w groan,
there has been introduced a custom of slipping a few pieces of money into
the hand of the confessor at parting. This gratuity varies according to
the means of the penitents; but the average may be taken at a dollar and
a half. May not the probability of a larger or a smaller fee on these
occasions, as pourtrayed in the aspect of the giver, have an influence,
more or less, in proportioning the amount of severity in the penance
imposed?

CHAPTER IX.

FASTS AND PENANCES--How observed--Indulgences--Spain is privileged by the
Bull of the Holy Crusade--Description of that bull--Prices of
copies--Commissary-General of Crusades--His Revenues--Their shameful
application--Copy of that bull--Other acts of penance--The _Disciplina_
or whipping--_Cilicios_.

The Roman Catholic Church prescribes two kinds of mortification with
respect to food, viz., fasting and abstinence from meat. Fasting is
obligatory during the whole period of Lent, and on the eve of each
principal feast-day in the year. To comply with this obligation, it is
enough to eat a mere formal meal on these days, consisting of some light
vegetable diet in the morning, and again in the evening. This
observance, however, admits of some indulgence, and confessors are wont
to absolve many of their penitents from its severity, under pretext of
their having to do hard work, or to contend with physical infirmity. The
clergy, besides the fasting common to all the devout, are bound also,
during the holy week, to abstain from eggs, milk, and all sorts of food
which come under the denomination of _lacticinio_, or any thing of which
milk or eggs form a component part. Friars and nuns fast, also, during
the whole of the period called advent; and when those obligations are
truly performed, there is no doubt that they have a considerable
influence on the physical constitution. Medical men are authorised to
consent to its infraction by their patients. In some religious
communities of both sexes, but especially in those of the Capuchines, the
fast-days are multiplied to such an extent, that they compose the greater
number of days in the year.

Abstinence from meat varies in the different bishoprics, according to the
established custom or the bishop's will. In France, for example, in some
dioceses they never eat animal food on Fridays or Saturdays; in others,
Friday only is a fast-day, but in all of them abstinence from meat is
obligatory during the whole o