The Theological Trilemma

The Threefold Question Of Endless Misery, Universal Salvation Or Conditional Immortality.

 

The Survival Of The Fittest.

Considered In The Light Of Reason, Nature And Revelation,

Reverend. J, H. Pettingell, M.A.

 

http://www.creationismonline.com/TSK/Immortality.html

 

NEW YORK

 

Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1878, by Sherwood & Co., in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, Washington, D.C.

 

Preface.

 

 THIS volume, entitled the "THEOLOGICAL TRI-LEMMA, was undertaken while the writer was residing abroad, and, with the exception of the Introduction, which has just been written, was ready for the press seven years ago. If the way had been open for its publication, it would have been issued at that time.

 

 But unexpected obstacles were encountered. Little interest was then felt by the Christian public, especially in this country, in the subject which it discusses. But the time was evidently near at hand, when it would receive attention. Of this he was quite sure. The manuscript was laid aside till that time should come. That it has come, the discussions now going on in public and in private, in the pulpit and through the press, give abundant evidence.

 

 Accordingly, the manuscript has been taken up, and again made ready for publication, and is now offered by the author to his brethren in the ministry, and to the laity of the Church, with the earnest hope and prayer, that it may please the Master to own and bless it, as the best contribution which he can make to the cause of truth, and to the glory of God, which, above all things else, he desires to promote.

 

 The work was originally written under such circumstances of isolation, as prevented all access to the volumes of his own, or of any other library. He had few books, at hand, but his Bible and Lexicon, which he could consult. Perhaps this was well, as it led him to study more thoroughly the Scriptures, and to depend on their testimony, rather than that of human authorities, on which we are all too much inclined to rely, in matters of Christian doctrine.

 

 While writing, he received from a friend in America, Dr. Bartlett's volume entitled, "Life and Death Eternal," then just issued. It was very timely. Nothing seemed better calculated to confirm his mind in the views to which he had come, after many months of anxious, careful and prayerful study, than the reading of this book, in opposition to them. If there had been any lingering doubts as regards the character of this stupendous traditional error, which the learned Doctor so earnestly labors to defend, this volume, in the arguments employed, the method pursued, the spirit manifested, and in the whose warp and woof of its composition, would have dispelled them. Some allusions to this volume will be found in the body of this work, and several foot notes referring to it, and to some of Dr. Bartlett's subsequent writings on the same topic, have been added, as this work is going through the press.

 

 The author had not then seen any of the writings of Messrs. Hudson, Hastings, Storrs, Blain, Ellis, Read and others, which are reviewed and criticized in Dr. Bartlett's book, nor has he since been able to read them. Of course, he cannot say, to what extent he may agree or disagree with them. He has attempted simply to express his own sentiments, not those of other men. While one may, no doubt, often receive valuable aid from intelligent thinkers, whose minds are tending in the same direction with his own, it is generally better to listen to what men may have to say in the other direction.

 

 During the past few months in which this earnest discussion, with respect to the future state, has been going on, he has read all that has come to hand, on all three sides of the question—for there are, in reality, but three sides. This has, however, been mostly on the popular side, for there are but few of our religious periodicals, that have a reputation for orthodoxy to maintain, and subscribers to hold, that have ventured hitherto, to allow more than one side, and that the popular side, to be heard on this question. But the tide is fast turning, and it will not be long before we shall see them all, very charitable and accommodating to " heretics " of this sort, and gradually " changing their base," as the percentage shall indicate the drift of popular opinion. We have in foot notes referred to some of these various recent publications, but we have seen nothing which requires us to modify the views, which we held when these chapters were first written.

 

 Human opinions are so largely traditional that we have learned to make very little account of the names and authorities that may be cited on one side or the other of any doctrine, and especially, in behalf of ,,this vi PREFACE.

 

 dogma, which, with Plato's philosophy, so early found its way into the Christian Church, and has been handed down from generation to generation almost unquestioned, as the orthodox doctrine; but in the breaking up of old systems of error, and in the more independent investigation to which intelligent men are now giving themselves, it is a source of satisfaction to see how this popular error is losing its hold upon not a few of our best and ablest men, and how, in increasing numbers, they are taking the ground, to which our own inquiries have led us, and which we have endeavored to set forth in this volume.

 

 We have just noticed in one of our religious papers a resum6 of the views of the learned theologian Richard Rothe, as given in the third volume of his Dogmatik, by Professor J. P. Lacroix, of Ohio Wesleyan University, from which we make the following extract:

                                                                                                                                                                                        

 The human soul is not an absolutely simple abstract entity; but it is a concrete thing. As such it is subject to the law of dissolution. Sin is per se destructive. It ruins, it destroys the soul that practices it. The punishment of Hell consists in the sinner's being left a prey to the process of destruction, which is already preying upon his very being. The completion of this process is absolute death—that is, it is the completed destruction of that concrete' reality which constitutes the human personality. The dissolution of material organisms is a species of combustion. This holds also true of the destruction of the soul. As the dissolution of material organisms is their combustion, so the corrosive, the disorganizing action of sin upon the soul is the soul's combustion. In this sense the biblical figure of hell-fire is strictly grounded in reality. The wages of sin is ruin, destruction, death. As the flame feeds upon the consuming candle until its whole substance is dissipated and exhausted, so the wasting disease of sin feeds upon the substance of the soul until the personal organism is entirely broken down and destroyed.

 Rev. R. W. Dale, D.D., of Birmingham, England, recent lecturer to the Theological Students of Yale College, in a series of letters to the Christian Union, March 6-13, 1878, says:

 

 For it would be impossible for me to say anything on this subject without avowing that I had myself rejected the traditional belief of evangelical Churches, and for some years I had openly maintained, that while those who have persistently revolted against the authority of Christ, and persistently rejected his love are menaced in the next world with indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish, there seems to me to be no authority in Holy Scriptures for the doctrine that those who die impenitent will be doomed to endless torment. Eternal life, as I believe, is the inheritance of those who are in Christ. Those who are not in Him will die the 'Second death,' from which there will be no resurrection. The chaff will be burned up in the fire which cannot be quenched. The dead soul will be consumed by the worm that dies not. Those that obey not the gospel of Our Lord Jesus Christ,' will be punished with everlasting destruction. We believe that c eternal life' is given to men in regeneration, that although the unregenerate have a life which does not perish with the death of the body, this life not being rooted in God, will come to an end: that tribulation, wrath, indignation and anguish are the destiny of those who refuse to obey the divine light which comes to them, and that they are destined to eternal destruction. We think that our position rests not on the mere literal teaching of a large number of texts, though we contend that the literal teaching of Scripture is decisively in our favor, but on the general contents of Revelation; and we further contend that our doctrine throws additional light on some of the central articles of the evangelical creed. We regard our doctrine, not as a special theory on the future of the impenitent, but as a substantial part of the general teaching of Holy Scriptures concerning the relation of Christ to the human race, and the salvation he has come to confer on mankind.

 

 An eminent Baptist clergymen at the south, whose attention had been arrested by an article or two, which the writer had kindly been permitted to publish in the Christian Union, over the signature of " CLERICUS," writes to express his cordial sympathy with the views expressed, and in the course of a correspondence thus opened, says:

 

 Your past experience has been somewhat similar to my own. I was raised up in the strictest Orthodoxy on Eschatological questions, and preached them fervently and honestly for many years. I took their truthfulness for granted, and taught them without examination.

 

I was led to careful and critical examination of the Scriptures, which resulted in the conviction that the Word of God. from Genesis to Revelation, is utterly silent on the natural immortality of man: and the silence of the Scriptures corresponds to the silence of nature on this point. The usual arguments from nature or reason are untenable and prove nothing. The argument from analogy will not bear examination: the worm that forms the butterfly is not dead, but living: the change is a process of life, not of death.

 

Natural immortality is the foundation stone of the modern theological structure. Remove this and the whole building will crumble to ruins: there is no place for endless misery or universal restorationism. Put Jesus Christ, the Life-giver, in the foundation, and "the whole building fitly joined together grows into a holy temple," symmetrical and beautiful, It solves those terrible problems that have " tormented men day and night " from the days of Augustine till now. It vindicates the justice, mercy and majesty of God; for righteousness and judgment are the habitation of His throne. The vast multitudes of earth who are unfit to live in a holy place " perish in their own corruption, and " are as though they had not been." And those who through grace believe in Jesus Christ, receive the gift of eternal life and are raised up in the last day.

 

 Christ is wonderfully magnified in His atoning work and redemptive power. He is the source of immortality to all who receive Him. This view greatly exalts the power and grace of the Lord Jesus and harmonizes the Scriptures on the sin and redemption of the race. The penalty of sin is death; the removal of the penalty is life. Genesis and Romans are alike: the Old and the New Testaments agree.

 The Orthodoxy of the day assumes that man is im-. mortal, and, therefore, if impenitent, must be miserable through all eternity, or else pass through a second probation, and by God's mercy be restored to holiness and happiness after ages of suffering. Bartlett and Beecher, though differing so much, build their theories on the same foundation of natural immortality. Both are blind leaders and both will fall into a common ditch."

 

 A clerical friend writes to express his concurrence in our views, and in reply to an inquiry whether he was allowed to preach the "heresy" of conditionalism in the region where he was laboring, says:

 

 You ask if I preach Eternal Life in Christ? Yes, I can preach nothing else. But it requires prudence. I never preach controversially. I never use unscriptural terms, as ‘the immortal soul,' ‘the death that never dies.' I use Scriptural phraseology. Everything relating to Death, and Life, and Immortality, is spoken of as the Scriptures speak. I emphasize them as to their meaning. I preach much on the Resurrection as Paul did. The resurrection time is the period of reward. I do not, of course, always harp on these things, but they have their place naturally in my pulpit ministrations. I have no difficulty, for my denomination generally are sticklers for the Bible, and a ‘Thus saith the Lord' settles all questions.

 

 Another believer, an aged layman, writes to express his gratitude to the writer of the articles in the Christian Union, above alluded to, and, after giving an interesting account of the manner in which he was led by the Spirit of God to a knowledge of the truth, he says:

 

 The glorious doctrine of conditional immortality is so satisfactory to me, and so clearly set forth in God's Word, and is, to my mind, so clearly in accordance with the principles of love and justice, that I praise His name that it was revealed to me as truth by His Spirit. Since the fall, men are horn into the world as flesh, God having withdrawn Spiritual communion with them, as President Edwards says in his work, pp. 532-538. And as it seems to me, they remain flesh until born of God, and unless so born of God, remain flesh, till they die a natural death, and if raised, are raised as flesh, and finally consumed as flesh, in the lake of fire and brimstone which is the second death, and final end of all not born of God.

 

 Other extracts might be given if it were necessary. But the above will serve to show the drift in the public mind at the present day, and the great relief and comfort this view brings to the minds of those, who have been trying to see God's justice and goodness through the gloom, which this old dogma throws around His character.

 

 The writer of this volume has written with the earnestness of true conviction. He could not do otherwise. He has sometimes used strong and emphatic language.

 

 The subject requires it. Error thrives under gentle treatment. But he has endeavored to write as one " speaking the truth in love." He is sure he has nothing but love in his heart for his Christian brethren, who are earnestly inquiring after the truth. He knows the power of early habits of thought in religious matters. He has the deepest sympathy for those who are struggling to free themselves from the influence of time-honored, but unchristian dogmas, and deeply footed beliefs, that are seen to have no real foundation in truth. He would fain help them to the extent of His ability. For such, this work has been written.

 

 No one can be more sensible of its imperfections than himself. Would that it were more worthy of the cause it advocates. But he would fain hope and pray, that He who often chooses things that are weak, and despised to bring to naught things which are mighty, will be pleased to use it, to aid in overturning this mighty error.

 

 Those who take up the book to criticize and oppose, will, no doubt, find enough to gratify their desires.

 

 But if they must oppose, he begs that they will at least, read what he has written, that they may know just what they are opposing. " STRIKE, BUT HEAR." And he also, most earnestly requests, that they will not charge upon him sentiments that he has not expressed, because forsooth, somebody else, who has written on this subject, may have held them.

 

 He had originally proposed, and intended up to the last moment of going to press, to publish the work anonymously, under the pseudonym of " CLERICUS; " not however from fear, or from modesty, but simply that his arguments might have their own proper influence—neither more nor less. But it has seemed better, on the whole, to hold himself personally responsible for what he has written; and if anyone should wish to communicate with him with reference to the book, or its subject matter, to give him the opportunity. He is just on the point of removing from New York, and may, after this date, be addressed as follows:

 

J. H. PETTINGELL,

NEW YORK, March 30, 1878.

 

Contents.

 

CHAPTER 1
The Common Belief; Its Consequences
The Gospel a message of Eternal Life

CHAPTER 2

The Real question at issue; Misuse of language; Scriptural terms perverted
 

CHAPTER 3
Reason enlightened by Revelation teaches that immortality is the peculiar attribute of Deity
Deductions of logic irresistible
The Dilemma

CHAPTER 4
Teachings of Nature enlightened by Revelation
Nature of the soul; its two-fold life
Words used in a double and contradictory sense
Destruction not necessarily annihilation

CHAPTER 5
Analogies
Vegetables
The Chrysalis
Successive creations and destructions
Survival of the Fittest
Everything must preserve its normal condition or premature ruin ensues
Nobility of Man's nature

CHAPTER 6
The instinct of immortality; what it shows
The belief popular, and why? The Papal Church
The Reformation
Skepticism

CHAPTER 7
Successive steps in Creation
Different orders
Psyche and Pneuma; the Soul and the Spirit, the one perishable and the other imperishable

CHAPTER 8
The Fall of Man
The Penalty
How Adam must have understood it
The Tree of Life
Why he was forbidden to eat of it
The Natural comes before the Spiritual

CHAPTER 9
Natural life from Adam transitory
Spiritual life from Christ eternal
Life and Death actual, not metaphorical terms
Hell; Sheol; Hades; Gehenna

CHAPTER 10
Five classes of Scripture Passages bearing on this question to be considered
The law, like the nature of Man, two-fold
Its temporal application under Moses; its spiritual application under Christ
 First class of passages
 Death and Destruction

CHAPTER 11
 Second class of passages
 Eternal life given to the righteous through Christ
 The New Testament a new Revelation
 The New Life, another Life, and not the same old Life restored
 It is Eternal because it is Spiritual—the life of Christ in us,
 
CHAPTER 12
 Third class of Scripture passages
 Death and Eternal Life contrasted
 Adam and Christ compared

CHAPTER 13
The old dogma supported by two props, viz
Assumption and the double use of words
Specious reasoning
What constitutes orthodoxy and what is heresy on this question
Natural immortality not hinted at in the Scriptures

CHAPTER 14
Fourth class of passages and mis-interpreted texts of Scripture examined
Everlasting; Eternal; Punishment; its nature and end; unquenchable fire

CHAPTER 15
The doctrine that especially needs to be proved is, by its advocates, assumed
Reasoning in a circle
Texts in the Apocalypse examined

CHAPTER 16
Fifth class of passages
The complete and final victory
The Old and New Testaments contrasted
Two different ideas of God
Truth gradually revealed
The last enemy destroyed
Glorious consummation

CHAPTER 17
Recapitulation
Incidental evidence to corroborate our position
Solution of many doctrinal difficulties

CHAPTER 18

Two principal objections considered.

Conclusion

CHAPTER 19

Will Satan live Forever?

 

Introduction.

 

 NOT to notice minor differences, Three general views prevail with respect to the Future State; and those who entertain them may be separated into three classes. First: Those who believe that all men are immortal, the good and the bad alike, and that the existence of the former will be perpetuated in endless bliss, and that of the latter in endless sin and misery. Those holding these views are usually called Orthodox. Second: Those who believe that the bad will, some how, and at some time more or less remote, be restored to the favor of God and enjoy equally with the good a pure and blessed immortality. Those who belong to this class are usually called Universalists. The number who entertain this view in some form—not all of them, perhaps, as a doctrine that can be proved, or which they would be willing openly to avow, but, as a sentiment or hope, it is believed, is large, and rapidly increasing. Third: Those who believe that the good only will live forever; that immortality is not the natural inheritance of all men from Adam, but the gift of God's grace through Jesus Christ, and that those who do not seek it or receive it from Him, cannot have Eternal life, but must, like the bad fish that were gathered in the net, with the good, be cast away at the final separation and perish forever. This is the doctrine of the survival of the fittest, md those who hold it may be called Conditionalists.

 

 These three alternatives are so distinct from each other, that no man can hold any two of them at the same time; and they are so general and comprehensive, that every man who receives the Scriptures as the Word of God, and believes in any future State—and we are speaking to no others—must be included in one of these three classes.

 

 This, then, is the Tri-lemma that is offered to the Christian World for their solution—Endless Misery, Universal Salvation or the Survival of the Fittest. It would seem that the truth on this question must lie somewhere within the limits of this triangle, and that one of these three terms must substantially express it. Which is it?

 

 It is to the solution of this tri-lemma, or rather, to the demonstration that the third alternative is the only one that solves the question, and that its truth is attested by Reason, Nature and Revelation, that the author addresses himself in the following pages.

 

 It will be observed in this tri-alternative controversy, that the first and second classes, that is, the orthodox and universalists agree in ascribing immortality to all men as their natural and inalienable inheritance, and that they differ from each other, only in respect to the eternal misery of the bad. So they are united in opposing the conditionalists of the third party, who believe in their final destruction.

 

 But the orthodox and the conditionalists of the first and third parties agree in respect to the salvation of the good only, and unite in opposing the views of the universalists of the second party, who hold to the ultimate salvation of all men; while they differ from each other, not as to the fact, that the wicked " shall go away into everlasting punishment and the righteous into life Eternal," but as to what and how much these terms mean. The former believe, that, as eternal life, or eternal existence, as the:: prefer to call it, is common to both the good and the bad, and that the eternal life especially promised to the one, and denied to the other, is a certain, pure and blissful condition of existence, which will endure forever, and that the everlasting punishment threatened to the bad, will consist in the infliction of positive suffering, to which they are doomed throughout the whole period of their endless existence; while the latter class believe that all men since the fall, are-mortal and transitory, and in no sense whatever immortal; that the Eternal life promised to those who seek it and are found worthy, means literally eternal life, together with all the bliss that flows from the favor of God forever; and that the "everlasting punishment of the wicked means, as Paul says, (1 Thes. 1:9) everlasting destruction, with such tokens of severity and wrath in its infliction as every individual sinner shall deserve—no more, no less—at the hands of a just and holy God. So far then as the question of punishment is concerned, the former believes that the penalty for sin under the government of God is not death in any literal sense of the word, but imprisonment for life, under torture, which they have agreed to call death, and that this torture will never cease because their miserable existence will never come to an end; the latter believe that it is actually the penalty of death, or what is commonly called under human governments, "Capital Punishment."

 

 The main reason for this difference of opinion among those calling themselves Christians, all of whom accept the Scriptures as their guide in matters of faith and doctrine, is not because these Oracles make no declaration on this subject, nor because their utterance is vague and ambiguous—for there is no subject upon which they are more full and explicit, than in regard to the eternal life of the righteous, and the death and everlasting destruction of the wicked—but it is evidently due to the different notions which men entertain concerning the soul, and which they bring with them to the interpretation of the Scriptures.

 

 Those who hold to the indestructible nature of the human soul, and to its natural and necessary immortality under all circumstances and conditions, as one of the fundamental principles of their philosophy, will, of course, interpret whatever is said in the Scriptures concerning the Eternal life of the righteous and the death (there is no such phrase as " Eternal death " in the Bible, death is final, unless life is again given), and the everlasting distinction that will be made between them in the future world, in such a way as not to conflict with their theory of the endless existence of both classes alike. So they construe all those many passages which promise "life," " immortality," " Eternal life," etc., to those who seek it and are found worthy, not to mean life itself; for this is understood to be the common inheritance of all men from Adam; but a certain holy and blissful condition of existence, such as the wicked cannot enjoy: and in like manner, they construe all those many passages which threaten the wicked with death and destruction, and which depict their disappointment, grief, chagrin and anguish when these threatening shall be executed, not in the literal and ordinary sense of the word, as implying actual death and destruction, but in some figurative sense, as implying that they will be doomed to sin and suffer forever. This is the dreadful conclusion to which the. Word of God, interpreted according to their psychological notions, inevitably leads them.

 

 But there are many, who are of this school of philosophy because they have been educated into it, who cannot rest in this terrible conclusion. It appalls them. It shocks their moral sense. They cannot reconcile it with their ideas of the wisdom, goodness and justice of God, who calls Himself Our Heavenly Father, and who invites all men to love and trust Him as infinitely better than any earthly parent—that He should be willing to consign any number of His children--much less so many of them as must be supposed, considering how few are represented as saved—to a hopeless eternity of sin and suffering. But if, according to their philosophy, all human souls alike, irrespective of their character or condition, are destined to an unending existence, they must of necessity exist somewhere, and if they are not pure and happy, they must be sinful and miserable forever. But they cannot accept the doctrine of eternal sin and suffering, therefore guided by their philosophy, on the one hand, and by their instincts on the other, they endeavor so to construe the Word of God as to relieve their apprehensions, and to save the character of their Heavenly Father from the cruel aspersion cast upon it by their orthodox brethren. They persuade themselves in spite of the apparent teachings of the Scriptures to the contrary, that all who die without the knowledge of Christ the Savior—and this includes the great majority of those who have lived and died thus far—will hereafter have another opportunity of embracing Him as their Savior, and that even the rejecters of proffered mercy here, and the worst of offenders will, somehow, and by some means through His infinite wisdom and mercy, be purified and restored to favor, and be gathered with the righteous into the Kingdom of heaven.

 

 Hence the controversy between these two parties, who are both of the same school of philosophy. They both assume as the common ground of their argument, the indefeasible immortality of the human soul?—the very thing that needs first to be established, the real previous question, which carries all these other questions with it? which, if maintained against them, leaves them little or nothing to contend for? Is there anything in the teachings of Reason, or Nature, or Revelation, that justifies the belief that God has given to fallen man an immortality like His own, subject to no condition or contingency whatever? Must we believe that all the inhabitants of the old world that were swept away by the flood; the countless multitudes that have swarmed upon the earth since that day, generation after generation, living and dying in ignorance and darkness, with no heavenward aspirations, controlled by their animal instincts and passions, scarcely raised above the level of the brutes they have worshiped; that infants of a brief hour and hoary headed savages, have all been garnered into a wretched harvest of sin and woe in the world beyond, where they are even now suffering, and must suffer without hope forever and ever, excepting, perhaps, the few—rari mutes in gurgite vasto—that have been snatched by the grace of God from the terrible abyss and made fit for an inheritance among the sons of light?

 

 As we write, Pres. Bartlett's second serial article on " Endless Punishment" in the Christian Union of Feb. 13th, 1878, comes to hand. In this, ignoring this third alternative, and assuming, as most writers on this question do, that all men are necessarily immortal, he kindly allows that instances may " occasionally " be found among the myriads of millions, who have lived and died without the Gospel, who were fit to be saved, because they possessed a " potential or germinal faith; " but as for all the rest, they are doomed .to endless punishment. To confirm this view, he quotes, or rather professes to quote, the following passage: Rom. 2: 12.-" As many as have sinned without law shall also PERISH without law." But he quotes it thus: " shall be punished without law." This can hardly be the printer's mistake—the very cardinal word—the hinge on which the verse turns is changed in a way to give support to his view. It is impossible to believe, that this was intentional; it must have been through ignorance or carelessness, but it is in keeping with another misquotation of a cardinal word in the same direction—in his "Life and Death .Eternal"—which we have noticed in a subsequent chapter. Indeed, they must " perish " (*daunted), "be destroyed," " be lost," " fade away," " go to decay," as the word means; but as for being punished with endless suffering, that is another question. That the whole race of Adam are mortal and must die or perish, however little or much they may sin, unless they receive eternal life through Christ, is a Scripture doctrine; but that any man is punished for Adam's sin, or any body's sins but his own, or, in other words, the doctrine of the imputation of sin and of consequent punishment, is too monstrous to be tolerated any longer in any system of theology.

 

Or shall we in the largeness of our faith in the goodness and mercy of God, think of them all—blood-thirsty warriors falling like leaves upon the battle-field, brutal savages dying in the death grapple with each other, countless barbarian hordes with scarcely more intelligence than the beasts around them, and with no higher aspirations—predatory nomads, stolid boors, cannibal man-eaters, the devourers and the devoured alike, as transformed at death into pure spirits, and taken to glory? If not, where else shall they go? That these poor creatures were born with a capacity for a higher and better life, is not to be questioned, but were they born with the principle already begun in their souls? Was their immortality already assured to them? Or rather does not their want of it constitute their great need of the gospel? The Bible surely tells us that dying unfit for heaven, they must perish; but does that mean that they must be confined in the prison house of despair and tormented forever and ever? If it does—well—we will try to believe it—for the Bible is the Word of God—but it will need to be made very plain. What does the Bible mean when it says "The kingdom of heaven is like a net that was cast into the sea, and gathered of every kind; which when it was full, they drew to shore, and set down and gathered the good into vessels, but cast the bad away?" or, " He will gather His wheat into the garner; but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire? " and a thousand other similar passages, but that the fit, or fittest only are preserved, and all the rest are destroyed—not kept in another garner to be tormented forever—but utterly destroyed as by a fire that shall not be quenched or 'arrested till it has completely accomplished its object?

 

 The writer's attention was first called particularly to this question, by noticing how constantly and emphatically the distinction between the saved and the lost was declared throughout the Scriptures to be one of life, and death—eternal preservation, and utter destruction. Although happiness and joy were represented as the accompaniments of that life, and misery and sorrow the pre-curses and accompaniments of that death and destruction, yet prominent above these accompaniments, were the life and the death of which they spoke, as the especial and peculiar portion of each. In reading the Gospel of John, he was struck with the manner in which our Lord constantly emphasized these words, LIFE-ETERNAL LIFE, as the portion of His people, and how repeatedly He declared that unless they received this life from Him, they had no eternal life abiding in them; they must die, must perish, must be cast away. Turning to his Greek Testament he noticed, what he had never particularly observed before, and what is not apparent to the English reader, that there are two words in the Original, both of which have been rendered by the same word " life," viz: psyche and zoe. By carefully collating the passages in which they occur, he observed that the former is used when mere animal life is denoted; that it is identified with that which is material and earthly, and never with that which is immaterial and heavenly: that it is not only applied to man, but to beasts and to all things which have voluntary motion. It is represented by the Hebrew word Nephesh and the Latin word Anima. From this comes the word Animal. It is that which man possesses in common with all animals. But the latter word, zoe, seems to have a higher and more spiritual signification. It is constantly used to designate that higher and better life which is imparted by the Spirit of God to His children. It is used by Our Lord repeatedly in connection with the word aionios signifying eternal. It is then, the eternal life which is the peculiar portion of the soul that has been born again. It is that other, higher life, which if not received, eternal life is impossible. This word aionios is never in one single instance used in connection with the word psyche denoting the natural life of man. Here, then, appeared a broad and palpable distinction between the natural man and the renewed man, which is not brought out in our English version for the want of another word to express it; but both the psyche and the zoe are translated by one word, life.

 

 When the writer was led still further to inquire into the use of this Greek word psyche and its equivalent Hebrew word nephesh, he observed that they were sometimes rendered by our translators, " life " and sometimes " soul " without any apparent rule or reason, excepting that the use of the word soul where mere animals were spoken of, was avoided as much as possible by them, and the word " life," or " creature," or " animal," or " beast," was used, so that the fact that this nephesh or psyche was something which man possessed in common with them, was concealed from the English reader, and even when man was spoken of, the same word was translated sometimes life and sometimes soul, and even in the same connection, as for instance Matt. 16: 25-26, "Whosoever will save his (psychen) life shall lose it; and whosoever will lose his (psychen) life for my sake shall find it. For what is a man profited if he gain the whole world and lose his own (psychen life) soul? or what shall he give in exchange for his (psyches, life) soul." Again, John 12: 25. " He that loveth his (psychen) life shall lose it, and he that hateth his (psychen) life in this world shall keep it unto (Zoe aionios) life eternal." Here then there would appear to be a distinction between the words life and soul in the first passage where there is none in the original; and in the second passage the real distinction observed between the psyche life and the Zoe life in the original, is lost in our translation, for the want of the words to bring it out; numerous other passages of the same character were noticed.

 

 " Our study of the Word of God discovers to us, that in the English version of the Bible, there has been a deliberate and persistent effort to cover up the truth on this question, of the soul, from the ordinary English reader, unacquainted with the original language in which the Bible was written. In the first, second, and ninth chapters of Genesis, nine times is the Hebrew for 'living soul' applied to lower animals. Not once does it so appear in the English text. So, too, our translators of the Bible have largely concealed from us the mortal nature of the real Soul, by practically expurgating such passages as bring the natural death of a soul prominent before the mind. Where the Hebrew speaks of the death of a soul by violence, they, as a rule, substitute some other English word. The design of this concealment of the meaning of the Hebrew is most apparent. And it furnishes a most convincing proof, if such were needed, of the radical difference between the doctrines of the Bible and the doctrines of modern theology, in reference to the soul. Our translators recognized the fact, that if they translated the Bible into its equivalent English, this radical difference were made apparent to every mind. And so the question came up; they could not evade it. Must we put into the hands of the common people a book which will stultify our own doctrines in translating from the original languages in which the Bible was given to man, shall the Bible doctrine, or our own doctrine, of the nature of the soul give way? The result we have before us. On this question, Bible truth went to the wall; it was crushed out of sight! "—Bible Doctrine of the Soul, Ives, pp. tor, 102. While we are hardly willing to impeach, so severely, the motives of King James' translators, we are free to say, that if the Revision Committee do not correct these -mistakes (?) in the new edition they are preparing, they will be entirely inexcusable.

 

 The writer's attention was then directed to the use of the word Spirit (pneuma) as distinguished from the word soul. The distinction had always been very vague in his own mind, and he believes it is, in the minds of most persons who have been educated to believe that the soul is the immortal principle in man. Indeed, the definitions given of both in our dictionaries are very nearly identical, and often interchangeable. But there seems to be a radical distinction between the two in the Word of God. That it is distinct from the soul, and superior to it, is apparent from such passages as these, Heb. 4: 12, " For the Word of God is quick and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword,. piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit.” 1 Thes. 5: 23, "And I pray God, your whole spirit, and soul, and body be preserved blameless," etc. Soul denotes the mind, as connected with the vital principle of Adam. It is what man has in common with other animals. It is cosmical in its relations. It looks downward towards the earth. It is natural and transitory like all earthly things. But Spirit denotes the mind or superior and supernatural vital principle of Jesus Christ. It is from above. It tends heavenward, and is indestructible. It is the spirit (Ne-shammah)of life, the breath of God Himself, so to speak, which He only can communicate to man. The soul, he receives by ordinary generation, but the Spirit only by a new birth. John 3: 3, " That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the spirit is spirit." The possession of body and soul constitutes a natural man; but it needs the spirit to constitute him a spiritual man, and an heir of Eternal life. The one may be destroyed or lost forever; the other is indestructible and eternal. Our Lord possessed both. He laid down his (psyche) life but not his (Zoe life, nor his) spirit. " He was put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the spirit: " and by the same spirit are all His people quickened. This distinction is more apparent in the use of the adjective by which the two classes of men are brought into contrast. 1 Cor. 15: 45, " The first man Adam was made a living soul (els psuchen zosan) the last Adam a quickening spirit " (Eis pneuma Zoopoioun).

 

1 Cor. 2: 14. " The natural man (soul-ical man) receives not the things of the Spirit of God because they are spiritually discerned." 1 Cor. 15:44. There is a natural (or soul-ical) body, and there is a spiritual (pneumati-bon) body.

 

 When the writer came to apprehend the distinction between the Soul and Spirit: the souli-cal man and the (pneuma-tikos) spiritual man, as set forth in the Scriptures, and the earthly and transitory nature of the (psuchikos) natural life, and the permanent nature of the (pneumatikos) spiritual life—the Zoe aionios life, the whole subject opened as by magic with surprising fulness and beauty. The clouds that had hung over it, all vanished, and the Gospel scheme which, with all the mists surrounding it, he had long trusted in, and loved, and preached, and tried to explain, was clothed with new beauty and power. The lost and hopeless condition of man by nature, seemed more sure and dreadful than before, because he could now fully believe the doom that awaited him, and the great salvation provided by Christ appeared infinitely greater than ever, for it was seen to be a salvation, not simply from sin and suffering, but from death, to life eternal.

 

 The difficulties and perplexities which the old dogma of the unconditional immortality of man had brought round the doctrines of revelation, and some special portions of God's Word, all vanished. These doctrines were not disproved, but established upon a firmer basis: the truths which were before but dimly apprehended, stood out more fully and clearly than it is possible to describe. He then began to recognize the "power of Christ's resurrection," of which the apostle Paul and the early disciples made so much: for on this, all our hopes of another life are suspended. "For if Christ be not raised, then they also which are fallen asleep are perished." The same law and the same Gospel were left, but they were invested with a new power—the language of Scripture needed no change, it became vastly more expressive. Death meant death, Destruction meant destruction, and Life meant life, really and truly. They were no longer metaphorical expressions, that needed to be explained away, or invested with a new meaning before they could be received.

 

 The writer most fully sympathizes with his Christian brethren in the anxiety and alarm they feel at the rapid progress of universalism in its various forms at the present day. The arguments that have recently appeared and are yet appearing in quick succession, as he now writes, intended to demonstrate the majesty and holiness of God's law: the immutable distinction between sin and holiness: the absolute necessity of the new birth; the finality of our present state of trial; the certainty of a future judgment, and the irrevocable doom of those who die in their sins, he can most fully endorse, and emphasize even more earnestly than those who use them. The third serial article of Dr. Bartlett in the Christian Union (Feb. 20, 1878) on " Endless Punishment," which now lies before him, he regards as an able statement of the truth in regard to the necessity of a fitness for the Kingdom of heaven, and of the eternal exclusion of the wicked. He could most heartily accept it as an argument against the doctrine of Universal Salvation, were it not for the quiet assumption that underlies the whole, that saints and sinners are alike immortal, the very thing that needs most to be proved, and the insinuation—nay, the declaration, at the outset, that all that do not receive this dogma are infidels and " Atheists."

 

 A distinguished clerical friend says, in a private note just received, " I have read Dr. Bartlett's articles in the Christian Union with care. He establishes firmly the doctrine of eternal punishment, but signally fails to establish endless misery. And yet, all through his articles, he uses the two expressions as equivalents. Is it possible he cannot discriminate?

 

 He does gross injustice to such writers as Hudson, Dobney, Hastings, and others, on future punishment, professing to give the page and volume. He charges these writers with saying, that the doctrine of future punishment is most dishonoring to the character of God, etc., etc. And yet, the great burden of these writers is to show, that the punishment is eternal. I had the curiosity to turn to the pages specified, and I find not a word about future punishment; but what they condemn as unscriptural, is endless, conscious misery. Dr. Bartlett can see, no punishment, excepting where there is conscious, unending pain. To me it seems a most extraordinary blindness. Is there nothing in the punishment of death, by hanging, but the momentary pain that is inflicted? etc., etc.

 

Nothing seems more astonishing, than the manner in which theologians, philosophers, physiologists and metaphysicians treat this great fundamental question, and the scorn, contempt, and not unfrequently, the abuse they bestow upon those who cannot accept this dogma, without at least some show of reason or Scripture in support of it.

 

Many of them assume it as a self-evident truth that requires no proof.

 

 In the profound and scholarly work of Dr. Noah Porter, on the Human Intellect, where we should expect to find the question of the immortality of the soul discussed, we find scarcely any reference to it. He alludes to it in his introductory treatise upon Psychology and the Soul, but somewhat incidentally, and in such terms that it is impossible to draw any inference as to what the author believes or would teach on the question. In his argument, to show that the vital and psychical or spiritual forces in man are not two distinct agents or principles, but one and the same, he says: § 25. " It might be objected, that this view is incompatible with the doctrine of the natural and necessary immortality of the soul. The immortality of the soul has, ever since the time of Plato, been often, not to say generally, taught as a necessary consequence of its etherial essence, which, in its turn, involved an essential superiority to, and non-conformity with, gross matter. Plato taught the preexistence of the spirit, and regarded its connection with matter as an imprisonment of its energies and a soiling of its purity, and the remnants of these doctrines have survived till the present time, and have been supposed, in a certain sense, to be sanctioned by, or, at least, to be more consistent with the Christian doctrine of immortality. Whatever is important (?) in the Platonic or the Christian view of the spirituality and immortality of the human spirit, is not at all diminished by the doctrine of its unity with the vital force Whatever may be our speculations in respect to a preexistent eternity of the soul, the evidence of observation and of facts, is decisive that it begins its existence as a vital agency, and emerges by a gradual waking into the conscious activities of its higher nature. These facts it is the duty of the philosopher to adjust to the conception which he may form (?) of its more exalted nature and its immortal destiny."

 

Other writers, and perhaps the majority, consider our unconditional immortality as sufficiently proved by the common assent of the world. If this were a question of fact, to be established by the testimony of witnesses, then the greater the number of witnesses, the stronger the evidence; but on a question of mere opinion, especially when that opinion has been handed down from one generation to another, it is no evidence at all. A thousand men can no more stand together upon nothing than can one man alone. All the time-pieces in Christendom, if set by one that is disordered, or in error, cannot establish the true time, against one that registers the time on the great dial plate which God has fixed in the heavens. How often has the whole world been proved to be in error by the discoveries of science? Yea, how continually do their opinions need to be modified by our advance in knowledge? Philosophers indeed may make new discoveries and advance new views, but let a man beware how he ventures to call in question any theological dogma of the past!

 

 * There once sprang up within the Church of God a " sect," which was " everywhere spoken against," and that, not by the heathen, but by the Church itself. It appealed to the Oracles of God, but the people to whom these Oracles were committed, and especially those who sat in Moses' seat, as its authorized expounders, rejected the appeal and pronounced the appellants guilty of heresy. Priests and Levites, Scribes and Pharisees, Sadducees and Herodians, Doctors and Lawyers, 'though differing on almost everything else, cordially agreed in condemning the new sect, root and branch. It was a tremendous prima facie presumption against it, no doubt; but the sect was right and the Church was wrong, notwithstanding.—MINTON.

 

 There are others who have attempted to prove it by the use of such arguments as would surely prove, if they proved anything, the deathless nature of all animal souls. And then they would take back all their arguments, excepting as they related to the soul of man. Others would establish it by those analogies of nature which suggest the possibility of another life, but have no bearing whatever upon the endlessness of that life, which is the very thing to be shown, and which at best, indicate not the survival of all, but the survival of the fittest only; which is just the ground we have taken, but directly opposed to their own doctrine of the survival of all.

 

 Others argue that it is so agreeable to the natural instincts of man, that it must be true. All of these reason as if man were still in his normal condition of holiness, and had never lost or forfeited anything by sin. They do not stop to consider, that these instincts and desires may remain after the boon has been lost, and linger to show man into what ruin he has fallen by sin, and to urge him to lay hold of the hope of Eternal life set before him in the Gospel.

 

 Others still attempt to prove it by the negative process. They set up as its antagonist a man of straw, and call it Annihilation, and then, when they have annihilated this, they think they have established their own dogma. The writer is admonished to be charitable towards those who pursue this line of argument, and to be very modest by the remembrance of his own former practice, when he thought he was doing God service by stoutly insisting on the indestructible nature of the human soul, and by trying to prove it by this same process. The argument he used and which is very common, may be reduced to the following syllogism:

 

 Nothing is ever annihilated.

 

 The soul cannot be destroyed except by annihilation. Therefore the soul will not be destroyed, but will live forever.

 

 It did not occur to him, that the major premise was a mere assumption or guess, without any proof whatever. It may be so; and it may not. But nescience is no good foundation for a positive argument. As for the minor premise; it was not only assumed without evidence, but contrary to all the evidence that is possible on the subject. For what becomes of the psyche of animals when they are destroyed? They lose their individual existence, but are they annihilated? if so, what becomes of the proposition? if not, then why may not the same be true of men? And as for the conclusion; it is a complete non sequitur, having no logical connection with the premises.

 

 And here we must, in passing, PROTEST as we have done more at length, in another place, against the practice of characterizing the doctrine of conditional immortality as the doctrine of annihilation. Because,

 

1. The word expresses too much. It is more than we affirm or believe; and it is just this excess of meaning that .is used against us. Loosely speaking all men who believe in any kind of destruction, believe in annihilation; but in the strict sense of the word we no more believe in it than those who accuse us of it.

 

 2. The term is not found in the Scriptures, and the implication is, that we believe in an unscriptural doctrine, when on the contrary, it is just the Scriptural doctrine for which we are contending—the Scriptures terms " to die," " to perish," " to be lost," " to be destroyed," "to be blotted out of the book of life," etc., are just the very terms that express our belief. We want no stronger language. We object to being driven out of the Bible to find words to express our belief to accommodate our antagonists, who wish to appropriate these terms to their own peculiar use as meaning something less than they were intended to mean. Dr. Bartlett in the Preface to his "Life and Death Eternal " notices our protest, but says he shall use the term because it is " convenient," "indeed indispensable." He may find it so, but what a confession! Is it indispensable to a successful argument against our belief, first to misstate it, and then to attack that. statement? What must be thought of the cause when its ablest defender confesses that it is " indispensable " to support it by such means?

 

 3. It is an adroit way of shifting the. onus probandi from the affirmative to the negative side. Our opponents affirm the endless existence of the wicked. We deny it, or at least, call it in question, and demand the proof. But instead of proving their doctrine, they charge upon us the doctrine of annihilation, that is, they postulate for us a doctrine which we repudiate, and expect us to try to make it good, as though we had affirmed it; and all that devolves upon them is to show its absurdity. Amid the confusion created by this question, which no one has raised but themselves, they would escape the responsibility of sustaining their own dogma.

 

 4. It distorts the real doctrine and presents it in a wrong light. It makes that prominent which is subordinate. It assumes that it is the destruction—that is the annihilation—of the wicked for which we are principally. contending, and that, as men are naturally immortal, it can only be effected by Almighty power, when we contend that men, by nature, are mortal and transitory—that death, since the fall is a natural process, and that immortality and Eternal life are only offered them in the Gospel. It is a gospel of Life, and not of death that we preach, and if they would only consent to look at this doctrine in front, rather than in the rear, they would see how glorious it is, and say with us, " Thanks be unto God for His unspeakable gift."

 

Principal Tulloch truly says, in his Religion and Life, "Hope in death can 'only spring from the principle of personal immortality, and this principle has no root save in Christ."

 

 But most men are willing to admit, that this doctrine of unconditional immortality cannot be proved but they say it ought to be true, and so they assume it as an axiom, and build their system upon it. The old theological disputants dispose of this third alternative, if they condescend to notice it at all, in the most summary manner possible. Pres. Dwight attempts to show, that the soul is not material, and having done this, he seems to have supposed its immortality to be sufficiently established. He appears to make little or no distinction between Soul and Spirit, but quotes texts referring to the latter as equally applicable to the former. In his sermon (Vol. I.) on " The sentence pronounced upon man," he disposes of the main question in this summary and oracular way:

 

 Adam was plainly threatened with the loss of immortal life. Whatever else was contained in the threatening, this must be allowed to be a part of it. It follows, therefore, that either Eternal death was threatened; or, Annihilation; or, temporal death followed by eternal happiness. This last will not be pretended. The second, viz., Annihilation, could not be threatened, because it certainly was no part of the design of God in the creation of man (!!). It seems evident, therefore, that the first is the true and only scheme of this part of the Scriptures.

 

 And by " Eternal death!" in the first supposition, he means Eternal sin and misery. And the reason he gives to show why the death threatened cannot mean what it says, is, "because it certainly was no part of the design of God in the creation of man. Pres. Edwards pursues very much the same method. In his long argument with Dr. John Taylor, " concerning the kind of death threatened to our first parents," and, indeed, in all his writings, he assumes that it " is a state of total, confirmed wickedness, and perfect hopeless misery, under the divine displeasure and curse; not excluding temporal death or the destruction of the body, as an introduction to it."

 

 The same is true of later theologians. They all follow in nearly the same track. They all seem to suppose, that when they have demonstrated the doctrine of a future retribution, it cannot possibly mean anything else than the doom of endless sin and misery.

 

 Others treat all those many passages in the Scriptures that speak of the future life, and promise it to the saints, as so many proof texts of the certain immortality of all men. They ignore the real and radical distinction between saints and sinners. They argue against the doctrine of " Eternal life only in Christ," as though it were the old doctrine of the Sadducees, who denied a future life to all men, and seem to suppose, that when they have confuted this heresy, and proved the future life of the good from the Scriptures, they have proved the future endless life of the bad also, and that the only difference between the two consists in the opposite states and conditions of that future life.

 

 It is astonishing how men have contrived to ignore, misunderstand, misstate, and evade, the real question that lies at the bottom of this whole subject, viz: Is immortality conditional or unconditional? is it the common inheritance of all men from Adam, or is it the special gift of God through Christ the Savior?

 

 It is wonderful how sophistically, inconclusively, and unfairly, they have treated it, when it has been forced upon their consideration. It is especially surprising that those who really love the truth, and desire to honor their Lord and Savior should be willing to concede to His enemies their own highest prerogative, as heirs of eternal life, and content themselves by urging the claims of the Gospel upon lower grounds, and refuse to see how they are making it of none effect through their tradition, and "making the heart of the righteous sad, whom He hath not made sad, and strengthening the hands of the wicked, that he should not return from his wicked way by PROMISING HIM LIFE."—(Ezek. 13: 22.)

 

 Is it not time that this lie of Satan, this conceit of Plato's brain, this figment of the school-men, this popish dogma, were expunged from the creed of the Christian Church? Is is not full time that this glorious Gospel, bringing life and immortality to light, which has been so long hidden, or greatly obscured, by the blinding power of this stupendous error, were again uncovered and preached in all its fulness and simplicity as a message of Life to perishing mortals; and that Christ were again offered as the only Savior from death? not from sin and misery merely, but from Death? Alas! that the God of this world should so long have blinded the minds of those which believe not, lest the light of the glorious Gospel of Christ, Who is the image of God, should shine unto them!" —(2. Cor. 4: 4.)

 

 My dear brethren in the ministry: suffer one who understands the perplexities of your position, who knows your anxieties and cares, and who fully sympathizes with you in your work and would gladly aid you in every possible way, to address you—not as an antagonist, but as a Christian brother—not in words of reproof, but of suggestion and entreaty.

 

 You have received your religious notions in the first instance, as all men do, by inheritance and tuition; as students of theology, you have accepted your systems of philosophy and of doctrine, with more or less confidence, from your instructors, as they did from theirs. Indeed, your professors were required to bind themselves by a solemn obligation, when they accepted their office, to teach a specific traditional creed and system of doctrine, and they are not allowed to call it in question. Among the various conflicting systems that are so taught, you have honestly believed, that the one they have taught you, is the one that is true; you have taken the texts of Scripture that your teachers, and commentators have given you, and the interpretation they have put upon them to sustain your system, and have, perhaps, found other texts to go with them; you have learned how to meet the various objections that were urged against your belief. You have taken this system to your different fields of labor, and have molded your discourses into conformity with it. In doing this, you have done what you were expected to do, and what you were employed to do.

