[XII.] Only there was no nuptial cohabitation; because He who was to be without sin, and was sent not in sinful flesh, but in the likeness of sinful flesh,55    Rom. viii. 3. could not possibly have been made in sinful flesh itself without that shameful lust of the flesh which comes from sin, and without which He willed to be born, in order that He might teach us, that every one who is born of sexual intercourse is in fact sinful flesh, since that alone which was not born of such intercourse was not sinful flesh. Nevertheless conjugal intercourse is not in itself sin, when it is had with the intention of producing children; because the mind’s good-will leads the ensuing bodily pleasure, instead of following its lead; and the human choice is not distracted by the yoke of sin pressing upon it, inasmuch as the blow of the sin is rightly brought back to the purposes of procreation. This blow has a certain prurient activity which plays the king in the foul indulgences of adultery, and fornication, and lasciviousness, and uncleanness; whilst in the indispensable duties of the marriage state, it exhibits the docility of the slave. In the one case it is condemned as the shameless effrontery of so violent a master; in the other, it gets modest praise as the honest service of so submissive an attendant. This lust, then, is not in itself the good of the nuptial institution; but it is obscenity in sinful men, a necessity in procreant parents, the fire of lascivious indulgences, the shame of nuptial pleasures. Wherefore, then, may not persons remain man and wife when they cease by mutual consent from cohabitation; seeing that Joseph and Mary continued such, though they never even began to cohabit?

CAPUT XII.

Omnis quae de concubitu nascitur, caro peccati est. Solus ibi nuptialis concubitus non fuit, quia in carne peccati fieri non poterat sine illa carnis pudenda concupiscentia, quae accidit ex peccato, sine qua concipi voluit, qui futurus erat sine peccato, non in carne peccati, sed in similitudine carnis peccati (Rom. VIII, 3): ut hinc etiam doceret, omnem quae de concubitu nascitur, carnem esse peccati; quandoquidem sola quae non inde nata est, non fuit caro peccati. Quamvis conjugalis concubitus qui fit intentione generandi, non sit ipse peccatum: quia bona voluntas animi, sequentem ducit, non ducentem sequitur corporis voluptatem; nec humanum arbitrium trahitur subjugante peccato, cum juste redigitur 0422 in usum generandi plaga peccati. Hujus plagae quidam pruritus in adulteriorum et fornicationum et quorumlibet stuprorum atque immunditiarum foeditatibus regnat; in connubiorum vero necessitudinibus servit. Ibi de domino tali turpitudo damnatur, hic de pedissequo tali honestas verecundatur. Non est igitur haec libido nuptiarum bonum, sed obscoenitas peccantium, necessitas generantium, lasciviarum ardor, nuptiarum pudor. Cur ergo non conjuges maneant, qui ex consensu concumbere desinunt; si manserunt conjuges Joseph et Maria, qui concumbere nec coeperunt?