a

and love to him at whose hands we receive pardon; doth not Luke vii. God foresee, that they which with ill-advised modesty seek 47. to hide their sin like Adam, that they which rake it up under ashes, and confess it not, are very unlikely to requite with offices of love afterwards the grace which they shew themselves unwilling to prize at the very time when they sue for it; inasmuch as their not confessing what crimes they have committed is a plain signification how loath they are that the benefit of God's most gracious pardon should seem great? Nothing more true than that of Tertullian, "Confession doth as much abate the weight of men's offences, as concealment doth make them heavier." For he which confesseth hath purpose to appease God; he, a determination to persist and continue obstinate, which keeps them secret to himself. St. Chrysostom, almost in the same words, "Wickedness is by being acknowledged lessened, and doth but grow by being hid." If men having done amiss let it slip, as though they knew no such matter, what is there to stay them from falling into one and the same evil? To call ourselves sinners availeth nothing, except we lay our faults in the balance, and take the weight of them one by one. Confess thy crimes to God, disclose thy transgressions before thy Judge, by way of humble supplication and suit, if not with tongue, at the least with heart, and in this sort seek mercy. A general persuasion that thou art a sinner will neither so humble nor bridle thy soul, as if the catalogue of thy sins examined severally be continually kept in mind.

This shall make thee lowly in thine own eyes; this shall preserve thy feet from falling, and sharpen thy desires towards all good things. The mind, I know, doth hardly admit such unpleasant remembrances; but we must force it, we must constrain it thereunto.

It is safer now to be bitten with the memory, than hereafter with torment of sin.

21.

The Jews, with whom no repentance for sin is available Lev. xvi. without confession either conceived in mind or uttered, (which latter kind they call usually confession delivered by word of mouth,) had first that general confession which once every year was made both severally by each of the peo

a Tantum relevat confessio derelictorum, quantum dissimulatio exaggerat. Confessio autem satisfactionis consilium est, dissimulatio contumaciæ. Tert. de pœn. Chrys. hom. 30. in Epist. ad Heb.

Num. v. 6.

Lev. v. 5.

Misne Tora Tractatu Teshuba cap. 1. et

R. M. in lib. Mis

cap. 6.

Mos. in

ple for himself upon the day of expiation, and by the priest for them all. On the day of expiation the high priest maketh three express confessions, acknowledging unto God the manifold transgressions of the whole nation, his own personal offences likewise, together with the sins, as well of his family as of the rest of his rank and order.

They had again their voluntary confessions, at the times and seasons when men, bethinking themselves of their wicked conversation past, were resolved to change their course, the beginning of which alteration was still confession of sins.

Thirdly, over and besides these, the law imposed upon them also that special confession, which they in their book

confession of that particular fault for כויהחר זדרי על עיד called

which we namely seek pardon at God's hands.

The words of the law concerning confession in this kind are as followeth: when a man or woman shall commit any sin that men commit and transgress against the Lord, their sin which they have done (that is to say, the very deed itself in particular) they shall acknowledge.

In Leviticus, after certain transgressions there mentioned, we read the like: When a man hath sinned in any one of these things, he shall then confess, how in that thing he hath offended. For such kind of special sins they had also special sacrifices; wherein the manner was, that the offender should lay his hands on the head of the sacrifice which he brought, and should there make confession to God, saying, "Now, O Lord, that I have offended, committed sin, and done wickedly in thy sight, this or this being my fault; behold I repent me, and am utterly ashamed of my doings; my purpose is, never to return more to the same crime.

noth. par. 2. None of them, whom either the house of judgment had condemned to die, or of them which are to be punished with stripes, can be clear by being executed or scourged, till they repent and confess their faults.

Misnoth,

par. 2. præ. 16.

a

Finally, there was no man amongst them at any time, either condemned to suffer death, or corrected, or chastised with stripes, none ever sick and near his end, but they called upon him to repent and confess his sins.

Of malefactors convict by witnesses, and thereupon either

a All Israel is bound on the day of expiation to repent and confess. R. Mos. in lib. Mitsworth haggadol. par. 2. præ. 16.

b. To him which is sick and draweth towards death, they say, Confess. Mos. in Misnoth, par. 2. præ. 16.

adjudged to die, or otherwise chastised, their custom was to exact, as Joshua did of Achan, open confession; "My son, now give glory to the Lord God of Israel; confess unto him, and declare unto me what thou hast committed; conceal it not from me."

Concerning injuries and trespasses, which happen between men, they highly commend such as will acknowledge before

many.

It is in him which repenteth accepted as an high sacrifice, if he will confess before many, make them acquainted with his oversights, and reveal the transgressions which have passed between him and any of his brethren; saying, I have verily offended this man, thus and thus I have done unto him; but behold I do now repent and am sorry. Contrariwise, whosoever is proud, and will not be known of his faults, but cloaketh them, is not yet come to perfect repentance; for so it is written, "He that hides his sins shall not prosper:" which words of Solomon they do not further extend, than only to sins committed against men, which are in that respect meet before men to be acknowledged particularly. But in sins between man and God, there is no necessity that man should himself make any such open and particular recital of them; to God they are known, and of us it is required, that we cast not the memory of them carelessly and loosely behind our backs, but keep in mind, as near as we can, both our own debt, and his grace which remitteth the same.

