u De lioirie.ssional 
 
 REV. A.R.BUCKLAND, MA. 
 
THE LIBRARY 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 LOS ANGELES 
 
C6e Confessional tn tije 
 Cnglts!) C&urcf) 
 
NISBET'S 
 
 Cburcb of JEn^lant) ibanfcboofes 
 
 EDITED BY THE 
 
 Rev. W. H. GRIFFITH THOMAS, M.A. 
 
 Small crown 8vo. Each 2s. 
 
 THE CONFESSIONAL IN THE 
 CHURCH OF ENGLAND. By the Rev. 
 A. R. Buckland, M.A. 
 
 THE DOCTRINE OF BAPTISM. 
 By the Rev. Hay M. H. Aitken, M.A. 
 
 THE CHURCHMAN'S A. B. C. 
 
 HOW WE GOT OUR PRAYER- 
 BOOK. By the Rev. T. W. Drury, B.D. 
 
 LONDON : JAMES NISBET & CO., LIMITED 
 21 Berneks Street 
 
Cfje Confe0Stonal in 
 engltsl) Cljurcl) 
 
 ITS AUTHORITY AND ITS INFLUENCE 
 
 REV. A. R. BUCKLAND, M.A. 
 
 MORNING PREACHER AT THE FOUNDLING HOSPITAL 
 
 JAMES NISBET & CO., LIMITED 
 21 BERNERS STREET 
 1901 
 
Printed by BALLANTYNE, HANSON &•> Co. 
 At the Ballantyne Press 
 
b 
 
 g NOTE 
 
 The following chapters deal only with 
 certain aspects of the Confessional, and 
 make no claim to completeness. The 
 manuals and tracts placed in the hands 
 
 8 of adults and young children have been, 
 as far as possible, used to show the doc- 
 
 g trine and practices recommended within 
 
 p the English Church. 
 
 390687 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2013 
 
 http://archive.org/details/confessionalinenOObuck 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 PAGES 
 
 The Position To-Day 1-19 
 
 " The Priest in Absolution " : 
 Its Publication. 
 Its Authorship. 
 Its Exposure. 
 Its Offence. 
 
 Pusey's Version of the Same Original. 
 
 His Defence of "The Priest in Absolution": 
 Its "Weakness. 
 
 The Course of the Controversy. 
 
 The Public Deceived by the Withdrawal 
 of the Book, though its Principles 
 were still Followed. 
 The Trial of Toleration. 
 
 The Position to-day more Serious. 
 
 Extent to which the Confessional is used 
 Greater. 
 
 Character of its Work the same. 
 
 vii 
 
viii 
 
 Contents 
 
 Proofs of this — 
 
 From the Parishes. 
 From Pusey's Gaume. 
 From the Manuals 
 For Adults, 
 For Children. 
 Public Feeling To-day. 
 Need of the Position being understood. 
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 The Authority for the Confessional : Not 
 
 Holy Scripture 
 
 Penance exalted to a Sacrament : Authority in 
 Holy Scripture therefore needed. 
 
 But not placed foremost. 
 
 Examples of the Appeal to the Bible. 
 Texts most relied on considered : — 
 
 St. Matt, xviii. 18. 
 
 St. Matt. viii. 4. 
 
 Acts xix. 18. 
 
 1 Cor. v. and 2 Cor. ii. 
 
 St. John xx. 22, 23. 
 Failure of Corroborative Evidence. 
 The Verdict of the Homily. 
 
Contents 
 
 ix 
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 PAGES 
 
 The Authority for the Confessional : Not 
 
 English but Roman 38-58 
 
 Steps by which the present Roman Position 
 
 was reached : 
 The Statement of the Council of Trent. 
 Its Date Important. 
 
 The Prayer-book, Articles and Homilies 
 in relation to the proceeding of the 
 Council. 
 
 The Stages in the Reformed Prayer-books : 
 Confession in the — 
 
 First Prayer-book of Edward VI. 
 Second Prayer-book of Edward VI. 
 Queen Elizabeth's Prayer-book. 
 The Prayer-book To-day. 
 Our Present Prayer-book : Five Kinds of Con- 
 fession provided for : — 
 
 (1) Open and Common Confession to God. 
 
 (2) Confession One to Another. 
 
 (3) Confession for the Satisfaction of the 
 
 Congregation. 
 
 (4) Confessions of One who " requireth 
 
 further Counsel or Comfort." 
 
 (5) Confession of the Sick. 
 
 (4) and (5) Considered in detail. 
 The Real Source of Authority — Rome. 
 As shown in Pusey's Gaume. 
 
X 
 
 Contents 
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 PAGES 
 
 The Moral Argument for the Confes- 
 sional : The Appeal to Statistics . . 59-71 
 
 Confessional charged with harming Confessor 
 and Penitent — 
 Met by Claim for high moral value of the 
 Confessional, which, if made good, 
 would be conclusive with some. 
 The Verdict of History — 
 
 But with the Times the Institution may 
 
 have changed. 
 Must therefore consider modern facts. 
 Claims made — 
 By Pusey. 
 
 By the Rev. J. P. F. Davidson. 
 
 By the St. Bartholomew's Church Tract. 
 
 In weighing them the Defects of Personal 
 
 Testimony to be remembered. 
 The Appeal to the Case of Ireland — 
 Her Statistics as to Illegitimacy. 
 But Ireland alone Quoted. 
 And the other Crimes of Ireland refute the 
 
 plea. 
 
 Statistics of Illegitimacy — 
 
 In European Countries. 
 
 The Case of Italy in particular. 
 
 In Great Towns. 
 The Witness of Dr. McCabe. 
 
Contents 
 
 xi 
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 PAGES 
 
 The Moral Argument for the Confes- 
 sional : The Peril of the Confessor . 72-90 
 No Claim Made that the Confessional Helps 
 the Confessor — 
 But much as to his Perils. 
 The Warnings point to History. 
 Posey's Cautions to Confessors — 
 
 Against the Taint of Confessions. 
 Circumspection in dealing with Women. 
 Admission of Falls. 
 Confessors in Mortal Sin. 
 Pusey's Cautions Natural — 
 
 From the History of the Confessional. 
 The Struggles of the Church against its 
 Impurities. 
 Can we Ignore the Danger ? 
 A Recent Case. 
 
 Archdeacon Allen's Testimony. 
 The Bishop of Truro's Testimony. 
 Indignation at the Possibility of Fall — 
 
 Reproved by the Literature of the Con- 
 fessional ; 
 Especially by Pusey. 
 Other Dangers to Confessors — 
 Impaired Sense of Sin. 
 Doubts as to Use of Powers. 
 The Training of the Confessor — 
 The Literature to be Consulted. 
 Its Character. 
 
 Illustrated from " The Priest in Absolution," 
 And from Pusey. 
 Casuistry of the Confessional. 
 
xii 
 
 Contents 
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 PAGES 
 
 The Moral Argument for the Confes- 
 sional : The Influence on the Penitent 91-111 
 The Influence of the Confessional on Children — 
 The Age of Confession. 
 The Authority Roman. 
 The Doctrine taught to Children — 
 
 Examples. 
 The Effect of Such Doctrine — 
 Primarily Fear. 
 Bishop Moberly's Opinion. 
 Evidence of a Former Romanist. 
 The Decay of Fear, and the Results — 
 
 Dr. McCabe's Evidence. 
 Dangers in the Confessional : 
 The Suggestion of Evil. 
 
 Pusey's Cautions. 
 Dangers to Young Girls. 
 Dr. McCabe's Evidence. 
 The Influence on Home and Family Life — 
 Mr. Davidson's Plea. 
 
 Answered by Wilson v. Wakeford, 
 and the Cavalier Case. 
 The Influence on Adults — Producing — 
 A Morbid Habit. 
 
 Dangerous Discrimination as to Sin. 
 A False Sense of Security. 
 
 Jeremy Taylor Quoted. 
 
 And Mr. Davidson. 
 An Over-Scrupulous Spirit. 
 Weakening of Self-Control. 
 Lessening Responsibility to God and Man. 
 
%\)t Confessional in ti)e 
 Cnsiisf) Ctmrci) 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 THE POSITION TO-DAY 
 
 In 1866 Mr. Joseph Masters, publisher, 
 New Bond Street, produced a small paper- 
 covered octavo volume of ninety pages, 
 entitled "The Priest in Absolution: a 
 Manual for such as are Called unto the 
 Higher Ministries in the English Church " 
 (Part I.). There were no indications as to 
 authorship, nor as to the agency which 
 procured the issue of the work. The book 
 must, however, have found a welcome, for 
 by the year 1869 it had appeared in a 
 second edition. The volume put forth as 
 Part I, was succeeded by another, distin- 
 
 A 
 
Ubc Confessional 
 
 guished as Part II., of the same general 
 appearance, but containing 322 pages. 
 This volume presented externally some 
 curious changes. It had no author's name, 
 no publishers name, no printer's name. 
 The cover announced it as " Privately 
 printed for the use of the clergy," and 
 the following note appeared below the 
 " Advertisement to the Eeader " : — 
 
 "To prevent scandal arising from the 
 curious or prurient misuse of a book which 
 treats of spiritual diseases, it has been 
 thought best that the sale should be con- 
 fined to the clergy who desire to have at 
 hand a sort of Vade Mecum for easy refer- 
 ence in the discharge of their duties as 
 Confessors." 
 
 The apprehensions here expressed do not 
 seem to have been felt at first, but it must 
 be confessed that the contents of the two 
 books amply justified the caution at last 
 displayed. In Great Britain the work is, 
 as the result of public indignation, placed 
 beyond the reach of the prurient ; but it is 
 
XTbe position XTo*2)ap s 
 
 said that in America a cheap edition has 
 been published, doubtless to gratify the 
 curiosity of persons lacking any sort of 
 claim or desire to act as " Confessors." 
 
 It is no part of my present task to recall 
 in detail the controversy which the publica- 
 tion of this book caused. It is an English 
 version of a manual by the Abbe Gaume. 
 Its author or adapter was the Kev. J. C. 
 Chambers. He prepared the manual at the 
 suggestion of the Society of the Holy Cross, 
 to the members of which Part II. is dedi- 
 cated. They may have anticipated its 
 general use. For, whilst the manual was in 
 undisturbed circulation, the Bishops were 
 approached with a formal petition to appoint 
 clergy as authorised "Confessors." "The 
 Priest in Absolution" would doubtless have 
 been suggested as their recognised handbook. 
 The character of the work was hardly known 
 to the general public until, on June 14, 1877, 
 Lord Eedesdale, a trusted High Churchman 
 of the older school, brought the subject be- 
 fore the House of Lords. His exposure 
 
4 
 
 Ube Confessional 
 
 moved the whole country. The Upper House 
 of Canterbury Convocation condemned the 
 book, and the Bishops had some dealings 
 with the Society concerned in its publica- 
 tion. The Society itself was not at one as 
 to its duty ; but the general result was to 
 stop the circulation of the manual. 
 
 It is quite unnecessary to recall in quota- 
 tions the particular passages in the book to 
 which especial attention was drawn. Pub- 
 lic comment seems to have been most 
 affected by their brutal frankness. The 
 offence, however — in a book not meant for 
 general reading — did not lie in words, but 
 in the system they implied. As a matter 
 of fact, those passages merely reproduced, 
 with some modifications and omissions, 
 what may be called the common form of 
 the Continental method at the Confessional. 
 The matter, indeed, was old ; and the most 
 repulsive parts of the originals had been 
 omitted. But the English people did not 
 then know much either of the Confessional 
 or its literature. When they learned such 
 
XTbe fl>osttlon TToBas 5 
 
 details as " The Priest in Absolution " chose 
 to tell, they were amazed and alarmed. 
 But the language of utter disgust and 
 loathing used towards the book by Bishops, 
 clergy, and laity alike only expressed the 
 natural feeling of decent minds. Pusey, 
 then the great central figure of extreme 
 Churchmen, seems to have thought Mr. 
 Chambers went a little too far ; but his 
 defence is, in effect, the worst condemna- 
 tion of the book. 
 
 Pusey, as his "Life" (iv. 303) shows, 
 was himself at work translating and edit- 
 ing Gaume when the Holy Cross Society 
 forestalled him with the version they 
 called "The Priest in Absolution." When 
 his own book came out, it was found that 
 Pusey had omitted Gaume's section (§ 178) 
 dealing with the Seventh Commandment. 
 Whether he would have done so but for 
 the excitement caused by the disclosure 
 of "The Priest in Absolution" is perhaps 
 doubtful ; but in any case the book he 
 chose for the edification of English clergy 
 
6 XTbe Confessional 
 
 had to be more severely edited by him 
 than by Mr. Chambers before it could be 
 put into open circulation in England. 
 Pusey was more cautious than the author 
 of "The Priest in Absolution"; but that 
 he could not disguise the true character 
 of the work, and of the institution of which 
 it treats, any reader of Pusey's Gaume can 
 see for himself. 
 
 Pusey's own method of defending " The 
 Priest in Absolution " is not that the worst 
 section was unnecessary, but that it was 
 ud necessary in certain cases. He has some 
 oratorical references (Preface to Gaume, 
 pp. xvi, xviii) to the " wickedness of the 
 adversary" in insinuating "that questions 
 of this sort" (that of the kind most ob- 
 jected to in "The Priest in Absolution") 
 " would be asked of the modest wives and 
 daughters of our English homes." The 
 questions, he contends, " directed to be 
 made of the ^/-instructed do not justify 
 any alarm as to the 2^/Z-instructed." I 
 do not think the average English mind 
 
Ube IPosttion TToBa^ 7 
 
 will regard this as an adequate defence. 
 Apparently questions may be put to the 
 maid-servant which should not in general 
 be asked of the mistress ; and the wife of 
 the labourer may be cross-examined about 
 what should not be suggested to the wife 
 of the peer. And what of children and 
 young people? Are they " we^-instructed" 
 or " z7Z- instructed " ? The distinction is in- 
 teresting ; but, as a matter of fact, it is 
 unreal. The Confessor is rightly urged to 
 be careful how he suggests thoughts of im- 
 purity that may not be in the penitent's 
 mind — a caution the authors of some 
 manuals have ignored — but at the least 
 hint or suggestion of sin he must use the 
 
 CO 
 
 probe. For if there has been sin it is his 
 business to find it out. He must know 
 " Quis, quid, uhi, quibus auxiliis, cur, 
 quomodo, quando" (Pusey, p. 152). 
 
 Looking back at the controversy, it is a 
 little astonishing to compare the intense 
 excitement of the seventies with the very 
 modified resentment of the present time. 
 
