It is sometimes said that Christianity has always had its own form of psychoanalysis in the practice of confession.... It is true ...that a skilled confessor will compel the penitent to examine his mind more carefully and honestly than he has been doing, but he still works only on the conscious level. The psychoanalyst, on the other hand, tries to pierce through the conscious level to penetrate and expose the unconscious, and he works chiefly there. He does not call on the patient's willpower, but endeavors to get him to relax, making much more use of the patient's imagination. Further, he is not concerned with passing moral judgments on his patient's behavior or, at any rate directly, with strengthening him morally.... He tries to clear away the rubbish that is choking the spring of life and is not concerned with what happens to the stream when he has restored the flow. The confessor on the other hand is pre-occupied with directing the flow into the right channels.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
So spake our Father penitent; nor Eve Felt less remorse. They, forthwith to the place... Repairing where he judged them, prostrate fell Before him reverent, and both confessed Humbly their faults, and pardon begged, with tears Watering the ground, and with their sighs the air Frequenting, sent from hearts contrite, in sign Of sorrow unfeigned and humiliation meek.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
See what gross inconsistency is tolerated. I have heard some of my townsmen say, "I should like to have them order me out to help ...put down an insurrection of the slaves, or to march to Mexico;Msee if I would go"; and yet these very men have each, directly by their allegiance, and so indirectly, at least, by their money, furnished a substitute. The soldier is applauded who refuses to serve in an unjust war by those who do not refuse to sustain the unjust government which makes the war; is applauded by those whose own act and authority he disregards and sets at naught; as if the state were penitent to that degree that it hired one to scourge it while it sinned, but not to that degree that it left off sinning for a moment. Thus, under the name of Order and Civil Government, we are all made at last to pay homage to and support our own meanness.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »