THE CANON LAW AND THE ATTITUDE OF THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH

Canon law reaffirms the subjection of women--Women and
marriage--Protection to women--Divorce--Cardinal Gibbons on protection
of injured wives by Popes--Catholic Church has no divorce--But it allows
fourteen reasons for declaring marriage null and void and leaving a
husband or wife free to remarry--Some of these explained--Diriment
impediments and dispensations--Historical instances of the Roman
Church's inconsistency--Attitude towards women at present day--Opinions
of Cardinals Gibbon and Moran, and Rev. David Barry and Rev. William
Humphrey--Sources


CHAPTER VII

WOMEN'S RIGHTS IN ENGLAND

Single women have always had private rights--But males preferred in
inheritance--Examples--Power of parents--Husband and wife--Wife
completely controlled by husband--He could beat her and own all her
property--Recent abrogation of the husband's power--Divorce--Jeremy
Taylor and others on duty of women to bear husband's sins with
meekness--Injustice of the present law of divorce--Rape and the age of
legal consent--Progress of the rights to an education--Women in the
professions--Woman suffrage--Sources


CHAPTER VIII