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North African, Frankish, and Spanish councils down to the seventh century. The common object of these Penitentials is to enforce practical duties and to extirpate the ferocious and licentious passions of heathenism. They present a very dark picture of the sins of the flesh. They kept alive the sense of a moral government of God, who punishes every violation of his law, but they lowered the sense of guilt by fostering the pernicious notion that sin may be expiated by mechanical exercises and by the payment of a sum of money.

There were many such books, British, Irish, Frankish, Spanish, and Roman. The best known are the Anglo-Saxon penitentials of the seventh and eighth centuries, especially that of Theodore, archbishop of Canterbury (669–690). He was a Greek by birth, of Tarsus in Cilicia, and reduced the disciplinary rules of the East and West to a system. He was not the direct author of the book which bears his name, but it was drawn up under his direction, published during his life-time and by his authority, and contains his decisions in answer to various questions of a priest named Eoda and other persons on the subject of penance and the whole range of ecclesiastical discipline. The genuine text has recently been brought to light from early MSS. by the combined labors of German and English scholarship. The introduction and the book itself are written in barbarous Latin. Traces of the Greek training of Theodore may be seen in the references to St. Basil and to Greek practices. Next to Theodore's collection there are Penitentials under the name of the venerable Bede (d. 735), and of Egbert, archbishop of York (d. 767).2

1 By Prof. Wasserschleben of Halle, 1851 (from several Continental MSS.), and Canon Haddan and Prof. Stubbs, Oxford, 1871, (III. 173–203) from a Cambridge MS. of the 8th century. The texts of the earlier editions of Theodori Pænitentiale by Spelman (1639), D'Achery (1669), Jaques Petit (1677, reprinted in Migne's Patrol. 1851, Tom. 99), Thorpe (1840), and Kunstmann (1844) are imperfect or spurious. The question of authorship and of the MS. sources is learnedly discussed in a note by Haddan and Stubbs, III. 173 sq. See extracts in the Notes.

2 * Both are given in Haddan and Stubbs, Councils, etc. III. 326 sqq. and 413 sqq.

The earliest Frankish penitential is the work of Columban, the Irish missionary (d. 615). He was a severe monastic disciplinarian and gave prominence to corporal punishment among the penalties for offences. The Cummean Penitential (Pænit. Cummeani) is of Scotch-Irish origin, and variously assigned to Columba of Iona (about 597), to Cumin, one of his disciples, or to Cummean, who died in Columban's monastery at Bobbio (after 711). Haltigar, bishop of Cambray, in the ninth century (about 829) published a "Roman Penitential," professedly derived from Roman archives, but in great part from Columban, and Frankish sources. An earlier work which bears the name "Poenitentiale Romanum," from the first part of the eighth century, has a more general character, but its precise origin is uncertain. The term "Roman" was used to designate the quality of a class of Penitentials which enjoyed a more than local authority. Rabanus Maurus (d. 855) prepared a "Liber Poenitentia" at the request of the archbishop Otgar of Mayence (841). Almost every diocese had its own book of the kind, but the spirit and the material were substantially the same.

NOTES.

As specimens of these Penitential Books, we give the first two chapters from the first book of the Pænitentiale Theodori (Archbishop of Canterbury), as printed in Haddan and Stubbs, Councils and Eccles. Doc. relating to Great Britain and Ireland, vol. IIIrd. p. 177 sqq. We insert a few better readings from other MSS. used by Wasserschleben.

I. De Crapula et Ebrietate.

1. Si quis Episcopus aut aliquis ordinatus in consuetudine vitium habuerit ebrietatis, aut desinat aut deponatur.

2. Si monachus pro ebrietate vomitum facit, XXX. dies peniteat. 3. Si presbiter aut diaconus pro ebrietate, XL. dies peniteat.

