Man's Destiny: Immortality (1856)

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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS.

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

MAN'S DESTINY.

IMMORTALITY:

THE ARGUMENTS

FROM

NATURE AND SCRIPTURE,

BY REV. T. M. POST, D.D., OF ST. LOUIS MO.,

REVIEWED

BY GEORGE STORRS,

EDITOR OF BIBLE EXAMINER, NEW YORK.

NEW-YORK: PUBLISHED AT 109 NASSAU STREET. 1856.

MAN'S DESTINY.

IMMORTALITY:

THE ARGUMENTS

THE ARGUMENTS

FROM

NATURE AND SCRIPTURE,

BY REV. T. M. POST, D.D.,

OF ST. LOUIS MO

REVIEWED

BY GEORGE STORRS,

EDITOR OF BIBLE EXAMINER, NEW YORK.

NEW-YORK: PUBLISHED AT 109 NASSAU STREET. 1856.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1856, by GEORGE STORRS, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New York.

J. J. REED,

PRINTER AND STEREOTYPER,

16 Spruce-St., N. Y.

REVIEW OF THE ARGUMENT FROM NATURE FOR UNIVERSAL IMMORTALITY,

5-56

REVIEW OF THE ARGUMENT FROM SCRIPTURE FOR UNIVERSAL IMMORTALITY,

57-149

APPENDIX.

DIFFICULTIES STATED BY DR. POST TO BE ENCOUNTERED

IN ESTABLISHING THE IDEA OF THE IMMORTALITY OF

THE WICKED, - - - - - 150-152

GENERAL INDEX TO TOPICS, - - - - 154,155 PUBLISHER'S PREFACE.

REV. T. M. Post, D.D., of St. Louis, Mo., a well known and talented clergyman, was selected by certain ministers and others, in New England, to write a Prize Essay on Immortality, for which a gentleman in New York paid $150. It was intended to have it the best that could be said or written in favor of the immortality of all men, without regard to their moral character; that is, of their inherent immortality.

Dr. Post took up the subject under two heads of argument. First, "The Argument from Nature;" and second—"The Argument from Scripture." The first of these appeared in The New Englander of February, and the other in May.

The REVIEWER has followed these Arguments in their order. The Review of the Argument from Nature was written before that from Scripture appeared.

The Author of the Review wrote it by request, and with the expectation that it would be published with a reprint of the Essay in one volume; but before completing it, circumstances occurred which led the Reviewer to decline furnishing it for that purpose, and he concluded to let it be issued in its present form. This statement was deemed necessary to explain its appearance at all, and to account for some expressions to be found in it, as also for not referring to the pages in the Essay from which the extracts are taken. PUBLISHER.

New York, July, 1856.

IMMORTALITY:

REVIEW OF THE ARGUMENT FROM NATURE.

BY GEO. STORRS, EDITOR BIBLE EXAMINER, NEW YORK.

We would have been glad if our author had, at the outset, given us the argument from nature that man is a double entity, or a dual being. He speaks of "the soul" and its "material companion;" thus giving us to understand that man is not one—or a unit—but dual. If nature teaches this, where is its utterance? Instead of any attempt to show from nature that man is dual he assumes it; and upon that assumption he builds an argument for "the immortality of the soul." Having begun with assumption we can look for nothing but endless "conjectures" as he proceeds.

We are glad to find him frankly dismissing "all arguments from the essence of the soul as impracticable and irrelevant." He says—"Assuming that it is of an essence not to be affected by forces and agents which slay the body," &c.

This is an assumption unsustained by any revelation of nature. Nature proclaims when the body is slain the man is dead, and gives us no hint that there is any conscious survivance of him. He admits that even supposing the soul to survive the body, "agencies may await it, somewhere in the endless future, before which it may at last fall." Hence he dismisses "also all arguments from the phenomena of the soul" [why not say the mind?] "at or near the death of the body." That is—At the death of the man: for nature uses no such language as our author employs; and we protest it is irrelevent till he shall show that nature reveals man as a dual being.

He admits that "mortal vision cannot follow" the soul when death "has conquered its material companion;" and hence, "our argument to God, as alone possessing the key to the mighty secret." This is, in fact, an admission that nature can give no knowledge about immortality for man, or "the soul." Why then shall we spend time in speculating from nature which can give no more help in favor of immortality than Baal himself? But he proceeds thus:—

"Our present argument supposes us to be standing alone with nature, and in her revelations of God we have to read our answers." He adds, "That answer she gives us in her discourse of a God of Reason, Justice and Love."

Taking this position, we are compelled to put aside the Scriptures and walk by the light of nature alone, in the argument from nature: we must consider ourselves without any positive knowledge that the moral or physical world ever were any better than now, or that they ever will be; or that any other world exists where men will be compensated for the evil and sufferings of this. We are not to allow a ray of light to shine on our path from revelation proper; otherwise we are not "standing alone with nature and her revelations of God."

Our author says, nature "discourses of a God of Reason, Justice and Love;" and adds, "a God is revealed to the soul in its own being and constitution." He then says—"The power that is to determine the question of the soul's continuance, is reasonable, just and benevolent. How will these attributes require him to determine it? In answering this question he says:—"First, the aptitude and capacities of the soul, and its culture and discipline to ends not attained in this life, foretoken, under the rule of a God of reason, a future in which these aptitudes and capacities shall find their object, and those ends shall be fully accomplished."

In reply, we ask, if nature in her reasoning, or actings, sustains such an idea? Does nature now testify that life must be continued till the greatest possible perfection is attained? Do not multitudes die before attaining even a tolerable maturity? yea, many before they have discovered at all, their aptitudes and capacities, and without any culture or discipline?

If nature thus deals with men now, what ground is there for reasoning that they might not be dealt with in the same manner in a future life? Indeed, what ground for an assumption, judging from nature alone, that there is or can be any future life at all? Look at nature in the man who is in a course of cultivation, and has arrived at that maturity which fits him for years of usefulness. He is cut down in the midst of usefulness and passes away into the silence of death. Reason is utterly bewildered by such an event for all that nature can help her. What right, what ground, has reason to conclude that if nature thus acts now she will ever alter her course in another life, or that another life could be expected when nature deprives the man of this at a period best suited for his usefulness? And how does reason know, from nature, but that the soul did attain all the ends designed for it, before death?