 

 But as ambassadors for Christ have you felt that your responsibility in regard to the truth to be preached was here at an end? That you had no need to examine the foundations on which you are resting, or to inquire with docility of spirit of the Master Himself, What is truth? When by His spirit He has said, as to his Apostles, " Go stand and speak in the temple to the people all the words of this life" (Acts 5: 20.) And when, as His appointed watchman, you have heard the command to warn the sinner and say " O wicked man, thou shalt surely die." (Ezk. 33: 8) have you gone to Him or to human authorities to know what "THIS LIFE " is, and what " THE DEATH " is, you were called to preach?

 

 Has it never occurred to you that these words Death and Life were something more than metaphors, denoting depraved and holy states of existence? that they expressed realities, and were pregnant with a deeper and higher meaning than you have been wont to give them? that the ruin of sin was more complete, and the great salvation infinitely greater than you have been educated to believe? that Christ is entitled to higher honor, and His gospel more necessary and more precious than your philosophy allows? Or, have you suppressed your rising convictions and feared to follow them out, lest you should fall under the suspicion of your brethren, and be found preaching after "the way they call heresy." (Acts 24: 14)? Are you willing to know what is the truth on this great question of immortality which is beginning to agitate the minds of all men at the present day as never before; and which will yet more thoroughly agitate the world till the truth is fully established and acknowledged?

 

 Infidels and scoffers of every name are rallying to assert and defend their most cherished doctrine; they care but little for the threat of endless misery, which Christians are so reluctant to believe and so unwilling to preach, if their own indefeasible immortality is allowed to them. They deny to Christ who has died to give them Life—the credit, the honor, the glory of this gift, and claim it as their own by inheritance. And alas! His own people join hands with them and encourage them in their opposition to the truth. We weep as we write, to see how Christ, the Savior, is wounded in the house of His friends; how He is denied and rejected as the chief corner-stone elect and precious—the only foundation of hope for eternal life, and men are encouraged to build their hopes on the nobility of their nature and the general mercy of God.

 

 O my brethren wait not to see whether " any of the Rulers or Pharisees have believed it," nor till this doctrine of Eternal Life in Christ alone, shall become more generally popular. It never will be popular with the world. Natural men will oppose it with all their might, and the Church will no doubt, surrender the long cherished dogma with reluctance, and frown upon those who do not consent to be bound by her decretals. You have a higher Master. You have His Word. You can read it for yourselves. Notwithstanding the veil that has been thrown over its teachings on this question by our translators, and the false construction put upon them by commentators, yet the truth stands out so plainly that it would seem to be impossible for it to be hid from any honest, earnest inquirer. Are you willing in the simplicity of your hearts to ask after the truth, with the determination to follow the guidance of the Divine Spirit to whatever result He may lead you? Are you willing to brave the consequences of such an independent inquiry? Are you able to bear the scorn, the pity, the censures which your more self-complacent brethren will bestow on those who shall embrace so unpopular a doctrine?

 

 We know that there are many, honest, earnest Christian ministers and laymen, who are in great doubt and perplexity, on this question of the future state. They are confronted by a dilemma, neither horn of which they can accept, and yet they have been educated to believe that there could be no other. They have great respect for the piety and wisdom of their fathers, and would gladly confide in the learned men of the present day.

 

"Deliver me from the narrowing influence of human lessons, from human systems of theology; teach me directly out of the fulness and freeness of Thine own Word. Hasten the time, when unfittered by sectarian intolerance and unawed by the authority of men, the Bible shall make its rightful impression upon all: the simple and obedient readers thereof, calling no man Master, but Christ only."—T. CHALMERS.

 

 They are cautious, as they should be, about adopting new views, however plausible they may seem, until they can be shown to be in harmony with sound philosophy and the teachings of God's Word, and yet, they are not so presumptuous as to believe that the farthest goal of truth, has been reached, and that there is nothing more for them to learn or inquire after.* To such, the writer hopes he may, by the blessing of God, be of some service. For such he has written. He has no fondness for discussion. He loves and honors his Christian brethren in the ministry, and out of it. Nothing grieves him more than to seem to differ from them in any respect. But he must be true to his convictions. He must utter the truth that is burning in his heart.

 

 But he rejoices to know, that it is not to other sources of light and knowledge that he invites them: but only to a more careful searching of God's Word, and a more implicit reliance on its teachings. It is not to another Gospel or another Savior that he has been led, and to which he would now lead others, but to higher, fuller, richer views of that Gospel, and to more exalted thoughts of Him a:: our Life. "Give unto the Lord the glory due unto His Name."

 

 There are various incidental questions which are frequently brought into this discussion, upon which he has not expressed an opinion. This is not because they are unimportant, but simply because their decision is not necessary to the main question under consideration; and he would not have the mind diverted from that. It is the custom with wary critics, when unable to controvert an author's main position, to nibble at such various incidental matters as seem most open to their attacks.

 

 The author does not rest his argument upon any special interpretation of disputed texts, nor upon the particular meaning that may be given to certain words and phrases, but rather upon the uniform teaching of God's Word, and upon the sense which every man would give to its utterances, if he had no opposing theory of his own to maintain.

 

 What may be the real nature and constitution of the human soul, and whether it can live at all, after its natural and Spiritual life are both gone, and if so, for how long a time, and under what conditions, are questions to which the author has attempted to give no decisive answer. At any rate, he founds no argument upon any particular theory of the soul.

 

For an able and full discussion of this question on psychological grounds, and a learned criticism of Scripture passages bearing on it, the writer takes great pleasure in referring his readers to the learned and candid work of his friend, Prof. C. L. Ives, entitled, " The Bible Doctrine of the Soul; or, Man's Nature and Destiny as Revealed." Published by Claxton, Remsen & Haffelfinger: Philadelphia, 1878. Whatever the critics may think of the extreme ground he takes in regard to the soul, and of the new interpretation he puts upon some disputed passages of Scripture, they will find it very difficult to answer his arguments. They must concede the ability and candor with which he has argued his points. The general conclusion to which he comes though by a different method from that pursued by the writer, would seem to be most conclusively established.

 It is sufficient for him to know that He who gave it all the life it has, of whatever kind, can take it away, and that He will take it, as He Himself declares, from all who will not submit to His law and government.

 

 What agonies the soul may suffer, in the process of the second death; how long they may be protracted; what tribulations and anguish may be visited upon the sinner hereafter, by a just and holy God, we forbear to predict. Every unrepenting sinner, and especially every rejector of offered mercy, has reason to fear and tremble in view of the wrath to come, "It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God," for " He is a consuming fire." But we cannot believe, that this means that He is a fire that torments ceaselessly and forever the objects of His wrath, without "consuming " them.

 

 Whether the souls of the righteous, or of the wicked, of either, or both, are conscious between death, and the resurrection and final judgment, is a disputed point, which he has not attempted to settle. He has no theory, which is vital to the main issue, to establish on this question.

 

 With respect to the Second Advent of Our Lord, His personal reign on the earth, and the order and manner in which the great events of the future are to take place, neither the advocates nor the opposers of the doctrines of this book are united among themselves, and he sees no occasion for bringing his own private. views on these questions into this controversy.

 

 He desires to hold the mind of the reader steadily to this one inquiry. Do we become immortal through Adam or through Christ? Is eternal life a gift of Nature or of Gi-ace?

 

 He pauses at the threshold Of the argument, to see what enlightened Reason and Nature may have to say, and though of themselves alone, they can give us no certain answer, they are found to prepare us by many hints, to receive with strong confidence the declaration of God's Word, that " The wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ Our Lord; " which declaration, we understand, not as meaning that " The wages of sin is endless misery, but the gift of God is eternal happiness," but as meaning just what it says. This we believe, and attempt to show; with what success, every reader must decide for himself. It harmonizes with all the utterances of Scriptures from Genesis to Revelation. To these divine oracles we make our appeal. "To the law and to the testimony, if they speak not according to this Word, it is because there is no light in them."

 

Chapter 1.

 

 The common belief: its consequences. The gospel a message of eternal life.

 

 THE immortality of the righteous is most positively affirmed in the Word of God. No Christian will for one moment call this in question. Have we equal assurance that the wicked will also live forever? Is every individual soul, without respect to its character here, or its condition hereafter, endowed with the same deathless nature? This is the common belief—with the exception of a very small class of Atheistic Materialists, who, like the Sadducees of old, deny all spiritual and future existence, to the good and bad alike—men of all creeds, and of no creed, have very generally everywhere united in calling themselves immortal, and have held to this belief with great tenacity?

 

 It early became one of the most cherished and popular doctrines of the Papal Church. Protestant Christians have received it by inheritance and handed it down to us as an almost self-evident truth as one of the fundamental doctrines of the Christian religion. It is true, that our Lord and His immediate disciples taught with extraordinary emphasis and constant reiteration that eternal life is the peculiar portion of the children of God, and that all His irreclaimable enemies are doomed to inevitable death and destruction. But, giving to these terms no literal but only a metaphorical signification., Christians of all denominations very generally hold, in common with unbelievers and the world at large, that there is no difference between saints and sinners in respect to the deathless nature of their souls. It is held that every child of Adam that is born into the world, is born to a life that is absolutely endless. That the life which God gives to every soul in its creation is an unconditional gift, depending upon no contingencies whatever; that the creature can neither lose nor forfeit, nor extinguish it by any act of his own, and that the Creator will never, for any cause whatever, destroy it or take it from him, how much soever he may despise or abuse the gift, or fail of the end for which he was created; that the flame of life once kindled in the infant soul will burn on so long as God Himself endures; that there is no power in sin, which bringeth forth death, to put an end to it; that the waters of Lethe cannot quench it, nor the blasts of God's anger at the judgment extinguish it, nor the gnawing worm, nor the devouring fire of hell consume it, nor the agonies of the second death destroy it. It will survive the wreck of nature and the crash of worlds, and throughout all the revolving cycles of an unending future hold on its way unextinguished and inextinguishable like the life of the self-existent God who gave it being.

 

 Thus far most believers and unbelievers in Revelation are agreed. But when the inquiry is raised as to the conditions of that unending existence, there is a very wide divergence of belief. The Word of God evidently teaches, and that portion of the Christian Church usually denominated evangelical holds, that man has fallen from the condition of purity in which he was originally created, and that by sin the whole human race have forfeited their right to an eternal life of blessedness, and have fallen under the penalty of God's holy law that condemns them to death and destruction;—that is to say, when interpreted to harmonize with the doctrine of the deathless and indestructible nature of the soul, to the literal death of the mortal body and the unending wretchedness and misery of the " immortal soul."

 

 But, by the great mercy of God, a ransom has been provided in Christ, Who has died in the place of the sinner, by which sinners may be, and many will be, rescued from this fearful doom; but as for the rest—alas that any should fail of salvation; but the Scriptures give no encouragement to hope for the salvation of all men—eternal wretchedness and despair are the inevitable portion of their " undying " souls.

 

 This doctrine, which is set forth more or less distinctly in our various Church creeds and systems of theology, finds expression in the Westminster Assembly's Catechism in these words: " All mankind by their fall lost communion with God, are under His wrath, and so made liable to all the miseries in this life, to death itself and to the pains of hell forever." "God having out of His mere good pleasure, from all eternity, elected some to everlasting life, did enter into a covenant of grace to deliver them out of the estate of sin and misery and to bring them into an estate of salvation by a Redeemer."

 

 Christians may differ with respect to the terms of this formula, and with respect to other points of doctrine, and also with respect to the number of the saved and of the lost; but they agree in this: that the final doom of the unsaved, whether the number of such be proportionally great or small, is one of unending wretchedness and despair.

 

 It follows as a necessary deduction from this belief, that this once holy and happy universe will never be restored to its original perfection; that sin bringing death and misery in its train having once gained a lodgment here, whether with or without divine permission, it is not necessary now to inquire, will never be exterminated or expelled. It may, like a raging fire, be localized and circumscribed within certain limits, but it will never like that fire exhaust itself and die out, nor will it ever be extinguished by God Himself, but will rage on without ever coming to an end. And so long as Jehovah lives and reigns, holiness and sin, happiness and misery, praises and curses, life and death, will also continue and run parallel with each other to all eternity. Heaven will resound with the songs of the redeemed, and hell with the curses of the damned throughout the ceaseless flow of eternal ages; and the time will never, never come when Infinite Love, Divine Wisdom, or Almighty Power will have so successfully triumphed over the works of the devil as to have utterly destroyed them, nor over death and hell as to have destroyed them, nor when His justice will have so vindicated itself by the sufferings of the unsaved that they can be permitted to expire, nor when the foundations of His government will be secure, and the loyalty of His obedient subjects assured without this terrible exhibition of His infinite wrath, like the smoke of a furnace, rolling up forever before their eyes.

 

 These are the views that have long been commonly held, by what is called, the Orthodox branch of the Christian Church. It is the doctrine of our " Confessions of Faith " of our Scripture Commentaries, and of our Theological Schools. It pervades our Christian Literature.

 

 It is sung in the songs of the Sanctuary. It is taught in our Sunday-schools, and around the fireside by faithful parents. It is reiterated in the exhortations and prayers of the conference room, and proclaimed with more or less earnestness and confidence from ten thousand pulpits, by the ministers of the gospel of Christ.

 

 But it must be admitted that the doctrine of endless sin and endless misery is not as boldly preached as in former times; nor is it as cheerfully accepted. The main premise upon which this doctrine depends, viz.; that the human soul irrespective of its character and condition is immortal, may be as popular as ever; but thinking men shrink more and more from the terrible conclusion to which it leads them. When they stop to consider what is involved in the idea of suffering that is absolutely endless; what it is for conscious, sensitive creatures like themselves to writhe in the agonies of hell forever and ever, without the least possible hope of relief; when they consider what countless myriads of the human race, even with the most liberal construction of the testimony of the Scriptures concerning the number of the saved, must already have sunk into this abyss of woe, and what multitudes are daily following them there; when they come to apply this doctrine, not to sinners in the abstract and in general, but to the case of their own neighbors and friends, and, it may be, to their own children and bosom companions who die, giving no evidence whatever of piety, they are appalled at the conclusion to which their creed and their logic lead them. Their faith cannot endure the strain that is put upon it. Something must give way.: Holding to the idea of the endless, conscious existence of all men, beyond this life as a doctrine that is not for one moment to be doubted, they begin in their hearts to charge God foolishly with the cruelty and injustice which their creed attributes to Him, or to doubt the testimony of His Word as to the danger of losing the soul, and the necessity of laying hold of eternal life, or to deny the existence of the God of the Bible, or to take refuge in some other form of unbelief, or, else, still clinging to their faith in God, and to the Scriptures as His Truth, they earnestly set themselves to find, and, perhaps, think they do find in these oracles, in spite of their most positive declarations to the contrary, the assurance of the ultimate salvation of all men.

 

And even those who cannot relieve their burdened minds by doing such evident violence to the letter of the Scriptures, still hope, because they will, that possibly a second probation or some other way of escape will yet be found from the awful doom of endless misery which seems to be so surely threatened against all who die in their sins. They may not dare to deny explicitly a doctrine that has been held by so many of the wise and good who have gone before them, though they cannot reconcile it with their own sense of justice. They may not, perhaps, be willing to admit to themselves that they disbelieve it, lest they should seem to be sliding away from the true foundation; but they cannot but hope it is not true. They accept it, if at all, under a kind of mental protest. It is that dark, dark mysterious doctrine upon which they cannot trust themselves to meditate, lest they should have hard thoughts of Him whom they wish to love and trust. Indeed they do love and trust Him notwithstanding the cruel aspersion which their false theology ' or rather psychology, casts upon His name, but it is only as they include themselves among the saved; and—as for the rest,—they comfort their hearts by saying, and wisely saying, with faithful Abraham: " Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right? "

 

 In the rude and unfeeling ages of the past, when the severest penalties were inflicted for trivial offences, and when the chief object of punishment was torment, and the executioners of the law were called "tormentors," when human governments vied with each other in the severity of the tortures they inflicted upon the unhappy victims of their displeasure and even the death penalty was made as cruel and protracted as possible to those who suffered it, and medical aid was invoked to prolong their forfeited lives, that still more enduring agonies might be inflicted upon them while dying, in those days, not so very long since past, but now happily passed never to return, when Church officers exercised the function of inquisitors under the pretense of doing the will of God, this doctrine of endless torment, so consonant with the spirit and practice of those ages of darkness and cruelty, might easily find and hold its place unchallenged in the creed of the Church.

 

 But, in these "last days," under the softening influences of the gospel, when so much is done to assuage human sorrow and even brute suffering, and to relieve the distresses of even the most undeserving, and mercy is mingled with justice in the punishment of the worst of criminals. and even the death penalty is made as humane and summary as possible, men cannot but ask whether the majesty of the Divine -government to which all human governments must look, both for their authority to punish and for an example of the manner and spirit in which it is to be administered, can only be vindicated by the inflictions of tortures too horrible to think of, and protracted without end? Is there no such thing as death, actual death under the government of heaven? Has the Almighty Creator no alternative but to imprison the helpless victims of His displeasure and to pour out upon them forever and ever the vials of His wrath? Has He no way of putting an end to their miserable existence; or does He choose to prolong their forfeited lives, that they may never cease to suffer?

 

 And when they are told that this is the inevitable doom, not only of the rejectors of the gospel and irreclaimable sinners in Christian lands, but of countless multitudes who were born in sin and to whom no Savior was ever offered—of creatures who owe both their existence and the conditions of their existence to the sovereign will of Him who saw and predetermined all things from the beginning, they cannot but feel that there is a flaw somewhere in the chain of reasoning that leads to such monstrous conclusions, though they may not be able to detect it.

 

 The great divines of a former generation could school their severe and logical minds to accept all the terrible conclusions involved in the dogma of the deathless nature of the human soul, which they had received from their fathers. They could in their zeal for the glory of God's justice believe and teach to their docile hearers that the perpetual spectacle of the agonies of lost souls in hell would serve to augment the joys of the redeemed in heaven, and that " should eternal punishment cease and the fire be extinguished, it would put an end to a great part of the happiness and glory of the blessed." (See sermons of Dr. Hopkins, Pres. Edwards, etc.*)

 

 *Pres. Edwards in his sermon on Rev. 18: 20, entitled " The end of the wicked contemplated by the righteous; or the wicked in hell, no occasion of grief to the righteous," (Vol. 4), after showing how " the two worlds of happiness and misery will be in view of each other," remarks, " The saints in glory will be farmore sensible of it than now, we can possibly be. They will be far more sensible how dreadful the wrath of God is, and will better understand how terrible the sufferings of the damned are; yet this will be no occasion of grief to them. They will not be sorry for the damned; it will cause no uneasiness or dissatisfaction to them, but on the contrary, when they have this sight, it will excite them to joyful praises." However the saints in heaven may have loved the damned, while here, especially those of them who were near and dear to them, in this world, they will have no love to them hereafter." It will occasion rejoicing in them as they will have the greater sense of their own happiness (the italics are his) by seeing the contrary misery,"

 

 When they shall see how miserable others of their fellow-creatures are who were naturally in the same circumstances with themselves; when they shall see the smoke of their torment, and the raging of the flames of their burning, and hear their dolorous shrieks and cries, and consider that they in the mean time, are in the most blissful state and shall surely be in it to all eternity; how will they rejoice!"

 

It is taxing too heavily the faith of the men of the present day to insist upon their believing doctrines, however hoary with age and fortified by hum authority, that are abhorrent, at once to their reasons and their moral sense. Men will no longer be held to those views of God and His government that prevailed when all sovereigns were tyrants and justice was but another name for vengeance. They will not be terrified by threatening they do not and cannot believe will be executed, nor persuaded to flee to a refuge of which they have ceased to feel the need. They cannot be aroused to seek for an immortality which they have been made to believe is fully assured to them. If an alternative is threatened which to their minds is truly incredible, the truth which it is meant to enforce will soon lose its power to move them. In this way the glorious gospel is made of none effect through the tradition of the elders, and men in increasing numbers are seen turning away their ears from the truth mixed as it is with human dogmas, and turned unto fables. They forsake the altars at which their fathers worshipped, and betake themselves to other forms of belief or of unbelief that have, at least, the merit of seeming to be reasonable, however far they may be from the faith once delivered to the saints.

 

 This is just the result we have to deplore at the present day. Everywhere throughout Christendom the people are casting off the restraints of religion and forsaking the Sanctuary. Skepticism among all classes, especially among the educated, is becoming very general. Even among those who professedly hold to those forms of belief usually termed evangelical, there is a skepticism more or less latent as to the final and irreversible doom of those who die in their sins, a kind of half-doubting hope of their ultimate salvation, which greatly weakens the power of the gospel.

 

 Earnest Christians look with anxiety and concern upon the skepticism and irreligion of the present day. They are enquiring earnestly after the cause and the remedy. They ask, Why is it as knowledge and the spirit of inquiry increase and philanthropic efforts are multiplied, that infidelity, religious error and indifference increase? Why do not the masses frequent the house of God and listen to the ordinary preaching of the gospel as they once did? What shall bring them back to the sanctuary and to the faith of their fathers? What modifications in the services of God's house and in the method of presenting the truth are needed to accomplish this end? They do well to inquire. These are questions of vital importance. But does it not occur to any of them that their creed may require some modification: that the results they so much deplore are due quite as much to the nature of the dogmas that are preached, as to the manner in which they are presented, quite as much to the false light in which the great object of their worship is held up before them, as to the precise forms in which they are invited to worship Him? Not that the gospel needs any modification; but is it not time to inquire whether all the human philosophy that is preached with it is also from God and a necessary part of that gospel? Whether all the errors, perversions, false interpretations, foolish conceits, and traditions by which it was confessedly overlaid in its transit through the dark ages, were fully exposed and rejected in the Reformation, so that none of them remain to weaken its power, or dim its luster, or check its progress, in these last days? However practicable it might once have been, it is no longer possible to hold men to doctrines that contradict their intelligence, or to views of God and His government that are repugnant to their sense of justice.

 

 This apparent falling away is not an evidence that the truth is losing its hold upon the hearts and con-sciences of men, but that they are becoming more critical in their inquiry, What is Truth? and less under the control of traditions that have no foundation in sound reason. The simple gospel has lost none of its virtue or power. It is as really adapted to the wants of the soul as when it was first preached by Christ and His apostles. It is now as ever the only hope of a lost world. It is the wisdom of God and the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth and there is no salvation in any other name. But so long as men are assured of their indefeasible claim to an immortality without Christ, they will have but little sense of their need of Him as their Savior, or but little fear but that God in His great mercy will find a way to save them from the consequences of their sins, in the life beyond, if not in this life.

 

 But it is not from suffering chiefly, that the gospel offers to save men, but from Death. This is what pre-eminently constitutes it Good News to perishing men. Christ died not primarily to save us from suffering, but from dying, He is the Author of Eternal Life to all who receive Him as their Savior. So long as the minds of men are occupied by the delusive hope of an immortality already assured, the light of the glorious gospel cannot shine unto them in all its fulness and power. Christ,' though robbed of His chief glory, may still receive the praise and admiration of men as the kind suffering Lamb of God. But it is only as they are made to see and feel that without His life in their souls they must perish forever, that they will seek Him in earnest as their Savior.

 

 The real gospel message is a proclamation of Life—Eternal Life through Jesus Christ to dying men—not to immortals, but to mortal men. The grand feature which distinguishes the saint from the sinner is not that the one is so much better in his moral character than the other that he may expect to be rewarded with eternal bliss, while the other will be punished with eternal misery. The world cannot see any such difference nor can they be made to believe that any such distinction will be made between them. But they can be made to believe and feel that they are by nature destitute of that principle of life without which, however moral they may be, they must perish forever. That this is the Life—the Eternal Life which is offered them in the gospel of Christ. That it begins in the new birth, that it is already begun in the soul of the saint, and though feeble as the natural life of the infant, it tends upward toward its source and will never be extinguished because it is the life of Christ within him, while the natural life turns inevitably to death and dissolution.

 

 The Church of Christ by encouraging natura1 men as well as Christians, to expect immortality, have obscured the main distinction between the regenerate and the unregenerate; they have dimmed the lustre of the gospel and greatly weakened its power. And this, we believe, is the chief cause of their want of success in urging it upon the world.

 

 The doctrine of immortality only in Christ would, no doubt, meet with the bitterest opposition from men, who pride themselves on the deathless nature of their souls. But it has the merit of being credible as well as true. It is the doctrine of the Bible. It is the doctrine that Christ and His early disciples taught. When the Christian Church again receives it, as she will, there will be no difficulty in making men believe it, and believing it, they will cry out with an earnestness now rarely exhibited, " What must we do to be saved? " The Sanctuaries will again be crowded to hear the words of this life. Christians will labor with a zeal and faithfulness to save perishing men, which can only be awakened and kept alive by a hearty belief, that they are actually going down to death, and, unless rescued and brought to Christ before they pass away from earth, they must be lost forever. Then, and not till then, may we hope for the speedy triumph of the gospel through the world.

 

Chapter 2.

The real question at issue: misuse of language.

Scripture terms perverted.

 

 THE doctrine "Thou shalt not surely die," or, in other words, the certain immortality of the sinning soul, is a very old doctrine, as the Scriptures inform us (Gen. 3: 4.) But the assurance of its first promulgator, "who was a liar from the beginning," when in flat contradiction of the word of God Himself, is hardly sufficient authority for its truth. It is a very specious doctrine, as is evident from the readiness with which it was first received, and the currency it has always enjoyed in the world. It is a very delusive doctrine, as we hope to make apparent to any candid and unprejudiced inquirer after the truth. It is a very popular doctrine, as is manifest from the way in which it has insinuated itself into the literature of all ages, and into the theology of the Christian Church, and from the hold it has upon the popular mind. It could not be otherwise than popular. There is something so ennobling, so inspiriting, so flattering to the pride of man in the idea of living, like God, forever, (" Ye shall be as Gods")—something so responsive to the instincts of his nature—instincts which were implanted in his pure soul as a motive to perseverance in the way of holiness, and which sin has never eradicated; something so degrading and horrible in the thought of extinction that it is not surprising that man should seize hold of the hope of protracting his life forever beyond the grave, and cling to it as he clings to his natural life.

 

 And when we still further consider how, on the one hand, this notion of perpetual existence ministers to the hope of final happiness, (for "where there is life there is hope,") as in the case of the criminal under sentence of death; if he can by any means escape the execution of that penalty, which is absolutely final, he hopes to be able eventually to escape altogether; or, on the other hand, how the threat of eternal torments naturally fails of its end by the very incredible magnitude of the penalty threatened, and so, how, under either alternative, the law of God is brought into contempt, His wisdom, goodness, justice and truth are called in question, and His character is aspersed, and how the work of Christ is belittled and misconstrued, and how the progress of the gospel is hindered by this doctrine of life everlasting for the saint and sinner alike, we cannot wonder that the arch deceiver should exert all his cunning to perpetuate the delusion as long as possible. Surely the gospel must be possessed of a divine energy which nothing can destroy, or it could never have carried the burden of reproach which this dogma has brought upon it, and yet gather its trophies in the world. But its glory has been dimmed and its career impeded and its motives weakened; nor will it ever win its early triumphs again, until it is restored to its primitive simplicity, and Christ is preached once more, as the only Savior of man from Death, complete, inevitable and final Death—the only hope of Life and Immortality for them that believe on His name.

 

 We are aware of the difficulty and hazard of attempting to controvert a sentiment that is so deeply rooted in the human heart, and that has so thoroughly imbued the language, the literature, the philosophy and the religion of the world; we are aware how like foolish presumption it will seem to differ from so many of the wise and the good in the Church and out of it. We know something of the power of religious prejudice, and how intolerant many worthy men are of those who disagree with them in matters of religious faith, and how hopeless it is to attempt (as Dean Swift says) " to reason a man out of an opinion he was never reasoned into," op to argue with those who have no argumentative faculty, or who, if they have, insist on using their prejudices in the place of arguments.

 

 We know also that there are many who have no taste for discussions of this sort, and who prefer to follow their trusted leaders; and that the leaders themselves too often find it more convenient and safe to take their systems at second hand, than to form them by independent investigation, and so they hand down their stock in theology from one generation to another. It is no easy thing for those who have a reputation for sound orthodoxy to maintain, to brave the suspicions of their brethren, by calling in question any popular doctrine; and then the fear of the heresy-hunting dogs of the herd that are ever on the alert to worry back any who may wander from the beaten path, or else to drive them far away into the wilderness, constrains many to stifle their rising convictions that the whole truth may not lie in the pasture where they are feeding. And so they prefer to chew the cud of contentment and be quiet.

 

 But we are confident there are also many earnest Christians who are ill at ease in their present position on this subject, and are looking for light, and who would welcome any honest discussion of this question, and give it their candid attention. It is for such that we write. We boast of no superior intelligence, or learning, or zeal for the cause of Christ. It is supposed to be equally dear to all our brethren. We were brought up " after the most strait sect of our religion," and educated to believe in the inevitable immortality of the wicked, and the consequent eternal perpetuity of sin and misery. We faithfully preached it for a quarter of a century, relying implicitly on the commentators and our theological teachers. May God forgive us, for we did it ignorantly—but, led gradually by the Spirit of God through earnest and prayerful study of His Word, we have come—even contrary to our own expectation and purpose to find our error, and to see a meaning and beauty in both the law and the gospel, of which we had before only the faintest conception, and now, while we preach the same law and the same gospel, it is with inexpressibly greater satisfaction and delight. We would fain do what we can to bring others who may be involved in this error to the same point of view. We are not unmindful of the obloquy, the pity, and scorn which those who dwell complacently in their error will bestow upon us; but we must be true to our convictions of duty and utter the truth that is stirring our hearts. It is but little, though all we can do, to give the remnant of life to the work of dispelling this delusion, so derogatory to the character of God, and so obstructive to the progress of the gospel, and of preaching Christ, " Who only hath immortality, dwelling in the light, which no man can approach unto," as our sure and only hope of eternal life.

 

 It is important, before we go further, to have a clear understanding of the real point in question. It is quite common for those who advocate the eternal existence of the wicked to confuse their own minds, and the minds of those who follow their lead, by introducing a great deal of irrelevant matter into their discussion—to insist on the importance of adhering to the testimony of God's Word, and on the necessity of a general judgment and a future retribution and so forth; all of which is very good and true, but it is quite one side of the point at issue. This is not a question of the truth of the Scriptures, but what the Scriptures teach. It is not a matter of faith, but of opinion. It is not how much those who agree in denying the immortality of the wicked may disagree in other respects. It is a favorite method of some in their endeavors to support the affirmative of this question—to show how their opponents have disagreed among themselves. *It is specious, but it has no argumentative force. The Papist may endeavor to strengthen himself in upholding the doctrine of Purgatory, which we as Protestants all deny, by showing how we differ among ourselves, but this is really nothing in support of his dogma, nor does it make anything in behalf of that other greater Popish dogma, of a place of perpetual and eternal torment, from which the Protestant Church failed to free itself in the Reformation, for those who still cling to it, to show how they who have cast it off may yet disagree upon other points.

 

 This is not a question of the immortality of the soul, as a Christian doctrine; for, so far from denying this doctrine, we are most especially endeavoring to affirm it. But it is a question concerning the source or foundation of this immortality: whether it is received by all men as an inheritance from Adam, or by the Christian alone as a free gift from Christ.

 

 It is not a question as to how generally the idea of a future state prevailed among the Jews at the coming of Christ, but what He taught when He came. It is not as to how early Plato's doctrine of the essential immortality of the soul, and the consequent necessary immortality of the wicked, insinuated itself into the Christian Church, and how soon the fathers began to teach it, but whether it was a doctrine of the Church which Christ instituted in His time, and whether the inspired writers of the New Testament taught it.

 

See " Life and Death Eternal," by Prof. Bartlett, also New Englander, October, 1871

 

 It is not a question whether the soul dies at the same moment of time with the body, but whether it is so independent of the body on the one hand, and of God the source of all spiritual life on the other, that it can maintain a perpetual and eternal existence when entirely severed from both.

 

 It is not a question of an intermediate state, so-called, but of an eternal state of conscious existence beyond and after the dissolution of this material universe. It is not a question concerning the resurrection of the dead and a general judgment, nor of future punishment, nor of *the eternity of future punishment, but whether the everlasting punishment to which the wicked shall be consigned at the judgment, will be everlasting torture or everlasting destruction.

 

 It is not a question as to whether there will be degrees in the severity of the punishment visited upon the wicked—some receiving "many stripes," and some "few stripes," but whether in the case of all, these stripes, whether many or few, will be inflicted without measure and without end!

 

 It is not a question as to the irreversibility of the doom of the wicked, but as to the nature of that irreversible doom.

 

 It is not whether there shall be at the day of judgment, disappointment, chagrin and such grief and rage on the part of God's enemies, as may well be described as weeping and gnashing of teeth, and especially on the part of the opposers and rejectors of Christ and His gospel, when they shall find themselves separated from His friends and utterly rejected from His everlasting kingdom, but whether they shall be gathered into another kingdom, which is also everlasting, where they shall perpetuate their sin and misery forever.

 

 It is not a question of annihilation, strictly speaking, concerning which no one can assert anything positive, as we will soon show, though some of our adversaries insist on calling it so in spite of all our disclaimers, that they may travesty our position and mystify the point at issue; but it is a question of the utter destruction of the wicked, soul and body—the complete extinction of their conscious existence; as complete as "that of the brutes that. perish."

 

 It is not a question as to the general correctness of our English version, nor of the common and classical meaning of the Greek and Hebrew words translated " death," " destruction," " perdition," and the like, but whether these words, when employed to describe the fate of the human soul are to be taken in their ordinary, literal and natural sense, or in some extraordinary, metaphorical and unnatural sense.

 

 It is just here that we find our chief embarrassment in discussing this question. It is not in the prejudices of men in favor of the doctrine we are opposing, nor in the pertinacity with which they cling to it,—all this were sufficiently hard to meet—but it is in the perversion and misappropriation of the very terms we need to express our meaning, and which would express the true meaning of the Scriptures, had they not been first vacated of their legitimate signification and another sense, which will tally with this dogma infused into them, so that now, while the Word of God employs the strongest expressions of which language is capable, under every variety of phraseology, to declare the utter and final death and destruction of the wicked, both soul and body, and the absolute extinction of their conscious existence, it fails to convey any such idea to those who hold fast to the indestructibility of the human soul, and we cannot in our arguments express the idea without employing new terms less appropriate, or by the use of labored circumlocution and wordy reiteration.

 

 It would seem as if the scholarship of the Church and the literature and philosophy of the world had conspired together to perpetuate and sustain the delusion of the tempter, "Ye shall not surely die," in spite of the most positive declarations of God Himself, by giving another meaning to the words of Scripture. Our Commentators handing down their hermeneutics from one to another, have displayed their learning and skill in showing how it is possible to put another sense into these words which teach a truth their own dogma forbids them to receive, which they call the " Scriptural Sense."

 

 Our theological system-makers, blinded by the same delusion "ever learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth," reasoning in a circle, gravely assure us that the human soul is immortal, and therefore it will never die; it is indestructible, and therefore it will never be destroyed; it is destined to exist forever, and therefore it will never come to an end; and, of course, all those many passages that seem to teach that it will die, will be destroyed, will come to an end unless it is restored to holiness, cannot possibly mean any such thing; and what else can they mean but that it shall be miserable forever? therefore, it will be miserable forever. Q. E. D.

 

 Our lexicographers and philologists are agreed in the same cause. The authors of our standard Hebrew and Greek lexicons, while giving us the true and literal meaning of such words as ahvad and shahmad; thanatos, Apoleia, Apollumi, Katargeo, Kataluo and other words meaning actual death and destruction, and also, of Zoe Soteria, and others, meaning life and salvation, inform us that they have a peculiar and unnatural sense when applied to the soul—a "Scriptural Sense," and why so? Simply because they have put that sense into them, and then transferred it back to their lexicons. So when we go to these " Scripture Helps " for light, we find the " Word of God made of none effect through their tradition" and traduction. For example: in referring to Matthew 7: 13, 14, " Enter ye in at the strait gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leadeth to (apoleian) destruction, and many there be which go in thereat." " Because strait is the gate and narrow is the way which leadeth unto (zoen) life, and few there be that find it," my lexicon informs me that apoleian here means " endless misery," and zoen means " everlasting happiness." In Romans 6: 23, " For the wages of sin is (thanatos) death; but the gift of God is (zoe aionios) eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord," I am assured that thanatos means " an unchanging eternal state of wretchedness and misery," and that zoe aionios means as before, " everlasting happiness," and so is it with every important passage bearing on this question in the Bible. Why are not these words allowed to have their own usual and proper meaning? Why is this new meaning put into them but that they may not conflict with the dogma of the endless existence of all souls.

 

 Webster's English dictionary defines the word soul to be "the spiritual, rational and immortal principle in man," etc., as though the author would effectually estop all inquiry as to its immortality, by making it enter into the definition of the word itself, and then he gratuitously informs us that " The immortality of the soul is a fundamental article of the Christian system," and so he would close the door of the Church against all who May venture to call his definition in question. But in the name of truth, we protest against this unwarrantable perversion of the plainest Scripture terms to sustain a human dogma. If by the immortality of the soul he means the immortality of the souls of those to whom Christ gives eternal life--it is indeed a fundamental doctrine of the Christian system; but if he means the immortality of all souls as a natural inheritance from Adam, without any regard to Christ, so far from admitting it to be a fundamental doctrine of the Christian system, we demand by whose authority this heathen doctrine has any place whatever in the Christian system?

 

In the latest revised edition, this oracular dictum has very properly been suppressed.

 

The author used the above paragraph not long since (Jan. 30, 1878), by anticipation in an article on "Conditional Immortality," in one of our religious papers.

 

Chapter 3.

 

Reason enlightened by revelation teaches that immortality is an attribute of deity.

Deductions of logic irresistible.

The dilemma.

 

 IT will doubtless be admitted by all theists that absolute and essential existence, and, consequently, ab-solute and essential immortality, is the attribute of God alone. He only hath immortality dwelling in Him. He is the fountain of all life, of whatever kind, to the universe. Essential being is, more than any other, the peculiar attribute of JEHOVAH. He claims it as His name. The I AM THAT I Am. "He that is, and was, and ever shall be," the uncreated, self existent, and eternal God. Strictly speaking, there is no other Being in the universe. The highest arch angel is but a creature. We are all creatures—not beings—from the highest to the lowest. The frequency with which we call ourselves " beings " is indicative of an error which insinuates itself into all reasoning on the question of the immortality of man. Our existence had a definite beginning, and it may have, or at least it might have, a definite ending, if He who gave it to us should will to take it away. The power to give life implies the power to take it away. The power to create implies the power to destroy. God 69 has made no independent self-existent creatures—that is, He has made no beings. This term, as a personal substantive, is never applied to man or any other creature, in the Scriptures. "In Him we live and move, and have our being." 'It may well be questioned whether it were possible for God to invest any creature with an absolute and essential immortality like His own. It would be to create another God independent of Himself. The very act of creation implies a dependent existence. Plato, who taught the essential immortality of the soul, logically taught the eternal pre-existence of the soul also. They are both parts of the same doctrine, and must stand or fall together. According to his philosophy, man was not a creature, but a being, having eternal life dwelling in him as an essential attribute of his soul.

 

 Christian men repudiate this philosophical dogma when stated in its entirety, as essentially Atheistic or Pantheistic. But the greater part of them cling to the latter half of the dogma as though it were an undoubted axiom. They deny the eternal existence of the soul a parte ante, but inconsistently affirm it a parte post. It is so defined in our dictionaries and in our psychological text-books, and it is thought heretical to deny it. But this doctrine is nowhere to be found in the Word of God. Immortality is never predicated of the human soul. Indeed this attribute is ascribed to our Lord alone. In 1 Tim., 6: 15, 16, He is declared to be " The only Potentate, the King of kings, and Lord of lords who only hath immortality." These terms, "immortal," "eternal," "never-dying," " ever-living," and so forth, which are so common among men when speaking of their own souls, are never found in the Scriptures in any such connection. These and tither terms implying endlessness, are often used to describe the subjective state or condition of the righteous soul as one of never-ending blessedness, and the objective doom of the wicked as eternally final and irreversible, but never are they used with respect to the soul itself.

 

 If having begun to live, we shall continue to live, and live forever, it will not be because of any inherent property of life within us, irrespective of our condition, and independent of the will of our Creator; but because He is pleased to continue us in existence. Should He, at any time, withdraw his sustaining power or cut us off from Himself, the fountain of all life, we must inevitably cease to exist. If we continue in His favor, we may anticipate eternal life. He may promise it to us upon certain conditions. But we can never have any other assurance of it than what He shall -give us. Of even a passive body in motion, we cannot affirm that this notion will be perpetual and eternal unless we can be assured that nothing shall ever occur to arrest the original impulse. Much less can we predicate immortality of the soul which needs, not merely the original impulse, but the sustaining power of Him who gave it life every moment of its existence.

 

 Eternity is a tremendous word. It is not simply a long time, nor a succession of long times. It is infinite duration. It is a mode of existence peculiar to the Deity. No period of time, however long, bears any proportion whatever to eternity. Many of those who talk so glibly of their own immortality do not stop to consider what they are talking about. It were, perhaps, possible that God might give to His creatures an unconditional assurance of living forever, or that He might determine within Himself, without giving us this assurance, that He would perpetuate eternally the life of every intelligent creature He has made, under all conditions and circumstances, whether they shall obey or disobey; whether they shall preserve their normal state or fall from it; whether they shall be holy, and, consequently, blessed, or sinful and necessarily wretched; whether they shall rise to heaven or sink to hell.

 

 But that He has given us any such assurance or has formed any such determination within His own mind, no one can affirm with any show of reason or Scripture. On the contrary, Reason, Nature and Scripture all unite in declaring that our life is a conditional life; that we must obey God if we would live; that we must preserve our normal state (or be restored to it) or, like everything else in nature, come to certain ruin; that purity and blessedness are necessary, in the very nature of things, to perpetuity of existence; that there is something in the nature of sin, which, like disease or corroding leprosy in the body, to which it is compared in the Scriptures, will inevitably (unless eradicated) work the utter ruin of the soul into which it has entered. " Sin when it is finished bringeth forth death."

 

 The eternal life of the heavenly hosts belongs to them only in consequence of their union to Him, who is the source of all life, and not as an essential attribute of their holy souls, and if the souls of the lost, and wicked spirits continue to live and suffer forever, it will not be because they have eternal life inherent in their natures, but because God wills to sustain them in being, upholding them with one hand, while from the other, He pours out upon them the vials of His wrath forever. Apart from His will no creature in heaven or hell can have any life at all.

 

The editor of Calmet's Dictionary says; " Immortality, in an absolute sense belongs to God only; He cannot die, angels are immortal, but God who made them can terminate their being: Man is immortal in part, that is, in his spirit, but his body dies; inferior creatures are not immortal; they die wholly. Thus the principle of immortality is differently communicated, according to the will of the Communicator, who can render any creature immortal by prolonging his life; can confer immortality on the body of man together with his soul, and who maintains angels in immortality by maintaining them in holiness. Holiness is the root of immortality; but God only is absolutely holy, as God only is absolutely immortal. All imperfection is a drawback on the principle of immortality; only God is absolutely perfect, therefore only God is absolutely immortal." The above article contains a strange mixture of truth and fiction. The writer seems to have had a glimpse of the truth, but he does not venture to carry out the doctrine he asserts. If holiness is the root of immortality, what becomes of immortality, if the root is wanting? If God, as he says, " maintains angels in immortality by maintaining them in holiness," does he not maintain the saints in immortality in the same way? No doubt he does. But what then becomes of the evil angels and the wicked? How are they maintained in immortality? What he means by " all imperfection is a drawback on immortality," we cannot guess unless it is that the imperfect and the wicked are not quite so immortal as the perfect!! But is immortality a thing of degrees? Can one creature be more immortal than another and yet both be immortal? Or does he mean that it is more difficult for God to make imperfect creatures immortal, but He will do it? Why not say as God's Word says, that holiness is essential to immortality!

s

 It may well be questioned whether a dependent existence is not necessarily a conditional existence: whether these are not synonymous expressions; whether there is anything in the universe but God Himself that is absolute and unconditional; especially, whether there can be any life but His that is unconditional; whether the very fact of its dependence does not make it conditional, or Subject to certain conditions that are the sine qua non of its perpetuity.

 

 If so, then we have only to inquire, what are the conditions of our immortality? and to this inquiry, we shall address ourselves.

 

 We have been the more earnest in stating and repeating this almost self-evident principle that God alone is absolutely and essentially immortal, and that all His creatures depend upon Him for "life and breadth and all things " because of its fundamental importance in this discussion, and especially, because most men who would not think of denying it when categorically stated, continually lose Sight of it in their reasoning about the human soul. They think of the soul and speak of it and reason about it always, and everywhere, as if it were naturally immortal, and would of itself continue to live as long as Jehovah lives. Hence they are brought to the inevitable though unwelcome conclusion that if it is not saved, it must necessarily suffer for ever; the doom of the wicked which is and can be nothing else than that of sin and wretchedness forever is in their view a necessity of nature—an awful result of transgression which the Deity put it out of His power to prevent, when He created man, by making him naturally immortal. They offer it as an apology. for Him when speaking of the eternal miseries that will come upon the lost. They commiserate Him, under the plea that if the soul cannot be saved from sin it must necessarily exist in-sin and wretchedness forever. So they manage to comfort their own hearts and commend Him to the love and confidence of others, notwithstanding the cruelty their theory charges Him with inflicting upon the unsaved, because He does it involuntarily. It is well they have some way of justifying the ways of God to His creatures. But if it were not for their error, His ways would need no justifying.

 

 The deductions of logic are irresistible. If our premises are well taken the conclusions must be accepted however unwelcome. If we assume, as most persons do, that the soul is immortal and that whatever its condition, whether sinful or holy, lost or saved, it will maintain its conscious existence without end: and if we take for granted that the Bible is the Word of God, or in other words, that it is true, then these two propositions must harmonize with each other. If they should seem to conflict they must be made to agree.

 

 The Bible assures us most positively that only a portion (it would seem but a small portion) of the' human race will "inherit eternal life," that many shall seek to enter in and shall not be able. Of course, if the dogma of the actual endless life of all souls is true, the Bible cannot mean what it says, but this must be taken figuratively to imply some pure and blessed condition of the soul that will endure forever. The Bible assures us with a reiteration that is very remarkable that the souls that do not enter into "life eternal " shall " die," shall " perish," shall be " destroyed," shall be " consumed." Of course, if this dogma of the deathless and indestructible nature of the soul is true, these and the many other expressions that assert the contrary, must be understood as meaning something else. They cannot be allowed to mean what they always do mean and must mean when applied to other objects, but must be taken in some tropical, unnatural sense. Hence they are commonly received as describing a depraved and miserable condition of the " never dying " soul. And all those elements of destruction like the devouring " worm that never dies," and the consuming "fire that is not quenched " which are spoken of as employed (whether actually or figuratively we will not now stop to inquire) in bringing the soul to an utter and final end—to denote the completeness and thoroughness with which they do their dreadful work, and which are understood to mean this, and nothing else when spoken of in other connections (see Isaiah 66: 24) are in this case taken to be but the instruments of eternal torture.

 

.And to sustain this theory, what is predicated of the worm only, that it " never dies " and of the fire only that it is not quenched, to show that they do not leave their work half finished, is so transferred from these active agencies to the soul which is the passive recipient as to make the meaning to be just the reverse; viz.:—that the soul never dies—that the work of destruction is never completed.

