[255-1] In Sparta, impotent husbands were obliged to allow another man to have access to their young wives. (Xenoph., De Rep. Laced., I. Plutarch, Lycurg., 15.) Compare J. Grimm, Weisthümer, III, 42. Great importance of adoption in Roman law.
[255-2] Thus, the Indian laws of Menu, concerned principally with the necessity of sacrifices to assure parents an existence after death. Similarly, Zoroaster and Mohammed. In the Bible the periods should be accurately distinguished: I Moses, 2, 18; V Moses, 26, 5; Judges, 10, 4; 13, 14; Proverbs, 14, 28; 17, 6, and the Preacher, 4, 8 apparently agree; also I Corinth., 7, written under essentially different circumstances but precisely on this account not in contradiction with those passages of the Old Testament.
[255-3] Genesis, 30, 23. In Sparta, willful bachelorhood was almost infamous. (Plutarch, Lycurg., 15.) In Athens, a person might be charged with agamy as with a crime. (Pollux, VIII, 40.) Concerning the ancient censorial punishments inflicted on those who had no children and the rewards of prolificacy, see Valer. Max., II, 9, 1; Livy, XLV, 15; Gellius, I, 6: V, 19. Festus v. Uxorium. Many German cities made marriage a qualification for the holding of certain public offices, etc. In some places, the public treasury was made the heir of bachelors, a custom not abolished in Hanover until 1732. Compare Ludewig, on the Hagestolziatu (1727), but also Selchow, Elem. Juris Germ., § 290. On the fines imposed on old bachelors in Spain, during the middle ages, see Gans, Erbrecht, III, 401 seq. Recently recommended very strongly by Hermes, Sophiens Reise (3 aufl.), I, 660.
[255-4] Yearly rewards for polytekny in Persia: Herodot., I 136. In Sparta, a father with three children was relieved of guard duty; and one with four, of all public burthens. (Aristot., Polit., II, 6, 13. Aclian, V. H., VI, 6.) Between 1816 and 1823, 250 fathers received the royal gift made to godchildren at their christening in the district of Oppeln, for the seventh son. (v. Zedlitz, Staatskräfte der preuss. Monarchie, I, 285.) The king of Hannover paid annually about 900 thalers in such gifts. Lehzen, Hannovers Staatshaushalt, II, 346.
[255-5] Children who had fallen in the service of their country were considered as still living. Precisely similar laws had existed in Spain from 1623 (de Laet, Hispania Cap., 4); in Savoy from 1648 (Keysslers, Reise, I, 209).
[255-6] Russian law which required the serf master to emancipate his male serfs who were not married by their 20th year, and female serfs not married by their 18th. He could not charge them with desertion in such case, even where combined with theft. (Karamsin, Russ. Gesch., XI, 59.) An ancient Prussian law provides that the country people shall marry at the age of 25. Corpus Const., March, V, 3, 148, 274.
[255-7] Lettres, etc. de Colbert, éd. Clément, II, 68, 120. Voltaire, Siècle de Louis XIV. ch. 29, bitterly complains of this; and also Berkeley, Works, II, 187, and Forbonnais, Finances de France, I, 391. On the other hand, Ferguson, Hist, of Civil Society, III, 4, asks: what fuel can the statesman add to the fires of youth? Similarly, Franklin, Observations, etc. It should not be forgotten that the taxes necessary to supply the so-called marriage-fund, intended to enable poor couples to marry at the expense of the state, make marriage more difficult for other couples. (Krug, Staats-Oek., 31.)
[255-8] Frederick the Great limited the mourning time of widowers to 3 months and of widows to 9. His abolition of ecclesiastical punishment for those who had fallen, and his prohibition of censuring them under penalty of fine, was based as much on his population policy as on philanthropic grounds. (Preuss. Geschichte, Friedrich's M., II, 337.) Similarly in Sweden: Schlözer, V. W., V, 43. In Iceland, after a great plague, even in the last century, it was provided that it should be no disgrace to a young woman to have as many as six illegitimate children. (Zacchariä, Vierzig Bücher vom Staate, II, 112.) The marshal of Saxony wished, in the interest of the recruiting of the army, that marriages should be contracted only for a term of five years. (Rêveries de Maurice, etc., 345.) The sterile women of Egypt visit the Tantah, a place of pilgrimage and fair-town, where, under the cloak of religion, they give themselves up to unbridled and promiscuous intercourse. (Wachenhufen, vom ägypt. armen Mann, II, 151 ff.)
[255-9] Even in the year 131 B. C., the censor Metellus demanded that citizens should, for political reasons be compelled to marry. (Livy, LIX, Sueton., Oct. 89.) Aes uxorium for bachelors. (Valer. Max., II, 9, I.) Cæsar distributed land by way of preference among those who had three or more children. (Sueton., Cæs. 20.) Augustus' celebrated Lex Julia et Papia Poppæa sought to urge even widows to marry again in opposition to the moral public conscience. (Partly augendo ærario: Tacit., Ann., III, 25.) Dio Cass., LVI, 1 ff. Trajan did more yet, inasmuch as he gave great assistance to impoverished parents, even of the highest classes, to enable them to educate their children. Sub te liberos tollere libet, expedit! (Plin., Paneg., 26.) Of what little assistance all this really was, Tacitus, Ann., III, 25, IV, 16, and Plin., Epist. IV, 15, bear witness. If, under the Cæsars, the damage done to the childless in the case of inheritance was a frequent motive of divorce (Friedländer, Sittengeschichte I, 389), the L. Julia, in fact, operated in a direction contrary to that in which it was intended to work.