in old Saxon, signifies no more than hidden, or covered; so that in the original propriety of the word, our hell doth exactly answer the Greek dns which denotes ròv aid Tómov, the place which is unseen, or removed from the sight of man. So that the word hell, signifies the same with Hades in the Greek, and Inferi in the Latin. Concerning which St. Augustin gives us this note; The name of Hell (in Latin Inferi) is variously put in Scriptures, and in many meanings, according as the sence of the things which are intreated of do require.' And Mr. Casaubon (who understood the property of Greek and Latin words as well as any) this other; They who think that Hades is properly the seat of the damned, be no less deceived, than they, who when they reade Inferos in Latin writers, do interpret it of the same place.'" Whereupon the Lord Primate proceeds to shew that by Hell, in divers places of Scripture, is not to be understood the place of the wicked, or damned, but of the dead in general; as in Psal. 89. 48. "What man is he that liveth and shall not see death? shall he deliver his soul from the hand of hell?" And Esa. 38. 18, 19. "Hell cannot praise thee; death cannot celebrate thee; they that go down in the pit cannot hope for thy truth. The living, the living, he shall praise thee, as I do this day." Where the opposition betwixt hell, and the state of life in this world, is to be observed. Therefore since the word hell does not necessarily imply a place of torment, either in Scriptures, or ancient authors; and that Christ's descent into Hell is not to be proved from any express place of Scripture, as the Doctor himself grants, since upon the review of the Articles of our Church, passed in Edward the Sixth's time, this passage of St. Peter, of Christ's preaching to the spirits in prison, was left out in the present Articles of our Church, as not well bearing that interpretation. And that the learned Grotius, and Dr. Hammond have in their Comments on the New Testament, explained this place in a quite different sence. So that all the light we can receive as to this Article of our Creed, must be sought for in the ancient Fathers of the Church, "whose opinions on this point are various and uncertain (as the Lord Primat sufficiently sets forth in this treatise) some of them understanding by this word Hell [or Hades], Abraham's bosom, or place of happiness, whither the angels carried Lazarus; or that Paradise in which our Saviour promised the good thief he should be with him. So that this sort of Hell can have no great difference from Heaven itself. Others of them will have our Saviour descend into Hell, or some out-skirts of

it, which were no places of torment, only that he might make the patriarchs and prophets a visit, whom they supposed to be there detained, tho he did not fetch them from thence. Others, as St. Jerom, St. Augustine, and others, suppose Christ to have descended into Hell, as the place of torment, to bring forth such souls of his as he found there. Others, that he went thither to preach, and to bring from thence all the souls of the heathens, that heard then, and believed his preaching. Others again, that he emptied Hell of all its prisoners, and left the devils there alone; which opinion, tho very untrue, was maintained by St. Cyril, and others into which error they were led by the superficial consideration of those words of St. Peter above-mentioned." From which difference, and variety of opinions we may learn, that as the Fathers were not infallible; so this opinion of Christ's local descent into hell, as a place of torment, was not generally agreed on amongst them, no more than the reasons for which he should go thither. And therefore sure our more modern authors, as Bp. Bilson and Mr. Noel, could be no more certain than the Fathers themselves, in what sence our Saviour descended into hell, or what business he had to do there; especially since this Article of our Church only says, "we must believe he went down into hell," without specifying in what sence he went thither; which she might easily have done, if she had not thought it better to leave men to their liberty to put what reasonable sence they should think fit, upon so obscure and doubtful an Article; and which has so little influence upon our faith or manners, supposed to be taken in one or the other sence. Therefore I cannot see how the Lord Primate deserves to be blamed if in a matter of so great uncertainty and variety of opinions, he followed some of the most sober of the Fathers, who did not understand Christ's descent into hell, or Hades, to be understood of any local descent into a place of torment. And that the Lord Primate was not the first discoverer or broacher (as the Doctor would have him) of this interpretation of Hades, or hell, for the state of souls as separate from their bodies, I shall shew you from several quotations the Lord Primate makes use of, out of the Fathers, and other ancient authors to this purpose. First, as for the heathen, or profane writers, "he shews out of Plato, and other philosophers and poets, that the word Hades signifies a general invisible future state of the soul after it is separated from the body, consisting of two places, one of bliss, and the other of torment, according to the nature and actions of the soul whilst it was

