Yet I am glad that those shameful laws have at length attained to their full measure of glory, which is this: the Romanists of our day have through them become merchants. What is it they sell? The shame of men and women--merchandise, forsooth, most worthy of such merchants, grown altogether filthy and obscene through greed and godlessness. For there is nowadays no hindrance that may not be legalised upon the intercession of mammon, so that these laws of men seem to have sprung into existence for the sole purpose of serving those grasping and robbing Nimrods as snares for taking money and as nets for catching souls, and in order that that "abomination" might stand "in the holy place," [Matt. 24:15] the Church of God, and openly sell to men the shame of either sex, or as the Scriptures say, "shame and nakedness," [Lev. 13:6 ff.] of which they had previously robbed them by means of their laws. O worthy trade for our pontiffs to ply, instead of the ministry of the Gospel, which in their greed and pride they despise, being delivered up to a reprobate sense with utter shame and infamy. [Rom. 1:28]

But what shall I say or do? If I enter into details, the treatise will grow to inordinate length, for everything is in such dire confusion one does not know where to begin, whither to go on, or where to leave off. I know that no state is well governed by means of laws. If the magistrate be wise, he will rule more prosperously by natural bent than by laws. If he be not wise, he will but further the evil by means of laws; for he will not know what use to make of the laws nor how to adapt them to the individual case. More stress ought, therefore, to be laid, in civil affairs, on putting good and wise men in office than on making laws; for such men will themselves be the very best laws, and will judge every variety of case with lively justice. And if there be knowledge of the divine law combined with natural wisdom, then written laws will be entirely superfluous and harmful. Above all, love needs no laws whatever[140].

Nevertheless I will say and do what I can. I admonish and pray all priests and brethren[141], when they encounter any hindrance from which the pope can grant dispensation and which is not expressly contained in the Scriptures, by all means to confirm[142] any marriage that may have been contracted[143] in any way contrary to the ecclesiastical or pontifical laws. But let them arm themselves with the divine law, which says, "What God hath joined together, let no man put asunder." [Matt. 19:6] For the joining together of a man and a woman is of divine law and is binding, however it may conflict with the laws of men; the laws of men must give way before it without hesitation. For if a man leaves father and mother and cleaves to his wife, how much more will he tread underfoot the silly and wicked laws of men[144] in order to cleave to his wife! And if pope, bishop or official[145] annul any marriage because it was contracted contrary to the laws of men, he is antichrist, he does violence to nature, and is guilty of lese-majesty toward God, because this word stands,--"What God hath joined together, let no man put asunder." [Matt. 19:6]

Besides this, no man had the right to frame such laws, and Christ has granted to Christians a liberty which is above all laws of men, especially where a law of God conflicts with them. Thus it is said in Mark ii, "The Son of man is lord also of the sabbath," [Mark 2:28] and, "The sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath." [Mark 2:27] Moreover, such laws were condemned beforehand by Paul, when he foretold that there would be men forbidding to marry [1 Tim. 4:3]. Here, therefore, those cruel hindrances arising from affinity, spiritual or legal relationship[146], and consanguinity must give way, so far as the Scriptures permit, in which the second degree of consanguinity alone is prohibited. Thus it is written in Leviticus xviii, in which chapter there are twelve persons a man is prohibited from marrying; namely, his mother, his mother-in-law, his full sister, his half-sister by either parent, his granddaughter, his father's or mother's sister, his daughter-in-law, his brother's wife, his wife's sister, his stepdaughter, and his uncle's wife. [Lev. 18:6 ff.] Here only the first degree of affinity and the second degree of consanguinity are forbidden; yet not without exception, as will appear on closer examination, for the brother's or sister's daughter, or the niece, is not included in the prohibition, although she is in the second degree. Therefore, if a marriage has been contracted outside of these degrees, it should by no means be annulled on account of the laws of men, since it is nowhere written in the Bible that any other degrees were prohibited by God. Marriage itself, as of divine institution, is incomparably superior to any laws; so that marriage should not be annulled for the sake of the laws, rather should the laws be broken for the sake of marriage.