But, saith our author—"The moral inequalities of the present world are assurances, under the rule of justice, of a world where these shall be rectified, and where guilt escaping punishment here, shall find retribution."

In reply, we say, the God of this world does now suffer these inequalities and does not rectify them: and the present prevalence of triumphant injustice does not in itself bear witness to the justice of God or give ground to expect that a future administration will be introduced when the principles of government are to be directly the opposite to those now acted upon. If the justice of God allows men to go unpunished into another life, that same justice may allow them to go unpunished forever, for all nature can inform us to the contrary. Justice is justice in one life as well as in another; and if there are reasons in the divine mind—and how can our author tell but there may be—that, under the present administration, lets guilt escape punishment, how does nature reveal that it may not be so, if the sinner enters on another life? If justice is not impeached by letting it escape in this world, what reason is there in nature to assure us it may not let it escape in another?

Besides, if "the soul in its own being and moral constitution reveals that of its Author"—and if "it feels the Father of its reason and conscience must be reasonable and just," then the conclusion is inevitable, from nature, that when a wicked and guilty man is dead—ceases from life—he shall remain dead, and not be revived into life. Natural reason and conscience agree that justice can ask no more than that the guilty shall by some means be placed where they shall no longer injure others; or, at the most, be incapacitated—as they would be when dead—from repeating their crimes. Such is the voice of reason and conscience, and both revolt at the idea of the infliction of protracted pain, in punishment, unless designed as corrective. Hence the argument for a future life, for the wicked and incorrigible, is adverse to such a life, if drawn from reason and justice, which always condemn following a man, however wicked, to any worse infliction than death.

"In like manner," if "a capacity and faculty for virtue and happiness, cultivated and disciplined to the very close of life," are not fully rewarded in the happiness of well doing in this life, how are they "prophetic" that "a God delighting in happiness and virtue" will give "another life" for such end, or any other ends? Does nature teach God will be more favorably disposed to the happiness of the virtuous in another life than in this? And if His justice can let them suffer now, and fail of attaining their full desires, how can nature show it may not always be so, supposing another life given?

Says our author, "A benevolent God would not quench a being at a time when beyond any former period it was fitted to attain higher moral excellence and bliss."

But, nature declares that its God does often thus "quench a being" by death, and cut him off from life "at a time when beyond any former period," he "was fitted" not only "to attain higher moral excellence and bliss," but to be useful to an extent, among men, that he never was before.

How then is nature to decide that that cutting off is not final and eternal? or, if it decides for another life, what ground has it to affirm that life immortal, more than this?

"We think the argument from nature," presented by our author for "the immortality of the good," is far from being "conclusive;" by no means, not "perfectly" so. And when he adds, "If there be a good, wise, just and true God on the throne of being, such souls shall never die," we think he has made a fearful hazard to stake such perfections on nature's revelations; for "the good" do die, nature affirms; and it gives us no evidence that they shall ever rise from the dead.

Our author next proceeds to the argument from nature for the immortality of the wicked; and here, at the outset, he states the "difficulties that start on nature at the question of Immortality, in view of that monstrous and dreadful anomaly, a spiritual intelligence implacably and irrevocably at war with God and virtue." We shall spend no time in remarks on that statement at present, but hope the reader will carefully examine those difficulties, and bear them in mind as we proceed.* He admits that "Nature shudders at" the idea of the immortality of the wicked, and yet says, "the analogies of nature will not permit us to reject the doctrine of the reality" of "a lost soul under the reign of a God of love, because of its painfulness and terror:" he adds—"The mystery of evil which we know to be here, equally oppresses and overwhelms us."

Here we think our author is entirely mistaken. This life is a mixture—to every individual—of good and evil; and in no case without termination. If it terminates in no other way it does by death. Even while life is protracted, in a large portion of cases, the experience of each individual is, that the enjoyment of life overbalances by far its infelicities; so that with all the sufferings incident to this life men love it and cleave to it as long as possible.

The idea of unmixed, unmitigated, and interminable evil, has no analogy in nature. Such an idea can find nothing in nature that can "equally oppress and overwhelm us." Nature though not always able to account for the evils of this life, looks upon them as having a certain termination, by being removed, or the subject of them resting in death. Immortality in sin and unmitigated misery, has no such alleviating circumstances. "The mystery of" such "evil" has no analogy in nature; nor is it possible that any "mystery of evil which we know to be here," can "equally oppress and overwhelm us."

Our author says, "It is the purpose of this article to show that while admitting these difficulties, we cannot, even in the light of nature, build on them a valid presumption or argument against the truth of the doctrine embarrassed by them;" that is, against the doctrine of the endless conscious existence of the wicked in a state of unmitigated torture, where no means are ever to be employed to reform them, and where no hope is held out for any alleviation to their woe, even if a desire should ever arise in their minds to reform! If "the soul" is "constituted so that its moral sense instinctively and irresistibly loves and approves benevolence and hates and condemns malignity"—as our author said at the commencement of his argument—then nature's God must abhor and "loathe Himself" or abhor and loathe the doctrine of the unmitigated and remediless torture of the work of His hands; otherwise He is out of harmony with the moral sense He has created in man.

But our author goes on to say, the difficulties which appear against the doctrine of the endless being and sufferings of the wicked "do not entitle man to prejudge the question under discussion;" and adds, "they leave it open and uncommitted for revelation, and leave us in interpreting revelation, to the natural and obvious import of language." This last sentiment we concur in; but we do not concur in the idea that any revelation from the Author of our being can do violence to our "moral sense" with which He has endowed us.

Any communication, professing to be a revelation from Him, doing this, cannot be received as truthful—it must be an imposition—and cannot but be rejected, or else it must admit that "the Father of its reason and conscience" is neither "reasonable" nor "just."

