attached to it. History is the record of these. The
disappointed hopes, and the miseries of unnumbered homes speak forth their
execution. This great scripture law has its foundation in the very nature
of marriage itself. If marriage involves the law of spiritual harmony; if,
in the language of the Roman law, it is "the union of a man and woman,
constituting an united habitual course of life, never to be separated;" if
it is a partnership of the whole life,--a mutual sharing in all rights,
human and divine; if they are one flesh,--one in all the elements of their
moral being, as Christ and His church are one; if it is a mystery of man's
being, antecedent to all human law; if, in a word, man and woman in
marriage, are no more twain, but one flesh; and if the oneness of our
nature is framed of the body, the soul, and the spirit, then is it not
plain that when two persons marry, who possess no spiritual fitness for, or
harmony with, each other, they violate the fundamental law of wedlock; and
their marriage cannot meet the scripture conception of matrimonial union or
oneness. There will be no adaptation of the whole nature for each other;
they will not appreciate the sacred mysteriousness of marriage; instead of
the moral and religious development of the spiritual nature, there will be
the evolution of selfishness and sensuality as the leading motives of
domestic life. We see, then, that the Christian cannot with impunity,
violate the scripture law, "Be not unequally yoked with unbelievers."

Shall the Christian parent and child disregard this prohibition of God?
Will you ridicule this fundamental principle of Christian marriage? Will
the children of God not hesitate to marry the children of the devil? Can
these walk together, in domestic union and harmony? Can saint and sinner be
of one mind, one spirit, one life, one hope, one interest? Can the children
of the light and the children of darkness, opposite in character and in
their apprehension of things, become flesh of each other's flesh, and by
the force of their blended light and darkness shed, around their
home-fireside the cheerfulness of a mutual love, of a common life and hope,
and of a progressive spiritual work?

Parents! it is your right and duty to interfere when your children violate
this law. Bring them up from infancy to respect it. In the parlor, train
them to appreciate its religious importance. Show them that God will visit
the iniquity of their departure