The employment of erotic imagery to express the individual relation between Christ and the soul is always dangerous; but this objection does not apply to the statement that “the Church is the bride of Christ.”  Even in the Old Testament we find the chosen people so spoken of (cf.  Isa. liv. 5; Jer. iii. 14).  Professor Cheyne thinks that the Canticles were interpreted in this sense, and that this is why the book gained admission into the Canon.  In the New Testament, St. Paul uses the symbol of marriage in Rom. vii. 1-4; 1 Cor. xi. 3; Eph. v. 23-33.  On the last passage Canon Gore says:  “The love of Christ—­the removal of obstacles to His love by atoning sacrifice—­the act of spiritual purification—­the gradual sanctification—­the consummated union in glory; these are the moments of the Divine process of redemption, viewed from the side of Christ, which St. Paul specifies.”  This use of the “sacrament” of marriage (as a symbol of the mystical union between Christ and the Church), which alone has the sanction of the New Testament, is one which, we hope, the Church will always treasure.  The more personal relation also exists, and the fervent devotion which it elicits must not be condemned; though we are forced to remember that in our mysteriously constituted minds the highest and lowest emotions lie very near together, and that those who have chosen a life of detachment from earthly ties must be especially on their guard against the “occasional revenges” which the lower nature, when thwarted, is always plotting against the higher.