Chapter II: Part 2

Those who, like ourselves, derive their religious belief from the Bible alone, can scarcely meet on the ground of argument those who profess 'most firmly to admit and embrace apostolical and ecclesiastical traditions,' if the subject of discussion be other than the authority of such traditions. On this discussion we shall enter hereafter. It only belongs to the present division of our subject to observe, that, not admitting the authority of ecclesiastical traditions in matters of faith, and finding in the Scriptures no intimation of homage being due to the mother of Christ, or the holy men who glorified the Gospel in their lives and deaths, we offer no such homage, and that the worship and invocation of such are a direct infringement of the command, 'Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shall thou serve.'

It is not difficult to trace the origin and progress of a custom which, though founded on a natural veneration for holiness sealed by death, is in our opinion more fatal to the purity, and inimical to the dignity of the Gospel that any other which its professors have adopted.--It was a custom in the early times of Christianity, to meet for worship at the tombs of the Martyrs; not for the sake of paying homage to the departed, but because the survivors found their devotional feelings more sensibly excited there. Their imaginations were at the same time possessed by the poetical fictions of the pagan philosophy, which represented the souls of the departed as hovering round the place of interment, and conscious of what was passing near. From this superstition arose the practice of making offerings annually in the name of the deceased, as an acknowledgement that they were still considered members of their respective churches. This practice appears to have been first adopted at the death of Polycarp, and to have speedily grown into a rite scarcely distinguishable from the superstitions of heathenism. Tertullian observes, 'We make oblations for the dead and for their martyrdom, yearly, on certain days.' At this time it was the general belief that the usual abode of the dead was in subterraneous places, or at least 'below,' somewhere near the earth, and as long as this belief subsisted, prayers were offered _for_ the dead,--for their present repose and joyful future resurrection. The Virgin Mary was thus prayed for. As the Martyrs were more highly thought of, however, than other deceased Christians, it began to be imagined, about the middle of the fourth century, that they were, by peculiar favor, admitted earlier to the immediate presence of God, and permitted to exert influence even over his purposes. Then began the solicitations addressed to men doomed to death, that they would be mindful of the survivors; and the agreements of companions, that whichever should first depart should petition at the foot of the heavenly throne for his mortal friend. In a few more years arose the custom of invoking the spirits supposed to hover near the tombs; some hesitation being implied in the expression 'if they were indeed present, and had any influence in things below.' It was yet a long time before prayer was offered to Saints in general, and in the public services of the Church. That the practice, if it had been originated, was not approved by the Fathers of the Church in the third century, we know on the direct testimony of Origen, who says that men are not to pray to any derived being (not even to Christ himself), but to God the Father of all. Austin disapproved of praying _for_ the Saints, though he believed that the Church might be helped by their intercession; at the same time acknowledging, 'It is true the Saints do not themselves hear what passes below, but they hear of it by others who die and go to them.'

The time when the custom of invoking the Saints was first countenanced by the Church may be fixed about the end of the fourth century. In the fifth, all opposition to it had ceased, and the images of Martyrs began to be regarded with peculiar honor; it being imagined by many that the homage paid to the image drew down into it the propitious presence of the celestial being whom it represented; in the same manner as the statues of Jupiter and other pagan gods were believed by heathen worshipers to become instinct with divine life. The temples of the Martyrs were now, as Theodoret informs us, ornamented with little figures, of gold and silver, representing eyes, feet, hands, &c., deposited for the acceptance of the lords of the temples, as memorials of cures wrought by them on these several members: these memorials proclaiming the power of the dead; whose power, again, demonstrates their God to be the true God. How changed was this Christianity from that given by him who forbade his followers to ask anything even of him, because the Father himself loved them!

Concerning Mary, the mother of Jesus, those who have not vowed to admit ecclesiastical traditions as matters of faith, pretend to little knowledge from the time of the death of Christ. Her name is mentioned but once in the Book of Acts, when she is enumerated among the disciples who were collected after the ascension of Jesus; and how and where she lived and died, we have no means of ascertaining. The first act of respect to her memory which is on record is censured by Epiphanius, as 'a heresy of the women.' It consisted of an offering of cakes, prepared and offered by women only, and generally disapproved of, (though oblations on tombs were then very common,) because it was not known where she was interred. It may be inferred, however, from the account given by Epiphanius, that prayers were by some persons offered to the Virgin, though he rebukes the new superstition. The first person of authority who is known to have introduced and countenanced the worship of Mary, is Peter Gnapheus, bishop of Antioch, who in the fifth century appointed her name to be invoked in the prayers of the Church. If such homage were her due, how came the Apostles and the apostolic Fathers to withhold it from her? Why was her claim disallowed so long?

