Act iv. scene 5.)

651 Horace, _Sat._ i. 2.

652 “Verum si quis est qui etiam meretriciis amoribus interdictum juventuti putet, est ille quidem valde severus; negare non possum; sed abhorret non modo ab hujus sæculi licentia, verum etiam a majorum consuetudine atque concessis. Quando enim hoc factum non est? Quando reprehensum? Quando non permissum? Quando denique fuit ut quod licet non liceret?”—Cicero, _Pro Cælio_, cap. xx. The whole speech is well worthy of the attention of those who would understand Roman feelings on these matters; but it should be remembered that it is the speech of a lawyer defending a dissolute client.

653 Περί ἀφροδίσια, εἰς δύναμιν πρὸ γάμου καθαρευτέον. ἁπτομένῳ δέ, ὢν νομιμόν ἐστι, μεταληπτέον, μὴ μέν τοι ἐπαχθὴς γίνου τοῖς χρωμένοις, μηδὲ ἐλεγκτικός, μηδὲ πολλαχοῦ τό, Ὅτι αὐτὸς οὐ χρῇ, παράφερε.—_Enchir._ xxxiii.

654 “Et si uxores non haberent, singulas concubinas, quod sine his esse non possent.”—Lampridius, _A. Severus_. We have an amusing picture of the common tone of people of the world on this matter, in the speech Apuleius puts into the mouth of the gods, remonstrating with Venus for being angry because her son formed a connection with Psyche. (_Metam._ lib. v.)

655 Preserved by Stobæus. See Denis, _Hist. des Idées morales dans l’Antiquité_, tome ii. pp. 134-136, 149-150.

656 Philos. _Apol._ i. 13. When a saying of Pythagoras, “that a man should only have commerce with his own wife,” was quoted, he said that this concerned others.

657 Trebellius Pollio, _Zenobia_.

658 This is asserted by an anonymous writer quoted by Suidas. See Ménage, _Hist. Mulierum Philosopharum_, p. 58.

659 See, e.g., Plotinus, 1st Eun. vi. 6.

660 Capitolinus, _M. Aurelius_.

661 Amm. Marcell. xxv. 4.

_ 662 Cod. Theod._ lib. ix. tit. 24.

_ 663 Cod. Theod._ lib. xv. tit. 7.

664 “Fidicinam nulli liceat vel emere vel docere vel vendere, vel conviviis aut spectaculis adhibere. Nec cuiquam aut delectationis desiderio erudita feminea aut musicæ artis studio liceat habere mancipia.”—_Cod. Theod._ xv. 7, 10. This curious law was issued in A.D. 385. St. Jerome said these musicians were the chorus of the devil, and quite as dangerous as the sirens. See the comments on the law.

665 Ruinart, _Act. S. Perpetuæ_. These acts, are, I believe, generally regarded as authentic. There is nothing more instructive in history than to trace the same moral feelings through different ages and religions; and I am able in this case to present the reader with an illustration of their permanence, which I think somewhat remarkable. The younger Pliny gives in one of his letters a pathetic account of the execution of Cornelia, a vestal virgin, by the order of Domitian. She was buried alive for incest; but her innocence appears to have been generally believed; and she had been condemned unheard, and in her absence. As she was being lowered into the subterranean cell her dress was caught and deranged in the descent. She turned round and drew it to her, and when the executioner stretched out his hand to assist her, she started back lest he should touch her, for this, according to the received opinion, was a pollution; and even in the supreme moment of her agony her vestal purity shrank from the unholy contact. (Plin. _Ep._ iv. 11.) If we now pass back several centuries, we find Euripides attributing to Polyxena a trait precisely similar to that which was attributed to Perpetua. As she fell beneath the sword of the executioner, it was observed that her last care was that she might fall with decency.

ἡ δὲ και θνήσκουσ᾽ ὅμως πολλὴν πρόνοιαν εἶχεν εὐσχήμως πεσεῖν, κρύπτουσ᾽ ἂ κρύπτειν ὄμματ᾽ ἀρσένων χρεών.

Euripides, _Hec._ 566-68.

_ 666 Vita Pauli._

667 St. Ambrose relates an instance of this, which he says occurred at Antioch (_De Virginibus_, lib. ii. cap. iv.). When the Christian youth was being led to execution, the girl whom he had saved reappeared and died with him. Eusebius tells a very similar story, but places the scene at Alexandria.

