It is well known that even Louis XIV., notorious for his open and
profligate as well as habitual adulteries, had a confessor, and complied
with the duties of confession and communion in the presence of his whole
court. In Spain, robbers, assassins, and the most corrupt of the people,
pursued by justice for their crimes, and who are the terror of society,
always confess and receive the eucharist at Easter, but without ever
amending their lives or even intending to do so.

The priest, before saying mass, in which rite he is about to identify
himself with what he supposes to be the very body of our Saviour, is
bound to purify himself previously, so that in that awful ceremony the
holy elements may not enter a temple wherein dwelleth sin. The greater
number of those priests say mass every day, but seldom are they seen,
before assuming the sacred vestments to officiate at the altar, to
prepare themselves by means of confession, as the rules of their religion
most strictly enjoin. There are innumerable towns in Spain in which
there are no other clergymen than the parish priest. In what state then
must _his_ soul be when he approaches the altar to eat and drink, as he
professes to believe, the body and blood of Jesus Christ?

These considerations are so obviously natural and simple, that it has
required six centuries of civil and religious oppression to hide them
under the weight of ignorance and the fear of punishment. Nevertheless,
the invasion of the French, the political revolutions which have
followed, intercourse with foreign nations, and other causes which have
co-operated with these, have at last begun to open the eyes of Spaniards,
and confession is daily falling into disuse, particularly among the
educated classes of society. Even in these same classes, however, there
are many persons who, although persuaded of the truth of all that their
clergy teach them, refuse to confess, and declare that they will do so
only at the hour of death. Confession is, in the present day, more
common in the inferior ranks; for these move in a sphere without the pale
of civilization, and consequently are yet under the clerical power.
Still, there are villages in Spain in which the bad example of the
priest, and the enmity which is manifested towards him by the
inhabitants, prevent the compliance with those sacraments, so that for
years together the great majority of the people never think of purifying
their consciences in the