We can fully enter into, and are far from disapproving of, the natural curiosity which prompts an inquiry into the fate of one whom all generations unite in calling blessed. When we ponder, as we cannot but do, her privileges above all womanhood besides; when we imagine the intentness of soul with which she must have watched the course of her holy Son; perceiving perhaps before all others the manifestations of divine grace in him; becoming more and more elated in her hopes, as the presence of God in him became more evident; trembling at the malignity of the rulers and the madness of the people; and finally sinking in desolation of heart when every vital hope appeared extinguished; we cannot but search for an authentic record of what befell her after the day when the beloved disciple took her to his own home. But being convinced, as we are, that no such record exists, we dare not fill up the history with conjectures of our own; much less admit the claims founded on fable and supported by superstition, which are advanced in her favor by writers who possessed no more knowledge of her state than ourselves, and who were much less impressed by experience with the importance of keeping religion pure, simple, and undefiled. We regard Mary as one of the most interesting persons presented by history, but as in no respect connected with the Gospel we receive. Christianity was not revealed till Christ became a man; and as Mary had no act or part in its diffusion, she bears no other relation to us than as a being whose lot engages our sympathies, and whose tender nature and pious character should excite our affection and emulation. For the same reasons, however largely we may share the universal curiosity respecting the state of the dead, however rationally our philosophy may conceive, or however vividly our imaginations may represent them as living, as observing the course of events, as participating in our emotions, as enjoying the manifest presence of God, we dare not found any religious belief or practice on such speculations. If our religious observances had been in any way connected with the dead, we should have known something of their state and offices; but as no such knowledge is imparted, as there was no pretension to it in the earliest ages, and especially as Christianity clearly points to God as the sole object of religious worship, we invoke the departed for no other purpose than to satisfy our speculative doubts, we attribute to them no other office than that of endearing the past and hallowing the future, and offer no other oblations than those of the memory and the affections. Even if we believed them permitted to intercede for us with our Father, we should be slow to seek their aid; for if there be one privilege more precious than another, it is that of direct, intimate communion with Him who knoweth our weakness and our strength; if there be one provision more sacred than another in the charter of our 'glorious liberty,' it is that by which they who are far off and they who are near have equal access unto the Father; not through the ministrations of inferior spirits, but face to face in the sanctuary of his presence. He is not only our sure, but our near refuge; not only our unfailing, but our very present help; not only our hope, but our perpetual joy. The deepest of our joys and griefs, those which it is most necessary to confide to Him who caused them, are absolutely incommunicable to all besides; and what is emphatically true of our self-communings, that 'the heart knoweth its own bitterness,' is yet more true of spirit worship, 'no stranger intermeddling with its joy.'

Having thus stated the grounds of our dissent from that clause of the symbol of Pius IV. which declares that 'the Saints reigning together with Christ are to be honored and invocated, and that they offer prayers to God for us,' it is needless to notice what follows; viz. that their relics are to be venerated; 'that the images of Christ and the Mother of God, ever Virgin, and also of the other saints, are to be had and retained; and that due honor and veneration are to be given to them.' Such practices we hold to be utterly inconsistent with the principle that God is the sole object of religious worship; which principle is derived from what we have laid down as the first essential doctrine of Revelation,--the Unity of Jehovah.

The next essential doctrine is,

II. The unlimited extent of the Redemption by Christ.

A large proportion of the differences which have arisen in the Christian world respecting the doctrine of redemption, proceed from the variety of meanings which is attached to the term _salvation_. While one party understands by it an admission to the privileges of the Gospel, and a consequent emancipation from the penalties of the old dispensation; another, the state of virtue and peace which will prevail when Christianity has compassed the globe; and a third, a future state of perfect bliss in contrast to one of eternal torment; there is little hope of a mutual understanding respecting the doctrine of Justification. Our part now is to state our own views, and not to enter on any discussion of those of others.

We believe that by _salvation_ the Scripture writers commonly signified the state of privilege into which Christian believers were brought by their adoption of the principles of holiness and peace which the Gospel affords. Thus, according to its original meaning, the term was appropriated to a state of comparative blessedness in this world; but as the principles of the Gospel exert the most powerful influence over our spiritual state, over our capacity for happiness in a future world, the term Salvation has naturally and not improperly been accommodated to signify a state of future safety and bliss. That it did not always mean this, however, is evident to all attentive readers of the Scriptures; as there is not one of Paul's epistles or discourses which would be intelligible, if he were supposed to declare his converts saved from the pains of hell, instead of from the dominion of the evils of heathenism, or the condemnation of the Jewish law. By _redemption_, we understand a release from the same evils and penalties effected by a sacrifice on the part of a benevolent mediator. By _remission of sins_, we understand the forgiveness and consequent remission of punishment which are promised in the Gospel on condition of repentance and newness of life. By _justification_, we believe the sacred writers sometimes to signify the process by which believers are released from all obligations incurred towards the old law, and brought into a state of spiritual freedom; and sometimes that free state itself. We conceive that this interpretation of terms--not new and arbitrary, but only divested of the false associations which have been long gathering round them--will clear up most of the mysteries which obscure a very important Christian doctrine, and enable us, in comparing scripture with scripture, to discern a consistency of views and a depth of truth which afford an irresistible evidence of their divine authority.

