THE doctrine of eternal torment in fire and brimstone stands conspicuously in the foreground of modern theology. Hell and its black scenery and everlasting torture are paraded with a sort of savage pleasure from every pulpit in the land. The highest play of fancy is employed to depict the horrible sufferings of the damned, and imagination allowed to run riot through the realms of fire prepared for the devil and his angels, but equally reserved for all who do not accept the dogmas of the Christian faith. Everything that partakes of the lovely and the beautiful 'is smothered by the murky atmosphere that escapes from this fabled bottomless pit, and all the kindly feelings that man should feel towards man destroyed by the belief that a large portion of our fellow-creatures are reserved for so terrible a fate. Affection even towards one's own children is looked upon with jealousy by Christians, lest it should draw away the mind from the one grand business of avoiding the path that leads to hell. The " sole concern and single care " of believers is to escape " the death that never dies," and all else is sinful or puerile. The beautiful things of earth are dimmed and blighted by the smoke of the great brimstone lake, and all that is noble and grand smothered beneath its ashes. Its fires burn out all goodness and generous feelings from the soul, and leave man a savage fiend, somewhat akin to the personage that a disordered imagination has created to hold his court in the realms of darkness. All Christian teaching is tainted with this frightful dogma, and even the bright side of religion tarnished by its influence. The God of orthodoxy is a monster to be feared and dreaded, not loved, since he is said to consign the large majority of the beings that he himself has created to so frightful a torment that no imagination can realize half its horrors.

The best and warmest blood of the heart becomes frozen at the sad and sickening spectacle presented in religious books, and the only feelings evoked in a mind well constituted must be intense hatred of the author of a doom so fearful as that which is said to be in store for some of the best of men that have trod the earth. Moral greatness is smothered, beauty eclipsed, and the blaze of genius quenched by the poisonous effects of this dogma of eternal damnation. Religion has become a dark thunder-cloud, shutting out every trace of the sun, and enveloping its professors in a more than Egyptian darkness. Dreams of beauty, love-lit visions of enchanting scenes of goodness, purity, and truth, must all give place to a faith which sees nothing in the future but the gaping mouth of a fiery lake, from which ascends the groans and wailings of the majority of earth's population, amongst whom may be our nearest friends and the most beloved of our hearts. Dismal indeed is the creed which recognizes this, and he who does not use every effort to banish it from the earth, neglects his duty to humanity. We are not oblivious of the fact that Christianity bas also in store a heaven for those who accept its dogmas and believe in its teachings. But its Founder has declared the path to this region extremely narrow, and told us that only a favored few shall find it. For the major portion of mankind there is no escape from eternal damnation, and according to religious teachings the best and wisest men that earth has seen are included amongst the denizens of the lake of fire. Philosophers and poets, whose immortal productions are destined to survive a hundred generations of men, and shed a luster over all future ages, have already taken up their abode with the devil and his angels. The wrath of God has fallen on scores of patriots and philanthropists; and men of science whose lives have been sacrificed in investigating the laws of nature, have died at last to find themselves shut out of heaven. Hell-fire, therefore, being reserved for such large numbers, and celestial bliss designed for so few, it is not to be wondered at that the former should. "'muff the most conspicuous place in Christian teaching. theme would be too narrow for popular preaching were the discourses of the clergy confined to the joys of heaven, whilst on the opposite subject there is ample scope not simply for imagination, but for that vindictiveness for which most Christians are so noted.

The doctrine of eternal damnation is not simply accepted as a terrible fact which may be lamented but cannot be removed—regrettable but irremediable—frightful to contemplate but impossible to cure; orthodox Christians appear to take a delight in dwelling at length upon its horrors, and enlarging upon its most sickening details. Nothing but the supposition that they derive pleasure from the thought that a large mass of their fellow-creatures are doomed to suffer an eternity of torment can account for the fluency with which they talk on this subject, the levity with which they treat it, and the perfect indifference they display whilst depicting the sufferings of the damned in the world to come. He who does not believe in the barbarous Hell of modern theology may be excused for cracking a joke about his Satanic Majesty, and subjecting to ridicule the brimstone fires of the bottomless lake; but nothing can justify the raising a laugh in the discussion of such a topic by those who contemplate it as a reality. If the doctrine be true, it is far too serious to joke about, and far too terrible to be referred to with any other feelings than those of intense pain. Yet it is not simply discussed by the popular preachers of the present day with the most perfect sang froid, but by some of them made the subject of a stale pun, or the vehicle for bringing before their audience a worn-out witticism. Mr. Spurgeon talks as glibly and as coolly of hell-fire as though he were discussing the quality of a glass of punch, and enlarges on the torments of the damned with no more feeling than he would experience in describing the process of roasting a joint for his dinner. Myriads of his fellow-creatures broiling through eternity upon infernal gridirons, he looks upon as a bagatelle, to be talked about with the utmost levity; and the witnessing of one's own children dragged from them by devils to the realms of everlasting woe, he describes as the cause rather of pleasure than of the bitterest pangs of agony. If the popular religion be calculated to produce such a state of mind as this—and facts testify that it is—then he is criminal who does not use his every power to rid our world of so monstrous a curse. Jonathan Edwards somewhere has it, " However the saints in heaven may have loved the damned whilst here, their eternal damnation will only serve to increase a relish of their own enjoyments." Generous, kind-hearted, loving souls are those, who are to occupy seats in the realms of everlasting bliss! One, after all, can almost become reconciled to be doomed to the regions of woe, rather than live in heaven with so intensely selfish and brutal a class. To feel pleasure in seeing others suffer is a proof of the most degraded and barbarous nature, but that such torments as, we are told, are in store for the lost in the future world could " increase a relish of their own enjoyments," on the part of those who, in perfect bliss themselves, spend their time in looking down upon the agony of their fellow-creatures, proves clearly that all trace of manhood has departed. And if to this be added the fact that amongst those sufferers, whose pain is the source of so much pleasure to the denizens of the celestial kingdom, there are to be found the nearest and dearest friends which earthly ties had closely bound in the holiest affection, to those who now are to feast their eyes with this scene of woe, human language fails to describe with what monsters heaven must be peopled.—

"The godly wife conceives no grief,

Nor can she shed a tear

For the sad fare of her dear mare

When she his doom doth hear."

