[De veritate dicenda aut tacenda]

"In evil promises, rescind your faith," unless perhaps he heard it in confession, because then it is in no way to be revealed, and it must be held as if it were not known. There is another secret which can be concealed by itself without sin, and such a one must in no way be disclosed to a prelate if it was entrusted to his faith. He would sin, however, if he were to reveal it, because he would break the promised faith, which must be kept even with a pagan. Nor can a prelate receive this, because he would be acting against charity, namely towards a brother. And obedience is instituted, according to Bernard, for the sake of charity. Therefore, it ought not to fight against charity, which is according to natural law: "What you do not want done to you, do not do to another."

The seventh proposal: Someone who knows of a fault in secret and reveals it to a prelate or to anyone else without a permitted secret admonition, if he does this out of malice so that a brother might be oppressed, confounded, dishonored, or defamed, sins mortally, according to Thomas, Quodlibet 6. For such a person acts against the command of God in Matthew 18: "If your brother sins against you..." And charity has no place there, since it proceeds from a bad root, and he intends not the amendment of the brother, but his confusion. If, however, he knows the prelate to be pious and gentle, one not accustomed to being incited by hatred or fury or seeking vengeance, but rather to amendment, then it can piously be denounced to him—not as a prelate, but as a pious physician who knows how to cure the wounds of the infirm. This is especially true if he believes his own admonition will not profit that brother from prior experience, or if it is a matter of negligence, a type of thing which is not accustomed to bring infamy with it, as is often done in the chapters of religious orders regarding daily negligences. Let such people be careful, however, that the appetite for vengeance or rancor or envy does not intrude, lest one who desires to cast the splinter out of another's eye should bring in a beam of his own. Let him intend the amendment of the brother only, which if he can procure through secret