Page:Christian Marriage.djvu/142

 State had primarily to legislate for the social welfare of the entire community, and not for the presumed spiritual advantage of individuals.

It needs no prolonged examination of the circumstances under which the rival authorities necessarily acted to see that a wide discrepancy of law and method would speedily become apparent between them. The Church in theory could not vary, for the law it applied to human life claimed to be divine, and therefore unalterable. The State, when it had shaken off the ecclesiastical and Biblical notions of its constitution, was necessarily the reflection of the popular will, and by the law of its own being forced to adapt itself to the varying requirements of popular opinion.

To those who accept the claim of any organised society of Christians to express with plenary right the mind of Christ, it is clear enough that this discrepancy between the ecclesiastical and the civil handling of marriage will appear nowise perplexing. They will