which ground at last he maketh this conclusion; "Ceasing therefore all questions, hold the sentences of the learned fathers; and command continual prayers and sacrifices to be offered unto God in thy Church, for the foresaid priest."

Now having thus declared, unto what kind of persons the commemorations ordained by the ancient Church did extend, the next thing that cometh to consideration is, what we are to conceive of the primary intention of those prayers, that were appointed to be made therein. And here we are to understand that, first, prayers of praise and thanksgiving were presented unto God for the blessed estate that the party deceased was now entered upon; whereunto were afterwards added prayers of deprecation and petition, that God would be pleased to forgive him his sins, to keep him from hell, and to place him in the kingdom of heaven: which kind of intercessions, howsoever at first they were well meant, as we shall hear, yet in process of time they proved an occasion of confirming men in divers errors; especially when they began once to be applied not only to the good, but to evil livers also, unto whom by the first institution they never were intended.

The term of εὐχαριστήριος εὐχὴ, a thanksgiving prayer, I borrow from the writer of the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy; who, in the description of the funeral observances used of old in the Church, informeth us, first, that the friends of the dead "accounted" him to be, as he was, blessed; because that according to his wish he had obtained a victorious end:" and thereupon "sent forth hymns of thanksgiving to the author of that victory; desiring withal, that they themselves might come unto the like end:" and then that the bishop likewise offered up a prayer of thanksgiving

m Sopitis igitur quæstionibus, doctorum patrum sententias teneas: et in Ecclesia tua juges preces hostiasque Deo offerri jubeas pro presbytero memorato. Ibid.

η αὐτόν τε ὅς τίς (vel οἷός) ἐστι, μακαρίζουσι, πρὸς τὸ νικήφορον εὐκα ταίως ἀφικόμενον τέλος, καὶ τῷ τῆς νίκης αἰτίῳ χαριστηρίους ὠδὰς ἀναπεμπουσι, προσέτι καὶ αὐτοὺς ἀφικέσθαι πρὸς τὴν ὁμοίαν εὐχόμενοι λῆξιν. Dionys. ecclesiast. hierarch. cap. 7. Op. tom. 1. pag. 265.

• Εἶτα τελεῖ τὴν πρὸς θεὸν εὐχαριστήριον εὐχὴν ὁ ἱεράρχης. Ibid.

unto God; when the dead was afterward brought unto him, to receive as it were at his hands a sacred coronation. Thus at the funeral of Fabiola, the praising of God by singing of psalms, and resounding of Halleluia, is specially mentioned by St. Hierome: and the general practice and intention of the Church therein is expressed and earnestly urged by St. Chrysostom in this manner; "Do not we praise God, and give thanks unto him, for that he hath now crowned him that is departed, for that he hath freed him from his labours, for that quitting him from fear, he keepeth him with himself? Are not the hymns for this end? Is not the singing of psalms for this purpose? All these be tokens of rejoicing." Whereupon he thus presseth them that used immoderate mourning for the dead: "Thou' sayest, Return, O my soul, unto thy rest, for the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee; and dost thou weep? Is not this a stage-play? Is it not mere simulation? For if thou dost indeed believe the things that thou sayest, thou lamentest idly; but if thou playest and dissemblest, and thinkest these things to be fables, why dost thou then sing? Why dost thou suffer those things that are done? Wherefore doest thou not drive away them that sing?" and in the end he concludeth somewhat prophetically; that he "very much feared, lest by this means some grievous disease should creep in upon the Church."

Whether the doctrine now maintained in the Church of

• Λαβόντες δὲ αὐτὸν ἐπὶ τὴν ἱεράρχην ἄγουσιν, ὡς ἐπὶ στεφάνων ἱερῶν dóσiv. Ibid.

4 Sonabant psalmi; et aurata tecta templorum reboans in sublime quatiebat Alleluia. Hieronym. in epitaphio Fabiolæ, epist. 30.

· Οὐχὶ τὸν Θεὸν δοξάζομεν, καὶ εὐχαριστοῦμεν, ὅτι λοιπὸν ἐστεφάνωσε τὸν ἀπελθόντα, ὅτι τῶν πόνων ἀπήλλαξεν, ὅτι τῆς δειλίας ἐκβαλὼν ἔχει παρ' ἑαυτῷ; οὐ διὰ τοῦτο ὕμνοι; οὐ διὰ τοῦτο ψαλμῳδίαι ; ταῦτα πάντα XaιpóvTwv ¿σtiv. Chrysost. in epist. ad Hebr. hom. 4. op. tom. 12. pag. 46. • Επίστρεψον, ψυχή μου, εἰς τὴν ἀνάπαυσιν σου, ὅτι Κύριος εὐηργή τησέ σε, λέγεις, καὶ δακρύεις· οὐχὶ σκηνὴ ταῦτά ἐστιν, οὐχ ̓ ὑπόκρισις; εἰ μὲν γὰρ ὄντως πιστεύεις οἷς λέγεις, περιττώς πενθεῖς· εἰ δὲ παίζεις, καὶ ὑποκρίνῃ, καὶ μύθους αὐτὰ εἶναι νομίζεις, τί καὶ ψάλλεις; τί καὶ ἀνεχῃ τῶν παραγινομένων; διὰ τί μὴ ἀπελαύνεις τοὺς ψάλλοντας; Id. ibid. pag. 47. · Καὶ γὰρ μειζόνως δέδοικα, μὴ τούτῳ τῷ τρόπῳ χαλεπὴ τὶς νόσος ἐν τῇ ἐκκλησίᾳ ὑπεισέλθῃ. Ibid.

VOL. III.

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Rome, that the children of God, presently after their departure out of this life, are cast into a lake that burneth with fire and brimstone, be not a spice of this disease; and whether their practice in chanting of psalms (appointed for the expression of joy and thankfulness), over them whom they esteem to be tormented in so lamentable a fashion, be not part of that scene and pageant at which St. Chrysostom doth so take on; I leave it unto others to judge. That his fear was not altogether vain, the event itself doth shew. For, howsoever in his days the fire of the Romish purgatory was not yet kindled: yet were there certain sticks then a gathering, which ministered fuel afterwards unto that flame. Good St. Augustine, who then was alive, and lived three and twenty years after St. Chrysostom's death, declared himself to be of this mind; that the oblations and alms usually offered in the Church "for" all the dead that received baptism, were thanksgivings for such as were very good, propitiations for such as were not very bad; but as for such as were very evil, although they were no helps of the dead, yet were they some kind of consolations of the living." Which although it were but a private exposition of the Church's meaning in her prayers and oblations for the dead; and the opinion of a doctor too, that did not hold purgatory to be any article of his creed; yet did the Romanists in times following greedily take hold thereof, and make it the main foundation, upon which they laid the hay and stubble of their devised purgatory.

A private exposition I call this: not only because it is not to be found in the writings of the former fathers, but also because it suiteth not well with the general practice of the Church, which it intendeth to interpret. It may indeed fit in some sort that part of the Church service, wherein there was made a several commemoration, first, of

u Cum sacrificia, sive altaris sive quarumcunque eleemosynarum, pro baptizatis defunctis omnibus offeruntur, pro valde bonis gratiarum actiones sunt, pro non valde malis propitiationes sunt ; pro valde malis, etsi nulla sunt adjumenta mortuorum, qualescunque vivorum consolationes sunt. Augustin. enchirid. ad Laurent. cap. 110.

the patriarchs, prophets, apostles and martyrs, after one manner; and then of the other dead, after another: which, together with the conceit that "an injury was offered to a martyr, by praying for him," was it that first occasioned St. Augustine to think of the former distinction. But in the "supplications for the spirits of the dead, which the Church under a general commemoration was accustomed to make, for all that were deceased in the Christian and catholic communion;" to imagine that one and the same act of praying should be a petition for some, and for others a thanksgiving only, is somewhat too harsh an interpretation: especially where we find it propounded by way of petition, and the intention thereof directly expressed, as in the Greek liturgy, attributed to St. James the brother of our Lord; "Be mindful, O Lord God of the spirits and of all flesh, of such as we have remembered, and such as we have not remembered, being of right belief, from Abel the just until this present day. Do thou cause them to rest in the land of the living, in thy kingdom, in the delight of paradise, in the bosoms of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, our holy fathers; whence grief and sorrow and sighing are fled, where the light of thy countenance doth visit them, and shine for ever:" and in the offices compiled by Alcuinus; "O Lord, Holy Father, Almighty and everlasting God, we

w Augustin. de verbis apostoli. serm. 159. op. tom. 5. pag. 765. * Id. ibid. et in evang. Johann. tractat. 84.

