HO ARE IN
THE PLACE OF PARENTS, AND THEN DELIBERATE WITH HERSELF, BEFORE SHE
CONSENTS. The reason why parents are to be consulted is, because they
deliberate from judgement, knowledge, and love; from _judgement_,
because they are in an advanced age, which excels in judgement, and
discerns what is suitable and unsuitable: from _knowledge_, in respect
to both the suitor and their daughter; in respect to the suitor they
procure information, and in respect to their daughter they already know;
wherefore they conclude respecting both with united discernment: from
_love_, because to consult the good of their daughter, and to provide
for her establishment, is also to consult and provide for their own and
for themselves.

299. The case would be altogether different, if the daughter consents of
herself to her urgent suitor, without consulting her parents, or those
who are in their place; for she cannot from judgement, knowledge, and
love, make a right estimate of the matter which so deeply concerns her
future welfare: she cannot from _judgement_, because she is as yet in
ignorance as to conjugial life, and not in a state of comparing reasons,
and discovering the morals of men from their particular tempers; nor
from _knowledge_, because she knows few things beyond the domestic
concerns of her parents and of some of her companions; and is
unqualified to examine into such things as relate to the family and
property of her suitor: nor from _love_, because with daughters in their
first marriageable age, and also afterwards, this is led by the
concupiscences originating in the senses, and not as yet by the desires
originating in a refined mind. The daughter ought nevertheless to
deliberate on the matter with herself, before she consents, lest she
should be led against her will to form a connection with a man whom she
does not love; for by so doing, consent on her part would be wanting;
and yet it is consent that constitutes marriage, and initiates the
spirit into conjugial love; and consent against the will, or extorted,
does not initiate the spirit, although it may the body; and thus it
converts chastity, which resides in the spirit, into lust; whereby
conjugial love in its first warmth is vitiated.

300. IV. AFTER A DECLARATION OF CONSENT, PLEDGES ARE TO BE GIVEN. By
pledges we mean presents, which, after consent, are confirmations,
testifications, first favors, and gladnesses. Those presents are
_confirmations_, because they are c