find forgivne&s;s, as I &s;hall &s;oon &s;hew to the world how ea&s;ily ye ab&s;olve your &s;elves of that which this man calls your &s;in, and is indeed your wi&s;dome, and your Noble|ne&s;&s;e, whereof to this day ye have don well not to repent. He terms it</HI> a wicked book, <HI>and why but</HI> for allowing other cau&s;es of Divorce, then Chri&s;t and his Apo&s;tles mention; <HI>and with the &s;ame cen&s;ure condemns of wickedne&s;&s;e not onely</HI> Martin Bucer <HI>that elect In&s;trument of Reformation, highly honour'd and had in reverence by</HI> Edward <HI>the &s;ixth, and his whole Parlament, whom al&s;o I had publi&s;ht in Engli&s;h by a good providence, about a week before this calumnious digre&s;&s;ion was preach'd; &s;o that if he knew not</HI> Bucer <HI>then, as he ought to have known, he might at lea&s;t have known him &s;ome months after, ere the Sermon came in print,
<PB REF="3">
wherein notwith&s;tanding he per&s;i&s;ts in his former &s;entence, and condemnes again of wickedne&s;&s;e, either ignorantly or wilfully, not onely</HI> Martin Bucer, <HI>and all the choi&s;e&s;t and holie&s;t of our Reformers, but the whole Parlament and Church of England in tho&s;e be&s;t and pure&s;t times of</HI> Edward <HI>the &s;ixth. All which I &s;hall prove with good evidence, at the end of the&s;e Explanations. And then let it be judg'd and &s;eriou&s;ly con&s;ider'd with what hope the affairs of our Religion are committed to one among others, who hath now onely left him which of the twain he will choo&s;e, whether this &s;hall be his palpable igno|rance, or the &s;ame wickedne&s;&s;e of his own book, which he &s;o lavi&s;hly imputes to the writings of other men: and whether this of his, that thus peremptorily defames and attaints of wickedne&s;&s;e un&s;potted Churches, unblemi&s;ht Parla|ments, and the mo&s;t eminent re&s;torers of Chri&s;tian Doctrine, de&s;erve not to be burnt fir&s;t. And if his heat had bur&s;t out onely again&s;t the opinion, his wonted pa&s;&s;ion had no doubt bin &s;ilently born with wonted patience. But &s;ince again&s;t the charity of that &s;olemne place and meeting, it &s;erv'd him furder to inveigh opprobriou&s;ly again&s;t the per&s;on, branding him with no le&s;&s;e then impudence, onely for &s;etting his name to what he had writt'n, I mu&s;t be excus'd not to be &s;o wanting to the defence of an hone&s;t name, or to the reputation of tho&s;e good men who afford me their &s;ociety, but to be &s;en&s;ible of &s;uch a foule endeavour'd di&s;grace: not knowing ought either in mine own de&s;erts, or the Laws of this Land, why I &s;hould be &s;ubject, in &s;uch a notorious and illegal manner, to the intemperancies of this mans preaching choler. And indeed to be &s;o prompt and ready in the mid&s;t of his humblene&s;&s;e, to to&s;&s;e reproaches of this bulk and &s;ize, argues as if they were the weapons of his exerci&s;e, I am &s;ure not of his Mini|&s;tery, or of that dayes work. Certainly to &s;ub&s;cribe my name at what I was to own, was what the State had order'd and requires. And he who li&s;ts not to be malicious, would call it ingenuity, cleer con&s;cience, willingne&s;&s;e to avouch what might be que&s;tion'd, or to be better in&s;tructed. And if God were &s;o di&s;plea&s;'d with tho&s;e,</HI> I&s;a. 58. <HI>who</HI> on the &s;olemne fa&s;t were wont to &s;mite with the fi&s;t of wickedne&s;&s;e, <HI>it could be no &s;igne of his own humili|ation accepted, which di&s;pos'd him to &s;mite &s;o keenly with a reviling tongue. But if onely to have writ my name mu&s;t be counted</HI> impudence, <HI>how doth this but ju&s;tifie another, who might affirm with as good warrant, that the late Di&s;cour&s;e of</HI> Scripture and Rea&s;on, <HI>which is certain to be chiefly his own draught, was publi&s;ht without a name, out of ba&s;e fear, and the &s;ly avoi|dance of what might follow to his detriment, if the party at Court &s;hould hap to reach him. And I, to have &s;et my name, where he accu&s;es me to have &s;et it, am &s;o far from recanting, that I offer my hand al&s;o if need be, to make good the &s;ame opinion which I there maintain, by inevitable con&s;equences drawn parallel from his own principal arguments in that of</HI> Scripture and Rea|&s;on;
<PB REF="4">
<HI>which I &s;hall pardon him, if he can deny, without &s;haking his own com|po&s;ition to peeces. The</HI> impudence <HI>therfore, &s;ince he waigh'd &s;o little what a gro&s;&s;e revile that was to give his equall, I &s;end him back again for a</HI> phy|lactery <HI>to &s;titch upon his arrogance, that cen&s;ures not onely before conviction &s;o bitterly without &s;o much as one rea&s;on giv'n, but cen&s;ures the Congregation of his Governors to their faces, for not being &s;o ha&s;ty as him&s;elf to cen&s;ure.</HI></P>
<P><HI>And whereas my other crime is, that I addre&s;&s;'d the Dedication of what I had &s;tudied, to the Parlament, how could I better declare the loyalty which Iowe to that &s;upreme and maje&s;tick Tribunal, and the opinion which I have of the high-entru&s;ted judgement, and per&s;onall worth a&s;&s;embl'd in that place. With the &s;ame affections therfore, and the &s;ame addicted fidelity, Parla|ment of England, I here again have brought to your peru&s;al on the &s;ame argu|ment the&s;e following Expo&s;itions of Scripture. The former book, as pleas'd &s;ome to think, who were thought judicious, had of rea&s;on in it to a &s;ufficien|cie; what they requir'd, was that the Scriptures there alleg'd, might he di&s;|cu&s;&s;'d more fully. To their de&s;ires, thus much furder hath been labour'd in the Scriptures. Another &s;ort al&s;o who wanted more autorities, and citations, have not been here unthought of. If all this attain not to &s;atisfie them, as I am confident that none of tho&s;e our great controver&s;ies at this day, hath had a more demon&s;trative explaining, I mu&s;t confe&s;&s;e to admire what it is, for doubtle&s;&s;e it is not rea&s;on now adayes that &s;atisfies, or &s;uborns the common cre|dence of men, to yeeld &s;o ea&s;ily, and grow &s;o vehement in matters much more di&s;putable, and farre le&s;&s;e conducing to the daily good and peace of life. Some who&s;e nece&s;&s;ary &s;hifts haeve long enur'd them to cloak the defects of their un|&s;tudied yeers, and hatred now to learn, under the appearance of a grave &s;oli|dity, which e&s;timation they have gain'd among weak perceivers, find the ea&s;e of &s;lighting what they cannot refute, and are determin'd, as I hear, to hold it not worth the an&s;wering. In which number I mu&s;t be forc'd to reck'n that Doctor, who in a late equivocating Treati&s;e plau&s;ibly &s;et afloat again&s;t the</HI> Dippers, <HI>diving the while him&s;elfwith a more deep prelatical malignance again&s;t the pre&s;ent &s;tate, &amp; Church-government, mentions with ignominy</HI> the Tractate of Divorce; <HI>yet an&s;wers nothing, but in&s;tead thereof (for which I do not commend his mar&s;halling) &s;ets</HI> Mo&s;es <HI>al&s;o among the crew of his Anabapti&s;ts; as one who to a holy Nation, the Common-wealth of I&s;rael, gave Laws</HI> breaking the bonds of mariage to inordinate lu&s;t. <HI>The&s;e are no mean &s;urges of bla&s;phemy, not onely</HI> dipping Mo&s;es <HI>the divine Law|giver, but da&s;hing with a high hand again&s;t the ju&s;tice and purity of God him&s;elf; as the&s;e en&s;uing Scriptures plainly and freely handl'd &s;hall verifie to the launcing of that old</HI> apo&s;temated <HI>error. Him therefore I leave now to his repentance.</HI></P>
<P><PB REF="4">
<HI>Others, which is their courte&s;ie, confe&s;&s;e that wit and parts may do much to make that &s;eem true which is not (as was objected to</HI> Socrates <HI>by them who could not re&s;i&s;t his efficacy, that he ever made the wor&s;e cau&s;e &s;eem the better) and thus thinking them&s;elves di&s;charg'd of the difficulty, love not to wade furder into the fear of a convincement. The&s;e will be their excu&s;es to decline the full examining of this &s;erious point. So much the more I pre&s;&s;e it and re|peat it, Lords and Commons, that ye beware while time is, ere this grand &s;e|cret, and onely art of ignorance affecting tyrany, grow powerfull and rule among us. For if &s;ound argument and rea&s;on &s;hall be thus put off, either by an undervaluing &s;ilence, or the mai&s;terly cen&s;ure of a rayling word or two in the Pulpit, or by rejecting the force of truth, as the meer cunning of eloquence, and Sophi&s;try, what can be the end of this, but that all good learning and knowledge will &s;uddenly decay: Ignorance, and illiterate pre&s;umption, which is yet but our di&s;ea&s;e, will turn at length into our very con&s;titution, and prove the</HI> hectic <HI>evill of this age: wor&s;e to be fear'd, if it get once to reign over us, then any fift Monarchy. If this &s;hall be the cour&s;e, that what was wont to be a chief commendation, and the ground of other mens confidence in an Au|thor, his diligence, his learning, his elocution whether by right, or by ill mea|ning granted him, &s;hall be turn'd now to a di&s;advantage and &s;u&s;picion again&s;t him, that what he writes though unconfuted, mu&s;t therefore be mi&s;tru&s;ted, therfore not receiv'd for the indu&s;try, the exactne&s;&s;e, the labour in it, con|fe&s;&s;'d to be more then ordnary; as if wi&s;dome had now for&s;ak'n the thir&s;tie and laborious inquirer to dwell again&s;t her nature with the arrogant and &s;hallow babler, to what purpo&s;e all tho&s;e pains and that continual &s;earching requir'd of us by</HI> Solomon <HI>to the attainment of under&s;tanding; why are men bred up with &s;uch care and expence to a life of perpetual &s;tudies, why do your &s;elves with &s;uch endeavour &s;eek to wipe off the imputation of intend|ing to di&s;courage the progre&s;&s;e and advance of learning? He therfore who&s;e heart can bear him to the high pitch of your noble enterpri&s;es, may ea&s;ily a&s;&s;ure him&s;elf that the prudence and farre-judging circum&s;pectne&s;&s;e of &s;o grave a Magi&s;tracy &s;itting in Parlament, who have before them the prepar'd and purpos'd Act of their mo&s;t religious predece&s;&s;ors to imitate in this que&s;tion, cannot reject the cleerne&s;&s;e of the&s;e rea&s;ons, and the&s;e allegations both here and formerly offer'd them; nor can over-look the nece&s;&s;ity of ordaining more whol&s;omly and more humanly in the ca&s;ualties of Divorce, then our Laws have yet e&s;tabli&s;ht: if the mo&s;t urgent and exce&s;&s;ive grievances hapning in dome&s;tick life, be worth the laying to heart, which, unle&s;&s;e charity be farre from us, cannot be neglected. And that the&s;e things both in the right con|&s;titution, and in the right reformation of a Common-wealth call for &s;peedie&s;t redre&s;&s;e, and ought to be the fir&s;t con&s;ider'd, anough was urg'd in what was
<PB REF="5">
prefac'd to that monument of</HI> Bucer <HI>which I brought to your remembrance, and the other time before. Hence forth, except new cau&s;e be giv'n, I &s;hall &s;ay le&s;&s;e and le&s;&s;e. For if the Law make not timely provi&s;ion, let the Law, as rea&s;on is, bear the cen&s;ure of tho&s;e con&s;equences, which her own default now more evidently produces. And if men want manline&s;&s;e to expo&s;tulate the right of their due ran&s;om, and to &s;econd their own occa&s;ions, they may &s;it hereafter and bemoan them&s;elves to have neglected through faintne&s;&s;e the onely remedy of their &s;ufferings, which a &s;ea&s;onable and well grounded &s;peak|ing might have purchas'd them. And perhaps in time to come, others will know how to e&s;teem what is not every day put into their hands, when they have markt events, and better weigh'd how hurtfull and unwi&s;e it is, to hide a &s;ecret and pernicious rupture under the ill coun&s;ell of a ba&s;hfull &s;ilence. But who would di&s;tru&s;t ought, or not be ample in his hopes of your wi&s;e and Chri&s;tian determinations? who have the prudence to con&s;ider, and &s;hould have the goodne&s;&s;e like gods, as ye are call'd, to find out readily, and by ju&s;t Law to admini&s;ter tho&s;e redre&s;&s;es which have of old, not without God ordain|ing, bin granted to the adver&s;ities of mankind, ere they who needed, were put to ask. Certainly, if any other have enlarg'd his thoughts to expect from this government &s;o ju&s;tly undertak'n, and by frequent a&s;&s;i&s;tances from heaven &s;o apparently upheld, glorious changes and renovations both in Church and State, he among the formo&s;t might be nam'd, who prayes that the fate of England may tarry for no other Deliverers.</HI></P>
<CLOSER><SIGNED>JOHN MILTON.</SIGNED></CLOSER>
</DIV1>
</FRONT>
<BODY>
<DIV1 TYPE="treatise">
<PB N="1" REF="5">
<HEAD><HI>TETRACHORDON,</HI> Expo&s;itions upon the foure chiefe places in Scripture which treat of Mariage, or nullities in Mariage.</HEAD>
<DIV2 TYPE="part">
<EPIGRAPH>
<BIBL>Gen. 1. 27.</BIBL>
<Q><HI>So God created man in his owne image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.</HI></Q>
<Q>28. <HI>And God ble&s;&s;ed them, and God &s;aid unto them be fruitfull, &amp;c.</HI></Q>
<BIBL>Gen. 2. 18.</BIBL>
<Q><HI>And the Lord God &s;aid, It is not good that man &s;hould be alone, I will make him a helpe meet for him.</HI></Q>
<Q>23. <HI>And Adam &s;aid, This is now bone of my bones, and fle&s;h of my fle&s;h; &s;he &s;hall be called Woman, becau&s;e &s;he was taken out of Man.</HI></Q>
<Q>24. <HI>Therefore &s;hall a man leave his father and his mother, and &s;hall cleave unto his wife, and they &s;hall be one fle&s;h.</HI></Q>
</EPIGRAPH>
<DIV3 TYPE="section">
<EPIGRAPH>
<BIBL>Gen. 1. 27.</BIBL>
</EPIGRAPH>
<P><HI>SO God created man in his owne image.]</HI> To be inform'd aright in the whole Hi&s;tory of Mariage, that we may know for certain, not by a forc't yoke, but by an impartial definition, what Mariage is, and what is not Mariage; it will undoubtedly be lafe&s;t, faire&s;t, and mo&s;t with our obedience, to enquire, as our Saviours direction is, how it was in the beginning. And that we begin &s;o high as man created after Gods owne Image, there want not earne&s;t cau&s;es. For nothing now adayes is more degenerately forgott'n, then the true dignity of man, almo&s;t in every re|&s;pect, but e&s;pecially in this prime in&s;titution of Matrimony, wherein his native pre-eminence ought mo&s;t to &s;hine. Although if we con&s;ider that ju&s;t and naturall privileges men neither can rightly &s;eek, nor dare fully claime, unle&s;&s;e they be ally'd to inward goodne&s;&s;e, and &s;tedfa&s;t know|ledge, and that the want of this quells them to a &s;ervile &s;en&s;e of their own
<PB N="2" REF="6">
con&s;cious unworthine&s;&s;e, it may &s;ave the wondring why in this age many are &s;o oppo&s;ite both to human and to Chri&s;tian liberty, either while they under&s;tand not, or envy others that do; contenting, or rather priding them|&s;elves in a &s;pecious humility and &s;trictne&s;&s;e bred out of low ignorance that never yet conceiv'd the freedome of the Go&s;pel; and is therefore by the Apo&s;tle to the Colo&s;&s;ians rankt with no better company, then Will-wor|&s;hip and the meer &s;hew of wi&s;dome. And how injurious herein they are, if not to them&s;elves, yet to their neighbours, and not to them only, but to the all-wi&s;e and bounteous grace offer'd us in our redemption, will order|ly appear.</P>
<P><HI>[In the Image of God created he him.]</HI> It is anough determin'd, that this Image of God wherin man was created, is meant Wi&s;dom, Purity, Ju&s;tice, and rule over all creatures. All which being lo&s;t in <HI>Adam,</HI> was recover'd with gain by the merits of Chri&s;t. For albeit our fir&s;t parent had lord&s;hip over &s;ea, and land, and aire, yet there was a law without him, as a guard &s;et over him. But Chri&s;t having cancell'd the hand writing of ordinan|ces which was again&s;t us, <HI>Colo&s;&s;.</HI> 2. 14. and interpreted the fulfilling of all through charity, hath in that re&s;pect &s;et us overlaw, in the free cu&s;tody of his love, and left us victorious under the guidance of his living Spirit, not under the dead letter; to follow that which mo&s;t edifies, mo&s;t aides and furders a religious life, makes us holie&s;t and like&s;t to his immortall Image, not that which makes us mo&s;t conformable and captive to civill and &s;ub|ordinat precepts; whereof the &s;tricte&s;t ob&s;ervance may oftimes prove the de&s;truction not only of many innocent per&s;ons and families, but of whole Nations. Although indeed no ordinance human or from heav'n can binde again&s;t the good of man; &s;o that to keep them &s;trictly again&s;t that end, is all one with to breake them. Men of mo&s;t renowned vertu have &s;ometimes by tran&s;gre&s;&s;ing, mo&s;t truly kept the law; and wi&s;e&s;t Magi|&s;trates have permitted and di&s;penc't it; while they lookt not peevi&s;hly at the letter, but with a greater &s;pirit at the good of mankinde, if alwayes not writt'n in the characters of law, yet engrav'n in the heart of man by a divine impre&s;&s;ion. This Heathens could &s;ee, as the well-read in &s;tory can recount of <HI>Solon</HI> and <HI>Epaminondas,</HI> whom <HI>Cicero</HI> in his fir&s;t booke of <HI>invention</HI> nobly defends. <HI>All law,</HI> &s;aith he, <HI>we ought referr to the common good, and interpret by that, not by the &s;crowl of letters. No man ob&s;erves law for laws &s;ake, but for the good of them for whom it was made.</HI> The re&s;t might &s;erv well to lecture the&s;e times, deluded through belly-doctrines into a devout &s;lavery. The Scripture al&s;o affords us <HI>David</HI> in the &s;hew-bread, <HI>Hezechiah</HI>
<PB N="3" REF="6">
in the pa&s;&s;eover &s;ound and &s;afe tran&s;gre&s;&s;ors of the literall command, which al&s;o di&s;penc'd not &s;eldom with it &s;elf; and taught us on what ju&s;t occa&s;ions to doe &s;o: untill our Saviour for whom that great and God-like work was re&s;erv'd, redeem'd us to a &s;tate above pre&s;criptions by di&s;&s;olving the whole law into charity. And have we not the &s;oul to under&s;tand this, and mu&s;t we again&s;t this glory of Gods tran&s;cendent love towards us be &s;till the &s;ervants of a literall indightment?</P>
<P><HI>[Created he him.]</HI> It might be doubted why he &s;aith, <HI>In the Image of God created he him,</HI> not them, as well as <HI>male and female</HI> them; e&s;pecially &s;ince that Image might be common to them both, but <HI>male and female</HI> could not, however the Jewes fable, and plea&s;e them&s;elvs with the acci|dentall concurrence of <HI>Plato's</HI> wit, as if man at fir&s;t had bin created <HI>Her|maphrodite:</HI> but then it mu&s;t have bin male and female created he him. So had the Image of God bin equally common to them both, it had no doubt bin &s;aid, In the image of God created he them. But St. <HI>Paul</HI> ends the controver&s;ie by explaining that the woman is not primarily and immediatly the image of God, but in reference to the man. <HI>The head of the woman,</HI> &s;aith he, 1 <HI>Cor.</HI> 11. <HI>is the man: he the image and glory of God, &s;he the glory of the man:</HI> he not for her, but &s;he for him. Therefore his pre|cept is, <HI>Wives be &s;ubject to your hu&s;bands as is fit in the Lord, Colo&s;&s;.</HI> 3. 18. <HI>In every thing, Eph.</HI> 5. 24. Neverthele&s;&s;e man is not to hold her as a &s;ervant, but receives her into a part of that empire which God proclaims him to, though not equally, yet largely, as his own image and glory: for it is no &s;mall glory to him, that a creature &s;o like him, &s;hould be made &s;ubject to him. Not but that particular exceptions may have place, if &s;he exceed her husband in prudence and dexterity, and he contentedly yeeld, for then a &s;uperior and more naturall law comes in, that the wi&s;er &s;hould govern the le&s;&s;e wi&s;e, whether male or female. But that which far more ea&s;ily and obediently follows from this ver&s;e, is that, &s;eeing woman was pur|po&s;ely made for man, and he her head, it cannot &s;tand before the breath of this divine utterance, that man the portraiture of God, joyning to him|&s;elf for his intended good and &s;olace an inferiour &s;exe, &s;hould &s;o becom her thrall, who&s;e wilfulnes or inability to be a wife fru&s;trates the occa|&s;ionall end of her creation, but that he may acquitt him&s;elf to freedom by his naturall birth-right, and that indeleble character of priority which God crown'd him with. If it be urg'd that &s;in hath lo&s;t him this, the an|&s;wer is not far to &s;eek, that from her the &s;in fir&s;t proceeded, which keeps her ju&s;tly in the &s;ame proportion &s;till beneath. She is not to gain by be|ing
<PB N="4" REF="7">
fir&s;t in the tran&s;gre&s;&s;ion, that man &s;hould furder loo&s;e to her, becau&s;e already he hath lo&s;t by her means. Oft it happens that in this matter he is without fault; &s;o that his puni&s;hment herein is cau&s;eles: and God hath the prai&s;e in our &s;peeches of him, to &s;ort his puni&s;hment in the &s;ame kind with the offence. Suppo&s;e he err'd; it is not the intent of God or man, to hunt an error &s;o to the death with a revenge beyond all mea&s;ure and proportion. But if we argue thus, this affliction is befaln him for his &s;in, therefore he mu&s;t bear it, without &s;eeking the only remedy, fir&s;t it will be fal&s;e that all affliction comes for &s;in, as in the ca&s;e of <HI>Joh,</HI> and of the man born blind, <HI>Joh.</HI> 9. 3, was evident: next by that rea&s;on, all mi&s;eries comming for &s;in, we mu&s;t let them all lye upon us like the vermin of an Indian <HI>Cathari&s;t,</HI> which his fond religion forbids him to mole&s;t. Were it a particular puni&s;hment inflicted through the anger of God upon a per|&s;on, or upon a land, no law hinders us in that regard, no law but bidds us remove it if we can: much more if it be a dangerous temptation withall, much more yet, if it be certainly a temptation, and not certainly a puni&s;h|ment, though a pain. As for what they &s;ay we mu&s;t bear with patience, to bear with patience, and to &s;eek effectuall remedies, implies no contra|diction. It may no le&s;&s;e be for our di&s;obedience, our unfaithfulnes, and other &s;ins again&s;t God, that wives becom adulterous to the bed, and que|&s;tionles we ought to take the affliction as patiently, as chri&s;tian prudence would wi&s;h; yet hereby is not lo&s;t the right of divorcing for adultery. No you &s;ay, becau&s;e our Saviour excepted that only. But why, if he were &s;o bent to puni&s;h our &s;ins, and try our patience in binding on us a di&s;a&s;trous mariage, why did he except adultery? Certainly to have bin bound from divorce in that ca&s;e al&s;o had bin as plentifull a puni&s;hment to our &s;ins, and not too little work for the patiente&s;t. Nay perhaps they will &s;ay it was too great a &s;ufferance: And with as &s;light a rea&s;on, for no wi&s;e man but would &s;ooner pardon the act of adultery once and again committed by a per&s;on worth pitty and forgivnes, then to lead a weari&s;om life of unloving &amp; unquiet conver&s;ation with one who neither affects nor is affected, much le&s;&s;e with one who exerci&s;es all bitternes, and would commit adultery too, but for envy le&s;t the per&s;ecuted condition &s;hould thereby get the benefit of his freedom. 'Tis plain therefore that God enjoyns not this &s;uppo&s;ed &s;trictnes of not divorcing either to puni&s;h us, or to try our patience.</P>
<P>Moreover, if man be the image of God, which con&s;i&s;ts in holines, and woman ought in the &s;ame re&s;pect to be the image and companion of man, in &s;uch wi&s;e to belov'd, as the Church is belov'd of Chri&s;t, and if, as God
<PB N="5" REF="7">
is the head of Chri&s;t, and Chri&s;t the head of man, &s;o man is the head of woman; I cannot &s;ee by this golden dependance of head&s;hip and &s;ubje|ction, but that Piety and Religion is the main tye of Chri&s;tian Matrimo|ny: So as if there be found between the pair a notorious di&s;parity either of wickednes or here&s;ie, the husband by all manner of right is di&s;ingag'd from a creature, not made and inflicted on him to the vexation of his righ|teou&s;nes; the wife al&s;o, as her &s;ubjection is terminated in the Lord, being her &s;elf the redeem'd of Chri&s;t, is not &s;till bound to be the va&s;&s;all of him, who is the bond&s;lave of Satan: &s;he being now neither the image nor the glory of &s;uch a per&s;on, nor made for him, nor left in bondage to him; but hath recours to the wing of charity, and protection of the Church; unless there be a hope on either &s;ide; yet &s;uch a hope mu&s;t be meant, as may be a rationall hope, and not an endles &s;ervitude. Of which hereafter.</P>
<P>But u&s;ually it is objected, that if it be thus, then there can be no true mariage between misbeleevers and irreligious per&s;ons? I might an&s;wer, let them &s;ee to that who are &s;uch; the Church hath no commi&s;&s;ion to judge tho&s;e without, 1 <HI>Cor.</HI> 5. But this they will &s;ay perhaps, is but penu|riou&s;ly to re&s;olv a doubt. I an&s;wer therefore, that where they are both irreligious, the mariage may be yet true anough to them in a civill relati|on. For there are left &s;om remains of Gods image in man, as he is meerly man; which rea&s;on God gives again&s;t the &s;hedding of mans bloud, <HI>Gen.</HI> 9. as being made in Gods image, without expre&s;&s;ion whether he were a good man or a bad, to exempt the &s;layer from puni&s;hment. So that in tho&s;e mariages where the parties are alike void of Religion, the wife owes a civill homage and &s;ubjection, the husband owes a civill loyalty. But where the yoke is mi&s;-yok't, heretick with faithfull, godly with un|godly, to the grievance and manife&s;t endangering of a brother or &s;i&s;ter, rea&s;ons of a higher &s;train then matrimoniall bear &s;way; unle&s;&s;e the Go&s;|pel in&s;tead of freeing us, deba&s;e it &s;elf to make us bondmen, and &s;uffer evill to controule good.</P>
<P><HI>[Male and female created he them.]</HI> This contains another end of mat|ching man and woman, being the right, and lawfulnes of the marige bed; though much inferior to the former end of her being his image and helpo in religious &s;ociety. And who of weake&s;t in&s;ight may not &s;ee that this creating of them male and female, cannot in any order of rea&s;on, or Chri&s;tianity, be of &s;uch moment again&s;t the better and higher purpo&s;es of their creation, as to enthrall husband or wife to duties or to &s;ufferings, unworthy and unbe&s;eeming the image of God in them? Now when as
<PB N="6" REF="8">
not only men, but good men doe &s;tand upon their right, their e&s;timation, their dignity in all other actions and deportments with warrant anough and good con&s;cience, as having the image of God in them, it will not be difficult to determin what is unworthy and un&s;eemly for a man to do or &s;uffer in wedlock; and the like proportionally may be found for woman: if we love not to &s;tand di&s;puting below the principles of humanity. He that &s;aid, <HI>Male and female created he them,</HI> immediatly before that &s;aid al&s;o in the &s;ame ver&s;e, <HI>In the Image of God created he him,</HI> and redoubl'd it, that our thoughts might not be &s;o full of dregs as to urge this poor con&s;i|deration of <HI>male and female,</HI> without remembring the noblenes of that for|mer repetition; le&s;t when God &s;ends a wi&s;e eye to examin our triviall glo&s;&s;es, they be found extremly to creep upon the ground: e&s;pecially &s;ince they confe&s;&s;e that what here concerns mariage is but a brief touch, only preparative to the in&s;titution which follows more expre&s;&s;ely in the next Chapter: and that Chri&s;t &s;o took it, as de&s;iring to be briefe&s;t with them who came to tempt him, account &s;hall be given in due place.</P>
</DIV3>
<DIV3 TYPE="section">
<EPIGRAPH>
<Q>V. 28. <HI>And Godble&s;&s;ed them, and God &s;aid unto them, be fruitfull, and multi|ply, and repleni&s;h the earth, &amp;c.</HI></Q>
</EPIGRAPH>
<P>This declares another end of Matrimony, the propagation of mankind; and is again repeated to <HI>Noah</HI> and his &s;ons, Many things might be noted on this place not ordinary, nor unworth the noting; but I undertook not a generall Comment. Hence therefore we &s;ee the de&s;ire of children is hone&s;t and pious; if we be not le&s;&s;e zealous in our Chri&s;tianity, then <HI>Plato</HI> was in his heatheni&s;m; who in the &s;ixt <HI>of his laws,</HI> counts off-&s;pring therefore de&s;irable, that we may leav in our &s;tead &s;ons of our &s;ons, conti|nuall &s;ervants of God: a religious and prudent de&s;ire, if people knew as well what were requir'd to breeding as to begetting; which de&s;ire perhaps was a cau&s;e why the Jews hardly could endure a barren wed|lock: and <HI>Philo</HI> in his book of &s;peciall laws e&s;teems him only worth par|don that &s;ends not barrennes away. <HI>Carvilius</HI> the fir&s;t recorded in Rome to have &s;ought divorce, had it granted him for the barrennes of his wife, upon his oath that he maried to the end he might have children; as <HI>Dio|ny&s;ius</HI> and <HI>Gellius</HI> are authors. But to di&s;mi&s;&s;e a wife only for barrennes, is hard: and yet in &s;om the de&s;ire of children is &s;o great, and &s;o ju&s;t, yea &s;omtime &s;o nece&s;&s;ary, that to condemn &s;uch a one to a childles age, the fault apparently not being in him, might &s;eem perhaps more &s;trict then
<PB N="7" REF="8">
needed. Somtimes inheritances, crowns, and dignities are &s;o intere&s;ted and annext in their common peace and good to &s;uch or &s;uch lineall de|&s;cent, that it may prove a great moment both in the affairs of men and of religion, to con&s;ider throughly what might be don heerin, notwith&s;tan|ding the way wardnes of our School Doctors.</P>
</DIV3>
<DIV3 TYPE="section">
<EPIGRAPH>
<BIBL>Gen. 2. 18.</BIBL>
<Q><HI>And the Lord &s;aid, It is not good that man &s;hould be alone; I will make him a help meet for him.</HI></Q>
<Q>V. 23. <HI>And Adam &s;aid, &amp;c.</HI> V. 24. <HI>Therefore &s;hall a man leave, &amp;c.</HI></Q>
</EPIGRAPH>
<P>THis &s;econd Chapter is granted to be a Commentary on the fir&s;t; and the&s;e ver&s;es granted to be an expo&s;ition of that former ver&s;e, <HI>Male and female created he them,</HI> and yet when this male and female is by the ex|plicite words of God him&s;elfe heer declar'd to be not meant other then a fit help, and meet &s;ociety; &s;om who would ingro&s;&s;e to them&s;elves the whole trade of interpreting, will not &s;uffer the cleer text of God to doe the office of explaining it &s;elf.</P>
<P><HI>[And the Lord God &s;aid it is not good.]</HI> A man would think that the con&s;ideration of who &s;pake, &s;hould rai&s;e up the attention of our minds to enquire better, and obey the purpos of &s;o great a Speaker: for as we order the bu&s;ines of Mariage, that which he heer &s;peaks is all made vain; and in the deci&s;ion of matrimony, or not matrimony, nothing at all regar|ded. Our pre&s;umption, hath utterly chang'd the &s;tate and condition of this ordinance: God ordain'd it in love and helpfulnes to be indi&s;&s;oluble, and we in outward act and formality to be a forc't bondage; &s;o that be|ing &s;ubject to a thou&s;and errors in the be&s;t men, if it prove a ble&s;&s;ing to any, it is of meer accident, as mans law hath handl'd it, and not of in|&s;titution.</P>
<P><HI>[It is not good for man to be alone.]</HI> Hitherto all things that have bin nam'd, were approv'd of God to be very good: lonelines is the fir&s;t thing which Gods eye nam'd not good: whether it be a thing, or the want of &s;omthing, I labour not; let it be their tendance, who have the art to be indu&s;triou&s;ly idle. And heer <HI>alone</HI> is meant alone without woman; other|wi&s;e <HI>Adam</HI> had the company of God him&s;elf, and Angels to convers with; all creatures to delight him &s;eriou&s;ly, or to make him &s;port. God could have created him out of the &s;ame mould a thou&s;and friends and bro|ther <HI>Adams</HI> to have bin his con&s;orts, yet for all this till <HI>Eve</HI> was giv'n him, God reckn'd him to be alone.</P>
<P><PB N="8" REF="9">
<HI>[It is not good.]</HI> God heer pre&s;ents him&s;elf like to a man deliberating; both to &s;hew us that the matter is of high con&s;equence, and that he inten|ded to found it according to naturall rea&s;on, not impul&s;ive command, but that the duty &s;hould ari&s;e from the rea&s;on of it, not the rea&s;on be &s;wal|low'd up in a rea&s;onle&s;&s;e duty. <HI>Not good,</HI> was as much to <HI>Adam</HI> before his fall, as not plea&s;ing, not expedient; but &s;ince the comming of &s;in into the world, to him who hath not receiv'd the continence, it is not only not expedient to be alone, but plainly &s;infull. And therefore he who wilful|ly ab&s;tains from mariage, not being &s;upernaturally gifted, and he who by making the yoke of mariage unju&s;t and intolerable, cau&s;es men to abhorr it, are both in a diabolicall &s;in, equall to that of Antichri&s;t who forbids to marry. For what difference at all whether he ab&s;tain men from mary|ing, or re&s;train them in a mariage hapning totally di&s;commodious, di&s;ta&s;t|full, di&s;hone&s;t and pernicious to him without the appearance of his fault? For God does not heer preci&s;ely &s;ay, I make a female to this male, as he did briefly before, but expounding him&s;elfe heer on purpos, he &s;aith, becau&s;e it is not good for man to be alone, I make him therefore a meet help. God &s;upplies the privation of not good, with the perfect gift of a reall and po&s;i|tive good; it is mans pervers cooking who hath turn'd this bounty of God into a Scorpion, either by weak and &s;hallow con&s;tructions, or by proud arrogance and cruelty to them who neither in their purpo&s;es nor in their actions have offended again&s;t the due honour of wedlock.</P>
<P>Now whereas the Apo&s;tle &s;peaking in the Spirit, 1 <HI>Cor.</HI> 7. pronounces quite contrary to this word of God, <HI>It is good for a man not to touch a woman,</HI> and God cannot contradict him&s;elf, it in&s;tructs us that his commands and words, e&s;pecially &s;uch as bear the manife&s;t title of &s;om good to man, are not to be &s;o &s;trictly wrung, as to command without regard to the mo&s;t naturall and mi&s;erable nece&s;&s;ities of mankind. Therefore the Apo&s;tle adds a limitation in the 26 v. of that chap. for the pre&s;ent nece&s;&s;ity it is good; which he gives us doubtle&s;&s;e as a pattern how to reconcile other places by the generall rule of charity.</P>
<P><HI>[For man to be alone.]</HI> Som would have the &s;en&s;e heerof to be in re|&s;pect of procreation only: and <HI>Au&s;tin</HI> conte&s;ts that manly friend&s;hip in all other regards had bin a more becomming &s;olace for <HI>Adam,</HI> then to &s;pend &s;o many &s;ecret years in an empty world with one woman. But our Writers de&s;ervedly reject this crabbed opinion; and defend that there is a peculiar comfort in the maried &s;tate be&s;ides the genial bed, which no o|ther &s;ociety affords. No mortall nature can endure either in the actions
<PB N="9" REF="9">
of Religion, or &s;tudy of wi&s;dome, without &s;omtime &s;lackning the cords of inten&s;e thought and labour: which le&s;t we &s;hould think faul|ty, God him&s;elf conceals us not his own recreations before the world was built; <HI>I was,</HI> &s;aith the eternall wi&s;dome, <HI>dayly his delight, playing alwayes before him.</HI> And to him indeed wi&s;dom is as a high towr of plea&s;ure, but to us a &s;teep hill, and we toyling ever about the bottom: he executes with ea&s;e the exploits of his omnipotence, as ea&s;ie as with us it is to will: but no worthy enterpri&s;e can be don by us with|out continuall plodding and weari&s;omnes to our faint and &s;en&s;itive a|bilities. We cannot therefore alwayes be contemplative, or pragmati|call abroad, but have need of &s;om delightfull intermi&s;&s;ions, wherin the enlarg'd &s;oul may leav off a while her &s;evere &s;chooling; and like a glad youth in wandring vacancy, may keep her hollidaies to joy and harm|les pa&s;time: which as &s;he cannot well doe without company, &s;o in no company &s;o well as where the different &s;exe in mo&s;t re&s;embling unlikenes, and mo&s;t unlike re&s;emblance cannot but plea&s;e be&s;t and be pleas'd in the aptitude of that variety. Wherof le&s;t we &s;hould be too timorous, in the aw that our flat &s;ages would form us and dre&s;&s;e us, wi&s;e&s;t <HI>Salomon</HI> among his grave&s;t Proverbs countenances a kinde of ravi&s;hment and erring fondnes in the entertainment of wedded lei|&s;ures; and in the Song of Songs, which is generally beleev'd, even in the jollie&s;t expre&s;&s;ions to figure the &s;pou&s;als of the Church with Chri&s;t, &s;ings of a thou&s;and raptures between tho&s;e two lovely ones farre on the hither &s;ide of carnall enjoyment. By the&s;e in&s;tances, and more which might be brought, we may imagine how indulgently God provided again&s;t mans lonelines; that he approv'd it not, as by him&s;elf declar'd not good; that he approv'd the remedy therof, as of his own ordaining, con&s;equently good; and as he ordain'd it, &s;o doubtles proportionably to our fal n e&s;tate he gives it; els were his ordinance at lea&s;t in vain, and we for all his gift &s;till empty handed. Nay &s;uch an unbounteous giver we &s;hould make him, as in the fables <HI>Jupiter</HI> was to <HI>Ixion,</HI> giving him <HI>a cloud</HI> in&s;tead of <HI>Juno,</HI> giving him a mon&s;trous i&s;&s;ue by her, the breed of <HI>Centaures</HI> a neglected and unlov'd race, the fruits of a delufive mariage, and la&s;tly giving him her with a damnation to that wheele in hell, from a life thrown into the mid&s;t of temptations and di&s;orders. But God is no deceitfull giver, to be|&s;tow that on us for a remedy of lonelines, which if it bring not a &s;oci|able minde as well as a conjunctive body, leavs us no le&s;&s;e alone then