Then must human sympathy and human love be for ever banished from such a breast, and " the godly wife " in becoming elevated to an angel be degraded to a state lower than that of the brute. At least it must be a consolation to sceptics that they are not doomed to associate in the fixture world with such monsters—the fabled devil can hardly be worse. " Young man," says Mr. Spurgeon," what will you think when the last day comes, to hear Christ say, Depart ye cursed, and there will be a voice just behind him saying, amen; and as you inquire whence came the voice, you will find it was your mother. Or young woman, when thou art cast away into utter darkness, what will you think to hear a voice saying, amen, and as you look there sits your father, his lips still moving with the solemn curse?" Why, that it has been their lot to be-born of parents unworthy of the holy epithets of father and mother, and that one consolation in the bitter cup of agony still remained in the fact that they were separated for ever from such heartless wretches. Is there a Christian parent who can echo this language of Mr. Spurgeon? If so, we tell him that he is a disgrace to humanity, a blot on the age in which he lives, a hideous pest to the society amongst which his lot is cast. Humanity would prompt far other feelings, and we cannot help thinking that even this debasing theology must find a difficulty in effacing all traces of parental affection from the breasts of many of its disciples. How much higher are the promptings of human nature than the teachings of such a creed, let any reflecting mind decide. Let us never be told that Christianity is calculated to purify and exalt the affections till it gets rid of this monster dogma of eternal punishment. It debases man to a lower condition than the brute, and converts him into a fiend. We would simply request any father or mother to contemplate the scene which Mr. Spurgeon has depicted, and just endeavor to realize the possibility in their ova case of their being called upon to pronounce the " amen" to Christ's " Depart ye cursed," uttered against that son, who has been their only care and hope, or that daughter, the fondest offspring of their love. If even the thought does not freeze their blood and send a shudder through their frames, then has a brutal theology done its work effectually upon their minds.

Let a husband imagine that the fond wife of his bosom, the partner of his cares and his successes, the brightest spot in his domestic circle, the oasis in the desert of human life, the loving spirit entwined around his heart-strings, whose presence has cheered him in dis-tress through many a year, and whose smile has been an ample reward for days of toil—let him imagine her doomed to eternal damnation, whilst be is favored with a place in the realms of bliss, and what would his happiness be worth ? Tell him that he would be expected to re-echo the curse pronounced upon her, he would look upon the very suggestion as an insult. For him heaven could have no pleasure without her presence, and all its boasted felicity would be valueless amidst the contemplation of her woe. In truth, this difficulty has been felt by some Christians who have been better than their creed, and in whom a degrading theology had not been able to extinguish all the affections which make life valuable, and give to our existence here the greatest portion of the charm which it possesses. Professor Stuart remarks in reference to this matter—" That the subject is one of fearful interest none will deny who believe in future retribution. That there are difficulties pressed by it on the mind when one thinks of his own condition, that of his beloved friends, or of his brethren of the human race, it would be mere pretense to deny. But it is a consolation to believe that behind any clouds, however dark, that interpose between, us and the light of heaven, its beams still shine clearly.

All will be clear in the light of heaven. If parents, husbands, wives, brothers, sisters, must see those dear as their own life perish at last, while they themselves are saved, heaven in mercy will either extinguish their social susceptibilities, or else give them such a sweet and overpowering sense of the justice and goodness of God as shall, not permit the joys of the blessed to be marred, nor the songs of the redeemed to be interrupted with the sighs of sympathetic sorrow." Unlike such men as Spurgeon, who seem to take a delight in contemplating the torments of the damned, Professor Stuart admits that the subject is surrounded with difficulty, but he still thinks it is not insurmountable. He is terrified at the idea that his friends and relations whom he loves here may be lost, but he thinks he sees a mode by which the frightful consequence affecting his own happiness may be avoided—one loophole of escape is that God will in mercy " extinguish the social susceptibilities" of those who are saved. If this means anything, it means that all those feelings of love, sympathy, benevolence, disinterestedness which serve to give to human society all that is of any Value, and are productive of all the happiness that we experience here, are to be blotted out. In what then will consist the joys of heaven? A place inhabited by beings deprived of their social feelings assuredly can present but few attractions to those who know of how much pleasure of the very highest kind these feelings are the source. No man of an exalted mind would care to mix even for an hour with persons who were destitute of all love and interest in the welfare of others. The regions of perpetual ice and

snow are inhabited by beings in whose hearts some of the milk of human kindness flows which no frost can congeal; the tropical deserts are crossed by savages who, despite their degradation, are kind and hospitable; but heaven forsooth ! the place whose joys no tongue can tell, nor imagination depict, is tenanted by denizens who, wrapped up in an intense selfishness, manifest no concern for the welfare of those they most loved on earth. As to the other supposition, that God will give the saved " a sweet and overpowering sense of his justice and goodness," we have only to say that as far as our limited faculties can lead us to judge, there is neither justice nor goodness in eternal damnation; and even if there were, the recognition of that fact could do nothing towards destroying the affection experienced for those loved ones who had cheered our path through this mortal life. The man to whom the justice and the goodness of God can appear sweeter in consequence of the damnation of those dearest of all to his heart, must assuredly be more than human or less. Such a monster we have no desire to meet either here or hereafter.

By some of the more liberal members of modern Christian churches, the doctrine of everlasting damnation is glossed over or softened down, so as to hide from view its more horrible features. By a few it has been altogether rejected, and the ultimate happiness of the entire human race set forth. The latter have been confined almost exclusively to the Unitarians, a sect very much in advance of orthodox believers, both in the liberality of their sentiments and in the intelligence they bring to bear upon the investigation of theological creeds, but too small and obscure to attract much attention. Amongst Trinitarians it has occasionally happened, that men with larger souls, yearning for the good of their kind, have felt themselves unable to reconcile eternal torment with the goodness of God, and have either rejected the doctrine in toto, or have adopted some mystic modification of it which few could understand; in either case, however, they have been severely censured by their orthodox brethren. The articles of the Church of England once numbered three more than at present, and at that time the 42nd ran as follows: " All men not to be saved at last. They also deserve to be condemned who endeavor to restore

that pernicious opinion that all men (though never so ungodly) shall at last be saved, when for a certain time, appointed by the Divine Justice, they have endured punishment for their sins committed." In the revision of the Articles, in the time of Elizabeth, the 42nd, with one or two others, was omitted, and almost the only trace of eternal damnation left was to be found in the Athanasian Creed. In this respect the Church of England proved herself in advance of the majority of Dissenting sects, the latter scrupulously adhering to the dogma of everlasting punishment. Yet in that church no less a man than Professor Maurice was subjected, a few years ago, to all sorts of abuse and. petty persecution, and deprived of his Professorship in King's College, for propagating some whimsical theory about future punishment, which, whilst it rejected the most hideous form of the doctrine, did not boldly deny its reality, but cloaked the whole matter in such a mystic garment that none could discover its real form. Eternal damnation may, therefore, be looked upon as an essential of the Christian faith of the nineteenth century, and he who denies it renders himself, according to the accepted opinion, in danger of its brimstone fires.

