Selected quad for the lemma: mercy_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
mercy_n	great_a	let_v	sinner_n	1,997	5	7.5506	4	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A28402	A treatise of the sibyls so highly celebrated, as well by the antient heathens, as the holy fathers of the church : giving an accompt of the names, and number of the sibyls, of their qualities, the form and matter of their verses : as also of the books now extant under their names, and the errours crept into Christian religion, from the impostures contained therein, particularly, concerning the state of the just, and unjust after death / written originally by David Blondel ; Englished by J.D.	Blondel, David, 1591-1655.; Davies, John, 1625-1693.	1661 (1661)	Wing B3220; ESTC R38842	342,398	310

Creation shall be shaken with fear and then shall the light be changed O Word spare him who is translated hence Again I beseech you all who were of my acquaintance and who love me be mindful of me at the Day of Judgment that I may finde mercy before the Dreadful Tribunal Again Let us cry to the Immortal King when thou shalt come to make inquisition into the secret things of men spare thy Servant whom thou hast taken to thy self O Mankind-loving God Again I am dead after that I have passed away my life with security and I lye without voice in the Grave and now I expect the last Trumpet to awake me cries he who is dead but my Friends pray unto Christ that he would number me among the Sheep on his right hand c. I have consumed my life in great negligence and being translated from it I expect the dreadfull Tribunal before which O Jesu preserve me free from condemnation cries thy Servant Again O Lord who art the onely King entertain into the Celestial Kingdom thy Faithfull Servant whom thou hast now transferred hence and we beseech thee preserve him free from condemnation at the hour when all mortal men being to be judged shall make their appearance before the Judge c. Disacknowledged by my Brethren and sequestred from my Friends I cry in spirit from the noisomness of the Grave Examine not my failings at the day of Judgment despise not my Tears thou who art the joy of Angels but grant me rest O Lord even me whom out of thy great mercy thou hast taken to thy self c. Stuck fast in the Myriness of sin and devested of good actions I who am a prey to Worms cry to thee in Spirit cast me not behind thee wretch that I am place me not at thy left hand thou who hast framed me with thy Hands but out of thy great mercy grant him rest whom thou hast taken to thy self by thy Ordinance Having now quitted my Kinred and Countrey I am come into a strange way and am as stinking rottenness in the Grave Alass none shall afford me any assistance in that hour but O Lord because of thy great mercy grant him rest whom thou hast taken to thy self by thy Ordinance Again O what an inquisition and judgment are we to expect what fear and trembling in which Brethren the Elements themselves shall be moved and the creation shake come now and let us cast our selves at the feet of Christ that he may save the Soul he hath transferred An intolerable sire and external obscurity and the Worm which never dies is prepared for us sinners in the day of inevitable necessity then spare thy Servant whom thou hast transferred For as much then as the Prayers for the remission of sins made by the Greeks under the names as well of the Surviving praying for the Dead as of the Dead putting up their Requests for themselves are for the most part restrained to the day of Judgement we are so far from having any thing that might oblige us to take them in such a sence as that they should insinuate that the Faithfull between the moment of their death and that of the Last Judgment were reduced to the suffering of any pains that the Hypotheses of Antiquity seem clearly to exact the contrary And the result thence is that the Modern Greeks though great opposers of the Purgatory maintained by the Church of Rome have not kept within the Terms prescribed them by their Fore-fathers but have changed their Sentiments by the Introduction of Novelties which none of them would ever have imagined It will be demanded whence they derived the perswasion that there were Souls of a middle condition which being properly neither good nor bad could not after their separation from the Body enter into the possession of Paradise without having for a certain time lain drooping in I know not what place of Sequestration where they were to endure grief terrour and the incommodity of darkness which as is pretended covered them when nothing of all this either hath or could have any ground in Scripture which does every where make as immediate an opposition between Paradise and Hell the good and the bad the Faithfull and the Reprobate the Children of God redeemed and consecrated for ever by one onely Oblation and that once made with the blood of the Covenant and the children of the Devil who have held as prophane that precious blood as between