Chapter V — On the remaining circumstances

I. QUESTION I. What are the significations of the circumstance what? ANSWER. It signifies the quantity and quality of the sin, and of the person with whom one sins. They dispute whether the person is to be expressed concerning whom a man takes morose delight, which would have to be manifested if the deed followed. The affirmative opinion is to me true, the negative false: since common sense itself execrates as something most enormous a venereal delight conceived from lying with a mother.

II. Fr. La Croix, Book 6, part 2, no. 1030, writes: “He who without any desire looks upon a person with a lustful eye is not bound to say (in confession) of what sort the person was.” He subjoins there at no. 1031: “He who without desire touched a girl lustfully, according to Diana, satisfies by saying that he touched her so many times basely, saying nothing of the parts in which he touched her.” He subjoins again: “Others say PROBABLY that it is to be expressed if he touched a shameful part.” He leaves it to the reader, after the sceptical manner, to choose for himself what pleases him more. And why ought he not to express that he looked lustfully upon his mother, his sister, a nun, and so forth? Why ought he not to manifest that he touched a hand, cheeks, breasts, or shameful parts? What is the reason of the silence? The opinions probably denying the duty of manifesting the aforesaid circumstance are false.

III. Fr. La Croix goes on in the same place, no. 1040: “He who has fornicated with three at one time, or thrice with one, satisfies by saying that he has thrice fornicated; nor is he bound to say whether it was one or several, whether they were harlots or others, provided he has not cooperated to the hindering of generation. Bonacina, Tamburini.”

IV. Unless the casuists had devised figments of this kind, any Christian by the light of nature would express the three women, because they are three most grave and diverse scandals. But why ought he not to express the three women? Because the yoke is sweet, they say, and it ought not to be made heavy. The aforesaid opinion is false and improbable.

V. The same La Croix in the same place, no. 1041: “If a priest fornicate with a daughter of confession, St. Thomas, Soto, Sánchez, and other most grave authors, whom he relates and follows, and Aversa, part 16, § 14, still say that a new species of malice is contracted: because canon law calls it a certain adultery or incest; and in fact it seems to be a species of irreverence and sacrilege against the sacrament. On the contrary, that it is simple fornication, and that it can be kept silent that she was a daughter of confession, teach Ledesma, Vásquez, Sá, Bonacina, Filliucci, Sánchez, Pontius, Hurtado, Ochagavia, Dicastillo, Tamburini, Diana, Lupus — because from confession no spiritual kinship arises, and so forth. … Each opinion is probable. The first is more conformable to canon law; but the second seems from reason the more probable.”

VI. Probabilism creeps everywhere. Each is probable, the true and the false. The first is more conformable to canon law; the second from reason more probable, says Fr. La Croix. And why? Because Vásquez, Bonacina, Filliucci, Hurtado, Ochagavia, Dicastillo, Tamburini, and Diana comprehended the rights of reason more deeply than the Fathers, than the Councils, than the Pontiffs founders of canon law. This opinion, which Fr. La Croix calls the more probable, is false and lax, as the most wise Pontiff Benedict XIV declared it, when he took away from confessors the authority of absolving from this crime. Do the Pontiffs then publish canons without reason? Is there an appeal from the sacred canons to the tribunal of reason? Is not reason darkened by original sin? More things would occur to be said of this first circumstance; but see them, Vol. IX, dissertation 4, chapter 7.

VII. QUESTION II. What does the circumstance where betray? ANSWER. It indicates the place, and changes the species, as if a man in a sacred place shed human blood, fornicate, pollute himself, steal, or violate ecclesiastical immunity. He who in a sacred place steals a sacred thing perpetrates a sacrilege on a twofold title, and this ought to be expressed in confession. He who steals in a sacred place a profane thing — suppose a purse from a rich man — perpetrates a sacrilege, as authors commonly teach. Fr. Viva nevertheless after his manner adverts, citing de Lugo, Lessius, and Henríquez, that it can probably be thought not to be sacrilege, save when the thing has been placed in the Church for custody. But this figment is arbitrary and false. Fr. La Croix, Book 6, part 1, no. 1090, introduces Dicastillo, who acknowledges an almost equal probability in each opinion, yet nevertheless inclines to the first. The first alone is true, the other false.

VIII. Homicide perpetrated in a church without shedding of blood is sacrilege. He who, being in a church, kills another outside the church is sacrilegious. Similarly he who, being outside a church, kills with a missile another within the church is sacrilegious. He who strikes another with shedding of blood commits sacrilege. It is required nevertheless, says someone, that the shedding of blood be great, because shedding signifies a copious flow. A mortal wound made with a dagger emits only a few drops of blood. He therefore who strikes with a dagger unto death will not be sacrilegious. What will be the measure of that great flow? But why do I waste time in refuting a false opinion? False also is the opinion of others teaching that a pollution secretly done in a church is not sacrilege.

IX. QUESTION III. What is to be said of the opinion denying that immodest touches in a church are sacrilegious? ANSWER. That it is false is certain to me.

X. For whence will you gather that to kiss women and to touch their breasts and other parts, even publicly in a church, is not sacrilege? This doctrine terrifies me. Timorous and pusillanimous the probabilists have said I am. Be it so. But I reject this opinion as altogether false. Then only, subjoins Fr. La Croix, would sacrilege be committed, when a man should publicly touch a harlot immodestly in the presence of the altar. But if a man, behind the altar, or further from the altar, in the middle of the church, should publicly touch a harlot or another woman immodestly, would he not commit sacrilege? Ought it not to be expressed that the deed was done in a sacred place? Whether these be paradoxes repugnant to common sense, let the judgment be others'.

XI. QUESTION IV. What do the circumstances by what helps and why indicate? ANSWER. The circumstance by what helps signifies the counsels, persuasions, and means which a man uses for sinning. Why betrays the end on account of which a man sins, as if he steal for the sake of committing adultery. A sin of itself venial can become deadly on account of a mortally depraved end, as when a man lies that he may induce a woman to fornication.

XII. The circumstance how includes duration of the fault, contempt, and habit. You killed a man. How? Treacherously. Did you rage against the corpse? For how long a time had you the mind of killing? The circumstance when indicates the time in which the sin was perpetrated. Upon these last two circumstances also some dispute not a few questions; but I pass them over as of lesser moment.