CIVIL SOCIETY AND CIIKJSTIANITY. 20 



1. T/tc Marri<(r;c C<m{r,trf.—YA\\nv Hyacinthe i;\\\v. notice tliat 

 he did not intend, :it this time, to consider the niarriage contract 

 in its speciticaliy Christian aspect, and in the snpernatnral order, 

 in 's\hich it is exalted to the diîçnily of a sacrament; that he 

 treated of it liere in a moi'c p:cneral wa)', and wherever it exists, 

 as the fundamental act of domestic society. lie sets the State, 

 then, in comparison, not with the Church, but with the family. 



After remarking that the State invades the domain of individual 

 liberty when it imposes marriage, as Augustus did in a famous law, 

 or when it interdicts it, like certain States of modern Germ.any, 

 the orator comes directly on the question of the power of the 

 Slate over the contract considered in itself. This power does not 

 affect the substance of the contract, but only the civil solemnities 

 wliich accompany it, the civil eilects which follow it, and on 

 which it belongs to tiie civil power to determine ; it is the mo- 

 dality of right. There is, then, no propriety in the expression, 

 sometimes used, of " civil marriage," and Pope Pius YI. was right 

 when he declared in a brief that " marriage is a natural contract, 

 instituted and confirmed antecedently to all civil societ)\" So 

 that it is not only the sanctity of the sacrament which the Church 

 has in ever}»- age so euergeticall}'- defended against the attacks of 

 secular powers; it is more than this, it is the integrity of the 

 rights of the flimily.] 



For this cause I bless thee, my Churcli ! Cliiircli 

 Cutliolic, Church of the ^liddlc xVges, and of the great 

 pontiffs, Gregory VII. and Innocent III.! Xot alone 

 for the sanctity of thy sacrament hast thou contended, 

 thou hast been the defender of the liberty of our con- 

 sciences, the purity of our morals, the peace and dignity 

 of our homes. . . . The Churcli has de'fended the family ; 

 and because the soul of the family is, so to speak, con- 

 centrated in .the wife, a priceless treasure in a frail 

 vessel, it is especially over w^oman that it extends its 

 protection ; — woman, with whom the Church has affini- 

 ties so affecting and sublime, that it were vain to at- 

 tempt to sunder them ; woman, whose liberty is always 