life and death light and darkness the right hand and the left of the great Judge teaching us expresly that all the faithfull dying in the Lord are blessed rest from thenceforth come not into condemnation are passed from death to life are at their departure out of the body with the Lord and that all the rest without any exception dying in Adam and having not believed are already condemned 2. That Antiquity having happily shaken of the strange imagination which the Fathers of the Second Age had swallowed out of the pretended Sibylline Writing insinuating to them that the Spirits of all men as well good as bad necessarily descended into Hell and were to be there detained under the power of Devils till the Resurrection of the Bodies they had animated it thereupon formally maintained that immediately upon the Death of the Faithfull are the Nuptials of the Spouse that it remains onely for the surviving to give thanks to God that he hath crowned him who is departed from them and having delivered him out of all fear receives him to himself that to all the good Death is an assured Port a deliverance from the combat and bonds a Transporation to better things and that as soon as it happens the Cabinets are sealed and the time accomplished and the combat at an end and the race run and the Crowns bestowed and all is manifestly brought to perfection 3. That the Ritual it self as it were endeavouring to bring into discredit as well the distinction of the middle-conditioned Souls as their pretended banishment for a time into a dark place indifferently affirms of all those who die in the Faith of Christ men and women Ecclesiasticks those of Religious Professions and Laicks that they are gone to the Lord that they rest that Hell detains them not that they exchange Death for the divine life and are made the Children of immortality absolutely denying all that the vulgar Opinion temerariously and without any reason shewn affirms of some and wholly destroying it by so formal a contradiction But we are not to imagine our selves reduced to a necessity of being over-Critical in discovering the Origine of this errour since the falsificatour as well of the Ritual as of the Sentiment of those of his Nation hath done it so palpably to our hands that he hath not made any scruple to publish his own ignorance even in things evident and such as the word of God the best

according to them at such a point as immediately after their departure out of the Body to be at the self-same time exempted from the Pains of Restraint Obscurity or Grief through which it is affirmed they are to pass and deprived of the Rest which after the Pains they are to obtain so as that they are for the least space of time imaginable in a Neutral State which admits not the qualification of either Good or Bad of either Light or Darkness Rest or Torment and consequently of either Joy or Grief if not by accident And in Case that by the Place of Torment where it is feigned they fear being confined some may understand the Hell of the Damned is it possible they should ever be exposed thereto since it is presupposed they are of a middle Conditition and upon that very accompt as being chargeable onely with Venial Sins neither do nor can deserve Eternal damnation Be this therefore one unmaintainable and unimaginable Absurdity which must needs press hard upon our Forgers of Descriptions according to the Dictates of their own Fancies They make the deceased Priest further say Why O man dost thou trouble thy self thus unseasonably There is one onely hour and all passes away for in Hell there is no Repentance There is no Releasment in that place there is the Worm which never sleeps there is the darksom land and the obscure matter to which I am to be condemned c. Is this Discourse attributible to a Faithfull Person that had had here in this World the least taste of the Promise made by the Son of God assuring us that whoever believes in him is in such manner passed from death to life as that though he be dead yet shall he live through him that he shall not come into Condemnation and that there is not indeed any for those that are in him Are the Souls imagined to be in a middle Condition subject to the stingings of the Worm which never dies and liable to Damnation Which if it be supposed they neither are nor can why should they be feigned to say so and necessarily Lie in saying so This must then be a second Impertinence and a new Piece of Forgery committed by the Corrupters of the Ritual not onely against the Word of God but also against their Sentiment who in the same Ritual inserted this Confession which is both most true and Diametrically contrary to the Discourse before confuted Lament not all you who are departed in the Faith for as much as Christ hath suffered the Cross and was buried for us in the Flesh and hath made all those who call upon him children of Immortality For this once lay'd down does it signifie less then a total Eclipse of understanding and circumspection to make the children of