The quoted version says something about a marriage license, and explains that marriage licenses ensure punishments… . The corrected version (without commas) says something about a marriage license which ensures such punishment, but makes no general statements about marriage licenses.
Not in general. It separates the sentence into multiple parts. I don’t know enough grammar words to explain it better, but the original version meant almost the same as
… a marriage license (which ensures sufficient punishment for infidelity) …
The quoted version says something about a marriage license, and explains that marriage licenses ensure punishments… . The corrected version (without commas) says something about a marriage license which ensures such punishment, but makes no general statements about marriage licenses.
So, a comma determines whether a property applies to an instance or to the general class of some thing? Wow.
If syntax didn’t affect semantics, it’d be useless.
Not in general. It separates the sentence into multiple parts. I don’t know enough grammar words to explain it better, but the original version meant almost the same as