until the general resurrection. They made no such distinction at the death of Christ, as if those which believed in a Saviour to come should be kept out of heaven till he came, and those which now believe in the same Saviour already come, should be admitted thither immediately upon their expiration.

But such as thought the place in which the souls of the patriarchs did reside could not in propriety of speech be called hell, nor was ever so named in the Scriptures, conceived, that as our Saviour went to those who were included in the proper hell, or place of torment, so the end of his descent was to deliver souls from those miseries which they felt, and to translate them to a place of happiness and a glorious condition. They which did think that hell was wholly emptied, that every soul was presently released from all the pains which before it suffered, were branded with the name of heretics:* but to believe

that many were delivered, was both by them and many others counted orthodox.

The means by which they did conceive that Christ did free the souls of men from hell, was the application of his death unto them, which was propounded unto those souls by preaching of the Gospel there:* that as he revealed here on earth the

will of God unto the sons of men, and propounded himself as the object of their faith, to the end that whosoever believed in him should never die; so after his death he shewed himself unto the souls departed, that whosoever of them would yet accept of and acknowledge him should pass from death to life.

Thus did they think the soul of Christ descended into hell to preach the Gospel to the spirits there, that they might receive him who before believed in him, or that they might believe in him who before rejected him. But this cannot be received as the end, or way to effect the end, of Christ's descent: nor can I look upon it as an illustration of this Article, for many reasons. For, first, I have already shewn that the place of St. Peter, so often mentioned for it, is not capable of that sense, nor hath it any relation to our Saviour after death; secondly, The ancients seem upon no other reason to have interpreted this place of St. Peter in that manner, but because other Apocryphal Writings led them to that interpretation, upon the authority whereof this opinion only can rely. A place of the prophet Jeremy was first produced, that The Lord God of Israel remembered his dead, which slept in the land of the grave, and descended unto them, to preach unto them his salvation.' But being there is no such verse extant in that prophet or any other, it was also delivered that it was once in the translation of the Septuagint, but rased out from thence by the Jews, which as it can scarcely be conceived true, so if it were, it would be yet of doubtful authority, as being never yet found in the Hebrew text. And Hermes, in his book called the Pastor, was thought to give sufficient strength to this opinion;

Justin Martyr in his Dialogue with Trypho the Jew: Καὶ ἀπὸ τῶν λόγων τοῦ αὐτοῦ Ἱερεμίου ὁμοίως ταῦτα περιέκοψαν, Εμνήσθη δὲ Κύριος ὁ Θεὸς ἀπὸ Ἰσραὴλ τῶν νεκρῶν αὐτοῦ τῶν κεκοιμημένων εἰς γῆν χώματος, καὶ κατέβη πρὸς αὐτοὺς εὐαγγελίσασθαι αὐτοῖς τὸ σωτήριον αὐτοῦ. p. 298. This place is first brought by Irenæus, to prove that he which died for us was not only man but God: Et quoniam non solum homo erat qui moriebatur pro nobis, ait Esaias, Et commemoratus est Dominus Sanctus Israel mortuorum suorum, quia (leg, qui) dormierant in terra sepultionis, et descendit ad eos, evangelizare salutem quæ est ab eo, ut salvaret eos.' Adr. Hæres. 1. iii. c. 23. Only he names Isaiah instead of Jeremiah, whom he rightly names again: Sicut Hieremias ait, Recommemoratus est Dominus Sanctus Israel mortuorum, &c.' l. iv. c. 39. And as there, so more plainly, 1. v. c. 26. applies it to the soul of Christ while it was absent from his body: Nunc autem tribus diebus conversatus est ubi erant mortui, quemadmodum prophetia ait de eo, Commemoratus est Dominus Sanctorum (lege, Sanctus Israel) mor

tuorum suorum, eorum qui ante dormierunt in terra stipulationis (lege, sepultionis), et descendit ad eos, extrahere eos, et salvare eos.' Thus did Irenæus make use of this verse, to shew Christ preached unto the dead, rather than that of St. Peter; and yet there is no authority in it. For it is not to be found in the Hebrew text, and Justin Martyr charges the Jews only of rasing it out of the LXX. which how they could do out of those copies which were in the Christians' hands is scarce intelligible; and yet it is not now to be found there.