668 See Ceillier, _Hist. des Auteurs ecclés._ tome iii. p. 523.

669 Ibid. tome viii. pp. 204-207.

670 Among the Irish saints St. Colman is said to have had a girdle which would only meet around the chaste, and which was long preserved in Ireland as a relic (Colgan, _Acta Sanctorum Hiberniæ_, Louvain, 1645, vol. i. p. 246); and St. Fursæus a girdle that extinguished lust. (Ibid. p. 292.) The girdle of St. Thomas Aquinas seems to have had some miraculous properties of this kind. (See his _Life_ in the Bollandists, Sept. 29.) Among both the Greeks and Romans it was customary for the bride to be girt with a girdle which the bridegroom unloosed in the nuptial bed, and hence “zonam solvere” became a proverbial expression for “pudicitiam mulieris imminuere.” (Nieupoort, _De Ritibus Romanorum_, p. 479; Alexander’s _History of Women_, vol. ii. p. 300.)

_ 671 Vit. St. Pachom._ (Rosweyde).

672 See his _Life_, by Gregory of Nyssa.

673 A little book has been written on these legends by M. Charles de Bussy, called _Les Courtisanes saintes_. There is said to be some doubt about St. Afra, for, while her acts represent her as a reformed courtesan, St. Fortunatus, in two lines he has devoted to her, calls her a virgin. (Ozanam, _Études german._ tome ii. p. 8.)

674 See the _Vit. Sancti Joannis Eleemosynarii_ (Rosweyde).

675 Tillemont, tome x. pp. 61-62. There is also a very picturesque legend of the manner in which St. Paphnutius converted the courtesan Thais.

676 See especially, Tertullian, _Ad Uxorem_. It was beautifully said, at a later period, that woman was not taken from the head of man, for she was not intended to be his ruler, nor from his feet, for she was not intended to be his slave, but from his side, for she was to be his companion and his comfort. (Peter Lombard, _Senten._ lib. ii. dis. 18.)

677 The reader may find many passages on this subject in Barbeyrac, _Morale des Pères_, ii. § 7; iii. § 8; iv. § 31-35; vi. § 31; xiii. § 2-8.

678 “It is remarkable how rarely, if ever (I cannot call to mind an instance), in the discussions of the comparative merits of marriage and celibacy, the social advantages appear to have occurred to the mind.... It is always argued with relation to the interests and the perfection of the individual soul; and, even with regard to that, the writers seem almost unconscious of the softening and humanising effect of the natural affections, the beauty of parental tenderness and filial love.”—Milman’s _Hist. of Christianity_, vol. iii. p. 196.

679 “Tempus breve est, et jam securis ad radices arborum posita est, quæ silvam legis et nuptiarum evangelica castitate succidat.”—_Ep._ cxxiii.

680 “Laudo nuptias, laudo conjugium, sed quia mihi virgines generant.”—_Ep._ xxii.

681 See Ceillier, _Auteurs ecclés._ xiii. p. 147.

682 Socrates, iv. 23.

683 Palladius, _Hist. Laus._ cxix.

_ 684 Vit. S. Abr._ (Rosweyde), cap. i.

685 I do not know when this legend first appeared. M. Littré mentions having found it in a French MS. of the eleventh century (Littré, _Les Barbares_, pp. 123-124); and it also forms the subject of a very curious fresco, I imagine of a somewhat earlier date, which was discovered, within the last few years, in the subterranean church of St. Clement at Rome. An account of it is given by Father Mullooly, in his interesting little book about that Church.

_ 686 De Virgin._ cap. iii.

687 Greg. Tur. i. 42.

688 The regulations on this point are given at length in Bingham.

689 Muratori, _Antich. Ital._ diss. xx.

690 St. Greg. _Dial._ i. 10.

691 Delepierre, _L’Enfer décrit par ceux qui l’ont vu_, pp. 44-56.

692 Val. Max. ii. 1. § 3.

693 “Ille meos, primus qui me sibi junxit, amores Abstulit; ille habeat secum, servetque sepulchro.”

_Æn._ iv. 28.

694 E.g., the wives of Lucan, Drusus, and Pompey.

695 Tacit. _German._ xix.

696 Friedländer, tome i. p. 411.

697 Hieron. _Ep._ liv.

698 “Uxorem vivam amare voluptas; Defunctam religio.”

