4. About the Fourth Conclusion

91. About the fourth conclusion it is necessary to look at ‘who’ and ‘for whom’ and ‘when’.

About ‘who’ I say that not only is the confessor bound to concealment but also he to whom the confessor, though illicitly, reveals it. The proof is that he who transfers something to another de facto that he cannot licitly transfer de iure does not give the other the right to use it or the right to transfer it to another; because he is, from the fact of not having the right, unable to transfer the right to another, for no one gives what he does not have [Aristotle, Sophistical Refutations, 2.5/ ch.22.178b1-7]. But a confessor who reveals something does not have the right to transfer it to another; therefore, if he in fact transfers it, the other does not have the right to transfer it further.

92. I say the same of him who, being someone other than the confessor, hears the confession of a confessing penitent; for if he hears by chance he does not sin but he is bound to silence; if he hears by deceit he sins mortally, and along with this he is bound to silence.

93. These two conditions about ‘who’ [nn.91-92] are proved by the reasons set down above for the first and second conclusion [nn.78-89].

94. But ‘when’? I say always and at all times [sc. one is bound to conceal what is said in confession, n.65], because the precept is a negative one.Negative precepts are binding always and at all times because there is never a time when one should not be obeying a negative precept (such as the precept not to tell lies). Positive precepts are always binding but not at all times because a given time need not be a time when a positive precept applies. So the positive precept to follow the rules of driving is always binding but not at all times, as specifically when one is not driving. ⁶⁵ And from this follows that after the death of the person confessed no more [sc. is one released from concealing] than when he was alive, because the reasons posited for the first and second conclusion are conclusive as equally about concealment at both times as they are about a negative precept.

95. But as for the ‘to whom’ [one may not reveal a confession] it is said [William of Auxerre]: to anyone save a superior.

But the aforesaid reasons [nn.91-94] are conclusive about a superior as about an inferior, save in a case when the inferior cannot absolve but receives [a confession] so as to refer it to a superior who can absolve; and then he himself is not confessor, but one must reckon that the one confessing to him as to an inferior is telling it to him as to an interpreter only. And then the whole thing stands as a single act of confession, where the one confessing and the superior (who alone is then the confessor) are the to be judged and the judge; and the intermediary (who hears and refers) is only an interpreter, yet he is bound to silence as regard everyone beside him for whom he is interpreter.

96. If you say that thereby is a response given to a certain argument previously made in Gregory IX, Decretals etc. [n.70], because there an inferior tells a superior a sin confessed to him, and consequently the chapter is not proof that it is licit for anyone universally to state sins heard outside the forum of confession - this is nothing, because the cardinal did not write to the Pope so that the Pope might absolve, but he wrote requesting advice about what he himself should do, as is plain from the response of the Pope, who does not immediately absolve the woman as to what he supposed was a birth foreign to her, but replies to him how a discrete priest ought to advise the woman. And similarly could advice be requested in such a doubt not only from a superior but from any other prudent man, who of course would know how to give advice.

97. Hence what is said there against the first reason [n.69] is true generally, namely that the sin of a confessing penitent that is not referred back to, or made determinate relative to, the person confessing can be stated by the confessor, and usefully so, indeed necessarily so, when the priest is not so skilled that he know himself how to advise; and then he usefully can and necessarily should state it to someone prudent who knows how to advise him.

98. But surely a Pope can command that it be revealed to him? I reply: one should say that a Pope can never go beyond the right of nature.

99. About the ‘what’ I say that not only [must be concealed] the main sin of the one confessing and the circumstances of the sin (because circumstances cannot well be revealed without revealing the fact), but also the second person with whom the sin was done.

100. This is plain from the reasons posited for the first and second conclusion [nn.79-89], because even the one confessing wants to preserve the reputation of the person with whom he sinned, that is, he should want it as he wants his own reputation, indeed more so because that person was joined with him in the crime; for he is so much the more bound to that person for restitution of the good that he lost through him, and for guarding the good that, notwithstanding the evil committed, can be guarded.

101. Fidelity too and truth and unity or community [n.78] are plain here as before [nn.79-85].

102. Plain, likewise, for the three reasons for the second conclusion [nn.86-89] because not concealing draws away from confession; it also takes what is aired in this forum to another forum, and is an occasion for lying in this forum, as was said before.