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 punishment 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 us, and obtain for them everlasting bliss."

Where you may observe, that the souls unto which "everlasting bliss" was wished for, were yet acknowledged to rest “in peace," and, consequently, not to be disquieted with any purgatory torment. Even as in the canon of the mass itself, the

priest, in the commemoration for the dead, prayeth thus: "Remember, O Lord, thy servants and handmaids, which have gone before us with the ensign of faith, and sleep in the sleep of peace. To them, O Lord, and to all that are at rest in Christ, we beseech thee that thou wouldst grant a place of refreshing, light, and peace."

Nay, the Armenians, in their Liturgy, entreat GOD to "give eternal peace," not only in general " unto all that have gone before us in the faith of Christ;" but also in particular to the "patriarchs, apostles, prophets, and martyrs." Which maketh directly for the opinion of those, against whom Nicolas Cabasilas both dispute, who held that these "commemorations" contained "a supplication for the saints unto God," and not a "thanksgiving" only. As also do those forms of prayer, which were used in the Roman liturgy in the days of Pope Innocent the Third:

"Let such an oblation profit such or such a saint unto glory."

And especially that for St. Leo, which is found in the elder copies of the Gregorian Sacramentary :

"Grant unto us, O Lord, that this oblation may profit the soul of thy servant Leo."

For which the latter books have chopped in this prayer:

"Grant unto us, O Lord, that by the intercession of thy servant Leo, this oblation may profit us."

Concerning which alteration, when the Archbishop of Lyons propounded such another question unto Pope Innocent, as our challenger at the beginning did unto us,

"Who it was that did change it, or when it was changed, or why?" the Pope returneth him for answer.

"That who did change it, or when it was changed, he was ignorant of: yet he knew upon what occasion it was changed: because that where the authority of the Holy Scripture doth say, that he doeth injury unto a martyr, who prayeth for a martyr,"

(which is a new text of Holy Scripture, of the Pope's own canonization,)

"the same by the like reason is to be held of the other saints."

The gloss upon this decretal, layeth down the reason of this mutation a little more roundly :

"Of old they prayed for him, and now at this day he prayeth for us; and so was the change made."

And Alphonsus Mendoza telleth us, that the old prayer was deservedly" disused, and this other substituted in the room thereof:

"Grant unto us, we beseech thee, O Lord, that by the intercession of thy servant Leo, this oblation may profit us."

Which prayer, indeed, was to be found heretofore in modernioribus sacramentariis, as Pope Innocent speaketh, and in the Roman missals that were published before the Council of Trent, as, namely, in that which was printed at Paris, Anno 1529; but in the newly reformed missal, wherewith, it seemeth, Mendoza was not so well acquainted as with his scholastical controversies, it is put out again, and another prayer for Leo put in; that by the celebration of those

"offices of atonement a blessed retribution might accompany him."

Neither is there any more wrong done unto St. Leo, in praying for him after this manner, than unto all the rest of his fellows in that other prayer of the Roman Liturgy:

"We have received, O Lord, the divine mysteries; which as they do profit thy saints unto glory, so we do beseech thee that they may profit us for our healing :"

and nothing so much as is done unto all the faithful deceased, when, in their masses for the dead, they say daily,

"Lord Jesus CHRIST, King of Glory, deliver the souls of all the faithful that are departed from the pains of hell, and from the deep lake; deliver them from the mouth of the lion, that hell do not swallow them up, that they fall not into darkness."

So that, whatsoever commodious expositions our adversaries can bring for the justifying of the Roman service, the same may we make use of to show, that the ancient Church might pray for the dead, and yet in so doing have no relation at all unto Purgatory; yea, and pray for the martyrs and other saints that were in the state of bliss, without offering unto them any injury thereby.

For the clearing of the meaning of those prayers which are made for Leo and the other saints, to the two expositions brought in by Pope Innocent, Cardinal Bellarmine addeth this for the third:

"that peradventure therein the glory of the body is petitioned for, which they shall have in the day of the resurrection. For although," saith he," they shall certainly obtain that glory, and it be due unto their merits; yet it is not absurd to desire and ask this for them."

