y being delivered from the
necessity of supporting such a woman. In the absence of any false
traditions that would be obvious. It might not, indeed, be unreasonable
that a husband should pay heavily in order to free himself from a wife
whom, evidently, he has made a serious mistake in choosing. But to ordain
that a man should actually be indemnified because he has shown himself
incapable of winning a woman's love is an idea that could not occur in a
civilized society that was not twisted by inherited prejudice.[340] Yet as
matters are to-day there are civilized countries in which it is legally
possible for a husband to enter a prayer for damages against his wife's
paramour in combination with either a petition for judicial separation or
for dissolution of wedlock. In this way adultery is not a crime but a
private injury.[341]

At the same time, however, the influence of Canon law comes inconsistently
to the surface and asserts that a breach of matrimony is a public wrong, a
sin transformed by the State into something almost or quite like a crime.
This is clearly indicated by the fact that in some countries the adulterer
is liable to imprisonment, a liability scarcely nowadays carried into
practice. But exactly the same idea is beautifully illustrated by the
doctrine of "collusion," which, in theory, is still strictly observed in
many countries. According to the doctrine of "collusion" the conditions
necessary to make the divorce possible must on no account be secured by
mutual agreement. In practice it is impossible to prevent more or less
collusion, but if proved in court it constitutes an absolute impediment to
the granting of a divorce, however just and imperative the demand for
divorce may be.

The English Divorce Act of 1857 refused divorce when there was
collusion, as well as when there was any countercharge against
the petitioner, and the Matrimonial Causes Act of 1860 provided
the machinery for guaranteeing these bars to divorce. This
question of collusion is discussed by G.P. Bishop (op. cit.,
vol. ii, Ch. IX). "However just a cause may be," Bishop remarks,
"if parties collude in its management, so that in real fact both
parties are plaintiffs, while by the record the one appears as
plaintiff and the other as defendant, it cannot go forward. All
conduct of this sort, disturbing to the course of justice, falls
within the general idea of fraud on the court. Such is the