PART II.

ON DIRECTION IN GENERAL, AND ESPECIALLY IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY.

[CHAPTER I.]

Resemblances and Differences between the seventeenth and nineteenth Centuries—Christian Art—It is we who have restored the Church—What the Church adds to the Power of the Priest—The Confessional

Confession—Present Education of the Young Confessor—The Priest in the Middle Ages—1st, believed—2ndly, was mortified—3rdly, knew—4thly, interrogated less—The Dangers of the Young Confessor—How he Strengthens his Tottering Position

[CHAPTER III.]

Confession—The Confessor and the Husband—How they Detach the Wife—The Director—Directors in Concert—Ecclesiastical Policy

[CHAPTER IV.]

Habit—Power of Habit—Its Insensible Beginning; its Progress—Second Nature; often fatal—A Man taking Advantage of his Power—Can we get clear of it?

[CHAPTER V.]

On Convents—Omnipotence of the Director—Condition of the Nuns, Forlorn and Wretched—Convents made Bridewells and Bedlams—Captation—Barbarous Discipline; Struggle between the Superior Nun and the Director; Change of Directors—The Magistrate

[CHAPTER VI.]

Absorption of the Will—Government of Acts, Thoughts, and Wills—Assimilation of the Soul—Transhumanation—To become the God of another—Pride and Desire

[CHAPTER VII.]

Desire. Terrors of the other World—The Physician and his Patient—Alternatives; Postponements—Effects of Fear in Love—To be All-powerful and Abstain—Struggles between the Spirit and the Flesh—Moral Death more Potent than Physical Life—It will not revive