ave it the full and explicit sanction of
his authority, in the law of Moses, for various causes.--Deut. xxiv: 1.
For those causes, therefore, divorce could not have been a sin under
the law, unless human conduct, in exact accordance with the law of God,
was sinful. The first thing assumed by the Dr., therefore, that polygamy
and divorce were both sins, under the law, is proved to be false. They
were lawful, and therefore, could not be sinful.

The Dr.'s second assumption (with respect to polygamy and divorce,) is
this, that they are _known_ under the gospel to be sins, not by the
prohibitory _precepts_ of the gospel, but by the general _principles_ of
morality. This assumption is certainly a very astonishing one--for Jesus
Christ in one breath has uttered language as perfectly subversive of all
authority for polygamy and divorce in his kingdom, as light is
subversive of darkness. The Pharisees, ever desirous of exposing him to
the prejudices and passions of the people, "asked him in the presence of
great multitudes, who came with him from Galilee into the coasts of
Judea beyond Jordan," whether he admitted, with Moses, the legality of
divorce for every cause. Their object was to provoke him to the exercise
of legislative authority; to whom he promptly replied, that God made man
at the beginning, male and female, and ordained that the male and female
by marriage, should be one flesh. And for satisfactory reasons, had
sanctioned divorce among Abraham's seed; and then adds, as a law-giver,
"But I say unto you, that whosoever shall put away his wife, (except for
fornication,) and shall marry another, committeth adultery; and if a
woman put away her husband, and marry again, she committeth adultery."
Here polygamy and divorce die together. The law of Christ is, that
_neither_ party shall put the other away--that _either_ party, taking
another companion, while the first companion lives, is guilty of
adultery--consequently, polygamy and divorce are prohibited forever,
unless this law is violated--and that violation is declared to be
adultery, which excludes from his kingdom.--1 Cor. vi: 9. After the
church was organized, the Holy Ghost, by Paul, _commands_, let not the
wife depart from her husband, but, and if she depart let her remain
unmarried--and let not the husband put away his wife.--1 Cor. vii: 10.
Here _divorce_ is prohibited by _both parties_; a second marriage
according to Christ, would be adultery, while the first co