bible standard november 1877

8/9/2019 Bible Standard November 1877

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Issued monthly by "The Bible Standard Publication Society," 24, Mint Lane, Lincoln.EDITED BY

Geo. A.' BROWN, Pastor of Mint Lane Baptist Church, Lincoln.THE BIBLE STAND~RDs devoted to the exposition of Biblical Truth, especially the doctrine of Conditional Immortality, the literal Resurrection of

the Dead, the Final Destruction of the Wicked, the Signs of the Times, the Second Coming of Christ, and His Personal Reign on earth.

No. 2." The Wages of Sin is Death; but the gift of God is Eternal Life through Jesus Christ OUI' Lord."

Price Id.OVEMBER, 1877.THE INTERMEDIATE STATE OF THE DEAD.

Conti1ltl~d from page 5.THERE are several adverse theories entertained amongorthodox Protestants concerning the dead between deathand the resurrection. Some teach us that immediatelyafter death the soul enters either heaven or hell. Anotherclass tell us that the soul is detained in a conscious statein Hades, there to await the resurrection of the body.According to this theory, the Hadean state is a kind ofpurgatory existing somewhere, 'fmt nobody knows where.We cannot perhaps do better than lay before our readers afewtestimonies from the writings of our orthodox fathers inorder to show their utter lack of Scriptural evidence forsuch assertions as the following:-Adam Clarke says, " If I die, I shall go immediately to

Glory."Says Thomas Scott, "If our sins be forgiven, and our

~hearts renewed unto holiness, heaven will be the res); of oursouls, whilst our bodies will be secretly hid in the grave."Hiram Maddison says: .,We talk of the death of man,because we see the' earthy house' dissolve, but it is only anillusion. There is no death; what seems such is transition.The body dies, but the soul survives death. Thesainted dead are already before the throne, and serve Godday and night in His temple; and when Christ shall appearin the clouds of heaven to raise the dead, and burn theworld, and judge all men and angels, these 'saints' shallattend Him down His starry pathway, to re-enter theirbodies, now made incorruptible and glorious, and for the re-demption of which they have so long waited."You will see, dear reader, by this extract we are given to

understand that death is an illusion! Can it be true thatChrist, when He conquered death, only conquered anillusion? And when He comes the second time, will Hesimply destroy an illusion when He " destroys death"?The sentiment of this modern theologian reminds us

forcibly of the language used by the tempter when to ourMother Eve he said" Thou shalt not surely die."

Charles Wesley represents the saints in the following poemas receiving- their crowns, and beginning their reign withChrist immediately after their death:

" When from flesh the spirit freed,Hastens homeward to return,

Mortals cry, A man is dead!Angels sing, A child is born !

Born into the world above,They our happy brother greet,

Bear him to the throne of love,Place him at the Saviour's feet.

Jesus smiles and says, ' Well. done!Good and faithful seroant thou!

Enter and receive thy crown,Reign with 111\ tr iumphant now.'''

The intermediate state of wicked souls is thus sketched byJonathan Edwards :"As soon astever the soul parts f-rom the body, from thatmoment the case will be absolutely determined; there willthen be an end for ever to all hope, to everything that menhang upon in this life; the soul then shall know certainlythat it is to be miserable to all eternity, without any remedy.It shall see that God is its enemy; it shall see its Judgeclothed in His wrath and vengeance. Then its misery willbegin, it will that moment be swallowed up in despair; thegreat gulf will be fixed between it and happiness, the doorof mercy will be for ever shut up, the irrevocable sentence willbe passe4, . . . We may well suppose that when a

wicked man dies, his soul is seized by wicked angels; andthat they are round his bed ready to seize the miserable soulas soon as it is parted from the body. And with whatfierceness and fury do these cruel spirits fly upon their prey;and the soul shall be left in "their hands; There shall be nogood angels to guard and defend it. God will take no careof it; there is nothing to help it against those cruel spirits,th[l.t shall lay hold of it, carry it to hell, there to torment itfor ever! God will leave it wholly in their hands, and willgive it up to their possession when it comes to die [?]; and itshall be carried down to hell, to the abode of devils anddamned spirits." Departed spirits of wicked men are doubtless carried tosome particular place in the universe, which God has pre-pared to be the receptacle of His wicked, rebellious, and

miserable subjects; a place where God's avenging justice


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10 THE BIBLE STANDARD.shall be glorified; a place built to be the prison where thedevils and wicked men are reserved till the day of judgment.. . . And those who go to hell never can escajlethence; there they remain imprisoned till the day ofjudgment, and their torments remain continually. Thosewicked men who died many years ago, their souls went tohell, and there they are still; those who went to hell informer ages of the world have been in hell ever since, all thewhile suffering torment. They have nothing else to spendtheir time in there, but to suffer torment; they are kept inbeiu q for 110 other purpose." [!]Such is the language of tradition. Such are the views