Our author says, "We do not attempt positively to refute these objections" [against the endless sufferings of the wicked] "by evidence from nature or to obviate them by the resolution of the difficulties presented, or to demonstrate the truth of the doctrine against which they are leveled."

It was well he made this announcement; otherwise some might have prejudged the case, and have supposed that he was about to give satisfaction, from nature, that all nature's horror at, and abhorrence of such unparalleled injustice, as the idea of eternal sufferings for the sins of this life, was only imaginary, and not real; or, that by this horror nature contradicted the "moral sense" its Author had endowed it with. He adds—

"We shall not contend that the argument from nature for the immortality of the wicked, is positive or demonstrative, or is of itself sufficient."

What then is to become of the millions that never had anything but nature to instruct them on this subject? Are they to dwell in eternal fire, unmitigated pain, and sink in remediless woe, of which the Author of their being never gave "sufficient" evidence, or "positive demonstration?"—These questions are not to be put aside by the "endless" conjectures upon which our author now enters. To pursue this subject then with imaginary "possibilities," or mere "hypothetical" conjectures, and tell us that they are "not capable of disproof," is, to us, to "beat the air." He tells us—the "difficulties"—he has to encounter in the establishing the idea of the perpetuation of sin and the eternal sufferings of the wicked,

" Most of them have their counterpart in the course of nature and the actual administration of God, under which we find ourselves; and as they actually do cohere with the Divine Government in one case, so we cannot be competent to affirm they may not cohere with it in the other."

It is well our author put in the saving clause, "most of them." We claim the benefit of that clause, and affirm there is nothing in "nature and the actual administration of God, under which we find ourselves," that has any "counterpart" to the idea of unmitigated torture in a remediless state of sin and woe. This is the very point our author is bound to demonstrate, and which he must prove, or all his labor is lost; nor can he hide the nakedness of the field of nature, he is exploring for help, by saying his "hypothesis" of "possibilities" are "not capable of disproof." A man might, it seems to us, as well tell us that Moloch is possibly the God of nature; and conclude it is "not capable of disproof" because so many and so great sorrows and sufferings are manifest under the administration of the God of nature.

Our author would forestall us in subverting his argument on possibilities, by asking us to

"Let it be remembered that it is to be met, not by calling for positive proof where none is attempted."

Here then is a frank acknowledgment that he has no positive proof from nature on which to sustain an argument for the "endless existence of the wicked," and their unending torment and woe. His object in his possible hypothesis is,

"To clear the way for an unbiassed interpretation of the Scripture, and to show that nature at least does not prejudge this question against revelation."

If we understand this paragraph, it assumes that revelation does teach the endless being, or immortality and unmitigated sufferings of the wicked; and hence our author's desperate effort to harmonize the teaching of nature with what he regards as the teachings of revelation. In other words, it is a mighty effort, by possible "conjectures," to satisfy man's "moral sense" with the "interpretation of the Scripture" he designs to give in support of endless sin and suffering.

It seems his own "moral sense" needs this kind of support to embolden him to construe the words of the Most High God—who has sworn by Himself that He has no pleasure in the death of the wicked—to mean that death does not truly mean death, but endless, irremediable sufferings and woe; or immortality in sin and misery. We cannot blame him for an attempt to cover himself by "conjectures" of possibilities, that shall seem to give some show of reason for his interpretation of Scripture. How else could he stand forth as the advocate of the doctrine he is to attempt to sustain from that volume which reveals life, future and eternal, as the gift of God; and not as an infliction upon men?— "The wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord." Our author proceeds to say—

"Let us then approach this question in full view of the difficulties it presents, and see if in the light of Nature, they absolutely shut up the avenues of endless existence to the wicked; and if those difficulties would not, in many cases, as much preclude them from the present as from a future being; and as much from a life after death at all, as from one endlessly prolonged."

If we confine our inquiry to nature alone, it reveals no "life after death at all." Nature reveals a present life, and reveals it as a mixture of good and evil to each individual; not unmixed evil, in any case of mental development. It is not to be forgotten or overlooked that the future and endless life of the wicked, for which our author is endeavoring to put in a plea, is that of unmixed evil, suffering and woe; into which no ray of hope is ever to enter and no intermission of their anguish can ever take place. For such a state there is no analogy in nature, nor will our author pretend he can find any. Hence his resort to conjectures of possible reasons, all of which are a violation of our "moral sense" of justice, and irreconcilable with any known administration of God. While our author proceeds on his course, he speaks of "this conscious being within us."

Who is the "us?" Does the body constitute "us?" If so, the supposed soul is no part of us, and must be something distinct from the personality called man. Certainly, this ideal soul is no part of "us;" and it yet remains to be shown that any such "being" exists "within us." Nature gives no evidence of it; hence "possibly' our author is making "conjectures" about a nonentity; it is "not capable of disproof" that he is not doing so. Our author goes on:

"With terror and awe then, we approach the gulf of night that yawns for the evil on the limit of this earthly life; and strain our gaze, far as we may, by nature's dim light, into its darkness; inquiring whether it may not be, that under the vestment of eternal night, there may beat the heart of eternal woe. We apply the ear to the infinite gloom to see whether we may not perchance catch, coming up through its mystery and silence, the accents of immortal sorrow."

Nature's God must be a most unfeeling and unsympathetic being to leave the children of men to strain their eyes and ears so dreadfully in unavailing conjectures about the future, if such a future is in store for men as our author is striving to find. How easy to have made it known, if true; and how would benevolence have prompted him to make it fully manifest so as to have made it highly probable, if not absolutely certain, unless He designed the eternal misery of a large portion of the work of His hands, and so kept them ignorant of their awful danger, as a fowler hides his snare, or a hunter conceals his trap. No wonder our author approaches his subject with "terror and awe;" but, alas, how manifest is it that his great anxiety is to "conjecture" something in the matter that shall give some ground of support for his theological conclusions from Scripture. But Nature is an incorrigible enemy to all his inquiries of her, and he plunges into "the gulf of night" in search of light, but finds himself in "infinite gloom," and in his zeal tries to conjecture "accents of immortal sorrow," and labors to find some "probable" reason for believing it may be so.

