Quesnel: Moral Reflections on the Gospels Vol 1

72 ST. MATTHEW.
of all that is most dear to us, in order to save our
souls. Men often part with the members of the
body, at the discretion of a surgeon, that they may
preserve the trunk, and die a little later; and yet
they will not deprive themselves of a look, a touch,
a small pleasure, &c. to save the soul, and secure
themselves from dying eternally. It is not enough
to shut the eye, nor to stop the hand ; the one must
be " plucked out," and the other " cut off." Nei-
ther is this yet enough : we must " cast them both
from us." Not one moment's truce with lust, it
must be rooted up and destroyed. But, alas ! the
end of this work is not to be seen in this life.
Sect. V. Marriage Indissoluble, Swearing.
" 31. It hath been said, "Whosoever shall put
away his wife, let him give her a writing of divorce-
ment :"
God permitted this evil, to prevent a greater, and
to prefigure his repudiating the synagogue, which
was his first spouse. A Christian ought rather to
beg of God the grace to bear patiently'and quietly
the faults and imperfections of his wife, than to think
of the means of being parted from her. That which
was allowed to the hardness of an uncircumcised
heart, ought not to serve as a rule to a heart into
which charity has been infused by the Holy Ghost.
" 32. But I say unto you. That whosoever shall
put away his wife, saving for the cause of fornication,
causeth her to commit adultery ; and whosoever shall
marry her that is divorced, committeth adultery."
How inviolable ought to be the alliance of man
with his God by charity, since conjugal society is