Adultery

Adultery, according to English law, the sexual intercourse of a married person with some person other than his or her wife or husband. Among the Greeks and in the earlier period of Roman law, and according to the Scriptures (as expounded by some of the best commentators), it is not adultery except where a married woman is the offender. In Britain it has been reckoned a spiritual offence, and cognisable by the spiritual Courts. The common law only allowed the party aggrieved his action for damages. In England the husband can claim damages from the adulterer in a petition for dissolution of the marriage. Adultery alone on the part of the wife entitles the husband to a dissolution of the marriage, but the wife is only entitled to a dissolution against the husband where there has been, in addition to the adultery, some other offence, as bigamy, gross cruelty, or desertion. She is, however, entitled to a judicial separation in case of adultery alone or of the other offences alone.