th each other on very many points here;
the same writer in his zeal is betrayed into great and palpable
inconsistency. Bellarmin, anxious to enlist the account given by our
Lord of the rich man and Lazarus, to countenance the invocation of
saints by the example of the rich man appealing to Abraham, maintains
that section of Holy Writ to be not a parable, but a true history of a
matter of fact which took place between two real individuals; and of his
assertion he adduces this proof, that "the Church worships that Lazarus
as verily a holy man[7];" and yet he denies that any of the holy men
were in heaven before the {32} death of Christ. Either Abraham was in
heaven in the presence of God, or not; if he was in heaven, why did not
his descendants invoke his aid? if he was not in heaven, the whole
argument drawn from the rich man's supplication falls to the ground.

[Footnote 5: See De Sacy on 4 Kings i. 1. See also Estius, 1629.
p. 168. Pope Gregory's Exposition; Rome, 1553. p. 99. Stephen's
Bible in loc. 1557, &c. The Vulgate ed. Antwerp, 1624, cites a
note, "Thy prayers are stronger than chariots and horsemen."]

[Footnote 6: Gaspar Sanctius, Antwerp, 1624. p. 1360, considers
the fable not improbable, that Elijah, living in the terrestrial
paradise, wrote there the letters to Joram (mentioned 2 Chron.
xxi. 12), and sent them by angels.]

[Footnote 7: Colit Lazarum ilium ut vere sanctum
hominem.--Bellarm. De Ecd. Triumph, p. 864.]

Another very extraordinary inconsistency, arising from the same
solicitude, forces itself upon our notice, when the same author urges a
passage in Leviticus [Levit. xix. 13.] to prove, that the saints are now
admitted at once into the enjoyment of the presence of God in heaven,
without waiting for the day of final judgment. [Bell vol. ii. p. 865.]
"God (such are his words) commanded it to be written, 'The work of the
hireling shall not remain with thee till the morning;' therefore, unless
God would appear inconsistent with Himself, He will not keep back the
reward of his saints to the end of the world." How strange, that in the
same treatise [Ibid. p. 833.] this author should expressly maintain,
that the reward of Abel and Abraham, and the holy prophet and lawgiver
Moses, the very man who was commanded to write that law in Leviticus,
was kept back,--the last for a longer period than a thousand years; the
first well nigh four thousand years.

I mention