even though she had no writing of dowry to show for it. As to the marriage ceremony itself. The best authorities hold that for the first three hundred years the solemnities of marriage were usually performed by the ministers of the Church; if one party happened to be a Jew, a heretic or a heathen, it is probable that the church had nothing to do with the union; of course as the State allowed these latter marriages to be celebrated in other ways the Church could not declare them null and void, but could only discipline the of fenders thus contracting. From the fourth to the eighth century the primitive way of marrying among Christians was much dis honored and neglected; then came a refor mation and a return to the early usage; Charlemagne, in the West, in 780 enacted, that no marriage should be celebrated with out the Church's blessing, with sacerdotal prayers and oblations, and whatever unions were performed otherwise should not be ac counted true marriages, but adultery, con cubinage, or fornication. A little later Leo the Wise revived the same ancient practice in the East. At the service the bride was veiled, the hands of the parties were joined together, probably a kiss was given, the woman's hair was untied and her tresses allowed to fall, and after the benediction was over and the new couple were ready to depart it was usual to adorn them both with crowns or garlands — the symbols of victory — and then the wife was led by her husband to her new home. The civil law in some cases required this last act, for by a decree of Valens a soldier's wife was freed from the poll-tax, if she could prove that she had been thus taken home. Wedding festivities were allowed, but only in moderation. The council of Laodicea said : " Christians ought not at marriage to indulge in balls and wanton dances, but dine
and sup gravely as become such professors." Chrysostom draws the attention of his hearers to Isaac's marriage with Rebecca, at which he says, there was no Satanical pomp; no cymbals, piping and dancing; no devilish feasting; no scurrilous buffoonery or filthy discourse, but all was gravity, wisdom and modesty. Let husbands and wives now imi tate these. (Bingham's Antiquities, Book XXII, Ch. I-IV.) On the question of divorce the ancients were no more agreed than are the moderns. The writers of the Church were divided among themselves, and the laws of the State differed from them all. Most of the Fathers agreed that Christ allowed no just cause of divorce, save fornication; but as to what fornication is they differed. Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, Chrysostom, Lactantius, Ambrose and Jerome interpreted forni cation, or adultery, in the plain and literal sense; one venerable sage cried out : " What God hath joined together, let no man put asunder. Hear this, ye hucksters, who change your wives as you do your clothes; who build new bride-chambers as often and easily as ye do shops at fairs; who marry the portion and the goods, and make wives a mere gain and merchandise; who for any little offence presently write a bill of divorce; who leave many widows alive at once : know of a surety, that marriage cannot be dissolved by any other cause but death only, or adul tery." But Saint Augustine, Hermas and Origen considered that our Saviour meant not only carnal fornication, but spiritual fornication as well, that is idolatry and apostasy, and all crimes of a like nature. Saint Augustine ar gues that " if infidelity be fornication, idola try be infidelity, and covetousness be idolatry, there is no doubt but that covetousness is also fornication," and he therefore concludes that for " all lusts which make the soul, by
