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MR. WHITE. 1301
the penalty. So with Sexual Passion, Gratify it in honest wedlock,
and accept the consequences" (II, p. 415). This also is the reason
why Mr. White, in contradiction to Swedenborg, condemns all "mis
tresses" to hell.
As Mr. White is unwilling to see a distinction between the two
kinds of fornication, one of which destroys conjugial love, and the
other preserves it ; so also he is unwilling to see a like distinction
which Swedenborg makes in concubinage, and he again joins the
"sickly virtuous and the hypocritically pure" in subjecting Sweden
borg to "gross calumny" for making such a distinction. For, says
he (II, p. 415), "His [i. e. Swedenborg’s] treatment of concubinage,
defined as the ’intercourse of a married man with a harlot’ (C. L. 462),
is even more repulsive.”
To this must be objected, in the first place, that Swedenborg in
the passage referred to does not define concubinage as the "inter
course of a married man with a harlot," but he defines it there as
the "conjunction of a married man entered into (pacta) with a
woman."
Swedenborg’s own words on this subject are as follows, "That
there are two kinds of concubinage, which differ exceedingly from
each other, and that one kind consists in adjoining a substituted
partner to the bed, and living conjointly and at the same time with
her and with a wife ; and that the other kind consists in engaging,
after a legitimate and just separation from a wife, a woman in her
stead as a bed-associate; and that these two kinds of concubinage
differ as much from each other as dirty linen differs from clean, may
be seen by those who take a considerate and distinct view of things,
but not by those whose view of things is confused and indistinct ; it
may be seen also by those who are in conjugial love, but not by
those who are in the love of adultery" (C. L. 463).
Swedenborg, besides, makes a distinction between the essence of
marriage, which is a conjunction of souls and hence of the body;
and the form of marriage which is the external ratification of
marriage by the laws of the state and of the church (nos. 156, and
306-310). He declares, besides, that "the external bonds of wed
lock must continue in the world till the decease of one of the parties"
(no. 276).
According to Swedenborg there are therefore internal and exter
nal marriage bonds ; and whenthe internal marriage bonds are dissolved,
he declares it to be a cause of separation from the bed, and also from
the house; but when not only the internal but also the external
bonds of marriage are broken, then he defines this as a cause of
divorce.
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