Immortality for whom the Saviour of the World died and who consequently cannot perish say that they shall be Damned Nay the Prayers of the Living for their departed Brethren would be still chargeable with inconvenience even though they were taken literally For instance this O Lord as thou saidst unto Martha I am the Resurrection by the Effect accomplishing thy Word and calling Lazarus out of Hell so also mercifully raise this thy servant out of Hell For besides that it is a little too freely supposed that our Lord's Friend was confined in Hell from the moment of the Death of his Body to that of his Resurrection it is also false that our Saviour raises out of Hell whence the Ritual confesses that none is delivered any of his Servants Whoever once enters there never comes out again nor is there any raising up to be expected by him But these words may be maintained if they meet with a favourable Interpretation which might admit Hell to signifie not the place of the Damned in which sence it is ordinarily taken but the Grave whence our Saviour who called forth Lazarus will at the Last day raise up the Bodies of all his Servants With the help of the same favourable way of Interpreting it were possible to finde a sence conformable to the apprehension of Antiquity in those Prayers whereby the Greeks do at this day Beg the Remission of Sins for their Dead taking care to make them to relate to the Absolution which shall be solemnly pronounced by the Great Judg at the last day as may be deduced from this that most of them expresly mention it among others this Vouchsafe O Redeemer that when thou shalt come with ineffable glory in the Clouds after a dreadfull manner to Judge the whole World that thy Faithfull Servant whom thou hast taken from the Earth may joyfully meet thee which words are Grounded on 1 Thess Chap. iv Verse 17. In like manner this Vouchsafe O God to be mindfull of our Father who is now at rest and be pleased to deliver him from the corruption of sin at the day of Judgment through the good odour of thy goodness mercy and love towards men Again O Lord from whom the Spirits of those who serve thee do come and to whom they return we beseech thee to cause to rest in a place of light in the Region of the Just the Spirit of N. thy Servant now lying in his Grave and raise him up at thy second and dreadfull coming not to be condemned after the Resurrection but to be Absolved for no man living shall be justified in thy sight Again Let not thy Servant O Lord be confounded at thy coming When thou shalt discover all things that are hidden and shalt O Christ reprove our sins spare him whom thou hast taken hence being mindfull of his Preaching Again Forgive O Saviour the sins of him who hath been translated hence in Faith and vouchsafe to admit him to thy Kingdom there shall not any escape the dreadfull Tribunal of thy judgment Kings and Potentates and the Hireling all shall appear together and the dreadfull Voice of the Judge shall call the People that have sinned to the condemnation of Hell from which O Christ deliver thy servant Again Out of thy mercy O Christ exempt from the Fire of Hell and the dreadfull Sentence thy Servant whom thou hast now taken hence in Faith and let thy Domestick praise thee as God the mercifull Redeemer c. Brethren how dreadfull is the hour which sinners are to expect O what fear is there Then the Fire of Hell devours and the ravenous Serpent swallows wherefore mercifull Lord Christ deliver him from the day of dreadfull Gehenna O how great shall be the Joy of the Just which they shall be possessed of when the Judge comes for the Nuptial room is prepared and Paradise and the whole Kingdom of Christ into which O Christ receive thy Domesticks to rejoyce with thy Saints eternally Who O Christ shall bear the dreadfull threatning of thy coming Then shall Heaven be rolled up together as a Book after a dreadfull manner and the Stars will fall the whole

to felicity and desire to escape Damnation she I say neither prays nor thinks she ought to pray for either the Saints Glorified nor the Sinners Condemned but onely for the Faithfull whom she presupposes to expect their Glorification and that onely for a certain time Thirdly that if from this antecedent he hath sinned it did of necessity always follow We must Pray for him the Church of Rome would be obliged to Pray First For the Apostatized Angels who having quitted their first station sinned no less then men do but in such manner that their offence condemned by an irrevocable decree is absolutely incapable of remedy Secondly For the Damned who are not in a state capable of amendment Thirdly For those that are Glorified who have not any good to obtain and that as well after as before the last Judgment since that after the Pronuntiation of it this truth that men and Devils have sinned will remain evident and irrefragable as before though that after the retribution which shall be for ever made to every one according to his works it will not be any longer either necessary or