Statius. _Sylv._ v. in proœmio.

699 By one of the laws of Charondas it was ordained that those who cared so little for the happiness of their children as to place a stepmother over them, should be excluded from the councils of the State. (Diod. Sic. xii. 12.)

700 Tertullian expounded the Montanist view in his treatise, _De Monogamia_.

701 A full collection of the statements of the Fathers on this subject is given by Perrone, _De Matrimonio_, lib. iii. Sect. I.; and by Natalis Alexander, _Hist. Eccles._ Sæc. II. dissert. 18.

702 Thus, to give but a single instance, St. Jerome, who was one of their strongest opponents, says: “Quid igitur? damnamus secunda matrimonia? Minime, sed prima laudamus. Abjicimus de ecclesia digamos? absit; sed monogamos ad continentiam provocamus. In arca Noe non solum munda sed et immunda fuerunt animalia.”—_Ep._ cxxiii.

_ 703 In Legat._

_ 704 Strom._ lib. iii.

_ 705 Contra Jovin._ i.

706 Ibid. See, too, _Ep._ cxxiii.

707 Hom. xvii. in Luc.

_ 708 Orat._ xxxi.

709 Perrone, _De Matr._ iii. § 1, art. 1; Natalis Alexander, _Hist. Eccles._ II. dissert. 18. The penances are said not to imply that the second marriage was a sin, but that the moral condition that made it necessary was a bad one.

710 See Stephen’s _Hist. of English Criminal Law_, i. p. 461.

711 Conc. Illib. can. xxxviii. Bingham thinks the feeling of the Council to have been, that if baptism was not administered by a priest, it should at all events be administered by one who might have been a priest.

712 Perrone, _De Matrimonio_, tome iii. p. 102.

713 This subject has recently been treated with very great learning and with admirable impartiality by an American author, Mr. Henry C. Lea, in his _History of Sacerdotal Celibacy_ (Philadelphia, 1867), which is certainly one of the most valuable works that America has produced. Since the great history of Dean Milman, I know no work in English which has thrown more light on the moral condition of the middle ages, and none which is more fitted to dispel the gross illusions concerning that period which High Church writers, and writers of the positive school, have conspired to sustain.

714 See Lea, p. 36. The command of St. Paul, that a bishop or deacon should be the husband of _one_ wife (1 Tim. iii. 2-12) was believed by all ancient and by many modern commentators to be prohibitory of second marriages; and this view is somewhat confirmed by the widows who were to be honoured and supported by the Church, being only those who had been but once married (1 Tim. v. 9). See Pressensé, _Hist. des trois premiers Siècles_ (1re série), tome ii. p. 233. Among the Jews it was ordained that the high priest should not marry a widow. (Levit. xxi. 13-14.)

715 Socrates, _H. E._ i. 11. The Council of Illiberis (can. xxxiii.) had ordained this, but both the precepts and the practice of divines varied greatly. A brilliant summary of the chief facts is given in Milman’s _History of Early Christianity_, vol. iii. pp. 277-282.

716 See, on the state of things in the tenth and eleventh centuries, Lea, pp. 162-192.

717 Ratherius, quoted by Lea, p. 151.

718 See some curious evidence of the extent to which the practice of the hereditary transmission of ecclesiastical offices was carried, in Lea, pp. 149, 150, 266, 299, 339.

719 Lea, pp. 271, 292, 422.

720 Ibid. pp. 186-187.

721 Lea, p. 358.

722 Ibid. p. 296.

723 Ibid. p. 322.

724 Ibid. p. 349.

725 The reader may find the most ample evidence of these positions in Lea. See especially pp. 138, 141, 153, 155, 260, 344.

726 Synesius, _Ep._ cv.

727 Lea, p. 122. St. Augustine had named _his_ illegitimate son Adeodatus, or the Gift of God, and had made him a principal interlocutor in one of his religious dialogues.

_ 728 Dialog._ iv. 11.