He says—

"Leaving out of view for the present the claims of justice, we look now simply at those of infinite wisdom, administering a universal and eternal system; and we inquire whether there may be, or rather whether we are sure there may not be, in the infinite and eternal economy of God, fitting and adequate uses demanding everlastingly the continued existence of even morally lost beings?"

That is, the eternal conscious existence, in hopeless and unmitigated torture, of some of the children of men. He proceeds to say—

"In the first place, could we not see, could we not even conjecture such uses, it by no means necessarily follows that we should be entitled to affirm there are none."

But we are "entitled to affirm" that nature reveals none; and the "conjecture" of an existence of unmitigated and unending woe, where no revelation of such a state had previously been made known to the subject liable to it, would be an eternal blot on wisdom, to say nothing of honesty, justice, or benevolence; and some imaginary use to result from such a state, could never wipe out the stain; it would be more unchangeable than the "leopard's spots."

Our author must know that by far the largest portion of the race of Adam never heard of a liability to eternal sufferings; and he does not pretend to find, aside from Scripture, which most men never had—"positive proof" of such an endless state of torment and woe as he is striving by "conjectures," to prepare our minds for. We cannot but regard "infinite wisdom" as highly impeached by the suggestion of such a "possible" state for millions to whom that wisdom never manifested their liability till they are hopelessly involved in it. If such be "infinite wisdom" it looks like the wisdom of the serpent, seeking to ruin by keeping its victims in the dark.

Nor is our author to satisfy our minds by talking about.

As if that fact—of which nature does not inform us—is conclusive, that infinite wisdom may make vast multitudes endlessly and hopelessly miserable without ever having informed them of its design to do so. We have to do with nature in the government of this world, and not of some real or imaginary one somewhere else; of which nature gives us no information, for the obvious reason, it does not concern us; and with its laws and government we have nothing to do; such laws and government—if they exist—have no claims on us; nor are we to regulate our conduct or form our opinions with any regard to "possibilities" existing there.

" Our inability to discover uses" [for endless existence in " immortal sorrow"] " does not authorize us to deny that there are any," saith our author.

If there are any "uses" in it, we are authorized to deny that nature has revealed any such state or its uses; and as we are now only on "the argument from nature" we will not attempt "universal negatives," but wait and see if our author finds "clear positive revelation" to sustain the idea of "immortal sorrow."

"The existence of the wicked even here presents, in many of its aspects, a mystery as difficult of complete solution as their existence hereafter; and their existence beyond the grave at all, a mystery as difficult as an existence forever," adds our author.

The existence of the wicked here, in a state of trial and discipline, where reformation may better their condition, and where their counsel and aid, in many things, often is a benefit to the community, is not "a mystery as difficult of complete solution as their existence" in a state of eternal and hopeless torment; where there is no design of their reformation, and where their counsel and work is eternally against all good. As to "their existence beyond the grave at all," nature makes no such revelation; and in the argument from nature we admit of no such existence; death eternally closes their existence, so far as nature is our teacher.

"Manifestly until we know fully the reason why God permits the existence of moral evil and of wicked men now, we are not competent to affirm that they will not exist eternally," saith our author.

Because we cannot fully solve the mystery of the present existence of the wicked, in a state where reformation is possible, and where, at all events, death will close the career of their wickedness, must we believe they may exist eternally where reformation is impossible or useless, and where death is never to put an end to their wickedness? But, our author says, because of our ignorance of the uses of the existence of the wicked now, all the objections against their endless existence, might be

"summarily disposed of" * "with the question of the Patriarch of Uz, asked ages ago but never answered, 'Why do the wicked live?' We might then leave all presumptions from nature against their endless existence, to wait an answer to this interrogatory."

We might answer all "possible conjectures" about the "uses of the endless existence of the wicked" with the prayer of the King of Israel and type of Messiah, offered to God "ages ago," and most certainly to be "answered"—"Oh let the wickedness of the wicked come to an end." "We might then leave all presumptions from nature"—if there be any—for the "endless existence of the wicked;" together with all those possible conjectures of the "uses" of their wickedness not coming to an end, to sink into their merited oblivion.

Why should we now be called upon to follow our author through his "countless ways" of attempting to show that the "uses" of the wicked and their wickedness may prevent them and it from ever having an "end"? To argue from the present state, in which each individual—righteous or wicked—has a mixture of good and evil, of joy and pain; and where their condition may be improved, or life end, to a state where unmixed evil and sorrow shall eternally continue and increase, is to argue, it seems to us, without any analogy, and without any tendency to produce conviction on the thoughtful mind.

Our author proceeds:

"Judging from the methods God has taken to instruct human minds in this world, we have reason to believe that created mind must be taught—can only be taught effectually—that knowledge of the Creator requisite as a power of moral government, by experience and practical illustration. It is upon this principle, and with this mode of education flowing from it, that the government of this world is conducted. And we have no reason, inferring from the nature of mind, to doubt it will be the same in all worlds; that it may be the same with new orders and new stages of being which shall emerge in the light of a million of axons hence, just as much as in this mortal life, and beneath these heavens."

If this reason is correct, then sin and wickedness are just as necessary and essential as holiness and virtue. Nor is that all: the first created mind could not possibly "be taught" at all; for it is not to be supposed that that mind had a "practical illustration" and "experience" of the "power of moral government" over wicked beings which had no existence; unless the Creator himself be supposed to be that wicked being; which is a blasphemy not to be admitted.

Furthermore, the beings inhabiting "this world" have had no "practical illustration and experience" of unmixed sin and suffering, and where reformation was unavailing and impossible. If the same system then is to be acted upon "in all worlds," there will be no such state as that of "immortal sorrow;" and there may be suffering and sorrow for the saints themselves, as they do suffer much in "this world; besides, "life" has always been "mortal beneath these heavens;" and if "government" is to be the same in "all worlds', life may be, nay must be mortal there, to both saints and sinners, so far as our author's argument proves anything. But we stand corrected: he does not design to give "positive proof" of his "hypothesis;" and it is well he did not design to do it; for had he succeeded in producing such proof, all distinction between good and evil would have been abolished forever.

