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man,

"Do

OPINION OF A MORMONITE'S WIFE—MR BINNEY.

truth than all Mr Binney's clever gaiety on the subject. A friend of the writer's was visiting as a missionary in a Mormonite family in this city, and the following graphic scene took place :-Entering on their peculiar tenets, the husband, like Mr Binney, defended polygamy, from the example of Abraham and others. The friend in question opened one of their tracts at a place where it gave their rules sanctioning polygamy. He said to the you agree to this?" "Yes," was the answer. To the woman, "How would you like this, if your husband shall see fit to carry it out?" The woman at once replied, "Ah, she shanna' come here, na, na; we'll ha'e naething to do wi' her." "But don't you admit polygamy to be one of the tenets of your faith?" "I'm no' caring what it be. I tell you, she'll no' come here—na, na.' This is genuine nature. But perhaps a little Turkish training would make it a better case for Mr Binney's argument, and accustom "Scotch and English girls" to desire it with as great "gratulation' as he says ancient Jewesses did. Those who quote them as authorities will doubtless do their best to reconcile Michaelis's necessary "hatred" with Mr Binney's "gratulations."

It may not be unsuitable to add here, that if Mr Binney's opinion of things be at all correct, the prohibition, according to the view of his friends, in Levit. xviii. 18, as forbidding the simultaneous marriage of two sisters, as in the case of Rachel and Leah, had little sense in it, and no foundation in the ground or reason of it at all; and he gets quit of the prohibition of marrying two sisters at once rather more easily than that of marrying the one after the other. After stating, in his usual style of levity, the case of Sarah and Hagar, he adds," So also, in the case of Jacob's sisterwives, each presented him with a secondary one. There was no vexing' in the matter." If we thought that Mr Binney believed that God was the legislator, and not Moses, and that the authority was not merely human but divine, we could not but denounce the gross impiety of the opinion that God legislated on an absurdity and a falsehood. But Mr Binney writes as a man who must have his amusement. Accordingly he most appropriately introduces a clause of Scripture, and a stave of a Scotch border song, to set forth the scene of David's marriage with Abigail. He says, p. 34, "Nevertheless 'she (Abigail) hasted and rose,' and rode off, with her five damsels along with her, blythe and merry,' laughing and lightsome,—

'Across the border and awa.'

And she became David's wife.'" The whole passage must fill every true believer in God's Word with nothing short of disgust. More perfect playing into the hands of infidels and socialists there could not be. Michaelis coolly tells us that his perfect belief, as a first principle, is, "that two wives of the same husband should love each other is inconceivable"-that the polygamist must "make two wives hate each other" in every case. Nevertheless God, according to him, sanctions the relationship where love is inconceivable and hatred certain, not only in the case of two women, but two hundred, though they should pluck out each other's eyes; provided only that it be not done by two sisters, who would certainly be " more unmannerly" to each other than stranger women, and "cannot so freely venture to outrage decency in their mutual hatred!!" A pretty account this of sister

professedly Christian man. The very views which such writers advocate seem to blunt their moral feelings. If any one think this is too strong, let him look to his pamphlet, pp. 33-35. We could not transfer them to our pages.

CONCEALMENT OF OPINIONS OF EMINENT MEN.

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hood. But come what will, the polygamist must be gratified, and the disgusting profanity is uttered, that God provides him with strangers. One would suppose that this certainty of mutual hatred in any case would be a very good reason for prohibiting polygamy in every case, but a very strange one for God sanctioning it in any case whatever; and, so far as the reason of the thing is concerned, is a tolerably strong presumption that in Lev. xviii. 18 polygamy of every sort is forbidden. But the absurdity of this argument of Michaelis and others we have previously exposed.*

Some commentators, such as Henry and Scott, to reconcile with the law of God the apparent permission-I say apparent, for it is not real or formal, but only a providential permission of polygamy in the case of some Old Testament characters, have interpreted this verse in reference to this permission, and as forbidding such cases of polygamy as that of Leah and Rachel, from the bad consequences that sprung from it, because they were sisters. And some men have either not read these commentators, or carefully conceal the fact that on Leviticus xviii. 16 they decidedly give the comment that it prohibits the strictly analogous case of a man marrying his wife's sister, without any qualification of time whatever. This concealment is practised with Henry and Scott and others, who are represented as favouring both the ordinary translation in the text of the Bible, and rejecting the marginal reading, and thus favouring the views of the Libertarians. Calvin is dealt with in this same way. The views of these commentators on the point in debate are concealed, while their negative testimony in behalf of the correctness of the version in the text of our English Bibles is held as proof that they disapproved of the marginal reading; as if their not questioning the accuracy of the rendering in the text, and yet holding and giving the opinion that such marriages were unlawful, were the same thing as both condemning the marginal reading and favouring the view which they actually opposed. This was so much the practice of American writers, that one of themselves,—viz., Marshall, who is characterised by a certain slapdash recklessness-finding that this piece of disingenuousness was so liable to exposure, cautions his readers against it, and admits that the opinions of these authors were against him. Dr Eadie inserts a sort of saving clause, when alluding to Calvin's treatment of Lev. xviii., which will be understood by those perfectly versant in the question, but which would never convey to the ordinary reader the fact that Calvin held most decidedly, with all the Reformed Churches, that such marriages were forbidden by the law of God. In reply to Dr Symington, Dr Eadie says,-" Want of candour is an accusation that neither applies to me, nor to John Calvin or George Bush, who hold the same grammatical analysis, but with a different deduction." The deduction might, however briefly, have been stated. Truth required it, as it is nowhere else stated in Dr Eadie's letters. The so-called Free Church Elder" is guilty of disingenuous concealment of the opinions of Scott and Henry, while the writer has reason to be certain that his attention was called to this fact before he printed his letter, so that it could not arise from ignorance. This disingenuous concealment is most unworthy, and cannot be too strongly reprobated. On the actual question the following are the opinions of Henry and Scott :-Henry, on Lev. xviii., while holding it to prohibit incestuous marriages, says, Marriage is a divine institution; that and the Sabbath, the eldest of all others, of equal standing with man upon the earth." "These prohibitions (in Lev.

