I have hardly detained the reader long enough on the subject, to give him a just impression of the stress laid on confession. It is one of the great points to which our attention was constantly directed.

Monk’s tale was clearly modeled on the gothic novels that were popular in the 18th and early 19th centuries a literary genre that had already been used to stoke anti-Catholic sentiments in such works as Denis Diderot's La Religieuse. Atmosphere of anti-Catholic sensationalism
Monk’s book was publiMaria Monkd in an American atmosphere of anti-Catholic hostility (partly fueled by early 19th-century Irish and German Catholic immigration to the U. Maria Monk’s book Awful Disclosures of Maria Monk or The Hidden Secrets of a Nun’s Life in a Convent Exposed was publiMaria Monkd in January 1836.

The Black Nunnery or Convent of Sister Bourgeoise. Maria Monk’s book Awful Disclosures of Maria Monk or The Hidden Secrets of a Nun’s Life in a Convent Exposed was publiMaria Monkd in January 1836. The priests supposedly entered the convent through a secret tunnel.