The whole scheme of revelation we conceive to be the method designed by the divine wisdom, and adopted by the divine benevolence, for bringing the human race into a state of purity and peace more rapidly than could be effected by the religion of nature. The welfare of the whole race was no less the object of the Jewish than of the Christian dispensation, though its apparent privileges were confined to the peculiar people. These privileges, immediately and positively advantageous to the chosen people, were remotely and relatively so to others, by establishing before their eyes evidences of a divine moral government; and as a moral government implies consistency of authority, it affords a strong presumption of the unity of the Governor. The Jews were led on from the fundamental principle of the Divine Unity to the apprehension of a divine moral government; while observant heathens, perceiving the moral results of the national vicissitudes of the Hebrew people, deduced thence the truth of the Unity of the Deity. Meanwhile, both were advancing to a state of fitness for a fuller revelation; the Jews more rapidly than the heathens, as being specially placed under the schoolmaster who was to bring them unto Christ; but still, dispensing spiritual benefits towards the heathen, for whose sake as well as for their own they were placed in a state of privilege. The old dispensation, though a condition of light and privilege compared with that of nature, was a state of darkness and bondage when contrasted with Christianity. Though the Hebrews had more elevated conceptions of God and clearer notions of duty than the Gentiles, they yet could not appreciate the riches of divine grace, or the extent of divine and human relations, or the full beauty of holiness. They were burdened by a heavy yoke of ritual observances; an escape from the penalties of the law was impossible; and especially, they had no certain knowledge of a future life. The blessings therefore which Christianity offered,--the _redemption_ from the bondage of the law, the _remission_ of the penalties of sin on repentance, the _justification_ by which they were placed in a condition of spiritual power and freedom,--were worthy of all the exultation experienced and all the thanksgivings expressed by those who were thus redeemed, forgiven, and justified. These blessings were yet more valuable to the Gentiles, in proportion to the more rigorous bondage and deeper moral darkness to which they had been subjected. Instead of the strict but salutary discipline of the law, they had sustained the tyranny of lawless appetites and passions, had lived without other restraints than those of nature; and had no hope in death, but the glimmering and uncertain presages which their own faculties or long-corrupted traditions supplied.

The mode of preparation for the introduction of the Gospel affords a strong presumption that its benefits were intended for the whole race. The Jews had been led on to the point when their spiritual development absolutely required a more expansive revelation; and the Gentiles were prepared, by their observation of the Hebrew people, and by their own wants, sins, and sorrows, to receive with joy happier tidings than their fondest hopes could anticipate, and richer benefits than their desires could previously have comprehended. The benefits of the Gospel, after being offered to the Jews and partially accepted by them, were freely held out to the whole human race, and received by all who were conscious of the need of them: so that the Gospel was truly what the aged Simeon declared it, 'the salvation which God had prepared before all people; a light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of his people Israel.'

Yet there were many among the people of Israel who were blind to this glory, and many of the Gentiles who rejected this guiding light. This rejection was not caused by any restrictive quality in the revelation, any provision in the Gospel itself for the limitation of its privileges: nor was it caused by any previous arbitrary decree of the ordainer of salvation, that on account of some very ancient event, totally unconnected with the present dispensation, a large majority of the human race should be rendered absolutely incapable of participating in the blessings of redemption. It was occasioned by the prejudices of narrow minds, by the ignorance of darkened minds, by the spiritual pride of presumptuous minds, by the petty hopes and fears of selfish minds,--prejudices, ignorance and selfishness naturally arising in the then state of the world, and not to be immediately or speedily got rid of but by miracle: a mode of agency which the Divine Being has frequently made use of to sanction his revelations, but never to prepare the human mind for their reception. Thus spiritual ignorance and moral blindness are, we apprehend, the only obstacles to universal redemption; and we firmly believe that these obstacles are only temporary. The Gospel itself bears such an indisputable character of permanence and universality (as we shall hereafter show), and so evident a provision is made for the gradual dissipation of darkness and error, that we may confidently anticipate the time when the hope of the Gospel shall be the rich possession of every individual of every nation.

That it will be so we conclude, not from the persuasion of our own hopes, or at the bidding of our reason in opposition to the declarations of Scripture; but because every principle derived from the Gospel sanctions the commands of our reason and affords a warrant of our hope. There is in no Gospel, History, or Epistle, a hint of any restriction or limitation of the blessings of redemption. Christ is ever spoken of as having died for all; there are thanksgivings in the name of all, invitations embracing all, and anticipations of the ultimate bliss of all. Those who are mourned over, reproached, entreated, compassionated, because they will not accept freedom and peace, are spoken of as excluded by their own unfitness for grace, arising from natural causes, and not by any sin of any ancestor, or by any arbitrary decree of God, or by any repellant and exclusive character in the dispensation of grace itself. Its most distinguishing character, on the contrary, was its boundlessness. Its first work was to throw down the wall of partition which had separated the favored people from others, to abolish arbitrary distinctions, to exchange the multifarious conditions of the old law for the few, simple and universal requisites of salvation declared in the new. If other distinctions have since been instituted, other conditions imposed, other requisites insisted on, they are no part of Christianity, and shall no more impede its ultimate prevalence than the cloud which shrouds the lightning can prevent its shining from one part of the heaven unto the other.

