Temporall pains to be imposed upon the Penitent to the end he the Penitent may satisfy on his part according to his power and for other reasons which we shall speak of In the undertaking of this Temporall punishment consists the satisfaction whereof we speak in this place which is the third part of Penance CHAP. II. That God pardoning the Sin obliges to a temporal Punishment THis is a fundamental truth in the matter of satisfaction and it is very necessary to understand it well that we may know what satisfaction or a Penance is and how much it imports us to comply with it I said above that God ordinarily makes use of the second sort of reconciliation which imposeth an obligation at least to suffer some punishment for sin which is easy to be proved He hath always practiced this in the Old Testament Nay even from the beginning of the World. When he pardoned the first man his sin it was upon condition to do Penance by labour to which he condemned him and in effect it was a very severe Penance which continued all his Life When he pardoned David his sins of Adultery and Murther he told him by his Prophet that he should be chastised by the death of his Child and he remitted him nothing of all the menaces with which he threatned him by the same Prophet That he himself should see the dishonour of his house the dissention amongst his Children and other misfortunes which were foretold him and all which came to pass For this reason the Penitents of the Old Testament when they begged of God pardon of their sins they never as much as ask'd to be exempt from all punishment but only not to be chastised according to the rigour of the divine justice they desired to avoid his fury and the more fignal effects of his wrath but they submitted themselves to the fatherly correction he should be pleased to impose upon them Reprehend me not O Lord said David Psal 27. in thy Fury nor punish me in thy Wrath. And a little after he declares that he is ready to do Penance and to suffer for his Sins ibid. v. 18. Ecce ego in flagella paratus Sum I am prepared saith he for Scourges Another begs of God that he will Chastise him but not in his Fury Corripe me Domine veruntamen in judicio non in furore Hierem 10.24 There are a vast number of the like examples in the old Testament which shew evidently that God doth not pardon Sins but with an obligation to do Penance and that the Penitents of that time never pretended nor required to be exempt from suffering for their Sins Yea even there have been some of the most illuminated amongst them who have sounded into the depth of the punishment which God hath reserved to himself in the other Life and who knew that God punished after death the Sins of the just which had not been sufficiently expiated during Life So Judas Machabeus not only a great Captain but also high Priest of the Law after a signal Victory sent orders to Jerusalem to offer Sacrifice for the sins of the faithfull who had been slain in that fight And the Scripture 2. Mach. 12.46 approves that action as an holy and wholsome thought assuring us that by prayers and Sacrifices the dead are released from their Sins But this cannot be understood of Sin as to the fault or the eternall punishment which cannot be remitted after Death no more then the fault from whence it springs It must then be understood of the Temporall punishment which the dead ought to satisfy for in the other Life and from which they may be released by the Prayers and Sacrifices of the Living As to the new Law here also God hath still continued the same manner of receiving Christians into his Grace in obliging them to satisfaction by temporal punishment and that with so much more reason as the Law they profess is more holy and more perfect This is the Reason why our Saviour hath said Mat. 12.35 that at the day of Judgment we must give account of the least Sins as idle words This sentence shall be given after death There we shall give an account of our sins there to receive the punishment This shall not at all be an eternall punishment for they will not at all deserve it it must then be a temporall punishment which must be undergone and by which we must satisfy in the other Life if we have not satisfyed during this Hence also it is that the same Son of God by giving to his Apostles power to remit and retain sins hath also given that of binding and loosing Sinners This power of binding reacheth to many things but amongst others it contains the Power of obliging Penitents to make satisfaction for their sins and in releasing them from the bonds of the guilt and eternall punishment it imposes upon them a temporall pain for the satisfaction of the Divine Justice Thus the Church hath always urderstood that power of binding as the Council of Trent hath declared Ses 14. c. 8. adding Can. 15. an Anathema to those that hold the contrary This is the cause why the same Church which is infallible in the interpretation of the sentiments of her Spouse hath always made use of this power from the Apostles even unto this present time having always received Sinners unto the Sacrament of Penance by imposing upon them wholsome penances for their sins For which she her self hath made rules and Canons prescribing different penances for different sorts of Sins CHAP. III. Excellent reasons out of the Council of Trent to shew why God remitting the Sin by Penance obligeth the Penitent Sinner to a Temporal Punishment THe holy Council of Trent treating of Penance