Choose a topic from Part 3 Suppl:

48. Object of the Consent in Marriage

1. The consent that makes a marriage is, implicitly, theconsent to the use of marital rights.

2. The essential end of marriage is the begetting andrearing ofchildren, and the control of fleshly tendencies.The parties may have many other accidental or nonessential ends inview, good or bad. Thus a person may marry for wealth, or forsocial position, or to prevent another from getting the personespoused, or to reform the person married, or for a variety ofother reasons. But the essential end of marriage is in marriageitself, and those who assume the marital state assume what thatstate is, no matter what their individual purposes andintentions may be. The accidental ends (the personal or individualpurposes and intentions of the spouses) cannot prevent theirmarriage from being a true one. Thus a woman who marries for socialposition is a married woman, despite her unworthy purpose inmarrying. A man who marries for wealth is a married man,notwithstanding his personal objective in taking a wife.

"The more you know and the better you understand, the more severely will you be judged, unless your life is also the more holy. Do not be proud, therefore, because of your learning or skill. Rather, fear because of the talent given you."
Thomas á Kempis

* * *

"God gives us some things, as the beginning of faith, even when we do not pray. Other things, such as perseverance, he has only provided for those who pray."
St Augustine

* * *

"A man should keep himself down, and not busy himself in mirabilibus super se."
St Philip Neri

* * *