"What ground," asks our author, "have we for assuming that in the infinite march of being there will not always be beginners; always in the universe, a fresh childhood, as well as the rich perfection of maturer culture and experience in the older born sons of God? What reason have we to suppose that the creative energy is not, like the love of God, infinite? Who shall dare prescribe limits to either, or to the number of God's children? Why, then, may we assume that the present order of means requisite to form, guard and perfect virtue in created minds—requisite from the very essential nature of mind itself—to have no place in the coming cycle of being?"

Here our author stumbles at the outset. The question is not whether new-born intelligences will be eternally coming into existence? that may be granted: nor is it, whether "the present order of means" is "to have no place in the" training of those "new born" ones? but whether an entirely new and unheard of system of government for the training of them is to be introduced? viz: the use of a system of torment, woe, and unmitigated sufferings, and hopeless anguish, where reformation is both unavailing and impossible? Is God to train these "new born" ones produced by His creative power by such a system? Has such been the "requisite" method of teaching in "this world?" And if the system of training for these supposed new born ones, is to be like that of "this world," we ask, if the exhibition of evil and wickedness must not arise from themselves, and not from seeing another race of beings, not of themselves, constantly before their eyes, given over to "immortal sorrow?" The fact is, there is no analogy in the system of the government of this world and that conjectured by our author: they are as dissimilar as light and darkness: as unlike as justice and revenge. There is no concord, agreement, or likeness between them, that we can discover.

The idea is expressed by our author, that the wicked may be kept in "immortal sorrow," because there may be a

"necessity of experimental lessons and historic illustration "*** "to the ever rising orders of being; and possibly, also, to those of older date, for the perfection and eternal security of their virtue."

"Possibly" those "older" beings are so unbelieving that history is wholly unavailing to convince them of the evil of rebellion; and that they have so little confidence in God's word, that they would have no "security of their virtue" if their ears could not hear "the accents of immortal sorrow," and their eyes see the goblins of Almighty wrath writhing in eternal pain! and possibly they would need all this for their "perfection"! Truly, such must be hard to perfect! and we cannot wonder at it, considering in what school our author thinks "possibly" they may be taught. We think it much more probable they would learn rebellion than "virtue" under such teaching. No such teaching has the God of nature allowed in the school of "this world;" and therefore—on our author's own assumption of a corresponding administration in other worlds—no such teaching is to find place elsewhere. He goes on—

"The same difficulty in the existence of souls morally lost, has to be met this instant, that has to be met through the infinite hereafter."

Does our author know that any soul is morally and hopelessly lost while it exists here? How does he know but that the moment of the wicked man's death is the point where he was hopelessly lost in moral pollution? And how does he know that that fact, known only to the Divine mind, was not the true reason why his death occurred at that very point?

"The present moment is a part of eternity, and is subject to its logic and its laws; and what that logic and those laws permit here, they may permit forever," saith our author.

If so, then the sinner—if his living existence is to be endlessly continued—may expect God will give him a great many blessings and comforts in hell: yea, a much larger share of pleasure than pain; for the laws of this life did not forbid it; and what "those laws permit here, they may permit forever," we are told; and as a matter of experience, the sinner had a large share of enjoyment here; hence he may expect it hereafter: and then what becomes of the "possibility" of eternal and unmitigated pain?

It has vanished "like the baseless fabric of a vision."

Our author goes on thus—"The wicked may therefore endure, to exhibit the eternal discomfiture and the hopeless impotency of sin. For aught we know, certainly, it may be requisite they should do so. And the greater and mightier and more cunning and desperate, may be the malignant power baffled and coerced into the service of Divine wisdom, the more strikingly and impressively will this lesson be exhibited; and the more will God's glory of strength and knowledge and goodness shine forth to the educating and strengthening of virtue in the elder or future orders of the saved."

Why should such an exhibition of "Divine wisdom," &c., not have been made to the human race at the outset? Why not have given them a manifestation of the awful sufferings of some previous race of sinners, and so kept our "new born" race back from sin? or were there no sinners in all eternity past? If not, how did "new born" beings ever maintain holiness in that infinite duration behind us? How happens it that sin and sufferings were not necessary to keep "new born" beings, then, in the paths of virtue and obedience? It is singular, truly, that sin and giant sinners, with their giant torments, and the giant "coercion" of them "into the service of Divine wisdom," should be reserved for the race of Adam: and this race should be the manufacturing establishment to produce giant sinners to keep after "born" being in the ways of virtue, and to "perfect elder" ones.

But it so happens, after all, that in "the present part of eternity," which is "subject to" the "logic and laws" of "the infinite hereafter," that no giant sinners are suffered to live long; and all of them meet death, or are cut off by violence, sooner or later; so that if the "Divine administration now" is evidence of what it will be "through the infinite hereafter," we need no stronger proof that "all the wicked will God destroy;" and that "the wickedness of the wicked" shall "come to an end."

Our author saith—"To breed the requisite horror and fear of sin, it may be, that nothing else will suffice, than the spectacle of its final, complete, and everlasting perdition—nothing less than the frightful examplar of an immortal soul in immortal ruin." "One example," he says, "of a being in the terrible maturity of evil, may be equivalent to innumerable ones of lesser date! so that in truth, benevolence may require its continuance, instead of multiplied cases of more recent fall from virtue."

