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of our Saviour, 262 Whether it were lawful to offer oblations for the dead," (which he should have no reason to do, if no question had been made thereof among the Germans); and is plainly delivered by Hugo Etherianus, about 1170 years after Christ, in these words: 263 I know that many are deformed with vain opinions, thinking that the dead are not to be prayed for, because that neither Christ nor the Apostles that succeeded him have intimated these things in the Scriptures. But they are ignorant that there be many things, and those exceeding necessary, frequented by the holy Church, the tradition whereof is not had in the Scriptures; and yet they pertain nevertheless to the worship of God, and obtain great strength." Whereby it may appear that this practice wanted not opposition even then, when in the Papacy it was advanced unto its greatest height. And now it is high time that I should pass from this article unto the next following.

OF LIMBUS PATRUM, AND CHRIST'S DESCENT INTO HELL.

HERE doth our Challenger undertake to prove against us, not only" that there is a Limbus Patrum," but "that our Saviour" also "descended into hell, to deliver the ancient Fathers of the Old Testament; because, before his passion, none ever entered into heaven." That there was such a thing as Limbus Patrum, I have heard it said; but what it is now, the doctors vary, yet agree all in this, that Limbus it may well be, but Limbus Patrum sure it is "Whether it were distinct from that place in which

not.

262 Pro obeuntibus quoque consuluisse dignosceris, si liceat oblationes offerre. Gregor. II. vel 111. Epist. ad Bonifac. in Tomis Conciliorum.

263 Scio plerosque vanis opinionibus deformari, putantes non esse orandum pro mortuis; eo quod neque Christus neque apostoli ejus successores hæc scriptis intimaverint. Nesciunt quidem illi plura esse, ac persumme necessaria, quæ sancta ecclesia frequentat, quorum tra

ditio ex scripturis non habetur; nihilo tamen minus ad cultum Dei pertinent, et vigorem maximum obtinent. Hug. Etherian. de Animar. Regress. ab Infer. сар. 13.

1 An ab eo loco distinctus fuerit, in quo nunc infantes sine baptismo de vita decedentes recipi creduntur, theologi dubitant; nec est quicquam de re dubia temere pronunciandum. Jo. Mald. Commentar. in Luc. xvi. 22.

the infants that depart out of this life without baptism are now believed to be received, the divines do doubt; neither is there any thing to be rashly pronounced of so doubtful a matter," saith Maldonat the Jesuit. The Dominican Friars, that wrote against the Grecians at Constantinople, in the year 1252, resolve, that "into this Limbus the holy Fathers before the coming of Christ did descend; but now the children that depart without baptism are detained there:" so that in their judgment that which was the Limbus of fathers is now become the Limbus of children. The more common opinion is, that these be two distinct places, and that the one is appointed for unbaptized infants, but the other now remaineth void," and so "shall remain, that it may bear witness as well of the justice as of the mercy of God." If you demand, how it came to be thus void and emptied of the old inhabitants, the answer is here given,That our Saviour descended into hell" purposely "to deliver" from hence "the ancient Fathers of the Old Testament." But shell is one thing, I ween," saith Tertullian, and "Abraham's bosom," where the Fathers of the Old Testament rested, "another;"""neither is it to be believed that the bosom of Abraham, being the habitation of a secret kind of rest, was any part of hell," saith St Augustine. To say, then, that our Saviour descended into hell to deliver the ancient Fathers of the Old Testament out of Limbus Patrum, would by this construction prove as strange a tale as if it had been reported, that Cæsar made a voyage into Britain to set his friends at liberty in Greece.

Yea, but "before Christ's passion none ever entered into heaven," saith our Challenger. The proposition that

* In quem (Limbum) ante adventum Christi sancti patres descendebant: nunc vero pueri, qui absque baptismo decedunt, sine pœna sensibili detinentur. Tractat. contra Græc. in Tomo auctorum a P. Steuartio edit. p. 565.

Nunc vacuus remanet. Purg. lib. ii. cap. 6.

Bellar. de

* Manet autem, manebitque, licet vacuus, hic infernus; ut testimonium perhibeat tum justitiæ tum misericordiæ

Dei. Hen. Vicus, de Descensu Christi ad Infer. sect. 41. Vide Abulens. Paradox. v. cap. 188.

