[To love, cherish, and to obey]. In the Salisbury Manual, that of Hereford, and some others" dating as established uses from the 11th Century, the corresponding phrase is "to be bonour and buxum in bedde and at borde."" Bonour, some times varied to bonere and bonaire, is a Norman equivalent to the modern débonnaire, "complaisant." Buxum, which stands alone in some of the oldest uses, is Saxon, equivalent to bough-some," "yielding." In the contemporary Latin, it was translated by "obedire;" and this again into modern English by "to obey." Such is the parent

cause it is a thing capable of proof, and for the most part operating inevitably upon all persons' minds in the same manner, in virtue of the universal affections and habits of mankind: but that the permanent unfitness of two minds to the conjugal union is not capable of proof, since the effects of transient passion, caprice, or design, are not distinguishable from permanent unfitness of mind; and further, that it does not appear that, in any case, such unfitness may not be overcome, by cultivating those affections which religion and morality enjoin us to cultivate; kindness, gentleness, meekness, patience, cheerfulness

"It may also be remarked, that the cultivation of such affec tions, in such a case, will be prosecuted more resolutely and successfully, if the parties believe that the marriage cannot be disBolved, merely because this task of self-cultivation is imperfectly executed; and if they further believe that such an ordinance respecting marriage is sanctioned by the Divine command."— Whewell, E. M. Bk. iv., art. 634.

"See Procter and Blunt, 1. c.

"Compare Wheatly and all the Commentators "Richardson's Dictionary.

age of our formula, in this particular more closely" Scriptural than any other extant form; and such for substance every English bride, for a thousand years at the least, and doubtless much longer, has vowed at the altar to be, both in the tendernesses of love and in the sterner affairs of outside life.

[And thereto I plight thee my troth.] Troth, found also trouth or trouthe in very old English, and in Saxon treothe, is an obsolete orthography for truth." It is now hardly extant elsewhere, save, in the phrases, " in troth," " by my troth," of Shakespeare and still older writers. The sense is a superlative pledge of fidelity, the staking of one's character for truth and trustworthiness on the fulfillment of the uttered Vow. It is exactly translated in the contemporary Latin by "tibi fidem præsto," and "tibi fidem do." The latter, "I give thee," instead of "I plight [pledge] thee," is used by the English and American formularies (though not by the Roman)," in the repetition of the Vow by the Woman, on the principle"

46

Eph. v. 22. 24: Coloss. iii. 18: 1. Pet. iii. 1. 6.

See the dictionaries, Webster, Worcester, etc. Blunt 1. c. makes the word mean trust; but without sufficient authority we think.

* See Golden Manual.

"The Compilers of our Liturgy being anxious to reach the understandings of all classes, at a time when our language was in a less settled state than at present, availed themselves of this cir

which is everywhere adopted in these books, (and in fact lies at the foundation of the Protestant idea)," to insert a nearly synonymous word, where possible, to explain the meaning of a more obscure one, or to fix the meaning of a more doubtful one, which for reasons of venerable usage or otherwise has notwithstanding been retained.

[With all my worldly goods I thee endow.] The English Rite precedes this by With my body I thee worship'-a declaration of passionate love," omitted for delicacy's sake.

This vow of endowment, with all worldly goods, completes the earthly union into "one flesh" with one name, one united earthly life, so long as earthly goods are available. Even in the dreadful case of a necessity for separation from bed and board, this union is not annulled; but is the ground. of alimony.

cumstance [its composite character] in employing many synonymous or nearly synonymous expressions. . . . . Take, as an instance, the exhortation: "acknowledge" and "confess;" "dissemble" and "cloke; "-" humble" and "lowly; "-"assemble" and "meet together "— Archbp. Whateley, Elements of Rhet oric, Part iii. chap. 1, Sec. 2.

Compare the XXIVth of the " Articles of Religion." "It is a thing plainly repugnant to the Word of God and the custom of the Primitive Church, to have publick Prayer in the church or to minister the Sacrament in a tongue not understanded of the people."

Compare Canticles, Chapter vii.

VIII.

THE OFFICIAL UNITING AND

TH

BLESSING.

[Then the Minister shall say,

HOSE whom God hath joined together let no man put asunder.]

This branch of the Ceremony and the introduction, as the spiritually effective part of the whole, of these exquisitely appropriate words of our Lord Himself features which are peculiar to the English and American Rites-we owe indirectly, as has been explained,' to the studies of the great Luther. They seem, indeed, to have been used by the early Christians, and to be a part of the often mentioned "certa solemnia verba," though as to what precisely these words were, (the Marriage Rite being long among their unpublished mysteries), no testimonies, so far as known are

1 Page 72.

"No Liturgies were committed to writing before the end of the 2d or even of the 3d century."-Procter, p. 305.

"In the persecutions under Diocletian and his associates, though a strict inquiry was made after the books of Scripture and other things belonging to the church, which were often delivered

now extant.' The words under consideration constitute in a peculiar sense the "certa solemnia verba" of our Rite. The twain having been previously prepared, as to each other, are by this act cemented together forever.

By way of an outside view, we have just spoken of this union as thus cemented. A strict regard, however, to the profounder nature of it, would reject this term as savoring too much of a mechanical bond. For this union is, if we may so speak, of the nature, not of a mechanical joining, but of a chemical uniting. It is not one which holds two distinct entireties together by any kind of cement; but that which, by the eternal laws of God, like those in which the chemical affinities act, dissolves two existences into one. The eternally established proportions and conditions of the two being given, they coalesce into one new being-new and single in its status in the universe, new and single in the pur

up by the traditores to be burnt, we never read of any Ritual books.... delivered up among them."-Bingham, Antiq. uities, xiii. v. 3.

This explains also in part the long time (two or three years) during which Catechumens were commonly kept back from full communion, namely until they could repeat from memory not only the creed, etc., but the Liturgis and forms of Divine service.

*The same holds of the ancient Egyptians, not a fragment of whose Marriage Rite is now known-an evidence that the Ceremony among them was religious and a "mystery."