Page:Tracts for the Times Vol 3.djvu/102

14 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 Bellarraine addeth this for the third:

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:

And in that which is used by the Christians of St. Thomas, as they are commonly called, in the East Indies:

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