[1485] Notes 57 and 229, pp. 452, 549.
[1486] Concil. Trident. Sess. XXIV. De Reform. Matrim. c. viii.—It requires some artful special pleading on the part of Rivera and of the authorities on whom he relies to reconcile this Mexican laxity with the instructions of the council of Trent.
[1487] For the brutal details of the questions which the confessor was required to ask of his penitents, female as well as male, see Burchardi Decretorum Lib. XIX. c. v. I dare not give even a specimen.
[1488] Concil. I. Toletan. ann. 398 can. vi. For the custom of the early church in the matter of the confession of sins, see Socrates, H. E. V. xix., and Sozomen, H. E. VII. xvi.—In the ninth century it was still an open question whether sacerdotal confession was necessary, v. Concil. Cabillon. II. ann. 813 c. xxxiii. (Cf. c. xxv. xxxii.). It was finally settled and auricular confession made obligatory by the Council of Lateran in 1215 (Concil. Lateranens. IV. ann. 1215 c. xxi.).
[1489] Gratian. Caus. xxx. q. i. can. 8—I accept this decretal as genuine on Jaffé’s authority, though its authenticity seems to me more than doubtful.
[1490] Gratian. Caus. xxx. q. i. can. 9, 10.
[1491] See ante, passim, especially p. 350.
[1492] Calixti II. Serm. I. de S. Jacob. (Migne’s Patrolog. T. 163 p. 1390).—The genuineness of these sermons has been doubted, but they are unquestionably, if not by Calixtus, by a writer nearly contemporary.
[1493] Perrens, Jérome Savonarole, p. 71. See also Cornelius Agrippa, De Vanitate Scientiar. c. lxiv.
[1494] Limborch Hist. Inquisitionis p. 34.