PURANAS PURGATORY. 



757 



sorship, which limits their sphere, often does much 

 injury to their effect, as the manager of the puppet 

 show is thus precluded from availing' himself of the 

 momentary inspiration of his muse, when he as- 

 sists the performance by his voice, as is always the 

 case in the ordinary puppet shows. For more par- 

 ticulars, see Beckmann's interesting History of In- 

 ventions and Discoveries. See, also, Punchinello 

 and Automaton. 



PURANAS. See Indian Literature. 

 PURCELL, HENRY, an English musical compo- 

 ser, was the son of a musician of the chapel royal, 

 who, dying in 1664, left him an orphan in his sixth 

 year. He was admitted at an early age, a chorister 

 in the king's chapel, where he studied music under 

 captain Cook and his successor Pelham Humphrey, 

 and afterwards under doctor Blow. In 1 676, when 

 only eighteen years old, he was made organist to 

 Westminster Abbey, and six years afterwards, at 

 the chapel royal St. James's. From this period his 

 tiune seems to have increased rapidly, his anthems 

 and church music in general being popular in all 

 the cathedrals of the kingdom, nor were his compo- 

 sitions for the stage and music rooms less successful. 

 His genius embraced every species of composition 

 with equal facility ; and with respect to chamber 

 music, all prior productions seem to have been 

 at once totally superseded. Of his numerous 

 compositions, his celebrated Te Deum and Jubilate 

 appear to have been composed for the celebra- 

 tion of St. Cecilia's day, 1694. Of his instru- 

 mental music, a collection was published two 

 years after his decease, containing airs in four 

 parts, for two violins, tenor, and bass. Many of 

 his songs were published after his death, under the 

 title of Orpheus Britannicus. Ye twice ten hundred 

 Deities, contained in this collection, is considered 

 the finest piece of recitative in the language ; while 

 his music in King Arthur has maintained its popu- 

 larity undiminished above a century. In 1695, the 

 year of his death, he set to music Bonduca, and the 

 Prophetess, an opera altered by Dryden from Beau- 

 mont and Fletcher ; and he was the author of a vast 

 variety of catches, rounds, glees, &c., not less re- 

 markable for their melody than for their spirit, 

 humour, and originality. He died in 1695. 



PURCHAS, SAMUEL, an English divine, was 

 born in 1577, at Thaxtead, in Essex, and educated 

 at Cambridge. His principal work was entitled 

 Purchas his Pilgrimages, or Relations of the World, 

 (5 vols., fol.,) which, with Hakluyt's Voyages, led 

 the way to other collections of the same kind, and 

 have been much valued and esteemed. The first 

 volume was published in 1614 ; but the fourth edi- 

 tion of it, in 1626, contains numerous important addi- 

 tions. The four last volumes appeared in 1625. 

 He also wrote Microcosmos, or the History of Man, 

 (8vo. ;) the King's Tower and Triumphal Arch of 

 London. Mr Purchas was rector of St. Martin's 

 in Ludgate, and chaplain to Abbot, archbishop of 

 Canterbury. He died in London in 1628. 



PURCHASE, IN LAW ; the acquiring of land with 

 money, by deed or agreement, and not by descent or 

 right of inheritance. Purchase is also a name given 

 to any sort of mechanical power employed in raising 

 or removing heavy bodies. 



PURGATORY, according to the dogma of the 

 Roman Catholic Church ; a place of purification, in 

 which, after death, those souls are cleansed, which 

 are not sufficiently pure to enjoy the happiness of 

 heaven. The council of Trent confirmed this doc- 

 trine, as sanctioned by Holy Scripture and tradition. 

 The Protestants and the Greek Church do not re- 

 ceive it. The passages of Scripture on which this 

 article of faith is founded are Revelations xxi. 27 ; 



2 Maccabees xii. 38 ; Matthew x*v. ; Luke xii. 

 58 ; and 1 Corinthians iii. 2. Origen and Augus- 

 tine among the fathers, have been mojt full upon 

 this point, upon which later Catholic theologians 

 dwelt with still more minuteness. They teach that 

 it is situated on the borders of the infernal pit ; that 

 a spark of its fires causes more suffering than any 

 bodily pain ; that every soul is purified in it, the 

 members which have sinned being burned in its 

 flames ; and that, by masses for the deceased, their 

 sufferings may be mitigated, and the time of their 

 punishment shortened. The origin of this notion is 

 to be traced to the doctrine of Plato, that there was 

 a state of purification after death, which was intro- 

 duced by the fathers of the church, particularly 

 Clement of Alexandria, into the Christian system. 

 Gregory the Great gave to this article a further ex- 

 tension, and employed it for the profit of the church. 

 The council of Florence (1439) was the first in which 

 the doctrine of purgatory was mentioned ; the mon- 

 strous perversions which it had suffered in the hands 

 of the monks, made it a prominent object of attack 

 to the Protestants. 



Purgatory (written by a German Catholic.) The 

 doctrine of a state of future purification was closely 

 connected by the ancients with that of the transmi- 

 gration of souls, which, as it first prevailed among 

 the Egyptians, was nothing more than a symbolical 

 representation of the immortality of the soul. Suc- 

 ceeding philosophers made use of this doctrine of 

 transmigration, to deter rude tribes from sin, by 

 connecting their future condition with that of the 

 various species of animals, which was well fitted to 

 strike unreflecting natures. It was afterwards un- 

 happily chosen to indicate the mode of the purifica- 

 tion of the soul and its preparation for the joys of 

 heaven. Plato did more than is usually believed 

 to develope this doctrine. Such a middle state is 

 consistent with reason, since there are men who, at 

 death, are not deserving of the joys of heaven, not 

 of the punishments of hell ; and the doctrine accords 

 with the spirit of the Christian revelation, which 

 represents the holiness of God, and declares that 

 without holiness no one can see, i. e. be united with 

 him, (Hebrews xii.) and describes the purity which 

 is required for admission to his presence, (Revela- 

 tion xxi. 27.) The Jews had this doctrine. Judas 

 the Maccabee caused prayers and victims to be of- 

 fered for the warriors who had fallen in sin, that 

 their sins might be pardoned, and they obtain the 

 reward promised to those who die in piety, (2 Mac- 

 cabees xii.) Christ confirmed this doctrine, when 

 he (Matthew xii. 31, 32) spoke of the sins which 

 were forgiven neither in this world nor in the next, 

 and thus implied that such a forgiveness was in ge- 

 neral attainable in another life. Christianity is far 

 From pronouncing the severe doctrine, that eternal 

 damnation is the portion of all Christians who have 

 incurred the slightest sin. John (1 John v. 1 6, 17,) 

 says expressly that all unrighteousness is sin, but 

 not all mortal sin. In what way the purification of 

 the less guilty is to take place, is not known ; and 

 the church has never acknowledged the notions 

 of physical pain which many have on this subject, 

 [f brotherly love bids us pray for the good of our 

 fellow men, (James v. 16,) should it not impel us 

 to pray for those of our brethren who may have so 

 lived on earth as to be excluded from perfect hap- 

 piness? It is impossible to prove that such prayers 

 are wholly ineffectual. That the Jewish church 

 prayed for the dead, appears from the passage in 

 Maccabees above referred to. And in the oidest 

 documents of Christian antiquity, we find this prayer 

 as something common and unquestioned. Not only 

 is it clearly proved to have existed from private 