+ Clemens Alexandrinus first brings a strange place of Scripture to prove Christ's preaching in hell, Strom. 1. vi c. 6. Διόπερ ὁ Κύριος, εὐηγγελίσατο καὶ τοῖς ἐν ᾅδου. Φησί γ ̓ οὖν ἡ γραφὴ, Λέγει ὁ ᾅδης τῇ ἀπολείᾳ, Εἶδος μὲν αὐτοῦ οὐκ εἴδομεν, φωνὴν δὲ αὐτοῦ ἠκούσαμεν· which he thus interprets : Οὐχ ὁ τόπος δήπου φωνὴν λαβὼν εἶπεν τὰ προειρημένα, ἀλλ ̓ οἱ ἐν ᾅδου καταταγέντες καὶ εἰς ἀπόλειαν αὐτοὺς ἐνδεδωκότες, καθάπερ ἐκ τινος νεὼς εἰς θάλασσαν ἑκόντες ἀποῤῥίψαντες αὐτοὶ τοίνυν εἰσὶν οἱ ἐπακούσαντες τῆς θείας δυνάμεως καὶ φωνῆς· and then seeming to

whereas the book itself is of no good authority, and in this particular is most extravagant; for he taught that not only the soul of Christ, but also the souls of the apostles, preached to the spirits below; that as they followed his steps here, so did they also after their death, and therefore descended to preach in hell.

Nor is this only to be suspected in reference to those pretended authorities which first induced men to believe it, and to make forced interpretations of Scripture to maintain it; but also to be rejected in itself, as false and inconsistent with the nature, scope, and end, of the Gospel (which is to be preached with such commands and ordinances as can concern those only which are in this life), and as incongruous to the state and condition of those souls to whom Christ is supposed to preach. For if we look upon the patriarchs and prophets, and all saints before departed, it is certain they were never disobedient in the days of Noah; nor could they need the publication of the Gospel after the death of Christ, who by virtue of that death were accepted in him while they lived, and by that acceptation had received a reward long before. If we look upon them who died in disobedience, and were in torments for their sins, they cannot appear to be proper objects for the Gospel preached. The rich man, whom we find in their condition, desired one might be sent from the dead to preach unto his brethren then alive, lest they also should come unto that place; but we find no hopes he had that any should come from them which were alive to preach to him. For if the living, who "heard not Moses and the prophets, would not be persuaded though one rose from the dead;" (Luke xvi. 31.) surely those who had been disobedient unto the prophets, should never be persuaded after they were dead.

Whether therefore we consider the authorities first introducing this opinion, which were apocryphal; or the testimonies of Scripture, forced and improbable; or the nature of this preaching, inconsistent with the Gospel; or the persons to whom Christ should be thought to preach (which, if dead in the faith and fear of God, wanted no such instruction; if departed in

aim at the place of St. Peter, he passes to another proof, which he had produced in his second book: Δέδεικτα δὲ καν το δευτέρα Στρωματεῖ, τοὺς ̓Αποστόλους, ἀκο λούθως τῷ Κυρίῳ, καὶ τοὺς ἐν ᾅδου εὐηγγε λισμένους• which he there proved by the authority of his book called Pastor, and attributed to Hermes: 'o'Eguna dè

