Page:Tracts for the Times Vol 3.djvu/135

Rh flames of Purgatory; but forgetting as much as once to make mention of Purgatory, (the sole foundation of these suffrages for the dead, in our adversary's judgment,) doth trouble himself and his cause with bringing in such far-fetched reasons as these: that they who performed this duty did intend to signify thereby that their brethren departed were not perished, but remained still alive with the Lord; and to put a difference betwixt the high perfection of our Saviour Christ, and the general frailty of the best of all his servants? Take away popish Purgatory on the other side, (which in the days of Aerius and Epiphanius needed not to be taken away, because it was not as yet hatched,) and all the reasons produced by Epiphanius will not withhold our Romanists from absolutely subscribing to the opinion of Aerius; this being a case with them resolved, that

But though Thomas Aquinas and his abettors determined so, we must not, therefore, think that Epiphanius was of the same mind, who lived in a time wherein Prayers were usually made for them that never were dreamed to have been in Purgatory, and yieldeth those reasons of that usage, which overthrew the former consequence of Thomas, every whit as much as the supposition of Aerius.

For Aerius and Thomas both agree in this, that prayer for the dead would be altogether unprofitable, if the dead themselves received not special benefit thereby. This doth Epiphanius, defending the ancient use of these Prayers in the Church, show to be untrue, by producing other profits that redound from thence unto the living; partly by the public signification of their faith, hope and charity toward the decased; partly by the honour that they did unto the Lord Jesus, in exempting him from the common condition of the rest of mankind. And to make it appear that these things were mainly intended by the Church in her memorials for the dead, and not the cutting off of the sins which they carried with them out of this life, or the releasing of them out of any torment, he allegeth, as we have heard, that not only the meaner sort of Christians, but also the best of them, without exception, even the prophets and apostles, and martyrs themselves, were comprehended therein. From whence, by our adversary's good leave, we will make bold to frame this syllogism: