Testimonia

{"author":null,"backreferences":[{"context_html":"<p>And we see that, since the human race has increased and\r\nmultiplied, this is so strictly observed even among the profane\r\nworshippers of many and false gods, that though their\r\nlaws perversely allow a brother to marry his sister,<a id=\"FNanchor_182_182\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_182_182\">[182]</a> yet custom,\r\nwith a finer morality, prefers to forego this licence; and\r\nthough it was quite allowable in the earliest ages of the\r\nhuman race to marry one's sister, it is now abhorred as a\r\nthing which no circumstances could justify. For custom has\r\nvery great power either to attract or to shock human feeling.\r\nAnd in this matter, while it restrains concupiscence within\r\ndue bounds, the man who neglects and disobeys it is justly\r\nbranded as abominable. For if it is iniquitous to plough\r\nbeyond our own boundaries through the greed of gain, is it\r\nnot much more iniquitous to transgress the recognised boundaries\r\nof morals through sexual lust? And with regard to\r\nmarriage in the next degree of consanguinity, marriage between<span class=\"pagenum\"><a id=\"Page_80\">[Pg 80]</a></span>\r\ncousins, we have observed that in our own time the\r\ncustomary morality has prevented this from being frequent,\r\nthough the law allows it. It was not prohibited by divine\r\nlaw, nor as yet had human law prohibited it; nevertheless,\r\nthough legitimate, people shrank from it, because it lay so\r\nclose to what was illegitimate, and in marrying a cousin\r\nseemed almost to marry a sister,—for cousins are so closely\r\nrelated that they are called brothers and sisters,<a id=\"FNanchor_183_183\"></a><a class=\"fnanchor pginternal\" href=\"#Footnote_183_183\">[183]</a> and are\r\nalmost really so. But the ancient fathers, fearing that near\r\nrelationship might gradually in the course of generations\r\ndiverge, and become distant relationship, or cease to be relationship\r\nat all, religiously endeavoured to limit it by the\r\nbond of marriage before it became distant, and thus, as it\r\nwere, to call it back when it was escaping them. And on\r\nthis account, even when the world was full of people, though\r\nthey did not choose wives from among their sisters or half-sisters,\r\nyet they preferred them to be of the same stock as\r\nthemselves. But who doubts that the modern prohibition of\r\nthe marriage even of cousins is the more seemly regulation,—not\r\nmerely on account of the reason we have been urging,\r\nthe multiplying of relationships, so that one person might not\r\nabsorb two, which might be distributed to two persons, and\r\nso increase the number of people bound together as a family,\r\nbut also because there is in human nature I know not what\r\nnatural and praiseworthy shamefacedness which restrains us\r\nfrom desiring that connection which, though for propagation,\r\nis yet lustful, and which even conjugal modesty blushes over,\r\nwith any one to whom consanguinity bids us render respect?</p>","headings":["THE CITY OF GOD.","BOOK FIFTEENTH.","ARGUMENT."],"marker_anchor":null,"paragraph_id":"pg45305-paragraph-137"}],"canonical_references":[],"date_end":null,"date_start":null,"deduplication_fingerprint":"c93a45550123365ee5f452dc6a836b674bbea1db21089bdfa3bab24e76142de9","edition_title":"The City of God, Volume II","edition_translators":["Marcus Dods","George Wilson (Books XVII-XVIII)"],"edition_year":1871,"explicit_reference_candidates":[],"headings":[],"id":"pg45305-Footnote_183_183","license_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html","public_import_allowed":false,"record_kind":"original-editor-translator-note","review_required":["work and recension attribution","original-work chronology","Bible reference numbering and citation kind","English edition rights and attribution"],"review_status":"needs_review","rights_evidence":"Provider catalog reports public domain in the USA. Original transcription title leaves state T. & T. Clark, Edinburgh, 1871; printed translator allocation retained. Gutenberg credits Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries without an exact scan identifier. Full provider license preserved with acquired original; republication and per-work metadata remain unreviewed.","source_anchor":"Footnote_183_183","source_ebook":45305,"source_html":"<div class=\"footnote\">\n<p><a id=\"Footnote_183_183\"></a><a class=\"pginternal\" href=\"#FNanchor_183_183\"><span class=\"label\">[183]</span></a> Both in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin, though not uniformly, nor in Latin\r\ncommonly.</p></div>","source_sha256":"7e0ced9e70512f3cf050b53c9d548e36b70d468d875153869f95d8aff5bbb530","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/45305/pg45305-images.html#Footnote_183_183","text_sha256":"273fc0752e80815053a3d489fe1b0a52bd11bfadc13b1f8d7d527c8b6e2198b6","verified":false,"work_id":null}

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