Relationship Between Husband and Wife
173
The Privileges of Marriage
Those professing to be Christians should duly consider the result
of every privilege of the marriage relation, and sanctified principle
should be the basis of every action.
In very many cases the parents have abused their marriage privi-
leges, and by indulgence have strengthened their animal passions.
[On another occasion Mrs. White speaks of the “privacy and
privileges of the family relation.”]
[134]
It is carrying that which is lawful to excess that makes it a grievous
sin.
Many parents do not obtain the knowledge that they should in
the married life. They are not guarded lest Satan take advantage of
them and control their minds and their lives. They do not see that
God requires them to control their married lives from any excesses.
But very few feel it to be a religious duty to govern their passions.
They have united themselves in marriage to the object of their choice
and, therefore, reason that marriage sanctifies the indulgence of the
baser passions. Even men and women professing godliness give loose
rein to their lustful passions and have no thought that God holds them
accountable for the expenditure of vital energy, which weakens their
hold on life and enervates the entire system.
Practice Self-Denial and Temperance
Oh, that I could make all understand their obligation to God to
preserve the mental and physical organism in the best condition to
render perfect service to their Maker! Let the Christian wife refrain,
both in word and act, from exciting the animal passions of her husband.
Many have no strength at all to waste in this direction. From their
youth up they have weakened the brain and sapped the constitution
by the gratification of animal passions. Self-denial and temperance
should be the watchword in their married life.
We are under solemn obligations to God to keep the spirit pure and
the body healthy, that we may be a benefit to humanity and render to
God perfect service. The apostle utters these words of warning: “Let
not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the
lusts thereof.” He urges us onward by telling us that “every man that