Efésios 5:28

So ought men to love their wives... — From this glorious digression; applying only to the divine Antitype, St. Paul comes back to the one point, in which the type may imitate it — that is, a deep and unfailing love. “So” refers to the previous verse, describing the love of Christ, not to the “as” following; otherwise the want of connection would be strangely abrupt. Moreover, from this idea of the love of Christ as the pattern, the latter part of this verse and the following verses naturally arise. Christ loves the Church as His body, a part of Himself. Hence the idea that the husband is “the head of the wife” gives place to the absolute identification of himself with his wife, as “one flesh.”

He that loveth his wife loveth himself. — All right “love of our neighbour” is directed to be given to him “as to ourselves.” It is to be of the same kind as the love of self — that is, first, an instinct (as of self-preservation); and next a rational and settled principle (as of reasonable self-love, seeking our own perfection, which is our happiness). Here, however, this love to our neighbour is actually identified with self-love. The wife is the husband’s very self; he can no more fail to love her than to love himself, though (again to follow the example of Christ) he may love her better than himself. We may note that this identification of husband and wife is the basis of all ecclesiastical, and, in great degree, of all civil, law of Christian nations as to marriage.