<PB N="10" REF="10">
before; and if it bring a minde perpetually avers and di&s;agreeable, be|traies us to a wors condition then the mo&s;t de&s;erted lonelines. God cannot in the ju&s;tice of his own promi&s;e and in&s;titution &s;o unexpe|ctedly mock us by forcing that upon us as the remedy of &s;olitude, which wraps us in a mi&s;ery wor&s;e then any wildernes, as the Spirit of God him&s;elf judges, Prov. 19. e&s;pecially knowing that the be&s;t and wi&s;e&s;t men amid&s;t the &s;incere and mo&s;t cordiall de&s;ignes of their heart doe dayly erre in choo&s;ing. We may conclude therfore &s;eeing or|thodoxall Expo&s;iters confe&s;&s;e to our hands, that by lonelines is not on|ly meant the want of copulation, and that man is not le&s;&s;e alone by turning in a body to him, unle&s;&s;e there be within it a minde an&s;we|rable, that it is a work more worthy the care and con&s;ultation of God to provide for the worthie&s;t part of man which is his minde, and not unnaturally to &s;et it beneath the formalities and re&s;pects of the body, to make it a &s;ervant of its owne va&s;&s;al, I &s;ay we may conclude that &s;uch a mariage, wherin the minde is &s;o di&s;grac't and vilify'd below the bodies intere&s;t, and can have no ju&s;t or tolerable contentment, is not of Gods in&s;titution, and therfore no mariage. Nay in concluding this, I &s;ay we conclude no more then what the common Expo&s;iters them|&s;elves give us, both in that which I have recited and much more here|after. But the truth is, they give us in &s;uch a manner, as they who leav their own mature po&s;itions like the eggs of an O&s;trich in the du&s;t; I do but lay them in the &s;un; their own pregnancies hatch the truth; and I am taxt of novelties and &s;trange producements, while they, like that incon&s;iderat bird, know not that the&s;e are their own naturall breed.</P>
<P><HI>[I will make him a help meet for him.]</HI> Heer the heavnly in&s;tituter, as if he labour'd, not to be mi&s;tak'n by the &s;upercilious hypocri&s;ie of tho&s;e that love to mai&s;ter their brethren, and to make us &s;ure that he gave us not now a &s;ervil yoke, but an amiable knot; contents not him&s;elf to &s;ay, I will make him a wife, but re&s;olving to give us fir&s;t the meaning before the name of a wife, &s;aith graciou&s;ly, <HI>I will make him a help meet for him.</HI> And heer again, as before, I doe not require more full and fair deductions then the whole con&s;ent of our Divines u&s;ually rai&s;e from this text, that in matrimony there mu&s;t be fir&s;t a mutuall help to piety, next to civill fellow&s;hip of love and amity, then to generation, &s;o to hou&s;hold affairs, la&s;tly the remedy of incontinence. And com|monly they reck'n them in &s;uch order, as leavs generation and incon|tinence
<PB N="11" REF="10">
to be la&s;t con&s;ider'd. This I amaze me at, that though all the &s;uperior and nobler ends both of mariage and of the maried per&s;ons he ab&s;olutely fru&s;trat, the matrimony &s;tirs not, loo&s;es no hold, remains as rooted as the center: but if the body bring but in a complaint of frigidity, by that cold application only, this adamantine <HI>Alpe</HI> of wedlock has leav to di&s;&s;olve; which els all the machinations of religi|ous or civill rea&s;on at the &s;uit of a di&s;tre&s;&s;ed mind, either for divine wor&s;hip or humane conver&s;ation violated, cannot unfa&s;ten. What courts of concupi&s;cence are the&s;e, wherin fle&s;hly appetite is heard before right rea&s;on, lu&s;t before love or devotion? They may be pious Chri&s;tians together, they may be loving and friendly, they may be helpfull to each other in the family, but they cannot couple; that &s;hall divorce them though either party would not. They can neither &s;erv God together, nor one be at peace with the other, nor be good in the family one to other, but live as they were dead, or live as they were deadly enemies in a cage together; tis all one, they can couple, they &s;hall not divorce till death, no though this &s;entence be their death. What is this, be&s;ides tyranny, but to turn nature up&s;ide down, to make both religion, and the minde of man wait upon the &s;lavi&s;h errands of the body, and not the body to follow either the &s;anctity, or the &s;ov|ranty of the mind un&s;peakably wrong'd, and with all equity complai|ning? What is this but to abu&s;e the &s;acred and mi&s;terious bed of ma|riage to be the compul&s;ive &s;tie of an ingratefull and malignant lu&s;t, &s;tirr'd up only from a carnall acrimony, withour either love or peace, or regard to any other thing holy or human. This I admire how po&s;|&s;ibly it &s;hould inhabit thus long in the &s;en&s;e of &s;o many di&s;puting <HI>The|ologians,</HI> unle&s;&s;e it be the lowe&s;t lees of a canonicall infection liver|grown to their &s;ides; which perhaps will never uncling, without the &s;trong ab&s;ter&s;ive of &s;om heroick magi&s;trat, whole mind equall to his high office dares lead him both to know and to do without their fri|volous ca&s;e-putting. For certain he &s;hall have God and this in&s;titu|tion plainly on his &s;ide. And if it be true both in divinity and law, that con&s;ent alone, though copulation never follow, makes a mari|age, how can they di&s;&s;olv it for the want of that which made it not, and not di&s;&s;olv it for that not continuing which made it, and &s;hould pre&s;erve it in love and rea&s;on, and difference it from a brute conju|gality.</P>
<P><HI>[Meet for him.]</HI> The originall heer is more expre&s;&s;ive then other
<PB N="12" REF="11">
languages word for word can render it; but all agree effectuall con|formity of di&s;po&s;ition and affection to be heerby &s;ignify'd; which God as it were not &s;atisfy'd with the naming of a help, goes on de&s;cribing <HI>another &s;elf, a &s;econd&s;elf, a very &s;elf it &s;elf.</HI> Yet now there is nothing in the life of man through our mi&s;con&s;truction, made more uncertain, more hazardous and full of chance then this divine ble&s;&s;ing with &s;uch favorable &s;ignificance heer conferr'd upon us, which if we do but erre in our choice the mo&s;t unblamable error that can be, erre but one minute, one moment after tho&s;e mighty &s;yllables pronounc't which take upon them to joyn heavn and hell together unpardnably till death pardon, this divine ble&s;&s;ing that lookt but now with &s;uch a human &s;mile up|on us, and &s;poke &s;uch gentle rea&s;on, &s;trait vani&s;hes like a fair skie and brings on &s;uch a &s;cene of cloud and tempe&s;t, as turns all to &s;hipwrack without havn or &s;hoar but to a ran&s;omles captivity. And then they tell us it is our &s;in; but let them be told again, that &s;in through the mercy of God hath not made &s;uch wa&s;t upon us, as to make utterly void to our u&s;e any temporall benefit, much le&s;&s;e any &s;o much a vailing to a peacefull and &s;anctify'd life, meerly for a mo&s;t incident error which no warines can certainly &s;hun. And wherfore &s;ervs our hap|py redemption, and the liberty we have in Chri&s;t, but to deliver us from calamirous yokes not to beliv'd under without the endanger|ment of our &s;ouls, and to re&s;tore us in &s;om competent mea&s;ure to a right in every good thing both of this life, and the other. Thus we &s;ee how treatably and di&s;tinctly God hath heer taught us what the prime ends of mariage are, mutuall &s;olace and help. That we are now, upon the mo&s;t irreprehen&s;ible mi&s;take in choo&s;ing, defeated and de|frauded of all this originall benignity, was begun fir&s;t through the &s;nare of Antichri&s;tian canons long &s;ince obtruded upon the Church of Rome, and not yet &s;cour<GAP DESC="illegible" REASON="missing" EXTENT="1 letter">d off by reformation, out of a lingting vain-glory that abides among us to make fair &s;hews in formall ordi|nances, and to enjoyn continence &amp; bearing of cro&s;&s;es in &s;uch a garb as no Scripture binds us, under the thicke&s;t arrows of temptation, where we need not &s;tand. Now we &s;hall &s;ee with what acknow|ledgement and a&s;&s;ent <HI>Adam</HI> receiv'd this new a&s;&s;ociat, which God brought him.</P>
</DIV3>
<DIV3 TYPE="section">
<EPIGRAPH>
<Q><PB N="13" REF="11">
V. 23. <HI>And Adam &s;aid this is now bone of my bones, and fle&s;h of my fle&s;h, &s;he &s;hall be called Woman, becau&s;e &s;he was tak'n out of Man.</HI></Q>
</EPIGRAPH>
<P>That there was a neerer alliance between <HI>Adam</HI> and <HI>Eve,</HI> then could be ever after between man and wife, is vi&s;ible to any. For no other woman was ever moulded out of her husbands rib, but of meer &s;tran|gers for the mo&s;t part they com to have that con&s;anguinity which they have by wedlock. And if we look neerly upon the matter, though mariage be mo&s;t agreeable to holines, to purity and ju&s;tice, yet is it not a naturall, but a civill and ordain'd relation. For if it were in nature, no law or crime could di&s;anull it, to make a wife, or husband, otherwi&s;e then &s;till a wife or husband, but only death; as nothing but that can make a father no father, or a &s;on no &s;on. But divorce for adultery or de&s;ertion, as all our Churches agree but England, not only &s;eparats, but nullifies, and extingui&s;hes the relation it &s;elf of matrimo|ny, &s;o that they are no more man and wife; otherwi&s;e the innocent party could not marry el&s;e-where, without the guilt of adultery; next were it meerly naturall why was it heer ordain'd more then the re&s;t of morall law to man in his originall rectitude, in who&s;e bre&s;t all that was naturall or morall was engrav'n without externall con&s;titutions and edicts. <HI>Adam</HI> therfore in the&s;e words does not e&s;tabli&s;h an in|di&s;&s;oluble bond of mariage in the carnall ligaments of fle&s;h and bones, for if he did, it would belong only to him&s;elf in the literall &s;en&s;e; every one of us being neerer in fle&s;h of fle&s;h, and bone of bones to our pa|rents then to a wife; they therfore were not to be left for her in that re&s;pect. But <HI>Adam</HI> who had the wi&s;dom giv'n him to know all crea|tures, and to name them according to their properties, no doubt but had the gift to di&s;cern perfectly, that which concern'd him much more; and to apprehend at fir&s;t &s;ight the true fitnes of that con&s;ort which God provided him. And therfore &s;pake in reference to tho&s;e words which God pronounc't before; as if he had &s;aid, this is &s;he by who&s;e meet help and &s;ociety I &s;hall no more be alone; this is &s;he who was made my image, ev'n as I the Image of God; not &s;o much in body, as in unity of mind and heart. And he might as ea&s;ily know what were the words of God, as he knew &s;o readily what had bin don with his rib, while he &s;lept &s;o &s;oundly. He might well know, if God took a rib out of his in&s;ide, to form of it a double good to him, he would far
<PB N="14" REF="12">
&s;ooner di&s;-joyn it from his out&s;ide, to prevent a treble mi&s;chief to him: and far &s;ooner cut it quite off from all relation for his undoub|ted ea&s;e, then nail it into his body again, to &s;tick for ever there a thorn in his heart. When as nature teaches us to divide any limb from the body to the &s;aving of his fellows, though it be the maiming and de|formity of the whole; how much more is it her doctrin to &s;ever by in|ci&s;ion, not a true limb &s;o much, though that be lawfull, but an adhe|rent, a &s;ore, the gangrene of a limb, to the recovery of a whole man. But if in the&s;e words we &s;hall make <HI>Adam</HI> to erect a new e&s;tabli&s;h|ment of mariage in the meer fle&s;h, which God &s;o lately had in&s;titu|ted, and founded in the &s;weet and mild familiarity of love and &s;o|lace and mutuall fitnes, what do we but u&s;e the mouth of our generall parent, the fir&s;t time it opens, to an arrogant oppo&s;ition, and corre|cting of Gods wi&s;er ordinance. The&s;e words therfore cannot im|port any thing new in mariage, but either that which belongs to <HI>A|dam</HI> only, or to us in reference only to the in&s;tituting words of God which made a meet help again&s;t lonelines. <HI>Adam</HI> &s;pake like <HI>Adam</HI> the words of fle&s;h and bones, the &s;hell and rinde of matrimony: but God &s;pake like God, of love and &s;olace and meet help, the &s;oul both of <HI>Adams</HI> words and of matrimony.</P>
</DIV3>
<DIV3 TYPE="section">
<EPIGRAPH>
<Q>V. 24. <HI>Therefore &s;hall a man leav his father and his mother, and &s;hall cleav unto his wife; and they &s;hall be one fle&s;h.</HI></Q>
</EPIGRAPH>
<P>This vers, as our common heed expounds it, is the great knot tier, which hath undon by tying, and by tangling, millions of guiltles con|&s;ciences: this is that grei&s;ly Porter, who having drawn men and wi|&s;e&s;t men by &s;uttle allurement within the train of an unhappy matri|mony, claps the dungeon gate upon them, as irrecoverable as the grave. But if we view him well, and hear him with not too ha&s;ty and prejudicant ears, we &s;hall finde no &s;uch terror in him. For fir&s;t, it is not heer &s;aid ab&s;olutely without all rea&s;on he &s;hall cleave to his wife, be it to his weal or to his de&s;truction as it happens, but he &s;hall doe this upon the premi&s;es and con&s;iderations of that meet help and &s;ociety before mention'd, <HI>Therefore he &s;hall cleave to his wife,</HI> no o|therwi&s;e a wife, then a fit help. He is not bid to leave the dear cohabitation of his father, mother, brothers and &s;i&s;ters, to link him&s;elf in&s;eparably with the meer carcas of a Mariage, perhaps an enemy.
<PB N="15" REF="12">
This joyning particle <HI>Therefore</HI> is in all equity, nay in all nece&s;&s;ity of con&s;truction to comprehend fir&s;t and mo&s;t principally what God &s;pake concerning the inward e&s;&s;ence of Mariage in his in&s;titution: that we may learn how far to attend what <HI>Adam</HI> &s;pake of the out|ward materials therof in his approbation. For if we &s;hall bind the&s;e words of <HI>Adam</HI> only to a corporall meaning, and that the force of this injunction upon all us his &s;ons to live individually with any wo|man which hath befaln us in the mo&s;t mi&s;tak'n wedlock, &s;hall con&s;i&s;t not in tho&s;e morall and relative cau&s;es of <HI>Eves</HI> creation, but in the meer anatomy of a rib, and that <HI>Adams</HI> in&s;ight concerning wedlock reacht no furder, we &s;hall make him as very an idiot as the Socinians make him; which would not be reverently don of us. Let us be con|tent to allow our great forefather &s;o much wi&s;dom, as to take the in|&s;tituting words of God along with him into this &s;entence, which if they be well minded, wil a&s;&s;ure us that fle&s;h and ribs are but of a weak and dead efficacy to keep Mariage united where there is no other fit|nes. The rib of Mariage, to all &s;ince <HI>Adam,</HI> is a relation much rather then a bone; the nerves and &s;inews therof are love and meet help, they knit not every couple that maries, and where they knit they &s;el|dom break, but where they break, which for the mo&s;t part is where they never truly joyn'd, to &s;uch at the &s;ame in&s;tant both fle&s;h and rib cea&s;e to be in common; &s;o that heer they argue nothing to the conti|nuance of a fal&s;e or violated Mariage, but mu&s;t be led back to receive their meaning from tho&s;e in&s;titutive words of God which give them all the life and vigor they have.</P>
<P><HI>[Therefore &s;hall a man leav his father, &amp;c.]</HI> What to a mans thinking more plain by this appointment, that the fatherly power &s;hould give place to conjugall prerogative? yet it is generally held by reformed writers again&s;t the Papi&s;t, that though in per&s;ons at di&s;cretion the Ma|riage in it &s;elfbe never &s;o fit, though it be fully accompli&s;ht with bene|diction, board and bed, yet the father not con&s;enting, his main will without di&s;pute &s;hall di&s;&s;olv all. And this they affirm only from col|lective rea&s;on, not any direct law: for that in Exod. 22. 17. which is mo&s;t particular, &s;peaks that a father may refu&s;e to marry his daughter to one who hath deflour'd her, not that he may take her away from one who hath &s;oberly married her. Yet becau&s;e the generall honor due to parents is great, they hold he may, and perhaps hold not ami&s;&s;e. But again when the que&s;tion is of bar&s;h and rugged parents who deferr
<PB N="16" REF="13">
to be&s;tow their childern &s;ea&s;onably, they agree joyntly that the Church or Magi&s;trat may be&s;tow them, though without the Fathers con&s;ent: and for this they have no expre&s;s autority in Scripture. So that they may &s;ee by thir own handling of this very place, that it is not the &s;tubborn letter mu&s;t govern us, but the divine and &s;oftning breath of charity which turns and windes the dictat of every po&s;itive command, and &s;hapes it to the good of mankind. Shall the outward acce&s;&s;ory of a Fathers will wanting, rend the fitte&s;t and mo&s;t affecti|onat mariage in twain, after all nuptial con&s;ummations, and &s;hall not the want of love and the privation of all civil and religious concord, which is the inward e&s;&s;ence of wedlock, doe as much to part tho&s;e who were never truly wedded? &s;hall a Father have this power to vindicate his own wilfull honour and autority to the utter breach of a mo&s;t dearly-united mariage, and &s;hall not a man in his own power have the permi&s;&s;ion to free his Soul, his life, and all his comfort of life from the di&s;a&s;tre of a no-mariage. Shall fatherhood, which is but man, for his own plea&s;ure di&s;&s;olve matrimony, and &s;hall not ma|trimony, which is Gods Ordinance, for its own honour and better con&s;ervation, di&s;&s;olv it &s;elf, when it is wrong, and not fitted to any of the cheif ends which it owes us?</P>
<P><HI>[And they &s;hall bee one fle&s;h.]</HI> The&s;e words al&s;o inferre that there ought to be an individualty in Mariage; but without all que&s;tion pre|&s;uppo&s;e the joyning cau&s;es. Not a rule yet that we have met with, &s;o univer&s;all in this whole in&s;titution, but hath admitted limitations and conditions according to human nece&s;&s;ity. The very foundation of Matrimony, though God laid it &s;o deliberatly, <HI>that it is not good for man to bee alone</HI> holds not always, if the Apo&s;tle can &s;ecure us. Soon after wee are bid leav Father and Mother, and cleav to a Wife, but mu&s;t under&s;tand the Fathers con&s;ent withall, els not. <HI>Cleav to a Wife,</HI> but let her bee a wife, let her be a meet help, a &s;olace, not a nothing, not an adver&s;ary, not a defertrice; can any law or command be &s;o unrea&s;onable as to make men cleav to calamity, to ruin, to perdition? In like manner heer, <HI>They &s;hall be one fle&s;h:</HI> but let the cau&s;es hold, and be made really good, which only have the po&s;&s;ibility to make them one fle&s;h. Wee know that fle&s;h can neither joyn, nor keep together two bodies of it &s;elf; what is it then mu&s;t make them one fle&s;h, but likenes, but fitnes of mind and di&s;po&s;ition, which may breed the Spi|rit of concord, and union between them? If that be not in the nature
<PB N="17" REF="13">
of either, and that there has bin a remediles mi&s;take, as vain wee goe about to compell them into one fle&s;h, as if wee undertook to weav a garment of drie &s;and. It were more ea&s;y to compell the vegetable and nutritive power of nature to a&s;&s;imilations and mixtures which are not alterable each by other; or force the concoctive &s;tomach to turn that into fle&s;h which is &s;o totally unlike that &s;ub&s;tance, as not to be wrought on. For as the unity of minde is neerer and greater then the union of bodies, &s;o doubtles, is the di&s;&s;imilitude greater, and more dividuall, as that which makes between bodies all difference and di&s;tinction. E&s;pecially when as be&s;ides the &s;ingular and &s;ub&s;tantial differences of every Soul, there is an intimat quality of good or evil, through the whol progeny of <HI>Adam,</HI> which like a radical heat, or mortal chilnes joyns them, or disjoyns them irre&s;i&s;tibly. In whom therefore either the will, or the faculty is found to have never joyn'd, or now not to continue &s;o, 'tis not to &s;ay, they &s;hall be one fle&s;h, for they cannot be one fle&s;h. God commands not impo&s;&s;ibilities; and all the Eccle&s;ia&s;tical glue, that Liturgy, or Laymen can compound, is not able to &s;oder up two &s;uch incongruous natures into the one fle&s;h of a true be&s;eeming Mariage. Why did <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> then &s;et down thir u|niting into one fle&s;h? And I again ask, why the Go&s;pel &s;o oft repeats the eating of our Saviours fle&s;h, the drinking of his blood? <HI>That wee are one body with him, the members of his body, fle&s;h of his fle&s;h and bone of his bone.</HI> Ephe&s;. 5. Yet le&s;t wee &s;hould be Capernaitans, as wee are told there that the fle&s;h profiteth nothing, &s;o wee are told heer, if we be not as deaf as adders, that this union of the fle&s;h proceeds from the union of a fit help and &s;olace. Wee know that there was never a more &s;piritual my&s;tery then this Go&s;pel taught us under the terms of body and fle&s;h; yet nothing le&s;s intended then that wee &s;hould &s;tick there. What a &s;tupidnes then is it, that in Mariage, which is the neer|e&s;t re&s;emblance of our union with Chri&s;t, wee &s;hould deject our &s;elvs to &s;uch a &s;luggi&s;h and underfoot Philo&s;ophy, as to e&s;teem the validi|ty of Mariage meerly by the fle&s;h; though never &s;o brokn and di&s;|joynted from love and peace, which only can give a human qualifi|cation to that act of the fle&s;h, and di&s;tingui&s;h it from be&s;tial. The Text therefore u&s;es this phra&s;e, that <HI>they &s;hall bee one fle&s;h,</HI> to ju&s;tify and make legitimat the rites of Mariage bed; which was not unneed|full, if for all this warrant, they were &s;u&s;pected of pollution by &s;ome &s;ects of Philo&s;ophy, and Religions of old, and latelier among the
<PB N="18" REF="14">
Papi&s;ts, and other heretics elder then they. Som think there is a high my&s;tery in tho&s;e words, from that which <HI>Paul</HI> &s;aith of them, Ephe&s;. 5. <HI>This is a great my&s;tery, but I &s;peak of Chri&s;t and the Church:</HI> and thence they would conclude mariage to be in&s;eparable. For me I di&s;|pute not now whether matrimony bee a my&s;tery or no; if it bee of Chri&s;t and his Church, certainly it is not meant of every ungodly and mi&s;wedded mariage, but then only my&s;terious, when it is a holy, hap|py, and peacefull match. But when a Saint is joyn'd with a repro|bate, or both alike, wicked with wicked, fool with fool, a hee drun|kard with a &s;he, when the bed hath bin nothing els for twenty yeares or more, but an old haunt of lu&s;t and malice mixt together, no love, no goodnes, no loyalty, but counterplotting, and &s;ecret wi&s;hing one anothers di&s;&s;olution, this is to me the greate&s;t my&s;tery in the world, if &s;uch a mariage as this, can be the my&s;tery of ought, unle&s;s it bee the my&s;tery of iniquity: According to that which <HI>Paraeus</HI> cites out of <HI>Chry&s;o&s;tom,</HI> that a bad wife is a help for the devill, and the like may be &s;aid of a bad husband. Since therfore none but a fit and pious ma|trimony can &s;ignify the union of Chri&s;t and his Church, ther cannot hence be any hindrance of divorce to that wedlock wherin ther can be no good my&s;tery. Rather it might to a Chri&s;tian Con&s;cience bee matter of finding it &s;elf &s;o much le&s;s &s;atisfy'd then before, in the con|tinuance of an unhappy yoke, wherein there can be no repre&s;entation either of Chri&s;t, or of his Church.</P>
<P>Thus having enquir'd the in&s;titution how it was in the beginning, both from the 1 Chap. of <HI>Gen,</HI> where it was only mention'd in part, and from the &s;econd, where it was plainly and evidently in&s;tituted, and having attended each clau&s;e and word nece&s;&s;ary, with a diligence not drou&s;y, wee &s;hall now fix with &s;om advantage; and by a &s;hort view backward gather up the ground wee have gon; and &s;umm up the &s;trength wee have, into one argumentative head, with that <HI>or|ganic</HI> force that <HI>logic</HI> proffers us. All arts acknowledge that then only we know certainly, when we can define; for definition is that which refines the pure e&s;&s;ence of things from the circum&s;tance. If therfore we can attain in this our Controver&s;y to define exactly what mariage is, wee &s;hall &s;oon lern, when there is a nullity thereof, and when a divorce.</P>
<P>The part therfore of this Chapter which hath bin heer treated, doth orderly and readily re&s;olv it &s;elf into a definition of mariage, and a
<PB N="19" REF="14">
con&s;ectary from thence. To the definition the&s;e words cheifly con|tribute. <HI>It is not good, &amp;c. I will make, &amp;c.</HI> Where the con&s;ecta|ry begins this connexion <HI>Therfore</HI> informs us, <HI>Therfore &s;hall a man,</HI> &amp;c. Definition is decreed by Logicians to con&s;i&s;t only of cau&s;es con&s;tituting the e&s;&s;ence of a thing, What is not therfore among the cau&s;es con&s;tituting mariage, mu&s;t not &s;tay in the definition. Tho&s;e cau&s;es are concluded to be <HI>matter,</HI> and, as the Arti&s;t calls it, <HI>Form.</HI> But ina&s;much as the &s;ame thing may be a cau&s;e more waies then one, and that in relations and in&s;titutions which have no corporal &s;ub&s;i&s;t|ence, but only a re&s;pective beeing, the <HI>Form</HI> by which the thing is what it is, is oft &s;o &s;lender and undi&s;tingui&s;hable, that it would &s;oon confu&s;e, were it not &s;u&s;tain'd by the efficient and final cau&s;es, which concurre to make up the form invalid otherwi&s;e of it &s;elf, it will bee needfull to take in all the fowr cau&s;es into the definition. Fir&s;t ther|fore the material cau&s;e of matrimony is man and woman; the Author and efficient, God and their con&s;ent, the internal <HI>Form</HI> and &s;oul of this relation, is conjugal love ari&s;ing from a mutual fitnes to the final cau&s;es of wedlock, help and &s;ociety in Religious, Civil and Dome|&s;tic conver&s;ation, which includes as an inferior end the fulfilling of natural de&s;ire, and &s;pecifical increa&s;e; the&s;e are the final cau&s;es both moving the <HI>efficient,</HI> and perfeting the <HI>form.</HI> And although copula|tion be con&s;ider'd among the ends of mariage, yet the act therof in a right e&s;teem can no longer be matrimonial, then it is an effect of conjugal love. When love findes it &s;elf utterly unmatcht, and ju&s;tly vani&s;hes, nay rather cannot but vani&s;h, the fle&s;hly act indeed may continue, but not holy, not pure, not be&s;eeming the &s;acred bond of mariage; beeing at be&s;t but an animal excretion, but more truly wors and more ignoble then that mute kindlyne&s;s among the heards and flocks: in that proceeding as it ought from intellective principles, it participates of nothing rational, but that which the feild and the fould equalls. For in human actions the &s;oule is the agent, the body in a manner pa&s;&s;ive. If then the body doe out of &s;en&s;itive force, what the &s;oul complies not with, how can man, and not rather &s;omthing beneath man be thought the doer.</P>
<P>But to proceed in the per&s;ute of an accurat definition, it will a vail us &s;omthing, and whet our thoughts, to examin what fabric heerof others have already reard. <HI>Paraeus</HI> on <HI>Gen.</HI> defines Mariage to be <HI>an indi&s;&s;oluble conjunction of one man and one woman to an individual and inti|mat
<PB N="20" REF="15">
conver&s;ation, and mutual benevolence, &amp;c.</HI> Wherin is to be markt his placing of intimat conver&s;ation before bodily benevolence; for bodily is meant, though indeed <HI>benevolence</HI> rather &s;ounds will then body. Why then &s;hall divorce be granted for want of bodily per|formance, and not for want of fitnes to intimat conver&s;ation, when as corporal benevolence cannot in any human fa&s;hion bee without this? Thus his definition places the ends of Mariage in one order, and e&s;teems them in another. His <HI>Tautology</HI> al&s;o of indi&s;&s;oluble and in|dividual is not to be imitated; e&s;pecially &s;ince neither indi&s;&s;oluble, nor individual hath ought to doe in the exact definition, beeing but a con&s;ectary flowing from thence, as appears by plain Scripture, <HI>Therfore &s;hall a man leav, &amp;c.</HI> For Mariage is not true mariage by bee|ing individual, but therfore individual, if it be true Mariage. No ar|gument but cau&s;es enter the definition; a Con&s;ectary is but the effect of tho&s;e cau&s;es. Be&s;ides, that Mariage is indi&s;&s;oluble, is not <HI>Catho|lickly</HI> true; wee know it di&s;&s;oluble for Adultery, and for de&s;ertion by the verdit of all Reformed Churches. Dr. <HI>Ames</HI> defines it <HI>an indi|vidual conjunction of one man and one woman, to communion of body and mutual &s;ociety of life;</HI> But this perverts the order of God, who in the in&s;titution places meet help and &s;ociety of life before communion of body. And vulgar e&s;timation undervalues beyond compari&s;on all &s;ociety of life and communion of minde beneath the communion of body; granting no divorce, but to the want, or mi&s;communica|ting of that. <HI>Hemingius,</HI> an approved Author, <HI>Melanchtons</HI> Scholler, and who next to <HI>Bucer</HI> and <HI>Era&s;mus</HI> writes of divorce mo&s;t like a Divine, thus compri&s;es, <HI>Mariage is a conjunction of one man and one woman lawfully con&s;enting, into one fle&s;h, for mutual helps &s;ake, ordain'd of God.</HI> And in his explanation &s;tands punctually upon the conditions of con&s;ent, that it be not in any main matter deluded, as beeing the life of wedloc, and no true marriage without a true con&s;ent. <HI>Into one fle&s;h</HI> he expounds into one minde, as well as one body, and makes it the formal cau&s;e: Heerin only mi&s;&s;ing, while he puts the effect into his definition in&s;tead of the cau&s;e which the Text affords him. For <HI>one fle&s;h</HI> is not the formal e&s;&s;ence of wedloc, but one end, or one effect of <HI>a meet help;</HI> The end oft times beeing the effect and fruit of the form, as Logic teaches: Els many aged and holy ma|trimonies, and more eminently that of <HI>Jo&s;eph</HI> and <HI>Mary,</HI> would bee no true mariage. And that <HI>maxim</HI> generally receiv'd, would be fals,
<PB N="21" REF="15">
that <HI>con&s;ent alone, though copulation never follow, makes the mariage.</HI> Therefore to con&s;ent lawfully into one fle&s;h, is not the formal cau&s;e of Matrimony, but only one of the effects. The Civil Lawyers, and fir&s;t <HI>Ju&s;tinian</HI> or <HI>Tribonian</HI> defines Matrimony a <HI>conjunction of man and woman containing individual accu&s;tom of life.</HI> Wherin fir&s;t, individual is not &s;o bad as indi&s;&s;oluble put in by others: And although much ca|vil might be made in the di&s;tingui&s;hing between indivi&s;ible, and in|dividual, yet the one tak'n for po&s;&s;ible, the other for actuall, neither the one nor the other can belong to the e&s;&s;ence of mariage; e&s;peci|ally when a Civilian defines, by which Law mariage is actually di|vorc't for many cau&s;es, and with good leav, by mutual con&s;ent. Ther|fore where <HI>conjunction</HI> is &s;aid, they who comment the <HI>In&s;titutes,</HI> agree that conjunction of minde is by the Law meant, not nece&s;&s;arily con|junction of body. That Law then had good rea&s;on attending to its own definition, that divorce &s;hould be granted for the breaking of that conjunction which it holds nece&s;&s;ary, &s;ooner then for the want of that conjunction which it holds not nece&s;&s;ary. And wheras <HI>Tu|ningus</HI> a famous Lawyer excu&s;es individual as the purpos of Mariage, not always the &s;ucce&s;s, it &s;uffices not. Purpos is not able to con&s;ti|tute the e&s;&s;ence of a thing. Nature her &s;elf the univer&s;al Mother in|tends nothing but her own perfection and pre&s;ervation; yet is not the more indi&s;&s;oluble for that. The <HI>Pandects</HI> out of <HI>Mode&s;tinus,</HI> though not define, yet well de&s;cribe Mariage, <HI>the conjunction of male and fe|male, the &s;ociety of all life, the communion of divine and human right:</HI> which <HI>Bucer</HI> al&s;o imitates on the fifth to the <HI>Ephe&s;ians.</HI> But it &s;eems rather to comprehend the &s;everal ends of Mariage, then to contain the more con&s;tituting cau&s;e that makes it what it is.</P>
<P>That I therefore among others (for who &s;ings not <HI>Hylas)</HI> may give as well as take matter to be judg'd on, it will be lookt I &s;hould pro|duce another definition then the&s;e which have not &s;tood the tryal. Thus then I &s;uppo&s;e that Mariage by the natural and plain order of Gods in&s;titution in the Text may be more demon&s;tratively and e&s;&s;en|tially defin'd. <HI>Mariage is a divine in&s;titution joyning man and woman in a love fitly di&s;pos'd to the helps and comforts of dome&s;tic life. A divine in&s;titution.</HI> This contains the prime efficient cau&s;e of Mariage; as for con&s;ent of Parents and Guardians, it &s;eems rather a concurrence then a cau&s;e; for as many, that marry are in thir own power as not; and where they are not thir own, yet are they not &s;ubjected beyond
<PB N="22" REF="16">
rea&s;on. Now though efficient cau&s;es are not requi&s;ite in a definition, yet divine in&s;titution hath &s;uch influence upon the <HI>Form,</HI> and is &s;o a con&s;erving cau&s;e of it, that without it the <HI>Form</HI> is not &s;ufficient to di&s;tingui&s;h matrimony from other conjunctions of male and female, which are not to be counted mariage. <HI>Joyning man and woman in a love, &amp;c.</HI> This brings in the parties con&s;ent; until which be, the mariage hath no true beeing. When I &s;ay <HI>con&s;ent,</HI> I mean not error, for er|ror is not properly con&s;ent: And why &s;hould not con&s;ent be heer under&s;tood with equity and good to either part, as in all other freind|ly covnants, and not be &s;train'd and cruelly urg'd to the mi&s;cheif and de&s;truction of both? Neither doe I mean that &s;ingular act of con&s;ent which made the contract, for that may remain, and yet the ma|riage not true nor lawful; and that may cea&s;e, and yet the mariage both true and lawful, to their &s;in that break it. So that either as no efficient at all, or but a tran&s;itory, it comes not into the definition. That con&s;ent I mean which is a love fitly di&s;pos'd to mutual help and comfort of life; this is that happy <HI>Form</HI> of mariage naturally ari&s;ing from the very heart of divine in&s;titution in the Text, in all the former definitions either ob&s;curely, and under mi&s;tak'n terms expre&s;t, or not at all. This gives mariage all her due, all her benefits, all her beeing, all her di&s;tinct and proper beeing. This makes a mariage not a bond|age, a ble&s;&s;ing not a cur&s;e, a gift of God not a &s;nare. Unle&s;s ther be a love, and that love born of fitnes, how can it la&s;t? unle&s;s it la&s;t how can the be&s;t and &s;weete&s;t purpo&s;es of mariage be attain'd, and they not attain'd, which are the cheif ends, and with a lawful love con&s;titute the formal cau&s;e it &s;elf of mariage, how can the e&s;&s;ence thereof &s;ub&s;i&s;t, how can it bee indeed what it goes for? Conclude therfore by all the power of rea&s;on, that where this e&s;&s;ence of ma|riage is not, there can bee no true mariage; and the parties either one of them, or both are free, and without fault rather by a nullity, then by a divorce may betake them to a &s;econd choys; if thir pre&s;ent condition be not tolerable to them. If any &s;hall ask, why <HI>dome&s;tic</HI> in the definition? I an&s;wer, that becau&s;e both in the Scriptures, and in the grave&s;t Poets and Philo&s;ophers I finde the properties and ex|cellencies of a wife &s;et out only from dome&s;tic vertues; if they ex|tend furder, it diffu&s;es them into the notion of &s;om more common du|ty then matrimonial.</P>
<P>Thus farre of the definition; the <HI>Con&s;ectary</HI> which flows from
<PB N="23" REF="16">
thence, and altogether depends theron, is manife&s;tly brought in by this connexive particle <HI>Therfore;</HI> and branches it &s;elf into a double con&s;equence; Fir&s;t individual Society, <HI>therfore &s;hall a man leav father and mother:</HI> Secondly conjugal benevolence, <HI>and they &s;hall bee one fle&s;h.</HI> Which as was &s;hewn, is not without cau&s;e heer mention'd, to prevent and to aboli&s;h the &s;u&s;pect of pollution in that natural and un|defiled act. The&s;e con&s;equences therfore cannot either in Religion, Law, or Rea&s;on bee bound, and po&s;ted upon mankind to his &s;orrow and mi&s;ery, but receiv what force they have from the meetnes of help and &s;olace, which is the <HI>formal</HI> cau&s;e and end of that definition that &s;u&s;tains them. And although it be not for the Maje&s;ty of Scripture to humble her &s;elf in artificial <HI>theorems,</HI> and definitions, and <HI>Corolla|ries,</HI> like a profe&s;&s;or in the Schools, but looks to be <HI>analys'd,</HI> and in|terpreted by the logical indu&s;try of her Di&s;ciples and followers, and to bee reduc't by them, as oft as need is, into tho&s;e <HI>Sciential</HI> rules, which are the implements of in&s;truction, yet <HI>Mo&s;es,</HI> as if fore&s;eeing the mi&s;erable work that mans ignorance and pu&s;illanimity would make in this matrimonious bu&s;ines, and endevouring his utmo&s;t to prevent it, conde&s;cends in this place to &s;uch a methodical and School|like way of defining, and con&s;equencing, as in no place of the whole Law more.</P>
