seem to be beneficially affected by this severity. The government of Jehovah, it seems then, is too weak to save any of the race; all sin, and all are punished; and they sin and suffer punishment as long as they live, are imprisoned and then set at liberty to be imprisoned over and over again in the reputed hell of this world's misery. Thus we are taught to regard God chiefly as the jailer of the world. Though he is vigorous in the extreme in the discharge of this unpleasant office, his prisons are continually filled, and yet the earth remains the same abode of universal depravity.

Let it not be replied here that universalism teaches the final salvation of all men, and that it provides a remedy for all existing evils in the divine administration. If sin is punished only in this world, future salvation can be no remedy for the ills of our present state. The doings of this life are to have no bearing upon the future. Such is the singular admission of universalism, (Whittemore's Notes on the Parables, p. 354.) In forming our estimate then of the divine government, we must limit our views to its results in this life, and here, as we have seen, we witness weakness and inefficiency. The administration of the Almighty is more unsuccessful than the administration of any human ruler, if we must credit universalism.

The legislators of antiquity deemed it unwise to propose laws without enforcing their penalties by the fear of future punishment. It is the opinion of statesmen that human laws cannot be sustained without the aid of a belief in future punishment. Even Napoleon would not dispense with this aid among the means by which his government was administered. But universalism makes the Ruler of the world so unwise as to dispense entirely with the threatening of human punishment. If her statements were true, the all-wise God might improve his administration greatly if he would only learn from human sagacity to restrain mankind by the fear of future punishment.

The penalty of punishment in this life never has restrained men to any great extent. Whether it be threatened by God or by man, it is not sufficient to ameliorate essentially the character of our race. Universalists themselves show that all the hell which they suffer in this world is but an inconsiderable evil. For although confident that they shall be happy after death, they evince no eagerness to leave a world where the sins of men are rigorously punished. They like their prison. Its confinement is not intolerably irksome. They are not anxious to depart and

be with Christ, as Paul was. We have known some of their number to be extremely unwilling to die, and wish earnestly to stay longer on earth, to stay in the only place of punishment which they believe to be known in the dominions of the Almighty. Why should they wish to linger in our world, if it be a hell, and the only hell, as they assert, unless they begin to find that their doctrine is false, since it charges God with such incompetency as can never disgrace the government of the Eternal.

III. Universalism conflicts with the benevolence of God.

We, who believe the doctrine of future and endless punishment, are accused of dishonoring God by adopting the most revolting conceptions of his character. Especially are our views said to conflict with divine benevolence. We believe that our conceptions of divine goodness, when stripped of the hideous drapery which our opponents are pleased to hang around them, will be found to accord, not clash with the inspired assertion, "God is love." We are charged with denying the goodness of God. Those who differ from us claim at least to entertain more expanded views of the divine benevolence than we do. Are they sure that their sentiments involve no impeachment of the goodness of the Almighty? This is a point on which they express themselves with much warmth, sometimes in a strain that denotes the most sincere desire to show forth the praises of the Lord, sometimes with a hectic glow and a severity of expression that betokens more doubt than conviction of the alleged superior belief in the benignity of God.

We wish not to say in return the hard things that have been said of ourselves. Our sentiments teach us to render good for evil, blessing for reviling. We shall not then retort upon our assailants the charge that their doctrine supposes God " to delight in cruelty." But we shall attempt to show that universalism involves heavy charges against the benevolence of the Deity.

1. The first specification we would make of this charge is, that if the doctrine of eternal punishment be not true, its prevalence is irreconcileable with the alleged goodness of God, for we cannot suppose that he would suffer mankind to be deluded and afflicted as they have been by the dominion of a cruel error down to the present time.

If the heart of our Heavenly Father turns with instinctive horror from the mere conception of the future and endless pun

ishment of an impenitent sinner-with as much more aversion than universalists feel as he is greater and more benevolent than man-it is not a strange inference that he would not suffer his children on earth to be tormented by the fear of future punishment. His goodness certainly would not suffer him to play thus with their apprehensions. He would soon relieve a suffering world from such a horrible delusion as the doctrine in question seems to the universalist.

What is the fact? Has the doctrine of the endless punishment of unforgiven sin been disowned or favored by the Father of men? Has it been uniformly rejected by Him on whose character it is said to reflect most unhappily? And have the generations of men lived in happy ignorance of this cruel delusion? And was it reserved for some vile misanthrope to broach the false and pernicious sentiment as late as our own century? The doctrine of the eternal condemnation of the impenitent sinner has been more or less distinctly believed in every age of the world. Examine the tenets of the principal systems of religion that have prevailed among men, and you find a distinct avowal of belief in future punishment; in some, of endless punishment. Examine the dictates of conscience and the natural apprehensions of men. Do they declare that no punishment awaits the sinner beyond the grave? Their unwarped verdict accords with the Bible. They teach men to expect future wo. They suggest "a fearful looking for of judgment." It is not till men have been schooled out of their original impressions by patient effort that they deny the doctrine of future punishment, except perhaps, in the case of those who have been reared under the influence of erroneous belief, in whose breasts veneration for parental wishes and established prejudice may be expected to control the natural suggestions of the heart. The most of universalists have held originally the belief which they now reject. Even their testimony once concurred with the teachings of unprejudiced conscience.

