law of custom and public opinion has largely outgrown
this enactment of the Church, made when she had the power to thus
degrade women and brutalize men.

"If the wife be injured in _her person or her property she can bring
no action for redress_ without her husband's concurrence _and in his
name_," and on the basis of loss of _her services_ to him _as a servant.
"But in criminal prosecutions, it is true, the wife may be indicted and
punished separately_." *

* Blackstone.

In the case of punishment the Church was entirely willing to give the
devil his due. It had no ambition to deprive women of any indictments
and punishments that were to be had. In this case, although the husband
and wife were one, she was that one. Where privileges or property-rights
were to be considered, he was the "one." Such grand reversible doctrines
were always on tap with the clergy, and their barrel was always full.
Truly, wives do owe much to the Church.

Some of the provisions of these laws have, of late years, been modified
by the efforts of men who were pronounced "infidels, destroyers of the
Bible, the home, and the dignity of women," aided by women whom the
orthodox deride as "strong--minded, ill-balanced, coarse, impious,"
etc., etc., _ad infinitum, ad nauseam_. A strong mind, whether in man or
woman, has always been to the clergy as a red rag to a bull.

"A woman may make a will, _with the assent of her husband_, by way
of appointment of her _personal_ property. _She cannot even with his
consent devise lands_.... Although our law in general considers a man
and wife as one person, yet there are _some instances where she is
considered separately as his inferior_," and for that trip only.

As I remarked before when it comes to penalties she is welcome to the
whole lot.

"She may not make a deed."

"A man may administer moderate correction to his wife."

"These are the chief legal effects of marriage. Even the disabilities of
the wife," Blackstone naively remarks, "are for the most part _intended
for her protection; so great a favorite is the female sex of the laws of
England!_"

I should think that if this latter point were not quite clear to a
woman, "moderate correction" might convince her that she was quite an
unreasonable favorite--beyond her most eager desires. Where the Pagan
law recognized her as the equal of her husband, the Church discarded
that law, and based the Canon Law upon an archaic invention.

Where Ma