4. Si vero pro infirmitate aut quia longo tempore se abstinuerit, et in consuetudine non erit ei multum bibere vel manducare, aut pro gaudio in Natale Domini aut in Pascha aut pro alicujus Sanctorum commemoratione

1 This is the view of Wasserschleben, while Schmitz thinks that the Ponitentiale Romanum was originally intended for the Roman church, and that the Western Penitentials are derived from it.

faciebat, et tunc plus non accipit quam decretum est a senioribus, nihil nocet. Si Episcopus juberit, non nocet illi, nisi ipse similiter faciat.

5. Si laicus fidelis pro ebrietate vomitum facit, XV. dies peniteat.

6. Qui vero inebriatur contra Domini interdictum, si votum sanctitatis habuerit VII. dies in pane et aqua, LXX. sine pinguedine peniteat; laici sine cervisa [cervisia].

7. Qui per nequitiam inebriat alium, XL. dies peniteat.

8. Qui pro satietate vomitum facit, III. diebus [dies] peniteat.

9. Si cum sacrificio communionis, VII. dies peniteat; si infirmitatis causa, sine culpa.

II. De Fornicatione.

1. Si quis fornicaverit cum virgine, I. anno peniteat. Si cum marita, IIII. annos, II. integros, II. alios in XL. mis. III. bus., et III. dies in ebdomada peniteat.

2. Qui sepe cum masculo aut cum pecude fornicat, X. annos ut peniteret judicavit.

3. Item aliud. Qui cum pecoribus coierit, XV. annos peniteat.

4. Qui coierit cum masculo post XX. annum, XV. annos peniteat. 5. Si masculus cum masculo fornicaverit, X. annos peniteat.

6. Sodomitæ VII. annos peniteat [peniteant]; molles [et mollis] sicut adultera.

7. Item hoc; virile scelus semel faciens IIII. annos peniteat; si in consuetudine fuerit, ut Basilius dicit, XV. Si sine, sustinens unum annum ut mulier. Si puer sit, primo II. bus annis; si iterat IIII.

8. Si in femoribus, annum 1. vel. III. XL.mas.

9. Si se ipsum coinguinat, XL. dies [peniteat.]

10. Qui concupiscit fornicari [fornicare] sed non potest, XL. dies vel XX. peniteat. Si frequentaverit, si puer sit, XX. dies, vel vapuletur. 11. Pueri qui fornicantur inter se ipsos judicavit ut vapulentur.

12. Mulier cum muliere fornicando [si...fornicaverit], III. annos peniteat. 13. Si sola cum se ipsa coitum habet, sic peniteat.

14. Una penitentia est viduae et puellæ. Majorem meruit quae virum habet, si fornicaverit.

15. Qui semen in os miserit, VII. annos peniteat: hoc pessimum malum. Alias ab eo judicatum est ut ambo usque in finem vitæ peniteant; vel XXII. annos, vel ut superius VII.

16. Si cum matre quis fornicaverit, XV. annos peniteat, et nunquam, mutat [mutet] nisi Dominicis diebus: et hoc tam profanum incertum [incestum] ab eo similiter alio modo dicitur ut cum peregrinatione perenni VII. annos peniteat.

17. Qui cum sorore fornicatur, XV. annos peniteat, eo modo quo superius de matre dicitur, sed et istud XV. alias in canone confirmavit; unde non absorde XV. anni ad matrem transeunt qui scribuntur.

18. Qui sepe fornicaverit, primus canon judicavit X. annos penitere ;

secundus canon VII.; sed pro infirmitate hominis, per consilium dixerunt III. annos penitere.

19. Si frater cum fratre naturali fornicaverit per commixtionem carnis, XV. annos ab omni carne abstineat.

20. Si mater cum filio suo parvulo fornicationem imitatur, III. annos se abstineat a carne, et diem unum jejunet in ebdomada, id est, usque ad vesperum.

21. Qui inludetur fornicaria cogitatione, peniteat usque dum cogitatio superetur.

22. Qui diligit feminam mente, veniam petat ab eo [a Deo] id est, de amore et amicitia si dixerit si non est susceptus ab ea, VII. dies peniteat.”

