- gotten to lock that door? A hasty survey
revealed that nothing had been taken away, and the policeman was dismissed. Should he confess the delinquency? It was almost sure dismissal. But he resolved to make a clean breast of it, and when his employer came in later he told all the circumstances, and bravely admitted that he must have failed to lock the door. While making this confession, the policeman walked in, to report finding the door unlocked. But his report had been forestalled, and, with an injunction to be more careful in future, the matter was dismissed. The confession forestalling that report was all that saved dismissal. But that confession won the confidence of his employer, and won a higher trust and esteem than existed before. This is one of the first lessons to learn. Confess instantly a fault, a loss, a mistake, and it is half retrieved.—James T. White, "Character Lessons."
(518)
See Falsehood.
Among the hard-working Labrador fishermen was a rich man who had opprest them, but whom they believed to be strong enough to defy them. Dr. Wilfred Grenfell, the medical missionary, who is also a magistrate, went to the offender and told him that he must confess his sin and pay back to the fishermen a thousand dollars. He curst the missionary. At the next church service, the doctor announced that a sinful man would confess his sin that night. They couldn't believe that the rich sinner would yield. At the evening service, Dr. Grenfell asked them to keep their seats while he went after the sinner. He found the man at a brother's house on his knees in prayer, with all the family.
"Prayer," said the doctor, "is a good thing in its place, but it doesn't 'go' here. Come with me."
He meekly went, and was led up the aisle, where all could see him, and, after the doctor had described the great sin of which he was guilty, he asked, "Did you do this thing?" "I did." "You are an evil man of whom the people should beware?" "I am." "You deserve the punishment of man and God?" "I do."
At the end of it all the doctor told the man that the good God would forgive him if he should ask in true faith and repentance, but that the people, being human, could not. For a whole year, he charged the people, they must not speak to that man; but if, at the end of that time, he had shown an honest disposition to mend his ways, they might take him to their hearts.
The man finally paid the money and fled the place.
(519)
CONFESSION NOT CONCLUSIVE
Two men named Boven were convicted in
a Vermont court, mainly upon their own confession,
of the murder of a half-witted dependent
brother-in-law. They even said that
certain bones found were those of the supposed
victim. But the brother-in-law was
found alive and well in New Jersey, and returned
in time to prevent the execution. He
had fled for fear they would kill him. The
bones were those of some animal. They
(the Bovens) had been advised by some misjudging
friends that, as they would certainly
be convicted upon the circumstances proved,
their only chance for life was by commutation
of punishment, and this depended upon
their making a penitential confession. These
and many similar cases have satisfied English
and American lawyers that confessions
alone are unreliable as evidences of guilt.
When it is known that one accused, especially
one charged with a capital offense,
intends to make a confession, it is the practise
in our courts to delay the trial in order
to give him ample time to decide whether
or no he will pursue that course.—Boston
Globe.
(520)
CONFESSION, UNREPENTANT
A sergeant was accused, once upon a time,
by his brethren of the court, of having degraded
their order by taking from a client
a fee in copper, and on being solemnly arraigned
for this offense in their common
hall, it appears from the unwritten reports
of the Court of Common Pleas, that he defended
himself by the following plea of confession
and avoidance: "I fully admit that
I took a fee from the man in copper, and
not one, but several, and not only in copper,
but fees in silver; but I pledge my honor
as a sergeant, that I never took a single fee
from him in silver until I had got all his
gold, and that I never took a fee from him
in copper until I had got all his silver, and
you don't call that a degradation of our order!"
(Text.)—Croake James, "Curiosities
of Law and Lawyers."
(521)
CONFESSIONS
The Rev. Jonathan Goforth gives some striking instances of the confes-
