minum nostra dilectio; pro fratribus et
sororibus nostris apud misericordiam Patris non cesset oratio. Opto te,
frater carissime, semper bene valere.--This epistle is by some editors
numbered as the 60th, by others as the 61st, the 7th, and the 69th, &c.]

Whether the above view of this passage be founded in reason or not, it
matters little to the point at issue. Let both these passages be
accepted in the sense assigned to them by some Roman Catholic writers,
yet there is not a shadow of analogy between the language and conduct of
Cyprian, and the language and conduct of those who now invoke saints
departed. In each case Cyprian, still in the body, was addressing
fellow-creatures still sojourning on earth. The very utmost which these
passages could be forced to countenance would be, that the righteous,
when in heaven, may be mindful in their prayers of their friends, who
are still exposed to the dangers from which they have themselves finally
escaped, and who, when both were on earth, requested them to remember
the survivors in their prayers. But this is a question totally different
from our addressing them in supplication and prayer; a difference which
I am most anxious that both myself and my readers should keep in mind
throughout.

In the extract from Cyprian's letter, a modern author having rendered
the single word "utrobique," by the words "in this world and the next" I
am induced to add a few further observations on the passage. (The Latin
original and the version here referred to, will be placed side by side
in the Appendix.) It will, I think, appear to most readers on a careful
examination of the passage, that the expression "utrobique[62]" "on both
sides," or "on both parts," whatever be its precise {166} meaning, so
far from referring to "this world and the next," must evidently be
confined to the condition of both parties now in this life, because it
stands in direct contradistinction to what follows, the supposed case of
the death of either of the two; and because it applies no less to the
mutual relief of each other's sufferings and afflictions during their
joint lives, than to their mutual prayers: it cannot mean that all the
mutual benefits to be derived from their mutual remembrance of each
other, were to come solely through the means of their prayers. They were
doubtless mutually to pray for each other; but, in addition to their
prayers, they were also to relieve each other's pressures and
difficulties