Page:The Ancient City- A Study on the Religion, Laws, and Institutions of Greece and Rome.djvu/67

 CHAP, III. CONTINUITY OF THE FAMILY. 61 CHAPTER III. Continuity of the Family. Celibacy forbidden. Divorce in Cas3 of EterUity. Inequality between the Son and Daughter. The belief relative to the dead, and to the worship that was duo them, founded the ancient famil}^, and gave it vhe greater part of its rules. We have seen above that man, after death, was reputed a happy and divine being, but on the condition that the living con- tinued to offer him the funeral repasts. If these offer- ings ceased, the dead ancestor fell to the rank of an unliappy and malevolent demon. For when these ancient generations began to picture a future life to themselves, they had not dreamed of rewards and pun- ishments ; they imagined that the happiness of the dead depended not upon the life led in tliis state of existence, but upon the way in which their descendants treated them. Every father, therefore, expected of his posterity that series of funeral repasts which was to assure to his manes repose and happiness. This opinion was the fundamental principle of do- mestic law among the ancients. From it followed, in the first place, this rule, that every family must per- petuate itself forever. It was necessary to the dead that the descendants should not die out. In Jhe tomb where they lived this was the only inquietude which they experienced. Their only tliought, their only in- terest, was, that there should be a man of their blood to carry them offerings at the tomb. The Hindu, too,