confess to Christ himself, answers that it will satisfy his mind, if the fathers of the Church were of the same opinion.  From this my critic argues, not with dialectic art, but with rascally cunning, that I suggest that this Confession which we now practise was not instituted by Christ, but by the leaders of the Church.  Such an inference might appear sound, were not Christ one of the Primates of the Church, since according to Peter’s saying He is Chief Shepherd, and according to the word of the Gospel, Good Shepherd.  Therefore he who speaks of princes of the Church, does not exclude Christ, but includes Him along with the Apostles, and the successors of the Apostles, in the same manner as he who names the principal members of the body does not exclude the head.  But if any one shall deem this reply to savour of artifice:  well now, let us grant that the boy was thinking of pure men, heads of the Church:  is it then not enough for the boy that he follows in the matter of confession their authority, even although he is not assured whether the Popes could ordain this on their own authority, or handed it down to us from the ordinance of Christ?  For he has a mind to obey, in whatever way they have handed it down.  I am not even myself fully convinced as yet, that the Church defined the present practice of Confession to be of Christ’s ordinance.  For there are very many arguments, to me in fact insoluble, which persuade to the contrary.  Nevertheless, I entirely submit this feeling of my own to the judgment of the Church.  Gladly will I follow it, so soon as on my watch, for certainty I shall have heard its clear voice.  Nay, had Leo’s Bull given the fullest expression of this doctrine, and any one should either be ignorant of it, or should have forgotten it, it would meanwhile suffice (I imagine) to obey in this matter the authority of the Church, with a disposition of obedience, should the point be established.  Nor in truth can it be rightly inferred, This Confession is of human ordinance, therefore Christ is not its Author.  The Apostles laid down the discipline of the Church, without doubt from Christ’s ordinances:  they ordained Baptism, they ordained Bishops, &c., but by the authority of Christ.  And yet it cannot be denied, that many particulars of this Confession depend on the appointment of the Pontiffs, viz., that we confess once a year, at Easter, to this or that priest; that any priest absolves us from any trespasses whatever.  Hence I judge it to be clear how manifest is the calumny in what relates to Confession.

Further, no mention is there made of fasting, to which the Gospel and the Apostolic epistles exhort us, but concerning the choice of foods, which Christ openly sets at naught in the Gospel, and the Pauline epistles not seldom condemn; especially that which is Jewish and superstitious.  Some one will say, this is to accuse the Roman Pontiff who teaches that which the Apostle condemns.  What the Gospel