Priests, Women, and Families

by Jules Michelet

In changing continually one confessor for another, merely on account of his being more gentle and indulgent than the former, we run the risk of falling very low in morality. To get the upper hand over so many accommodating directors, an entirely new standard of effeminacy and baseness is required. The new comer must entirely change the characters; and instead of being the judge, as formerly, at the bar of penitence, he must be a suppliant; justice will be obliged to plead before the sinner, and the divine man becomes the penitent!

The Jesuits, who by these means supplanted so many directors, bear witness, that in this sort of opposition they had no one to fear. They knew well enough, that no other would be found better qualified than a Jesuit for easy indulgence, disguised connivance, and subtilty to overreach the Deity. Father Cotton was so little afraid of his penitents leaving him, that, on the contrary, he used occasionally to advise them to go to the other confessors: "Go," said he, "go and try them; you will return to me!"

Only imagine this general emulation among confessors, directors, and consulting casuists, to justify everything, to find every day some adroit means of carrying indulgence still further, of declaring innocent some new case, that had hitherto been supposed guilty. The result of this manner of waging war against sin, emulously carried by so many learned men, was its gradual and universal disappearance from the common life of man; sin could no longer find a haven of refuge, and one might reasonably suppose that in a few years it would cease to exist in the world.

The great book of "Provinciales," with all the artifice of method, omits one thing, which we regret. In showing us the unanimity of the casuists, the author presents them, as it were, on the same line, and as contemporaries. It would have been more instructive to have dated them, and given to each his appointed period; and thus, according to his merits in the progressive development of casuistry, to show how they severally advanced towards perfection, outbidding, surpassing, and eclipsing one another.

In so great a rivalry, it was necessary to make every effort, and set all their wits to work. The penitent having the option, might become difficult. He wanted his absolution at a cheaper rate every day; and they who would not lower their price lost their customers. It was business that required a clever man to find out, in so great a relaxation, by what means further indulgence might be given. A fine, elastic, and indulgent science, that, instead of imposing rules, adapted itself to proportions, narrowing or widening, and taking measurement, as the case might be. Every progress of this kind, being carefully noted down served as a starting-post to go further. In countries that have once become aguish, fever produces fever; the sick inhabitant neglecting the precaution for preserving health, filth accumulates on filth, the waters form marshes, and the miasma grows stronger; a close, heavy, and noxious atmosphere oppresses the country. The people crawl or lie down. Do not speak to them of attempting any remedy; they are accustomed to the fever; they have had it on and off ever since their birth, and their forefathers had it. Why try remedies? The country has been in the same state from time immemorial; it would be almost a pity, according to these authorities, to make a change.

[[1]] The Apostle puts the matter thus:—Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in His sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin. But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets; even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for there is no difference: for all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God: being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in His blood, to declare His righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; to declare, I say, at this time His righteousness: that He might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus.—Rom. iii. 20-26.

[[2]] See in Léger, the vast system of espionage, intrigue, and secret persecution, that the first ladies of Piedmont and France had organised, under the direction of the Jesuits.

[[3]] Excepting the electrical moment of Gustavus-Adolphus.

[[4]] The term is a harsh one, and I am sorry for it. If this great artist paints war so cruelly, it is doubtless because he had more feeling than any of his contemporaries, and appreciates more keenly the horror of this terrible epoch.