brings so efficacious and moving reasons to evince this truth that to omit them here Theotime would be to deprive you of a signal satisfaction It draws the first from the great equity of the Divine Justice which treats those in a different manner who are differently or unequally guilty as those are who have sinned before Baptisme and those who have offended after they have received it For as concerning the former as they have sinned with more ignorance and without having received so many graces as Christians have God remits them by Baptisme not only all their Sins but also all the punishment which he might justly exact in satisfaction for them granting them an absolute and entire pardon or an act of oblivion and indemnity of all that is passed in favour of their entrance into Christian Religion But he treats otherwise with them who relapse into sin after Baptisme whose faults are infinitly greater because then they have a clearer knowlege of the sin and offend after they have been delivered from the Slavery of Sin and the Devil After they have received the grace of the Holy Ghost by which there Soul became the dwelling place of God so that by sinning they violate the Temple of
count not many from the time they return'd unto his favour before they return to the offences by which they lost it Thus they pass all their Life Confessing from time to time and continually returning to Mortal Sin after Confession So that their whole life seems to be but one as it were continued Series or Succession of Confession and Relapses into Mortal Sin Now and then to Confess to give their Conscience a little ease and free it from some heinous Crime by this way of proceeding seems to be only a disposition to enslave it in some other yet more enormous Sin As if the Sacrament were instituted only for the remission of past Sins and not at all to give us strength to avoid them for the future Good God Theotime Is it possible that Christians believing Christians should be guilty of this disorder That men endued with the light of Faith should treat God after this unreasonable and unworthy manner Is this to understand the nature of the Sacrament of Penance what it is Is this to believe that it is a Sacrament of reconciliation with God not only by way of truce or for a time but after the manner of a perpetual or eternal peace is this to form a right judgment of his unlimited power not to value his favour and Friendship or do they as indeed their repeated and customary offences speak it believe him only infinite in his attribute of Mercy but not of Justice so easily to withdraw themselves from that Grace to which by his only Mercy they have been admitted Did God only seldom and with much difficulty receive us again into his favour after we had offended him every one would stand upon his guard one would be afraid to fall again into his dis-favour and to hazzard his Eternal Salvation by an unfortunate relapse But being we think we shall be re-admitted into his favour when we please and that there is no more to be done than to present our selves to him in the Sacrament of Penance to receive remission of our Sins we take the freedom to offend him on all occasions Thus we treat our God and thus we take a motive from his goodness to continue to offend him and to neglect that Sacred tye of his Friendship to that degree as every moment to break its bonds An affront one would not offer to the most contemptible Person living See then Theotime and consider well of what great consequence this Subject is and how it deserves to be solidly treated and requires also your serious reflection CHAP. II. How the relapse into Sin is a very great evil ALL what I have said doth sufficiently evince the greatness and enormity of this evil yet that you may be the more fully persuaded of it it is necessary that you learn it from the Holy Ghost himself and by those lights he hath vouchsafed to shew us in Holy Writ First the Wise Man in the 26th Chapter verse 25 of Ecclesiasticus considering the greatness of this evil declares that he cannot behold it without a just indignation He saith then that there are two things which when they happen grieve him very much the one to see a great Warriour after he hath served a long time in the Campagne reduc't to Poverty the other to see a Wise Man despised instead of being esteemed according to his merit But he adds that the third he is not able to endure and that it causes in him a transport of the highest wrath that is to see a man who falls from the State of Justice and Sanctity to that of Sin and who abandons Virtue to follow Vice and he assures us that God will make that Person feel one day the effects of his Justice In another place he exclaims against those who forsake the path of Virtue and give themselves over to Vice. Eccle. 