 

 This we understand to be the position of the great majority of Christian men at the present time. They cling to the idea of the necessary immortality of the soul with a pertinacity which nothing can shake. They also hold the Word of God in high esteem—none too high. They feel that they ought to love and trust God as their Heavenly Father. They do love and trust Him. They are jealous of His honor among men. Their hearts are imbued with the spirit of the gospel. But O, their logic! It leads them to dreadful conclusions concerning God and His government. They dare not believe in the final salvation of all men; for this would make Him a liar. They dare not accuse Him of injustice and of wrong, even towards His enemies. They shudder to think of what will become of the great multitude of the unsaved. The idea of their failing to be gathered with the ransomed of the Lord into His everlasting kingdom, and of their being blotted out from the book of life, were sufficiently terrible. But the thought of their writhing under the inflictions of God's wrath in all the agonies of hell forever and forever, and that He who made them, either cannot or will not put an end to their miserable existence; to be obliged to believe that there is no such thing as capital punishment under the government of God, but that He who has enjoined it upon human governments as the only suitable way of disposing of those who are guilty of the highest crimes, proposes to Himself no such summary way of disposing of incorrigible offenders under His righteous government; that although He threatens them with death, He will never execute them, but will imprison and torment them forever and forever. This fills them with dismay—they are utterly confounded. Their pious hearts are wrung with inexpressible grief —they know not which way to turn for relief. Their fidelity to the truth forbids them to take refuge in any of those forms of skepticism to which men of weaker faith resort. The well-known doleful confessions of Albert Barnes [See Barnes' Practical Sermons.] and of many Godly men like him, or the more positive protests of John Foster and others, need not be quoted. Every Christian man and woman who thinks at all on this subject, has felt substantially the same difficulty.

 

 But surely when our logic brings us to conclusions that are contradictory, preposterous and quite incredible, it is time we went back and examined not only the process, but the premises from which we started.t We do not propose to inquire into the truthfulness of the sacred Scriptures: they rest upon a foundation that cannot be shaken': nor into the correctness of our common translation: it is good enough for us as it is. But we do propose to inquire into the truth of this major proposition, and we beg of those who may follow us, to lay aside, as far as possible, for the time, their prejudices and to give us a candid hearing, while we inquire what are the teachings of Nature and of Revelation on this question of the natural immortality of the human soul.

 

 *

 

 The Bible never requires us to receive as true, anything which the constitution of our nature, given by God Himself, forces us to believe to be false or impossible.— Systematic Theology. By Charles Hodge, D.D.

 

Chapter 4.

 

Teachings of nature enlightened by revelation.

Nature of the soul; its two-fold life.

Words used in a double and contradictory sense.

Destruction not necessarily annihilation.

 

 I. THE necessary immortality of the soul is argued, so far as it is argued at all, on the ground that it is purely spiritual in its nature. Matter is corruptible. But that which is essentially spiritual is said to be incorruptible and indestructible. Whether there is any existence in the universe but the One Great uncreated self-existent Spirit that is absolutely and purely spiritual in the strictest sense of the word, is a disputed point among philosophers, which it is not necessary for us to discuss. Whatever may be the spiritual essence of the soul, according to the common use of the word spiritual, if, indeed, it be a spiritual essence, it is sufficient for us to know that the soul of man was created.

 

It is evident that the word " soul " is now taken in a higher and more ethereal sense than belongs to the words nephesh and pysche (Greek) in the original Scriptures, for which it stands. These two words are applied indiscriminately to men and beasts, in the Hebrew and Greek Scriptures. In the first chapters of Genesis, living souls (nephesh cayah) are predicated of animals as well as of men repeatedly, and so is it in other parts of the Bible; and in the New Testament the souls (psychai) of animals are spoken of as well as the souls of men; but our translators have thought it proper to translate this word " soul" almost never, excepting when man is spoken of, but to use the words " beasts," " creatures," " life," etc., when inferior animals are spoken of.

 

No theist will claim for it an eternal pre-existence. But if the soul was created it may be uncreated or destroyed by its Author. Whether it will ever be destroyed is a question of fact to be determined by such evidence as we can get from Reason and Revelation.

 

 But the argument for its necessary immortality on account of its spiritual nature rests entirely on the sup-position that it cannot be corrupted like matter. But what if this supposition should prove false? What if the soul shall actually become corrupted, depraved, diseased, in its own nature by sin? The argument for its indestructibility has no force, or, rather, whatever force there is in it goes to show, by analogy, that the soul, like material existences, will be destroyed as a soul. At any rate, the argument holds good only in case the original purity of the soul is maintained or restored. This will be found, when we come to the Scriptural Argument, to be the very doctrine taught by divine Revelation which we have undertaken to defend.

 

 The holy alone shall escape destruction, but "the soul that sinned it shall die."

 

 2. The human soul is generally understood to have been endowed with an amphibious nature, or a two-fold life; the one allying it to the spiritual; the other to the material world; the one looking upwards toward God and heaven, and communicating with Him through its spiritual faculties; the other looking downwards to the earth and communicating with natural and sensible objects through the senses; the one adapts it to fellowship with pure spirits that are above it in the scale of being; the other, to association with animals that are beneath it in the scale of creation: the one is called in the Scriptures the ( tneu-matikos )" spiritual mind ": the other the (psuchikos) "carnal mind," " the fleshy mind," or, as it should have been to perfect the antithesis, the psuchical or soulical mind.

 

 These two kinds of life in the same soul, so diverse in their natures, are supposed to have been originally adjusted to work in harmony together. Whether they were both designed to be perpetual, and if this harmony were maintained, to co-exist eternally, or whether the lower life was transitory in its very nature, and was so constituted as to fade away and give place to that which is higher and spiritual and eternal alone, we will not now stop to inquire. But it is evident that if this spiritual life is lost, and the soul is cut off from God, the only source of spiritual life, its animal or lower life alone remains. But this, whether through sin or by its original constitution, is now temporary and must come to an end. Every species of lower life is transitory. Every material organization is destined to be dissolved. What then becomes of the animal life of the soul? Or rather, what becomes of the soul itself, —if it can be regarded as a distinct organism or entity,—when both its spiritual and animal life are gone—when it is dead towards God and the spiritual world, and dead towards earth and earthly things? Has it still another third kind of life through which it may live forever? or can it exist as a soul without any life whatever? This is just what some of the advocates of this theory of the immortality of the soul have attempted to show. [See Life and Death Eternal, Chapter 3.] Because a tree can "exist," as it is claimed, for a time, after it is dead, we are assured that the human soul may exist, and that forever after it is dead, and not only exist without life forever, but exist as an intelligent, conscious, active, suffering, sinning soul, forever!!

 

 But we deny that a tree or an animal or anything that ever had life can continue to exist, as such in any true sense of the word, after it is dead. The dead form may remain. But it is not the carcass of an animal that constitutes the animal, nor the timber of a tree that constitutes the tree. No man can make a tree or an animal though he can make an image of either. Life is necessary to the very existence of the thing itself, and if the thing retains its life, it is not dead. The same is true of the soul.' We might, were it necessary, show how the death of a tree necessitates the decay of the very form, sooner or later, and how the death of an animal necessitates the decomposition of the carcass: But the question is not how long this dead tree might stand before going to decay, but whether it can grow, bear fruit, no matter how bitter it may be, or fulfil any of the functions of a living tree after it is dead. The question is not how long the carcass of a dead animal might be preserved afterthe life had gone out of it, but whether its animal functions can go on as before! If anyone chooses to assert the absurd proposition, that the soul, whether as a material or immaterial entity can exist as a soul after it is dead in both its spiritual and material natures, he has yet to prove that it can think, remember, feel, suffer and maintain the functions of a living soul though it is dead! The assertion is not only fatuous but self-contradictory. No man who asserts it can tell what he means by it. He must first vacate the words life and death of all their proper meaning and put another meaning into them; or rather he must use them in double and contradictory sense at the same time.

 

 No man at the present day would think of employing such sophistical quibbles as this were he not greatly straitened to sustain an untenable theory. It savors of the philosophical quirks. which the schoolmen of the dark ages spent so much time in trying to solve. For example—" When a man says "I lie," does he lie, or does he speak the truth! For, if he lies, he-speaks the truth, and if he speaks the truth, he lies." " Can a spirit go from one place to another without passing through the intervening space?" " Can two spirits occupy the same identical point at the same moment of time?" Haec exempli gratia sufficient. So it is by the employment of such words as life, death, existence and the like in a double and contradictory sense in the same proposition, that a semblance of support is given to the doctrine that the soul can survive its death, and exist after it is destroyed. But it ill becomes our theological instructors of the present day to employ such logodaedaly as this in the exposition of God's Word.

 

 The same sort of logical prestigiation is practiced with the word annihilation which our opponents are so fond of flinging at us notwithstanding our protests, for maintaining the Bible doctrine of the destruction of the soul, as though the extinction of conscious existence in any object implied or necessitated the annihilation of the very substance of which that object was composed. This is a very good Word to juggle with, but it has no force in this argument but in the double-entente of which it is capable. The trick consists in first predicating it of the elemental particles of which an object is composed; and then, " presto "—it is transferred to the object itself, and if we admit or deny the predicate in the one case we must admit or deny it in the other also. That is to say,—the elemental particles that enter into the composition of a house are not annihilated though the house be consumed by fire and the ashes scattered to the winds, but they still exist—therefore the house itself exists, and exists as a house!

 

 But we may be told that the soul is such a peculiar entity that it cannot be destroyed so as to cease to exist as a soul without the annihilation of its essence or substance also, and that therefore the soul as a soul cannot be destroyed so as to cease to exist as a soul. For nothing is ever annihilated.

 

 In all syllogistic reasoning one must look well to his premises or he may be led unawares to the most fatuous conclusions. In this syllogism both the premises are assumed without any positive evidence to support them, and assumed for the purpose of forcing the conclusion. As to whether any elemental substance ever has been, or ever will be annihilated, all we are at liberty to affirm is —that we do not know. And surely our ignorance is no proper foundation for a positive argument. As to the other premise, that the soul cannot be destroyed so as to cease to exist as a soul, without the annihilation of its elemental substance:—it is simply an assertion without any proof whatever. Before one can affirm this he must first be able to tell us what the human soul is, and of what it is composed, or whether it has or has not any composition or elemental base.

 

 The human body when formed was made, as the Scriptures tell us, out of materials already existing, and when it dies it is resolved back to its original elements. As a living organism it is destroyed and ceases to exist, but the elemental particles remain. If the soul is a living organism, no matter how ethereal the elements that compose it, then it may be resolved back into its original elements and, in like manner, cease to exist as a soul without the annihilation of these elements.

 

 But is the soul only the effect or the manifestation of certain organic relations? Then the effect ceases when these relations are destroyed. But there is no annihilation of any substance. Annihilation is a physical term and can only be predicated of substantial entities. We do not say of color or of sound that they are annihilated. We only say,—They vanish, or fade away, or cease. Nor do we predicate annihilation of a thought, nor of a series of thoughts, nor of the principle of life itself. We say,—It goes out, it is extinguished, it ceases to manifest itself in the organism it had animated. But we do not say that it is annihilated; nor can we truly say it.

 

 But is the soul neither an organism nor the effect of organic relations, but a simple entity or vital force, corresponding to the other invisible elemental forces in nature emanating from the Deity and acting or manifesting themselves only in connection with some organism or material object? Then what becomes of it when this connection A dissolved? What becomes of the animal soul, or the vital force in any of the inferior organisms when these objects die? What becomes of the electric or galvanic force that has spent itself in the object where it had manifested itself? What of the cohesive power, or of chemical affinity? What of the flash of light that is extinguished? What of heat which is said to be only another mode of motion? What of motion itself when it is arrested? Philosophy tells us that action and reaction are equal and that this force is not really annihilated. It has only entered into other relations. It suggests also the inquiry whether all these vital forces are not, in the last analysis, resolvable into one common principle emanating directly from the Deity and returning to Him, as the great Reservoir and only Source of all life and power in the universe.

 

 Dr. Noah Porter in his essay on "Psychology and the Saul," introductory to his work on the Human Intellect, teaches, if we correctly apprehend his meaning, that the life of the body and of the soul or the soul itself is one and the same principle or force, or agent; to quote his own words: " The progress of physiology in recent times as well as the more careful study of the conditions of certain psychical phenomena have seemed to favor the identity of the vital and spiritual forces." " The principle of life and of psychical activity is one." " If the principle of vital force and spiritual activity be one and the same "—" Now whether or not the life and the soul are one," etc.

 

 He then goes on to say, " That the soul begins to exist as a vital force does not require that it should always exist as a vital force in connection with a material body. Should it require another such body or medium of activity it may have the power to create it for itself as it has formed the one it first inhabited, or it may already have formed it in the germ and hold it ready for occupation and use as soon as it sloughs off the one which connects it with the earth." § 25. All this is not only very philosophical but just what the Gospel declares to be true in the case of every Christian; a new spiritual body will be given him, which his new and heaven-born spirit will animate forever. But how is it in the case of the wicked to whom no such body will be given? How, in the case of those who, according to the same Gospel, die, not only as to their bodies, but as to their souls? What possible life, or activity, or consciousness, remains to them, when not only the organism upon which the vital force exerted itself, but the very force or agent itself has ceased to be, or has returned to the source from which it came?

 

 Whether we reason about the cessation of cohesive, crystalline, chemical, vegetable, animal, or spiritual life, when the organism in which it manifests itself is destroyed, that is, when it dies, who can give any better account of the matter than the wise man gives? " Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was, and the spirit shall return to God who gave it."—Eccl. 12: 7. Our chief difficulty in reasoning on this subject is in our ignorance. Men ridicule the idea of the destruction of the soul, not because it seems impossible for God to destroy what He has made, but because they cannot understand what becomes of it. They might as well ridicule the idea of its being created because they cannot understand where it came from.

 

 But whatever its original source, God can demand it back. to that source. If, like the body, it was formed from something previously existing, it can return like the body to its original elements and cease to exist as a soul. If it had no previous elemental existence, but issued directly from God, then He may recall it to Himself so that it shall have no more separate existence than it had before. Is not this the meaning of the passage just cited?

 

 But the fact is, we know nothing and we affirm nothing concerning the annihilation of the elemental substances or forces in nature. The word ought not to be thrown into this discussion to confuse the mind and to bring ridicule upon the Scriptural doctrine of the destruction of the soul. We protest against being characterized or rather, caricatured as " annihilationist " for defending this Scriptural doctrine of destruction. It is a common practice of sophists and quibblers to endeavor to misrepresent their antagonists, or to throw the odium of obnoxious terms over any position they cannot successfully assail with fair arguments, but we have a right to expect, and to demand, in the interests of a common Christianity, more honest dealing on the part of Reverend Doctors and Theological Professors in the discussion of this question.

 

 The author of " Life and Death Eternal," in his Preface, says " We have commonly employed the term " Annihilation " to designate the cessation of existence which these writers advocate. We are aware that many of them object to the term as not being fully expressive of their mode of stating and arguing the case. We would only say that we cannot be debarred the use of a convenient (?), indeed an indispensable (!) term, out of deference to their preferences."

 

 It may be a very " convenient term," for him to use, and " indeed indispensable" to his mode of stating and arguing the case, but is it honest? What must we think of the merits of a cause that needs to be upheld by such methods.

 

Chapter 5.

 

What nature teaches.

Analogies. Vegetables. The chrysalis.

Successive creations and destructions. Survival of the fittest.

Everything must preserve its normal condition or premature ruin ensues.

 

 NOBILITY OF MAN'S NATURE.

 

 3. THE revivification of the vegetable world in the Spring, after the apparent death of Winter, also, the double life through which some insects pass, are thought to typify, if they do not foretell, a future life for man.

 

 These are certainly beautiful symbols of that future state which is more plainly revealed in the Gospel, but they come infinitely short of proving or even of symbolizing the immortality of man in that future state, and much less, the immortality of airmen, both good and bad, which is the point in question. If these analogies are to be based at all in this argument, they afford a remarkable confirmation of the doctrine taught in the Scriptures that immortality is not the portion of all, but only of a part of the human race. It is not every vegetable that revives in the Spring—nor every seed that sprouts up after an apparent death in the ground, but only such as have life remaining in them. All others go to decay.

 

 And as for the larvae that pass through the chrysalis state into a higher life as winged insects,—they must preserve the germ of their future life unimpaired while in their first stage, or the butterfly within them is never developed. They die after fulfilling their career as grubs or larvae and come short forever of that aerial lepidopterous state for which Nature had designed them, and into which those of their species that are fit are admitted.

 

 Naturalists tell us that every larva of this class, as the caterpillar for instance, carries within itself while in its grub state, an embryo butterfly or psyche (psuche?)—as it is called in Greek—the very word the Scriptures use for the human soul—possessing all the organs of the butterfly in an undeveloped state, in addition to its own proper organism, and that this embryo butterfly or psuche hidden within the grub, is peculiarly liable to the attacks of little winged insects called ichneumon flies, which prey upon its substance and destroy its life, and that too, without any apparent injury to the grub. It fulfils its larva life and goes into the chrysalis state, and like all other grubs of its kind, wraps itself in its cocoon or winding sheet in the anticipation of a higher life to come. But it rises not with its fellows to another life in the air as a winged butterfly, for the embryo psuche (soul) within was destroyed while it was yet a crawling grub. It only goes to corruption and perishes forever. This butterfly life is reserved for those only of its species that were prepared for it and died in a well founded hope of the life to come. Here is the doctrine of conditional Immortality typified in Nature as clearly as possible.

 

 The parallel is perfect, and if this does not foretoken and teach what we believe the Scriptures declare, concerning the destruction of the psuche or soul within man by sin while yet in this world, and his consequent forfeiture of that higher angelic life in the world to come which is reserved for the righteous alone, then it is impossible for Nature to teach us anything by analogy.

 

 4. Is there anything in the character of God as displayed in Nature and Providence, or in the nature of alien man to warrant the assumption that the soul will never under any contingency whatever be destroyed? What might have been true of the soul had it never been corrupted by sin, it is not needful now to inquire. But what is the truth concerning the soul in its present condition of sin? That God does destroy the works of His hands will not be denied. The history of creation so far as we are acquainted with it has ever been that of successive creations, and destructions, and of new creations which are yet to be destroyed to give place to other forms of life and beauty that are more perfect. And who shall say that this process will not go on till "That which is perfect is come and that which is in part shall be done away." (1 Cor. 13:10)? However true or false the new " Development theory " may be, as a theory of creation, it is unquestionably true that the less perfect are supplanted by the more perfect, and "the fittest survive." And this truth may be yet found to have a spiritual application in respect to the salvation of the righteous and the destruction of the wicked which its infidel advocates would be quite willing to ignore.

 

 It is not material structures alone that are dissolved by the hand that created them, but living organisms, also. Life has been scattered everywhere with a wonderful prodigality by Him who is the source of all life; and then it has been as freely taken away.

 

 The human race began its career upon the earth surrounded on every side by the relics of living creatures that had passed away. The life that had once animated them had gone out of them, and they had been dissolved and were dissolving back to their original elements. The very dust from which our bodies were formed was composed largely, if not wholly, of the debris of extinct organisms that had once had an individuality of their own but had lost it forever. The life (psyche) that was given to man at his creation, came from the same source—for there is no other,—that had animated them.

 

 Now in the formation of man, who stands confessedly at the head of God's creatures in this lower world, are we sure that the Almighty has come to the climax of perfection, or to the limit of His creative power, or even to that limit where this law of change must be reversed, and beyond which He will no longer destroy, but conserve and preserve forever? Did man at his creation have any such assurance? Does God's providence—to say nothing now of His Word, which we will consider by and by—teach us any such doctrine? We are told that the inferior forms of life and beauty are intended to be ephemeral, and when they have completed their round or cycle they have fulfilled their destiny, but that man was made to move in an eternal cycle. Granting this for the sake of the argument—on the supposition that man continued pure as God made him—what if he should not continue pure? What if he should drop from this cycle into an inferior one, and voluntarily seek selfish and finite ends? What if the blight of sin should come upon his soul,—will this make no difference with the result? Those living organisms that are transitory in their nature, are often blighted or nipped in the very bud and cut short in their career. Those that are the most beautiful and excellent are often the most frail and liable to premature death. They do not fulfil their natural round, ephemeral as it is, but come to an untimely end. Was man, the most beautiful and excellent of all God's creatures, placed by his Creator beyond the possibility of any such blight coming upon his soul to bring it to an untimely end.

 

 It seems to be a universal law, so far as our observation extends, that every thing in nature must preserve its normal condition or it comes to premature ruin. This is true not only of living organisms as a whole, but of every separate organ.' All organs or functions that are misused or unused become disordered and weakened and finally perish. Disease, paralysis and premature decay come upon the eye or the muscle or the limb that is abused or never used at all. There are said to be more than a dozen species of animals in the dark mammoth cave of Kentucky that have lost the faculty of vision. This is a law of the mind also. It is the secret of all mental and physical health, growth and progress. Is this law reversed in the soul of man? Does it stand as an exception among all the works of God? Is it indestructible in the very constitution of it being—liable to no blight, no contingency that shall bring it to an untimely end? Is man under no necessity of using his moral faculties and using them aright? Under no necessity of preserving his normal condition of holiness, that his soul may fulfil its cycle—its eternal cyclic—if such was the will of God in his creation? The question answers itself. The Scriptures reiterate over and over again just this very truth which Nature so plainly teaches. " For whosoever hath, to him shall be given, and he shall have more abundance; and whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken away even that he hath," Matt. 13: 12. " The soul that sinned, it shall die." " When sin is finished it bringeth forth death." " The end of those things is death," et passim.

 

 Might we not infer from the teachings of Nature, without the more positive declarations of the Word of God, that sin in the soul is analogous to that principle of disease or decay or rot in material organisms which is the sure precursor of death; which unless arrested will inevitably bring them sooner or later to dissolution? Is not holiness as necessary to perpetuity of being as it is to happiness? Holiness and happiness are one and inseparable. Is it possible to predicate eternal perpetuity of the one and not of the other? Purity is the soul's normal condition: and is not its preservation absolutely essential to Eternal Life—or Eternal existence (if anyone prefers the term) intelligent, active, conscious, sensitive existence in which the soul shall exercise its functions of life forever?

 

 What though man was intended for an eternal career, was it not for a career of blessedness and joy? Was it not as a holy and happy creature, living in obedience to the laws of his Creator and of his own being? Was not this the career upon which he was first started? Was not this his normal condition? And now that he has fallen from it and the blight of sin has come upon his soul, as all Nature, as well as God's Word declares—and now that he has lost, with his purity, his blessedness also, and consequently, all that makes his life worth preserving forever, will it be preserved? May he still eat of the Tree of Life? Reason and Nature by all her analogies, unite their testimony to the dreadful truth—no wonder man should be unwilling to receive it—that he must surely die. Not man's body merely, but the sinning soul—the man himself in the totality of his being.

 

 The living voice of God Himself in His Word comes to confirm their testimony, and yet, perishing man deluded by Satan and blinded by sin denies the unwelcome truth, and hopes to live forever!

 

 5. The advocates of the immortality of man insist much on the nobility of his nature. He was made in the image of God a little lower than (Elohim?) the angels (or, as some translate it, a little lower than God Himself and the very highest of all creatures.) He was crowned with glory and honor. He was made to have dominion over the works of God and all things (terrestrial?) were put under his feet (Psalm 8.) He was endowed with faculties and powers of which the highest orders of animals beneath him possess but the rudiments, and with others, of which they are entirely destitute: with a moral sense that enables him to distinguish the right from the wrong, with a mind that is able to rise towards God and examine and appreciate His works and ways, and is capable of unlimited expansion, and with a moral and spiritual nature that adapts him to communion and fellowship with his Maker.—Let all this be admitted, and more, that is said of the nobility of human nature in its original purity; it comes infinitely short of constituting him a real deity, or of investing him with any of the essential attributes of deity. He is but a creature after all, a dependent creature, subject to the law of God. He has neither Omnipotence, Omniscience, nor Omnipresence, nor Infallibility. Neither has he that most peculiar and essential, the most incommunicable, so to speak, of all the attributes of Jehovah, the I AM—the attribute of BEING, or of IMMORTALITY.

 

 Let it be granted that it might have pleased God to prolong his life indefinitely and without end if there should be no reason for taking it away. But as a dependent life, was it not necessarily a conditional life? Was there no condition of any kind attached to this boon? Was there no possible contingency by which this "noble creature " man, could forfeit his life? (We will listen to what the Scriptures say in answer to this question by and by.) What if man should spurn the high and holy alliance, the fellowship with His Maker to which he was invited? What, if turning his back upon God and heaven, he should seek his companionships among the transitory creatures of earth, and his pleasures in the things of time, and sense? What if he should disregard the voice of God within his soul and set up his own will and pleasure as the rule of his life, in opposition to the will of his Creator? What if he should ignore the spiritual and higher nature within him or bring it into degrading bondage to his animal nature? What if he should come down to the level of the brutes that perish, indulge in the same passions, live for the same finite, selfish, transitory ends? Is there no possible danger of his alienating, or losing, or forfeiting the boon that was offered to his hope, and which might have ever been held before him in the way of obedience? Is there no reason to fear lest he should share the fate of the brutes with which he has cast his lot, and of the world which he has chosen as his portion? Has the creature whose ends and aims are all selfish, finite, transitory, any reason to hope for an eternal career?

 

 What if he defies the wrath of the Almighty by rebelling against Him? What if he despises His laws and tramples His ordinances under his feet and finally rejects His overtures of mercy? Is there no such thing as judicial destruction under the government of heaven? Has God made the life of the soul so sacred that He Himself cannot take it away? Is there no death penalty? Is this last resort reserved for human governments alone, and must the Almighty Ruler content Himself with getting His enemies under a lock and key and tormenting them forever, because He gave them in the outset a life which He could not take away? Neither Reason nor Nature teaches any such doctrine as this.

 

Chapter 6.

 

Teachings of nature.

The instinct of immortality.

What it shows. The belief popular and why.

The papal church.

The reformation. Skepticism.

 

 6. IT is said that the subjective in man must have an objective answering to it. That to every natural instinct or faculty a corresponding object has been given upon which it may exercise itself, and in which it may find satisfaction. That man has an instinct of immortality,—that he shrinks back with horror from the thought of extinction.

 

 And, therefore, he will live forever. The philosophy of the ancients, and the poetry of the present day is full of this kind of reasoning.

 

 Whence springs this pleasing hope, this fond desire

 This longing after immortality?

 

 Or whence this secret dread and inward horror

 Of falling into naught? Why shrinks the soul Back on herself and startles at destruction?

 

 All this, and much more that might be urged in this line, would be very good reasoning and true, were man in his normal condition: had he not " fallen from the state in which he was created." The great fact of sin and its consequent ruin vitiates the whole. And now these instincts, these vain desires, this longing after good that is put beyond his grasp, these fearful forebodings of evil, only serve to show the magnitude of the disaster he has brought upon himself. It is not so surprising that heathen philosophers who had no Revelation to guide them, nor that infidels who rejects its testimony, though Nature testifies to the same truth, should reason about man as though he had forfeited nothing by sin; but how can Christian men take up these arguments and urge them, without ignoring the plainest teachings of God's Word, and denying one of the fundamental doctrines of the Christian religion?

 

 Does man shrink back from extinction? He also shrinks back from physical death. Does he have an instinct of immortality? So the criminal under sentence of execution has an instinct of life, and hopes, even against hope, that his life will be given to him. So all men desire to be happy, and they were constituted for happiness, but only in the way of holiness. A certain English writer [" Shall I live Forever?" by William Barker.] says: "A race of beings who can conceive of themselves as destined to immortality, whose universal aspirations have sought after it, whose language is almost universally framed to express their ideas about it, must, I believe, be destined to that end." Let the reader substitute for immortality the word happiness, which is equally appropriate, in the above sentence and then see what sense it makes. Again, he says, "every innate desire supposes a capacity in its subject answering to it. If, therefore, the soul craves immortality (happiness?), is capable of the conception of immortality (happiness?), and molds its beliefs and life with reference thereto, man must be immortal (happy?) his nature being plainly constructed with relation to indefinite and perpetual existence (happiness?)."

 

 Such an argument might have been expected from an infidel, or from one who denies human depravity, or from one who believes, and is endeavoring to prove, the final salvation of all men, but this is the language of an orthodox Christian who is trying to prove the necessary immortality of the ruined soul of man. If it proves anything, it proves that man, sinner though he be, and though he continue to be, shall have everything he desires and hopes for in the future. He longs for eternal blessedness as much as for eternal life. He is as " capable of the conception" of the one, as of the other. " His nature is as plainly constructed with relation " to the one as to the other. " He molds his beliefs and his life with reference " to the one as much as to the other. But what if he molds his life with reference to neither; but only with reference to time and the ephemeral pleasures of earth? What if he turns away from the only Source of both life and blessedness and seeks his highest gratification where neither the one nor the other can be found? Shall one be given to him and not the other? Is not holiness as necessary to eternal life as it is to eternal blessedness? The fact is, man has forfeited both by sin; and Nature, without the Gospel, shows him no way by which he can regain either the one or the other. And so " the whole creation groan-eth and travailed in pain together until now." But "the earnest expectation of the creature waited for the manifestation of the Sons of God."—Rom. 8.

 

 7. If the immortality of all men is not a true doctrine, why, its advocates triumphantly ask, is it so almost universally accepted? Vox Populi, Vox Dei. Not only such men as Plato, Socrates, Seneca, Cicero, Cato and other heathen philosophers believed and taught it with more or less assurance, but Atheists and Infidels unite with Christian believers in professing to find it in the Bible [* See New Englander, October, 1871, p. 689. Also Preface to " Life and Death Eternal."] and

 

Even the poor Indian whose untutored mind

Sees God in clouds and hears Him in the mind,

Whose soul proud Science never taught to stray

Far as the solar walk or milky way;

Yet simple Nature to his hope has given,

Behind the cloud-top hill a humbler heaven,

Some safer world in depth of wood embraced,

Some happier island in the watery waste,

Where slaves, once more their native land behold;

No fiend's torment: no Christian's thirst for gold:

And thinks admitted to yon equal sky

His faithful dog shall bear him company."

 

 The answer to this is very obvious. The instinct of life is an instinct of Nature. It was given to man, as indeed it is given to every living creature, however transitory his existence, as a motive to the preservation of his life. So long as he continued holy he had a right to hope for the continuation of his life. When he sinned, the instinct still remained as a sad reminder of the ruin into which he had fallen and as a foundation for that hope of recovery which was yet to be offered him in the Gospel.

 There is something so sweet, and attractive, so answering to the highest aspirations of his soul, in the thought of living forever, so assuring and flattering to his pride, that it is not strange that he should still cling to it, after he had forfeited all right to claim it, and lost everything that makes his life worth preserving.

 

 Hope springs eternal in the human breast, Man never is, but ever to be blest."

 

 That man should be willing to listen to the assurances of the tempter, as he still whispers in his ear the original lie, by which he compassed the ruin of our race, should not seem strange to Christian men who are instructed in the Scripture and " are not ignorant of his devices." With the Word of God in our hands it is folly to speculate upon the origin or universality of this delusion; for this tells us. It would be strange, indeed, if he who yet " deceives the whole world " should willingly give up that device which gained him so much power, and by which he is now able to asperse the character of God, dim the luster of the gospel, drive men into infidelity and " make the heart of the righteous sad and strengthen the hands of the wicked that he should not return from his wicked way by promising him life." Ezek. 13: 23.

 

 It was on this very question that Christ and his immediate followers came into collision with the Jews and the whole Heathen world. The Gentiles were filled with such vague notions as their poets had been pleased to give them of the Elysian fields in reserve for themselves, and the Avernian lake into which their enemies were to be cast, after death, and a multitude of other shadowy and fanciful ideas of happiness or misery "beyond the river." The Pharisees tinctured with these views, and dimly comprehending the prophetical testimony of their Old Testament Scriptures concerning the life and immortality yet to be revealed, had come to hope for a future life of blessedness for themselves at least, through the law of Moses. While the Sadducees, on the other hand denied the existence of any Spiritual world or Spirit whatever. But the Gospel, in opposition to them all, revealed a resurrection from the dead and a judgment to come for all men, and a new life and a blessed immortality for all the believers in Christ, and a second death with utter and final destruction for all who should refuse to believe on Him. Christ and His im-mediate followers preached no other doctrine than this. Nor can the Bible be made to teach any other, but by the most unwarrantable perversion of its uniform testimony from the beginning to the end. It was this truth, accompanied by the Holy Spirit, that gave the Gospel, at the first, such power over the hearts and consciences of men and carried it in triumph to the ends of the world.

 

 Satan well knew the mischief he could work with it: how he could bring the Gospel itself into disrepute-; how he could turn the grace of God to His elect into an accusation of injustice to the unsaved, and represent Him as yet more fiendish and cruel than himself. He knew also what a means of tyranny and oppression this doctrine would be in the hands of an ignorant and unscrupulous hierarchy which has always been so ready to do his bidding. The priesthood who were now beginning to assert the Divine prerogative of opening and shutting the doors of heaven to whomsoever they would, were quick to perceive what an almost superhuman power it would give them to keep the deluded and confiding masses in subjection, to be able, in addition to the loss of heaven, to hold over them the threat of eternal torments in the world to come. We all know how they have wielded their awful power. As a suitable accompaniment and necessary counterpart to this doctrine of endless tortures, they invented the doctrine of Purgatory, a place of .temporary and preliminary torture where such offences as they were pleased to specify, might be atoned for and condoned by money payments, and masses, if offered in time, and in sufficient abundance, and the "mystery of iniquity " was complete.

 

 When the people, groaning under the burden and thirsting after the Gospel of the blessed God, and inquiring as well they might, " Is His mercy clean gone forever?" began to show signs of revolt, the Inquisition with its fiendish tortures was set up on earth, as the fit prelude and counterpart of the yet more horrible and protracted tortures beyond, and the Church pointed to God Himself, in whose Name she acted, for both her warrant and her example for all the cruelties she inflicted upon these helpless victims of her displeasure!!

 

 It could not be expected that the Reformers just emerging into the light with all the prejudices in which they had been brought up, with all the errors of the past, like dark clouds hanging around 'them, should be able at once to cast off every human tradition and set forth the whole truth in its true proportions. They did all that could have been reasonably expected of men in their position. Luther, if not others in his day, appears to have had a perception of the truth on this question, and to have denounced this doctrine of the Papal Church as an error.

 

" I permit the Pope to make articles for himself and his faithful, such as that the soul is the substantial form of the human body, that the soul is immortal, and other monstrous opinions to be found in Roman decretals."— MARTIN LUTHER.

 

 But he seems to have seen it, like the doctrine of transubstantiation, but imperfectly, or he was too much occupied with subjects demanding more immediate attention, and this dogma, lying underneath all the other errors that confronted him was suffered to remain in the creed of the Reformed Church, to be yet eliminated—as it surely will be—by a more enlightened and calmer age.

 

I am very confident the Lord has more truth yet to break forth out of His Holy Word. For my part, I cannot sufficiently bewail the condition of the Reformed Churches, who are come to a period in religion, and will go at present no further than the instruments of the

first Reformation. The Lutherans cannot be drawn beyond what Luther saw; whatever part of His will our good God has imparted and revealed unto Calvin, they will rather die than embrace it. And the Calvinists, you see, stick fast where they were left by that great man of God, who yet saw not all things. This is a misery much to be lamented."—Robinson's Last Charge, 1620.

 

 The Christian Church is yet but very imperfectly freed from the unholy influence and mischievous operations of human authority. The house requires to be more carefully swept than it was at the Reformation from Popery, and a more thorough search must be made for the old heaven, that it may be more completely cast out.—Dr. Brown.

 

 It is owned that the whole scheme of Scripture is not yet understood: so, if it ever come to be understood before the restitution of all things, and without miraculous interpositions, it must be in the same way that natural knowledge is come at, by the continuance and progress of learning and liberty, and by particular persons attending to, comparing and pursuing intimations scattered up and down it, which are overlooked and disregarded by the generosity of the world. Nor is it at all incredible that a book which has been so long in the possession of mankind should contain many truths as yet undiscovered.—Bishop Butler.

 

The Reformers, like the family of Lot had no sooner hurriedly got out of the doomed city, than a portion of them began to look back as did Lot's wife, and from that day to this, they have remained like her lifeless image, making no progress whatever. And even the other members of the family, though now in earnest and more progressive, have shown themselves exceedingly. loth to leave the plain round about, and go up higher." This heirloom of error which they brought out with them, is still cherished with a peculiar fondness. Though, from time to time, there have been those to protest against it, their voice has been drowned by the cry of heresy, and it still remains as one of the chief sources of skepticism and a grand hindrance to the progress of the Gospel at the present day.

 

 There is nothing in the doctrine of the immortality of the soul to offend the pride or the prejudices of any man. Infidels and Scoffers of every name are quite willing to accept it, from whatever source it may come, and they are glad also to take the assurance of the Church, that it is found in the Bible, though accompanied by that other doctrine which they reject, but which, to the Christian is its necessary corollary—the perpetuity of evil, and the eternal misery of a portion of the human race: for it gives them one of their chief arguments against the Bible as the Word of God and against the God of the Bible. But strange to say, Christian men, who ought to be jealous for the Truth and for the Name of their God, in their zeal for the defense of their dogma, do not hesitate to quote the impious jibes and flings of these scoffers at the Word of God as so much evidence in their favor; and yet they mourn over the growing skepticism of the day and wonder why it is that the masses are breaking away from the teachings of the Church and running into every species of error!

 

The author of Life and Death Eternal, p. 15, quotes the following words of Theodore Parker: " I believe that Jesus Christ taught eternal torment."—" I do not accept it on his authority; " and again in his article in the New Englander Oct. 1871, p. 689, he refers to the testimony of the " Parkers and the Paines " as so much evidence on his side. Why did it not occur to him to quote also the testimony of another and older witness. Gen. 3:4?

 

 The Congregationalist of Dec. 19, 1877, in an editorial article quotes this same utterance of Theodore Parker and also similar utterances of T. Starr King and J. Ernest Revau for the same purpose!

 

 To deny the doctrine of the eternal existence of sin and misery, and that Satan with his gathered hosts will live to rage and suffer as long as God lives, will no doubt seem almost like blasphemy to some pious souls, for while they dwell in the comfortable assurance of eternal life for themselves, they have learned to look upon Satan and sin and misery as a necessary part of the universe of God. They dare not allow themselves to think of the time when every enemy shall be destroyed, and the arch foe of God and man shall cease to have any being; when the Kingdom of God shall completely come, His glory shall shine through the whole universe and His love shall fill every heart. This would be too good to be hoped for, and too much like Universalism to be true. But if this doctrine is true, as we think we can show from the Word of God itself, then it would be impossible to frame a greater libel on the Wisdom, Justice, Power and Goodness of Gad than the dogma we have undertaken to refute. But if we are in error, it shall be the error of those who are entertaining too exalted views of the character of God, and of the completeness of the destruction which Christ shall bring upon His enemies. But confident that the truth is with us, we are bold to say with the Psalmist, to the whole world, " O magnify the Lord with me, and let us exalt His Name together." "For His mercy endures forever."

 

Chapter 7.

Argument from revelation.

Successive steps in creation, different orders. Psyche and pneuma.

The soul and the spirit, the one perishable, the other imperishable.

 

SCIENCE shows a regular gradation in the works of God from the lowest to the highest. (1.) First, there is mere chaotic matter, or the simple elements of the universe. (2.) Next, there is matter aggregated into masses, having the property of cohesion, which for the want of a more general and comprehensive term we call its life or the life power in its lowest manifestation. (3.) In the next highest grade we find matter possessing chemical properties and entering into chemical combinations.

 

 (4.) After this, we find matter assuming certain definite and regular shapes, like the crystal, by a certain formative life force within and among its elemental particles.

 

 (1.) Then comes matter endowed, in addition to the properties of the orders beneath it, with organic life, and with the power of growing and of eliminating, by a certain blind instinct, its own proper pabulum from the objects around it. (6.) After this, comes matter possessing all the foregoing properties or various degrees of the life power, with a sensitive nature superadded, which is yet a higher kind of life, with the power of thought, volition and action. This kind of life is called in Hebrew, Nephesh, which means living soul, or creature that lives by breathing. The equivalent for this word in the Greek is psuche (or psyche) and this is the word commonly used in the Scriptures to designate Animal life, whether of brutes or men, often translated soul, but always with reference to its physical relations. The Latin equivalent is anima, meaning air or breath: hence our English word Animal, which by accommodation is applied to all sensitive creatures to distinguish them from vegetables, whether they live by breathing or not.

 

 (6.) Last of all, comes man, carrying with him all the properties, functions and faculties of the orders beneath him, and yet endowed with something more which links him to the invisible world above. This additional peculiar property in man is called in the Hebrew, Neshamah, a word never applied to the brutes: the Greek equivalent is Pneuma; in Latin, it is, Spiritus; hence our word Spirit; and the world above is called the Spiritual world; and this higher kind of life in man is called his Spiritual life (pneumatikos life) to distinguish it from his animal (or psuchikos) life.

 

 This would scientifically seem to be the natural order of creation, and when we inquire of the Divine Record, we find it declared to be the true order, in time also, of these six-days' work of Creation as described in Genesis, 1st and 2d Chapters. It was not till after all these lower orders, with their various kinds of life had been made, and had existed upon the earth,—for how long a time we need not now enquire—and the earth was fully prepared for his residence that man was made. " And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life (lives) * and he became a living soul." (Nephesh Chayah) Gen. 2: 7. This Hebrew word here translated living soul, but usually living creature, and its Greek equivalent, is applied indiscriminately to brutes and men throughout the Bible, (see Gen. 1: 20, 21, 24; 2: 19; 9: 4, 9, 10. Lev. 24: 18. Rev. 8: 9, etc.) But the word Neshamah translated the breath of life means the Spirit of God, and does not belong to man even, except as it is breathed into him by God Himself. The Greek word Pneuma and the Latin Spiritus, and the English Spirit, properly signify the same thing, but they are often used, as we shall see, with a greater latitude of meaning.

 

 We have seen that each order in the ascending scale of Creation, while including all that is below, possesses an additional something which gives it a superiority, and distinguishes it from the orders beneath it. So man was endowed with a superadded gift, which distinguishes him from mere animals, and gives him superiority over them. It is not the (psuche) the soul, the (psuchikos or) soulical nature, for this he possesses in common with other animals, though he possesses it in a more perfect degree, but the ( pneuma) the Spirit, the (pneumatikos or) spiritual nature, or otherwise called, his religious nature, which the brutes do not possess, and which allies him to his Maker and enables him to hold communion with Him. It is this spiritual or religious faculty that especially distinguishes him from other animals.

 

 We observe further that while each of these. orders appears to be distinct from every other—and though we have no good evidence from nature, much less from Revelation to show, what some scientists are beginning to guess and trying to prove, that the lower is developed into the higher, in the upward movement of all things towards perfection—we do yet find that they somewhat overlap each other, and each inferior order seems to possess, as by anticipation, in a shadowy form, that peculiar additional something which belongs only to the next higher degree and which gives it pre-eminence over those be-neath it. So is it with the brutes in relation to man. They possess a soulical nature in common with man, but the Spirit of God was never breathed into them as into man. They have, properly speaking, no spiritual or religious nature either in esse, or in passe. But yet they have, especially those that have been tamed and domesticated, something very much akin to it. We detect in them, what may be called the rudiments or shadows of the religious faculty in their loyalty to man, who stands to them, somewhat in the same relation as the Deity stands to us. They reverence and fear, and love him. They are capable of a kind of companionship, union and sympathy with him. They seem to have a sense of what is right or wrong so far as to perceive what will please or displease him. These are the faculties which, in man, when exercised toward God, are called his religious faculties. They belong properly, not to his soulical, —but to his spiritual nature. But the brute can ascend no higher; he has no sense of God whatever and no faculty by which he can hold any communion with Him. In other words, he has no Pneuma or Spirit, but simply a Psuche or Soul within him. But man was originally endowed with both.

 

 It is true, there are certain passages of Scripture in which the word spirit seems to be predicated of brutes, as Eccl. 3:21: " Who knoweth the spirit (rooach) of a man that goes upward, and the spirit, (rooach) of the beast that goes downward? " but it is not the spirit in its highest sense (the Neshamah) that is spoken of; another word (rooach) is here used which implies something common to both. Some have rendered the text, " Who knoweth the spirit of man that goes erect or upright, and the spirit of the brute that goes prone or on all fours? " Others, " Who knoweth if the spirit of the children of Adam goes upward and if the spirit of the beast goes downward? " For the wise man is not endeavoring to exalt the nature of the brutes, but rather to show that man in the loss of his true spiritual nature had sunk to a level with the beasts that perish, and must share in their fate, as is evident from the context, to which we will refer again.

 

 In the use of psychological terms, there must always be some degree of indefiniteness, either from the poverty of language, or from our inability fully to understand the subject. But there is a radical distinction between these two words, Soul and Spirit, which must not be ignored, or it is impossible to discuss this question intelligently.

 

 Every spiritual thing must first be incarnated that we may apprehend it in our lower natures. So every spiritual word must have a material base, so to speak, and a material and sensual signification, but still its spiritual signification is as real and actual as its material, and it is difficult to say which ought to be called the primary and which the secondary. At any rate, we often err in calling one the actual and the other the tropical signification.

 

 The words soul and spirit both have their base or counterpart in natural objects, and hence are each used in what appears to be two senses in the Scriptures as everywhere else. The word Psuche or soul means that life which man and brutes possess in common, and is predicated of either indiscriminately. It denotes and includes the whole animal mind in its cosmical relations. It often stands for the blood itself in which the life specially resides (See Gen. 9: 4. Lev. 17:11, etc.,) and often for the person or individual, implying personality or individuality. It denotes selfhood and in this sense it is often used as a personal pronoun, and God applies it to Himself in such expressions as " My soul shall have no pleasure in him." " In whom my soul delighted," etc. And in the text translated "Let me die the death of the righteous," it is in the original, " Let my soul (nephesh) die the death of the righteous." Hence it comes to mean even the dead body itself, as Num. 5:1-2; and 6: 6; 9: 6; 19: 11, 13, etc. But its more ordinary sense is the living person or individual, whether man or brute, with all the faculties and functions of his nature; and in its higher sense it denotes the mental faculty residing in the body and belonging to it. It is now used more generally with reference to man's higher nature, and less frequently to denote that which he has in common with the animals, than formerly—certainly in a much higher and exclusive sense than the words for which it stands in the Scriptures. Then there are various tropical senses which need not be mentioned In the New Testament, see also Matt. 2: 20; 6: 25; 10: 39; Luke 12: 19; Jn. 12: 25; Acts 2: 43, etc.

 

 The word Pneuma or spirit, is often used in its material sense to denote mere breath or wind, and also to designate those invisible intelligences, whether good or bad that are supposed to be above man in the scale of being, whose nature we do not propose here to inquire into, and also in various tropical senses, it is applied to brutes and other objects having any kind of life, to characterize the nature of that life. But in its higher and more common Scriptural sense it denotes that Divine principle of life dwelling primarily in God, and, by Him, communicated to the soul of man as its peculiar divine life. " God is a Spirit and they that worship Him, must worship Him in spirit and in truth." Jn. 4: 24. "It is the Spirit that quickened, the flesh profited nothing; the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, they are life." 6: 63. "The Spirit itself bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God." Rom. 8: 16; et al.