convenient or rational to pray for him CHAP. XVII Saint Epiphanius's fift Motive considered FOr a fifth consideration Saint Epiphanius alledges that Prayers for the Dead are made by the surviving out of a design to signifie what is accomplished thereby insinuates that he conceived the state of the Faithfull from the moment of their death to the time of their resurrection to be imperfect and capable of melioration it is possible Aerius might have been of the same Sentiment and upon that account have been forced to acknowledg some necessity of praying for them untill the absolute accomplishment of their Glory But this imagination neither hath nor can have any force against the Protestants who believe that the Faithfull at the very demolition of the earthly Tabernacles of their bodies are received according to the saying of St. Paul into their celestial habitations and that at the very instant of their putting-off of Flesh God cloaths their souls with the glory which they are eternally to enjoy so that what till then was in part and imperfect in them is from thence absolutely abolished and that these Considerations that the Prayer does not cut off all that is layed in charge against the dead and that it is made to signifie what is accomplished cannot be any way seasonable in respect of those who as they are perswaded by the Scripture that to no purpose are alledged either the need which the Faithfull departed stand in of their accomplishment since they are already in actual possession thereof being present with the Lord and absent from the body particularly to that end or the charges which are pretended to remain against them after death since there can be no accusation nor any one to lay ought to their charge who are justified by the Lord who protesteth according to the tenour of his own Covenant that he will be mercifull to their unrighteousness and their sins and iniquities will he remember no more CHAP. XVIII Saint Epiphanius's sixth Motive Considered IN the sixth place St. Epiphanius tells us That some in his Time prayed for Sinners departed having a respect or recourse 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to the Mercy of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 imploring the Mercy of God and it may be said that upon this ground That sinners continued charged with sins and imperfections after their decease Antiquity was induced to demand by Prayers the remission of their sins and consequently their establishment in a place of rest To this purpose is what we read in the one and fourtieth Chapter of the eighth Book of the Constitutions attributed to Saint Clement 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. That God the lover of men having received his soul would turn away his face from all his sins voluntary and unvoluntary and out of his Graciousness and Mercy place him in the Region of the godly who enjoy themselves in the Bosom of Abraham c. whence trouble sadness and sighing are departed c. Look upon this thy servant whom thou hast chosen and taken to thy self to receive another lot and pardon him what he hath voluntarily or involuntarily sinned and place about him good Angels and dispose of him into the Bosom of the Patriarchs c. where there is neither sadness nor trouble nor sighing c. In the Liturgie of the Armenians Memento Domine miserere fac gratiam animabus requiescentibus pacifica illumina eas c. Remember O Lord shew Mercy and be Gracious unto the souls which are in rest pacify them and illuminate them c. In the Liturgy of St. Basily 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For the repose and remission of thy Servant In the Anaphora or Liturgie translated out of the Syriack and attributed to St. Basil whereof the Summary is alledged by Cassander That God would conduct the departed through the horrid receptacles and place them in habitations of light That God would deliver them out of the thick darkness of tribulation and grief that he would not enter into judgement with them c. If they have sinned in any manner as men clad in flesh that he would pardon them In the Missal of the Latine Church Animabus famulorum famularumque tuarum remissionem cunctorum tribue peccatorum ut indulgentiam quam semper optaverunt piis supplicationibus consequantur c. Grant O Lord unto the souls of thy Servants of what Sex soever the remission of all their sins that by devout supplications they may obtain that indulgence which they have always desired c. Do away by the pardon of thy most mercifull Piety the sins which he hath committed through the frailty of worldly conversation c. Do thou O God mercifully out of thy wonted Goodness wipe away the stains which the souls have contracted from the contagion of the World Amen Mercifully pardon them c. put them into perpetual oblivion Amen c. O Lord enter not into judgment with thy Servants for no man shall be justifyed in thy sight deliver their souls from the Gates of Hell c. Grant them the remission of all their sins c. free them from all their sins c. We beseech thee that thy judicial sentence fall not heavy upon them c. That what vices soever she hath through the subtlety of the Devil contracted thou wouldest out of thy compassion and mercy indulgently do away c. Free O Lord we beseech thee the soul of thy Servant from all chains of sin Which Prayers are for the most part repeated in the first Book of Sacred Ceremonies Sect. 15. chap. 1. and the ensuing is there added over and above by a late Cardinal Non intres in judicium tuum Domine cum servo tuo c. O Lord enter not into judgment with thy servant for no man shall be justifyed in thy sight if the remission of

