, in the
Day of Judgment. {103a} He does not pray for temporal blessings, for
health, or even for grace. If it was too late to pray for these things,
this omission is quite intelligible.

The earliest Church Liturgies contained in them prayers for the dead.
{103b} And the earliest Christian writers, as well as the inscriptions
on tombs bear such witness to the existence of this primitive practice,
that it cannot be disputed. It is true that our English Prayer Book
neither expressly sanctions nor yet expressly forbids these
intercessions. But in the Liturgy, in the Litany, and in the Burial
Service, prayers occur which appear to have been purposely so worded, as
to lend themselves to a reference in the minds of worshippers to the
faithful dead, if any should desire so to apply them. Bishop Cosin, one
of the chief compilers of our present Prayer Book, writes that the words,
"that we and Thy whole Church may obtain remission of our sins, and all
other benefits of His Passion," occurring in our Liturgy, are to be
understood to refer as well to "those who have been here before," that is
to say, who have died in the Lord, as to those "that are now members of
it," that is, who still are living. {104}

And is not the custom reasonable? Are we to pray for those whom we
dearly love up to the very last moment of their life, and then for ever
to refrain? We could understand this on the supposition that death was
the end of all things, or that at death there followed an immediate
heaven or an instant hell; but not if the process of purification and of
real Church life are continuing after death. And Christian instinct
urges it. GOD is a Father. As children we ought to tell Him all that is
in our heart. Whatever we may rightly desire we may rightly pray for. It
is only that which we ought not to desire that we ought not to pray for.
It is not right to pray that they may, as by a miracle, be restored to
us; that is not the will of GOD. Nor is it right that we should seek by
occult and forbidden ways to hold converse with them. But we may surely
ask for them what S. Paul asked for his friend, that they may find mercy
in that day, that they may have rest and peace and light and refreshment,
the joy of Christ's Presence, and the gladness of a blessed Resurrection.

And now these words must be brought to a close. The arguments which have
been urged rest upon the very language of Holy Scripture, or upon
legitimate inferen