Unfortunately for our author, the laws of this "part of eternity"—or, "the present moment"—and the "Divine administration" under them, with "its logic," are all adverse to his "may be" in the "infinite hereafter." The mightiest sinners under the present administration sooner or later die. Must the poor race of Adam—though without a precedent—furnish "examples" of endless, or "immortal sorrows" for all other created beings, past and future? while they, themselves, are denied a solitary "example" of "an immortal soul in immortal ruin"—i.e. in "immortal" torments—for their own benefit? no such "example" ever having been given them! If such examples are so potent, what becomes of that "benevolence" that has so constantly, for six thousand years, withheld the "one example" that is so effectually to stimulate to virtue and keep back from sin? "Benevolence" is profaned by the thought; and a voice comes up on the ear, saying—"If they hear not the teachings now granted them, neither would they be persuaded though one rose from the dead." Any pretence that such an "example"—as our author supposes—would be effectual in leading men to virtue, or preserving them therein is without even the semblace of a "may be."

Base and servile indeed must be that mind that could be drawn to virtue, or be made to continue therein by such a horrible exhibition of wrath on a powerless enemy. Then to suppose, infinite and Divine wisdom could find no other way to secure obedience and virtue, in the souls He had made, than to exercise His almighty power in holding in eternal being and torment a worm of the dust—such is man—is an impeachment of His character which we dare not allow even to come within the range of a "may be." What! so abhor sin as to eternally perpetuate it! and never let it "come to an end!" The thought is not admissible; and nature has no such voice relating to individuals.

Furthermore, the case supposed as "possible," is utterly at variance with any laws in this "part of eternity," and in the nature of mind, "Virtue"—whatever might be said of obedience—must be produced, in created beings, not by the exhibition of evil in so horrible a light as to make it disgusting. No: evil must have charms, or there can be no temptation in it, nor any virtue in avoiding it. "The tree" must be "good for food," or "pleasant to the eye," or "desirable to make one wise," else it is no trial nor virtue to avoid it. The "possible" exhibition, contemplated by our author, suppose evil and sin to be presented in such a horrible manner, and with such awful aspects, with giant tortures, as shall make it in no possible way desirable to share in it. What virtue then can there be in avoiding it? Just none at all: and the "hypothesis" is stamped with all the characteristics of a manifest "absurdity."

Another "possibility" of our author runs as follows—

"It may be that holiness could wear its proper charm of beauty and bliss, only in contrast with its hideous antithesis. Such a selfexhibition of sin being needful here and now who shall say it may not be so forever?"

Thus "sin is needful!" as necessary as the exhibition of "holiness" in "its proper charm of beauty!"

Had it not been for some rebel against the Divine government what an uncharming thing holiness must have been! But we forbear: it was only a "conjecture" of a "possibility" by our author: yet such an exhibition of "sin" if "needful here and now" has never been made in this "part of eternity" as that our author contemplates "through the infinite hereafter." No, nothing that has any analogy to it, as we have before shown.

Our author thus proceeds :—"Now apart from all positive affirmance of the perpetuity of the present uses of the wicked, it is clear until one is prepared to prove a negative of this,a universal and eternal negative,—he is not warranted from nature in assuming the annihilation of the wicked; certainly not, in dogmatising on this subject, to the contradiction or wresting of the declarations of Revelation."

No such wicked exist on earth, as our author conjectures for the "infinite hereafter:" nor can he show that there is, or can be any "present uses" for such wicked, unless he can show that to be true which nature and experience contradict; and surely such an attempt would look very much like an attempt "to prove a universal," if not an "eternal negative." The fact is, no such exhibition of sin and sinners, of sorrow and torment, of hopelessness and despair, of unmixed evil and destitution of all goodness, and an eternal barrier to reconciliation, as our author's hypothesis contemplate, has ever been made. Nature has no voice to sustain him in such a position; and when we come to "Revelation" we shall see who wrests and contradicts its declarations, the advocates of the immortality of the wicked or those who believe "the wickedness of the wicked" shall "come to an end;" and that "all the wicked will God destroy;" because "the soul that sinneth it shall die." We can afford to wait till our author gets to "Revelation" on this part of the subject. But we are "warranted from nature" to believe—not to "assume"—"the annihilation of the wicked:" nature teaches no other end for them; and we shall yet see, perhaps, that "Revelation" and nature are in harmony, as they must be, if both proceed from an unmixed fountain of wisdom and truth.

Saith our author—" Amid the uses of the wicked here, one, eminently, is to prove, brace, nerve, and animate virtue. May it not possibly be so hereafter?"

This idea of "the uses of the wicked" seems to haunt our author. According to his theology the wicked seem—of the two classes—to be more useful, and to answer better "uses," than the righteous. It would appear as if the virtuous could hardly be proved, braced, nerved, and animated to virtue, if it were not for the useful wicked. Really, we would like to know if our author is a post-millenarian? one who believes the coming of Christ, the second time, is a thousand years after "all shall know the Lord from the least to the greatest." If so, and his theory of "the uses of the wicked here" is true, we may expect to see a very inferior race of Christians in the Millennium to those we have now, as they will have none of the useful wicked to "prove, brace, nerve, and animate virtue." Alas! that the so called "happy day," when "the millennium shall be ushered in," and which we have heard so highly extolled for the piety and consecration to God then to be manifested, is likely to vanish away into a very inferior race of Christians, because they have not "the uses of the wicked" we have now. Behold and see your millennium, ye post-millenarians, stript of a most important element of its happiness and virtue: there are no wicked there! But we are of those who have no faith in these imaginary uses of the wicked: "one sinner destroyeth much good," was a sentiment recorded three thousand years ago in a Book which our author will look into before he has done with his argument for "immortal sorrow" and "the immortality of the wicked." Till we meet him in that Book we leave our quotation as an offset to his assumption of "the uses of the wicked" so often repeated.

Saith our author—"No language could express God's estimate of sin, like visible disease and pain, and the thousand forms of individual death, with occasional more vast and awful expressions of his displeasure in deluge, pestilence and earthquake. The terrors of his abhorrence of sin must, in this life, look out at times on man from a burning Sodom or Jerusalem, or a deluged world, in order to quicken earth's moral consciousness by an outflashing of his own."

