"The holy and glorious prophet, precursor, and martyr, John the Baptist."

"The holy Stephen, the first of the deacons and the first of the martyrs."

"Our holy and blessed father, Mark, the apostle and evangelist, and our holy and wonder-working father Basil."

"The holy saint, (N.) whose memory we celebrate this day, and the whole company of thy saints, by whose prayers and intercessions also we pray thee to have mercy upon us, and save us for the sake of thy holy name which is invoked upon us.

Here the deacon reads the diptychs, that is, the lists of the departed faithful; and then the priest proceeds with the following prayer:

"In like manner, O Lord, remember all of the priesthood who have gone before, and those who were of the laity. Grant that all their souls may rest in the bosoms of our holy fathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Lead and gather them together in the green pastures, upon the river of rest, in the paradise of pleasure, from whence grief, sorrow, and sighing, shall flee away in the light of thy holy ones."

"And to those, O Lord, whose souls thou hast received, grant rest therein, and vouchsafe to transfer them into the kingdom of the heavens. And preserve us who are still in this world, in thy faith, and lead us to thy heavenly kingdom; granting to us thy peace at all times, so that, together with Jesus Christ and the Holy Ghost, thy most holy, glorious, and blessed name may be glorified, exalted, praised, blessed and hallowed, now and for ever."

This is the whole, brethren, of the Alexandrian Liturgy, bearing the name of Basil, in which there is any reference to the saints, and to the departed. And I must beg of you to observe the following facts, in connexion with it.

First, you perceive, that there is not the slightest allusion to

the idea of a purgatory, nor the least intimation that the departed souls were suffering any pain, torment, or punishment whatever.

Secondly, you perceive, that although the first place among the saints seems clearly to be granted to the virgin Mary, by her title, the mother of God, yet there is no invocation nor address to her.

Thirdly, that although it is assumed that the virgin and the saints offer prayers and intercessions for the Church, yet none of them are asked to pray for us; instead of which, the Church prays for them, beseeching God to remember them; clearly proving, that even so late as the fifth century, the Church of Christ had not departed so far from the primitive purity as to offer public worship to the saints.

Fourthly, that the very same supplication which is offered for these most eminent saints, namely, that God would remember them, is likewise offered for the souls of all the faithful departed. Hence you perceive, that if simply praying for them proves that the Church supposed they were in purgatory, the virgin, and the apostles, and all the most eminent martyrs, must have been in purgatory too; which the Church of Rome would esteem, as well as ourselves, to be a most extravagant absurdity.

And fifthly, that the Church plainly held our doctrine on the state of the departed, that is to say, that they were in paradise with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, that paradise in which our Lord promised to be with the penitent thief in the day of his crucifixion, and in which he represented the soul of Lazarus to have been carried by the angels; a place of rest and pleasure, from which they looked forward to be transferred to the kingdom of heaven intended for their eternal habitation, after the resurrection of the body, at the final day. Fairly examined, therefore, nothing can more fully prove the novelty of the Roman Catholic doctrines, on the subject of saint-worship

and purgatory, than the language of this Liturgy, although it is not to be doubted, that the form in which it has come down to us is considerably different from that which it exhibited at an earlier period.

So

The most plausible argument, however, which the Church of Rome can present for her doctrine of purgatory, is that which urges the necessity of some intermediate place for those who are indeed Christian believers, but who, nevertheless, die in a state not pure nor holy enough for the kingdom of heaven, into which nothing undefiled can be allowed to enter. And hence they sometimes gain assent as to the probability of a certain measure of punishment, in order to complete that sanctification which was left imperfect in the present life. Now it may well be granted, that such an intermediate place for the departed soul is necessary; but it will by no means follow that purgatory, as they define it, is calculated for the purpose. far from it, that I think a little reflection will show the very reverse of such a conclusion. For, according to the Scriptural account of the happy side of the region of departed spirits, it is a paradise, a place of rest and refreshment, inhabited by all the holy and the just who have ever lived upon the earth, visited by the angels, and even by Christ himself; while yet it is in sight of the regions of the lost, from which it is separated by an impassable gulf, across which, however, as the narrative of the rich man and Lazarus informs us, conversations may be held together. Suppose, then, the soul of a believer,such an one as, according to the Roman Catholic system, must be consigned to the excruciating torments of purgatory, up to the very day of judgment,—suppose him to depart this life, and to be taken to this holy and blessed society; having indeed the true principle of faith, but yet far from that perfect holiness which is necessary for the judgment day, which, I ask, is the better place to improve and sanctify him? the purgatorial flames of excruciating anguish, or the peaceful paradise of the

