church, taken collectively, is but one; but diftributively, it confifts of many. Rom. xii. 5. We being many, are one body in CHRIST and 1 Cor. xii. 12. For as the body is ONE, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body being many, are one body, fo alfo is CHRIST.

So that

the argument against polygamy, taken from the union and unity of CHRIST and His church, rather leans the other way; unlefs, contrary to fcripture and fact, it could be proved that the church confifted but of one member; whereas it confifts of many, and yet is but one body-one housebold-Eph. ii. 19. One family, even tho' the faints in heaven be alfo taken into the account. Eph. iii. 15. The bride or spouse of CHRIST is but one-i. e. one church yet every member of that church is as diftinctly the spouse of CHRIST, as really. married to Him that rofe from the dead (Rom. vii. 4.) as the whole is, collectively confidered. Surely thefe fcriptural illuftrations of the nature of the marriage-bond, afford a complete answer to that question, "If a man hath two wives, "how can he be one flesh with both

or each one flesh with him?" See Eph.;

v. 30.

We also read not only of the church of Chrift in the fingular number, but of the churches

churches of Chrift in the plural, about forty times in the New Teftament; which, by the way, is at least as conclufive an argument for polygamy, as the other is against it.

From the making CHRIST and His church an emblem of marriage, or marriage an emblem of CHRIST and His church, fome have looked upon it as a Sacrament. There is certainly an outward fign of fomething Spiritual; but as there wants that which is effentially neceffary to make it a facrament, which is GOD's own appointment of it as fuch, the more fcriptural profeffors of Chriftianity reject it. For the fame reafon I would reject thofe arguments against polygamy, which are drawn from the union of Chrift and His church, because GoD has no where established their authority (that I can find) either in the Old Teftament or the New. These arguments would have been just as conclufive under the former as under the latter. The church is called the married wife. If. liv. 1. Her REDEEMER, the LORD of hosts, is called her Husband, ver. 5; but never did Ifaiah, nor any other of the prophets, use this as an argument against the polygamy of the people. If this was not done, or fo much as hinted at, under the Old Teftament, why are

we

we to conceive it to be done under the New, when the fame things and perfons are equally represented under both?

Had polygamy been intended to have been condemned under the New-Teftament difpenfation, I should humbly suppofe that OUR LORD would have put the matter out of question by words too plain to admit of the leaft difpute: that He whofe loins were girt about with faithfulnefs (If. xi. 5.) would have been at least as faithful to His hearers of the loft sheep of the boufe of ISRAEL, to whom He was fo immediately fent (Matt. xv. 24.) and fpoken to them in as plain and unequivocal terms as John the Baptift did to Herod, upon the fubject of his brother Philip's wife (Matt. xiv. 4.) There cannot be the leaft doubt, that numbers of our LORD's multitudes of bearers were polygamifts, all in principle-many in practice; nor can it be doubted, that if this was against the law of marriage, the law of the feventh commandment, or any other pofitive law of GOD, it must be a mortal, damnable * fin, involving the man as well as the

woman

* St. Augustine, lib. xxii. c. 47. against Fauftus, fays of polygamy "Quando mos erat crimen non "erat."" When it was a cuftom, it was no

crime."How this great man could be capable

of

woman in destruction and perdition. Paul could declare openly, that if a woman, living her husband, be married to another, She

of fuch an abfurdity is aftonishing. The idea of a finful act lofing its criminality from custom, or the frequency of the commiffion of it, leaves little room for God's command, Exod. xxiii. 2. Thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil. Nunc propterea crimen eft, faith he, quia mos non eft.—“ Now it is a crime, becaufe not customary.'

St. Chryfoftom's account of the matter is much more confiftent with fcripture and common fense, when, fpeaking of Abraham and Hagar, he fays

ἐδέπω γαρ ταύτα τότε κεκωλυτο – There things were not then forbidden. Indeed Auguftine, in other parts of his writings, fpeaks much in the fame manner. "There was (fays he) a blameless custom "of one man having many wives-for there are "many things which at that time might be done "in a way of duty, which now cannot be done but "licentiously-becaufe, for the fake of multiplying pofterity, no law forbad a plurality of wives." See Grot. de Jur. vol. i. p. 268. note

h

St. Auftin, like others of the fathers, feems to have fuppofed that the command, Be fruitful and multiply and the allowance of polygamy, as a means of fulfilling it, went hand in hand together:-that as that command "Ratione multitudinis liberorum, perti"nuit ad tempora ante CHRISTUM; non ad nos "qui alio vivimus ævo quia hodie, repleto "mundo, non tam neceffarium fit quam olim"mundum non defiderare illud crefcite & multipli"camini" - therefore the allowance of polygamy ceased with the neceffity of the command which it accompanied.

---

Thus, as is ufual, one abfurdity begat another. Those who could be perfuaded, that the command

for

fhe fhall be called an adulterefs, and vouches the law of GoD for his authority, Rom. vii. 1, 2, 3. How is it that CHRIST did not openly say the same thing on the part of the man?-Because, if He had, He could not have vouched the law of GoD for His authority; and for the fame reafon that he could not say it, he could not think it, for GOD's law was within his beart, Pf. xl. 8. and no thought could ever be in the pure and perfect heart of CHRIST, but what was exactly conformable, in all things, to the pure and perfect law of GOD. Let us then carry what OUR LORD faith against divorce, Matt. xix. 9. to the law and to the teftimony, and it can no more conclude against polygamy, fimply confidered, than it concludes against bigamy, or a man's marrying a fecond wife after the death of his firft, and being twice married. Some of the primitive fathers cited it, to prove

for the propagation of the human fpecies, was only obligatory on former ages, might very confiftently fuppofe, that even marriage itfelf had very little to do with Chriftians, and that therefore polygamy became an evil, which they allowed to have been a lawful thing, and even duty, in times paft. Such are the pawders μubor-the aniles fabella-the old women's ftories-which the fathers told, till they believed them, and, on their authority, they are believed to this hour!

VOL. I.

S

that