 

 There is everywhere a real radical difference between these two words as used in the Scriptures, but there is a distinctive relative sense which is very obvious when they are used in the same connection, or in contrast or comparison with each other, as in 1 Cor. 15:45. "The first man Adam was made a living soul, (psuchen zosan) the last Adam, a quickening spirit, (pneuma zoo poioun); Or in 1 Thess. 5: 23, " And I pray God, your whole spirit, soul and body, be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ." Or in Heb. 4: 12. " For the Word of God 'is quick and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even, to the dividing asunder of the soul and spirit."

 

 This distinction is especially marked when these terms are used adjectively, as they often are, to exhibit the contrast between the two. But it would be more obvious to the English reader if our translators had employed the word animal to represent psuchikos as they have employed Spiritual to represent pneumatikos, but rejecting it because, perhaps it savored too much of the mere animal to express the exact idea, they have used such words as natural, sensual, etc., to represent it, and, if we continue to discard the adjective animal, we shall need to coin the somewhat uncouth word psuchical or soulical to bring out the contrast between the two Greek words pneumatikos and psuchikas in the Scriptures, as for example, " It is sown a natural body (soma pluchikon, i.e., a soulical body), it is raised a spiritual body (soma pneumatikon). There is a natural (soulical) body and there is a spiritual body," 1 Cor. 15:44. "This wisdom descended not from above, but is earthly, sensual, (soulical), devilish, James 3: 15. These be they who separate themselves, sensual, (soulical), having not the Spirit," Jude 1:19. "The natural man (psuchikos de anthropos, the soulical man, or man with a soul) received not the things of the Spirit of God, because they are spiritually discerned," 1 Cor. 2:14. This soulical mind or nature in man is very frequently called the carnal or fleshly mind or nature, and, as such it is contrasted with the Spirit. They are represented as opposed to each other and warring together in him in his fallen state. And the contrast between the two is continually pointed out in the Word of God, as " The Spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak." " Glorify God in your body and in your Spirit." " The flesh lusted against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh." "Being put to death in the flesh, but quickened in the Spirit." " To be carnally minded is death; but to be Spiritually minded is life and peace."

 

 From the above references and remarks it will be seen, that man in his, original State was endowed with a three-fold nature—a body, soul, and spirit, each distinct from the other but all united in one, a real trinity in unity. The body and soul, he possesses in common with other animals, the spirit in common with God. The soul, midway between the other two, is, strictly speaking, neither flesh on the one hand, nor spirit on the other, and yet it may be fleshly or carnal, or it may be spiritual according to the choice which it makes. In the one case it is called the carnal, sensual, fleshly or natural mind (for a great variety of epithets are used to express the same idea) in the other case, it is called the spiritual mind. The soul stands in the same relation to the body that the spirit does to the soul. The soul is the life of the body, and the spirit is the true normal life of the soul of man. But when used distinctively in the Word of God with reference to fallen man, soul denotes the mind in its Adamic, or, what is called, its natural or sensual relations, and spirit designates that which is heavenly and divine in him. In man's pure and normal state the spirit dominates the soul, and the soul the body, but in his fallen condition the order is reversed, and man is in disorder and ruin. The spirit is the breath of God. It is an immortal principle; it cannot die. But the soul can die spiritually, and it can die also naturally. And after it has lost its true spiritual life, it must die naturally as in all other animals.

 

 If man lives forever, while all other animals perish, it will not be because he has a living soul; so have they; nor because it is more perfect, more capacious, more noble than theirs, but because it allies itself with the Ever-living God and His Spirit gives it life. So long as it is united to the body only, and is dominated by its lusts and passions, and seeks its highest good in the things of time and sense that are transitory, it must pass away with them.

 

 This, we believe to be the true doctrine concerning the soul of man. We have been the more careful to point out the radical distinction between the Soul and the Spirit, and to dwell upon it, because it lies at the foundation of any intelligent understanding of the question at issue, and because it is just here that the greatest confusion exists in the minds of most persons who attempt to discuss it. The soul of man when it becomes entirely an animal soul, by the loss of its spiritual nature, becomes perishable like the soul of all other animals. But when it is, or becomes a spiritual soul, which can be only by union with God, it may live forever. It is here that we see the real difference between the children of Adam by a natural birth, and the children of God by a spiritual birth, and why it is, that while the former must perish, the latter are immortal. " For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is Life and peace."

 

Chapter 8.

 

The fall of man. The penalty.

How Adam must have understood it.

The tree of life. Why he was forbidden to eat of it.

The natural comes before the spiritual.

 

 MAN was created " in the image of God " with body, soul and Spirit; not with three distinct and separable personalities, but with the three, all united in one real triune personality. He was created pure and innocent, but not holy, in the sense of having a holy character* for character is subjective and is not an object of creation. His body was pure and perfect, though formed from the dust; his soul was pure; for it had never been polluted by sin: his spirit was pure; for it was the breath of his Maker. He was created " a living soul "—not actually immortal; neither was he created mortal; but he was made capable of either, or rather a candidate for immortality. He must first be tested and proved. His character was to deride his destiny.

 

 " But some may say, was not man created mortal? By no means. Immortal? Nor do we say this. But my opinion is, that he was neither mortal nor immortal by nature; for if he had been formed from the beginning immortal, He had made him a God. Again, on the other hand, if He had made him mortal, God would have seemed to be the author of death. Therefore, He made him neither mortal nor immortal, but capable of both, that he might advance to immortality, and by keeping divine commandments receive immortality as a reward and become divine. But, if by disobedience to God, he should turn .to the works of the flesh, he would become unto himself the author of his own death."—THEOPILUS, Bishop of Antioch. Second Century.

 

He was made lower than (Elohim, God?) the angels, in that he had an animal nature and was fitted for an earthly residence. And it may be questioned whether he was originally fitted for any' thing higher than a pure earthly existence; and he was made higher than the brutes, in that he was made capable of fellowship with God through his spiritual nature.

 

 What was the object of this test? Surely, not to determine whether he should be forever happy or forever miserable on earth; nor whether he should be forever happy or miserable in another state of existence, for there is no such state in question. There is not the least hint of it in the Bible account of his probation and fall. But the test was simply to determine what his character should be; whether he would obey or disobey His Maker; whether he would live after the flesh or the spirit; whether the sensual or spiritual nature that had been given him should predominate and rule in his soul; whether he would look upwards to God and heaven, or downwards to earth and the things of time and sense for the sources of his happiness; whether his motives and aims in life should be carnal, selfish, temporal and finite, or spiritual, holy, heavenly, and eternal,—in short, whether he should be a mere animal, though the highest of them all, and die with the animals upon the earth; or whether he should be a spiritual creature, and live in fellowship with other pure spirits above him, and with God Himself forever.

 

 Life he now has through the Spirit of God that was breathed into him; and so long as he shall continue in the favor of God, he has no reason to fear that it will be taken away. By the side of the " Tree of Knowledge of good and evil " by which he is to be tested, there is also standing in the midst of the garden, the "Tree of Life," whether as the pledge of the continuance of his life, or the means by which it is to be perpetuated, it matters not now to inquire. But in the other tree, there is the fearful alternative: "In the day thou eats thereof thou shalt surely DIE," If an inquiry be made here, how Adam would understand this; I reply that we have no reason to think he would understand it as referring to anything more than the loss of life as an expression of the displeasure of God. And indeed there is the highest evidence that the case admits of, that this was his understanding of it. For in the account of the infliction of the penalty after the law was violated; in God's own interpretation of it in Gen. 3: 19, there is still no reference to anything further, " Dust thou art and unto dust shalt thou return." Now it is incredible that Adam should have understood this as referring to what has been called " spiritual death " and to " eternal death," when neither in the threatening nor in the infliction of the sentence, is there the slightest recorded reference to it. Men have done great injury in the cause of correct interpretation by carrying their notions of doctrinal subjects to the explanations of words and phrases in the Old Testament.' —(Barnes' Notes on Rom. 5: 12.)

 

 Against whom or what is this threatening denounced? It seems almost like trifling to raise the inquiry, but this subject has been so mystified and perverted by human philosophy as to render it indispensable. We reply then, to the sinning man himself, most surely. Not to his hand, nor to his feet, nor to his body, but to the whole man. " What man holds of matter does not make up his personality. They are his, not he." (SIR W. HAMILTON.) The words of threatening are " Thou shalt surely die." It is not the body alone, nor the soul alone, nor the spirit alone, nor any two of them together,—much less the body on the one hand, and the spirit on the other, while the soul in which the personality of man especially resides, is to live on forever. Brit the whole man together in the totality of his being is to die. We have no warrant in reason or in Revelation for taking man to pieces in this way, and consigning the two extremes to death and destruction, or, rather, the extreme material to an actual death, the extreme spiritual, to a kind of metaphorical death, and the central portion, in which the real conscious being resides, which is actually the man himself, to a life of Eternal misery! Where could have such an incongruous, such a monstrous theory have come from? Who could have invented it? How is it possible for any intelligent believer in the Word of God to credit it for one moment? The Scriptures tell us—" and the serpent said unto the woman, -"Ye shall not surely die." Nothing but the suggestions of the tempter could have given it origin, and nothing but the necessity of keeping up this delusive fiction, at all hazards, could have perpetuated it in the world, and, above all, in the Church of God, in spite of the plainest declaration of His Word, to the present day. Every argument of which the subject is capable, from Reason, Nature and Revelation, is against it, and if man was not blinded by this theory, of the necessary immortality of the soul, he could not help seeing it to be false.

 

 We are obliged to admit, whether we will or not, that the body dies. The Christian admits; as he also must, that the sentence of death falls upon man's higher spiritual nature. But the greater always includes the less. It is this that especially distinguishes man from the brutes. If he loses that additional something, he must inevitably fall into the same category with them, and share in their fate. If man loses his peculiar higher nature by which alone he is capable of union with God and of living in Him, there remains to him only the soul and the body, and these, he has in common with the lower animals. But further, the loss of the higher carries with it the loss of everything beneath it, by a law everywhere observable in nature.

 

 As there are various kinds of life in nature, so there are various kinds of death. For death is the antithesis or negation of life. Spiritual life cannot be predicated of animals, nor spiritual death, (except by a figure of speech), for they never had such a life to lose. Nor can animal life or animal death be -predicated of a tree, for the same reason, nor can vegetable life or death be predicated of a crystal, but only such life and such death as is possible to it. When life or death is spoken of, that kind of life or death is meant which belongs to the object in question. What is the kind of death in question in the case of Adam? Primarily, of course, the loss of that life which is peculiar to him.; but secondarily, and necessarily, by a law of nature, every other kind of life of which he is possessed. But when any object loses the life that is peculiar to it, that is, when it falls out of its normal condition, it does not simply drop down to the next stage below, and there remain and flourish with the life and vigor of the inferior orders, but it falls down through them all to the very bottom. It goes to utter ruin and disintegration. It is dissolved into its original elements. It loses its own identity forever; but the elements remain to be reconstructed by the will and power of God, into other forms of life and beauty. The process of dissolution, after death may be gradual. The tree that has died may, for a time retain its organic form and its cohesive life-power, but its eventual decay and dissolution, however long retarded, is certain and inevitable.

 

 The body of an animal, after the life has gone out of it, may retain its vital heat, and the power of spasmodic motion, for 3 time and by the cohesive life or power among its elementary particles the bodily form may be preserved, but this is only for a time; it is on the way to utter dissolution as the final result. Is man an exception to this law? May he lose that which gives him his peculiar pre-eminence, the higher life of his soul, and yet remain a ruined living creature forever? Does death after doing its work in his spiritual nature overleap his soulical nature and fasten itself merely on the organic life of the body and bring that alone to ruin? That the soul is capable of a two-fold life all will admit. It may live through the spirit, what is called a spiritual life, or it may live through the body an animal life. This lower animal life, at best would seem to be temporal and limited in its duration, as in all animals; and shall the death of the spiritual nature, instead of bringing more speedy ruin upon all that which is below it, tend only to render his lower life perpetual and deathless? And yet to such an absurdity as this, one is brought in his effort to prove that the soul lives after its spiritual death; or rather, that it may live, and live forever after it is dead as to both its spiritual and its animal nature.

 

 That the soul may have a lingering moribund vitality, such as a limb of a tree has after it is severed from the source of its life, or as the animal body exhibits after the vital spark has fled, or, that God may by the exercise of His Almighty Power keep it alive, and re-unite it to the body, to be raised again, to be judged and utterly destroyed in the second death, or that he may regenerate that soul, while it lingers in its mortal body, and when that goes to decay, give it a new spiritual body in which it may live with Him forever, need not be asserted here, as it will be considered in another place,—but that the soul as a soul, severed both from God as the source of its spiritual lifer on the one hand, and from the body, through which it has its natural or animal life on the other, may live on independently of either, and live for-ever, is not only contrary to the analogy of nature but also to the uniform teaching of the Scriptures from Genesis to Revelation. The soul of man, apart from God the source of its spiritual life, must die heavenward; and, subordinated to the body, and in bondage to its lusts and passions, it must share with the body, its earthly destiny. However long it may linger here on earth, its destiny of utter ruin and dissolution is as sure as the law of nature and the law of God. " The soul that sinned it shall die." " For whosoever hath to him shall be given, and he shall have more abundance, but whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken away even that he hath."—(Matt. 13: 12.)

 

 A ruined, dying creature, man is now driven out of his earthly Paradise to linger indeed for a time, but to share the lot he has chosen with the brutes that perish, and return to the dust from which he was taken. And what is very significant and conclusive as to his destiny, he is now cut off from all approach to the " Tree of Life " to which he had hitherto had free access. "Cherubim and a flaming sword are said to keep it—lest he put forth his hand and take ALSO of the Tree of .Life and eat and live forever! " Whether we regard this prohibition as a merciful prohibition to prevent him from perpetuating his sin and misery forever; whether we regard this tree as the sacrament or the means of perpetuating his life, or in whatever light we regard it, it teaches unmistakably this one truth. Now that he has sinned he cannot be permitted to live forever. He must die. And yet, by a species of exegesis called " Scriptural," men are attempting to show that all this means, that the sinning soul shall not die, or rather, that it shall survive its owls death and live on in sin and misery forever!!

 

 Dr. Hodge in his Systematic Theology Vol. 2, Chap. 6, says: "The reward promised to Adam on condition of obedience was Life." This " included the happy, holy, immortal existence of the soul and body." " The death promised was the opposite of the life promised. But the life promised as we have seen, includes all that is involved in the happy, holy, immortal existence of the soul and body; and therefore death must include not only all the miseries of this life and the dissolution of the body, but also all that is meant by spiritual and eternal death." [But what is meant by this death of the soul? What is the " opposite " of its immortal existence but its actual death? It surely cannot be immortal existence continued, however miserable that existence may be.] "God is the life of the soul. His favor and fellowship with Him are essential to its holiness and happiness." [And why not, to, its continued existence also?] " If His favor be forfeited, the inevitable consequences are the death of the soul, i.e., its loss of spiritual life and unending sinfulness and misery."

 

 That is to say, the soul will sin and suffer forever after it has lost its "immortal existence." So the author slips away from his own premises to save his dogma that the " soul will not surely die."

 

It might be interesting here to inquire, What would have been the fortunes of the human race had there been no sin and no loss of spiritual life?

 

 That man was originally fitted for anything higher than a pure earthly existence, we have no evidence. That our first parents were at first pure and innocent, there is no doubt; but that they were such exalted creatures as some theological poets and poetical theologians have described them as having been, may well be questioned. Whether their material bodies, without undergoing some transformation, could have entered the heavenly world where "they neither marry nor are given in marriage but are as the angels of God," may well be doubted, for we are assured that " flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God." We may suppose that the natural decay of their bodies might have been somehow arrested or repaired by means of the Tree of Life, and so, their earthly existence might have been perpetuated without end. But, by what means were they to rise to that higher celestial life—that "life and immortality" that are brought to light in the Gospel? May we not inquire whether they could have been qualified for this, but by a knowledge of good and evil? Whether they could have risen to that life above, without first having gone down to death through the sad experience of sin? Was not the Adamic state necessarily preliminary and preparatory to the higher Christian state? In other words, was not all this a part of the divine plan? Do men not err in considering the fall of man too exclusively from that standpoint which makes it appear' as a disaster, in every sense deplorable, and the scheme of grace consequent upon it, as a mere expedient to repair the mischief, and which, at best, is but partially successful?

 

 To reason in regard to contingent events, as they appear to us, and to declare what would or would not have been, had the event been otherwise, is always unsatisfactory, even in respect to the affairs of men, but still more so when considering the plan and providence of the Almighty, with whom there are no contingencies, who sees the end from the beginning and arranges all things in infinite wisdom and according to His own good pleasure.

 

 It seems to be a law of nature, and of providence, and of grace, also, that the imperfect and the inferior should come before that which is higher and better, and that the highest stage should be reached only by coming up through those which are below. " And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul, the last Adam was made a quickening Spirit. Howbeit, that was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; and afterward that which is spiritual. The first man is of the earth, earthy; the second man is the Lord from heaven. As is the earthy such are they also that are earth); and as is the heavenly such are they also that are heavenly. And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly, Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, neither doth corruption inherit incorruption."—(1 Cor. 15: 45-50.) We must first go through this lower stage and die before we can rise to a higher life in the kingdom of God.

 

 Did not Christ teach this when He said, " Verily, verily, I say unto you, except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit;" and the Apostle Paul in the chapter just referred to, " That which thou sowed is not quickened except it die," and in his beautiful argument on this subject, in the context? Or will it be said that all this refers to the Adamic state after the fall? But in any case, is it not evident from this argument and from the whole 124 .

 

 tenor of the Gospel, that man does gain infinitely more in Christ than he lost in Adam? That what we lost in Adam, at best, was but an earthly Paradise, but that in Christ, we gain a celestial Paradise. That Christ came not simply to repair the ruin of the fall and to bring man back again into favor with God, but to raise His people to a state infinitely higher than they would have been entitled to, through their earthly progenitor, had he remained in the innocence in which he was created? But though these inquiries are full of interest, and closely related to our subject, they are -not so directly in our line of argument as to make it necessary to dwell upon them longer. It is sufficient for us to know that in our natural birth, through our relations to Adam, we all become heirs to sin and death, but that in our new birth, through Christ, we become heirs to "an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that faded not away, reserved in heaven."

 

Chapter 9.

 

Natural life from Adam transitory.

Spiritual life from Christ eternal.

Life and death, actual, not metaphorical terms.

Hell, Sheol, hades, Gehenna.

 

 WE have seen the result of man's first probation in the loss of his spiritual life, and in the consequent death of the whole man. We have seen how he was denied access to the " Tree of Life," lest he should " eat and live forever," not lest he should eat and become pure again and so live forever, not lest he should eat and regain his spiritual life and so live forever, but lest he should eat and live forever as he was, a sinful, ruined, miserable creature; that is, lest he should become immortal in sin and misery; or, if one pleases so to understand it,—lest he should retain the pledge of immortality after the reality had been lost. We have heard the doom that was pronounced upon Adam and his posterity,—a transitory life of pain and sorrow upon earth until he returns to the dust from which he was taken.

 

 We come now to consider, more particularly, the execution of that doom. He begets children in his own likeness, that is, " in the likeness of sinful flesh." The stream can rise no higher than its source. He had no spiritual life, and his posterity are born without any spiritual life. This is according to the uniform teaching of God's Word. It is what theologians call the " total depravity of man." They possess, like their fallen progenitor, a mere earthly and transitory life, or what is now called a " natural life," and in the Scriptures it is called the soulical (psuchikos) life to distinguish it from the spiritual (pneumatikos) life that has been lost. Death, death, sooner or later is the inevitable lot of the whole Adamic race,—and this whether we consider it as a law of man's physical nature, or as the penalty of a higher spiritual law that has been violated. Henceforth the soul's "natural " life, and its only life is that which unites it to the body with all its natural instincts, lusts, and passions. It acts and is acted upon through the senses of the body. Its pleasures, its hopes, its motives, its aims, its efforts are all in connection with sensible and perishable things. It is characterized in the Word of God by a great variety of names, as " the carnal mind," " the mind of the flesh," " the old Adam," "the natural man." This, in its own nature and by necessity, is perishable.

 

 If the soul ever comes to have any other life, it must be by the quickening power of the Spirit of God. It will not be natural, but supernatural. This spiritual and supernatural life, which is immortal, is yet to be revealed in the gospel. A vague hint of it was given to our first parents even when their doom of death was pronounced. Intimation of it became more clear and distinct as we come down the course of time from age to age, till, growing brighter and brighter, it ripens into an assured promise of Life and immortality through Jesus Christ the Savior. It is offered to the hopes of man after his fall, to keep him from utter demoralization and despair, and to encourage him to look heavenward in expectation. Hence, "the earnest expectation of the creature waited for the manifestation of the Sons of God," " while the whole creation groaned and travailed together in pain till now." It lay at the foundation of the faith which characterized the patriarchs and other eminent saints to whom He more plainly revealed His purposes of grace. It was that undefined "some better thing "which " He had provided," in anticipation of which they were enabled to live " as strangers and pilgrims on the earth," though they died " not having received the promises,"—an unbroken succession of faithful ones, till in the fulness of time, the vail is rent, and the future life of His people through Christ as the second Adam, which is an eternal life, is fully revealed in the Gospel.

 

 It ought to be clearly understood that this future life is not a continuation of the old natural or soulical life into another state. It is a new life, another life through the spirit. The former passes away; this, dating from the new birth, endures forever. That is natural and perishable; this, supernatural and imperishable. In order to possess it one must become a new creature, or rather, the very possession of it makes one a new creature. He is " quickened " by the Spirit of God. " He is born again," " not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God."

 

 But in the man that is born again we do not see two persons, for there is only one soul, though he is yet to have a new body. The soul preserves its identity through all this change, from the capacity it has for a two-fold life. It has not lost its capacity for a new spiritual life, though it has lost its spiritual life, and retains only its natural life. This new life begins before the soul is dead in its lower nature, and continues on after this death takes place, and is not affected by it. Indeed, so far as we know, this new spiritual life must begin before the soul is completely dead in both senses. Hence it is only in life that a man can be born again and saved to eternal life. He is now dead in the higher spiritual sense but alive in the lower natural sense.

 

 This capacity of the soul for a two-fold life, the one natural and mortal, and the other spiritual and immortal, is the key to the double sense in which the words life and death are used in the Scriptures. It is by disregarding this, that men are led into such perplexity and confusion of mind in reading and understanding its plainest language on this subject. As there are two lives, so there are two deaths predicated of the soul: both of them actual and real. Spiritual life and Spiritual death. Natural or soulical life, and natural or soulical death. Bearing this in mind, such passages as the following are perfectly clear: "You hath He quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins "—that is, they were already dead spiritually, but not naturally when they were quickened. " If ye live after the flesh ye shall die "—that is, they are already dead spiritually, but not yet naturally, but if they live after the flesh, natural and total death must ensue. " He that believeth on me, though he were dead, yet shall he live," " and whosoever lived (i.e., is alive) and believeth in me shall never die." " If a man keep my saying he shall never see death "—though the soul lets go its natural life it shall retain its spiritual life forever. "He that believeth on me hath everlasting life." " He that heareth my Word, and believeth on Him that sent me hath everlasting life (it is already begun) and shall not come into condemnation, but is passed from death unto life." " The hour is coming when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God, and they that hear shall live." "Let the dead bury their dead, but follow thou me." "Thou hast a name that thou lives and art dead." "No murderer hath eternal life abiding in him.” " Awake thou that sleeps, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light."

 

 This class of passages is very numerous, but it is not necessary to quote more. It will be observed that sometimes death is spoken of in the past tense, and sometimes in the future, because sometimes the reference is to spiritual death which is already passed, and some-times to soulical death, which is yet to come. The Greek scholar will observe, also, what is not brought out in our English translation, that this higher spiritual life, which endures forever, is designated by zoe in contradistinction from psyche the soul's lower or natural life.* But there is no need of two words in referring to death; the same word thanatos serves as the antithesis of both kinds of life, for death is the negative or the cessation of life, of whatever kind it may be.

 

 Here we wish to protest, with all the emphasis in our power, against the practice, which has become so common in dealing with the Word of God as to pass unnoticed, of frittering away the meaning of these words, Life and Death, to make them agree with the theory of the natural immortality of the soul. Nothing must be allowed to contradict it. Whether dead or alive, the soul must be permitted to maintain its conscious existence forever. Hence this spiritual life, so often spoken of in the Scriptures, is taken to be a kind of purification operated upon the soul by the Spirit of God which brings joy and blessedness as a consequence. It is metaphorically called "life," or "the new life," and the death, that answers to it, is only a metaphorical death, signifying the loss of its purity, and consequently, the loss of its joy and blessedness, but, in either case, the soul itself lives on, and exercises the functions of life. It remembers, thinks, loves or hates, enjoys or suffers all the same as before. And even the words life and death when used with reference to the natural life of man, are not allowed their full natural * The word °ionic', eternal, is constantly joined with zoe in the Scriptures, but never in one instance, with psuchce meaning, as in the case of other things that have life. In the natural death of other animals, everything they have, is supposed to be included—not merely their bodies as a material organism, but their living souls, such as they have, are extinguished and they come to utter ruin and disintegration, but in the natural death of man, his living soul is excluded. So in either case, say they, whether he dies naturally or spiritually, and when he dies in both of his natures, he survives—that is, the soul lives, (for the soul is the man himself), he is only metaphorically dead. Nor can he die in any other way, according to this philosophy. And yet to save the appearance of consistency and to avoid seeming to contradict the Scriptures too flatly, when crowded by this argument, the advocates of this theory will not say that the soul lives, although it exercises the functions of life, but that it exists forever! And what do they mean by exists? Why, simply that it lives a life of sin and misery forever.

 

 The fact is, spiritual life and spiritual death are as actual and real as any other kind of life and death; and natural life and natural death, in man or in the soul of man, are as real and as actual as in anything else that has life and is capable of dying. Spiritual things or entities are as truly entities as though they came within the cognizance of our senses, and the words, life and death, are as applicable to them, not as figures of speech in some shadowy tropical unmeaning sense, but as actual verities, as to things altogether material and sensible. That these words as well as other words may be used tropically, is not denied, but there is no more reason why they should be used so, with reference to man's higher nature than to man's lower. There is no reason whatever for frittering them away in figures when predicated of the soul of man, but just to save this dogma of the natural immortality of the soul, which the Scriptures everywhere so plainly deny. This whole theory of immortality in sin, is but the baseless fabric of a vision. It vanishes into thin air the moment it is touched by the wand of truth, and the dreamer consents to open his eyes to the light. It is full time this stupendous delusion, " Ye shall not surely die," were confronted with the testimony of God's Word, and driven from the Christian Church. It is full time that believers in that Word had done trifling with its plainest utterances, and were willing to acknowledge Christ " Who only hath immortality," as the only source of immortality to perishing man.

 

 There are too many who read their Bibles backward, instead of forward as they ought; and carry back into the Old Testament what is peculiar to the New. They throw, without any discrimination, the fearful alternatives of the Gospel, and all the superadded curses denounced against those who reject it, over the whole human family, and they import into the simple words of both Testaments their own erroneous conceits and false philosophies. We take for example the word Hell, which occurs so often in all parts of our English Bible. Every scholar knows that the Hebrew word sheol and the Greek word Hades, both of which are translated Hell, have no such proper meaning as men now attach to it. But they meant simply the grave or the place to which all go when they die, whether good or bad. Then, there comes up, under the Gospel another word of more fearful import, (in the Greek)—Gehenna, from the Hebrew Ge Hinnom, signifying the Valley of Hinnom. This also is translated Hell. This Valley of Hinnom was a valley just outside of the walls of Jerusalem where formerly the Hebrews, under some of their idolatrous kings, had worshipped Moloch and had caused their children to pass through the fire to him. It was afterwards devoted to the foulest uses, and the offal and sewage of the city was carried into it, and the dead carcasses of animals and criminals were carried there to be consumed by devouring worms, or by fires that were kept constantly burning for this purpose, and to purify the atmosphere. Hence, under the Gospel, it became a symbol of death and corruption; of the place, into which, the wicked after the judgment, were to be cast, and into which Satan and all his hosts and every evil thing and death and hell even were to be cast, to be utterly consumed. But unlearned readers, and even those who ought to know better, carry back all the terrible ideas associated with Gehenna into the words Sheol and Hades wherever they are translated Hell, and make them all alike to mean a place of torment. But the ancient Hebrews attached no such idea to this word Hell. "Generally speaking, the Hebrews regarded the grave as the final end of all sentient and intelligent existence, the land where all things are forgotten."

 

SMITH'S BIBLE DICTIONARY, Art. "Hell." The same author says, " This is the word generally and unfortunately used by our translators to render the Hebrew Sheol, and Greek Hades and once, Thanatos. We say unfortunately because the English word Hell is mixed up with numberless associations entirely foreign to the minds of the ancient Hebrews.

 

 This was the place down to which Jacob expected to go mourning for his son Joseph. Gen. 26: 35; 42: 38. It was where Job wished he might be hid. 14: 13. David prayed that his enemies might go down quick into (sheol) hell. Ps. 55: 15. Not into a place of eternal torment, but of eternal silence and death. It was the place into which our Lord Himself descended at His death. Ps. 16: ro. Hence, by misunderstanding this and other passages, Papists will have it that Christ went into Limbo to deliver captive souls. See also Ps. 85:10; 89: 48; Prov. 1: 12; 30: 16; Is. 5: 14; Matt. 11: 23; 1 Cor. 15: 55; Rev. 20: 13; et al.

 

 We have no theory to propound or to maintain with regard to the death of the wicked either before or after the coming of Christ. What kind of a lingering moribund vitality the human soul, that is already spiritually dead, may possess, if any, when separated from the body, beyond that possessed by other animals; how long it may be in the act of dying; under what conditions of suffering and agony; what distinctions there may be among greater and lesser offenders; what lamentations and anguish on the part of the rejectors of the Gospel and abusers of great privileges,—we know and profess to know nothing more than is revealed to us by the Word of God.

 

 It is not so much with the process as with the fact of their death that we are principally concerned in this argument. That they do actually die, His Word assures us. And we believe it. We contend that no process of dying is death until it is completed. That process which goes on forever without coming to an end, however great may be the agony, is not death. The loss of purity, the loss of joy, the loss of heaven, is not death. Nothing but the loss of life constitutes death. Separated from God, their souls are already dead in their higher natures, and when separated from their bodies in which they now only have life, they die in their lower natures also.

 

 We have no wish to take away any of the safeguards which God has thrown around His holy law, nor to derogate in the least from the terrible doom of transgressors, whether under the law or the gospel, nor even to excuse those whom He does not excuse, who "perish without law." We do not look upon His threatening as mere bruta fulmina that will never be executed. But we do not believe that all sinners will suffer alike, though all sinners must die. For Christ Himself tells us that those who "knew not" and yet committed things "worthy of death," " shall be beaten with few stripes." But how can those stripes be called few, however light they may be, that are inflicted without cessation and without end? He tells us that it shall be " more tolerable " for some than for others "in the day of judgment." But how can that doom be tolerable in any sense of the word, which is a doom of hopeless and eternal suffering?

 

 However heavy and numerous the " many stripes," and however bitter and awful the less tolerable doom that shall come upon such as did know, and upon those among whom His "many mighty works were done," and " repented not," we have no authority from Him for throwing these dreadful threatening indiscriminately and without mercy over the whole human race that lived from the time of Adam to the coming of Christ; and over the myriads of millions who have lived and died without any knowledge whatever of His Gospel. We have no reason or right to suppose that the whole Antediluvian world were swept alive into a Gehenna of fire where they shall never die, but be tormented forever: nor that the beastly inhabitants of Sodom, after four thousand years, are still writhing in the fire and brimstone that consumed the cities of the plain, but refuses to consume them; and that they are destined to writhe on in agonies that shall never, never end; nor that the brutal Canaanites, whom the children of Israel were commissioned to exterminate from the promised land, were only exterminated from the surface of the earth, that God might perpetuate their miserable and worthless lives underneath it, to all eternity.

 

 The judgments of God are sufficiently terrible, without any human, or rather inhuman exaggerations, to set them off, and make them impressive! The mortal doom of the whole Adamic race is sufficiently sad and dreary, without investing it with such cruel and eternal tortures as brutal men and fiends alone could invent to be poured out upon all alike (save His elect) by the hand of the God who made them.

 

 We are jealous of the name of Our Heavenly Father, we believe He is worthy to be loved and trusted by all His 'creatures, even by those to whom the gospel has never been given. We believe "He is good to all and His tender mercies are over all His works."

 

 When we consider how unmerciful men often are to each other; what cruelties they have inflicted upon the victims of their power, as by His authority; what tortures upon earth and what infinite and eternal tortures they have invented for their fellow-men in the world to come; what a veritable Moloch they have set up for us to love and worship, we must say, give us back the God of the Bible rather than the God bequeathed to us by the Papal Church. Guilty and undeserving as we are, we cannot but exclaim in the words of David to the prophet, " Let me now fall into the hands of the Lord: for very great are His mercies: but let me not fall into the hand of man." 1 Chron., 21: 13.

 

 One of the chief objections urged against the doctrine of "Annihilation," as they call it, by the advocate of endless torment is, that sinners will not suffer enough, however long they may be in the agonies of the second death, if they are ever permitted to expire. This is the ground Dr. Bartlett takes in all his arguments on this subject, and of others who follow him. This is Dr. Howard Crosby's objections, (See sermon on " Endless Punishment " in The Complete Preacher, February, 1878.) He first says, " The alienated race of man, as such, must suffer eternal death—that is eternal banishment from God." By what right or reason does he interpret " death " to mean banishment, excepting to make it to harmonize with his dogma? But all other advocates of this doctrine do the same—they cannot do otherwise. Does banishment and the death penalty mean the same thing under human governments? Why should they, under the divine government but to save this miserable dogma? Then, after apologizing for God and trying to excuse him for inflicting endless torture, because forsooth, " The sinner's torture is the operation of his own sin," he says, " Eternal Punishment is not annihilation. If it be punishment at the moment of annihilating, it certainly is not punishment afterward. You cannot punish a being who does not exist. Destruction and death do not mean annihilation, but the ruin of the soul away from God—its misery and torture." As though the loss of Eternal life with all its joys was not an eternal loss! But the wretched culprit, or rather the countless millions of them, must be kept alive forever, and that too under torture that they may never cease to see and feel their loss and hopelessly to deplore it! Then, expanders of God's will, not satisfied with the punishment of death, which is the highest possible on earth, would add to it that of perpetual imprisonment under torture, which though contradictory, they have contrived to unite in one, by calling death and destruction "banishment," and punishment " torture," arid so the punishment of eternal destruction comes to be eternal torture! No wonder they feel compelled to apologize for God upon whom they charge such atrocious cruelty!!

 

Chapter 10.

 

Five classes of scripture passages bearing on this question, to be considered.

The law, like the nature of man, two-fold.

Its temporal application under Moses; its spiritual application under Christ.

First class of passages, death and destruction.

 

 OUR limits forbid us to undertake a minute and critical examination of all the many passages of Scripture bearing on this question: nor will it be necessary. For the sake of brevity and convenience, those that we shall quote, may be grouped into the five following classes; a few of which, under each of these several classes will be more particularly noticed.

 

 1st. Such as deny the immortality of the natural man and assert, that as such, he must die, perish, be destroyed.

 

 2d. Such as speak of a new, higher, better life, a spiritual and eternal life through Jesus Christ the Savior.

 

 3d. Such as bring into contrast the character and destiny of the natural and the spiritual man, and declare the life of the former to be transitory, and that of the latter, eternal.

 

 4th. Such as speak of the future destiny of each of these two classes beyond the grave.

 

 5th. Such as foretell the complete victory which Christ shall obtain over sin and Satan; the utter destruction of all His enemies; the abolishment of Death and Hell; the creation of all things new, and the universal prevalence of purity, love and joy forever.

 

 We have seen that the soul of man was originally endowed with a two-fold,—or, perhaps we should rather say,—with an alternative nature, enabling him, on the one hand, to look upwards towards heaven, and to unite himself with God through the Spirit, and to look downwards, on the other hand, to the earth and unite himself with the flesh through the senses; the one spiritual, and, by consequence, eternal, the other natural, and, by consequence, transitory. He would be a spiritual man or a natural man according as the one or the other should predominate. We have seen how his pure soul, like an evenly adjusted balance finally preponderated towards earth, and he became a (soulical) carnal and mortal man.

 

 Now the Holy Law of God that was given to him, possessed this same two-fold character; a spiritual and a soulical application, adapting it to both, or to either of these two natures in man. In losing his spiritual life through sin, and coming under the spiritual penalty of the law which made him a mortal, he lost also the sense of the spiritual character of the law, as he did of everything else that was spiritual, and came directly under the law as a temporal dispensation. The law itself lost nothing of its spiritual character, though it passed into desuetude or eclipse, to be again uncovered by Christ when He should come to bring spiritual life and immortality to the soul of man. But it is obvious to every intelligent reader of the Bible how pre-eminently, if not exclusively, temporal the Old Testament dispensation is, when compared with the New. The rewards and the penalties, the blessings and the curses of the law seem to be confined to this life, and were so understood by the great mass of those who lived under it. Health, prosperity, abundant harvests, long life, a numerous posterity, the favor of God, a peaceful death were the blessings promised to the obedient, and the reverse of all these, to the disobedient. Yet all these sanctions are capable of a two-fold sense.

 

They have a higher application which was, no doubt, also intended, even though this was not apprehended by those who had no spiritual discernment, an application which Christ Himself brought to light when He came,—an application of which the Old Testament saints got glimpses more or less clear, and which grew more and more perfect as they drew near to the light of the Gospel-day. But not merely the righteous came to have anticipations of " some better thing " awaiting them beyond this life yet to be revealed to them, but the wicked also came to have more and more distinct forebodings of evil beyond the grave to disturb their security in sin. To the one, the many promises of Life which abound in the Old Testament as well as in the New, seemed like the dawning of " light that arises in darkness," to the other, the threatening of Death which are equally numerous, were like the rumbling of distant thunder from behind the dark cloud which their vision could not penetrate. As we come down the track of ages, these intimations grow more and more distinct, till they culminate under the Gospel, in a full announcement of a Resurrection from the dead, a Judgment to come, and of a Second life, a spiritual and eternal Life for the righteous, and of a Second death—a death that knows no waking forever, for the wicked.

 

 In the life and death that were set before the Hebrews, when Moses gave them the law from heaven in an objective form and exhorted them to choose life that they might live (Deut. 30): in the blessings .and curses he caused to be pronounced from Ebal and Gerizim, (28): in the exhortations and warnings of Jeremiah, when in the name of the Lord he says: " Behold, I have set be-fore you the way of life and the way of death" (Jer., 21): in the expostulations of Ezekiel by divine command, 140 .

 

 saying: " As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way and live; turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways: for why will ye die, O house of Israel," (Ezek., 33), and on the numerous other occasions, when substantially the same language is addressed to them, how much real significance they attached to these words (or whether any) beyond what belonged to their earthly career, it is impossible for us to say, nor is it necessary that we should know. We who read the Old Testament in the light of the New, no doubt, invest these words with a deeper meaning than any they could attach to them. But whether they are to be taken in a higher or lower sense, the result to the sinning soul is the same. Death is the antithesis, the destruction, of whatever kind of life may be spoken of. We have seen how spiritual death carries with it, sooner or later, every other kind of death (unless that life shall be again enkindled by the Spirit of God), and if now, having no spiritual life to lose, the death of their lower or soulical nature is intended; this brings their soul's life to an end. Nor do we need to inquire as to the accompaniments of this death—how much of real suffering and how protracted; or whether the idea of the second death was always included in the threatening of the first, before the doctrine of a resurrection is revealed. In either or any case, it must have been the death of the person addressed—of the individual sinning soul, if language has any meaning, and not of some irresponsible part of the person. It must have been a real death, if the life in question was real. That death and destruction—that is, just such death and destruction as they are capable of, is declared to be the lot of sinful man throughout both the Old and the New Testaments alike, needs no multiplied array of texts to prove. It seems quite sufficient for us to quote a few only in addition to those already cited, taken almost at random from various parts of the Bible.

 

 In the book of Job, such passages as the following are of frequent occurrence: " The candle of the wicked is put out." " They are as stubble before the wind, and as chaff that the storm carried away." " They shall lie down alike in the dust and the worms shall cover them." "The wicked is reserved to the day of destruction." "By the blast of God they perish and by the breath of His nostrils are they consumed." " He shall perish for, ever like His own dung." " He shall fly away as a dream, and shall not be found, yea, he shall be chased away as a vision of the night." " If He set His heart upon man, if he gather unto Himself his spirit and his breath, all flesh shall perish together, and man shall turn again unto dust." We might transcribe the whole of the 14th chapter, as in point, " Man that is born of a woman is of few days and full of trouble. He cometh forth as a flower, and is cut down: he flees also as a shadow and continued not." " There is hope of a tree if it be cut down, that it will sprout again, but man dies and wastes away; yea, man giveth up the ghost and where is he?" " As the waters fail from the sea, and the flood decayed and dries up, so man lieth down and rises not; till the heavens be no more (that is, never, so far as Job knew) they shall not awake nor be raised out of their sleep." (And then he asks, as though it were utterly hopeless, as will be seen from what he has already said) " If a man die, shall he live again?"

 

 The Psalms are full of such utterances.as these, "The way of the ungodly shall perish." " They are like the chaff which the wind drives away." " Thou shalt destroy them that speak leasing." " The wicked shall be turned into hell (sheol) and all the nations that forget God." " The wicked shall perish and the enemies of the Lord shall be as the fat of lambs: they shall consume: into smoke shall they consume away." " As wax melted before the fire, so let the wicked perish at the presence of God." " For lo, they that are far from Thee shall perish." " When the wicked spring as the grass and when all the workers of iniquity do flourish, it is that they shall be destroyed forever." " For lo, thine enemies O Lord, for lo, thine enemies shall perish." " His breath goes forth; he returned to his earth; in that very day his thoughts perish." The 90th Psalm is one continued dirge in view of the mortality of man. In the 49th Psalm the writer declares how impossible it is for the rich man to redeem the soul (or life) of his brother. " For the redemption of the soul is precious and it ceased forever, (whether ' it ' refers to the soul or the redemption, the thought is the same) that he should still live forever and not see corruption. For he sees that wise men die, likewise the fool and the brutish person perish and leave their wealth to others Nevertheless man being in honor abideth not, he is like the beasts that perish." Like sheep they are laid in the grave: death shall feed on them, and the upright shall have dominion over them in the morning (or, speedily, to-morrow. It is possible there may be a hint of another life for the righteous, but of none, surely, for the wicked, for the Psalmist goes on to say,) " He shall go to the generation of his fathers; they shall never see light. Man that is in honor, and understand not is like the beasts that perish."

 

 Solomon in' the Book of Proverbs says that " The lamp of the wicked shall be put out." " His destruction cometh as a whirlwind." " He that speaketh lies shall perish," etc. And in the Book of Ecclesiastes 3d chapter, he compares man in his mortality to the brutes. " For that which befalls the sons of men befalls the beasts; even one thing befalls them: as the one dies, so dies the other; yea they have all one breath, so that a man hath no pre-eminence above a beast; (he has lost his essential pre-eminence) for all is vanity. All go unto one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again."

 

 We might follow the prophets, quoting numerous passages, as " The soul that sinned it shall die." " The destruction of the transgressors and of sinners shall be together, and they that forsake the Lord shall be consumed." " They shall be as nothing: and they that strive against Thee shall perish." " Behold, the whirlwind of the Lord goes forth with fury, a continuing whirlwind: it shall fall with pain upon the head of the wicked. The fierce anger of the Lord shall not return, until He have done it, and until He have performed the intents of His heart." And finally, we come to the memorable words of Malachi at the very close of the volume. "Behold the day cometh that shall burn as an oven and all the proud, yea and all that do wickedly shall be stubble: and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the Lord of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch."

 

 Thus far these judgments upon the wicked are invariably spoken of as final. There is not one hint that they survive their own death, and exist to suffer after they are destroyed. The language itself excludes the idea. But in regard to the righteous, there are intimations, more or less clear, as we have already seen and shall have occasion to notice more at length in the Sequel, of a life to come.

 

 But when we go forward into the New Testament dispensation, net only the righteous are fully assured of that new life to come, but to the wicked, these threatening, though the same threatening as before, are clothed with an additional terror by the revelation of a resurrection and a judgment to come, and a second death and destruction that shall be absolutely irreversible and final. It is the same doom as before. It is death and destruction as before, but now, rendered more terrible by the knowledge of a new fact concerning it.

 

 It is the main fact of the death and destruction of the wicked that we are considering, and not the circumstances attending it. The great mistake of our opponents is, in looking so exclusively at the circumstances, as to lose this main fact out of sight altogether. They put that which is subordinate and instrumental in the place of that which is primary and central. They ignore the object or end in view entirely, and take cognizance only of the means employed to accomplish it. The pains and agonies that accompany the death of the body or of the soul, however great they may be, are not the death itself, nor is there any death, until they have had their issue and have ceased. A criminal may be put to death under any one of a great variety of ways, more or less ignominious and painful, and he may weep and deplore his fate during the whole process of execution, but the penalty of the law has not been inflicted upon him until he is "dead," "dead," " dead."

 

 The undying worm, and the fire that is not quenched are fearful agents, whether we understand them as figuratively or actually employed in the destruction of the wicked, but they are only agents or instruments, after all, for the accomplishment of a certain end, and not the end itself. That end is destruction, and they are employed to show how terribly, how surely, how completely they will do their work. Far be it from us to attempt to derogate in the least from the terribleness and certainty of God's judgments upon the wicked. Indeed, our object is to show how terrible and certain they are, and for this reason, we are unwilling to see them explained away at the expense of His truth, and so misinterpreted as to traduce His character—and all for the purpose of sustaining the baseless assumption that the guilty soul is deathless and indestructible, when He Himself has declared, it shall die and shall be destroyed.

 

 Our limits forbid us to transcribe all the passages in the New Testament we had marked for quotation. It will not be necessary.

 

Matt., 10: 28—" 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 hell (Gehenna). The scholar need not be told that the word (apolesai) here translated destroy, means not only or merely to kill, but to completely destroy.

 

 Mark 8: 35—" For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the Gospel's, the same shall save it. For what shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul (life)? "

 

Luke 13: 2—" Suppose ye that these Galileans were sinners above all Galileans, because they suffered such things? I tell you, Nay: but except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish," (apoleisthe, be utterly destroyed).

 

John 3: 16—"For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have eternal life, (not psuchen life, but zoen life).

 

 Acts 8: 20—" Thy money perish (eie eis apoleian) with thee."

 

 Rom. 2: 12-" For as many as have sinned without law, shall also perish without law."

 

 1 Cor. 15:17—" If Christ be not raised then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished." (Had it not been for Christ the death of all would have been final).

 

 2 Cor. 4:3—" But if our Gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost," (without this Gospel they must die utterly).

 

 Eph. 2: 3—" By nature, children of wrath."

 

 Philip 3: 19—" Whose end is destruction, (telos," end," means finish, beyond which there is nothing further).

