feel persuaded, the order of his moral government absolutely forbids the bestowal; that it is lawful for us to pray for that, which we at the same time firmly believe cannot, in the very nature of things, be granted. The divine Author of our faith commands us to ask, that we may have to seek, that we may find. But Sir Herbert Jenner's doctrine is, that we may ask for that which we cannot have-and seek for that which we cannot find."

But supposing that Sir Herbert Jenner does not mean anything so contradictory as this to these quotations from the Homily, and intends only that the Church does not declare it illegal: how can this be maintained? If it be not unlawful to pray for the dead, then it is lawful for a clergyman to hold doctrines at variance with the articles to which he has subscribed. But would not a clergyman upholding the doctrines of purgatory be liable to the highest censure? Ought he not to be suspended from the functions of his ministry, for contradicting

the plainest declaration of the Article, (xxii) "that the Romish doctrine concerning purgatory is a fond thing, vainly invented, and grounded upon no warranty of Scripture, but rather repugnant to the word of God."

On this ground we are still more astonished at the following assertion of Dr. Pusey, that the Church of England nowhere restrains her children from praying for departed friends.* How lamentable it is to hear such a sentiment from a dignified Ecclesiastic! It is desperate to think that any of the sons whom our Church hath brought up, should prefer the fables of Heathenism, or the dogmas of Popery, to the sound scriptural judgment of a parent, whose authority they profess to revere, and to whose instructions they have again and again subscribed their unfeigned assent. We feel compelled, after reading such a false assertion in the Oxford tracts, so contrary to the words of

* Pusey's "Earnest Remonstrance," forming part of the third volume of "Tracts for the times."

God, and the formularies of our Church, to quote, with sorrow, the words of the Prophet: "This is a rebellious people, lying children, children that will not hear the law of the Lord." (Isaiah xxx. 9.)

But let us now resume our subject, and pass to the consideration of customs, deeply interesting, as they may be traced to those feelings. which are common to our nature. For, to die in our own country, and to be buried with our kindred, is a feeling too strong ever to be wholly eradicated from the human breast.

The Patriarch Abraham, when a stranger, and sojourner in the land of Canaan, and whilst indifferent to all other things, ardently desired "the possession of a burying place," where he might deposit the remains of Sarah, his wife, and where his own might rest in hope of a heavenly inheritance. As early as the time of Abraham, the custom of possessing family burial places was already well established; and that it was then not unusual to

provide them before they were actually required, appears by the reply of "the children of Heth" to the request of Abraham, that they would grant him for a burying place one of their unoccupied sepulchres: "Hear us, my lord: thou art a mighty prince among us: in the choice of our sepulchres bury thy dead; none of us shall withhold from thee his sepulchre." (Gen xxiii. 6.) On the situation of the sepulchre which Abraham made choice of, that it was in the end of the field," one of our old divines has this pious and just remark, "that whatever our possessions are, there is a sepulchre at the end of them;"

"Man's whole domain, at last, a turf, or stone."

But these feelings, which the sons of Heth manifested in no less degree than Abraham himself, and had long been accustomed to act upon, prove that they were not peculiar to the Patriarch, but inherent in the whole family of man. The Patriarch Jacob twice expressed

the anxious desire he felt, to be buried with his

fathers, in the land of Canaan: first, to Joseph alone, and afterwards to all his sons together. For when "the time drew nigh that Israel must die: and he called his son Joseph, and said unto him, If now I have found grace in thy sight, put, I pray thee, thy hand under my thigh, and deal kindly and truly with me; bury me not, I pray thee, in Egypt. But I will lie with my fathers, and thou shalt carry me out of Egypt, and bury me in their burying place. And he said, I will do as thou hast said. And he said, swear unto me. And he sware unto him. And Israel bowed himself upon the bed's head,” (Gen. xlvii. 29, 30, 31.) in adoration, and praise to God, for the promise of Canaan; and the solemn assurance he had now received from his son Joseph, of his being buried there with his fathers. Again we find the Patriarch speaking on the same subject, which so deeply interested his feelings, and which, during his abode in Egypt, seemed, of all others, to dwell the most upon his mind; for when on his death