held to a great extent by the modern orthodox exponents ofman's intermediate state. "Orthodox," though it may becalled, it is directly opposed to the teachings of Scripture.Charles Wesley gives us to understand in the poem

quoted that the righteous go immediately to their reward atdeath,-then they are crowned, then they meet Christ."Now" they reign with Christ "triumphant." Thelanguage of Scripture bears a direct testimony against bothWesley and Jonathan Edwards, and everybody else holdingsuch views.The inspired writers are- by no means silent on this

subject; as we have shown in our first article, their uniformtestimony is, when speaking of the righteous, that they areasleep. Paul writes, 1 Cor. xv. 18, 20 ; 1 Thess. iv. 13, 16 ;and this sleep is not in heave but in the dust, Don. xii. 2.The dead are said to "know not anything," Eccl. ix. 5.

When death comes to man, whether he be righteous orwicked, it is said of him, "In that very day his thoughtsperish," Psalm cxlvi. 4. "In death there is no remembranceof God," Psalm vi. 5. They are" in the land of forgetful,ness," Psalm lxxxviii. 10, 12.When we come to the subject of the judgment, we find

that Christ teaches that no rewards are to be given until the,resurrection. Speaking of the righteous, He says they shallbe "recompensed at the resurrection of the just," Lukexiv. 14.In the Book of Revelation we find under the 7th trumpet it

is said, " The nations were angry, Thy wrath is come, andthe time of the dead, that they should be judged, and thatThou shouldst give reward unto Thy servants the prophets,and to the saints, and them that fear Thy name, small andgreat; and shouldst destroy them which destroy the earth."Rev. xi. 18.Paul, in writing his last epistle to Timothy, says, "I

charge thee therefore, before God and the Lord JesusChrist, Who shall judge the quick and the dead at Hisappearing and His kingdom." 2 Tim.. iv. 1. 'If the statements made by Christ, and His Apostles Paul

and John, are true, then Charles Wesley and J. Edwardswith all who teach that men immediately after death receivetheir reward and punishment must be wrong,-which shall webelieve? We are fully persuaded that the Scriptures, whenreferring to man in death, teach a aegation of all life,

thought, or action, and that he is not in heaven or in thetheological hell, but in the grave, a place of silence, oblivion,darkness, and corruption, and that he must of necessity abidethere until Christ bids" all that are in their graves to comeforth."Archbishop Whately, one of the ablest scholars and most

acute theologians and a popular religious author of theEnglish Church, says, referring to the intermediate state," To the Christian, indeed, all this doubt would be instantlyremoved, if he found that the immortality of the soul, as adisembodied spirit, were revealed in the Word of God. Infact, however no such doctrine is revealed to us ; the Christian'shope, as founded on the promises contained in the Gospel,is the resurrection of the dead."The views we are now advocating caused serious disputes

in the days of the Reformation, so' much so that PopeLeo X. thought it necessary to call a Council together tosettle the matter once for all. With some it did settle it,but with others we feel thankful to say it produced little orno effect, for light from the Word of the Lord had broken inupon their minds, and in spite of the Pope and his so-called'infallible decree, they dared to study the Word and proclaimtheir convictions of its truth. We will give our readers thedecree of the Council, held A.D. 1513, under Pope Leo X. :" Whereas in these our days some have dared to assert

concerning the nature of the reasonable soul, that it ismortal, or one and the same in all men; and some declarethis to be true. We, with the approbation of the SacredCouncil, do condemn ancl reprobate all those who assert thatthe intellectual soul is mortal, or one and the same in allmen, and those who call these things in question; seeingthat the soul is not only truly, and of)tself, and essentially,the form of the human body, as is expressed in the canonof Pope Clement V., published in the General Council. ofVienna; but likewise Immortal, and, according to the num-ber of bodies into which it is infused, is singularly multipli-able, multiplied, and to be multiplied; and we strictlyinhibit all from dogmatizing otherwise, and we decree thatall who adhere to~the like erroneous assertions shall beshunned and punished as heretics."We now gite Martin Luther's answer to the above decree.In Luther's Defence of the Propositions condemned by the

bull of Leo X., proposition 27, he replies:" It is certain that it is 'not in the power of the Church or

the Pope to establish articles of faith or laws for morals orgood works, But I permit the Pope to makearticles of faith for himself and his faithful, such asThe soul is the substantial form of the human body. ThePope is the emperor of the world, and the king of heaven,and God upon earth, The soul is immortal, with all thosemonstrous opinions to be found in the Roman dunghill ofdecretals. "


