teaches the opposite doctrine. It was while the ark was preparing, in the days of Noah, that the long-suffering of God waited upon the antediluvians. It was during this period, that Christ, by his Spirit and prophet, preached to these hardened men. This whole period was allotted them, as a season of trial, a space for repentance, in which they might turn from their sins and live. But when this period was closed, God would wait no longer. Their state of probation was at an end; the flood came and swallowed them up; and their immortal spirits descended to the prisons of darkness, where they were confined in the days of the Apostle Peter, and where undoubtedly they will remain confined till the day of judgment. This passage, therefore, which has been so often quoted for a different purpose, teaches us that the present life is the season of probation, or the period when the long suffering of God waits upon sinners to turn and live.

8*

CHAPTER VIII.

A DIFFICULTY PROPOSED AND CONSIDERED.

THEOLOGICAL Writers have found much difficulty in reconciling the earnestness of God for the salvation of sinners with the fact that so many of them are not saved.-It results from the moral perfection of God, that he must earnestly desire the salvation of sinners. To suppose the contrary would be to divest him of even common benevolence.

In the Bible, God has manifested his earnestness in relation to this matter, in a thousand forms. "As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live." Ezek. 33: 11. "O that my people had hearkened unto me, and that Israel had walked in my ways"! Ps. 81: 13. "O that there were such an heart in them, that they would fear me, and keep all my commandments always, that it might be well with them, and with their children forever." Deut.

5 29. God has manifested his earnest desire for the salvation of sinners, not only in what he has said, but in what he has done. He has given his Son to die for sinners. He has proposed to them easy terms of salvation. He has urged his proposals upon them with all the eloquence of motive, and waited long for their compliance. He has sent his Holy Spirit to strive with them, and bring them to repentance and the acknowledgment of the truth. Of whatever else we stand in doubt, therefore, we must never doubt the earnestness of God for the salvation of lost men. We must never call in question the sincerity of his benevolent desires, when, with the yearnings of a father, he cries in the ears of his wandering children, "Turn ye, turn ye, why will ye die"?

On the other hand, with our eyes open upon the Bible and the world, we cannot reasonably call in question the melancholy fact, that great numbers of the human family have failed of salvation. So it was in the early history of mankind, when the earth became so filled with violence, that almost its entire population was swept away in the deluge. So it was all

along under the former dispensation, when the heathen world lay in gross wickedness, and when the frequent apostasies of God's chosen people called down upon them desolating judgments. So it was in the days of the Saviour, when with deep concern he exhorted the surrounding multitude, "Enter ye in at the strait gate; for wide is the gate, and broad is the way that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.” Mat. 7: 13. Such, in general, has been the state of the world, from the times of the Saviour to the present. Such it is now. None, who believe that heaven is a holy place, and that without holiness no man shall see the Lord, can resist the conviction, in view of the present moral aspect of the world, that a vast majority of its adult inhabitants are not saved.

We are looking indeed for better days. We are expecting a long season of rest and peace to this agitated world, when its remotest ends shall teem with inhabitants, and when, in the strong language of prophecy, "all shall be righteous." Is. 60: 21. But we must not

blind ourselves in regard to the existing state of things. We must not indulge hopes relative to the salvation of men, in past ages or at the present time, which are forbidden alike by Scripture, and by plain matters of fact.

But how are we to reconcile the earnestness of God for the salvation of sinners, with the fact that so many are not saved? If he desires their salvation, why does he not save them? If he has no pleasure in the final destruction of the wicked, why does he not rescue them from so dreadful an end?

Shall we reply to these inquiries by saying that God cannot save more of the human family than he does, without destroying their freeagency-which is equivalent to saying that he cannot save them at all? For to convert, sanctify, and save sinners, or rather creatures, things, which are not free agents, is a contradiction in terms. Shall we then meet the difficulty in question by affirming that God cannot save more of the human family than he does? He desires to save more, but he cannot accomplish it. He saves as many as he possibly can. But are such assertions consistent with reason, or with truth? Is not God om