112
has recoiled £rom the unimpressible substance of
popery, and left it in the grossness, as well as reality,
of its own unchanged and unchangeable vitiosity.
It is remarkable, and frightfully characteristic, that
this little volume of 94 pages terminates with the
recital of the constitution of Benedict XIV* De
Denunciandis ConfessariiSy Pienitentes ad inhO'
nesta Sf turpia solliciUintibus, kc. This is the last
papal Constitution on the subject : but it is not the
last recognition of it, nor the last unavailing eflfort
to stem the profligacy, which is the joint result of
compulsory celibacy in the Confessor, and compul*
sory obligation to confess in all — or, on this sub-
ject, the eompuUory system in the church of
Borne. The tractate, in order to appear with all
due authority, ends with the words Authenticitatem
testar^ and the autograph, Broussen, Secret.*
It may not be amiss to add, by way of rather
oddly circumstanced contrast, that i have a little
piece entitled Begulae Ordinationes et Constitutiones
Cancellariae Apostoliccc Sanctissimi D. N. D. Leonis
Divina Frovidentia Papae XII. Bomse MDCccxxiii^
Typis Beverendae Cameree Apostolicse. The reader
will fitnd nothing here to oticnci him in point of
crime, or the description of it; except, indeed, the
voracious cupidity, which all the Begulations
breathe, may impress him with the feeling, that the
- The reader may sec a pjeat deal, instructive in one Knie^
lespecting iieserved Ca^es in X>enfi's Tiieology, vi, 261^—325^
