CONGRESS, med. juris. This name was anciently given in France, England, and other countries, to the-indecent intercourse¹ between married persons, in the presence of witnesses appointed by the courts, in cases when the husband or wife was charged by the other with impotence. Trebuchet, Jurisp. de Med. 101 Dictionnaire des Sciences Medicales, art. Congres, by Marc.

CONJECTURE². Conjectures³ are ideas or notions founded on probabilities without any demonstration⁵ of their truth. Mascardus has defined conjecture: "rationable vestigium latentis veritatis, unde nascitur opinio sapientis;" or a slight degree of credence⁶ arising from evidence too weak or too remote to produce belief. De Prob. vol. i. quoest. 14, n. 14. See Dict. de Trevoux, h. v.; Denisart, h. v.

CONJOINTS. Persons married to each other. Story, Confl. of L. 71; Wolff. Dr. de la Nat. 858.

CONJUGAL⁷. Matrimonial; belonging, to marriage as, conjugal rights, or the rights which belong to the husband or wife as such.

CONJUNCTIVE, contracts, wills, instruments. A term in grammar used to designate particles which connect one word to another, or one proposition to another proposition.

2. There are many cases in law, where the conjunctive and is used for the disjunctive or, and vice⁸ versa.

3. An obligation is conjunctive when it contains several things united by a conjunction to indicate that they are all equally the object of the matter or contract for example, if I promise for a lawful⁹ consideration, to deliver to you my copy of the Life of Washington, my Encyclopaedia¹⁰, and my copy of the History of the United States, I am then bound to deliver all of them and cannot be discharged by delivering one only. There are, according to Toullier, tom. vi. n. 686, as many separate obligations Is there are things to be delivered, and the obligor may discharge himself pro⁴ tanto by delivering either of them, or in case of refusal the tender will be valid¹¹. It is presumed, however, that only one action could be maintained for the whole. But if the articles in the agreement had not been enumerated¹²; I could not, according to Toullier, deliver one in discharge of my contract, without the consent of the creditor¹³; as if, instead of enumerating¹⁴ the, books above mentioned, I had bound myself to deliver all my books, the very books in question. Vide Disjunctive, Item, and the case, there cited; and also, Bac. Ab. Conditious, P; 1 Bos. & Pull. 242; 4 Bing. N. C. 463 S. C. 33 E. C. L. R. 413; 1 Bouv. Inst. n. 687-8.

CONJURATION. A swearing together. It signifies a plot, bargain, or compact made by a number of persons under oath, to do some public harm. In times of ignorance, this word was used to signify the personal conference which some persons were supposed to have had with the devil, or some evil spirit, to know any secret, or effect any purpose.