<P>Thus wee have &s;een, and if wee be not contentious, may know what was Mariage in the beginning, to which in the Go&s;pel wee are referr'd; and what from hence to judge of nullity, or divorce, Heer I e&s;teem the work don; in this field the controver&s;ie decided; but becau&s;e other places of Scripture &s;eem to look aver&s;ly upon this our deci&s;ion, although indeed they keep all harmony with it, and becau&s;e it is a better work to reconcile the &s;eeming diver&s;ities of Scripture, then the reall di&s;&s;entions of neere&s;t friends, I &s;hall a&s;&s;ay in three following Di&s;cour&s;es to perform that Office.</P>
</DIV3>
<DIV3 TYPE="section">
<EPIGRAPH>
<BIBL>Deut. 24. 1, 2.</BIBL>
<Q>1. <HI>When a man hath taken a Wife, and married her, and it come to pa&s;s that &s;he find no favour in his eyes, becau&s;e he hath found &s;om uncleannes in her, then let him write her a bill of divercement, and give it in her hand, and &s;end her out of his hou&s;e.</HI></Q>
<Q><PB N="24" REF="17">
2 <HI>And when &s;he is departed out of his hou&s;e, &s;he may goe and be another mans wife.</HI></Q>
</EPIGRAPH>
<P>THat which is the only di&s;commodity of &s;peaking in a cleer mat|ter, the abundance of argument that pre&s;&s;es to bee utter'd, and the &s;u&s;pence of judgement what to choo&s;e, and how in the multitude of rea&s;on, to be not tedious, is the greate&s;t difficulty which I expect heer to meet with. Yet much hath bin &s;aid formerly concerning this Law <HI>in the Doctrins of divorce;</HI> Wherof I &s;hall repeat no more then what is nece&s;&s;ary. Two things are heer doubted: Fir&s;t, and that but of late, whether this bee a Law or no, next what this rea&s;on of <HI>uncleannes</HI> might mean for which the Law is granted; That it is a plain Law no man ever que&s;tion'd, till <HI>Vatablus</HI> within the&s;e hunder'd years profe&s;s'd Hebrew at <HI>Paris,</HI> a man of no Religion, as <HI>Beza</HI> deciphers him. Yet &s;om there be who follow him, not only again&s;t the cur|rent of all antiquity, both Jewi&s;h and Chri&s;tian, but the evidence of Scripture al&s;o, Malach. 2. 16. <HI>Let him who hateth put away &s;aith the Lord God of I&s;rael.</HI> Although this place al&s;o hath bin tamper'd with, as if it were to be thus render'd, <HI>The Lord God &s;aith, that hee hateth putting away.</HI> But this new interpretation re&s;ts only in the autority of <HI>Junius;</HI> for neither <HI>Calvin,</HI> nor <HI>Vatablus</HI> him&s;elf, nor any other known Divine &s;o interpreted before. And they of be&s;t note who have tran&s;lated the Scripture &s;ince, and <HI>Diodati</HI> for one, follow not his reading. And perhaps they might reject it, if for nothing els, for the&s;e two rea&s;ons: Fir&s;t, it introduces in a new manner the per&s;on of God &s;peaking le&s;s Maje&s;tic then he is ever wont; When God &s;peaks by his Profet, he ever &s;peaks in the fir&s;t per&s;on; thereby &s;ignifying his Maje&s;ty and omni-pre&s;ence. Hee would have &s;aid, I hate putting away, &s;aith the Lord; and not &s;ent word by <HI>Malachi</HI> in a &s;udden faln &s;tile, The <HI>Lord God &s;aith that hee hateth putting away:</HI> that were a phra&s;e to &s;hrink the glorious omnipre&s;ence of God &s;peaking, into a kind of circum&s;criptive ab&s;ence. And were as if a Herald in the <HI>At|cheivment</HI> of a King, &s;hould commit the <HI>indecorum</HI> to &s;et his helmet &s;ide|waies and clo&s;e, not full fac't and open in the po&s;ture of direction and command. Wee cannot think therfore that this la&s;t Profet would thus in a new fa&s;hion ab&s;ent the per&s;on of God from his own words as if he came not along with them. For it would al&s;o be wide from the proper &s;cope of this place: hee that reads attentively will &s;oon
<PB N="25" REF="17">
perceav, that God blames not heer the Jews for putting away thir wives, but for keeping &s;trange Concubines, to the <HI>profaning of Juda's holines,</HI> and the vexation of thir Hebrew wives, v. 11. and 14. <HI>Judah hath maried the daughter of a &s;trange God:</HI> And exhorts them rather to put thir wives away whom they hate, as the Law permitted, then to keep them under &s;uch affronts. And it is receiv'd that this Profet livd in tho&s;e times of <HI>Ezra</HI> and <HI>Nehemiah</HI> (nay by &s;om is thought to bee <HI>Ezra</HI> him&s;elf) when the people were forc't by the&s;e two Wor|thies to put thir &s;trange wives away. So that what the &s;tory of tho&s;e times, and the plain context of the 11 ver&s;e, from whence this re|buke begins, can give us to conjecture of the ob&s;cure and curt <HI>E|brai&s;ms</HI> that follow, this Profet does not forbid putting away, but for|bids keeping, and commands putting away according to Gods Law, which is the plaine&s;t interpreter both of what God will, and what he can be&s;t &s;uffer. Thus much evinces that God there commanded divorce by <HI>Malachi,</HI> and this confirmes that he commands it al&s;o heer by <HI>Mo&s;es.</HI></P>
<P>I may the le&s;s doubt to mention by the way an Author, though counted Apocryphal, yet of no &s;mall account for piety and wi&s;dom, the Author of <HI>Eccle&s;ia&s;ticus.</HI> Which Book begun by the Grand-fa|ther of that <HI>Je&s;us</HI> who is call'd the Son of <HI>Sirach,</HI> might have bin writt'n in part, not much after the time when <HI>Malachi</HI> livd; if wee compute by the Reigne of <HI>Ptolemaeus Euergetes.</HI> It profe&s;&s;es to ex|plain the Law and the Profets; and yet exhorts us to divorce for in|curable cau&s;es, and to cut off from the fle&s;h tho&s;e whom it there de|&s;cribes, <HI>Eccle&s;ia&s;tic.</HI> 25. 26. Which doubtles that wi&s;e and ancient Writer would never have advis'd, had either <HI>Malachi</HI> &s;o lately for|bidd'n it, or the Law by a full precept not left it lawful&punc; But I urge not this for want of better prooff; our Saviour him&s;elf allows di|vorce to be a command, <HI>Mark.</HI> 10. 3. 5. Neither doe they weak'n this a&s;&s;ertion, who &s;ay it was only a &s;ufferance, as &s;hall be prov'd at large in that place of <HI>Matthew.</HI> But &s;uppo&s;e it were not a writt'n Law, they never can deny it was a cu&s;tom, and &s;o effect nothing. For the &s;ame rea&s;ons that induce them why it &s;hould not bee a law, will &s;trair'n them as hard why it &s;hould bee allow'd a cu&s;tom. All cu&s;tom is either evil or not evil; if it be evil, this is the very end of Law-giving, to aboli&s;h evil cu&s;toms by whol&s;om Laws; unle&s;s wee ima|gin <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> weaker then every negligent and &s;tartling Politician. If
<PB N="26" REF="18">
it be, as they make this of divorce to be, a cu&s;tom again&s;t nature, a|gain&s;t ju&s;tice, again&s;t cha&s;tity, how, upon this mo&s;t impure cu&s;tom tolerated, could the God of purenes erect a nice and preci&s;e Law, that the wife marryed after divorce could not return to her former husband, as beeing defil'd? What was all this following nicenes worth, built upon the leud foundation of a wicked thing allow'd? In few words then, this cu&s;tom of divorce either was allowable, or not allowable; if not allowable, how could it be allow'd? if it were allowa|ble, all who under&s;tand Law will con&s;ent, that a tolerated cu&s;tom hath the force of a Law, and is indeed no other but an unwritt'n Law, as <HI>Ju&s;tinian</HI> calls it, and is as prevalent as any writt'n &s;tatute. So that thir &s;hift of turning this Law into a cu&s;tom wheels about, and gives the on&s;et upon thir own flanks; not di&s;proving, but concluding it to be the more firm law, becau&s;e it was without controver&s;y a granted cu&s;tom; as cleer in the rea&s;on of common life, as tho&s;e giv'n rules wheron <HI>Euclides</HI> builds his propo&s;itions.</P>
<P>Thus beeing every way a Law of God, who can without bla&s;phe|my doubt it to be a ju&s;t and pure Law. <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> continually di&s;avows the giving them any &s;tatute, or judgement, but what hee learnt of God; of whom al&s;o in his Song hee &s;aith, Deut. 32. <HI>Hee is the rock, his work is perfet, all his waies are judgement, a God of truth and without iniquity, ju&s;t and right is hee.</HI> And <HI>David</HI> te&s;tifies, the judgements of the Lord <HI>are true and righteous altogether.</HI> Not partly right and part|ly wrong, much le&s;s wrong altogether, as Divines of now adaies dare cen&s;ure them. <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> again of that people to whom hee gave this Law &s;aith, Deut. 14. <HI>Yee are the childern of the Lord your God, the Lord hath cho&s;en thee to bee a peculiar people to him&s;elf above all the nations upon the earth, that thou &s;hould&s;t keep all his Commandements; and be high in prai&s;e, in name, and in honour, holy to the Lord, Chap.</HI> 26. And in the fourth, <HI>Behold I have taught you &s;tatutes and judgements eevn as the Lord my God commanded mee, keep therfore and doe them. For this is your wi&s;dom and your under&s;tanding in the &s;ight of Nations that &s;hall hear all the&s;e Statutes and &s;ay, &s;urely this great Nation is a wi&s;e and under|&s;tanding people. For what Nation is ther &s;o great, who hath God &s;o nigh to them? and what Nation that hath Statutes and Judgements &s;o righte|ons as all this Law which I &s;et before you this day?</HI> Thus whether wee look at the purity and ju&s;tice of God him&s;elf, the jealou&s;y of his ho|nour among other Nations, the holines and moral perfection which
<PB N="27" REF="18">
hee intended by his Law to teach this people, wee cannot po&s;&s;ibly think how he could indure to let them &s;lugg &amp; grow inveteratly wick|ed, under ba&s;e allowances, &amp; whole adulterous lives by di&s;pen&s;ation. They might not eat, they might not touch an unclean thing; to what hypocri&s;y then were they train'd up, if by pre&s;cription of the &s;ame Law, they might be unju&s;t, they might be adulterous for term of life? forbid to &s;oile thir garments with a coy imaginary pollution, but not forbid, but countnanc't and animated by Law to &s;oile thir &s;oules with deepe&s;t defilements. What more unlike to God, what more like that God &s;hould hate, then that his Law &s;hould bee &s;o curious to wa&s;h ve&s;tures; and &s;o careles to leav unwa&s;ht, unregarded, &s;o foul a &s;cab of <HI>Egypt</HI> in thir Soules? what would wee more? the Sta|tutes of the Lord are all pure and ju&s;t: and if all, then this of Divorce.</P>
<P><HI>Becau&s;e hee hath found &s;om uncleannes in her.</HI> That wee may not e&s;teem this law to bee a meer authorizing of licence, as the Phari|&s;es took it, <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> adds the rea&s;on, for <HI>&s;om uncleannes found.</HI> Som heertofore have bin &s;o ignorant, as to have thought, that this <HI>unclean|nes</HI> means adultery. But <HI>Era&s;mus,</HI> who for having writ an excellent Treati&s;e of Divorce, was wrote again&s;t by &s;om burly &s;tandard Di|vine, perhaps of <HI>Cullen,</HI> or of <HI>Lovain,</HI> who calls him&s;elf <HI>Phimo&s;to|mus,</HI> &s;hews learnedly out of the Fathers with other Te&s;timonies and Rea&s;ons, that <HI>uncleannes</HI> is not heer &s;o under&s;tood; defends his for|mer work, though new to that age, and perhaps counted licentious, and fears not to ingage all his fame on the Argument. Afterward, when Expo&s;iters began to under&s;tand the Hebrew Text, which they had not done of many ages before, they tran&s;lated word for word not <HI>uncleannes,</HI> but <HI>the nakednes of any thing;</HI> and con&s;ide|ring that nakednes is u&s;ually referr'd in Scripture to the minde as well as to the body, they con&s;tantly expound it any defect, annoyance, or ill quality in nature, which to bee joyn'd with, makes life tedious, and &s;uch company wors then &s;olitude. So that heer will be no cau&s;e to vary from the generall con&s;ent of expo&s;ition, which gives us free|ly that God permitted divorce, for whatever was unalterably di&s;ta&s;t|ful, whether in body or mind. But with this admoni&s;hment, that if the <HI>Roman</HI> law e&s;pecially in contracts and dowries left many things to equity with the&s;e cautions, <HI>exfide bon&acirc;, quod aequius melius erit, ut inter bonos bene agier,</HI> wee will not grudge to think that God inten|ded not licence heer to every humor, but to &s;uch remediles greevan|ces
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as might move a good, and hone&s;t, and faithfull man then to di|vorce, when it can no more bee peace or comfort to either of them continuing thus joyn'd. And although it could not be avoided, bat that men of hard hearts would abu&s;e this liberty, yet doubtles it was intended as all other privileges in Law are, to good men principal|ly, to bad only by accident. So that the &s;in was not in the permi&s;&s;i|on, nor &s;imply in the action of divorce (for then the permitting al|&s;o had bin &s;in) but only in the abu&s;e. But that this Law &s;hould, as it were, bee wrung from God and <HI>Mo&s;es,</HI> only to &s;erve the hard hear|tednes, and the lu&s;t of injurious men, how remote it is from all &s;en&s;e, and law, and hone&s;ty, and therfore &s;urely from the mean|ing of Chri&s;t, &s;hall abundantly be manife&s;t in due order.</P>
<P>Now although <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> needed not to adde other rea&s;on of this law then that one there expre&s;t, yet to the&s;e ages wherin Canons, and <HI>Scoti&s;ms,</HI> and <HI>Lumbard</HI> Laws, have dull'd, and almo&s;t obliterated the lively Sculpture of ancient rea&s;on, and humanity, it will be re|qui&s;it to heap rea&s;on upon rea&s;on, and all little enough to vindicat the whitenes and the innocence of this divine Law, from the calum|ny it findes at this day, of beeing a dore to licence and confu&s;ion. When as indeed there is not a judicial point in all <HI>Mo&s;es,</HI> con&s;i&s;ting of more true equity, high wi&s;dom, and God-like pitty then this Law; not derogating, but pre&s;erving the honour and peace of Mariage, and exactly agreeing with the &s;en&s;e and mind of that in&s;titution in <HI>Gene&s;is.</HI></P>
<P>For fir&s;t, if Mariage be but an ordain'd relation, as it &s;eems not more, it cannot take place above the prime dictats of nature; and if it bee of natural right, yet it mu&s;t yeeld to that which is more na|tural, and before it by elder&s;hip and precedence in nature. Now it is not natural that <HI>Hugh</HI> marries <HI>Beatrice,</HI> or <HI>Thomas Rebecca,</HI> beeing only a civill contract, and full of many chances, but that the&s;e men &s;eek them meet helps, that only is natural; and that they e&s;pou&s;e them &s;uch, that only is mariage. But if they find them neither fit helps, nor tolerable &s;ociety, what thing more natural, more original and fir&s;t in nature then to depart from that which is irk&s;om, greevous, actively hateful, and injurious eevn to ho&s;tility, e&s;pecially in a con|jugal re&s;pect, wherin antipathies are invincible, and wher the forc't abiding of the one, can bee no true good, no real comfort to the o|ther. For if hee find no contentment from the other, how can he re|turn
<PB N="29" REF="19">
it from him&s;elf, or no acceptance, how can hee mutually accept? what more equal, more pious then to untie a civil knot for a natural enmity held by violence from parting, to di&s;&s;olv an accidental con|junction of this or that man &amp; woman, for the mo&s;t natural and mo&s;t nece&s;&s;ary di&s;agreement of meet from unmeet, guilty from guiltles, contrary from contrary? It beeing certain that the my&s;tical and ble&s;&s;ed unity of mariage can bee no way more unhallow'd and pro|fan'd, then by the forcible uniting of &s;uch di&s;unions and &s;eparations. Which if wee &s;ee oft times they cannot joyn or peece up to a com|mon friend&s;hip, or to a willing conver&s;ation in the &s;ame hou&s;e, how &s;hould they po&s;&s;ibly agree to the mo&s;t familiar and united amity of wedlock? <HI>Abraham</HI> and <HI>Lot,</HI> though dear friends and brethren in a &s;trange Country, cho&s;e rather to part a&s;under, then to infect thir friend&s;hip with the &s;trife of thir &s;ervants: <HI>Paul</HI> and <HI>Barnabas</HI> joyn'd together by the Holy Gho&s;t to a Spiritual work, thought it better to &s;eparate when once they grew at variance. If the&s;e great Saints joynd by nature, friend&s;hip, religion, high providence, and revela|tion, could not &s;o govern a ca&s;ual difference, a &s;udden pa&s;&s;ion, but mu&s;t in wi&s;dom divide from the outward duties of a friend&s;hip, or a Collegue&s;hip in the &s;ame family, or in the &s;ame journey, le&s;t it &s;hould grow to a wors divi&s;ion, can any thing bee more ab&s;urd and barba|rous then that they whom only error, ca&s;ualty, art or plot hath joynd, &s;hould be compell'd, not again&s;t a &s;udden pa&s;&s;ion but again&s;t the per|manent and radical di&s;cords of nature, to the mo&s;t intimat and incor|porating duties of love and imbracement, therin only rational and human, as they are free and voluntary; beeing els an abject and &s;er|vile yoke, &s;cars not bruti&s;h. And that there is in man &s;uch a peculiar &s;way of liking, or di&s;liking in the affairs of matrimony is evidently &s;een before mariage among tho&s;e who can bee freindly, can re&s;pect each other yet to marry each other would not for any per&s;wa&s;ion. If then this unfitnes and di&s;parity bee not till after mariage di&s;cover'd, through many cau&s;es, and colours, and concealements, that may over&s;hadow; undoubtedly it will produce the &s;ame effects and per|haps with more vehemence, that &s;uch a mi&s;takn pair, would give the world to be unmarried again. And thir condition <HI>Solomon</HI> to the plain ju&s;tification of divorce expre&s;&s;es, <HI>Prov.</HI> 30. 21. 23. Where hee rells us of his own accord, that a <HI>hated,</HI> or a <HI>hatefull</HI> woman, <HI>when &s;hee is married, is a thing for which the earth is di&s;quieted and cannot
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bear it;</HI> thus giving divine te&s;timony to this divine Law, which bids us nothing more then is the fir&s;t and mo&s;t innocent le&s;&s;on of nature, to turn away peaceably from what afflicts and hazards our de&s;tru|ction; e&s;pecially when our &s;taying can doe no good, and is expos'd to all evil.</P>
<P>Secondly, It is unju&s;t that any Ordinance ordain'd to the good and comfort of man, where that end is mi&s;&s;ing, without his fault, &s;hould be forc't upon him to an un&s;ufferable mi&s;ery and di&s;comfort, if not commonly ruin. All Ordinances are e&s;tabli&s;ht in thir end; the end of Law is the vertu, is the righteou&s;nes of Law. And therfore him wee count an ill Expounder who urges Law again&s;t the intention therof. The general end of every Ordinance, of every &s;evere&s;t, e|very divine&s;t, eevn of Sabbath is the good of man, yea his temporal good not excluded. But marriage is one of the benigne&s;t ordinan|ces of God to man, wherof both the general and particular end is the peace and contentment of mans mind, as the in&s;titution declares. Contentment of body they grant, which if it bee defrauded, the plea of frigidity &s;hall divorce: But heer lies the fadomles ab&s;urdity, that granting this for bodily defect, they will not grant it for any de|fect of the mind, any violation of religious or civil &s;ociety. When as, if the argument of Chri&s;t bee firm again&s;t the ruler of the Syna|gogue, Luk. 13. <HI>Thou hypocrite, doth not each of you on the Sabbath day loos'n his Oxe or his A&s;&s;e from the &s;tall, and lead him to watering, and &s;hould not I unbind a daughter of Abraham from this bond of Sa|tan?</HI> it &s;tands as good heer, yee have regard in mariage to the gree|vance of body, &s;hould you not regard more the greevances of the mind, &s;eeing the Soul as much excells the body, as the outward man excells the A&s;s and more; for that <HI>animal</HI> is yet a living creature, perfet in it &s;elf; but the body without the Soul is a meer &s;en&s;eles trunck. No Ordinance therfore givn particularly to the good both &s;piritual and temporal of man, can bee urg'd upon him to his mi&s;chief, and if they yeeld this to the unworthier part, the body, wherabout are they in thir principles, that they yeeld it not to the more worthy, the mind of a good man?</P>
<P>Thirdly, As no Ordinance, &s;o no Covnant, no not between God and man, much le&s;s between man and man, beeing as all are, inten|ded to the good of both parties, can hold to the deluding or making mi&s;erable of them both. For equity is under&s;tood in every Covnant,
<PB N="31" REF="20">
eevn between enemies, though the terms bee not expre&s;t. If equi|ty therfore made it, extremity may di&s;&s;olv it. But Mariage, they u&s;e to &s;ay, is the Covnant of God. Undoubted: and &s;o is any covnant frequently call'd in Scripture, wherin God is call'd to witnes: the covnant of freind&s;hip between <HI>David</HI> and <HI>Jonathan,</HI> is call'd <HI>the Cov|nant of the Lord,</HI> 1 Sam. 20. The covnant of <HI>Zedechiah</HI> with the King of <HI>Babel,</HI> a Covnant to bee doubted whether lawfull or no, yet in re&s;pect of God invok't thereto, is call'd <HI>the Oath, and the Covnant of God,</HI> Ezech. 17. Mariage al&s;o is call'd the <HI>Covnant of God,</HI> Prov. 2. 17. Why, but as before, becau&s;e God is the witnes therof, Malach. 2. 14. So that this denomination adds nothing to the Covnant of Mari|age, above any other civil and &s;olemn contract: nor is it more indi&s;&s;o|luble for this rea&s;on then any other again&s;t the end of its own ordina|tion, nor is any vow or Oath to God exacted with &s;uch a rigor, where &s;uper&s;tition reignes not. For look how much divine the Covnant is, &s;o much the more equal; So much the more to bee expected that eve|ry article therof &s;hould bee fairly made good, no fals dealing, or un|performing &s;hould be thru&s;t upon men without redre&s;s, if the covnant bee &s;o divine. But faith they &s;ay mu&s;t bee kept in Covnant, though to our dammage. I an&s;wer, that only holds true, where the other &s;ide performs, which failing, hee is no longer bound. Again, this is true, when the keeping of faith can bee of any u&s;e, or benefit to the other. But in Mariage a league of love and willingnes, if faith bee not willingly kept, it &s;cars is worth the keeping; nor can bee any delight to a generous minde, with whom it is forcibly kept: and the que&s;tion &s;till &s;uppo&s;es the one brought to an impo&s;&s;ibility of keep|ing it as hee ought, by the others default, and to keep it formally, not only with a thou&s;and &s;hifts and di&s;&s;imulations, but with open angui&s;h, perpetual &s;adnes and di&s;turbance, no willingnes, no cheerfulnes, no contentment, cannot bee any good to a minde not ba&s;ely poor and &s;hallow, with whom the contract of love is &s;o kept. A Covnant ther|fore brought to that pa&s;&s;e, is on the unfaulty &s;ide without injury di&s;|&s;olv'd.</P>
<P>Fourthly, The Law is not to neglect men under greate&s;t &s;uffe|rances, but to &s;ee Covnants of greate&s;t moment faithfulle&s;t perform'd. And what injury comparable to that &s;u&s;tain'd in a fru&s;trat and fals dea|ling Mariage, to loo&s;e, for anothers fault again&s;t him, the be&s;t portion of his temporal comforts, and of his &s;piritual too, as it may fall out.
<PB N="32" REF="21">
It was the Law, that for mans good and quiet, reduc't things to pro|priety, which were at fir&s;t in common; how much more Law-like were it to a&s;&s;i&s;t nature in di&s;appropriating that evil which by continu|ing proper becomes de&s;tructive. But hee might have bewar'd. So hee might in any other covnant, wherin the Law does not con&s;train error to &s;o dear a forfeit. And yet in the&s;e matters wherin the wi&s;e&s;t are apt to erre, all the warines that can bee, oft times nothing avails. But the Law can compell the offending party to bee more duteous. Yes, if all the&s;e kind of offences were fit in public to bee complain'd on, or beeing compell'd were any &s;atisfaction to a mate not &s;otti&s;h, or malicious. And the&s;e injuries work &s;o vehemently, that if the Law remedy them not, by &s;eparating the cau&s;e when no way els will paci|fy, the per&s;on not releev'd betakes him either to &s;uch di&s;orderly cour|&s;es, or to &s;uch a dull dejection, as renders him either infamous, or u&s;eles to the &s;ervice of God and his Country. Which the Law ought to prevent as a thing pernicious to the Common wealth; and what better prevention then this which <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> us'd?</P>
<P>Fifthly, The Law is to tender the liberty and the human dignity of them that live under the Law, whether it bee the mans right above the woman, or the womans ju&s;t appeal again&s;t wrong, and &s;ervi|tude. But the duties of mariage contain in them a duty of benevo|lence, which to doe by compul&s;ion again&s;t the Soul, where ther can bee neither peace, nor joy, nor love, but an enthrallment to one who either cannot, or will not bee mutual in the godlie&s;t and the ci|vile&s;t ends of that &s;ociety, is the ignoble&s;t, and the lowe&s;t &s;lavery that a human &s;hape can bee put to. This Law therfore ju&s;tly and pi|ou&s;ly provides again&s;t &s;uch an unmanly task of bondage as this. The civil Law, though it favour'd the &s;etting free of a &s;lave, yet if hee prov'd ungratefull to his Patron, reduc't him to a &s;ervil condition. If that Law did well to reduce from liberty to bondage for an ingrati|tude not the greate&s;t, much more became it the Law of God to enact the re&s;torement of a free born man from an unpurpos'd, and unwor|thy bondage to a rightfull liberty for the mo&s;t unnatural fraud and in|gratitude that can be committed again&s;t him. And if that Civilian Emperour in his tide of <HI>Donations,</HI> permit the giver to recall his guift from him who proves unthankful towards him, yea, though hee had &s;ub&s;crib'd and &s;ign'd in the deed of his guift, not to recall it though for this very cau&s;e of ingratitude, with much more equity doth <HI>Mo&s;es</HI>
<PB N="33" REF="21">
permit heer the giver to recall no petty guift, but the guift of him&s;elf from one who mo&s;t injuriou&s;ly &amp; deceitfully u&s;es him again&s;t the main ends and conditions of his giving him&s;elf, expre&s;t in Gods in&s;titution.</P>
<P>Sixthly, Although ther bee nothing in the plain words of this Law, that &s;eems to regard the afflictions of a wife, how great &s;o ever, yet Expo&s;iters determin, and doubtles determin rightly, that God was not uncompa&s;&s;ionat of them al&s;o in the framing of this Law. For &s;hould the re&s;cript of <HI>Antoninus</HI> in the Civil Law give relea&s;e to &s;er|vants flying for refuge to the Emperours &s;tatue, by giving leav to change thir cruel Mai&s;ters, and &s;hould God who in his Law al&s;o is good to injur'd &s;ervants, by granting them thir freedom in divers ca|&s;es, not con&s;ider the wrongs and mi&s;eries of a wife which is no &s;er|vant. Though heerin the counter &s;en&s;e of our Divines, to me, I mu&s;t confe&s;&s;e &s;eems admirable; who teach that God gave this as a merci|full Law, not for man whom he heer names, and to whom by name hee gives this power, but for the wife whom hee names not, and to whom by name hee gives no power at all. For certainly if man beli|able to injuries in mariage, as well as woman, and man be the wor|thier per&s;on, it were a prepo&s;terous law to re&s;pect only the le&s;s wor|thy; her whom God made for mariage, and not him at all for whom mariage was made.</P>
<P>Seventhly, The Law of mariage gives place to the power of Pa|rents: for wee hold that con&s;ent of Parents not had may break the wedlock, though els accompli&s;ht. It gives place to mai&s;terly pow|er, for the Mai&s;ter might take away from an Hebrew &s;ervant the wife which hee gave him, <HI>Exod.</HI> 21. If it be an&s;wer'd that the ma|riage of &s;ervants is no matrimony: tis reply'd, that this in the anci|ent <HI>Roman</HI> Law is true, not in the <HI>Mo&s;aic.</HI> If it bee added, &s;he was a &s;tranger not an Hebrew, therfore ea&s;ily divorc't, it will be an&s;werd that &s;trangers not beeing <HI>Canaanites,</HI> and they al&s;o beeing Converts might bee lawfully maryed, as <HI>Rahab</HI> was. And her conver&s;ion is heer &s;uppos'd; for an Hebrew mai&s;ter could not lawfully give a hea|then wife to an Hebrew &s;ervant. However, the divorcing of an I&s;|raeliti&s;h woman was as ea&s;y by the Law, as the divorcing of a &s;tran|ger, and almo&s;t in the &s;ame words permitted, <HI>Deut.</HI> 24. and <HI>Deut.</HI> 21. La&s;tly, it gives place to the right of warr, for a captiv woman law|fully maryed, and afterward not belov'd, might bee di&s;mi&s;t, only without ran&s;om. <HI>Deut.</HI> 21. If mariage may bee di&s;&s;olv'd by &s;o
<PB N="34" REF="22">
many exterior powers, not &s;uperior, as wee think, why may not the power of mariage it &s;elf for its own peace and honour di&s;&s;olv it &s;elf, wher the per&s;ons wedded be free per&s;ons, why may not a greater and more natural power complaining di&s;&s;olv mariage? for the ends why matrimony was ordain'd, are certainly and by all Logic above the Ordinance it &s;elf, why may not that di&s;&s;olv mariage without which that in&s;titution hath no force at all? for the prime ends of mariage, are the whole &s;trength and validity therof, without which matrimo|ny is like an Idol, nothing in the world. But tho&s;e former allow|ances were all for hardnes of heart. Be that granted, untill we come where to under&s;tand it better: if the Law &s;uffer thus farr the ob&s;tina|cy of a bad man, is it not more righteous heer, to doe willingly what is but equal, to remove in &s;ea&s;on the extremities of a good man?</P>
<P>Eightly, If a man had deflowr'd a Virgin, or brought an ill name on his wife that &s;hee came not a Virgin to him, hee was amerc't in certain &s;hekles of Silver, and bound never to divorce her all his daies, <HI>Deut.</HI> 22. which &s;hews that the Law gave no liberty to divorce, wher the injury was palpable; and that the ab&s;olute forbidding to divorce, was in part the puni&s;hment of a deflowrer, and a defamer. Yet not &s;o but that the wife que&s;tionles might depart when &s;hee pleas'd. O|therwi&s;e this cours had not &s;o much righted her, as deliverd her up to more &s;pight and cruel u&s;age. This Law therfore doth ju&s;tly di&s;tin|gui&s;h the privilege of an hone&s;t and blameles man in the matter of di|vorce from the puni&s;hment of a notorious offender.</P>
<P>Ninthly, Suppo&s;e it might bee imputed to a man, that hee was too ra&s;h in his choy&s;e and why took hee not better heed, let him now &s;mart, and bear his folly as he may; although the Law of God, that terrible law doe not thus upbraid the infirmities and unwilling mi&s;|takes of man in his integrity: But &s;uppo&s;e the&s;e and the like proud aggravations of &s;om &s;tern hypocrite, more merciles in his mercies, then any literall Law in the vigor of &s;everity, mu&s;t be patiently heard; yet all Law, and Gods Law e&s;pecially grants every where to error ea&s;y remitments, eevn where the utmo&s;t penalty exacted were no un|doing. With great rea&s;on therfore and mercy doth it heer not torment an error, if it be &s;o, with the endurance of a whole life lo&s;t to all hou&s;|hold comfort and &s;ociety, a puni&s;hment of too va&s;t and huge dimen|&s;ion for an error, and the more unrea&s;onable for that the like objecti|on may be oppos'd again&s;t the plea of divorcing for adultery; hee
<PB N="35" REF="22">
might have lookt better before to her breeding under religious Pa|rents: why did hee not then more diligently inquire into her man|ners, into what company &s;he kept? every glaunce of her eye, every &s;tep of her gate would have propheci'd adultery, if the quick &s;ent of the&s;e di&s;cerners had bin took along; they had the divination to have foretold you all this; as they have now the divinity to puni&s;h an er|ror inhumanly. As good rea&s;on to be content, and forc't to be con|tent with your adultre&s;s, if the&s;e objecters might be the judges of hu|man frailtie. But God more mild and good to man, then man to his brother, in all this liberty givn to divorcement, mentions not a word of our pa&s;t errors and mi&s;takes, if any were, which the&s;e men object|ing from their own inventions pro&s;ecute with all violence and ini|quity. For if the one bee to look &s;o narrowly what hee takes, at the peril of ever keeping, why &s;hould not the other bee made as wary what is promis'd, by the peril of loo&s;ing? for without tho&s;e promi&s;es the treaty of mariage had not proceeded. Why &s;hould his own error bind him, rather then the others fraud acquit him? Let the buyer be|ware, &s;aith the old Law-beaten termer. Belike then ther is no more hone&s;ty, nor ingenuity in the bargain of a wedloc, then in the buying of a colt: Wee mu&s;t it &s;eems drive it on as craftily with tho&s;e who&s;e affinity wee &s;eek, as if they were a pack of &s;ale men and complot|ters. But the deceiver deceivs him&s;elf in the unpro&s;perous mariage, and therin is &s;ufficiently puni&s;ht. I an&s;wer, that the mo&s;t of tho&s;e who deceiv, are &s;uch as either under&s;tand not, or value not the true purpo&s;es of mariage; they have the prey they &s;eek, not the puni&s;h|ment: yet &s;ay it prove to them &s;om cro&s;s, it is not equal that error and fraud &s;hould bee linkt in the &s;ame degree of forfeture, but rather that error &s;hould be acquitted, and fraud bereav'd his mor&s;el: if the mi&s;take were not on both &s;ides, for then on both &s;ides the acquit|ment will be rea&s;onable, if the bondage be intolerable; which this Law graciou&s;ly determins, not unmindful of the wife, as was gran|ted willingly to the common Expo&s;iters, though beyond the letter of this law, yet not beyond the &s;pirit of charity.</P>
<P>Tenthly, Mariage is a &s;olemn thing, &s;om &s;ay a holy, the re&s;emblance of Chri&s;t and his Church; and &s;o indeed it is where the per&s;ons are truly religious; and wee know all Sacred things not perform'd &s;in|cerely as they ought, are no way acceptable to God in thir outward formality. And that wherin it differs from per&s;onal duties, if they be
<PB N="36" REF="23">
not truly don, the fault is in our &s;elves; but mariage to be a true and pious mariage is not in the &s;ingle power of any per&s;on; the e&s;&s;ence whereof, as of all other Covnants is in relation to another, the mak|ing and maintaining cau&s;es thereof are all mutual, and mu&s;t be a com|munion of &s;piritual and temporal comforts. If then either of them cannot, or ob&s;tinatly will not be an&s;werable in the&s;e duties, &s;o as that the other can have no peaceful living, or enduring the want of what he ju&s;tly &s;eeks, and &s;ees no hope, then &s;trait from that dwelling love, which is the &s;oul of wedloc, takes his flight, leaving only &s;om cold performances of civil and common re&s;pects, but the true bond of ma|riage, if there were ever any there, is already bur&s;t like a rott'n thred. Then follows di&s;&s;imulation, &s;u&s;picion, fals colours, fals pretences, and wors then the&s;e, di&s;turbance, annoyance, vexation, &s;orrow, temta|tion eevn in the faultles per&s;on, weary of him&s;elf, and of all action public or dome&s;tic; then comes di&s;order, neglect, hatred, and perpe|tual &s;trife, all the&s;e the enemies of holines and chri&s;tianity, and eve|ry one of the&s;e per&s;i&s;ted in, a remediles violation to matrimony. Ther|fore God who hates all faining and formality, wher there &s;hould bee all faith and &s;incerenes, and abhorrs to &s;ee inevitable di&s;cord, wher there &s;hould be greate&s;t concord, when through anothers default, faith and concord cannot bee, counts it neither ju&s;t to puni&s;h the innocent with the tran&s;gre&s;&s;or, nor holy, nor honourable for the &s;anctity of mariage, that &s;hould bee the unlon of peace and love, to be made the commitment, and clo&s;e fight of enmity and hate. And therfore doth in this Law, what be&s;t agrees with his goodnes, loo&s;ning a &s;acred thing to peace and charity, rather then binding it to hatred and con|tention; loo&s;ning only the outward and formal tie of that which is already inwardly, and really brokn, or els was really never joyn'd.</P>
<P>Eleventhly, One of the cheif matrimonial ends is &s;aid to &s;eek a ho|ly &s;eed; but where an unfit mariage admini&s;ters continual cau&s;e of hatred and di&s;temper, there, as was heard before, cannot choo&s;e but much unholines abide. Nothing more unhallows a man, more un|prepares him to the &s;ervice of God in any duty, then a habit of wrath and perturbation, ari&s;ing from the importunity of troublous cau&s;es ne|ver ab&s;ent. And wher the hou&s;hold &s;tands in this plight, what love can ther bee to the unfortunat i&s;&s;ue, what care of thir breeding, which is of main conducement to thir beeing holy. God therfore knowing
<PB N="37" REF="23">
how unhappy it would bee for children to bee-born in &s;uch a family, gives this Law either as a prevention, that beeing an unhappy pair, they &s;hould not adde to bee unhappy parents, or els as a remedy that if ther be childern, while they are fewe&s;t, they may follow either parent, as &s;hall bee agreed, or judg'd, from the hou&s;e of hatred and di&s;cord, to a place of more holy and peaceable education.</P>
