Page:Delineation of Roman Catholicism.djvu/377

 CHAP. XII.] PURO,TORY. 369 at any time the adversary deliver thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee to the officer, and thou be cast into prison. Verily, I say unto thee, thou shalt by no means come out thence till thou hast paid he uttermost farthing," Matt. v, 25, 26. That the passage is to be understood as belonging to this life is proved by the best critics; and refers to that irreconcilable state of mind which is at enmity with God. And consequently such a temper, unrepented of, will ultimately termi- nate in destruction. That it gives no ground for purgatory is proved by the following considerations: 1. To the person who is in danger of being tlrust into the prison, it is said, "Tuou shalt by ro coroe out, till ThOU hast paid the uttermost farthing." This admits of no commutation of punishment. The sinner must pay the whole debt in his own person. The priests promise deliverance by roearts of masses and money; but, according to the text, he shall come out by no roeans except paying the uttermost farthing. 2. As the crime spoken of here is encAarOaS/ess, and therefore a mortal si, they eanno with any consistency, say that purgatory is the prison; because, as they teach, mortal sins send persons to hell. 3. If the text refer to the other world, it may be expounded by that parable, (Matt. xviii,) where the unkind servant is cast into prison till he shall pay all that is due; that is, he should lie there for ever; becatme the debt was ten thou- sand talents, too much for a prince, much less for a servant who had notAing to pay, and therefore his master forgave him his debt. Our deb as sinners, is not  unto God by us, but forven; therefore, when it is not pardoned, it can never be paid. Uncharitable and mali- cious teen, who will not forve others, will b.e sent to hell; for he that hateth his brother is a murderer, and no murderer hath eternal life. Maldenat, the Jesuit, owns, "that purgatory cannot be' proved from ,Matthew v, 25, as the prison there spoken of is hell, and not purga. or." 4. They quote Matthew xii, 32: "The blasphemy against the Holy Ghost 8hall not be forgiven, neither in this world, nor in the world to coroe." From hence they infer, that some 8ins may be forgiven in the world to come. To this we reply: 1. The Scripture knows only two iroes for the remission of sins, one here upon earth, (Matt. ix, 6,) to the believer and penitent person; he Other at the day of' judgment, when the great Judge shall dede the sentence of nifoluSh to all his faithful servants. Christ therefore says, this blasphemy shall have no reroiasion now, or at the day of judgment; at is, it shall never be forgiven. 2. The phrase, fiitAe in tAis z,ld, ,' tA world to com, may be rendered, neither/ tA/ d/../_d, that is, the Jewish, nor in tA d o com, that is, the Christian. The Messiah's do,n, age, or d/,,,at, is distinguished from the Jewish t/o, age, or tw'/d, which then wss. Heb. ii, 5 i vi, 3; xii, 27, 28. And this interpretation is srenghened by the consideration, that the phrase is a Hebraism, very curren among the Jews, and as Matthew wrote in Hebrew, the phrase is to be intereted according to the idiom of that language, which means by the expression, that such sin shall never be forgiven. 3. And this interpretation i8 proved by the other evangelists, who give the same passage in somewhat different phrase*. ology, and stripped of its Jewish garb. St. Mrk saith, that the bias- ' phemer/fA n,e,'.fog/vo. Mark iii, 10. And St. Luke says, that VOL. I.---24

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