That Christians in general glory in the doctrine, is obvious from the fact that they take a delight in painting it as horrible as their disordered imaginations will allow them. It is quite possible to be firmly convinced of the truth of a theory which one's inclination would rather to be false, and to feel compelled to preach a doctrine with a regret that it is true. Truth is not always palatable, even to him who has received it. But there is neither compunction nor regret with the orthodox believer as he hurls abroad his hell-fire darts. He grins like some savage fiend, as he paints the horrors of the damned, and almost yells with delight as he depicts the barbarous torments in store for those with whom be comes daily into contact. If the doctrine were true, it would be calculated to fill the world with the in-tensest misery. Who could gaze upon vast myriads of his fellow-creatures, marching with rapid strides to the orthodox hell, and not be filled with the bitterest agony of soul? Who but those in whom a brutal faith has crushed out every feeling of humanity and of love?

The learned and accomplished Jeremy Taylor, whose writings still live, and deservedly so, thus describes the condition of the lost:—"The damned persons shall be eternally branded with the infinity of their offences, so that they shall be scorned and scoffed at by the devils themselves: men and angels shall detest them as infamous and wicked traitors to their King, God, and Redeemer. And as fugitive slaves are marked and cauterized with burning irons, so this infamy, by some mark of ugliness and deformity, shall be stamped upon their faces and bodies. (Isaiah xiii.) So ignominious shall be the body of a sinner, that when his soul returns to enter it, it shall be amazed to behold it so terrible, and shall wish it were in the same state as when it was half eaten up with Worms. And that which adds misery to their calamity, they shall be banished from heaven, and made prisoners in the profound bowels of the earth; a place most remote from heaven, and the most calamitous of all others, where they shall neither see the sun by day nor the stars by night; where all shall be horror and darkness; a land covered with the obscurity of death: a land of sulfur and burning pitch; a land of pestilence and corruption—into this land shall be banished the enemies of God. The tyrants of Japonica invented a strange torment for those who confessed Christ.

They hung them with their heads downwards, half their bodies into a hole digged in the earth, which they filled with snakes, lizards, and other poisonous vermin; but even these were better companions than those infernal dragons of the pit of hell, where into not half but the whole body of the miserable sinner shall be plunged." He then goes on to describe the nature of the torments more in detail; from what source he acquired his information he does not say:—" The eyes shall not only be grieved with a scorching beat, but shall be tormented with monsters and horrible figures," etc. The ears, whilst they are to suffer " from the ever burning and penetrating fire," are to be saluted with " the fearful and amazing noises of thunders, howling, clamors, groans, curses, and blasphemies." The nose is to be tormented with the most horrible stenches, arising from the pent-up brimstone and other poisonous vapors; and even " the bodies of the damned shall cast forth a most horrible stink of themselves, and that more or less, according to the quality of their sins." Hell is, according to Jeremy Taylor, a kind of gigantic cesspool, into which all the filth of the world is continually being drained, by what system of sewerage we are left in the dark. It is, he informs us, " the world's sink, and the receptacle of all the filth in this great frame, and, withal, a deep dungeon, into which the air hath no access," and there is no " vent or breathing." Now, we ask, would any man have penned this description of a place of which he knew nothing, and have entered upon the most disgusting details of a region which he had no authority—not even that of the Bible— for describing, unless he had felt a kind of pleasure in contemplating the sufferings in store for those who were not so highly favored as himself, and in painting in the most horrid manner possible, the torments to which a large portion of human beings were doomed?

Not only love and goodwill, but even taste and refinement are smothered by the barbarous tenets of orthodoxy. Jeremy Taylor was a man of education and a gentleman, yet even he could not refrain from sketching this frightful picture of hell, so powerful a hold had the theological dogmas of the age taken upon his mind. In these material descriptions of the brimstone lake the details are frequently involved in absurdity and contradiction, and would thereby refute themselves did persons look at questions of religion with the same careful scrutiny and, reason that they employ in matters of business. Keen, sharp, intelligent men in the every-day affairs of life be—come fools in theology, taking any absurd statement on trust that comes to them in the name of religion.

Nothing can be clearer than the fact that the hell of Jeremy Taylor is impossible to be inhabited by human beings. He has fixed the locality in the center of the earth, where there are poisonous vapors, sulfur, and all sorts of filthy stenches, but into which no pure air can find its way. Respiration cannot go on in such a place, and, as a consequence. all the functions of the body must cease, which is death. We shall be told doubtless that man will then have been made immortal, and consequently enabled to live, whatever may be the influences operating upon him. If so, this must occur in one of two ways—either his present body must be rendered independent of those agencies upon which it now depends, or another, and a different kind of body, must be substituted for it. The first supposition is impossible, as we have above shown; the latter destroys the identity of the individual. To say that a man is to be subjected to eternal fire, and yet that it is a being possessed of physical qualities totally different from those of man who is to tormented, is to put forth a paradox and an absurdity. Man, constituted as he is, cannot possibly endure everlasting burning; a being constituted otherwise, is not man. The advocate of hell-fire is here placed on the horns of a dilemma, and may take his choice. It may be replied that the punishment is spiritual, and that it is the soul that is subject to its torment. Jeremy Taylor clearly saw nothing but a material fire, kept up with material fuel, surrounded with material agencies, and operating upon material- bodies. Remove these, and his description is worthless. Besides, as John Wesley remarks in answer to those who propounded the question as to whether the fire of hell was material, immaterial fire is an absurdity; you might as well talk of immaterial air or immaterial water.

Modern preachers are equally material in their descriptions of this place, and paint it quite as horrible as did Jeremy Taylor. The doctrine has the same brutalising effects now as then. " I shall look through thy hand and flesh," says Mr. Spurgeon, "and shall see thy heart within, and how shall I see it? Set in a case of fire—in a case of fire, and thou shalt revolve for ever with the worm gnawing within thy heart which shall never die. A case of fire around thy never-dying, ever-tortured heart." And again, "-The angel binding you hand and foot, holds you one single moment over the mouth of the chasm. He bids you, look down, down. There is no bottom. And you hear coming lip from the abyss sullen moans, and screams of tortured ghosts. You quiver, your bones melt like wax, and your marrow quakes within you. Where is now thy might, and where thy boasting and bragging? Ye shriek and cry, ye beg for mercy. But the angel with one tremendous grasp seizes you fast and then hurls you down with the cry, away, away." This angel must be a devil whatever his name, and not much less a fiend is he who revels in such brutal sentiments. Here is literal fire, literal groans and moans, literal grasping the lost one on the part of the angel, a literal pit into which he is hurled, and indeed the whole sketch is material. Two or three points are somewhat different from anything that we are at present acquainted with. The body, it appears, had become transparent so that the case of fire in which the heart was set could be seen from without. A transparent body is most assuredly not a human body, and a heart that could perform its functions when set in a case of fire is not a human • heart. For whatever class of beings, real or imaginary, the punishment portrayed be designed, they most certainly do not belong to the race of men. The bottomless pit is a paradox, but were it a reality how it could exist in the " bowels of the earth " is somewhat puzzling. It will be seen from the above quotations that the hell of the present day is quite as barbarous as that believed in by our forefathers a century or two ago. If there be any difference,

"'Tie only change of pain, a bitter change Severer for severe."

