husband, to whom, as her lord, she owes allegiance, and render her irresponsible for offences committed in his company, on the hypothesis that they are committed under his authority and control.

The golden rule of Christianity requires of its disciples to do unto others as they wish that others should do unto them: and the great principle from which the apostle proceeds to the recommendation of the relative duties is the submission of one to another in the fear of Gods. In the strict communion of married life, in which there is not only a reciprocal obligation, hardly varied by the distinct condition of the sexes, but in which, in the energetic language of inspiration, the man cleaves unto his wife, and they become one flesh", this principle is of the highest value and importance. In the equal condition of the husband and the wife mutual submission and mutual reverence form the virtue and the happiness of conjugal life, and the infringement of them its crime, its misery, and its shame. In this union of persons one and the same object and end should be set before the man and the woman'. There should be an unity of purpose, of pursuits, of affections, and desires, without which the singleness of the conjugal relation must be broken and destroyed. Each should consider the other as another self, morally and mystically incorporated by an union which death only can dissolve, and practically consolidated in the parentage of a common offspring. It is no metaphorical or unnatural representation of Chris

Ephes. v. 21.

h Gen. ii. 24. 'Clem. Al. Strom. 1. iv.

tian duty which requires of husbands that they shall love their wives as their own bodies: He that loveth his wife loveth himself: for no man ever yet hated his own flesh, but nourisheth and cherisheth it, even as the Lord the Church; for we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones. For this cause shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh. This is a great mystery; but I speak concerning Christ and his Church: nevertheless let every one of you in particular so love his wife even as himself. It is in perfect accordance with this scriptural authority that the union of persons in marriage is so strictly maintained under the law of England, that the very being or legal existence of the woman is suspended during the marriage, or at least is incorporated and consolidated into that of her husband; that she does every thing under his wing or cover; that her rights merge in those of her husband; that her responsibility devolves upon him; that she can bring no action for redress of wrongs but in her husband's name and with his concurrence; nor be herself sued without making the husband a defendant: the principle also upon which they are precluded from bearing witness for each other is, that no man may be witness in his own cause; nor may they testify against each other, because no man is bound to accuse himself'. But, whatever be the doctrine or the law, can this personal unity of marriage be supposed to subsist, in fact, where the hearts and minds are distracted and at

Ephes. v. 28-33.

'1 Blackstone, c. 15.

variance; where each pursues a separate object; where various and incompatible friendships are contracted; where there is a perpetual conflict in the pleasures and business of life; where, in the privacy of domestic intercourse, instead of the mutual confidence which becomes a personal union, there is distrust on the one side, and reserve on the other; here jealousy, and there susceptibility of offence? If the whole force of friendship consists in the supreme agreement of desires, pursuits, and sentiments, the union of marriage, which is the most intimate and unreserved of all friendship, should proscribe all secrecy and concealment, which the one is not bound to maintain, and the other is not concerned to penetrate; all distraction of interests and affections, which are incompatible with the strictest unity; all collision of opinions and sentiments, which one and the same mind cannot entertain. The unity of marriage, if it has any practical existence, is that oneness of mind, of heart, and of soul, which alone corresponds with the original identity of the sexes, before the woman was taken out of the man, bone from his bone, and flesh from his flesh, to be an help meet for him. It is only when there is unanimity and harmony of the husband toward the wife, of the one as chief, and the other acting in obedience to the precept, He shall rule over thee, that it can be truly said of them, that they are no more two".

There is a community of interest subsisting between the husband and the wife which should constitute an unfailing motive to the discharge of the

reciprocal duties of the married state. In conveying, as it were, their persons to each other, beyond the power of reclaiming them, or making any new disposition of them, and in putting themselves into a condition in which they may grow into one flesh, there is nothing of external circumstances which they can be supposed to reserve. The ancients were not unmindful of the unlimited confidence which the husband in his marriage reposed in his wife, and they expressed it in the forms of marriage, in which they included the delivery of the bridegroom's keys to the bride'; (and the taking back of the keys was equivalent to a message of divorce ;) and in the form of betrothing, in which they severally agreed the man to be Caius, where the woman was Caia; the woman to be Caia, where the man was Caius°; intimating that in whatever respects the man was master, the woman should be mistress; a form of which the traces may yet be perceived in the custom of the woman's taking the name and title of her husband. These acts were designed to denote the commitment to the woman of the superintendence of the family, and the entire management of domestic concerns. The common participation of the same fortune, whether of riches or of poverty, was held to be most agreeable to nature, which requires, that in the changes and chances of life the husband should be the partner of the wife, and the wife of the husband: and it is a beautiful picture which the historian has drawn of the condition of the Roman

"Brisson de Rit. Nupt. A. Hotman de Vet. Rit. Nupt. c. 10. A. Hotman, ibid. c. 16. Ulpian: apud Hotman.

wife, that by her discretion, and the constancy of her submission to her husband, she was the mistress of the house in the same manner as her husband was the master; that when he died she was the heir of his property, as a daughter of a father's; that if he died childless and intestate she became the mistress of all which he left; that if he left issue she was entitled to an equal portion with the children'. Plutarch also maintains the necessity of the goods of the wife belonging to the husband, and those of the husband to the wife'; and, in the practical operation of this reciprocity of interest, married persons were incapable of making presents to each other, and it was held, that no judgment could be pronounced on the wife for subtracting her husband's goods, of which the society of life had made her a mistress'; there was no sign of any division in the house, there was nothing which the husband could appropriate to himself, or the wife to herself; their property was consecrated by both in common; and the sedulity of the mistress was exerted with an equal care of industry with the more active employments of the man in the forum. In the same manner the Christian wife is said in an ancient form of espousals to have conveyed all her substance and her whole dower to her husband, and to have thrown it into his hands with strong affection, saying, I have nothing of my own; my goods are thine, the dower is thine, even my soul and my body are thine".

Brisson.

• Plut. Ev Mitions apud

'A. Hotman de

Dion. Halicarn. apud Hotman. Brisson de Vet. Rit. Nupt. Vet. Rit. Nupt. c. 26. Macarii Homil. xxxii. apud Hotman.