صور الصفحة
PDF
النشر الإلكتروني

call your uncle presently: I have fitted my divine and my canonift, dy'd their beards and all. Come, mafter doctor, and mafter parfon, look to your parts now, and discharge 'em bravely; you are well fet forth, perform it as well. If you chance to be out, do not confefs it with ftanding ftill, or humming, or gaping one at another; but go on, and talk aloud, and eagerly; use vehement action, and only remember your terms, and you are safe. Here he comes: Set your faces, and look fuperciliously, while I present you.

Enter Morofe and Dauphine.

Mor. Are these the two learned men?
Tru. Yes, Sir; please you falute 'em!

Mor. Salute 'em? I had rather do any thing, than wear out time fo unfruitfully, Sir.

Tru.We'll go to the matter then. [Sit at the table.] Gentlemen, mafter doctor, and mafter parfon, I have acquainted you fufficiently with the business for which you are come hither; and you are not now to inform yourselves in the ftate of the queftion, I know. This is the gentleman who expects your refolution; and therefore, when you please, begin.

Otter. Please you, mafter doctor.

Cut. Please you, good mafter parfon.

Otter. I would hear the canon-law speak first.

Cut,

Cut. It must give place to pofitive divinity, Sir.

Mor. Nay, good gentlemen, do not throw me into circumflances. Let your comforts arrive quickly at me, thofe that are... Be swift in affording me my peace, if so I fhall hope any. For the caufe of noise, am I now a fuitor to you. You do not know in what a misery I have been exercis'd this day, what a torrent of evil! My very house turns round with the tumult! I dwell in a windmill! The perpetual motion is here.

Tru. Well, good master doctor, will you break the ice? Mafter parfon will wade after.

Cut. Sir, tho' unworthy, and the weaker, I will prefume.

Otter. 'Tis no prefumption, domine doctor.
Mor. Yet again!

Cut. Your queftion is, for how many causes a man may have divortium legitimum, a lawful divorce. First, you must understand the nature of the word divorce, a divertendo.

Mor. No excurfions upon words, good doctor; to the question briefly.

Cut. I answer then, the canon-law affords divorce but in few cafes; and the principal is in the common cafe, the adulterous cafe: But there are duodecim impedimenta, twelve impediments (as we call 'em) all which do not dirimere contractum, but

irritum

irritum reddere matrimonium, as we say in the canonlaw; not take away the bond, but cause a nullity

therein.

Mor. I understood you before: Good Sir, avoid your impertinency of translation.

Otter. He cannot open this too much, Sir, by your favour.

Mor. Yet more!:

Tru. Oh, you must give the learned men leave, Sir. To your impediments, mafter doctor. Cut. The first is impedimentum erroris. Otter. Of which there are several species. Cut. Ay, as error perfonæ.

Otter. If thou contract thyfelf to one perfon,. thinking her another.

Cut. Then error fortune.

Otter. If fhe be a beggar, and you thought her rich.

Cut. Then error qualitatis.

Otter. If the prove ftubborn or head-ftrong, that you thought obedient.

[ocr errors]

Mor How? Is that, Sir, a lawful impediment? One at once, I pray you, gentlemen. Otter. Ay, ante copulam, but not post copulam, Sir.

"

Tru. Alas, Sir, what a hope are we fall'n from!
Cut. The next is conditio: The third is votum :

The

The fourth is cognatio: if the perfons be of kin within the degrees.

Otter. Ay, do you know what the degrees are, Sir? Mor. No, nor I care not, Sir; they offer me no comfort in the queftion, I am fure.

Cut. But there is a branch of this impediment may, which is cognatio fpiritualis: If you were her god-father, Sir, then the marriage is incestuous.

Mor. Oh, me! To end the controverfy, I never was a god-father, I never was a god-father in my life, Sir. Pafs to the next.

Cut. The fifth is crimen adulterii; the known cafe. The fixth cultús difparitas, difference of religion: Have you ever examin'd her, what religion fhe is of.

Mor. No, I would rather fhe were of none, than be put to the trouble of it.

Cut. The feventh is, viz. if it were upon compulfion or force.

: Mor. Oh, no, it was too voluntary, mine, too voluntary.

Cut. The eighth is, ordo; if ever the have taken holy orders.

Otter. That's fuperftitious, abfurd, abfurd, and merely apoftatical.

Cut. You fhall pardon me, mafter parfon; I can that

prove

Otter.

you

Offer. You can prove a will, master doctor can prove nothing else. Does not your own canon fayHac focianda vetant connubia, facta retractant.

Cut. I grant you; but how do they retractare, mafter parfon?

Mor. Oh, this was it I fear'd. Peace, good echoes! Oh, mine ears, mine ears!

Tru. Nay, good Sir, attend the learned men. They have near done. Proceed to the next, Sirs. Cat. The ninth is, ligamen.

Otter. If you were bound to any other before,

Mor. No, no, I thrust myself too soon into these

The tenth is, publica honeftas.

Ay, and is but leve impedimentum.

Cut The eleventh is, affinitas ex fornicatione. Otter. Which is no lefs vera affinitas, than the other, mafter doctor.

Cut. True, qua oritur ex legitimo matrimonio.

ter. You fay right, venerable doctor: And, nafcitur ex eo

Cut. I conceive you, mafter parfon: Ita æque eft verus pater

Otter. Et vere filius qui fic generatur.

Mor. What's all this to me?

Cut. The twelfth and laft is, fi forte

Enter

« السابقةمتابعة »