cunctipotens animae c. Pardon thy Soul he whom all things obey he takes him for an Intercessour as he in requital Prays for him saying Oramus pro te pro nobis quaesumus ora c. We pray for thee thou us thy Pray'rs afford And elsewhere he lays it down as certain that the one and twentieth of January the day of his Decease Destituit Mundo substituitque Polo Snatch'd him from hence to place him in the Skie which cannot stand without his being received into Heaven In those of Howel Bishop of Mans deceased in the year 1129. and of the Abbot Joel having said Morte pari modicò Deus attigit ambos Ut sint translati Sidera magna Poli c. In equal death God did them both conjoyn Translated hence in Heav'n great Stars to shine A Discourse representing them already possessed of Celestial Glory and and particularly of the former Coram Sancto Vota vovent Tumulo c. Before his Tomb their Vows they pour Whence it follows that they took him for their Patron and must of necessity think him in Happiness Yet does he nevertheless pray for him saying Praesulis obtineat Spiritus Astra Poli c. May Heav'n the Prelate's Soul obtain as if contrary to his precedent Protestations he had thought him at a great distance from it In those of Audebert Abbot of Bourg-dieux and Arch-Bishop of Bourges deceased in the year 1098. he is very liberal of his Wishes as Communem Patrem communi tangite voto Ut det Pastori sedem super aethera vestro Again Audeberte vale sit pax tibi lúxque perennis Again In Domino requiem Spiritus inveniat c. Omnipotens animam Pontificis foveat c. To th' common Father your joynt Vows address That he your Pastour bring to happiness c. Audebert be well Eternal peace and light Thy Portion be May's Soul in God finde rest Kindely may God the Prelate's soul receive Who hearing him talk after this rate would not say that he were out of Heaven deprived of light peace and rest But look upon the Reverse of the Medal and you shall finde he looks on him as his Patron already possessed of Heaven saying Tu Pater à Superis saepe revise tuos c. Vadis te Christo per idonea signa vocante Et velut emerito tibi praemia digna parante Omni momento nostrî Patrone memento Et succurre gregi mortali morte redempto Again Nunc quoque cum Christo nos saepè revisat ab alto Thou Father from on high revisit thine c. By Christ hence As a discharged Champion thou art Of great rewards call'd to receive thy Part O Patron ever-mindfull of us be And those relieve whom mortal death set free With Christ from Heav'n often revisit us What could he have said more to St. Peter or St. Paul according to the Theologie of that Time In that of William Bishop of Engoulesm having invited those of his Diocess to worship his Body he advises them to pray for him Artus venerare Paternos Dic quoque Transcendat Gulielmi Spiritus Astra Thy Father's body having worship'd pray That William's soul to Heav'n may finde the way What could have been more ridiculous then to have perswaded People to the Veneration of a Body whose Spirit should at the same time have been in a place of Pain and deprived of Glory In that of Gerald of Orleans he says Datur hîc sua portio Terrae Spiritus in tenues vivens elabitur auras Cui tamen è rebus lutulentis si quid inhaesit Expediat totum clemens miseratio Christi His Precibus Lector Amen adjiciendo faveto Here Earth hath had her share The Spirit lives dissolv'd to subtile Air Which yet if stain'd with ought terrestrial May Christ in his great Mercy pardon all T advance these Prayers Reader Amen let fall Since then he conceived that at the fall of the Body when it became the portion of the Earth the Spirit lived and was escaped who sees not that he believed it to be in some other place then that of a grievous punishment and that the Prayer he afterward makes tends rather to assure the Expiation of his Offences then to implore it for him in as much as the Mercy of God is not communicated after death but to those who obtained it while they lived In that of Durand Bishop of Cler-mont deceased the nineteenth of November 1095. during the time of the Councel or Croisado for the Conquest of the Holy Sepulchre was published he exhorts the People of Auvergn to worship him and thereby declares him to be in Happiness saying Arvernus sanctos cineres reverenter habeto Atque Patrocinio tutior esto suo Worship his sacred ashes Cler-mont and Thou shalt in his protection