The far-reaching results of the various schools of philosophy which rose in Greece during the Periclean age will be noted in this chapter. That the principles involved in this philosophy may not have been formulated by the hetairai of Athens is doubtless true, yet that the inception and development of these principles were largely due to the freedom of these gifted women seems probable, especially when we remember the conditions under which this philosophy arose.
A glance at the principles involved in the Stoic philosophy will show its thoroughly altruistic character. The sum of its tenets was to “live according to nature’s laws,” to subordinate one’s self to the welfare of one’s family, one’s country, and the entire race, and to “rise above the gross indulgences and pleasures of the vulgar” to higher laws of thought and action; it taught that to be just, and to live according to the dictates of reason rather than to be governed by the promptings of blind passion and the desire of the appetites, should be not only the duty but the highest pleasure of mankind. Possibly some of the minor precepts of the Stoic philosophy were absurd; no doubt in their desire for reform, its founders set up a canon of conduct which was severe and impracticable; but its fundamental principles, the subjection of the animal in man to the reasoning faculties, as applied to future Roman law, Roman civilization, and Roman character, served to produce specimens of manhood which the women of all subsequent ages should delight to honour. So long as virtue is applauded and moral greatness is exalted, the enactments of the Roman jurisconsults in the interest of women, prior to, and during the time of the Antonine Cæsars, will stand forth throughout the ages as the one single movement, during thousands of years, toward the removal of the legal disabilities of women. When we remember that the Stoic philosophy took root and flourished during an age of unparalleled profligacy which was stimulated and encouraged by the example of the most opulent and luxurious personages among the Greeks, and at a time when licentiousness had for centuries been sanctioned by religion and upheld by laws made by the men of Greece, it is quite evident that some potent influence, which had hitherto been unfelt, had been in operation to produce it.
In order to understand the influence which the Stoic philosophy exerted on civilization, and especially on the legal position of women, we must first understand its effect upon Roman law. An inquiry into the changes which had been wrought in Roman jurisprudence at the time of the Antonine Cæsars, by engrafting upon it the underlying principles contained in the Stoic philosophy, discloses the fact that the emancipation of women had been practically accomplished in Rome.
Perhaps there is no subject which at the present time possesses greater interest for inquiring women than that concerning the status of their sex under the older Roman law; for, by an understanding of woman’s legal status, as fixed under this institution at a time when man had gained the summit of his power over her, is furnished a key whereby may be unlocked many of the mysteries surrounding the still extant social and legal disabilities of women.
The thoroughly egoistic character of the principles underlying the older Roman law has been noticed in a former portion of this work. We have seen that in Rome the father, who was the sole representative of the family, had drawn to himself not only all the authority over the child which under the earlier gentile organization of society had been acknowledged as belonging exclusively to the mother, but, ignoring individual liberty, and all the principles of personal freedom which had been established under the matriarchal system, had proclaimed himself absolute sovereign over all within the agnatic bond. The divine oracle of Apollo, which had enunciated the doctrine that the soul of the child is derived from the father, had at the same time declared that the mother has to do only with furnishing the body. Thus the father, as Creator, became the household god; his authority, as we have seen, being supreme even to the exercise of the power of life and death over its members.
