Civilians, who view marriage simply as it respects society and affects the rights of citizens, content themselves with considering it as only a civil contract; and define it to be "a covenant made between a man and a woman, in which they mutually promise cohabitation, and a continual care to promote the comfort and happiness of each other." This may be proper and sufficient for civilians; yet religion gives a more exalted view of the institution. It admits such a covenant, but inculcates something more than by any covenant can be effected, while it predicates an union, so complete, that those who were formerly two are now no longer twain but one.
The sacred scriptures, from whence we derive our only infallible information respecting divine ordinances, teach us:
1. That the union produced by marriage is not merely nominal, but real and perfect. It constitutes what unerring wisdom denominates, without reserve, to be one, and designates it by the strongest terms language can express. "This now is bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh, there-