66

* See p. 16.

xviii.), besides their being enacted by an incontestable authority, are in themselves highly reasonable and equitable." He says again,-" The relations forbidden are most of them plainly described; and it is generally laid down as a rule, that what relations of a man's own he is bound up from marrying with, the same relations of his wife he is likewise forbidden to marry with, for they two are one. The law which forbids marrying a brother's wife, ver. 16, had an exception peculiar to the Jewish state, that if a man died without issue his brother or next of kin should marry the widow, and raise up seed to the deceased, Deut. xxv. 5, for reasons which held good only in that commonwealth; and therefore, now that those reasons have ceased, the exception ceases, and the law is in force that a man may in no case marry his brother's widow." On Luke iii. 19, 20, Henry says," Herod the tetrarch being reproved by him (John), not only for living in incest with his brother Philip's wife, but for the many other evils which he had done," &c.; so that Henry's opinion that such marriages were incestuous cannot be doubted.

The opinion of Scott is more full and decided. "They"—the laws in Lev. xviii. 6-17-" are therefore to be considered either as moral in themselves, or so nearly connected with other moral obligations, as to be proper to be observed by all mankind; and, in general, the wiser heathens have deemed such marriages unlawful, and abstained from them. It is elsewhere enjoined, that if a man died without issue, his surviving brother should marry his widow (Note-Deut. xxv. 5-10.) But as this appointment respected special purposes under the Mosaic dispensation, the prohibition of marrying a brother's wife is absolute to us; and, by parity of reason, that of a woman marrying the husband of her deceased sister. "Severe laws," he adds, "on this subject seem essentially necessary, and have always been judged to be so by legislators, heathen as well as Christian. Yet if these laws are not obligatory under the Christian dispensation, there is no law of God in force regulating marriages, nor any restricting the intermarriages of the nearest relations. Did the Lord, then, intend to leave his church under the New Testament wholly without law in this most important concern? or hath he confirmed his own pre-existing law as of moral obligation? St Paul's language concerning the incestuous Corinthians, Such fornication (uncleanness) as is not named among the Gentiles, that one should have his father's wife' (1 Cor. v. 1), implies that Christians had a rule in this respect, and a stricter rule than the Gentiles; + yet that rule can be found only in this chapter.

I must therefore consider those laws as in equal force at this day among Christians as they were formerly in Israel; those implied by parity of reason, as well as those more expressly mentioned, according to the regulation of our ecclesiastical law." He then gives the ordinary view as to Lev. xviii. 18 as a connivance at polygamy, with the exception of such a case as Jacob marrying Rachel and Leah, and winds it up thus,-" As a woman might not in ordinary cases marry the brother of her deceased husband, it can hardly be supposed that it was allowable for a man to marry the sister of his wife, even after her decease, though this verse seems not to contain a prohibition of it." None who understand the subject assert that it does. It is enough

With such a consideration before us as this, one is truly sorry to find a man of Dr Eadie's standing characterising as he does, in his letter in the Chronicle newspaper of May 29, 1850, the law in Leviticus as "the so-called marriage law of the book of Leviticus." +See the admirable passage quoted from Böehmer's "Jus Ecclesiasticum," at page 76.

OPINION OF CALVIN ON LEV. XVIII. 18.

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for our argument that it does not sanction it, as is plainly the opinion of Scott. But this text will fall to be considered still further in the sequel, as also the general subject of polygamy.

Let us now see the opinion of Calvin. It is found at length in his Commentary on Leviticus. On Lev. xviii. 16, on the words, "the nakedness of a brother's wife," he says, "There are bad interpreters, who raise a controversy concerning this place, and explain that a spouse is not to be violently taken (rapiendum) from the couch of a brother, that their marriage was unlawful while the husband lived. For it is not suitable to wrest to different senses things which in one place are declared in the very same words. God forbids to uncover the nakedness of the wife of a father, a father's brother, and of a son. When he employs the same phraseology (sententiam) in so many words concerning a brother's wife, it is absurd to feign different senses. Wherefore, if it is not lawful to marry the wife of a father, of a son, of a father's brother or nephew, it is proper to think one and the same thing of a brother's wife, concerning which a perfectly similar law is enacted in one context and tenor."

