the depraved affections of the heart; a fruit which, it is evident, they alone can derive from them, who satisfy for themselves. Of these particulars touching the three parts of penance, contrition, confession, and satisfaction, it is the duty of the pastor to give an ample and clear exposition.
The confessor, however, will be scrupulously careful, before N he absolves the penitent whose confession he has heard, to insist that ii he has been really guilty ot having injured his neighbour in property or character, he make reparation for the injury: promised no person is to be absolved until he has first faithfully promised to repair fully the injury done; and, as there are many who, although free to make large promises to comply with their duty in this respect, are yet deliberately determined not to fulfil them, they should be obliged to make restitution, and the words of the Apostle are to be strongly and frequently pressed upon upon their minds: " He that stole,, let him now steal no more; but rather let him labour working with his hands the thing which is good, that he may have something to give to him that suffereth need." [1]
But, in imposing penance, the confessor will do nothing arbitrarily; he will be guided solely by justice, prudence, and piety; and in order to follow this rule, and also to impress more deeply on the mind of the penitent the enormity of sin, he will find it expedient to remind him of the severe punishments inflicted by the ancient penitential canons, as they are called, for certain sins. The nature of the sin, therefore, will regulate the extent of the satisfaction: but no satisfaction can be more salutary than to require of the penitent to devote, for a certain number of days, a certain portion of time to prayer, not omit ting to supplicate the divine mercy in behalf of all mankind, and particularly for those who have departed this life in the Lord. Penitents should, also, be exhorted to undertake of their own accord, the frequent performance of the penances usually imposed by the confessor, and so to order the tenor of their future lives that, having faithfully complied with every thing which the sacrament of Penance demands, they may never cease studiously to practise the virtue of penance. But, should it be deemed proper sometimes to visit public crimes with public penance, and should the penitent express great reluctance to submit to its performance, his importunity is not to be readily yielded to: he should be persuaded to embrace with cheerfulness that which is so salutary to himself and to others. These things, which regard the sacrament of Penance and its several parts, the pastor will teach in such a manner as to enable the faithful not only to understand them perfectly, but, also, with the Divine assistance, piously and religiously to reduce them to practice.
- ↑ Ephes. iv. 28.