2.16 Woe be to you who have forsaken the right and have declined into perverse ways what will you do when God shall examine your ways and all the actions of your Life The Apostle St Peter 2. Ep. 2.20 inveighs with much zeal against those who return to sin after they have renounc't it by the Profession of Christianity and declares that they fall back into a far worse State or Condition than the former from whence they were deliver'd by their Conversion which was a State of darkness and Sin. That it had been better for them they had never known the Truth than to have forsaken it after they had known it That their relapse into Sin makes them resemble the Dog which returns to his vomit and the Hog which after he hath been wash'd wallows in the mire What could be more emphatically said against the relapse into Sin yet it is the Holy Ghost himself who speaks it Add also that which he hath spoken upon this Subject by the Council of Trent in those excellent words which we cited above in the Fourth Part the third Chapter in which he describes with much energy the enormity of their fault who relapse into Sin after Baptism He remarks four notorious circumstances which aggravate their first relapse The first is that they sin after that they have been once delivered from the Slavery of Sin and the Devil Mark this word Once 2. That they sin after they have received the Grace of the Holy Ghost 3. That they sin with knowledge or knowingly 4. That in sinning they violate the Temple of God and contristate his Holy Spirit CHAP. III. Of three great indignities which are found in the Sin of relapse The Ingratitude The Perfidiousness and the Contempt of God. THis is to shew you yet more clearly the grievousness of the Sin of relapse from three circumstances which it includes and which render it most enormous The first is a prodigious Ingratitude which it discovers towards God in offending him over and over after innumerable benefits received from his hand and above the rest after he hath been by God's pure Mercy deliver'd not only once or twice but many times from Sin and eternal death Ponder well upon this ingratitude Theotime judge what it is for a Slave to be ungratefull to his Lord his Redeemer to him to whom he owes all he hath in fine to God himself If the Councill of Trent exaggerate with such vigour the first sin which one commits after Baptism upon this only account that it offends God after one hath been once deliver'd from the captivity of Sin and the Devil Semel a peccati Daemonis Servitute liberate What would they say of those who fall back into sin after they have been delivered from it not once but many times only by the Sacrament of Penance Was there ever an ingratitude parallel to this Deut. 32.6 Haeccine reddis Domino Popule stulte insipiens O Christian Souls is it thus that you treat your God Must you not have lost all your judgment and understanding to be thus forgetfull of the infinite favours of your Creator and
will and there is no will where there is no knowledge Thus when Noe by drinking Wine at first was overseen his excess in drink was not a Sin because he knew not then the force of wine nor could know it Secondly when ignorance proceeds from our fault by an express will or grosse and affected ignorance it neither takes away nor diminishes at all the Sin on the contrary it rather augments it The reason is because he that desires the cause desires also the effect If then I desire to be ignorant of the evil that is in an action and it happen by that ignorance that I Sin more freely and without remorse I am the voluntary cause of the Sin whose enormity I would not know Such was the ignorance of the unchast old men in the History of Susanna of whom it is said Dan. 13.9 That they cast down their Eyes that they might not see Heaven nor remember the Judgments of God. Such is the ignorance of those that will not be instructed in what they ought to know nor advertised of the evil they do and who will not understand to do well As the Prophet saith Psal 35.4 This is what frequently happens to young People Thirdly as the total ignorance of any evil in an action taketh away all the Sin when it doth not proceed from our fault so the ignorance of the part of the evil in which is a Sin takes away part that is diminisheth the Sin This is to be understood of that ignorance which doth not proceed from our fault nor is it in our power to be better instructed Such is the ignorance of young People when they begin to fall into Sins of impurity for they know well enough that there is ill in it which appears by the doubts they have in their Conscience and by the shame they have to Confess But they do not understand that the ill is so great as in reality it is untill such time as they are instructed and till then their Sins are not so great altho' they be almost always Mortal Sins ARTICLE II. Of Sins of Frailty or of Passion THe Sins of frailty are those which proceed from the will moved with some passion Passions are actions of the sensitive Appetite which is an inferiour part of the Soul and moves towards things forbidden by the law of God such as are Love Hatred Sadness Fear Anger Some push on the Soul to do that which is forbidden it as Love Hatred Joy Choler others withdraw it from doing the good which is commanded as Fear Sadness Despair Those cause the Sins of Action These the Sins of Omission Passions diminish the liberty of the will because being push'd on or withdrawn by other causes then by her self she doth not act with all the liberty she hath in that action either to do or not do what she will. Besides these Passions diminish also the judgment hindring the understanding which guides the will from judging of things so clearly as otherwise it would They diminish by consequence the Sin which is found in an action or omission and this differently sometimes less sometimes more and sometimes totally and othertimes they diminish them not at all but rather augment them They diminish sometimes but little when they are but light and the will may easily overcome them They diminish the Sin much when they are strong and violent because for that time