The Christian princes were the first who specified the just
causes of a private divorce; their institutions, from Constantine to
Justinian, appear to fluctuate between the custom of the empire and the
wishes of the Church, and the author of the _Novels_ too frequently
reforms the jurisprudence of the _Code_ and _Pandects_. In the most
rigorous laws, a wife was condemned to support a gamester, a drunkard,
or a libertine, unless he were guilty of homicide, poison, or sacrilege,
in which cases the marriage, as it should seem, might have been
dissolved by the hand of the executioner.
But the sacred right of the husband was invariably maintained, to
deliver his name and family from the disgrace of adultery: the list of
_mortal_ sins, either male or female, was curtailed and enlarged by
successive regulations, and the obstacles of incurable impotence, long
absence, and monastic profession were allowed to rescind the matrimonial
obligation. Whoever transgressed the permission of the law was subject
to various and heavy penalties. The woman was stripped of her wealth and
ornaments, without excepting the bodkin of her hair: if the man
introduced a new bride into his bed, _her_ fortune might be lawfully
seized by the vengeance of his exiled wife.
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