The doctrine still stands before us in all its hideous deformity. It is still a part of modern theology, and, as such, must be done battle with. It is the fruitful source of a thousand crimes, the cause of the wreck of many a brilliant intellect, and the promoter of discord amongst mankind. In the Times not long since a report appeared of a waiter at one of the London Club Houses who was brought up to the Lambeth Police Court for murdering his little daughter sixteen months old. He stated that he had been reading religious books, and destroyed his child, of whom he was exceedingly fond, to secure its salvation, and prevent it from running the risk of eternal damnation. The man was mad, they said. Why? Because he believed in the doctrine of eternal torment, and acted as though he did? If the doctrine be true, his conduct should be considered the greatest proof of his sanity. Who would not rather destroy his child than subject it to the risk of such a frightful punishment? The more the child was beloved, the more likely would any kind parent be to perpetrate the act. The man was mad, doubtless, and to the monstrous doctrine of hellfire the loss of his reason must be ascribed. And his is not an isolated case. Our lunatic asylums are filled with the Victims of this and kindred dogmas. What wonder that men lose their reason, when they contemplate the possible fate of those they love more dearly than their own lives, and behold an eternal fire gaping to receive husband, wife, or child. Unless all humanity has departed, little less than madness can be expected. And where as in many cases, persons believe in the doctrine, and feel no concern for those whom nature would prompt them to love, such should be looked upon as more brutal than the brutes themselves. What can any man, with the least vestige of love for his species remaining in his breast, think of the following language—" For me there is no hell. Let it smoke and burn. If I am a believer I shall never have my portion there. For me there are no eternal racks, no torments . . . We are free from punishment, and we never quake on account of it. However horrible it may be—if it is eternal, as we know it is—it is nothing to us, for we can never suffer it." And this brutal selfishness is preached to vast mobs who go in thousands to hear a man who confesses that so long as he escapes hell, he cares nothing for the rest of mankind. Would not anyone imagine that to propound such a sentiment would be to subject oneself to universal scorn, and to become detested by all good men? Yet Mr. Spurgeon is the most popular preacher of the day. Nothing can better prove the influence of this barbarous theology upon men's minds.

The Egyptians were probably the first to teach the dis—tinct and independent existence of the soul after death. (Herod. Lib. II. o. 123.) Diodorus Siculus says that instead of lamenting the death of good men, they rejoiced in their felicity, conceiving that they would live for ever in the invisible world. (Lib. I., c. 12.) The Persians held, according to Zoroaster, that, "the human soul is a particle of divine light;" and the Chaldeans regarded it as an emanation of the divine nature. This kind of Pantheism spread itself throughout nearly all the eastern nations, and prevails in India even at the present day. The early Hebrews were essentially materialistic in their philosophy. They saw nothing beyond the present state of existence—the grave was their everlasting home. Rewards and punishments were all confined to this life. They knew of no soul apart from the body, and the theory of the resurrection of the dead had not yet been invented. The doctrine of eternal torment did not therefore originate with the Jews.

The Hebrew term (sheol), in some places translated hell in the Bible, simply signified the grave. It has three meanings—first, to pray for or petition for anything; the second, to ask for the purpose of borrowing or to solicit advice; and the last a grave or burial place. In the latter sense it is used sixty-six times in the Old Testament, thirty-two of which have been translated hell, thirty-one grave, and three pit. Up to the death of Abraham, whenever persons are spoken of as quitting the present state of existence, the plain, simple words are, " And he died." On this occasion we find for the first time a fresh mode of expression employed. Abraham is spoken of as giving up the ghost, and being " gathered to his people " (Gen. 25.8.) The first simply meant breathing his last breath, the same, in fact, as our word expire; and the last, being consigned to the dormitory of Machpelah. which he had previously purchased. Many promises had been made to Abraham during life as rewards for his obedience and fidelity, but not one had the slightest reference to a state beyond the grave. The first time that sheol is used is in the case of Jacob, who, lamenting for his son Joseph, exclaims, " I will go down into sheol unto my son mourning" (Gen. 37.35.) It will not be argued even by the most orthodox that the modern hell was intended in this passage. It occurs the next time in the case of Borah, Dathan, and Abiram, of whom Moses said the earth should open and they should go, down quick into the pit—sheol (Numbers 16.30)—i.e., into the earth, certainly not into a lake of fire and brimstone. They were, in a word, to be buried alive. The same meaning attaches to the word in Deut. 32.22, where it is translated hell, all the references in the passage being to the earth, and no allusion made to the imaginary bottomless pit of modern theology. In the rejoicing of Hannah at having given birth to a son, she exclaims, " The Lord killed and makes alive, he bringeth down to the grave [sheol] and bringeth up" (1 Sam. 2.6.)

The translators have correctly enough rendered sheol grave in this passage, but when next it occurred (2 Sam. 22.6), they have absurdly translated it hell. When David had handed over the government to his son Solomon, he informed him that he was about to die and " go the way of all the earth;" and in charging him what to do, he desires him not to let the hoary head of Joab go down to the grave (sheol) in peace (1 Kings 2.6), and to bring down the hoar head of Shimei " to the grave [sheol] with blood" (v. 9). When next the term occurs it is used by Job, who, dissatisfied with his present condition, expresses his desire of quitting life, a feeling somewhat opposed to that patience he is usually given credit for, and announces his belief that he shall see no more good. He longs for death, and declares most emphatically that they that go down into sheol shall come up no more. Up to this time, at least, neither the immortality of the soul, nor the resurrection of the dead, had been taught. The ways of God are declared to be higher than heaven, and deeper than hell (Job 11.8)—i.e., higher than the fretted canopy of stars, and deeper than sheol, the innermost recesses of the earth, the limits of a Jewish imagination. Job prays to God to hide him in sheol till his wrath be passed (14.13), a most unlikely prayer had he referred to the brimstone hell of modern theology.

He declares, too, in his anxiety for death, that he has no hope, that sheol is his house, that he has made his bed in darkness, and "said to corruption, Thou art my father, to the worm, Thou art my mother and my sister " (17.13, 14). And further, that those who saw him should go down with him to sheol, and that they should rest together in the dust. If all this does not prove that Job was a Materialist, and saw no state of existence beyond the present life, then have words no meaning. The term sheol is used in several other places in the same book, but always in a similar sense. In the Psalms we come across the word many times, but never in such a connection as to lead us to imagine that it had undergone any change. David in one place, addressing the Lord, exclaims, "In death there is no remembrance of thee, in the grave [sheol] who shall give thee thanks?" (Psalms 6.5) showing clearly that by sheol he understood the unconscious condition of the dead. A very similar expression occurs in Isaiah—" For sheol cannot praise thee, death cannot celebrate thee," from which it is clear that he took the same view of sheol as did the previous writers. David, in another place, speaking of the omnipresence of Jehovah, exclaims, " If I ascend up into heaven thou art there, if I make my bed in hell [sheol] behold thou art there " (Ps. 139.8), which Street very correctly translates—" If I climb the heavens, there thou art; if I make a bed of the grave, lo ! thou art present."

