it was unchaste to commit acts that are now heavily punished in every Christian country. On the other hand, there is no reason to suppose that a man who intrigued with public women or with slaves was considered unchaste unless he did it in a scandalous way,[1] or was held to have given his wife some special cause of complaint. That the Germanic standard was higher than the Roman is probable; but unless we assume that the Germans and Norsemen were very soon corrupted we know that their practice was not very different.[2] To put it briefly, the ancient marriage was based on suitability of family connections and fortunes rather than on inclination, and as love had not been in the contract the husband was easily pardoned if he allowed himself some license outside the house, provided he rendered his wife all proper respect under the common roof. This mariage de convenance has lasted down to our own days on parts of the Continent, and the liberty enjoyed by the Roman husband has been more or less freely claimed by husbands everywhere; but the tolerance of old custom is becoming a thing of the past. It no doubt lingers in our laws. As a rule, the husband can divorce the wife for a single act of misconduct, while the husband must either be guilty of systematic misconduct, as in Victoria, or of some additional offence, such as protracted desertion,
- ↑ To take two familiar instances, Plutarch appears to blame Cato the Censor for making a slave his mistress in the house where his daughter-in-law was living; but Pompey's attachment to the courtezan Flora is spoken of as rather creditable to him than otherwise. Valerius Maximus pretty well indicates the boundary line of Roman continence when he praises "frugalitas" as "ab immoderate Veneris usu aversa."—Lib. ii. c. 5.
- ↑ M. Henri Martin says, for instance, of the Frank Princes (c. 500-550): "Jetés par la conquête au milieu d'une civilisation corrompue, ils ue faisaient guère avec elle qu'un échange de vices, prenant ses raffinements sensuels, et lui communiquant leur brutalité."—Hist. de France, tome ii. p. 12.