they notoriously diminish the judgment and liberty however as long as they leave man with the knowledge of the evil which he does the Sin continues still They totally take away the Sin when they are so violent that they totally cloud the reason so that one doth not perceive at all that there is a Sin which never happens but in the first motions of passion which being a little appeas'd the mind returns to it self and knows what it has done and from thenceforward he Sins if he continues in his Passion In fine Passions do not at all diminish the Sin when they are voluntary and this happens when they are willingly excited or when one entertains them and endeavours to augment them as it happens too often and in this case they are not Sins of Passion but of malice ARTICE III. Of Sins of Malice BY Sins of Malice we do not understand here Sins which are maliciously committed whether purely to displease God or for the sole pleasure which one takes in doing ill These Sins are rather Sins of Devils then men and those who are so unfortunate as to Sin thus begin in this world to live the life of Devils which God often punisheth also with the punishment of Devils which is Obstinacy and Impenitence These are the Sins which our Saviour calls Mat. 12.32 Sins against the holy Ghost which are neither forgiven in this world nor the next Sins of Malice whereof I speak in this place are those which are committed without Ignorance and without Passion that is with full knowledg and entire liberty and they are called Sins of Malice because being commited neither out of ignorance nor passion they proceed only from the ill inclination of the will which scruples not to offend God upon condition it may compass the enjoyment of its Pleasures or other sensible content which it seeks by Sin. These Sins are very great and highly displeasing in the sight of God being they have nothing to excuse them as the two former had These must be Confessed very exactly declaring fully this circumstance that they committed them knowing well what they did and on set purpose and it is necessary that they do great pennance for them As these Sins are great so they ought to be rare and unheard of amongst Christians but it happens by a sad misfortune that there is nothing more common And if the lives of men were well examined the greatest part of Sins would be found to be Sins of Malice For as concerning Ignorance tho' much of it is found amongst the ordinary Sins of men and for that reason it is said that every man that Sins is ignorant How often doth it happen that the ignorance with which they Sin is affected and voluntary one searches after it expressly and with design he will be ignorant of that which he is obliged too know he will not be instructed he fears to look too narrowly into his own actions and he obliged to the good by the knowledge which he shall have of it To do thus is it not to desire the Sin upon set purpose and out of malice for this reason they fly all those things that may instruct them as reading of Books Sermons or amongst Preachers they care not for those that reprehend vice or discover the ablest Ghostly Father They seek the less understanding and most indulgent They do not consult at all about the doubts of Conscience or if they do they discover not all they seek after favourable resolutions to indulge themselves in remiss false opinions they frame a Conscience to
in effect it be not it follows that I shall not sin at all in committing it I answer that this is sometimes true when this erroneous judgment proceeds from an innocent ignorance or where there was no sault at all of ours or that it was not in our power to be instructed in the contrary But if this errour arise from a culpable ignorance and because we would not be better informed as it often happens in this case it doth not at all excuse the sin as 't is above said As concerning doubt this also is very often the cause of sin and it concerns us to know it We call that a doubt when one is uncertain whether an action or omission be a sin or no. This doubt is either very great or small or betwixt both it is very great when it inclines the judgment to determine that it is a Sin light when it rather resolves that it is not mean or betwixt both when it hangs in suspence and we know not on which side to incline the ballance Hence it is easy to tell when a doubt causes a Sin and when not A very strong doubt makes an action or omission a sin because it is esteemed as much as a judgment A light doubt doth not make a thing to be a sin in as much as it doth not at all destroy the contrary credence by which one believes there is no sin in it As for the doubt which is in the middle betwixt these two and which leaves the judgment in a totall uncertainty neither being able to affirm nor deny it is so far from excusing from sin that he who in this doubt resolves to do an action or omission which he doubts whether it be a Mortall sin or no sins Mortally The reason is because acting in that formall doubt he is supposed to desire it such as it might be in it self and as it might be evill he was resolved to do it in case it were so This deserves to be carefully remembered CHAP. XVI Of the Sins which we Commit in others WE are not only guilty of those sins which we commit by our selves but also of those which we commit by others that is of sins which others commit through our fault These Sins are often very heinous and of great consequence These are those of