<P>Twelfthly, All Law is available to &s;om good end, but the final pro|hibition of divorce a vails to no good end, cau&s;ing only the endles ag|gravation of evil, and therfore this permi&s;&s;ion of divorce was givn to the Jews by the wi&s;dom and fatherly providence of God; who knew that Law cannot command love, without which, matrimony hath no true beeing, no good, no &s;olace, nothing of Gods in&s;tituting, no|thing but &s;o &s;ordid and &s;o low, as to bee di&s;dain'd of any generous per&s;on. Law cannot inable natural inability either of body, or mind, which gives the greevance; it cannot make equal tho&s;e inequalities, it cannot make fit tho&s;e unfitne&s;&s;es: and where there is malice more then defect of nature, it cannot hinder ten thou&s;and injuries, and bit|ter actions of de&s;pight too &s;uttle and too unapparent for Law to deal with. And while it &s;eeks to remedy more outward wrongs, it expo|&s;es the injur'd per&s;on to other more inward and more cutting. All the&s;e evils unavoidably will redound upon the children, if any be, and the whole family. It degenerates and di&s;orders the be&s;t &s;pirits, leavs them to un&s;ettl'd imaginations, and degraded hopes, careles of them|&s;elvs, their hou&s;hold and their freinds, unactive to all public &s;ervice, dead to the Common-wealth; wherin they are by one mi&s;happ, and no willing tre&s;pas of theirs, outlaw'd from all the benefits and com|forts of married life and po&s;terity. It conferrs as little to the honour and inviolable keeping of Matrimony, but &s;ooner &s;tirrs up temptati|ons, and occa&s;ions to &s;ecret adulteries, and uncha&s;t roaving. But it maintaines public hone&s;ty. Public folly rather, who &s;hall judge of public hone&s;ty? the Law of God, and of anciente&s;t Chri&s;tians, and all Civil Nations, or the illegitimat Law of Monks and Canoni&s;ts, the mo&s;t malevolent, mo&s;t unexperienc't, and incompetent judges of Matrimony?</P>
<P>The&s;e rea&s;ons, and many more that might bee alleg'd, afford us plainly to perceav, both what good cau&s;e this Law had to doe for good men in mi&s;chances, and what nece&s;&s;ity it had to &s;uffer acciden|tally the hard heartednes of bad men, which it could not certainly
<PB N="38" REF="24">
di&s;cover, or di&s;covering could not &s;ubdue, no nor indeavour to re|&s;train without multiplying &s;orrow to them, for whom all was indea|vour'd. The guiltles therfore were not depriv'd thir needful redre&s;|&s;es, and the hard hearts of others uncha&s;ti&s;able in tho&s;e judicial Courts, were &s;o remitted there, as bound over to the higher Se&s;&s;ion of Con&s;cience.</P>
<P>Notwith&s;tanding all this, ther is a loud exception again&s;t this Law of God, nor can the holy Author &s;ave his Law from this exception, that it opens a dore to all licence and confu&s;ion. But this is the rude&s;t, I was almo&s;t &s;aying the mo&s;t graceles objection, and with the lea&s;t reverence to God and <HI>Mo&s;es,</HI> that could bee devis'd: This is to cite God before mans Tribunal, to arrogate a wi&s;dom and holines above him. Did not God then fore&s;ee what event of licence or confu&s;ion could follow? did not hee know how to ponder the&s;e abu&s;es with more prevailing re&s;pects, in the mo&s;t eevn ballance of his ju&s;tice and purenes, till the&s;e correctors cameup to &s;hew him better? The Law is, if it &s;tirre up &s;in any way, to &s;tirre it up by forbidding, as one con|trary excites another, <HI>Rom.</HI> 7. but if it once come to provoke &s;in, by granting licence to &s;in, according to Laws that have no other hone&s;t end, but only to permit the fulfilling of ob&s;tinat lu&s;t, how is God not made the contradicter of him&s;elf? No man denies that be&s;t things may bee abus'd: but it is a rule re&s;ulting from many pregnant expe|riences, that what doth mo&s;t harm in the abu&s;ing, us'd rightly doth mo&s;t good. And &s;uch a good to take a way from hone&s;t men, for bee|ing abus'd by &s;uch as abu&s;e all things, is the greate&s;t abu&s;e of all. That the whole Law is no furder u&s;efull, then as a man u&s;es it lawfully, St. <HI>Paul</HI> teaches 1 <HI>Tim.</HI> 1. And that Chri&s;tian liberty may bee us'd for an occa&s;ion to the fle&s;h, the &s;ame Apo&s;tle confe&s;&s;es, <HI>Galat.</HI> 5. yet thinks not of removing it for that, but bidds us rather <HI>Stand fa&s;t in the liberty wherwith Chri&s;t hath freed us, and not bee held again in the yoke of bondage.</HI> The very permi&s;&s;ion which Chri&s;t gave to divorce for a|dultery, may bee fouly abus'd, by any who&s;e hardnes of heart can ei|ther fain adultery, or dares committ, that hee may divorce. And for this cau&s;e the Pope, and hitherto the Church of <HI>England,</HI> forbid all divorce from the bond of mariage, though for opene&s;t adultery. If then it bee righteous to hinder for the fear of abu&s;e, that which Gods Law notwith&s;tanding that caution, hath warranted to bee don, doth not our righteou&s;nes come &s;hort of Antichri&s;t, or doe we not rather
<PB N="39" REF="24">
heerin conform our &s;elvs to his unrighteou&s;nes in this undue and un|wi&s;e fear. For God regards more to releev by this Law the ju&s;t com|plaints of good men, then to curb the licence of wicked men, to the cru&s;hing withall, and the overwhelming of his afflicted &s;ervants. He loves more that his Law &s;hould look with pitty upon the difficulties of his own, then with rigor upon the boundle&s;&s;e riots of them who &s;erv another Mai&s;ter, and hinder'd heer by &s;trictnes, will break ano|ther way to wors enormities. If this Law therfore have many good rea&s;ons for which God gave it, and no intention of giving &s;cope to leudnes, but as abu&s;e by accident comes in with every good Law, and every good thing, it cannot be wi&s;dom in us, while we can content us with Gods wi&s;dom, nor can be purity, if his purity will &s;uffice us, to except again&s;t this Law, as if it fo&s;ter'd licence. But if they affirm this Law had no other end, but to permitt obdurat lu&s;t, becau&s;e it would bee obdurat, making the Law of God intentionally to proclame and enact &s;in lawful, as if the will of God were becom &s;infull, or &s;in &s;tron|ger then his direct and Law-giving will, the men would bee admo|ni&s;ht to look well to it, that while they are &s;o eager to &s;hut the dore again&s;t licence, they doe not open a wors dore to bla&s;phemy. And yet they &s;hall bee heer furder &s;hewn thir iniquity; what more foul and common &s;in among us then drnnkennes, and who can bee igno|rant, that if the importation of Wine, and the u&s;e of all &s;trong drink were forbid, it would both clean ridde the po&s;&s;ibility of committing that odious vice, and men might afterwards live happily and health|fully, without the u&s;e of tho&s;e intoxicating licors. Yet who is ther the &s;evere&s;t of them all, that ever propounded to loos his Sack, his Ale, toward the certain aboli&s;hing of &s;o great a &s;in, who is ther of them, the holie&s;t, that le&s;s loves his rich Canary at meals, though it bee fetcht from places that hazard the Religion of them who fetch it, and though it make his neighbour drunk out of the &s;ame Tunne? While they forbid not therfore the u&s;e of that liquid Marchandi&s;e, which forbidd'n would utterly remove a mo&s;t loath&s;om &s;in, and not impair either the health, or the refre&s;hment of mankind, &s;uppli'd many other wayes, why doe they forbid a Law of God, the forbidding wherof brings into an exce&s;&s;ive bondage, oft times the be&s;t of men, and bet|ters not the wors? Hee to remove a Nationall vice, will not par|don his cupps, nor think it concerns him to forbear the quaffing of that outlandi&s;h Grape, in his unnece&s;&s;ary fullnes, though other men
<PB N="40" REF="25">
abu&s;e it never &s;o much, nor is hee &s;o ab&s;temious as to intercede with the Magi&s;trate that all matter of drunkennes be bani&s;ht the Common|wealth, and yet for the fear of a le&s;s inconvenience unpardnably requires of his brethren, in thir extreme nece&s;&s;ity to debarre them|&s;elves the u&s;e of Gods permi&s;&s;ive Law, though it might bee thir &s;a|ving, and no mans indangering the more. Thus this peremptory &s;trictnes we may di&s;cern of what &s;ort it is, how unequal, and how un|ju&s;t.</P>
<P>But it will breed confu&s;ion. What confu&s;ion it would breed, God him&s;elf took the care to prevent in the fourth ver&s;e of this Chapter, that the divorc't beeing maried to another, might not return to her for|mer Husband. And <HI>Ju&s;tinians</HI> law coun&s;els the &s;ame in his Title of <HI>Nuptials.</HI> And what confu&s;ion els can ther bee in &s;eparation, to &s;e|parat, upon extrem urgency, the Religious from the irreligious, the fit from the unfit, the willing from the wilfull, the abus'd from the a|bu&s;er, &s;uch a &s;eparation is quite contrary to confu&s;ion. But to binde and mixe together holy with Athei&s;t, hevnly with helli&s;h, fitnes with unfitnes, light with darknes, antipathy with antipathy, the injur'd with the injurer, and force them into the mo&s;t inward neernes of a dete&s;ted union, this doubtles is the mo&s;t horrid, the mo&s;t unnatural mix|ture, the greate&s;t confu&s;ion that can be confus'd?</P>
<P>Thus by this plain and Chri&s;tian <HI>Talmud</HI> vindicating the Law of God from irreverent and unwary expo&s;itions, I tru&s;t, wher it &s;hall meet with intelligible perufers, &s;om &s;tay at lea&s;t of mens thoughts will bee obtain'd, to con&s;ider the&s;e many prudent and righteous ends of this divorcing permi&s;&s;ion. That it may have, for the great Authors &s;ake, heerafter &s;om competent allowance to bee counted a little purer then the prerogative of a legal and public ribaldry, granted to that holy &s;eed. So that from hence wee &s;hall hope to finde the way &s;till more open to the reconciling of tho&s;e places which treat this matter in the Go&s;pel. And thether now without interruption the cours of method brings us.</P>
</DIV3>
</DIV2>
<DIV2 TYPE="part">
<PB N="37" REF="25">
<HEAD>TETRACHORDON,</HEAD>
<EPIGRAPH>
<BIBL>MATT. 5. 31, 32.</BIBL>
<Q>31 <HI>It hath beene &s;aid who&s;oever &s;hall put away his wife, let him give her a writing of divorcement.</HI></Q>
<Q>32 <HI>But I &s;ay unto you that who&s;oever &s;hall put away his wife, &amp;c.</HI></Q>
</EPIGRAPH>
<DIV3 TYPE="section">
<EPIGRAPH>
<BIBL>MATT. 19. 3, 4. &amp;c.</BIBL>
<Q>3 <HI>And the Phari&s;es al&s;o came unto him tempting him, &amp;c.</HI></Q>
</EPIGRAPH>
<P><HI>_IT hath beene &s;aid.]</HI> What hitherto hath beene &s;poke upon the law of God touching Matri|mony or divorce, hee who will deny to have bin argu'd according to rea&s;on, and all equity of Scripture, I cannot edifie how, or by what rule of proportion that mans vertue calculates, what his <HI>elements</HI> are, not what his <HI>analytics.</HI> Con|fidently to tho&s;e who have read good bookes, and to tho&s;e who&s;e rea&s;on is not an illiterate booke to them&s;elves I appeale, whether they would not confe&s;&s;e all this to bee the commentary of truth and ju&s;tice, were it not for the&s;e recited words of our Saviour. And if they take not backe that which they thus grant, no|thing &s;ooner might per&s;wade them that Chri&s;t heer teaches no new pre|cept, and nothing &s;ooner might direct them to finde his meaning, then to compare and mea&s;ure it by the rules of nature and eternall righteou&s;nes, which no writt'n law extingui&s;hes, and the Go&s;pel lea&s;t of all. For what can be more oppo&s;ite and di&s;paraging to the cov'nant of love, of freedom, &amp; of our manhood in grace, then to bee made the yoaking pedagogue of new &s;everities, the &s;cribe of &s;yllables and rigid letters, not only greevous to the be&s;t of men, but different and &s;trange from the light of rea&s;on in them, &s;ave only as they are fain to &s;tretch &amp; di&s;tort their apprehen&s;ions, for feare of di&s;plea&s;ing the verbal &s;traightne&s;&s;e of a text, which our owne &s;ervil feare gives us not the lei&s;ure to under&s;tand aright. If the law of Chri&s;t &s;hall be writt'n in our hearts, as was promis'd to the Go&s;pel, <HI>Jer.</HI>
<PB N="38" REF="26">
31, how can this in the vulgar and &s;uperficiall &s;en&s;e be a law of Chri&s;t, &s;o farre from beeing writt'n in our hearts, that it injures and di&s;&s;allowes not onely the free dictates of nature and morall law, but of charity al&s;o and religion in our hearts. Our Saviours doctrine is, that the end, and the fulfilling of every command is charity; no faith without it, no truth without it, no wor&s;hip, no workes plea&s;ing to God but as they partake of charity. He him&s;elfe &s;ets us an example, breaking the &s;olemne&s;t and the &s;tricte&s;t ordinance of religious re&s;t, and ju&s;tify'd the breaking, not to cure a dying man, but &s;uch who&s;e cure might without danger have beene de&s;err'd. And wherefore needes mu&s;t the &s;ick mans bed be carried home on that day by his appointment, and why were the Di&s;ciples who could not forbeare on that day to pluck the corne, &s;o indu&s;triou&s;ly de&s;ended, but to &s;hew us that if he preferr'd the &s;lighte&s;t occa&s;ions of mans good be|fore the ob&s;erving of highe&s;t and &s;evere&s;t ordinances, hee gave us much more ea&s;ie leave to breake the intolerable yoake of a never well joyn'd wedlocke for the removing of our heavie&s;t afflictions. Therefore it is that the mo&s;t of evangelick precepts are given us in proverbiall formes, to drive us from the letter, though we love ever to be &s;ticking there. For no other cau&s;e did Chri&s;t a&s;&s;ure us that what&s;oever things wee binde, or &s;lacken on earth are &s;o in heaven, but to &s;ignifie that the chri&s;tian arbitrement of cha|rity is &s;upreme decider of all controver&s;ie, and &s;upreme re&s;olver of all Scripture; not as the Pope determines for his owne tyrany, but as the Church ought to determine for its owne true liberty. Hence <HI>Eu&s;ebius</HI> not far from beginning his Hi&s;tory, compares the &s;tate of Chri&s;tians to that of <HI>Noah</HI> and the Patriarkes before the Law. And this indeede was the rea|&s;on, why <HI>Apo&s;tolick</HI> tradition in the antient Church was counted nigh equall to the writt'n word, though it carried them at length awry, for want of con&s;idering that tradition was not left to bee impos'd as law, but to be a patterne of that Chri&s;tian prudence, and liberty which holy men by right a&s;&s;um'd of old, which truth was &s;o evident, that it found en|trance even into the Councell of <HI>Trent,</HI> when the point of tradition came to be di&s;cus&s;t. And <HI>Marinaro</HI> a learned <HI>Carmelite</HI> for approaching too neere the true cau&s;e that gave e&s;teeme to tradition, that is to &s;ay, the dif|ference betweene the Old and New Te&s;tament, the one punctually pre|&s;cribing writt'n Law, the other guiding by the inward &s;pirit, was repre|hended by Cardinall <HI>Poole</HI> as one that had &s;poken more worthy a <HI>Ger|man Collequie,</HI> then a generall councell. I omit many in&s;tances, many proofes and arguments of this kind, which alone would compile a ju&s;t vo|lume,
<PB N="39" REF="26">
and &s;hall content me heer to have &s;hew'n breifly, that the great and almo&s;t only commandment of the Go&s;pel, is to command nothing a|gain&s;t the good of man, and much more no civil command, again&s;t his ci|vil good. If we under&s;tand not this, we are but crackt cimbals, we do but tinckle, we know nothing, we doe nothing, all the &s;weat of our toil&s;om|e&s;t obedience will but mock us. And what wee &s;uffer &s;uper&s;titiou&s;ly re|turnes us no thankes. Thus med'cining our eyes wee neede not doubt to &s;ee more into the meaning of the&s;e our Saviours words, then many who have gone before us.</P>
<P><HI>[It hath beene &s;aid, who&s;oever &s;hall put away his wife.]</HI> Our Saviour was by the doctors of his time &s;u&s;pected of intending to di&s;&s;olve the law. In this chapter he wipes off this a&s;per&s;ion upon his accu&s;ers, and &s;hewes how they were the law brea kers. In every common wealth when it decayes, corruption makes two maine &s;teps; fir&s;t when men cea&s;e to doe according to the inward and uncompell'd actions of vertue, caring only to live by the outward con&s;traint of law, and turne the Simplicity of reall good, into the craft of &s;eeming &s;o by law. To this hypocritical hone&s;ty was <HI>Rome</HI> declin'd in that age, wherein <HI>Horace</HI> liv'd and di&s;cover'd it to <HI>Quintius.</HI></P>
<Q><L>Whom doe we count a good man, whom but he</L>
<L>Who keepes the lawes and &s;tatutes of the Senate,</L>
<L>Who judges in great &s;uits and controver&s;ies,</L>
<L>Who&s;e witne&s;&s;e and opinion winnes the cau&s;e;</L>
<L>But his owne hou&s;e, and the whole neighbourhood</L>
<L>Sees his foule in&s;ide through his whited skin.</L></Q>
<P>The next declining is, when law becomes now too &s;traight for the &s;ecular manners, and tho&s;e too loo&s;e for the cincture of law. This brings in fal&s;e and crooked interpretations to ecke out law, and invents the &s;ut|tle encroachment of ob&s;cure traditions hard to be di&s;prov'd. To both the&s;e de&s;cents the Phari&s;es them&s;elves were fall'n. Our Saviour therefore &s;hews them both where they broke the law in not marking the divine in|tent thereof, but onely the letter, and where they deprav'd the letter al&s;o with &s;ophi&s;ticall expo&s;itions. This law of divor&s;e they had deprav'd both waies. Fir&s;t, by teaching that to give a bill of divor&s;e was all the duty which that law requir'd, what ever the cau&s;e were. Next by running to divor&s;e for any triviall, accidentall cau&s;e; whenas the law evidently &s;tayes in the grave cau&s;es of naturall and immutable di&s;like. <HI>[It hath been &s;aid</HI> &s;aith he Chri&s;t doth not put any contempt or di&s;e&s;teeme upon the law
<GAP DESC="missing" EXTENT="2 pages">
<PB N="42" REF="27">
&s;truct, but if he di&s;cerne his willingne&s;&s;e and candor made u&s;e of to intrapp him, will &s;uddainly draw in him&s;elfe, and laying a&s;ide the facil vein of per|&s;picuity, will know his time to utter clouds and riddles; If he be not le&s;&s;e wi&s;e then that noted Fi&s;h, when as he &s;hould bee not unwi&s;er then the Serpent. Our Saviour at no time expre&s;t any great de&s;ire to teach the ob|&s;tinate and unteachable Phari&s;es; but when they came to tempt him, then lea&s;t of all. As now about the liberty of divorce, &s;o another time about the puni&s;hment of adultery they came to &s;ound him, and what &s;atisfaction got they from his an&s;wer, either to them&s;elves or to us, that might direct a law under the Go&s;pel, new from that of <HI>Mo&s;es,</HI> unle&s;&s;e we draw his ab&s;olution of adultery into an edict. So about the tribute, who is there can picke out a full &s;olution, what and when we mu&s;t give to <HI>Cae&s;ar,</HI> by the an&s;wer which he gave the Phari&s;es? If we mu&s;t give to <HI>Cae&s;ar</HI> that which is <HI>Cae&s;ars,</HI> and all be <HI>Cae&s;ars,</HI> which hath his image, wee mu&s;t either new &s;tamp our Coine, or we may goe new &s;tamp our Fore|heads with the &s;uper&s;cription of &s;laves in &s;tead of freemen. Be&s;ides it is a generall precept, not only of Chri&s;t, but of all other Sages, not to in|&s;truct the unworthy and the conceited who love tradition more then truth, but to perplex and &s;tumble them purpo&s;ely with contriv'd ob&s;curi|ties. No wonder then if they who would determine of divorce by this place, have ever found it difficult, and unfatisfying through all the ages of the Church, as <HI>Au&s;tine</HI> him&s;elfe and other great writers confe&s;&s;e. La&s;t|ly it is manife&s;t to be the principal &s;cope of our Saviour both here, and in the 5. of <HI>Mat.</HI> to convince the Phari&s;es of what they being evill did licentiou&s;ly, not to explaine what others being good and blamele&s;&s;e men might be permitted to doe in ca&s;e of extremity. Neither was it &s;ea&s;o|nable to talke of hone&s;t and con&s;cientious liberty among them who had abu&s;ed legall and civil liberty to uncivil licence. We doe not &s;ay to a &s;er|vant what we &s;ay to a &s;onne; nor was it expedient to preach freedome to tho&s;e who had tran&s;gre&s;t in wantonne&s;&s;e. When we rebuke a Prodigal, we admoni&s;h him of thrift, not of magnificence, or bounty. And to &s;chool a proud man we labour to make him humble, not magnanimous. So Chri&s;t to retort the&s;e arrogant inqui&s;itors their own, tooke the cour&s;e to lay their hautine&s;&s;e under a &s;everity which they de&s;erv'd; not to ac|quaint them, or to make them judges either of the ju&s;t mans right and pri|vilege or of the afflicted mans nece&s;&s;ity. And if wee may have leave to conjecture, there is a likelyhood offer'd us by <HI>Tertullian</HI> in his 4. a|gain&s;t <HI>Marcion,</HI> whereby it may &s;eeme very probable that the Phari&s;es had a private drifr of malice again&s;t our Saviours life in propo&s;ing this que&s;ti|on;
<PB N="43" REF="27">
and our Saviour had a peculiar aim in the rigor of his an&s;wer, both to let them know the freedome of his &s;pirit, and the &s;harpene&s;&s;e of his di&s;cerning. <HI>This I mu&s;t now &s;hew,</HI> &s;aith <HI>Tertullian, Whence our Lord de|duc'd this &s;entence, and which way he directed it, whereby it will more fully appeare that he intended not to di&s;&s;olve Mo&s;es.</HI> And there upon tells us that the vehemence of this our Saviours &s;peech was cheifly darted again&s;t <HI>He|rod</HI> and <HI>Herodias.</HI> The &s;tory is out of <HI>Jo&s;ephus: Herod</HI> had beene a long time married to the daughter of <HI>Aretas</HI> King of <HI>Petra,</HI> til hapning on his jorney towards <HI>Rome</HI> to be entertain'd at his brother <HI>Philips</HI> hou&s;e, he ca&s;t his eye unlawfully and ungue&s;tlike upon <HI>Herodias</HI> there, the wife of <HI>Philip,</HI> but daughter to <HI>Ari&s;tobulus</HI> their common brother, and dur&s;t make words of marrying her his Neece from his brothers bed. She a&s;&s;ented upon agreement he &s;hould expell his former wife. All was accompli&s;ht, and by the <HI>Bapti&s;t</HI> rebuk't with the lo&s;&s;e of his head. Though doubtle&s;&s;e that &s;taid not the various di&s;cour&s;es of men upon the fact, which while the <HI>Herodian</HI> flatterers, and not a few perhaps among the Phari&s;es endevout'd to defend by wre&s;ting the law, it might be a meanes to bring the que&s;tion of divorce into a hot agitation among the people, how farre <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> gave allowance. The Phari&s;es therefore knowing our Saviour to be a friend of <HI>Iohn the</HI> Bapti&s;t, and no doubt but having heard much of his Sermon in the Mount, wherein he &s;pake rigidly again&s;t the licence of di|vorce, they put him this que&s;tion both in hope to find him a contradicter of <HI>Mo&s;es,</HI> and a condemner of <HI>Herod;</HI> &s;o to in&s;nare him within compa&s;&s;e of the &s;ame accu&s;ation which had ended his friend; and our Saviour &s;o or|ders his an&s;wer, as that they might perceive <HI>Herod</HI> and his Adultre&s;&s;e on|ly not nam'd; &s;o lively it concern'd them both what he &s;pake. No wonder then if the &s;entence of our Saviour &s;ounded &s;tricter then his cu&s;tome was; which his con&s;cious attempters doubtle&s;&s;e apprehended &s;ooner then his other auditors. Thus much we gaine from hence to informe us, that what Chri&s;t intends to &s;peake here of divorce, will be rather the forbidding of of what we may not doe herein pa&s;&s;ionately and abu&s;ively, as <HI>Herod</HI> and <HI>Herodias</HI> did, then the di&s;cu&s;&s;ing of what herein we may doe rea&s;onably and nece&s;&s;arily.</P>
<P><HI>[Is it lawfull for a man to put away his wife]</HI> It might be render'd more exactly from the Greeke, <HI>to loo&s;en or to &s;et free;</HI> which though it &s;eeme to have a milder fignification then the two Hebrew words commonly us'd for divorce, yet Interpreters have noted, that the Greeke al&s;o is read in the <HI>Septuagint,</HI> for an act which is not without con&s;traint. As when <HI>A|chi&s;h</HI>
<PB N="44" REF="28">
drove from his pre&s;ence <HI>David</HI> counterfeting madne&s;&s;e. <HI>P&s;al.</HI> 34. the Greeke word is the &s;ame with this here, to put away. And <HI>Era&s;|mus</HI> quotes <HI>Hilary</HI> rendering it by an expre&s;&s;ion, not &s;o &s;oft. Whence may be doubted, whether the Phari&s;es did not &s;tate this que&s;tion in the &s;trict right of the man, not tarrying for the wives con&s;ent. And if our Saviour an&s;wer directly according to what was askt in the tearm of putting away, it may be que&s;tionable, whether the rigor of his &s;entence did not forbid only &s;uch putting away as is without mutuall con&s;ent&punc; in a violent and and har&s;h manner, or without any rea&s;on, but will, as the <HI>Tetrarch</HI> did. Which might be the cau&s;e that tho&s;e Chri&s;tian Emperours fear'd not in their con&s;titutions to di&s;&s;olve mariage by mutuall con&s;ent; In that our Saviour &s;eemes here, as the ca&s;e is mo&s;t likely, not to condemne all divorce but all injury and violence in divorce. But no injury can be done to them who &s;eeke it, as the <HI>Ethics</HI> of <HI>Aristotle</HI> &s;ufficiently prove. True it is, that an unju&s;t thing may be done to one though willing, and &s;o may ju&s;tly be for|bid'n: But divorce being in it &s;elfe no unju&s;t or evill thing, but only as it is joyn'd with injury, or lu&s;t, injury it cannot be at law, if con&s;ent be, and <HI>Ari&s;totle</HI> erre not. And lu&s;t it may as frequently not be, while charity hath the judging of &s;o many private greevances in a misfortun'd Wed|lock, which may pard'nably &s;eeke a redemption. But whether it be or not, the law cannot di&s;cerne, or examine lu&s;t, &s;o long as it walkes from one lawfull terme to another, from divorce to marriage both in them|&s;elves indifferent. For if the law cannot take hold to puni&s;h many actions apparently covetous, ambitious, ingratefull, proud, how can it forbid and puni&s;h that for lu&s;t, which is but only &s;urmi&s;'d &s;o, and can no more be certainly prov'd in the divorcing now, then before in the marrying. Whence if divorce be no unju&s;t thing, but through lu&s;t, a cau&s;e not di&s;cer|nable by law, as law is wont to di&s;cerne in other ca&s;es, and can be no in|jury where con&s;ent is, there can be nothing in the equity of law, why di|vorce by con&s;ent may not be lawfull: leaving &s;ecrecies to con&s;cience, the thing which our Saviour here aimes to rectifie, not to revoke the &s;tatutes of <HI>Mo&s;es.</HI> In the meane while the wotd <HI>To put away,</HI> being in the Gteeke, to loo&s;en or di&s;olve, utterly takes away that vaine papi&s;ticall di&s;tinction of divorce from bed, and divorce from bond, evincing plainly that both Chri&s;t and the Phari&s;es meane here that divorce which finally di&s;olves the bond and frees both parties to a &s;econd marriage.</P>
<P><HI>[For every cau&s;e.]</HI> This the Phari&s;es held, that for every cau&s;e they might divorce, for every accidentall cau&s;e, any quarrell or difference
<PB N="45" REF="28">
that might happ'n. So both <HI>Jo&s;ephus</HI> and <HI>Philo,</HI> men who liv'd in the &s;ame age, explain; and the <HI>Syriac</HI> tran&s;later, who&s;e antiquity is thought pa|rallel to the <HI>Evangeli&s;ts</HI> them&s;elves, reads it conformably <HI>upon any occa&s;ion or pretence.</HI> Divines al&s;o generally agree that thus the Phari&s;es meant. <HI>Cameron</HI> a late writer much applauded, commenting this place not un|diligently, affirmes that the Greeke prepo&s;ition <GAP DESC="foreign"> tran&s;lated unu&s;ually (For) hath a force in it implying the &s;uddenne&s;&s;e of tho&s;e Phari&s;aic di|vorces; and that their que&s;tion was to this effect, <HI>whether for any cau&s;e, whatever it chanc'd to be, &s;traight as it ro&s;e, the divor&s;e might be lawfull.</HI> This he freely gives what ever mou'd him, and I as freely take, nor can deny his ob&s;ervation to be acute &amp; learned. If therfore we in&s;i&s;t upon the word of <HI>putting away,</HI> that it imports a con&s;traint without con&s;ent, as might be in&s;i&s;ted, and may enjoy what <HI>Cameron</HI> be&s;towes on us, that for every cau&s;e is to be under&s;tood, <HI>according as any cau&s;e may happen,</HI> with a rela|tion to the &s;peedine&s;&s;e of tho&s;e divorces and that <HI>Herodian</HI> act e|&s;pecially, as is already brought us, the &s;entence of our Saviour wil appeare nothing &s;o &s;trict a prohibition as hath beene long conceiv'd, forbidding only to divorce for ca&s;uall &amp; temporary cau&s;es, that may be &s;oon ended, or &s;oone remedied; &amp; likewi&s;e forbidding to divorce ra&s;hly, &amp; on the&s;ud|den heate, except it be for adultery. If the&s;e qualifications may be admit|ted, as partly we offer them, partly are offer'd them by &s;ome of their own opinion, and that where nothing is repugnant why they &s;hould not bee admitted, nothing can wre&s;t them from us, the &s;evere &s;entence of our Sa|viour will &s;traight unbend the &s;eeming frowne into that gentlene&s;&s;e and compa&s;&s;ion which was &s;o abundant in all his actions, his office and his doctrine, from all which otherwi&s;e it &s;tands off at no meane di&s;tance.</P>
</DIV3>
<DIV3 TYPE="section">
<EPIGRAPH>
<Q>Ver&s;. 4. <HI>And he an&s;wered and &s;aid unto them, have ye not read that he which made them at the beginning, made them Male and Female?</HI></Q>
<Q>Ver&s;. 5. <HI>And &s;aid, for this cau&s;e &s;hall a man leave Father and Mother, and &s;hall cleave to his wife, and they twaine &s;hall be one fle&s;h?</HI></Q>
<Q>Ver&s;. 6. <HI>VVherefore they are no more twaine but one fle&s;h, what therefore God hath joyned together, let no man put a&s;under.</HI></Q>
</EPIGRAPH>
<P>[4. and 5 <HI>Made them Male and Female, And &s;aid for this cau&s;e, &amp;c.]</HI> We &s;ee it here undeniably, that the law which our Saviour cites to prove that divorce was forbidd'n, is not an ab&s;olute and tyrannicall command without rea&s;on, as now adaies wee make it little better, but is grounded
<PB N="46" REF="29">
upon &s;ome rationall cau&s;e not difficult to be apprehended, being in a mat|ter which equally concernes the meane&s;t and the plaine&s;t &s;ort of per&s;ons in a hou&s;hold life. Our next way then will be to inquire if there bee not more rea&s;ons then one, and if there be, whether this be the be&s;t and chei|fe&s;t. That we &s;hall finde by turning to the fir&s;t in&s;titution, to which Chri&s;t referrs our owne reading; He him&s;elfe having to deale with treacherous affailants, u&s;eth brevity, and lighting on the fir&s;t place in <HI>Gene&s;is</HI> that mentions any thing tending to Marriage in the fir&s;t chapter, joynes it im|mediately to the 24. ver&s;e of the 2 chapter, omitting all the prime words between, which create the in&s;titution, and containe the noble&s;t and pu|re&s;t ends of Matrimony, without which attain'd, that conjunction hath nothing in it above what is common to us with bea&s;ts. So likewi&s;e be|neath in this very chapter, to the young man who came not tempting him, but to learne of him, asking him which commandments hee &s;hould keepe, he neither repeates the fir&s;t table, nor all the &s;econd, nor that in or|der which he repeates. If heere then being tempted, hee de&s;ire to bee the &s;horter, and the darker in his conference, and omitt to cite that from the &s;econd of <HI>Gene&s;is,</HI> which all Divines confe&s;&s;e is a commentary to what he cites out of the fir&s;t, the <HI>making them Male and Female;</HI> what are we to doe, but to &s;earch the in&s;titution our &s;elves; and we &s;hall finde there his owne authority giving other manner of rea&s;ons why &s;uch firme union is to bee in matrimony, without which rea&s;ons their being male and female can be no cau&s;e of joyning them un&s;eparably: for if it be, then no Adultery can &s;ever. Therefore the prohibition of divorce depends not upon this rea&s;on heere expre&s;t to the Phari&s;es, but upon the plainer &amp; more eminent cau&s;es omitted heere and referr'd to the in&s;titution; which cau&s;es not be|ing found in a particular and ca&s;uall Matrimony, this &s;en&s;itive and ma|terious cau&s;e alone can no more hinder a divorce again&s;t tho&s;e higher and more human rea&s;ons urging it, then it can alone without them to war|rant a copulation, but leaves it arbitrary to tho&s;e who in their chance of marriage finde not why divorce is farbidd them, but why it is per|mitted them; and finde both here and in <HI>Gene&s;is,</HI> that the forbidding is not ab&s;olute, but according to the rea&s;ons there taught us, not here. And that our Saviour taught them no better, but u&s;es the mo&s;t vulgar, mo&s;t animal and corporal argument to convince them, is fir&s;t to &s;hew us, that as through their licentious divorces they made no more of mariage then as if to marry, were no more then to be male and female, &s;o hee goes no higher in his confutation; deeming them unworthy to be talkt with in a
<PB N="47" REF="29">
higher &s;traine, but to bee ty'd in marriage by the meere material cau&s;e thereof, &s;ince their owne licence te&s;tify'd that nothing matrimonial was in their thought but to be male and female. Next it might be don to di&s;|cover the brute ignorance of the&s;e carnall Doctors, who taking on them to di&s;pute of marriage and divorce, were put to &s;ilence with &s;uch a &s;lender oppo&s;ition as this, and outed from their hold with &s;carce one quarter of an argument. That we may beleeve this, his entertainment of the young man &s;oon after may per&s;wade us. Whom, though he came to preach eter|nall life by faith only, he di&s;mi&s;&s;es with a &s;alvation taught him by workes only. On which place <HI>Paraeus</HI> notes. <HI>That this man was to be convinc'd by a fal&s;e per&s;wa&s;ion; and that Chri&s;t is wont otherwi&s;e to an&s;wer hypocrites, other|wi&s;e tho&s;e that are docible.</HI> Much rather then may we thinke that in hand|ling the&s;e tempters, he forgot not &s;o to frame his prudent ambiguities and concealements, as was to the troubling of tho&s;e peremtory di&s;putants mo&s;t whol&s;ome. When therefore we would know what right there may be, in ill accidents, to divorce, wee mu&s;t repaire thither where God pro|fe&s;&s;es to teach his &s;ervants by the prime in&s;titution, and not where we &s;ee him intending to dazle &s;ophi&s;ters: Wee mu&s;t not reade <HI>hee made them Male and Female,</HI> &amp; not under&s;tand he made them more intendedly <HI>a meet helpe</HI> to remove the evill of being <HI>alone.</HI> We mu&s;t take both the&s;e together, and then we may inferre compleatly as from the whole cau&s;e why a man &s;hall cleave to his wife, and they twaine &s;hall be one fle&s;h: but if the full and cheife cau&s;e why we may not divorce, be wanting heer, this place may skirmi&s;h with the rabbies while it will, but to the true chri&s;tian it prohi|bits nothing beyond the full rea&s;on of it's own prohibiting, which is be&s;t knowne by the in&s;titution.</P>
<P>Ver&s;. 6. <HI>[Wherefore they are no more twaine, but one fle&s;h.]</HI> This is true in the generall right of marriage, but not in the chance medley of every par|ticular match. For if they who were once undoubtedly one fle&s;h, yet be|come twain by adultery, then &s;ure they who were never one fle&s;h rightly, never helps meete for each other according to the plain pre&s;cript of God, may with le&s;&s;e adoe then a volume be concluded &s;till twaine. And &s;o long as we account a Magi&s;trate no Magi&s;trate, if there be but a flaw in his e|lection, why &s;hould we not much rather count a Matrimony no Matri|mony, if it cannot be in any rea&s;onable manner according to the words of Gods in&s;titution.</P>
<P><HI>[What therefore God hath joyned, let no man put a&s;under.]</HI> But heare the chri&s;tian prudence lies to con&s;ider what God hath joyn'd; &s;hall wee &s;ay
<PB N="48" REF="30">
that God hath joyn'd error, fraud, unfitne&s;&s;e, wrath, contention, perpe|tuall loneline&s;&s;e, perpetuall di&s;cord; what ever lu&s;t, or wine, or witchery, threate, or inticement, avarice or ambition hath joyn'd together, faith|full with unfaithfull, chri&s;tian with antichri&s;tian, hate with hate, or hate with love, &s;hall we &s;ay this is Gods joyning?</P>
<P><HI>[Let not man put a &s;under.]</HI> That is to &s;ay, what God hath joyn'd; for if it be, as how oft we &s;ee it may be, not of Gods joyning, and his law tells us he joynes not unmachable things but hates to joyne them, as an abominable confu&s;ion, then the divine law of <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> puts them a&s;under, his owne divine will in the in&s;titution puts them a&s;under, as oft as the rea&s;ons be not extant, for which only God ordain'd their joyning. Man only puts a&s;under when his inordinate de&s;ires, his pa&s;&s;ion, his violence, his injury makes the breach: not when the utter want of that which lawfully was the end of his joyning, when wrongs and extremities, and un&s;upportable greevances compell him to disjoyne: when &s;uch as <HI>Herod</HI> &amp; the phari&s;es divorce be&s;ide law, or again&s;t law, then only man &s;eparates, and to &s;uch only this prohibition belongs. In a word, if it be unlawful for man to put a&s;under that which God hath joyn'd, let man take heede it be not dete&s;table to joyne that by compul&s;ion which God hath put a&s;|&s;under.</P>
</DIV3>
<DIV3 TYPE="section">
<EPIGRAPH>
<Q>Ver&s;. 7. <HI>They &s;ay unto him, why did Mo&s;es then command to give a wri|ting of divorcement, and to put her away?</HI></Q>
<Q>Ver&s;. 8. <HI>He &s;aith unto them, Mo&s;es becau&s;e of the hardne&s;&s;e of your hearts &s;uffered you to put away your wives, but from the beginning it was not &s;o.</HI></Q>
</EPIGRAPH>
<P><HI>[Mo&s;es becau&s;e of the hardne&s;&s;e of your hearts &s;uffered you.]</HI> Henee the divinity now current argues that this judiciall <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> is aboli&s;ht. But &s;up|po&s;e it were &s;o, though it hath bin prov'd otherwi&s;e, the firmene&s;&s;e of &s;uch right to divorce as here pleads, is fetcht from the prime in&s;titution, does not &s;tand or fall with the judiciall Jew, but is as morall as what is morale&s;t. Yet as I have &s;hewn po&s;itively that this law cannot bee abroga|ted, both by the words of our Saviour pronouncing the contrary, and by that unaboli&s;hable equity which it convaies to us, &s;o I &s;hall now bring to view tho&s;e appearances of &s;trength which are levied from this text to maintaine the mo&s;t gro&s;&s;e and ma&s;&s;y paradox that ever did violence to rea&s;on and religion, bred onely under the &s;hadow of the&s;e words, to all other piety or philo&s;ophy &s;trange and in&s;olent, that God by act of law