Under ancient law, the father, as head of the household, really constituted the family, the remaining members being merely ciphers which, from the peculiar position in which they were placed, were without significance except as vassals under the strictest tutelage of their master. Under this august system of father-worship, males as well as females had become enslaved. The bondage of men, however, differed somewhat from the “perpetual tutelage of women,” in the fact that they themselves in time might become heads of families, and in that imperial position to assume the same authority and dominion over others as had been exercised over them. Women, however, could never become heads of families, and therefore could never hope to be free. So long as they remained single they were under the tutelage of their blood-relations, or were subject to the authority of some individual whom the father, before his death, might choose to appoint over them as guardian. Thus arose the law known as the Perpetual Tutelage of Women. Upon this subject Sir Henry Maine says:
Ancient law subordinates the woman to her blood-relations, while a prime phenomenon of modern jurisprudence has been her subordination to her husband. The history of the change is remarkable. It begins far back in the annals of Rome. Anciently, there were three modes in which marriage might be contracted according to Roman usage, one involving a religious solemnity, the other two the observance of certain secular formalities. By the religious marriage of Confarreation; by the higher form of civil marriage, which was called Coemption; and by the lower form, which was termed Usus, the husband acquired a number of rights over the person and property of his wife, which were on the whole in excess of such as are conferred on him in any system of modern jurisprudence. But in what capacity did he acquire them? Not as Husband, but as Father. By the Confarreation, Coemption, and Usus, the woman passed in manum viri—that is, in law she became the Daughter of her husband. She was included in his Patria Potestas. She incurred all the liabilities springing out of it while it subsisted, and surviving it when it had expired. All her property became absolutely his and she was retained in tutelage after his death to the guardian whom he had appointed by will.255
On this subject of male supremacy in the family Mr. Maine remarks:
The foundation of Agnation is not the marriage of Father and Mother, but the authority of the Father. All persons are Agnatically bound together who are under the same Paternal Power, or who have been under it, or who might have been under it if their lineal ancestor had lived long enough to exercise his empire.256
Under this bond would be united all the children belonging to the head of the household and all the descendants of the sons, but not of the daughters; the daughters’ children under this manner of reckoning descent belonged to the families of their respective fathers. Although under this system a man might adopt a stranger into his family, and invest him with all the rights and privileges appertaining thereunto, no descendant of a daughter could claim any of the rights of agnation. Under Hindu law, which is saturated with the primitive notions of family dependency, in the genealogies, the names of women are omitted altogether. We are assured by Mr. Maine that the exclusion of women from governmental functions certainly had its origin in agnation. Thus it is seen that paternity had come to involve the idea of a supreme ruler or potentate, and that the overshadowing predominance of the male over the female had paved the way to the future worship of one all-powerful male deity.
We have seen that the principles involved in the Stoic philosophy were justice, equality, and the subjection of the appetites to the dictates of reason and conscience. So soon as Greece was subjugated by Rome, the ablest of the Romans espoused the principles embodied in this philosophy, and notably among those who became interested in its tenets were the Roman lawyers, who began immediately to reconstruct the civil law upon the principles underlying this system.
That it is only through a return to the archaic and natural principles of justice and right living, the acknowledgment of which at once establishes the proper relations of the sexes, that women may ever hope to be free, is plain to all those who have given attention to this subject. This fact was evidently observed by the Roman lawyers who, through the persistency with which only those labour who are engaged in establishing a principle, had so far succeeded in overcoming the prejudice against sex as to have established a legal code wherein was practically recognized the equality of women with men.
Doubtless the Romans were as tenacious of their ancient customs, prejudices, and long-established privileges as have been the people of any other country; hence we may perhaps form a faint idea of the obstacles which presented themselves, and of the devices which must have been resorted to by Roman jurists in an endeavour to remove the existing legal restrictions upon the liberties of women.
Mr. Maine informs us that Gaius, a celebrated jurist who lived in the age of the Antonine Cæsars, devoted an entire volume to descriptions of the ingenious expedients devised by Roman lawyers to evade the letter of the ancient law, and that it was through this source that the fact finally became known that in the age of the Antonine Cæsars the legal disabilities of women had been practically annulled.
From the facts at hand it is observed that the object of the Roman lawyers was to frame an edictal jurisprudence which should supersede the older law, or which in effect should annul its power. We are informed that the prætor was not only the chief equity judge, but that he was also the common-law magistrate. So soon, therefore, as the edict had passed through the necessary formalities enabling it to become a law, the prætor’s court began to apply it in place, or by the side of the civil law, “which was directly or indirectly repealed without any express enactment of legislation.” In reference to the legal status of women in the age of the Antonine Cæsars, Henry Maine observes: “Led by their theory of natural law, the jurisconsults had at this time assumed the equality of the sexes as a principle of their code of equity.”257
Although the seed, sown in Greece during the Periclean age when conveyed to Rome, produced a golden harvest, the fact will doubtless be remembered that the Roman lawyers had but just completed their work of establishing the legal equality of the sexes when the agencies which for years had been at work to destroy the Empire culminated; and finally, when Christianity, in the person of Constantine ascended the throne, the results of four centuries of civilization were destroyed, or for more than sixteen hundred years were practically annulled.