Where, laying aside those unsavoury terms of debt and merits, whereof we shall have occasion to treat in their proper place, the answer is otherwise true in part, but not full enough to give satisfaction unto that which was objected. For the primary intention of the Church indeed, in her prayers for the dead, had reference unto the day of the resurrection; which also in divers places we find to have been expressly prayed for. As in the Egyptian Liturgy, attributed unto St. Cyril, Bishop of Alexandria:

"Raise up their bodies in the day which thou hast appointed, according to thy promises, which are true and cannot lie; grant unto them, according to thy promises, that which eye hath not seen, and ear hath not heard, and which hath not ascended into the heart of man, which thou hast prepared, O Lord, for them that love thy holy name, that thy servants may not remain in death, but may get out from thence, although slothfulness and negligence have followed them." And in that which is used by the Christians of St. Thomas, as they are commonly called, in the East Indies:

"Let the Holy Ghost give resurrection to your dead at the last day, and make them worthy of the incorruptible kingdom."

Such is the prayer of St. Ambrose, for Gratian and Valentinian the emperors:

"I do beseech thee, most high GOD, that thou wouldst raise up again those dear young men with a speedy resurrection, that thou mayest recompense this untimely course of this present life, with a timely resurrection."

And that in Alcuinus:

"Let their souls sustain no hurt; but when that great day of the resurrection and remuneration shall come, vouchsafe to raise them up, O Lord, together with thy saints and thine elect."

And that in Grimoldus's Sacramentary:

'Almighty and everlasting God, vouchsafe to place the body and the soul and the spirit of thy servant N., in the bosoms of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, that when the day of thy acknowledgment shall come, thou mayest command them to be raised up among thy saints and thine elect."

And that which the Syrians do use:

"Cause, Lord GOD, their souls and their spirits and their bodies to rest; and sprinkle the dew of mercy upon their bones."

But yet the Cardinal's answer, that the glory of the body may be prayed for, which the saints shall have at the day of the resurrection, cometh somewhat short of that which the Church used to request in the behalf of St. Leo: for in that prayer express mention is made of his soul, and so it is wished that profit may redound by the present oblation. And, therefore, this defect must be supplied out of his answer unto that other prayer, which is made for the souls of the faithful departed, that they may be delivered out of the mouth of the lion, and that hell may not swallow them up. To this he saith, that,

"the Church doth pray for these souls, that they may not be condemned unto the everlasting pains of hell; not as if it were not certain, that they should not be condemned unto those pains, but because it is GOD's pleasure that we should pray, even for those things which we are certain to receive."

The same answer did Alphonsus de Castro give before him,

that

very often those things are prayed for which are certainly known shall come to pass as they are prayed for; and that of this there be very many testimonies."

And Johannes Medina, that

"GOD delighteth to be prayed unto for those things which otherwise he purposed to do. For God had decreed," saith he, "after the sin of Adam to take our flesh, and he decreed the time wherein he meant to come; and yet the prayers of the saints, that prayed for his incarnation and for his coming, were acceptable unto him. God hath also decreed to grant pardon unto every repentant sinner; and yet the prayer is grateful unto him, wherein either the penitent doth pray for himself, or another for him, that GOD would be pleased to accept his repentance. God hath decreed also and promised not to forsake his Church,

and to be present with councils lawfully assembled; yet the prayer notwithstanding is grateful unto God, and the hymns, whereby his presence and favour and grace are implored both for the council and the Church."

And whereas it might be objected, that howsoever the Church may sometimes pray for those things which she shall certainly receive, yet she doth not pray for those things which she hath already received; and this she hath received, that those souls shall not be damned, seeing they have received their sentence, and are most secure from damnation; the Cardinal replieth, that this objection may easily be avoided :

"For although those souls," saith he, "have received already their first sentence in the particular judgment, and by that sentence are freed from hell, yet doth there yet remain the general judgment, in which they are to receive the second Wherefore the Church, praying that those souls in the last judgment may not fall into darkness, nor be swallowed up in hell, doth not pray for the thing which the soul hath, but which it shall receive."

sentence.

Thus, these men, labouring to show how the prayers for the dead used in their Church may stand with their conceits of Purgatory, do thereby inform us how the Prayers for the dead used by the ancient Church may stand well enough without the supposal of any purgatory at all. For if we pray for those things which we are most sure will come to pass, and the Church, by the adversary's own confession, did pray accordingly that the souls of the faithful might escape the pains of hell at the general judgment, notwithstanding they had certainly been freed from them already by the sentence of the particular judgment; by the same reason, when the Church in times past besought God to "remember all those that slept in the hope of the resurrection of everlasting life," which is the form of prayer used in the Greek Liturgies, and to give unto them rest, and to bring them unto the place where the light of His countenance should shine upon them for evermore, why should not we think that it desired these things should be granted unto them by the last sentence at the day of the resurrection, notwithstanding they were formerly adjudged unto them by the particular sentence at the time of their dissolution?

For, as

that which shall befall unto all at the day of judgment is accomplished in every one at the day of his death;"