Canon Law

This was in part inevitable, since no society which preserves any tincture of Christian institution is likely to restore to married women the personal liberty conferred on them by the middle Roman law, but the proprietary disabilities of married females stand on quite a different basis from their personal incapacities, and it is by the tendency of their doctrines to keep alive and consolidate the …

There is no principle in all law which the moderns, in spite of its beneficial character, have been so loath to adopt and to carry to its legitimate consequences as that which was known to the Romans as Usucapion, and which has descended to modern jurisprudence under the name of Prescription.

and they obscure an interesting and yet unsettled problem, the origin of the Canon law.

It has come to us from the Canon law, or else from the Roman law, more particularly as declared in the 118th Novel of Justinian, but it is not at all confined to societies deeply affected by Civil and Canon law.

During the Middle Ages our lady the Common Law was in frequent strife with the more ancient and, at those times, more highly organized empire of the Church and the Canon Law.

On the other hand the canon law, to take the case of the greatest rival, is personal though it is universal.

As between the two rival branches of jurisprudence outside England, they belonged not to the civilian, but to the canonical side;

For though some of the canon-laws may favour such a plea, that is not surprising, considering they are framed solely with the view of promoting charity among Christians.