Page:The Family in its Civil and Churchly Aspects.djvu/83

Rh with him in whom it is original and supreme; and in the act of assuming it she is gently reminded of the "submission" which marks her position, and through which her own authority has been acquired. Her control, however, is none the less real because it is here conveyed only by implication, or because it is a control which descends to her from a source which is higher.

Let not the reader dismiss this as a mere refinement of thought. Undoubtedly, the father has a natural right to rule, because he begets. But so has the mother an equal right, grounded also in nature, because she produces. This would yield two wills, both of which are supreme, each resting upon a different basis, and destined to clash through the modifications which attach to both. The Scriptures, however, lift the whole subject to a higher plane, and effect a perfect reconcilation between the two. They teach that the family is a divinely constituted state, in which the parents rule, not simply by natural right, but by an authority immediately delegated from God. Hence, in the moral law,