In the other places which he allegeth out of the Old Testament, there is not so much as any show or colour of proof. He brings in every text wherein there is the word “anger,” or “fire,” or “burning,” or “purging,” or “cleansing,” in case any of the fathers have but in a sermon rhetorically applied it to the doctrine of purgatory, already believed. The first verse of Psalm 37: “O Lord, rebuke me not in thy wrath, nor chasten me in thy hot displeasure”; what were this to purgatory, if Augustine had not applied the “wrath” to the fire of hell, and the “displeasure” to that of purgatory? And what is it to purgatory, that of Psalm 66:12, “We went through fire and water, and thou broughtest us to a moist place”; and other the like texts, with which the doctors of those times intended to adorn or extend their sermons, or commentaries, haled to their purposes by force of wit?
But he allegeth other places of the New Testament, that are not so easy to be answered. And first that of Matt. 12:32: “Whosoever speaketh a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him; but whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, nor in the world to come”: where he will have purgatory to be the world to come, wherein some sins may be forgiven, which in this world were not forgiven: notwithstanding that it is manifest, there are but three worlds; one from the creation to the flood, which was destroyed by water, and is called in Scripture “the old world”; another from the flood to the day of judgment, which is “the present world,” and shall be destroyed by fire; and the third, which shall be from the day of judgment forward, everlasting, which is called “the world to come”; and in which it is agreed by all, there shall be no purgatory, and therefore the world to come and purgatory are inconsistent. But what then can be the meaning