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Question 50. Why did the Flamen Dialis (Jupiter's
priest), when his wife died, lay down his priestly dignity,
as Ateius tells us?
Solution. Is it not for this reason, because he that marries a wife and loses her after marriage is more unfortunate
than he that never took a wife; for the family of a married
man is completed, but the family of him that is married
and loseth his wife is not only incomplete but mutilated?
Or is it because his wife joins with the husband in consecration (as there are many sacred rites that ought not to be
performed unless the wife be present), but to marry another
immediately after he hath lost the former wife is not perhaps easy to do, and besides is not convenient? Hence it
was not lawful formerly to put away a wife, nor is it at this
present lawful; except that Domitian in our remembrance,
being petitioned, granted it. The priests were present at
this dissolution of marriage, doing many terrible, strange,
and uncouth actions. But thou wilt wonder less, if thou
art informed by history that, when one of the censors died,
his partner was required to lay down his place. When
Livius Drusus died, Aemilius Scaurus his colleague would
not abandon his government before one of the tribunes of
the people committed him to prison.
[p. 233]
Plutarch. Plutarch's Morals. Translated from the Greek by several hands. Corrected and revised by. William W. Goodwin, PH. D. Boston. Little, Brown, and Company. Cambridge. Press Of John Wilson and son. 1874. 2.
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