which David speaks when he says Psal 18.13 Cleanse me O Lord from my hidden Sins and pardon thy Servant from those which I commit in others Yet there is nothing more common amongst men nor of which they take less care for want of sufficient knowledge or understanding of the different ways by which one may concur to anothers Sin. Wherefore I shall here treat of them breifly To sin by another is to be the voluntary and culpable cause of the Sin which another commits I say voluntary and culpable because if we are the cause of the sin of another without our fault we do not Sin Now we may be the cause of the sin of another two ways positively and negatively by action or by omission By action when we do or say something which induceth our neighbour to sin By omission when we are wanting to say or do something that might hinder our neighbour from offending God. I said when we do or say to denote two ways whereby we may cause sin in another positively viz. by our actions and by our words By our actions which give ill example to our neighbour or an occasion to offend God. By words which induce others to evil The first way is called the sin of scandall the second inducement to evil The first happens as often as we do any action which is either wicked or esteemed so which we know or ought to know that it will be the cause that our neighbour will offend God. The second happens different ways viz. by Teaching Commanding Concealing and Soliciting to Sin by Entreaties Threats c. The One and the Other of these ways are very common amongst men and probably are the cause of the greatest part of those sins which are dayly committed The Son of God saith Mat. 18.7 Vae mundo a Scandalis necesse est enim ut veniant Scandale Veruntamen vae homini illi per quem Scandalum venit c. That it is a great misfortune that the world should be so filled with scandalls as it is and that this cannot otherwise be then a most lamentable case for him who causeth the scandall and that it were better for a man to have a Millstone tyed to his neck and cast into the bottom of the Sea then to give Scandall unto his neighbour that is then to make him fall into sin Besides this way of positively contributing to the sin of another by actions or words there is another which we may call negative which happens when any one refrains from doing or saying something which might hinder our neighbour from offending God. For not to hinder one from sinning when we may is to be the cause of the Sin of another This happens in many cases of which we shall discourse hereafter at the end of the examen of Sins The Fourth Part of the Treatise of Penance which is Satisfaction CHAP. I. What Satisfaction is IT is the third part of Penance which consists in doing or suffering something to repair in some manner the offence or injury which is done to God by Sin. I say to repair in some manner because the great reparation for Sin was performed by the Son of God who by his Precious Blood and Death hath exactly repaired the injury which Sin did to God and merited a generall Pardon of all the punishment which the Divine Justice could require This reparation hath opened and facilitated a way to a reconciliation with God after Sin. For as much as the merits of our Saviour being applyed to us as they are by the Sacraments of Baptism and Penance restore us again to the Grace of God which we had lost and make us receive the remission of the eternall Punishment due to our Sins All this through the merits of Jesus Christ and by the vertue of the Satisfaction which he hath given to God the Father for the same Sins A satisfaction without which we should always have remained uncapable of satisfying God and by consequence of ever returning again into his Grace and Favour But as it is in his power who receives him again into his favour by whom he hath been offended to admit him on such conditions as himself shall think sit and either to remit him all the punishment or to oblige him to undergo only part of it it hath pleased the Divine wisdom in respect of us to make use of both the one and the other of these two ways of reconciliation tho' more ordinarily of the second For in Baptism he receives us into his Grace and remits us all the Punishment due to our Sins But in Penance he remits us indeed the Eternall punishment but still reserves some
I believe the Gospel I must also necessarily believe the Acts of the Apostles because the same Authority of the Catholick Church obliges to believe them both We may say the same of all the other truths which are proposed by the Church for if we believe one we ought also to believe the others because it is the same Authority and the same Church which proposes and gives us assurance of them both And the same St. Augustin l. 16. cont Faust c. 3. speaking of Hereticks and those who would give credit to nothing but their own will. You says he who in the Gospell believe what you please and what you like not reject You rather give credit to your selves then to the Gospell because when led by your private Spirit you approve what pleaseth and disapprove what displeases you in Scripture you do not at all submit your selves to the authority of holy writ there to find out your faith but rather you subject the Scripture to your selves to judge of it according to your will. In fine Faith ought to be firm that is fixed steddy and free from any at least voluntary doubt And this also for the same reason the infallible authority of the Church