spirits of the just? Surely it must be manifest, that the mere suffering of agony cannot teach, nor sanctify, nor exalt the thoughts and affections of the sinner. When the soul of the

believer leaves the body, it has done with the temptations of the flesh, with the assaults of Satan, with the corrupt allurements of the world. Where can it increase its holiness, enlarge its divine knowledge, cherish the truth of God, adore his mercy in Christ, and thus become purified from all the stains and defilements of its earthly course, if not in the society of patriarchs, prophets and apostles, with the spectacle of the lost in view, the glory of heaven in prospect, and every motive and stimulus imaginable to help it forward, that it may be ready in the great day? While, on the other hand, all that we know of the effects of intense suffering is directly opposed to improvement. To burn the soul into goodness, to scorch it into wisdom, to rack it into knowledge, to torture it into the love of God, who can listen to such a proposition without a mixture of wonder and indignation at the system, which talks of fire and flames as the means of spiritual sanctification? Most manifest then, it seems, to my mind, that the whole force of this most plausible argument of the Church of Rome, is directly hostile to their purgatorial theory; although it might well agree with the account which Scripture gives us of the place of departed spirits, in which the souls of the redeemed await the day of resurrection.

But we proceed, secondly, to the testimony of the fathers, in which we shall see, in the very evidence which is commonly adduced to sustain this invention, a clear proof that it was a novelty, unknown to the purer days of primitive Christianity.

Beginning with Irenæus, the bishop of Lyons, A. D. 170, we have a distinct corroboration of the true doctrine. "Since, therefore," saith he, (Lib. v. Cont. Hær. cap. 31, p. 331,) "the Lord himself obeyed the law of death, that he might be

the first born from the dead, and remained until the third day in the lower parts of the earth, and afterwards arose in the flesh, so that he showed the very marks of the nails to his disciples, and thus ascended to his Father, how should they not be confounded that say that these lower regions are only this world, according to the present bodily state, but that the internal man, as soon as it leaves the body, ascends immediately to heaven? For even the Lord went into the midst of the shadow of death, where the souls of the dead were; and afterwards rose again in his body, and after his resurrection ascended up to heaven. And therefore it is manifest that the souls of his disciples, for whom the Lord did these things, will likewise depart into the invisible place, appropriated to them by the Deity, and will there remain until the resurrection; expecting the hour when they shall receive their bodies again, and rising in their perfect state, that is corporeally, as the Lord himself arose, will thus come to the vision of God." Here, brethren, we have a faithful statement of the doctrine of antiquity. Irenæus believed in no ascension to heaven for any saint, before the day of resurrection, and no purgatory nor punishment for the redeemed in the place of departed spirits; and therefore he did not agree, in either point, with the modern innovations of the Church of Rome.

Let us next hear Tertullian, in A. D. 200, on the same subject.

"Our lower regions," saith he, (De Anima, p. 303) speaking in reference to the notions of the heathen philosophers, "are not a naked cavity, nor yet a certain drain of the world under the waters; but they are a profound and vast space, in the inmost bowels of the earth. Therefore we read that Christ was in the heart of the earth, during the three days of his death, that is in the internal recess, enclosed within its lower abysses. But if Christ our God, because he was also man, being dead and buried according to the Scriptures, satisfied also this law,