If we pass ori to the books ascribed to Solomon, the Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Epithalamium or Wedding Song, in which orthodox commentators strive to find some mystical reference to Christ's church—we shall find sheol used in the same sense as that previously described. The word occurs nine times in the Proverbs—seven times rendered hell, and twice the grave--in all, however, the meaning being the same. " Let ns swallow them up alive as the grave " [shed] (1.12). " Her house is the way to hell [sheol], going down to the chambers of death " (vii. 27), beautifully rendered in meter by Dr. Hodgson as follows—

"Her house is the way to the sepulcher, It leadeth down to the chambers of death."

" But he knows not that the dead are there, and that her guests are in the depths of hell" [sheol] (9.18), which Dr. Hodgson has translated—

" But he knows not that dead men are there, That in the depths of the grave are her guests."

In the book of Ecclesiastes the author's materialistic opinions are most definitely expressed—" For the living know that they shall die, but the dead know not anything, neither have they any more a reward, for the memory of them is forgotten " (9.5). "Whatsoever thy hand finds to do, do it with thy might, for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave [sheol] whither thou goes " (10). If this refers to the orthodox brimstone lake, it is clear that those who inhabit it are unconscious, and therefore suffer nothing. In the Song of Solomon jealousy is said to be as cruel—merciless would be a better term—as the grave [sheol] (8.6).

Jonah, who for three days and nights occupied apartments in the stomach of a whale, describes himself as residing during that period in the belly of sheol, curiously enough rendered hell by our translators, though what analogy there can be between the alimentary canal of a fish and the fiery bottomless pit of modern theologians, it is difficult to discover.

In Isaiah the term sheol occurs nine times, in six of which it is translated hell and three grave. "Hell [sheol] hath enlarged herself and opened her mouth without measure" (v.14) —i.e., the famine and disease to which reference is made enlarge the domains of death. In a denunciation of the faults of the people, they are said to have made a covenant with death and an agreement with hell [sheol] (28.15), which was clearly not an eternal one, for it is afterwards disannulled (18). The expression here comes very near that of Lucan when speaking of the Psylli, who were said to be unhurt by the bites of the serpents abounding in their country:—

"Truce with the dreadful tyrant death they have, And border safely on his realm, the grave."

Hezekiah speaks of going to the gates of (sheol) the grave (38.10). Lucifer is said to have been "cut down to the ground," and "brought down to hell" [sheol] (14. 12, 15)—clearly not the orthodox place of torment, since he is spoken of as being " as a carcass trodden under feet," in, contradistinction to the other kings who were to lie in state, each in his own apartment. " Thou art cast out of thy grave " [kibor] (19). "Thou shalt not be joined with them in burial " (20), are the condemnations passed upon him, in which case the punishment will assuredly be admitted to be temporal.

Amos speaks of persons digging down into sheol (9. 2), which, it is presumed, no one has ever done into the orthodox hell, although in modern times we have certainly penetrated as for into the interior of the earth as ever the ancients could have done. Hosea, rhapsodizing on the future national restoration of the Jews, exclaims—" I will ransom them from the power of the grave " [sheol] (13. 14).

In all the other instances in which the word sheol is used, it has the same meaning. No such doctrine as that of eternal torment was known to the Jews in the earlier period of their history. With them existence commenced and ended with the present life—a conscious state beyond the tomb they had never heard of. All that was said of the best of them was, that they died and were gathered to their fathers, and this was considered a satisfactory termination to a long life. Even the one commandment which promises a reward for obedience to its mandate, offers no joys beyond the grave, but simply promises long life in the favoured land.

Later in their history the Jews doubtless embraced other views—though there never entered into their theology the barbarous hell of modern Christianity—but until the canon of their Scriptures was said to be closed they were essentially Materialists. It is clear, therefore, that the brimstone lake must be traced for its origin to some other source.

One of the best editions of the Bible extant is that which bears the name of the Septuagint version. It was the production of Alexandrian Jews who lived under Ptolemy Philadelphus, and is said to have been, written by order of the king, at the instigation of Demetrius Phalerius. The tale, however, is very improbable, that a peripatetic philosopher, such as Demetrius was, should have cared sufficiently for the sacred books of a small sect like the Jews to have induced him to use his influence with the king to have them translated. And supposing that he had done so, it is not by any means likely that his solicitation would have been attended to by Pbiladelphus, since no very friendly feeling existed between the two. Demetrius Phalerius bad been previously appointed to the government of Athens, by Cassandar, King of Macedon, and whilst filling that position had been so popular, that something like three hundred and sixty brazen statues were erected in his honor. The populace were, however, then, as now, changeable and fickle, the demigod of today being the spurned and despised of to-morrow: the wind of popular opinion shifted, and Demetrius was driven from his office. He now sought protection under Ptolemy Soter, who a few years before had gone to Jerusalem under pretense of offering sacrifice in the temple on the Sabbath, and had surprised the inhabitants and carried about one hundred thousand Jews captive into Egypt. Ptolemy appears we) nave placed great confidence in Demetrius, ultimately consulting him as to his choice of a successor to the throne.

The philosopher's advice was that the preference should be given to a son of the king by his wife Eurydice, rather than to Beronices, afterwards called Philadelphus. The monarch rejected the advice, and, as might be supposed, an enmity sprung up between the philosopher and the young prince. When Philadelphus came to the throne he banished Demetrius to a distant province, and the latter put an end to his existence by the bite of an asp.

Under this monarch the Jews were placed on a footing of equality with the rest of his subjects, and allowed the free and open profession of their religion. They were joined by others who voluntarily left Judea. The Greek language became spoken by them, and, on the whole, they were admirably qualified for the translation of their Scriptures into that tongue. But that any royal mandate had been issued for the accomplishment of this work, is more than questionable. The tale was probably invented by the translators as an excuse to their brethren in Palestine for making public to Greeks the context of Hebrew sacred books, a course of procedure which would naturally be displeasing to the Jewish people in general. Afterwards the story was caught up by Christian Fathers, and is commonly accepted at the present day. The translation was probably the work of private individuals. Beausobre thinks that several different persons were employed in its production, and this appears obvious from the great difference of style to be observed in various parts. Still there can be no doubt that they were admirably qualified for the task.

