ining such relationships.

When, however, we refrain from concentrating our attention on particular
countries and embrace the general movement of civilization in the matter
of divorce during recent times, there cannot be the slightest doubt as to
the direction of that movement. England was a pioneer in the movement half
a century ago, and to-day every civilized country is moving in the same
direction. France broke with the old ecclesiastical tradition of the
indissolubility of matrimony in 1885 by a divorce law in some respects
very reasonable. The wife may obtain a divorce on an equality with the
husband (though she is liable to imprisonment for adultery), the
co-respondent occupies a very subordinate position in adultery charges,
and facility is offered for divorce on the ground of simple _injures
graves_ (excluding as far as possible mere incompatibility of temper),
while the judge has the power, which he often successfully exerts, to
effect a reconciliation in private or to grant a decree without public
trial. The influence of France has doubtless been influential in moulding
the divorce laws of the other Latin countries.

In Prussia an enlightened divorce law formerly prevailed by which it was
possible for a couple to separate without scandal when it was clearly
shown that they could not live together in agreement. But the German Code
of 1900 introduced provisions as regards divorce which--while in some
respects more liberal than those of the English law, especially by
permitting divorce for desertion and insanity--are, on the whole,
retrograde as compared with the earlier Prussian law and place the matter
on a cruder and more brutal basis. For two years after the Code came into
operations the number of divorces sank; after that the public and the
courts adapted themselves to the new provisions (more especially one which
allowed divorce for serious neglect of conjugal duties) and the number of
divorces began to increase with great rapidity. "But," remarks Hirschfeld,
"how painful it has now become to read divorce cases! One side abuses the
other, makes accusations of the grossest character, employs detectives to
obtain the necessary proofs of 'dishonorable and immoral conduct,'
whereas, before, both parties realized that they had been deceived in each
other, that they failed to suit each other, and that they could no longer
live together. Thus we see that the narrowing of individual responsibility
in sexual matters