729 This is mentioned by Henry of Huntingdon, who was a contemporary. (Lea, p. 293.)

730 The first notice of this very remarkable precaution is in a canon of the Council of Palencia (in Spain) held in 1322, which anathematises laymen who compel their pastors to take concubines. (Lea, p. 324.) Sleidan mentions that it was customary in some of the Swiss cantons for the parishioners to oblige the priest to select a concubine as a necessary precaution for the protection of his female parishioners. (Ibid. p. 355.) Sarpi, in his _Hist. of the Council of Trent_, mentions (on the authority of Zuinglius) this Swiss custom. Nicolas of Clemangis, a leading member of the Council of Constance, declared that this custom had become very common, that the laity were firmly persuaded that priests _never_ lived a life of real celibacy, and that, where no proofs of concubinage were found, they always assumed the existence of more serious vice. The passage (which is quoted by Bayle) is too remarkable to be omitted. “Taceo de fornicationibus et adulteriis a quibus qui alieni sunt probro cæteris ac ludibrio esse solent, spadonesque aut sodomitæ appellantur; denique laici usque adeo persuasum habent nullos cælibes esse, ut in plerisque parochiis non aliter velint presbyterum tolerare nisi concubinam habeat, quo vel sic suis sit consultum uxoribus, quæ nec sic quidem usquequaque sunt extra periculum.” Nic. de Clem. _De Præsul. Simoniac._ (Lea, p. 386.)

731 This was energetically noticed by Luther, in his famous sermon “De Matrimonio,” and some of the Catholic preachers of an earlier period had made the same complaint. See a curious passage from a contemporary of Boccaccio, quoted by Meray, _Les Libres prêcheurs_, p. 155. “Vast numbers of laymen separated from their wives under the influence of the ascetic enthusiasm which Hildebrand created.”—Lea, p. 254.

732 “Quando enim servata fide thori causa prolis conjuges conveniunt sic excusatur coitus ut culpam non habeat. Quando vero deficiente bono prolis fide tamen servata conveniunt causa incontinentiæ non sic excusatur ut non habeat culpam, sed venialem.... Item hoc quod conjugati victi concupiscentia utuntur invicem, ultra necessitatem liberos procreandi, ponam in his pro quibus quotidie dicimus Dimitte nobis debita nostra.... Unde in sententiolis Sexti Pythagorici legitur ‘omnis ardentior amator propriæ uxoris adulter est.’ ”—Peter Lombard, _Sentent._ lib. iv. dist. 31.

733 Many wives, however, were forbidden. (Deut. xvii. 17.) Polygamy is said to have ceased among the Jews after the return from the Babylonish captivity.—Whewell’s _Elements of Morality_, book iv. ch. v.

734 Levit. xii. 1-5.

735 Ecclesiasticus, xiii. 14. I believe, however, the passage has been translated “Better the badness of a man than the blandishments of a woman.”

736 This curious fact is noticed by Le Blant, _Inscriptions chrétiennes de la Gaule_, pp. xcvii.-xcviii.

737 See the decree of a Council of Auxerre (A.D. 578), can. 36.

738 See the last two chapters of Troplong, _Influences du Christianisme sur le Droit_ (a work, however, which is written much more in the spirit of an apologist than in that of an historian), and Legouvé, pp. 27-29.

739 Even in matters not relating to property, the position of women in feudalism was a low one. “Tout mari,” says Beaumanoir, “peut battre sa femme quand elle ne veut pas obéir à son commandement, ou quand elle le maudit, ou quand elle le dément, pourvu que ce soit modérément et sans que mort s’ensuive,” quoted by Legouvé, p. 148. Contrast with this the saying of the elder Cato: “A man who beats his wife or his children lays impious hands on that which is most holy and most sacred in the world.”—Plutarch, _Marcus Cato_.

740 See Legouvé, pp. 29-38; Maine’s _Ancient Law_, pp. 154-159.

741 “No society which preserves any tincture of Christian institutions is likely to restore to married women the personal liberty conferred on them by the middle Roman law: but the proprietary disabilities of married females stand on quite a different basis from their personal incapacities, and it is by keeping alive and consolidating the former that the expositors of the canon law have deeply injured civilisation. There are many vestiges of a struggle between the secular and ecclesiastical principles; but the canon law nearly everywhere prevailed.”—Maine’s _Ancient Law_, p. 158. I may observe that the Russian law was early very favourable to the proprietary rights of married women. See a remarkable letter in the _Memoirs of the Princess Daschkaw_ (edited by Mrs. Bradford: London, 1840), vol. ii. p. 404.

_ 742 Germania_, cap. ix. xviii.-xx.

