CONDONATION. The conditional for giveness or remission, by a husband or wife, of a matrimonial offence which the other has committed.
2. While the condition remains unbroken, condonation, on whatever motive it proceeded, is an absolute bar to the remedy for the par ticular injury condoned. Bishop, Marr. & D. 354.
The doctrine of condonation is chiefly-, though not exclusively, applicable to the offence of adultery. It may be either ex press, i.e. signified by words or writing, or implied from the conduct of the parties. The latter, however, is much the more common; and it is in regard to that that the chief legal difficulty has arisen. The only general rule is, that any cohabitation with the guilty party, after the commission of the offence, and with the knowledge or belief on the part of the injured party of its commission, will amount to conclusive evidence of condona tion. The construction, however, is more strict when the wife thftn when the husband is the delinquent party. Bishop, Marr. & D.
N 355-371.
3. Every implied condonation is upon the implied condition that the party forgiven will abstain from the commission of the like offence thereafter, and also treat the forgiving party, in all respects, with conjugal kindness. Such, at least, is the better opinion; though the latter branch of the proposition has given rise to much discussion. It is not necessary, there fore, that the subsequent injury be of the same kind, or proved with the same clear ness, or sufficient of itself, when proved, to warrant a divorce or separation. Accord ingly, it seems that a course of unkind and cruel treatment will revive condoned adul tery, though the latter be a ground of divorce a vineulo matrimonii, while the latter will, at most, only authorize a separation from bed and board. 1 Edw. Ch. N. Y. 439 ; 4 Paige, Ch. N. Y. 460 ; 14 Wend. N. Y. 637 ; Bishop, Marr. & D. 371 a-380 a.