Page:Faithcatholics.pdf/391

 as related by the historians, has been variously explained, he proceeds to say, that three points in it should be noticed: first, in regard to the Penitentiary, why, and when he was instituted: second, what was the confession made by the woman, private or public; and what was the penance enjoined her, public also or private : third, what office it was that Nectarius abrogated.

First: The Penitentiary, he says, was appointed in the third Century, about the time of the Decian persecution and the Novatian schism, when the number of those who fell from the faith was great, and their return to the Church, was, however, frequent. His office, therefore, was to attend principally to these sinners; to take care that they were not re-admitted till after due probation and due penance; and thus to ease the Bishop in the discharge of his duties. Other sinners fell under the same cognizance. The Penitentiary, therefore, was a censor morum; to whom belonged the inspection of general conduct, but particularly that of the public penitents.-Second: To this minister, the woman in question, first made the general confession of her sins, and, afterwards, the particular confession of the crime of fornication with the deacon, both which confessions, made at different times, he maintains, were private. Private also, he says, was the penance enjoined her, on both occasions, to perform. But the crime of the deacon transpired; the indignation of the people was excited; and the Bishop was advised to exercise his authority, as some imprudence of the Penitentiary, he thinks, had helped to make the crime public.—Third : Nectarius, on this deposed the minister: but this deposition or removal, he insists, was a temporary act, not a regulation meant to be permanent, which should affect the office itself, much less the practice of private and public confession, and of public and private penances. All these, he says, continued in full vigour as they were before. “The Bishop enacted no fixed Canon; but merely to satisfy the public