It may be objected, and with justice, that this method of considering the scheme of justification makes out the gift of grace to be only ultimately and not strictly universal; unlimited in its tendencies, but hitherto very limited in the diffusion of its blessings: and hence may arise an inquiry concerning the fate of those who have died without the hope of the Gospel.

As to the limited spread of the Gospel thus far, it is our business not to assign the final cause of the fact, but to admit and reason on the fact itself. The fact occasions no horror in our minds, and less regret than is felt perhaps by any denomination of Christians besides ourselves; and for this reason, that we do not hold perdition to be the only alternative to salvation by Christ. We find no sanction for so fearful a collocation of terms in the record of the covenant; no mode of reconciling the doctrine thus originated with the attributes of Deity, or with our conceptions of justice, much less of benignity. Moreover we can clearly discern through what misconception the monstrous belief in the everlasting destruction of unbelievers, whether by natural or moral necessity, has sprung to birth. We believe it to have arisen from the before-mentioned misapprehension of the terms Salvation, Remission of sins, and Justification.

To the enjoyment of the blessings of the Gospel no alternative could be opposed but their non-possession; to the remission of sins, but their retention; to justification, but condemnation under the law. But it does not follow that when these terms are shifted from their original use, and accommodated to a subject to which they do not naturally belong, they should be still opposed to each other, no others being allowed to intervene. If it be generally agreed to understand by _Salvation_ a state of perfect bliss after death, it is well: but if any man then choose to transfer the term _Perdition_ from meaning the loss of the privileges of Christianity to the loss of the happiness of heaven and a consequent subjection to the pains of hell, he goes further than the customary use of language allows, further than reason can sanction, and much further astray from a true theology than he can at present estimate, or can hereafter sufficiently deplore. It is mournful enough that myriads have died in ignorance and error, that thousands have rejected offered light; but no words can express the horror of the popular doctrine of the eternal condemnation of all who have not died in the faith of Christ, or our reprobation of the corruption through which such a doctrine has been originated, received, and retained. While we believe that grace and truth came by Jesus Christ, and that 'all things are but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus our Lord,' we cannot believe that wrath from above and misery from below, sin from within and darkness around, destined to be dissipated only by the flames of hell, are the portion of all but those who are equally happy with ourselves. Our belief appears to us more consistent with our apprehensions of the perfections of our Father, with our interpretations of his providence, and with the spirit of his revealed law. We believe that though Christianity is the focus in which all the lights of reason and religion are concentrated, every ray is not there absorbed. We believe that though shadows brood more or less darkly over every heathen land, there is in the most remote a glimmering of the dawn; a ray which may direct the eye towards the fountain of glory, and engage the attention to watch the rising of that sun which shall set no more.

We believe that the rewards of righteousness are promised to all; and that the practice of righteousness is not limited to any kindred, tongue, or people, or essentially connected with any religious belief. We hold that retribution is the universal sanction of the universal moral law; and if the nature of the sanction be more fully understood by Christians, and therefore practically admitted with greater readiness, let them be as grateful as they will for the great privilege, but beware of supposing that the sanction is abolished to all besides. Under the various obscurations of this sanction, savage virtue may be inferior to civilized,--Hottentot to Roman virtue, as both are to Christian holiness; but there is every reason to believe that the savage who surrendered his hard-earned meal to the hungry stranger, and the Pagan senators and warriors who toiled and bled for their country, were as sure of an appropriate reward as the most benevolent and heroic of Christians.

The unlimited nature of salvation in this sense, leads us on to another great doctrine of the Gospel; viz.

