PURCHAS 



PUBIM 



495 



works, many of which are still in MS., was under 

 taken hy the Purcell Society, instituted in 1876. 

 Pnrcell died of consumptio'n in 1695, and was 

 buried in Westminster Abbey. 



Purchas, SAMUEL, was born at Thaxted in 

 Essex in 1577, and educated at St John's College, 

 Cambridge. He was presented by the king in 1604 

 to the vicarage of Eastwood, which he soon resigned 

 to his brother, as the chosen labour of his life 

 required residence in London. Later he became 

 rector of St Martin's, Ludgiite, and chaplain to 

 Archbishop Abbot, and died in September 1626, if 

 not in a debtor's cell, yet in difficulties. His great 

 works were Purchas his Pilgrimage, or Relations 

 of the World and the Religions observed in all ages 

 ( 1613 ; 4th ed. much enlarged, 1626), and Hakluytus 

 Posthumus, or Pnrchas his Pilgrimes : containing 

 a History of the World, in Sea Voyages and Land 

 Travels by Englishmen and others (4 vols. folio, 

 162o). The fourth edition of the former usually 

 accompanies the latter as if a fifth volume, although 

 a quite distinct work. Purchas himself thus 

 describes the two hooks : 'These brethren holding 

 much resemblance in name, nature, and feature, 

 yet differ in both the object and the subject. This 

 [the Pilgrimage] being mine own in matter, though 

 borrowed, and in form of words and method; 

 whereas my Pilgrimes are the authors themselves, 

 acting their own parts in their own words, only 

 furnished by me with such necessaries as that 

 stage further required, and ordered according to 

 my roles.' Another work is Purchas his Pilgrim: 

 Microcosmus, or the History of Man ; relating the 

 wonders of his Generation, varieties in his Degenera- 

 tion, and necessity of his Regeneration ( 1619). 



Purchase-system. See COMMISSIONS. 



Purfleet, a village of Essex, on the north bank 

 of the Thames, 15 miles by rail E. by S. of London 

 and 8 miles E. of Woolwich, contains government 

 powder-magazines, built in 1781. 



Purgation. See ORDEAL. 



Purgatives. See APERIENTS, CONSTIPATION. 



Purgatory ( Lat. purgatori um, from purgo, 'I 

 cleanse ) is the name given to a place of purgation, 

 in which, according to the Roman Catholic and 

 Oriental churches, souls after death either are puri- 

 fied from venial sins (peccata venalia) or undergo 

 the temporal punishment which, after the guilt of 

 mortal sin (peccata mortalia) has l>een remitted, 

 still remains to l>e endured by the sinner (see 

 ATONEMENT). The ultimate eternal happiness of 

 their souls is supposed to be secured ; but they are 

 detained for a tune in a state of purgation, in order 

 to l>e fitted to appear in that Presence into which 

 nothing imperfect can enter. Catholics hold as 

 articles of their faith ( 1 ) that there is a purgatory 

 in the sense explained above, and (2) that the souls 

 there detained derive relief from the prayers of the 

 faithful and from the sacrifice of the mass. The 

 Tiptural grounds alleged by them in support of 

 his view are 2 Mace. xii. 43-46, Matt. xii. 32, Luke, 

 xii. 4-8, 1 Cor. iii. 11-15, 1 Cor. xv. 29; as well as 

 certain less decisive indications contained in the 

 language of some of the Psalms. And in all these 

 passages they argue not alone from the words 

 themselves, but from the interpretation of them 

 by the Fathers. The direct testimonies cited by 

 Catholic writers from the Fathers are very numer- 

 ous, from the days of Clement and Origen down ; 

 amongst the Latins Augustine being one of the 

 most important (though at times he speaks doubt- 

 fully); in Gregory the Great the doctrine is found 

 in all the fullness of its modern detail. The epi- 

 taphs of the catacomlis, too, supply Catholic con- 

 troversialists with some testimonies to the belief 

 of a purgatory, and of the value of the intercessory 



prayers of the living in obtaining not merely 

 repose, but relief from suffering, for the deceased ; 

 and the liturgies of the various rites are still more 

 decisive and circumstantial. Beyond these two 

 points Catholic faith, as defined by the Council 

 of Trent, does not go ; and the council expressly 

 prohibits the popular discussion of the ' more diffi- 

 cult and subtle questions, and everything that 

 tends to curiosity, or superstition, or savours of 

 filthy lucre.' As to the existence of purgatory 

 Greek and Latin churches are agreed ; and they 

 are further agreed that it is a place of suffering ; 

 but, while the Latins commonly hold that this 

 suffering is 'by fire,' the Greeks do not determine 

 the manner of the suffering, but are content to 

 regard it as ' through tribulation. ' The decree of 

 union in the Council of Florence (1439) left this 

 point free for discussion. Equally free are the 

 questions as to the situation of purgatory ; as to 

 the duration of the purgatorial suffering ; as to the 

 probable number of its inmates ; as to whether 

 they have, while there detained, a certainty of 

 their ultimate salvation ; and whether a ' particular 

 judgment 'is passed on every one immediately after 

 death. For Patrick's Purgatory, see DERG ( LOUGH ). 



The mediaeval doctrine and practice regarding 

 purgatory were among the leading grounds of the 

 protest of the Waldenses and other sects of that 

 age. The Reformers as a body rejected the 

 doctrine. Protestants generally reply to the 

 arguments of Roman Catholics on the subject of 

 purgatory by refusing to admit the authority of 

 tradition or the testimonies of the Fathers, "and 

 at the same time by alleging that most of the 

 passages quoted from the Fathers, as in favour of 

 purgatory, are insufficient to prove that they held 

 any such doctrine as that now held by the Roman 

 Catholic Church, some of them properly relating 

 only to the subject of prayer for the dead (see 

 PRAYER), and others to the doctrine of Linibus 

 (q.v.). That the doctrine of purgatory is the fair 

 development of that which maintains that prayer 

 ought to be made for the dead Protestants gener- 

 ally acknowledge. As to the alleged evidences 

 from Scripture, they are commonly set aside by 

 Protestants as irrelevant or wholly insufficient to 

 support such an inference. The doctrine of purga- 

 tory in it* historical connection with other escliato- 

 logical doctrines is touched on in the article HELL. 



Purging Nut. See PHYSIC NUT. 



Purgstall. See HAMMER-PURGSTALL. 



Puri. See JUGGERNAUT. 



Purification of the Blessed Virgin 

 Mary, FEAST OF, a festival in commemoration 

 of the ' purification ' of the Blessed Virgin Mary, 

 in accordance with the ceremonial law of Lev. xii. 

 2. This ceremony was appointed for the fortieth 

 day after childbirth, which, reckoning from 

 December 25 (the nativity of our Lord), falls 

 upon February 2, on which day the purification 

 is celebrated. The history of Mary's compliance 

 with the law is related in Luke, ii. 22-24. The 

 date of the introduction of this festival is un- 

 certain. The first trace of it is about the middle 

 of the 5th century, and in the Church of Jerusalem. 

 In the Western Church it was known to Bede. Its 

 introduction in the Roman Church in 494 was 

 made by Pope Gelasius the occasion of transfer- 

 ring to a Christian use the festivities which at that 

 season were annexed to the pagan festival of the 

 Lupnrcalia. See CHURCHING OF WOMEN. 



I'lirim, a Jewish secular rather than religious 

 east, in honour of the deliverance of the nation, 

 recorded in the Book of Esther, held on 14tli to 

 15th Adar. Apparently it spread but slowly ; still 

 Josephus tells us that by his time it was observed 

 over all the Jewish world. Most modern scholars 