<PB N="49" REF="30">
drew out a line of adultery almo&s;t two thou&s;and yeares long: although to detect the prodigy of this &s;urmi&s;e, the former booke &s;et forth on this argument hath already beene copious. I &s;hall not repeate much though I might borrow of mine own, but &s;hall endeavour to adde &s;omething either yet untoucht, or not largely anough explain'd Fir&s;t it &s;hal be manife&s;t that the common expo&s;ition cannot po&s;&s;ibly con&s;i&s;t with chri&s;tian doctrine: next a truer meaning of this our Saviours reply &s;hall be left in the roome. The receiv'd expo&s;ition is, that God though not approving did enact a law to permit adultery by divorcement &s;imply unlawfull. And this con|ceit they feede with fond &s;uppo&s;als that have not the lea&s;t footing in Scripture. As that the Jews learnt this cu&s;tome of divorce in <HI>Egypt,</HI> and therefore God would not unteach it them till Chri&s;t came, but let it &s;tick as a notorious botch of deformity in the mid&s;t of his mo&s;t perfect and &s;evere law. And yet he &s;aith, <HI>Levit.</HI> the 18^t^h <HI>after the doings of Egypt ye &s;hall not do.</HI> Another while they invent a &s;lander (as what thing more bold then teaching Ignorance when he &s;hifts to hide his nakednes) that the Jews were naturally to their wives the cruelle&s;t men in the world; would poi|&s;on, braine, and doe I know not what, if they might not divorce. Cer|tain, if it were a fault heavily puni&s;ht, to bring an evill report upon the land which God gave, what is it to rai&s;e a groundles calumny again&s;t the people which God made choi&s;e of? But that this bold interpretament, how commonly &s;o ever &s;ided with, cannot &s;tand a minute with any com|petent reverence to God or his law, or his people, nor with any other maxim of religion, or good manners, might bee prov'd through all the heads and <HI>Topics</HI> of argumentation: but I &s;hall willingly bee as conci&s;e as po&s;&s;ible. Fir&s;t the law, not onely the moral, but the judicial given by <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> is ju&s;t and pure; for &s;uch is God who gave it. <HI>Harken O I&s;rael,</HI> &s;aith <HI>Mo&s;es, Dent.</HI> 4. <HI>unto the statutes and the judgements which I teach you, to doe them, that ye may live, &amp;c. ye &s;hall not adde unto the word which J command you, neither &s;hall ye dimini&s;h ought from it, that ye may keepe the commande|ments of the Lord your God which I command you.</HI> And onward in the chap|ter, <HI>Behold I have taught you &s;tatutes and judgements, even as the Lord my God commanded me. Keepe therefore and doe them, for this is your wi&s;edome and your under&s;tanding. For what nation hath God &s;o nigh unto them, and what-nation hath &s;tatutes and judgements &s;o righteous as all this law which I &s;et before ye this day.</HI> Is it imaginable there &s;hould bee among the&s;e a law which God allow'd not, a law giving permi&s;&s;ions laxative to unmarry a wife and marry a lu&s;t, a law to &s;uffer a kind of <HI>tribunall</HI> adultery? Many
<PB N="50" REF="31">
other &s;criptures might be brought to a&s;&s;ert the purity of this judicial law, and many I have alleg'd before; this law therefore is pure and ju&s;t. But if it permit, if it teach, if it defend that which is both unju&s;t and impure, as by the common doctrine it doth, what thinke we? The three generall doctrines of <HI>Ju&s;tinians</HI> law, are <HI>To live in hone&s;ty, To hurt no man, To give every one his due.</HI> Shall the <HI>Roman civil</HI> law ob&s;erve the&s;e three things, as the onely end of law, and &s;hall a &s;tatute be found in the civil law of God, enacted &s;imply and totally again&s;t all the&s;e three precepts of nature and morality?</P>
<P>Secondly, the gifts of God are all perfet, and certainely the law is of all his other gifts one of the perfete&s;t. But if it give that outwardly which it takes away really, &amp; give that &s;eemingly, which, if a man take it, wraps him into &s;inne and damns him, what gift of an enemy can be more dange|rous and de&s;troying then this.</P>
<P>Thirdly, <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> every where commends his lawes, preferrs them be|fore all of other nations, and warrants them to be the way of life and &s;afety to all that walke therein, <HI>Levit.</HI> 18. But if they containe &s;tatutes which God approves not, and traine men unweeting to committ inju|&s;tice and adultery, under the &s;helter of law, if tho&s;e things bee &s;in, and death &s;ins wages, what is this law but the &s;nare of death?</P>
<P>Fourthly, the &s;tatutes and judgements of the Lord, which without ex|ception are often told us to be &s;uch, as doing wee may live by them, are doubtles to be counted the rule of knowledge and of con&s;cience. <HI>For I had not known lu&s;t,</HI> &s;aith the Apo&s;tle, <HI>but by the law.</HI> But if the law come downe from the &s;tate of her incorruptible maje&s;ty to grant lu&s;t his boon, palpably it darkns and confounds both knowledge and con&s;cience; it goes again&s;t the common office of all goodnes and freindline&s;&s;e, wich is at le&s;t to coun&s;el and admoni&s;h; it &s;ubverts the rules of all &s;ober education; and is it &s;elfe a mo&s;t negligent and debau&s;hing tutor.</P>
<P>Fiftly, if the law permit a thing unlawfull, it permitts that which el&s;e where it hath forbid; &s;o that hereby it contradicts it &s;elfe, and tran&s;|gre&s;&s;es it &s;elfe. But if the law become a tran&s;gre&s;&s;or, it &s;tands guilty to it &s;elfe, and how then &s;hall it &s;ave another; it makes a confederacy with &s;in, how then can it ju&s;tly condemne a &s;inner? and thus reducing it &s;elfe to the &s;tateof neither &s;aving nor condemning, it will not faile to expire &s;olemne|ly ridiculous.</P>
<P>Sixtly, the Prophets in Scripture declare &s;everely again&s;t the decreeing of that which is unju&s;t, <HI>P&s;al.</HI> 94. 20. <HI>I&s;aiah</HI> the 10^t^h. But it was done, they
<PB N="51" REF="31">
&s;ay, for heardne&s;&s;e of heart; To which objection the Apo&s;tles rule, <HI>not to doe evill that good may come thereby,</HI> gives an invincible repuls; and here e&s;pecially, where it cannot be &s;hewn how any good came by doing this evil, how rather more evil did not hereon abound; for the giving way to hardne&s;&s;e of heart hard'ns the more, and adds more to the number. God to an evil and adulterous generation would not <HI>grant a &s;igne;</HI> much le&s;&s;e would he for their hardne&s;&s;e of heatt pollute his law with an adulterous permi&s;&s;ion. Yea but to permitt evil is not to doe evil. Yes, it is in a mo&s;t eminent manner to doe evil: where el&s;e are all our grave and faithfull &s;ayings, that he who&s;e office is to forbid and forbids not, bids, exhorts, encourages. Why hath God denounc'd his anger again&s;t parents, mai&s;ters, freinds, magi&s;trates neglectfull of forbidding what they ought, if law the common father, mai&s;ter, friend, and perpetuall magi&s;trate &s;hall not onely not forbidd, but enact, exhibit, and uphold with countnance and pro|tection a deede every way di&s;hone&s;t, what ever the pretence be. If it were of tho&s;e inward vices, which the law cannot by outward con&s;traint re|medy, but leaves to con&s;cience and per&s;wa&s;ion, it had bin guiltle&s;&s;e in be|ing &s;ilent: but to write a decree of that which can be no way lawfull, and might with ea&s;e be hinder'd, makes law by the doome of law it &s;elfe acce&s;|&s;ory in the highe&s;t degree.</P>
<P>Seventhly, it makes God the direct author of &s;in, For although he bee not made the authour of what he &s;ilently permitts in his providence, yet in his law, the image of his will, when in plaine expre&s;&s;ion he con&s;titutes and ordaines a fact utterly unlawfull, what wants hee to authorize it, and what wants that to be the author?</P>
<P>Eightly, to e&s;tabli&s;h by law a thing wholy unlawfull and di&s;hone&s;t, is an affirmation was never heard of before in any law, rea&s;on, philo&s;ophy, or religion, till it was rais'd by incon&s;ideratglo&s;&s;i&s;ts from the mi&s;take of this text. And though the Civilians have bin contented to chew this opinion, after the canon had &s;ubdu'd them, yet they never could bring example or authority either from divine writt, or human learning, or human practice in any nation, or well-form'd republick, but only from the cu&s;tomary abu&s;e of this text. U&s;ually they allege the Epi&s;tle of <HI>Cicero</HI> to <HI>Atticus;</HI> wherein <HI>Cato</HI> is blam'd for giving &s;entence to the &s;cumme of <HI>Romulus,</HI> as if he were in <HI>Plato's</HI> common wealth. <HI>Cato</HI> would have call'd &s;ome great one into judgeme~t for bribery, <HI>Cicero</HI> as the time &s;tood, advis'd again&s;t it. <HI>Cato,</HI> not to endammage the public trea&s;ury, would not grant to the Roman Knights, that the <HI>A&s;ian</HI> taxes might bee farm'd them at a
<PB N="52" REF="32">
le&s;&s;e rate. <HI>Cicero</HI> wi&s;ht it granted. Nothing in all this will bee like the e|&s;tabli&s;hing of a law to &s;inne: here are no lawes made, here onely the exe|cution of law is crav'd might be &s;u&s;pended: between which and our que&s;tion is a broad difference. And what if human law givers have con|fe&s;t they could not frame their lawes to that perfection which they de|&s;ir'd, we heare of no &s;uch confe&s;&s;ion from <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> concerning the lawes of God, but rather all prai&s;e and high te&s;timony of perfection given them. And although mans nature cannot beare exacte&s;t lawes, yet &s;till within the confines of good it may and mu&s;t; &s;o long as le&s;&s;e good is far anough from altogether evil. As for what they in&s;tance of u&s;ury, let them fir&s;t prove u&s;ury to be wholly unlawfull, as the law allowes it; which learned men as numerous on the other &s;ide will deny them. Or if it be altogether unlawfull, why is it tolerated more then divorce? he who &s;aid divor&s;e not, &s;aid al&s;o <HI>lend hoping for nothing againe,</HI> Luk. 6. 35. But then they put in, that trade could not &s;tand. And &s;o to &s;erve the commodity of in&s;a|tiable trading, u&s;ury &s;hall be permitted, but divorce, the onely meanes oft times to right the innocent, &amp; outrageou&s;ly wrong'd, &s;hall be utterly forbid. This is egregious doctrine, and for which one day charity will much thanke them. <HI>Beza</HI> not finding how to &s;alve this perplexity, and <HI>Cameron</HI> &s;ince him, would &s;ecure us; although the latter confe&s;&s;es that to <HI>permit a wicked thing by law, is a wickedne&s;&s;e from which God abhorrs; yet to limit &s;in, and pre&s;cribe it a certaine mea&s;ure, is good.</HI> Fir&s;t this eva&s;ion will not helpe heere; for this law bounded no man; he might put away whatever found not favour in his eyes. And how could it forbid to di|vorce, whom it could not forbidd to di&s;like, or command to love. If the&s;e be the limits of law to re&s;traine &s;inne, who &s;o lame a &s;inner but may hoppe over them more ea&s;ily then over tho&s;e <HI>Romulean</HI> circum&s;criptions, not as <HI>Remus</HI> did with hard &s;ucces, but with all indemnity. Such a limiting as this were not worth the mi&s;cheif that accompanies it. This law there|fore not bounding the &s;uppo&s;ed &s;inne, by permitting enlarges it, gives it enfranchi&s;ement. And never greater confu&s;ion, then when law and &s;in move their land markes, mixe their territories, and corre&s;pond, have intercour&s;e and traffic together. When law contracts a kindred and ho|&s;pitality with tran&s;gre&s;&s;ion, becomes the godfather of &s;inne and names it Lawfull; when &s;in revels and go&s;&s;ips within the arcenal of law, plaies, and dandles the artillery of ju&s;tice that &s;hould be bent again&s;t her, this is a faire limitation indeede. Be&s;ides it is an ab&s;urdity to &s;ay that law can mea&s;ure &s;in, or moderate &s;in; &s;in is not in a predicament to be mea&s;ur'd
<PB N="53" REF="32">
and modify'd, but is alwaies an exce&s;&s;e. The lea&s;t &s;inne that is, exceeds the mea&s;ure of the large&s;t law that can bee good; and is as boundle&s;&s;e as that vacuity beyond the world. If once it &s;quare to the mea&s;ure of Law, it cea&s;es to be an exce&s;&s;e, and con&s;equently cea&s;es to be a &s;inne; or el&s;e law conforming it &s;elfe to the obliquity of &s;in, betraies it &s;elfe to be not &s;trait, but crooked, and &s;o immediatly no law. And the improper conceit of moderating &s;in by law will appeare, if wee can imagin any lawgiver &s;o &s;en&s;ele&s;&s;e as to decree that &s;o farre a man may &s;teale, and thus farre bee drunk, that moderately he may cozen, and moderatly committ adultery. To the &s;ame extent it would be as pithily ab&s;urd to publi&s;h that a man may moderately divorce, if to doe that be intirely naught. But to end this moot, the law of <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> is manife&s;t to fixe no limit therein at all, or &s;uch at le&s;t as impeaches the fraudulent abu&s;er no more then if it were not &s;et; only requires the di&s;mi&s;&s;ive writing without other caution, leaves that to the inner man, and the barre of con&s;cience. But it &s;topt other &s;ins. This is as vaine as the re&s;t, and dangerou&s;ly uncertain: the contrary to be fear'd rather, that one &s;in admitted courteou&s;ly by law, open'd the gate to another. However evil mu&s;t not be don for good. And it were a fall to be lamented, an indignity un&s;peakable, if law &s;hould becom tributary to &s;in her &s;lave, and forc't to yeild up into his hands her awfull mini&s;ter Puni&s;hment, &s;hould buy out her peace with &s;inne for &s;inne, paying as it were her &s;o many <HI>Phili&s;tian</HI> foreskins to the proud demand of Tran|gre&s;&s;ion. But &s;uppo&s;e it any way po&s;&s;ible to limit &s;inne, to put a girdle a|bout that <HI>Chaos,</HI> &s;uppo&s;e it al&s;o good; yet if to permitt &s;in by Law bee an abomination in the eyes of God, as <HI>Cameron</HI> acknowledges, the evil of permitting will eate out the good of limiting. For though &s;in be not li|mited, there can but evil come out of evil; but if it be permitted &amp; decreed lawfull by divine law, of force then &s;in mu&s;t proceed from the infinit Good, which is a dreadfull thought. But if the re&s;training of &s;inne by this permi&s;&s;ion beeing good, as this author te&s;tifies, be more good then the permi&s;&s;ion of more &s;in by the re&s;traint of divorce, and that God waigh|ing both the&s;e like two ingots in the perfet &s;cales of his ju&s;tice and pro|vidence found them &s;o, and others coming without authority from God, &s;hall change this counter poi&s;e, and judge it better to let fin multi|ply by &s;etting a judicial re&s;traint upon divorce, which Chri&s;t never &s;et, then to limit &s;in by this permi&s;&s;ion, as God him&s;elfe thought be&s;t to per|mitt it, it will behoove them to con&s;ult betimes whether the&s;e their bal|lances be not fals and abominable; and this their limiting that which God loo&s;en'd, and their loo&s;ning the &s;innes that he limited, which they
<PB N="54" REF="33">
confe&s;&s;e was good to doe: and were it po&s;&s;ible to doe by law, doubtle&s;&s;e it would be mo&s;t morally good; and they &s;o beleeving, as we heare they doe, and yet aboli&s;hing a law &s;o good and moral, the limiter of &s;in, what are they el&s;e but contrary to them&s;elves? for they can never bring us to that time wherein it will not be good to limit &s;inne, and they can never limit it better then &s;o as God pre&s;crib'd in his law.</P>
<P>Others conceav it a more defen&s;ible retirement to &s;ay this permi&s;&s;ion to divorce &s;infully for hardne&s;&s;e of heart was a di&s;pen&s;ation. But &s;urely they either know not, or attend not what a di&s;pen&s;ation meanes. A di&s;|pen&s;ation is for no long time, is particular to &s;om per&s;ons rather then generall to a whole people; alwaies hath charity the end, is granted to nece&s;&s;ities and infirmities, not to ob&s;tinat lu&s;t. This permi&s;&s;ion is another creatnre, hath all tho&s;e evils and ab&s;urdities following the name of a di&s;|pen&s;ation, as when it was nam'd a law; and is the very <HI>antarctic pole</HI> a|gain&s;t charity, nothing more advers, en&s;naring and ruining tho&s;e that tru&s;t in it, or u&s;e it; &s;o leud and criminous as never dur&s;t enter into the head of any Politician, Jew, or Pro&s;elyte, till they became the apt Schol|lers of this canoni&s;tic expo&s;ition. Ought in it, that can allude in the le&s;t manner to charity, or goodnes, belongs with more full right to the chri|an under grace and liberty, then to the Jew under law and bondage. To Jewi&s;h ignorance it could not be di&s;penc'd, without a horrid imputation laid upon the law, to di&s;pence fouly, in &s;tead of teaching fairly; like that di&s;pen&s;ation that fir&s;t polluted Chri&s;tendom with idolatry, permitting to lay men images in &s;tead of bookes and preaching. Sloth or malice in the law would they have this calld? But what ignorance can be preten|ded for the Jewes, who had all the &s;ame precepts about mariage, that we now: for Chri&s;t referrs all to the in&s;titution. It was as rea&s;onable for them to know then as for us now, and concern'd them alike: for wherein hath the go&s;pel alter'd the nature of matrimony: All the&s;e con&s;iderati|ons, or many of them have bin furder amplify'd in <HI>the doctrine of divorce.</HI> And what <HI>Rivetus</HI> and <HI>Paraeus</HI> hath objected, or giv'n over as pa&s;t cure hath bin there di&s;cu&s;st. Whereby it may be plain anough to men of eyes, that the vulgar expo&s;ition of a permittance by law to an entire fin, what ever the colour may be, is an opinion both ungodly, unpolitic, unver|tuous, and void of all hone&s;ty &amp; civil &s;en&s;e. It appertaines therefore to e|very zealous Chri&s;tian both for the honour of Gods law &amp; the vindicati|on of our Saviours words, that &s;uch an irreligious depravement no lon|ger may be &s;ooth'd and flatter'd through cu&s;tome, but with all diligence and &s;peed &s;olidly refuted, and in the room a better explanation giv'n; which is now our next endeavour.</P>
<P><PB N="55" REF="33">
<HI>[Mo&s;es &s;uffer'd you to put away, &amp;c.]</HI> Not commanded you, &s;aies the common ob&s;erver, and therefore car'd not how &s;oon it were aboli&s;ht, be|ing but &s;uffer'd; heerin declaring his annotation to be &s;light &amp; nothing law prudent. For in this place <HI>commanded and &s;uffer'd</HI> are interehangeably us'd in the &s;ame &s;en&s;e both by our Saviour and the Phari&s;es. Our Saviour who heer &s;aith, <HI>Mo&s;es &s;uffer'd you,</HI> in the 10^t^h of <HI>Marke</HI> &s;aith, <HI>Mo&s;es wrote you this command.</HI> And the Phari&s;ees who heer &s;ay, <HI>Mo&s;es commanded,</HI> and would mainly have it a command, in that place of <HI>Marke</HI> &s;ay <HI>Mo&s;es &s;uf|fer'd,</HI> which had made again&s;t them in their owne mouthes, if the word of <HI>&s;uffering</HI> had weakn'd the command. So that <HI>&s;uffer'd</HI> and <HI>commanded</HI> is heer taken for the &s;ame thing on both &s;ides of the controver&s;y: as <HI>Ca|meron</HI> al&s;o and others on this place acknowledge. And Lawyers know that all the precepts of law are devided into obligatorie and permi&s;&s;ive, containing either what we mu&s;t doe, or what wee may doe; and of this latter &s;ort are as many precepts, as of the former, and all as lawfull. Tutelage, an ordainment then which nothing more ju&s;t, being for the de|fence of Orfanes, the <HI>Ju&s;titutes</HI> of <HI>Ju&s;tinian,</HI> &s;ay <HI>is given and permitted by the civil law:</HI> and <HI>to parents it is permitted to choo&s;e and appoint by will the guardians of their children.</HI> What more equall, and yet the civil law calls this <HI>permi&s;&s;ion.</HI> So likewi&s;e to <HI>manumi&s;e,</HI> to adopt, to make a will, and to be made an heire is call'd <HI>permi&s;&s;ion</HI> by law. Marriage it &s;elfe, and this which is already granted, to divorce for adultery, obliges no man, is but a permi&s;+&s;ion by law, is but &s;uffer'd. By this we may &s;ee how weakly it hath bin thought that all divorce is utterly unlawfull, becau&s;e the law is &s;aid to &s;uffer it: whenas to <HI>&s;uffer</HI> is but the legall phra&s;e denoting what by law a man may doe or not doe.</P>
<P><HI>[Becau&s;e of the hardne&s;&s;e of your hearts]</HI> Hence they argue that there|fore he allowd it not; and therefore it mu&s;t be aboli&s;ht. But the contra|ry to this will &s;ooner follow, that becau&s;e he &s;uffer'd it for a cau&s;e, there|fore in relation to that cau&s;e he allow'd it. Next, if he in his wi&s;edome, and in the mid&s;t of his &s;everity allow'd it for hardne&s;&s;e of heart, it can be nothing better then arrogance and pre&s;umption to take &s;tricter cour&s;es again&s;t hardnes of heart then God ever &s;et an example and that under the Go&s;pel which warrants them to no judicial act of compul&s;ion in this matter, much le&s;&s;e to be more &s;evere again&s;t hardnes of extremity, then God thought good to bee again&s;t hardnes of heart. He &s;uffer'd it, rather then wor&s;e inconveniences; the&s;e men wi&s;er as they make them&s;elves, will &s;uffer the wor&s;t and hainou&s;e&s;t inconveniences to follow, rather then
<PB N="56" REF="34">
they will &s;uffer what God &s;uffer'd. Although they can know when they plea&s;e, that Chri&s;t &s;pake only to the con&s;cience, did not judge on the civil bench, but alwaies di&s;avow'd it. What can be more contrary to the waies of God then the&s;e their doings. If they bee &s;uch enemies to hardnes of heart, although this groundle&s;&s;e rigor proclaims it to be in them&s;elves, they may yet learne, or con&s;ider that hardne&s;&s;e of heart hath a twofould acception in the Go&s;pel. One, when it is in a good man taken for infir|mity, and imperfection, which was in all the Apo&s;tles, who&s;e weakne&s;&s;e only, not utter want of beleef is call'd hardnes of heart, <HI>Marke</HI> 16. part|ly for this hardne&s;&s;e of heart, the imperfection and decay of man from o|riginal righteou&s;ne&s;&s;e, it was that God &s;uffer'd not divorce onely, but all that which by Civilians is term'd the <HI>&s;econdary law of nature and of nations.</HI> He &s;uffer'd his owne people to wa&s;t and &s;poyle and &s;lay by warre, to lead captives, to be &s;om mai&s;ters, &s;om &s;ervants, &s;om to be princes, others to be &s;ubjects, hee &s;uffer'd propriety to divide all things by &s;everall po&s;&s;e&s;&s;ion trade and commerce, not with out u&s;ury; in his comon wealth &s;ome to bee unde&s;ervedly rich, others to bee unde&s;ervingly poore. All which till hardne&s;&s;e of heart came in, was mo&s;t unju&s;t; whenas prime Nature made us all equall, made us equall coheirs by common right and dominion over all creatures. In the &s;ame manner, and for the &s;ame cau&s;e hee &s;uffer'd divorce as well as mariage, our imperfet and degenerat condition of nece&s;&s;ity requiring this law among the re&s;t, as a remedy again&s;t intolerable wrong and &s;ervitude above the patience of man to beare. Nor was it giv'n only becau&s;e our infirmity, or if it mu&s;t be &s;o call'd, hardne&s;&s;e of heart could not endure all things, but becau&s;e the hardnes of anothers heart might not inflict all things upon an inno|cent per&s;on, whom far other ends brought into a league of love and not of bondage and indignity. If therefore we aboli&s;h divorce as only &s;uffer'd for hardnes of heart, we may as well aboli&s;h the whole law of nations, as only &s;ufferd for the &s;ame cau&s;e; it being &s;hewn us by Saint <HI>Paul</HI> 1 <HI>Cor.</HI> 6. that the very &s;eeking of a mans right by law, and at the hands of a worldly magi&s;trat, is not without the hardne&s;&s;e of our hearts. <HI>For why doe ye not rather take wrong,</HI> &s;aith he, <HI>why &s;uffer ye not rather your &s;elves to be defrauded?</HI> If nothing now mu&s;t be &s;uffer'd for hardnes of heart, I &s;ay the very pro&s;ecution of our right by way of civil ju&s;tice can no more bee &s;uffer'd among Chri&s;tians, for the hardnes of heart wherwith mo&s;t men per&s;ue it. And that would next remove all our judiciall lawes, and this re&s;traint of divorce al&s;o in the number; which would more then halfe
<PB N="57" REF="34">
end the controversy. But if it be plaine that the whole juridical law and civil power is only &s;uffer'd under the Go&s;pel, for the hardnes of our hearts, then wherefore &s;hould not that which <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> &s;uffer'd, be &s;uffer'd &s;till by the &s;ame rea&s;on?</P>
<P>In a &s;econd &s;ignification hardnes of heart is tak'n for a &s;tubborne re&s;o|lution to doe evil. And that God ever makes any law purpo&s;ely to &s;uch, I deny; for he vout&s;afes not to enter gov'nant with them, but as they fortune to be mixt with good men, and pa&s;&s;e undi&s;cover'd; much le&s;&s;e that he &s;hould decree an unlawfull thing only to &s;erve their licentiou&s;nes. But that God <HI>&s;uffers</HI> this reprobate hardnes of heart I affirm, not only in this law of divorce, but throughout all his be&s;t and pure&s;t commande|ments. He commands all to wor&s;hip in &s;inglenes of heart according to all his Ordinances; and yet &s;uffers the wicked man to performe all the rites of religion hypocritically and in the hardnes of his heart. He gives us generall &s;tatutes &amp; privileges in all civil matters, ju&s;t &amp; good of them|&s;elves, yet &s;uffers unworthie&s;t men, to u&s;e them &amp; by themt, o pro&s;ecute their own right, or any colour of right, though for the mo&s;t part malici|ou&s;ly, covetou&s;ly, nigorou&s;ly, revengefully. He allow'd by law the di&s;creet father and husband to forbidd, if he thought fit, the religious vows of his wife or daughter: <HI>Num.</HI> 30. and in the &s;ame law &s;uffer'd the hard heartednes of impious and covetous fathers or husbands abu&s;ing this law to forbidd their wives or daughters in their offrings and devotions of greate&s;t zeal. If then God &s;uffer hardnes of heart equally in the be&s;t laws as in this of divorce, there can be no rea&s;on that for this cau&s;e this law &s;hould be aboli&s;ht. But other lawes, they object, may be well us'd, this ne|ver. How often &s;hall I an&s;wer both from the in&s;titution of mariage, and from other general rules in Scripture, that this law of divorce hath ma|ny wi&s;e and charitable ends be&s;ides the being &s;uffer'd for hardnes of heart; which is indeed no end, but an accident happning through the whole law; which gives to good men right, and to bad men who abu&s;e right under fal&s;e pretences, gives only &s;ufferance. Now although Chri&s;t expre&s;&s; no other rea&s;ons here, but only what was &s;uffer'd, it nothing followes that this law had no other rea&s;on to be permitted but for hardnes of heart. The Scripture &s;eldome, or never in one place &s;ets down all the rea&s;ons of what it grants or commands, e&s;pecially when it talks to enemies and tempters. St <HI>Paul</HI> permitting mariage, 1 <HI>Cor.</HI> 7, &s;eems to permit even that al&s;o for hardnes of heart only, le&s;t we &s;hould run into fornication; yet no intelligent man thence concludes mariage allow'd in the Go&s;pel
<PB N="58" REF="35">
only to avoid an evill, becau&s;e no other end is there expre&s;t. Thus <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> of nece&s;&s;ity &s;uffer'd many to put away their wives for hardne&s;&s;e of heart; but enacted the law of divorce doubtles for other good cau&s;es, not for this only &s;ufferance. He permitted not divorce by law as an evil, for that was impo&s;&s;ible to divine law, but permitted by accident the evil of them who divorc't again&s;t the lawes intention undi&s;coverably This al&s;o may be thought not improbably, that Chri&s;t &s;tirr'd up in his &s;pirit again&s;t the&s;e tempting Phari&s;es, an&s;wer'd them in a certain forme of indignation u&s;ual among good authors; wherby the que&s;tion, or the truth is not directly an|&s;wer'd, but &s;om thing which is fitter for them, who aske, to heare. So in the eccle&s;ia&s;tical &s;tories one demanding how God imploy'd him&s;elf before the world was made, had a~&s;wer; that he was making hel for curious que&s;ti|oners. Another (and <HI>Libanius</HI> the <HI>Sophi&s;t</HI> as I remember) asking in deri&s;i|on &s;om Chri&s;tian, what the Carpenter, meaning our Saviour, was doing, now that <HI>Julian</HI> &s;o prevail'd, had it return'd him, that the Carpenter was making a coffin for the <HI>Apo&s;tat.</HI> So Chri&s;t being demanded maliciou&s;ly why <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> made the law of divorce, an&s;wers them in a vehement <HI>&s;cheme,</HI> not telling them the cau&s;e why he made it, but what was fitte&s;t to be told them, that <HI>for the hardnes of their hearts</HI> he &s;uffer'd them to abu&s;e it. And all beit <HI>Mark</HI> &s;ay not he &s;uffer'd you, but <HI>to you he wrote this precept; Mark</HI> may be warrantably expounded by <HI>Mathew</HI> the larger. And whether he &s;uffer'd, or gave precept, being all one as was heard, it changes not the <HI>trope</HI> of indignation, fitte&s;t account for &s;uch askers. Next for the hardnes of <HI>your hearts to you he wrote this precept,</HI> inferrs not therfore for this cau&s;e on|ly he wrote it, as was parallell'd by other Scriptures. La&s;tly, It may be worththe ob&s;erving, that Chri&s;t &s;peaking to the Phari&s;es does not &s;ay in general that for hardnes of heart he gave this precept, but <HI>you he &s;uffer'd,</HI> &amp; <HI>to you he gave this precept for your</HI> hardnes of heart. It cannot be ea&s;ily thought that Chri&s;t heer included all the children of I&s;rael under the per|&s;on of the&s;e tempting Phari&s;es but that he conceals wherefore he gave the better &s;ort of them this law, and expre&s;&s;es by &s;aying emphatically <HI>To you</HI> how he gave it to the wor&s;er, &s;uch as the Phari&s;es be&s;t repre&s;ented, that is to &s;ay for the hardnes of your hearts: as indeed to wicked men and hardn'd hearts he gives the whole law and the Go&s;pel al&s;o, to hard'n them the more. Thus many waies it may orthod oxally be under&s;tood how God or <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> &s;uffer'd &s;uch as the demanders were, to divorce for hardnes of heart. Whereas the vulgar expo&s;iter be&s;et with contradictions and ab|&s;urdities round, and re&s;olving at any peril to make an expo&s;ition of it, as
<PB N="59" REF="35">
there is nothing more violent and boi&s;trous then a reverend ignorance in fear to be convicted, ru&s;hes brutely and impetuou&s;ly again&s;t all the prin|ciples both of nature, piety, and moral goodnes; and in the &s;ury of his literal expounding overturns them all.</P>
<P><HI>[But from the the beginning it was not &s;o.]</HI> Not how from the beginning doe they &s;uppo&s;e, that men might not divorce at all, not nece&s;&s;arily, not deliberatly except for adultery, but that &s;om law, like canon law pre&s;ent|ly attacht them both before and after the flood, till &s;tricter <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> came, and with law brought licence into the world? that were a fancy indeed to &s;mile at. Undoubtedly as to point of judiciall law, divorce was more permi&s;&s;ive from the beginning before <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> then under <HI>Mo&s;es.</HI> But from the beginning, that is to &s;ay, by the in&s;titution in Paradice it was not in|tended that matrimony &s;hould di&s;&s;olve for every trivial cau&s;e as you Pha|ri&s;es accu&s;tome. But that it was not thus &s;uffer'd from the beginning ever &s;ince the race of men corrupted, &amp; laws were made, he who will affirme, mu&s;t have found out other antiquities then are yer known. Be&s;ides we mu&s;t con&s;ider now, what can be &s;o as from the beginning, not only what &s;hould be &s;o. In the beginning, had men continu'd perfet, it had bin ju&s;t that all things &s;hould have remain'd, as they began to <HI>Adam</HI> &amp; <HI>Eve.</HI> But after that the &s;ons of men grew violent &amp; injurious, it alter'd the lore of ju&s;tice, and put the goverment of things into a new frame. While man and woman were both perfet each to other, there needed no divorce; but when they both degenerated to imperfection, &amp; oft times grew to be an intolerable evil each to other, then law more ju&s;tly did permitt the alienating of that evil which mi&s;take made proper, then it did the appropriating of that good which Nature at fir&s;t made common. For if the ab&s;ence of outward good be not &s;o bad as the pre&s;ence of a clo&s;e evil, &amp; that propriety, whe|ther by cov'nant or po&s;&s;e&s;&s;ion, be but the attainment of &s;ome outward good, it is more natural &amp; righteous that the law &s;hould &s;ever us from an intimat evil, then appropriate any outward good to us from the commu|nity of nature. The Go&s;pel indeed tending ever to that which is perfete&s;t, aim'dat the re&s;torement of all things, as they were in the beginning. And therefore all things were in common to tho&s;e primitive Chri&s;tians in the Acts, which <HI>Ananias &amp; Sapphira</HI> dearly felt. That cu&s;tome al&s;o continu'd more or le&s;&s; till the time of <HI>Ju&s;tin Martyr,</HI> as may be read in his 2^d <HI>Apolo|gy,</HI> which might be writt after that act of communion perhaps &s;ome. 40. yeares above a hunder'd. But who will be the man &s;hall introduce this kind of common wealth, as chri&s;tianity now goes? If then mariage mu&s;t
<PB N="60" REF="36">
be as in the beginning, the per&s;ons that marry mu&s;t be &s;uch as then were, the in&s;titution mu&s;t make good, in &s;om tolerable &s;ort, what it promi&s;es toeeither party. If not, it is but madnes to drag this one ordinance back to the beginning, and draw down all other to the pre&s;ent nece&s;&s;ity, and con|dition farre from the beginning even to the tolerating of extortions and opp re&s;&s;ions. Chri&s;t only told us that from the beginning it was not &s;o; that is to &s;ay, not &s;o as the Phari&s;es manu<GAP DESC="illegible" REASON="faint" EXTENT="1 letter">'d the bu&s;ines; did not com|mand us that it &s;hould be forcibly &s;o again in all points, as at the begin|ning; or &s;o at lea&s;t in our intentions and de&s;ires, but &s;o in execution, as rea&s;on, and pre&s;ent nature can bear. Although we are not to &s;eek, that the in&s;titution it &s;elfe from the fir&s;t beginning was never but conditional, as all cov'nants are: becau&s;e thus and thus, therefore &s;o and &s;o; if not thus, then not &s;o. Then moreover was perfete&s;t to fulfill each law in it &s;elfe; now is perfete&s;t in this e&s;tate of things, to ask of charity how much law may be fulfill'd: els the fulfilling, oft times is the greate&s;t breaking. If any therefore demand, which is now mo&s;t perfection, to ea&s;e an extremity by divorce, or to enrage and fe&s;ter it by the greevous ob&s;ervance of a mi|&s;erable wedloc, I am not de&s;titute to &s;ay which is mo&s;t perfection (al|though &s;om who beleev they thinke favourably of divorce, e&s;teem it only venial to infirmity) Him I hold more in the way to perfection who forgoes an unfit ungodly &amp; di&s;cordant wedloc, to live according to peace &amp; love, &amp; Gods in&s;titution in a fitter chois, then he who debarrs him|&s;elf the happy experience of all godly, which is peaceful conver&s;atio~ in his family, to live a contentious, and unchritian life not to be avoided, in temptations not to be liv'd in, only for the fals keeping of a mo&s;t unreal nullity, a mariage that hath no affinity with Gods intention, a daring phanta&s;m, a meer toy of terror awing weak &s;en&s;es, to the lamentable &s;uper|&s;tition of ruining them&s;elves, the remedy wherof God in his law vout&s;afes us. Which not to dare u&s;e, he warranting, is not our perfection, is our in|firmity, our little faith, our timorous and low conceit of charity: and in them who force us, it is their masking pride and vanity, to &s;eem holier &amp; more circum&s;pect then God. So far is it that we need impute to him in|firmity, who thus divorces: &s;ince the rule of perfection is not &s;o much that which was don in the beginning, as that which now is neare&s;t to the rule of charity. This is the greate&s;t, the perfete&s;t, the highe&s;t commandment.</P>
</DIV3>
<DIV3 TYPE="section">
<EPIGRAPH>
<Q>V. 9. <HI>And I &s;ay unto you, who &s;o &s;hall put away his wife, except it be for Fornication, and &s;hall marry another, committeth adultery; and who&s;e mar|rieth her which is put away, doth commit adultery.</HI></Q>
</EPIGRAPH>
<P><PB N="61" REF="36">
