Verb

(head)

(archaic, or, poetic) (confess)

* {{quote-book, year=1676, author=Izaak Walton, title=The Compleat Angler, chapter=, edition= citation

, passage=

* {{quote-book, year=1783, author=William Godwin, title=Four Early Pamphlets, chapter=, edition= citation

, passage=What though her face confest a darker shade? }}

*{{quote-book, year=1840, author=Edward Bulwer-Lytton, title=, chapter=, edition= citation

, passage=Oh! bold Fighting Attie, the knowing, the natty, By us all it must sure be confest , Though your shoppers and snobbers are pretty good robbers, A soldier is always the best. }}

Verb

(es)

(senseid) To admit to the truth, particularly in the context of sins or crimes committed.

People confess to anything under torture.

* Shakespeare

I never gave it him. Send for him hither, / And let him confess a truth.

* Milton

And there confess / Humbly our faults, and pardon beg.

* Addison

I must confess I was most pleased with a beautiful prospect that none of them have mentioned.

To acknowledge faith in; to profess belief in.

* Bible, Matthew x. 32

Whosoever, therefore, shall confess' me before men, him will I ' confess , also, before my Father which is in heaven.

* Bible, Acts xxiii. 8

For the Sadducees say that there is no resurrection, neither angel, nor spirit; but the Pharisees confess both.

(religion) To unburden (oneself) of sins to a priest, in order to receive absolution.

* Addison

Our beautiful votary took an opportunity of confessing herself to this celebrated father.

(religion) To hear or receive such a confession of sins from.

* Ld. Berners

He heard mass, and the prince, his son, with him, and the most part of his company were confessed .

(senseid) To disclose or reveal.

* Alexander Pope

Tall thriving trees confessed the fruitful mould.