brutes, nine-tenths of the multitudes who go to confess, are obliged to
recount some such desolate narrative as that of Miss Richardson, when they
are sufficiently honest to say the truth.

The most fanatical apostles of auricular confession cannot deny that the
examination of conscience, which must precede confession, is a most
difficult task; a task which, instead of filling the mind with peace, fills
it with anxiety and serious fears. Is it then only after confession that
they promise such peace? But they know very well that this promise is also
a cruel deception ... for to make a good confession, the penitent has to
relate not only all his bad actions, but all his bad thoughts and desires,
their number, and various aggravating circumstances. But have they found a
single one of their penitents who was certain to have remembered all the
thoughts, the desires, all the criminal aspirations of the poor sinful
heart? They are well aware that to count the thoughts of the mind for days
and weeks gone by, and to narrate those thoughts accurately at a subsequent
period, are just as easy as to weigh and count the clouds which have passed
over the sun, in a three days storm, a month after that storm is over. It
is simply impossible, absurd! This has never been, this will never be done.
But there is no possible peace so long as the penitent _is not sure_ that
he has remembered, counted and confessed every past sinful thought, word
and deed. It is then impossible, yes! it is morally and physically
_impossible_ for a soul to find peace through auricular confession. If the
law which says to every sinner: "You are bound, under pain of eternal
damnation, to remember all your bad thoughts and confess them to the best
of your memory", were not so evidently a satanic invention, it ought to be
put among the most infamous ideas which have ever come out from the brain
of fallen man. For, who can remember and count the thoughts of a week, of a
day, nay, of an hour of his sinful life?

Where is the traveller who has crossed the swampy forests of America, in
the three months of a warm summer, who could tell the number of musquitoes
which have bitten him and drawn the blood from the veins?

What should that traveller think of the man who, seriously, would tell him:
"You must prepare yourself to die, if you do not tell me, to the best of
your memory, how many times you have been bitten by the musquitoes, the
last three summer months, when you