<HI>[And I &s;ay unto you]</HI> That this re&s;trictive denouncement of Chri&s;t con|tradicts and refutes that permi&s;&s;ive precept of <HI>Mo&s;es,</HI> common ex|po&s;iters them&s;elves di&s;claime: and that it does not traver&s;e from the clo|&s;et of con&s;cience to the courts of civil or canon law, with any Chri&s;ti|an rightly commenc't requires not long evincing. If Chri&s;t then did not heer check permi&s;&s;ive <HI>Mo&s;es,</HI> nor did reduce matrimony to the beginning more then all other things, as the rea&s;on of mans condition could beare, we would know preci&s;ely what it was which he did, and what the end was of his declaring thus au&s;terely again&s;t divorce. For this is a confes&s;t oracle in law, that he who lookes not at the intention of a precept, the more &s;uper&s;titions he is of the letter, the more he mi&s;interprets. Was it to &s;hame <HI>Mo&s;es?</HI> that had beene mon&s;trous: or all tho&s;e pure&s;t ages of I&s;rael, to whom the permi&s;&s;ion was granted? that were as incredible. Or was it that he who came to abrogate the burden of law, not the equity, &s;hould put this yoke upon a blamele&s;&s;e per&s;on, to league him&s;elfe in chaines with a begirting mi&s;cheif, not to &s;eparat till death? hee who taught us that no man puts a peece of new cloth upon an old garment, nor new wine into old bottles, that he &s;hould &s;ow this patch of &s;trictnes upon the old appa|rel of our frailty, to make a rent more incurable, when as in all other a|mendments his doctrine &s;till charges, that regard be had to the garment, and to the ve&s;&s;el, what it can endure; this were an irregular and &s;ingle peece of rigor, not onely &s;ounding di&s;proportion to the whole Go&s;pel, but out&s;tretching the mo&s;t rigorous nervs of law and rigor it &s;elfe. No other end therefore can bee left imaginable of this exce&s;&s;ive re&s;traint, but to bridle tho&s;e erroneous and licentious po&s;tillers the Phari&s;es; not by telling them what may bee done in nece&s;&s;ity, but what cen&s;ure they de|&s;erve who divorce abu&s;ively, which their Tetrarch had done. And as the offence was in one extreme, &s;o the rebuke, to bring more efficaciou&s;ly to a rectitude and mediocrity, &s;tands not in the middle way of duty, but in the other extreme. Which art of powerfull reclaiming, wi&s;e&s;t men have al&s;o taught in their ethical precepts and <HI>gnomologies;</HI> re&s;embling it, as when wee bend a crooked wand the contrary way; not that it &s;hould &s;tand &s;o bent, but that the overbending might reduce it to a &s;traitne&s;&s;e by its own reluctance. And as the Phy&s;ician cures him who hath tak'n down poy&s;on, not by the middling temper of nouri&s;hment, but by the other extreme of <HI>antidote,</HI> &s;o Chri&s;t admini&s;ters heer a &s;harpe &amp; corro&s;ive &s;en|tence again&s;t a foul and putrid licence; not to eate into the fle&s;h, but into the &s;ore. And knowing that our divines through all their comments make
<PB N="62" REF="37">
no &s;cruple, where they plea&s;e, to &s;often the high and vehem ent &s;peeches of our Saviour, which they call <HI>hyperbolics,</HI> why in this one text &s;hould they be &s;uch crabbed <HI>ma&s;orites</HI> of the Letter, as not to mollifie a tran&s;cen|dence of literal rigidity, which they confe&s;&s;e to find often el&s;ewhere in his manner of delivery, but mu&s;t make their expo&s;ition heer &s;uch an obdurat <HI>Cyclops,</HI> to have but one eye for this text, and that onely open to cruelty and enthralment, &s;uch as no divine, or human law before ever heard of. No, let the foppi&s;h canoui&s;t with his fardel of matrimonial ca&s;es goe and be vendible where men bee &s;o unhappy as to cheap'n him; the words of Chri&s;t &s;hall be a&s;&s;erted from &s;uch elementall notaries, and re&s;olv'd by the now-only lawgiving mouth of charity; which may be done undoubted|ly by under&s;tanding them as followes.</P>
<P><HI>[Who&s;oever &s;hall put away his wife.]</HI> That is to &s;ay, &s;hall &s;o away as the propounders of this que&s;tion, the Phari&s;ees were wont to doe and covertly defended <HI>Herod</HI> for &s;o doing; whom to rebuke, our Saviour heer mainely intends, and not to determine all the ca&s;es of divorce, as appeares by Saint <HI>Paul.</HI> Who&s;oever &s;hall put away, either violently without mu|tuall con&s;ent for urgent rea&s;ons, or con&s;piringly by plot of lu&s;t, or cun|ning malice, &s;hall put away for any &s;udden mood, or contingency of di&s;|agreement, which is not daily practice, but may blow &s;oone over, and be reconcil'd, except it bee fornication; who&s;oever &s;hall put away ra&s;hly, as his choler prompts him, without due time of deliberating, and thinke his con&s;cience di&s;charg'd only by the bill of divorce giv'n, and the outward law &s;atisfi'd; who&s;oever la&s;tly &s;hall put away his wife, that is a wife in|deede, &amp; not in name only, &s;uch a one who both can and is willing to bee a meet helpe toward the cheif ends of mariage both civil, and &s;anctify'd, except fornication be the cau&s;e, that man, or that pair committ adulcery. Not he who puts away by mutuall con&s;ent, with all the con&s;iderations and re&s;pects of humanity and gentlene&s;&s;e without malicious or lu&s;tfull drift. Not he who after &s;ober and coole experience, and long debate with|in him&s;elf puts away whom though he cannot love or &s;uffer as a wife, with that &s;incere affection that marriage requires, yet loves at le&s;t with that ci|vility and goodne&s;&s;e, as not to keepe her under a neglected and unwelcom re&s;idence, where nothing can be hearty, and not beeing, it mu&s;t needs bee both unjoyous and injurious to any perceaving per&s;on &s;o detain'd, and more injurious, then to be freely, and upon good termes di&s;mi&s;t. Nor doth hee put away adulterou&s;ly who complaines of cau&s;es rooted in im|mutable nature, utter unfitne&s;&s;e, utter di&s;conformity, not concileable, be|cau&s;e
<PB N="63" REF="37">
not to be amended without a miracle. Nor hee who puts away an unquen&s;hable vexation from his bo&s;om, and flies an evil then which a greater cannot befall human &s;ociety. Nor hee who puts away with the the full &s;uffrage and applau&s;e of his con&s;cience, not relying on the writ|t'n bill of law, but claiming by faith and fulnes of per&s;wa&s;ion the rights and promi&s;es of Gods in&s;titution, of which hee finds him&s;elfe in a mi&s;tak'n wedlock defrauded. Doubtle&s;&s;e this man hath baile anough to bee no a|dulterer giving divorc: for the&s;e cau&s;es.</P>
<P><HI>[His Wife.]</HI> This word is not to be idle here, a meere word without a &s;en&s;e, much le&s;&s;e a fallacious word &s;ignifying contrary to what it pre|tends; but faithfully &s;ignifies a wife, that is, a comfortable helpe and &s;o|ciety, as God in&s;tituted; does not &s;ignify deceitfully under this name, an intolerable adver&s;ary, not a helpele&s;&s;e, unaffectionate and &s;ullen ma&s;&s;e who&s;e very company repre&s;ents the vi&s;ible and exacte&s;t figure of lonelines it &s;elfe. Such an a&s;&s;ociate he who puts away, divorces not a wife, but di&s;|joyns a nullity which God never joyn'd, if &s;he be neither willing, nor to her proper and requi&s;ite duties &s;ufficient, as the words of God in&s;titute her. And this al&s;o is <HI>Bucers</HI> explicat<GAP DESC="illegible" REASON="blotted" EXTENT="1 letter">on of this place.</P>
<P><HI>[Except it bee for fornication, or &s;aving for the cau&s;e of fornication,</HI> as <HI>Matt.</HI> 5^t^h. This declares what kind of cau&s;es our Saviour meant; for|nication being no natural and perpetual cau&s;e, but onely accidental and temporary; therefore &s;hewes that head of cau&s;es from whence it is excep|ted, to bee meant of the &s;ame &s;ort. For exceptions are not logically de|duc't from a divers kind, as to &s;ay who &s;o puts away for any naturall cau&s;e except fornication, the exception would want &s;alt. And if they un|der&s;tand it, who &s;o for any cau&s;e what ever, they ca&s;t them&s;elves; granting divorce for frigidity a naturall cau&s;e of their own allowing, though not heer expre&s;t, and for de&s;ertion without infidelity when as he who mar|ries, as they allow him for a de&s;ertion, de&s;erts as well as is de&s;erted, and finally puts away, for another cau&s;e be&s;ides adultery. It will with all due rea&s;on therefore be thus better under&s;tood, who &s;o puts away for any ac|cidental and temporary cau&s;es, except one of them, which is fornication. Thus this exception finds out the cau&s;es from whence it is excepted, to be of the &s;ame kind, that is, ca&s;uall, not continuall.</P>
<P><HI>[Saving for the cau&s;e of fornication.]</HI> The New Te&s;tament, though it be &s;aid originally writt in Greeke, yet hath nothing neer &s;o many <HI>Atti|ci&s;ms as Hebrai&s;ms, &amp; Syriaci&s;ms</HI> which was the Maje&s;ty of God, not filing the tongue of Scripture to a Gentili&s;h <HI>Idiom,</HI> but in a princely manner off|ring
<PB N="64" REF="38">
to them as to Gentiles and Foreiners grace and mercy, though not in forein words, yet in a forein &s;tile that might induce them to the foun|taines; and though their calling were high and happy, yet &s;till to ac|knowledge Gods ancient people their betters, and that language the <HI>Me|tropolitan</HI> language. He therefore who thinks to <HI>Scholiaze</HI> upon the Go&s;|pel, though Greek, according to his Greek <HI>Analogies,</HI> and hath not bin Auditor to the oriental dialects, &s;hall want in the heat of his <HI>Analy&s;is</HI> no accomodation to &s;tumble. In this place, as the 5^t^h of <HI>Matth,</HI> reads it, <HI>Sa|ving for the cau&s;e of fornication,</HI> the Greek, &s;uch as it is, &s;ounds it, except for the <HI>word, report, &s;peech, or proportion</HI> of fornication. In which regard with other inducements, many ancient and learned writers have under|&s;tood this exception as comprehending any fault equivalent and propor|tional to fornication But truth is, the Evangeli&s;t heer <HI>Hebraizes,</HI> taking <HI>word</HI> or <HI>&s;peech</HI> for <HI>cau&s;e</HI> or <HI>matter</HI> in the common ea&s;tern phra&s;e, meaning perhaps no more then if he had &s;aid for fornication, as in this 19^t^h chap|ter. And yet the word is found in the 5^t^h of <HI>Exodus</HI> al&s;o fignifying <HI>Pro|portion;</HI> where the I&s;raelites are commanded to doe their tasks, <HI>The mat|ter of each day in his day.</HI> A task we know is a proportion of work not do|ing the &s;ame thing ab&s;olutely every day, but &s;o much. Whereby it may be doubtfull yet, whether heer be not excepted not only fornication it &s;elf, but other cau&s;es equipollent, and proportional to fornication. Which very word al&s;o to under&s;tand rightly, wee mu&s;t of nece&s;&s;ity have recours again to the Ebrew. For in the Greek and Latin &s;en&s;e by fornication is meant the common pro&s;titution of body for &s;ale. So that they who are &s;o exact for the letter, &s;hall be dealt with by the <HI>Lexicon,</HI> and the <HI>Etymologi|con</HI> too if they plea&s;e, and mu&s;t be bound to forbidd divorce for adultery al&s;o, untill it come to open whoredom and trade, like that for which <HI>Claudius</HI> divorc't <HI>Me&s;&s;alina.</HI> Since therfore they take not heer the word fornication in the common &s;ignificance, for an open exerci&s;e in the &s;tews, but grant divorce for one &s;ingle act of private&s;t adultery, notwith&s;tand|ing that the word &s;peakes a public and notorious frequency of fact, not without price, we may rea&s;on with as good leav, and as little &s;training to the text, that our Saviour on &s;et purpo&s;e cho&s;e this word <HI>Fornication,</HI> improperly appli'd to the lap&s;e of adultery, that we might not think our &s;elvs bound from all divorce, except when that fault hath bin actually committed. For the language of Scripture &s;ignifies by fornication (and others be&s;ide St. <HI>Au&s;tin</HI> &s;o expounded it) not only the tre&s;pas of body nor perhaps that between maried per&s;ons, unle&s;&s;e in a degree or quality as
<PB N="65" REF="38">
&s;hameles as the <HI>Bordello,</HI> but &s;ignifies al&s;o any notable di&s;obedience, or in|tractable cariage of the wife to the husband, as <HI>Judg.</HI> the 192. Whereof at large <HI>in the Doctrin of Divorce. l.</HI> 2. <HI>c.</HI> 18 Secondly &s;ignifies the apparent alienation of mind not to idolatry, (which may &s;eeme to an&s;wer the act of adultery) but farre on this &s;ide, to any point of will wor&s;hip, though to the true God; &s;ome times it notes the love of earthly things, or world|ly plea&s;ures though in a right beleever, &s;ome times the lea&s;t &s;u&s;picion of unwitting idolatry. As <HI>Num.</HI> 15. 39. will&s;ull di&s;obedience to any the lea&s;t of Gods commandements is call'd fornication. <HI>P&s;al.</HI> 73. 26, 27. A di&s;tru&s;t only in God, and withdrawing from that neernes of zeal and confidence which ought to be, is call'd fornication. We may be &s;ure it could not import thus much le&s;s then Idolatry in the borrow'd metaphor between God and man, unle&s;s it &s;ignifi'd as much le&s;s then adultery in the ordinary acception between man and wife. Adde al&s;o that there was no need our Saviour &s;hould grant divorce for adultery, it being death by law, and law then in force. Which was the cau&s;e why <HI>Jo&s;eph</HI> &s;ought to put away his betrothed wife privately, lea&s;t he &s;hould make her an exam|ple of capitall puni&s;hment, as lernede&s;t expounders affirm, <HI>Herod</HI> being a great zelot of the Mo&s;aic law, and the Phari&s;es great mai&s;ters of the text, as the woman tak'n in adultery doubtle&s;s had cau&s;e to fear. Or if they can prove it was neglected, which they cannot doe, why did our Saviour &s;hape his an&s;wer to the corruption of that age, and not rather tell them of their neglect? If they &s;ay he came not to meddle with their judicatures, much le&s;s then was it in his thought to make them new ones, or that di|vorce &s;hould be judicially re&s;train'd in a &s;tricter manner by the&s;e his words, more then adultery judicially acquitted by tho&s;e his words to the adultres. His &s;entence doth no more by law forbidd divorce heer, then by law it doth ab&s;olve adultery there. To them therefore, who have drawn this yoke upon Chri&s;tians from his words thus wre&s;ted, nothing remaines but the guilt of a pre&s;umption and perver&s;nes which will be hard for them to an&s;wer. Thus much that the word fornication is to be under&s;tood as the language of Chri&s;t under&s;tands it, for a con&s;tant alienation and di&s;affection of mind, or for the continual practi&s;e of di&s;o|bedience and cro&s;&s;nes from the duties of love and peace, that is in &s;umm, when to be a tolerable wife is either naturally not in their power, or ob|&s;tinatly not in their will, and this opinion al&s;o is St. <HI>Au&s;tins,</HI> lea&s;t it &s;hould hap to be &s;u&s;pected of novelty. Yet grant the thing heer meant were only adultery, the rea&s;on of things will afford more to our a&s;&s;erti|on,
<PB N="66" REF="39">
then did the rea&s;on of words. For why is divorce unlawfull but only for adultery? becau&s;e, &s;ay they, that crime only breaks the matrimony. But this, I reply, the in&s;titution it&s;elfe gain&s;aies: for that which is mo&s;t contrary to the words and meaning of the in&s;titution, that mo&s;t breaks the matrimony; but a perpetuall unmeetnes and unwillingne&s;&s;e to all the duties of helpe, of love and tranquillity is mo&s;t contrary to the words and meaning of the in&s;titution; that therefore much more breaks matrimony then the act of adultery though repeated. For this, as it is not felt, nor troubles him who perceaves it not, &s;o beeing perceav'd, may be &s;oon re|pented, &s;oon amended, &s;oon, if it can be pardon'd, may be redeem'd w^t^h the more ardent love and duty in her who hath the pardon. But this naturall unmeetnes both cannot be unknown long, and ever after cannot be amen|ded, if it be natural, and will not, if it be farregon ob&s;tinat. So that wan|ting ought in the in&s;tant to be as great a breach as adultery, it gains it in the perpetuity to be greater. Next adultery does not exclude her other fitnes, her other plea&s;ingnes; &s;he may be otherwi&s;e both loving and pre|valent, as many adultre&s;&s;es be; but in this general unfitnes or alienation &s;he can be nothing to him that can plea&s;e. In adultery nothing is given from the husband, which he mi&s;&s;es, or enjoyes the le&s;s, as it may be &s;uttly giv'n: but this unfitnes defrauds him of the whole contentment which is &s;ought in wedloc. And what benefit to him, though nothing be giv'n by the &s;tealth of adultery to another, if that which there is to give, whether it be &s;olace, or &s;ociety, be not &s;uch as may ju&s;tly content him? and &s;o not only deprives him of what it &s;hould give him, but gives him &s;orrow and af|fliction, which it did not ow him. Be&s;ides is adultery the greate&s;t breach of matrimony in re&s;pect of the offence to God, or of the injury to man? if in the former, then other &s;ins may offend God more, and &s;ooner cau&s;e him to di&s;unite his &s;ervant from being one fle&s;h with &s;uch an offender. If in re&s;pect of the latter, other injuries are demon&s;trated therein more hea|vy to mans nature then the iterated act of adultery. God therfore in his wi&s;edom would not &s;o di&s;po&s;e his remedies, as to provide them for the le&s;s injuries, and not allow them for the greater. Thus is won both from the word fornication, &amp; the rea&s;on of adultery, that the exception of di|vorce is not limitted to that act, but enlarg'd to the cau&s;es above &s;pecify'd.</P>
<P><HI>[And who &s;o marieth her which is put away doth committ adultery.</HI></P>
<P>By this clau&s;e alone, if by nothing els, we may a&s;&s;ure us, that Chri&s;t intended not to deliver heer the whole doctrin of divorce, but only to condemn abu&s;es. Otherwi&s;e to marry after de&s;ertion, which the Apo&s;tle,
<PB N="67" REF="39">
and the reformed Churches at this day permitt, is heer forbid, as adultery. Be &s;he never &s;o wrongfully de&s;erted, or put away, as the law then &s;uffer'd, if thus for&s;ak'n and expul&s;t, &s;he accept the refuge and protection of any hone&s;ter man who would love her better, and give her &s;elf in mariage to him, by what the letter guides us, it &s;hall be pre&s;ent adultery to them both. This is either har&s;h and cruel, or all the Churches teaching as they doe the contrary, are loos and remi&s;s; be&s;ides that the Apo&s;tle him&s;elfe &s;tands deeply fin'd in a contradiction again&s;t our Saviour. What &s;hall we make of this? what rather the common interpreter can make of it, for they be his own markets, let him now trie; let him trie which way he can wind in his <HI>Vertumnian</HI> di&s;tinctions and eva&s;ions, if his canonical gabardine of text and letter do not now &s;it too clo&s;e about him, and pinch his activity; which if I erre not, hath heer hamper'd it &s;elfe in a &s;pringe fitt for tho&s;e who put their confidence in Alphabets. <HI>Spanheim</HI> a writer of <HI>Evangelic doubts</HI> comes now and confe&s;&s;es that our Saviours words <HI>are to be limited beyond the limitation there expre&s;t and excepted beyond their own exception,</HI> as not &s;peaking of what happn'd rarely, but what mo&s;t commonly. Is it &s;o rare <HI>Spanheim,</HI> to be de&s;erted, or was it then &s;o rare to put away injuriou&s;ly, that a per&s;on &s;o hatefully expell'd, &s;hould to the heaping of more injury be turn'd like an infectious thing out of all mari|ed fruition upon pain of adultery, as not con&s;iderable to the brevity of this halfe &s;entence? Of what then &s;peakes our Saviour? <HI>of that collu&s;ion,</HI> &s;aith he, <HI>which was then mo&s;t frequent among the Jews of changing wives and husbands, through incon&s;tancy and uncha&s;t de&s;ires.</HI> Colluders your &s;elves, as violent to this law of God by your unmercifull binding, as the Phari&s;es by their unbounded loo&s;ning! Have thou&s;ands of Chri&s;tian &s;ouls peri&s;ht as to this life, and God knows what hath betided their con&s;ciences, for want of this healing explanation, and is it now at la&s;t ob&s;curely drawn forth, only to cure a &s;cratch, and leave the main wound &s;pouting? <HI>Who &s;o ever putteth away his wife except for fornication committeth adultery;</HI> That &s;hall be &s;poke of all ages, and all men, though never &s;o ju&s;tly otherwi&s;e mov'd to divorce: in the very next breath, <HI>And who &s;o marieth her which is put away committeth adultery,</HI> the men are new and miraculous, they tell you now <HI>you are to limit it to that age, when it was in fa&s;hion to chop ma|trimonies; and mu&s;t be meant of him who puts away with his wives con&s;ent through the lightnes, and leudnes of them both.</HI> But what rule of Logic, or in|deed of rea&s;on is our commi&s;&s;ion to under&s;tand the <HI>Anteeedent</HI> one way and the <HI>Con&s;equent</HI> another; for in that habitude this whole vers may be
<PB N="68" REF="40">
fider'd: or at lea&s;t to take the parts of a <HI>copulat axiom,</HI> both ab&s;olutely af|firmative, and to &s;ay the fir&s;t is ab&s;olutely true, the other not, but mu&s;t bee limited to a certain time and cu&s;tome; which is no le&s;&s;e then to &s;ay they are both fal&s;e. For in this <HI>compound axiom,</HI> be the parts never &s;o many, if one of them doe but falter, &amp; be not equally ab&s;olute and generall, the re&s;t are all fals. If therefore, that <HI>he who marries her which is put away committs adultery,</HI> be not generally true, neither is it generally true that <HI>he committs adultery who puts away for other cau&s;e then fornication.</HI> And if the marry|ing her which is put away mu&s;t be under&s;tood limited, which they cannot but yeild it mu&s;t, with the &s;ame limitation mu&s;t be under&s;tood the putting away. Thus doth the common expo&s;ition confound it &s;elfe, and ju&s;tify this which is heer brought; that our Saviour as well in the fir&s;t part of this &s;entence as in the &s;econd, prohibited onely &s;uch divor&s;es as the Jewes then made through malice or through plotted licence, not tho&s;e which are for nece&s;&s;ary and ju&s;t cau&s;es; where charity and wi&s;edome disjoyns, that which not God, but Error and Di&s;a&s;tre joyn'd.</P>
<P>And there is yet to this our expo&s;ition, a &s;tronger &s;iding freind, then any can be an adver&s;ary, unle&s;&s;e Saint <HI>Paul</HI> be doubted, who repeating a command concerning divorce, 1 <HI>Cor.</HI> 7. which is agreed by writers to be the &s;ame with this of our Saviour, and appointing that the <HI>wife remaine un|maried, or be reconcil'd to her husband,</HI> leavs it infallible that our Saviour &s;pake cheifly again&s;t putting away for ca&s;ual and choleric di&s;agreements, or any other cau&s;e which may with human patience and wi&s;edom be re|concil'd, not hereby meaning to hale and da&s;h together the irreconcilable aver&s;ations of nature, nor to tie up a faultle&s;&s;e per&s;on like a parricide, as it were into one &s;ack with an enemy, to be his cau&s;ele&s;&s;e tormenter and ex|ecutioner the length of a long life. La&s;tly, let this &s;entence of Chri&s;t bee under&s;tood how it will, yet that it was never intended for a judicial law, to be inforc'd by the Magi&s;trat, be&s;ides that the office of our Saviour had no &s;uch purpo&s;e in the Go&s;pel, this latter part of the &s;entence may a&s;&s;ure us, <HI>And who &s;o marrieth her which is put away committs adultery.</HI> Shall the exception for adultery belong to this clau&s;e or not? if not, it would be &s;trange, that he who marries a woman really divorc't for adultery, as Chri&s;t permitted, &s;hould become an adulter by marrying one who is now no other mans wife, him&s;elf being al&s;o free, who might by this meanes re|claim her from common whordome. And if the exception mu&s;t belong hither, then it followes that he who marries an adultre&s;&s;e divorc'd, com|mits no adultry; which would &s;oone di&s;cover to us what an ab&s;urd and
<PB N="69" REF="40">
&s;en&s;eles peece of inju&s;tice this would be, to make a civil &s;tatute of, in penal courts: whereby the adultre&s;&s;e put away may marry another &s;afely, and without a crime to him that marries her: but the innocent and wrong|fully divorc'd &s;hall not marry again without the guilt of adultery both to her &s;elfe and to her &s;econd husband. This &s;aying of Chri&s;t therefore can|not be made a temporal law, were it but for this rea&s;on. Nor is it ea&s;ie to &s;ay what coherence there is at all in it from the letter, to any perfet &s;en&s;e not obnoxious to &s;om ab&s;urdity, and &s;eems much le&s;&s;e agreeable to what ever els of the Go&s;pel is left us written; doubtles by our Saviour &s;pok'n in that fiercenes and ab&s;tru&s;e intricacy, fir&s;t to amu&s;e his tempters, and ad|moni&s;h in general the abu&s;ers of that Mo&s;aic law; next to let <HI>Herod</HI> know a &s;econd knower of his unlawfull act, though the Bapti&s;t were beheaded; la&s;t that his Di&s;ciples and all good men might learne to expound him in this place, as in all other his precepts, not by the written letter, but by that unerring paraphra&s;e of Chri&s;tian love and Charity, which is the &s;umme of all commands, and the perfection.</P>
</DIV3>
<DIV3 TYPE="section">
<EPIGRAPH>
<Q>Ver&s;. 10. <HI>His Di&s;ciples &s;ay unto him, if the ca&s;e of the man be &s;o with his wife, it is not good to marry.</HI></Q>
</EPIGRAPH>
<P>This ver&s;e I adde, to leave no objection behind unan&s;wer'd: for &s;ome may thinke, if this our Saviours &s;entence be &s;o faire, as not commanding ought that patience or nature cannot brook, why then did the Di&s;ciples murmur and &s;ay, <HI>it is not good to marry.</HI> I an&s;wer that the Di&s;ciples had bin longer bred up under the Phari&s;aean doctrin, then under that of Chri&s;t, and &s;o no marvel though they yet retain'd the infection of loving old li|centious cu&s;toms; no marvel though they thought it hard they might not for any offence that throughly anger'd them, divorce a wife, as well as put away a &s;ervant; &s;ince it was but giving her a bill, as they were taught. Secondly, it was no unwonted thing with them not to under&s;tand our Sa|viour in matters farre ea&s;ier. So that bee it granted their conceit of this text was the &s;ame which is now commonly conceiv'd, according to the u|&s;uall rate of their capacity then, it will not hurt a better interpretation. But why did not Chri&s;t &s;eeing their error informe them? for good cau&s;e; it was his profe&s;t method not to teach them all things at all times, but each thing in due place and &s;ea&s;on. Chri&s;t &s;aid <HI>Luke</HI> 22. <HI>that hee who had no &s;word &s;hould &s;ell his garment and buy one:</HI> the Di&s;ciples tooke it in a manife&s;t wrong &s;en&s;e, yet our Saviour did not there informe them better. He told
<PB N="70" REF="41">
them <HI>it was ea&s;ier for a Camell to go through a needles eye,</HI> then a rich man in at heav'n gate. They were <HI>amaz'd exceedingly:</HI> he explain'd him&s;elfe to meane of tho&s;e <HI>who tru&s;t in riches, Mark</HI> 10. <HI>They were amaz'd then out of mea&s;ure,</HI> for &s;o <HI>Marke</HI> relates it; as if his explaining had increas'd their amazement, in &s;uch a plaine ca&s;e, and which concern'd &s;o neerely their calling to be inform'd in Good rea&s;on therefore, if Chri&s;t at that time did not &s;tand amplifying, to the thick prejudice and tradition where in they were, this que&s;tion of more difficulty, and le&s;&s;e concernment to any perhaps of them in particular. Yet did he not omitt to &s;ow within them the &s;eeds of a &s;ufficient determining, agen the time that his promis'd &s;pirit &s;hould bring all things to their memory. Hee had declar'd in their hearing not long before, how di&s;tant hee was from aboli&s;hing the law it &s;elfe of di|vorce; hee had referr'd them to the in&s;titution; and after all this, gives them a &s;et an&s;wer, from which they might collect what was cleer anough, that <HI>all men cannot receive all &s;ayings,</HI> ver&s;e 11. If &s;uch regard bee had to each mans receiving of mariage or &s;ingle life, what can ari&s;e, that the &s;ame chri&s;tian regard &s;hould not bee had in mo&s;t nece&s;&s;ary divorce? All which in&s;tructed both them and us, that it be&s;eem'd his Di&s;ciples to learne the deciding of this que&s;tion, which hath nothing new in it, fir&s;t by the in&s;titution, then by the generall grounds of religion, not by a particular &s;aying here or there, temper'd and level'd only to an incident occa&s;ion, the riddance of a tempting a&s;&s;ault. For what can this bee but weake and &s;hallow apprehen&s;ion, to for&s;ake the &s;tandard principles of in&s;titution, faith, &amp; charity; then to be blanke &amp; various at every occurrence in Scrip|ture, and in a cold <HI>Spa&s;m</HI> of &s;cruple, to reare peculiar doctrines upon the place; that &s;hall bid the gray autority of mo&s;t unchangeable and &s;ovran rules to &s;tand by &amp; be contradicted. Thus to this Evangelic precept of fa|mous difficulty, which for the&s;e many ages weakly under&s;tood, and vio|lently put in practice, hath made a &s;hambles rather then an ordinance of matrimony, I am firme a truer expo&s;ition cannot be given. If this or that argument heer us'd, plea&s;e not every one, there is no &s;car&s;ity of arguments, any halfe of them will &s;uffice, Or &s;hould they all faile, as Truth it &s;elfe can faile as &s;oon, I &s;hould content me with the in&s;titution alone to wage this controver&s;ie, and not di&s;tru&s;t to evince. If any need it not, the happier; yet Chri&s;tians ought to &s;tudy earne&s;tly what may be anothers need. But if, as mortall mi&s;chances are, &s;om hap to need it, let them be &s;ure they a|bu&s;e not, and give God his thanks, who hath reviv'd this remedy, not too late for them, and &s;cowr'd off an inveterat mi&s;expo&s;ition from the
<PB N="71" REF="41">
Go&s;pel: a work not to peri&s;h by the vaine breath or doome of this age. Our next indu&s;try &s;hall bee, under the &s;ame guidance, to try with what fidelity that remaining pa&s;&s;age in the <HI>Epi&s;tles</HI> touching this matter, hath bin commented.</P>
</DIV3>
<DIV3 TYPE="section">
<EPIGRAPH>
<BIBL>1 COR. 7. 10, &amp;c.</BIBL>
<Q>10. <HI>And unto the maried I command, &amp;c.</HI></Q>
<Q>11. <HI>And let not the husband put away his wife.</HI></Q>
</EPIGRAPH>
<P>THis intimates but what our Saviour taught before, that divorce is no ra&s;hly to be made, but reconcilement to be per&s;uaded and endevo'rd, as oft as the cau&s;e can have to doe with reconcilement, &amp; is not under the dominion of blameles nature; which may have rea&s;on to depart though &s;eldome&s;t and la&s;t from charitable love, yet &s;omtimes from friendly, and familiar, and &s;omthing oftner from conjugal love, which requires not on|ly moral, but natural cau&s;es to the making and maintayning; and may be warrantably excus'd to retire from the deception of what it ju&s;tly &s;eeks, and the ill requitals which unju&s;tly it finds. For Nature hath her <HI>Zodiac</HI> al&s;o, keepes her great annual circuit over human things as truly as the Sun and Planers in the firmament; hath her <HI>anomalies,</HI> hath her obliquities in a&s;cen&s;ions and declinations, acce&s;&s;es and rece&s;&s;es, as blamele&s;ly as they in heaven. And &s;itting in her planetary Orb with two rains in each hand, one &s;trait, the other loos, tempers the cours of minds as well as bodies to &s;everal conjunctions and oppo&s;itions, freindly, or unfriendly a&s;pects, con&s;enting ofte&s;t with rea&s;on, but never contrary. This in the ef|fect no man of meane&s;t reach but daily &s;ees; and though to every one it appeare not in the cau&s;e, yet to a cleare capacity, well nurtur'd with good reading and ob&s;ervation, it cannot but be plaine and vi&s;ible. Other expo|&s;ition therefore then hath bin given to former places that give light to the&s;e two &s;ummary ver&s;es, will not be needfull: &s;ave onely that the&s;e pre|cepts are meant to tho&s;e maried who differ not in religion.</P>
<P><HI>[But to the re&s;t &s;peake I, not the Lord; if any brother hath a wife that be|leeveth not, and &s;he be plea&s;ed to dwell with him, let him not put her away.</HI></P>
<P>Now followes what is to be done, if the per&s;ons wedded be of a diffe|rent faith. The common beleef is, that a chri&s;tian is heer commanded not to divorce, if the infidel plea&s;e to &s;tay, though it be but to vexe, or to de|ride, or to &s;educe the chri&s;tian. This doctrin will be the ea&s;ie worke of a refutation. The other opinion is, that a chri&s;tian is heer conditionally
<PB N="72" REF="42" MS="y">
permitted to hold wedloc with a misbeleever only upon hopes limited by chri&s;tian prudence, which without much difficulty &s;hall be defended. That this heer &s;poken by <HI>Paul,</HI> not by the Lord cannot be a command, the&s;e rea&s; avouch. Fir&s;t the law of <HI>Mo&s;es, Exod.</HI> 34. 16. <HI>Dent.</HI> 7. 3. 6. interpreted by <HI>Ezra,</HI> and <HI>Nehemiah</HI> two infallible authors, commands to divorce an infidel not for the feare onely of a ceremonious defilement, but of an ir|religious &s;educem ent, fear'd both in re&s;pect of the beleever him&s;elfe, and of his children in danger to bee perverted by the misbeleeving parent. <HI>Nehem.</HI> 13. 24. 26 and <HI>Peter Martyr</HI> thought this a convincing rea&s;on. If therefore the legal pollution vani&s;hing have abrogated the ceremony of this law, &s;o that a chri&s;tian may be permitted to retaine an infidel without uncleannes, yet the moral rea&s;on of divorcing &s;tands to eternity, which neither Apo&s;tle nor Angel from heaven can countermand. All that they reply to this, is their human warrant, that God will pre&s;erve us in our obedience to this command again&s;t the danger of &s;educement. And &s;o undoubtedly he will, if we under&s;tand his commands aright; if we turn not this evangelic permi&s;&s;ion into a legal, and yet illegal command: If we turne not hope into bondage, the charitable and free hope of gaining another, into the forc't and &s;ervil temptation of loo&s;ing our &s;elves; but more of this beneath. Thus the&s;e words of <HI>Paul</HI> by common doctrin made a command, are made a contradiction to the morall law.</P>
<P>Secondly, not the law only, but the Go&s;pel from the law, and from it &s;elfe requires even in the &s;ame chapter, where divorce between them of one religion is &s;o narrowly forbidd, rather then our chri&s;tian love &s;hould come into danger of back&s;liding, to for&s;ake all relations how neer &s;o ever, and the wife expre&s;ly, with promi&s;e of a high reward, <HI>Mat.</HI> 19. And he who hates not father or mother, wife, or children hindring his chri&s;tian cours, much more, if they de&s;pi&s;e or a&s;&s;ault it, cannot be a Di&s;ciple, <HI>Luke</HI> 14. How can the Apo&s;tle then command us, to love and continue in that matrimony, which our Saviour bids us hate, and for&s;ake? They can as &s;oon teach our faculty of re&s;piration to contract and to dilate it &s;elfe at once, to breath and to fetch breath in the &s;ame in&s;tant, as teach our minds how to doe &s;uch contrary acts as the&s;e, towards the &s;ame object, and as they mu&s;t he done in the &s;ame moment. For either the hatred of her reli|gion, &amp; her hatred to our religion will work powerfully again&s;t the love of her &s;ociety, or the love of that will by degrees flatter out all our zealous hatred and for&s;aking and &s;oone en&s;nare us to unchri&s;tianly compliances.</P>
<P>Thirdly, In mariage there ought not only to be a civil love, but &s;uch a
<PB N="73" REF="42">
love as Chri&s;t loves his Church; but where the religion is contrary with|out hope of conver&s;ion, there can be no love, no faith, no peacefull &s;ocie|ty, (they of the other opinion confe&s;s it) nay there ought not to be, fur|der then in expectation of gaining a &s;oul; when that cea&s;es, we know God hath put enmity between the &s;eed of the woman, and the &s;eed of the Serpent. Neither &s;hould <HI>we love them that hate the Lord,</HI> as the Prophet told <HI>Jeho&s;aphat.</HI> 2 <HI>Chron.</HI> 19. And this Apo&s;tle him&s;elfe in another place, warns us <HI>that we be not unequally yokt with Infidels</HI> 2 <HI>Cor.</HI> 6. for that there can be no fellow&s;hip, no communion, no concord between &s;uch. Out|ward commerce and civil intercours cannot perhaps be avoided; but true friend&s;hip and familiarity there can be none. How vainly therefore, not to &s;ay how impiou&s;ly would the mo&s;t inward and dear alliance of mari|age or continuance in mariage be commanded, where true friend&s;hip is confe&s;t impo&s;&s;ible. For &s;ay they, wee are forbidd heer to marry with an infidel, not bid to divorce. But to rob the words thus of their full &s;en&s;e will not be allow'd them: it is not &s;aid, enter not into yoke, but <HI>be not unequally yokt;</HI> which plainly forbids the thing in pre&s;ent act, as well as in purpo&s;e; and his manite&s;t conclu<GAP DESC="illegible" REASON="faint" EXTENT="1 letter">ion is, not only that <HI>we &s;hould not touch,</HI> but that having toucht, <HI>we &s;hould come out from among them, and be &s;eparat;</HI> with the promi&s;e of a ble&s;&s;ing thereupon that <HI>God will receave us, will be our father, and we his &s;ons and daughters.</HI> v. 17. 18. Why we &s;hould &s;tay with an Infidel after the expence of all our hopes, can be but for a civil relation; but why we &s;hould depart from a &s;educer, &s;etting a|fide the mi&s;con&s;truction of this place, is from a religious nece&s;&s;ity of de|parting. The wors cau&s;e therefore of &s;taying (if it be any cau&s;e at all, for civil government forces it not) mu&s;t not overtop the religious cau&s;e of &s;eparating, executed with &s;uch an urgent zeal, &amp; &s;uch a pro&s;trate humili|ation by <HI>Ezra</HI> and <HI>Nehemiah.</HI> What God hates to joyn, certainly he can|not love &s;hould continue joyn'd: it being all one in matter of ill con&s;e|quence, to marry, or to continue maried with an Infidel, &s;ave only &s;o long as we wait willingly, and with a &s;afe hope. St. <HI>Paul</HI> therefore citing heer a command of <HI>the Lord Almighty,</HI> for &s;o he terms it, that we &s;hould <HI>&s;eparate,</HI> cannot have bound us with that which he calls his own whether command or coun&s;el that we &s;hould not &s;eparate.</P>
<P>Which is the fourth rea&s;on, for he him&s;elfe takes care lea&s;t we &s;hould mi&s;take him, <HI>[But to the re&s;t &s;peak If not the Lord.]</HI> If the Lord &s;pake not, then man &s;pake it and man hath no Lord&s;hip to command the con|&s;cience: yet modern interpreters will have it a command maugre St.
