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...his flesh" (Job 31:12). "He shall rain upon the sinners snares, fire and brimstone; a tempestuous wind [shall be] the portion of their cup." "Fire shall devour them" (Ps. 10:7; 20:10). "[The sinners] shall inherit that which was spoken by David: the portion of the inheritance of sinners, and that is fire and brimstone mingled with lightless darkness" (Ignatios Vardapet in the *Commentary on Luke* 12:21). Now, that sin hath a likeness unto darkness, as we have stated above, let us now confirm by the testimonies of the Holy Scriptures: "Such as sat in darkness and in the shadow of death" (Ps. 106:10). "Let us therefore cast off the works of darkness" (Rom. 13:12). "Iniquity is in itself darkness" (Sargis Shnorhali, Constantinople edition, page 112). Then, by the grace of the holy and immortal Sacrifice, the darkness of iniquity is dispelled, and the fire of sins is quenched; wherefore the sorrowing souls rejoice, for there is remission of sins. Behold, this is the purgatory concocted and feigned by the slanderers, which they strive to establish by the testimonies of the Scriptures and by their strange interpretation thereof. Having here refuted by the testimonies of the Scriptures this sixth argument of their false speech, let us make haste to set forth the refutation of the seventh.

DISCOURSE VII.

“We acknowledge as correct that the miraculous Nativity of Jesus Christ our Lord [falls] on December 25, and [His] Baptism on January 6; likewise the Annunciation of the Holy Virgin on March 25, and moreover the forty-day Presentation on the 2nd of the month of February. Wherefore we too celebrate these wondrously renewed solemnities together with the Greeks and with the Latins” (in Article 4). If these [men] had been conversant with ecclesiastical histories, they would have been obliged to confess the truth, even as the trueborn sons of the holy Illuminator confess [it]; but if—