8 
 
 TLl)c Confessional 
 
 But there are facts which may account 
 for the change. The almost universal 
 condemnation of " The Priest in Absolu- 
 tion," and its withdrawal from public cir- 
 culation, led careless observers to suppose 
 that the evil had been arrested ; that the 
 practice had been stopped as well as the 
 sale of the book, or at least gravely 
 modified. Moreover, the indignation of 
 the seventies was succeeded by the com- 
 parative indulgence of the eighties. To 
 a time of resentment and active hostility 
 there succeeded in many quarters a period 
 of toleration. Men, anxious as far as pos- 
 sible to avoid controversy, waited to see 
 whether the relapse into pre-Eeformation 
 practices would lose its strength if left 
 without the incentive of studied hostility. 
 
 That policy, as many of those who 
 thought it should be tried now sadly con- 
 fess, was an utter failure. But in the 
 period of toleration the party who agreed 
 with the principles and methods of " The 
 Priest in Absolution" were not idle. The 
 
XTbe position Uo*Ba£ 9 
 
 book which had outraged the public sense 
 of decency was kept out of sight ; its teach- 
 ing went on. There is no evidence to show 
 that members of the Holy Cross Society or 
 other extreme Churchmen modified their 
 action in the smallest degree as the re- 
 sult of that agitation. There is, however, 
 abundant evidence to prove that the prin- 
 ciples of the book are carefully followed 
 to-day. The late Mr. Mackonochie, in his 
 published correspondence with "A London 
 Priest," admitted that the "principles" of 
 "The Priest in Absolution" "are those 
 which govern, I believe, all Confessors 
 amongst ourselves." That statement seems 
 still to be true. 
 
 It is significant of the present condition 
 of affairs that the long and exciting con- 
 troversy which raged over " The Priest in 
 Absolution " is (doubtless as implying shame 
 to the Church) ignored in popular (and 
 even some more ambitious) Church his- 
 tories, and is as hastily as possible dismissed 
 even in the encyclopaedic " Life of Pusey." 
 
io zrbe Confessional 
 
 Is our position, therefore, satisfactory? 
 Assuredly not ; for whatever customs and 
 whatever scandals were implied by the use 
 of "The Priest in Absolution" still exist, 
 and that more widely than in the seventies. 
 
 In particular there seems evidence that 
 the minute inquiries into sins of impurity 
 made of adults and children in the Con- 
 fessional flourish more than ever. 
 
 As to the extent to which the Koman 
 doctrine of the Sacrament of Penance is 
 taught I have no statistics. But all the 
 evidence goes to show that the doctrine and 
 the accompanying resort to the Confes- 
 sional have a firm hold on many parishes. 
 Confessors' notices appear in church porches. 
 Parish magazines announce the hours at 
 which clergy attend to hear confessions. 
 Neo-Anglican literature commands or sug- 
 gests resort to the Confessional. In one 
 parish, that of St. Peter's, London Docks, 
 the approximate number of confessions 
 heard in 1899 was given in the Annual 
 Report as 3100 (Record, July 6, 1900). 
 
Ube position TZo*JS)av n 
 
 There seem also to be vagrant confessors, 
 mysteriously announcing by advertisement 
 their presence at various churches. 1 
 
 The position secured amongst us by the 
 Confessional may, however, be shown from 
 evidence of another kind. 
 
 First let it be remembered that although 
 "The Priest in Absolution" is not openly 
 on sale in England, Pusey's own manual, 
 " Advice for Those who Exercise the Min- 
 istry of Reconciliation through Confession 
 and Absolution," is, as I have said, only an 
 expurgated version of the same manual by 
 the Abbe Gaume, which Mr. Chambers 
 treated with less reserve. He had much of 
 the volume in print, when Mr. Chambers 
 forestalled him ("Life of Pusey," iv. 303). 
 The last edition of Pusey's version is dated 
 1893 ; the book must therefore be in some 
 
 1 The following is taken from the Church Times of 
 June 8, 1900 : — 
 
 ■O —ST. SAVIOUR'S, St. George's-square, 
 ■M' S.W., June 9th and 16th, 3.30 p.m. to 5. 
 
 As to the meaning of such announcements, see the Record, 
 October 6, 1899. 
 
12 xrbe Confessional 
 
 demand. The extreme minuteness of the 
 directions there conveyed to Confessors 
 (though Pusey deemed it wise to leave 
 some of the Abbe's material unexposed 
 to the English gaze) is matched by the 
 minuteness of inquiry suggested to 
 " penitents." 
 
 The public mind resented most of all in 
 the version of Mr. Chambers two or three 
 passages of especial indecency. But the 
 particular direction is of little importance 
 if the principle be left behind. Pusey, 
 though more guarded than Chambers, re- 
 veals the essential corruption of the Con- 
 fessional. Take, for example, this direction 
 from the chapter on "The Necessity of 
 Questioning " : — 
 
 " If necessary, the Confessor will teach 
 the penitent how to examine his conscience, 
 so as to recall all his sins and their circum- 
 stances, going through his whole life, first 
 dividing it by age, childhood, youth, &c., 
 then by his various conditions, before and 
 since marriage, &c." (Pusey, p. 150). 
 
XTbe position TIo*E>a£ is 
 
 Or witness this as to dealing with a 
 person possibly guilty of sacrilegious con- 
 fessions : — 
 
 " Ask if in past time he has concealed 
 any sin out of shame ? This question is 
 specially necessary with ignorant people 
 and women who make but rare confes- 
 sions " (Pusey, p. 127). 
 
 And again of the same class : — 
 
 "As to scandal, ask if he has tried to 
 make others sin, and whether he has for- 
 warded the sins of others ? " (Ibid. p. 128). 
 
 It would be easy to multiply details 
 of this kind ; but the case against the 
 clergy does not rest on the Gaume book. 
 It is out of the question that there should 
 be a small library of manuals about Con- 
 fession if the clergy did not teach its need. 
 And these manuals, though compiled with 
 more care and reserve than Mr. Chambers 
 thought needful for the reading of the 
 clergy, still indicate the existence of, and 
 prepare the penitent for answering, those 
 particular inquiries as to the temptations 
 
14 ube Confessional 
 
 and sins of the flesh the making of which 
 the Gaume books discuss. 
 
 A few examples of the contents of such 
 manuals may be pardoned. For the 
 guidance of adults here is a neatly got up 
 little volume entitled " Catholic Prayers for 
 Church of England People" (W. Knott). 
 The preface is signed " A. H. S.," and the 
 fourth edition is dated 1897. The section 
 entitled " The Sacrament of Penance " 
 contains a " Preparation for Confession," 
 and "Another Form of Self-examination." 
 In the section "Sins against Myself," "Sins 
 against Self and Fellow-men," " Sins of 
 Married People," " Sins of Young Women," 
 we have the preparation to answer the 
 very kind of questions which the public 
 mind in 1877 deemed revolting. One 
 paragraph on inquiry into " Sins Against 
 Self and Fellow-men " will suffice : — 
 
 11 Last — Impure thoughts or desires — in- 
 decent curiosity — delight in reading or 
 writing of unclean things — improper con- 
 versation, jokes, songs, pictures, danger- 
 
Zhc position Qo*Way is 
 
 ous dances — improper liberties — immodest 
 touch of yourself or another" (p. 33). 
 
 " Absolution and How to Obtain It" 
 (W. Knott) deals fully with the Seventh 
 Commandment, thus : — 
 
 " Committed adultery ; fornication ; in- 
 decent acts with others, or alone ; done 
 things I should be ashamed for others to 
 know of. Eead, written, or said indecent 
 things ; encouraged indecent thoughts. 
 Been too free with others ; allowed any one 
 to be too free with me. Got drunk ; taken 
 more drink than was good for me ; made 
 fun of drunkenness. Led others into sin 
 of any kind ; gone with bad companions, 
 or to bad places. Laughed at others for 
 doing right. Been over-fond of dress ; 
 been greedy, or dainty. Been slothful, or 
 lazy " (p. 8). 
 
 This manual adds, " The Priest will ask 
 you questions if he thinks it necessary " 
 (P- 13). 
 
 "Pardon for the Penitent" (W. Knott) 
 may also serve as an example of the 
 
16 XTbe Confessional 
 
 manual designed for simpler people. Its 
 r questions, particularly on pp. 14 and 15, 
 again recall the worst features of " The 
 Priest in Absolution." Here also one para- 
 graph will be quite enough : — 
 
 "Have I ever been guilty of the follow- 
 ing sins : Adultery, fornication, indecent 
 acts with others, indecent acts alone, 
 listening to or joining in indecent conver- 
 sation, giving way to indecent thoughts, 
 reading, looking at, or writing what is 
 indecent, immodesty in manner, trying to 
 attract notice from others of the opposite 
 sex, putting myself in the way of tempta- 
 tion by keeping out late at night, going 
 with bad companions or to bad places, 
 vanity, being too fond of dress, greediness, 
 drunkenness, daintiness, sloth, lying in 
 bed, neglect of cleanliness ? " 
 
 "The First s Communion " (W. Knott) is 
 a specimen of the Confessional manuals put 
 into the hands of children. It will suffice 
 to note the passage on p. 13 : — 
 
 " If there is something that you ought 
 
Ube position Uo*2>as 
 
 17 
 
 to confess, but you don't know how to say- 
 it, stop when you come to that part of your 
 confession, and say : ' Father, there is some- 
 thing that I don't know how to confess.' 
 Then the priest will give you the help you 
 need." 
 
 Such are the preparations which the peni- 
 tent is asked to make that he or she may 
 be ready first to speak voluntarily and then 
 to answer the questions of the priest. 
 
 In the face of this evidence it seems diffi- 
 cult to avoid the conviction that whatever 
 offence was implied in the accused parts of 
 " The Priest in Absolution " exists now, and 
 assuredly over a very much wider area than 
 in 1877. The book is named still with 
 every sign of loathing ; the thing to which 
 it witnessed flourishes unchecked. Now 
 and then the public hear indignant denials 
 that the Confessional produces any such 
 questions as Pusey yesterday and the 
 manuals for penitents to-day so frankly 
 suggest. Why the clergy manual should 
 deal with them, why it should go at such 
 
 B 
 
is XTbe Confessional 
 
 length into the practical casuistry asso- 
 ciated with such subjects if the questions 
 are not asked, we do not know. But the 
 passages already quoted seem to refute the 
 plea. Perhaps an equally plain answer 
 will be found in Pusey's introductory matter. 
 He is there at some pains to defend the use 
 of Confession in regard to sins against the 
 Seventh Commandment, especially amongst 
 boys. 
 
 Whatever indignation existed when " The 
 Priest in Absolution " was first exposed to 
 the public gaze is, then, even more justified 
 now. The real feeling of the English 
 people is, in all probability, as hostile as 
 ever to the Confessional. But the general 
 public have now been familiarised with its 
 existence and, though uneasily and resent- 
 fully, are learning to tolerate it. The atti- 
 tude of the Bishops as a body is in striking 
 contrast to their conduct in the seventies. 
 Amongst the clergy who do not practise as 
 Confessors there is a manifest disposition 
 to accept the revival of the Confessional as 
 
Ube position Uo^Bas 19 
 
 merely a detail in the Neo-Anglican cam- 
 paign. Unless the principles and methods 
 of the Abbe Gaunie, as expounded by Mr. 
 Chambers and Dr. Pusey, are to be finally 
 rooted amongst us, it is time that the stage 
 of development already reached should be 
 understood. 
 
CHAPTEE II 
 
 THE AUTHORITY FOR THE CONFESSIONAL : 
 NOT HOLY SCRIPTURE 
 
 Rome and the advanced Anglican clergy, 
 having exalted Penance to a place amongst 
 the Sacraments, and declared this Sacra- 
 ment to be the appointed way by which 
 sin after Baptism is forgiven, we are en- 
 titled to demand the authority in Holy 
 Scripture for the doctrine thus assumed. 
 
 It is at once plain that the voice of Holy 
 Scripture is not that upon which the sup- 
 porters of the Confessional are accustomed 
 most to rely. The popular literature of 
 the subject, the manuals so extensively 
 circulated amongst the children and adults 
 of parishes where the Neo- Anglican clergy 
 are in power, occasionally refrain from any 
 endeavour to support by reference to, or 
 
Butborttg for tbe Confessional 21 
 
 quotation from, Holy Scripture the doctrine 
 they state. "Absolution, and How to Ob- 
 tain It " (fifth edition ; Griffith, Farran, 
 and Co.), takes this simple course. It 
 offers a budget of sweeping assertions as 
 to the purpose of God, without any sup- 
 porting reference to Biblical or other autho- 
 rity. This, for example, is the bold way 
 in which doctrine is defined : — " When we 
 know our sins, and have true sorrow for 
 them, we of course wish to have them for- 
 given ; and God has mercifully sent his 
 priests to give us absolution. Before, how- 
 ever, we can get this, we must show that 
 our sorrow is true by telling God, before 
 His priest, all the sins we can remem- 
 ber"(p. 3 ). 
 
 Occasionally the statement of the tract 
 or manual is more explicit, but deals with 
 the Bible in the Roman manner by general 
 reference rather than by giving chapter and 
 verse. Thus in " A Book for the Children 
 of God" (W. Knott) we have (pp. 106, 107) 
 the following statement : — 
 
22 Zhc Confessional 
 
 " If we are sorry for our sins ; if we 
 confess them truly ; if we really intend to 
 do better ; then no matter how bad they 
 are, nor how many they are, the priest in 
 Christ's Name can forgive them. 
 
 " IV. Jesus gave this power to the priest- 
 hood when He breathed on His Apostles, 
 and said, ' Keceive ye the Holy Ghost ; 
 whose soever sins ye remit, they are re- 
 mitted unto them, and whose soever sins 
 ye retain, they are retained.' To 'remit' 
 means to ' forgive ' : to ' retain ' means to 
 'bind.' 
 
 " If, when we have made our confession, 
 the priest sees that we are really sorry, and 
 that we want to do better, then he says, 
 ' I absolve thee,' and when those words are 
 said the Precious Blood of Jesus touches 
 our souls, and we really are forgiven." 
 
 In "The Catholic Keligion" ("The Sac- 
 raments," IV. Penance) Mr. Vernon Staley 
 seems content to rely solely upon his in- 
 terpretation of St. John xx. 19-24, which, 
 he holds, gives an account of our Lord's 
 
Hutborttp for tbe Confessional 23 
 
 institution of " the Sacrament of Ab- 
 solution." 
 
 A more elaborate statement, amounting 
 to a definite and detailed appeal to Holy 
 Scripture, is. however, found in pp. 6, 7. 8, 
 of " Pardon for the Penitent " (W. Knott). 
 I give it in full : — 
 
 " Confession to God before a priest was 
 taught to the Jews by God in the law of 
 Moses. It was taught by St. John the 
 Baptist, and much practised by the people 
 who came to him. It is recommended to 
 Christians by St. James, chapter v. 16. 
 And we find that Christians at Ephesus, 
 who, having fallen away from God, were 
 again converted by St. Paul, used it : ' They 
 came and confessed, and showed their 
 deeds' (Acts xix. 18). 
 
