Chapter XI

SOME OF THE MATTERS ON WHICH THE PRIEST OF ROME MUST QUESTION HIS PENITENTS.

A CHAPTER FOR THE CONSIDERATION OF LEGISLATORS, HUSBANDS, AND FATHERS.

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Dens wants the confessors to interrogate on the following matters:--

1. "Peccant uxores, quæ susceptum viri semen ejiciunt, vel ejicere conantur." (Dens, tom. vii. p. 147).

2. "Peccant conjuges mortaliter, si copulâ inceptâ, cohibeant seminationem."

3. "Si vir jam seminaverit, dubium fit an femina lethaliter peccat, si se retrahat a seminando; aut peccat lethaliter vir non expectando seminationem uxoris." (p. 153).

4. "Peccant conjuges inter se circa actum conjugalem. Debet servari modus, sive situs; imo ut non servetur debitum vas, sed copula habeatur in vase præpostero, alioquoque non naturali. Si fiat accedendo a postero, a latere, stando, sedendo, vel si vir sit succumbus." (p. 166).

5. "Impotentia. Est incapacitas perficiendi copulam carnalem perfectam cum seminatione viri in vase se debito, seu, de se, aptam generationi. Vel, ut si mulier sit nimis arcta respectu unius viri, non respectu alterius". (vol. vii. p. 273).

6. "Notatur quod pollutio, in mulieribus possit perfici, ita ut semen earum non effluat extra membrum genitale.

Indicium istius allegat Billuart, si scilicet mulier sensiat seminis resolutionem cum magno voluptatis sensu, quâ completâ, passio satiatur" (vol. iv. p. 168).

7. "Uxor se accusans, in confessione, quod negaverit debitum, interrogetur an ex pleno rigore juris sui id petiverit" (vol. vii. p. 168).

8. "Confessarius poenitentem, qui confitetur se peccasse cum sacerdote, vel sollicitatam ab eo ad turpia, potest interrogare utrum ille sacerdos sit ejus confessarius, an in confessione sollitaverit" (vol. vi. p. 294).

There are a great many other unmentionable things on which Dens, in his fourth, fifth, and seventh volumes, requires the confessor to ask from his penitent, which I omit.

Now let us come to Liguori. That so-called Saint, Liguori is not less diabolically impure than Dens, in his questions to the women. But I will cite only two of the things on which the spiritual physician of the Pope must not fail to examine his spiritual patient:--

1. "Quærat an sit semper mortale, si vir immitat pudenda in os uxoris?...

Verius affirmo quia, in hoc actu, ob calorem oris, adest proximum periculum pollutionis, et videtur nova species luxuriæ contra naturam, dicta, irruminatio."

2. "Eodem modo, Sanchez damnat virum de mortali, qui, in actu copulæ, immiteret digitum in vas præposterum uxoris; quia, ut ait, in hoc actu adest affectus ad Sodomiam" (Liguori, tom. vi. p. 935).

The celebrated Burchard, Bishop of Worms, has made a book of the questions which had to be put by the confessors to their penitents of both sexes. During several centuries it was the standard book of the priests of Rome. Though that work to-day is out of print, Dens, Liguori, Debreysne, &c., &c., have ransacked its polluting pages, and given them to study to the modern confessors, in order to question their penitents. I will select only a few questions of the Roman Catholic bishop to the young men:--

1. "Fecisti solus tecum fornicationem ut quidam facere solent; ita dico ut ipse tuum membrum virile in manum tuam acciperes, et sic duceres præputium tuum, et manu propriâ commoveres, ut, sic, per illam delectationem semen projiceres?"

2. "Fornicationem fecisti cum masculo intra coxas; ita dico ut tuum virile membrum intra coxas alterius mitteres, et sic agitando semen funderes?"

3. "Fecisti fornicationem, ut quidem facere solent, ut tuum virile membrum in lignum perforâtum, aut in aliquod hujus modi mitteres, et, sic, per illam commotionem et delectationem semen projiceres?"

4. "Fecisti fornicationem contra naturam, id est, cum masculis vel animalibus coire, id est cum equo, cum vaccâ, vel asinâ, vel aliquo animali?" (vol. i. p. 136.)