There is no likeness or resemblance, in any of these cases with the incessant, unmitigated, hopeless, and eternal pain and anguish, that our author is striving to show may possibly exist "in the infinite hereafter." If pain and sorrow were admitted to exist there, there is no reason in nature why it should exist in the horrible and hopeless form our author anticipates, unless the "elder saints are harder to govern there than here, or the "new born beings"—if such there should be—are more stupid and intractable than is reasonable to suppose infinite wisdom would hereafter create, seeing Adam's race have done no better.

In the worst cases, "in this life," our author has produced as his analogies, death has terminated the pain and sorrows of the visited sinners, so far as nature can teach us. Why then, if nature and analogy are to guide us, conclude such will not be the result hereafter, supposing the wicked to enter there? Nor even there would nature teach us that they should die again till they had another trial, to see if they might not do better in their new state. What reason then has our author to make the following inquiries?—

"Are we prepared to affirm that Divine displeasure may not find it requisite to write its definition in an everlasting ruin?—that the wrath that here burns below Jerusalem and Sodom, below the foundation of the mountains and the deep, may not burn to the depths of an eternal hell? If such a self-utterance of God be necessary here, can we prove that it may not be so hereafter? and if so during one period of the hereafter, may it not be so forever? When can the universe live without a seen and felt God? When can its sentiment of justice stand, except in this vision and feeling? And how shall God be felt and seen, otherwise than as he is thus practically reflected and defined?"

Our author has fallen into the "infinite gloom" where he went to "apply the ear"—at the commencement of his argument—to see if he could not hear "the accents of immortal sorrow." The sentiments now uttered have covered, in fact, the eternity past as well as the future. Were there no "new born beings" in the past infinite? If so, did they find beings in an "eternal hell," that they could have a practical exhibition of God's "justice?" "When can the universe live without a seen and felt God?" asks our author. If this question has any application to the question before us, it amounts to this—"When can the universe live without an eternal hell of immortal sorrow, sin and torment?" So that such a hell must have been the abode of some beings from the first moment of the days of the "universe," or it could not "live." But to Adam's race of "new born beings," it seems, Divine wisdom did not see fit to give the "practical and awful expressions of his displeasure," that "eternal hell" of "immortal sorrow;" but left the poor creatures to furnish multitudes more victims for that useful state! "If such a self-utterance of God be necessary hereafter," to "new born beings," was it not equally necessary to the newborn beings of Adam's line? And if an "eternal hell" of "immortal sorrow" did exist, does it not seem as if Divine wisdom and benevolence would have given this "new born" race a practical exhibition of the scrrows and woes of sin, by uncapping that hell to sight, seeing it "may be" so effectual hereafter to other "new born beings?" Not to do so would seem to indicate that infinite wisdom was overpowered by the "uses of the wicked," so that the number of them should be mightily increased! Alas, for a theory that must plunge into such "infinite gloom" to "conjecture" "possibilities" to reconcile us to the idea of eternal pain and "immortal sorrow!" Our author adds—

"Other modes there may be, but if so, they are beyond the present scope of our experience and our faculties. It is for the objector to prove them before he assumes a change of God's present economy."

This is truly cool—almost refreshing. After all, the multitude of "conjectures" of "possibilities"—our author has labored to impress on our mind—"may be" all fancy, and without any foundation. And for our comfort we are allowed "to prove," if we can, "a change of God's present economy!" Now, that's just the thing we do not wish to prove; for under the present economy of God sin and suffering end in death, and nature reveals nothing beyond. Under the present economy, the "orthodox" say, as long as there is life "the vilest sinner may return:" so that sin and suffering may be wiped away, and the sinner become holy and happy. If the wicked go into the "infinite hereafter," as conscious beings, it is for our author "to prove, before" he "assumes, a change of God's present economy:" which if he cannot do he is quite as likely to establish the conversion of sinners in "the infinite hereafter," as that their case is one of "immortal sorrow." Under "God's present economy" neither sin or suffering are perpetual; and the general character of God's dealings—while life lasts—is goodness to the evil and unthankful. "So it may be hereafter," if the wicked "live beyond the grave;" the evidence for which, if found at all, is not found in nature.

Our author adds—" Looking at all these aspects of the case, are we ready to affirm that Divine wisdom requires the annihilation of the wicked? Yea, that it may not eternally forbid it? If it forbids it now, who shall travel down the infinite hereafter, and fix the date when it may let the guilty drop into eternal nothing?"

"Divine wisdom" does not "forbid now" under the "present economy"—"the annihilation of the wicked;" as the cases of Sodom and the old world—our author has referred to—abundantly prove: for they were annihilated, so far as nature's testimony can be relied on: and if "Divine wisdom required" their annihilation, "who shall travel down the infinite hereafter, and fix the" sufferings and woe of the wicked there in "immortal sorrow?"

or, affirm "the guilty' shall not "drop into eternal nothing?" Very true, our author does not do that! he affirms nothing! but only deals in insinuations and conjectures! But we wait patiently to see if he pursues the same course in his appeals to "Revelation."

Our author proceeds with his argument from nature as follows :

"But even if the above mentioned uses" [those he had dwelt on] "did not require Divine wisdom to perpetuate the existence of the morally lost, yet natural reason might hesitate whether Divine justice would not still keep the ruined and guilty soul from annihilation; at least whether it does not leave the question fairly open, and to be determined by the natural and obvious sense of language in Revelation."

We are perfectly willing, and anxious, to have the question "determined by the natural and obvious sense of language in Revelation;" and we sincerely hope our author will not forget this implied pledge to adhere to the natural and obvious sense of language when we come to Revelation.

He goes on to inquire—" Are we perfectly sure that the satisfaction to justice, which the wicked actually owe in the present time every moment, and which may be due through each moment of eternal duration, will not forever forbid the dismissal of the debtors to annihilation ?"

Our author's inquiry implies that possibly infinite wisdom can never find out a way whereby to meet the claims of Divine justice. For, if the sinner keeps eternally ahead of justice, by adding to his debt, must not justice be eternally seeking satisfaction in vain? Where then is wisdom, that it can devise no means to help justice to satisfaction? Has the sinner so improved in this short life, that when he enters the next, he may practice so wisely, that while justice is looking up the old debt and seeking payment, he manages to run still deeper in debt, so that justice is outrun in the race? Truly, if the sinner has become such an adept, in this imperfect state, and has escaped justice in this world, he is not likely to be overtaken by it in the next, if his life is to extend into that.

