Already in the Carolingian empire, through co-operation of the secular authority, the teachings of Augustine had gained a similar triumph. The ecclesiastical capitularies of the Frankish kings, from the ascendency of the house of Charles Martel to the consolidation of the state under Charles the Great, are of especial interest in this connection, for they prepare the way for the synthetic work of the canonists. During the dark period of the Merovingian line any attempt through legislation to deal seriously with divorce or any similar social or moral problem could scarcely arise; for it would have meant some restriction of the prevailing licentiousness, to which all classes were committed. Civil rulers were steeped in debauchery. The church was apathetic and corrupt. "With the advent of the Carolingian major domus, the level of morality begins to rise."[105] Already in 744, at the Synod of Soissons, a royal capitulary clearly forbids divorce to each spouse, except that a husband may put away a guilty wife on the scriptural ground; but in that case whether the innocent person may contract a new marriage we are not informed.[106] This attempt to enforce the rigid doctrine of the ancient church seems to have been premature; for a few years later, at the synods of Verberie (753) and Compiègne (757), rules much more tolerant are proclaimed.[107] These capitularies possess more than usual historical interest in view of their "profound and durable influence" on the final settlement of the law by Gratian and his successors.[108] Several grounds of divorce with remarriage are admitted. According to the decree of Verberie, the man whose wife plots against his life may put her away and take another spouse; but the divorced woman may not remarry. So also, by the same decree, the man may form a new marriage, if his wife through love of her parents or some selfish interest refuses to accompany him when he flees from danger or is constrained to follow his lord into another duchy or province. In this case, the woman must remain unmarried while her husband lives.[109] Again, the Synod of Verberie provides that if either person in course of the wedded life shall fall into slavery, the one remaining free is at liberty to marry again when he likes. "A single exception is admitted which throws a sombre light on the society of that epoch: if a spouse under pressure of misery has sold himself as a slave, the partner remaining free, who has shared the bread thus gained and whom the sale has saved from hunger, is not entitled to a divorce."[110] [Footnote 105: GEFFCKEN, _op. cit._, 45, who gives, 44-46, 52-55, an interesting discussion of the reasons for the absence of divorce regulations during the Merovingian era.] [Footnote 106: ESMEIN, _op. cit._, II, 58, 64; GEFFCKEN, _op. cit._, 55.]