III. A Future State.

This truth, the most important to human improvement, the most interesting to human affections, was so fully brought to light by the Gospel, that Christians have differed respecting it no further than as to the time and mode in which future retribution will take place. That Jesus died on the cross, was inclosed in the sepulchre, and was led forth thence by the manifest power of God, are facts too well authenticated to be questioned to any purpose by the most hardy sceptic; and on them securely rests the sublime belief which, from the midst of obscurity, had already cheered the bereaved, animated the martyr, and exalted the hopes and fears of the great body of the Hebrew nation. They had been led, like many of the Gentiles, by the mournful questionings of their affections, to inquire concerning a future state, and at length to believe in it; but their indistinct belief was widely different in nature and far inferior in power to the firm and clear faith with which the resurrection of Christ authorized them to look forward. Their former belief was strong enough to reconcile them to death; and perhaps they had sufficiently clear convictions that the future life would be a scene of retribution, to govern their own conduct by some regard to it; but the evidence was not such as to authorize their pressing on the minds of others the motives which the doctrine now affords. Without the evidence of the facts of Christ's resurrection, Paul could not have made Felix tremble at the prospect of judgement to come; or have enforced the duties of masters to their servants by considerations of their accountability to a master in heaven; or have felt how far better it was to depart and be with Christ than to pursue his earthly labors. Without this evidence, Stephen could not have met his fate as if he had been welcoming the hour of rest from which the beams of a new day should awaken him. Without this evidence, no one of the Apostles could have passed through his labors and sufferings with zeal, patience, and cheerfulness; for we have their own testimony, that if in this life only they had had hope in Christ, they would have been of all men the most miserable. Without this evidence, not only would the hopes of millions who have since lived have vacillated, the peace of millions have been at the mercy of sickness and death, and their spiritual strength in perpetual peril from temptation, but the state of morals through the whole civilized world, imperfect as it yet is, would have been far inferior to what we see it, and could never attain the purity which we confidently anticipate in some future age. Without this evidence, Christianity would be almost nothing; for the doctrine of future retribution is not only its most important revelation, but it is so intimately connected with every other, as a sanction, that the Church might as well be supposed complete without its chief corner-stone, as Christianity to be efficacious if deprived of this last grand truth. This evidence we have, however; and possessing it, it is of comparatively little importance how widely men differ in their speculations as to the time and mode in which the future life shall succeed to the present, and as to the nature of the rewards and punishments which shall follow their probation. The belief in a certain and righteous retribution is all that is enforced upon us by Christianity, all that is a necessary consequence of our faith in the resurrection of Christ. Yet, as a tendency to unauthorized speculation, and also a misapprehension of some Scriptural expressions, appear to us to have caused a very extensive forgetfulness that retribution is not only certain, but will be righteous, we must enter on some explanation of our views respecting the extent of punishment of which the life to come is to be the scene.

We say respecting the _extent_ only, because the _nature_ of the punishment is a subject of far inferior importance, and one on which we possess so little light that it may fairly be left to the imagination of each individual to conceive for himself. Some persons, perhaps the great majority of every denomination of Christians, believe that the pains of actual burning will be inflicted on a corporeal frame, susceptible of suffering in the same way as the body which we at present inhabit, but rendered indestructible. Others conceive that the Scripture language which describes the wicked as tormented by fire is metaphorical, and that it clearly refers, by way of allusion, to the valley of Hinnom, where corrupt substances were devoured by worms, and where human sacrifices were offered by fire to Moloch. Such imagine that the future sufferings of the wicked will be purely mental, but not therefore the less severe and awful. If it had been necessary to form clear conceptions on this subject, a fuller light would have been cast upon it; and as that fuller light is not granted, we may fairly suppose that we cannot at present understand the exact nature of the evil of which we are emphatically called on to beware. But of the duration of the evil, we believe ourselves so far qualified to judge, as to anticipate that it will not be eternal.

Our reasons for thus determining are various. It is, in the first place, utterly inconceivable that God should appoint to any individual of his creatures a lot in which misery predominates over happiness. Our belief in the Divine prescience requires that we suppose the fate of every man to be ordained from the beginning. Our faith in the Divine mercy requires that we should expect an overbalance of good in the existence of every being thus ordained; and that in no case can the punishment be disproportionate to the offence. Our faith in the Divine benevolence inspires a conviction that all evil is to be made subsidiary to good, and that therefore all punishment must be corrective, all suffering remedial. Thus far the light of nature teaches us to anticipate the final restitution of sinners.

It is confirmed by revelation,--by every passage of the sacred records which represents God as a tender Father to all the human race, as just and good, as incapable of being 'angry for ever,' or of taking pleasure in the punishment of the wicked, and as chastising in mercy, for corrective purposes. It is confirmed by every passage which describes the good brought into the world by Christ as overbalancing the evil produced by the introduction of sin and death. It is confirmed by every passage which prophetically announces the triumph of the Gospel over all adverse powers,--death, sin, and sorrow. Above all, it is confirmed by the whole tenor of the preachings and writings of the Saviour and his followers,--by the spirit of boundless benevolence, of joyful faith, of exulting hope, which is every where blended with their emphatic warnings of the perils of sin, and their mournful regret for the infatuation of sinners. It appears to us that against all this array of evidence on the one side, little or none can be adduced on the other.

That which is brought forward most frequently and with the most show of reason is the expressions commonly translated _everlasting_, and which are applied both to the future happiness of the righteous and misery of the wicked. These terms (which are much less frequently applied to a future state than is commonly supposed) do not invariably signify 'everlasting' and 'eternal,' as is evident from their being applied to various institutions and states which have already come to an end and passed away: as to the covenant with Abraham, which is declared to have been long since annulled; to the priesthood of Aaron, of which no vestiges remain; and to the flames of Gehenna, which have been quenched for ages. The strictly correct rendering of the terms in these cases is _permanent_, _continual_, _lasting_, and not absolutely eternal.