In the Septuagint the term sheol is translated Abic (hada), one of the Greek words, which in the English version, is rendered hell. That it had been selected as a synonym of this Hebrew word, is of itself clear and conclusive proof that at that period no such meaning was attached to it as it has since obtained. Hades appears to be derived from A, not and iiaw, to see, and means the invisible resting place of the dead. Like sheol, therefore, it may be translated the grave. It is used frequently in the sense of a deprivation of light, a dark and gloomy habitation. Scapula considered it as a dark place, a house without light; and Hesychius looks upon it as synonymous with unpleasant, disagreeable, giving forth a stench, and quotes Cyril. Lex. as applying it to a dark habitation, and to a man who had lost his sight.. The poets of Greece and Rome sometimes used it to describe the region of disembodied spirits; but the Jews having no belief in souls apart from bodies, could not have employed it in that sense. Moreover, in no case is it ever used to describe such a place as the brimstone lake of modern Christianity, the bottomless abyss of fire reserved for such myriads of the human race.

Throughout the New Testament the term hades has usually the same meaning as Sheol in the Old, and certainly in no instance is it used to describe the region portrayed in such elegant language by Dr. Watts:—

Eternal plagues and heavy chains,

Tormenting racks and fiery coals,

And darts to inflict immortal pains,

Dyed in the blood of damned souls.

Tempests of angry fire shall roll

To blast the rebel worm,

And beat upon his rebel soul

In one eternal storm.

The first time that we meet with the term hades in the New Testament is in Matthew 9.23—" And thou Capernaum which art exalted unto heaven, shalt be brought down to hell" (hades)—in which case it is used in the sense of low or desolate, indicative of a state of the deepest degradation. It can have no reference to a place of torment. The gates of hades Christ declared should not prevail against his church (Matt. 16.18), the real meaning of which probably is that the fear of death and the dread of the grave, should not influence his disciples. Certain it is that at this period the hell of modern Orthodoxy had not been conjectured. And the term hades could not, to anyone acquainted with Greek, have conveyed any such idea. By this time, however, it must be borne in mind, the Jews had, from their intermixture with other nations, begun to embrace the doctrine of the soul's immortality. A portion of them still remained Materialists, but others had embraced Alexandrian Platonism, and began to express ideas in Greek which their own language would have been totally incompetent to embody in words. In Hebrew it would have been extremely difficult—perhaps impossible—to describe the immortality of the thinking principle, the language being essentially materialistic, and containing no term which would convey any such meaning as that which is attached to the English word soul.

Indeed it is questionable whether the Greek words translated soul and spirit could be interpreted etymologically to imply immortality; but then mystic doctrines of Greek philosophers had by this time tended to employ these and other terms in a sense foreign to that in which for so many ages they had been used. In the parable of Dives and Lazarus there is unquestionably a reference to a future state, and hades appears to have been used somewhat in the sense in which the Greek poets had employed it—viz., as the region in which the souls of the departed were assembled. There is still no trace of the modern brimstone fire lake to be discovered. The rich man and Lazarus were both in the same place, so near to each other in point of fact that a conversation could be carried on between them without difficulty; and although there appears to have been a gulf which it was impossible for them to pass, still it is evident that the chasm could not have been a very wide one. "It is singular," says a writer on this subject, " how a preconceived theory shuts out the plain meaning of a passage. Had hades been the name of a city wherein dwelt various persons in very diversified states, and the language had run thus:—‘ In hades Dives lifted up his eyes, being in pain from fire, and sees far down the street a physician, and Lazarus leaning on his arm,' who would have confounded the name of the city at large with the particular place wherein Dives was suffering? Hades can clearly mean no more than the general state of the dead here, including the state of both Lazarus and Dives."

Peter, somewhat less mystic than his Master, used the term hades in its original and popular sense. Speaking of the resurrection of Christ, and endeavoring to conciliate the Jews, he quotes Psalm 16.10, as a prophecy—" Because thou wilt not leave my soul in hell [hades], neither wilt thou suffer thine holy one to see corruption." (Acts 2.27.) Hades is here used as the synonym of sheol, and clearly means the grave, as is evident from the reference to corruption. That the English word hell was once used in the same sense, is evident from the expression in the Apostles' Creed (so called)—" He descended into hell." The word translated soul is used frequently in the sense of person or whole man. Paul, again, employed the term hades in the same sense, and the translators of the English version have rendered it grave—" O death! where is thy sting? O grave! [holes] where is thy victory?" (1 Cor. 15.55.)

In the passage from which this is a quotation (Hosea 13.14) sheol is rendered grave, which fact may have influenced the translators in dealing with this text. Hades occurs three times in Revelation, in all of which it has obviously the same meaning. " Behold I am alive for evermore, and have the keys of hades and of death" (1.18.), which Archbishop Newcome correctly renders, " The keys of the grave and of death." " And behold a pale horse, and his name that sat on him was Death, and hades followed with him " (6.8). The pale horse, indicative of sickness, was mounted by death, and the grave followed in his train. Any other interpretation would completely destroy the appropriateness of the figure. In the description of the resurrection which appears in the twentieth chapter, the same meaning must be ascribed to the term —" And the sea gave up the dead which were in it, and death and hades delivered up the dead which were in them," (v. 13)—i.e., death and the grave. It is clear that hades could not refer to the orthodox hell, since it is spoken of in connection with the dead and the sea, the dead inhabitants of which were to be given up to receive judgment. From the use of this term, then, we fail to discover any trace of those infernal dungeons so widely portrayed by all true and faithful preachers of the gospels.

The English word hell, as at one time understood, was a very proper term by which to render either sheol or hades, since it had nearly the same meaning. In the early history of our language, the brutal notion now associated with it was never imagined to be indicated by its use. Hell is derived from the Anglo-Saxon helan to hil—that is, to cover or hide, and was hence a fitting expression to describe the tomb. In the old copies of the English Bible it was used in this sense:—" Therefore take no thought saying, What shall we eat or what shall we drink? or wherewithal shall we be clothed ?" (Matt. 6.31) Indeed, in some parts of the country, terms derived from this word are still used in the same sense. The roof of a house is called heling in Cornwall at the present day, and thatches are still called heliers in the West of England. Language therefore so far refuses to lend its sanction to the barbarous fire lake of modern orthodoxy. This hideous bugbear is an invention of ' the priesthood for the purpose of crushing out every spark of freedom from the human mind, and, up to the present, the scheme has been tolerably successful. A brighter day however is dawning, Freethought is advancing, and the bottomless pit will speedily become lost sight of in its own profound abysses.