The remaining chapters of the first book treat De Avaritia Furtiva; De Occisione Hominum [De Homicidio]; De his qui per Heresim decipiuntur; De Perjurio; De multis et diversis Malis; De diverso Lapso servorum Dei; De his qui degraduntur vel ordinari non possunt; De Baptizatis bis, qualiter peniteant; De his qui damnant Dominicam et indicta jejunia ecclesiæ Dei; De communione Eucharistiæ vel Sacrificio; De Reconciliatione; De Penitentia Nubentium specialiter; De Cultura Idolorum. The last chapter shows how many heathen superstitions prevailed in connection with gross immorality, which the church endeavored to counteract by a mechanical legalism. The second book treats De Ecclesiæ Ministerio; De tribus gradibus; De Ordinatione; De Baptismo et Confirmatione; De Missa Defunctorum, etc.

$86. Ecclesiastical Punishments. Excommunication, Anathema,

Interdict.

FRIEDRICH KOBER (R. C.): Der Kirchenbann nach den Grundsätzen des canonischen Rechts dargestellt. Tübingen 1857 (560 pages). By the same author: Die Suspension der Kirchendiener. Tüb. 1862. HENRY C. LEA: Excommunication, in his Studies in Church History (Philadelphia 1869), p. 223-475.

The severest penalties of the church were excommunication, anathema, and interdict. They were fearful weapons in the hands of the hierarchy during the middle ages, when the church was believed to control salvation, and when the civil power enforced her decrees by the strong arm of the law. The punishment ceases with repentance, which is followed by absolution. The sentence of absolution must proceed from the bishop who pronounced the sentence of excommunication; but in articulo mortis every priest can absolve on condition of obedience in case of recovery.

1. EXCOMMUNICATION was the exclusion from the sacraments, especially the communion. In the dominions of Charlemagne it was accompanied with civil disabilities, as exclusion from secular tribunals, and even with imprisonment and seizure of property. A bishop could excommunicate any one who refused canonical obedience. But a bishop could only be excommunicated by the pope, and the pope by no power on earth.' The sentence was often accompanied with awful curses upon the bodies and souls of the offender. The popes, as they towered above ordinary bishops, surpassed them also in the art of cursing, and exercised it with shocking profanity. Thus Benedict VIII., who crowned Emperor Henry II. (A. D. 1014), excommunicated some reckless vassals of William II., Count of Provence, who sought to lay unhallowed hands upon the property of the monastery of St. Giles,2 and consigned them to Satan with terrible imprecations, although he probably thought he was only following St. Peter's example in condemning Ananias and Sapphira, and Simon Magus.3

1 But during the papal schism, the rival popes excommunicated each other, and the Council of Constance deposed them.

2 Aegidius (Aiyídios); Italian: Sant Egidio; French: S. Gilles. He was an abbot and confessor in France during the reign of Charles Martel or earlier, and much more celebrated than reliably known. He is the special patron of cripples, and his tomb was much visited by pilgrims from all parts of France, England and Scotland. Almost every county in England has churches named in his honor, amounting in all to 146. See Smith and Wace I. 47 sqq.

3 Bened. Papæ VIII. Epist. 32 (ad Guillelmum Comitem). In Migne's Patrol. T. 139, fol. 1630–32. Lea translates it in part, l. c. p. 337. "Benedict Bishop, Servant of the servants of God, to Count William and his mother, the Countess Adelaide, perpetual grace and apostolic benediction. ... Let them [who attempted to rob the monastery] be accursed in their bodies, and let their souls be delivered to destruction and perdition and torture. Let them be damned with the damned: let them be scourged with the ungrateful; let them perish with the proud. Let them be accursed with the Jews who, seeing the incarnate Christ, did not believe but sought to crucify Him. Let them be accursed with the heretics who labored to destroy the church. accursed with those who blaspheme the name of God. Let them be accursed with those who despair of the mercy of God. Let them be accursed with those who lie damned in Hell. Let them be accursed with the impious and sinners unless they amend their ways, and confess themselves in fault towards

Let them be