In order to reconcile the terms as usually rendered with the attribute of Divine justice, some Christians have imagined that the limited punishment of the wicked will be followed by immediate destruction; but this supposition leaves the difficulty where it was before, and is besides destitute of all support from reason or Scripture; as it is incompatible with the character of the Divine dispensations that punishment should be appointed for any but corrective purposes, or that sin and sorrow should triumph in the annihilation of any individual of God's creatures.

If we are asked why then we firmly believe in the immortality of the righteous? we reply, that we found our faith on much better evidence than the use of the terms we have now been considering. We believe it, because the happiness of the creature is the fulfilment of the ends of creation and providence; because happiness is an eternal principle, while misery is only a temporary influence; and because it would argue imperfection in the Deity, if he were either unable or unwilling to prolong a holy and blissful existence.

This doctrine,--of the limited and corrective nature of future punishment,--is often likened by those who disbelieve and disapprove it, to the Catholic doctrine of purgatory; a likeness which Catholics and Unitarians are perhaps equally unwilling to admit, though the latter have little doubt that the belief in purgatory is a corruption of the genuine doctrine as they hold it now.

It was the opinion of many of the Fathers in very early times, that the world would be destroyed by fire; that the good would be purified by the process, and the wicked consumed. It is clear that they derived a part of this belief from some other source than the Scriptures; but it is equally clear that they had no notion of an eternity of torment. Origen, Clemens Alexandrinus, his master, with Gregory Nazianzen, and others of the Fathers, held that the wicked would survive this punishment, and come out purified and fit for a blissful state. The Catholic doctrine of purgatory probably arose out of some of these opinions, though it embraces much which does not appear to have entered into the imaginations of the Fathers. Its substance, as declared in the councils of Florence and Trent, is that every man is liable both to temporal and eternal punishment for his sins; that the eternal punishment may be escaped by faith in the atonement of Christ; but that the temporal must be borne by the individual in this world or at his entrance on the next; that the sufferings of those who undergo purgation may be relieved by the prayers and suffrages of their earthly brethren, though in what manner this relief is wrought, whether by a process of satisfaction, or of intercession, or of any other method, it is not essential to true faith to be certified. Neither is it necessary to know where the place of purgation is; of what nature its pains are, and how long sufferers may be detained there. The belief in purgatory was, for some ages, held by all Christians, except the ancient Waldenses, who left the Church of Rome before the doctrine was established there, and who never admitted it. Soon after the Reformation, it was abandoned by all who left the Church of Rome; so that it has since been peculiar to that church.

Our reasons for rejecting it are, that we find no trace of it in Scripture, and that, as we declared before, we do not admit ecclesiastical traditions as matters of faith. We also reject the notion that any part of the punishment of sin can be escaped through the sacrifices, or mediation, or intercession of any being whomsoever. We have been frequently accused of impairing a divinely appointed sanction by asserting the limited extent of future punishment; but we think that the sanction is, in reality, abolished by the admission that the Divine decrees may be set aside by human acts, and that the relations of good and evil, virtue and vice, which are declared to be immutable, may be changed at the pleasure of mortal agents. We believe the punishment of sin to be of limited duration; but as certain as the existence of the moral agent, and as little capable of remission through the will of any created being as the law which regulates the rise and fall of the tides, the changes of the moon, and the revolutions of the planets. We hold it to be awful, not only from its certainty, but from its concealed nature. It will doubtless transcend all that the experience of earth can suggest to the imagination. Can it be said that we impair this sanction when we hold that the suffering consequent on guilt is absolutely certain, lasting in its duration, and inconceivably dreadful in its nature? What apprehensions could be fitted to excite greater dread?

For the purpose of explaining why we believe that no part of the consequences of guilt can be evaded through the sacrifices, mediation, or intercession of any being whatsoever, it is necessary to pass on to the next division of our subject. Having stated the three leading doctrines of Christianity, the Unity of God, the unlimited scope of the plan of redemption, and a future state, we now proceed briefly to examine the principles of morals proposed by the Gospel.

