Lord." [Mark xii. 29.] While the same heavenly Teacher commands us with
authority, "When thou prayest, pray to thy Father which is in secret,
and thy Father, who seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly." [Matt.
vi. 6.] No allusion in any word of His do we find to any prayer from a
mortal on this earth to an angel or saint in heaven. And yet occasions
were multiplied on which a reference to the invocation of angels would
have been natural, and apparently called for. He again and again places
beyond all doubt the reality of their good services towards mankind, but
it is as God's servants, and at God's bidding; not in answer to any
supplication or invoking of ours. The parable of the rich man and
Lazarus has been cited [Bellarmin, p. 895.] to bear contrary evidence;
but, in the first place, that parable does not offer a case in point; in
the second place, were it in point, it might be fairly and strongly
urged against the practice of invoking the spirit of any departed
mortal, even the father of the faithful himself. For what are the
circumstances of the parabolic representation? A lost spirit in the
regions of torment prays to Abraham in the regions of the blessed, and
the spirit of the departed patriarch professes himself to have no power
to grant the request of the departed and condemned spirit. [Luke xvi.
19.] The practice indeed of our Roman Catholic brethren would have been
exemplified, had our blessed Lord represented the rich man's five
brethren still on earth as pious men, and as supplicating Abraham in
heaven to pray for themselves, or to mitigate {49} their lost brother's
punishment and his woes. But then it would have afforded Christians
little encouragement to follow their example, when they found Abraham
declaring himself unable to aid them in attaining the object of their
prayer, or in any way to assist them at all. Without one single
exception, we find our blessed Lord's example, precepts, and doctrines
to be decidedly against the practice of invoking saint or angel; whilst
not one solitary act or word of His can be cited to countenance or
palliate it.

Next it follows, that we inquire into the conduct and the writings of
Christ's Apostles and immediate followers, to whom He graciously
promised that the Holy Spirit should guide them into all truth. In the
Acts of the Apostles, various instances of prayer attract our notice,
but not one ejaculation is found there to any other being save God
alone. Neithe