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<HI>Paul</HI> him&s;elfe, they will make him a Prophet like <HI>Caiaphas</HI> to &s;peak the word of the Lord not thinking, nay denying to think; though he di&s;avow to have receav'd it from the Lord, his word &s;hall not be tak'n, though an Apo&s;tle, he &s;hall be born down in his own Epi&s;tle, by a race of expo&s;iters who pre&s;ume to know from whom he &s;pake, better then he him&s;elfe. <HI>Paul</HI> depo&s;es that the Lord &s;peaks not this, they, that the Lord &s;peaks it: can this be le&s;s then to brave him with a full fac't contradiction? Cer|tainly to &s;uch a violence as this, for I cannot call it an expounding, what a man &s;hould an&s;wer I know not, unle&s;s that if it be their plea&s;ure next to put a gag into the Apo&s;tles mouth, they are already &s;urni&s;ht with a commodious audacity toward the attempt. <HI>Beza</HI> would &s;eem to &s;hun the contradictory by telling us that the Lord &s;pake it not in per&s;on, as he did the former precept. But how many other doctrines doth St. <HI>Paul</HI> deliver which the Lord &s;pake not in per&s;on, and yet never u&s;es this preamble but in things indifferent? So long as we receave him for a me&s;|&s;enger of God, for him to &s;tand &s;orting &s;entences what the Lord &s;pake in per&s;on, and what he, not the Lord in per&s;on, would be but a chill trif|ling, and his readers might catch an ague the while. But if we &s;hall &s;up|ply the grammatical <HI>Ellip&s;is</HI> regularly, and as we mu&s;t in the &s;am <HI>ten&s;e,</HI> all will be then cleer, for we cannot &s;upply it thus, to the re&s;t I &s;peake, the Lord &s;pake not, but I &s;peake, the Lord &s;peaks not. If then the Lord nei|ther &s;pake in per&s;on nor &s;peakes it now, the Apo&s;tle te&s;tifying both, it follows duely, that this can be no command. For&s;ooth the fear is, lea&s;t this not being a command, would prove an evangelic coun&s;el, &amp; &s;o make way for &s;upererogations. As if the Apo&s;tle could not &s;peak his mind in things indifferent, as he doth in fowr or five &s;everal places of this chapter with the like preface of not commanding, but that the doubted inconvenience of &s;upererogating mu&s;t needs ru&s;h in. And how adds it to the word of the Lord, (for this al&s;o they object) when as the Apo&s;tle by his chri&s;tian prudence guids us in the liberty which God hath left us to, without command? could not the &s;pirit of God in&s;truct us by him what was free, as well as what was not? But what need I more, when <HI>Cameron</HI> an ingenuous writer, and in high e&s;teem, &s;olidly confutes the &s;urmi&s;e of a command heer, and among other words hath the&s;e. That <HI>when Paul &s;peaks as an Apo&s;tle, he u&s;es this forme,</HI> The Lord &s;aith, not I v 10. <HI>but as a privat man he &s;aith,</HI> I &s;peak, not the Lord. And thus al&s;o all the prime fathers <HI>Au&s;tin, Jerom,</HI> and the re&s;t under&s;tood this place.</P>
<P>Fiftly, The very &s;tating of the que&s;tion declares this to be no com|mand;
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<HI>If any brother hath an unbeleeuing wife, and &s;he be plea&s;ed to dwell with him, let him not put her away.</HI> For the Greek word <GAP DESC="foreign"> does not imply only her being pleas'd to &s;tay, but his being pleas'd to let her &s;tay; it mu&s;t be a con&s;ent of them both. Nor can the force of this word be render'd le&s;s, without either much negligence or iniquity of him that otherwi&s;e tran&s;lates it. And thus the Greek Church al&s;o and their Sy|nods under&s;tood it, who be&s;t knew what their own language meant, as appeares by <HI>Matthaeus Monachus</HI> an author &s;et forth by <HI>Leunclauius</HI> and of antiquity perhaps not inferior to <HI>Bal&s;amon</HI> who writes upon the canons of the Apo&s;tles; this Author in his chap. <HI>that mariage is not to be made with heretics,</HI> thus recites the &s;econd canon of the 6. Synod, <HI>As to the Corinthians Paul determins, If the beleeving wife choos to live with the unbeleeving husband, or the beleeving husband with the unbeleeving wife. Mark</HI> &s;aith he, <HI>how the Apo&s;tle heer conde&s;cends, if the beleever plea&s;e to dwell with the unbeleever; &s;o that if he plea&s;e not, out of doubt the mariage is di&s;&s;olv'd. And I am per&s;waded it was &s;o in the beginning, and thus preach't.</HI> And thereupon gives an example of one, who though not de&s;erted, yet by the decree of <HI>Theodotus</HI> the Patriarch divorc't an unbeleeving wife. What therefore depends in the plain &s;tate of this que&s;tion on the con&s;ent and well liking of them both, mu&s;t not be a command. Lay next the lat|ter end of the 11. v, to the twelf (for wherefore els is Logic taught us) in a <HI>di&s;crete axiom,</HI> as it can be no other by the phra&s;e, <HI>The Lord &s;aith, let not the husband put away his wife, But I &s;ay let him not put away a misbelee|ving wife;</HI> this &s;ounds as if by the judgement of <HI>Paul,</HI> a man might put away any wife but the misbeleeving; or els the parts are not <HI>di&s;crete,</HI> or <HI>di&s;&s;entanie,</HI> for both conclude not putting away, and con&s;equently in &s;uch a form the propo&s;ition is ridiculous. Of nece&s;&s;ity therfore the for|mer part of this &s;entence mu&s;t be conceav'd, as under&s;tood, and &s;ilently granted, that although the Lord command to divorce an infidel, yet I, not the Lord command you? No, but give my judgement, that for &s;om evangelic rea&s;ons a chri&s;tian may be permitted not to divorce her. Thus while we reduce the brevity of St. <HI>Paul</HI> to a plainer &s;en&s;e, by the need|full &s;upply of that which was granted between him and the Corinthians, the very logic of his &s;peech extracts him confe&s;&s;ing that the Lords com|mand lay in a &s;eeming contrariety to this his coun&s;el: and that he meant not to thru&s;t out a command of the Lord by a new one of his own, as one nail drives another, but to relea&s;e us from the rigor of it, by the right of the Go&s;pel, &s;o farre forth as a charitable cau&s;e leads us on in the
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hope of winning another &s;oule without the peril of loo&s;ing our own. For this is the glory of the Go&s;pel to teach us that <HI>the end of the commandment is charity,</HI> 1 <HI>Tim.</HI> 1. not the drudging out a poore and worthle&s;&s;e duty forc't from us by the taxe, and taile of &s;o many letters. This doctrine therefore can bee no command, but it mu&s;t contradict the moral law, the Go&s;pel, and the Apo&s;tle him&s;elfe both el&s;e where, and heere al&s;o eevn in the act of &s;peaking.</P>
<P>If then it be no command, it mu&s;t remain to be a permi&s;&s;ion, and that not ab&s;olute, for &s;o it would be &s;till contrary to the law, but with &s;uch a cau|tion as breaks not the law, but as the manner of the Go&s;pel is, fulfills it through charity. The law had two rea&s;ons, the one was ceremonial, the pollution that all Gentiles were to the Jewes; this the vi&s;ion of <HI>Peter</HI> had aboli&s;ht, Acts 10. and clens'd all creatures to the u&s;e of a Chri&s;tian. The <HI>Corinthians</HI> under&s;tood not this, but fear'd le&s;t dwelling in matrimony with an unbeleever, they were defil'd. The Apo&s;tle di&s;cu&s;&s;es that &s;cru|ple with an Evangelic rea&s;on, &s;hewing them that although God hereto|fore under the law, not intending the conver&s;ion of the Gentiles, except &s;ome &s;pecial ones, held them as polluted things to the Jew, yet now pur|po&s;ing to call them in, he hath purify'd them from that legal uncleanne&s;&s;e wherein they &s;tood, to u&s;e and to be us'd in a pure manner.</P>
<P>For &s;aith he, <HI>The unbeleeving husband is &s;anctifi'd by the wife, and the un|beleeving wife, is &s;anctifi'd by the husband, el&s;e were your children uncleane; but now they are holy.</HI> That is, they are &s;anctify'd to you, from that legal impurity which you &s;o feare; and are brought into a neer capacity to be holy, if they beleeve, and to have free acce&s;&s;e to holy things. In the mean time, as being Gods creatures, a chri&s;tian hath power to u&s;e them accor|ding to their proper u&s;e; in as much as now, <HI>all things to the pure are be|come pure.</HI> In this legal re&s;pect therefore ye need not doubt to continue in mariage with an unbeleever. Thus others al&s;o expound this place and <HI>Cameron</HI> e&s;pecially. This rea&s;on warrants us onely what wee may doe without feare of pollution, does not binde us that we mu&s;t. But the other rea&s;on of the law to divorce an infidel was moral, the avoiding of en|ticement from the true faith. This cannot &s;hrink; but remains in as full force as ever, to &s;ave the actuall chri&s;tian from the &s;nare of a misbe|leever. Yet if a Chri&s;tian full of grace and &s;pirituall gifts finding the misbeleever not frowardly affected, feares not a &s;educing, but hopes rather a gaining, who &s;ees not that this morall rea&s;on is not viola|ted by not divorcing, which the law commanded to doe, but better ful|fill'd
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by the excellence of the Go&s;pel working through charity. For nei|ther the faithfull is &s;educ't, and the unfaithfull is either &s;av'd, or with all di&s;charge of love, and evangelic duty &s;ought to be &s;av'd. But contrary|wi&s;e if the infirme Chri&s;tian &s;hall bee commanded here again&s;t his minde, again&s;t his hope, and again&s;t his &s;trength, to dwell with all the &s;candals, the hou&s;hold per&s;ecutions, or alluring temptations of an infidel, how is not the Go&s;pel by this made har&s;her then the law, and more yoaking? Therefore the Apo&s;tle ere he deliver this other rea&s;on why wee need not in all ha&s;t put away an infidel, his mind mi&s;giving him lea&s;t he &s;hould &s;eem to be the impo&s;er of a new command, &s;taies not for method, but with an abrupt &s;peed in&s;erts the declaration of their liberty in this matter.</P>
<P><HI>But if the unbeleeving depart, let him depart; a brother or a &s;i&s;ter is not un|der bondage in &s;uch ca&s;es: but God hath called us to peace.</HI></P>
<P><HI>[But if the unbeleeving depart.]</HI> This cannot be re&s;train'd to locall de|parture only; for who knows not that an offencive &s;ociety is wor&s;e then a for&s;aking. If his purpo&s;e of cohabitation be to endanger the life, or the con&s;cience, <HI>Beza</HI> him&s;elfe is halfe per&s;waded, that this may purcha&s;e to the faithfull per&s;on the &s;ame freedome that a de&s;ertion may; and &s;o <HI>Ge|rard</HI> and others whom he cites. If therefore he depart in affection, if hee depart from giving hope of his conver&s;ion, if he di&s;turb, or &s;coffe at reli|gion, &s;educe, or tempt, if he rage, doubtle&s;&s;e not the weake on|ly, but the &s;trong may leave him, if not for feare, yet for the dignities &s;ake of religion, which cannot be liable to all ba&s;e affronts, meerely for the wor&s;hiping of a civil mariage. I take therefore <HI>departing</HI> to bee as large as the negative of being well pleas'd: that is, if he be not pleas'd for the pre|&s;ent to live lovingly, quietly, inoffen&s;ively, &s;o as may give good hope; which appeares well by that which followes.</P>
<P><HI>[A brother or a &s;i&s;ter is not under bondage in &s;uch ca&s;es.]</HI> If Saint <HI>Paul</HI> provide &s;eriou&s;ly again&s;t the bondage of a chri&s;tian, it is not the only bondage to live unmaried for a de&s;erting infidel, but to endure his pre|&s;ence intolerably, to beare indignities again&s;t his religion in words or deedes, to be wearied with &s;educements, to have idolatries and &s;uper&s;titi|ons ever before his eyes, to be tormented with impure and prophane con|ver&s;ation, this mu&s;t needs be bondage to a chri&s;tian; is this left all unpro|vided for, without remedy, or freedom granted? undoubtedly no, for, the Apo&s;tle leavs it furder to be con&s;ider'd with prudence, what bondage a brother or &s;i&s;ter is not under, not onely in this ca&s;e, but as hee &s;peaks him&s;elfe plurally, <HI>in &s;uch ca&s;es.</HI></P>
<P><PB N="78" REF="45">
<HI>[But God hath called us to peace.]</HI> To peace, not to bondage, not to brabbles and contentions with him who is not pleas'd to live peaceably, as mariage and chri&s;tianity requires. And where &s;tri&s;e ari&s;es from a cau&s;e hopele&s;&s;e to be allayd, what better way to peace then by &s;eparating that which is ill joyn'd. It is not divorce, that fir&s;t breaks the peace of family, as &s;om fondly comment on this place, but it is peace already brok'n, which, when other cures fail can only be re&s;tor'd to the faultles per&s;on by a ne|ce&s;&s;ary divorce. And Saint <HI>Paul</HI> heer warrants us to &s;eeke peace, rather then to remain in bondage. If God hath call'd us to peace, why &s;hould we not follow him, why &s;hould we mi&s;erably &s;tay in perpetual di&s;cord under a &s;ervitude not requir'd?</P>
<P><HI>[For what knowe&s;t thou O wife, whether thou &s;halt &s;ave thy husband, &amp;c.]</HI> St. <HI>Paul</HI> having thus clear'd him&s;elfe, not to goe about the mining of our chri&s;tian liberty, not <HI>to ca&s;t a &s;nare upon us,</HI> which to doe hee &s;o much ha|ted, returnes now to the &s;econd rea&s;on of that law to put away an infi|del, for feare of &s;educement, which hee does not heer contradict with a command now to venture that; but if neither the infirmity of the Chri|&s;tian, nor the &s;trength of the unbeleever be fear'd, but hopes appearing that he may be won, he judges it no breaking of that law, though the be|leever be permitted to forbeare divorce, and can abide, without the peril of &s;educement, to offer the charity of a &s;alvation to wife or husband, which is the fulfilling, not the tran&s;gre&s;&s;ing of that law; and well worth the undertaking with much hazard and patience. For what knowe&s;t thou whether thou &s;halt &s;ave thy wife, that is, till all meanes convenient and po&s;&s;ible with di&s;cretion and probability, as human things are, have bin us'd. For Chri&s;t him&s;elfe &s;ends not our hope on pilgrimage to the worlds end; but &s;ets it bounds beyond which we need not wait on a brother, much le&s;&s;e on an infidell. If after &s;uch a time we may count a profe&s;&s;ing Chri&s;tian no better then a heathen, after le&s;s time perhaps wee may cea&s;e to hope of a heathen, that hee will turne chri&s;tian. Otherwi&s;e, to binde us harder then the law, and tell us wee are not under bondage, is meere mockery. If till the unbeleever plea&s;e to part, we may not &s;tirre from the hou&s;e of our bondage, then certain this our liberty is not grounded in the purchas of Chri&s;t, but in the plea&s;ure of a mi&s;creant. What knowes the loyal husband whether he may not &s;ave the adultere&s;&s;e, he is not ther|fore bound to receive her. What knowes the wife but &s;hee may reclaim her husband who hath de&s;erted her? yet the reformed Churches doe not enjoyn her to wait longer then after the contempt of an Eccle&s;ia&s;tical
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Summons. <HI>Beza</HI> him&s;elfe heer befriends us with a remarkable &s;peech, <HI>what could be firmly con&s;tituted in human matters if under pretence of ex|pecting grace from aboue, it &s;hould be never lawfull for us to &s;eeke our right.</HI> And yet in other ca&s;es not le&s;&s;e rea&s;onable to obtain a mo&s;t ju&s;t and need|full remedy by divorce he turnes the innocent party to a taske of prayers beyond the multitude of beads and <HI>ro&s;aries,</HI> to beg the gift of cha&s;tity in re|compence of an injurious mariage. But the Apo&s;tle is evident anough, <HI>we are not under bondage,</HI> tru&s;ting that he writes to tho&s;e who are not ig|norant what bondage is, to let &s;upercilious determiners cheat them of their freedome. God hath call'd us to peace, and &s;o doubtle&s;&s;e hath left in our hands how to obtaine it &s;ea&s;onably; if it be not our own choi&s;e to &s;it ever like novices wretchedly &s;ervile.</P>
<P>Thus much the Apo&s;tle on this que&s;tion between Chri&s;tian and Pagan, to us now of little u&s;e; yet &s;uppo&s;ing it written for our in&s;truction as it may be rightly apply'd, I doubt not but that the difference between a true beleever and a heretic, or any one truely religious either de&s;erted or &s;ee|king divorce from any one gros&s;ly erroneous or profane may be referr'd hither. For St. <HI>Paul</HI> &s;eaves us heer the &s;olution not of this ca&s;e only, which little concernes us, but of <HI>&s;uch like ca&s;es,</HI> which may occurr to us. For where the rea&s;ons directly &s;quare, who can forbid why the verdit &s;hould not be the &s;ame? But this the common writers allow us not. And yet from this text which in plaine words gives liberty to none unle&s;&s;e de&s;er|ted by an infidel, they collect the &s;ame freedom though the de&s;ertion bee not for religion, which, as I conceive, they neede not doe; but may with|out &s;training reduce it to the cau&s;e of fornication. For fir&s;t they confe&s;&s;e that de&s;ertion is &s;eldome without a ju&s;t &s;u&s;pition of adultery: next it is a breach of mariage in the &s;ame kind, and in &s;ome &s;ort wor&s;e: for adulte|ry though it give to another, yet it bereaves not al; but the de&s;erter wholly denies all right, and makes one fle&s;h twain, which is counted the ab&s;olute&s;t breach of matrimony, and cau&s;es the other, as much as in him lies, to commit &s;in, by being &s;o left. Neverthele&s;&s;e tho&s;e rea&s;ons which they bring of e&s;tabli&s;hing by this place the like liberty from any de&s;ertion, are faire and &s;olid: and if the thing be lawfull, and can be prov'd &s;o, more waies then one, &s;o much the &s;afer. Their arguments I &s;hall heer recite, and that they may not com idle, &s;hall u&s;e them to make good the like free|dome to divorce for other cau&s;es; and that we are no more under bon|dage to any hainous default again&s;t the main ends of matrimony, then to a de&s;ertion: Fir&s;t they allege that to <HI>Tim.</HI> 1. 5. 8. <HI>If any provide not for
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tho&s;e of his own hou&s;e, hee hath deny'd the faith, and is wor&s;e then an Infidel.</HI> But a de&s;erter, &s;ay they, <HI>can have no care of them who are most his owne, therefore the de&s;erted party is not le&s;&s;e to bee righted again&s;t &s;uch a one then a|gain&s;t an infidel.</HI> With the &s;ame evidence I argue, that man or wife who hates in wedloc, is perpetually un&s;ociable, unpeacefull, or unduteous, either not being able, or not willing to performe what the maine ends of mariage demand in helpe and &s;olace, cannot bee &s;aid to care for who &s;hou'd bee deare&s;t in the hou&s;e; therefore is wor&s;e then an infidel in both regards, either in undertaking a duty which he cannot performe, to the unde&s;erved and un&s;peakable injury of the other party &s;o defrauded and betrai'd, or not performing what he hath undertaken, whenas he may or might have, to the perjury of him&s;elfe more irreligious then heathe|ni&s;me. The blamele&s;&s;e per&s;on therefore hath as good a plea to &s;ue out his delivery from this bondage, as from the de&s;ertion of an infidel. Since mo&s;t writers cannot but grant that de&s;ertion is not only a lo|cal ab&s;ence, but an intolerable &s;ociety; or if they grant it not, the rea|&s;ons of Saint <HI>Paul</HI> grant it, with all as much leave as they grant to en|large a particular freedom from pagani&s;me, into a general freedom from any de&s;ertion. Secondly, they reafon from the likenes of either fact, <HI>the &s;ame lo&s;&s;e redounds to the de&s;erted by a chri&s;tian, as by an infidel, the &s;ame pe|ril of temptation.</HI> And I in like manner affirme that if hone&s;t and free per|&s;ons may be allow'd to know what is mo&s;t to their owne lo&s;&s;e, the &s;ame lo&s;&s;e and di&s;content, but wor&s;e di&s;quiet with continuall mi&s;ery and temp|tation re&s;ides in the company, or better call'd the per&s;ecution of an unfit, or an unpeaceable con&s;ort, then by his de&s;ertion. For then the de&s;erted may enjoy him&s;elfe at lea&s;t. And he who de&s;erts is more favourable to the party whom his pre&s;ence afflicts, then that importunat thing which is and will be ever conver&s;ant before the eyes a loyal and individual vexati|on. As for tho&s;e who &s;till rudely urge it no lo&s;s to mariage, no de&s;ertion, &s;o long as the fle&s;h is pre&s;ent and offers a benevolence that hates, or is ju&s;t|ly hated, I am not of that vulgar and low per&s;wa&s;ion, to thinke &s;uch forc'd embracements as the&s;e worth the honour, or the humanity of mariage, but farre beneath the &s;oul of a rational and freeborne man. Thirdly they &s;ay, <HI>it is not the infidelity of the de&s;erter, but the de&s;ertion of the infidel from which the Apo&s;tle gives this freedom;</HI> and I joyne that the Apo&s;tle could as little require our &s;ubjection to an unfit and injurious bondage pre&s;ent, as to an infidel ab&s;ent. To free us from that which is an evil by being di&s;tant, and not from that which is an inmate, and in the bo&s;ome
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evil, argues an improvident and careles deliverer. And thus all occa&s;ions, which way &s;o ever they turn, are not unofficious to admini&s;ter &s;omthing which may conduce to explain, or to defend the a&s;&s;ertion of this book touching divorce. I complain of nothing, but that it is indeed too copi|ous to be the matter of a di&s;pute, or a defence, rather to be yeelded, as in the be&s;t ages, a thing of common rea&s;on, not of controver&s;ie. What have I left to &s;ay? I fear to be more elaborat in &s;uch a per&s;picuity as this; le&s;t I &s;hould &s;eem not to teach, but to upbraid the dulnes of an age; not to commun with rea&s;on in men, but to deplore the lo&s;s of rea&s;on from a|mong men: this only, and not the want of more to &s;ay, is the limit of my di&s;cours.</P>
<Q>Who among the &s;athers have interpreted the words of Chri&s;t concerning divorce, as is heer interpreted; and what the civil law of Chri&s;tian Emperors in the primitive Church determi'nd.</Q>
<P>Although te&s;timony be in Logic an argument rightly call'd <HI>inartificial,</HI> &amp; doth not &s;olidly fetch the truth by multiplicity of Authors, nor argue a thing fal&s;e by the few that hold &s;o, yet &s;eeing mo&s;t men from their youth &s;o accu&s;tom, as not to &s;canne rea&s;on, nor cleerly to apprehend it, but to tru&s;t for that the names and numbers of &s;uch, as have got, and many times unde&s;ervedly, the reputation among them to know much, and be|cau&s;e there is a vulgar al&s;o of teachers, who are as blindly by whom they fancy led, as they lead the people, it will not be ami&s;s for them who had rather li&s;t them&s;elves under this weaker &s;ort, and follow authorities, to take notice that this opinion which I bring, hath bin favour'd, and by &s;om of tho&s;e affirm'd, who in their time were able to carry what they taught, had they urg'd it, through all Chri&s;tendom; or to have left it &s;uch a credit with all good men, as they who could not bouldly u&s;e the opi|nion, would have fear'd to cen&s;ure it. But &s;ince by his appointment on whom the times and &s;ea&s;ons wait, every point of doctrin is not fatall to be throughly &s;ifted out in every age, it will be anough for me to find, that the thoughts of wi&s;e&s;t heads heertofore, and hearts no le&s;s reverenc't for devotion have tended this way, and contributed their lot in &s;ome good mea&s;ure towards this which hath bin heer attain'd. Others of them and modern e&s;pecially, have bin as full in the a&s;&s;ertion, though not &s;o full in the rea&s;on; &s;o that either in this regard, or in the former, I &s;hall be manife&s;t in a middle fortune to meet the prai&s;e or di&s;prai&s;e of beeing
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&s;omthing fir&s;t. But I deferr not what I undertooke to &s;hew, that in the Church both primitive and reformed, the words of Chri&s;t have bin un|der&s;tood to grant divorce for other cau&s;es then adultery; and that the word <HI>fornication</HI> in mariage hath a larger &s;en&s;e then that commonly &s;uppos'd.</P>
<P><HI>Iu&s;tin Martyr</HI> in his fir&s;t Apology writt'n within 50. yeares after St. <HI>Iohn</HI> dy'd, relates a &s;tory which <HI>Eu&s;ebius</HI> tran&s;cribes, that a certain ma|tron of Rome, the wife of a vitious husband, her &s;elfe al&s;o formerly vi|tious, but converted to the faith, and per&s;uading the &s;ame to her husband, at le&s;t the amendment of his wicked life, upon his not yeilding to her daily entreaties and per&s;ua&s;ions in this behalf, procur'd by law to be di|vorc't from him. This was neither for adultery, nor de&s;ertion, but as the relation &s;aies, <HI>E&s;teeming it an ungodly thing to be the con&s;ort of bed with him, who again&s;t the law of nature and of right &s;ought out voluptuous waies.</HI> Suppo&s;e he endeavour'd &s;om unnaturall abu&s;e, as the Greek admitts that meaning, it cannot yet be call'd adultery; it therefore could be thought worthy of divorce no otherwi&s;e then as equivalent, or wors; and other vices will appear in other re&s;pects as much divor&s;ive. Next tis &s;aid her freinds advis'd her to &s;tay a while; and what rea&s;on gave they? not be|cau&s;e they held unlawfull what &s;he purpos'd, but becau&s;e they thought &s;he might longer yet hope his repentance. She obey'd, till the man going to <HI>Alexandria,</HI> and from thence reported to grow &s;till more impenitent, not for any adultery or de&s;ertion, wherof neither can be gather'd, but, &s;aith the <HI>Martyr,</HI> and &s;peaks it like one approving, <HI>le&s;t &s;he &s;hould be par|taker of his unrighteous and ungodly deeds, remaining in wedloc, the commu|nion of bed and board with &s;uch a per&s;on, &s;he left him by a lawfull divorce.</HI> This cannot but give us the judgement of the Church in tho&s;e pure and next to Apo&s;tolic times. For how els could the woman have bin permit|ted, or heer not reprehended; and if a wife might then doe this without reprooff, a husband certainly might no le&s;s, if not more.</P>
<P><HI>Tertullian</HI> in the &s;ame age writing his 4. book again&s;t <HI>Marcion</HI> wit|ne&s;&s;es <HI>that Chri&s;t by his an&s;wer to the Phari&s;es protected the con&s;titution of Mo&s;es as his own, and directed the in&s;titution of the creator,</HI> for I alter not his <HI>Carthaginian</HI> phra&s;e; <HI>he excus'd rather then de&s;troi'd the con&s;titution of Mo&s;es; I &s;ay he forbidd conditionally, if any one therefore put away that he may marry another: &s;o that if he prohibited conditionally, then not wholly; and what he forbadd not wholly, he permitted otherwi&s;e, where the cau&s;e cea|&s;es for which he prohibited:</HI> that is when a man makes it not the cau&s;e of
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his putting away, meerly that he may marry again. <HI>Chri&s;t teaches not contrary to Mo&s;es, the ju&s;tice of divorce hath Chri&s;t the a&s;&s;erter: he would not have mariage &s;eparat, nor kept with ignominy, permitting then a divorce,</HI> and gue&s;&s;es that this vehemence of our Saviours &s;entence was cheifly bent again&s;t <HI>Herod,</HI> as was cited before. Which leavs it evident how <HI>Tertullian</HI> interpreted this prohibition of our Saviour; for wheras the text is, <HI>Who&s;oever putteth away and marieth another,</HI> wherfore &s;hould <HI>Tertullian</HI> explain it, <HI>Who&s;oever putteth away that he may marry another,</HI> but to &s;ig|nify his opinion that our Saviour did not forbidd divorce from an un|worthy yoke, but forbidd the malice or the lu&s;t of a needles change and cheifly tho&s;e plotted divorces then in u&s;e.</P>
<P><HI>Origen</HI> in the next century te&s;tifies to have known certain who had the government of Churches in his time, who permitted &s;om to marry, while yet their former husbands liv'd, and excu&s;es the deed, as don <HI>not without cau&s;e, though without Scripture,</HI> which confirms that cau&s;e not to be adul|tery; for how then was it again&s;t Scripture that they maried again. And a little beneath, for I cite his 7. homily on <HI>Matthew,</HI> &s;aith he, <HI>To endure faults wors then adultery and fornication, &s;eems a thing unrea&s;onable,</HI> and di&s;putes therfore that Chri&s;t did not &s;peak by <HI>way of precept, but as it were expounding.</HI> By which and the like &s;peeches <HI>Origen</HI> declares his mind farre from thinking that our Saviour confin'd all the cau&s;es of divorce to actual adultery.</P>
<P><HI>Lactantius</HI> of the age that &s;ucceeded &s;peaking of this matter in the 6. of his <HI>in&s;titutions,</HI> hath the&s;e words. <HI>But le&s;t any think he may circum&s;cribe divine precepts, let this be added, that all mi&s;interpreting, and occa&s;ion of fraud, or death may be remov'd, he commits adultery who marries the di|vorc't wife, and, be&s;ides the crime of adultery, divorces a wife that he may marry another.</HI> To divorce and marry another, and to divorce that he may marry another, are two different things; and imply that <HI>Lactanti|us</HI> thought not this place the forbidding of all nece&s;&s;ary divorce, but &s;uch only as proceeded from the wanton de&s;ire of a future chois, not from the burden of a pre&s;ent affliction.</P>
<P>About this time the Councel of <HI>Eliberis</HI> in <HI>Spain</HI> decreed the husband excommunicat, <HI>If he kept his wife being an adultre&s;s; but if he left her, he might after ten yeares be receav'd into communion, if he retain'd her any while in his hou&s;e after the adultery known.</HI> The councel of <HI>Neocae&s;area</HI> in the year 314. decreed, that if the wife of any <HI>Laic</HI> were convicted of adultery, that man could not be admitted into the mini&s;tery: if after ordination it
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were committed, he was to divorce her; if not, he could not hold his mi|ni&s;tery. The councel of <HI>Nantes</HI> condemn'd in 7. yeares penance the hus|band that would reconcile with an adultre&s;s. But how proves this that other cau&s;es may divorce? it proves thus; there can be but two cau&s;es why the&s;e councels enjoyn'd &s;o &s;trictly the divor&s;ing of an adultre&s;s, either as an offender again&s;t God, or again&s;t the husband; in the latter re&s;pect they could not impo&s;e on him to divorce; for every man is the mai&s;ter of his own forgivenes; who &s;hal hinder him to pardon the injuries don again&s;t him&s;elf? It follows therfore that the divorce of an adultre&s;s was commanded by the&s;e three councels, as it was a &s;in again&s;t God; and by all con&s;equence they could not but beleeve that other &s;ins as hainous might with equal ju&s;tice be the ground of a divorce.</P>
<P><HI>Ba&s;il</HI> in his 73. rule, as <HI>Chamier</HI> numbers it, thus determins, that di|vorce ought not to be, unle&s;&s;e for adultery, <HI>or the hindrance to a godly life.</HI> What doth this but proclaime aloud more cau&s;es of divorce then adulte|ry, if by other &s;ins be&s;ides this, in wife or husband, the godlines of the better per&s;on may be certainly hinder'd, and endanger'd.</P>
<P><HI>Epiphanius</HI> no le&s;s ancient, writing again&s;t Heretics, &amp; therefore &s;hould him&s;elf be orthodoxal above others, acquaints us in his &s;econd book <HI>Tom.</HI> 1, not that his private per&s;ua&s;ion was, but that the whole Church in his time generally thought other cau&s;es of divorce lawful be&s;ides adulte|ry, as comprehended under that name; If, &s;aith he, <HI>a divorce happ'n for any cau&s;e either fornication, or adultery, or any hainous fault, the word of God blames not either the man or wife marrying again, nor cutts them off from the congregation, or from life, but beares with the infirmity; not that he may keep both wives, but that leaving the former he may be lawfully joyn'd to the latter, the holy word, and the holy Church of God commi&s;erates this man, e&s;pecially, if he be otherwi&s;e of good conver&s;ation, and live according to Gods law.</HI> This place is cleerer then expo&s;ition, and needs no comment.</P>
<P><HI>Ambro&s;e</HI> on the 16. of <HI>Luke,</HI> teaches <HI>that all wedloc is not Gods joyning</HI> and to the 19. of <HI>Pro.</HI> That a <HI>wife is prepard of the Lord,</HI> as the old latin tran&s;lates it, he an&s;wers that the &s;eptuagint renders it, <HI>a wife is fitted by the Lord, and temper'd to a kind of harmony; and where that harmony is there God joyns; where it is not, there di&s;&s;ention reigns, which is not from God, for God is love.</HI> This he brings to prove the marrying of Chri&s;tian with Gen|tile to be no mariage, and con&s;equently divorc't without &s;in: but he who &s;ees not this argument how plainly it &s;erves to divorce any untunable, or unattonable matrimony, &s;ees little. On the 1 to the <HI>Cor,</HI> 7, he grants a wo|man
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may leave her husband not for only fornication, <HI>but for Apo&s;tacy, and inverting nature, though not marry again; but the man may:</HI> heer are cau&s;es of divorce a&s;&s;ign'd other then adultery. And going on he affirms, <HI>that the cau&s;e of God is greater then the cau&s;e of matrimony; that the reve|rence of wedloc is not due to him who hates the author thereof; that no matri|mony is firm without devotion to God; that di&s;honour don to God acquitts the other being de&s;erted from the bond of matrimony; that the faith of mariage is not to be kept with &s;uch.</HI> If the&s;e contorted &s;entences be ought worth, it is not the de&s;ertion that breaks what is broken, but the impiety; and who then may not for that cau&s;e better divorce, then tarry to be de&s;erted? or the&s;e grave &s;ayings of St. <HI>Ambro&s;e</HI> are but knacks.</P>
<P><HI>Jerom</HI> on the 19. of <HI>Matthew</HI> explains, that for the cau&s;e of fornica|tion, or the <HI>&s;u&s;picion thereof a man may freely divorce.</HI> What can breed that &s;u&s;picion, but &s;undry faults leading that way? by <HI>Jeroms</HI> con&s;ent therfore divorce is free not only for actuall adultery, but for any cau&s;e that may encline a wi&s;e man to the ju&s;t &s;u&s;picion therof.</P>
<P><HI>Au&s;tin</HI> al&s;o mu&s;t be remember'd among tho&s;e who hold that this in|&s;tance offornication gives equal inference to other faults equally hate|ful, for which to divorce: &amp; therfore in his books to <HI>Pollentius</HI> he di&s;putes that <HI>infidelity, as being a greater &s;in then adultery, ought &s;o much the rather cau&s;e a divorce.</HI> And on the Sermon in the Mount, under the name of for|nication will have <HI>idolatry, or any harmfull &s;uper&s;tition</HI> contain'd, which are not thought to di&s;turb matrimony &s;o directly as &s;om other ob&s;tinacies and di&s;&s;affections, more again&s;t the daily duties of that cov'nant, &amp; in the ea&s;tern tongues not unfrequently call'd fornication, as hath bin &s;hew'n. <HI>Hence is under&s;tood,</HI> faith he, <HI>that not only for bodily fornication, but for that which draws the mind from Gods law, and fouly corrupts it, a man may with|out fault put away his wife, and a wife her husband, becau&s;e the Lord excepts the cau&s;e of fornication, which fornication we are con&s;train'd to interpret in a general &s;en&s;e.</HI> And in the fir&s;t book of his <HI>retractations</HI> chap. 16. he re|tracts not this his opinion, but commends it to &s;erious con&s;ideration; and explains that he counted not there all &s;in to be fornication, but the more dete&s;table &s;ort of &s;ins. The cau&s;e of fornication therefore is not in this di&s;cours newly interpreted to &s;ignify other faults infringing the du|ties of wedloc, be&s;ides adultery.</P>
<P>La&s;tly the councel of <HI>Agatba</HI> in the year 506. can. 25. decreed, that <HI>if lay men who divorc't without &s;ome great fault, or giving no probable cau&s;e, therfore divorc't, that they might marry &s;om unlawfull per&s;on, or &s;om other