 

 2 Thess. 1:9—" Who shall be punished (How, with everlasting torment?) with everlasting DESTRUCTION."

 

 For if we sin willfully after that, we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remains no more sacrifice for sin, but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation which shall devour the adversaries. Heb. 10: 26, 27.

 

 For our God is a consuming fire, 12: 29 (not a scorching, or roasting, or a torturing fire, but a consuming fire). " But these, as natural brute beasts made to be taken and destroyed—shall utterly perish in their own corruption," 2 Pet. 2: 12.

 

 James r: 15—" Sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death (thanaton, the complete extinction of life of whatever kind it is).

 

 John 3:15—" No murderer hath eternal life abiding in him," (He cannot, therefore, possibly live forever).

 

 Rev. 20:12-" And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God. And the books were opened; and another book was opened which is the Book of Life, and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books according to their works."

 

 13—" And the sea gave up the dead which were in it, and death and hell (hades) delivered up the dead which were in them, and they were judged every man according to their works."

 

 And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.

 

 And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.

 

1 Cor. 15—" The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death."

 

 Rev. 21—"And there shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain; for the former things are passed away."

 

 But we forbear to multiply quotations to prove that the whole human race are mortal—not mortal in the lower sense of the word, which needs no proof—but mortal in every sense of the word, and that as sinners, we all must be destroyed, unless we shall find our life again in Christ. If these do not suffice, no array of texts would suffice to prove it. As if to put this truth beyond the possibility of question, it is asserted under every variety and form of expression of which language is capable. The wicked are said to die, to perish, to pass away, to fade away, to wither, to be destroyed, consumed, utterly consumed, root and branch, devoured, cut down, ground to powder, burned up, plucked up by the roots, broken to shivers, dashed in pieces, crushed, cut in sunder, put away like dross, cast away, to vanish away like smoke, like a dream, to perish like the brutes, to be as ashes, to be as nothing, to be no more, not to be, etc., etc.

 

 Verily, if they can endure all this, and yet live—or exist, if anyone prefer the term,—preserving their faculties, their sinning and suffering powers in the liveliest exercise, it must be because their souls are absolutely immortal and cannot possibly be extinguished. And what is more, the truth for which we are contending cannot be expressed. There is no language adequate to its expression. And having once accepted the idea of immortality for all the world alike, men cannot be disabused, simply because it is impossible to frame language strong enough to disabuse them.

 

 It is quite useless to enter into any discussion as to the original meaning of the Greek and Hebrew words that are employed in this Connection. The fault is not in the original words, nor in our English translation, but in the meaning that is put into them when they are read. Every Greek scholar knows that apollumi and its cognates with their derivatives, translated by loss of life, lost, death, destruction, perdition and the like, are the very words to express this doctrine for which we contend, if the writers of the Scriptures had intended to express it. They could have employed none that were stronger, or more in point. They had a well defined classical meaning when they employed them. Plato when discussing this very doctrine of the immortality of the soul, in his " Phaedo " uses them, and denies what the Scriptures assert concerning it, that it will die, will be destroyed or will perish. But now as men deny this doctrine, notwithstanding the words assert it, they have invented another meaning for all these words when used in the Bible, to sustain their delusion, a kind of tropical metaphorical, religious sense, which makes them mean just what they desire, or rather just the very opposite of what they say, and leaves the soul a living, sinning, suffering soul forever, after it has died, and perished and been utterly destroyed forever.

 

 All words are capable of being used in a secondary and non-natural sense. But because by diligent searching through the classics, and because in some of the poetical Books of the Bible, some of these words are found to be sometimes so used, they hasten, at once to the conclusion, that they all must be so understood, and always so understand: and that never, even in the sober, judicial language of the Scripture, in the most solemn utterances of our Savior or the other sacred writers, can they have any other than a secondary, figurative, mysterious, enigmatical, inexplicable sense. And why? Is th.re any other reason but simply this? That the ordinary and natural sense must not be allowed, because it would be fatal to their dogma, which must be defended at all hazards. The fact is, they come to the reading of God's Word with a foregone conclusion, which no testimony can shake. No matter if it denies, point blank, in the plainest terms, and ten thousand times repeated, the doctrine they have embraced, all they have to do is to put another meaning into these terms, and still hold on to their cherished doctrine and to their Bibles also. And if by any possible ingenuity of construction, they can find a few texts that can be adapted to their use, however fragmentary or whatever their original application, their doctrine is abundantly sustained. Indeed it needs no proof. It is self-evident. No matter if the Scriptures, never anywhere, assert the endless existence of the human soul, as they are obliged to confess. " They are charged with messages of such tremendous import concerning the character and condition of that endless existence, as quite to throw into the background the abstract proposition of the souls immortality "! [Life and Death eternal, p. 191.] etc.

 

 If this is Christian exegesis, what is Rationalism? If theological teachers may handle the Word of God in this way, what can they say to those who adopt their method upon all doctrines, and play upon these Oracles of truth as upon an old fiddle, any tune that may suit them, or explain them all away as myths having no palpable meaning whatever? Would it not be more honest and decent to shut up the volume entirely, and fall back upon the finding of reason alone? Would it not be more reverent to accept at once this doctrine, " Ye shall not surely die," from the mouth of its originator, and give him the credit of it, than to compel the Word of God to indorse it?

 

Chapter 11.

 

Second class of passages.

Eternal life given to the righteous through Christ.

The new testament a new revelation.

The new life, another life, and not the same old life restored.

It is eternal, because it is spiritual—the life of Christ in us.

 

 THE New Testament is not simply a fuller and clearer revelation of Divine truth than the Old. It is all this, but it is more: it is a New Revelation. As in Nature we' find one stage following another in the work of creation, each higher than the one to which it succeeds; so is it in the revelation of Divine truth. And as in nature each higher grade, while it includes all that is in the grades beneath, and exhibits it in greater perfection, contains something more that especially distinguishes it from them; so the New Testament, while it embraces all the truths of the Old, and reveals them more clearly, contains other and higher truths which distinguish it as a New Revelation.

 

 And still further: As every inferior grade in nature over-laps that which is to follow, and foreshadows its peculiar characteristics, and, perhaps, contains them all in a rudimental state, so the Old Testament contains in an undeveloped form, in its types and symbols, in its prophesies and promises, hints more or less clear of the truths yet to be revealed in the New. But these two Revelations are separated from each other by a line, as broad and distinct as that which separates any two grades in nature.

 

 If it be asked, What is that " additional something," that truth which is peculiar to the New Testament and gives it pre-eminence over the Old? We reply without hesitation, THE GOSPEL. The Revelation of Life and Immortality through Jesus Christ the Savior. And subordinately or coordinately in connection with this, the doctrine of the New birth, the Resurrection, the General judgment and the Second death.

 

 But this is not only a new and higher revelation, but the Life itself that is revealed is a new and higher Life, and those who are the subjects of it are new creatures. " If any man be in Christ he is a new creature." Not new in some metaphorical sense as denoting simply that he is a reformed man, that he now forsakes his old way of sin and begins to regulate his life by a higher standard of morality, that he now seeks and finds his enjoyment in higher things. It means all this, but infinitely more. He is actually a "new creature." He has the beginning of another Life in his soul. He does not lose his identity, for it is the same soul that receives this new life. But its former life was a natural life only: this is spiritual. It has hitherto lived only through the body. It now begins to live through the spirit also. The old Adamic nature still survives for a time, but it goes to death, and the soul that was associated with it must have shared in its destiny, had it not received this new life; but now, after this natural body shall go to corruption, the renewed soul will take to itself a spiritual and incorruptible body in which it will live forever.

 

 This new Life of the soul is a spiritual Life, but none the less real and actual because it is spiritual, but infinitely more so. We should be glad so to emphasize the idea of its actuality that our meaning will be understood. It is a mistake—the great mistake that is made by most persons in considering spiritual things, to fritter away their reality in tropes and figures, to suppose that they are unreal, to suppose that the new birth is not a new birth in any other than a tropical sense, that the spiritual Life in the regenerated' soul denotes only a purified condition of the soul under its old life, which is the only actual life the soul ever has.

 

 The old life of the soul is mortal: this is immortal, and is as distinct from it as any other two kinds of life in nature can be. It lifts the soul out of its former condition into a higher sphere. Its condition and destiny are altogether changed.

 

 There is no such thing in nature as spontaneous generation or regeneration. No object takes to itself life, even of the lowest kind by any inherent power of its own. It is the prerogative of God alone to confer it. All life of whatever kind must be communicated directly from Him, the source of all life. Much less can any dying human soul take to itself this new life, by any effort of its own. It is the prerogative of the Spirit of God to give it. The soul may indeed put itself into a receptive condition. It may seek this new life from Him, but from Him alone it must come: " Of His own will begat He us through the word of truth," " which were born not of blood. nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God."

 

 The new life in the soul is eternal because it is spiritual. It is the Pneuma, the breath of God Himself; the same that animates Him who lives forever. The old life is the same with that of his natural progenitor. The new Life is the same with that of his Spiritual Progenitor. All the inferior forms of life are transitory. The objects they animate are earthly and go to decay. The whole material universe with all it contains of organized matter and life will pass away and be dissolved into its original elements, to be again reformed into the new heavens and new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness; but the regenerated soul of man, purified by the Spirit dwelling within it, from all its carnal dross, and clothed with its new spiritual body, will survive the wreck and dissolution, and live in the presence of God, pure, im-mortal and blessed forever.

 

 Christ came, not merely to reveal this Life and to take the natural and legal obstacles to our receiving it out of the way, but also to communicate it to us by the Spirit dwelling in Him and proceeding from him, " For God giveth not the Spirit by measure unto Him." He came not as John, to exhort to repentance and newness of life, but He came as the " Way, the Truth and the Life," the very Source and Fountain of Life itself. " In Him was Life and the Life was the light of men." Adam was, at best, but a creature, a mere living soul, and like all other earthly creatures with a transitory life. " His breath was in his nostrils." We could derive. no higher life from him. But Christ our Spiritual Progenetor was the everlasting Creator Himself, and we, who are begotten by Him and live in Him, must live forever ," " Because He lives we must live also:" " The first man Adam was made a living soul, the last Adam a quickening Spirit." This is the doctrine Our Lord would have taught Nicodemus in the very beginning of His ministry, (John 3), verily, verily I say unto thee, except a man be born again (actually) he cannot see the Kingdom of God. " That which is born of the flesh is flesh (this includes the natural soul as well as the body) and that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit." " As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness even so must the Son of man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish (die utterly) but have eternal life." " For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life."

 

 Nicodemus, like the other Pharisees, had vague notions of a life beyond this, but it was only the prolongation of the soul's natural life into another state; it was the same old life continued—the same doctrine substantially that men still cling to; the same we are combatting. He had no conception of this new Spiritual Life, which begins only in a new birth, and which is the only foundation for any good hope of eternal Life. He was destitute of that spiritual principle by mina only he could conceive of it. And so is it with the great mass of men even to the present day. " The natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God because they are spiritually discerned. For they are foolishness unto him; neither can he know them."

 

 This is the doctrine Our Lord taught to the woman of Samaria at the well, under the figure of living water (John 4). Figures are used to represent realities and not to represent other figures, and this Spiritual Life of which He speaks under a figure, was an actual life. " If thou knew the gift of God and who it is that saith to thee Give me to drink; thou wouldst have asked Him and he would have given thee living water."

 

 Whosoever drinks of this water shall thirst again; but whosoever drinks of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst: but the water that I shall give him, shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life. But her fleshly mind was filled only with temporal and carnal ideas, and, as yet, there was no place in it for these spiritual and eternal verities.

 

 It was of this Life that Christ spoke in His discourse to the Jews after healing the man at the pool of Bethesda, " For as the Father raised up the dead, and quickened them even so the Son quickened whom He will. Verily, verily I say unto you, He that heareth my word and believeth on Him that sent me, hath everlasting Life, (it is already begun) and shall not come into condemnation, but is passed from death unto Life. The hour is coming and now is when the dead (as to their spiritual natures) shall hear the voice of the Son of God; and they that hear shall live. As the Father hath life in Himself, so hath He given to the Son to have Life in Himself. Search the Scriptures, for in them ye think ye have eternal life. (Why do you think so? You are in error if you expect it from any other source than this) and they are they which testify of me. And ye will not come unto me that ye might have Life." (And therefore ye must die, there is no eternal Life for you.)

 

 We desire to call special attention to this passage just quoted. From the many hints, and prophecies in their Scriptures, and from other sources these Jews, like others, and they especially, as they had more light, had come to have notions more or less clear of an immortality for the soul, but they expected it as a natural inheritance, and not as a special gift through Christ. They thought they found this doctrine taught in their Scriptures, but it was only as these Scriptures testified of Christ that it was taught, and it was only to be had through Him. It would seem that nothing could be more conclusive on this question.

 

 The same truth was preached after the miracle of the loaves and fishes, (Chap. 6). " Labor not for the meat which perished, but for that meat which endures unto everlasting life, which the Son of man shall give unto you. I am the bread of Life, he that cometh to me shall never hunger, and he that believeth on me shall never thirst. And this is the will of Him that sent me, that every one which sees the Son and believeth on Him may have everlasting Life. And I will raise him up at the last day. Verily, verily I say unto you, He that believeth on me hath everlasting Life, (even now) I am the bread of Life. Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness and are dead. This is the bread which cometh down from heaven that a man may eat thereof and not die. I am the living bread which came down from heaven, if any man eat of this bread he shall live forever. And the bread that I shall give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world. Verily, verily I say unto you, except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink His blood ye have no life in ye (no spiritual and abiding life). Whoso eats my flesh and drinks my blood hath eternal Life, and I will raise him up at the last day. As the Living Father hath sent me and I live by the Father, so he that eats me, even he shall live by me. This is the bread which came. down from heaven; not as your fathers did eat manna and are dead: he that eats of this bread shall live forever. It is the Spirit that quicken-eth; the flesh profited nothing; the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life."

 

 If any amount of reiteration could have conveyed this truth to their carnal minds they must have under-stood Him. But they did not comprehend His meaning. Neither do men who have no Spiritual discernment now comprehend, it. " From that time many of His disciples went back and walked no more with Him. Then said Jesus unto the twelve, will ye also go away? Then Simon Peter answered Him, Lord, to whom shall we go, Thou hast the words of Eternal Life?" Alas, how many there are of Christ's disciples, so-called, and even of those who profess to teach the meaning of His words to others, who if they do not " go back and walk no more," on account of this truth, still continue to look at Him and to " Know Him only after the flesh," as a Savior from hell and eternal misery, but not from actual death, and as a Giver of joy and blessedness that shall endure forever, but not of Eternal Life—Eternal Life itself!! How shall they be made to understand this great and glorious truth excepting by the Spirit of God. [An unknown friend who has recently come to the knowledge of this glorious truth writes, " I verily believe it to be a revelation from the Lord and that no man can or will receive it unless it is given him from above."] May it please Him to bless our humble efforts to this end, that they may be able to say with us in the language of the Apostle, " Though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we Him (so) no more."

 

 O brethren in Christ, why, will you any longer agree with the enemies of your Lord to rob Him of His peculiar glory as the Giver of Life, Eternal Life to His people. You indeed love and cherish Him, as well you may as your Savior from sin and misery, but He is infinitely more, He is the Author of Eternal Life to your souls. Is it not time that old things had passed away and all things had become new in your views of Him? And ye whose privilege it is to preach Him to your fellowmen, O preach Him in all the fulness of His glorious character as the Life and the only Life of a perishing world!

 

 Then said Jesus again unto them (Chap. 8) I go my way and ye shall seek me and shall die in your sins; whither I go ye cannot come. Ye are from beneath; I am from above: ye are of this world, I am not of this world. I said therefore unto you, that ye shall die in your sins.

 

For if ye believe not that I am He, ye shall die in your sins." Verily, verily I say unto you, If a man keep my sayings, he shall never see death," (not misery, but death). They were already spiritually dead and were going down to natural death, their souls with their bodies. But there was another life which He could impart to their souls that would endure forever.

 

 Again He teaches the same truth under the allegory of the Good Shepherd (Chap. 10) " Who giveth His life for the sheep." And again under that of the vine and the branches, (Chap. 16) " If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them and cast them into the fire and they are burned (not tormented but consumed.)

 

 This is the burden of His instructions to Martha at the grave of Lazarus, (Chap. 11.) She, with Mary also, had been taught by Him concerning the resurrection of the dead, the judgment and the life to come; but her notions were very imperfect and confused. She had no real understanding of the source, the method and the nature of that life when she said, " I know he shall rise again at the resurrection at the last day." Jesus said unto her, " I am the Resurrection and the Life, he that believeth in Me, though he were dead, yet shall he live. And Whosoever lives (being alive) and believeth in Me shall never die."

 

 This same truth is expressed in His intercessory prayer, (Chap. 17) "As thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him. And this is eternal Life that they might know Thee, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast sent."

 

 We might refer to the other Evangelists, but John is more full on this subject. If these quotations do not suffice, no array of texts would be sufficient to prove that there is no eternal Life but in and through Jesus Christ.

 

 Can it be possible that any of His people should still claim immortality as the natural prerogative of their own souls and deny to Him " who only hath immortality " the gift which He purchased for them with His own blood. Give unto the Lord O ye His people—" Give unto the Lord the glory due unto His Name."

 

 Is it possible that this eternal Life of which our Lord speaks so earnestly and with such constant reiteration as the boon He came to bring to dying man, for which He gave up His own life, and which He freely offers to all who will believe on Him,—is not after all, eternal Life, but only a certain condition of life, a pure blissful condition of life it is true,—but as for eternal Life itself it is equally the portion of all men?—it was never forfeited and cannot be lost? Can it be that He meant no more by these high sounding words than, that he would engraft upon the naturally eternal life of His people a condition of blessedness which should endure forever, while those who refused to believe in Him would spend their eternal life in sin and misery?

 

 How long will men under the Gospel hug to their souls this delusion of immortality in sin? O how long will Christ's people even, shut their eyes to this truth that illuminates every page of the New Testament, humiliating indeed to the pride of man, but glorious to Himself and so full of comfort and of joy to those who receive it and so full of hope for the world?

 

 It was not until after the Holy Spirit had been poured out with power upon the Apostles and immediate followers of our Lord, that their minds were opened to receive this truth, but when they did receive it, and "knew the power of His resurrection," they were lifted completely out of their former condition and filled with an energy and zeal which nothing could withstand. To the Apostles the angel said, (Acts 5:20); " Go stand and speak in the temple to the people all the words of this Life.'' This is what Paul and Barnabas preached at Antioch, first to the Jews, but when they refused to believe they said, (Chap. 13) " It was necessary that the Word of God should first have been spoken to you, but seeing ye put it from you and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo we turn to the Gentiles And when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad and glorified the Word of the Lord, and as many as were ordained to eternal Life, believed."

 

 This is what Paul preached to the Athenians, but with their minds full of the fanciful notions of their poets and philosophers concerning the spirit world, they scouted the idea of a resurrection of the dead and of eternal Life through Christ alone.

 

 It is the leading truth that runs through the Epistles of this great Apostle, and the string upon which all the other doctrines of the Gospel are hung.

 

 To the Romans he preached that all, whether Jews or Gentiles, were under one common sentence of death. Those who had sinned without law must perish (not be punished) without law, and those who had sinned under the law should be judged by the law, but that all had come short of the glory of God, and that death reigned over all the children of Adam by nature. But that by the grace of God there was hope. Though the wages of sin was death, "the gift of God was Eternal Life through Jesus Christ our Lord." As in the gift of natural life and in the appointment of man's temporal condition God was a Sovereign, He was also a Sovereign in the bestowment of this higher gift of eternal Life. This was a new life, a spiritual life.

 

 It concerned itself not with carnal and perishable things, but with things Spiritual and Eternal. They who possessed it were led by the Spirit of God. They would not come, into condemnation. Nothing would be able to separate them from the love of Christ, in whom and to whom they were henceforth to live as the elect of God and the heirs of eternal life.

 

 This great truth is equally prominent in his Epistles to the Corinthians. In the First, he shows how impossible it is for human philosophy or human wisdom to attain to any true knowledge of the Gospel—how foolish these truths seem to natural men, " For the natural man receives not the things of God. But that this is the foundation of all their hopes for the future life. " Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor have entered into the heart of man the things God hath prepared for them that love Him." "The fashion of this world passed away, the prize which natural men seek is corruptible, tut theirs is incorruptible. And finally, coming to the great and glorious doctrine of the Resurrection, he dwells upon it more at length, and shows how it is assured to them by the death and resurrection of Christ. If this assurance were to be taken away they would be the most miserable of all men, for then they would have no hopes of life beyond the grave. He attempted to explain the nature of these Spiritual bodies which their Spiritual souls will take on at the resurrection—how glorious and incorruptible they will be; how entirely different from these earthly bodies which are fitted only for carnal souls and which could not possibly inherit the kingdom of God, and how those who should be alive at the coming of Christ would be changed, " In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump. For the trumpet shall sound and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality," and Death be "swallowed up in victory."

 

 The Second Epistle is equally full of this great truth —Eternal Life through Christ alone, and so are his other Epistles, but we must cut short this view. We have no room to quote the many passages in which he speaks of Christ as "our Life," and exhorts his fellow disciples to lay, hold of Eternal Life, to seek for glory, honor and immortality, (why seek for it if it is theirs without seeking?) with the assurance that He will render to them Eternal Life Peter, James and Jude follow in the same track and speak of the "inheritance incorruptible, undefiled, and that faded not away, reserved in heaven ready to be revealed the last time," and John, especially in his Epistles, as in his Gospel, dwells upon the theme of the New birth, its spiritual nature, and the eternal Life to which it introduces its subjects. And finally, in his Revelation, he gives a panoramic view of the field of battle to the end of time, and shows us Christ as the Lamb that was slain, victorious over all His foes: Satan and his hosts are bound, judged and utterly destroyed. And the redeemed from earth whose names are written in the Lamb's Book of Life from the foundation of the world, clothed in white robes, shall walk the golden streets of the Celestial Paradise, with crowns on their heads and harps in their hands, singing praises to Him who hath gotten the victory. And they shall have a right to the Tree of Life and the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them, and shall lead them unto living fountains of waters. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes."

 

Chapter 12.

 

Third class of scripture passages.

Death and eternal life contrasted.

Adam and Christ compared.

 

 OUR attention has been directed in the last two Chapters, especially to two classes of texts. 1^st. Those that teach that the portion of the sinner or natural man is death and destruction:-2d. Those that teach that the portion of the righteous or spiritual man .is Life everlasting.

 

 Under the designation of sinners is included the whole human race. As children of Adam we are all mortal,—not mortal in any partial sense, as to our bodies merely, but mortal in every sense of the word—having no eternal Life of any sort abiding in us by nature. Immortality is declared to be the gift—the special and peculiar gift of God through Jesus Christ, and is only received as we are born again by a new Spiritual birth.

 

 The two opposite destinies of these two classes are set forth, both positively and negatively, categorically and figuratively, with such constant reiteration and in such a variety of language, in every part of God's Word, that these two prime truths, if no others, might well be considered as established beyond all question, viz: 1. That apart from Christ, the natural man has no possible ground of hope for immortality or eternal Life, 2. That this immortality is just what every regenerated soul has assured to him, in the Gospel of Christ.

 

 But, as if to put these truths beyond all controversy, and to make them stand out as clearly as possible, there is still another class of passages in which they are brought into juxtaposition; and a comparison by contrast is instituted between the wicked and the righteous, sinners and saints, natural men and spiritual men, the children of Adam by ordinary generation, and the children of God by regeneration; and their opposite characters and destinies are set, the one over against the other. The children of Adam are shown to be like their fellow progenitor, sinful, selfish, carnal, finite in their aims, earthly, mortal, and beset by a thousand ills, as they run their transitory career, until they go down to sheol, and return to the dust from which they were taken. While, on the other hand, the children of God, by a new birth, are, like their spiritual progenitor, holy, heavenly minded, seeking those things that are above; though these two natures, the old and the new mingle for a time, and struggle for the mastery in the same body, like the infants Esau and Jacob, the last born shall finally supplant the first, and come off completely victorious. And when the old nature shall go down to death and decay, the new man, created after the image of God in true holiness, shall take to itself a spiritual body adapted to its spiritual nature, and rise immortal both in body and soul, to its inheritance, incorruptible, undefiled, and that faded not away, reserved for him in heaven.

 

 3. It is to the consideration of this class of passages that we now come.

 

 It is not in the Gospel that this contrast is first instituted. But from the time when God first began to choose to Himself a peculiar people out of this world, and the line began to be drawn between them and others, a separate destiny was suggested to their hopes; and their faith laid hold of it, though it was but dimly conceived of. For life beyond the grave and immortality through Jesus Christ was not yet brought to light. Though a very prominent place is given to temporal blessings, in the good that was promised to the faithful, yet they finished their earthly course under an impression more or less distinct, that they had not exhausted the promise. " All these having obtained a good report through faith received not the promise, God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect." Heb. 11:39-40. Their faith lighted up the dark valley and dissipated its chief terrors. The way to the grave became brighter and brighter as the Gospel day began to dawn. While to the wicked these shadowy terrors that came up from sheol to meet them, became more and more terrible.

 

 There was much mystery even in the language of Christ Himself, and much more in that of the old prophets; but their words were felt to be pregnant with meaning.

 

 Says Moses, in his farewell address Deut. 30, etc. " I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing, therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live." In many of the Psalms, this contrast is beautifully drawn out—in the First, Second, Thirty-fourth, Thirty-seventh, Seventy-second and third and in many more. They abound in the writings of Solomon, " The wicked is driven away in his wickedness, but the righteous hath hope in his death." " The light of the righteous rejoiced, but the lamp of the wicked shall be put out." "Though a sinner do evil a hundred times, and his days be prolonged, yet surely I know that it shall be well with them that fear God, which fear before him. But it shall not be well with the wicked, neither shall he prolong his days, which are as a shadow, because he feared not before God."

 

In the Prophetical books this contrast is set forth in earnest and glowing language, " Say ye to the righteous, that it shall be well with him; for they shall eat the fruit of their doings. Wo unto the wicked, it shall be ill with him; for the reward of his hands shall be given him."

 

 Ezekiel, a thousand years after Moses, makes use of the same pregnant words Life and Death, in exhorting the murmuring Hebrews. They complained that the ways of God were unjust and unequal in dooming them all to death for the sins of their fathers; that it made no difference whether they were righteous or wicked, for all must die alike. He declared that it was not so; that God had no pleasure in the death of him that dies. It was His will that the wicked should turn and live. " Turn ye, turn ye, for why will ye die." He could not have meant Life and Death in a mere physical sense, for then His words would have been nothing but irony. Their complaints would not have been 'met. He must have meant Life and Death in the fullest conceivable sense. This they could not doubt, though they failed to comprehend his meaning and though the prophet failed himself to comprehend it.

 

 Daniel looking forward in prophetic vision to the final issue says, "And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting Life and some to shame and everlasting contempt." [Not ever-lasting shame and contempt, as most persons read it, but " shame and everlasting contempt."]

 

 The author of Life and Death Eternal, in his zeal to sustain a position which needs every text that can be pressed into the service, has fallen—unintentionally it is to be hoped—into the common error of misquoting this text and joining the epithet everlasting to the word shame instead of contempt as it is in the text. There is not another passage in the Old Testament that even seems to hint at an eternal future for the wicked, and so it is necessary to make the most of this. Nor does this if it is properly quoted. He says. " Dan. 12: 2; also describes in the same utterance the life' of the righteous and the ' shame ' of the wicked by the same epithet ' everlasting.' (!!) It cannot without violence be understood otherwise than as declaring them to be equally, and in the same sense everlasting." p. 332. Now this is just the very thing Daniel does not do. It is not the shame which the wicked feel that is everlasting but the contempt that is felt for them by the righteous!

 

 And the wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament, and they that turn many to righteousness, as the stars forever and ever. Shame is subjective and is expressive of what one feels within himself; but contempt (or abhorring, for this is the rendering of the same word in Is. 66: 24) is objective, and expressive of the feelings of others towards him. No man can properly be said to feel shame any longer than he lives, but he may be, like Judas, an object of contempt in the memory of others, long after he has passed away.

 

 This is just what the prophet was careful to say. And in saying it, he gives no hint that the wicked shall have any other immortality but that of contempt in the memory of those who have seen their destruction.

 

 Malachi concludes the Old Testament canon with a vivid picture of the preservation of the righteous as the jewels of God, and the destruction of the wicked, who shall be burned up as stubble and the ashes trodden under foot.

 

 Now comes John the Baptist like the day star before the rising sun, or as a herald in advance of the king to prepare the way, saying, " Repent ye for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." A new spiritual kingdom is to be erected on the earth. " The axe is laid unto the root of the trees. Therefore every tree which bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down and cast into the fire. (For what purpose? To be consumed of course.) " His fan is in His hand and he will thoroughly purge His floor, and gather His wheat into the garner. But [not, and He will gather His chaff into another garner, that both wheat and chaff may be separably kept forever, but] He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire." * At last, in the fulness of time the King Himself comes down, bringing with Him to earth the Kingdom of heaven. He comes to set it up in this lower world, and to call men into it. But all men are, by nature, earthly and carnal, under the dominion of temporal things. This is purely spiritual. Hence they must be born again. They must become new creatures. Their natural birth gives them only a low and transitory life. But the new life that He gives to His followers shall never pass away. " Because He lives, they live also." " He is the Door by which they enter." " He is the Way, the Truth and the Life." The gate that leads to destruction is wide, the way is broad, and therefore many go in thereat; and because the gate that leads to Life is straight and the way narrow, there are few that find it; and yet it is open to all who will enter it. "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting Life." They who build on any other foundation will be completely overwhelmed when the final test shall come; but they who build on Him, like a man who builds on a rock, will never fail. Treasures laid up on earth will be lost; those that are laid up in heaven will be secure forever, He is the bread that came down from heaven. All who feed on Him shall live forever; but other bread—even the manna that was given in the wilderness can nourish only for a little time. He gives the water of Life. Natural water is transient in its effect; but the water He gives, shall be in one—a well of water springing up unto Everlasting Life.

 

We shall have occasion to comment on this word unquenchable (asbestos) in another place and will simply remark here that it is of frequent use in the Scriptures and in the classics to describe a fire or anything else that is violent, excessive and irrepressible. Had it always been correctly rendered, as here, much misapprehension would have been avoided, but in Mark loth our translators have taken the liberty of substituting a whole phrase in the place of this one word, viz.: that never shall be quenched. This, no doubt was their idea about it, but they did not get it out of the word asbestos. When Homer speaks of asbestos gelos, (irrepressible laughter) we do not understand him as predicting that this laughter " never shall be quenched," but only as saying that it was violent and irrepressible.

 

 He is the true Vine, His people are the branches, and live by their union to Him as long as He lives—that is forever: But branches that are cut off from Him must wither away and be burned up.

 

 By these and by a great variety of other figures, our Lord set forth in contrast the perishable nature of all earthly things, and the certain destruction of those who choose them as their chief good, and the enduring nature of heavenly things and the eternal Life of those who seek them. This is the thought that runs through all His teachings. Whatever other truths He taught beside, this stands out prominent among them all. This, indeed, was the grand object of His mission, to rescue man from sin and consequent death, and restore him to God and to eternal Life, Life, eternal Life was the boon He offered to dying man. And this Life He could impart to those only who believe on Him.

 

 The moral law which Moses had given to the Israelites was holy and perfect, even in its adaptation to their earthly life alone, though none of them had been able fully to keep it. And its penalty of death was a righteous penalty. But now He uncovers a new and Spiritual aspect of the law, -of which they had hitherto had no conception. It is found to be equally adapted to the wants of His Spiritual Kingdom. It needs no change. Everything belonging to this world is gross, sensual, changing and perishable. It must soon pass away. They who set their affections on it, and pursue its trifles must pass away with it. But everything belonging to His Kingdom is Spiritual and incorruptible, and for this reason, abiding and eternal. The new life of His people is a Spiritual life. Their desires, their affections, their motives to action, the hopes that animate them, the instruments they use, their weapons of offense and of defense are all Spiritual.

 

 Their bodies are yet fleshly, and the old life yet lingers in their souls: but all this is soon to be changed. Their bodies with all their lusts are to be cast off, and they are to be clothed in bodies that are pure and incorruptible. For flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of heaven. In that world to which He will bring them, " they neither marry nor are given in marriage, neither can they die any more."

 

 Let no one suppose that by Spiritual, something shadowy, unsubstantial, unreal is meant. There cannot be a greater mistake. This new life and these Spiritual things are as much more real and substantial than the old life and the things of this world, as they are more abiding. Hence our Lord exhorts men to seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and to lay up their treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt it, and where thieves do not break through nor steal. He who seeks mainly to save his natural life, shall lose it, but he who hates it (or forgets it in his higher aim) shall keep it unto (zoe) Life eternal. " Fear not them which kill the body but are not able to kill the soul. (This, man cannot do, but God can). But fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell (Gehenna) (Is there anything left of a sinner after both soul and body are destroyed? The elements perhaps, but what becomes of the individual?)

 

 The net gathers all sorts of fishes: the good are kept; the bad are cast away. The curse that fell upon the tree that bore nothing but leaves, was "Let no fruit grow on thee henceforward forever." It was not condemned to bear miserable and bitter fruit forever, but no fruit at all, and it withered away. The good wheat, at the time of the harvest, was gathered into bundles to be pre-served, but the tares were—not kept in separate bundles, but burned up. Only those who had on the wedding garment were admitted to the feast. The man who failed to put it on was forever excluded. The wise virgins who had oil in their vessels with their lamps went in with the bridegroom; but the door was shut against the foolish virgins who had no oil, and their lamps went out.

 

 At the final separation He would say to those on His right hand "Come ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from before the foundation of the world ": and to those on his left hand. Depart from me, ye cursed into everlasting fire, prepare for the devil and his angels." And these shall go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into Life eternal.

 

 As this is one of the passages principally relied on to prove the eternal existence of the wicked, we shall consider it in the proper place in a following chapter. We forbear to remark further upon it at this time, than to say, that we hope to show, that the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels was prepared—not to preserve them alive, but to destroy them, and that the everlasting punishment of the wicked is elsewhere declared to be, not everlasting torment, but everlasting destruction " Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction " (2 Thess. 1.) If .the reader had not his mind preoccupied by the notion, that the wicked will certainly exist forever, this passage would no more suggest to him the idea of an eternal process of punishing than the words "eternal judgment" (Heb. 6: 2) would suggest the idea of an eternal process of judging, or the words " eternal redemption " (Heb. 9: 12) an eternal process of redeeming, or the words eternal " salvation " (v. g.) an eternal process of saving. It is the completeness, the finality and irreversibleness of the act that is signified. At the final separation the righteous are to be rewarded with eternal Life—which of course, is continuous, for it is actual and positive, and the wicked—and this includes the devil, and all his followers, are to be punished with everlasting destruction, which can mean nothing less than a completed act. The one is a state which continues forever, and the other is—not a state but, an event or transaction, final and eternal in its consequences.

 

 In fixing our attention upon the prominent points in this contrast between the two great classes into which the whole family of man is to be divided, Life to the one, and Death to the other, we are not losing sight of what our Lord said of the rewards and penalties that would be distributed to everyone according to his deserts at the last day.

 

 To the righteous will be given that measure of commendation, and those stations of honor and trust to which their faithfulness has entitled them. They who have sown sparingly shall reap also sparingly, and they who have sown bountifully shall reap bountifully. And upon the wicked, will be visited that measure of reprobation and wrath they have deserved—and no more, but so surely and impartially, as may well cause every sinner to tremble in view of it. There will be "many stripes " and " few stripes." " There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth," " tribulation and anguish," There will be disappointment, dismay, despair and rage on the part of the rejectors and enemies of Christ, when they shall see " many coming from the East and the West, from the North and the South, and sitting down in the Kingdom of God and themselves thrust out. But these rewards, on the one hand, are not the Life itself which Christ gives to this people, neither are these final judgments, on the other hand the Death in which all who die unsaved share alike. This Life eternal is not a reward of faithfulness. And those who conceive of it as such have no true conception of the Gospel. It is "the gift of God." Neither is this death the penalty of individual transgression. It is the common lot of all who fail of the great salvation. It must not be confounded with, the penalties, every sinner is to receive according to his own individual deserts. Pre-eminent among all the dreadful accompaniments of death is Death itself, from which the Gospel offers to deliver men, and in addition to all this, the forgiveness of their own individual sins, however many or few through the merits of the Savior. So also is the Life, which is already begun in the soul of every true believer, pre-eminent and distinct from the reward he shall receive for his faithful services, whether many or few while on earth.

 

 It is by confounding these two things together, Eternal Life, which is the gift of grace, and is common to every believer, and the varying rewards of every one according to his deserts, on the one hand, and the " debt of nature," which is also common to all natural men, with the penalties which every sinner must receive according to his deserts, on the other hand—an error which those who maintain the doctrine of the immortality of all men cannot well avoid—that the whole Gospel system has been thrown into inexplicable confusion, in the minds of most persons.

 

 We must cut short our quotations of individual passages contrasting the natural with the spiritual man and showing the opposite destinies of the two, which abound in all the Epistles, and the observations we had intended to make on them, that we may have room, before closing this chapter, to notice the extended parallel which the Apostle Paul has drawn in the Epistle to the Romans, and also again in the First of Corinthians, between Adam and Christ, or the first and the last Adam.

 

 Commentators and common readers of these Epistles have found great difficulty in understanding them, especially in understanding this parallel. But the chief, —if not the whole difficulty springs from the false meaning which they give to the words Death and Life in the text. The theory which they have in their own mind, in regard to the deathless nature of the soul, forbids them to understand the word Death, which is the key to the whole, in its only true and proper sense. It may mean the separation of the soul and body. It may mean a depraved and miserable condition of the soul in another state of existence. But it cannot mean, according to their theory, the real death of the soul. No wonder, under such limitations, that they find it difficult to make good sense out of the Apostle's argument—without impugning the justice of God. Theologians have been obliged to invent the monstrous doctrine of imputation of sin and its correlative, the imputation of holiness, and to resort to various contrivances and special pleas to relieve the difficulty, which their own error has created, and to explain the reasonableness and justice of God in consigning the whole human race to endless misery on account of the original sin of our first parents—a doctrine which never has been, and never can be justified to the moral sense of any man.

 

 If anyone will consent to lay aside this blinding theory of the deathless nature of the human soul, long enough to read these Epistles through, giving to the words Life and Death—just for the sake of the experiment,—their true and proper meaning, he will see a beauty and clearness in the whole argument of which he before had no conception.

 

 We have room only to indicate, in the briefest manner possible, the main points in this parallel.

 

 Adam and Christ stand respectively at the head of two kingdoms, the one natural, the other spiritual. The natural is first, and necessarily so, "afterward that which is spiritual."

 

 Adam is a mere creature; he possesses-, at best, but a derived and a dependent life. Christ is the Almighty Creator, the Source and Fountain of all life.

 

 To Adam as an individual was offered, and to us also, through him as our representative, a natural earthly immortality conditioned upon perfect obedience, which was liable to be forfeited any moment by sin. He lost it both for himself and for us, by one act of sin. Christ also, in the flesh that He might become a perfect Savior, stood before the same law. His obedience was tested, " He was tempted in all points as we are, yet without sin," and through Him is offered to us, a spiritual and heavenly immortality which cannot be forfeited or lost.

 

Adam was a mere earthly creature,—at any rate, he became so after his sin;—there was no spiritual life in his soul; it was dominated by his animal nature; and therefore he could not be otherwise than transitory and mortal; he became the progenitor of a race like himself, destitute of spiritual life, carnal, selfish, sinful and, necessarily, mortal, —mortal in every sense of the word. Christ was a Spiritual Being; though in the flesh for a time, His spiritual nature, which is undying, dominated the whole man; and this nature He communicates to us as His children by the new birth; and "because He lives, we live also."

 

 Because Adam sinned, we all must die, irrespective of our individual deserts;—even those who have not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression must pay the penalty of a natural law violated;—because Christ died and rose again, " we all shall be made alive," irrespective of our individual deserts;—both the death of the body, and the resurrection of the body are equally involuntary, and equally comprehensive of the whole human race, and both without regard to individual moral character.

 

 But we become participants in the moral guilt of Adam only as we sin by our own individual act—So, also, we become participants in the merits of Christ only as we are united to Him by a personal act of faith. This is the foundation of the rewards and penalties that shall be distributed to everyone, at the last day according to his deserts.

 

 But through Adam we inherit a proclivity to sin, and we also suffer a thousand ills we did not bring upon ourselves by our sins. So through Christ a thousand blessings, and heavenly influences come round us which 'we have never deserved or sought.

 

 Through the sin of Adam and our participation with him in its guilt, we lose both our natural bodies and the natural life of our souls; we lose an earthly paradise, and the right to the Tree of Life in the midst of it, by which means only, our frail natures could have been renewed and kept in repair. But in Christ we gain "much more " than we lost in Adam. We gain a glorious Spiritual body, an incorruptible nature that needs no repair, a heavenly Paradise and a right to the Tree of Life which stands in the midst of the garden of God, not as the instrument but the enduring pledge and sacrament of a pure and blissful immortality.

 

 Our opponents charge us with narrowing down, and restricting to their most literal sense, the words Life and Death as employed in the Scriptures to set forth the opposite destinies of the righteous and the wicked. While, at the same time, they complain that we charge them with making them to mean mere happiness and misery. But neither of us admit the charge. There is nothing gained to the cause of truth by misrepresenting each other. We both, no doubt, understand them to mean vastly more. We all regard them as pregnant words, full of meaning, and desire to give them as broad and full a sense as our respective theories will allow. But they cannot receive them in as broad and full a sense as we do. They cannot understand by them all that we do; for, then, there would be no controversy between us. They are the crucial words in this dispute. The question is, how much or how little we are to understand by them. We believe that eternal Life means Life indeed, but it includes also and carries with it all the blessings promised to the righteous, and that Death means death indeed, and it also includes and carries with it all the curses threatened to the wicked. Our opponents believe that the words mean all that we do, except Life itself and Death itself! That is, they reject from these words the main idea. It is the play of Hamlet with Hamlet left out. Surely the accompaniments of Life, however joyous, are not life itself, nor are the accompaniments of death, however terrible, death itself. We hold that the leading thought, around which all the others cluster in subordination, in the portion of the righteous, is Life, Life, and that this Life is derived from Christ their living Head. We hold also that the leading thought, around which all the other cluster in subordination, in the portion of the wicked, is Death, Death; for they are utterly and forever separated from Him who is the only source and sustainer of Life.

 

 We cannot but ask: is it probable? Nay. Is it possible that the Scriptures should ring with these two words from one end to the other—the two most prominent and important words in all the Bible as regards our destiny, when neither Life itself nor Death itself is really meant, but only a certain condition of life—blessed indeed on the one hand, and miserable indeed on the other; but as for Life itself, it is not the peculiar gift of God to the righteous through Jesus Christ, but the common inheritance of both the righteous and the wicked through Adam—and as for Death itself, it is not the wages of sin; for there is no such thing as actual Death even to the wicked—but only endless misery. Any theory that requires such wresting of God's Word to sustain it has no foundation in Truth.

 

Chapter 13.

 

The old dogma supported by two props; assumption and the double use of words.

Specious reasoning.

What constitutes orthodoxy, and what is heresy on this question?

Natural immortality not hinted at in the scriptures.

 

 THE doctrine of eternal sin and misery rests on two props:—namely, (1.) The assumption that man is necessarily immortal, and (2.) A certain, or rather uncertain double or alternative use of the crucial words in the controversy according to the convenience of its advocates.

 

 1. If it be assumed as a postulate that man is destined to an endless existence regardless of its character or condition, then there are many passages of 'Scripture that may be made to appear to sustain the inference, that the wicked will exist forever in sin and misery; for if, according to the assumption, they must spend a conscious eternal existence somewhere, and if they cannot spend it in the happiness of heaven, then where else can they spend it but in the misery of hell? Hence all those many passages that speak of the final rejection of sinners, of their exclusion from heaven, of their destruction, of their perdition, of the loss of their souls, of their never being forgiven, etc., are received as teaching the doctrine of eternal sin and misery: All that speak of their weeping and gnashing of teeth at the last day, are supposed to teach that this weeping and gnashing of teeth will be kept up forever: All that speak of the disappointment, dismay and anguish that shall seize upon the wicked when God shall bring them into judgment for their sins, are supposed to teach the same doctrine.

 

 The "undying worm " and the "unquenchable fire," are supposed to represent agents that will forever feed upon the bodies and souls of their miserable victims without consuming them. " Everlasting punishment " is supposed to mean everlasting torture. The two expressions are taken to be synonymous. " Everlasting destruction " is taken to mean the same thing,—that is, the everlasting process of destroying that never ends in destruction. Even death, the word that is more frequently used than any other, to describe the doom of sinners, is supposed to mean, the eternal agony of dying that never ends in death. When all these passages are collected and set forth in fearful array, they are thought to be very conclusive by those who are fully possessed of the idea that the soul is immortal and indestructible. They are certainly conclusive against the doctrine of universal salvation. But not one of them sustains the doctrine of eternal sin and suffering, as distinguished from everlasting destruction. So far from having any real force against this doctrine of everlasting destruction which we are maintaining, we take them all as so many incontrovertible arguments in favor of our position. If the inquirer could be induced to drop his theory of the necessary immortality of the soul, which he will find nowhere asserted or even hinted at in the Bible, and to look at these passages with a mind unbiased by prejudice, he would be surprised to see how uniformly they all sustain the doctrine for which we are contending. He would, also, be amazed to see how little support he can find in the Word of God for his doctrine of eternal sin and suffering. It is only as he assumes the unconditional immortality of the soul —the very thing that needs first to be proved—that he is able to find any apparent support for it. While, without any theory on the subject to blind him, he will find innumerable passages that assert, in almost every form of language, and in the most positive manner, the death and destruction of the wicked.

 

 2. As for the other prop on which this dogma rests for support:—namely, the double or alternate use of the principle words in the discussion:—we. have already, in a previous chapter shown the double duty the word annihilation is made to perform, and how the sophistical reasoner sometimes predicates the term of the living organism, and sometimes of the elements that compose it; and alternates from the one to the other, as the necessities of his argument require. The same double game is played with the correlative word existence, upon which we have also remarked. We may predicate existence of a house, for instance, or of the materials of which the building is composed, even after the house has been destroyed as a building, but it is not the house that now exists, but only the ruins or the elements that exist. A running brook maybe said to exist for a time. But let it be dried up. The vapory particles may be somewhere in existence, and the dry bed may still exist but the brook no longer exists. The body of an animal may exist after the animal is dead, or has been destroyed, but it is not the animal that exists. All this is so obvious that it would seem unnecessary to say it. Yet there are those calling themselves Christian teachers who, by playing on this word exist attempt to show that the soul may exist not only after it is dead, but after it has been destroyed, and not only exist but exist as a living, conscious soul, and that too, forever—because forsooth its elements—if indeed it has any elements—may be said to exist:—a kind of sophistry of which any honest man ought to be ashamed. [See Life and Death Eternal, pp. 37, 38.]

