"Have not the boldness to say: 'I will go to confession and gain a plenary indulgence, and thus I shall be saved?' Remember that the full confession and entire contrition which are requisite to gain a plenary indulgence are not easily attained. Did you know how hardly they are come by, you would tremble with fear and be more sure of losing than of gaining them." EXTRACTS FROM THE FATHERS. [1] [Footnote 1: These extracts are purposely different from those quoted by the learned author of "Purgatory Surveyed," in that portion of his treatise herein comprised.] ST. CYPRIAN [1] writes: "Our predecessors prudently advised that no brother, departing this life should nominate any churchman his executor; and should he do it, that no oblation should be made for him, nor sacrifice offered for his repose; of which we have had a late example, when no oblation was made, nor prayer, in his name, offered in the Church." [2] [Footnote 1: Ep., xlvi., p. 114.] [Footnote 2: Cardinal Wiseman commenting upon this passage, says: "It was considered, therefore, a severe punishment, that prayers and sacrifices should not be offered up for those who had violated any of the ecclesiastical laws."--_Lectures on the Catholic Church._ Lecture xi., p. 59.] ORIGEN, who wrote in the same century as Cyprian, and some two hundred years after Christ, speaks as follows, in language the most distinct, upon our doctrine of Purgatory: "When we depart this life, if we take with us virtues or vices, shall we receive reward for our virtues, and shall those trespasses be forgiven to us which we knowingly committed; or shall we be punished for our faults, and not receive the reward of our virtues? Neither is true: because we shall suffer for our sins and receive the reward of our virtues. For if on the foundation of Christ you shall have built not only gold and silver and precious stones, but also wood and hay and stubble, what do you expect when the soul shall be separated from the body? Would you enter into Heaven with your wood, and hay, and stubble, to defile the Kingdom of God; or on account of those encumbrances remain without, and receive no reward for your gold and silver and precious stones? Neither is this just. It remains, then, that you be committed to the fire, which shall consume the light materials; for our God, to those who can comprehend heavenly things, is called a _consuming fire_. But this fire consumes not the creature, but what the creature has himself built--wood, and hay, and stubble. It is manifest that, in the first place, the fire destroys the wood of our transgressions, and then returns to us the reward of our good works." [1] [Footnote 1: Homil. xvi al. xii. in Jerem. T. iii. p. 231,232.]