Wherefore, to let pass Jewish confession, and to come unto them which hold confession in the ear of the priest commanded, yea, commanded in the nature of a sacrament, and thereby so necessary that sin without it cannot be pardoned; let them find such a commandment in Holy Scripture, and we ask no more.

6.

Josh. vii.

19.

John the Baptist was an extraordinary person; his birth, his actions of life, his office extraordinary. It is therefore recorded for the strangeness of the act, but not set down as an everlasting law for the world, That to him Jerusalem and Matt. iii. all Judea made confession of their sins; besides, at the time of this confession, their pretended sacrament of repentance, as they grant, was not yet instituted; neither was it sin after baptism which penitents did there confess. When that which befell the seven sons of Sceva, for using the name of our Lord Jesus Christ in their conjurations, was notified to Jews and 18.

Acts xi...

18.

8.

Grecians in Ephesus, it brought an universal fear upon them, insomuch that divers of them, which had believed before, but not obeyed the laws of Christ, as they should have done, being terrified by this example, came to the apostle, and confessed their wicked deeds. Which good and virtuous act no wise man, as I suppose, will disallow, but commend highly in them, whom God's good Spirit shall move to do the like when need requireth. Yet neither hath this example the force of any general commandment or law, to make it necessary for every man to pour into the ears of the priest whatsoever hath been done amiss, or else to remain everlastingly culpable and guilty of sin; in a word, it proveth confession practised as a virtuous act, but not commanded as a sacrament.

Jam. v. 14. Now concerning St. James's exhortation, whether the former branch be considered, which saith, "Is any sick among you? let him call for the ancients of the church, and let them make their prayers for him;" or the latter, which stirreth up all Christian men unto mutual acknowledgment of faults amongst themselves," Lay open your minds, make your confessions one to another;" is it not plain, that the one hath relation to that gift of healing, which our Saviour promised his Mark xvi. church, saying, "They shall lay their hands on the sick, and the sick shall recover health;" relation to that gift of healing, whereby the apostle imposed his hands on the father of Acts xxviii. Publius, and made him miraculously a sound man; relation, finally, to that gift of healing, which so long continued in practice after the apostles' times; that whereas the NovatianAmb. de ists denied the power of the church of God in curing sin pœnitentia, after baptism, St Ambrose asked them again, "Why it might not as well prevail with God for spiritual as for corporal and bodily health; yea, wherefore (saith he) do ye yourselves lay hands on the diseased, and believe it to be a work of benediction or prayer, if haply the sick person be restored to his former safety?" And of the other member, which toucheth mutual confession, do not some of themselves, as namely Cajetan, deny, that any other confession is meant, than only that "which seeketh either association of prayers, or reconciliation, or pardon of wrongs?" Is it not confessed by the greatest part of their own retinue, that we cannot certainly affirm sacramental confession to have been meant or spoken of in this place? Howbeit, Bellarmine delighted to run a course by himself where colourable shifts of wit will but make the way

lib. i. c. 7.

Annot. Rhem.

in Jac. 5.

i. 9.

passable, standeth as formally for this place, and not less for that in St. John, than for this. St. John saith, "If we con- 1 John fess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness:" doth St. John say, If we confess to the priest, God is righteous to forgive; and, if not, that our sins are unpardonable? No, but the titles of God, just and righteous, do import that he pardoneth sin only "for his promise-sake: And there is not (they say) any promise of forgiveness upon confession made to God without the priest;" not any promise, but with this condition, and yet this condition no where expressed.

Is it not strange, that the Scripture, speaking so much of repentance, and of the several duties which appertain thereunto, should ever mean, and no where mention, that one condition, without which all the rest is utterly of none effect? or will they say, because our Saviour hath said to his ministers, "Whose sins ye retain," &c. and because they can remit no more than what the offenders have confessed, that therefore, by the virtue of his promise, it standeth with the righteousness of God to take away no man's sins until, by auricular confession, they be opened unto the priest.

They are men that would seem to honour antiquity, and none more to depend upon the reverend judgment thereof. I dare boldly affirm, that for many hundred years after Christ the fathers held no such opinion; they did not gather by our Saviour's words any such necessity of seeking the priest's absolution from sin by secret and (as they now term it) sacramental confession. Public confession they thought necessary by way of discipline, not private confession, as in the nature of a sacrament, necessary.

For to begin with the purest times, it is unto them which read and judge without partiality a thing most clear, that the ancient ouoλoynois, or confession, designed by Tertullian to be a discipline of humiliation and submission, framing men's behaviour in such sort as may be fittest to move pity; the confession which they used to speak of in the exercise of repentance was made openly in the hearing of the whole, both ecclesiastical, consistory, and assembly.

This is the reason wherefore he perceiving that divers

a 'Plerosque hoc opus ut publicationem sui aut suffugere, aut de die in diem differre, præsumo pudoris magis memores quam salutis, velut illi qui, in partibus verecundioribus corporis contracta vexatione, conscientiam medentium vitant, et ita cum erubescentia sua pereunt. Tert. de pœnitentia.