[323] Gibbon, vol. iv., p. 341: “The law of nature instructs most animals to cherish and educate their youthful progeny. The law of reason inculcates to the human species the returns of filial piety. But the exclusive, absolute and perpetual dominion of the father over his children is peculiar to the Roman jurisprudence and seems to be coeval with the foundation of the city.”
[324] Dionysius Halic., bk. ii., par. 15.
[325] W. A. Hunter, Roman Law, p. 190, calls the conclave of neighbours a “humane and interesting exception.” John P. McLennon, in Primitive Marriage, says it is a “fine example of good old savage law.” According to Hunter, infanticide receives its first customary check when the destruction of males and the eldest female is forbidden: the ancient tribes preferring rather to steal their wives than to rear them.
[326] Dionysius Halic., bk., ii., par. 26.
[327] “Numa Pompilius,” Plutarch, Dryden’s Translations, vol. ix., p. 106: “He is also much to be commended for the repeal, or rather amendment, of that law which gives power to fathers to sell their children; he exempted such as were married, conditionally that it had been with the liking and the consent of their parents; for it seems a hard thing that a woman who had given herself in marriage to a man she judged free, should afterwards find herself living with a slave.”
[328] Valerius Maximus, edition of 1678, lib. v., cap. viii. According to Niebuhr, the story was disbelieved, and the historian himself says it is an invention by those who found it difficult to believe that after three consulships and as many triumphs, Cassius was still in his father’s potestas. Hist. of Rome, vol. ii., p. 167.
[329] Stephen, Hist. of the Criminal Law of England, p. 1.
[330] Ortolan.
[331] Madame Dacier observes upon this passage, that the ancients thought themselves guilty of a heinous offence if they suffered their children to die without having bestowed on them some of their property; it was consequently the custom of the women, before exposing children, to attach to them some jewel or trinket among their clothes, hoping thereby to avoid incurring the guilt above mentioned, and to ease their consciences.
[332] Madame Dacier says that the meaning of this passage is this: Chremes tells his wife that by having given this ring, she has done two good acts instead of one—she has both cleared her conscience and saved the child; for had there been no ring or token exposed with the infant, the finder would not have been at the trouble of taking care of it, but might have left it to perish, never suspecting it would be inquired after, or himself liberally rewarded for having preserved it. (Bohn trans.) See chapters xii. and xiii.