 ''Above all, our Lord showed His ap- 
 proval of Confession by giving His Church 
 power to remit or retain sins, St. John 
 xx. 21-23. This is a twofold gift to be 
 used for the good of souls ; and the priests 
 can only know in which way to exercise 
 
24 XTbe Confessional 
 
 the power by first hearing the person's 
 confession. 
 
 "Absolution is a special gift which 
 Christ brought us. The Jewish sacrifices 
 were only types of the great deliverance 
 which Christ would win for us on the 
 Cross, and make over to us through the 
 Sacraments of the Church. 
 
 "Absolution or the power to forgive 
 sins was given to our Lord as Son of Man, 
 as we read in St. Matthew ix. 6. It was 
 always His as Son of God, but He had the 
 power given to Him as Son of Man. Our 
 Lord gave this power to His Church to use 
 for Him : ' As the Father hath sent Me, so 
 send I you, . . . receive the Holy Ghost ; 
 whose soever sins ye remit they are re- 
 mitted unto them, and whose soever sins 
 ye retain they are retained' (St. John xx. 
 21-23). 
 
 " God has chosen to use men as instru- 
 ments by which to give us His spiritual 
 gifts. He gave us the Bible through the 
 men He inspired to write it. He makes 
 
Hutbortty for tbe Confessional 25 
 
 us Christians in Holy Baptism, and feeds 
 us with His Body and Blood in Holy 
 Communion, through the ministry of His 
 clergy. We receive the Holy Ghost in 
 Confirmation through the ministry of the 
 Bishop. It is quite natural that God 
 should also give us the forgiveness of sins 
 after Baptism by the ministry of His 
 priests." 
 
 The St. Bartholomew's (Brighton) tract, 
 "Do You Hold with Confession?" (Taylor, 
 Warwick-lane, E.C.) also discusses the 
 appeal to Holy Scripture, with a certain 
 degree of ingenious, not to say audacious 
 application of familiar passages. Thus, 
 "Lo, I am with you alway ..." "meant 
 that He would be with their [the Apostles'] 
 successors in the ministry as long as the 
 world lasts, and would give force to all the 
 acts which He had bidden them do in His 
 Name, including the forgiving of sins" 
 (p. 3). Simon Magus does not receive 
 absolution because he was unrepentant; 
 " but if Simon had been really sorry and 
 
26 xrbe Confessional 
 
 had owned his sin, don't you think that 
 St. Peter would have exercised on him the 
 power of absolution which all the Apostles 
 received from the Lord on Easter Day?" 
 (p. 4). On other like reasoning in this 
 tract more will be found below. 
 
 The appeal to Holy Scripture is almost 
 exclusively confined to the interpretation 
 of St. John xx. 22, 23, as ordaining the 
 Sacrament of Absolution, and then to forc- 
 ing from a few passages in the Epistles some 
 support to the plea. Of attempt to prove 
 from the New Testament the actual practice 
 of the Confessional as we know it — as, for 
 example, a preliminary to the reception of 
 the Holy Communion, or as a recognised, 
 habitual means of grace — there are few 
 traces. The author of the St. Bartholo- 
 mew's tract attempts to account for the 
 gap by alleging that there are " very few 
 references in the Acts to any Sacramental 
 ordinances at all." There, of course, are 
 sufficient and very detailed references in 
 Acts to the only Sacraments recognised by 
 
Hutfoorxts for tbe Confessional 27 
 
 the English Church as ordained by Christ ; 
 whilst in the Epistles — surely a better 
 guide as to the pastoral life of the Apos- 
 tolic Church — such references are still more 
 adequate. Yet even the most tortuous 
 exegesis fails to supply warrant for the regu- 
 lar resort to the Confessional commanded 
 by Eome and the Neo- Anglican clergy. 
 
 It is necessary, however, to look in some 
 detail at such passages as, by one manual 
 or another, are pressed into service of the 
 cause. 
 
 There are the familiar words of our Lord 
 in St. Matt, xviii. 18: — "Whatsoever ye 
 shall bind on earth shall be bound in 
 heaven : and whatsoever ye shall loose on 
 earth shall be loosed in heaven." But the 
 misapplication of this passage is obvious. 
 It is not persons but things (oo-a iav Srja-tjre 
 . . . oo-a eav XuV^re) which are "bound" 
 and "loosed." As the Bishop (J. Words- 
 worth) of Salisbury reminded his clergy 
 {Letter to the Clergy of the Diocese of 
 Salisbury, p. 49), the power indicated is 
 
28 xrbe Confessional 
 
 a power over things and not persons, a 
 power to prohibit or admit, a power to 
 make rules and not to grant absolutions ; 
 so that " on this text we may rest the 
 validity of the canonical rules of the 
 Church, but not the ministry of penitence 
 to persons." 
 
 There are, again, the less used but occa- 
 sionally quoted words of our Lord in St. 
 Matt. viii. 4, " Go thy way, show thyself 
 unto the priest," upon which some Angli- 
 cans as well as some Romans have stoutly 
 relied. But the passage is absolutely fatal 
 to those who use it ; for our Lord did not 
 utter the words " show thyself to the priest " 
 until after the man had been cleansed of his 
 leprosy. 
 
 Sometimes reference is confidently made 
 to the case of the Ephesian converts (Acts 
 xix. 18), who "came, and confessed, and 
 showed their deeds" (igofioXoyov/jievoi, kcll 
 dvayyeWovres Ta? 7r/)afet? avrcov). The word 
 (e^o/jLoXoyovfjbevot) is the same as that em- 
 ployed in Matt. iii. 6, and Mark i. 5 of the 
 
Hutbortt£ for tbe Confessional 29 
 
 confession of sins by those whom John 
 baptized in Jordan. It is the same also 
 as that used by St. James (v. 16, efo/xo- 
 
 Xoyelade ovv dWrjkoL^ ra? djiaprla^). In the 
 
 case of St. John's converts, as in that of 
 the Ephesians, the obvious interpretation 
 is that of a public admission of past wrong 
 — a confession as unlike the whispered con- 
 ferences of the Confessional as anything can 
 well be. In the precept of St. James the 
 " confess your faults one to another" abso- 
 lutely discountenances the assumption of 
 any special duty of confessing to a priest. 
 On the Neo-Anglican theory the Apostles 
 and their successors were already in full 
 possession of their powers of absolution. 
 St. James has just spoken of recourse to 
 " the presbyters," and yet when it comes 
 to the confession of sins it is " to one 
 another" that the Confession is directed. 
 Some even of the Eoman authorities admit 
 the impossibility of building on this text. 
 Indeed in all these cases there seems a 
 reasonable ground for publicity. Others 
 
so Ube Confessional 
 
 had, no doubt, known of the sins — or some 
 of them. As the offences were public, so 
 also was the confession. This is the inter- 
 pretation offered to us by our own Church 
 in Homily xxxii., Part 2 : — 
 
 " The true meaning of it is, that the faith- 
 ful ought to acknowledge their offences, 
 whereby some hatred, rancour, grudge, or 
 malice, have risen or grown among them 
 one to another, that a brotherly reconcilia- 
 tion may be had, without the which nothing 
 that we do can be acceptable unto God, 
 as our Saviour Jesus Christ doth witness 
 Himself, saying, When thou offerest thine 
 offering at the altar, if thou rememberest 
 that thy brother hath aught against thee, 
 leave there thine offering, and go and be 
 reconciled; and when thou art reconciled 
 come and offer thine offering (Matt. v. 23, 
 24). It may also be thus taken, that we 
 ought to confess our weakness and infir- 
 mities one to another, to the end that, 
 knowing each other's frailness, we may 
 the more earnestly pray together unto Al- 
 
BittborttE for tbe Confessional si 
 
 mighty God, our heavenly Father, that He 
 will vouchsafe to pardon us our infirmities, 
 for His Son Jesus Christ's sake, and not 
 to impute them unto us, when He shall 
 render to every man according to his 
 works." 
 
 Nor are they more happy in the argu- 
 ment drawn from the case of the incestuous 
 offender in the Corinthian Church. The 
 St. Bartholomew's tract " Do You Hold 
 with Confession ? " appears to regard the 
 details of this case (i Cor. v.; 2 Cor. ii.) 
 as furnishing an example of priestly " bind- 
 ing" and "loosing," with, I suppose, con- 
 fession as a precedent to absolution, which 
 will furnish an exact precedent for the 
 modern doctrine and practice as to the 
 Confessional. But ( 1 ) there could have been 
 no confession to St. Paul, for he issued his 
 directions from a distance on information 
 supplied to him by others. (2) The work 
 is to be done by the Church in conjunction 
 with the Apostle, and not by St. Paul 
 alone; all that is effective being, in con- 
 
32 XTbe Confessional 
 
 formity with the Apostle's wish, wrought 
 by the common action of the community 
 (verses n, 13). This joint exercise of 
 ecclesiastical discipline is illustrated by the 
 restoration of the offender (2 Cor. ii.). The 
 punishment (or censure) "inflicted of many" 
 had been efficacious. St. Paul, therefore, 
 pleads for the offenders pardon and restora- 
 tion to his place in the community : "Ye 
 ought rather to forgive him, and comfort 
 him" (verse 7) ; and promises to agree with 
 their decision (verse 10). If, therefore, 
 this is a case of absolution, it is given by 
 the whole community, and agreed to by the 
 Apostle. There is indeed " binding and 
 loosing," inflicting and remitting an earthly 
 penalty, but it is no example of the merely 
 priestly use of such power. 
 
 It is scarcely perhaps credible that the 
 Apostle's words, " for if I forgave anything, 
 to whom I forgave it, for your sakes for- 
 gave I it in the person [margin : ' in the 
 sight'] of Christ" (2 Cor. ii. 10), should 
 be mistaken by any person who can read 
 
Hutbonts for tbe Confessional ss 
 
 Greek. But I cull the following inter- 
 pretation from "Do You Hold with Con- 
 fession?" (p. 4): "And in 2 Cor. 10, St. 
 Paul forgives e in the Person of Christ ' this 
 same man, after he had repented. To forgive 
 ' in the Person of Christ ' can mean nothing 
 less than that the Apostle's forgiveness 
 was identical with Christ's." To forgive h> 
 irpoawTTw Xpcarov is, of course, to forgive 
 " before the face of Christ," in the presence 
 of his Master, though Paul could not be in 
 the presence of the Corinthians to whom he 
 was writing. The whole case is one of 
 personal discipline being used towards an 
 offender at the instigation of the Apostle, 
 and being later on remitted at the plea of 
 the same Apostle. There can be no pos- 
 sible question of the offender confessing to 
 the Apostle and receiving absolution from 
 him. 
 
 We come, therefore, to St. John xx. 22 
 23, upon which the Council of Trent bases 
 the theory. Before that period many 
 illustrious canonists had declined to found 
 
 c 
 
34 Uhc Confessional 
 
 the doctrine on the words of our Lord, 
 whilst others, claiming this authority, yet 
 disagreed as to their argument from it. 
 
 It may not immediately be clear to some 
 minds why the words of St. John xx. 22, 
 23 ("And when He had said this, He 
 breathed on them, and saith unto them, 
 Keceive ye the Holy Ghost : Whose soever 
 sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them ; 
 and whose soever sins ye retain, they are 
 retained,") should imply the need of 
 habitual confession to a priest. The 
 reasoning is, however, as follows : — Christ, 
 so it is argued, has made all priests His 
 judges upon earth ; no man can, speaking 
 generally, obtain absolution and remission 
 of sins committed after Baptism save 
 through them ; but they cannot absolve 
 without full knowledge of the facts and 
 motives, thoughts, words, and deeds of the 
 penitent ; therefore the penitent must tell 
 all this in confession to the priest. 
 
 Will St. John xx. 22, 23 bear the strain 
 thus put upon it ? 
 
Butborttp for tfoe Confessional so 
 
 A fatal difficulty is found in the fact 
 that the words " He breathed on them, and 
 saith unto them" are not necessarily 
 limited to the ten Apostles. From St. 
 Luke xxiv. 33 we learn that the eleven 
 were not alone at this time. The words, 
 " whose soever sins ye remit," cannot there- 
 fore apply only to the Apostles or any 
 presumed successors ; " the commission," 
 says Bishop Westcott (on St. John, in the 
 "Speaker's Commentary," p. 295), "must 
 be regarded properly as the commission of 
 the Christian society, and not as that of 
 the Christian ministry." The whole pas- 
 sage is strikingly illustrated by the case of 
 the incestuous person at Corinth, where an 
 ecclesiastical and social penalty is first 
 imposed by St. Paul and the community 
 and the offender is afterwards forgiven in 
 the same way. The " binding " is only to 
 an earthly penalty, from which the " loos- 
 ing" follows. 
 
 It would appear, then, that the attempt 
 to found the Confessional on the witness of 
 
s6 xrbe Confessional 
 
 the New Testament must fail. If it were 
 otherwise ; if the New Testament really 
 does teach the doctrine of priestly Absolu- 
 tion and the necessity of Sacramental 
 Confession ; if the passages quoted really 
 do indicate their existence in the Church 
 of the New Testament, then surely we 
 must find evidence of the facts in the other 
 documents of the primitive Church. There 
 is absolutely no such evidence — not a jot, 
 not a tittle. Neither the Apostolic Fathers 
 nor the Didache will supply the smallest 
 countenance to either theory. Their silence 
 is natural ; they could not speak of what 
 did not exist. 
 
 We may safely, therefore, reject the claim 
 for Scriptural authority, and re-echo the 
 words of our Church expressed in the 
 Homily on Eepentance : — 
 
 "It is most evident and plain that this 
 auricular confession hath not His warrant 
 of God's Word. I do not say but that if 
 any do find themselves troubled in con- 
 science they may repair to their learned 
 
HutborttE for tbe Confessional si 
 
 Curate or Pastor and show the trouble and 
 doubt of their conscience to them, that 
 they may receive at their hands the com- 
 fortable salve of God's Word ; but it is 
 against the true Christian liberty that any 
 man should be bound to the numbering of 
 his sins, as it hath been used heretofore in 
 the time of blindness and ignorance." 
 
 390681! 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 THE AUTHORITY FOR THE CONFESSIONAL I 
 NOT ENGLISH BUT ROMAN 
 
 I have endeavoured to show that there is 
 no warrant in Holy Scripture for the Con- 
 fessional as ordered by the Romans and by 
 some Anglicans. 
 
 It remains to ask whether such authority 
 can be found in the Formularies of the 
 English Church. 
 
 But, before entering upon this inquiry, 
 it may be as well to see how the Roman 
 Church arrived at the position in regard to 
 the Confessional which it occupies to-day. 
 The story describes a process of develop- 
 ment the direction of which is steadily 
 away from the pattern of primitive and 
 Apostolic faith and practice. 
 
