Such are some of the wise safeguards provided by both Church and State for the Sacrament of Marriage. Their object is to prevent the {122} marriage state being entered into "lightly, unadvisedly, or wantonly," to secure such publicity as will prevent clandestine marriages,[14] and will give parents, and others with legal status, an opportunity to lodge legal objections. Great is the solemnity of the Sacrament in which is "signified and represented the mystical union that is betwixt Christ and His Church". [1] Husband--from _hus_, a house, and _buan_, to dwell. [2] Until fifty-three years ago an Act of Parliament was necessary for a divorce. In 1857 _The Matrimonial Causes Act_ established the Divorce Court. In 1873 the _Indicature Act_ transferred it to a division of the High Court--the Probate, Divorce, and Admiralty Division. [3] "Visitation Charges," p. 252. [4] It is a common legal error that seven years effective separation between husband and wife entitles either to remarry, and hundreds of women who have lost sight of their husbands for seven years innocently commit bigamy. Probably the mistake comes from the fact that _prosecution_ for bigamy does not hold good in such a case. But this does not legalize the bigamous marriage or legitimize the children. [5] The origin of Banns. [6] The Rubric says: "It is convenient that the new-married persons receive the Holy Communion _at the time of their marriage_, or at the first opportunity after their marriage," thus retaining, though releasing, the old rule. [7] Consanguinity--from _cum_, together, and _sanguineus_, relating to blood. [8] Affinity--from _ad_, near, and _finis_, a boundary. [9] See a most helpful paper read by Father Puller at the E.C.U. Anniversary Meeting, and reported in "The Church Times" of 17 June, 1910. [10] There seems to be no legal definition of the word "reside". The law would probably require more than leaving a bag in a room, hired for twenty-one days, as is often done. It must be remembered that the object of the law is _publicity_--that is, the avoidance of a clandestine marriage, which marriage at a Registry Office now frequently makes so fatally easy. [11] 25 Hen. VIII, cap. 21. [12] Such as, for example, Royal Chapels, St. Paul's Cathedral, Eton College Chapel, etc. [13] Cf. Blunt's "Church Law," p. 133; 4 Geo. IV, c. 76, s. 21. [14] It will be remembered that runaway marriages were, in former days, frequently celebrated at Gretna Green, a Scotch village in Dumfriesshire, near the English border. {123} CHAPTER X. HOLY ORDER. The Second Sacrament of Perpetuation is Holy Order. As the Sacrament of Marriage perpetuates the human race, so the Sacrament of Order perpetuates the Priesthood. Holy Order, indeed, perpetuates the Sacraments themselves. It is the ordained channel through which the Sacramental life of the Church is continued.