5 Aliud enim inferi, ut puto, aliud quoque Abrahæ sinus. Tertull. advers. Marcion. lib. iv. cap. 34.

"Non utique sinus ille Abrahæ, id est, secretæ cujusdam quietis habitatio, aliqua pars inferorum esse credenda est. Augustin. Epist. 99. ad Evodium.

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Cardinal Bellarmine taketh upon him to prove, where he handleth this controversy, is, "that the souls of the godly were not in heaven before the ascension of Christ." Our Jesuit, it seemeth, considered here with himself, that Christ had promised unto the penitent thief upon the cross, that not before his ascension only, but also before his resurrection, even that day he should be with him in paradise; that is to say, in the kingdom of heaven; as the Cardinal himself doth prove, both by the authority of 10 St Paul making paradise and the third heaven to be the selfsame thing, and by the testimony of the ancient expositors of the place. This, belike, stuck somewhat in our Jesuit's stomach, who being loth to interpret this of his Limbus Patrum, as "others of that side had done, and to maintain that paradise, instead of the third heaven, should signify the third or the fourth hell, thought it best to shift the matter handsomely away by taking upon him to defend, that not before Christ's ascension, lest that of the thief should cross him, but before his passion none ever entered into heaven; but if none before our Saviour's passion did ever enter into heaven, whither shall we say that Elias did enter? The Scripture assureth us that he went up into heaven, 2 Kings ii. 11; and of this Mattathias put his sons in mind upon his death-bed, that 12 Elias being zealous and fervent for the law, was taken up into heaven. Elias and Moses both, before the passion of Christ, are described to be in glory: Lazarus is carried by the angels into a place of comfort, and not of imprisonment: in a word, all the Fathers accounted themselves to be strangers and pilgrims in this earth, seeking for a better country, that is, an heavenly, as well as we do; and therefore having ended their pilgrimage, they arrived at the country they

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7 Quod animæ piorum non fuerint in cœlo ante Christi ascensionem. Bellarm. de Christ. lib. iv. cap. 11.

8 Luke xxiii. 43.

9 Vera ergo expositio est Theophylacti, Ambrosii, Bedæ, et aliorum, qui per paradisum intelligunt regnum cœlorum. Bellarm. de Sanct. Beatit. lib. i. cap. 3. 10 2 Cor. xii. 2, 4.

11 Henr. Vic. de Descens. ad Infer.

sect. 41. p. 129. Vide Thom. in part. III. Summ. Quæst. LII. Art. 4. ad 3. et Lyranum in Luc. xxiii. 43.

12 Ηλίας ἐν τῷ ζηλῶσαι ζῆλον νόμου ἀνελήφθη ἕως εἰς τὸν οὐρανόν. 1 Maccab. ii. 58.

13 Luke ix. 31.
14 Luke xvi. 22, 25.
15 Hebr. xi. 13, 14, 16.
16 Hebr. xiii. 14.

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sought for, as well as as we; they "believed to be saved through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, as well as we; they lived by that faith, as well as we; they 19 died in Christ, as well as we; they received 20 remission of sins, imputation of righteousness, and the blessedness arising therefrom, as well as we; and the mediation of our Saviour being of that present efficacy that it took away sin and brought in righteousness from the very beginning of the world, it had virtue sufficient to free men from the penalty of loss as well as from the penalty of sense, and to bring them unto him in whose presence is fulness of joy, as to deliver them from the 22 place of torment, where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth.

21,

The first that ever assigned a resting place in hell to the Fathers of the Old Testament, was, as far as we can find, Marcion the heretic, 24 who "determined that both kind of rewards, whether of torment or of refreshing, was appointed in hell for them that did obey the law and the prophets." Wherein he was gainsaid by such as wrote against him, not only for making that the place of their eternal rest, but also for lodging them there at all, and imagining that Abraham's bosom was any part of hell. This appeareth plainly by the disputation, set out among the works of Origen, betwixt Marcus the Marcionite and Adamantius the defender of the Catholic cause; who, touching the parabolical history of the rich man and Lazarus in the sixteenth of St Luke, are brought in reasoning after this manner : 26 Marcus. He saith that Abraham is in

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(quod olim in S. Irenæi Cœnobio Lugdunensi, hodie in publica Cantabrigiensis Academiæ Bibliotheca asservatur) historiæ huic præmittitur ista præfatio: Elme δὲ καὶ ἑτέραν παραβολήν. Dixit autem aliam parabolam. Cui similis etiam in Missali Romano (feria 5 post Dominicam 2 Quadragesima) legebatur, Dixit Jesus discipulis suis parabolam hanc. Verum in Missali reformato duæ postremæ voces sublatæ nuper sunt.