Regarding the changes which had been wrought in the legal status of women in the age of the Antonine Cæsars, we are informed that whereas under the older Roman law a woman at marriage came under the Patria Potestas of her husband, under the later law, as influenced by the principles involved in the Stoic philosophy, she remained as a member of her own family, or was placed under the protection of a guardian appointed by her parents, whose jurisdiction over her, although superior to that of her husband, was not such as to interfere with her personal liberty; thus, the same as under matriarchal usages, the situation of the Roman woman, whether married or single, was one of great influence. Of this freedom exercised by women in the time of the Antonine Cæsars, Mr. Maine remarks:
But Christianity tended somewhat from the very first to narrow this remarkable liberty.... The latest Roman Law, so far as it is touched by the Constitutions of the Christian Emperors, bears some marks of a reaction against the liberal doctrines of the great Antonine jurisconsults. And the prevalent state of religious sentiment may explain why it is that modern jurisprudence, forged in the furnace of barbarian conquest, and formed by the fusion of Roman jurisprudence with patriarchal usage, has absorbed, among its rudiments, much more than usual of those rules concerning the position of women which belong peculiarly to an imperfect civilization.258
Concerning the influence of ecclesiasticism on that portion of Roman jurisprudence relating particularly to women, Mr. Lecky observes:
Wherever the canon law has been the basis of legislation, we find laws of succession sacrificing the interests of daughters and of wives, and a state of public opinion which has been formulated and regulated by these laws.
By means of a formulated ecclesiastical jurisprudence the complete inferiority of the sex was maintained,
and that generous public opinion, which in Rome had frequently rebelled against the injustice done to girls in depriving them of the greater portion of the inheritance of their fathers, totally disappeared.
In comparing the Roman law with the canon or ecclesiastical code, the same writer says that the pagan laws during the Empire were constantly repealing the old disabilities of women; but that it was the aim of the canon law to substitute enactments which should entail on the female sex the greatest personal restrictions and the most stringent subordination.259
Those who have paid attention to the history of the English Common Law, which forms the basis of our present system of jurisprudence, and who have noted the part played by ecclesiasticism in fixing the status of women therein, will not be surprised at the attitude which the so-called Christian Church has assumed toward women. Referring to the Common Law, an able writer has said:
This imperishable specimen of human sagacity is, strange to say, so grossly unjust toward women that a great writer upon that code has well observed that in it women are regarded not as persons but as things; so completely were they stripped of all their rights, and held in subjection to their proud and imperious masters.260
It has been remarked that in no one particular does the canon law depart so widely from the spirit of secular jurisprudence as in the view it takes of the relations created by marriage. Although the leaven of civilization preserved from Roman institutions was the codified jurisprudence of Justinian, as the chapter of law relating to women was read by the light of canon law, the altruistic principles which had characterized the later Roman code soon became extinct. Upon this subject Mr. Maine remarks:
This was in part inevitable since no society which preserves any tincture of Christian institutions is likely to restore to married women the personal liberty conferred on them by the middle Roman law.
And this is doubtless true for the reason that the entire Christian superstructure rests on the dogma of female weakness and female depravity. The doctrine of Original Sin, which depends entirely on the story of the fruit-tree of Genesis being taken in a literal sense, had by canonists been accepted. On her first appearance upon the scene of action, woman is labouring under a curse pronounced upon her by an all-powerful male God for the mischief she had wrought on innocent man; it is only reasonable, therefore, that human law should unite with the divine decree in establishing her complete and final degradation; hence, the return to the ancient Hindu law and the older Roman code for models of legislation concerning her.
On this subject Mr. Maine remarks:
I do not know how the operation and nature of the ancient Patria Potestas can be brought so vividly before the mind as by reflecting on the prerogatives attached to the husband by the pure English Common Law, and by recalling the rigorous consistency with which the view of a complete legal subjection on the part of the wife is carried by it, where it is untouched by equity or statutes, through every department of rights, duties, and remedies.261
Note.—As the position of women among the early German hordes was one of great dignity and respect, it may scarcely be argued that the sentiments embodied in the English Common Law relative to wives were in any degree the result of innate Teutonic prejudice against the female sex.
