His
infinite mercy, hide him under the shadow of His wing. May He raise him at
the end of his days and cause him to drink of the stream of His
delights."(293)

Among the many-sided merits of Shakespeare may be mentioned his happy
faculty of portraying to life the manners and customs and traditional
faith of the times which he describes. How deep-rooted in the Christian
heart in pre-Reformation times, was the belief in Purgatory, may be
inferred from a passage in Hamlet who probably lived in the early part of
the eighth century. Thus speaks to Hamlet the spirit of his murdered
father:

"I am thy father's spirit,
Doom'd for a certain time to walk the night;
And for the day confin'd too fast in fires,
Till the foul crimes done in my days of nature
Are burnt and purg'd away."(294)

I am happy to say that the more advanced and enlightened members of the
Episcopalian church are steadily returning to the faith of their
fore-fathers regarding prayers for the dead. An acquaintance of mine, once
a distinguished clergyman of the Episcopal communion, but now a convert,
informed me that hundreds of Protestant clergymen in this country, and
particularly in England, have a firm belief in the efficacy of prayers for
the dead, but for well-known reasons they are reserved in the expression
of their faith. He easily convinced me of the truth of his assertion,
particularly as far as the Church of England is concerned, by sending me
six different works published in London, all bearing on the subject of
Purgatory. These books are printed under the auspices of the Protestant
Episcopal church; they all contain prayers for the dead and prove, from
Catholic grounds, the existence of a middle state after death and the duty
of praying for our deceased brethren.(295)

To sum up, we see the practice of praying for the dead enforced in the
ancient Hebrew church and in the Jewish synagogue of today. We see it
proclaimed age after age by all the Fathers of Christendom. We see it
incorporated in every one of the ancient Liturgies of the East and of the
West. We see it zealously taught by the Russian church of today, and by
that immense family of schismatic Christians scattered over the East. We
behold it, in fine, a cherished devotion of three hundred millions of
Catholics, as well as of a respectable portion of the Episcopal church.

Would it not, my friend, be the height of rashness and presumption in you
to prefer yo