which proposes unto us the divine truths the objects of our Faith and cannot be deceived in what she proposes to us So that there is no more reason to doubt of any one truth then of all the rest And there is not a better way to dispell with ease the doubts which arise against any one article of our faith then to reflect upon the others which one believes with all the certainty imaginable which yet are no otherwise grounded then upon the same authority of the Church for if we do not doubt of those neither ought we to question these In all the doubts which may occur concerning any point or points of faith whether they arise from our own imaginations or spring from occasion of Heresy new doctrins or scandall given in the Church we ought to have recourse to this authority as to a secure refuge A refuge where we shall find the divine Protection against the contradiction of evill tongues as the Psalmist hath it and after him St. Augustin in those excellent words which he delivers upon that passage of Psa 30. exposi 2. Serm. 3. Preteges eos in tabernaculo tuo a condictione linguarum If you find tongues which contratradict you heresies raised up against you and divisions which oppose you have recourse to the Tabernacle of God adhere and stick fast to the Catholick Church do not depart from this rule of Truth and you shall be protected and guarded from the contradiction of tongues in the Tabernacle of God. Behold not only a wholsome but also a necessary advice which ought to be practised upon occasion of any doubts in faith and especially in the beginning of any heresy And had the hereticks of our time follow'd this good councell they would never so unfortunately have continued obstinate in their errour or drawn others into the same ruin as they have done CHAP. II. Of the things we are obliged to believe WE shall reduce them to four heads 1. The Divinity or what we are obliged to believe of God. 2. The Incarnation or the Humanity of the Son of God which shall comprehend what we are to be believe of Jesus Christ 3. The Church 4. The Sacraments These four things are all contained in the Apostles Creed ARTICLE I. What are we oblig'd to believe of God FOur things The First I believe in God that God is that is that there is one only true God who is an uncreated Being Eternall Independent Infinite in perfections in Knowledge in Power in Wisdom in Goodness in Justice and in all other things Secondly The Father Almighty and in his only Son I believe in the Holy Ghost that in God there are three Persons The Father the Son and the Holy Ghost That all these three are but one true God having the self same divine Essence the self same Wisdom the self same Goodness the self same Power and so of the other divine perfections That the Son the Eternal Word proceeds from the understanding of the Father by a perfect Knowledge which the Father conceives of himself by which he expresses his Image in the Son. And the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father and the Son by a Mutuall love which they bear one another That these Processions do not cause any inequality or dependence or priority amongst the Divine Persons who are all Equall and Eternall as being all but one only true God One in Nature and three in Persons Thirdly Creator of Heaven and Earth That God is the authour and creator of all things that he hath made both Heaven and Earth and all the creatures therein whether visible or invisible of nothing by his only word That he conserves them by his power and governs them by his wisdom Fourthly Life Everlasting That as he is the beginning and first cause so also he is the end of all things and particularly of Men and Angels whom he created to adore and serve him and for whom he hath prepared eternall happiness which will consist in this that the blessed shall see him perfectly and enjoy him as he is in himself and this enjoyment shall endure for all eternity it shall never no never end ARTICLE II. What are we obliged to believe of Jesus Christ FOR the greater facility and distinctions sake we shall divide this Article into Questions Quest I. What is Jesus Christ And in Jesus Christ his only Son. HE is the Son of God the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity who was Incarnate that is made Man for us men and for our Salvation But Quest II. Why was he made Man TO redeem man from the Sentence of everlasting death which we had all incurred by disobedience of the first man and to give full satisfaction to the Divine Justice as well for that first or Original Sin as for all the rest which have been committed ever since by other men Quest III. This Incarnation in what doth it consist Who was conceived of the Holy Ghost born of the Virgin Mary IT consists in the strict and personal union of the Eternall word with human nature that is with a mortall body and an immortall Soul such as we have from which union there results a compound whom we call Jesus Christ true God and at the same time true man. Whence it plainly follows that in Jesus Christ there are two Natures and one only Person viz. the one divine the other humane nature both united in one the same Person of the Son of God or the eternal word whereas on the contrary in the divinity there is but one Nature three Persons By this Union the Divinity was neither changed into the Humanity nor the Humanity into the Divinity of our Lord for that is impossible But both natures enjoying either of them their own perfections