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neth to be ended, and the day to spring, before the rising of the sun, the darkness is in some sort mingled together with the light, until the remains of the departing night be turned into the light of the following day; so the end of this world was then intermingled with the beginning of the world to come; and the very darkness of the remains thereof made transparent by a certain mixture of spiritual things." And this he assigneth for the reason, why in those last times so many things were made clear touching the souls, which before lay hid: so that by open revelations and apparitions the world to come might seem to bring in and open itself unto them." But as we see that he was plainly deceived in one of his conceits, so have we just cause to call into question the verity of the other; the Scripture especially having informed us, that a people for enquiry of matters should not have recourse to the dead, but to their God, to the law, and to the testimony: it being not God's manner to send men from the dead to instruct the living, but to remit them unto Moses and the prophets, that they may hear them. And the reason is well worth the observation which the author of the questions to Antiochus rendereth, Why God would not permit the soul of any of those that departed from hence to return back unto us again, and to declare the state of things in hell unto us; lest "much error" might arise from thence unto us in this

aliquo modo tenebræ cum luce commixtæ sunt, quousque discedentis noctis reliquiæ in luce diei subsequentis perfecte vertantur: ita hujus mundi finis jam cum futuri sæculi exordio permiscetur, atque ipsæ reliquiarum tenebræ quadam jam rerum spiritalium permixtione translucent. Id. ibid. cap. 41. pag. 445.

Quid hoc est, quæso te, quod in his extremis temporibus tam multa de animabus clarescunt, quæ ante latuerunt; ita ut apertis revelationibus atque ostensionibus venturum sæculum inferre se nobis atque aperire videatur. Ibid. cap. 40. pag. 445.

Luke, chap. 16. ver. 29, 30.

k Isai. chap. 8. ver. 19, 20. τη Πολλὴ ἐντεῦθεν πλάνη ἐν τῷ βίῳ τίκτεσθαι ἔμελλεν· πολλοὶ γὰρ τῶν δαιμόνων ἐν σχήμασιν ἀνθρώπων εἶχον μετασχηματίζεσθαι τῶν κοιμη θέντων, καὶ ἔμελλον ἐκ νεκρῶν ἐγηγέρθαι αὐτοὺς λέγειν, καὶ πολλὰ ψευδῆ πράγματα, καὶ δόγματα περὶ τῶν ἐκεὶ εἶχον ἡμῖν ἐγκατασπεῖραι πρὸς τὴν ýμшν πλávην kai áñŵλɛiaν. Ad Antioch. quæst. 35. inter opera Athanasii. tom. 2. pag. 275.

life. For many of the devils," saith he, "might transform themselves into the shapes of those men that were deceased, and say that they were risen from the dead; and so might spread many false matters and doctrines of the things there, unto our seduction and destruction."

Neither is it to be passed over, that in those apparitions and revelations, related by Gregory, there is no mention made of any common lodge in hell appointed for purging of the dead, which is that which the Church of Rome now striveth for; but of certain souls only, that for their punishment were confined to baths" and other such places here upon earth: which our Romanists may believe if they list, but must seek for the purgatory they look for somewhere else. And yet may they save themselves that labour, if they will be advised by the bishops assembled in the council of Aquisgran, two hundred and forty years after these visions were published by Gregory; who will resolve them out of the word of God, how sins are punished in the world to come. "The sins of men," say they, "are punished three manner of ways: two in this life, and the third in the life to come. Of those two the apostle saith: If we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged of the Lord. This is the punishment wherewith, by the inspiration of God, every sinner, by repenting for his offences, taketh revenge upon himself. But where the apostle consequently adjoineth, When we are judged, we are chastened of the Lord, that we should not be condemned with this world; this is the punishment which

n Gregor. dialog. lib. 4. cap. 40, et 55. pag. 444, et 464.

• Tribus itaque modis peccata mortalium vindicantur: duobus in hac vita, tertio in futura vita. De duobus ita apostolus inquit: Si nosmetipsos judicaverimus, a Domino non judicabimur. Hæc est vindicta quam, inspirante Deo, omnis peccator, pro suis admissis pœnitendo, in seipso vindicat. Quod autem prosecutus idem apostolus infert; Cum judicamur autem, a Domino corripimur, ut non cum mundo damnemur : hæc est vindicta, quam omnipotens Deus misericorditer peccatori irrogat, juxta illud: Deus quem amat, corripit; flagellat autem omnem filium quem recipit. Tertia autem extat valde pertimescenda atque terribilis, quæ non in hoc sed in futuro, justissimo Dei judicio, fiet sæculo; quando justus judex dicturus est: Discedite a me maledicti in ignem æternum, qui paratus est diabolo et angelis ejus. Capitul. Aquisgran. concil. ad Pipinum miss. lib. 1. cap. 1.

Almighty God doth mercifully inflict upon a sinner according to that saying, Whom God loveth he chasteneth, and he scourgeth every son that he receiveth. But the third is very fearful and terrible, which by the most just judgment of God shall be executed, not in this world, but in that which is to come, when the just Judge shall say: Depart from me ye cursed into everlasting fire, which is prepared for the devil and his angels." Add hereunto the saying of the author of the books De vanitate sæculi, and De rectitudine Catholicæ conversationis, wrongly ascribed to St. Augustine, "Know that when the soul is separated from the body, presently it is either placed in paradise for his good works, or cast headlong into the bottom of hell for his sins;" as also of the second sermon De consolatione mortuorum. "When the soul departeth, which cannot be seen with carnal eyes, it is received by the angels, and placed either in the bosom of Abraham, if it be faithful, or in the custody of the prison of hell, if it be sinful; until the day appointed come, wherein it is to receive the body, and render an account of the works thereof at the tribunal of Christ the true Judge ;" and that in the days of Otto Frisingensis himself, who wrote in the year of our Lord one thousand one hundred and forty-six, the doctrine of purgatory was esteemed only a private assertion held by some, and not an article of faith generally received by the whole Church, for why should he else write of it in this manner? "That' there is

P Scitote, quod, cum anima a corpore evellitur, statim aut in paradiso pro meritis bonis (as it is in the one, or, pro bonis operibus, as it is in the other book: both importing the selfsame thing) collocatur, aut certe pro peccatis in inferni tartara præcipitatur. Lib. de vanit. sæculi, cap. 1. et de rectitud. catholic. conversat. app. tom. 6. operum Augustini.