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THE BIBLE STANDARD. 11Again he says: "All souls lie and sleep until doomsday."Duke George, in writing to Duke John, October 15, 1521,

says: "Some deny the immortality of the soul. All thiscomes from Luther's teachings." The Reformers were alsocharged with stating: "All which had been said about theimmortality of the soul was invented by Anti-Christ for thepurpose of making the Pope's pot boil."In the celebrated Historical Review, published in Londonin 1772, it is recorded that Luther taught that souls" lay in

a profound sleep, in which opinion he followed many Fathersof the ancient Church." It adds: "The doctrine was heldby the first Reformers."Sir Thomas More, a zealous Roman Catholic, wrote a

book to refute the doctrine taught by the Reformers, inwhich he assails the teachings of Luther. He asks, " Whatshall he care how long he live in sin, that believeth Luther,that he shall after this life feel neither good nor evil in bodyor soul until the day of doom [judgment]?"To this book of More, William Tyndale, the man who first

translated the Scriptures into the English language, repliedthus:" Christ and His Apostles taught no other, but warned to

look for Christ's coming every hour, which coming again,because ye believe will never be, therefore have ye forgedthat other merchandise [purgatory]."" And ye, in putting them [souls] into heaven, hell, and

purgatory, destroy the argument wherewith Christ and Paulprove the resurr~ction. If the souls be in heaven, tell mewhy they be not in as good a case as the angels be? Andthen what cause is there of the resurrection? "We consider the argument of Tyndale both logical andScriptural, and we think that if our friends will come back

to the Word of God, they will find to their utter astonish-ment that much is said and written upon the subject of theIntermediate state which cannot be sustained by thestandard of truth. We would, therefore, earnestly entreatyou to search the Scriptures, and see if these things be so.Death is not" the gate to Glory," but the gate to the landof silence, the land of forgetfulness. Death returns man tothe dust, and "in that very day his thoughts perish."Resurrection from the dead is our only hope of life, ofimmortality, and of eternal glory. "For if there be no re-surrection, then they which are fallen asleep in Christ areperished."-B.

" The common theory of eternal misery involves God, Hiswhole administration, and His eternal Kingdom, in thedeepest dishonour that the mind of man or angel can con.ceive. The human mind cannot be held back from abhorringsuch a theory except by the most unnatural violence to its'divinely-insp'i:red convictions of honour and right."-EDWARD BEEcHER, D.D. "Conflict of Ages."

THE COMING OF CHRIST.By Madame de Gasparin,

The whole primitive Church expected the coming of Christ,and believed in His temporal reign. This belief, so strongand firm in apostolic times, faded in proportion as faith lostits early simplicity. Men took to materialize precepts andspiritualize prophecy, and thus truth got modified on bothsides.I am one who takes the promises in a literal. sense. I

believe with all my soul in my Saviour's coming. I believethat our earth will witness the scenes described by theprophets, and I hav~ drawn ~y conviction from the study ofthe Bible.The Lord comes! As the lightning shining from the

east to the west, so is the coming of the Son of God. Hecomes surrounded by His redeemed, by myriads of angels,comes as conqueror to claim His crown. The hour hasstruck, the elect have put on their glorified bodies. God'spower has done this. In the same moment the faithful who,still live have been conscious of a marvellous transformation.It is not death; it is rather the casting ,off of a chrysaliscovering. In the twinkling of an eye, incorruption hastriumphed over corruption. Do you realize this moment,this coming, this object of faith, now beheld from far, asactually come to pass? Yes, it is true; my imagination isnot at work, my eyes see. It is indeed Jesus my Lord.This is He who had pity on me; Who suffered for me ;whom I love with all the strength of my soul. My breastexpands with a divine breath, each moment I love more,and feel that I am beloved. Mf God! oh, to prostratemyself before Thee! to adore Thee!' It is as though asun had arisen within my heart. At one glance my eyehas taken in the thousand thousands in Thy train. 'My dearones, there you all are; you indeed, you living, you for evermine-all of us the Lord's. But yesterday, I laid you inthe grave; but yesterday I wandered alone, losing myself inthe immensity of my sorrow, and now you are here, myhands touch you, you will not die any more. If God's armdid not sustain, surely man" would founder in this ocean ofbliss.The rest of the dead live not again, says the Scripture,

till the thousand years are over. Christ's risen elect, to-gether with those living at the time, people our regeneratedearth; Israel has beat 'his breast and gathered round theKing of Glory. Peace is made on earth. No more wars, nomore wrongs; a law of love easily obeyed; a hosanna of allcreation.No more desolate places, no more broken hearts; we hear

no longer the lion's roar; the shrieks of the slaughtered arechanged to songs of thanksgiving. The Lord's alliance withHis creatures glorifies the universe.