Some slight glimpses, perhaps, of the place of torment of modern Christianity, may be obtained from the other term rendered hell in the English version of the New Testament. Its horrors, however, are much less than those now said to be in store for all who reject the Gospel. Moreover, though fire is unquestionably referred to, it must be remembered it is material fire in a terrestrial locality, and operating upon a material organization. This may be real or figurative. If real, it must be limited in its duration to the existence of the body operated upon by the fire; if figurative, imagination must supply the reality. This it does in orators of the Spurgeon class, and hence the intensity of the torments depicted will always be in proportion to the brutality of the mind in which they are conceived. Such a man as Nero would have made an excellent hell-fire preacher had he been acquainted with the doctrines of modern Christianity. Those who use this weapon most forcibly, are men destitute of education and refinement, " with foreheads villainously low," large sensual features, and a coarse and brutal nature. The true gentleman who becomes a preacher never succeeds in drawing vast mobs to hear him, nor of frightening his auditors out of their wits a la Richard Weaver, because he is too refined to descend to the religious blackguardism which forms so conspicuous a portion of popular preaching. Dog fighting and bull baiting are refinement itself compared to depict. lug, with a fiendish relish, the torments of the damned, and reveling in the thought that it is to last for ever."

When the damned jingle the burning irons of their torments," says Spurgeon, " they shall day for ever. When they howl, echo cries for ever."

"For ever is written on their racks,

For ever on their chains,

For ever burned in the fire,

For ever, ever reigns."

The term rievya (Gehenna) may have partially supplied the notion of punishment by fire, but assuredly not that of eternal torment. This word can hardly be considered Greek, since it is made up, a proper name, and refers to the valley of Hinnom, to the south-east of Jerusalem. (Joshua, 15.8.) In this place, it is stated, children were burnt in sacrifice to Moloch, an idol of the Ammonites, and ft fire was continually kept burning there for this and other kindred purposes. To put a stop to these practices, Josiah is said to have defiled the place by filling it with human bones. (2 Kings, 23.10-14.) After this it was customary to throw the filth and offal of the city, with the dead Carcasses of animals, into the valley, to consume which, a fire was kept burning. Here, too, were burned the bodies of criminals denied burial, and some are even said to have been burned alive. The valley was also used as a place of sepulture for the poor inhabitants of the city who could not afford tombs or embalming. (Jeremiah, 7.32, 33. Vide also Clarke's Travels, vol. iv.) The place, therefore, was on the whole one calculated to excite a feeling of terror, and the Pharisees were long accustomed to designate the future punishment of the wicked by its name. Whatever horrors might, however, be connected with it, they were all of a temporal and material character.

The term Gehenna is not used very frequently in the New Testament, and in most of the cases where it is, it can have no reference to punishment in another life. The first time we meet with it is in Matthew, 5. 22 —" Whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause, shall be in danger Of the judgment; and whosoever shall say to his brother Rata, shall be in danger of the council; but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell-fire " (Gehenna), If this reading be correct, then the last crime was committed by Christ himself, who scrupled not to call the Pharisees fools on more occasions than one. Paul, too, in one of hie epistles exclaims, "O foolish Galatians." (Gal. 3.1.) The first and lesser of the three crimes referred to in this passage rendered the offenders amenable to the judgment—i.e., the court of judicature established in each city for the trial of more trivial offences than those brought before the Sanhedrim.

In the second, the Syriac word (Raka) is absurdly retained, since its meaning is probably unknown to most English readers. It means one who renders himself contemptible by his folly. For the crime referred to here, the offender was amenable to the supreme council composed of the rulers. The third crime, that of saying "Thou fool," if the Greek word (more) be correctly employed, was very much the same as the second. But more was probably used to express the Hebrew word (moreh), which it does as nearly as Greek characters can do, and this means one who rebels against the authority of Jehovah or apostatizes from his religion. Moses uses this term when he calls the children of Israel rebels (Numbers, 20.10), and, therefore, whatever the crime might be, he renders himself guilty of it. The punishment to be inflicted was not to be sent to an imaginary brimstone lake in the next world, but to be condemned to the valley of Hinnom, probably to work there at the employment of burying the dead and carrying the bodies of criminals and offal out of the city. Ezekiel refers to persons who were constantly engaged in this employment (39.13-15). Nothing could be more degrading to a Jew than a daily contact with the dead such as this would necessitate. Yet the work must be done by someone. Large quantities of refuse from the animals slaughtered for the purpose of sacrifice had constantly to be carried to the fire of Gehenna to prevent its putrefying in the city, which it would be extremely likely to do in a warm climate. That this employment was not voluntary is obvious from the use of the word (enochos), which signifies adjudicated to punishment. (Hesych. Lex.) From a calm investigation of this passage it is as clear as day light that it has no reference to the orthodox hell nor to any punishment in a future state, but simply means the valley of Hinnom. In the same sense it is probably used by Christ; when addressing the Pharisees he exclaims, " Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the condemnation of Gehenna?" (Matthew, 23.33.)

In the ninth chapter of Mark this term is used by Jesus in a sense which would at the first glance appear to convey. the idea of something far more terrible than the fire in the valley of Gehenna; but a more careful examination will show that in all probability nothing further was meant. "And if thy hand offend thee cut it off, it is better for thee to enter into life maimed, than having two hands, to go into hell (Gehenna), into the fire that never shall be quenched. Where their worm dies not, and the fire is not quenched" (43, 44). Now whatever might be the nature of the punishment here referred to, it is evident that it extended no further than the body. It was not a spiritual essence that was doomed to this burning, but the material organization, and only that part of it which the individual should be possessed of at the time of his death. The inference is clear as day, that if a leg or an arm had been got rid of prior to the general dissolution of the body, that such a member shared neither in the advantages nor the disadvantages that were to happen afterwards. The principal objection to a temporal fire being meant will arise from the statement that it was never to be quenched. This, however, upon further examination will be seen to amount to nothing. It simply implied that the fire was to be kept continually burning, and the very expression employed to indicate its perpetuity, is quoted from an Old Testament writer who most certainly in its use had no reference to anything more than the valley of Hinnom. " And it shall come to pass that from one new moon to another, and from one Sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the Lord. And they shall go forth and look upon the carcasses of the men that have transgressed against me. For their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched, and they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh." (Isaiah, 66.23, 24.) Fire and worms were, moreover, figurative expressions long in use among the Jews, to denote temporal punishment.

In Judith we read, " Woe to the nations that rise up against my kindred, the Lord will take vengeance on them in the day of judgment in putting fire and worms in their flesh." (16.17.) Jesus, the son of Sirach, remarks, "The vengeance of the ungodly is fire and worms." (Ecclesiasticus, 7.17.) The expression in Mark, therefore, cannot be considered as referring to any such hell as that which modern orthodox Christianity has, in the plenitude of its brutality, depicted. In the parallel passage in Matthew the fire spoken of is called " everlasting fire " (18.8), which, it might be thought, could not possibly refer to the terrestrial Gehenna. Theterm attovtov (aionion), translated everlasting, however, by no means implies eternal. Abraham was to have the land of Canaan for an everlasting possession. (Gen. 17.8.) Moses was commanded to anoint Aaron and his sons to an " everlasting priesthood." (Exodus, 40.15.) In the Septuagint the same word aionion is used. A score of other passages of similar import might be quoted. The everlasting (aionion) fire, therefore, was nothing more than the temporal fire of Gehenna, and the punishment to be inflicted, not by any fabled Devil, but by the Sanhedrim.