The fundamental truths of Morals are eternal as He to whom they primarily relate, and immutable as the purposes which they subserve. But it is necessary that they should be communicated to men under different forms and according to various methods, as minds are prepared to receive them: and their application must also be regulated according to the circumstances in which men are placed. The same principle was proposed to Adam in Paradise, to Abraham in Beersheba, and to Paul when he set his face steadfastly to go to Jerusalem, knowing that bonds and afflictions awaited him there. Obedience to God was the motive proposed for abstaining from the forbidden fruit, for sacrificing an only son, and for facing suffering and death. But an intimation which was all powerful with Abraham was insufficient to secure a much less painful obedience from Adam; and the self-devotion of Paul was ennobled in all its manifold instances, by its springing, not from so many express directions, but from a principle, undeviating and perpetual in its operation. In the infancy of the race, it would have been utterly useless to reveal the grand principles of morals in any other way than that which was adopted, viz. by exhibiting their application in various instances. The Divine will was therefore made known in express directions, probably very few in number at first, and gradually increasing in number and importance, so as to enable observers, from remarking the similar tendency of several, to infer a general principle from them. All the records which we possess of the history of the race to the calling of the Israelites out of Egypt, prove this to have been the method adopted. The commands of God, and the promises and threats by which they were sanctioned, bore an analogy, in their gradual elevation, to those by which we influence an opening mind in its progress from the first manifestation of intelligence to the age when the power of conscience is recognizable. In the Mosaic system, a considerable advance was made, a direct appeal to conscience being instituted, and the gradual revelation of a moral government being provided for. Men were then taught, not what we now know, that the relation between virtue and happiness, vice and misery, is immutable (which they could not have understood,) but that in their particular case, obedience to certain laws would secure prosperity, and disobedience adversity. Such obedience, the most virtuous were incited to render, from a fear and love of God; but they could not have rendered it in any but specified cases, because, not yet being made acquainted with the principle as a principle, they could not direct its application for themselves. The case was the same with the other great principle, Benevolence, as with Piety; and, accordingly, the body of laws which was prepared for the Israelites was voluminous, and their sanctions were expressed in a copious variety of promises and threatenings, and embodied in a burthensome ritual, consisting chiefly of penal acts. When the nation had thus been exercised long enough to prepare it for entering on a new course of moral agency (as we prepare a child for the spontaneous exercise of filial duty and fraternal love by a discipline of express commands and particular acts,) Christianity was dispensed, and men were at length furnished with the principles themselves, with whose application they were henceforth to be entrusted.

Christianity was designed to be permanent and universal; and, therefore, though it was first communicated in the form best adapted to those who were first to receive it, it contains within itself that which shall fit it to be a revelation to the mind of man in every stage.

It contains eternal principles of doctrine and morals, embodied in facts, which are the only immutable and universal language. The character of Christ affords a never-failing suggestion, and a perfect illustration of the principles of morals; a suggestion which only the most careless minds can fail to receive, and an illustration by which only the most hardened can fail to be impressed. From him it was learned what part of the moral law of Moses was to be retained and what forgone; how much was vital and permanent and how much external and temporary. From him it was learned, and shall be learned to the end of time, how the sympathy which caused tears at the grave of Lazarus, the compassion which relieved the widowed mother of Nain, the tenderness which yearned towards the repentant Apostle, the diffusive love which embraced in its prayer all of every age and nation who needed the gospel of grace, combined to enforce and adorn the principle of Benevolence. His parables are eloquent in their praise of benevolence; his entreaties to mutual love are urgent, and his commands decisive; but the eloquence of his example is by far more urgent and irresistible. From him it was, and ever shall be, learned that the rule of life is to be found in the will of God. From his devotion to the work which God had given him to do, from his perpetual reference of all things to the Divine will, from his unhesitating submission to suffering and death, from his supreme delight in devotional communion, we learn how Piety is the pre-eminent principle of feeling and action which men are required to adopt. The parables which inculcate ready filial obedience and sorrow for disobedience, the declarations that it was his meat and drink to do the will of God, and that he was not alone because the Father was with him, are powerful enforcements of the principle; but not so powerful as the acts of obedience and resignation in which its power shone forth. The whole scheme of morals is comprehended in the precepts, 'Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and soul, and mind, and strength, and thy neighbor as thyself;' but the concentration of truth and beauty is less resplendant, less engaging, less universally clear and interesting, than in the character of him who deduced these two principles from all the law and the prophets.

With these two principles, and all the subordinate ones which are derived from them, are connected sanctions from above, which attest their origin and secure their adoption. By an irreversible decree of Him who founded nature and vouchsafed a revelation, certain states of enjoyment and suffering are connected with the practical adoption or rejection of the principles of duty, not by way of arbitrary appointment, but of natural consequence. The relations of holiness and happiness, of guilt and misery, are unalterable; shown to be so by the teachings of nature and experience, by the explicit declarations of Scripture, and by every species of evidence which the mind of man is capable of receiving.

Though the chief object of the Christian revelation was to make this relation more evident than it had ever been before, many who received the Gospel imagine that it discovers to them a means by which the relation may be suspended or destroyed. This misapprehension we hold to be more fatal in its moral consequences than any other which human prejudice has originated. By what appears to us a strange perversion of Scripture language, and by the gradual increase of some subordinate errors, it began to be imagined, some centuries ago, that, though misery is necessarily connected with guilt, yet that the guilt may be perpetrated by one person, and the consequent misery endured by another; and this belief has subsisted in almost every Christian church till this day. It is well that it has been confined to the churches, and that its application has been limited, by all but Catholics, to one very peculiar case; for if it had become the common doctrine of our schools, and colleges, and homes, if it had been enforced by parents and moral philosophers and professors as a general truth, as it is by divines with reference to a particular case, the very foundations of virtue would have been overthrown, and the force of its sanctions not only wasted but fatally perverted.