 We start in the Apostolic Church with 
 
 38 
 
XTbe Butborits not Enslisb 39 
 
 Confession one to another, often, it would 
 seem, made in public. Then came the 
 advice to penitents to seek out a spiritual 
 director, who should tell them how far 
 their most secret offences ought to be con- 
 fessed in public. The office of a public peni- 
 tentiary in the Greek Church began about 
 the year 360. In the Latin Church public 
 Confession to the whole congregation went 
 on till about 450, when Pope Leo the Great 
 decided that private Confession was enough 
 of itself to clear the conscience of the 
 offenders. With private Confession grew 
 up the custom of private absolution. The 
 doctrine was firmly established by the year 
 12 15, when the Lateran Council laid it 
 down that every one should confess yearly 
 to the minister of the parish. The next 
 step was to elevate penitence to the posi- 
 tion of an article of the faith. This is 
 definitely reached in the proceedings of the 
 Council of Trent in its fourteenth Session 
 in 1 55 1. The statement of the Council of 
 Trent, in English, is as follows ; — 
 
40 xrbe Confessional 
 
 "Can. i. If any one shall say, that pen- 
 ance in the Catholick Church is not truly 
 and properly a sacrament, instituted by 
 Christ our Lord, for reconciling the faith- 
 ful to God, as often as they fall into sin 
 after baptism : let him be accursed. 
 
 " Can. 4. If any one shall deny, that for 
 the entire and perfect remission of sins 
 there are required three acts in the peni- 
 tent, being, as it were, the matter of the 
 sacrament of penance, namely, Contrition, 
 Confession, and Satisfaction, which are 
 called the three parts of penance : ... let 
 him be accursed. 
 
 " Can. 6. If any one shall deny, that sac- 
 ramental confession was either instituted, 
 or is necessary to salvation, by the divine 
 law ; or shall say, that the method, which 
 the Catholick Church from the beginning 
 has always observed, and does observe, of 
 secretly confessing to the priest alone, is 
 foreign from the institution and command 
 of Christ, and is a human invention : let 
 him be accursed. 
 
Uhc Hutfoorttp not lEngltsb *i 
 
 " Can. 7. If any one shall say, that in 
 the sacrament of penance it is not by the 
 divine law necessary for the remission of 
 sins, to confess all and singular mortal sins, 
 the memory of which may be had on due 
 and diligent premeditation, even secret 
 ones, and those which are against the two 
 last commandments of the decalogue, and 
 the circumstances which change the appear- 
 ance of the sin ; but that such confession 
 is only useful for instructing and consoling 
 the penitent, and was formerly observed 
 only for imposing canonical satisfaction ; or 
 shall say that they who study to confess 
 all their sins, are willing to leave nothing 
 to be pardoned by the divine mercy ; or, 
 finally, that it is not lawful to confess 
 venial sins : let him be accursed. 
 
 " Can. 8. If any one shall say, that Con- 
 fession of all sins, such as the Church pre- 
 serves, is impossible, and a human tradition, 
 to be abolished by the pious ; or that all 
 and singular the faithful of Christ of each 
 sex are not bound to observe it, according 
 
42 xrbe Confessional 
 
 to the constitution of the great council of 
 Lateran, once a year ; and therefore that 
 the faithful of Christ are not to be per- 
 suaded to confess in the time of Lent : let 
 him be accursed." (The Eoman doctrine 
 on this and other points on which she is at 
 variance with the Church of England may 
 be found conveniently set out in Bishop 
 Mant : "Churches of Kome and England 
 Compared." S.P.C.K.) 
 
 The date of the Tridentine statement, 
 1 55 1, must be carefully observed. It has 
 been the custom of some Neo- Anglican con- 
 troversialists to assume that the English 
 Church in drawing up its Prayer-book and 
 Formularies did not mean definitely to 
 dissent from and protest against certain 
 articles of faith and certain practices of the 
 Church of Kome. But the Council of Trent 
 lasted from 1545 to 1563. Now the Book 
 of Common Prayer, as we have it, was finally 
 revised in 1661 ; and we are therefore en- 
 titled to consider the Prayer-book as framed 
 in full view of the Tridentine proceedings. 
 
ZTbe Butboritg not Englisb 43 
 
 The Thirty-nine Articles finally reached 
 their present form in the year 1 57 1, and 
 their testimony must be viewed in the same 
 light. The Second Book of the Homilies, 
 containing the sermon which deals with 
 the argument for the Confessional, was pub- 
 lished in 1563. 
 
 We have, in fact, this position : Before 
 the Eeformation the custom of the English 
 Church is that of the rest of the world in 
 communion with Eome. After the Eefor- 
 mation that custom is decisively changed 
 and the former habits expressly discoun- 
 tenanced in the official documents of the 
 Church. If so distinct a subversion of the 
 old order means nothing, it can only be 
 that acts and words have no meaning. 
 
 Let us now mark the process of return to 
 primitive doctrine as shown in the English 
 Prayer-books. In the First Prayer-book of 
 Edward VI., 1549, we have the following 
 passage in the Exhortation in the Com- 
 munion Office : — 
 
 " And yf there bee any of you, whose 
 
44 ube Confessional 
 
 conscience is troubled and greued in any- 
 thing, lackyng comforte or counsaill, let 
 him come to me, or to some other dyscrete 
 and learned priest, taught in the law of 
 God, and confesse and open his synne and 
 griefe secretly, that he may receiue suche 
 ghostly counsaill, aduyse, and comfort, that 
 his conscience maye be releued, and that of 
 us (as of the ministers of GOD and of the 
 churche) he may receiue comfort and abso- 
 lucion, to the satisfaccion of his mynde, 
 and auoyding of all scruple and doubtful- 
 nes : requiryng suche as shalbe satisfied 
 with a generall confession, not to be of- 
 fended with them that doe use, to their 
 further satisfiyng, the auriculer and secret 
 confession to the Priest : nor those also 
 whiche thinke nedefull or conuenient, for 
 the quietnes of their awne consciences, par- 
 ticularly to open their sinnes to the Priest : 
 to bee offended with them that are satisfied, 
 with their humble confession to GOD, and 
 the generall confession to the churche. But 
 in all thinges to folowe and kepe the rule 
 
XTbe Hutborits not Bn^Zisb 45 
 
 of charitie, and euery man to be satisfied 
 with His owne conscience, not iudgyng other 
 mennes myndes or consciences ; where as 
 he hath no warrant of Goddes word to the 
 same." 
 
 In the Visitation of the Sick there are the 
 following rubric and form of Absolution : — 
 
 " 11 Here shall the sicke person make a speciall con- 
 fession, yf he fele his conscience troubled with 
 any iceightie matter. After which confession, 
 the priest shall absolue hym after this forme : 
 and the same forme of absolucion shalbe used 
 in all pryuate confessions. 
 
 " Our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath lefte 
 power to his Churche to absolue all sin- 
 ners, which truely repent and beleue in 
 hym : of his great mercy forgeue thee thyne 
 offences : and by his autoritie committed 
 to me, I absolue thee fro all thy synnes, in 
 the name of the father, and of the sonne, 
 and of the holy gost. Amen." 
 
 The corresponding passages in the Second 
 Prayer-book of Edward VI., 1552, are as 
 follows : — 
 
46 Ube Confessional 
 
 " And because it is requisite that no man 
 shoulde come to the holy Communion but 
 with a full truste in God's mercy, and with 
 a quiet conscience : therefore if there be 
 any of you which by the meanes afore said 
 cannot quiet his own conscience, but re- 
 quireth further comfort or counsel ; then 
 let him come to me, or some other discreet 
 and learned minister of god's word, and 
 open his griefe, that he may receiue such 
 gostlye counsail, aduise, and coumfort, as 
 his conscience maye be relieued ; and that 
 by the ministery of god's word he may 
 receiue coumfort and the benefite of abso- 
 lucion, to the quieting of his conscience, 
 and auoiding of al Scruple and doubt- 
 fulnes. 
 
 " U Here shal the sicke person make a special con- 
 fession, yf he feele his conscience troubled loyth 
 any weyghtie matter. After which confession 
 the Priest shal absolue hym after thys sorte. 
 
 "Our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath left 
 power to his Church to absolue al sinners, 
 whiche truely repent and beleue in him, 
 
Zbc Hutbortts not JEmlisb 4.7 
 
 of his great mercy forgeue thee thine 
 offences : and by his aucthoritie committed 
 to me, I absolue thee from all thy synnes, 
 in the name of the father, and of the sonne, 
 and of the holy gost. Amen." 
 
 These forms are continued in Elizabeth's 
 Prayer-book, 1559, which came after the 
 reformed services had been disused under 
 Mary. 1 With these we can now compare 
 the language of our present Prayer-book: — 
 
 " And because it is requisite, that no man 
 should come to the holy Communion, but 
 with a full trust in God's mercy, and with 
 a quiet conscience ; therefore if there be 
 any of you, who by this means cannot quiet 
 his own conscience herein, but requireth 
 further comfort or counsel, let him come 
 to me, or to some other discreet and 
 learned Minister of God's word, and open 
 his grief; that by the ministry of God's 
 holy word he may receive the benefit of 
 
 1 The Prayer-books may be conveniently compared in 
 the cheap series, " The Ancient and Modern Library of 
 Theological Literature." (Griffith, Farran & Co.) 
 
48 ubc Confessional 
 
 absolution, together with ghostly counsel 
 and advice, to the quieting of his con- 
 science, and avoiding of all scruple and 
 doubtfulness. 
 
 "Here shall the sick person be moved to make a 
 special confession of his sins, if he feel his con- 
 science troubled with any weighty matter. After 
 which confession, the Priest shall absolve him 
 (if he humbly and heartily desire it) after this 
 sort. 
 
 "Our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath left 
 power to his Church to absolve all sinners 
 who truly repent and believe in him, of his 
 great mercy forgive thee thine offences : 
 And by his authority committed to me, I 
 absolve thee from all thy sins, In the Name 
 of the Father, and of the Son, and of the 
 Holy Ghost. Amen." 
 
 We start, then, with admission of " auri- 
 cular and secret confession to the Priest," 
 and when the Book of Common Prayer now 
 in use is reached we have dropped the words 
 " auricular and secret confession " as well as 
 the word " Priest." At the same time, in- 
 
Zhc HutboritE not Bnglisb 49 
 
 stead of a " Form of Absolution," we have 
 only absolution " after this sort." 
 
 Together with this development let it be 
 noted the First Prayer-book of Edward VI. , 
 which countenanced secret Confession, lacked 
 the General Confession and Absolution at 
 Morning and Evening Prayer. When the 
 General Confession comes into the daily 
 service, the duty of Confession directed to 
 God and in the face of the congregation 
 received the primitive emphasis. At the 
 same time the countenance to secret Con- 
 fession is withdrawn. 
 
 But now to deal specifically with our 
 Prayer-book as it stands. Five kinds of 
 Confession are noted in it : — 
 
 (1) Open and common Confession to God, 
 made by clergy and people together in the 
 General Confession at Morning and Evening 
 Prayer, the Confession in the Communion 
 Service, and the Confession in the Com- 
 mination Service. 
 
 (2) Confession one to another : — " If ye 
 shall perceive your offences to be such as are 
 
 D 
 
50 xrbe confessional 
 
 not only against God, but also against your 
 neighbours, then ye shall reconcile your- 
 selves unto them, being ready to make 
 restitution and satisfaction according to the 
 uttermost of your powers for all injuries 
 and wrongs done by you to any other." — 
 Notice of Holy Communion. 
 
 (3) Open Confession for the satisfaction 
 of the " congregation " : — " If any be an 
 open and notorious evil liver or have done 
 any wrong to his neighbours by word or 
 deed so that the congregation be thereby 
 offended the Curate shall call him and ad- 
 vertise him that in anywise he presume not 
 to come to the Lord's Table until he have 
 openly declared himself to have truly re- 
 pented and amended his former naughty 
 life, that the congregation may be thereby 
 satisfied which before were offended." — 
 Rubric, Communion Service. 
 
 (4) Private Confession, in the case of one 
 who requireth " further comfort or counsel " 
 before Holy Communion : — 
 
 " And because it is requisite that no man 
 
XTfce Hutbortts not JEngltsb 51 
 
 should come to the holy Communion, but 
 with a full trust in God's mercy, and with a 
 quiet conscience ; therefore if there be any 
 of you, who by this means cannot quiet his 
 own conscience herein, but requireth further 
 comfort or counsel, let him come to me, or 
 to some other discreet and learned Minister 
 of God's word, and open his grief; that by 
 the ministry of God's holy word he may 
 receive the benefit of absolution, together 
 with ghostly counsel and advice, to the 
 quieting of his conscience, and avoiding of 
 all scruple and doubtfulness." — Notice of 
 Holy Communion. 
 
 (5) Private Confession of the Sick : — 
 
 " Here shall the sick person be moved to make a 
 special confession of his sins, if he feel his con- 
 science troubled with any weighty matter. After 
 ivhich confession, the Priest shall absolve him 
 (if he humbly and heartily desire it) after this 
 sort. 
 
 " Our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath left 
 power to His Church to absolve all sinners 
 who truly repent and believe in Him, of His 
 
52 Uhe Confessional 
 
 great mercy forgive thee thine offences : 
 And by His authority committed to me, I 
 absolve thee from all thy sins. In the 
 Name of the Father, and of the Son, and 
 of the holy Ghost. Amen." — Visitation of 
 the Sick. 
 
 Only two of these kinds of Confession 
 call for any discussion. 
 
 The first is the passage in the Warning 
 or Notice of Holy Communion. It is this 
 that is most relied upon by extreme clergy 
 for a proof that our Church requires or 
 countenances habitual and secret Confes- 
 sion to the priest as a part of a Sacrament 
 of Penance. A little consideration will 
 show that the inferences drawn from it are 
 quite unwarrantable. 
 
 For: — i. Care has been taken to avoid 
 these very inferences. Confession to the 
 priest and absolution by the priest had 
 been the law for all. All are no longer 
 contemplated as needing this ministry, but 
 only some — " if there be any ..." To 
 convert "if there be any" into "all of 
 
XTbe Butbortt£ not BnGltsb 53 
 
 you without exception" is a feat of some 
 daring. The majority are to be content 
 with the Confession to God suggested 
 earlier in the " warning " : — 
 
 '•'First, to examine your lives and con- 
 versations by the rule of God's command- 
 ments ; and whereinsoever ye shall perceive 
 yourselves to have offended, either by will, 
 word, or deed, there to bewail your own 
 sinfulness, and to confess yourselves to Al- 
 mighty God, with full purpose of amend- 
 ment of life." 
 