safer stand In those of Gerald Abbot of Selue Majour in Bourdelois he is yet more excessive as hath been observed in the precedent Chapter And though the Prayers he makes in the Epitaphs of his other Friends as Reynold Clere Guy Raoul Clerembant William of Mont-soreau Berenger Arch-Deacon of Anger 's Froden of Anger 's Peter Dean of Dol Reinould Canon of Poictiers Geoffrey of Rheims Alexander of Tours Eriland Peter Prior Eudes Abbot of St. John d'Angely Raoul Arch-Deacon of Poictiers Chevalier Bouchard Chevalier Rahier the Countess Osanna Guy Tourangeau William Abbot of Bourgueil and Herard of Loudun though I say those Prayers might presuppose the Belief of Purgatory yet since they are consistent with the other Presuppositions and that Baldric made the like for Persons whom he believed crowned with Glory in Heaven it cannot be safely concluded that he ever intended to apply any one of them to the common Opinion current in his Time and which the Church of Rome maintains at this day The same is to be said of those who after him and to this present have declared and do declare according to the Custom of the Church of Rome and even in her Communion that the Persons whose Memory they have celebrated by their Verses and Sepulchral Inscriptions are in Happiness and possessed of celestial Glory For though they do not openly impugn the Opinion of Purgatory as the Protestants do and though they use such Expressions as might seem to maintain it yet do they not oblige themselves to maintain it in Effect and without any injury done them it may be taken for certain that they believed no more of it then the Reverend Peter Chastellain Bishop of Mascon who having on the three and twentieth of May 1547. advanced into Glory the great King Francis and scandalized the College of Sorbonne which looked on his Discourse as a Piece of Lutheranism flatly contradicting the common Opinion of Purgatory and demanded of him either the formal Retractation or Explication of it thought it satisfaction enough to give the Complainers and that in the presence of King Henry the Second and all his Court a Jest instead of an Apologie

that we are made partakers of their Dignity that they are to be honoured by way of imitation and not adored upon any religious accompt In a word that neither the Blessed Virgin Mother of our Saviour nor any of the Saints of either Sex can pretend to any part of that religious homage Saint Epiphanius one of the most earnest maintainers of Prayer for the Dead hath left to them and the whole Church of these last times these remarkable Precepts 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Indeed the Body of Mary was holy but it was not God the Virgin was indeed a Virgin and honoured but she was not given us to be adored on the contrary she adored him who was begotten of her as to the flesh c. If God will not have the Angels to be adored how much rather will he not that she who was born of Ann should be c. God came from Heaven and the Word was clad in flesh taken from the holy Virgin but the Virgin is not adored c. Let Mary be honoured but let the Father Son and Holy Spirit be adored Let no man adore Mary though Mary be excellent and holy and honoured it is not that she should be adored c. Let Mary be honoured but let the Lord be adored But not to press any further this notorious defect which we finde at present in the Service of the Greeks we are to observe that among them the Office of the Dead is full of Prayers whereby is desired as in the Latine Service the mercy of God the remission of the sins of the deceased his absolution his blessed resurrection his introduction into rest into Abraham ' s Bosom into the Mansion of the blessed into refreshment into Paradise into the Tabernacle of God into his Kingdom glory light to the right hand of the great Judge into the Society of the Saints and Angels all which Expressions according to the Hypotheses of Antiquity may be applied to the Spirits already received into glory Which is so much the more evident for that the particular Office which concerns the Obsequies of Children is full of these Prayers that God would number the deceased among the Children to whom he hath promised his Kingdom that he would place him among the just who are acceptable in his sight that he would make him partaker of the good things which are above this World that he would let him enter into the joys of the Saints that in his holy Mountain he would gratifie him with celestial goods that he would write his name in the Book of those who shall be saved that he would make his face to shine upon him that he would lodge him in Abraham ' s Bosom that he would grant him the enjoyment of his Kingdom c. Yet were not these Desires made without a presupposition of his Beatitude as First when it is said to him He who hath taken thee from the Earth and gives thee place among his Saints shew● that thou O truly blessed Childe art a Citizen of Paradise The Sword of Death falling on thee hath cut thee off as a tender Branch O blessed