Let it be also observed, that in this "advance towards the truth" the State has taken the lead. In former acres the Church went before the State. She received the law of her God on the subject of marriage; and from her example, and the light of Christianity which she diffused abroad, the laws of the Roman Empire derived such a salutary improvement in regard to this fundamental institution in human society. But now the Puritan would have the State to reform the Church. "In this country," he says, (p. 23,) "all the States but one allow of the marriage of a wife's sister. In the Protestant States of Europe, the case is similar. Throughout the whole of Prussia, Saxony, Hanover, Baden, Mecklenberg, Hamburg, Denmark, and most other Protestant States, such marriages may be contracted." Here is a numerical display.
It would require much labor to test fully the correctness of this statement. As it is unnecessary, we only remark, that, with the exception of Prussia and Denmark, the European States enumerated are small; that beyond this number we are unable to count more than four or five other Protestant States in Europe; and that
