die impenitent,
nevertheless obtain salvation after death. The plain teaching of
Scripture is that it is appointed unto men once to die, and after that
the judgment.[123] And whatever the statement of Peter may mean, it does
not sanction belief in purgatory or in universal restoration. Romanists
teach that the department of Hades to which the spirit of our Lord
descended was that in which dwelt the souls of believers who died before
the time of Christ, and that the object of His descent was the
deliverance and introduction into heaven of the pious dead who had been
imprisoned in the _Limbus Patrum_, as they term that portion of Hades
which these occupied. This they say was the triumph of Christ to which
Paul refers in Ephesians iv. 8, when, quoting the 68th Psalm, he tells
us that He ascended up on high, leading captivity captive.

According to the Romanists, Hades consists of three divisions--heaven,
hell, and purgatory. Heaven is the most blessed abode reserved for three
classes of persons:--1st, Those Old Testament saints whose spirits were
detained in custody until Christ arose, when they were led out by Him in
triumph; 2nd, Those who in this life attain to perfection in holiness;
and 3rd, Those believers in Christ, who, having died in a state of
imperfection, have made satisfaction for their sins and receive
cleansing through endurance of the fires of purgatory. Hell is the abode
of endless torment, where heretics and all who die in mortal sin suffer
eternally. Purgatory is supposed to complete the atonement of Christ.
His work delivers from original sin and eternal punishment, but
satisfaction for actual transgression is not complete until after the
endurance of temporal punishments and the pains of purgatory. The Church
of Rome claims the right to prescribe the nature and extent of such
punishments, and having devised a complicated system of indulgences,
penances, and masses, professes to hold the Keys of Heaven and to
possess authority to regulate penalties and obtain pardon for the living
and the dead. Such claims are unfounded and false. God alone can forgive
sin, and He recognises only two classes--the righteous and the
wicked--here and hereafter; and only two everlasting
dwelling-places--heaven and hell. The Romanist doctrine has no authority
in Scripture, but is of heathen origin, being derived from the Egyptians
through the Greeks and Romans, and having been current throughout the
Roman Empire. Its effect