this act of obedience,' or in persuading us to submit to this odious yoke. The command must absolutely have come from heaven; from Him who reads the heart and rules the conscience; and the first christians must have heard it from Jesus Christ himself, or his apostles. They must have been firmly convinced, that according to the ordinance of Christ, there is no pardon to be expected for sins committed after baptism, except by the voluntary acknowledgment of them to his ministers: and the christians of every age, for all have sinned, and the greater part grievously, must have felt themselves in the inevitable alternative of sacrificing, either shame to salvation, or salvation to shame. Observe again that the children of the reformation shook off the yoke of confession, as soon as they understood from their leaders that it was nothing more than a purely ecclesiastical institution: so true it is, that in the beginning, men could never have submitted to it upon any other ground than considering it as a divine precept. You may seek, as long as you please, for some other origin of a practice, the very idea of which alarms self-love; to me it appears impossible to find any other than the express command of Jesus Christ.

'We know that after having set aside the divine precept of confession, and abolished its usage, the magistrates of Nuremberg, quickly terrified at the prevalence of crime within their town, had recourse to Charles V., the most powerful monarch of Europe, requesting to send forth an imperial decree for the re-establishment of auricular confession. But the precept of God being once trodden under foot, what could these magistrates expect from a monarch, who, although he possessed the power to bend their knees, had not the power to open their consciences ? Charles V. treated their petition as it deserved.

It may be a matter of curiosity and surprise to an Englishman

Accordingly, he has given this command'. So we are taught by the church, and this is sufficient to oblige all to believe it, according to the doctrine we have solidly established. But since upon this subject, as well as upon preceding ones, you require of me to justify her decrees, let us again examine the double deposit of revelation, and see whether scripture and tradition actually teach that confession was instituted by Jesus Christ as a necessary means for obtaining the pardon of sins committed after baptism. We read in St. Matthew, that our Saviour promised his apostles that whatsoever they should bind on earth, should be bound also in

to find the above mode of argumentation, discussed by the pen of one of his ancient sovereigns, Henry VIII. Put the Case, that "not one Word was particularly, or figuratively read of Confession,

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nor any Thing spoken of it by the Holy Fathers; Yet when I "consider that all People have discovered their Sins to the Priests, "for so many Ages; when I consider the Good that continually fol"lows the Practice of it, and no Evil at all; I cannot think, or "believe it be established, or upholded by any human Invention, "but by the divine Order of God. For the People could never, by

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any human Authority, be induced to discover their secret Sins, "which they abhor in their Consciences, and which they are so much "concerned to conceal, with such Shame, and Confusion, and so un"doubtedly to a Man that might, when he pleased, betray them. "Neither could it happen, that among such great Numbers of "Priests, some good, and some bad, indifferently hearing Con❝fessions, they should all retain them; and that also, when some of "them can keep Nothing else secret; if God himself, the Author on "the Sacrament did not, by his special Grace, defend this so ," wholesome a Thing. For my Part, let LUTHER say what he ́ ́ will, I will believe that Confession was instituted, and is preserved by God himself; not by any Custom of the People, or Institution "of the Fathers." Defence of the Seven Sacraments.

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heaven; and that whatsoever they should loose on earth, should be loosed also in heaven. We read in St. John', that, after his resurrection and before his return to his Father, he confirmed his promise; and, in order that the world might have nothing to say against the prerogative to which the apostle would boldly lay claim of forgiving sins, he establishes the right he confers upon them on his own heavenly mission, and invests them with the power he had received from his Father. "hath sent me I also send you. When he had said "this he breathed on them; and he said unto them: "Receive ye the Holy Ghost: whose sins you shall forgive, they are forgiven; aud “shall retain they are retained."

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"As the Father

whose sins you And because the work which our Saviour was come to establish was to be as durable as the world: and the power of remitting or retaining sins was not to be less necessary in the course and till the consummation of this work, than in its establishment, it cannot be doubted that in the person of the apostles, our Saviour had an eye to their successors, just the same as he had in the other command: "Go and teach all nations, bap"tizing them, &c." Now the power he confers upon them, before his ascension, consists not merely in forgiving sins, but in forgiving or retaining them; whence it follows that this power must be exercised with prudence and discretion, lest they should forgive when they ought to retain, or retain when they ought to forgive. It is a judgment of clemency or rigour which the ministers have to pronounce, according as they consider that the sins can or cannot as yet be pardoned. But how are they to come

1 Ch. XX. v. 73.

to a reasonable decision as to whether they can or cannot forgive the sins: unless they know them well, and not only their numbers and quality, but also whatever may considerably aggravate or extenuate them, and moreover, the natural dispositions of the sinners? It is evident that all this is indispensably necessary for enlightening the mind, and directing the minister to pass a just sentence. Now, as spiritual judges have not the privilege of reading the thoughts and the heart of man any more than the judges of the land, they cannot arrive at a suffieient knowledge of all these circumstances by any other means than by the frank and voluntary declaration of the sinner himself: and this is precisely what we call confession. You see it is so essentially connected with the judicial power given by Christ to his ministers, that, without it, it would be altogether impossible for them to exercise their functions.

To this simple and natural mode of argumentation the followers of the reformation have often replied, that the power given by our Saviour to the apostles was not that of judging, but merely that of declaring that sins are forgiven or retained. But whence, let me ask, do they gain this idea? Do they find it in the Scripture? In the sacred books there is not a single word about this passive and declaratory ministry. Jesus Christ does not say whose sins you shall declare to be forgiven, but whose sins you shall forgive, and whose sins you shall retain. Between the two there is a manifest and essential difference. Our Saviour's words are too clear to need any explanation: the substitution of this declara_ tory sense in place of the plain and obvious meaning of the passage is an audacious and sacrilegous attempt to take away from Christ his own words

and to put the words of man into his mouth, as if he could have made use of a false or incorrect expression. And, after all, what more is gained by it, than throwing back the difficulty a little? For how is a minister to declare that sins are forgiven or retained, unless he knows the sins? Is he to declare the sins to be forgiven on the vague and general assurance given by the penitent of his repentance? But supposing that the sinner deceives you, or deceives himself, mistaking a passing emotion for a solid repentance, for you have not tried his repentance; supposing that the habit is inveterate, that he is in the immediate occasion of sin, that he has not quitted his unlawful profession, negociation, or connection; supposing that he has not repaired the injury done by him, or restored ill-acquired goods or possessions, &c.! Respecting all these essential points you know nothing of his state. Will you, then, in such ignorance declare that God has forgiven him? Very possibly you ought to make quite an opposite declaration. You know nothing for certain in the case; except that you put forth your declaration at hazard and in the dark, and leave it to take its chance; and that you cannot reasonably take upon yourself to give any such decision without a previous and sufficient declaration of the sins committed and the actual dispositions of the sinner. Here again, then, according to your own explanation, of the words of Christ, confession is necessary.

I see clearly, you will acknowledge, that the apostles and their successors could not remit or retain sins, without knowing them, and that in this point of view, confession is of divine institution. But I do not see how sinners are obliged to apply to the apostles and their successors to receive the