em?e you recover from that sickne?, y.ou must cmudder whether must not take out a new one for the next sickness; or will the first, without any* sensible error, be valid when you are about to die ? (8.) You must also inquire whether an indulgence granted on a cer- tain festival will be valid when the day is changed, u they. were all at once by' the Gregorian calendar; or, if y.ou go into another country*, where the feast is not kept the same day, as it happens in moveable feasts. (9.) It must next be ucertained whether a succeeding pope have not, or cannot revoke an indulgence granted by' his predecessor; for this is often done as a fayour or privilege. (10.) It is worth inquiry*, whether, in the y.ear of jubilee, all other indulgences be not suspended. (11.) indulgences are of no avail in reserved cases, which are so very numerous. Many' more uncertainties are connected with indulgences, and there seems to be no remedy but to procure more masses, and you need not fear that saying masses will ever become unnecessary by the multitude of indulgences. The priest must still be employed, since there are. so many ways of making the indulgence good for nothing. The truth is, the system is based in fraud, and no one can be a partaker of such for- bidden traffic without endangering his soul. 3. Indulgence.? o?erate as a co9vni.?sion to commit zin. That this charge against indulgences can be fully sustained, we have ample proofs. But before we adduce them we will meet an ob- jection or two which are commonly. brought against the immoral ten- dency of indulgences. It is affirmed by Roman Catholic divines, "that the effect of indul- gences is not to remit sin, whether mortal or venial, but the guilt of sin; and when in the indulgence we have the words r?mission of?i?, the word sins is there to be taken for the Panis/m,ent of sin. The effect of an indulgence is the remission of the remaining temporal punish- ment due to sins which are pardoned as it respects their guilt." This we select from Ferraris on the word indulgence.* On this we pre- sent the following observations :- The formula in which remission is uniformly expressed in indul- gences is, an indulgence and remission o.f all z?ns; and if this, in its obvious sense, does not embrace remission of sins, the language em- ployed is the most unhappy that can be selected. Two words, indul- g?n? and remission, are coupled together by. a conjunction, so as, ac- cording to the common canons of language, to present two distinct ideas; and the term peccaturn, z4n, not culpa, gui/t, or pinna, punislonent, is uniformly employed in the formula of remission. Therefore, to ever).' unbiased person, the expression in the indulgence goes to say, that remission of s/ns forms an important part of the indulgence. Nor will it avail to say, as Maldenat does, "that with one voice all theologians, without exception, declare that an indulgence is not the remission of guilt, but of punishment."?' The reasons are, that the explanations of the theologians are locked up in Latin, and rarely reach the ears of the people. It was, besides, the arguments of Protestants which com- e Art. iii, Nos. 1, 2. ? Tom. i, de l?nit., q. 6, tit. D? Inshaig., part i, qu. 1, quoted by Fm'mrb =? show. 1
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