[313] J.A.  Godfrey, Science of Sex, p. 119.

[314] E.D.  Cope, “The Marriage Problem,” Open Court, Nov., 1888.

[315] See ante, p. 395.

[316] Waechter, Eheschiedungen, pp. 95 et seq.; Esmein, Marriage en Droit Canonique, vol. i, p. 6; Howard, History of Matrimonial Institutions, vol. ii, p. 15.  Howard (in agreement with Lecky) considers that the freedom of divorce was only abused by a small section of the Roman population, and that such abuse, so far as it existed, was not the cause of any decline of Roman morals.

[317] The opinions of the Christian Fathers were very varied, and they were sometimes doubtful about them; see, e.g., the opinions collected by Cranmer and enumerated by Burnet, History of Reformation (ed.  Nares), vol. ii, p. 91.

[318] Constantine, the first Christian Emperor, enacted a strict and peculiar divorce law (allowing a wife to divorce her husband only when he was a homicide, a poisoner, or a violator of sepulchres), which could not be maintained.  In 497, therefore, Anastasius decreed divorce by mutual consent.  This was abolished by Justinian, who only allowed divorce for various specified causes, among them, however, including the husband’s adultery.  These restrictions proved unworkable, and Justinian’s successor and nephew, Justin, restored divorce by mutual consent.  Finally, in 870, Leo the Philosopher returned to Justinian’s enactment (see, e.g., Smith and Cheetham, Dictionary of Christian Antiquities, arts.  “Adultery” and “Marriage").

[319] The element of reverence in the early German attitude towards women and the privileges which even the married woman enjoyed, so far as Tacitus can be considered a reliable guide, seem to have been the surviving vestiges of an earlier social state on a more matriarchal basis.  They are most distinct at the dawn of German history.  From the first, however, though divorce by mutual consent seems to have been possible, German custom was pitiless to the married woman who was unfaithful, sterile, or otherwise offended, though for some time after the introduction of Christianity it was no offence for the German husband to commit adultery (Westermarck, Origin of the Moral Ideas, vol. ii, p. 453).

[320] “This form of marriage,” says Hobhouse (op. cit., vol. i, p. 156), “is intimately associated with the extension of marital power.”  Cf.  Howard, op. cit., vol. i, p. 231.  The very subordinate position of the mediaeval German woman is set forth by Hagelstange, Sueddeutsches Bauernleben in Mittelalter, 1898, pp. 70 et seq.