PROTESTANTS AND PURGATORY.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume III, Issue 150, 17 March 1876, Page 8

PROTESTANTS AND PURGATORY.

+4 A roHUEsroxKENT wives as follows to tie ' Westminster Gazetlo:' " Jteqwescaf in pace has lately received a solution, more literal than logical, by the following announcement in the' Guardian' of December I— ' J'raycrs for the Dead — We hate received so largo n number of letters on this subject that we cannot continue the controversy.' This implies — Ist, That the dicta of the Bishop of Ripon against prayers for the dead have roused a strong feeling among the laity and clergy ; and, 2nd, th. t the supply of comment on this weighty quo tion,°i'ar from equalling the demand, shall, on the contrary, for the future, be nil, so tar as regards this influential clerical journal There must be strong motive* for such unwonted suppression of a legitimate question! Can the reasons for so doing be equally legitimate ? There is ro smoke witho ,t fire I was glad, however, to observe that the ' Guardian,' in its dying gasps on this subject, in the nu-nber of the previous week, had given the letter of Bishop Wilberforce on prayers for the dead. The following extracts of a letter, from ' good' Bishop Heber, are on the si'lj.'ct. This letter is found in full in ' Diaries of a Lady of Q lality.' The writer of the 'Diaries' was a daughter of Sir Wat kin Williams Wynn Bishop Ileber says : ' Few persons, I believe, have lost a beloved object, more particularly by sudd?n death, without feeling an earnest desire to recommend them in their pnyers tJ God's mercy, and a sort of instinctive impression that such devotions might still be serviceab'c to them in that intermediate state which we are taught by Scripture precedes the final judgment,.' After some reference to the Catholics, the Bishop continues: 'This opinion is n it, I confess, so clearly revealed or countenanced in Scripture as to make the practice of praying for the dead obligatory on uny Christian. Yet having been led attentively to consider the question, my own opinion i<, on the whole, favorable to the practice, which, indee I, is so natural and so comfortable, that this alone is a presumption it is neither unpleasant to the Almighty nor unavailing with Him.' After showing that the Jews, both before and since the birth of Christ, have u»e 1 prayers for the dead ; and alleging it also as the custom of the Greek Church, Bishop Heboi' adds : ' We know the practice to have be^n L'ni'ers.d, or nearly so, among the Christians little more than 130 years after our Saviour. It is spoken of as the usual custom by Tertulliau and Epiphanius. Augustine, in his confessions, has gh en a beautiful prayer which he himself used for his deceased mother, Monica ; and among Protestants Lv her and Dr. Johnson are eminent instances of the same conduct. I have accordingly been myself in the habit, for some years, of recommending on some occasions, as after receiving the sacnvi.ents, &c, my lost friends by name to God's goodness and compassion through his Son as what can do them no harm, and may, and I hope will, be of service to them. Only this caution I always endeavor to observe, that I beg His forgiveness at the same time for myself, if unknowingly I am too presumpluous, and His grace leal, I, who am thus solicitous for others, should neglect the appointed means for my own salvation."