Chap. L. p. 446.
It is the highest grace and gift of God to have an honest, a
God-fearing, housewifely consort, &c. But God thrusteth many into the
state of matrimony before they be aware and rightly bethink
themselves.
The state of matrimony (said Luther) is the chiefest state in the
world after religion, &c.
Alas! alas! this is the misery of it, that so many wed and so few are
Christianly married! But even in this the analogy of matrimony to the
religion of Christ holds good: for even such is the proportion of
nominal to actual Christians;--all _christened_, how few baptized! But
in true matrimony it is beautiful to consider, how peculiarly the
marriage state harmonizes with the doctrine of justification by free
grace through faith alone. The little quarrels, the imperfections on
both sides, the occasional frailties, yield to the one thought,--there
is love at the bottom. If sickness or other sorer calamity visit me, how
would the love then blaze forth! The faults are there, but they are not
imprinted. The prickles, the acrid rind, the bitterness or sourness, are
transformed into the ripe fruit, and the foreknowledge of this gives the
name and virtue of the ripe fruit to the fruit yet green on the bough.
Ib. p. 447.
The causers and founders of matrimony are chiefly God's commandments,
&c. It is a state instituted by God himself, visited by Christ in
person, and presented with a glorious present; for God said, 'It is
not good that the man should be alone': therefore the wife should be a
help to the husband, to the end that human generations may be
increased, and children nurtured to God's honour, and to the profit of
people and countries; also to keep our bodies in sanctification.
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