Page:The Spirit of the Chinese People.djvu/135

Rh which comes three days after.—In the moral or religious marriage, the man and women becomes husband and wife before the moral Law—before God. The contract so far is solely between the man and woman. The State or, as, [sic] in China, the Family takes the place of the State in all social and civic life—the State acting only as Court of appeal,—the Family takes no cognisance of the marriage or contract between the man and woman here in this, what I have called the moral or religious marriage. In fact on this first day and until the civic marriage takes place on the third day of the marriage, the bride is not only not introduced, but also not allowed to see or be seen by the members of the bride-groom's family.

Thus for two days and two nights the bride-groom and the bride in China live, so to speak not as legal, but, as sweetheart-husband and sweet-heart wife. On the third day,—then comes the last ceremony in the Chinese marriage—the Miao-chien, the temple presentation or civic marriage. I say, on the third day because that is the rule de riguer as laid down in the Book of Rites (三日廟見). But now to save trouble and expense, it is generally performed on the day after. This ceremony—the temple presentation, takes place, when the ancestral temple of the family clan is near by, —of course in the ancestral temple. But for people living in towns and cities where there is no ancestral temple of the family clan near by, the ceremony is performed before the minatureminiature [sic] ancestral