 2. The changes made in the successive 
 Prayer-books prove that this private Con- 
 fession was to be not the rule but the ex- 
 ception. The words " confess," " secretly," 
 " auricular and secret Confession to the 
 Priest," are removed after the First Prayer- 
 book. There is no talk of " Confession," 
 but to " open his grief." There is no 
 " Priest," though endeavours were made to 
 retain the word here ; a Deacon may give 
 this "comfort or counsel." There is no 
 " secretly " — a man may go with his friends, 
 
54 ube Confessional 
 
 or the sick man may talk in the presence 
 of his family. There is no form of absolu- 
 tion, but " the benefit of absolution " is to 
 come from "the ministry of God's Holy 
 Word" — the application to the sinners 
 need of the passages of Holy Scripture 
 which meet his condition. With this in- 
 terpretation agrees the familiar passage in 
 the Homily of Kepentance, Part II. : — 
 
 "Being therefore not led with the con- 
 science thereof, let us with fear and trem- 
 bling, and with a true contrite heart, use 
 that kind of confession that God doth com- 
 mand in His word ; and then doubtless, as 
 He is faithful and righteous, He will forgive 
 us our sins, and make us clean from all 
 wickedness. I do not say, but that, if any 
 do find themselves troubled in conscience, 
 they may repair to their learned curate or 
 pastor, or to some other godly learned man, 
 and show the trouble and doubt of their 
 conscience to them, that they may receive 
 at their hand the comfortable salve of God's 
 word : but it is against the true Christian 
 
Zbc Hutborits not jEnalisb 55 
 
 liberty, that any man should be bound to 
 the numbering of his sins, as it hath been 
 used heretofore in the time of blindness and 
 ignorance." 
 
 I suppose there are few clergy who are 
 not familiar with this form of Confession. 
 It is sometimes the private discussion of 
 religious doubts and difficulties, sometimes 
 of moral doubts and difficulties ; it is some- 
 times conducted in the presence of hearers ; 
 indeed, two or three persons may be dealt 
 with at once. It is, in fact, the primi- 
 tive germ from which the Confessional 
 sprang. 
 
 3. No form of absolution is provided. 
 As this kind of Confession was only con- 
 templated as preceding attendance at Holy 
 Communion, the penitent would receive ab- 
 solution, just as others did, there in the 
 course of the service. 
 
 The second passage is that in the Visita- 
 tion of the Sick. As to this it will be 
 observed that : — 
 
 (1) Absolution is conditional on the re- 
 
56 tlbe Confessional 
 
 quest of the person ; it is no compulsory 
 part of a sacramental act. 
 
 (2) The priest has no option if absolution 
 be desired. He cannot refuse it — " The 
 Priest shall absolve him." 
 
 (3) The absolution "from all thy sins" 
 can only be the statement of the ecclesias- 
 tical voice on earth — the remittance of 
 ecclesiastical censure or penalty ; for, after 
 the absolution, the priest prays : — " Con- 
 tinue this sick member in the unity of the 
 Church : consider his contrition, accept his 
 tears . . . impute not unto him his 
 former sins." This prayer is everywhere 
 absolutely incompatible with priestly for- 
 giveness of sins save in the sense of the 
 release from earthly penalties and obli- 
 gations. 
 
 Finally, let it be remembered that the 
 English Church (1) refuses to accept Pen- 
 ance as a Sacrament (Article XXV.) ; (2) 
 provides no form of absolution for any save 
 the sick ; and (3) nowhere speaks of regular 
 resort to a Confessional. 
 
Ube HutborttE not Bnglisb 57 
 
 If this be the position of our Church, 
 whence are the laws and custom of the 
 Neo- Anglican Confessional derived ? The 
 answer is, Not from England but from 
 Eome. This is apparent from every 
 chapter of Pusey' s Gaume. 
 
 Pusey has no hesitation about seeking 
 his support in the decrees of the Council 
 of Trent. He habitually refers to this and 
 other late Eoman authorities. 
 
 Thus, " The Council of Trent teaches 
 that venial sins may be remitted by other 
 means" (Pusey, pp. 233-4). On frequent 
 communion he quotes Pope Benedict XIV., 
 1 740-1 758 (p. 234); "the Roman Cate- 
 chism, explaining the order of the Council 
 of Trent" (p. 235); the Third Council 
 of Milan, 1573 (p. 235); Innocent XL, 
 1 676-1 689 (p. 235). In like subservience 
 to Rome we get such words as " Urge him to 
 return speedily to confession according to 
 the opinion expressed by Benedict XIV. in 
 his Apostolic Bull" (p. 280) ; and "Such is 
 the intention of the Church as we find in 
 
58 ube Confessional 
 
 the Roman ritual " (p. 288). These refer- 
 ences could be augmented almost indefi- 
 nitely. It may be urged that Pusey was 
 translating a Roman book. The excuse will 
 not do. Pusey's own biographer says : — 
 " This work may be said to be Pusey's 
 rather than Gaume's " (" Life," iv., App. A, 
 P. 435). 
 
 In fine, the Confessional, as recommended 
 by the Neo-Anglicans, is the product of the 
 dark ages, is rejected by our Church, but, 
 alike in its doctrine and its practice, is 
 borrowed by some of her ministers from 
 Rome. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 THE MORAL ARGUMENT FOR THE CONFES- 
 SIONAL : THE APPEAL TO STATISTICS 
 
 No charge against the Confessional has been 
 more frequent than this — that it has helped 
 to weaken, or even to destroy, the character 
 both of the confessor and the penitent. 
 The charge is boldly met. It is claimed 
 that the Confessional is a moral agent of 
 the highest order, and especially that in 
 regard to sins of the flesh it has a purifying 
 and protective influence. The Confessional 
 is, in fact, recommended as a means of 
 grace, of peculiar efficacy and clearly proved 
 value. To neglect it is, we are asked to 
 believe, to despise a prophylactic which 
 might be of incalculable advantage to the 
 Christian man and woman. 
 
 If this claim could be supported, many 
 
 59 
 
60 XTbe Confessional 
 
 objectors to the custom would feel a diffi- 
 culty in resisting the plea for the Confes- 
 sional. They would argue that the tempta- 
 tions of life are so many and so severe that 
 persons anxious to " live a godly, righteous 
 and sober life " would do well to make trial 
 of any means which promised help in their 
 conflict with sin. 
 
 The appeal to history would at once, of 
 course, cast doubt on such a claim. But 
 they might not feel that the argument from 
 history was final. We may fairly urge that 
 at the Eeformation the Confessional was 
 put upon its trial and condemned. If at 
 that period there were any places where 
 the power of the Confessional to protect 
 men and women against the grosser vices 
 of the flesh should have been clearly de- 
 monstrated, it was in the religious houses. 
 There, at all events, it had full play. There 
 it appealed to those who should most fully 
 have understood its worth. There, how- 
 ever, it seems most absolutely and con- 
 clusively to have demonstrated its own 
 
/Ifcoval Brgument tor Concessional 61 
 
 failure. The curious may, if they please, 
 consult to-day the catalogues of vices con- 
 fessed to by inmates of those religious 
 houses. If any man after looking at them 
 can suppose the Confessional to have been 
 a protection against vice in its lowest and 
 most detestable forms, he must be a singu- 
 larly credulous person. 
 
 But the verdict of history might perhaps 
 be set aside by some objectors, on the ground 
 that the times had changed, and that the 
 failure of one age might be redeemed by 
 the triumph of a later. 
 
 It is necessary, therefore, to look at 
 the moral argument for the Confessional in 
 the light entirely of the modern claims 
 made on its behalf, and the modern facts 
 which either support or negative those 
 claims. 
 
 Let us see what those claims are. 
 
 In Pusey's Preface to Gaume (p. xix, ed. 
 1893) i s this passage: — " ' There are some 
 sins of young men,' I had occasion once to 
 
62 XTbe Confessional 
 
 say to Bishop Wilberforce, ' for which Con- 
 fession is the remedy.' " 
 
 The late Eev. J. P. F. Davidson, of St. 
 Matthias's, Earl's Court, in a little pamphlet 
 entitled " Confession in the Church of Eng- 
 land" (Wells Gardner & Co.), says: "I 
 have often found that a first Confession is 
 the real starting-point in the more serious 
 life of the soul. And as that Confession is 
 followed up by the continual use of this 
 ministry, at regular intervals (not neces- 
 sarily frequent), the serious impressions of 
 sin are deepened. . . . The moral char- 
 acter certainly does not suffer from this 
 deepening seriousness. It is braced by the 
 earnest determination to face its vices and 
 its secret faults, and gradually to overcome 
 them" (pp. 10, n). And again: "It be- 
 comes the occasion for healing domestic 
 discord, and pressing upon husband and 
 wife, upon parents and children, the Chris- 
 tian duties of sympathy, of affection, and 
 of self-sacrifice " (pp. n, 12). 
 
 The "St. Bartholomew's Church Tracts" 
 
/IDorai Brgument for Confessional 63 
 
 represent popular Neo-Anglican teaching. 
 In one of these, already referred to, en- 
 titled "Do You Hold with Confession?" 
 the claim is put even more pointedly : 
 " Confession is the most powerful means of 
 turning people from sin, and the devil 
 knows it well. There are thousands of 
 people who feel that Confession has been 
 the saving of them " (p. 6). 
 
 These claims are sufficiently sweeping, 
 and compel examination. 
 
 Here, however, one preliminary fact must 
 be kept in mind. Individual testimony 
 should have its weight, but it cannot be 
 decisive. When the Confessional was under 
 discussion a year or two ago some corres- 
 pondents of the morning newspapers seemed 
 to think they could settle the doubts of 
 inquirers once and for all by saying in 
 effect something like this : — " I go to Con- 
 fession regularly ; I am an exceedingly 
 moral person and a very determined 
 character. Therefore the moral value of the 
 Confessional is proved by my experience." 
 
64 Ube Confessional 
 
 These interesting confessions are no doubt 
 made in absolute sincerity, though they 
 seem commonly to be read with amused 
 scepticism. But we are offered merely X.'s 
 personal conviction as to the strength of 
 his moral character, and a cautious obser- 
 ver craves a little independent testimony. 
 Moreover, we hear only one side of the 
 question. The failures of the Confessional 
 do not rush into print with their experiences. 
 
 But we must look at the question a little 
 more broadly. 
 
 Attempts have been made by some apolo- 
 gists for Kome to show that the Roman 
 faith is peculiarly conducive to good morals. 
 The English defenders of the Confessional 
 in like manner nibble at statistics in order 
 to show that the Confessional is the guardian 
 of virtue. The following extract from the 
 St. Bartholomew's tract, "Do You Hold 
 with Confession ? " is typical : — 
 
 "As to the supposed bad effects of 
 Confession, consider this : The Irish people, 
 as a whole, go to Confession. We should 
 
flfcoral Hrgument for Confessional 65 
 
 expect to see any bad effects which follow 
 from a particular practice shown very mark- 
 edly when it is practised on so large a scale. 
 Yet what is the case ? Statistics show that 
 Ireland is twice as pure as England, and 
 three times as pure as Scotland. And, more- 
 over, Ireland is less pure in the North, 
 where many of the people do not go to 
 Confession " (p. 7). 
 
 A falsehood is never so dangerous as 
 when a grain of truth is mixed in its 
 composition. The false allegation that the 
 Confessional makes for personal purity con- 
 tains this grain of truth, that the Irish 
 statistics of illegitimacy are good. Let us 
 be quite frank, and allow all possible weight 
 to figures which, although the author of the 
 tract does not give them, candid disputants 
 may be glad to have. They show the 
 tract-writer's inaccuracy ; but it is not 
 decided enough to invalidate the general 
 argument as to Ireland. In 1896 the 
 illegitimate birth-rate per 1000 was : — 
 Scotland, 72 ; England, 42 ; Ireland, 26. 
 
 E 
 
66 zbc Confessional 
 
 (Mulhall, "Dictionary of Statistics," 1899, 
 P- 645.) 
 
 For the moment we will ignore the highly 
 suspicious fact that Ireland is the only 
 country cited by the defenders of the Con- 
 fessional ; for the argument can be met 
 without going further. If the Confessional 
 is a moral safeguard, its influence will not 
 be confined to sins of impurity ; it will also 
 tend to reduce other crimes. How, then, 
 was it that the Confessional failed to pro- 
 tect Ireland against the ghastly murders, 
 the cattle-maiming, the rick-burning, and 
 other crimes of violence and disorder which 
 so plentifully soil the pages of her modern 
 history ? The question may be left with 
 those who to-day make the same claim for 
 the moral value of the Confessional as was 
 made in the face of equally inconvenient 
 facts by the Council of Trent. 
 
 But, as I have said, the isolation of 
 Ireland in this particular is exceedingly 
 suspicious. If the argument is worth any- 
 thing, it should hold good of other countries 
 
/Ifcoral Hraument for Confessional 67 
 
 — if not as decisively, at least with suffi- 
 cient distinctness to carry conviction. The 
 subject is an unpleasant one ; but, as it 
 is raised by the defenders of the Confes- 
 sional, it must be dealt with. The follow- 
 ing table, constructed from Mulhall (p. 
 645), gives the illegitimate births per 
 1000 in 1896 : — 
 
 Austria (Eoman Catholic) . . .145 
 Portugal (Roman Catholic) . . .123 
 Sweden (Protestant) . . . .107 
 Denmark (Protestant) . . . .101 
 Germany (about two-thirds Protestant) . 91 
 Prance (Roman Catholic) . . .88 
 Belgium (Roman Catholic) ... 87 
 Scotland (Protestant) . . . -72 
 Italy (Roman Catholic) ... 64 
 England (Protestant) .... 42 
 Holland (mainly Protestant) . . .29 
 Ireland (Roman Catholic and Protestant) 26 
 
 It will be seen that Italy does not stand 
 high in the list ; but according to Von Oet- 
 tingen, Die Moralstatistik, p. 324 (quoted 
 in Lea, "Auricular Confession, ii. 434), the 
 several parts of Italy show a great diversity 
 
68 xrbe Confessional 
 
 in this respect. We should expect, of course, 
 that the Roman State would — in virtue of 
 the presence of the Papal head-quarters, the 
 army of priests at Rome, and its ecclesias- 
 tical atmosphere — be the most satisfactory. 
 As a matter of fact it is a long way the 
 worst. From the little table showing for 
 the provinces of Italy the average of ille- 
 gitimate births per iooo for the years 
 1872 to 1879 it appears that whilst Lom- 
 bardy has but 27.9 illegitimates per 1000, 
 the Roman State has 215.4. The fact 
 recalls the statement of a French autho- 
 rity on criminology, that the French De- 
 partment of Lozere, where the people are 
 highly religious, is one of those with 
 the highest percentage of criminals (Lea, 
 ii. 435)- 
 
 Again, if we take great cities instead of 
 countries, the lesson is the same. For the 
 year 1888-89 the illegitimate births per 
 1000 were for Protestant Berlin 154, for 
 Roman Catholic Vienna 449. The follow- 
 ing statistics are from Von Oettingen, and 
 
flfcoral argument for Confessional 69 
 
 show the percentage of illegitimates, unfor- 
 tunately, for varying years : — 
 
 London (1866) 
 Edinburgh (187 1) 
 Berlin (1864) 
 Madrid (1862) 
 Dresden (186 1) 
 St. Petersburg (iS 
 Lisbon (1861) 
 Paris (1869) . 
 Eome (1871) . 
 Vienna (1868) 
 Munich (1861) 
 
 3-9 
 9-5 
 
 14.9 
 
 17.2 
 
 18 
 
 20.2 
 
 21 
 
 28.5 
 
 44-5 
 49.9 
 
 5o-9 
 
 These figures speak for themselves. They 
 must be read with a due regard for racial 
 and social influences. But even so their 
 destruction of the claim advanced for the 
 Confessional seems to be decisive. 
 
