ESSAY, &c. Or all the wounds to which the sensibility and affections of man are exposed in his character and connexions as a social being, perhaps that which is inflicted by Adultery is the most poignant; and of all the remedial and penal consequences which the civil and ecclesiastical polities of nations have devised for those injuries which the passions of men inflict upon each other, none perhaps have been so diversified in their nature, or so frequently altered by circumstances, as those which have followed this crime. The penal results have passed through all the intermediate gradations between the forfeiture of life, and of a pecuniary mulct, while the chief and most appropriate of the remedial consequences, has been that of Divorce; but even this has been found varying with the changes of time; and existing or withdrawn, as all the varieties of corporal infliction have been, according to the shades of criminality which those who B legislated on the subject have attached to this offence. These sentiments will find a more full expression in the subsequent parts of this Essay: the terms of the Thesis have drawn certain limits around the subject, which shall not be overstepped, but which may be incidentally pointed out in the course of the following remarks, to justify the absence of any more extended observations on certain parts of the subject of considerable importance, but from which the Thesis requires to be detached. The principal object of the Essay will be the investigation of those doctrines, which the Scriptures, both of the Old and New Testaments, maintain, in relation to the crime of Adultery, and the law of Divorce, and in connexion with these, the views which appear to have been taken of each, by the ancient laws of England, and of the other principal nations of the world. It is not distinctly apprehended, whether the terms, 66 other countries," in the Thesis, were meant to include those great empires which survive now only in the records and recollections of departed glory, or whether they were intended to confine the observation to countries coeval only with ancient England; nor whether the exclusive mention of the term laws, would prohibit all reference to the customs and usages of each people, for whom those laws may have been enacted ; but it is considered, that the customs and usages of a people so often originate, or modify, or explain their laws, and are always so closely connected with them, that an analysis of the latter would be next to impracticable, without a distinct reference to the former; and with respect to the treatment of these great subjects by the ancient nations of the world, but particularly the two most conspicuous in the annals of literature and science, it was considered that allusion to them was essential to the history of the case; and it has been desired, that nothing should be omitted which may render the investigation as full and complete as the subject itself is interesting and important. For this purpose, the outline of these observations should perhaps be of an historical character; and in order to reduce them as much as possible to clearness and method, it may be better to treat progressively of the laws and customs of the different countries and nations, as they have severally existed in order of time: this arrangement may, perhaps, a little invert the line marked out in the Thesis, but it will not essentially disturb it, and may probably contribute to the increased clearness of the discussion. Still the |