united with the body, and which places they fancied to be as far beneath the earth as the heaven is from it: for they imagined that the earth was not round but flat, and that the sea and skies did meet. So that most of the ancient Fathers having no notion of the roundness of the earth, and of its being encompassed with air; and likewise being most of them Platonic philosophers, it is no wonder if they had the same notion of this Hades, as those ancient philosophers and poets had before. Yet some of them. were better instructed, as St. Chrysostom, who says modestly, 'If thou dost ask me (saith he) of the situation and place of Gehenna? I will answer and say, that it is seated somewhere out of this world; and that it is not to be enquired in what place it is situated, but by what means rather it may be avoided.' But St. Gregory Nyssen, in his dialogue between himself and Macrina touching the soul and the resurrection, makes her to answer the question proposed by Gregory in this manner: Where' is that name of Hades so much spoken of? and which is so much treated of in our common conversation, so much in the writings both of the heathen and our own? into which all men think that the souls are translated from hence as into a certain receptacle? for you will not say that the elements are this Hades.' Whereunto Macrina thus replies: 'It appeareth that thou didst not give much heed to my speech, for when I spake of the translation of the soul from that which is seen unto that which is invisible, I thought I had left nothing behind to be enquired of Hades; neither doth that name, wherein souls are said to be, seem to me to signifie any other thing either in profane writers, or in the holy Scripture, save only a removing unto that which is invisible and unseen.' So likewise Theophylact, and Hugo Etherianus after him,' What" is Hades, or Hell? Some say that it is a dark place under the earth; others say that it is the translation of the soul from that which is visible, unto that which is unseen and invisible. For while the soul is in the body, it is seen by the proper operations thereof; but being translated out of the body it is invisible; and this did they say was Hades.' Hitherto also may be referred the place cited before out of Origen in his fourth book, Tipi apar, which by St. Jerom is thus delivered: They" who die in this world by the separation of the flesh and the soul, according to the difference of their works, obtain divers places in hell.' Where, by Hades, Inferi, or Hell, he meaneth indefinitely

tWorks, vol. iii. pag. 378.

VOL. I.

" Ibid. pag. 380.

m

6

the other world; in which how the souls of the godly were disposed, he thus declares in another place: The soul leaveth the darkness of this world, and the blindness of this bodily nature, and is translated into another world, which is either the bosom of Abraham, as it is shewed in Lazarus, or paradise, as in the thief that believed upon the cross; or yet God knows if that there be any other places, or other mansions, by which the soul that believeth in God, passing and coming unto that river which maketh glad the city of God, may receive within it the lot of the inheritance promised unto the Fathers.' For touching the determinate state of the faithful souls departed this life, the ancient Doctors (as we have shewed) were not so thoroughly resolved."

The Lord Primate having thus shewn in what sence many of the ancient Fathers did understand this word Hades, which we translate hell, proceeds to shew that divers of them expound Christ's descent into hell (or Hades) according to the common law of nature, which extends it self indifferently unto all that die: "For as Christ's soul was in all points made like unto ours (sin only excepted) while it was joined with his body here in the land of the living: so when he had humbled himself unto the death, it became him in all things to be made like unto his brethren, even in the state of dissolution. And so indeed the soul of Jesus had experience of both for it was in the place of human souls, and being out of the flesh, did live and subsist. It was a reasonable soul therefore, and of the same substance with the flesh of men, proceeding from Mary. Saith Eustathius the Patriarch of Antioch, in his exposition of that text of the Psalm, • Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, χῶρος τῶν ἀνθρωπινῶν ψυχῶν, the place of humane souls, (which in the Hebrew is the world of spirits) and by the disposing of Christ's soul there, after the manner of other souls, concludes it to be of the same nature with other mens souls. So St. Hilary in his exposition of the 138th Psalm, 'This is the law of humane necessity,' saith he, 'that the bodies being buried, the souls should go to hell. Which descent the Lord did not refuse for the accomplishment of a true man.' And a little after he repeats it, that 'de supernis ad inferos mortis lege descendit,' he descended from the supernal to the infernal parts by the law of death. And upon Psal. 53. more fully; 'To fulfil the nature of man, he subjected himself to death ;' that is, to a departure as it were of the soul and body; and pierced into

▾ Works, vol. iii. pag. 383. 384.

the infernal seats, which was a thing that seemed to be due unto man.”

I shall not trouble you with more quotations of this kind out of several of the ancient Greek and Latin Fathers which he makes use of in this treatise, most of them agreeing in this, that Christ died, and was buried, and that his soul went to that place or receptacle, where the souls of good men do remain after death; which whether it is no more in effect but differing in terms, than to say, he died and was buried, and rose not till the third day : which the Doctor makes to be the absurdity of this opinion, I leave to the judgment of the impartial reader; as I likewise do whether the Lord Primate deserves so severe a censure after his shewing so great learning as he has done, concerning the various interpretations of this word Hades, or Hell, both out of sacred and prophane writers, that it only serves to amaze the ignorant, and confound the learned. Or that he meant nothing less in all these collections than to assert the doctrine of the Church of England in this particular; or, whether Christ's local descent into hell can be found in the Book of Articles which he had subscribed to, or in the Book of Common-Prayer which he was bound to conform to? And if it be not so expressed in any of these, I leave it to you to judge how far Dr. H. is to be believed in his accusation against the Lord Primate in other matters. But I doubt I have dwelt too long upon this less important Article, which it seems was not thought so fundamental a one, but (as the Lord Primate very well observes) Ruffinus in his Exposition of the Creed takes notice, that in the Creed or symbol of the Church of Rome there is not added, he descended into hell; and presently adds, yet the force or meaning of the word seems to be the same, in that he is said to have been buried. So that it seems old Ruffinus is one of those who is guilty of this impertinency (as the Doctor calls it) of making Christ's descent into hell to signifie the same with his lying in the grave, or being buried, tho the same author takes notice that the Church of Aquileia had this Article inserted in her Creed, but the Church of Rome had not, (which sure with men of the Doctor's way, should be a rule to other Churches.) And further Card. Bellarmin noteth (as the Lord Primate confesses) "that St. Augustin in his book, De Fide & Symbolo, and in his four books De Symbolo ad Catechumenos, maketh no mention of this Article,

w Works, vol. iii. pag. 341.