PURGATORY.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."]
Sin,—The sorrowful question which you raise in connection with Mr. De Vere's poem on Purgatory, how we can imagine ourselves as enjoying perfect blessedness, with the knowledge that those dearest to us are shut out from it, is one which must have pressed heavily on many hearts. But the very beauty and value of the thought of Purgatory (dear and luminous to many quite anti-Papal minds), seems to be that it suggests the answer to this question. Its hold on us lies in its power to bring home that deep central truth of Christianity, that blessedness is not (as the flesh would persuade us) incompatible with suffering, but rather to be brought about through suffering,—that the value of blessedness, as contrasted with mere absence of suffering, is unspeakable and incom- mensurable. Why then may not the blessedness of souls in Purgatory coexist with keenest suffering on behalf of their beloved ones outside ; of those who by persistence in refusing chastisement, may conceivably cut themselves off from the last hope of purification ? Why may not this suffering even be one of the sharpest of those purifying agencies by which their own redemption (involving, let us remember, the power to bless) is being perfected? The modern sense of " solidarity " of which you speak, would seem, in this view, to combine peculiarly well with the thought of Purgatory.
In speaking of the beauty and value of that thought, I refer of course to the kernel of deep, mystical truth underlying the technical doctrine. The germ of truth must doubtless grow at the expense of its enfolding sheath of theory. As we learn, by the exercise of a right and trustful freedom of thought and, above all, by experience, more of the all- penetrating reach, tenderness, and severity of the Divine discipline, so does our hope for others, as well as for ourselves, expand and free itself from many presumptuous limitations. One real glimpse of the purifying fires does more to banish despair than any amount of kindly optimism.—I
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