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12 THE BIBLE STANDARD.And now, tell me, do not you find such a restoration

sublime? Does it not seem to you worthy of the Lord,this restoration of a world lost by the madness of man,tormented by the rage of the great enemy, saved by the verySon of an offended God?

The mountains of Judea have beheld Thy cross, Jesus,Thou. Holy of Holies; the walls of Jerusalem have heard theshouts of the maddened crowds that dragged Thee fromCaiaphas to Pi late ; Gethsemane has drunk Thy blood;Golgotha has echoed with the mocking laughter of theRoman soldiers; the sighs of Thy agony have passed overthis land. Thy own country, Lord, the land of promise,shall see Thy triumph, and stirred to its inmost depths,shall break forth in a cry of love and welcome.

In east and west, the children of the land have led apainful life. They have been mocked, trampled upon, tillat times even they doubted, despaired of themselves andThee. The earth that saw them so wretched, so prostratedbeneath the hatred of the world, shall see them, humblestill, but radiant with joy, surround their God who reignsin the midst of them.

Oh, the tears of thy mourners, Earth! the lonely steps ofthose who walked among thy tombs! Thou who hastswallowed up generations of cherished beings; and to thosewho asked of thee their dead, hast shown thy dust as solereply. Thou wilt restore them all, eternally young andhappy; they will deck thee like a burst of new flowers; twoand two, in families, in companies, they will walk again,singing with joy, on the sites they loved.

Thou thyself, curse-stricken Earth; thou whose breastcracks at the equator beneath the breath of the simoon;whose barren poles are crushed beneath icebergs,-thoushalt blossom out fair and fresh, younger than in the daysof ~den. Thou hast borne our rebellion and our woethrough the immensity of space; thou shalt then march inbridal beauty through a tranquil sky; blessed amongworlds, bearing on thy surface the redeemed .and theRedeemer.

He will come soon! Watchmen, lost in the. darkness, wesend this cry of hope one to the other. Yes, the morningstars will soon sing together the hymn which greeted thedawn of the seventh day; Jesus will soon return. I shallsee thee again, thou holy city, no longer depressed andtrodden down by unbelievers; I shall see thee glorious, Ishall salute thee, queen of the world. Thy fountains willgush forth anew, 0 Judea! Under thy oaks, 0 Carmel, theturtle-dove shall fly in peace, not fearing the cruel sports-man! Desert, thy wide swamps shall change to gardens;thy swords, turned to ploughshares, shall prepare thy richharvests. 0 country, everywhere called blessed! You whoweep, say, are not your tears less bitter? You who aretossed upon the open sea, do you not begin to discern theshores of the land of life?

IS MAN IMMORTAL?By A. A. Phelps, A.DJ., Late F1'ee Methodist Minister, U.S.A.

For many years I tenaciously clung to the dogmanatural immortality. At length I so far laid aside mprejudice as to give the whole subject a thorough investigtion. I became intensely in earnest to know the truthwhatever might befall my preconceived opinions. Tinvestication r~sulted in a radical revolution of sentimeoin rezard to man's nature and the sinner's destiny. I habeen0compelled, by an overwhelming array of Scriptuevidence, to reject and repudiate the current doctrineinherent immortality. I subjoin a few reasons, very briefstated, for this rejection.

1. The doctrine of natural immortality has a very ufavourable origin. It can be traced back through thRomish Church to the Pharisees, and from them to thheathen philosophers and idolatrous Egyptians! whaccording to Herodotus, were the first of the human famiwho advocated it. They probably received it by a sortSatanic Mesmerism; for the old Serpent first publishedthed6ctrine amid the lovely bowers of Eden in these word" Ye shall not surely die." A dogma that was invented bthe devil, received by Pagans, nursed by Papists, anadopted by Protestants, ought to be looked upon with somsuspicion.

2. It is at variance with the inspired record of mancreation. His origin is succinctly stated thus: "The LoGod formed man of the dust of the ground, and breatheinto his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a livinsoul." (Gen. ii-7.) There is not the faintest intimatiohere of an invisible, intangible, imponderable, immaterialimmortal conscious entity, without length, breadth, or thickness, without exterior or interior, capable of thinkingknowing, and feeling, independent of the body, andestined to live through all the years of God. .