He then meets in his own way the supposed objection from the case of the Leviral law, so often referred to, and concludes his statement on Lev. xviii. 16 thus:-"I therefore hold it as indubitable, that by the law of Moses marriage is forbidden with the widow of a brother-german, being of opinion that the law of Deut. xxv. 5 related, not to brothers-german, but more remote relatives, according to the usage of the word brother, as applied in Hebrew to all blood relations."

On Lev. xviii. 18-Mulierem quoque cum sorore—a woman with her sister -he says, "Some perverse (protervi) men trusting to this text, wish to allow that if any one be deprived of his wife, he may marry her sistergerman, because the restriction is added, that he may not take another, the former being alive, whence they conclude that it is not prohibited that she succeed to the place of the dead wife. But it was necessary to draw (expendere) the design of the legislator from his express words; because not only is there mention of incest or shame, but of the jealousy and quarrels which thence arise. If it were only said, 'Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness,' not without some colour of reason might they put forth that the husband in widowhood was free to marry the other; but when a different end of the law is expressed, that she who married in good faith be not vexed with quarrels and contentions, it is certain that the license of polygamy was bridled by this exception, that the Israelites, content with one injustice, should at least not commit two sisters to hostile contention. Now the condition of the first wife was too hard (iniqua) when she was compelled to bear a rival and a concubine, but constantly to quarrel with a blood relative was less tolerable. Wherefore the word sister is not restricted only to sisters-german, but I think that our near relatives are comprehended, of whom otherwise the marriage were not incestuous. In fine, it is not incest so much as the cruelty of the husband which is condemned, if he wishes to marry over and above (superducere) the relation of his wife. Nor can we resolve otherwise from the words of Moses; for if the nakedness of a brother is uncovered when a brother marries his widow, not less is the nakedness of a sister uncovered when the other sister marries her husband after widowhood.” *

Such are the opinions of Calvin on the disputed passages themselves. * "Calvini Opera," fol., Amst. 1671, tom i. p. 520.

We have formerly seen his opinions as given in the Synodicon of the Reformed Church of France. It is not easy to see on what ground of any honest or fair argument his authority to any extent is quoted in favour of the lawfulness of the marriage of a man with the sister of his deceased wife; and yet it is asserted with as much confidence by unscrupulous writers, as if it were without any possibility of question to be on that side. Let it be observed, then, that Calvin nowhere rejects the rendering of the margin of our English Bibles, and does not affirm, in contradistinction to it, the rendering in the text. He takes the ordinary rendering, and even with it maintains the opinions which we have quoted; so that Dr Eadie is certainly not entitled to claim Calvin as a coadjutor in rejecting the marginal reading, and still less can he be claimed as an advocate of the lawfulness of marriage with a deceased wife's sister. He is decidedly the reverse, and that beyond doubt or question.

Poole, the author of the five folio volume "Synopsis Criticorum," in his Annotations on Leviticus xviii. 16, "Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy brother's wife," says, "Neither in his lifetime nor after his death; and therefore a woman might not marry her husband's brother, nor might a man marry his wife's sister, either before or after his wife's death; for so all the prohibitions are to be understood; which will give light to verse 18. But God, who can undoubtedly dispense with his own laws, did afterwards make one exception to this rule, of which see Deut. xxv. 5." It is an important observation, "for so" (that is, whether before or after the death of one of the parties) "all the prohibitions are to be understood;" and this certainly does throw light on Lev. xviii. 18. If in the case of all the others the prohibition holds whether before or after death, why should there be an exception in the case of the sisters of the deceased wife? In consistency, therefore, with this view, Poole, on Lev. xviii. 18, says, "The word sister is understood here, either (1) properly,―so some; whence others infer, that it is lawful to marry one's wife's sister after her death; or (2) improperly, for any other woman, as not only persons but things of the same kind are oft called sisters and brethren; of which see plain examples, Exod. xxvi. 3, and xxxii. 27, 29; Ezek. i. 9, and iii. 13, and xvi. 45, 48, 49. So the sense is, Thou shalt not take one woman to another; and this sense may seem more probable,—1. Because, else here were a tautology, the marriage of a man with his wife's sister being sufficiently forbidden (ver. 16), where marriage with his brother's wife is forbidden; as also ver. 9 and 11. When he forbids the marriage of one's own sister, and consequently the marriage of one's wife's sister, it being manifest and confessed that affinity and consanguinity are of the same consideration and obligation in these matters. Nor can this be added for explication; for then the comment would be darker than the text, nay, it would destroy the text; for then what was simply and absolutely and universally forbidden before, is here forbidden doubtfully and restrainedly, and might, at least, seem to be allowed after the wife's death; which is rejected by those who own the former interpretation. 2. Because the reason of this prohibition, which is, lest he should vex her thereby, is much more proper and effectual against marrying any other woman than against marrying the wife's sister;-so near and dear a relation being most commonly and probably a means to induce them rather to love and please and serve, than to vex one another in such a relation. And therefore to take her natural sister to vex her, would seem a course unsuitable to his