LECTURE III.

REASONS FOR RENOUNCING UNIVERSALISM, DRAWN FROM THE THREATENINGS OF THE BIBLE.

2 COR. v. 11.

KNOWING, THEREFORE, THE TERROR OF THE LORD, WE PERSUADE MEN.

WHEN resolved to review the whole subject of the final destiny of mankind, I set myself down to a candid, critical, and prayerful examination of all that the Bible teaches on this momentous question. With the threatenings of the Bible I thought myself familiar. I knew the chapter and verse wherein each of those testimonies might be found, which are supposed to refute Universalism. I could recite them without the Bible. I also had an interpretation for each of them; and felt prepared to defend my sentiments against all objections drawn from the Word of God.

But now, as I looked at them, they assumed an aspect that they never before seemed to wear. There was a solemnity about them, which to my mind had never before rested upon them. I approached them, not with a design to explain them away; not to see how I could make them harmonize with Universalism. I had no wish to trifle with the Bible. I

DURST NOT DO IT.

In some measure I felt the responsibility of my position, and the danger of my hands being dyed in the blood of souls. I went to this work with a trembling spirit of supplication.

In reviewing the threatenings of the Bible, I did so as a Universalist. This book, I said to myself, sustains my faith. Nothing, therefore, will be found in the Bible which cannot be easily explained in harmony with Universalism. If this system be true, the Savior was its Author: he came to reveal the salvation of all men, to enforce it upon men. But the people to whom the Savior came and preached, were far from believing in this doctrine. Their belief in endless punishment is as well known as their belief in the existence of God. They declared, openly and constantly, that impenitent men were exposed to eternal death. This sentiment was as universal among the generation to which the Savior was sent, as their faith in a future life. No matter from what source they derived this opinion, the fact that they held it cannot be questioned by any student of the Bible; and is fully admitted in the writings of the Universalists. As a Universalist, I must regard this doctrine as an error, fraught with evils of an appalling nature, being at once dishonorable to God and injurious to man. Moreover, the Savior could do nothing towards inducing the Jews to receive Universalism, until the idea of endless death should be removed from their minds. As a teacher sent from God, he will speak as decidedly upon this great evil as Universalists now do.

But when I examined the sacred writings, to see in

what terms the Savior rebuked this sentiment, I was surprised to read no rebuke, no warning, no testimony against it; no, not one! But, on the contrary, the language employed by the Redeemer was most evidently adapted to confirm the Jews in their opinions.

THE PREACHING OF JOHN BAPTIST.

John the Baptist came to herald the Messiah; to prepare the way of the Lord, that the people who believed in the eternity of future punishment might receive the doctrine that all will be saved. As I read the sermon with which his ministry began, it seemed to me that it was not such a sermon as might have been expected under the circumstances.

John commenced his ministry by calling men to repentance, by warning them of "wrath to come," by assuring them that the august Personage whom he came to announce, would burn up the wicked, in the last day, "like chaff in an unquenchable fire." How much instruction of this kind would it take, to convince men that there was no wrath in the future world, no unquenchable fire into which the wicked would be cast?

PREACHING OF CHRIST.

The preaching of the divine Redeemer was equally inexplicable upon the same principle. If he was a Universalist, he came to introduce ideas at war with the opinions of the whole world; and not only to teach, but to create them. But so far from asserting,

in direct terms, the salvation of all men, and employing language that would leave no room to doubt his meaning, he used language which has led nine tenths of the Christian world, and those the most competent to judge, to believe that he taught, and designed to teach, that many souls would perish forever.

Let a sermon in defence of Universalism be printed, and a copy thrown into every house in the country; and no difference of opinion would arise in respect to the faith of the author, or the design of the sermon. And should a Universalist preacher send forth to the world a sermon so written, that the great mass of intelligent men in the community would suppose that the writer meant to teach that many of our race would finally be lost, all would regard the writer as destitute of common honesty or common sense.

If Universalism be true, it impeaches either the honesty of the Savior, or his competency to teach. He used language which no Universalist can harmonize with his system; language which none but an insane man would use, if he were a sincere believer in the salvation of all men.

Like his forerunner, Christ began his ministry by calling men to repentance. In his first sermon, he

describes the class of men who are blessed and accepted of God; and, by contrast, those also who are cursed and rejected. He adverts to the broad way, through which the thronging multitudes go down to death, and points out the narrow way, in which few travellers are found. He mentions sins, the commission of which exposes men "to hell-fire"-"a fire

that never shall be quenched." He urges men to lay up for themselves treasures in heaven, for so only can they have an inheritance there. He plainly teaches that all who heed not his words will, in the last day, resemble the foolish man who was ruined in the hour of tempest and storm. How many converts would this first sermon of the Savior secure, if now repeated, from place to place, by the advocates of Universalism?

The whole teaching of the Savior was of the same character. A few instances I will produce.

"Fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul; but rather fear Him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell." "But I will forewarn you whom ye shall fear: Fear Him which, after he hath killed, hath power to cast into hell; yea, I say unto you, fear him." (Matt. x. 28. Luke xii. 5.)

This was always a perplexing text to me, and difficult to harmonize with Universalism. This difficulty all Universalist writers admit. No two of them ex

plain it alike. No interpretation satisfies. The simple fact that Christ warns men to fear God, who can cast the soul into hell after the body is destroyed, and cautions them that, as men can commit an act which will forfeit their life, so can they commit sins which will expose the soul to hell, is too apparent to be denied, and too awful to be trifled with. And not only could men commit such sins, and be thus exposed, but some already had done so. This is implied in Christ's exclamation, "How can ye escape the damnation of hell?" (Matt. xxiii. 33.) Could he