 

 The same sort of logodaedaly is practiced with the words Life and Death. Sometimes, that is, when it is convenient, the word Life is taken to mean life, and so also, the word death is taken to mean death. But when the theory requires it, neither of them can be allowed to mean either life or death, but the one, a certain blissful condition of life, and the other a certain miserable condition of life. It is by playing between these two meanings, calling one of them scriptural and the other literal, and taking either just as the theory requires, that these advocates contrive to delude others, and themselves, also, with the idea that they are proving from the Bible, that the soul exists as a soul after it has been destroyed, and lives and exercises the functions of life after it is dead!

 

 The same art is practiced with the word destruction (apoleian, olethros, both from the same root,) of such frequent use in the Scriptures. It is the strongest word that can be employed to denote the complete and utter demolition, taking to pieces, and ruination of the thing spoken of. It means everything but the absolute annihilation of the elements of the object. It is so understood ordinarily. But when the Scriptures speak of the destruction of the soul, why, that is a different thing, for the soul is, according to the theory, indestructible. Therefore when the Bible speaks of the soul and body both as being destroyed in hell, it cannot mean that they will actually be destroyed, but it means that they will both be made as miserable as possible in hell. This is called Bible exegesis.

 

 The same may also be substantially said of the word punishment (kolasis), which has a subjective and an objective application, the one referring to the pain which the criminal feels, and the other to the demonstration which justice makes for the observation of others. In regard to the future punishment of sinners, the theory requires that it should be taken subjectively as pain that is eternally felt, although the Scriptures tell us that the wicked are "punished with everlasting destruction." And so of other important words which might be mentioned.

 

 Starting with the assumption that man is destined to an endless existence, and then by a skillful selection of texts without regard to their original connection or application, and by taking the crucial words in them in either one of two or more senses, as may be found convenient, it would be astonishing indeed, if a specious argument could not be made out from the Bible in favor of eternal misery.

 

 There is no popular heresy or error, and there never was one, current in the Church that could not in this way glean some apparent support from the Scriptures. All the old errors of the Papal Church, which we as Protestants have long since discarded; such as Transubstantiation, Penance, Auricular Confession, Extreme unction, Salvation by works, Peter's supremacy and the Infallibility of his successors, etc., have a show of support in many passages of Scripture. So of many Protestant errors that might be mentioned. But the question with every sincere inquirer after the truth should be, not how much apparent support can I get out of the Scriptures for my favorite dogma by an ingenious use of certain texts? but what do they really teach, and what is the general spirit and tenor of their testimony? We are bold to affirm, that if anyone will come to the Word of God in this way, without any theory of his own to sustain on this subject, he will not find half a dozen passages in all the Bible that even suggest to his mind the thought—we will not say of the natural immortality of the soul—for there is not one that does this, while there are hundreds that flatly contradict it —but of an eternity of sin and suffering for the wicked. This is more than can be said of most of the other errors that have had or now have currency in the world. And there is not one of even these few passages, as we hope to show, that cannot be understood equally well—unless one is determined not to so understand them—as harmonizing with the overwhelming flood of testimony from all parts of the Bible to tile actual death and destruction of the wicked.

 

 It is time that Christians uttered their protest against the license that is taken with the Word of God by those who are set to proclaim its messages to dying men and to expound its meaning—and not their own philosophies. There is no book that requires a more reverential handling. There is none that is so deceitfully dealt with. And upon no subject has its testimony been more wrested and falsified, than upon the subject now in hand—the ultimate doom of the unsaved. It has a weaker basis to rest upon than any other false doctrine that ever found its way into the Christian Church, even in the times of its deepest corruption. It was the policy of the Papal Church to heap every possible, imaginable horror upon the heads of those who fell under her censure or who died out of her communion. While Protestants denounce her Spirit as that of barbarism, and have rejected most of her grosser dogmas and methods as unchristian and demoralizing, they have inherited her Spirit and teachings on this question with scarcely any modification. They have rejected her Purgatory with its purifying fires, it is true, but they have retained her Hell with all its eternal tortures without any protest.

 

They cherish her extremist views on this subject as specially sacred. They labor hard to prove them correct, and have little charity for those who call them in question, or attempt to show that their reasoning in this regard is sophistical and contrary to the whole tenor and Spirit of the Gospel. Garbled passages are taken here and there from the Bible wherever they can be found without any regard to their connection or application; bits of sentences and poetic ejaculations are gathered up; predicates are transferred from their proper subjects to others; the fire and brimstone that was rained upon Sodom; the everlasting burnings spoken of by Isaiah with sole reference to the temporal miseries inflicted upon his people by their invading enemies; the undying worm and the unquenchable fire of the valley of Hinnom, spoken of by the same prophet, and quoted by our Lord; the sheol of the Old Testament, clothed with all the terrors of the Gehenna of the New; the tormenting flame and the parched tongue of Dives in the parable describing a scene anterior to the judgment; the vials of wrath poured out upon the enemies of the Church in its victorious progress through the world, causing them to gnaw their tongues for anguish and to call upon the rocks and mountains to fall upon them and hide them from the face of the Lamb, as seen by John in his vision in the book of Revelation; the miseries of those who worship the beast, having no rest, day nor night, forever; the wrath that comes upon mystical Babylon, and upon the beast, and the false prophet, and the old serpent, in their final destruction, the smoke of whose torment ascended up ages upon ages to the end of time: these and all the other terrible epithets and predicates, and metaphors, and figures, and images, that can be gathered from the Bible, are brought together and mingled into one seething caldron of wrath and fury to be poured without mercy, and without cessation upon the " never-dying " souls of all the unsaved children of Adam, by their Maker forever and ever, and ever!

 

 We read in the history of the Church of many revolting deeds of cruelty—of men and women being flayed alive; having live coals poured over their naked bodies; being roasted on gridirons over slow fires; being stretched in racks till their limbs were wrenched asunder; being broken on wheels; having their nails torn off, and their eyes gouged out, and their tongues torn out by the roots, and of suffering many other savage and cruel tortures, such as human fiends alone could invent, while every device was employed to protract their agonized lives as long as possible, though, at length, exhausted nature would give out, and their tormentors could only seek new victims upon whom to exercise their hellish functions. But not so with the Almighty Tormentor of their creed, whom they professed to serve and to imitate. They had not the power to protract interminably the lives of their victims, though they had the will to do it. He, as they represented Him, has both the power and the will. Hence the fleeting miseries of this life are but trifles; they are nothing at all compared with the infinite and endless miseries of the death—that is, of the Life—to come. Accepting from the mouth of the tempter the assurance to sinning man "ye shall not surely die," they could prove all the rest of this doctrine and even this assurance, from the Word of God itself. We have accepted at their hands, both the assurance and the doctrine of endless torment that rests upon it, as well as their methods of proof.

 

 It is a very suggestive fact that no man is ever suspected of heresy, however much he may lean in this direction, however much he may draw on his imagination, or however sophistically he may handle the Scriptures to sustain his doctrine, or however cruel or unmerciful a character he may attribute to oar Heavenly Father. Indeed, the more extreme he is in this. line of things the more orthodox he is. But let him begin to suspect that the Bible really means what it says about the death and utter destruction of the wicked; let him begin to question whether it is possible for God, who so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting Life, to be so cruel towards the whole race of unsaved men, whether this Gospel has ever been offered to them or not, as to consign them all alike to perpetual and endless miseries in a world to come; to keep them alive eternally by an effort of miraculous power, that' He may torment them for His own glory and the good of those whom He saves—let him begin to ask whether the Bible really teaches any such doctrines as this: and 'he at once falls into discredit. Why is all this? Is the dark side of God's character that which alone is to be cherished? and the darker it can be made to appear, the more worthy of being defended and cherished? Are we in danger of error and obnoxious to suspicion, only when we begin to look at His paternal character, and to speak of His love and mercy? Does not the fact of human depravity and the certain doom of death and extinction, to which every natural man is hastening, present a background sufficiently dark and dismal upon which to paint the Gospel in all its glory? Has this Gospel no beauty, no living force of its own, no power to touch the hearts of perishing men without these lurid horrors thrown in around and behind it, as a foil, to give it piquancy and zest? Is it rather to the way in which one paints the background than the picture itself that we are to look for the test of his orthodoxy?

 

 Take a specimen extract from one of the discourses of a leading orthodox divine of the last century:

 

 The world will probably be converted into a great lake or liquid globe of fire—a vast ocean of fire, in which the wicked shall be overwhelmed, which will always be in tempest, in which they shall be tossed to and fro, having no rest day or night, vast waves or billows of fire continually rolling over their heads, of which they shall forever be full of a quick sense within and without; their heads, their eyes, their tongues, their hands, their feet, their loins and their vitals shall forever be full of glowing, melting fire, enough to melt the very rocks and elements. Also they shall be full of the most quick and lively sense to feel torments—not for one minute, not for one day, not for one age, nor for two ages, nor for a thousand ages, nor for ten thousand millions of ages, one after another, but forever and ever, without any end at all and never, never to be delivered! —Jonathan Edwards.

 

 Take another passage from the same author:

 

 We can conceive but little of the matter, but cannot conceive what that sinking of the soul in such a case is. But to help your conception, imagine yourself to be cast into a fiery oven, all of a glowing heat, or into the midst of a glowing brick-kiln, or of a great furnace, where your pain would be as much greater than that occasioned by accidentally touching a coal of fire, as the heat is greater. Imagine also that your body were to lie there for a quarter of an hour, full of fire, as full within and without as a bright coal of fire, all the while full of quick sense; what horror would you feel at the entrance of such a furnace? How long would that quarter of an hour seem to you? If it were to be measured by a glass, how long would the glass seem to be running? And after you had endured it for one minute, how overbearing would it be to you to think that you had it to endure the other fourteen? But what would be the effect on your soul, if you knew you must lie there enduring that torment to the full for twenty-four hours? And how much greater would be the effect if you knew you must endure it for a whole year; and how vastly greater still, if you knew you must endure it for a thousand years? O then, how would your heart sink, if you thought, if you knew, that you must bear it forever and ever! That there would be no end! That after millions and millions of ages, your torment would be no nearer to an end than ever it was, and that you never, never should be de-livered. But your torment in hell will be immensely greater than this illustration represents.—(Edwards' Works, Volume 4.)

 

 No doubt, that wise and good man believed all this, at least, he thought he did, or he would not have preached it. Do men believe it at the present day? If not, why not? What then do they believe and preach on this subject? If all this is true, it ought to be preached. It has come down to us formulated in our creeds and catechisms, which are held to be the embodiment of truth, and almost as sacred as the Scriptures.

 

 If there is any difference between orthodox theologians of the present day and of the former age on this subject, it is not in their creed, but in their mode of presenting it.

 

 In reply to a circular sent out by the publishers of the Congregationalist in December, 1877, to one hundred representative Congregational Ministers, propounding the inquiry whether there had been any essential departure from the faith of our fathers on this question of endless punishment, the great majority expressed their decided conviction that there had been none. It was generally admitted, however, that while Ministers believed this doctrine, they handled it with more delicacy and reserve than formerly! The principal difference seems to be that these grosser representations have given place to those that are more refined. Mental torment is substituted for corporal, and by many it is described as subjective rather than objective, in order to relieve God from the responsibility of inflicting it, and throwing it on the sufferer Himself. It is implied, that as it is the natural result of sin, and the creature was made immortal, God is obliged to witness the shocking spectacle! Did not He make a mistake in giving an unconditional immortality to these poor wretched creatures?

 

 It would greatly have served the convenience of those who are anxious to prove the doctrine set forth in the above extracts, if the Word of God had somewhere asserted, or at least, had hinted at the indefeasible im-mortality of the human soul; but so far from this, it has uniformly denied it in the plainest terms on almost every page from Genesis to Revelation. It seems to be one of the chief objects of the Bible to show how brief, vapory, shadowy, transitory the life—not the earthly life, but the actual life—of fallen man is, and how enduring, substantial and eternal is the life which dwells in God and which is imparted to the souls of His children. It is said by those who have taken the pains to examine this point, that the human soul is spoken of in the Scriptures more than sixteen hundred times, and in not one solitary instance is it spoken of as immortal or deathless in its nature, but always as a short-lived and perishable thing. The only hope of an eternal existence hereafter that is held out to man since the fall, is that which is offered to him through the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

 

 Olhausen says in his commentary on Luke 16: The Bible knows not either the expression immortality of the soul, or the modern doctrine of immortality." And again in his comment on Matt. 22: 23: "The resurrection, we must distinguish from the immortality of the soul. Of the latter the Scriptures never speak: on the contrary, God is called O monos echon athanasian' who alone has immortality, 1 Tim., 6: 16."

 

 The advocates of an eternal existence in hell have felt the force of this fact: and how do they meet it? Why, nothing is more easy. Let us hear what one of their chief champions has to say on this point.

 

 Why does not the Bible deal in such phrases as ‘the immortality of the soul? '—phrases of so frequent occurrence in human compositions. The answer is short.

 

 It is not alone because the fact was admitted (1) and might be assumed, but also, because they were charged with messages of such tremendous import concerning the character and condition of that endless existence as quite to throw into the background (2) the abstract proposition of the soul's immortality. If they had been mere human teachers very possibly they might have indulged in sentimental dissertations and romantic speculations on the greatness and immortality of the human soul. But they come as divine teachers to teach men concerning their present and eternal relations to the government of God, to proclaim endless holiness and well-being, or everlasting sin and woe as pending on faith and repentance here. To them the naked question of immortality aside from these relations and issues, was of no account at all, (3)—no more than the life of an oyster!! (Life and Death Eternal, pp. 191, 192.)

 

 This we regard as a most remarkable declaration for a master of Israel to make. (I) So far from being " admitted " as he says—of all people in the world the ancient Hebrews had the least suspicion of the immortality of the human soul. The reason was, they were under the special teaching of God Himself. In confirmation of what we assert, it will suffice to quote a remark, which any candid Bible scholar will endorse, of the author of Ecce Homo, who was himself a believer in the dogma we oppose.

 

 It is surprising that the early Jews, in whom the sense of God was so strong and who were familiar with the conception of an Eternal Being, should yet have been behind rather than before other nations in suspecting the immortality of the soul. [It is not at all surprising.] The Greek did not even in the earliest times believe death to be annihilation though he thought it fatal to all joy and vigor, but the early Jews, the Legislator himself, and most of the Psalmists limit their hopes and fears to the present life, and compare man to the beasts that perish. The suspicion of immortality appears in the later prophets, that suspicion which Christ Himself was to develop into a glorious confidence," pp. 35-36.

 

 (2) Instead of "throwing this doctrine of immortality into the background " they have no such back ground at all. It is foreign from their thoughts. But they do give us a background of death and destruction on which to set forth their " tremendous messages." (3) As for being " of no account at all," it is of all questions of fact the most important to have answered by the Word of God; for man cannot answer it himself. It has been the question of questions in all ages of the world, on the part of those who had no Revelation to teach them. " If a man die shall he live again? " And shall he live forever? God has thought it more important to declare His own immortality than any other attribute, and that too " as an abstract proposition." He has chosen this attribute to be the title by which He is to be known. Jehovah, " the Ever-living " "the Eternal God," " the Everlasting Father." "He who is and was and ever shall be," " whose years have no end," " who lives forever and ever," " the Lord shall endure forever."

 

 It is just on this point that He contrasts Himself with "man whose breath is in his nostrils." " I kill and I make alive, neither is there any that can deliver out of my hand For I lift my hand up to heaven and say I live forever."

 

 Shall puny man lift up his hand to heaven and say I, too, live forever? Is his immortality so much more evident and sure than that of his Creator, that there is no need of even hinting at it in all the Bible, while that of Jehovah must be constantly asserted? Is it not rather because man is a finite creature with no immortality of his own to speak of, and no hope of living forever but in union with God through Christ the Savior, who has promised, eternal. Life to all who believe on Him?

 

Chapter 14.

 

Fourth class of passages and misinterpreted texts of scripture examined.

Everlasting, eternal punishment: its nature and end.

Unquenchable fire.

 

 THE words (aion, aionos, eis ton aiona, eis ton aiona tou aionos, eis ton aiona kai eti, etc., etc.) eternal, everlasting, forever, forever -and ever, etc., of so frequent occurrence in the Scripture, are used, as every Bible scholar knows, with a wide latitude of signification: sometimes relating to this world and to things evidently transient as hills, mountains, the Aaronic priesthood, the temple service, a temporal inheritance, the leprosy of Gehazi, life servitude, etc., and sometimes to God Himself and the things of the world to come.

 

 This agrees with the radical meaning of the word aion from which all these other forms of expression are de-rived. Its simple, primary signification is duration. Hence it is often taken for a definite period of time, as a lifetime, a generation, an age or cycle, and, perhaps, oftener, for an indefinite period of time or simply for duration, without regard to any limit. But in either case, it does not contain the idea of endlessness, but simply of duration to which no limit is seen or assigned. Men are very apt to confound the indefinite with the infinite, but there is a radical difference between these two ideas, as we shall see if we will apply the test to numbers instead of time. The number of grains of sand on the sea-shore is indefinite, and we may express this idea by a word implying actual infinity, because we do not know or cannot express the actual number; but still they come infinitely short of being infinite in number. The same is true of this word aion and its derivatives. The term is often and properly applied to God, Whose life-time actually has no end; but this term does not of itself necessarily imply it. The fact of the absolute endlessness of anything to which it is applied must be declared in other ways, and determined by other considerations.

 

 When the Scriptures speak of the everlasting hills, or of everlasting earthly arrangements or processes, of everlasting doors, or chains, or burnings, or fire, or any natural or transient thing, the word is limited by the nature of the thing spoken of, and by the common sense of those to whom they speak, and there is no need of misunderstanding their meaning. When they speak thus, of that which in its own nature is absolutely incorruptible, and which has been declared in other ways and by other forms of speech to be absolutely without end, we have no occasion, either in reason or in the nature of the thing to limit the term. It takes all the force of which it is capable. Hence it is equally proper to speak of an everlasting inheritance on earth and of an everlasting inheritance in heaven, though reason assures us that one will come to an end and the Word of God assures us that the other will be without end.

 

 When the term is applied to that which might be supposed to be endless without doing violence to reason, or to that concerning which we have no other evidence whatever but such as we find in this word or phrase, all we can do is to give to the expression that very indefiniteness, which is its peculiar characteristic.

 

 Since the above was written the meaning of these words has been the subject of thorough discussion by many learned scholars, and  the views we have expressed would seem to be confirmed by their united testimony.

 

 But we have but little concern, excepting so far as regards the truth in this matter, as to what force may be given to them. We do not rely at all on any peculiar meaning that may be attached to them. They are never employed to define the lifetime of the human soul, nor the duration of the sufferings of the wicked. They are employed, however, in connection with the (zoe) Life of the righteous and the irreversible rejection and punishment of the wicked, which is declared to be that of everlasting destruction. Whatever meaning may be given to them, they have no real force against the doctrine for which we contend—that of eternal Life only in Christ.

 

 

 We have not the least desire to detract from the force or meaning of these phrases, as used in the Bible, and we have no need to do so. Let them have the entire and full meaning that belongs to them in the connection where they are found. But we believe there is a very general misapprehension as regards the use of these terms in connection with the soul of man and the allotments of the future world, in the Scripture. The expressions, the "ever-living soul," "never-dying soul," "the immortal soul," "the deathless soul," etc., also, "eternal misery," "eternal sorrow," "eternal woe," "eternal death," "the death that never dies," etc. which are so frequently on the lips of religious teachers, have no place whatever in the Bible. They are human inventions, and have their origin in that false philosophy we are opposing. There is no term signifying endless duration, or duration without limit, ever applied to the soul itself in the Word of God. Nor is any such term ever applied to the subjective condition of the wicked as one of unhappiness or sorrow, etc., in a future state. But they are of very frequent occurrence in their application to the subjective condition of the righteous, as one of life, joy and blessedness.

 

 The question is often asked, why the Bible speaks of the "eternal death" of the wicked, if by it eternal misery is not meant. We reply: It does not so speak. There is no such phrase in the Bible. We have the phrase eternal Life constantly repeated, but never once eternal death. It is true we have a book written to prove that eternal death means eternal torment. It is entitled, "Life and Death Eternal," as though both these terms were found in the Scriptures; but the title is as misleading as the book itself.

 

 The word everlasting is several times applied to the agents or agencies employed in the destruction of the wicked, and twice applied to their objective doom—that is, a doom that may be observed by others and remembered after they have passed away, once, as " everlasting punishment," Matt. 25: 46, and once (2 Thess. 1:9) as " everlasting destruction," and, lest any should take the word punishment altogether in a subjective sense, and make it mean everlasting misery, instead of taking it in its objective sense, as intended, the latter phrase defines the former and makes the meaning sure. The passage reads "Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction (issuing) from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his power." There would be no need of the word everlasting even in its application to the objective doom of the wicked; the term death or destruction without any epithet would have sufficed, if no salvation or rescue from this death had been revealed in the Gospel of Christ; had not the glorious fact of life from the dead been made known. Now there is hope for those who have fallen under the curse of the law which is death; those who have brought destruction upon themselves may yet be saved if they seek the Lord while He may be found. But in the end, of this day of grace, when this reprieve shall be exhausted without the accomplishment of its object, and the final judgment shall come, then, the sentence of death and destruction will be final and conclusive. The gospel is no more offered. There is no longer any hope of rescue, and the doom may well be termed everlasting. This also brings the sentence that is pronounced upon each of the two parties in the judgment scene described in Matt. 25, into contrast and shows that on both sides it is final, conclusive and irreversible. "These shall go away with everlasting punishment (which is everlasting destruction) but the righteous into Life eternal."

 

 But it is a monstrous perversion of this passage to say, that it show that the miseries of the wicked will endure as long as the blessedness of the righteous, and that both will be without end. It shows no such thing. The scene here pictured for us to look at is objective. Whatever of happiness or of misery there may be in it to the parties described is incidental to the main point in question. It is not in regard to the happiness and misery of the two parties that our Lord is primarily speaking, but in regard to their final separation and the infinite difference between their respective allotments. The righteous will be received into eternal Life and rewarded for all their good deeds while upon earth. Of course this will bring everlasting joy, for life itself is positive and subjective. It is not something merely for another to observe, and if it is without end, as it is declared to be elsewhere, they never shall die any more, then their blessedness will be perpetual and unending. The wicked will be cast into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels, there to be punished for their misdeeds and to be forever destroyed. Death is the negative of life, as darkness is of light. It is not something that can be enjoyed or suffered, excepting in the process of dying, and the same may be said of destruction. There cannot be an everlasting dying which does not issue in death, nor an everlasting destroying that never issues in destruction. However great the pain that is suffered in the process, when the process is completed, as it must be, or there is no meaning in the term, then it becomes an objective doom, and if it is final, it may well be called an ever-lasting destruction, and when this destruction is the penalty inflicted upon the wicked, they are punished with everlasting destruction, or, in other words, it is " everlasting punishment."

 

 The advocates of the doctrine of endless suffering regard this passage (Matt. 25:46) as their main reliance and as decisive in their favor. They say that, as the happiness of the righteous and the misery of the wicked are both declared to be everlasting, the one must endure as long as the other—all this is very specious; but there is a fallacy here which thousands fail to perceive, and which perhaps, they do not see themselves. If these were the two objects contrasted, viz: happiness and misery, their argument would be good. But the Scriptures make no such contrast, and it is just here that their error lies. It is not the happiness and the misery of the two classes, but the Life of the one and the death-punishment of the other that are contrasted. Life is a state; it continues forever, and is full of joy and blessedness in the case of the righteous. Punishment is not a state but an act, .an event, and so is death. There will be sorrow, pain and anguish, no doubt, on the part of the wicked, but the contrast is not in this, but in the separation and the issue, and in the everlasting finality of the issue. All this would be plain enough were it not for the presence of this dogma in the mind which blinds it to the real meaning of this and other passages bearing on the subject. It is assumed that the souls of the wicked are immortal, and so they will live on and sin and suffer forever after they have been punished with everlasting destruction! But the Scriptures teach no such doctrine.

 

 But what is punishment, and what is the object and end of it? That it supposes pain, or loss, or evil of some kind inflicted upon the subject of it, is not to be questioned. The chief object in view may be, as it usually, or often, is in this world, the good of the sufferer. In that case, mercy is mingled with severity, and it is called chastisement or correction, or disciplinary punishment. But it may have no respect whatever to the good of the sufferer but only the public good. Its chief object may be to vindicate law and justice and to maintain authority. But in either case the suffering inflicted is not the chief or ultimate object in view, though it may be incidental and necessary to that object. At least, it is not the chief object under any just government. Here is just the mistake of most of the advocates of the doctrine of eternal torment. It is the great error of the book entitled " Life and Death Eternal." The author devotes a large portion of his work to an attempt to show, that suffering is the main thing in punishment, and that the intensity of. the pain and the length of time it is felt determines the amount of punishment inflicted. He closes the Sixth Chapter with this emphatic conclusion, to the proof of which the whole chapter is devoted. " The future punishment spoken of in the Scriptures clearly consists in intensity of suffering." And again in the following Chapter "As the punishment consists in suffering, etc. Again in a previous chapter, he says: " Even extinction, in so far as it would be punishment at all, would be so only so far as the expectation of it, and the process would be productive of suffering." Why, according to this theory capital punishment is one of the lightest kinds of punishment, if summarily executed.

 

 If the criminal is arrested and tried, condemned and executed without delay, he is hardly punished at all; for his sufferings are but momentary. Whereas, they should have been made as full of the intense agony, and as protracted as possible. Or rather, there should be no death penalty at all under any government; but for the highest offenses the penalty should be torture, and torture as long as the victim could be made to live and endure it. This is just the kind of punishment that men of brutal instincts, and unfeeling hearts, and too little of the love and tenderness of the Gospel in their souls have invented for the government of God. But it is sheer barbarism, and has long ago been exploded as philosophically unsound, and repudiated by every decent government on earth, but it is still suffered to remain in our orthodox theology as the theory of God's government, because the dogma of necessary immortality requires it.

 

 There is a great confusion of ideas in the minds of these men on this question of punishment. They overlook the main and ultimate object which every just ruler has in view in the punishment of criminals. Instead of being vindicative, as it should be, they make it simply vindictive.

 

 In fact, the whole question between us and these theologians reduces itself to this: What is the leading object which God, the Creator of all men, has in view, in His dealings with them, especially those who are not saved; those to whom the Gospel has been offered and who have rejected it, and the millions upon millions of those to whom it has never been offered? Is it to torment them, and torment them forever, or is it to destroy them? Is it His declared purpose to purify His kingdom and maintain His government by casting out and destroying all who are disloyal and impure and cannot be reclaimed, or to preserve them in sin and misery forever? Will the unsaved portion of His creatures be tormented forever for the purpose of maintaining the blessedness of the other portion and the glory of His Name, or will they be utterly and forever consumed, so that nothing shall remain but what is holy and blessed forever throughout His universal kingdom?

 

 We believe it to be His primary purpose in His dealings with fallen men to save them, if they will or can be saved; but if they will not or cannot be saved, then to destroy them. If they will not live according to the laws of their own being, if they will not live as loyal, obedient and loving subjects of His righteous government, then they shall not live at all. They shall die. But if on the other hand they will live in union with Him and all His holy creatures, He will make them blessed and happy forever.

 

 This we believe to be according to the uniform teaching of His Word. And the doctrine that He will preserve the lives of all alike, whether angels or devils, saints or sinners, permitting the one class to bask in the sunshine, of His favor, while He lavishes upon them every conceivable good, and compel the other class to writhe in all the agonies of an non consuming fire, while He pours out upon them every conceivable woe forever and ever, we believe to be an unwarranted perversion of the teachings of the Bible, and an abominable reproach to His holy character.

 

 The passage in Isaiah 33: 14, "Who among us shall dwell with devouring fire? Who among us shall dwell with everlasting burnings? " which is often quoted to help out the rhetoric of those who are trying to describe the torments of hell and to give as lurid a glare as possible to the picture, we need not inform the intelligent reader, has no relevancy to the question of future punishment. We only notice it because some will insist on quoting it in this connection. But it will readily be seen that the prophet refers only to temporal calamities and miseries brought upon his people by their enemies. It is one of those impassioned outbursts of which there are many examples among the prophets of the Old Testament.

 

 We know of but one solitary text in all the Old Testament that requires to be noticed among the Scripture texts that seem to favor this doctrine of eternal suffering, and this only, because it is misquoted. We have already noticed it perhaps sufficiently. It is in Daniel 12: 2, 3, "And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt. And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament: and they that turn many to righteousness, as the stars forever and ever." It is generally supposed that this refers to the last resurrection. If so, it is the most explicit announcement of that doctrine in the Old Testament. But the reader will notice how very careful the prophet is, in the use of the epithet everlasting, not to say the very thing which he is charged with saying. What is it that is everlasting, and forever and ever? It is the life of the righteous and the brightness of their shining. It is not the " shame; " there is no such epithet applied to that which the wicked feel themselves, and no doubt will feel as long as their miserable lives continue; but it is the " contempt " (or " abhorring," as this word is elsewhere translated) which others shall feel towards them, that will be everlasting.

 

 There are many passages in the New Testament that speak of the " outer darkness " into which the wicked shall be cast, and of the disappointment and anguish they shall feel in being rejected from the kingdom of heaven. All these are pertinent to the question of future punishment, but they have no bearing on the question of the eternity of that punishment, and can only be made to appear to have any relevancy to this question but by first assuming the very point to be proved, that the soul is indestructible and will live forever.

 

 With regard to the parable of Dives and Lazarus, (Luke 16)—What may be its precise meaning and application—questions much contested by Commentators—we need not stop to inquire; as all of them agree in the only point which concerns this discussion—that it refers to scenes anterior to the resurrection and the judgment. For Dives is represented as still having five brethren alive upon the earth, while he and Father Abraham are holding this dialogue in Hades.

"Rightly to understand the whole delineation, we must, above all, keep clearly in view that it is not everlasting salvation or condemnation which is here described, but the middle state of departed souls between death and the resurrection. THE BIBLE KNOWS NOT EITHER THE EXPRESSION IMMORTALITY OF THE SOUL (God is monos echon athanasian, 1 Tim. 6: 16) OR THE MODERN DOCTRINE OF IMMORTALITY." (Olshausen on Luke 16: 24, 26.)

 

The passage in Mark 9: 43-48, claims more particular notice. Here these fearful words are thrice repeated with very little change: " To be cast into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched; where the worm dies not and the fire is not quenched:

 

 We remark on this passage:

 

 1. Two of these thrice repeated expressions "where the worm dies not and the fire is not quenched," (44th, 46th verses) and the words, " into the fire that never shall be quenched," in 45th verse, and the word "fire," in the end of 47th verse, are not found in the Sianitic and the Vatican Codices, and in several other of the oldest manuscripts, and are supposed by many critics to be spurious. But as they are found substantially in the 43d and 48th verses, these supposed interpolations and these repetitions do not affect the main question with us, only so far as they show how strong the tendency, and how early it was manifested, to magnify and make as much as possible of the terrible expressions found in the Scriptures.

 

 2. We have hitherto avoided making criticisms on our common excellent version, not because there was no room for them, but because we did not wish to appear to be captious, and because the doctrine we maintain can be made sufficiently evident without such criticisms; but we must here say that our translators have taken a very unwarranted license with the word asbestos occurring here. They have elsewhere rendered it by its proper equivalent English adjective, unquenchable, but here they have substituted in the place of it the whole phrase, " that never shall be quenched." It is composed of two parts, a, privative, meaning " not," and asbestos, from sbennumi, meaning " to quench," " to extinguish," " repress," etc., hence asbestos means unquenchable, inextinguishable, irrepressible, etc., and nothing more. It no more means " that never shall be quenched," than the word aoratos "unseen," "invisible," means that never shall be seen, or the word agnos " unknown," " unperceived," means never shall be known, or the word adikos " unjust," means never shall be just, etc. Why they, instead of translating it by its simple equivalent epithet unquenchable, as they have done in Matt. 3: 13, have taken the liberty of forcing an extra meaning into it, and introducing a prophecy of their own concerning this fire into the text, we are unable to guess, unless it was that they might lend all the help possible to the doctrine they, no doubt, fully believed—that this fire will prey upon the bodies and souls of its miserable victims forever without consuming them.

 

 3. This word asbestos is frequently found in the Classics and elsewhere, and no one thinks of giving it that sense, or, rather, nonsense, which is here given it.

 

 "The Greek authors used asbestos unquenchable, in the sense of violent or excessive without any reference to its duration or possibility of its being quenched or stopped. Homer speaks of asbestos gelos, 2. 1:559, and after saying that in the attempt of the Trojans to burn the Grecian fleet, phlox asbeste (an unquenchable fire spread itself over one of the ships (16: 123,) he saw nothing absurd or contradictory in adding in the same book (293) of Patroclus, that he extinguished the blazing fire and that the ship was left half burned kata d esbesen, aithomenon pur."—MINTON'S GLORY OF CHRIST. NOTE on p. 58.

 

 Homer speaks of an unquenchable fire which broke out among the Grecian ships, and was afterwards extinguished. The early Christian writers do not hesitate to call the fire which consumed the bodies of the martyrs " unquenchable fire." Eusebius tells us in the sixth book of his Ecclesiastical History, that Cronion and Julian, at one time, and Epimachus and Alexander at another, were destroyed " with unquenchable fire." We read in Jer. 13: 27: " I will kindle a fire in the gates thereof and it shall devour the palaces of Jerusalem, and it shall not be quenched." Who supposes that this fire is now burning and will literally burn forever? All the language means here or anywhere else in the Scripture is, that the fire shall not go out, or be put out, till that which it preys upon shall be completely consumed, and no one would think of putting any other sense upon it but for the assumption that the souls and bodies of the wicked will be miraculously preserved alive forever in hell, and then, this text seems to sustain the postulate.

 

 4. But we are not greatly concerned to correct the rendering of this word. It is the attribute of the fire and not of the soul. The same may be said of the epithet undying in the text. These theologians reason as though the Scriptures predicated the terms unquenchable, and undying of the souls and bodies of sinners in hell, but it is only of the agencies that are set to devour and destroy them. Here we have another illustration of the artful practice of which we had occasion to speak in commenting on Daniel 12: 2, of transferring the attribute or predicate from one subject to another, and making the sacred writers affirm that of one thing, which they meant only to affirm of another. If anyone chooses to spend his strength in attempting to prove that this Scriptural fire, is so unlike all other fire that it is actually unquenchable, or rather never shall be quenched, and that these Scriptural worms are so different from all other worms, that they are actually immortal, let him not suppose, after his foolish task is accomplished to his own satisfaction, that he has proved anything of the kind concerning the bodies and souls of the wicked in hell, of which nothing of this sort is predicated in this or in any other text of the Bible. But we have a right to demand if he imposes his conclusions upon us, that he shall be consistent with himself, and carry out his principles of exegesis into other passages where the same figures are used. He will find in the closing verses of Isaiah this passage to which Our Lord referred and no doubt intended to quote: " 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 to all flesh."

 

 Barnes, in his notes on Mark 9:43-48 well says:

 

 This figure is clearly taken from Isaiah 66: 24. In describing the great prosperity of the Kingdom of the Messiah, Isaiah says that the people of God shall go forth and look upon the carcasses of men who have transgressed against God. Their enemies shall be overcome. They shall be slain. The people of God shall triumph. The figure is taken from heaps of the slain in battle; and the prophet says that the number shall be so great that their worm—the worm feeding on the dead—shall not die—shall live long—as long as there are carcasses to be devoured: and that the fire which was used to burn the bodies of the dead shall continue long to burn, and shall not be extinguished till they are consumed.

 

 This is just what it means, no doubt, and no more.

 

 And no sensible man thinks of giving it any other interpretation as originally used by the prophet. But when our Lord quotes this figure to describe the complete and miserable destruction of all sinners, it is seized upon to prove, what? Why just exactly the opposite, namely: that they never shall be devoured by the worm, and never shall be consumed by the fire!!

 

 To such devices are these advocates driven in order to defend their favorite doctrine of eternal sin and misery. In their eagerness to make out their case, they not only overlook the chief point in the figure used by Our Lord, the complete and eternal destruction of sinners, soul and body together, but they turn it into an argument for the certain preservation of both in misery forever.

 

 5. It is the function of the worm to devour, not primarily to torment; and if the worm does not die, it will surely accomplish this work. It. is the office of fire to consume. Philosophically speaking, fire is the effect and evidence of consumption, and when there is no consumption, there is no fire; and if it is not extinguished, it will surely accomplish its work. The chief object for which it is ordinarily employed is not torment, but destruction. Torment may accompany its action upon living flesh, as also that of the worm. But this is incidental and subordinate to the main purpose, which is destruction. This is what is meant by the worm and the fire of the valley of Hinnom, spoken of by the prophet. They are horrid but impressive images, not primarily and principally of torment, but of death and destruction. This is what is meant by the same figures as used by our Lord, when speaking of the worm and fire of Gehenna. And nothing but an inveterate, " unquenchable " determination to establish this dogma, against which we are contending, could have obscured the meaning and reversed the sense of this passage which so clearly teaches the certain, complete and eternal destruction of the wicked.

 

 6. Our champion author, so often referred to, complains of those who give to this passage its natural and common-sense meaning. He says the principle is unsound. And why? This is his reason:

 

 Its unsoundness appears at once from the fact that it necessarily cuts off the possibility (the italics are his own) of imaging forth any other penal transaction than a transient one, and forcibly turns all such representations into images of extinction (!!), for the reason that every process in a temporal world is temporary, and each process here that is most terrific and painful is incidentally the most short lived.—(pp. 284-285.)

 

 Verily, this is a most extraordinary confession for one to make who is sincerely endeavoring to show us what this passage means. The figure used by our Lord must not be allowed to have its natural and proper meaning, such as it has elsewhere, but must be understood and taken in exactly the contrary sense—and why? Because he can't prove his dogma without perverting it! Then let it go unproved, as it must. Does he not see that if these natural and transient figures cannot be used to prove the immortality of the soul, it is all the more necessary, if the doctrine is true, that the Scriptures should definitely and categorically assert it " as a naked truth aside from these figures " as they have that of God. But no. He tells us in a previous chapter that there is no need whatever of this, that " it is always in the form of the actual concrete immortality that Christ and his Apostles teach this doctrine " " On such abstract propositions they waste no breath." " To them the naked question of immortality, aside from these relations and issues is of no account at all—no more than the life of an oyster." If then, they have not asserted this doctrine—as they surely have not—aside from these relations and issues as imaged forth in these transient figures, and these figures cannot be used to prove it without doing violence to them and actually reversing their meaning: What is to become of this doctrine? Like all the other works of the devil it is doomed to be destroyed.

 

Near to the place where the above was written is the splendid Church of Saint Peter and Saint Paul, in the grounds of which immediately adjacent is an immense collection of statuary, bas-relief images and various devices, representing sacred characters and scenes. At the further end is a grotto, where lies an image of the body of our Lord, wrapped in the vestments of the tomb. Sculptured on the surrounding walls, and painted in vivid colors, is a representation of Purgatory and miserable creatures, enveloped in flames, writhing in agony, and stretching out their shriveled hands in supplication for relief. But more prominent than these victims, or the devils that are tormenting them, are the stokers standing by, and with long poles stirring the fires. The eager satisfaction they take in their pious work manifests itself in their countenances, and in the earnestness with which they address themselves to it. The only drawback to their complete happiness would seem to be the fact, that these fires are not " unquenchable and everlasting," but only purgatorial, and these wretched victims may yet find relief. But there is no such drawback to the happiness of those who advocate the doctrine of endless torment, and who seem determined, if it were possible, to make it true, whether they can prove it or not.

 

 In Dr. Bartlett's book—to which we have had frequent occasion to refer, because it claims to be a " Refutation of the theory of Annihilation," as he is pleased to call the doctrine of conditional immortality, and because he assumes to be, and is perhaps, considered as the chief champion of the doctrine of endless torment—nothing is more striking than the self-complacent, positive, oracular, unfeeling manner in which he handles this grave question, and his contemptuous and scornful bearing toward such of his Christian brethren as cannot accept his hideous doctrine.

 

 It might be supposed, that a man, who was simply contending for the truth, however earnest he might be, would have no occasion or desire to misrepresent his antagonists, or to handle the Word of God deceitfully. But he not only misstates the position of his opponents, but boldly confesses that he does it, because it is "indispensable" to his argument to do so!!

 

 And, of the multitude of texts that are quoted, he must know, that many of them—and especially those on which he mainly relies—have no relevancy whatever to the question in hand; they are pressed into the service, like Simon the Cyrenian, who was compelled to bear the cross on which his Savior was crucified.

 

 His theory is, that the great end of punishment is not exemplary and demonstrative, but vindictive and for the special purpose of inflicting pain; and the greater the suffering, and the longer it is continued, the greater the punishment; that all future punishment under God's government is always and inevitably endless; the whole posterity of Adam, without exception, are already condemned, not simply to death and extinction, as we hold, but to endless punishment, which means endless torment, and that this punishment will be inflicted upon every individual soul, excepting such as are saved by the special grace of God; that not only the rejectors of an offered Gospel, but all the myriads of millions to whom no Gospel has been offered, excepting perhaps a few rare cases of those possessing " a potential or germinal faith," who may possibly escape the common doom, are inevitably destinated, if not predestinated, to endless punishment, that is, endless torment in the life to come.

 

 One would think, that a man with human instincts, not to say of Christian feelings, if he felt obliged to advocate so dismal a theory, would, at least, manifest some tenderness of spirit, if not sadness, and grief, and, perhaps, drop a tear or two. over the helpless, hopeless doom of so large a portion of his fellow men. But, instead of all this, he writes as if he would be grieved to have his doctrine disproved, and as having no patience with those who call it in question or hesitate to receive it. We have the deepest sympathy and utmost respect for those who, like Albert Barnes and others, preach this doctrine with bowed heads, and aching hearts, and tearful eyes, because they know not how to escape from the dilemma into which their false philosophy has led them.

 

 If this volume, entitled "Life and Death Eternal," had been written in a modest and tender spirit, it might have done something to check the alarming spread of universalism, which the doctrine it advocates is doing so much actually to encourage. But as an argument against the Scripture doctrine of Eternal Life from Christ, it is utterly wide of the mark; and the zeal it shows, and the spirit it breathes, and the method it pursues in the work to which it is devoted, are sadly suggestive of the grim services of the zealous stokers in the grotto at Antwerp. But this book is very, very orthodox. It bears the imprint of the American Tract Society. Fresh editions are called for to meet the growing skepticism of the times. Let them be issued; and let the scene above described be added as a frontispiece! 'Why not? It would make the doctrine it advocates more impressive! We used to have such pictures in our old Catechisms. Why have they been omitted? Is it another sign of the growing skepticism of the day?

 

 No doubt these men think they are doing God service. Perhaps they are; for He knows how to make even the wrath of man to praise Him. But would that they might seek and find some better way of doing it.

 

Chapter 15.

 

The doctrine that especially needs to be proved, is by its advocates, assumed. Reasoning in a circle.

Texts in the apocalypse examined.

 

 THE advocates of the doctrine of eternal sin and misery, as we have seen, assume as the basis of their Bible argument on this subject, that man is naturally and unconditionally immortal. It is this idea which they carry with them into the texts they cite, that gives all the plausibility and force there is to their reasoning. Let their postulate be denied, and they have no ground to stand upon. They believe, or, at any rate, reason as though they believe, that unless God, by a special act of His power take away the life of the soul—whatever may be true of the body—it will live on, and on, by a certain vis vita of its own forever; that there is given to every human soul in its creation an indefeasible life which cannot be forfeited; that the natural and normal cycle of its existence is an eternal cycle, and that it makes no difference with respect to the perpetuity of its conscious existence whether it is holy or sinful, whether it possesses any spiritual life or not, whether it lives in Union with God or not, it will live on and on, independent of all considerations whatever. All this we deny, as being supported by no evidence, and as something very much akin to atheism. We hold that no created soul has any such asbestos nature given to it; that there is but one independent existence in the universe: That is God. That a dependent existence implies necessarily a conditional existence; and God Himself has defined for us the condition of our perpetual existence. This condition has been forfeited. It is no more possible for the human soul than for anything else to live, in any sense, when entirely cut off from God the Source of all Life. Spiritual Life, which is the Life of God in the Soul is the only Life that is eternal.

 

 2. They also hold, that the common lot of the whole human race—excepting such as are saved—is not death in any literal sense (excepting so far as the body is concerned), but is punishment, that is, torment; for according to their theory, as we have shown, punishment implies torment, and there is no more punishment than there is suffering or torment.

 

 This we also deny. We do not for a moment call in question the fact of the future punishment of the wicked, and such punishment as will cause suffering. God will be as true to His threatening as to His promises, and every individual will " receive according to that he hath done whether, it be good or bad." But we maintain that there is a wide difference between the death that comes upon every child of Adam as the result of his inherited, fallen condition, and the punishment that is inflicted for his own individual transgression: It is by confounding the two and calling them both by the same term, punishment, and by making this punishment to consist in torment, and eternal torment, that such a terrible mystery has been thrown over God's dealings with fallen man. Though every child of Adam is to die—and by death we mean no partial death, but the actual death of the whole person—unless a new life shall be given him in Christ, it does not follow that every one is born to be punished, that is, tormented, and this too forever, unless he shall personally deserve it. We also deny that the chief end God has in view, even in the punishment of the most unworthy, is to torment them. Punishment is objective and demonstrative, as well as subjective and painful. It is vindicative rather than vindictive.

 

It is true, the words basanizo, to test, to try by torture, and kolazo, to prune, to hold in check, to punish, with their derivatives, are used somewhat interchangeably, as though they were synonymous, and for this reason, that in the inhuman practices of men, the one often implied the other. It was once the chief function of the executive officer of the law to torment. Hence prison keepers were called tormentors, and they continued to be so called, even after these inhuman practices that once prevailed had been discarded—or without any special regard to this function which gave them their original name—just as the title alderman (elderman) which was once given to civil officers, who were selected for certain purposes on account of their age, is still retained without any reference to their age.

 

 3. These advocates not only assert (I) that God deals with the whole race of unsaved men in the world to come, whatever may have been their opportunities or characters in this, in the way of punishment, and (2) that the chief thing in punishment is torture, but also (3) that this punishment in all cases will be ceaseless And eternal.

 

 These three propositions belong together. The monstrous conclusions to which they bring us concerning God and His method of dealing with His creatures is a logical deduction from the premises they have chosen to take. Hence, many accept it in spite of their reason and their hearts, because their theory, compels them to accept it. The God of their philosophy and the God of their love and faith are not the same. They must have, and they will have, a better God to love and trust, than their theology allows them.

 

 The advocates of this theory have an adroit and facile way of proving these three propositions by making them reciprocally support each other, thus:

 

 They first assume, as we have seen, that man has an indefeasible immortality. Then, if he is forever excluded from the happiness of heaven, as the Scriptures declare every impenitent man will be, and if he is punished, as every unsaved sinner will be, and if punishment is torture —then every unsaved sinner will be tortured forever and ever. There is no escape from the conclusion, if the premises are granted.

 

 But how do they prove the original premise, the indefeasible immortality of every man? Why, nothing is more easy; all they have to do is just to reverse the syllogism, and take this last conclusion for the main premise of a new syllogism, and they get the postulate of the first as the conclusion of the second, thus: All unsaved sinners will be punished forever, for this has been proved from the Bible, and this punishment means eternal torture; but if they are tortured forever, then they must exist forever. Therefore the human soul is immortal. Q. E. D. So this' argument, with its premises and conclusions perpetually changing places, chasing each other round in one eternal circle, becomes a fit symbol of the eternal circle of existence in which the miserable soul is said to move with nothing but itself to rest upon.

