Preces Quotidianae
Confession of Sinful Origin
The soul confesses its conception in uncleanness, citing Job and Psalm 51, acknowledging original sin from the very beginning.
Confession of sins. I confess to You, Lord, that I was conceived in unclean seed, Job.✦ 14. 14.✦ heated in iniquity in my mother's womb, Psalm.✦1 h.2 6.
The Bitter Roots of Sin
Two images of sinful inheritance are drawn from Deuteronomy: a root of bitterness and a wild vine of Sodom.
Root of bitterness, Deut.✦ 29. 18.✦ Wild vine of Sodom, Deut.✦3 31.4 32.✦
Viper and Wild Olive
The soul confesses its kinship with the viper's brood and the wild olive, echoing Matthew and Romans.
Viper's brood, Matt.✦5 1.6 7.✦ A shoot from a wild olive tree.7
The Heart and Its Defilements
A litany of sinful members and states: son of wrath, vessel of destruction, rebellious heart, and every bodily part turned to evil.
A child of wrath, as mentioned in Ephesians.✦8 2.9 3. Vessel of destruction, rebellious heart like a deceitful bow, mouth like an open grave, I am overflowing with foolishness; my lips are polluted; my tongue is a world of iniquity; my eyes are wicked and ready for lust; my ears are uncircumcised like a deaf asp; I have the forehead of a prostitute, hard as bronze; my neck is stiff as an iron sinew; my hands are lazy toward what is good; and my feet are swift toward evil.✦✦✦✦✦✦10 Whatever I have done,
The Emptiness of Works
All human deeds are likened to a spider's web or a basilisk's egg, vain and fruitless.
Read the original Latin
CONFESSIO PECCATORUM.
CoNFITEOR Tibi, Domine, Quod conceptus sum in immundo semine, Jo . xiv. 14. calefactus in iniquitate in utero matris, Psal. h. 6.
Radix amaritudinis, Deut. xxix. 18.
Labrusea Sodomz, Deut. xxxi. 32.
Germen vipere, Matt. i. 7.
Sureulus oleastri;,
Fihus ire, Eph. n. 3.
Vas perditionis, Rebelle cor, instar arcus dolosi, Os quasi sepulchrum patens,
Ebulliens stultitias, Polluta labia habens, Linguam universitatem iniquitatis, Oculos nequam, pronos ad libidines, Aures incircumcisas instar surdze aspidis, Frontem meretriciam instar seris, Cervicem duram instar nervi ferrei, Manus remissas ad bonum, Pedes veloces ad malum. Quidquid egi
' Vel aranearum tela est,
Vel ovum basilisci.
Scripture echoes
- ↩Job.14.4 — Who can bring what is clean out of what is unclean? Not one.
- ↩Job.14.4 — Who can bring what is clean out of what is unclean? Not one.
- ↩Ps.51.5 — For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me.
- ↩Deut.29.18 — And it shall be, when he hears the words of this curse, that he blesses himself in his heart, saying, 'Peace will be to me, for in the stubbornness of my heart I walk' — so that the moist is added to the thirsty.
- ↩Deut.29.18 — And it shall be, when he hears the words of this curse, that he blesses himself in his heart, saying, 'Peace will be to me, for in the stubbornness of my heart I walk' — so that the moist is added to the thirsty.
- ↩Deut.32.32 — For their vine is from Sodom, and from the fields of Gomorrah; their grapes are grapes of poison, bitter clusters are theirs.
- ↩Deut.32.32 — For their vine is from Sodom, and from the fields of Gomorrah; their grapes are grapes of poison, bitter clusters are theirs.
- ↩Deut.32.32 — For their vine is from Sodom, and from the fields of Gomorrah; their grapes are grapes of poison, bitter clusters are theirs.
- ↩Matt.3.7;Matt.1.7 — But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, 'Offspring of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath?' Matt.1.7 — Solomon became the father of Rehoboam, Rehoboam became the father of Abijah, and Abijah became the father of Asaph.
- ↩Eph.2.3 — Among them we too all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the flesh and the thoughts, and we were by nature children of wrath, just like the rest.
- ↩Jas.3.6 — And the tongue is a fire. The tongue is set among our members as the world of unrighteousness, staining the whole body, setting the wheel of birth ablaze, and itself set ablaze by hell.
- ↩Jer.6.10;Acts.7.51 — To whom shall I speak and bear witness, that they may listen? Behold, their ear is uncircumcised; they cannot pay attention. Behold, the word of the LORD has become to them a reproach; they take no delight in it. Acts.7.51 — You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so you do.
- ↩Ps.57.5 — My soul is among lions; I lie among those who devour, the children of man, whose teeth are spears and arrows, and whose tongue is a sharp sword.
- ↩Jer.3.3 — So the showers were withheld, and there was no spring rain; yet you had the brazen face of a prostitute — you refused to be ashamed.
- ↩Isa.48.4 — For I knew that you are stubborn, and your neck is an iron sinew, and your forehead is bronze.
- ↩Isa.59.7;Prov.1.16 — Their feet run to evil, and they hurry to shed innocent blood; their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity; destruction and ruin are in their highways. Prov.1.16 — For their feet run to evil, and they hurry to shed blood.
- ↩Isa.59.5-Isa.59.6 — They hatch vipers' eggs and weave spider webs. Whoever eats their eggs dies, and when one is crushed, a viper breaks out. Isa.59.6 — Their webs shall not become garments, nor shall they cover themselves with their works; their works are works of iniquity, and the act of violence is in their hands.
- ↩Isa.59.5 — They hatch vipers' eggs and weave spider webs. Whoever eats their eggs dies, and when one is crushed, a viper breaks out.
Notes
- 1 ↩calefactus is rendered literally as 'heated' (also possible: kindled/inflamed). It may be free confessional paraphrase of original-sin language rather than a word-for-word Psalm lemma.
- 2 ↩Citation fragment 'h.' is unclear (possible corruption, abbreviation, or nonstandard psalm label); left as printed.
- 3 ↩Source reads 'Labrusea Sodomz'; taken as Labrusca Sodomae (wild vine / wild grape of Sodom), a compact confession epithet in the botanical-sinner chain (root of bitterness; viper's brood; wild-olive shoot).
- 4 ↩Source has Roman 'xxxi.' (31). Deuteronomy 31 has only 30 verses; the vine-of-Sodom locus is Deuteronomy 32:32, so the intended chapter is more likely xxxii/32. Retained as '31.' only as a straight rendering of the printed numeral.
- 5 ↩Latin 'Germen vipere' is almost certainly 'Germen viperæ' (brood/offspring of a viper). In the surrounding plant-image chain (vine of Sodom; wild-olive shoot), it is likely the biblical image of the 'brood of vipers,' not a botanical name.
- 6 ↩Source has Roman 'i.' If the allusion is the Matthean 'brood of vipers,' the intended chapter is more likely 3 (iii.) than 1; retained as '1.' only as a straight rendering of the printed 'i.'
- 7 ↩Source reads Sureulus; taken as Surculus (shoot/scion). oleastri = of the wild olive (oleaster).
- 8 ↩Source reads 'Fihus ire'; most plausible correction is 'Filius irae' (son/child of wrath), the Ephesians 2:3 epithet in this litany of self-reproaches.
- 9 ↩Bare 'n.' is almost certainly a broken citation numeral (likely 'ii.' / '2.' from Eph 2:3), not independent prose.
- 10 ↩Source reads surdze and seris; translated as the standard biblical pairings surdae (deaf) and aeris (of bronze/brass), matching Ps 57:5 Vulg. and Isa 48:4.
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