OR, WHERE DO OUR DEPARTED GO? BY BERNARD O'REILLY, D.D., D. LIT., "LAVAL." "Thou hast made us, O Lord, for Thee; and our heart knoweth BALTIMORE: THE BALTIMORE PUBLISHING CO., No. 106 E. Baltimore Street. THE AUTHOR'S PREFACE. THE subject of this little book has long haunted me. A portion of it was written on my return from Spain to the United States over two years ago. The rest was the result of an interval of comparative repose during my stay in Ireland. It is natural that, as I approach the limit assigned by Scripture to the ordinary life of man, I should think a little of the "eternal years," and of the goal toward which I am traveling. If I have, in answering the question, “Where do our departed go?" only treated of everlasting rewards, it is not because I feared to consider the subject of eternal punishment. The title given to this work would have been misleading had it not been my purpose to verify it by treating in`a future volume both of the punishment and purification to be undergone after death. Fra Angelico, in painting his exquisite "Last Judgment," lavished all the splendor of his genius and the affection of his gentle nature on the representation of his Saints and angels. They are truly heavenly, divine. It is evident that he recoiled with horror from the uncongenial task of painting hell, with its demons and lost souls. I confess that the labor of writing about the supernatural destiny of man, about God's infinite generosity, and "the unsearchable riches of Christ"-bestowed on us in part in this *NOVISSIMA➡"The Last Things." |