3. It clashes with the Bible account' of man's fall. Adawas placed on probation. A simple test was appliedObedience would have brought immortality, while disobedence would as certainly rellultin mortality. The penaltwas thus briefly stated: "In the day that thou eatethereof thou shalt surely die; " or" dying thou shalt dieWhen a term is employed for the first time it ought tobused in a plain, natural, literal sense. It was so used iEden. If the penalty of Adam's trangression was moradeath, then the doctrine of Universalism is true; "for as iAdam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made aliveAdam sinned. He at once became a dying man, He wadriven out of Paradise, " Iest he put forth his hand and takalso of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever." 0,was the hand of love that pushed fallen, sinful man asidethat shut him away from the tree of life, and thus cut off apossibilty of his becoming immortal in sin and misery!


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THE BIBLE STANDARD. 134. It .renders the execution of the sinner's penalty impos-

sible. God allowed the race to be propagated under themalediction of physical death, yet coupled with graciousprovisions for the future. Adam's disobedience lands all hisprogeny in the grave; but Christ's obedience lifts them allout of it. The whole human family share so fully in theatonement of Jesus as to have secured to them an uncon-ditional resurrection from the Adamic death. Every manmust now stand or fall for himself. Whoever will come intothe glorious plan, will be eternally saved. Whoever refuses,must die for his own sins. This awful doom awaits theimpenitent, after the judgment verdicts shall have beenpronounced. In various phrases do the Scriptures teach thefinal extermination of all the wicked in the" lake of fire."They shall "die." They shall "perish." They shall be"destroyed." They shall be .< consumed." They shall be'"burnt up, root and branch." Such a destiny would beimpossible, if man possessed an immortal soul.

5. Immortality is never ascribed to man. In our commonversion the term" immortal" occurs only once, and is thenapplied to God (1 Tim. i-17.) The term" immortality" isfound five times; from which we learn: (1) that God onlypossesses it (1 Tim, vi-lB.); (2) that Christ brought it tolight in the Gospel (2 Tim, i-ID,); (3) that we are to seekforit (Rom. ii-Z.}: (4 and 5) that Christians are to put it on atthe resurrection (1 Cor. 15, 53, 54.) Such terms as " undyingsoul," "deathless soul," "never dying spirit," though socommon in theology are nowhere to be found in the Bible.So far from teaching that immortality is a birthrightpossession, the Scriptures everywhere hold it up as a price-less boon to be sought-a blessing for which we are entirelydependent upon Jesus Christ, the great Life-giver.

B. The doctrine of natural immortality supersedes thenecessity of a resurrection. The difference betweenChurch theology-and Bible theology is this: The formerpredicates a future life upon the assumed fact of inherentimmortality; the latter predicates it upon a resurrectionfrom the dead. There is a natural antagonism between thetwo positions. Hence it is that the glorious doctrine of theresurrection, so conspicuous in the teaching of Christ andthe Apostles, has fallen into amazing disrepute. Manypopular divines utterly repudiate it. Others habituallyignore it. In the Churches generally very little stress islaid upon it. Indeed, why should there be if certain pre-vailing notions are correct? If death is a grand emancipa-tion, coming with a friendly hand to open our prison and letus go free, if " death is the gate to endless joys," if the deadare not really dead, but more fully alive than ever; then aresurrection is entirely superfluous, and ought to be rejected.

7. It reduces the judgment scene to a solemn nullity. Ifthe current view is correct, that the real man is immortal,"shuffling off the mortal coil" and entering upon his reward

at death, surely a judgment day would be entirely useless.Consistency demands that we should either give up the ideaof a coming tribunal, or cease to believe that man can berewarded before he is judged. Popular theology would haveus believe that Christians are continually flying up toheaven, and sinners sinking down to hell! that the oneclass are already crowned with glory, and the other classalready cursed with the pangs of their merited doom! butthat there is still to be a day of judgment, when the saintsare to be rallied from their abode of blessedness, and sinnersare to be brought out of their prison of despair; that theyare to receive their formal sentence, and then be sent backto their former abodes of blackness or bliss! Can anyoneseriously believe that God's administration will ever be soabsurd?

8. It subverts the doctrine of Christ's second coming. Ifmen are rewarded and punished in a " disembodied" state,there is no need of Christ's coming to raise the dead. If thedestinies of men can be adjusted at death, there is no needof Christ's coming to judge the world. If the saints are tolive for evel! in heaven, there is no need of Christ's comingto renew the earth and set up His kingdom upon it; for itwould be a lonely reign with every saint in heaven, andevery sinner removed to a distant hell. Surely there is noadequate reason why Christ should ever return to earth if theprevalent ideas of man's nature and destiny are correct. Isit any wonder that so little stress is laid upon the doctrine ofChrist's personal coming ~ The traditions of men havedisplaced this glorious truth, and turned the whole systemof revealed religion into a terrible moral chaos!

