Page:Vindicationoflaw00hath.djvu/77

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feeling of Scotland and Ireland, which the representatives of the people have respected? If not, whether Lord Gage will support a bill which will enable a man to have two wives, one in Scotland or Ireland, and one in England? His lordship says, "Every example given in Leviticus, with the one exception of the maternal aunt, is either of blood relations, or of one imported and installed as a member of the family." I do not quite understand this passage, for a maternal aunt is a blood relation, and must not therefore be excepted. But possibly the uncle's wife is meant (verse 14). I do not myself see how it is made out that any of the three cases in verse 17 are necessarily imported or installed as members of the family, and certainly they are not blood relations. I can, however, vouch for the sister-in-law being very frequently "installed as a member of the family," and thousands of them would be driven from their homes by any alteration of the law. Lord Gage thinks a sister-in-law is "by fiction of law called sister; and is in fact, and on a matter of incest, as entirely unrelated to him as she was before." That is simply begging the question, a remark which I may apply to a great portion of his lordship's letter. As far as there are arguments to meet, I think I have dealt with them. His lordship will probably in the House of Lords meet both with "opponent prelates" and opponent laymen who will do them more ample justice.