1 Corinthians 7:1

Et rursus cure dicit: “Bonum est homini uxorem non tangere, sed propter fornicationes unusquisque suam uxorem habeat;” id veluti exponens, rursus dicit: “Ne vos tentet Satanas.” Non enim iis, qui continenter utuntur matrimonio propter solam liberorum procreationem, dicit, “propter intemperantiam;” sed iis, qui finem liberorum procreationis cupiunt transilire: ne, cure nimium annuerit noster adversarius, excitet appetitionem ad alienas voluptates. Fortasse autem quoniam iis, qui juste vivunt, resistit propter æmulationem, et adversus eos contendit, volens eos ad suos ordines traducere, per laboriosam continentiam eis vult præbere occasionera. Merito ergo dicit: “Melius est matrimonio jungi quam uri,” ut “vir reddat debiturn uxori, et uxor viro, et ne frustrentur invicem” hoc divino ad generationera dato auxilio. …

Grant, now, that you marry “in the Lord,” in accordance with the law and the apostle, if, notwithstanding, you care even about this, with what face do you request (the solemnizing of) a matrimony which is unlawful to those of whom you request it; of a monogamist bishop, of presbyters and deacons bound by the same solemn engagement, of widows whose Order you have in your own person refused? And they, plainly, will give husbands and wives as they would morsels of bread; for this is their rendering of “To every one who asketh thee thou shalt give!” And they will join you together in a virgin church, the one betrothed of the one Christ! And you will pray for your husbands , the new and the old. Make your election, to which of the twain you will play the adulteress. I think, to both. But if you have any wisdom, be silent on behalf of the dead one. …

Necessary it is, therefore, that the (character of the) apostle should be continuously pointed out to them; whom I will maintain to be such in the second of Corinthians withal, as I know (him to be) in all his letters. (He it is) who even in the first (Epistle) was the first of all (the apostles) to dedicate the temple of God: “Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that in you the Lord dwells?”, who likewise, for the consecrating and purifying (of) that temple, wrote the law pertaining to the temple-keepers: “If any shall have marred the temple of God, him shall God mar; for the temple of God is holy, which (temple) are ye.” Come, now; who in the world has (ever) redintegrated one who has been “marred” by God (that is, delivered to Satan with a view to destruction of the flesh), after subjoining for that reason, “Let none seduce himself;” that is, let none presume that one “marr …

In Genesis: “Multiplying I will multiply thy sorrows and thy groanings, and in sorrow shalt thou bring forth children; and thy turning shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.” Of this same thing in the Gospel according to Matthew: “All men do not receive the word, but they to whom it is given: for there are some eunuchs who were born so from their mother’s womb, and there are eunuchs who have been constrained by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven’s sake. He who can receive it, let him receive it.” Also according to Luke: “The children of this world beget, and are begotten. But they who have been considered worthy of that world, and the resurrection from the dead, do not marry, nor are married: for neither shall they begin to die: for they are equal to the angels of God, since they are the children of the resurrection. …

3. Oh for one to have regulated my disorder, and turned to my profit the fleeting beauties of the things around me, and fixed a bound to their sweetness, so that the tides of my youth might have spent themselves upon the conjugal shore, if so be they could not be tranquillized and satisfied within the object of a family, as Thy law appoints, O Lord, who thus formest the offspring of our death, being able also with a tender hand to blunt the thorns which were excluded from Thy paradise! For Thy omnipotency is not far from us even when we are far from Thee, else in truth ought I more vigilantly to have given heed to the voice from the clouds: “Nevertheless, such shall have trouble in the flesh, but I spare you;” and, “It is good for a man not to touch a woman;” and, “He that is unmarried careth for the things that belong to the Lord, how he may please the Lord; but he that is married caret …

27. For, if it was possible for one man to use many wives with chastity, it is possible for another to use one wife with lust. And I look with greater approval on the man who uses the fruitfulness of many wives for the sake of an ulterior object, than on the man who enjoys the body of one wife for its own sake. For in the former case the man aims at a useful object suited to the circumstances of the times; in the latter case he gratifies a lust which is engrossed in temporal enjoyments. And those men to whom the apostle permitted as a matter of indulgence to have one wife because of their incontinence, were less near to God than those who, though they had each of them numerous wives, yet just as a wise man uses food and drink only for the sake of bodily health, used marriage only for the sake of offspring. …

All the commandments of God, then, are embraced in love, of which the apostle says: “Now the end of the commandment is charity, out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned.” Thus the end of every commandment is charity, that is, every commandment has love for its aim. But whatever is done either through fear of punishment or from some other carnal motive, and has not for its principle that love which the Spirit of God sheds abroad in the heart, is not done as it ought to be done, however it may appear to men. For this love embraces both the love of God and the love of our neighbor, and “on these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets,” we may add the Gospel and the apostles. For it is from these that we hear this voice: The end of the commandment is charity, and God is love. …

78. Why do you reproach us by saying that men renewed in baptism ought no longer to beget children, or to possess fields, and houses, and money? Paul allows it. For, as cannot be denied, he wrote to believers, after recounting many kinds of evil-doers who shall not possess the kingdom of God: "And such were you," he says: "but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God." By the washed and sanctified, no one, assuredly, will venture to think any are meant but believers, and those who have renounced this world. But, after showing to whom he writes, let us see whether he allows these things to them. He goes on: "All things are lawful for me, but all things are not expedient: all things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any. …

Forasmuch, then, as marriage cannot be such as that of the primitive men might have been, if sin had not preceded; it may yet be like that of the holy fathers of the olden time, in such wise that the carnal concupiscence which causes shame (which did not exist in paradise previous to the fall, and after that event was not allowed to remain there), although necessarily forming a part of the body of this death, is not subservient to it, but only submits its function, when forced thereto, for the sole purpose of assisting in the procreation of children; otherwise, since the present time (as we have already said) is the period for abstaining from the nuptial embrace, and therefore makes no necessary demand on the exercise of the said function, seeing that all nations now contribute so abundantly to the production of an offspring which shall receive spiritual birth, there is the greater room …

But let no one consider this an undertaking beside the purpose, nor a search of this kind a piece of superfluous curiosity; for the date of the Epistles contributes no little to what we are looking after. For when I see him writing to the Romans and to the Colossians about the same subjects, and yet not in a like way about the same subjects; but to the former with much condescension, as when he says, “Him that is weak in the faith receive ye, but not to doubtful disputations; for one believeth that he may eat all things, another, herbs” ( Rom. xiv. …

[3.] They had written accordingly to him by the hand of Fortunatus and Stephanas and Achaicus, by whom also he himself writes; and this he has indicated in the end of the Epistle: not however upon all these subjects, but about marriage and virginity; wherefore also he said, ( ch. vii. 1 .) “Now concerning the things whereof ye wrote” &c. And he proceeds to give injunctions, both on the points about which they had written, and those about which they had not written; having learnt with accuracy all their failings. Timothy, too, he sends with the letters, knowing that letters indeed have great force, yet that not a little would be added to them by the presence of the disciple also.

1 Cor. vii. 1, 2 Now concerning the things whereof ye wrote to me: it is good for a man not to touch a woman. But because of fornications, let each man have his own wife; and let each woman have her own husband. Having corrected the three heaviest things laid to their charge, one, the distraction of the Church, another, about the fornicator, a third, about the covetous person, he thenceforth uses a milder sort of speech. And he interposes some exhortation and advice about marriage and virginity, giving the hearers some respite from more unpleasant subjects. But in the second Epistle he does the contrary; he begins from the milder topics, and ends with the more distressing. …