Our author asks-

"Is it not true that each new moment of sin puts in its claim anew on Divine justice, for new retribution?"

That may be while men are under law claiming obedience. But how is it, when a murderer is led forth to execution, suppose he murder a dozen on the way to the gallows; does the law take cognizance of those murders? Not at all.—Who is accountable for those additional murders? The officer of justice, if any body. Why so? Because it was his business to see that the criminal was secured so that he could harm no one. So "natural reason" would affirm; and all civilization would cry out against the officer of justice for neglect of duty if he allowed the criminal to add another murder to his previous; and still more if he were to add to his neglect the offence of contriving to make the murderer die thirteen deaths, or twelve times harder ones for the additional murders. No; the "hypothesis" of our respected author, on this topic, is at variance with justice, if "natural reason" is to decide. When punishment begins—if it is not designed for reformation—the claims of law for obedience end. It is the makers and executive officers of the law who are to see that the criminal has no further power or opportunity to commit crime: not to do this is an act of injustice both to the criminal and to community. We believe this view is a self-evident one; and we need not to press it further, and might dismiss all that follows in our author's argument from justice. It will be expected, however, that we should not dismiss it so summarily.

He says—"To the question, Shall the atrocious, and cruel," &c., "or any of the giant offenders of this life, go out of this world unwhipped of justice, to find no retribution beyond? 'No,' you reply. 'No, if there be a righteous God, He will, for awhile at least, keep back the power of the grave, until justice has had its atonement."

The "reply,' our author gives to his question, nature can never discover; because that can neither "keep back the power of the grave" nor look beyond it.

Besides, "natural reason" is satisfied when a wicked man is dead, and regards that as the end of the claims of justice; and unless a spirit of revenge takes the place of reason, it would never think of following even a "giant offender" into another state—beyond death—to inflict pain. At any rate, we do not know from nature that any such thing will occur: nature seems satisfied when an enemy is dead, and wishes not his revival into life, unless he could be brought to repentance and reformation.

Our author goes on to inquire—"But if in his impenitent state the punished offender is adding perpetually to his sin, does not each new moment of that period of penal woe, claim the next moment following, also as due to retribution? And," he adds, "this must be the case immortally with a soul immortally sinning."

Let us see if we can look through our author's point in this paragraph. Does he, or does he not, believe that the wages of sin—committed in this life—is immortal woe? If so, how can the position be assumed, or maintained, that possibly that penalty will be inflicted, because the sinner, while undergoing this "penal woe"—this eternal woe—will be "adding to his sin"? Why seek such a refuge for the horrible idea of eternal woe? Is our natural sense of justice shocked at the infliction of such woe, for the sins of this life? It would seem so; and hence our author endeavors to find some plausible "hypothesis" to quiet this feeling of nature. But how does he do it? By supposing the sinner adding to his sin while undergoing his punishment for the sins of this life. Yet he has informed us of no law the sinner is then under claiming obedience; and all nature saith, "Where there is no law there is no transgression." Hence our author's "possible" case resolves itself into a simple "absurdity." But if he does not believe that the sins of this life earn the wages of eternal woe, then, if eternal suffering is inflicted, all nature must cry out against it as unjust. Besides, if the sinner in a future state is where he can commit sin, he must be under some law which it is possible for him to obey.

How then can our author tell but that instead of the "soul immortally sinning" he may, when under the discipline of that state, conclude to be evermore obedient? Specially, since our author thinks it possible that the horrible torture of that state may keep "new born beings" from sinning and help to "perfect elder" ones. Hence "possibly" it may lead those enduring the "penal woe" to conclude best to stop sinning; then, it seems, our author's "natural reason" would judge it might be very doubtful if it would accord with "Divine justice" to continue their "sorrows immortally."

Our author says—"It is clear that the unrepenting, defiant and persisting sinner cannot claim, as a matter of justice, that God whom he ever defies or disobeys, should deliver him by annihilation from the natural consequences of his obduracy in crime. Manifestly he could not demand it as his right."

If God had informed the individual that "the wages of sin is death," and "the soul that sinneth it shall die," Justice would cease to be "justice" if instead of death, it turned aside to inflict an endless life in torment. As to the sinner's "right" to "demand annihilation;" it is the "right" of the worst criminal to "demand" that no worse punishment shall be inflicted upon him than what the law clearly specifies: and it is an act of injustice to treat any criminal otherwise. So far as "nature" is concerned in this "argument," if a man is convicted of crime, the penalty of which is death, "natural reason" would say, to substitute unnumbered years of torture, over a slow fire, would be an act of insufferable injustice; and the criminal would have a "right" to "demand" that he should not be dealt with in this manner.

"To speak of an everlasting not-being as an everlasting punishment, is in our view a misnomer," saith our author

If our author had only substituted death for "not being," he would have had no occasion for his "misnomer." An everlasting death, implies that the subject was once alive, hence, to be everlastingly deprived of life, and eternally to remain in death is an "everlasting punishment" if it is an infliction of law against a transgressor.

Our author goes on—"Such a doom may be a calamity, a loss most dreadful to our instinctive love of existence; but to term it an atonement to justice, is false to the proper idea of that word."

We do not admire the term "atonement," in this connection; but if our author chooses to use it, he will find it equally effectual against endless woe. Does "immortal sorrow" make "an atonement to justice?" If the atonement is made the sorrow must cease, unless justice claims more than its "right"—which would be injustice. But if the sorrow is to be unending, or eternal, then "an atonement to justice" is never made, and never can be, unless the end of eternal can be reached. Justice eternally seeking atonement —satisfaction—but pursues its object in vain—it never reaches the point of satisfaction. Our author has a "misnomer" for "everlasting punishment" when he calls it "immortal sorrow" or "woe." Justice eternally lags behind its claim, and "never, no never" reaches satisfaction!

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