CONFESSION.
[To TON EDITOR OF TER esrserAeos.1 SIR,—The Church has always laid great stress on the duty of Confession, but has it ever confessed its own sins P Has the odium theologicum which has passed into a proverb ever been seriously condemned by the Church, and its record of wrong and robbery repented of in any true sense of the word P Has not the tendency been to absolve itself rather than to submit the case to the one great Tribunal, at which justice, mercy, and truth are the assessors of the judge P Casuistry holds no brief in that Court. Palliation is a threadbare cloak against the accusing conscience. There is something in the Confessional akin to the prevailing faith in panaceas adver- tised widely as cures for all the diseases flesh is heir to. The true physician will have none of them. He rather 'wonders that a Government, which should make good citizenship the very test of efficacy, permits the dissemination of falsehood and draws revenue from it. And the question at once occurs, Has the Government ever confessed its blunders, or does it still glory in its shame P It is perfectly obvious that our present unrest is directly due to the action of a Government which has passed laws in the name of Liberalism restricting liberty in countless directions and setting up judges whose competence is unassured to decide matters of which they are imperfectly informed. The give-and-take between man and man, the friendliness which should make all relations easy and helpful, has given place to a network of arbitrations, involving endless expense and turning society into offensive and defensive bodies of inspectors and inspected. France is apparently reacting against an epidemic of soft sentimentality, and rightly attributing to it the reign of the bandit ; and England, in turn, must confess that injustice and tyranny are only producing their legitimate fruits.
" Who made me a ruler and a judge P" said Christ. He meant, You are your own ruler and your own judge. It is not for you to judge others : judge yourself. It is time the whole nation should humble itself, and confess its sins, not only publicly, but in the silent sessions which bring us face to face with ourselves.
The Black Prince's motto is the motto for the day, and
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