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or the eating of a mouthful of meat on Friday to be a mortal sin; that while he claims the power to grant absolution for all sins, both venial and mortal, and teaches that there is no salvation out of the Church, he threatens with excommunication and purgatory and hell those who do not confess to him all their sins or do not accept the penances which he prescribes. Surely here is machinery that may and does enslave and crush and ruin souls.

CHAPTER XIX.

INDULGENCES.

The Council of Trent passed the following decree in respect to indulgences:

"Since the power of bestowing indulgences was granted by Christ to the church, and the power of this sort, divinely given her, she has used even from the most ancient times; the holy synod teaches and enjoins that the use of indulgences, especially salutary to Christian people, and approved by the authority of holy councils, is to be retained in the church; and it anathematizes those, who either assert that they are useless, or that the power of granting them is in the church. Nevertheless, it desires that moderation, according to the old and approved custom in the church, be shown in granting them, lest by too great facility ecclesiastical discipline be weakened. But desiring the amendment and correction of the abuses which have crept in among them, and by reason of which this honorable name of indulgences is blasphemed by heretics, it determines generally by the present decree that all improper gains for obtaining these, whence has flowed the principal cause of abuses among Christian people, are to be altogether abolished. But since the other abuses, which have arisen from superstition, ignorance, irreverence, or other source in any way whatever, cannot conveniently, on account of the multiplied corruptions of the places and provinces in which these are committed, be specially prohibited; it commands all bishops, that each diligently collect the abuses of this sort belonging to his own church, and report them in the first provincial synod: that after they are examined and the opinion of other bishops is obtained, they may be at once referred to the supreme Roman pontiff, by whose authority and prudence may be determined what is expedient for the whole church; that thus the gift of holy in

dulgences may be dispensed to the faithful piously, solemnly, and uncorruptly."

It will be noticed that the Council of Trent does not define the nature, or the benefit, or the proper use of indulgences; nor does it specify any improper use; though it curses those who pronounce them useless, or dispute the right to grant them.

Pope Leo X. had explained the doctrine of indulgences thus, as translated by Mr. Cramp:

"The Roman church, whom other churches are bound to follow as their mother, hath taught that the Roman pontiff, the successor of Peter in regard to the keys, and the vicar of Jesus Christ upon earth possessing the power of the keys,1 by which power all hindrances are removed out of the way of the faithful,—that is to say, the guilt of actual sins by the sacrament of penance-and the temporal punishment due for those sins, according to the divine justice, by ecclesia-tical ́indulgence; that the Roman pontiff may, for reasonable causes, by his apostolic authority grant indulgences, out of the superabundant merits of Christ and the saints, to the faithful who are united to Christ by charity, as well for the living as for the dead; and that in thus dispensing the treasure of the merits of Jesus Christ and the saints, he either confers the indulgence by the method of absolution, or transfers it by the method of suffrage. Wherefore all persons, whether living or dead, who really obtain any indulgences of this kind, are delivered from so much temporal punishment, due according to divine justice for their actual sins, as is equivalent to the value of the indulgence bestowed and received."

Bishop Challoner, in his "Catholic Christian Instructed," defines an indulgence thus:

"An indulgence is simply a remission, or mitigation, of those temporal punishments, which the sinner still owes to the eternal justice, even after the forgiveness of the guilt of his offense."

Archbishop Butler's Catechism says of an indulgence"It releases from canonical penances, enjoined by the church on

1 See, on this power of the keys, &c., Chapters II., XVII., and XVIII.

penitents, for certain sins. . . . It also remits the temporary punishments, with which God often visits our sins, and which must be suffered in this life, or in the next; unless canceled by indulgences, by acts of penance, or other good works."

Collot's Catechism devotes 3 pages to its section on indulgences.

It distinguishes indulgences as partial or plenary; defines a plenary indulgence as "that which remits all the temporal punishment due for sin," while a partial indulgence remits only a part of this punishment; and reckons 3 sorts of plenary indulgences, viz: (1.) The "jubilee," which now occurs every 25 years (formerly, once in 100-then 50-— then 33 years), and usually brings with it the three privileges, that then one may choose his confessor at will, that the confessor may then absolve reserved cases and censures, and that he may also change his vows, except those of religion and chastity; (2.) That given under the form of jubilee, as on a pope's accession, or other important occasion; (3.) The simple plenary indulgence, which is granted only to certain persons in certain places, as to confraternities, &c. The pope may grant indulgences unrestrictedly; bishops may also grant indulgences for a year at the dedication of a church, and 40 days on other occasions. The conditions of gaining indulgences are defined to be(1.) To be truly penitent; (2.) To fulfill the conditions prescribed by the church. The final question and answer are:

"Q. In what state is a person who has truly gained the jubilee?

"A. In the same state in which he was after baptism: in the state grace, without spot or stain, and with the same rights."

of

The following brief of indulgence is published in Sadliers' Catholic Directory for 1870 and 1871:

"ST. PATRICK'S DAY.

"Most Holy Father:

James Frederic, Bishop of Philadelphia, most humbly begs that Your Holiness would deign to grant to all the faithful of his Diocese who, having duly confessed and worthily approached the Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist, on the FEAST OF ST. PATRICK, OR WITHIN ITS OCTAVE, shall visit their respective churches, a Plenary Indulgence,

which may be gained every year, and which may also be applied in suffrage of the souls in Purgatory.

Et, &c., &c.

"From an audience of the Most Holy Father, had on the 15th day of June, 1862, our Most Holy Father Pius IX,, by the Grace of God, Pope, the case having been laid before him by me, the undersigned, Secretary of the Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith, out of his goodness, graciously condescended to our request, on condition of praying according to the intention of the Supreme Pontiff.

"At Rome, in the House of the aforesaid Congregation, on the day and year above mentioned.

H. CAPALTI, Secretary."

The following, translated from the original Italian, represents, as nearly as possible in English, an indulgence sold at Palermo, in Sicily, and engraved in fac-simile in Sir Culling Eardley Smith's " Romanism of Italy." The apostles Peter and Paul ornament the upper right-hand corner, and the arms of Gregory XVI. are on the corner opposite. Below are the Papal Commissioner's arms on the right, and the impression of a cross on the left, with the Commissioner's signature (here, for want of room, printed perpendicularly instead of horizontally) between them.

1 "Suffrage" here denotes favor, aid, or assistance. It is also used, as in the creed of pope Pius IV., to denote "the expression of assent on the part of a congregation to a petition as uttered by a minister; united response or prayer" (Webster's Dictionary).

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