The stability of society demands that the divinely established institution of marriage shall be administered under secular law, whereby the family unit shall be a legalized entity, with responsibilities and obligations clearly defined, the rights of husband, wife and children protected, property interests safeguarded, and inheritance regulated. But the marriage covenant is more than a legalized contract. It is a solemn sacrament, under which the parties are made eligible to the blessing of Divine approval, and by which they are answerable both to the law of man and to the Power that transcends all human institutions. That marriage is honorable is as true today as when the precept was written in the Epistle to the Hebrews. The Latter-day Saints accept the doctrine of the imperative necessity of wedlock and the sanctity thereof; and they apply it as a requirement to all who are not prohibited by physical or other disability from assuming the sacred responsibilities of the married state. They hold as part of the birthright of every worthy man the privilege and duty of standing at the head of a household, the companion of a virtuous wife, both imbued with the hope of posterity, which by the blessing of God may never become extinct; and equally ennobling is the desire of every worthy woman to be a wife and mother in the family of mankind. We repudiate and abhor the pernicious doctrine that the sexual relation is but a carnal necessity, inherent in human kind because of fleshly desire, or that celibacy is a feature of exalted status more acceptable than marriage in the sight and judgment of God. Touching this matter the Lord hath spoken through direct revelation in the current age, saying: "And again, I say unto you, that whoso forbiddeth to marry is not ordained of God, for marriage is ordained of God unto man. Wherefore it is lawful that he should have one wife, and they twain shall be one flesh, and all this that the earth might answer the end of its creation, and that it might be filled with the measure of man, according to his creation before the world was made." (D&C 49: 15-17.) Without the power of perpetuating his kind man is in part bereft of his glory; for small is the possibility of achievement within the limited range of an individual life. Grand as may seem to be the attainments of a man who is really great as gaged by the best standards of human estimation, the culmination of his glorious heritage lies in his leaving offspring from his own body to carry forward the worthy efforts of their sire. And as with the man, so with the woman.