 

 Having considered all the Scripture texts that are relied on to prove the doctrine of eternal sin and misery but such as are in the Apocalypse, and found them to be, not only very few in number, but without any real force in this behalf, unless one assumes the chief point to be proved; we now come to the examination of the passages in this book that are so often quoted to sustain the doctrine, and upon which these advocates are obliged mainly to rely. They are the only texts that present any real difficulty. This, however, arises only from the mysterious and symbolical character of the book.

 

 It is confessedly the most difficult part of the Word of God to interpret and understand. No two Commentators are agreed in their explanation of its incongruous allegories, its perpetually changing figures, its phantasmagorical images, its unnatural combination of types and symbols, and its intense and intentionally extravagant language. We certainly do not profess to be wise enough to tell just what and how much is meant by all that is shadowed forth in this vision or dream, but we remark in a general manner:

 

 That we see no good reason to question the canonicity of this book, as some have done, or to deny any doctrine it may evidently design to teach. We believe it to be an important part of the divine Revelation God has given to us, and a very fitting close to the whole volume of His inspired teachings. But it should be remembered, in trying to decipher the meaning of any part of it, that it is neither sober history, nor sober prophecy; that it is neither didactic prose, nor poetry, nor was it intended to be so understood, but rather as a vision, or dream, as it really is—a relation of what John saw and heard while in a trance in the isle of Patmos—a panoramic view of the leading events in the history of this world to the end of time, and, especially, of the great last struggle between Christ and His enemies; and the final victory which He gains over them.

 

 We contend that its imagery of hieroglyphics and word painting is not to be taken as plain, sober, didactic utterances. We protest against the practice so common with the advocates of this doctrine, of taking half an image in a figurative, and half of it in a literal sense, just because it best suits their purpose to do so; or of picking out, here and there, from the midst of a dramatic scene, such words and sentences and bits of sentences as can be made to fit into their dogma, and calling them proof texts. And, still further, we insist on its being taken as a canon of Scripture interpretation, especially in drawing proof texts from such a book as this, that, when any passage is equally capable of two interpretations, and one of them is sensible and in accord with other parts of the Bible, and the other is contrary to reason and to the -uniform teachings of Scriptures, the former is to be preferred.

 

 The first passage occurs in Chapter 14: 8-11, where the destruction of mythical Babylon and the beast, which is usually supposed to symbolize the Papacy, are described. She had "made all the nations drunk with the wine of her wrath," and now .her votaries in turn are made to " drink of the wine of God's wrath." " If any man (shall) worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, the same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of His indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment ascended up forever and ever (to ages of ages); and they have no rest day or night, who worship (worshiping) the beast and his image, and whosoever receives the mark of his name."

 

 In the i8th Chapter a fuller account of her destruction is given, and John is shown how " her plagues shall come in one day, death, mourning and famine, and she shall be utterly burned with fire; and how the kings and merchants and ship masters, and those who have committed fornication with her, and traded with her, shall bewail and lament her. And then, to further indicate the completeness of her destruction, " a mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone, and cast it into the sea, saying, 'Thus, with violence, shall that great city Babylon be thrown down and shall be found no more at all,'" (21). "And after these things, I heard a great voice of much people in heaven saying, Alleluia! salvation and glory and honor and power unto the Lord our God! For true and righteous are His judgments; for He hath judged the great whore which did corrupt the earth with her fornication, and hath avenged the blood of His servants at her hand. And again, they said Alleluia, and her smoke rose up forever and ever, and the four and twenty elders and the four beasts fell down and worshipped God that sat on the throne, saying, Amen, Alleluia "—(19: 1-4). Then the marriage of the Lamb is described, and the array of the bride and the supper. And after this, the Lamb, under another designation, comes riding out of heaven on a white horse, with his garments dipped in blood. " Out of his mouth goes a sharp sword, many crowns are on his head," " His eyes are like a flame of fire." A mighty host follow Him, all on white horses, and He smites the nations and rules them with a rod of iron, and treads the wine press of the fierceness and wrath of God. Then an angel is seen standing in the sun, and he cries with a loud voice saying to all the fowls that fly in the midst of heaven, "Come and gather yourselves together unto the supper of the great God." (17, 18).

 

 And now he sees this beast combining with the kings of the earth, and gathering a mighty host to make war against Him who sits on the white horse, " And the beast was taken, and with him, the false prophet, that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast and them that worshipped his image. These both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone, and the remnant were slain with the sword of Him that sat upon the horse, which sword proceeded out of his mouth, and all the fowls were filled with their flesh," (20-21).

 

 The reader will bear in mind that this vision is intended to describe, in shadowy outlines, events transpiring—not in some future state, but in this world in which we now live, and events occurring, perhaps, in our day, at any rate, previous to what is called the millennium. We see how complete has been the destruction of the two great evils or organized systems of evil personified as the beast and the false prophet, that have withstood the progress of the Gospel. There yet remains another obstacle to be removed before the universal reign of Christ on earth shall begin. " The Dragon, that Old serpent, which is the Devil and Satan " must be removed, but he is not yet to be destroyed. The time has not come for that. But he is to be bound; and now John sees " an angel come down from heaven having the key of the bottomless pit, and a great chain in his hand, and he lays holds of this monster and binds him, and casts him into the bottomless pit, and shuts him up, and sets a seal upon him, that he shall deceive the nations of the earth no more till the thousand years shall be fulfilled, and after that he must be loosed a little season." (20: 1-3.)

 

 The first resurrection now takes place, whatever may be understood by that. The souls of the martyrs are raised, and they live and reign with Christ on the earth a thousand years. Then Satan is loosed out of prison.

 

 There is a general outburst of wickedness. Gog and Magog are gathered together, in number, as the sand of the sea, in battle array. They compass, the camp of the Saints, and the beloved city. Fire from God, out of heaven comes down upon them—all these wicked hosts—and devours them. But their diabolical leader is reserved for particular wrath. He is cast into the same bottomless pit where the beast and the false prophet had been cast a thousand years before, to be destroyed, and he too like them, to be tormented day and night forever and ever (to the end of time.)

 

If this word aionios when referring to the past can properly be rendered, as it is, " Since the world began," Rom. 16: 23. " Before the world." 1 Cor. 2.7. " From the beginning of the world." Eph. 3: 9. " From ages." Col. 1: 26, it is equally proper to render it, when referring to the future, especially when temporal events like the succession of day and night are concerned, " to the end of time." Indeed it is rendered (1 Cor. 8:13), " While the world stands." But in this passage (Rev. 20:10) day and night " forever and ever," and so this passage is quoted every few pages, again and again throughout the whole book entitled Life and Death Eternal, and is the author's main reliance to prove that the wicked—to whom it does not even refer, are to suffer torments that are absolutely endless!! This is, indeed, the very best foundation that can be laid for the monstrous superstructure that has been built upon it.

 

Then follows—how soon, or how long after this we are not told—the second or general resurrection, and the judgment, and they whose names are not written in the book of Life, are cast into the lake of fire. Death and Hell also are cast into the same lake of fire. This is the SECOND' DEATH. The earth and the heavens flee away, and there is no place for them.

 

 Now, the vision changes. Time has passed away. Eternity begins. All opposition has been completely destroyed. All systems of error, the beast, the false prophet, the dragon, that old serpent the original tempter, the very concentration of evil, are all together cast into the bottomless pit, and, finally, Hell itself, their prison house, and Death the king of terrors are cast in after them, and all, together, destroyed. Could there be a more clear and positive description of the utter destruction of all evil of every sort than this? Why, death instead of reigning any longer, as these advocates assert, is actually destroyed. " There is no more death." As for Hell—the Scriptures always speak of it in connection with this earth. It has no other locality. The fallen angels when they were cast down to hell, were 'cast down to this earth. And when this earth is destroyed, hell, their prison house, and the prison house of all the wicked, is destroyed. But that there should be no doubt whatever on the subject, we are here told that not only death, but Hell also, is cast into this all-consuming lake of fire.

 

 A new scene opens. This material earth, the theatre of this conflict and victory, has passed away, and the visible heaven also. A new heaven and a new earth appear. The tabernacle of God is with men. All tears are wiped away. "There shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying; neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away."—(21: 1-4.)

 

 We need be at no loss to understand the general truths intended to be taught by this book. That it was given to comfort and encourage the hearts of the people of God during the many trials that would come upon them, from age to age, and to assure them of the glorious issue of all these conflicts in the complete triumph of Christ and His followers, and the final destruction of all evil, is quite evident. No doubt it was given in the form best adapted to all the purposes for which it was intended. It was not designed to be a didactic or doctrinal treatise, like some of the Epistles of Paul, or the discourses of our Lord. It was not intended that we should reduce its language to logical propositions, or define with precision its dramatic imagery, and bring all the details of this panorama into place, as we would the events of a sober history; certainly not while in the midst of the scenes it is describing to us. No man but a fool is wise enough to do this. Nor will any sane man (unless he has a theory to maintain; and then it is impossible to say what a man will not do) think of analyzing the wine of wrath that is said to be poured out, to discover how much alcohol it contains, or of inquiring into the shape of the cup of indignation into which it is poured, or of criticizing the anatomy of the grotesque figures that appear on the scene. No man will undertake to prove from the language here used that Christ actually rides, or will ride, on a white horse, with a sharp sword in His mouth, or that an angel stands in the sun, or throws a great stone into the sea, or that there is somewhere a bottomless pit with a key fitting to it, and that an angel will bring this key in one hand, with which to open the door to it, and a great chain in the other, with which to bind the old serpent that he may cast him into it, and lock him up for a thousand years, or that there is an actual lake of fire and brimstone, where there are myriads of millions of human beings roasting, without being consumed, in the presence of the holy angels and the Lamb, while the smoke of their torment ascended up before them, forever and ever.

 

 And yet, strange to say, we find pious and otherwise rational men, so blinded by this dogma, and so hard pressed for arguments to support it, eagerly catching up such of the figures and phrases of this vision as will suit their purpose, and parading them as so many proofs of the doctrine of eternal sin and misery. They freely allow the unreal character of most of these images and phantasms, as they have no special use for them; but they hesitate not to pick out the fire, and the brimstone, and the torment, and the smoke, and the words, forever and ever, from the mass of other symbols, and apply them literally to what? Not to those personifications only, but to living men and women, like themselves. They insist that all the other texts, occurring in the didactic and doctrinal parts of God's Word, which speak of Life and Death, etc., should have a metaphorical and not a literal sense given to them; but now, when they have come to that part of His Word, which is altogether metaphorical, they insist on giving a literal sense to such texts as they may be able to pick out of it, that will suit their purpose.

 

 But what is still more strange and inconsistent: they are not content with giving them a full and literal application to the things of time and sense, where they belong; for they are used with reference to events, transpiring on earth previous to the consummation of all things; but they must wrest them from their terrestrial and temporal connections, and carry them over into the spiritual world, where the Scriptures tell us, there are no such material agencies, and no succession of day and night, and no more pain, and no more death, in order to prove that there is pain and death there, and a lake of fire and brimstone, and that the wicked are still writhing there in unutterable anguish, having no rest, day nor night, while the smoke of their torment ascended up, forever and ever. We verily believe that a more entire perversion of God's truth, a more complete reversal of the decided testimony of this book, could not be perpetrated. But these two texts—14:10, 11, and 20:10—are the very texts, above all others, that are relied on to prove this doctrine. They are quoted over and over again in every discussion of this question: The author of "Life and Death Eternal" puts them first, and last, and midway, throughout his book, quoting and requoting them more than thirty. times, as though by their frequent repetition he could multiply their number and strengthen his case.

 

 If anyone inquires what we make of these expressions, "fire and brimstone," " smoke of their torment forever and ever," "without rest day or night," we reply, that we make sense of them; we take them in the connection in which they occur, as applying to temporal and not eternal scenes. We treat them as we do all other passages of Scripture of the same class, and as these advocates would treat them, provided they had no theory to maintain. If the enquirer will turn to Gen. 19th, he will there find a description of the destruction of Sodom and the cities of the plain—a scene which John, no doubt, had in mind in describing the destruction of typical Babylon by the same elements. ' " The smoke of the country went up like the smoke of a furnace," 28th verse. Jude (7th verse) tells us that Sodom and Gomorrah "are set forth as an example suffering the vengeance of eternal fire." If he will also turn to Isaiah 34th, he will see what a judgment was to come upon Idumea. "And the streams thereof shall be turned into pitch, and the dust thereof into brimstone, and the land thereof shall become burning pitch, and it shall not be quenched, night nor day; the smoke thereof shall go up forever: from generation to generation it shall lie waste, none shall pass through it forever and ever."

 

 No one attempts to construe all this literally. The prophecy in its spirit and full import, has long since been fulfilled: and these fires have gone out. And yet the Hebrew words translated forever and ever in this passage are even stronger if possible than in the corresponding passage in Revelation, le nehtsagh nehtsaghim, "the perpetuity of perpetuities," yet all this has come to an end; and we now look back upon it as fully. accomplished, as the righteous will look back from their eternal state upon their old world with all its sin and misery, so utterly and forever destroyed that it shall no more be found.

 

Chapter 16.

 

Fifth class of passages.

The complete and final victory.

The old and new testaments contrasted.

Two different ideas of God.

Truth gradually revealed. The last enemy destroyed.

Glorious consummation.

 

 THE Old Testament opens with a description of the creation of this lower world, with an earthly Paradise where all things were very good, though in their nature material and transitory.

 

 The New Testament reveals to us the new creation, and closes with a glowing description of the celestial Paradise, in which everything is also very good, but in an infinitely higher degree, because it is spiritual and eternal.

 

 The Old Testament describes the formation of man from the dust of the earth, and tells us of his perfection as an earthly creature, but also, of his frailty and of his fall, and the consequent ruin of the whole human race. The New Testament shows us the Creator Himself, not of an earthly origin, but descending from heaven, not made, but becoming also a man, but without frailty or liability to fall; and instead of bringing ruin, bringing salvation to this lost race again.

 

 Through the one, we see how a natural life and an earthly Paradise are lost; through the other, we see how a spiritual life and a celestial Paradise are gained—not simply regained, for Christ acquired for us in dying, infinitely more than Adam lost, or could have kept, by living.

 

 The one, was at best, but a creature, the other was the Creator; the one earthly, natural, frail and temporal; the other heavenly, Spiritual, Almighty and Eternal. The inferior comes before the superior. Night comes before the day. " That was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; and afterwards that which is spiritual. The first man is of the earth earthy; the second marl is the Lord from heaven."

 

 Those dwelling under the shadows of the temporal, and temporary dispensation of the Old Testament, looked back upon an earthly progenitor, and beyond him into the blackness of chaos; and forward toward the day dawn, which, through the mists that enveloped them, was but dimly perceived even by those who stood upon the walls of Zion; and to those who anxiously inquired " Watchman what of the night," they were able to give but a vague reply. But dwelling under the brighter spiritual dispensation of the Gospel morning, we are able to look back upon Christ, our spiritual progenitor, as the sun already risen, and beyond, to the retiring shades of a night passing away forever, and forward, with assured hope, to the coming on of the noon tide glory of the perfect day—the day in which no cloud shall obscure the brightness of the sun; the day that shall be followed by no night and shall be without end.

 

 We are so accustomed in this imperfect state, to the mixture of " good and evil " that it is difficult for us to conceive of the one without the other. Holiness and sin, joy and sorrow, life and death, light from above and darkness from beneath, mingle together in this midway sphere. Everything that is true, and bright, and lovely, has its counterpart in that which is false, and dark, and hateful. It always has been so in our experience, and we naturally come to feel that it must always be so; or if these extremes do not meet and mingle in the same scene or person, they must somehow be perpetuated as cotemporary with each other and as necessary to each other, in some part of this universe. It somehow seems unreasonable to think of a heaven without a hell some-where—of the King of glory and of His angels, without thinking of the devil and his angels also—of the ransomed of the Lord, rejoicing forever in the kingdom of Light and life, without thinking also of the lost, suffering and wailing forever in the kingdom of darkness and death.

 

 The idea that the time ever will come, or can come, or ought to come, when .there shall be no sin anywhere, no sorrow, no death, no darkness, no devil, no hell, but one complete rounded universe of holy, happy creatures centering in God, and revolving around Him as the source of all their life and all their blessedness, seems so strange and extravagant, that those who have been trained to regard eternal sin and suffering as an integral part of the universe are, afraid to indulge it. They look with suspicion upon any one who ventures to express the hope of such a consummation, as though he were giving up an essential part of the orthodox faith. To most Christians, evil seems to be as permanent a part of the universe as good—the eternal existence of Satan as certain and logically necessary, as that of God Himself. Theologians have undertaken to show that this perpetual antagonism or antithesis is necessary in the very nature of things.

 

 The Manicheans held that there are two eternal principles, the one good and the other evil, both without be-ginning and both without end, eternally in conflict with each other. But these Christian theologians, less consistent than the Manicheans, hold, that, while there are now two such principles at war with each other, it is good only that had no beginning; evil dates its origin in time; but now that it has begun to be, it will never end; that God either cannot, or will not eradicate it, so that it shall cease to exist. But we, in opposition to both these teachers, hold to the Scriptural doctrine of the eternity of good alone, both in the past and in the future, and to the transitory nature of the evil that now exists. It had a definite beginning, and it shall have a definite ending: that however necessary it may be to this incipient and preparatory stage of our existence; however useful as a foil or a background to the picture yet to be; however necessary night may be to the introduction of day, or the knowledge of evil to the knowledge of good, or the experience of death, to the enjoyment of Life eternal, or of sin to the " bringing in of everlasting righteousness," it is but incidental and temporary after all, and not integral and perpetual, and that the time will come when, having fully subserved its purpose, whatever that purpose may be, it will pass away.

 

 What is the chaff to the wheat that it should be garnered and preserved forever? Why should the staging, used in the erection of the building, be suffered to remain forever after it is finished, to disfigure its beauty? Of what value are the chips and the debris, but to be destroyed? Why should the fogs and mists that usher in the coming day, remain forever, to obscure the light of the risen sun?

 

 We believe that the Bible plainly teaches that the devil and all his works shall utterly be destroyed; that death shall be abolished and swallowed up of life; that all evil shall give place to good—and that sorrow and sighing shall be unknown, and that there shall be no more pain; that the victory that Christ shall gain over all His enemies, and all the enemies of His people, will be complete; and that "every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess Him Lord to the glory of the Father."

 

 To us, this glorious consummation seems, also, essential to the idea of a perfect Deity, perfect in wisdom, perfect in goodness, perfect in power.

 

 The difference between us and our adversaries, in this discussion, consists really, in the different ideas we entertain of the perfection of our Leader. Our arguments have been directed, sometimes to one subordinate point, and sometimes to another, but in reality the question in dispute is, " What think ye of Christ? " As an Almighty Sovereign and Leader, what has He undertaken to do? What does he desire to do? What can He do? Is there any limit to His goodness or to his power? or any such limit as hinders Him from destroying his enemies as He has threatened to do?

 

 In regard to the work of creation, our opponents believe that He gave to man in the outset an unconditional, indefeasible immortality like His own: we believe that He only gave to man a dependent and conditional life, liable to be lost by sin.

 

 They believe " that all mankind, by their fall, lost communion with God, are under His wrath and curse, and so made liable to all the miseries of this life, to death itself, and to the pains of hell forever." We believe the penalty incurred in the fall was, "Cursed is the ground for thy sake, in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life. Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee: and thou shalt eat the herb of the field. In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground. For out of it was thou taken. For dust thou art, to dust shalt thou return."

 

 They believe that God will punish the unsaved children of Adam in another life as well as in this, and eternally punish them, both for the sin of their progenitor and for their own sins. We believe He will punish no man in a future life, but for His own sins.

 

 They believe that this future punishment which God will inflict "will consist in intensity of suffering," and that this suffering will be perpetuated forever. We believe that this punishment will consist in such suffering as each one deserves, and no more; and end in their everlasting destruction.

 

 They believe it is His purpose and end in the punishment of the unsaved, to perpetuate their miserable existence in sin and suffering forever. We believe it is His purpose and end to exterminate all sin and sinners and suffering from the universe.

 

 They believe that Christ proposes to Himself in the struggle in which He is now engaged with Satan in this world, as the very object for which He came down, and died, to get back as much as possible of the territory He has lost, and to recover as many of the human race as He can, from the power of His adversary, and to make them pure and blessed forever in heaven; and as for the rest, to get them with their leader safely under lock and key, where He can torment them all unceasingly forever and ever.

 

 We believe He had an end infinitely higher and more glorious in view, in His humiliation and death for dying man. He comes to bring Life—eternal Life, with all its accompanying and consequent blessings, to His redeemed people—blessings infinitely greater than any that man lost in the fall. And as for the rest, whether they be many or few, whom He does not see fit to save, or cannot save, or who would not be saved,—He will blot them out entirely from the book of Life, and utterly destroy them. And when His work is completed, He shall see of the travail of His soul and be satisfied. There shall be but one King and one Kingdom, " One fold and one Shepherd."

 

 It is not according to the Divine method to reveal truth in logical and categorial forms, nor to reveal it all at one time, but only so far and so fast as man can receive and use it. To the most enlightened of the Old Testament saints, many of the facts and principles of the Gospel, that are now clear to the child, were revealed only in the most dim and shadowy outline. Our Lord said to those who came under His own immediate tuition: " I have yet many things to say unto you, but you cannot bear them now." We must not expect, even under the clearer and increasing light of these " last days," to be able fully to understand and describe that which is peculiar to the dispensation yet to come, that is entirely spiritual—the dispensation of immortality—or, to be able to fix the precise and definite meaning of all the many allusions to it, in the Scriptures. The inspired writers themselves did not fully comprehend the import of the language they used, and surely, it was not the intention of the Spirit that inspired them, to give us, even had it been possible, a literal, definite and accurate account of the affairs of the Spiritual and eternal world which lies before us. All we can hope for, is to be assured, as we are, of its actual existence, to know what are our present practical relations to it, and to get such glimpses of its excellence and glory, as shall stimulate us to wise endeavors, and cheer our hearts, and strengthen our faith in that Adorable Leader, who has undertaken to bring us thither.

 

 All this we have in the Word of God. It gives us every assurance we need, of His wisdom, goodness and power, of the complete victory He will gain over all His foes and our foes, and of the glorious consummation that will finally crown His self-sacrificing work of love.

 

 1. We believe that the celestial Paradise, with its spiritual beauties and glories, and " filled with the fulness of Him that filled all in all," so graphically described in the closing chapters of the Apocalypse, was typified, and meant to be typified, in the terrestrial Paradise described in the beginning of Genesis, with its earthly beauties and pleasures, where everything according to its nature was very good.

 

 2. We understand the enigmatical address of God to the serpent that had seduced our first parents from their allegiance to Him, as prophetical of the issue of the struggle he had challenged, " I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed, and it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel." His brief career of apparent success was to be followed by a complete overthrow and utter extinction. The head is the citadel of life—a crushing blow here, as the word means, is fatal, but an injury to the heel may be repaired.

 

 3. We take the many promises God made to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, concerning their spiritual posterity, and the extermination of all their enemies, and especially the solemn oath He made to Moses, " As truly as I live, all the earth shall be filled with the glory of God," in no partial, restricted sense, but as giving us the assurance, that when that time shall come, when the earth shall be filled with the glory of God, not only its surface shall be cleansed, but, within its bowels, there shall be no dark place left where the miserable victims of His wrath shall sin and curse and suffer forever.

 

 4. The book of Psalms is full of promises, more or less explicit, especially the Messianic Psalms, of the glory to come under the reign of Christ, " His name shall endure forever." His name shall be continued as long as the sun, and men shall be blessed in Him. All nations shall call Him blessed. Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, who only doeth wondrous things; and blessed be His glorious name forever; and let the whole earth be filled with His glory. Amen, and Amen.—(72d Psalm.)

 

 Many 'of the Prophets, especially Isaiah and Zechariah, describe in the most extravagant and glowing terms, the completeness of the victory and the fulness of the glory of His universal reign. There shall be nothing to hurt or destroy throughout His everlasting Kingdom. " The ransomed of the Lord shall return and come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads, and they shall obtain joy and gladness; and sorrow and sighing shall flee away." "The mountains and the hills shall break forth before you into singing, and all the trees of the fields shall clap their hands." " Instead of the thorn shall come up the fir tree; instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle tree; and it shall be to the Lord, for a name, and for an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off." See also the whole of the 50th Chapter of Isaiah.

 

 The Old Testament closes with a description of the gathering in of God's people, as jewels, into His Kingdom, and the utter destruction of all the wicked. " He will burn them up as stubble is burned in an oven, and leave neither root nor branch." He will not heap up all this garbage and rubbish in some dark corner and leave it to rot and give forth its pestilential strength forever; neither will He cast it into a fire which will forever burn and smoke, but by a miracle, never consumes that refuse upon which it feeds. But He will " burn it up " " and leave neither root nor branch."

 

 5. John Baptist taught the same truth under the figure of the wheat garnered from the threshing floor, and of the chaff that is burned with unquenchable fire, and also, of the axe laid unto the root of the tree, and every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down and cast into the fire—to be burned—not to be pre-served.

 

 4. This, the Scriptures declare to be the very purpose and end for which Christ came, " That, through death He might destroy—not torment forever—him that hath the power of death, that is the devil," Heb. 2: 14. "For this purpose the Son of God was manifest, that He might destroy the works of the devil, 1 John 3: 8. This is very plain and explicit. We have the faith to believe that He will not fail of His object. He will accomplish it too, not in some partial and figurative sense, but actually and completely. Indeed, Satan is now destroyed in all his moral nature. He has destroyed himself thus far by his own act, and so does every one who sins against God. What other destruction remains for him, or them, but an actual and utter destruction? It is impossible to make any other sense out of this passage, and no one would think of trying, were it not required, by this miserable theory we are opposing, to perpetuate the existence of Satan and his victims throughout an eternity of sin and suffering. God's word assures us that they all shall be destroyed together; but these advocates declare that instead of this they shall all be " salted with fire," and so preserved to sin and suffer forever.

 

 The demons themselves were conscious of their pending fate, and cried out when they saw Jesus, " What have we to do with thee Jesus thou Son of God? Art thou come hither to torment us (to bring us to trial and punishment) before the time." Matt. 8: 29. And again, at another time, changing the language but not the thought. " Art thou come to destroy us." Luke 4: 34.

 

 Peter and Jude both assure us that they are even now kept—in what manner we do not know—" in ever-lasting chain under darkness unto the judgment of the great day "—that day when their time of destruction will come.

 

 We understand this to be what our Lord taught concerning the unsaved, in many of His parables, and in His didactic utterances—such as the parables of the tares and the wheat, the good fish and the bad, the talent taken away, and in the miracle of the blasted fig tree, etc., and especially in the scenic representation of the last judgment, when He consigns them on His left hand to the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels, which, we are elsewhere told, means, everlasting destruction, "when the Lord shall be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that know not God and that obey not the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction (issuing) from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power, when He shall come to be glorified in His saints and admired in all them that believe in that day," 2 Thess. 1: 7-10.

 

 There are many allusions scattered along through all the Epistles, more or less distinct, to the glorious issue of the contest now going on between Christ and Satan, the Prince of Peace, and the Prince-of the Power of the Air —" that wicked whom He shall consume with the Spirit of His mouth and destroy with the brightness of His coming; " but we have no room, more particularly to refer to others.

 

 In r Cor. 15th Chapter, Paul, after drawing a parallel between the first and second Adam, and showing how that which is base must come before that which is pure, and that which is natural, before that which is Spiritual, and that which is temporal, before that which is eternal, speaks in glowing language of the glorious consummation, when that which is imperfect is done away, and that which is perfect is come. In describing the resurrection of the righteous and the glorious bodies they shall then put on, his mind is so filled with the theme, that he quite ignores the resurrection of the wicked—though, from other parts of the Bible we have reason to believe that their souls will be united to their vile material bodies again, that they both may be destroyed together. " Then cometh the end, when He shall have delivered up the Kingdom to God, even the Father, when He shall have put down all rule, and all authority, and all power. For He must reign till He hath put all enemies under His feet." " The last enemy that shall be destroyed is Death."

 

 Peter, in his first Epistle, Chapter 3d, describes the coming of the last day, and the complete destruction of all the wicked, and the general conflagration in this " day of God, when the heavens, being on fire, shall be dis-solved and the earth shall melt with ferment heat," and then he adds, "nevertheless, we, according to His promise, look for the new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness." Jude informs us that even Enoch prophesied of these things.

 

 9. But it is reserved for the last book in the Bible, as we might naturally suppose, and especially for the concluding portion of it, to give us the fullest description of the closing scenes in this earthly drama, and the most perfect picture of the world to come.

 

 We will not here attempt to follow the course of this wonderful vision through its scenes of conflict, and carnage, and fire, and smoke, in which our Lord, now as the " Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the Ending, which was, and is, and is to come, the Almighty," and now, as " the Lamb which was slain from the foundation of the world," and now as a glorious conquering " Prince," is described as waging war with the many protean forms of evil personified under every actual or imaginable symbol or image. The grotesque imagery which the Seer employs of beasts with many heads and horns, of dragons belching forth floods of water, of horses breathing fire from their nostrils, of locusts with scorpion strings, of angels flying through the air with vials of wrath, or with sickles, with which to reap the harvest of this earth; the impossible figures he introduces, the extravagant language he uses, are such as to defy all logical analysis or definite and precise application. Nor is this at all necessary to a most clear understanding of the object for which he employs them, and of the truths he intends to express, and of the certain result towards which they all point us, namely, the overthrow and abolishment of all opposition, and of all evil, whatever form it may assume, or, however strongly it may be entrenched, and the ultimate reign of righteousness, peace and love, throughout the universal kingdom of God.

 

 We see how the mystical Babylon, that had so long held sway in the earth, is overthrown and consumed with fire, like Sodom of old; how the beast and the false prophet, whatever forms of organized evil they may represent, are unceasingly tormented and then destroyed in the lake of fire and brimstone, and how, finally the great head center of all this apostacy and iniquity, is first bound, and then, when his time is fully come, is judged and destroyed in the same lake of fire with the beast and false prophet. " Then cometh the end." The Judge is seated upon a great, white throne; and before His face heaven and earth flee away. The dead, small and great, stand before Him. 'The sea, and Death, and Hell, give up all that are in them. The books are opened, and everyone is judged according to his works; and all, whose names are not written in the Book of Life, are cast into the lake of fire, prepared for the devil and his angels. This is the Second Death; and then Death and Hell are cast in after them; and the earth itself, with its Sheol, its Hades, its Gehenna, its Tophet, its Tartarus, or by whatever name the place of the abode of the wicked here confined may be known, is consumed with the visible heavens, in one general conflagration, and the curtain falls upon time, and eternity begins.

 

 Once more, for a little season it is lifted, and we look in for a moment upon the glories of the celestial world. We see a " new heaven and a new earth," " for the first heaven and the first earth are passed away." We see "the New Jerusalem coming down from God out of heaven," with its jasper walls, its golden palaces, its crystal streams, and its trees bearing all manner of precious fruit, and, in the midst of all, the Tree of Life again. We see the celestial and glorified inhabitants clothed in white, with crowns on their heads, and harps in their hands, singing the praises of God. "There shall' be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain, for the former things are passed away." The Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them, and lead them unto living fountains of water, and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes. And there shall be no night there. And they need no light of a candle, neither light of the sun; for the Lord God giveth them light; and they shall reign forever and ever."

 

Chapter 17.

 

Recapitulation.

Incidental evidence to corroborate our position.

Solution of many doctrinal difficulties.

 

 WE first showed in our Introduction, that the question under discussion, instead of presenting a Dilemma, as had generally been supposed, had another alternative in which was found the true solution of all the difficulties of the case.

 

 We then, in the two preliminary chapters, proceeded to remark on the common orthodox belief, and to show the appalling and incredible conclusions to which it leads; and defined more particularly the real question at issue between those who hold to this belief and those who hold to the doctrine maintained in this book.

 

 We, then, before making our final. appeal to the Scriptures, stopped to inquire what Reason and Nature have to say with respect to the natural immortality of man.

 

 i. Reason, when enlightened by Revelation, teaches that there is but one unconditional, independent existence in the universe—that self-existence is the distinguishing attribute of Jehovah, that He is the source of all life; and that the life of every other creature, however high or low, must depend on His will and power, or in other words, be conditional life.

 

 2. It was shown, also, that Nature, while giving us hints, and affording many beautiful symbols of a higher and better life beyond this, has nothing .to say respecting the duration of that future life. Much less does Nature teach that any such life is necessarily without end. or that it is the common inheritance of the whole race. Indeed, the analogies of Nature show, that, as this second life may be destroyed in the grub while in the first stage of its existence, so that it never attains to the second, so it may be in man: also, that everything having life must fulfil the conditions of that life and preserve its normal state,, or it comes to a premature end; and we have reason to believe that this is true of the soul of man: that the instinct of life in man, he possesses in common with the brutes that perish, and that this shrinking from death proves no more in his case than in theirs: and as for the longing man has for immortality, it may indicate the possibility of an endless life, but it certainly does not show that there are no conditions attached to this boon, and that it cannot be alienated; indeed, these, and other longings that are unsatisfied may serve to show him the ruin into which he has fallen by sin, and the need he has of a Savior.

 

 Coming then to the Scriptures, we showed that it is not in the possession of a living soul that man is distinguished from the brutes, but in the possession of a living soul that is capable of Spiritual life, and consequently of communion with God; that it is this life alone that insures to the soul its immortality, and that it was just this Spiritual life and union with God that man failed to maintain; that when man loses this "additional something " which distinguishes him from the brutes, he falls into the same perishable category with them; the loss of the higher, necessitates the loss of the lower, and he becomes inevitably a transient and dying creature. We observed, also, that the terms " Spiritual life " and " Spiritual death " so frequently occurring in the Scriptures, are not figures of speech denoting certain pure or depraved conditions of life, but that they denote an actual life and an actual death of the soul; and that the "new life" that is given in regeneration denotes, not a renovation of the old life, but a real new life like that of Christ Himself; and that it is by this life and not by the perpetuation of the natural life of the soul that we are to have immortality.

 

 We then showed (1) by a long array of passages taken from all parts of the Scriptures, how they uniformly speak of man in his natural—that is in his fallen condition, as mortal and perishable, and also (2) by citing another large class of passages, how they speak of the regenerated man as possessing a life that shall never come to an end; and that this eternal life is the gift of God through Jesus Christ alone.

 

 We then (3) examined another large class of texts in which the brief and transitory life of the wicked is contrasted with the enduring and endless life of the righteous, and after this, (4) those passages that are relied on to prove the doctrine of the eternal existence of the wicked in a state of sin and suffering, and showed, that instead of asserting this, as is claimed, one must assume the fact of the immortality of the soul before they can be made to appear to sustain the doctrine; and that it is only because man's indestructible nature is taken for granted that these texts seem to have any force in this direction; and finally, (5) we showed it to be the uniform testimony of the Word of God from the beginning to the end, that sin with its consequent evil is not eternal, a parte ante, nor, a parte post—that it had its beginning in time, and is restricted to this material world, and that it will have its end, with the end of time, and its final extinction when this world shall be destroyed and God shall make all things new; that Christ will gain a complete victory over every form of evil, and that in the new heavens and the new earth yet to be, there shall be found neither darkness, nor sin, nor pain, nor sorrow, nor death, but only light, and love, and joy, and life, and blessedness forever.

 

 It only remains to allude briefly to a few points that have occurred to us while pursuing this discussion which, not falling exactly in the line of our argument, may be taken as incidental evidences in favor of the position we are endeavoring to maintain.

 

 Whenever any doctrine is found to be in conflict with itself and with other doctrines known to be true, and to lead to incredible conclusions, we ought to infer that it is either wholly or partly unsound. On the other hand, whenever any doctrine is found to harmonize with itself and all other known truth, and to throw much light upon many dark places in the Word of God, and to solve for us mysteries otherwise inexplicable; all this—if not an absolute proof of its soundness—ought, certainly, to commend it to our favorable consideration. This describes, as we think, the case as it stands, between the two doctrines brought into comparison in this discussion.

 

 The doctrine of the unconditional and necessary immortality of man, however agreeable it may be to the instincts of our nature, and flattering to our pride, is surrounded by many difficulties. No one pretends that it can be demonstrated from reason or nature, that man, even as a holy creature, possesses the power of an endless life; and now that he has fallen from his normal condition by sin, the Word of God seems certainly to teach that he is altogether mortal, unless divine mercy shall interpose to save him from the doom he has incurred; and in order to maintain the contrary, a forced construction must be put upon the entire testimony of the Bible.

 

 It leads directly to conclusions concerning God and the character of His government that are appalling, and that shroud Him in terrible gloom, and bring different parts of His Word into direct conflict with each other; it throws a mystery over many of its doctrines; it renders some of them shocking to our moral sense, and others quite inexplicable.

 

 It is not for a moment to be supposed that any finite creature will be able to comprehend a complete system of divine truth, and to fathom all its depths and solve all its mysteries; or, that the natural heart of the sinner will beat in sympathy with all the doctrines of the Bible. But all truth, so far as it is discoverable, whether in nature or in revelation should harmonize with itself; and no man whether holy or sinful can be made to accept of doctrines that are at war with his reason and moral sense.

 

 There is nothing in the doctrine we maintain; namely, that man might have been immortal had he not forfeited his right to live forever by disloyalty to his Maker, that is opposed to the teachings of Reason or of Nature; but on the contrary, this position is agreeable to many of the teachings of both, if man would only listen to them; and when we inquire of Revelation, this doctrine is found to be in harmony with all its utterances from beginning to end. It agrees with the sanctions of the Law and the provisions of the Gospel. It defines very clearly the penalty of sin. Though it is humiliating to the pride of man, he cannot find any fault with it on the score of justice. It frees the Almighty from those aspersions and accusations of cruelty which the doctrine of eternal torment casts upon Him. It magnifies the work of Christ, and greatly enhances the power and glory of God in our redemption. It makes evident the distinction between the natural man and the spiritual man, and shows whys every child of Adam must be born again, that he may enter the Kingdom of God and live forever. In short, it clears up many collateral doctrines and passages of Scriptures that have long been regarded as dark and incomprehensible. It is the key to many, if not to most of the questions that have been in dispute among Christians in all ages. It sets the believer upon a vantage ground from which fie may triumphantly meet the attacks of infidels and scoffers against the Bible as the Word of God.

 

 Let that most peculiar and distinguishing privilege of the saints; namely, eternal life, be conceded to all men in their sins, and the main argument by which the Gospel is to be urged upon the world is thrown away; and other and inferior motives must be substituted--motives which are too often powerless, because they commend themselves neither to the hearts nor consciences of men.

 

 Let, natural men be assured by the heralds of the Gospel, as Christ and His immediate disciples assured them, that they can have no hope of immortality but through Him; that not merely a fearful reckoning awaits them hereafter, and deserved punishment for all their own sins, but final and inevitable destruction as members of a mortal race, and you have laid a foundation in truth for the presentation of the Gospel, which however humbling it may be to their pride, they will find it hard to gainsay or resist.

 

 When all Christians come to understand the truth on this question, the occasion for most of their doctrinal differences will be taken away.

 

 1. Origenism, Socinianism, Swedenborgianism, the extremes of Arminianism and Calvinism, Spiritualism and many other errors and heresies that have Availed, or now prevail, have their origin, or find their chief support in this dogma of the indestructible nature of the human soul. Without this, they would be quite unable to justify their existence.

 

 (1.) The arguments of Universalists and Restorationists against the doctrine of eternal sin and suffering, have no significance or force but in the assumption that the wicked are equally immortal with the righteous. [* The arguments of Mr. Jukes, in the Christian Union, (March 20-27, 1878, in favor of the doctrine of universal restoration, have no foundation or force but in the assumption that saints and sinners alike are destined to an endless existence.] (2.) The Socinian cannot but see that if Christ came not simply as a Reformer of men's lives, but as a Savior from death, not simply to teach and bless the world but to give life and immortality to His people, He must have been divine as well as human. To improve or restore what already exists might be the work of a man, but to communicate to dying man the immortality which God alone possesses,—to make him a new creature, is the work of a Divine Being only. As in the first miracle of Christ, it was not poor wine that was made better, but good wine that was made out of what was no wine at all, so in the miracle of regeneration, He does not simply make men more pure and more blessed, and so lift them up to heaven, but He gives them a new life—another life, which, like His own, is pure and eternal.

 

 (3.) The fancies of the Swedenborgians concerning the other world, will be seen to be but the baseless fabric of a vision when one awakes to the realization of this truth, that the future life is not, at all, the prolongation of this present life into another state, but it is quite another life, which dates its beginning not in the Natural, but in the Spiritual birth of the soul.

 

 (4.) The Arminian differs from the Calvinist, not so much as to the doctrine of God's Sovereignty, as to the inferences that are drawn from it, and the supposed manner of its exercise. He finds fault, and with good . reason, with the doctrine that God first imperiled the eternal happiness of the whole race in the trial of their progenitor, and then elected a certain number to eternal happiness and foredoomed all the rest, most of whom have never had the offer of salvation, to an endless existence of sin and misery. But let it be Understood that it was a question—not of eternal woe or eternal weal, but of death or life, that is, of mortality or immortality that was decided in Adam; and that every member of this fallen race, though a mortal by the conditions of his birth, is answerable for his own sins only at the bar of God, and that God exercises His Sovereignty, as indeed, He must, in giving or in not giving another life—His own peculiar life—as He does in giving any other kind of life to whomsoever He will, and no man can call His justice or goodness in question.

 

 (5.) Modern Spiritualism, which is but the revival of the old heathenish art of Necromancy, which the Scriptures ascribe to the devil and the practice of which is forbidden on pain of death, is the natural outgrowth of this error, and could not exist a moment were it not for the sanction and support derived from it.

 

 2. This great error like a veil or cataract upon the eyes of the reader of the Scriptures, prevents him from seeing the beauty and completeness of the contrast between Adam as the Natural man and Christ as the Spiritual man, to which allusion is often made in the Scriptures, and which the Apostle Paul has drawn out in detail in his Epistles, and which Commentators have found so much difficulty in explaining. But let this veil be taken away, and then the parallel between the first and the second Adam, and the Natural, Earthly, Mortal and Transitory life which comes through the one, and the Spiritual, Heavenly and Eternal life which comes through the other, will appear beautifully perfect, and in harmony with our highest conceptions of the wisdom and goodness of God. "That is not first which is Spiritual, but that which is natural and afterwards that which is Spiritual."

 

 (3.) Were it not for the blinding influence of this error, the distinction between the sinner and the saint, the Natural man and the Spiritual man, the Moral man and the Christian, the " children of this world " and the "children of the Kingdom," which is so vaguely apprehended by most believers, and is an utter mystery to all unbelievers, would be very clearly defined. It is not a distinction in degrees, but in kind; not a mere moral distinction between men, all of whom are more or less imperfect, but a distinction between two different things—two different kinds of life, the one received from Adam, the other from Christ; the one tending naturally downward to its origin in the dust, the other upward to its origin in the heavens; the one is essentially and necessarily transitory, for it is imperfect and finite, the other is essentially and necessarily eternal, for it is the life of the holy and infinite Jehovah Himself, though in the soul of man.

 

 The heir of heaven, in the outset, may be no more moral than his neighbor—he may be far beneath him in all the elements of natural goodness, but there is an assimilating power in this new life, which will subdue all things to itself, and go on increasing more and more unto the perfect day; but the other nature, however fair it may now appear, has the seeds of death within it, and goes inevitably downward to death and dissolution. Let the moral man who boasts of his goodness, and hopes to be saved by the law of Moses, come to apprehend this distinction, and he will see at once, how impossible it is to attain to eternal life without being born again—not of blood, nor of flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. The principle of immortality is not in the soul of any child of Adam, however moral he may be, it must be implanted there by the Spirit of God, or he can never hope to live forever.

 

 4. Here we have explained also the otherwise unaccountable omission of any mention of a future life for the sinner in the Old Testament, and of the natural immortality of the soul in either the Old or New Testament. Life and immortality are only brought to light in the Gospel, and then only as the portion of the believer Christ. The Law in its spiritual and higher application was quite unknown. It was carnal, as the Apostle says. It was received and understood only in its lower and tern poral application by those to whom it was first given. Under Moses, men were all treated as mortal men, and approved and rewarded, or condemned and punished according as they obeyed or disobeyed its behests.

 

 Warburton devotes a large part of his learned work on " the divine legation of Moses" to the proof of this proposition, to which every Bible scholar must give his assent, " That the doctrine of a future state of rewards and punishments is not to be found in, nor did it make a part of the divine legation of Moses."

 

 But if man had been on trial as to the weal or woe of an endless existence, and if the sanctions of this law were actually eternal blessedness, on the one hand, and eternal torment on the other, in a life beyond the grave, it is absolutely incredible that this great fact should have been so utterly ignored by God's commissioned lawgiver. When, however, we once recognize this great fundamental truth of both the Law and the Gospel, that the eternal life which is given to the people of God, comes to them in no sense whatever by the observance of the law, but only through faith in the Savior, and that it is the peculiar gift of God through Jesus Christ, this mystery vanishes at once, and we see the necessity there is for both the law and the gospel. The law once broken may remain as a rule of life, but it can afford no relief to those who have incurred its penalty which is death.

 

 5. It is here too, that we see how Christ suffered the full penalty of the law for us.

 

 Theologians have endeavored to show how the temporary suffering of an infinite being was commuted for the eternal sufferings of a multitude of finite creatures; .or how the supreme dignity of the sufferer rendered it a full equivalent; or, how Christ actually suffered in dying, the full amount of all the agony that was threatened against all those whom he redeemed, had their agonies been prolonged through all eternity. But all these speculations are very unsatisfactory. But if the penalty of the law was death to both soul and body, and not suffering, excepting as it precedes and accompanies this death, then, there is no difficulty in understanding how Christ, by suffering and dying in His whole human nature—for in His divine nature He could not die—paid the full penalty of the law. Is not this the true meaning of what Peter says. " For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit,"—and the meaning of what Christ Himself says, I am He that lived and was dead, and behold I am alive forevermore.

 

 6. New light is thrown upon the sacrificial system of the Old Testament; and the real significance of these offerings is made very clear. That they were typical of the great sacrifice yet to be made by Christ there can be no doubt. But if the atonement made by Christ consisted in suffering to redeem us from suffering, then why should not these sacrificial victims be put to torture? But if it consisted in dying to redeem us from death, the giving of one life for another; and if the suffering He endured was only incidental to this, then we see plainly that the death of the victim, and not the suffering, was the chief thing necessary to its completeness.

 

 1. From this point of view we can understand, also, what Moses meant when he prayed, if God would not forgive the sins of the people, that He would blot him out of the book which he had written (Ex. 32:31), and what Paul meant by saying that he could wish that he were accused from Christ for his brethren and kinsmen in the flesh (Rom. 9:3), not that they could be willing to sin and suffer eternal agonies as the enemies of God, but that such was their love for the people of their care, that they would rather die for them, or with them, and perish forever and be forgotten, than to live after they were utterly destroyed.

 

 8. There are other passages, such as those that foretell the destruction of the last enemy—death, (1 Cor. 15: 26,) and the casting of death and hell into the lake of fire which is the second death, (Rev. 20: 54,) etc., which commentators find it very difficult to explain while they hold to the doctrine, that death shall reign forever over a portion of the children of Adam. But there is really no difficulty whatever but such as their dogma imposes.