Notwithstanding the efforts which for several centuries were put forth in Rome to secure to women that independence which under the earlier Roman law had been denied them, in the code of Justinian, which was compiled in the early part of the sixth century, no word respecting the remarkable degree of liberty which under the later Roman law was accorded to women appears; and but for the discovery of the manuscript of Gaius, to which reference has already been made, we would never have become acquainted with the changes which had been wrought in this particular branch of Roman jurisprudence. In the Justinian code, instead of the humane edicts of the later, or middle Roman law, appeared the Canon or ecclesiastical law, by means of which women were condemned to a state of servitude even more degrading than that which had been imposed on them by the older law.
Had mediæval scholasticism succeeded in concealing from the world the information contained in the manuscript of Gaius, still there would have remained sufficient evidence left to prove that in the second century of the present era woman’s freedom had been practically won. That women themselves were claiming absolute legal equality with men may not be doubted. Honoria, a Roman matron, first enunciated the principle: Taxation without representation is tyranny.262 Cato’s celebrated oration in which he passionately exclaims: If you allow your women to be your equals how long will it be before they become your superiors?263 shows that a certain type of men were becoming alarmed over the growing independence of women.
The freeing of women from the bondage entailed on them by the older Roman law, an achievement which had required more than three centuries to accomplish, was a triumph for civilization unparalleled during the historic period. That this triumph over tyranny was of short duration is shown in the sequel to this movement.
That the coming of Jesus at a time when the principles of justice and equality were becoming the recognized rule of life among the better class of Romans is not surprising. No one may study Greek philosophy without noting the similarity between it and the teachings of Christ. Justice, self-restraint, and regard for the rights and feelings of others, principles which when applied to Roman law had liberated women from the tyranny of the past, were also the principles taught by Jesus. It seems to have been the mission of the latter to convey these lofty doctrines to the multitude. Do unto others as you would have others do unto you was not however understood by the masses who knew no other rule of life than that of selfishness and ungoverned lust. Hence in process of time the new movement came to have no other effect than to add to the already established evils another quite as contemptible, namely—hypocrisy.
Among the earliest Christians theological disputes were unknown. Original sin and the doctrine of a vicarious atonement whereby a man is “saved” not from sin but from the penalty for sin were unheard of. To spread the simple principles enunciated by Jesus and by so doing to kindle into life the divine spark in man, seem to have constituted the object and aim of the earliest Christians. The activities necessary for the propagation of these principles were shared alike by both sexes. Women exhorted, prophesied, and prayed in the churches. They baptized their own sex. One of them wrote a gospel which, so long as woman’s influence continued, was in use among the Christians.
Such were the conditions when Paul, a Jew who had espoused the new religion, first appeared on the scene. An extant legend describes this man as small in stature and of ignoble bearing. According to this legend Paul was bald-headed and bow-legged. As to his intellectual ability we have the following Corinthians x., 10: “For his letters they were weighty and strong but his speech is of no account.” It is elsewhere recorded of him that “his speech was contemptible.” From what is known of this man Paul it is evident that he was domineering, self-sufficient, and aggressive. He quarrelled with Peter and was intolerant of the ideas of his associates. His forceful character, his untiring energy, his zeal for the cause which he had espoused and above all his capacity for organization soon gained for him the leadership of the new movement.
Nowhere is it recorded that during the earlier years of Paul’s Christian career he attempted to discourage, or curtail, the activities of women. On the contrary he refers to them as co-workers, acknowledges them as prophets, and praises their ministrations. In his writings, the name of Priscilla occurs many times. Phœbe, Claudia, Julia and others are regarded as worthy of mention by him. As his influence and power increased, however, his egoism began to assert itself. It is evident that Paul’s strong masculine nature could no longer tolerate a religion which might with some degree of consistency be regarded as a feminine movement. The old doctrine enunciated by Apollo during the reign of Cecrops namely that man is a divine emanation while woman is only human must be revived.
The following from Paul’s writings shows that his aim was to crush the influence and power exercised by women, and the means employed was to subject them to the dominion of their husbands.