Jesus told the Pharisees—and his remarks would apply most forcibly to the majority of Christian Pharisees of the present day—that they compassed sea and land to make one proselyte, and that when they had made him, he was twofold more the child of hell (Gehenna) than themselves. (Matt. 23.15.) This expression, "child of Gehenna," was a Jewish phrase for a wicked character, similar to child of sin, son of darkness, and other like similes, and probably implied that the persons so described deserved to be condemned to perpetual toil in the valley of Gehenna.

There is one passage in which the term Gehenna is 'used figuratively to illustrate some kind of punishment after death, seemingly total destruction, rather than perpetual life in torments, and in this we gain the first glimpse from Bible writers of the modern hell. " Fear not them which kill the body but are not able to kill the soul, but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in Gehenna." (Matt. 10.28.) In the parallel passage in Luke the expression is less strong, and might, perhaps, be construed to refer simply to the valley of Hinnom, but here it clearly indicates some other punishment. Nothing, however, can be clearer than this, that no terms were then known by which future torments could be described, and therefore a well known temporal punishment was selected as an illustration, and the known horrors of the one employed to symbolize the imaginary horrors of the other.

The doctrine, once invented, grew with amazing rapidity, and it was not long before it stood forth in all its brutal hideousness. Christian Fathers racked their brains to intensify its terrors, ascetic and bigoted monks added fuel to its fires, and with the modern Puritan it reached its climax.. Pagan philosophies were searched to discover something that could make more terrible this debasing doctrine, and the more appeal and alarm those whose judgments could not be reached. When Christianity was introduced into England, an old Anglo-Saxon notion was discovered which admirably answered the purpose:—

"Among the fearful beings whose power was dreaded even by the Gods, was Hel, mistress of the cold and joyless under-world. Called through the-fate of battles to the glories of Waelheal, the Teutonic or Norse hero trembled at a peaceful death, which would consign him to a dwelling more desolate and wretched than even that which awaited the fallen warriors of heroic Greece, and many a legend tells of those whose own hand saved them from a futurity so abhorred. But Hel was not herself the agent of death, she only received those who had not earned their seat in Opin's hall by a heroic fall, and the Waelcyrian or Shieldmays, were the choosers of the slain. The realm of Hel was all that Waelheal was not—cold, cheerless, shadowy; no simulated war was there from which the combatants desisted with renovated strength and glory; no capacious quaighs of mead or cups of the life-giving wine; no feast continually enjoyed and miraculously reproduced; no songs, nor narratives of noble deeds; no expectation of the last great battle where the Ein herjar were to accompany Allfather to meet his gigantic antagonists; no flashing Shieldmays animating the brave with their discourse and lightening the hall with their splendor; but chill and ice, frost and darkness shadow realms without a sun, without song or wine, or feast, or the soul-inspiring company of heroes glorying in the great deeds of their worldly life. For the perjurer and the secret murderer Ngstrond existed, a place of torment and punishment—the strand of the dead—filled with foulness, peopled with poisonous serpents, dark, cold, and gloomy. The kingdom of Hal was hades the invisible, the world of shadows; Nistrond was what we call hell. Christianity however admitted no Goddess of death, and when it was thought necessary to express the idea of a place of punishment after death, the Anglo-Saxon united the realm of Hel with Nitstrond, to complete a hideous prison for the guilty; the prevailing idea in the infernal regions of the Teuton is cold and gloom, the poisonous snakes which waking or sleeping seem ever to have haunted the Anglo-Saxon, formed a convenient point of junction between his own traditional hell and that which he heard of from the pulpit, in quotations from the works of the Fathers; and to these and their influence alone, can it be attributed, when we find flames and sulfur, and all the hideous apparatus of Judaic tradition adopted by him. In this fact, seems to me, to be a, very important mark of ancient heathendom, and one which the clergy themselves admitted a belief in which they shared, and which they did not scruple to impress upon their flocks, even in spite of the contrary tendency of their authorities. It will be sufficient to refer to the description given of hell in the poetic Saloman and Saturn, a composition redolent of heathendom. On the defeat of the rebel angels it is said God

for them he made a hell,

a dwelling deadly cold,

with winter covered;

water he sent in

and snake-dwellings,

many a foul beast

with horns of iron;

bloody eagles

and pale adders;

thirst and hunger

and fierce conflict,

mighty terror,

joylessness.'

Even in their mare orthodox descriptions ecclesiastical poets, though naturally adopting the Judaic notions, cannot always shake off the old habitual tradition of their forefathers, but recur to the frost, gloom, and serpents of Thistrond and the realm of Hel."—(Kemble's " Saxons in England," vol. 1., pp. 392-395.)

Thus the hell of heathenism and the hell of Christianity became blended, and the union of the two resulted in that brimstone lake which is still so powerful a weapon in defense of the orthodox faith. We who have outgrown these monstrous dogmas may smile at the fabled bottomless pit, but we must not forget that hell-fire is a most powerful instrument for doing battle with the weak-minded. Women, children, and men of weak nerves become frightened out of their wits by its horrors, and bow down to any brazen image which the priesthood may set up, rather than risk the chance of condemnation to its torments. The mission of Freethought in this matter is clear. Let our children be taught in early life that the whole affair is a monstrous and pernicious fable, and the influence of priestcraft in the next generation will be considerably lessened. For society at large, we must endeavor to inform their minds upon the subject, and the result cannot fail to be beneficial.

The author of the" Purgatory of Suicides," once an earnest champion of Freethought, now an advocate of the " patched dogmas " he then so bitterly exposed, speaks thus of the doctrine of eternal torment; and whatever he may now say to the contrary, his words will remain true to all time—

What say’s thou, priest! "It is not thus ?" Do threats

Of Hell, then, fill the heart with this intense

And holy bliss of pitying love P Begets

Thy rhetoric of the flames which Providence

Almighty ever blows for bodily sense

(By miracle also made eternal); worm,

Deathless and sateless, preying without suspense

On conscience; do these horrors sow the germ

Of love in Man, and threats renewed its growth confirm?

Hell-fire, coercion,—for the ingrate hard

Who will not love the God set forth as high,

Vast, indescribable, in His Love's regard

For Men! " Love Him; or He will magnify

His glory by consigning thee to die

In ceaseless flames an ever-living death!"-

O Christ! how can I love what doth outvie

All tyrannies in horribleness of wrath;

This monstrous Thing derived from an old monster Faith?

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The Doctrine Of Eternal Torment Refuted