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than to furnish the most satisfactory proofs of each of the above points. With regard to the first, viz.: that the most distinguished authors who wrote during the eleven centuries preceding the Council of Lateran, have unanimously admitted the necessity of confession, I believe no one will question, who will take the trouble to read the five preceding chapters. I shall therefore, attend solely to the points that follow.

EMPERORS AND KINGS CONFESSED.

In the first place, I will shew that emperors and kings had their confessors, as all Catholic Princes have at this day; I shall content myself with simply naming some, and pointing out the authors, who inform us of it. King Thiery I. (a) had in the 7th century, for his confessor St. Ausberg, Archbishop of Rouen; St. Viron Bishop of Ruremond, (b) was in the same century, the confessor to Pepin, the father of Charles Martel. St. Eiden, Bishop of Wexford in Ireland, heard the confession of Brandubh, king of that Island, after having raised him to life, as it is expressly mentioned, (c) in his life. St. Martin, a monk of Corbia, (d) was the confessor of Charles Martel, in the eighth century. St. Corbinien Bishop of Frisingua, (e) heard the confession of Grimoald, duke of Bavaria. Offa, a king in England, according to the relation of a Protestant, (f) had for his confessor a priest named Humbert. We find in the ninth century, that St. Aldric Bishop of Man, was according to Mr. Baluze, (g) the confessor of Louis, the meek; that Donatus Scot, Bishop of Peluze, was, according to Ughel, (h) the confessor of Lothaire, the son and successor of Louis; in the tenth century, St. Udaldric, bishop of Augsburg,(i) was confessor to the emperor Otho. William, Archbishop of Mentz, (k) heard the confession of St. Matilda, wife of Henry surnamed the bird-catcher, in his last sickness. Didacus Fernandus, (1) was confessor to Ordonnius II. king of Spain. In the eleventh century, I shall cite only Queen

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(a) 2. Sæcul. Benedict. p. 1055. (b) Bolland. 7. Maii. T. 2. 313. (c) Bolland. 31. Jan. T. 2. p. 1118. (d) 1. part. 3. Sæcul. Bened. p. 462. (e) 1. part. 3. sæcul. Bened. p. 511. (ƒ) Spelman. T. 1. Cenc. (g) Miscell. T. 3. p. 5. (h) Italia. sacra. T. 3. p. 173. (i) Dietmar lib. 2. Chron. Auth. Brunsw. p. 333. (k) Bolland. 14. Martii. T. 2. 369. (1) Yepez. in Chron. Ord. s. Bened, T. 4. p. 450.

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Constantia, wife of the pious Robert, (a) who had for her confessor a priest of the Diocess of Orleans, named Stephen; and in the twelfth, Henry I. king of England, who had for his confessor Atheldulf, Prior of St. Oswald, (b) and afterwards Bishop of Carlisle,' the king having founded this new Bishoprick to gratify his confessor.

THE ARMIES HAD THEIR CONFESSORS.

Ir must not be thought, that during the ages of which I have just spoken, the armies were without their confessors; these were supplied no less than the courts of princes. The first Council of Germany, celebrated under the auspices of St. Boniface, in the year 742, informs us of this. It is there said in the second Canon, (c) that each Colonel shall be provided with a priest, who shall hear the confessions of the soldiers, and impose on them an appropriate penance. Charlemagne made nearly a similar regulation, which may be found in the fourth article of his Ecclesiastical chapters. (d) William of Sommerset, a Religious of Malmsbury commends the Normans, (e) for employing the whole night in confessing their sins, before they engaged in battle.

THE MULTITUDE OF PENITENTS WHO PRESENTED THEMSELVES FOR CONFESSION.

WHAT I have already stated would be sufficient to convince any unprejudiced mind, that anterior to the council of Lateran, the prac tice of confession was very general amongst the faithful; but the multitude and crowd of penitents who presented themselves at the tribunal of penance, furnishes me with a new proof which ought not to be suppressed.

Nicephorus, the keeper of the Archives, a Greek author, of the seventh century, according to Labignus, and of the ninth, according

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(a) Tom. 2. Spicil. Acheri. p. 676. (b) History of England by Andrew Duchere. edition by Duverdier, T. 1. L. XI. p. 449. (c) Quisque Præfectus unum Presbyterum secum habeat, qui bominibus peccato confitentibus judicare, & indicare penitentiam possit. Tom. 6. Labb. p. 1534. (d) Tom. 7. Labb. p. 1165. (e) Tota nocte confessioni peccatorum vacantes. Lib. 3. de Gestis Anglorum Cap 15.

to Coccius, informs us, (a) that the Bishops were at first the only persons who attended to the ministry of reconciliation, but not being in sufficient number to hear the multitude of penitents, they were obliged to commit the care of them to those monks who joined to the priesthood an approved and exemplary virtue.

THE PRIESTS DURING MASS PRAYED FOR THOSE WHO CONFESSED TO THEM.

