Untitled - Rore Sanctifica

166 Defects and their Remedy in Re-union.
tunities are constantly thrown away, and the act
becomes the merest formality on both sides ;
but still there is the machinery ready to work
easily and naturally at any moment. The non-
confessing Anglican only knows the glaring
public faults of his people and especially
of his
poor, while even from formal confessions the
Roman learns much more, and if at length the
soul turns to Goi> in earnest, he does not come
to its history as a stranger. Enforced con
fession, to which absolution should be by no
means a necessary or even frequent adjunct,
would be more in accordance with the ancient
practice, and diminish many of the objections
brought against the modern Roman practice.
But, as before observed, Englishmen will never
be compelled to anything. We know how the
attempt to compel the use of the surplice in
the pulpit was received, and we see also how
the use of vestments has been voluntarilv ex-
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tended since that time. In this matter Rome
may learn a useful lesson from Anglicanism.
The same principle will apply to the Celibacy
of the Clergy. The true policy is to convince
men s minds, and teach them to see its advantages
for themselves, and not to force it upon all alike,
high-toned and low-toned, men of the world and
saints, without distinction or possibility of
change. To force men to celibacy is like forcing
girls into the religious life, if it happens to be