 But Eome herself has supplied us with a 
 witness of another kind. Dr. Joseph McCabe 
 is no longer a Eomanist, and his experience 
 may on that account be set aside by some 
 persons. He is, however, a man of letters 
 whose evidence is not so lightly to be dis- 
 posed of. In discussing this question he 
 
70 zhc Confessional 
 
 pays little regard to statistics, but makes 
 the following assertion : — 
 
 " Within our own frontiers there is a 
 large section of frequenters of the Con- 
 fessional, and a comparison of their average 
 lives with those of their fellow-citizens re- 
 flects no special credit upon their insti- 
 tutions as moral prophylactics. Liverpool 
 and Glasgow are much more Catholic 
 than Manchester or London ; missionaries 
 admit that they are much more immoral " 
 ("Twelve Years in a Monastery," pp. 126, 
 127). 
 
 And again : — 
 
 " I have heard Confessions in very many 
 parts of England and abroad, I have read 
 much casuistical literature which is per- 
 meated with Confessional experiences, and 
 I have conferred on the subject with mis- 
 sionaries who have heard hundreds of thou- 
 sands of Confessions ; and I am convinced 
 that the majority of Catholics are unaffected 
 by the Confessional ... in the whirligig 
 of life the Confessional is forgotten, and has 
 
/n>oral Htdument for Confessional 7i 
 
 no influence whatever on their morality" 
 (ibid. pp. 127, 128). 
 
 In the face of the statistics already 
 quoted, Dr. McCabe's words cannot lightly 
 be disregarded. They seem finally to dis- 
 pose of the plea that the Confessional is a 
 moral prophylactic, attested by the experi- 
 ence of the Eoman Church. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 THE MORAL ARGUMENT FOR THE CON- 
 FESSIONAL. THE PERIL OF THE CON- 
 FESSOR. 
 
 I turn now from the appeal to statistics to 
 other considerations affecting both Con- 
 fessor and penitent. 
 
 I have not so far seen it urged in defence 
 of the Confessional that the Confessor him- 
 self derives moral strength and support 
 from interviewing his penitents. But the 
 labours of the Confessor must inevitably 
 affect his character for good or for ill. He 
 cannot attend day by day to have the sins 
 of men, women, and children freely exposed 
 before him, to weigh those sins, to sit in 
 judgment on sinners, without being himself 
 affected. The supporters no less than the 
 
 opponents of the Confessional are com- 
 72 
 
Ube Confessor's peril 73 
 
 pelled to ask, What is the moral effect of 
 the Confessional on the clergy who act as 
 Confessors ? This aspect of the subject, 
 however delicate, must be considered, in 
 the interests no less of the clergy than of 
 their people. What help does the English 
 literature of the subject provide towards an 
 answer to the question ? 
 
 The condition of things is at least 
 ominous. For it is at once apparent that, 
 if no claims are made as to the moral profit 
 derived by the Confessor from his work in 
 the Confessional, there is no lack of warning 
 against the moral disaster which may over- 
 take him. Nor in those warnings can we 
 fail to recognise the admission of familiar 
 and grievous evil. They assuredly point to 
 some of the saddest facts in the Church's 
 past history ; to the admitted and con- 
 sistent depravity in other ages of so many 
 clergy who practised in the Confessional. 
 But they cannot have a merely academic 
 interest and no present meaning, or they 
 would find no place in the books of to-day. 
 
74 ZTbe Confessional 
 
 Once more the witness of Pusey in his 
 edition of Gaume's Manual is decisive and 
 even clamorous. He has a section headed 
 " Counsels for such Confessors as are Liable 
 to Temptation," in which, whilst he urges 
 them not to be kept from the work by the 
 fear of falling (pp. 90, 91), he frankly sets 
 forth some conspicuous perils. 
 
 Thus, amongst the dangers to be met 
 with by a Confessor, Pusey cites " being 
 himself more or less polluted by the im- 
 purities he has to hear told out " (p. 94), a 
 peril which any student of human nature 
 will admit to be most serious. 
 
 He is at great pains to warn against the 
 dangers in dealing with female penitents, 
 pointing out that "this circumspection is 
 specially necessary where your penitents' 
 youth or attractions, the subjects you have 
 to deal with . . . are liable to make any 
 unwonted impression on your heart or on 
 their own " (p. 105). 
 
 In recommendations as to dealing with 
 young women he delivers what might, to 
 
Zhc Confessor's peril 75 
 
 the inexperienced, have seemed a super- 
 fluous warning against " permitting them 
 to kiss your hand" (p. 107). He proceeds 
 to quote St. Augustine's caution against 
 the ease with which Spiritualis devotio 
 convertitur in carnalem ; adding the mel- 
 ancholy, startling reflection, " How many 
 good priests have been the victims of such 
 affections, begun in piety, and have at 
 last lost both piety and God Himself!" 
 (p. 108). 
 
 When he further speaks of men who " do 
 not fear to hear confessions at times when 
 they themselves are in mortal sin" (p. 109), 
 " being the cause of temptation to others, 
 therein proving yourself no spiritual father, 
 but rather a ravening wolf; no minister of 
 God, but of the devil ; no physician, but 
 the murderer of souls " (p. 99), it must be 
 clear that Pusey himself fully recognised 
 the urgent peril of the worst sins admitted 
 in the Confessional overtaking, through its 
 influence, the Confessor himself. 
 
 But how could Pusey or any other 
 
76 Ube Contessxonal 
 
 adviser do otherwise ? In this book he 
 draws for the support of his case, and for 
 the material of his instruction to Confessors, 
 from Eoman sources ; and the Eoman Church 
 has always admitted the dangers of the 
 Confessional. His authorities are teachers 
 of the type of his chief guide, Liguori, 
 whose pages teem with statements and 
 discussions indescribably gross and obscene. 
 Pusey, as every chapter in his book shows, 
 knew how real the dangers of the Confes- 
 sional to the Confessor had been in those 
 ages ; nor could he have been unaware 
 with what plenitude of minutely nauseous 
 but perhaps inevitable detail they have been 
 handled by the Roman authorities. 
 
 The warnings which he conveys are, to 
 those who know, only the faint echo of 
 the Roman Church's past struggles against 
 the sins produced by the Confessional. 
 Councils laboured to fight the most familiar 
 of these evils. The Inquisition had its 
 attention directed to them. Casuists dis- 
 cussed such questions as whether a woman 
 
Ufoe Confessor's peril 77 
 
 should go to confession when the only 
 priest available was known to solicit his 
 female penitents ; and whether, if a priest 
 absolved his own paramour for sinning 
 with him, the absolution held good. Truly 
 Pusey's cautions were, to those who set 
 store by Eoman example, most natural. 
 
 Here in England we are tempted to 
 soothe ourselves with the assurance that 
 these things belong either to other times or 
 other countries. We are entitled to view 
 our clergy with a confidence that every 
 nation does not, because it dare not, give. 
 But we have reason to know that even the 
 Englishman is not always strong. 
 
 The public allegations of the late Father 
 Chiniquy — to go no further — show that 
 the old evil is still not abolished in other 
 lands. Nay, have we not had our warnings 
 here at home ? Is it not a fact that the 
 quite recent records of an English diocese 
 contain the official details of a case as 
 scandalous almost as any of old time ? 
 Did not Archdeacon Allen adduce in Con- 
 
78 XTbe Confessional 
 
 vocation (July 4, 1877, "Chronicle of 
 Convocation," 1877, pp. 231, 232), the 
 testimony of "an elderly clergyman — a 
 rural dean ... a venerable and wise High 
 Churchman," to the effect that in his own 
 experience he had "known three clergymen 
 who had practised this teaching of habitual 
 Confession as a duty who had fallen into 
 habits of immorality with women who 
 came to them for guidance " ? Did not the 
 Bishop of Truro (Dr. Gott, "Charge," 1897, 
 p. 97), speak of "many a fallen Confessor" 
 as a warning that " the instrument is able 
 to kill as well as cure, and that it often 
 wounds the hand of the untrained or un- 
 holy practitioner " ? 
 
 We are entitled to believe that the 
 English clergy are the purest in the world ; 
 but, so long as human nature remains what 
 it is, we have no right to ignore the perils 
 against which Pusey and others warn Con- 
 fessors — perils to the persistence of which 
 known facts witness. A show of indigna- 
 tion at the bare possibility of a Confessor's 
 
Uhc Confessor's peril 79 
 
 fall stands condemned in the presence of 
 the very literature to which the Confessor 
 goes for guidance. If his friends deny the 
 peril, its reality must at least be known to 
 him. "If you had no fears," says Pusey 
 (p. 90), " I should fear for you. I should 
 question whether it be wise to urge you to 
 a ministry wherein you would be so liable 
 to fall from not fearing its perils, and con- 
 sequently taking no precautions ; for I do 
 not deny that there are many perils." 
 
 There are, however, other dangers to the 
 Confessor. Does the constant hearing of 
 the sins of others tend to increase the 
 sensitiveness of the Confessor's own con- 
 science ? Can the belief that he, a frail 
 and erring man, has it in his power to send 
 the vilest sinner away absolutely pardoned 
 — to do this though he himself should be in 
 mortal sin, "opening the gates of Hell for 
 themselves while they open those of Heaven 
 to others" (Pusey, p. 109) — tend to in- 
 crease his sense of the awfulness of sin and 
 the soul's need of a Saviour ? May not sin 
 
80 
 
 TTbe Confessional 
 
 become to him merely a kind of professional 
 fact, to be thought of and treated as such? 
 
 Is there any security that Confessors will 
 not find even a morbid pleasure, unsanctified 
 and perilous to themselves, in listening to 
 the secrets of others' hearts \ May they 
 not regulate their use of the Confessional 
 accordingly ? " Confessors," says Pusey, 
 "should not give themselves so wholly 
 to confessing women as to refuse men who 
 may seek them. It is a sad sight to see 
 Confessors giving their whole morning to 
 young women -devotees while they dismiss 
 men or married women" (Pusey, p. 108). 
 
 There is another aspect of the Con- 
 fessional in which the moral influence upon 
 the Confessor is important. The youngest 
 priest, fresh from the University or the 
 Theological College, unskilled in the know- 
 ledge of his own heart or the complex 
 problems of human life, unpractised in the 
 discerning of motives, is told to regard 
 himself as the repository of the most awful 
 powers. He can, to use Pusey's phrase, 
 
Wot Confessor's peril si 
 
 lock or unlock the gates of Heaven itself. 
 How can he exercise this office with 
 confidence or peace of mind 1 How can 
 he avoid the awful conviction that at 
 intervals he must err ; must absolve the 
 guilty or condemn the innocent ; may 
 by over-laxity encourage a soul in sin, 
 or by over - stringency drive one into 
 despair ? 
 
 The danger is no imaginary one. The 
 priest is supposed to weigh, and to weigh 
 accurately — however limited his own ex- 
 perience of life or of his duty — the guilt 
 or innocence of the most complicated acts 
 and the most obscure motives. He under- 
 takes a task for which omniscience is 
 needed, and he is only a man. He is 
 taught, indeed, to look for the guidance 
 of God ; but an immense mass of literature 
 on the subject shows that he must expect 
 no supernatural illumination. By prayer 
 and study he is to attain what Pusey 
 calls (p. 62) "a sound, practical, moral 
 science." He is to beware of being opinion- 
 
 F 
 
82 , xrbe Confessional 
 
 ated, and is bidden to observe how theo- 
 logians differ. 
 
 But who are the guides to whom he must 
 go? He is an English Churchman, and 
 he is exercising a function which, on the 
 showing of men like Pusey, is of almost 
 indescribable delicacy and danger. What 
 help, what warning, what guidance does 
 his Church offer ? None ; not a word, not 
 a syllable. The English Church as a 
 Church has nothing to say by way of 
 instruction, guidance, or warning for the 
 priest in the Confessional. It has adopted 
 no system of Moral Theology and made no 
 provision for the direction of its clergy in 
 one of the most thorny of paths. It is an 
 amazing deficiency if the Eeformers ex- 
 pected the Confessional as an institution 
 and Penance as a Sacrament to continue 
 as in pre-Eeformation days. It is natural 
 enough if they believed they had abolished 
 the old regular resort to a mainly corrupt 
 and degrading institution. 
 
 To what sources, therefore, must the 
 
Uhc Confessor's ©erxl ss 
 
 young Confessor go ? To the Continental 
 guides with whom Pusey's Gaume and 
 "The Priest in Absolution" have helped 
 to make so many familiar. " The Priest 
 in Absolution," despite some offensive 
 passages, is, however, a work of decency 
 and restraint compared with the Con- 
 tinental books to which any student must 
 betake himself. Those works form, as 
 Archbishop Magee has put it, c< A museum 
 of spiritual iniquity at which fiends may 
 shudder and blush ; w T here murderers may 
 learn cruelty ; where hoary-headed convicts 
 may be taught fraud ; and satyrs impurity." 
 Pusey's Gaume is, as I have pointed out, 
 a bowdlerised version of the same original. 
 But the references in Pusey to, for ex- 
 ample, Liguori are constant, and the 
 English student who would verify his 
 references is, in effect, directed to a 
 literature which has cast all decency aside. 
 
 Even as it is, the instructions to the 
 Confessor amply suggest the extreme dif- 
 ficulties of his task. I will take him as 
 
84 zhc Confessional 
 
 represented by the " Priest in Absolution," 
 because Mr. Mackonochie stated that this 
 work embodied the principles followed by 
 English clergy engaged in this work. For 
 brevity I will not quote verbatim ; but the 
 abstract can be verified by any who question 
 its accuracy. 
 
 It is laid down (ibid. Part I.) that the 
 Confessor must know ( i ) how to distinguish 
 between " sins unto death and sins not unto 
 death" ; (2) how to classify sins ; (3) when 
 to order restitution ; (4) how to discover 
 " the immediate source or occasion produc- 
 ing the evil," and the best remedies; (5) 
 the " proper dispositions . . . the penitent 
 ought to entertain " ; and (6) the penances 
 and remedies usually enjoined; finally (7) 
 he must be an apt moral theologian so as 
 to know what cases to decide and what 
 cases to reserve (p. 7). 
 