9. The dogma of natural immortality is thefruitful sourceof dangerous error. It has given birth to a ha:teful progeny.It is the foundation of the worst religious developments thathave ever cursed tha-world. The intelligent reader willhardly venture to deny that Mormonism, Mahometanism,Swedenborgianism, Shakerism, and Spiritualism are builtupon the assumed fact that man is immortal. It is. theboasted mission of Spiritualism, indeed, to teach that" manhas an immortal soul." The whole system depends upon it.And yet it is but a natural and logical outgrowth from whatthe Churches generally advocate as" orthodoxy." Spirit-ualism is "orthodoxy" gone to seed. Nor can we with anyconsistency pour our denunciations upon a class of re-ligionists for having travelled legitimately to certain conclu-sions from the premises we have sogenerously granted them.Who does not know that Mariolatry and Purgatory arebased upon the assumption that dead folks are alive? Letthe Scripture fact, that" the dead know not anything," beestablished; and there will be no more money paid to havedeparted friends prayed through the pains of purgatory!Let the whole Catholic Church be convinced that the VirginMary is now dead, and she will cease to be an object of


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14 THE BIBLE STANDARD.worship. The horrid dogma of eternal torment wouldnever have fou~d a place in the Church of God but for theantecedent notion of natural immortality. This granted,the other is .a logical necessity! unless it can be shown thatall men are to be saved. But the doctrine of endless miseryis so foul a slander on God's character that many have beencompelled to repudiate it. Assuming that man is immortal,the only alternative is eternal torment or universalism. Thelatter is a natural rebound' from the former. If men are toexist eternally, they must exist in a state of happiness ormisery. The one being rejected, the other must be accepted.The consequence is, that the dogma of unending agony ismaking men universalists and infidels on a large scale.Universalism and endless misery are both built upon thefoundation of inherent immortality. They are the dangerousextremes. The truth lies between them. But enough.The bitterness of the fruit attests the badness of the tree.

IMMORTALITY AND THE CITY TEMPLE.

Extracts front a Discourse by Joseph Parker, D.D.London boasts many able preachers, and among their

number Joseph Parker, D.D., now ofthe City Temple, holdsa conspicuous place. This gentleman long ago identifiedhimself with those who believe and teach that pain is but anepisode in life, and not of eternal continuance; and thatrighteousness alone has for its guerdon and crown everlast-ing being. (When we have sometimes mentioned the name of this

celebrity as in sympathy with the doctrine of the non-eternity of evil, we have had the question put to us, "Why, ifsuch a man believes as you say, does he not preach it? "We have the pleasure this month of making some extractsfrom a sermon of his,printed in the Chrietian Union ofDecember 31, 1875, by which it will be seen that he doespreach it. The remarks occur under the text heading," The City Temple Pulpit," being on page 833. They areas follows :-

" The doctrine of Eternal torments, as popularly under-stood, was the next doctrine that used to give me muchuneasiness. My minister- an honest and faithful man,well read in the letter of Scripture-wished me to believethat impenitent sinners, and all the heathen world, werecondemned to the torment of literal fire. I felt thatit could not be true, yet I could not put into words thestrong feeling which rose up in my heart against it. I saw,if this doctrine were true, that God had given to his creaturesa power which He could not take from them, namely, thepower of living for ever, and defying Him to put an end totheir existence. The wicked man, shut up in fire andbrimstone, would be able to say to God, ' I am as immortal

as You are! You cannot put an end to my being; Ichallenge, I defy you to destroy me; and in this pit thereare millions upon millions like me, from every land underthe sun; we outvote Your saved ones; in mere numbers weoverwhelm You; hell is larger than heaven; and whilsthell exists it will be a memorial against Your supposedomnipotence.' I know these were horrible words, but I sawthat there was no getting over them by fair and soundargument. I could have said 'Hush!' and I could haveavoided the subject; but this was neither honest nor bold." If God had the power to put an end to the misery, by

putting an end to the existence of these unhappy creatures,and yet did not exercise that power, I felt that the argumenttold against Him in a deadlier manner; fur whilst in thefirst instance it might be a strictly logical necessity, itbecame in the second a moral purpose, a deliberate andabsolutely worthless visitation of cruelty, Isay' absolutelyworthless,' because it led to nothing, and was meant to leadto nothing. The case used to show itself to my viewin this ;yay :- The man sinned for a period of seventy yea.rsand then he spent seventy years in hell fire, and seventymore, and a hundred more, and a thousand more, and amillion more, and was told in the madness of .his agony thathis punishment was only beginning to begin; and then helingered a thousand ages more, and was told he was as farfrom the end of his torture as he was at the beginning! AsI thought this, I was filled with great distress; not so muchon account of myself as actually on account of God;. for Ifelt that it was not right that there should be a limit tomercy and no limit to pu.nishment-that mercy should pleadfor a brief day, but that punishment should have the libertyof ages innumerable, I said in my young ardour, , This isnot even-handed jnstice; it is utterly unlike God.'

