§ 118. PENANCE AND INDULGENCES. 735
and a compensation to God for offences against Him, as Thomas Aquinas,1 following Anselm, taught. The priest is the judge of what the act of satisfaction shall be. Among the more notable cases of public penance were those of Henry II. after Becket's death, Philip I. of France, and Raymund of Toulouse.
Satisfaction differs from contrition and confession in the very important particular that one person can perform it for another. To prove this point, Thomas Aquinas used the words of the Apostle when he said, "Bear ye one another's burdens." Gal. 6 : 2.
4. The fourth element in the sacrament of penance was the formal sentence of absolution pronounced by the priest. This function, which Schwane calls the main part of the sacrament of penance,2 or the power of the keys, potestas clavium, belongs primarily and in its fulness to the pope and then, by distribution, to bishops and priests. Its use opens and shuts the kingdom of heaven to immortal souls.
§ 118. Penance and Indulgences.
The year 1200 marks the dividing line between opinions differing most widely on the meaning of the priest's absolu tion. Peter the Lombard represented the prevailing view of the earlier period when he pronounced the absolution, a declarative announcement. Alexander of Hales represented the later period, when he pronounced it a judicial sentence. According to Peter, God alone remits sins. It was the Lord who restored the lepers to health, not the priests to whom he sent them. They did nothing more than bear witness to the healthy condition of the lepers. The priest's prerogative is ended when he " shows or declares those who are bound and those who are loosed."3 This view of the Master of Sentences the later theology set aside.
1 Supplem., XV. 3, Migne, IV. 978. Duns Scotus (quoted by Seeberg, 412) says, satisfaction is the voluntary return of an equivalent redditio voluntaria cequivalentis. 2 Schwane, p. 670.
8 Potestas solvendi et ligandi, i.e. ostendendi homines ligatos vel solutos, etc. IV. 18, 6, Migne, p. 887,
736 THE MIDDLE AGES. A.D. 1049-1294.
Before the end of the thirteenth century, the petitional form of absolution was in general, though not exclusive, use and the priest made intercession for the grace of forgiveness upon the offender.1 After that, the positive forensic form was substituted, " I absolve thee in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost," the form which Thomas Aquinas vindicated against all others.2 Hugo of St. Victor had advocated this form and pronounced the contrary form more laughable and frivolous than worthy of refutation. He was followed by Richard of St. Victor who emphasized the distinction between the priest's right to remit the punish ment of sin and God's prerogative which is to forgive the guilt of sin.3 The priest's absolution effects the deletion of sin. He acts towards the sinner as Christ did toward Lazarus when he said, " Loose him and let him go."
The absolution from certain offences was reserved to the bishops, such as murder, sacrilege in the use of the eucharist or the baptismal water, perjury, poisoning, and letting chil dren die without being baptized.4 Other offences came under the exclusive jurisdiction of the papal chair, such as the abuse of the person of a priest or monk, the burning of church buildings, and falsifying of papal documents.
In the article of death, the sacrament of absolution is in no case to be refused. At such times works of satisfaction cannot be required, even as they were not required of the thief on the cross.
The extent to which absolution is efficacious called forth careful discussion and statement. Does it cover guilt as well as punishment and does it extend to the punishments of purgatory? The answer to these questions also was positive
1 See the form used by Honorius of Autun about 1130, indulgentiam et absolutionem de omnibus peccatis . . . tribuat vobis Pater et Filius et Sp. Sanctus et custodiet vos a peccatis et ab omnibus malis et post hanc vitam perducat vos in consortium omnium sanctorum. Lea, I. 206.
2 Summa, III. 84, 3, Migne, IV. 857. It was not sufficient to say, " The omnipotent God absolve thee," or " God bestow on thee absolution," etc.
3 De.sacr., II. 14, 8, Migne, 176. 568. . . . De potestate ligandi et solvendi.
4 So the synods of Treves 1227, Canterbury 1236, London 1237, etc. The unchastity of nuns came under the bishop's jurisdiction.