26 Μάρκος. Ἐν τῷ ᾅδῃ εἶπεν εἶναι τὸν Ἀβραὰμ, οὐκ ἐν τῇ βασιλείᾳ τῶν οὐρανῶν. —Αδαμάντιος. Ανάγνωθι ὅτι ἐν τῷ ᾅδῃ λέγει τὸν Ἀβραάμ.—Μαρκ. Ἀπὸ τοῦ συνομιλεῖν αὐτῷ τὸν πλούσιον, δείκνυνται

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hell, and not in the kingdom of heaven.—Adamantius. Read whether he saith that Abraham was in hell.-Marc. In that the rich man and he talked one to the other, it appeareth that they were together.-Adamant. That they talked one with another, thou hearest; but the great gulf spoken of, that thou hearest not. For the middle space

between heaven and earth he calleth a gulf.-Marc. Can a man therefore see from earth unto heaven? it is impossible. Can any man lifting up his eyes behold from the earth, or from hell rather see into heaven? If not, it is plain that a valley only was set betwixt them.-Adamant. Bodily eyes use to see those things only that are near, but spiritual eyes reach far. And it is manifest, that they who have here put off their body do see one another with the eyes of their soul. For mark how the Gospel doth say that he lifted up his eyes. Toward heaven one useth to

lift them up, and not toward the earth." In like manner doth Tertullian also retort the same place of Scripture against Marcion, and prove that it maketh a plain difference between hell and the bosom of Abraham. For it affirmeth saith he, "both that a great deep is interposed betwixt those regions, and that it suffereth no passage from either side. Neither could the rich man have lifted up his eyes, and that afar off, unless it had been unto places above him, and very far above him, by reason of the mighty distance betwixt that height and that depth." Thus far Tertullian; who, though he come short of Adamantius, in 28 making

ὁμοῦ ὄντες.—Ἀδαμαντ. Τὸ ὁμιλεῖν πρὸς
ἀλλήλους ἤκουσας, τὸ δὲ λεγόμενον χάσμα
μέγα οὐκ ἤκουσας· τὸ γὰρ οὐρανοῦ καὶ
τῆς γῆς τὸ μέσον χάσμα λέγει... Μαρκ.
Δύναται οὖν τὶς ἀπὸ γῆς ἕως οὐρανοῦ
ὁρᾷν; ἀδύνατον. ἐπάρας τοὺς ὀφθαλ
μοὺς αὐτοῦ ἰδεῖν δύναταί τις ἀπὸ γῆς,
ἢ μᾶλλον ἀπὸ τοῦ ᾅδου εἰς τὸν οὐρανὸν
ὁρᾷν ; εἰ μὴ δῆλον ὅτι φάραγξ ἦν ἐν μέσῳ |
αὐτῶν. Ἀδαμαντ. Οἱ σωματικοὶ ὀφθαλ-
μοὶ τὰ ἔγγιστα μόνον πεφύκασιν ὁρᾷν
οἱ δὲ ψυχικοὶ εἰς μῆκος ἀποτείνονται.
καὶ δῆλον ὅτι τὸ σῶμα ἐντεῦθεν ἀποθέ-
μενοι, τοῖς τῆς ψυχῆς ὄμμασιν ὁρῶσιν
ἀλλήλους. Πρόσχες γὰρ πῶς λέγει τὸ
ἐυαγγέλιον, ὅτι ἐπάρας τοὺς ὀφθαλμοὺς
αὐτοῦ, εἰς τὸν οὐρανὸν πέφυκεν ἐπαίρειν,

Kai OÙк Eis Tην ynu. Orig. Dial. II. cont.
Marcion.

27 Respondebimus, et hac ipsa scriptura revincente oculos ejus, quæ ab infernis discernit Abrahæ sinum pauperi: aliud enim inferi, ut puto, aliud quoque Abrahæ sinus. Nam et magnum ait intercedere regiones istas profundum, et transitum utrinque prohibere. Sed nec allevasset dives oculos, et quidem de longinquo, nisi in superiora, et de altitudinis longinquo per immensam illam distantiam sublimitatis et profunditatis. Tert. advers. Marcion. lib. iv. cap. 34.

28 Eam itaque regionem sinum dico Abrahæ, etsi non cœlestem, sublimiorem tamen inferis, interim refrigerium præbi.

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