art thou who hast made no tryal of worldly pleasures but behold Christ opening the Gates of Heaven to thee numbring thee● out of his great goodness among the Elect● Secondly When he is brought in making this Discourse Why do you bewail me a Childe translated out of the World for I am not a Subject to be bewailed The joy of all the just is required for those Children who have not done works worthy Tears Thirdly When he acknowledges that Death is a freedom to Children that they are thereby exempted from the miseries of life and that they are gone to rest that they rejoyce in Abraham ' s Bosom in the divine Quires of Blessed Children and assuredly dance because their departure hence was a deliverance from the corruption which loves sin If then the Ritual of the Creeks be full of Prayers for the Children whom they unanimously acknowledge to be among the Blessed what inconvenience can there be to attribute to them that they had the same apprehension for persons of age of whose felicity they no way doubted But though reason should not lead us to think so yet does their formal confession obliges us to believe as much for there is not any deceased person for whom they say not to God Mercifully receive the faithfull person departed who hath holily quitted this life and is O Lord passed towards thee and whose Funeral Solemnities they do not conclude saying to him three several times Our Brother worthy to be ever blessed and always remembred thy memory is eternal To every Monk without any exception they address these words Brother thè way thou art in is that of bliss for that a place of rest is prepared for thee adding to that purpose the sixteenth Verse of the one hundred and sixteenth Psalm Return unto thy rest O my Soul for the Lord hath dealt kindly with thee and a little after He who is taken hence hath passed through the ever-troubled Sea of Life and by Faith is arrived at his Port conduct him O Christ with the Saints into thy tranquillity and ever-living pleasures In like manner to every Priest Thou hast piously signalized thy self in Faith Charity Hope Gentleness Purity of life and in the Sacerdotal dignity and therefore O Brother of eternal memory God who is before all Ages whom thou hast served will himself dispose thy Spirit into a place full of light and pleasure where the just are in rest and will make thee obtain of Christ at the day of Judgment pardon and great mercy And the deceased Person is introduced using these words I am now at rest and have found great favour for that I have been transferred from the corruption of life glory be to thee O Lord c. Thy divine Servant Deified in his Transportation by thy now-enlivening Mystery is come towards thee To every Woman departed Detain not any longer O malicious Hell the Souls of the Elect in the condemnation of the Transgression for all being now made assuredly conformable to Christ instead of Death receive divine life In a word she is made to say the same words as had been attributed to the Priest I am now at rest c. All these Confessions grounded on the Lessons of Scripture which for the most part contain assurances of the Love of God towards those who serve him and promises of their future Beatitude and glorious Resurrection demonstratively prove that the first Compilers of the Greek Office agreeing in what is most substantial with the Protestants believed that whoever dies in the Faith of the Lord does from the moment of his Death enjoy rest and glory in him and with him But for as much as from time to time the purity of belief and worship receiving adulteration among them there rose up a sort of people apt to feign any

Antiquity and Reason assisted by both teach so clearly that there can be onely those who are unwilling to learn of them that are not informed thereof Take the draught he gives us of it with his own hand introducing the Priest whose Funeral Obsequies are celebrated making at his death this Discourse strange indeed and more suitable with the Principles of a Pagan without hope then to those of a Christian illuminated by Faith Brethren I am banished from my Brethren I leave all my Friends and go my ways yet I know not whither I am going and am ignorant what condition I shall be in there God onely who calls me knows but make a commemoration of me with the Antients Hallelujah Whither do Souls now go And after what manner do they now converse together in that place I would gladly understand that Secret but there is no body able to declare it to me c. None of those that are there ever returned to life again to give us an accompt in what manner they behave themselves who were sometime our Brethren and Nephews who are gone before us to the Lord c. It is a bad way that I go in and I never went it before and that Region where no body knows me I have not any account or knowledge of It is a horrour to see those who are carried away and he who calls me is worthy to be dreaded he who is Lord of Life and Death and who calls us away when he pleases Hallelujah Removing out of