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an Hour, or he would have her put to Death with Tortures.
The Woman's Body being permitted to be put in conſecrated Ground, was of no real Conſequence to her; ſhe was removed from all Intereſt in this World; her irrecoverable Doom was paſt where, I fear, the Command of an Huſband would not be deem'd a ſufficient Apology for ſo great a Breach of the Laws of her Creator[1]. Nor can any think, that was in Truth and Reality the Caſe; for what worſe Conſequence could have followed from her refuſing her Huſband, than her own, and her Child's Death? But it was thought agreeable to our Laws that a Wife ſhould be abſolutely at the Command of her Huſband, and the Determination was given in Regard to the living, not to the dead.
From hence I muſt take the Liberty to aſſert, that this Exemption of a Wife from Puniſhment, upon Conſideration that ſhe obeys her Huſband, never was deſigned as a Privilege to Wives, and that it never can be ſuch in its own Nature, but is a Snare and
- ↑ St. Peter thought it no Excuſe for Sapphira that ſhe agreed with her Huſbaud to ſin againſt God; he pronounced the ſame Sentence upon the Wife, as he had done upon the Husband, which ſhewed, that he judged their Guilt to be equal. Acts Chap. v.