↑ Recedens anima, quæ carnalibus oculis videri non potest, ab angelis suscipitur; et collocatur aut in sinu Abrahæ, si fidelis est, aut in carceris inferni custodia, si peccatrix est: donec veniat statutus dies, quo suum recipiat corpus, et apud tribunal Christi judicis veri reddat suorum operum rationem. Serm. 2. de consolat. mortuor. Ibid.

Esse apud inferos locum purgatorium, in quo salvandi vel tenebris tantum afficiantur, vel expiationis igne decoquantur, quidam asserunt. Otto Fris. lib. 8. chron. cap. 26.

in hell a place of purgatory, wherein such as are to be saved are either only troubled with darkness, or decocted with the fire of expiation, SOME do affirm;" and lastly, that the purgatory, wherewith the Romish clergy doth now delude the world, is a new device, never heard of in the Church of God, for the space of a thousand years after the birth of our Saviour Christ.

For the Gregorian purgatory, which reached no further than to the expiation of "small and very light faults," would not serve these men's turn; who very providently. considered that little use could be made of that fire, if it had no other fuel but this to maintain it. For such peccadilloes as these, they say, may be taken away in this life; by knocking the breast, by receiving the bishop's blessing, by being sprinkled with holy water, and by such other easy remedies; that, if this were all the matter to be cared for, men needed not greatly to stand in fear of purgatory. Yea, admit they should be so extremely negligent in their lifetime, that they forgat to use any of these helps; they might for all this at the time of their death be more afraid than hurt: yea, this fear" alone, if there were nothing else, might prove a means to “ purge their souls, at the very departing, from those faults of the lightest kind;" if Gregory may be credited. Nay, which is more, divers of their own elder divines, to whom we may adjoin cardinal Cajetan also in these latter days,

Sed tamen hoc de parvis minimisque peccatis fieri posse credendum est; sicut est assiduus otiosus sermo, immoderatus risus, &c. Gregor. dialog. lib. 4. cap. 39. op. tom. 2. pag. 444.

Sext. procm. in Glossa verb. Benedictionem. Francisc. a Victoria in summa sacramentor. eccles. num. 110. Jacob. de Graffiis, decis. cas. conscient. part. 1. lib. 1. cap. 6. num. 10.

Sed plerumque de culpis minimis ipse solus pavor egredientes justorum animas purgat. Gregor. dialog. lib. 4. cap. 46. op. tom 2. pag. 453.

w Delet gratia finalis peccatum veniale in ipsa dissolutione corporis et animæ ; &c. Hoc ab antiquis dictum est: sed nunc communiter tenetur, quod peccatum veniale cum hinc deferatur a multis, etiam quantum ad culpam, in purgatorio purgatur. Vid. Albert. Magn. in compend. theologicæ veritat. lib. 3. cap. 13. Alexand. Halens. summ. part. 4. quæst. 15. membr. 3. art. 3. dist. 45. quæst. 1. &c.

Cajetan. opusc. tom. 1. tract. 23. de purgator. quæst. 1.

VOL. III.

Durand. lib. 4.

have taught, that all the remains of sin in God's children are quite abolished by final grace, at the very instant of their final dissolution; so that the stain of the least sin is not left behind to be carried unto the other world.

Now purgatory, as Bellarmine describeth it, is a "certain' place, in which as in a prison those souls are purged after this life, which were not fully purged in this life; that, being so purged, they may be able to enter into heaven, whereinto no unclean thing can enter. And of this," saith he, "is all the controversy." If that be so, their own doctors, you see, will quickly bring this controversy unto an end. For if the souls be fully purged here from all spot of sin, what need have they to be sent unto any other purgatory after this life? Yes, say they, although the fault be quite remitted, and the soul clearly freed from the pollution thereof: yet may there remain a temporal punishment due for the very mortal sins that have been committed; which, if relief do not otherwise come, by the help of such as are alive, must be soundly laid on in purgatory. But why in purgatory, say we, seeing here there is no more purging work left: for the fault and the blot being taken away already, what remaineth yet to be purged? The punishment only, they say, is left behind: and punishment, I hope, they will not hold to be the thing, that is purged away by punishment. Again, we desire them to tell us, what father or ancient doctor did ever teach this strange divinity? that a man being clearly purged from the blot of his sin, and fully acquitted here from the fault thereof, should yet in the other world be punished for it with such grievous torments, as the tongue of man is not able to express. And yet, as new and as absurd a doctrine as it is, the pope and his adherents have builded thereupon both their guileful purgatory, with which it suiteth as evil-favouredly as may be; and their gainful indulgences, which, by their

y Locus quidam, in quo tanquam in carcere post hanc vitam purgantur animæ, quæ in hac non plene purgatæ fuerunt: ut nimirum sic purgatæ in cœlum ingredi valeant, quo nihil intrabit coinquinatum. De hoc est tota controversia. Bellarmin. de purgator. lib. 1. cap. 1.