_ 743 De Gubernatione Dei._

744 See, for these legends, Mallet’s _Northern Antiquities_.

745 Tacitus, _Germ._ 9; _Hist._ iv. 18; Xiphilin. lxxi. 3; Amm. Marcellinus, xv. 12; Vopiscus, _Aurelianus_; Floras, iii. 3.

746 Valer. Max. vi. 1; Hieron. _Ep._ cxxiii.

747 Plutarch, _De Mulier. Virt._

748 Plutarch, _Amatorius_; Xiphilin. lxvi. 16; Tacit. _Hist._ iv. 67. The name of this heroic wife is given in three different forms.

749 On the polygamy of the first, see Greg. Tur. iv. 26; on the polygamy of Chilperic, Greg. Tur. iv. 28; v. 14.

750 Greg. Tur. iv. 3.

751 Ibid. iii. 25-27, 36.

752 Fredegarius, xxxvi.

753 Ibid. lx.

754 Eginhardus, _Vit. Kar. Mag._ xviii. Charlemagne had, according to Eginhard, four wives, but, as far as I can understand, only two at the same time.

755 Smyth’s _Lectures on Modern History_, vol. i. pp. 61-62.

756 Milman’s _Hist. of Latin Christianity_, vol. i. p. 363; Legouvé, _Hist. Morale des Femmes_, p. 57.

757 See, on these laws, Lord Kames _On Women_; Legouvé, p. 57.

758 Favorinus had strongly urged it. (Aul. Gell. _Noct._ xii. 1.)

759 These are the reasons given by Malthus, _On Population_, book iii. ch. ii.

760 St. Augustine (_De Conj. Adult._ ii. 19) maintains that adultery is even more criminal in the man than in the woman. St. Jerome has an impressive passage on the subject: “Aliæ sunt leges Cæsarum, aliæ Christi; aliud Papianus, aliud Paulus nostri præcepit. Apud illos viris impudicitiæ fræna laxantur et solo stupro atque adulterio condemnato passim per lupanaria et ancillulas libido permittitur, quasi culpam dignitas faciat non voluntas. Apud nos quod non licet feminis æque non licet viris; et eadem servitus pari conditione censetur.”—_Ep._ lxxvii. St. Chrysostom writes in a similar strain.

761 See Troplong, _Influence du Christianisme sur le Droit_, pp. 239-251.

762 We find, however, traces of a toleration of the Roman type of concubine in Christianity for some time. Thus, a Council of Toledo decreed: “Si quis habens uxorem fidelis concubinam habeat non communicet. Cæterum is qui non habet uxorem et pro uxore concubinam habet a communione non repellatur, tantum ut unius mulieris, aut uxoris aut concubinæ ut ei placuerit, sit conjunctione contentus.”—1 _Can._ 17. St. Isidore said: “Christiano non dicam plurimas sed nec duas simul habere licitum est, nisi unam tantum aut uxorem, aut certo loco uxoris, si conjux deest, concubinam.”—_Apud Gratianum_, diss. 4. Quoted by Natalis Alexander, _Hist. Eccles._ Sæc. I. diss. 29. Mr. Lea (_Hist. of Sacerdotal Celibacy_, pp. 203-205) has devoted an extremely interesting note to tracing the history of the word concubine through the middle ages. He shows that even up to the thirteenth century a concubine was not necessarily an abandoned woman. The term was applied to marriages that were real, but not officially recognised. Coleridge notices a remarkable instance of the revival of this custom in German history.—_Notes on English Divines_ (ed. 1853), vol. i. p. 221.

763 Legouvé, p. 199.

764 See some curious passages in Troplong, pp. 222-223. The Fathers seem to have thought dissolution of marriage was not lawful on account of the adultery of the husband, but that it was not absolutely unlawful, though not commendable, for a husband whose wife had committed adultery to re-marry.

765 Some of the great charities of Fabiola were performed as penances, on account of her crime in availing herself of the legislative permission of divorce.

766 Laboulaye, _Recherches sur la Condition civile et politique des Femmes_, pp. 152-158.

767 “A discourse concerning the obligation to marry within the true communion, following from their style (_sic_) of being called a holy seed.” This rare discourse is appended to a sermon against mixed marriages by Leslie. (London, 1702.) The reader may find something about Dodwell in Macaulay’s _Hist. of England_, ch. xiv.; but Macaulay, who does not appear to have known Dodwell’s masterpiece—his dissertation _De Paucitate Marturum_, which is one of the finest specimens of criticism of his time—and who only knew the discourse on marriages by extracts, has, I think, done him considerable injustice.

