From the Decretal Letter of the Same, to Exuperius, Bishop of Toulouse, A.D. 405

Decree IV. And this also was desired to be known: why men communicating with adulterous wives are not suited, when, on the contrary, wives seem to remain in the company of adulterous husbands. Concerning this, the Christian religion condemns adultery in each sex by equal reckoning. But women do not easily accuse their husbands of adultery, and hidden sins do not have punishment; but men have been accustomed more freely to report adulterous wives before priests. And therefore, their crime having been betrayed, communion is denied to women; but, the offense of men lying hidden, hardly anyone is kept away by suspicions. He indeed will be removed if his disgrace is uncovered.

Decree VI. Your love also inquired concerning those who, divorce intervening, have coupled themselves to another marriage. It is manifest that these are adulterers on each side. But those who, even while the wife is living, although the marriage seems to have been dissociated, have hastened to another union, cannot fail to be seen as adulterers, to such an extent that even those persons to whom such men have been joined seem themselves also to have committed adultery, according to that which we read in the Gospel: "He who has dismissed his wife and has married another commits adultery; likewise also he who has married one dismissed commits adultery."

Roman laws, enacted by Emperors who were even Christian, permitted repudiation for certain causes, in such a way that the bond of marriage was dissolved and it was lawful to enter other nuptials while the prior spouse was surviving. Thus Constantine (in Cod. Theod., book III, title 16, law 1), and Theodosius and Valentinian (Cod., book V, title 17, law 8), and Justinian both in the same place and in Novella 117, chapters 8-9. But the Church rejected these laws as opposed to Christian right. Wherefore Innocent says that, divorce intervening, the marriage seems to be dissociated, because Roman right approves the dissolution of the bond; but the same Pontiff denies that the bond has been dissolved, since he affirms that spouses of this sort are adulterers if they are joined to others.