· φησὶ τοὺς ̓Αποστόλους καὶ τοὺς διδασκάλους, τοὺς κηρύξαντας τὸ ὄνομα τοῦ υἱοῦ τοῦ Θεοῦ, καὶ κοιμηθέντας, τῇ δυνάμει καὶ τῆ πίστει κηρύξαι τοῖς προκεκοιμημένοις. Strom. 1. ii. c. 9. which words are thus in the old Latin translation of Hermes, l. iii. Sim. 9. "Quoniam hi Apostoli et doc

tores qui prædicaverunt nomen Filii Dei, cum habentes fidem ejus et potestatem defuncti essent, prædicaverunt his qui ante obierunt.' And then Clemens supplies that authority with a reason of his own, that as the apostles were to imitate Christ while they lived,so they did also imitate him after death: 'Exeñv yap, οἶμαι, ὥσπερ κονταῦθα, οὕτως δὲ κἀκεῖσε τοὺς ἀρίστους τῶν μαθητῶν μιμητὰς γενέσθαι τοῦ didacnákov. Stromat. 1. vi. c. 6. And therefore they preached to the souls in hell as Christ did before them. This is the doctrine of Clemens Alexandrinus out of his Apocryphal Authorities

infidelity and disobedience, were unworthy and incapable of such a dispensation), this preaching of Christ to the spirits in prison cannot be admitted either as the end, or as the means proper to effect the end, of his descent into hell.

Nor is this preaching only to be rejected as a means to produce the effect of Christ's descent; but the effect itself pretended to be wrought thereby, whether in reference to the just or unjust, is by no means to be admitted. For though some of the ancients thought, as is shewn before, that Christ did therefore descend into hell, that he might deliver the souls of some which were tormented in those flames, and translate them to a place of happiness: yet this opinion deserveth no acceptance, neither in respect of the ground or foundation on which it is built, nor in respect of the action or effect itself. The authority upon which the strength of this doctrine doth rely, is that place of the Acts, (ii. 24.) whom God hath raised up, loosing the pains of hell, for so they read it; from whence the argument is thus deduced: God did loose the pains of hell when Christ was raised. But those pains did not take hold of Christ himself, who was not to suffer any thing after death; and consequently he could not be loosed from or taken out of those pains in which he never was: in the same manner the patriarchs and the prophets, and the saints of old, if they should be granted to have been in a place sometimes called hell, yet were they there in happiness, and therefore the delivering them from thence could not be the loosing of the pains of hell: it followeth then, that those alone who died in their sins were involved in those pains, and when those pains were loosed, then were they released; and being they were loosed when Christ was raised, the consequence will be, that he, descending into hell, delivered some of the damned souls from their torments there.

But, first, though the Latin translation render it so, the pains of hell; though some copies, and other translations, and divers of the fathers, read it in the same manner; yet the original and authentic Greek acknowledgeth no such word as hell, but pro

The Vulgar Latin renders it thus, Quem Deus suscitavit, solutis doloribus inferni: so also the Syriac, ban xwn

. So some of the ancient fathers read it as Irenæus, l. iii. c. 12. or rather his interpreter: Quem Deus excitavit, solutis doloribus inferorum:' Capreolus bishop of Carthage: Resolvere, sicut scriptum est, inferorum parturitiones.' Epist. ad Vit. et Constant. p. 48. and before these Polycarpus : Ὃν ἤγειρεν ὁ Θεὸς λύσας τὰς ὠδῖνας τοῦ ἄδου nem resuscitavit Deus, dissolvens autores inferni. Epist. ad Phil. §. 1 whom I suppose Grotius understood, when he cited Barnabas; and thus St. Augustin read it, and laid the stress of

his interpretation upon this reading: Quia evidentia testimonia et infernum commemorant et dolores, &c.' Epist. 99. al. 164 §. 8. But in the original Greek it is generally written ὠδῖνας θανάτου, and in all these many copies of it, only that of Petrus Fraxardus, and two of the sixteen copies which Robertus Stephanus made use of, read it do. And this mistake was very easy, for in the eighteenth Psalm, verse the fifth, there is an Javárou, and verse the sixth, w an SIVE ou. And we find twice in the Proverbs, xiv. 12. and xvi. 25 m translated wμiva adou, and 2 Sam. xxii. 6. τον 1920 ὠδῖνες θανάτου