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Rickaby, Joseph , S. J., 1845-1932

"Moral Philosophy"

This life-communion, called by divines _fides_, or mutual
faith, is then the second good fruit of marriage. Indeed it is the
more characteristically human good, _offspring_ being rather related
to the animal side of our nature. But as animal and rational elements
make one human being, so do _offspring_ and _mutual faith_ constitute
the adequate good of that human union of the sexes, which we call
marriage.
10. Whatever good there is in marriage, connections formed by either
party beyond the marriage-bed, are agents of confusion to the undoing
of all that good and the practical dissolution of the marriage.
_Readings_.--_Contra Gentes_, iii., 122; _ib_., iii., 126; _ib_.,
iii., 136; Devas, _Studies of Family Life_, SS 90-101, where he
disposes of the proof of primitive promiscuity, drawn from the fact
that in early societies kinship is traced and property claimed only
through the mother.

SECTION II.--_Of the Unity of Marriage_.

1. _Both man and woman are by nature incapable of a second marriage,
while their former marriage endures_. No woman can have two husbands
at the same time, which is _polyandry_; and no man can have two wives
at the same time, which is _polygamy_.


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