Among the questions we find in the Compendium of the Right Rev. Burchard, Bishop of Worms, which must be put to women, are the following (p. 115):--

1. "Fecisti quod quædam mulieres solent, quoddam molimen, aut machinamentum in modum virilis membri ad mensuram tuæ voluptatis, et illud loco verendorum tuorum aut alterius cum aliquibus ligaturis, ut fornicationem faceres cum aliis mulieribus, vel alia eodem instrumento, sive alio tecum?"

2. "Fecisti quod quædam mulieres facere solent, ut jam supra dicto molimine, vel alio aliquo machinamento, tu ipsa in te solam faceres fornicationem?"

3. "Fecisti quod quædam mulieres facere solent, quando libidinem se vexantem extinguere volunt, quæ se conjungunt quasi coire debeant et possint, et conjungunt invicem puerperia sua, et sic, fricando pruritum illarum extinguere desiderant?"

4. "Fecisti quod quaedam mulieres facere solent, ut cum filio suo parvulo fornicationem faceres, ita dico ut filium tuum supra turpidinem tuam poneres ut sic imitaberis fornicationem?"

5. "Fecisti quod quædam mulieres facere solent, ut succumberes aliquo jumento et illud jumentum ad coitum qualicumque posses ingenio, ut sic coiret tecum?"

The celebrated Debreyne has written a whole book, composed of the most incredible details of impurities, to instruct the young confessors in the art of questioning their penitents. The name of the book is "Moechiology," or "treaty on all the sins against the six (seven) and the nine commandments, as well as on all the questions of the married life which refer to them."

That work is much approved and studied in the Church of Rome. I do not know that the world has ever seen anything comparable to the filthy and infamous details of that book. I will cite only two of the questions which Debreyne wants the confessor to put to his penitent.

To the young men (page 95) the confessor will ask:--

"Ad cognoscendum an usque ad pollutionem se tetigerint, quando tempore et quo fine se tetigerint; an tunc quosdam motus in corpore experti fuerint, et per quantum temporis spatium; an cessantibus tactibus nihil insolitum et turpe acciderit; an non longe majorem in corpore voluptatem perceperint in fine tactuum quam in eorum principio; an tum in fine quando magnam delectationem carnalem senserunt, omnes motus corporis cessaverint; an non madefacti fuerint?" &c., &.

To the girl the confessor will ask:--

"Quæ sese tetigisse fatentur, an non aliquem pruritum extinguere tentaverit, et utrum pruritus ille cessaverit cum magnam senserint voluptatem; an tunc, ipsimet tactus cessaverint?" &c., &c.

The Right Rev. Kenrick, late Bishop of Boston, United States, in his book for the teaching of confessors on what matters they must question their penitents, has the following, which I select among thousands as impure and damnable to the soul and body:--

"Uxor quæ, in usu matrimonii, se vertit, ut non recipiat semen, vel statim post illud acceptum surgit, ut expellatur, lethaliter peccat; sed opus non est ut diu resupina jaceat, quum matrix, brevi, semen attrahat, et mox, arctissime claudatur" (vol. iii. p. 317).

"Puellæ patienti licet se vertere, et conari ut non recipiat semen, quod injuria ei immittitur; sed, exceptum, non licet expellere, quia jam possessionem pacificam habet, et haud absque injuriâ naturæ ejiceretur" (tom. iii. p. 317).

"Conjuges senes plerumque coeunt absque culpâ, licet contingat semen extra vas effundi; id enim per accidens fit ex infirmitate naturæ. Quod si vires adeo sint fractæ ut nulla sit seminandi intra vas spes, jam nequeunt jure conjugii uti" (tom. iii. p. 317).

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Notes

[1] "To avoid fornication, let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband." (1 Cor. vii. 2.)

[2] A silver box containing consecrated bread, which is believed to be the real body, blood, and divinity of Jesus Christ.

[3] And remark that all their religious authors who have written on that subject hold the same language. They all speak of those continual degrading temptations; they all lament the damning sins which follow those temptations; they all entreat the priests to fight those temptations and repent of those sins.

[4] He is dead long ago.

[5] By the word _penitents_, Rome means not those who _repent_, but those who _confess_ to the priest.

[6] He died many years after when at the head of the Laval University.

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Corrections made to printed original.