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mans, if before the provinciall Bi&s;hops were made acquainted, or judgement pa&s;t; they pre&s;um'd this, excommunication was the penalty.</HI> Whence it followes, that if the cau&s;e of divorce were &s;om great offence, or that they gave pro|bable cau&s;es for what they did, and did not therefore divorce that they might pre&s;ume with &s;om unlawfull per&s;on, or what was another mans, the cen&s;ure of Church in tho&s;e daies did not touch them.</P>
<P>Thus having alleg'd anough to &s;hew after what manner the primitive Church for above 500. yeares under&s;tood our Saviours words touching divorce, I &s;hall now with a labour le&s;s di&s;per&s;t, and &s;ooner di&s;patcht, bring under view what the civil law of tho&s;e times con&s;tituted about this mat|ter: I &s;ay the civil law, which is the honour of every true Civilian to &s;tand for, rather then to count that for law, which the <HI>pontificiall</HI> Canon hath enthrall'd them to, and in &s;tead of interpreting a generous and ele|gant law, made them the drudges of a blocki&s;h <HI>Rubric.</HI></P>
<P><HI>Theodo&s;ius</HI> and <HI>Valentinian,</HI> pious Emperors both, ordain'd that <HI>as by con&s;ent lawfull mariages were made, &s;o by con&s;ent, but not without the bill of divorce, they might be di&s;&s;olv'd; and to di&s;&s;olve was the more difficult, onely in favour of the children.</HI> We &s;ee the wi&s;edome and piety of that age one of the pure&s;t and learnede&s;t &s;ince Chri&s;t, conceav'd no hindrance in the words of our Saviour, but that a divorce mutually con&s;ented, might bee &s;uffer'd by the law, e&s;pecially if there were no children, or if there were, carefull provi&s;ion was made. And further &s;aith that law (&s;uppo&s;ing there wanted the con&s;ent of either) <HI>wee de&s;igne the cau&s;es of divorce by this mo&s;t whol&s;om law; for as we forbid the di&s;&s;olving of mariage without ju&s;t cau&s;e, &s;o we de&s;ire that a husband or a wife di&s;tre&s;t by &s;om advers nece&s;&s;ity, &s;hould be freed, though by an unhappy, yet a nece&s;&s;ary releefe.</HI> What dramm of wi&s;edome, or religion (for charity is true&s;t religion) could there be in that knowing age, which is not virtually &s;umm'd up in this mo&s;t ju&s;t law? As for tho&s;e other Chri&s;tian Emperours, from <HI>Con&s;tantine</HI> the fir&s;t of them, finding th&eacute; Roman law in this point &s;o an&s;werable to the Mo&s;aic, it might bee the likelie&s;t cau&s;e why they alter'd nothing to re&s;traint, but if ought, rather to liberty, for the helpe, and con&s;ideration of the weaker &s;exe, according as the Go&s;pel &s;eems to make the wife more equal to her husband in the&s;e conjugal re&s;pects then the law of <HI>Mo&s;es</HI> doth. Therefore <HI>if a man were ab&s;ent from his wife foure yeares, and in that &s;pace not heard of, though gon to warre in the &s;ervice of the Empire,</HI> &s;he might divorce, and mary another by the edict of <HI>Con&s;tantine</HI> to <HI>Dalmatius. Co. l.</HI> 5. <HI>tit.</HI> 17. And this was an age of the Church both antient, and cry'd up &s;till for the mo&s;t flouri|&s;hing
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in knowledge and pious government &s;ince the Apo&s;tles. But to re|turne to this law of <HI>Theodo&s;ius,</HI> with this ob&s;ervation by the way, that &s;till as the Church corrupted, as the Clergie grew more ignorant, and yet more u&s;urping on the Magi&s;trate, who al&s;o now declin'd, &s;o &s;till divorce grew more re&s;train'd; though certainly if better times permitted the thing that wor&s;e times re&s;train'd, it would not weakly argue that the permi&s;&s;ion was better, and the re&s;traint wor&s;e. This law therefore of <HI>The|odo&s;ius</HI> wi&s;er in this then the mo&s;t of his &s;ucce&s;&s;ors though not wi&s;er then God and <HI>Mo&s;es,</HI> reduc't the cau&s;es of divorce to a certain number which by the judiciall law of God, and all recorded humanitie were left before to the bre&s;t of each husband, provided that the di&s;mi&s;&s;e was not without rea&s;onable conditions to the wife. But this was a re&s;traint not yet come to extreames. For be&s;ides adultery and that not only actual, but &s;u&s;|pected by many &s;ignes there &s;et down, any fault equally puni&s;hable with adultery, or equally infamous might bee the cau&s;e of a divorce. Which informes us how the wi&s;e&s;t of tho&s;e ages under&s;tood that place in the Go&s;pel, whereby, not the pilfering of a benevolence was con&s;ider'd as the main and only breach of wedloc, as is now thought, but the breach of love and peace, a more holy union then that of the fle&s;h; and the dig|nity of an hone&s;t per&s;on was regarded, not to bee held in bondage with one who&s;e ignominy was infectious. To this purpo&s;e was con&s;tituted <HI>Cod. l.</HI> 5. <HI>tit.</HI> 17. and <HI>Authent. collat.</HI> 4. <HI>tit.</HI> 1. <HI>Novell.</HI> 22. where <HI>Ju&s;tini|an</HI> added three cau&s;es more. In the 117. <HI>Novell.</HI> mo&s;t of the &s;ame cau&s;es are allow'd, but the liberty of divorcing by con&s;ent is repeal'd: but by whom? by <HI>Ju&s;tinian,</HI> not a wi&s;er, not a more religious emperor then ei|ther of the former, but noted by judicious writers for his fickle head in making and unmaking lawes; and how <HI>Procopius</HI> a good hi&s;torian, and a coun&s;elor of &s;tate then living deciphers him in his other actions, I wil|lingly omitt. Nor was the Church then in better ca&s;e, but had the cor|ruption of a 100. declining yeare &s;wept on it, when the &s;tatute of <HI>con&s;ent</HI> was call'd in; which as I &s;aid, gives us every way more rea&s;on to &s;u&s;pect this re&s;traint, more then that liberty: which therfore in the reign of <HI>Justin</HI> the &s;ucceeding Emperor was recall'd, <HI>Novel.</HI> 140. &amp; e&s;tabli&s;ht with a pre|face more wi&s;e &amp; chri&s;tianly then for tho&s;e times, declaring the nece&s;&s;ity to re&s;tore that <HI>Theodo&s;ian</HI> law, if no other meanes of reconcilement could be found. And by whom this law was abrogated, or how long after, I doe not finde; but that tho&s;e other cau&s;es remain'd in force, as long as the Greek empire &s;ub&s;i&s;ted, and were a&s;&s;ented by that Church, is to bee read
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in the Canons and edicts compar'd by <HI>Photius</HI> the Patriarch, with the avertiments of <HI>Bal&s;amon,</HI> and <HI>Matthaeus Monachus</HI> thereon.</P>
<P>But long before tho&s;e dayes <HI>Leo</HI> the &s;on of <HI>Ba&s;ilius, Macedo</HI> reigning about the yeare 886. and for his excellent wi&s;dome &s;urnam'd the <HI>Philo&s;o|pher,</HI> con&s;tituted <HI>that in ca&s;e of madne&s;&s;e the husband might divorce after three yeares, the wife after</HI> 5. <HI>Con&s;titut. Leon.</HI> 111. 112. this declares how hee expounded our Saviour, and deriv'd his rea&s;ons from the in&s;titution, which in his preface with great eloquence are &s;et downe; whereof a pa&s;|&s;age or two may give &s;om proofe, though better not divided from the re&s;t. <HI>There is not,</HI> &s;aith he, <HI>a thing more nece&s;&s;ary to pre&s;erve mankind, then the helpe giv'n him from his own rib; both God and nature &s;o teaching us: which being &s;o, it was requi&s;ite that the providence of law, or if any other care be to the good of man, &s;hould teach and ordaine tho&s;e things which are to the helpe and comfort of maried per&s;ons, and confirme the end of mariage purpos'd in the beginning, not tho&s;e things which afflict and bring perpetuall mi&s;ery to them.</HI> Then an&s;wers the objection that they are one fle&s;h; <HI>if Matrimony had held &s;o as God ordain'd it, he were wicked that would di&s;&s;olve it. But if we re&s;pect this in matrimony, that it be contracted to the good of both, how &s;hall he, who for &s;ome great evil feard, per&s;wades not to marry though con|tracted, not per&s;wade to unmarry, if after marriage a calamity befall? &s;hould we bid beware least any fall into an evil, and leave him helple&s;&s;e who by hu|mane error is fall'n therein? This were as if we &s;hould u&s;e remedies to prevent a di&s;ea&s;e, but let the &s;ick die without remedy.</HI> The re&s;t will be worth reading in the author.</P>
<P>And thus we have the judgement fir&s;t of primitive fathers; next of the imperial law not di&s;allow'd by the univer&s;al Church in ages of her be&s;t authority; and la&s;tly of the whole Greeke Church and civil &s;tate, incor|porating their Canons and edicts together, that divorce was lawfull for other cau&s;es equivalent to adultery, contain'd under the word fornicati|on. So that the expo&s;ition of our &s;aviours &s;entence heer alleg'd hath all the&s;e ancient and great a&s;&s;erters, is therefore neither new nor licentious, as &s;ome now would per&s;wade the commonalty; although it be neerer truth that nothing is more new then tho&s;e teachers them&s;elves, &amp; nothing more licentious then &s;ome known to be, who&s;e hypocri&s;ie yet &s;hames not to take offence at this doctrine for licence; when as indeed they feare it would remove licence, and leave them but few companions.</P>
<Q><PB N="89" REF="50">
That the Popes Canon law incroaching upon civil Magi&s;tracy abo|li&s;ht all divorce eevn for adultery. What the reformed Divines have re|cover'd; and that the famou&s;e&s;t of them have taught according to the a&s;&s;ertion of this booke.</Q>
<P>But in the&s;e we&s;tern parts of the empire it will appeare almo&s;t unque|&s;tionable that the cited law of <HI>Theodo&s;ius</HI> and <HI>Valentinian</HI> &s;tood in force untill the blinde&s;t and corrupte&s;t times of Popedom di&s;plac't it. For that the volumes of <HI>Ju&s;tinian</HI> never came into <HI>Italy,</HI> or beyond <HI>Illiricum,</HI> is the opinion of good Antiquaries. And that only manu&s;cript thereof found in <HI>Apulia</HI> by <HI>Lotharius</HI> the <HI>Saxon,</HI> and giv'n to the &s;tate of <HI>Pi&s;a</HI> for their aid at &s;ea again&s;t the <HI>Normans</HI> of <HI>Sicily,</HI> was receav'd as a rarity not to bee matcht. And although the <HI>Gothes,</HI> and after them the <HI>Lombards</HI> and <HI>Franks</HI> who over-run the mo&s;t of <HI>Europ</HI> except this I&s;land (unle&s;&s;e wee make our <HI>Saxons</HI> and <HI>Normans</HI> a limm of them) brought in their owne cu&s;tomes, yet that they follow'd the Roman laws in their contracts and mariages, <HI>Agathias</HI> the hi&s;torian is alleg'd. And other te&s;timonies relate that <HI>Alaricus</HI> &amp; <HI>Theodoric</HI> their Kings writ their &s;tatutes out of this <HI>The|odo&s;ian Code</HI> which hath the recited law of Divorce. Neverthele&s;&s;e while the Monarchs of Chri&s;tendome were yet barbarous, and but halfe Chri&s;tian, the Popes tooke this advantage of their weake &s;uper&s;tition, to rai&s;e a corpulent law out of the canons and <HI>decretals</HI> of audacious prei&s;ts; and pre&s;um'd al&s;o to &s;et this in the front; <HI>That the con&s;titutions of prin|ces are not above the con&s;titutions of clergy, but beneath them.</HI> U&s;ing this very in&s;tance of divorce as the fir&s;t prop of their tyranny; by a fal&s;e con&s;e|quence drawn from a pa&s;&s;age of <HI>Ambro&s;e</HI> upon <HI>Luke</HI> where hee &s;aith, though <HI>Mans law grant it, yet Gods law probibits it,</HI> Whence <HI>Gregory</HI> the Pope writing to <HI>Theocti&s;ta</HI> inferrs that Eccle&s;ia&s;ticall Courts cannot be di&s;&s;olv'd by the Magi&s;trate. A faire conclu&s;ion from a double error. Fir&s;t in &s;aying that the divine law prohibited divorce, for what will hee make of <HI>Mo&s;es;</HI> next &s;uppo&s;ing that it did, how will it follow, that what ever Chri&s;t for bids in his Evangelic precepts, &s;hould be hal'd into a judici|al con&s;traint again&s;t the patterne of a divine law: Certainely the Go&s;pel came not to enact &s;uch compul&s;ions. In the meane while wee may note heere that the re&s;traint of divorce was one of the fir&s;t faire &s;eeming pleas which the Pope had, to &s;tep into &s;ecular authority, and with his Antichri&s;tian rigor to aboli&s;h the permi&s;&s;ive law of Chri&s;tian princes con|forming to a &s;acred lawgiver. Which if we con&s;ider, this papal and un|ju&s;t
<PB N="90" REF="51">
re&s;triction of divorce need not be &s;o deere to us, &s;ince the plau&s;ible re&s;training of that, was in a manner the fir&s;t loo&s;ning of Antichri&s;t; and as it were the &s;ub&s;tance of his elde&s;t horn. Nor doe we le&s;s remarkably ow the fir&s;t meanes of his fall heer in <HI>England</HI> to the contemning of that re|&s;traint by <HI>Henry</HI> 8. who&s;e divorce he oppos'd. Yet was not that rigour ex|ecuted anciently in &s;piritual Courts untill <HI>Alexander</HI> the third, who trod upon the neck of <HI>Frederic Barbaro&s;&s;a</HI> the Emperor, and &s;ummond our <HI>Henry</HI> 2. into <HI>Normandy</HI> about the death of <HI>Becket.</HI> He it was, that the worthy author may be known, who fir&s;t actually repeal'd the impe|rial law of divorce, and decreed this tyranous decree, that matrimony for no cau&s;e &s;hould be di&s;olv'd, though for many cau&s;es it might &s;eparate; as may be &s;een <HI>decret, Gregor. l.</HI> 4. <HI>tit.</HI> 19. and in other places of the Cano|nicall Tomes. The main good of which invention, wherein it con&s;i&s;ts who can tell? but that it hath one vertue incomparable, to fill all chri|&s;tendom with whordomes, and adulteries beyond the art of <HI>Balaams</HI> or of divells. Yet neither can the&s;e, though &s;o perver&s;e, but acknowledge that the words of Chri&s;t under the name of fornication allow putting a|way for other cau&s;es then adultery both from <HI>bed and bord,</HI> but not from the <HI>bond;</HI> their only rea&s;on is, becau&s;e mariage they beleeve to bee a Sa|crament. But our Divines who would &s;eem long &s;ince to have renounc'd that rea&s;on, have &s;o forgot them &s;elves, as yet to hold the ab&s;urdity, which but for that rea&s;on, unle&s;&s;e there be &s;ome my&s;tery of Satan in it, perhaps the Papi&s;t would not hold. Tis true, we grant divorce for actual &amp; prov'd adultery, and not for le&s;&s;e then many tedious and unreparable yeares of de&s;ertion, wherein a man &s;hall loo&s;e all his hope of po&s;terity, which great and holy men have bewail'd, ere he can be righted; and then perhaps on the confines of his old age, when all is not worth the while. But grant this were &s;ea&s;onably don; what are the&s;e two ca&s;es to many other, which afflict the &s;tate of mariage as bad, and yet find no redre&s;&s;e? What hath the &s;oule of man de&s;erv'd, if it be in the way of &s;alvation, that it &s;hould be morgag'd thus, and may not redeem it &s;elfe according to con&s;cience out of the hands of &s;uch ignorant and &s;lothfull teachers as the&s;e, who are neither able nor mindful to give due tendance to that pretious cure which they ra&s;hly vndertake; nor have in them the noble goodne&s;&s;e to con&s;ider the&s;e di&s;tre&s;&s;es and accidents of mans life; but are bent rather to fill their mouthes with Tithe and oblation. Yet if they can learne to follow, as well as they can &s;eeke to be follow'd, I &s;hall direct them to a faire num|ber of renowned men, worthy to be their leaders, who will commend to them a doctrin in this point wi&s;er then their own, and if they bee not-impatient,
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it will be the &s;ame doctrin which this treatis hath defended.</P>
<P><HI>Wicklef</HI> that Engli&s;hman honor'd of God to be the fir&s;t preacher of a general reformation to all <HI>Europe,</HI> was not in this thing better taught of God, then to teach among his cheife&s;t recoveries of truth, that divorce is lawfull to the chri&s;tian for many other cau&s;es equall to adultery. This book indeed through the poverty of our Libraries I am forc't to cite from <HI>Arni&s;aeus</HI> of <HI>Halber&s;tad on the right of mariage,</HI> who cites it from <HI>Cora&s;ius</HI> of <HI>Tolou&s;e c.</HI> 4. <HI>Cent. Sct.</HI> and he from <HI>Wicklef. l.</HI> 4. <HI>Dial. c.</HI> 21. So much the &s;orrier, for that I never lookt into author cited by his adver&s;ary upon this occa&s;ion, but found him more conducible to the que&s;tion, then his quotation render'd him.</P>
<P>Next <HI>Luther,</HI> how great a &s;ervant of God, in his book of <HI>conjugal life</HI> quoted by <HI>Gerard</HI> out of the Dutch, allowes divorce for the ob&s;tinate de|nial of conjugal duty; and <HI>that a man may &s;end away a proud Vasthi, and marry an E&s;ther in her &s;tead.</HI> It &s;eemes if this example &s;hall not be imper|tinent, that <HI>Luther</HI> meant not onely the refu&s;all of benevolence, but a &s;tub|born denial of any main conjugal duty; or if he did not, it will be evinc't from what he allowes. For out of que&s;tion, with men that are not bar|barous, love and peace, and fitne&s;&s;e will be yeelded as e&s;&s;ential to mariage, as corporal benevolence. <HI>Though I give my body to be burnt,</HI> &s;aith Saint <HI>Paul, and have not charity, it profits me nothing.</HI> So though the body pro&s;ti|tute it &s;elfe to whom the mind affords no other love or peace, but con|&s;tant malice and vexation, can this bodily benevolence de&s;erv to be call'd a mariage between Chri&s;tians and rationall creatures.</P>
<P><HI>Melanchton,</HI> the third great luminary of reformation in his book <HI>con|cerning marriage</HI> grants divorce for cruell u&s;age, and danger of life, ur|ging the authority of that <HI>Theodo&s;ian</HI> law, which he e&s;teemes written with the grave deliberation of godly men; <HI>and that they who reject this law, and thinke it di&s;agreeing from the Go&s;pel, under&s;tand not the difference of law and Go&s;pel; that the Magi&s;trat ought not only to defend life, but to &s;uccour the weake con&s;cience, lest broke with greif and indignation it relinqui&s;h praier, and turn to &s;om unlawful thing</HI> What if this heavy plight of de&s;paire ari&s;e from other di&s;contents in wedloc which may goe to the &s;oule of a good man more then the danger of his life, or cruel u&s;ing, which a man cannot bee liable to, &s;uppo&s;e it be ingratefull u&s;age, &s;uppo&s;e it be perpetuall &s;pight and di&s;obedience, &s;uppo&s;e a hatred, &s;hall not the Magi&s;trat free him from this di&s;quiet which interrupts his prayers, and di&s;turbs the cours of his &s;ervice to God and his Country all as much, and brings him &s;uch a mi&s;e|ry,
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as that he more de&s;ires to leave his life then feares to loo&s;e it: Shall not this equally concerne the office of civil protection, and much more the charity of a true Church to remedy?</P>
<P><HI>Era&s;mus</HI> who for learning was the wonder of his age, both in his <HI>notes</HI> on <HI>Matthew,</HI> and on the fir&s;t to the <HI>Corinthians</HI> in a large and eloquent di&s;cour&s;e, and in his an&s;wer to <HI>Phimo&s;tonus</HI> a Papi&s;t, maintaines (and no prote&s;tant then living contradicted him) that the words of Chri&s;t com|prehend many other cau&s;es of divorce under the name of fornication.</P>
<P><HI>Bucer,</HI> whom our famous D^r <HI>Rainolds</HI> was wont to preferr before <HI>Cal|vin,</HI> in his comment on <HI>Matthew,</HI> and in his &s;econd booke <HI>of the King|dome of Chri&s;t,</HI> treats of divorce at large to the &s;ame effect, as is written <HI>in the doctrine and di&s;cipline of divorce</HI> lately publi&s;ht, and the tran&s;lation is extant: whom le&s;t I &s;hould be thought to have wre&s;ted to mine own pur|po&s;e, take &s;omthing more out of his 49. Chap. which I then for brevity omitted. <HI>It will be the duty of pious princes, and all who govern Church, or common wealth, if any, whether husband or wife, &s;hall affirme their want of &s;uch who either will, or can tolerably performe the nece&s;&s;ary duties of maried life, to grant that they may &s;eeke them &s;uch, and marry them; if they make it appeare that &s;uch they have not.</HI> This book he wrote heer in <HI>England,</HI> where he liv'd the greate&s;t admir'd man, and this hee dedicated to <HI>Edward</HI> the &s;ixth.</P>
<P><HI>Fagius</HI> rankt among the famous divines of <HI>Germany,</HI> whom <HI>Frederic</HI> at that time the <HI>Palatine</HI> &s;ent for to be the reformer of his Dominion, and whom afterwards <HI>England</HI> &s;ought to, and obtain'd of him to come and teach her, differs not in this opinion from <HI>Bucer,</HI> as his notes on the <HI>Chaldey paraphra&s;t</HI> well te&s;tify.</P>
<P>The whole Church of <HI>Strasburgh</HI> in her mo&s;t flouri&s;hing time, when <HI>Zellius, Hedio, Capito,</HI> and other great Divines taught there, and tho&s;e two renouned magi&s;trates <HI>Farrerus</HI> and <HI>Sturmius</HI> govern'd that common wealth and Academy to the admiration of all <HI>Germany,</HI> hath thus in the 21. Article. <HI>We teach that if according to the word of God, yea or against it, divorces happen, to doe according to Gods word, Devt.</HI> 24. 1. <HI>Mat.</HI> 19. 1 <HI>Cor.</HI> 7. <HI>and the ob&s;ervation of the primitive Church, and the Chri&s;tian con|&s;titution of pious Cae&s;ars.</HI></P>
<P><HI>Peter Martyr</HI> &s;eems in word our ea&s;y adver&s;ary, but is in deed for us: toward which though it be &s;omthing when he &s;aith of this opinion, <HI>that it is not wicked, and can hardly be refuted,</HI> this which followes is much more, <HI>I &s;peake not heer</HI> &s;aith he, <HI>Of natural impediments which may &s;o happ'n, that
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the matrimony can no longer hold:</HI> but adding, <HI>that he often wonder'd, how the antient and mo&s;t chri&s;tian Emperors e&s;tabli&s;ht tho&s;e lawes of divorce, and neither</HI> Ambro&s;e, <HI>who had &s;uch influence upon the lawes of</HI> Theodo&s;ius, <HI>nor any of tho&s;e holy fathers found fault, nor any of the Churches, why the Magi&s;trats of this day &s;hould be &s;o loth to con&s;titute the &s;ame. Perhaps, they feare an inundation of divorces, which is not likely, whenas we reade not either among the</HI> Ebrews, Greeks, <HI>or</HI> Romans <HI>that they were much frequent where they were mo&s;t per|mitted. If they judge chri&s;tian men wor&s;e then Jewes or Pagans. they both injure that name, and by this rea&s;on will bee con&s;train'd to grant divorces the rather; becau&s;e it was permitted as a remedy of evil, for who would remove the medcin, while the di&s;ea&s;e is yet &s;o rife?</HI> This being read both in <HI>his common places,</HI> &amp; on the fir&s;t <HI>to the Corinthians,</HI> with what we &s;hall relate more of him yet ere the end, &s;ets him ab&s;olute|ly on this &s;ide. Not to in&s;i&s;t that in both the&s;e, &amp; other places of his commentaries hee grants divorce not onely for de&s;ertion, but for the &s;educement and &s;candalous demeanour of a heretical con|&s;ort.</P>
<P><HI>Mu&s;culus</HI> a divine of no ob&s;cure fame di&s;tingui&s;hes betweene the religious and the civil determination of divorce; and lea|ving the civil wholly to the lawyers, pronounces a con&s;cionable divorce for importence not only natural, but accidental, if it be durable. His equity it &s;eems, can enlarge the words of Chri&s;t to one cau&s;e more then adultery; why may not the rea&s;on of ano|ther man as wi&s;e, enlarge them to another cau&s;e.</P>
<P><HI>Gualter</HI> of <HI>Zuric</HI> a well known judicious commentator in his Homilies on <HI>Matthew,</HI> allows divorce for <HI>Lepro&s;ie, or any other cau&s;e which renders unfit for wedloc,</HI> and calls this rather <HI>a nullity of mariage then a divorce,</HI> and who, that is not him&s;elfe a meer body, can re&s;train all the unfitnes of mariage only to a corporal defect.</P>
<P><HI>Hemingius</HI> an Author highly e&s;teem'd, and his works printed at <HI>Geneva,</HI> writing of divorce, confe&s;&s;es that lerned men <HI>vary in this que&s;tion, &s;ome granting three cau&s;es thereof, &s;ome five, others many more;</HI> he him&s;elfe gives us &s;ixe, <HI>adultery, de&s;ertion, inability, error, evill u&s;age, and impiety,</HI> u&s;ing argument <HI>that Chri&s;t under one &s;peci|al containes the whole kind, &amp; under the name &amp; example of fornication</HI> he includes <HI>other cau&s;es equipollent.</HI> This di&s;cours he wrote at the
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reque&s;t of many who had the judging of the&s;e cau&s;es in <HI>Denmark and Norway,</HI> who by all likely hood follow'd his advice.</P>
<P><HI>Hunnius</HI> a Doctor of <HI>Wittenberg,</HI> well known both in Divinity &amp; other arts, on the 19. of <HI>Matt.</HI> affirmes <HI>that the exception of fornica|tionexpre&s;t by our Saviour excludes not other cau&s;es equalling adul|tery, or de&s;tructive to the &s;ub&s;tantials of matrimony; but was oppos'd to the cu&s;tom of the Jewes who made divorce for every light cau&s;e.</HI></P>
<P><HI>Felix Bidenbachius</HI> an eminent Divine in the Dutchy of <HI>Wir|temberg</HI> affirmes <HI>that the ob&s;tinat refu&s;al of conjugal due is a law|ful cau&s;e of divorce,</HI> and gives an in&s;tance <HI>that the con&s;i&s;tory of that &s;tate &s;ojudg'd.</HI></P>
<P><HI>Gerard</HI> cites <HI>Harbardus</HI> an author not unknown, and <HI>Arni&s;aeus</HI> cites <HI>Wigandus,</HI> both yeelding divorce <HI>in ca&s;e of cruel u&s;age;</HI> and another author who te&s;tifies <HI>to have &s;een in a dukedom of Germany mariages disjoynd for &s;ome implacable enmities ari&s;ing.</HI></P>
<P><HI>Beza</HI> one of the &s;tricte&s;t again&s;t divorce, denies it not <HI>for danger of life from a Heretic,</HI> or <HI>importunat &s;olicitation to doe ought again&s;t religion:</HI> and counts it <HI>all one whether the heretic de&s;ert, or would &s;tay upon intolerable conditions.</HI> But this deci&s;ion well examin'd will be found of no &s;olidity. For <HI>Beza</HI> would be askt why, if God &s;o &s;trictly exact our &s;tay in any kind of wedloc, wee had not better &s;tay and hazard a murdering for Religion at the hand of a wife, or husband, as he and others enjoyn us to &s;tay and venture it for all other cau&s;es but that? and why a mans life is not as well and warrantably &s;av'd by divorcing from an orthodox murderer, as a heretical? Againe, if de&s;ertion be confe&s;t by him to con&s;i&s;t not only in the for&s;aking, but in the un&s;ufferable conditions of &s;taying, a man may as well deduce the lawfulne&s;&s;e of divorcing from any intolerable conditions (if his grant bee good that wee may divorce thereupon from a heretic) as he can deduce it lawfull to divorce from any de&s;erter, by finding it lawful to divorce from a de&s;erting infidel. For this is plaine, if Saint <HI>Pauls</HI> permi&s;&s;ion to divorce an infidel de&s;erter, inferre it lawfull for any malicious de&s;ertion, then doth <HI>Beza's</HI> definition of a de&s;erter transferr it &s;elfe with like facility from the cau&s;e of religion to the cau&s;e of malice, and proves it as good to divorce from him who intolerably &s;tayes as from him who purpo&s;ely departs; and leaves it as lawfull to depart from him who urgently requires a
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wicked thing, though profe&s;&s;ing the &s;ame religion, as from him who urges a heatheni&s;h or &s;uper&s;titious compliance in a different faith. For if there be &s;uch nece&s;&s;ity of our abiding, wee ought ra|ther to abide the utmo&s;t for religion then for any other cau&s;e; &s;eeing both the cau&s;e of our &s;tay is pretended our religion to mari|age, and the cau&s;e of our &s;uffering is &s;uppos'd our con&s;tant mari|age to religion. <HI>Beza</HI> therfore by his owne definition of a de&s;erter ju&s;tifies a divorce from any wicked or intolerable conditions ra|ther in the &s;ame religion then in a different.</P>
<P><HI>Aretius</HI> a famous Divine of <HI>Bern</HI> approves many cau&s;es of di|vorce in his <HI>Problemes,</HI> and adds <HI>that the lawes and con&s;i&s;tories of Swizzerland approve them al&s;o.</HI> As fir&s;t, <HI>adultery, and that not actu|al only, but intentional,</HI> all eging <HI>Matthew</HI> the fifth, <HI>Who&s;oever looketh to lu&s;t, hath committed adultery already in his heart. Wher by</HI> &s;aith he, <HI>our Saviour &s;hewes that the breach of matrimony may be not only by outward act, but by the heart and de&s;ire; when that hath once po&s;&s;e&s;t, it renders the conver&s;ation intolerable, and commonly the fact followes.</HI> Other cau&s;es to the number of 9. or 10. con&s;enting in mo&s;t with the imperial lawes, may bee read in the author him&s;elfe, who a|verrs them <HI>to be grave and weighty.</HI> All the&s;e are men of name in Divinity, and to the&s;e if need were, might be added more. Nor have the Civilians bin all &s;o blinded by the Canon, as not to avouch the ju&s;tice of tho&s;e old permi&s;&s;ions touching divorce.</P>
<P><HI>Alciat</HI> of <HI>Millain,</HI> a man of extraordinary wi&s;edome and lear|ning, in the &s;ixt book of his <HI>Parerga</HI> defends tho&s;e imperial lawes, <HI>not repugnant to the Go&s;pel, as the Church then interpreted.</HI> For &s;aith hee, <HI>the antients under&s;tood him &s;eparat by man, whom pa&s;&s;ions and corrupt affections divorc't, not, if the provincial Bi&s;hops fir&s;t heard the matter, and judg'd, as the councel of Agatha declares;</HI> and on &s;ome part of the Code hee names <HI>I&s;idorus Hi&s;palen&s;is</HI> the fir&s;t computer of Canons, <HI>to be in the &s;ame minde.</HI> And in the former place gives his opinion <HI>that diuorce might be more lawfully per|mitted then u&s;ury.</HI></P>
<P><HI>Cora&s;ius</HI> recorded by <HI>Helvicus</HI> among the famous Lawyers hath been already cited of the &s;ame judgement.</P>
<P><HI>We&s;embechius</HI> a much nam'd Civilian in his comment on this law defends it, and afficms <HI>that our Sauiour excluded not other faults
<PB N="96" REF="54">
equall to adultery; and that the word fornication &s;ignifies larger among the Hebrewes then with us, comprehending every fault which alienates from him to whom obedience is due, and that the primitive Church interpreted &s;o.</HI></P>
<P><HI>Grotius</HI> yet living, and of prime note among learned men re|tires plainly from the Canon to the antient civility, yea to the Mo|&s;aic law, <HI>as being mo&s;t ju&s;t and undecevable.</HI> On the fifth of <HI>Matt.</HI> he &s;aith, <HI>that Chri&s;t made no civil lawes, but taught us how to u&s;e law: that the law &s;ent not a husband to the Judge about this matter of divorce, but left him to his owne con&s;cience; that Chri&s;t therfore can|not be thought to &s;end him; that adultery may be judg'd by a vehement &s;u&s;pition; that the exception of adultery &s;eems an example of other like offences;</HI> proves it <HI>from the manner of &s;peech, the maxims of law, the rea&s;on of charity, and common equity.</HI></P>
<P>The&s;e authorities without long &s;earch I had to produce, all excellent men, &s;om of them &s;uch as many ages had brought forth none greater: almo&s;t the meane&s;t of them might de&s;erve to obtain credit in a &s;ingularity; what might not then all of them joyn'd in an opinion &s;o con&s;onant to rea&s;on? For although &s;om &s;peak of this cau&s;e, others of that, why divorce may be, yet all agreeing in the nece&s;&s;ary enlargement of that textual &s;traitnes, leave the matter to equity, not to literal bondage, and &s;o the opinion clo&s;es. Nor could I have wanted more te&s;timonies, had the cau&s;e needed a more &s;ollicitous enquiry. But herein the &s;atisfaction of others hath bin &s;tudied, not the gaining of more a&s;&s;urance to mine own per|&s;wa&s;ion: although authorities contributing rea&s;on withall, bee a good confirmation and a welcom. But God, I &s;olemnly atte&s;t him, with held from my knowledge the con&s;enting judgement of the&s;e men &s;o late, untill they could not bee my in&s;tructers, but only my unexpected witne&s;&s;es to partial men, that in this work I had not given the wor&s;t experiment of an indu&s;try joyn'd with integrity and the free utterance though of an unpopular truth. Which yet to the people of <HI>England</HI> may, if God &s;o plea&s;e, prove a memorable informing; certainly a benefit which was intended them long &s;ince by men of highe&s;t repute for wi&s;edome &amp; piety <HI>Bucer &amp; Era&s;mus.</HI> Only this one autority more, whether in place or out of place, I am not to omitt; which if any can think a &s;mall one, I mu&s;t bee pati|tient
<PB N="97" REF="54">
it is no &s;maller then the whole a&s;&s;embl'd autority of <HI>Eng|land</HI> both Church and State; and in tho&s;e times which are on re|cord for the pure&s;t and &s;incere&s;t that ever &s;hon yet on the refor|mation of this Iland, the time of <HI>Edward</HI> the 6^t^h. That worthy Prince having utterly aboli&s;ht the Canon Law out of his Domini|ons, as his Father did before him, appointed by full vote of Par|lament, a Committy of two and thirty cho&s;en men, Divines and Lawyers, of whom <HI>Cranmer</HI> the Archbi&s;hop, <HI>Peter Martyr,</HI> and <HI>Walter Haddon,</HI> (not without the a&s;&s;i&s;tance of Sir <HI>John Cheeke</HI> the Kings Tutor a man at that time counted the learnede&s;t of Engli&s;h|men, &amp; for piety not inferior) were the cheif, to frame anew &s;om Eccle&s;ia&s;tical Laws, that might be in &s;tead of what was abrogated. The work with great diligence was fini&s;ht, and with as great ap|probation of that reforming age was receav'd; and had bin doubt|le&s;&s;e, as the learned Preface thereof te&s;tifies, e&s;tabli&s;ht by Act of Parlament, had not the good Kings death &s;o &s;oon en&s;uing, arre&s;ted the furder growth of Religion al&s;o, from that &s;ea&s;on to this. Tho&s;e laws, thus founded on the memorable wi&s;edome and piety of that religious Parlament and Synod, allow divorce and &s;econd mariage <HI>not only for adultery or de&s;ertion, but for any capital cnmity or plot laid again&s;t the others life, and likewi&s;e for evil and fierce u&s;age?</HI> nay the 12. Chap. of that title by plaine con&s;equence declares, <HI>that le&s;&s;er contentions, if they be perpetual, may obtaine divorce:</HI> which is all one really with the po&s;ition by me held in the former treati&s;e publi&s;ht on this argument, herein only differing that there the cau&s;e of perpetual &s;trife was put for example in the unchangeable di&s;cord of &s;om natures; but in the&s;e lawes intended us by the be&s;t of our ance&s;tors, the effect of continual &s;trife is determin'd no un|ju&s;t plea of divorce, whether the cau&s;e be naturall or wilfull. Wher|by the warine&s;&s;e and deliberation from which that di&s;cour&s;e pro|ceeded, will appeare, &amp; that God hath aided us to make no bad con|clu&s;ion of this point; &s;eeing the opinion which of late hath under|gon ill cen&s;ures among the vulgar, hath now prov'd to have don no violence to Scripture, unle&s;&s;e all the&s;e famous Authors alleg'd have done the like; nor hath affirm'd ought more then what in|deed the mo&s;t nominated Fathers of the Church both ancient and modern are unexpectedly found affirming, the lawes of Gods pe|culiar
<PB N="98" REF="55">
people, &amp; of primitive Chri&s;tendom found to have practis'd, reformed Churches and &s;tates to have imitated, and e&s;pecially the mo&s;t pious Church-times of this Kingdom to have fram'd and pub|li&s;ht, and, but for &s;ad hindrances in the &s;udden change of religion, had enacted by Parlament. Hence forth let them who condemn the a&s;&s;ertion of this book for new and licentious, be &s;orry; le&s;t, while they think to be of the graver &s;ort, and take on them to be teachers, they expo&s;e them&s;elves rather to be pledg'd up and down by men who intimatly know them, to the di&s;covery and contempt of their ignorance and pre&s;umption.</P>
</DIV3>
</DIV2>
<TRAILER>The End.</TRAILER>
</DIV1>
</BODY>
<BACK>
<DIV1 TYPE="errata">
<HEAD>Errata.</HEAD>
<LIST>
<ITEM><HI>Pag.</HI> 57. <HI>lin.</HI> 16. <HI>and by them to pro&s;ecute, no comma between.</HI></ITEM>
<ITEM><HI>Pag.</HI> 88. <HI>lin.</HI> 3. Ba&s;ilius Macedo, <HI>no comma between.</HI></ITEM>
</LIST>
<PB REF="55">
</DIV1>
</BACK>
</TEXT>
</EEBO>
</ETS>