Happily the accents of reason and religion have been too distinct and harmonious to be overpowered by the dictates of error, or very extensively neglected. Notwithstanding all that religious teachers have erroneously inculcated of the possible and actual separation of guilt and its punishment on the principle of vicarious suffering, education has still proceeded, and moral discipline been enforced as if no such false principle had ever been advocated. Children are swayed by hope and fear of the consequences of their actions to themselves; and self-government is enforced at a riper age by the same motives, though enlarged and elevated. In religion alone has an error, as absurd in its nature as injurious in its tendencies, been retained thus long by the force of prejudice; and that it has not spread further we hold to be owing to its manifest folly and to its evidently noxious influence when applied to any case but that to which it is appropriated. There can be no surer proof that the principle itself is false.

It is difficult to know where to begin in disproving a doctrine which is repugnant to every other doctrine, inconsistent with every received truth, and incompatible with every admitted divine and human relation, with every known attribute of mind, divine or human. It will be sufficient to state one reason for utterly rejecting as we do the doctrine of vicarious suffering; that reason being suggested and confirmed both by our own understandings and by Scripture.

It is clear that no man can sin for another. He may sin at the instigation of another, or for the supposed benefit of another; but in the first case, the sin remains with both, and in the last, with the perpetrator only. Moral disease thus bears an exact analogy to natural disease. Natural disease may be communicated, or even incurred for the benefit of another, but it cannot be so transferred as to be annihilated with respect to the person who was first subject to it. The case is precisely the same with the pain which is the inseparable consequence of sin. If endured by any but the sinner, it is actually and completely disconnected with the sin. It is no longer a punishment, but a gratuitous infliction. This is so evident that, if proposed in any court of justice but that from which our purest conceptions of justice are derived, the reason and conscience of every man would exclaim against the monstrous notion of a substitution of punishment. If a man had transgressed the laws of his country by theft, would he not be the most unjust judge upon earth who would sentence his elder brother, known to be innocent and virtuous, to imprisonment or death for the offence?

Would the case be altered, except in the way of aggravation, if the sentence were inflicted at the desire of the innocent man? Would any purpose of justice be answered by such a process? Would not every principle of equity--to say nothing of benevolence--be violated? Would not the sufferer be as foolish and blind in his submission as the judge arbitrary in the infliction? Is it not utterly impossible that a transaction, perfectly analogous in principle, though infinitely more momentous in its influences, should take place between the just Judge, the tender Father of men, a creature made fallible by Him, and His holy and beloved Son?

But we are told it is not for us to argue thus on the right and wrong of a transaction which has taken place, and is continually taking place, by Divine appointment. It is enough that God has appointed this method of salvation.

The lawfulness of examining the Divine decrees with intent to understand them, will be discussed hereafter. Our business now is to declare why we do not believe this to be the appointed method of salvation, set forth in the sacred records. Repentance (including not merely shame and sorrow for sin, but newness of life) appears to us to stand forth on the face of the sacred records as the grand, the sole, condition of forgiveness of sins. The faith in Christ, which is so strenuously insisted on as a requisite, is valuable as inducing sorrow for sin and purity of life. Our obligations to Christ, which are so vividly described, are due to him for the benefits he has bestowed on us through his Gospel, and not for any subsequent arbitrary gift, which we feel it impossible for him to have offered, for us to avail ourselves of, and for God to accept. Our obligations to him are boundless and eternal;--for having devoted and sacrificed his life to furnish us with the conditions of salvation,--to teach us repentance, and incite us to holiness. He was truly a sacrifice for men; he suffered and died because they were sinners, and in order to bring them salvation. This the Scripture teaches, and this we readily admit; finding, however, no intimation that any sin has ever been forgiven on any other condition than that of repentance; that repentance has ever failed to procure forgiveness; that any being whatever has at any time exercised or possessed the power of separating sin and suffering by taking either upon himself, or of transferring both from the consciousness of another to his own; that if the endurance of suffering by substitution were possible, it could not be righteous; or that if it were not unrighteous, it could be available to any beneficent purpose. Finding none of these suppositions, but all their opposites in the spirit and detail of the sacred records, we absolutely reject the popular doctrine of the atonement by Christ, while we regard his sacrifices for us with reverential gratitude, and our obligations to him with awe and rejoicing.

The more attentively we ponder his instructions and the more amply we estimate the benefits he brought us, the more conscious do we become of the impiety of withholding from the Supreme Author of our salvation the gratitude and praise which are due to his free, unpurchased grace. It is given through Christ, but it originates in God. It comes through a mediator; but that mediator was appointed, informed, guided by God. To him Christ ascribed, not only the acceptance of his sacrifice and mediation; but the design in which it originated, the means by which it was wrought, and the end which it should ultimately accomplish; and the more we contemplate the design, become acquainted with the means, and joyfully anticipate the end, the more eagerly do we join with Christ in ascribing to Jehovah the glory and the praise.