 

 The editor of the Cottage Bible in commenting on this latter passage, says:

 

 What is meant by death and hell, or the grave, or invisible world cast into the lake of fire, is not so clear. We apprehend with Mr. Lohman that it is designed to intimate, that there will be in future no intermediate state, no death, no grave;—the whole human race will in future be found in heaven or hell, in eternal life or everlasting misery! awful thought! How important it is to secure for our names a place in the Lamb's book of life.

 

 How completely he ignores the main sentiment and drift of the passage! and yet, this is the way many commentators darken counsel by words without knowledge, when they come across any passage that conflicts with their notions about the eternal perpetuity of death, and hell, and sin, and misery.

 

 9. Much light also is throw upon the great question of ages—the divine permission of sin, or the existence of evil in this universe. We may not be able by searching to find out God, to find out the Almighty to perfection. There are secret things which belong to God alone. This may be one of them. But they involve it in darkness and gloom infinitely more profound who teach, that now this evil which God has permitted to come into His universe, or which has come in without His permission, never can, or never will be expelled; that though all things were very good and perfect in the morning of creation, the clouds that have since come over the face of Nature will never cease to linger in the horizon and to cast their dark shadow upon some portion of the field; that He will permit the rival that rose up against Him in heaven, though cast down to hell, to retain a portion of his prey, and reign over them, and that He will concede to him and to all the victims of his wiles one province, at least, of His own hitherto universal empire; that the integrity and unity of His government has been forever destroyed, and that hereafter, instead of one everlasting kingdom, there shall be two everlasting kingdoms,—a kingdom of light and a kingdom .of darkness, a kingdom of joy and a kingdom of sorrow, a kingdom of praise and a kingdom of cursing—running parallel with each other to all eternity.

 

 No wonder that the good and wise, in all ages have confessed themselves amazed and confounded by the enigma, and utterly unable to see the goodness or wisdom of God through the clouds which their own false philosophies have thrown around Him.

 

 But this dark subject assumes, at least, a lighter and more cheerful shade, when we come to learn that all the evil that now exists—as it had a beginning—will have an end; that it will all be dissipated like the fogs and mists of the morning when the sun shall shine forth in His strength; that it is in some sense preliminary and preparatory to the coming in of the perfect day in its noontide splendor; that it is but an incident in the development of his infinite plan—necessary perhaps, to its perfection, but not integral to it; that, after having made the rage of Satan and the wrath of man to praise Him, the remainder He will restrain, and as surely as He lives, "all the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of God." That the very object for which Christ came down from heaven was to destroy Satan and all his works, and He will surely accomplish the object of His mission. " For He must reign, till He has put all enemies under His feet." " The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death," (1 Cor. 15: 25, 26), and, in the new heavens and the new earth that shall follow, " There shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying; neither shall there be any more pain, for the former things are passed away." (Rev. 21.)

 

It may be perhaps, unnecessary to say, that our inquiries and conclusions are confined to this universe of intelligences centering in Christ, the Lord, to which our attention is especially directed in the Scriptures, and to the cycle of being, through which we, in common with the Spiritual world about us, are passing. As to other universes —to use an astronomical paradox—if there be other universes, and to other cycles of being; if there be such, we know nothing. As to what may have been, or may yet be, or now is, in the infinite reach of the boundless dominions of the Almighty, and in the sweep of cycles that are measureless, we do not presume even to guess.

 

 When any one comes to have any true conception, however faint, of the possibilities of the infinite; of duration without any beginning or end whatever;—of extent without limit; of being that is absolute and independent; a sense of his own insignificance, and of the littleness of the sphere through which he moves, forbids him to dogmatize or to make much account of his own knowledge or wisdom. What is the earth itself with all it contains, but a particle of dust floating in the sunbeams? or the circuit through which it revolves, but a mere point in the vast expanse that stretches out without any possible limit on every side? or the duration of its career, but that of the bubble that forms and bursts in the same moment upon the surface of the ocean?—compared with the lifetime of the Almighty, the amplitude of His sway, and the totality of his works?

 

Chapter 18.

 

Two objections considered.

Conclusion.

 

 THE two main objections to any modification of the old doctrine we have been opposing are:

 

 1. That this belief has generally prevailed in all ages of the world, and is the popular belief at the present day.

 

 If this belief were the result of a careful induction of facts, or if it were based on testimony, this would be a strong argument in its favor. And yet, even in such a case—in regard to facts and principles that are demonstrable—how often have the whole world been found to have been wrong in their belief, by the more careful investigations of science. But this belief is, at best, but a mere opinion or sentiment, which cannot be demonstrated or proved to be true by human testimony.

 

 On such a question, the belief of a multitude carries no more authority with it than the belief of one person; nor does it gain any real force by being handed down from one generation to another.

 

 But even if it could be shown to be probable that the soul lives after the death of the body, which we have not attempted to assert or deny, this is far from showing, what many seem to suppose, that it will never die, much less, that this is true of all souls, without any condition or qualification whatever.

 

 It is just at this point that we take issue with the advocates of this doctrine, not as to the possibility or probability of another state, nor, indeed, as to the fact of a future state for both the righteous and the wicked; but as to whether the life of the wicked is eternal, as well as, that of the righteous, or, in other words, as to the indestructibility of the human soul.

 

 We think we have proved, so far as it is capable of proof, both from reason and nature, and especially and conclusively from the Scriptures, that no human soul can possibly live eternally, unless it is in union with God, and consequently, pure and blessed; that the sinful soul has no power of an endless life within itself: that, cut off from Him Who is the source of all life, it must necessarily perish; that, when it is both physically and spiritually dead, it is also actually dead.

 

 Man was made capable of immortality, because he was made capable of spiritual union with God. Immortality is the boon that was offered to him, but only on condition of continued obedience. So long as he remained holy he had "a right to the tree of life." But the right has been lost by sin. The original birth-right has been traded away for a mess of pottage. And now he is unwilling to accept the consequences of his foolish bargain, or to believe that his Heavenly Father will disinherit him. He clings to the hope, as is quite natural, in spite of the forfeiture. The tempter, who whispered in the ears of our confiding parents, " Ye shall not surely die," continues to delude their posterity with the same assurance, and they are equally ready to believe him. The great mistake and delusion of the world from that day to this, has been in claiming for man in his sins, what could be true of him only in his normal condition. And now that a new way of eternal life has been made known in the Gospel, man refuses to recognize this way, or to accept it at the hands of Christ as a gift of grace, but claims it as his natural inheritance. We can hardly wonder that those to whom this Gospel has never been offered should cling to the delusion, nor that those to whom Christ is preached as a mere Savior from sin and misery, and not as a Savior from death, should, under the blinding power of sin, hold fast to this belief in the unconditional immortality of their souls, which has been taught to them from their infancy; but it is surprising that those who have been enlightened by the Spirit of God and called to be Saints, should so utterly ignore the chief distinction which God has made between themselves and the world, that they should deny to Christ the special glory of the gift He has purchased for them—the gift of Eternal Life.

 

 It is surprising that they should concede to dying sinners the preposterous claims they make to an immortality like their own, and so reduce the Gospel message which ought to be an offer of Life—eternal Life to mortal men, to a mere proclamation of a way of escape from those infinite and eternal torments which, to most men, are quite incredible, and which those who proclaim them scarcely believe will be inflicted.

 

 It may seem like foolish presumption to oppose so popular a doctrine as the indefeasible right of all men to an endless existence, and to stand by this great truth of the Gospel, which has been so obscured by human philosophy:—That there is no eternal Life for any child of Adam apart from Christ: but the humiliating doctrines of the Gospel have never been popular in the world—nor have they always been in the Church. Christ has too often and too long been wounded in the house of His friends and robbed of half of His glory. This doctrine of immortality from Adam and not from Christ is so flattering to the pride of man, and so sweet and delusive, that the world will cling to it as to their last hope. Certainly they will never give it up so long as they are sustained in it by the authority of the Church herself. It will, no doubt, be one of the last of the many delusions from which the Church of Christ, in her onward progress, will free herself. But this, too, like others that have had their day, will pass away, and then, and not till then, will she go forth as the morning, clear as the sun, and fair as the moon, and terrible as an army with banners, to a speedy triumph in the earth.

 

 2. It is urged that a belief in the indestructibility of the human soul and in the eternal misery of the unsaved is necessary to restrain men from sin, and dispose them to seek salvation. It is on this ground that most Christian 'people, many of whom cannot bear to think of or hear of the agonies of the lost in hell, cling to the doctrine with such tenacity. They fear that if it is called in question, the foundation of God's government will be weakened, and the Gospel will lose its power over sinners. We greatly respect their pious solicitude for the ark of God, and their anxious desire for the conversion of sinners. We sympathize with them to the fullest extent in their zeal for the truth. We agree with Ahem in the truism that God's law, like every other law, must have a penalty, and a penalty too, that answers to the offence, and that the Gospel will never be anything but foolishness to those who neither feel nor fear the evils from which it offers to deliver them.

 

 We desire not to weaken the power of the law or of the Gospel, but rather to give them that efficacy and force which they are losing through the prevalence of error, by setting forth the truth as it is in the Word of God, and as it was preached by Christ and His early disciples.

 

 It is not our object to deny the doctrine of future punishment, but to establish its truth upon a firmer basis; to show how just, how terrible and how sure the punishment of the wicked will be. It is not ourselves, but the advocates of the doctrine we are opposing, who are bringing—though unwittingly—both the law and the Gospel into contempt, by proclaiming a doctrine which they secretly hope is not true, and by endeavoring to make sinners receive it and act in view of it, while they scarcely believe it themselves. Their mistake lies in supposing that to deny the doctrine of future punishment as they have been accustomed to hold it, is to deny the doctrine altogether, and that there is no alternative to the doctrine of endless misery, but that of no punishment at all. They seem to suppose that God has no way of magnifying His law and making it honorable without threatening all transgressors with infinite and eternal torments. Is there nothing dreadful in the thought of being excluded from the kingdom of heaven; of being counted as unfit to live; of being blotted out from among God's creatures and forgotten forever?

 

 Is there no terror in the death penalty? Is there no such thing—can there be no such thing as capital punishment for irreclaimable offenders under the government of God? How is it under human government? Is that penal system which is the most savage and cruel that can be devised, the one which reflects the most honor on the government that employs it, and which the most perfectly secures the ends of justice? Must the death penalty be made as full of torment and as protracted as possible—or rather, must there be no death penalty at all, but only life long torture inflicted upon criminals of the first grade? This is the way that all tyrants have reasoned. The more terribly cruel and protracted they could make their punishment, the more force, as they supposed, they were giving to their laws.

 

 All the fiendish tortures of the inquisition were thought to be justified on this plea. And both the church and the state, in the dark ages of the world, have found an example for all their most shocking cruelties in this theory of the divine government. But this kind of philosophy, so far as civil polity is concerned, has had its day. A more humane, enlightened, and wise system of penal jurisprudence is taking the place of the old barbarous codes that were once so popular, and is beginning everywhere to prevail, and this too, with manifest advantage to the cause of justice and good government. But in theology the old dogma yet lingers. The Deity must be represented, not as simply just, but as infinitely cruel. He must not punish the wicked with death according to His word—this would be dangerous leniency—but he must keep them alive forever, and inflict upon them endless torments; at any rate, He must be represented as threatening to do it, and sinners must be made to believe the doctrine if possible. And then, in order to free Him, somewhat, froth their unjust aspersion, so that men can love and trust Him, it is vaguely hinted that perhaps, after all, some way, yet unrevealed, may be found by which sinners will be saved from so dreadful a doom.

 

 Christian Union, October 56, 1872, notices the ordination of a Congregational Minister by vote of Council 55 against 2, who at his examination .said: " I believe there will be an opportunity for repentance in the future to all who die in impenitence, and hope that all will willingly embrace it," Since then other candidates have avowed similar hopes and beliefs. How many others entertain them in secret it is impossible to say. There is reason to fear that the number is large and rapidly increasing.

 

 This we understand to be in substance, the ground taken by Canon F. W. Farrar, in recent sermons, preached in Westminster Abbey and republished in this country. And this, we fear, is the position which the eloquent preacher and pastor of the Plymouth Church, Brooklyn, is taking. It is certainly creditable to their hearts that they should reject with abhorrence the dreadful doctrine of endless torment for those who die in their sins. It is creditable to their honesty that they should say this openly when they have so many reasons for keeping silent. But what shall we say of their theology? What possible ground for hope does the Word of God give for the final recovery of these lost souls? It is remote Universalism, at the best, and will have all the demoralizing influence of that pernicious error, upon those who accept their views. But what else can they preach, so long as they cling to this dogma of the deathless nature of the human soul? They shut themselves up to a dilemma, which compels them to deny the goodness and justice of God on the one hand, or the truth of His Word on the other. When by dropping their false philosophy they might hold to both; O that they, and others like them, who are now groping in darkness, might be led to the only sure foundation for their feet to rest upon—that the scales might fall from their eyes that Christ might be seen and owned and preached as the only hope and source of immortality for perishing men.

 

Is this the way to magnify the law of God and make it honorable? Must He be represented as the most tyrannical and cruel Being in the universe that sinners may fear Him, and then as a deceiver, and too good to execute His terrible threatening that men may love and trust Him? We do not so understand the truth. We sympathize most fully with our opponents in the end they would secure; but we believe that there is no more effectual way of defeating it than the method they pursue. If there is any one doctrine which stands out prominent above others in the Word of God, and which ought to be held and preached without any peradventure, it is the doctrine of a future retribution—of the absolutely hopeless and remediless doom of those who die in their sins —of the eternal and irreversible distinction that will be made between the righteous and the wicked. But the sanctions of God's' law are sufficiently impressive without

any human additions. If there is no power in the threat of "everlasting destruction " or in the offer of " eternal life " to move the heart of the sinner, the preacher cannot make them effective by any false coloring of his own. He loses vastly more than he gains by endeavoring to exalt the judicial character of God at the expense of His justice, on the one hand, or of His truth on the other. The sinner must believe that He is just as well as terrible in His judgments, and that He will be as true to all His threatening as to His promises. But in order to this, the threatening must be such as his own conscience assures him are just. Fear without conviction of sin will never lead to repentance. Men may be shocked, and horrified by terrible descriptions of the ceaseless and eternal agonies of the lost, till every true sentiment of their moral nature revolts against the monstrous injustice and cruelty of Him whom they are taught to believe will inflict them, but all this has no tendency what-ever to produce conviction of sin, or penitence, or love, Those who have relied the most upon this kind of exhortation, have not been the most successful in bringing men to embrace the Gospel.

 

 There may be a kind of restraint for a time exercised over low and groveling natures through the influence of such motives, but they soon exhaust themselves. Their ultimate effect is to degrade, demoralize and harden the heart. It is a better policy, even under human governments, to endeavor to control men by appealing to their moral sentiments, to make them feel that the penalties of law are just and necessary, and that they will surely fall upon the head of the transgressor. But this is absolutely essential under the government of God. A religion without confidence and love is worthless. God's first demand is for the heart of the sinner.

 

 It is a sense of His goodness that leads men to repentance. Men may be made Christians in name—the world is full of them:—a servile conformity to the outward forms of religion may be secured by operating on their fears: but they cannot be made true Christians; they cannot be made really obedient; they cannot be made pure and holy in this way.

 

 And what now if men shall outgrow their early fears? What if they shall begin to suspect they have been dealt with deceitfully—that their real danger has been greatly magnified in order, if possible, to catch them by guile? A reaction is sure to follow. Both the law and the Gospel will be brought into contempt, and they will be further from salvation than ever before.

 

 This we sincerely believe to be the state of the case at the present day. The evil is rapidly increasing, and there is no way to meet it but by the presentation of the truth as it is in God's Word, and as we have endeavored to present it in these pages. It is not to be disguised that the doctrine of eternal sin, and eternal suffering, as it was once held, is practically, if not theoretically losing its hold upon the Christian world. Even those who are the most pertinacious in retaining it as an article of the creed, are unwilling to preach it or hear it preached as in former times. Those who occasionally venture to touch upon it in their public ministrations, do it with ill-concealed doubts and misgivings. And many of our most devoted and intelligent ministers have ceased altogether to preach it. But the dogma upon which the doctrine depends, and which, if true, makes it logically certain—namely: the indestructibility of the soul, is as popular as ever. The result is, the law of God is not feared or honored, and the Gospel as a message of salvation has but little of its rightful power over the hearts and consciences of men. The exhortations of those who proclaim this message are comparatively heartless and feeble. Their warnings and their invitations fall upon the ears of their unbelieving hearers as an idle tale; or they refuse to hear them at all. Complaint is made that the pulpit is losing its influence over the masses; that the missionary spirit is dying out in our theological seminaries; that young men and women are not offering them-selves, as formerly, to carry the Gospel message to the heathen. Indeed, why should they, if the heathen will probably be saved without the Gospel. If these myriads of millions of human beings are destined to an endless existence, as they suppose, they cannot doubt that a just and merciful God will provide some way of escape for them, either here or hereafter, from eternal misery. It seems to them incredible that He should foredoom from their birth, so large a portion of the human race to eternal torment in another life for the sin of their pro-genitors, or even for their own sins, without giving them, at least some chance to escape—even if they die without a knowledge of the Gospel.—It is incredible.

 

 But it is not incredible, that He should create a mortal race of men, nor that He should permit men to be-. come mortal through the sin of their progenitors, and then, that He should provide a way by which mortal men can have the offer of everlasting life as a gift of grace, and that He should condition their salvation upon their knowledge and acceptance of a Savior. It is not incredible that He should judge and punish all men from both Christian and Heathen lands according, to their individual deserts, after this life is ended, some with few, and others with many stripes; that there should be a second death for the unsaved, from which there is no recovery. The declaration of God's Word, literally understood as we claim it should be, that " The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord," is every way credible. It commends itself to the understanding and the conscience of every man, not only as reasonable and just, but also as worthy of a God of infinite goodness and mercy. There is nothing, either in the law of God or in the Gospel, that needs to be covered up, or explained away, or apologized for. It is only because man, by his false philosophy, and Satan by his artifices, have distorted and perverted the simple truth that its power has been weakened and God's character dishonored. Let it be believed and felt, that sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth Death, and that the whole race of-Adam have fallen under the power of sin, and that the Gospel is an offer of life, of eternal life, to dying man, and that there is none other name given under heaven whereby we must be saved but the name of Jesus Christ, and, that this offer of life must be tendered and accepted before sin has finished its work, or there can be no possible hope of salvation:—let it be believed and felt, as it should be, that every sinner, whether in Christian or in Heathen lands, who is brought to Christ, is a soul saved from death to eternal life, and that every sinner, who dies apart from Christ, must inevitably perish forever, and there will be found to be no lack of power, either in the law or the Gospel, to move the hearts of men.

 

 This is the very message of truth, the good tidings of great joy which Christ commanded His disciples to preach through the world. " He that believeth shall be saved and he that believeth not shall be damned " (condemned). This was the truth that fired the souls of His apostles and early disciples, and gave them such abundant success in all the world.

 

 This truth has lost none of its power to nerve the hearts of His people to their highest endeavor to save as many as possible of their fellow men, nor to bring the stoutest rebels to the foot of the cross. Let it go forth again in its fulness and simplicity, freed from the traditions of men and the interpretations of science, falsely so-called, and it will prove, as it always has proved, mighty to the pulling down of the strongholds of Satan, the wisdom of God and the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth.

 

 When that day shall come, as it surely will come, the kingdom of heaven will be near at hand. "The Lord hasten it in His time."

 

Chapter 19.

 

Will Satan live forever?

 

[NOTE.—The following essay was not originally intended for this volume. It was written for another purpose; but having never been published, it is added as germane to the subject under consideration, and a fitting close to the discussion. The author has used, as will be noticed. sonic of the arguments and illustrations, and possibly, some of the language employed in the foregoing chapters.]

 

ACCEPTING without question the views commonly called orthodox concerning the existence and personality of Satan and the host of evil spirits that are associated with him, and using this title generically for the sake of convenience, as is usually done, we naturally inquire what is to be his future destiny? Will Satan live forever, or will he be destroyed? That he has been already destroyed by sin, in his moral nature, and that there is no possible hope of his recovery, we are well assured. Is his ruined, wretched life, to be perpetuated without end, or is there a further and more complete destruction awaiting him?

 

 We are aware that to many this is a startling question. Their suspicion is at once excited against anyone who raises it. They do not consider it to be an open question. With them it is as fixed, if not as fundamental a doctrine of belief, that Satan is doomed to an interminable existence, as that Christ Himself will exist forever. They freely admit that there was a time when he did not exist even as a holy angel, but now that he has come into being, though he has fallen irrecoverably from the purity and blessedness of his original estate, and forfeited everything worth living for, he has not forfeited life itself; he cannot forfeit it. His restoration to holiness is hopeless; his exit from life is equally hopeless. The time never will come, nor can come, in all the cycles of the future, when he shall cease to be the same miserable, ruined fiend, he now is! In him evil had a beginning; but in him it shall never have an end; nor, what-over changes shall occur, shall it cease to mar the beauty and completeness of the universe into which he introduced it! Sin has the power to destroy everything else it touches; but the life of the creature into whom it enters it cannot destroy! The blight and misery it brings have no tendency to extinguish the light of life in the soul of its miserable victim! It separates from God the source of all life: it works disorganization and ruin, and when " finished bringeth forth death," that is; the death of everything but life!

 

 They dare not, even in their thoughts, look forward to the time, however much they might desire it, when Satan and all his works shall be utterly destroyed, and when all the evil that now exists shall be transmuted into good, or eradicated from the universe, and God shall be able as in the beginning to pronounce everything very good. Such a consummation is too glorious to be hoped for, or thought of. Even God who made Satan, has no power to unmake him, or, if he has, He will never exercise it! He can defeat Him, He can bind him; He can imprison him; He can torment him forever. All this He will do. But He cannot or will not put an end to his miserable life! Christ proposed to Himself in coming to earth to set up his kingdom, no such achievement as the utter destruction of Satan and all his works excepting in a figurative sense! He only proposed to overcome him, and wrest from his grasp as large a portion of his prey as possible, and, then to cast him, with the remainder of his deluded victims, like so many wild beasts or raving maniacs, into the bottomless pit, and pour out upon them the vials of his wrath forever; while he gathers all whom he has redeemed and rescued, into the bright realms of glory, where, with the angels, who have kept their allegiance, they shall praise Him as their deliverer and king, forever and ever! And He shall "see the travail of His soul and be satisfied!" Such they believe to be the glorious consummation promised and provided for in the Gospel of Christ.

 

 But what if we shall find in the Word of God the assurance of a victory yet more complete, and a consummation more glorious than this? do we dishonor God, or discredit the work of Christ or tarnish the lustre of the Gospel, if we believe it? Is our fidelity to the truth to be suspected, because we believe it more literally and fully, and find even more to hope for and pray for in the promises of our glorious Redeemer, than many others who hold them with us in common?

 

 As we read and understand the Word of God, the popular view concerning this conflict between Christ and Satan, and the final victory he shall achieve, comes infinitely short of the truth. The popular notion that to Satan belongs an immortality like that of Christ "who only hath immortality," and that contemplates him as a dethroned monarch occupying, after his defeat, a certain realm partitioned off from God's otherwise universal dominions, still in rebellion, and holding on to a portion of his ill-gotten spoils, and rioting and raging with the horde of his miserable subjects, so long as God and heaven endure, is, we humbly think, a sad perversion of the truth.

 

 This doctrine has been long and extensively held. Our fathers believed and taught it. It is the doctrine of the Romish Church. It was the doctrine of the dark ages. But we cannot trace it back to Christ and His Apostles and to their teaching in the Scriptures. The Word of God tells us very explicitly, that He has it, not only in His power, but in His purpose, not merely to defeat and subjugate Satan, but to destroy him and all his works utterly and forever; that the evil that now exists as the fruit of his malice, whether real or apparent, is but transient. It had a beginning and it shall have an end. It shall not remain forever to mar the perfection and glory of the universe. It is not necessarily an integral and permanent part of it. When it shall have served its purpose, it will not be garnered like the good seed, but consumed like the chaff. God has already prepared an inextinguishable, all-consuming fire, for the purpose—not of simply tormenting Satan and all his hosts, though this will be incidental, but for the purpose of destroying them: And that the day is coming that shall burn them up and leave neither root nor branch.

 

 The object for which Christ came was, not simply to get Satan safely under lack and key, where he can be held forever, so that he can do no more mischief, but only rage and curse and suffer forever; but that He might exterminate him; and we believe as fully as we believe in Ills promises, that the time is coming when He shall have so perfectly accomplished His object, that there shall be found no place for him or any of his persistent followers, in any portion of His universal dominions. There shall lie, not two folds, but one fold and one Shepherd. Every knee shall bow, of things in heaven and things in earth and things under the earth, and every tongue shall confess Him Lord, to the glory of God the Father. This lower world into which he and his associates in rebellion were cast from heaven, and which has been the theater of this conflict between Christ and His enemies, shall be burned up, and with it, death and hell and all their guilty crew. In that new heaven and new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness that shall follow, there shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any pain, for the former things are passed away.

 

 The doctrine of the endless existence of Satan needs to be proved. It is not enough to say that it is very generally believed. This may entitle it to our respectful consideration: but this affords no solid ground for our own belief—certainly, it gives us no warrant for imposing it upon others. The general prevalence of any belief in matters of doctrine may warrant the supposition that there is some evidence for it, but it is not the evidence itself. The opinion of—no matter how many persons—is no better than the opinion of one person, if it rests on no other foundation than the fact that it is the popular belief. Ten thousand men holding on to each other can no more stand on nothing, than one solitary individual. It is not, then, how general is this belief that Satan will live forever? but what are the grounds for this belief? which is the subject of our present inquiry.

 

 In order to prove that Satan will live forever, one must establish either one of these two positions, (r) that neither God nor any other power exists, or can exist, that is able to destroy his life; or (2) that, though there may be such a power, it will never be exercised to destroy his life. These are the only two alternatives that are supposable by which this doctrine can be maintained.

 

 If God gave to Satan when He created him, an absolute, indefeasible, inextinguishable life, which maintains itself independent of Gad and every possible contingency —if in short, God gave to him, as to Jesus Christ, to have life in himself, then, of course, he will, like Christ, live forever, and for the same reason. But if this position cannot be established, then it will be necessary to show, at least, that either reason or Scripture teaches -us that God never will take from him the life which He originally gave him, nor withdraw His sustaining power and suffer him to expire, nor allow him to destroy himself, but will perpetuate that life so long as He Himself shall live.

 

 Let us examine these two alternatives in their order:

 

 I. Did God give to Satan in His creation an absolute, necessary immortality—an unconditional, inalienable, indestructible life, like His own? Every theist must admit that self-existence is an attribute of deity, and is incommunicable in its very nature; for existence that is communicated is not self-existence. It cannot therefore, possibly be an attribute of any creature. God is the only Being, strictly speaking, in the universe, or rather, it is to the Being that is self-existent that we give the name of God. We cannot go higher than this. It is this attribute of self-existence more than any other that constitutes Him what He is. It is this that gives Him His pre-eminence: Everything else is from Him and dependent upon Him. He is the source and fountain of life to all His creatures, "seeing He giveth to all, life and breath and all things." This is His name, JEHOVAH, which means self-existence. It is by this name I Am that I Am, that He makes Himself known to His creatures. This is the attribute which He emphasizes and insists on more than any other. It includes all His other attributes. He is the Living God; the EverlastingGod; the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the Ending, which Is, which was and which Is to come, the Almighty. All the Life in the universe flows out from Him and centres in Him—not merely such life in its lower forms and manifestations as is continually coining and going at His bidding, which we call transient and ephemeral, but life in the very highest manifestations known to us. Our Adamic life, or the natural life of the soul, is His breath, breathed into us. Apart from Him, we have no life at all: That higher life, the Spiritual life, called also Eternal life, which He gives to His people in the new birth, is from Him, and is ours only as we live in Him, and are united to Him, as the branch is united to the vine. It will never 'be extinguished, not because it is independent and self-perpetuating, but because He has guaranteed its perpetuity. Gabriel is as dependent on God for his life, and for its continuance, as the insect of a day. To suppose otherwise would be to invest him with the highest attribute of deity, and to 'make him a god at once, independent of his Maker.

 

 If Satan possesses an absolute and necessary existence, then he is not only like God, but equal to God in the most essential attribute of his nature—that of self-existence, and we have two gods, one good and the other bad, built alike immortal in their natures; indeed we have as many god's, both good and bad, as there are such beings. This brings us at once into the depths of Polytheism. This was the very doctrine which Satan himself taught to our first parents in their temptations. Ye shall not surely die. Ye such be as god's,—the doctrine which He has perpetuated with respect to himself, and to his followers, in spite of God's Word to the contrary,—to the present hour. " Ye shall not surely die," " Ye shall live forever, assert your independence; defy His power, He cannot execute upon you the death He has threatened. He doth know that you ate immortal. We all have within us the power of an endless life." This is Plato's doctrine, which has overlaid and perverted the most evident teachings of Gou s Word on this subject. It is the very pivot on which his philosophy turns. Man is a being, not a creature. There never was a time when he began to be and of course, there never will come a time when he shall cease to be. In this he was more logical and consistent than his followers. For self-existence implies an eternity of being both in the past and in the future. They both go together and hang upon each other. If we accept of one we must accept the other also: if we reject one, we must for the same reason reject the other also. And yet nothing is more common, than to hear men talking of themselves and of all living creatures above them in the scale of life, whether good or bad, as immortal and indestructible by nature; as having been made so in the act of their creation—or in other words as having been constituted beings, to distinguish the life that is in them from the lower forms of life in creation. The angels above them are beings, the devils also are beings. In this sense, brutes are not beings, for they hold their lives subject to the will of God. But man, and angels, and devils, are beings, living by a certain vis vita, that was given to them in their creation, and will continue of necessity to live to all eternity. But how can one be a creature and a being in the absolute sense of this word at the same time? There is no irreverence. in saying that the divine power could not create such a being, The terms are contradictory.

 

 Sensible men have given up the idea of self motion, or perpetual motion as it is called in physics. It is time that the cognate doctrine of life self-originated and self-perpetuated—in metaphysics, were abandoned also.

 

 Spirits may be invested with power over matter as supernatural agents, by their Creator, and with power over inferior spirits, but they cannot have power either to originate their own lives, or to perpetuate them independently of their Creator. Every created life is a dependent life. It cannot possibly be anything else.

 

 Neither to Adam in his innocence, nor to Satan as a holy angel, did God give any other life than this, and surely by their fall. they have not put themselves beyond the reach of His Almighty power. If Satan, or any other fallen creature, shall actually live forever, it .will not be because he has eternal life abiding in him, nor because he has acquired it by sinning; but because the Being who created him, and upon whom he depends for life and breath and all things, wills to keep him alive forever.

 

 This is the alternative to which all who assert the endless existence of Satan must come; for there is no other ground upon which they can stand for a moment, than this:—that it is the will and purpose of God, by His Almighty power to uphold, sustain, and perpetuate his miserable life so long as He Himself shall live.

 

 II. Have we then, any good reason to believe that it is the will and purpose of God to keep Satan alive forever? All the knowledge we can have on the subject is what Reason and Revelation give us.

 

 r. Reason apart from Revelation cannot positively answer this question. We believe that the good angels will live forever, not because they are absolutely and unconditionally immortal; for such an immortality as we have shown is the attribute of God alone—" Who only 'lath immortality," nor because they are so highly exalted in the scale of existence—for as creatures, they are infinitely beneath their Creator who is self-existent and eternal, nor because they are spirits without bodies, if such be the case—or with spiritual bodies composed of matter infinitely attenuated. Neither do we believe in their endless existence precisely on the same grounds that we believe in the eternal life of the glorified saints. For to the saints eternal life is given by Christ, and guaranteed so positively and with such frequency of reiteration throughout the gospel, that no believer in the gospel can doubt it. (Perhaps, however, the words of our Lord, Luke 20: 36, " Neither can they die any more; for they are equal to the angels,"—ought to be understood as positively asserting the immortality of the angels.) But we believe it because we have no reason to doubt it,—because no intimation is given to us that their cycle of existence is a limited one,—because we can find no reason why God should withdraw from them His sustaining power, and cut them off from life, so long as they continue in the normal state of holiness in which they were created.

 

 And yet we are to remember that God does give life and take it away. He does create and destroy the work of His own hands, without making known to us the reasons for his conduct. All the living forms and organisms throughout this lower sphere are more or less transient.

 

 They come into existence at His call; fulfill their round, and then pass away forever, to give place to others that are also to die and be dissolved into their original elements; and the life that animated them returns to the source from which it came. Not that they are annihilated as to their constituent elements, or ever will be—for concerning this we know absolutely nothing, and ought to say nothing. But as individual organisms, they are dissolved, lose their identity and pass away forever.

 

 We cannot look above and fathom the infinite depths of God's eternal being, and say what He has been 'doing throughout the infinite eternity of the past nor what He will do throughout that which is to come,—what worlds of sentient creatures He may have treated and destroyed before the creation of this world in which we have our short round of life—nor what worlds He will create after this shall have been destroyed. Nor do we know the boundaries of the universe as it now exists; what worlds and systems of worlds beyond this little earth and the system of which it is a part; what ranks and orders of creatures, or how high or how low they may be in the scale of life, and what may be the conditions of their existence. But so far as we do know, He has appointed to every creature a certain round or cycle for it to fulfill. But to none of His creatures has He given an unconditional and indestructible existence even in its appointed cycle. However ephemeral or transient its natural life may be, it must keep within its sphere. Its normal condition must be maintained, or it comes to an unnatural and premature end. We have every reason to believe that this is a universal law of life for all God's creatures, from the lowest to the highest.

 

 What if the angelic cycle was designed to be an unending cycle like His own, never to be completed (though it could not be like His own in having had no beginning) —must not these high and holy creatures preserve their normal condition in order to live forever? Did God give to them, alone of all His creatures, an unconditional right and power to live as long as He lives? The supposition is absurd. He gave to man in his original creation the hope of an eternal career, but only in the way of obedience. So far from giving him any guarantee that his life would be perpetuated, He actually conditioned its perpetuity upon his maintaining his normal state of purity. If he fell from it; premature and certain death was to be the result.

 

 The mysterious tree of Life, by which his life was guaranteed, or perpetuated, was accessible to him only on this condition. The alternative was Thou shalt surely die, not thy body, THOU thyself shalt surely die, not figuratively, but actually. Not thou shalt be miserable forever, but be blotted out of life. Misery is the necessary consequence of sinning; but it is only the precursor of that death to which it inevitably leads. Sin brings disorder and blight upon the soul, and when it is finished it bringeth forth death—not deprivation, not wretchedness merely, but death. It is to the spiritual organism what mildew or rot, or a cancer, or the leprosy, by which it is symbolized in the Scriptures—or any other disease unchecked, is to the physical organism. It brings it, sooner or later, to certain destruction. The pain and anguish and despair that ensue, and precede this death, are, not the death itself, but its forerunners. It takes time for sin, like any other mortal disease, to complete its work of ruin, but when it is finished, it bringeth forth death, and nothing less.

 

 But in our case, there is still hope of an eternal life, for God has provided a ransom, and a remedy if applied in season. This eternal life, if we receive it at all, is not received from Adam —for in Adam all die, but from Christ who only has immortality. We are not born to immortality in our natural birth, but born to die. It is only in the new birth that we are born to life eternal—the one is transient; the other is imperishable, because it is the life of Christ in our souls. It is not the chief glory of Christ, that He brings holiness and happiness to an immortality already assured, but that He brings both eternal life and blessedness to the perishing soul.

 

 Through what processes of trial and development, the angels may have risen to their present exalted condition, or whether they were created the high and lofty creatures they now are, we know not. But we have no reason to suppose that they have been placed beyond the possible contingency—not of sinning for some of them have fallen by sin—but of reaping the legitimate fruits of sin in their death. Are they now too high and too spiritual in their natures to be subject to any such law? To which of the angels has He said at any time, as He said to Christ Thy throne is forever and ever. Is Satan so great a power in the universe, or so necessary to its integrity, or so exquisite a specimen of workmanship, that the Almighty cannot, or dare not destroy him? Shall he defy the Living God and trample upon His authority with the assurance that he can never forfeit his life? Lifting his hand to heaven shall he say like Jehovah Himself "I five forever." (Deut. 32: 40.)

 

 Has the Almighty Lawgiver enjoined it upon human governments to put their worst offenders to death—and is there no such thing as capital punishment under His higher government? Or is it true that Satan, as yet, has done nothing worthy-of death? Or does the threatened penalty "the soul that sinned it shall die" mean imprisonment for life under torture? Is this the example He intended to give to human governments of the way in which to punish offenders? an example which cruel tyrants in past ages have been too happy to plead—but which is everywhere discarded under the benign teachings of the gospel. Has our glorious King and Lord no way to rid the universe of devils and demons? Can he only banish them to some dreary penal colony, where they shall suffer and rage forever? We think the Scriptures rightly understood give us higher views of the power, justice and goodness of God.

 

 2. But let us quit the domain of speculation, and inquire of God's word whether Satan will be permitted to live forever. That he is permitted to live after his fall is evident. That he is permitted to exercise his malice upon the human race that had been created a little lower than the angels and endowed with life conditioned upon their obedience, is equally evident. He would seem to have accomplished his purpose in dragging them down to ruin with himself. But God who was able to cast him down from heaven, is able also, to defeat his malice in this lower world, which he was permitted to enter, and to overrule his malice to the promotion of His own glory in the redemption of man, and in the more complete and utter destruction of Satan himself.

 

 We have in the very opening of the Scriptures, in the scene where Satan is first introduced to our notice, a prophecy which would seem to be decisive of this whole question as to the doom that awaits him. " I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed, it shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise her heel:"—(Gen. 3:15.) This prophecy, though mysterious and enigmatical when it was first uttered, is no longer so under the Gospel. It is universally, and no doubt, truly understood, to foretell the coming of Christ, as the seed of the woman to bruise, or rather to crush the head of the serpent, by which Satan is represented. Literally translated it is, "He shall crush thee as to thy head." The heel is the least vital part of the body; it is farthest from the head. A wound in the heel may be severe; it may indeed lead on to death, if no remedy is applied. But it can be healed. But if the head is crushed, death is a sure consequence. A serpent may retain life and motion in his body and tail for a considerable time even after his head has been crushed. It is popularly said "till the sun goes down;" but the next morning will find him dead throughout the whole length of his body. Be that as it may, the injury is mortal. He cannot long survive it. Neither can Satan that old serpent live forever after his head has been crushed. He may retain a certain degree of moribund life till the last sun has gone down upon the scene of conflict, but when the morning of eternal glory, so beautifully pictured in the Apocalypse, shall dawn upon the new celestial paradise, he will have passed away forever. There shall be no more Satan, nor sin, nor sorrow; " no more death, nor pain, neither shall there be any need of the light of the sun," for the whole rounded universe shall be bright with the glory of the fulness of Him that fills all in all.

 

 We understand the Scriptures to teach most explicitly, that this is the very end for which Christ is born into the world as the seed of the woman, " to destroy the works of the devil," and then, last of all, " to destroy him that hath the power of death, that is the devil," and we believe that He will not fail of His purpose Indeed, what other destruction can await him but the destruction of his life? He is already destroyed in all his moral nature—nothing of good remains to him to enjoy or hope for nothing to fear, but the final execution of that dreaded penalty, long delayed but sure to fall " when the Lord shall consume him with the spirit of His mouth and destroy him with the brightness of His coming."

 

 The demons when confronted by Jesus in person, anticipating the doom that awaited them, cried out " What have we to do with thee, Jesus thou Son of God? Art thou come hither to torment us before the time" (that is, 'to bring us to trial and punishment). And again, changing the expression but not the thought, " Art thou come to destroy us?" There will, no doubt, be torment in this destruction: they expect it; but torment alone is not destruction. The word torment is sometimes used as synonymous with punishment in the Scriptures, because it was customary to punish with torment, and the executioners of the law were also called tormentors. But when the penalty to be inflicted was death, however protracted the torments, by which it was preceded, these tormentors or executioners did not stop short of the life of their victim.

 

 Surely " to be punished with everlasting destruction " cannot possibly mean nothing more than to be punished with everlasting torments. The process of destruction that is never completed is not destruction. The act of dying that never issues in death, is not death. They suffer torment to a certain degree even now in anticipation of the day of wrath to come. " They believe and tremble." "They are already in everlasting chains," that is, in chains which will hold them till death, as Peter and Jude both assure us, awaiting that dreadful day. Their range is limited to this earth and its immediate surroundings. They cannot go beyond the length of the chains that hold them surely against the judgment of that great day," " when the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, and the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up." " Nevertheless we, according to the promise, look for new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness."

 

 God has prepared an everlasting fire, an all-consuming, unquenchable fire, for the very purpose of destroying Satan and all his hosts;—not for the purpose of tormenting simply, as some would have it, much less, for the purpose of tormenting them eternally without destroying them. " For behold the day cometh that shall burn as an oven, and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly shall be stubble, and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the Lord of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch." It is the nature of fire to destroy, to devour, to consume. Indeed, scientifically speaking, fire is the effect of consumption. That fire is unquenchable which cannot be arrested or turned aside from its object, until that which it preys upon is completely consumed; then it dies out by the limitations of its very nature. It is everlasting in the same sense in which many other things that are transient in their nature and have their issue in time, are said in the Scriptures to be everlasting, and eternal; that is, they endure to the end of the age, eon or cycle, under consideration. Every scholar knows that the words aion, aionas, eis ton aiona, etc., etc., translated, everlasting, eternal, forever, etc., do not express the idea of absolute endlessness;—certainly not when applied to objects or processes that are naturally-limited and transient. They are equally applicable to the affairs of this life and of the life to come. They are used in the Scriptures, and in the classics, as well as in common parlance, at the present day, with a wide latitude of signification, and the extent of their application is not to be found in the words themselves, but in the nature of the thing spoken of. Even could it be shown that God's special agent of destruction is absolutely eternal like Himself, we are far from showing that everything it is set to devour is eternal in the same sense. We have no authority for transferring these epithets from the former to the latter,—much less for rendering these forcible expressions, by which the irresistible, all-consuming nature of fire is indicated, in such a manner as to reverse their meaning and make them declare, that the object upon which it feeds never will be consumed.

 

 No one supposes that Isaiah meant to declare that the carcasses of the slain who had transgressed against God, would never be consumed, When he said, "their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched," (66). He rather meant to declare how surely and completely these devouring agencies would do their dreadful and loathsome work. And so our Lord, who evidently quotes this passage, in setting forth in the most vivid manner the dreadful and certain destruction of Satan and his followers meant to declare, not that they never would be destroyed or consumed, as many would have it—but their destruction would be sure, awful and complete.

 

 When the same prophet foretelling the vengeance that would come upon the enemies of Zion and upon their land (Is. 34) says: "And the streams thereof shall be turned into pitch, and the dust thereof into brimstone, and the land thereof shall become burning pitch. It shall not be quenched night nor day: the smoke thereof shall go up forever," no one attaches the idea of absolute endlessness to this scene. No one supposes that this smoke shall continue to ascend after the earth itself shall be destroyed. Neither does any rational man suppose that the smoke of Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities of the plain, which " went up as the smoke of a furnace " which cities, Jude tells us “Are set forth as an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire," is yet ascending and will continue to ascend to all eternity. The example of their suffering is all that is perpetuated without end. And yet, when these same figures of speech are used in the Apocalypse, a book which is confessedly altogether figurative, to set forth the doom of Satan as an individual, or as a personification of evil agencies, together with the beast and the false prophet, also personified symbols of the two great organized systems of error in the world, the expression " the smoke of their torment ascended up forever and ever, that is, ages upon ages, or throughout the age, they are taken, literally to mean, not that they shall be fearfully destroyed, which is the evident intent of the writer—but just the opposite—that they shall never be destroyed; but continue to exist and be tormented, when these ages upon ages have passed away and this earth itself and all it contains shall have been burned up; and the smoke of their torment shall be wafted across the bounds of time to obscure forever the glory of the world beyond.

 

 The fact is, all these scenes of conflict, of victory and destruction have their theatre, and their issue upon this earth, and in this eon or cycle of time, and the words of the text here find their limitation. The forever that is mundane is temporal and transcendent, and not the forever of the world beyond.

 

 The inheritance of the Israelites; the servitude of their bondsmen: the priesthood of Aaron; the leprosy of Gehazi; the hills round about Jerusalem, etc., were all everlasting; they were to endure forever,—that is, to the end of the dispensation or period spoken of. Such expressions are not intended to convey the idea of absolute endlessness, but of duration throughout the present dispensation, or at most to the end of the world.

 

 What scenes may be transpiring in all the many mansions of Our Father's house, throughout the vast realms of the boundless universe that surrounds us on every side: what orders of creatures, like, or unlike ourselves, may occupy them; how He manifests His glory to then), and through what trials and temptations they may be led, to develop their virtue and to confirm them in holiness, we will not venture to guess. There may be one common, central heaven, where He has His peculiar throne, into which He is gathering and will gather, His elect from the four quarters of His universal kingdom,—perhaps we might say that the Scriptures give us some hints that point to such a consummation. But be that as it may, there is no hint of one common, universal antipodal hell, into which shall be garnered all the refuse of the universe for its eternal preservation in wretchedness and misery, unending; but, on the contrary, the whole tenor, spirit and letter of God's Word is opposed to this monstrous assumption. We have no reason, whatever, to suppose that the range of Satan and his evil angels extends beyond this earth, the theater for the display of his malice, and, also, for the grace and power of His Almighty conqueror, and to which his destiny is linked in its coming doom. The hell, of which the Scriptures speak, whether the Sheol of the Old Testament, or the Hades or Gehenna of the New, has no extension beyond the limits of this earth and its immediate surroundings. It is altogether mundane, and is destined to be destroyed, when the elements shall melt with fervent heat and the earth and the works therein shall be burned up; and when the new heavens and the new earth shall appear, wherein dwelleth righteousness, it will have passed away forever, with all it contains. Not only Satan and all his hosts shall be cast into the all-devouring lake of fire, but death and hell shall be cast in after them, to be all consumed together. There shall be left "neither root nor branch" to disturb the peace or dim the glory of God's universal kingdom.

 

 We discredit the power, and greatness, and glory of our Lord and Leader, and unduly exalt the power of Satan, His enemy, when we divide this universe, however unequally, between them, as between two contending chieftans, and give to each a perpetual and inalienable portion—to the one the Kingdom of heaven, and to the other the Kingdom of hell.

 

 The Kingdom of Satan is a Kingdom of darkness and death. It is essentially weak and transient, and destined to fade away before the Kingdom of light and life that is to come. The one is as much superior to the other in its extension and durability, as it is in its perfection and glory. They are not to run parallel with each other to all eternity. The lifetime of Satan, however protracted it may be, throughout the ages of this world, bears no greater proportion to the lifetime of Him who hath immortality, Who is and was, and ever shall be, the Almighty, than time bears to eternity. He is at best, but a fallen, miserable, dying creature, " whom the Lord shall consume with the Spirit of His mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of His coming."

 

 THE END.

 

 

http://www.creationismonline.com/TSK/Immortality.html