 Furthermore, " to the knowledge of a 
 moral theologian must be added the de- 
 cision of a judge." He must not decide 
 against Holy Scripture or " Catholic Canons 
 
Ube Confessor's peril 85 
 
 rightly interpreted," or manifest reason. 
 He must " go on something more than pro- 
 bability in cases of right or fact, of what 
 is lawful and what is valid." Where 
 opinions are equally balanced, he must 
 take his own line with due regard to the 
 circumstances of the case (ibid. p. 9). All 
 this, be it remembered, as a preliminary to 
 opening or shutting the gates of heaven. 
 In fact, even whilst claiming to exercise 
 this awful power, the priest has " learnt 
 how to put questions discreetly, how to 
 absolve without error, and how to retain 
 sins without loss to the peniteut" (ibid. 
 p. 14 ; the italics here are mine). 
 
 To these and other general directions are 
 added " Hints for the Priest in Examining 
 the Penitent," which instruct him particu- 
 larly how to cross-examine those who come 
 to him. Here quotation or even a sum- 
 mary is impossible, as may be judged by 
 the fact that the priest is told how to in- 
 quire as to " conjugal duty." Upon this 
 subject even a celibate Confessor, however 
 
86 uhc Confessional 
 
 juvenile, is required to have very precise 
 and minute opinions. 
 
 To the inexperienced it would seem that 
 a lifetime would be too short in which to 
 master even in theory the moral theology 
 required for the right discharge of a Con- 
 fessor's duties. But the difficulty of the 
 learner seems in part to be removed by the 
 many suggestions that (as we should ex- 
 pect) he can only do his best. A single 
 extract from Pusey will sufficiently illus- 
 trate these difficulties and the way in which 
 the practising Confessor is instructed to 
 deal with them. The subject suggested is 
 " a question of certain occupations, of 
 actions which are dangerous in themselves, 
 but not actual sins." Pusey says : — 
 
 " A discreet Confessor will put hindrances 
 in the way of such occupations, and only 
 permit them when accompanied with such 
 precautions as may avert their danger. 
 Thus in the question of occasions of sin, 
 supposing a person to have been twenty 
 times in the society of a woman, and to 
 
XTbe Confessor's ©edl 87 
 
 have been led into sin nine times, it would 
 be blamably lax of you not to observe 
 that this is a proximate occasion, and not 
 to insist upon a cessation of intercourse, 
 because they had met more often without 
 sinning than guiltily. But if in similar cir- 
 cumstances these persons had resisted sin, 
 and had only failed two or three times by 
 interior acts, it would be over-severe to 
 insist on putting an end to such an occa- 
 sion of sin. Of course I should except a 
 case where you had special reason to take 
 a different course, or to believe that your 
 penitent would not abstain from sin if he 
 continued to meet that person. A wise 
 Confessor would insist in the first instance 
 on the occasion of sin being at once avoided; 
 in the second he would begin by putting 
 difficulties in the way, by exhorting his 
 penitent, and warning him of his danger. 
 But if it is difficult for him to leave the 
 person who is the cause of temptation 
 altogether, you may insist on certain pre- 
 cautions, such as that he should not remain 
 
88 zhc Confessional 
 
 alone with that person, and that if he falls 
 into sin he should at once come and con- 
 fess it. A rigorist Confessor will allow no 
 hindrance in the avoiding an immediate 
 occasion of sin, save physical impossibility ; 
 the lax Confessor accepts excuses which 
 cannot even plead a moral impossibility. 
 Do you, as a discreet Confessor, accept such 
 excuses as amount practically to moral im- 
 possibility, even though they do not amount 
 to physical impossibility ; but point out 
 the means whereby the occasion may be 
 removed " (pp. 70, 71). 
 
 Can it fairly be argued that the persistent 
 exercise of such an occupation as this pas- 
 sage suggests can be without peril to the 
 conscience and spiritual life of the Con- 
 fessor ? 
 
 I do not wish to fasten on English Con- 
 fessors all the evils of the casuistry of 
 Borne. But the guide to whom Pusey 
 over and over again refers them is Liguori. 
 He died in 1787, and is a comparatively 
 modern authority. It is not without reason 
 
ftbe Confessor's iperil 39 
 
 that the system of moral theology taught 
 by him has been regarded as the embodi- 
 ment of craft, deceit, and impurity. In 
 effect it allows the sinner to observe to- 
 wards God an attitude which between man 
 and man would in England be deemed con- 
 temptible deceit. It instructs men how to 
 sin at the least cost ; how to get to Heaven 
 whilst sacrificing as little as possible of the 
 sins of earth. What wonder that Diana, 
 the greatest of the casuists, was blasphe- 
 mously honoured with the title of Agnus 
 Dei, as taking away the sins of the 
 world ? 
 
 Is there no danger, even to clergy, in 
 handling a system of morals such as this ? 
 I know of no answer save the suggestion 
 that our clergy, as Englishmen, must be 
 presumed to be superior to the weaknesses 
 so painfully evidenced in the Continental 
 history of the Confessional. We are 
 entitled to argue that racial characteristics, 
 the circumstances of English life, and the 
 high level of honour amongst our clergy 
 
go ube Confessional 
 
 count for much. But they do not place 
 even the Englishman beyond the reach of 
 perils which have made the history of the 
 Confessional the foulest blot in the record 
 of the Western Church. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 THE MORAL ARGUMENT FOR THE CON- 
 FESSIONAL : THE INFLUENCE ON THE 
 PENITENT. 
 
 We have now to consider the influence of 
 the Confessional on the penitent. 
 
 The case of children may be taken first. 
 I fear that the extent to which the Con- 
 fessional is forced upon little children by 
 Anglican clergy is as yet imperfectly under- 
 stood ; but the facts are sufficiently clear. 
 Pusey (in accordance with his habit of 
 accepting Roman authority as applying to 
 the English Church) quotes a decision of 
 the Council of Trent for direction as to the 
 age at which Confession should begin. His 
 acceptance of its dictum is interesting, 
 especially as Pusey's own Church has 
 
 nothing to say on, and not the smallest 
 91 
 
92 zrbe Confessional 
 
 countenance to offer to, the position in 
 regard to child penitents which he adopts 
 from Rome. The passage is as follows : — 
 
 " The Council of Trent says : — ' Si quis 
 negaverit omnes et singulos fideles utriusque 
 sexus, cum ad annos discretionis pervene- 
 rint, teneri singulis annis, saltern in pas- 
 chate, ad communicandum justa prseceptum 
 sanctse matris ecclesige, anathema sit.' And 
 elsewhere it decides that none are exempt 
 from these obligations, save ' parvulos usu 
 rationis carentes.' You need not fear to 
 apply this precept in its proportion to con- 
 fession, and absolve them with great bene- 
 fit to their souls, all the more as the 
 ordinary and right custom among the 
 faithful is, to bring children to confession 
 from the time they are seven years old ; 
 and it is a great negligence in parents to 
 omit doing so" (Pusey's Gaume, p. 159). 
 
 In agreement with this complete accept- 
 ance of the Roman doctrine, children are, by 
 a plentiful literature, taught the necessity 
 of early and regular attendance at the Con- 
 
Ube influence on tbe penitent 9s 
 
 fessional, not merely for moral support and 
 guidance, but for the saving of their souls. 
 Thus in "A Little Catechism for Little 
 Catholics " (third edition ; W. Knott) we 
 have the following questions and answers : — 
 
 " How is actual sin forgiven ? — Actual 
 sin is forgiven in Baptism and afterwards 
 by the Sacrament of Penance " (p. 12). 
 
 " What is the Sacrament of Penance ? — 
 Penance is a Sacrament whereby the sins, 
 which we have committed after Baptism, 
 are forgiven " (p. 1 7). 
 
 " How does the Priest forgive sins ? — 
 The Priest forgives sins by the power of 
 God when he says, ' I absolve thee from all 
 thy sins in the Name of the Father, and of 
 the Son, and of the Holy G-host " (p. 17). 
 
 So in "Confession"' (edited by a Com- 
 mittee of Clergy ; W. Knott) we have 
 this : — 
 
 f~ " Absolution is the pardon which God, 
 for Christ's sake, gives to the penitent, by 
 the ministry of the Priest. To confess and 
 to receive absolution is the appointed means 
 
94 TOe Confessional 
 
 by which a sinner can be again restored to 
 the favour of God " (p. 13). 
 
 "Absolution may be received as soon as 
 a person has attained the age of reason " 
 (p. 14). 
 
 The " First Communion " (second edition ; 
 W. Knott) opens with a long statement 
 urging the necessity of confessing before 
 communicating for the first time : — 
 
 " Jesus can do for you what no one else 
 can. He can make your soul all white and 
 clean again. . . . That is what He is going 
 to do for you in the Sacrament of Penance, 
 for which you are now waiting. In order 
 that He may be able to do this you must 
 be careful to make a good confession ; for 
 without this you cannot really be absolved " 
 (p. 10). ^ 
 
 Such is the doctrine which week by week 
 is being taught in a certain number of 
 parishes. 
 
 What is likely to be its moral effect on 
 children ? 
 
 It is no part of my purpose here to con- 
 
Zhc influence on tbe penitent 95 
 
 sider the spiritual effect of such teaching, or 
 its after influence upon the faith of young- 
 people— a subject upon which much could 
 be said. Here I am only considering the 
 results as to the character and conduct of 
 the penitent. 
 
 The first impression upon children is 
 doubtless one of fear. The late Bishop 
 of Salisbury, Dr. Moberly, in the Convo- 
 cation Debate on " The Priest in Absolu- 
 tion " put this in the forefront of his 
 objections to the system: — "I believe," he 
 said, " the practice of habitual confession 
 to be mischievous in the highest degree, 
 and I have a particular object in referring 
 to it, for the greater part of my life . . . 
 has been spent as a schoolmaster, and I 
 confess that there is not one thing in all 
 the world which is deeper in my heart 
 and conscience than the corrupting mischief 
 of any such system as this getting into our 
 schools. . . . We all know that little 
 children six or seven years of age are 
 frightened out of their wits if they are 
 
96 ube Confessional 
 
 told they must go to a clergyman and 
 speak of what they have been doing, and 
 yet according to this system they must go. 
 It appears to me to be cruel in the last 
 degree" (" Chronicle of Convocation," 1877, 
 P- 330- 
 
 The testimony of the Bishop is decisively 
 corroborated in a letter now before me. It 
 is written by a man of letters who was 
 reared in the Church of Rome, is now a 
 member of the English Church, and a High 
 Churchman. " The harm," says my corres- 
 pondent, " which he [the priest] does in 
 other ways is incalculable, especially if (as 
 often happens) he is a stupid man dealing 
 with sensitive or morbid children. In my 
 experience it is the children who suffer — I 
 know I suffered agonies." 
 
 Thus the child, taught that it cannot 
 hope for the pardon of its sins, unless it 
 goes to Confession, learns at the age of 
 seven to associate the thought of approach 
 to God with fear and shrinking, with the 
 suffering of " agonies," with feelings of 
 
TLbc Jnfluence on tbe {penitent 97 
 
 dread which are in the most striking con- 
 trast to every thought of child access to God 
 suggested by the New Testament. 
 
 Yet in the child's mind the agony is 
 produced, not by the access to God, but 
 by the approach to a human intermediary. 
 The child in time comes to appreciate the 
 distinction. It learns that the person who 
 stands in the place of God is, after all, very 
 human. His weaknesses are the subject of 
 comment and discussion ; his little tempers, 
 his mistakes, his foibles, his frequent ex- 
 hibitions of commonplace humanity, accord 
 ill with the character he assumes to himself 
 in the Confessional. The dread sooner or 
 later, therefore, loses any religious char- 
 acter ; either it becomes resentment against 
 a human institution and its human agent, 
 or it passes into unconcern. 
 
 As the Church of Eome is at least as 
 exacting in the matter of the Confessional 
 as any of the Anglican clergy, we may 
 reasonably assume that what is true of the 
 children brought to the Eoman Confessional 
 
 G 
 
98 tlbe Confessional 
 
 will, in the main, be true also of children 
 brought to the Anglican Confessor. The 
 evidence of Dr. McCabe may therefore be 
 admitted. It is exactly what we should 
 expect : — 
 
 "Needless to say, the Confession of the 
 average child of seven or eight is a mere 
 farce ; they used to be marched over to us 
 from the schools every three months, after 
 a careful drilling from their teachers, but 
 scarcely one child in ten had the faintest 
 glimmering of an idea of the nature of the 
 operation they were subjected to. Few of 
 them could even be sufficiently instructed 
 to fulfil the material part of the ceremony ; 
 they mixed the various parts of the formulae 
 in the most unintelligible fashion, and 
 generally wished to retreat before they 
 had received the essential object of their 
 coming — absolution" ("Twelve Years in a 
 Monastery," p. 129). 
 
 That the institution fails to keep its hold 
 upon young people, and that the number 
 who go on frequenting the Anglican Con- 
 
XTbe influence on tfoe penitent 99 
 
 fessional after having been brought to it in 
 childhood is very small, is, I believe, freely 
 conceded. But even so it would not follow 
 that it was harmless. As a preparation for 
 coming to Confession, there is put into the 
 hands of children manuals which suggest 
 minute self-examination of the kind already 
 illustrated (Chap. L, pp. 14-17)- Curiosity 
 is one of the most powerful influences in 
 childhood, and it is scarcely possible that 
 some of the directions for self-examination 
 should fail to excite prurient and morbid 
 thought about subjects to which no wise 
 person would wantonly turn the minds of 
 children. 
 
 In the Confessional itself this danger 
 again arises. Pusey repeatedly warns Con- 
 fessors against communicating to the young 
 thoughts of evil to which they had been 
 strangers. Writing of Gaume's questions 
 for the "ill-instructed," which "The Priest 
 in Absolution" reproduced for the use of 
 English clergy, he says : — " I know not 
 how some of them could be put without 
 
ioo uhc Confessional 
 
 the risk of teaching evil, happily unknown " 
 (Preface to Pusey's Gaume, p. 15). The 
 caution and the admission are sufficient 
 witnesses that this evil does happen ; that 
 the man sitting to hear in the place of God, 
 and to declare pardon in the name of God, 
 may plant the first thought of grievous 
 impurity in the mind of a boy or a girl. 
 To that seedling the abundant crop of a 
 ruined and corrupt life may hereafter be 
 traced. 
 
 That this is no imaginary peril will be 
 recognised by every one who has studied 
 child-life, who has watched the effects of 
 curiosity, of morbid speculation, of prurient 
 inquiry, on young lives. With the Con- 
 fessional at its best, the Confessor the 
 wisest, and the youthful penitent the 
 purest, the danger exists. But Confessors 
 are not always wise. Pusey himself admits 
 that " a lax Confessor " will treat children 
 from seven to twelve "as he would grown- 
 up people who were guilty of the same 
 faults" (Gaume, p. 158). 
 