That nonsense about conpaternities, conmaternities, confraternities, consororities, and confilieties must therefore be altogether abolished, when a marriage has been contracted. What was it but the superstition of men that invented those spiritual relationships?[147] If one may not marry the person one has baptised or stood sponsor for, what right has any Christian to marry any other Christian? Is the relationship that grows out of the external rite, or the sign, of the sacrament more intimate that that which grows out of the blessing[148] of the sacrament itself? Is not a Christian man brother to a Christian woman, and is not she his sister? Is not a baptised man the spiritual brother of a baptised woman? How foolish we are! If a man instruct his wife in the Gospel and in faith in Christ and thus become truly her father in Christ, would it not be right for her to remain his wife? Would not Paul have had the right to marry a maiden out of the Corinthian congregation, of whom he boasts that he has begotton them all in Christ? [1 Cor. 4:15] Lo, thus has Christian liberty been suppressed through the blindness of human superstition.

There is even less in the legal relationship[149], and yet they have set it above the divine right of marriage. Nor would I recognise that hindrance which they term "disparity of religion,"[150] and which forbids one to marry any unbaptised person, even on condition that she become converted to the faith. Who made this prohibition? God or man? Who gave to men the power to prohibit such a marriage? The spirits, forsooth, that speak lies in hypocrisy, as Paul says [1 Tim 4:1]. Of them it must be said: "The wicked have told me fables; but not as thy law." [Ps. 119:85] The heathen Patricius married the Christian Monica, the mother of St. Augustine; why should not the same be permitted nowadays?

The same stupid, nay, wicked cruelty is seen in "the hindrance of crime,"[151]--as when a man has married a woman with whom he had lived in adultery, or when he plotted to bring about the death of a woman's husband in order to be able to wed the widow. I pray you, whence comes this cruelty of man toward man, which even God never demanded? Do they pretend not to know that Bathsheba, the wife of Uriah, was wed by David, a most saintly man, after the double crime of adultery and murder? If the divine law did this, what do these despotic men to their fellowservants?

Another hindrance is that which they call "the hindrance of a tie,"[152]--as when a man is bound by being betrothed to another woman. Here they decide that, if he has had carnal knowledge of the second, the betrothal with the first becomes null and void. This I do not understand at all. I hold that he who has betrothed himself to one woman belongs no longer to himself, and because of this act, by the prohibition of the divine law, he belongs to the first, though he has not known her, even if he has known the second. For it was not in his power to give the latter what was no longer his own; he deceived her and actually committed adultery. But they regard the matter differently because they pay more heed to the carnal union than to the divine command, according to which the man, having plighted his troth to the first, is bound to keep it for ever. For whoever would give anything must give of that which is his own. And God forbids a man to overreach or circumvent his brother in any matter [1 Thess. 4:6]. This prohibition must be kept, over and above all the traditions of all men. Therefore, the man in the above case cannot with a good conscience live in marriage with the second woman, and this hindrance should be completely overthrown. For if a monastic vow make a man to be no longer his own, why does not a promise of betrothal given and received do the same?--since this[153] is one of the precepts and fruits of the Spirit (Galatians v) [Gal. 5:22 f.; Eph. 5:9], while a monastic vow is of human invention. And if a wife may claim her husband despite the act that he has taken a monastic vow, why may not a bride claim her betrothed, even though he has known another? But we said above[154] that he who has plighted his troth to a maiden ought not to take a monastic vow, but is in duty bound to keep faith with her, which faith he cannot break for any tradition of men, because it is commanded by God. Much more should the man here keep faith with his first bride, since he could not plight his troth to a second save with a lying heart, and therefore did not really plight it, but deceived her, his neighbor, against God's command. Therefore, the "hindrance of error"[155] enters in here, by which his marriage to the second woman is rendered null and void.