These, then, are the two methods of Confession at our disposal. God is "the Father of an infinite Majesty". In _informal_ Confession, the sinner goes to God as his _Father_,--as the Prodigal, after doing penance in the far country, went {149} to his father with "_Father_, I have sinned". In _formal_ Confession, the sinner goes to God as to the Father of an _infinite Majesty_,--as David went to God through Nathan, God's ambassador. It is a fearful responsibility to hinder any soul from using either method; it is a daring risk to say: "Because one method alone appeals to me, therefore no other method shall be used by you". God multiplies His methods, as He expands His love: and if any "David" is drawn to say "I have sinned" before the appointed "Nathan," and, through prejudice or ignorance, such an one is hindered from so laying his sins on Jesus, God will require that soul at the hinderer's hands. _Absolution._ It is the same with Absolution as with Confession. Here, too, we start on common ground. All agree that "_God only_ can forgive sins," and half our differences come because this is not recognized. Whatever form Confession takes, the penitent exclaims: "_To Thee only it appertaineth to forgive sins_". Pardon through the Precious Blood is the one, and only, source of {150} forgiveness. Our only difference, then, is as to God's _methods_ of forgiveness. How does God forgive sin? Some seem to limit His love, to tie forgiveness down to one, and only one, method of absolution--direct, personal, instantaneous, without any ordained Channel such as Christ left. Direct, God's pardon certainly is; personal and instantaneous, it certainly can be; without any sacramental _media_, it certainly may be. But we dare not limit what God has not limited; we dare not deny the existence of ordained channels, because God can, and does, act without such channels. He has opened an ordained fountain for sin and uncleanness as a superadded gift of love, and in the Ministry of reconciliation He conveys pardon through this channel. At the most solemn moment of his life, when a Deacon is ordained Priest, the formal terms of his Commission to the Priesthood run thus: "Receive the Holy Ghost for the Office and Work of a Priest in the Church of God, now committed unto thee by the Imposition of our hands. Whose sins thou dost forgive, they are forgiven; and whose sins thou dost retain, they are retained." "_Now_ committed unto thee." No Priest dare hide his commission, play with {151} the plain meaning of the words, or conceal from others a "means of grace" which they have a blessed right to know of, and to use.