768 Dodwell relies mainly upon this fact, and especially upon Ezra’s having treated these marriages as essentially null.

769 “Jungere cum infidelibus vinculum matrimonii, prostituere gentilibus membra Christi.”—Cyprian, _De Lapsis_.

770 “Hæc cum ita sint, fideles Gentilium matrimonia subeuntes stupri reos esse constat, et arcendos ab omni communicatione fraternitatis.”—Tert. _Ad Uxor._ ii. 3.

771 See on this law, and on the many councils which condemned the marriage of orthodox with heretics, Bingham, _Antiq._ xxii. 2, §§ 1-2.

772 Many curious statistics illustrating this fact are given by M. Bonneville de Marsangy—a Portuguese writer who was counsellor of the Imperial Court at Paris—in his _Étude sur la Moralité comparée de la Femme et de l’Homme_. (Paris, 1862.) The writer would have done better if he had not maintained, in lawyer fashion, that the statistics of crime are absolutely decisive on the question of the comparative morality of the sexes, and also, if he had not thought it due to his official position to talk in a rather grotesque strain about the regeneration and glorification of the sex in the person of the Empress Eugénie.

773 See Pliny, _Hist. Nat._ xxxiv. 19.

774 “Tantum inter Stoicos, Serene, et ceteros sapientiam professos interesse, quantum inter fœminas et mares non immerito dixerim.”—_De Const. Sapientis_, cap. i.

775 This is well illustrated, on the one side, by the most repulsive representations of Christ, by Michael Angelo, in the great fresco in the Sistine Chapel (so inferior to the Christ of Orgagna, at Pisa, from which it was partly imitated), and in marble in the Minerva Church at Rome; and, on the other side, by the frescoes of Perugino, at Perugia, representing the great sages of Paganism. The figure of Cato, in the latter, almost approaches, as well as I remember, the type of St. John.

776 In that fine description of a virtuous woman which is ascribed to the mother of King Lemuel, we read: “She stretcheth out her hand to the poor; yea, she reacheth forth her hands to the needy.” (Proverbs xxxi. 20.) I have already quoted from Xenophon the beautiful description of the Greek wife tending her sick slaves. So, too, Euripides represents the slaves of Alcestis gathering with tears around the bed of their dying mistress, who, even then, found some kind word for each, and, when she died, lamenting her as their second mother. (Eurip. _Alcest._) In the servile war which desolated Sicily at the time of the Punic wars, we find a touching trait of the same kind. The revolt was provoked by the cruelties of a rich man, named Damophilus, and his wife, who were massacred with circumstances of great atrocity; but the slaves preserved their daughter entirely unharmed, for she had always made it her business to console them in their sorrow, and she had won the love of all. (Diodor. Sic. _Frag._ xxxiv.) So, too, Marcia, the wife of Cato, used to suckle her young slaves from her breast. (Plut. _Marc. Cato_.) I may add the well-known sentiment which Virgil puts in the mouth of Dido: “Haud ignara mali miseris succurrere disco.” There are, doubtless, many other touches of the same kind in ancient literature, some of which may occur to my readers.

777 Theodoret, v. 19.

778 See the beautiful description of the functions of a Christian woman in the second book of Tertullian, _Ad Uxorem_.

779 See, upon the deaconesses, Bingham’s _Christian Antiquities_, book ii. ch. 22, and Ludlow’s _Woman’s Work in the Church_. The latter author argues elaborately that the “widows” were not the same as the deaconesses.

780 Phœbe (Rom. xvi. 1) is described as a διάκονος.

781 A very able writer, who takes on the whole an unfavourable view of the influence of Christianity on legislation, says: “The provision for the widow was attributable to the exertions of the Church, which never relaxed its solicitude for the interests of wives surviving their husbands, winning, perhaps, one of the most arduous of its triumphs when, after exacting for two or three centuries an express promise from the husband at marriage to endow his wife, it at last succeeded in engrafting the principle of dower on the customary law of all Western Europe.”—Maine’s _Ancient Law_, p. 224.

782 See Troplong, _Influence du Christianisme sur le Droit_, pp. 308-310.

783 The results of this change have been treated by Miss Parkes in her truly admirable little book called _Essays on Woman’s Work_, better than by any other writer with whom I am acquainted.