Ube influence on tbe penitent 101 
 
 It is said that the practice of urging boys 
 to Confession is now prevalent in a certain 
 number of English schools. The fear ex- 
 pressed by Bishop Moberly (quoted p. 95) 
 of " the corrupting mischief of any such 
 system as this getting into our schools " 
 was well justified. In the absence of direct 
 evidence as to the methods pursued I do 
 not care to discuss the practice ; but the 
 persons who think that the morals of boys 
 reared in Continental schools where Confes- 
 sion is enforced furnish a happy augury for 
 the results in England must surely be the 
 victims of culpable credulity. 
 
 In the case of young girls Dr. McCabe 
 can, out of a wide experience, speak with 
 some authority. Few persons, I suspect, 
 will dissent from him when he says :■ — 
 
 "It is bad enough for adult men and 
 women to have to kneel weekly or monthly 
 at the feet of a priest (usually one whom 
 they know intimately), and detail every 
 unworthy thought and act into which they 
 have been betrayed, but for girls and young 
 
102 xLhc Confessional 
 
 women to discuss their inmost thoughts and 
 feelings with a person of the opposite sex is 
 vicious and lamentable. If they are still of 
 a refined character, such a practice is a 
 source of exquisite pain, and often leads 
 either to duplicity or to actual debasement ; 
 if they are less refined already the tempta- 
 tion to abuse their condition is overpower- 
 ing" ("Twelve Years in a Monastery," pp. 
 1 20, 121). 
 
 The results of the Confessional, as he has 
 seen them, amply justify this conclusion. 
 For he says : — 
 
 " A yet sadder category is the large 
 number of girls who are actually corrupted 
 by the practice of Confession. Girls who 
 would never dream of talking to their com- 
 panions, even to their sisters or mothers, on 
 certain points will talk without the least 
 restraint to the priest. They are taught when 
 young that such is the intention of Christ, 
 that in the Confessional every irregular 
 movement (and to their vaguely disciplined 
 moral sense the category embraces the whole 
 
Hbe influence on tbe {penitent 103 
 
 of sexual physiology) must be revealed : 
 they are reminded that nothing superfluous 
 must be added, still that the sense of shame 
 in the Confessional must be regarded as a 
 grave temptation of the Evil One. So they 
 learn to control it, then to lay it aside tem- 
 porarily, and finally to lose it. They begin 
 to confer with each other on the subject, to 
 compare the impressibility, the inquisitive- 
 ness, the knowledge of different Confessors, 
 and make plots (they have admitted so 
 much to me) to put embarrassing questions 
 to priests. For, although they frequently 
 manifest a quick sense of shame and deli- 
 cacy at the commencing period, they are 
 forced to be more circumstantial in their 
 narratives. A girl will often try to fit in 
 her less delicate transgressions between two 
 common and more respectable peccadilloes, 
 and only accuse herself in a general way of 
 having been ' rude ' or immodest. No Con- 
 fessor can allow such a general accusation 
 to pass : he is bound to recall her and 
 question her minutely on the subject. The 
 
104 xibe Confessional 
 
 conversation which ensues is much better 
 imagined than described ; for by some curi- 
 ous process of reasoning (assisted by the 
 light of faith) the Church of Rome has 
 deduced from certain words of Christ that 
 the Confessor must have a detailed know- 
 ledge of every serious transgression before 
 he can give absolution " (" Twelve Years in 
 a Monastery," pp. 122, 123). 
 
 So thoroughly, indeed, does the poison 
 work that there are, it seems, women 
 upon whose morbid natures the habit of 
 confessing so grows that at last they 
 " deliberately concoct the most shameful 
 stories in order to gratify their craving 
 for that peculiar tete-a-tete which they 
 have grown accustomed to in the Confes- 
 sional" (ibid. p. 124). 
 
 The influence of the Confessional on 
 women suggests the allegation of Mr. David- 
 son (quoted p. 62) that the Confessional 
 helps to promote the peace and happiness 
 of the family. There is a widely current 
 belief that it has exactly the opposite effect : 
 
Zhc influence on tbe penitent 105 
 
 that it obtrudes a new and deeply resented 
 authority into the privacy of the home ; 
 that it sows discord between husband and 
 wife, parent and children. It will be 
 admitted that the Liverpool libel action, 
 Wilson v. Wake ford, reported in the Times 
 of June 2, 1900, scarcely supports Mr. 
 Davidson's theory that the Confessional 
 " becomes the occasion for healing domestic 
 discord." The notorious case of the son of 
 the Eev. A. E. Cavalier, brought before the 
 Bishop of London, seems equally to contra- 
 dict Mr. Davidson's plea. 1 I prefer the 
 opinion of Bishop Samuel Wilberforce, that 
 the Confessional in families " introduces 
 untold mischief. It supersedes God's ap- 
 pointment of intimacy between husband 
 and wife, father and children ; substituting 
 another influence for that which ought to 
 be the nearest and closest, and producing 
 reserve and estrangement where there ought 
 to be perfect freedom and openness." 
 
 1 The facts may be found in the Record, March 24, 
 1899, p. 296, and March 30, 1899, P- 3 2 °- 
 
106 £be Confessional 
 
 But, to speak more generally, can we 
 hope that with any nature the practice of 
 habitual Confession will be helpful? The 
 Confessor is called a physician, and Confes- 
 sion a medicine for the soul ; but what 
 healthy person wishes to visit his doctor 
 once a week or to dose himself regularly 
 with medicine ? 
 
 Habitual Confession encourages a morbid 
 mental habit, the curious inquiry into sinful 
 motions, the systematic contemplation of 
 sinful thought and deed. To meditate upon 
 evil, to tabulate (as Pusey says) " Quis, quid, 
 ubi, quibas auxiliis, cur, quomodo, quando"; 
 to scrutinise " the degree of sin," and to 
 pry into the " purely interior will and de- 
 sires " (Pusey, p. 153), is at least to run 
 a danger of encouraging the growth and 
 vitality of the evil impulse. 
 
 Habitual Confession promotes unwarrant- 
 able and dangerous discrimination as to sins. 
 Some, the penitent is taught, are mortal, 
 some venial. Much must be made of one 
 class, little of the other. The mind is led to 
 
XTbe influence on tbe penitent 107 
 
 regard the latter with comparative uncon- 
 cern, and grievously to mislead itself, pos- 
 sibly to its own undoing. 
 
 Habitual Confession promotes a false sense 
 of security. Absolution given, the sin is 
 wiped out. " Go, and sin no more " is, no 
 doubt, the message of the Confessional ; but 
 where pardon is so simple a transaction the 
 message loses its force. Here Jeremy Taylor 
 — as good an authority, no doubt, as a 
 modern Anglican Confessor — speaks with 
 characteristic decision : — 
 f 4 Men look upon it as a certain cure, like 
 pulling off a man's clothes to go and wash in 
 a river, and make it by use and habit, by 
 confidence and custom, to be no certain pain, 
 and the women blush or smile, weep or are 
 unmoved, as it happens, under their veil, 
 and the men under the boldness of their 
 sex : when we see that men and women 
 confess to-day, and sin to-morrow, and 
 are not affrighted from their sin the more 
 for it, because they know the w T orst of it, 
 and have felt it often, and believe to be 
 
108 ube Confessional 
 
 eased by it ; certain it is, that a little reason 
 and a little observation will suffice to con- 
 clude, that this practice of Confession hath 
 in it no afFrightment, not so much as the 
 horror of the sin itself hath to the con- 
 science. For they who commit sins confi- 
 dently, will with less regret (it may be) 
 confess it in this manner, where it is the 
 fashion for every one to do it. And when all 
 the world observes how loosely the Italians, 
 Spaniards, and French do live in their car- 
 nivals, giving to themselves all liberty and 
 license to do the vilest things at that time, 
 not only because they are for a while to 
 take their leave of them, but because they 
 are (as they suppose) to be so soon eased of 
 their crimes by Confession, ancl the circular 
 and never-failing hand of the priest ; they 
 will have no reason to admire the severity 
 of Confession , which as it was most certainly 
 intended as a deletory of sin, and might do 
 its first intention, if it were equally managed; 
 so now certainly it gives confidence to many 
 men to sin, and to most men to neglect the 
 
XTbe Jnfluence on tbe penitent 109 
 
 greater and more effective parts of essential 
 repentance " (" Dissuasive from Popery," 
 Chap, ii., Sec. 2). 
 
 Here, too, I may fairly quote the admis- 
 sions of the Rev. J. P. F. Davidson : — 
 
 "Confession may be perverted to the 
 deadening rather than the quickening of the 
 Conscience. The Priest, in the exercise of 
 this Ministry, has need to watch carefully 
 the effect which it is producing on the souls 
 that come to him : whether it is stimulating 
 them, as it should be, to more personal 
 effort in the spiritual life, and to a live- 
 lier sense of their own responsibilities ; or 
 whether, by a perversion of its proper pur- 
 pose, it is tending to enervate the life by 
 the substitution of another conscience for 
 its own " (" Confession in the Church of 
 England," p. 14). 
 
 Habitual Confession, according to Mr. 
 Davidson, has a special peril for the 
 devout : — 
 
 "Another danger is the encouragement 
 of an over-scrupulous and too self-intro- 
 
no ube Confessional 
 
 spective spirit. The snares of the devil are 
 manifold, and while, perhaps, the greater 
 number of professing Christians are tempted 
 to carelessness and indifference, for the 
 earnest he prepares the snare of scrupu- 
 lousness, which consumes the vital energies 
 of the soul" (ibid. p. 14). 
 
 Habitual Confession, even when the 
 subject is a good one, must weaken self- 
 control and self-reliance. The penitent's 
 morality is secured by reliance on the 
 priest. His moral condition is like the 
 physical state of the man kept alive by the 
 resources of the doctor and chemist. 
 
 Habitual Confession weakens the sense 
 of responsibility to the laws of God and 
 man. For both those laws are interpreted 
 by, and in effect superseded by, the voice 
 of the Confessor. Is he content ? Has he 
 absolved ? Are his trifling penances and 
 his possible directions executed ? Then all 
 is well. 
 
 Whether, then, the Confessional be tried 
 by statistics, by the position of the Con- 
 
XTbe influence on tbe ©emtent in 
 
 fessor, or by the influence on the penitent, 
 the moral argument for it seems hopelessly 
 to fail. 
 
 In fine, without plain warrant in Holy 
 Scripture, without sanction by our Church, 
 condemned by the voices of history and 
 experience, the Confessional exists in the 
 English Church mainly, if not solely, because 
 it is commanded and used by Eome. 
 
INDEX 
 
 " A Book for the Children of 
 God," 21 
 
 "Absolution and How to Ob- 
 tain It," 15, 21 
 
 Allen, Archdeacon, 78 
 
 " Catholic Prayers for 
 Church of England Peo- 
 ple," 14 
 
 " Catholic Religion, The," 22 
 
 Cavalier Case, The, 105 
 
 Chambers, the Rev. J. C, 3, 
 5- 6, 11, 13 
 
 Children and the Confes- 
 sional, IO, l6, 21, 92-103 
 
 Chiniquy, Father, 77 
 
 Church Times, The, 1 1 
 
 " Confession," 93 
 
 Confession, Roman doctrine 
 as to, 38 ; in Early Church, 
 39 ; Council of Trent on, 
 40 ; and its relation to 
 English formularies, 42 ; 
 English Prayer-books on, 
 43 present Prayer-book 
 on, 49-55 ; Pusey's autho- 
 rities for, 57 
 
 Confessional, corruption of, 
 12 ; moral argument for, 
 59 ; casuistry of, 89 
 
 Confessions at St. Peter's, 
 London Docks, 10 
 
 Confessors, notices of, 10 ; 
 vagrant, 1 1 ; directions to, 
 12; effect of Confessional 
 on, 72 ; Pusey's warnings 
 to, 74, 75 ; Rome and the 
 sins of, 76 ; fall of, 78 ; 
 dangers to, 79-81 ; train- 
 ing of, 81 ; guides of, 
 82-88 
 
 Convocation, 4, 78 
 
 Davidson, Rev. J. P. F., 62, 
 105, 109 
 
 Diana, 89 
 
 Didache, The, 36 
 
 "Do you Hold with Confes- 
 sion ?" 25, 31, 33, 63 
 
 ''First Communion, The," 
 16, 94 
 
 Gott, Dr., Bishop of Truro, 78 
 
 Holy Cross Society, the, 3, 9 
 Homily xxxii., 30, 36 
 
 Illegitimacy, statistics of, 
 65-69 
 
 Liguoei, 83, 88 
 " Little Catechism for Little 
 Catholics, A," 93 
 
 3 H 
 
114 
 
 3nt>eE 
 
 Mackonochie, the Kev. 
 
 A. H., 9, 84 
 Magee, Archbishop, 83 
 Masters, Mr. J., 1 
 McCabe, Dr., quoted, 70, 98, 
 
 101, 102, 104 
 
 "Pardon for the Penitent," 
 15. 23 
 
 Penitents, self-examination 
 of, 13-16 ; child penitents, 
 91 ; Bishop Moberly on, 
 95 ; an ex-Komanist on, 
 96 ; Dr. McCabe on, 98, 
 ioi, 102 ; dangers to, 100 ; 
 boys as, 101 ; young girls 
 as, 102 ; women as, 104 ; 
 other dangers to, 105-111 
 
 Prayer-book, the appeal to : 
 First Prayer-book of Ed- 
 ward VI., 43, 49 ; Second 
 Prayer-book of Edward 
 VI., 45 ; Queen Elizabeth's 
 Prayer-book, 47 ; our pre- 
 sent Prayer-book, 47, 49 
 
 " Priest in Absolution, The," 
 h 3, 4. 6, 7, 9, 17, 1 8, 83, 
 84 
 
 Pusey's version of Gaume's 
 manual, 5, 6, 11 ; is Pusey's 
 rather than Gaume's, 58 ; 
 the manual quoted, 12, 57, 
 58, 61, 74, 79-81, 86, 91, 
 99 
 
 Record, The, 10, II, 105 
 Redesdale, Lord, 3 
 
 St. Peter, 26 
 St, Peter's, London Docks, 
 10 
 
 Simon Magus, 25 
 
 Taylor, Jeremy, 107 
 Texts quoted or discussed — 
 St. Matt. iii. 6, 28 
 „ v. 23, 30 
 „ viii. 4, 28 
 „ xviii. 18, 27 
 St. Mark i. 5, 28 
 St. Luke xxiv. 33, 35 
 St. John xx. 19-24, 22-24, 
 
 26, 33, 34 
 Acts xix. 18, 23, 28 
 1 Cor. v. and 2 Cor. ii. 31, 
 
 ! 3 2 
 
 St. James v. 16, 23, 29 
 I Trent, Council of, 33, 42, 57, 
 : 66, 91 
 
 ; ' ' Twelve Years in a Monas- 
 j tery," 70, 98, 101, 102 
 
 ! Westcott, Dr. (Bishop of 
 ! Durham), 35 
 Wilberforce, Bishop S., 
 105 
 
 Wilson v. Wakeford, 105 
 Wordsworth, Dr. (Bishop of 
 Salisbury), 27 
 
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