t matter on which it is to act;
and it is still more singular to consider mere registration as
constituting in itself the very thing that is to be registered. But it
seems to be so written in the Bill before us.

Various other observations will occur as to the imperfect structure of
the two Acts thus taken in connexion; but we pass over these minor
matters to point out the characteristic principles of this measure, and
the consequences which we think it involves.

It will be seen, first, that it declares marriage to be constituted by
mere registration to all effects and purposes, so that two parties thus
entered in the register, are conclusively and irrevocably united by that
simple fact. Second, that it professes no preference, and shows no
favour for ecclesiastical marriages over those constituted by simple
contract or mere registration, the old-fashioned mode of solemnising,
them by a clergyman being merely saved from abolition, but shorn of all
its privileges, and left, as it were, to die out in due time. Third,
that in registration marriages, no proclamation of banns is required,
and no notice of any kind is given to the public, nor any interval for
deliberation forced upon the parties. Fourth, that no locality is
assigned within which the parties may thus marry by registration, it
being competent apparently to carry out the arrangement in any district
however distant from their ordinary abode, by requiring, in a somewhat
Irish fashion, "the registrar of the subdistrict within which such
marriage HAS BEEN contracted to attend _at the contraction_."

Now we think it can require little argument to show that a system of
this kind, introduced as the basis of _the marriage law of the land_,
is, as has been predicted, much more likely to prove a bane than a
blessing. Marriage is undoubtedly a civil contract, but in all
enlightened Christian countries it has been looked upon as a solemn
engagement, over which the church ought to preside, in order duly to
impress the contracting parties with the religious origin from which it
sprung, with the religious duties which it involves, and with the
religious sanctions by which those duties are guarded. Considered as the
foundation of society itself, as the source of all pure and kindly
affections, as the introduction to the parental as well as to the
conjugal relation, it is impossible that it can be lightly treated or
hurried over as a matter of mere routine or ordinary busines