ords, good doctor, to the question briefly.

CUT: I answer then, the canon-law affords divorce but in a few
cases; and the principal is in the common case, the adulterous
case: But there are duodecim impedimenta, twelve impediments, as
we call them, all which do not dirimere contractum, but irritum
reddere matrimonium, as we say in the canon-law, not take away the
bond, but cause a nullity therein.

MOR: I understood you before: good sir, avoid your impertinency of
translation.

OTT: He cannot open this too much, sir, by your favour.

MOR: Yet more!

TRUE: O, you must give the learned men leave, sir.--To your
impediments, master Doctor.

CUT: The first is impedimentum erroris.

OTT: Of which there are several species.

CUT: Ay, as error personae.

OTT: If you contract yourself to one person, thinking her another.

CUT: Then, error fortunae.

OTT: If she be a begger, and you thought her rich.

CUT: Then, error qualitatis.

OTT: If she prove stubborn or head-strong, that you thought
obedient.

MOR: How! is that, sir, a lawful impediment? One at once, I pray
you gentlemen.

OTT: Ay, ante copulam, but not post copulam, sir.

CUT: Master Parson says right. Nec post nuptiarum benedictionem.
It doth indeed but irrita reddere sponsalia, annul the contract:
after marriage it is of no obstancy.

TRUE: Alas, sir, what a hope are we fallen from by this time!

CUT: The next is conditio: if you thought her free born, and she
prove a bond-woman, there is impediment of estate and condition.

OTT: Ay, but, master doctor, those servitudes are sublatae now,
among us Christians.

CUT: By your favour, master parson--

OTT: You shall give me leave, master doctor.

MOR: Nay, gentlemen, quarrel not in that question; it concerns not
my case: pass to the third.

CUT: Well then, the third is votum: if either party have made a
vow of chastity. But that practice, as master parson said of the
other, is taken away among us, thanks be to discipline. The fourth
is cognatio: if the persons be of kin within the degrees.

OTT: Ay: do you know what the degrees are, sir?

MOR: No, nor I care not, sir: they offer me no comfort in the
question, I am sure.

CUT: But there is a branch of this impediment may, which is
cognatio spiritualis: if you were her godfather, sir, then the
marriage is