The introduction of this entering-wedge is easily explicable. St. Paul had specified the monogamic condition—“unius uxoris vir”—as a prerequisite to the diaconate, priesthood, and episcopate, and the temper of the times was such as to lead irresistibly to this being taken in its literal sense, rather than to adopt the more rational view that it was intended to exclude those among the Gentiles who indulged in the prevalent vice of concubinage, or who among the Jews had fallen into the sin of polygamy—or those among either race who had taken advantage, either before or after conversion, of the disgraceful laxity prevalent with regard to divorces, for, as we learn from Origen, the rule was by no means obeyed which forbade a divorced person to marry during the lifetime of the other spouse.[46] When once this principle was fairly established, and when at the same time the efforts of the Montanists to render it binding on the whole body of Christian believers had failed, a distinction was enforced between the clergy and the laity, as regards the marriage-tie, which gave to the former an affectation of sanctity, and which was readily capable of indefinite expansion. It is therefore easy to comprehend the revival, which shortly followed, of the old Levitical rule requiring the priesthood to marry none but virgins—a rule which was early adopted, though it took long to establish it in practice, for as late as 414 we find Innocent I. complaining that men who had taken widows to wife were even elevated to the episcopate, and Leo I. devoted several of his epistles to its enforcement.[47] A corollary to this speedily followed, which required a priest whose wife was guilty of adultery to put her away, since further commerce with her rendered him unfit for the functions of his office; and this again, as subsequent authorities were careful to point out, afforded a powerful reason for requiring absolute celibacy on the part of the clergy, for, in view of the fragility of the sex, no man could feel assured that he was not subject to this disability, nor could the faithful be certain that his ministrations were not tainted with irregularity.[48] We thus reach the state of ecclesiastical discipline at the close of the third century, as authoritatively set forth in the Apostolical Constitutions and Canons—bishops and priests allowed to retain the wives which they may have had before ordination, but not to marry in orders; the lower grades, deacons, subdeacons, etc., allowed to marry after entering the church; but all were to be husbands of but one wife, who must be neither a widow, a divorced woman, nor a concubine.[49]