3-043-764 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

"A Confession", by R. Lehmann, in the exhibition of the Royal Academy, 1872. Engraving of a painting. 'The scene...is laid in an Italian church...On one side of the partition kneels a beautiful woman, pouring her confession into the ear of the "confessor"...Her reddened eyes, pale face, her intensely anxious expression and attitude, the entirely-absorbed preoccupation which has let slip the veil that should hide her face, all speak of an agony of emotion; they all suggest that some grievous sin or gravest frailty could alone account for such profound contrition...On the other side of the thin partition, we are shown to what kind of man this young and beautiful woman is intrusting the secret of her inmost soul, and it is only too evident that the "father" confessor is a man of like passions with other men...With what avidity he drinks in the woman's secret! See how he clenches his first to steady himself under the surprise of the discovery, or to control the swelling at his heart of pride, ambition, revenge - love itself, it may be. He, too, is young and handsome; and nature made him passionate; a fierce fire burns in those rolling dark eyes, as well as the keenest intelligence and craft...this picture is...pregnant with grave suggestiveness'. From "Illustrated London News", 1872.