Non sunt prætermittendæ supplicationes pro spiritibus mortuorum: quas faciendas pro omnibus in Christiana et catholica societate defunctis, etiam tacitis nominibus quorumque, sub generali commemoratione suscepit Ecclesia. Id. de cura pro mortuis, cap. 4.

2 Μνήσθητι, κύριε ὁ θεὸς τῶν πνευμάτων καὶ πάσης σαρκὸς, ὧν ἐμνήσε θημεν, καὶ ὧν οὐκ ἐμνήσθημεν, ὀρθοδόξων, ἀπὸ ̓Αβὲλ τοῦ δικαίου μέχρι τῆς σήμερον ἡμέρας. αὐτὸς ἐκεῖ αὐτοὺς ἀνάπαυσον ἐν τῆ βασιλείᾳ σου, ἐν τῇ τρυφῇ τοῦ παραδείσου, ἐν τοῖς κόλποις ̓Αβραὰμ καὶ Ἰσαὰκ καὶ Ιακώβ, τῶν ἁγίων πατέρων ἡμῶν. ὅθεν ἀπέδρα ὀδύνη, λύπη καὶ στεναγμός. ἔνθα ἐπισκοπεῖ τὸ φῶς τοῦ προσώπου σου, καὶ καταλάμπει διὰ παντὸς. Jacob. liturg.

a Te, Domine sancte, Pater omnipotens, æterne Deus, supplices deprecamur pro spiritibus famulorum et famularum tuarum, quos ab origine seculi hujus ad te accersire præcepisti: ut digneris, Domine, dare eis locum lucidum, locum refrigerii et quietis; et ut liceat eis transire portas infernorum, et vias tenebrarum,

humbly make request unto thee for the spirits of thy servants and handmaids, which from the beginning of this world thou hast called unto thee: that thou wouldest vouchsafe, O Lord, to give unto them a lightsome place, a place of refreshing and ease, and that they may pass by the gates of hell, and the ways of darkness, and may abide in the mansions of the saints, and in the holy light which thou didst promise of old unto Abraham and his seed."

So the commemoration of the faithful departed, retained as yet in the Roman missal, is begun with this orison: "Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord: and let everlasting light shine unto them." Whereunto we may add these two prayers, to omit a great number more of the like kind, used of old in the same Church: "Receive, O holy Trinity, this oblation, which we offer unto thee for all that are departed in the confession of thy name: that, thou reaching unto them the right hand of thy help, they may have the rest of everlasting life; and, being separated from the punishments of the wicked, they may always persevere in the joy of thy praise:" and, "This oblation, which we humbly offer unto thee for the commemoration of the souls that sleep in peace, we beseech thee, O Lord, receive graciously; and of thy goodness grant, that both the affection of this piety may profit

maneantque in mansionibus sanctorum, et in luce sancta quam olim Abrahæ promisisti et semini ejus. Alcuin. offic. per ferias, col. 228. oper. edit. Paris. ann. 1617.

b Requiem æternam dona eis, Domine: et lux perpetua luceat eis. Introitus missæ, in commemoratione omnium fidelium defunctorum. Agenda mortuorum, in Antiphonario Gregorii, circa finem. op. tom. 3. pag. 725.

Suscipe, sancta Trinitas, hanc oblationem, quam tibi offerimus pro omnibus in tui nominis confessione defunctis: ut, te, dexteram auxilii tui [porrigente, vitæ perennis requiem habeant; et a pœnis impiorum segregati, semper in tuæ laudis lætitia perseverent. Missa Latina antiqua, edit. Argentin. ann. 1557. pag. 52.

d Hanc igitur oblationem, quam tibi pro commemoratione animarum in pace dormientium suppliciter immolamus, quæsumus, Domine, benignus accipias; et tua pietate concedas,, ut et nobis proficiat hujus pietatis affectus, et illis impetret beatitudinem sempiternam. Offic. Gregorian. tom. 3.oper. Gregor. Liturg. Pamelii, tom. 2. pag. 610. et præfation. vetust. edit. Colon. ann. 1530. num. 111.