The reasons for an engagement are these:

1. So that subsequently the souls of the couple may incline towards each other. 2. So that the sexual love all feel may be restricted to one person of the other sex. 3. So that each may get to know the other's inner affections, and by making them conformable link them in the inward cheerfulness of love. 4. So that the spirit of each may enter upon marriage, and become ever more closely associated. 5. So that conjugial love may thus advance duly from its first warmth to the wedding flame. 6. Consequently, so that conjugial love may develop and grow in the proper sequence from its origin.

The state of being engaged can be likened to the state of spring before the summer begins, and the inner pleasantness of that state to the flowering of trees before they form fruit. Since the first and subsequent stages of conjugial love develop in sequence because of their influence on the realisation of love, which begins with the wedding, there are also engagements in the heavens.