Page:Vindicationoflaw00hath.djvu/59

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ON SCRIPTURAL PRINCIPLES.
51

marriage objected to to be within the Levitical degrees. There is certainly a very feeble, though I doubt not an honest attempt of Dr. M'Caul to fasten on Augustine his own notion that his translation, by inference, settles the whole question. In his letter to me, page 3, he says, "With regard to Augustine it is plain from his words that he did receive the inference. What he considers forbidden is, 'Sororem sorori superducere.'" He then cites a passage from a different work of Augustine where he says, "Et nostris quidem temporibus, ac more Romano nec superducere licet, ut amplius habeat quam unam viventem;" and he adds this singular reasoning: "As Augustine therefore believed that to superduce a second wife, was to take a second wife whilst the first was still alive, and that it was lawful (whatever he thought of the expediency) to have a second wife when the first was dead, so when he uses the same word respecting two sisters 'Sororem sorori noluit superducere,' he means that it is unlawful to have a second wife whilst the first is living, but that when the first is dead it is lawful." The words in italics beg the whole question. The argument is that the 18th verse, however translated, does not abrogate the law against marrying those who are "near of kin" as contained in the 6th verse; and that an inferential permission is not given to marry the wife's sister after the wife's death, by a prohibition to marry her during the