The head of every man is Christ; and the head of every woman is the man and the head of Christ is God.
For the man is not of the woman but the woman of the man. Neither was the man created for the woman but the woman for the man.
Let your women keep silence in the churches, for it is not permitted unto them to speak but they are commanded to be under obedience.
And if they would learn anything let them ask their husbands at home.
That women were no longer to be the equals and companions of their husbands but that they were to become sexual slaves is indicated by the command, “Wives subject yourselves unto your husbands.”
It must be remembered that these commands of Paul were not, as has been frequently asserted, delivered to and about weak, ignorant women devoid of influence, but were directed against those whose position of equality in the new religion had not before been questioned, and whose legal disabilities had at that time been well-nigh removed.
Before the close of the second century, the simple, ethical teachings of Jesus were forgotten. Christianity had disappeared and Paulism had taken its place. A century later, after the Empire had come under the control of so-called Christian rule, woman’s influence, as we have already seen, entirely disappeared. All that had been gained by means of the middle Roman law had been annulled by the decrees of the Canon law.
Pauline Christianity in the fourth century A.D. was an attempt to re-establish that form of Paganism which had prevailed prior to the rise of Greek philosophy. This older religion, which had its origin in Sun worship, or in the worship of the two fecundating principles throughout nature, had as early as the Periclean age ceased to claim the attention of the educated classes among the Greeks. Æschylus barely escaped being stoned to death for heresy, and as is well known, Socrates the founder of the Stoic philosophy was forced to drink of the fatal cup because of his unbelief in the prevailing superstitions. Not to destroy Paganism itself but to exterminate the last vestige of Greek philosophy was the task which the Pauline Christians had set themselves to perform. Jesus now became the new Solar Deity and all the forms observed under the older Paganism were now attached to his worship. He was born at the winter solstice, or at the time when the sun had reached its zenith and was about to return. He died and was buried, but at the vernal equinox, Easter, the time at which all nature is revived—he arose from the dead and became the Saviour of mankind. The entire Christian calendar is copied from the ancient Pagan worship. A medal was struck on which appeared the figure of a man on a cross, on the obverse side of which was the representation of a blazing sun. Christ was the new Sun of Righteousness, the giver and preserver of life.
Every page in the history of the Pauline religion reveals its masculine origin. The Deities worshipped are a Father and a Son. All the angels and archangels are men. All extant Gospels and Epistles have been written and expounded by men. It is true that in response to a popular demand in the fifth century for a recognition of the female principle, the Virgin Mary, an ancient Deity, reappeared. The lateness of her coming, however, shows that she was an afterthought. Moreover, it must be borne in mind that, true to the ancient doctrine which was revived by Paul relative to the divinity of man and the material nature of woman, the Mother of Jesus was human while the Father and the Son were divine. She was matter. They were spirit.
Among the discussions of the early Pauline “Fathers” none was more important than these. Ought women to be allowed to learn the alphabet? And has woman a soul? It is recorded that a few of these pious leaders entertained the opinion that because of the great power and goodness of the Almighty “women may possibly be permitted to rise as men at the resurrection.”
As we have seen, to destroy Greek philosophy was the slogan of the new movement. The destruction of the Alexandrian library by a fanatical mob led by Archbishop Theophilus is an example of the fury with which all institutions not directly connected with the new religion were attacked. As is well known, this library contained the accumulated knowledge of a highly civilized people, extending over a period of several thousands of years. Among the priceless treasures stored in this library were the records of astronomical observations scientifically registered during a period of not less than three thousand years.
The lectures delivered by Hypatia in Alexandria during the latter part of the fourth century were the last attempt made to stem the tide of fanaticism which was destined to sweep over a large portion of the habitable globe. The fate of Hypatia who was foully murdered by a mob led by St. Cyril was a forecast of the fate which awaited any and all who should henceforth dare to think or act independently of the new religion.
When Greek philosophy was no longer taught, the principles of equality and liberty which had been incorporated into the middle Roman law were annulled or practically forgotten; and when the doctrine of woman’s inferiority and total depravity became crystallized not only in religion but in law and in all the customs of the time, women sank to a degree of degradation never before witnessed in the history of mankind.