[18] Westermarck, History of Human Marriage, p. 18.
[19] Ibid. p. 19.
[20] Ibid. p. 511 sq.
Turning to peoples who have reached a higher stage of culture:—Abû Shugâʿ says that, among Muhammedans, parents are obliged to support their families, “if the children are both poor and under age, or both poor and lastingly infirm, or both poor and insane.”[21] But that this duty chiefly devolves on the father is evident from the fact that the mother is even entitled to claim wages for nursing them.[22] Buddhistic law goes so far as to prescribe that the parents shall provide their son with a beautiful wife, and give him a share of the wealth belonging to the family.[23] It has been observed that in the Confucian books there is no mention of any real duties incumbent upon the father towards his children;[24] nor does the Decalogue contain anything on the subject; nor any law of ancient Greece or Rome.[25] But, as has been justly argued, if legal prescriptions are wanting, that is because they are thought to be superfluous, nature itself having sufficiently prepared men for the performance of their duties towards their offspring.[26] So, also, it is regarded as a matter of course that the husband shall support his wife, however great power he may possess over her. Among the Romans manus implied not only the wife’s subordination to the husband, but also the husband’s obligation to protect the wife.[27]
[21] Sachau, Muhammedanisches Recht, p. 18.
[22] Ibid. p. 99 sq.
[23] Hardy, Manual of Budhism, p. 495.
[24] Faber, Digest of the Doctrines of Confucius, p. 82.
[25] Leist, Græco-italische Rechtsgeschichte, p. 13.
[26] Ibid., p. 13. Schmidt, Ethik der alten Griechen, ii. 141. Adam Smith, Theory of Moral Sentiments, p. 199 sq.