If you’ve contracted terminal cancer, irremediable by all means, would you go public with your killing a travel mate by abandoning him in the wilderness, or setting someone’s home on by accident?

That tinge of conscience, or namely the will to open up and confess, in the face of death is what I call morbid conscience. Morbid conscience isn’t the bent of a particular race; rather, it is rife among the entire human race and fictitious realm (which is unsurprising, as good novels depict authentic humans.) I once saw a documentary in which an infamous felon, accused for multiple murders and rapes, wailed on his execution day. I also came by the wizened lady in Oliver Twist who confessed and repented on appropriating a woman’s gold. Another example is the cranky old woman in To Kill a Mockingbird who resolved to wean herself off drugs in the last month of her life.

So why do people have this penchant for confessing or remedying at the juncture of life and death? I think this has to do with at least two considerations. On the face of it, confessing at that point is beneficial on net, at any rate- you can both divest yourself of sin, be exempt from penance and feel good about yourself. Nobody is going to demand, or capable of demanding, accountability from a body. Delving deeper into this inclination suggests the Christian retribution theory, a salient representation of which is the Myth of Er in The Republic. Per the myth, one’s deeds in earthly life is indicative of their experience in Hades; the unjust souls would, in this matter, experience a millennium of punishment (presumably penance and whipping,) whereas the just ones would lead gaily lives. Since almost everyone would opt for the latter posthumous life, they would try to erase all sin before entering “the place of judgment,” whereby they’re assessed as on whether they’ve been just. Confessing wouldn’t clear you of sin altogether, but it could at least prevent you from being a sinful liar without chance of rehabilitation.