one Region into another we stand in need of some Guids what shall we do where we go in a Region in which we have no acquaintance Of the same strain are the Discourses in the Office of the Soul in Agony for she is made to speak as one in the depth of despair begging assistance of the Blessed Virgin of Angels and of Men and complaining that she is forsaken of all that estranged from the Glory of God she served unclean Devils who holding the Schedules of her sins and crying with vehemence would impudently have her that she is alienated from God and her Brethren that a Cloud of Devils come pouring upon her and that the darkness of her own unclean actions cover her commands her Body to be cast into a Common-Sewer that as she is dragged into the places of dreadful punishments the Dogs may eat her heart declares that she is delivered up to the Devils who carry her away by violence to the bottom of Hell that she knows all have forgotten her that she shall remember God no more since that in Hell there is no memory of the Lord that overwhelmed with darkness she expects the Resurrection that examined by all men she shall be cast into the fire that neither God nor his Angels nor his Saints shall think of her for which reason she calls upon the Virgin Angels and Men Earth nay Hell it self to which she is delivered to be bitterly punished to bewail her Misery What greater Impurity could the rage of a despairing Judas disgorge shall we say there could be any thing of Christianity in the apprehensions of a sinner who without any recourse to the Mercy of God and the Merit and Intercession of his Saviour numbers himself among the damned not vouchsafing to consider the assurances which the Scripture gives all men testifying unto them that Christ is our peace and redemption that his blood cleanseth us from all sin that if we confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness Further that he is still living to make intercession for us and since he vouchsafes to receive us among his Sheep no man shall pluck us out of his hand and the wicked one shall not touch us When the same Divinely-inspired Scripture hath loudly published that all the righteous that is to say those who walk before God are taken away from the evil to come that being absent from the body they are present with him that even here upon Earth they are of the Houshold of God and fellow-Citizens with the Saints that they ought to go boldly to the Throne of Grace where he himself gives them access by the Spirit of his Son and that the Angels are now ministring Spirits to minister to their Salvation should we ever imagine so brutish a stupidity and so prophane an excoecation in any of those who have any way contributed to the Greek Ritual affirming according to the Scripture that the Christian who dies does by death arrive at the Port goes to the Lord rests is translated from the corruption of life exchanges death for divine life and is at his death in the way to bliss as that he should presume to say that way is bad and that he knows not whether he is going knows no body there nor is known to any Can the way to bliss be a bad way Is he who knows he is going to God in a condition to complain truly that he knows not whether he goes Since he is retiring to his Father and those of the same Houshold with him hath he any cause to say that he knows not any of those to whom he is retiring and that they know not him Being called how can he imagine that he who calls him should be so far mistaken as to take his Childe for a Stranger And since he gives him access to himself by his own Spirit is there any reason it should be supposed not onely that he stands in need of a Guid but that he neither hath nor can finde any What occasion have either the living or the dying to bemoan themselves that not any one returns from the Dead to inform them of the state of the World to come since the Son of God himself gave us this advertisement that it is of greater advantage to us to have Moses and the Prophets that is to say the holy Scriptures then if one rose from the Dead to give us an accompt of their condition It were not haply much besides our Purpose to desire those who entertain us with Stories of dark Prisons for those Souls which they pretend to be of a Middle-condition to tell us whether they hope to revive that ruined Party among the Antients who believing that Angels and separated Souls were clad with a body subject as ours to be incommodated by Darkness discovered that they apprehended not any distinction between immortal Substances and corporeal As also whether allowing them separated from all matter and assigning them for Torment Obscurity and Darkness taken in their Proper and Primitive Signification they think themselves better grounded in Reason then those who are perswaded that material Fire whose activity can onely exercise it self on Bodies is and eternally shall be the Instrument of Torment as well for Devils as impious Souls Turn which side they will they shall not free themselves