THIS was the constant practice of the Greek church; as to the Latin church, it does not appear, that there existed any distinction relatively to this article, between secular and regular priests, both having been indifferently employed in hearing confessions; it appears even, that all those who were honoured with the priesthood, were at the same time charged with the care of directing consciences, as may be seen from the Gallican Mass, which Illiricus has presented to the public, and which on this account ought to be less suspected. It is as ancient at least as the eighth century. The priest there prays, in more than ten places, (b) for all those who were in the habit of confessing to him; whence it may be easily inferred, that every priest who celebrated mass, was also ordinarily the confessor of many penitents.

But why should I recur to authorities to prove the generality of the practice of confessing, prior to the council of Lateran, in order to conclude that there must have existed a law at that time, obliging the faithful to confess their sins, when we have monuments of the tenth, and even of the eighth century, wherein the time of satisfying this law, is positively and expressly laid down.

A TIME EXPRESSLY APPOINTED FOR CONFESSION.

REGINON, whom I have already cited, makes mention, at the beginning of his second book on Ecclesiastical discipline, of a regulation of the Council of Rouen, touching the questions a bishop ought to put in

(a) Negotii tædio frequentiâque multitudinis & turbulentia fatigati id operæ ad Monachos transmisêre. De potestate ligandi et absolvendi. Bibl. Patrum, Edit. Colon. Tom. 12. p. 547. (b) Pro omnibus quorum confessiones suscepi. Le Cointe ad annum 60. 1. T. 2. p. 499. p. 406, p. 514. ́

the visit of his diocess; and it is there said, (a) that a bishop should not fail to inform himself of all those persons who shall have passed, in his parish, a whole year without confession, and who shall not have made it, particularly at the beginning of Lent. Where we may see that this was the time specially marked out for complying with the ob ligation imposed by the law of confession.

Chrodegandus, bishop of Metz, who died in 707, exacted still more. In his rule it was required, (b) that every religious should confess every Saturday, and that the other faithful of his diocess should do it at least thrice during the year, namely, before the festival of Easter, Christmas and St. Johu, during the three Lents which were at that time observed, exhorting one another to arm themselves with courage to declare their sins with great sincerity, and adding that it is from an humble and sincere confession that pardon is to be obtained, and with out this, no pardon is to be expected.

To assert after this, that before the thirteen century, the precept of Confession was unheard of, that the obligation of confession originated at the Council of Lateran, and that it was Innocent III. who first imposed it, is to betray in the face of the world, the grossest ignorance and temerity, to speak of things one knows nothing about, and upon which he has not even been willing to inform himself; but I have other still stronger proofs yet to produce.

THE SICK, IN DANGER OF DEATH, ALWAYS
CONFESSED.

VENERABLE BEDE relates in his history that a certain Courtier of the King of the Mercians, (c) having fallen dangerously ill, the King, who had a high esteem for him in consequence of the eminent servi

(a) Si aliquis ad confessionen veniat vel unâ vice in anno, id est in capite Quadragesimæ. Lib. 2. Interog. 65. p. 228.

(b) In tribus Quadragesimis populus fidelis suam confessionem sacerdoti faciat, et qui plus fecerit melius facit. Monachi in uno quoque Sabbato confessionem faciant. Quando volueris confessionem facere, viriliter age, & noli erubescere, quia inde veniet indulgentia & sine confessione non est indulgentia. Cap. 32. T. 1. Spicil. Acheri. p. 228.

(c) Lib. 5. Cap. 14. tom. 2, edit. Colon. p. 130.

ces he had rendered him, went to see him and exhorted him to set his conscience in order by a good confession. The sick mau replied, that although he was fully resolved to confess, yet he preferred not to do it whilst he was sick, but to wait until he should recover his health, lest he might be reproached with having confessed through fear of death. The King, zealous for the salvation of his courtier, and apprehensive for him from the debauched life which he had till then led, continuing to press him by new instances, this unfortunate man declared to him that it was now too late, and that he had already received his judgment. From this passage of the ancient history of England, it will be seen what the persuasion of the eighth century was touching this point, and how fully impressed they were, at that time, of the indispensable necessity of a good confession, to dispose one to appear before God.

But this is not the only example I have to produce; it is said in the life of St. Philbert, founder of the Abbey of Jumiege, who lived in the seventh century, (a) that one of his Monks being speechless and in the agonies of death, the holy Abbot accosted him with great mildness and tenderness, and requested him, if he had yet any sin left upon his conscience, to signify it by squeezing his hand; the sick man having accordingly given him this sign, St. Philbert repaired to the church to beseech of God to restore him the use of his speech, lest, by not confessing his sin, the devil should have power to seize upon his soul at her exit from the body. (b) God heard the prayer of the saint; the sick man recovered his speech, confessed his sin, and died shortly after in the peace of the Lord.

Peter the Venerable, a man of the first quality, who had cultivated with great care the talents which nature had given him and the advantages of his birth, writes (having learnt it from a religious of St. Angeli, an occular witness of the fact he relates) that a certain religious of this Monastery, (c) after having been for some time in his

(a) Sæcul. 2. Bened. p. 821.

(b) Ne adversarius animam pro abscondito crimine, valeret sub verrere in barathrum inferni. 2 Sec. Bened. p. 821.

(c) Unde scias nullatenus te posse salvari, nisi quod perniciosè calaveras, salubriter studeas confitendo manifestare. Lib. 1. miracul. cap. 4. T. 22. Bibl. pag. 1089.

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