To my brethren, the Clergy and lay-members of the Christian Church,<br><br>I offer this Treatise on the History of Confession in the hope that, by following the sequence of the authorities in the Church, they may gain a more sure and correct knowledge of the doctrine of Confession as to the occasion of its practice during the first twelve centuries and to the lack of any necessity during that period of revealing to a Priest all the evil thoughts and lesser sins, of which a member of the society of Christians may have been guilty.<br><br>I have endeavoured to put forward facts of history rather than theories, based upon the teaching of the Church which gained ascendancy in subsequent ages.<br><br>I have carefully verified all the passages put forward except the few marked with an asterisk.