3 cards
Self-accusation (n.) is a mimetic collaboration with the executioner: witches chose their own stake, heretics called for punishment, Stalinist victims confessed more than they were asked.
Self-accusation (n.) is the possibility of justification: before God, wishing to justify oneself is to declare oneself guilty, and smiting one's breast is the condition of being declared just.
Self-accusation (n.) may say what no parson dares say to his hearers: there are things one man cannot say to another, but to myself I must say, it would have gone no better with me than with the mob.