Before the coming of Christ the doctrine of future and endJess punishment prevailed among Jews and Pagans. This is admitted by Dr. Hartley a zealous defender of universal salvation; who believed it to be a general tradition, and who admits that it has been "the doctrine of the Christian world ever since, some very few persons excepted." (See Dr. Hawes's Tract on Universalism, p. 3.)

Why is it the deep seated sentiment of the mind that sin VOL. XII. No. 31.

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must be punished hereafter. This conviction, as ancient as the world, whether we trace it to tradition or to the natural suggestions of the mind, comes from God. If it be a false sentiment, how can its existence and prevalence be reconciled with the alleged goodness of the Lord?

The doctrine of future and endless punishment has been most distinctly believed by those who have enjoyed the instructions of inspired prophets and teachers. The men who have been authorized by divine inspiration to teach the way of salvation, have conveyed the belief that this doctrine is founded in truth. Have prophets and apostles then taught what they were not instructed to teach? Were they commissioned to make known the doctrines of universalism, and have they taught the opposite doctrines so distinctly, that the whole christian world "some very few persons excepted," have been grievously misled? Was it incompetency, or dishonesty, that made Christ and the apostles teachers of error? Teachers of error they were in fact, if universalism be true-for their instructions have established the belief that sin will be punished forever.

Will it be said that they were incompetent teachers, that while they believed the truth of universalism, they were not able to defend and explain it to the satisfaction of their hearers, and that in spite of their most vigorous exertions the prejudices of the world remained unshaken? If the defenders of universalism assumed this position, and thus claim for their leaders more talent than fell to the lot of the Saviour and his apostles, how will they vindicate the goodness of God? Why did not a benevolent Deity raise up in former ages prophets and apostles who could teach universalism as distinctly and intelligibly as Balfour and Ballou? Why was the valuable discovery that revelation teaches universalism postponed to our own time? Why was not the first promulgation of Christianity entrusted to men who would perform their work in a less bungling manner than incompetent apostles are supposed to have done? The same benignant Providence that has blessed the world with the instructions of modern preachers of universalism, could have easily raised up men of equal talents in the first age of Christianity.

Will it be said that the prevalence of our doctrine is to be traced to dishonesty in the first teachers of Christianity? That divine goodness made ample provision for the promulgation of the truth, and that the agents to whom the work was committed,

were not true to their trust? This is a grave charge. Were Christ and his apostles base deceivers? Did they conceal the messages they were sent to teach, and substitute doctrines perfectly at variance with universalism? What motive could have prompted them to withhold the sentiment that sin will meet with no future punishment, and teach in its stead the stern doctrine of endless misery? It is impossible to assign any reason for a measure like this. Why did they persevere in teaching error when they gained nothing but persecution, and when they had only to announce the welcome doctrine, that sin will not be punished hereafter, to become the favorites of the world? Surely they were not dishonest teachers. They did believe what they taught. Did they then receive their instructions from God? Did he impart the doctrines that have prevailed in the world? The universalist says the doctrine is not true. Has the Almighty then sanctioned error? If so, where is his benevolence?

If he has not sanctioned the teachings of the apostles, why did he not send more successful teachers-men who could teach universalisin as distinctly as modern preachers do?

The God of nature may withhold some of the discoveries of science, for centuries, without incurring the suspicion of a want of benevolence. It has not been essential to the welfare of the world to know, from the beginning of time, whether the earth or the sun is the centre of our planetary system, or how vessels may be propelled by steam, or railroads constructed. But the truths of religion are essential to our welfare. The universalist claims to go far beyond others in his conceptions of divine goodness; he contends that his doctrine is the needed remedy for human misery. Will he explain then why it is that a merciful God entrusted this remedy to agents, who were so incompetent or so unfaithful as to substitute for this blessing the poison of error and torture a suffering world with the doctrine of future punishment? Why divine benevolence did not impart sooner the vaunted specific? Why the doubts and fears of men were not removed entirely fifty centuries ago?

It is the favorite representation of the universalist, "If God be endowed with benevolence, he desires the salvation of all men. If omnipotent, he is able to save all. The doctrine of endless misery denies then either the power, or the benevolence of the Almighty?" Not to dwell upon the sophistical nature of this argument, we would contend that it may be retorted upon