" So Igave up this horrible view oj the destiny oj the wickedbecausemy moral instincts uiould not tolerate it. Ipro-ceeded to open the Bible and consult the Revelation. I soonfound relief. I saw that ;nan was made capable of im-mortality; that God's design was that man should live forever, but that he should do so not by an arbitrary decreebut by his own. consent to the will of God; so that immor-tality should not be a burden but a blessing,-jor a jrightfulth-ir.g it is to be uhat you cannot help being! Mark thatdoctrine clearly if you please, and see how graciously Godhas saved himself from every reproach that might arisefrom its application. Has God given you a body? Youcan destroy it. Has God given you reasoning faculties?You can turn yourself into. a madman. Has God sent youinto a certain country? You can denationalize yourself.Has God made you susceptible of immortality? You maychoose death rather than life. Tell me that I must beimmortal, and you oppress me with a burden; tell me thatI may be immortal, and you preach to me glad tidings o


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THE BIBLE STANDARD. 15

THERE is a tendency in the Christian Church to prefer theteachings of ancient Heathenism on some points ofeschatology, to the teachings of the New Testament. We,would, in this article, show how this is done in regard to thematter indicated by the words which we have adopted as ourcaption.Heathenism knew nothing of the doctrine of the resurrec-

tion. The soul at death was dismissed at once to its ever-lasting state. Its judgment took place immediately onleaving the body, and its eternal allotment of joy or sorroww!l's given. There was, indeed, in heathenism somethinganswering to the Romish doctrine of purgatory, but nothinganswering to the Scriptural doctrine of the intermediatestate of the dead. At death the body was regarded as donewith for ever. It is painful 'to find to what extent suchnotions are preferred to Christian doctrines. In Christian Most of those who have uttered these sentiments have beenpulpits it is often quietly assumed that death brings one at. I Christians, but the sentiments are not Christian. It is not

great joy. Such glad tidings I found in the Gospel.Christ asked me to live; He said He came to give me' life ;He said that He Himself was the Life."From other remarks made by Mr. Parker in the same dis-

course it appears that he would like to see his way clear to"final and universal restoration of the human race," [whowould not?] but is unable to do so. He concludes with thefollowing advice-" What I want you to do in this matter, however, is clear

enough; Do not un-Christianize any man who is trying tomitigate the awful gloom which accompanies the doctrine ofthe unceasing, undiminishing, and hopeless torture of thewicked. If any man thinks he can throw one ray of lighton the dark problem, welcome him as a brother, and listento him lovingly, if haply he may have a message from God;and whatever decision you may come to, hold it reverently,and modestly, being always ready to receive light and helpfrom every quarter. Whatever darkness may rest upon thedestiny of the wicked, it must be a fearful thing to fall intothe hands of the living God; yet, seeing that His mercyendureth for ever, it is. better to fall into the hands of God,than into the hands of men. One thing is certain; thosewho are in Christ can never die! [i.e., forever.] That isthe blessed truth-that is the glorious Gospel! Able andhonest men may differ widely as-to the destiny of the finallyimpenitent, but there can be no substantial difference ofopinion as to the future of those who know the fellowship ofChrist's sufferings and the power of Christ's resurrection.Do not be harsh with any man who differs from you; sayin your heart of hearts, the Judge of the whole earthcannot but do right.-Bible Echo.

ANDEATH GLORY.

once to all the bliss and glory of heaven. In funeral dis-courses this is the more prevalent teaching. How often dowe hear words like these spoken over the coffins of therighteous; "He has now entered upon his reward." "Thecrown of glory which fadeth not away is now his." "Wetrust he is now gathering the clusters of the vine of God,or sitting under the tree of life, or walking the goldenstreets of the New Jerusalem, or bowing with all theredeemed and glorified ones around the throne of God andthe Lamb." We remember a glcwing passage in a discourseby Dr. Griffin on the worth of the soul. Having traced thesaint to the last moment of life he says: "The soul burstsits cerement, and is an angel now; wings are lent it, and Itrace it soaring to the regions of light. I follow it in itscourse of endless progression till it becomes greater thanGabriel was." There is more of it, all grand and beautiful,if it were only Christian. If one will learn the notionswhich have prevailed in any community touching thesethings, let him go into "God's acre" and read the inscrip-tions on gravestones. Is not that a place where the hope ofthe resurrection should be brought to mind? shall we notfind it in some of those" rhymes uncouth " which have beenchiselled on the marble? In most burial-places few and faintare the intimations of the coming morning. Instead ofintimating that the dead are resting in hope, we more oftenfind it implied that the departed ones are" safe at home'"indeed most of the "holy texts" inscribed there are simpleadmonitions to prepare for death. And the "lines" oftenappended to obituary notices in newspapers-a kind ofliterature that seldom ranks high-usually contain intima-tions of glory already entered upon. And our funeralhymns,-it WC;uldbe amusing, if it were not sad, to see howin the same collection the sentiments of one hymn arecontradicted by another,-following it perhaps immediately.As a specimen of a hymn expressing Christian sentiment wemay give the favourite one:

"Unveil thy bosom, faithful tomb."As a specimen of one of an opposite kind we might give theone beginning with the words:

" Vital spark of heavenly flame."Or, perhaps, the one of which these stanzas form a part:

" In' vain our fancy strives to paintThe moment after death;

The glories that surround a saintWhen he resigns his breath.

" One gentle sigh his fetters breaks,One effort, and he's gone;

And lo! tbe willingspirit takesIts mansion near the throne."


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PUBLICATIONSTHE BIBLE STANDARD.

in harmony with the gospel of the kingdom to teach thatsaints are glorified this side of the resurrection. The greathope which is set before us-the event for which those whohave the first fruits of the Spirit long and groan-is theredemption of our bodies," (Rom .viii. 23.) As the Headwas not seated in the glory of the heavenly places till theFather had raised Him from the dead, so the members ofChrist cannot reign with Him so long as they are held underthe power of death. The great promise of Christ to thebeliever is, "I will raise him up at the last day" (John, vi.40.) and "I will come again and receive you to Myself"(Juhn, xiv. 3.) The great consolation which St. Pauloffered to them who were sorrowing over those thathad fallen asleep in J esus was, that they would beglorified at the same time with those who should bealive at the coming of the Lord. He did not comfortthem with the thought that they had gone to Glory,but with the thought that Glory was coming to them in theday of Christ,-coming to the sleeping and to the. livingsaints at one and the 'same time. We do not now hearChristians comfort one another with any such words. "Wetrust," say they "that our loss is his gain." They do notrefer to the time when .J esus shall come to bring back thesleeping ones; and when they say we "sorrow' not even asothers which have no hope" they twist. the-passage to makeit refer to the hope that the departed are already in Glory.It is seldom that funeral sermons refer to the resurrection asa matter of the slightest importance. It is not that mendeny the doctrine, but, by putting it over the other side ofthe millennium, it becomes to them of none effect. Wenot long since heard a remark which seems to us the exacttruth, that the doctrine of the resurrection had come to beviewed much as men regard a piece of furniture for whichthey have no use. They set it away in their attics for safekeeping. Whenever they take an inventory they put it in,but they never bring it to use. The resurrection is still inthe creeds of men, and they have an impression that it is agood thing; but in general they quite overlook it; and, evenwhen sore bereavements come, they usually fail to repair toit for comfort.,We need a readjustment of our common theology, whichshall dissociate death and glory, and associate glory with theresurrection. Every thoughtful man knows that thesethings are thus associated in Holy Scripture. Death is notswallowed up in victory whena believer dies in the triumphsof faith, but when the corruptible puts on incorruption inthe day of the glorious resurrection. The true time forraising the shout, "0 death, where is thy sting! 0 grave,where is thy victory ! " will be when Jesus comes to take theprey from that mighty spoiler. Death-bed triumphs areno doubt very precious, but resurrection triumphs will be farmore glorious,-J. 8. J.

By H. CON S TAB L E, M.A,(Late Prebendary of Cork, Irelalld).

DURATION AND NATURE OF FUTURE PUNISHMENT. 5th Edition, 340 pp. An elaborate argument touchingthe Punishment of the Unsav-d. It is particularly fine in it sphilological chapters respecting the meaning of the Greek wordsnsed by the inspired writers to indicate the doom of the lostPrice 3s. 6d.

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NATURE OF MAN: Is he Mortal or Immortal? Notesand Queries. Thoughts on the Soul, &c. Every principal objectionanswered. Price Is. /

WHAT IS MAN? and the Meaning of Soul, Spirit,Death, and Hell. Price 3d.

SPIRIT IN MAN: What is it? Price 4d.THE SOUL: a Bible View of its Meaning. Price 4d.RICH MAN AND LAZAR US; THIEF ON THE

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MINT LANE CHAPEL, LINCOLN.Services and Meetings durinq the Month as follous-s-

SUNDAY:Morning at 1030, Evening at 6.MONDAY:Prayer Meeting at 7 p.m.WEDNESDAY:Preaching at 7 p.m.:FRIDAY:Bible Class at 730 p.m. (All seekers after Truthinvited.)

WillTHE PASTOR, G. A. BROWN,

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bible standard november 1877

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