CONDITION, persons. The situation in civil society which creates certain relations between the individual, to whom it is applied1, and one or more others, from which mutual2 rights and obligations arise. Thus the situation arising from marriage gives rise to the conditions of husband and wife that of paternity to the conditions of father and child. Domat, tom. 2, liv. 1, tit. 9, s. 1, n. 8.
2. In contracts every one is presume to know the condition of the person with whom he deals. A man making a contract with an infant cannot recover against him for a breach3 of the contract, on the ground that he was not aware of his condition.
CONDITIONAL4 OBLIGATION. One which is superseded5 by a condition under which it was created and which is not yet accomplished6. Poth. Obl. n. 176, 198.
CONDITIONS OF SALE, contracts. The terms upon which the vendor8 of property by auction10 pro9 poses to sell it; the instrument containing these terms, when reduced to writing or printing, is also called the conditions of sale.
2. It is always prudent11 and advisable that the conditions of sale should be printed and exposed in the auction room; when so done, they are binding12 ou both parties, and nothing that is said at the time of sale, to add to or vary such printed conditions, will be of any avail. 1 H. Bl. 289 12 East, 66 Ves. 330; 15 Ves. 521; 2 Munf. Rep. 119; 1 Desauss. Ch. Rep. 573; 2 Desauss. Ch. R. 320; 11 John. Rep. 555; 3 Camp. 285. Vide forms of conditions of sale in Babington on Auctions13, 233 to 243; Sugd. Vend7. Appx. No. 4. Vide duction; ductioneer; Puffer.
CONDONATION14. A term used in the canon law. It is a forgiveness by the husband of his wife, or by a wife of her husband, of adultery committed, with an implied condition that the injury shall not be repeated, and that the other party shall be treated with conjugal15 kindness. 1 Hagg. R. 773; 3 Eccl. Rep. 310. See 5 Mass. 320 5 Mass. 69; 1 Johns. Ch. R. 488.
2. It may be express or implied, as, if a husband, knowing of his wife's infidelity, cohabit with her. 1 Hagg. Rep. 789; 3 Eccl. R. 338.
3. Condonation is not, for many rea sons, held so strictly16 against a wife as against a husband. 3 Eccl. R. 830 Id. 341, n.; 2 Edw. R. 207. As all condonations, by operation of law, are expressly or impliedly conditional, it follows that the effect is taken off by the repetition of misconduct; 3 Eccl. R. 329 3 Phillim. Rep. 6; 1 Eccl. R. 35; and cruelty revives condoned17 adultery. Worsley v. Worsley, cited in Durant v. Durant, 1 Hagg. Rep. 733; 3 Eccl. Rep. 311.
4. In New York, an act of cruelty alone, on the part of the husband, does not revive condoned adultery, to entitle the wife to a divorce. 4 Paige's R. 460. See 3 Edw. R. 207.
5. Where the parties have separate beds, there must, in order to found condonation, be something of matrimonial intercourse18 presumed; it does not rest merely on the wife's not. withdrawing herself. 3 Eccl. R. 341, n.; 2 Paige, R. 108.
6. Condonation is a bar to a sentence of divorce. 1 Eccl. Rep. 284; 2 Paige, R. 108. In Pennsylvania, by the Act of the 13th of March, 1815, 7, 6 Reed's Laws of Penna. 288, it is enacted19 that " in any suit or action for divorce for cause of adultery, if the defendant20 shall allege21 and prove that the plaintiff has admitted the defendant into conjugal society or embraces, after he or she knew of the criminal fact, or that the plaintiff (if the husband) allowed of his wife's prostitutions, or received hire, for them, or exposed his wife to lewd22 company, whereby she became ensnared to the crime aforesaid, it shall be a good defence, and perpetual bar against the same." The same rule may be found, perhaps, in the codes of most civilized23 countries. Villanova Y Manes, Materia Criminal Forense, Obs. 11, c. 20, n. 4. Vide, generally, 2 Edw. 207; Dev. Eq. R. 352 4 Paige, 432; 1 Edw. R. 14; Shelf. on M. & D. 445; 1 John. Ch. R. 488 4 N. Hamp. R. 462; 5 Mass. 320.