ple; obstinately attached to a false system, which cannot be supported by scripture authority. But do they support their views of Gehenna, or any other part of their system, by such kind of authority as this? No. We have appealed to evidence and argument drawn from Scripture, for the views we have advanced about Gehenna, and invite a refutation by an appeal to the same authority. All we have had to do with the Targums, and other Jewish writings, has been in exposing the rotten foundation on which the common doctrine rests about Gehenna punishment.

SECTION VI.

OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED.

THERE is no truth revealed in the Bible against which objections may not be urged. It would, however, be a waste of time, and a very trifling employment, to answer every one which might be made. Those which are rational, and which affect the subject in dispute, demand an answer. Every one which has occurred to me, or has been suggested by others, of any weight against my views, I shall now attempt to consider. They divide themselves into two classes; common popular objections, and objections which are urged against the argument adduced. Let us begin with the first of these.

OBJECTION I.

It is said, "If you do away Gehenna or hell as a place of endless punishment, what is left to deter men from the commission of every crime?" "Indeed," say some; "if I believed there was no hell, I would indulge myself in all kinds of iniquity! Look," they say, (6 at the loose principles, and still more loose morals, of the Universalists; and then add, by way of triumph, "who ever heard of a revival of religion among them?" It will be allowed that I have stated this objection fully

and fairly. It shall now be my business as fully and fairly to meet it.

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If hell, a place of endless punishment, is done away, what is left to deter men from the commission of crime? In reply, I remark

1st. Under the Old Testament dispensation, it is allowed

that the doctrine of endless hell torments was not known. Suffer me, then, to ask what was left to deter men from crime before this doctrine had existence? When these persons have told us what was left in those days to deter men from crime without it, we are prepared to inform them what can deter men in these days without it. And if this doctrine was not preached under the Old Testament to make men holy, how came any then to be holy without it? Did Adam preach the doctrine of hell torments to Cain to make him holy? Did Noah preach this doctrine to make the antediluvians holy? Did Lot preach this doctrine to make the Sodomites holy? Yea, was the belief of this doctrine the cause of the holiness of Adam, Noah, Abraham, Lot, and a host of others? Did the belief of hell torments make them holy, in distinction from those who were unholy? If this was the cause of their being holy themselves, why did they not preach it to make their friends, neighbors, and indeed all mankind holy? If this doctrine was believed in those days, and was so well fitted, as is supposed, to prevent wickedness, why was it not preached? Surely Noah ought to have preached it to the people of the old world, when all flesh had corrupted their way upon the earth. He was a

preacher of righteousness, but I do not find a hint given in his history that he was a preacher of hell torments to deter men from their licentious courses. Besides; why did not Lot preach it to the Sodomites to make them holy? They were sinners before the Lord exceedingly; but I do not find that this doctrine kept him holy, or that he preached it to others to deter them from licentiousness. Not a word is said which would lead one to conclude that the antedilyuians and Sodomites were all

believers in the doctrine of universal salvation, and that this was the cause of their wickedness; but that Noah, Lot, and others, believed in the doctrine of hell torments, and that this led them to holiness.

2d. If the doctrine of hell torments is so well calculated to prevent sin, and promote holiness, why did not our Lord teach it to the Jews who are allowed to have been a race of very wicked men? Can any man believe that, by the damnation of hell, Jesus meant a place of eternal misery; that he thought it well fitted to prevent licentiousness, yet only mentioned it once to the unbelieving Jews? Did he think there was nothing left to prevent men from committing all manner of iniquity, and yet but once, and that in a discourse relating to the destruction of Jerusalem, say to them, "How can ye escape the damnation of hell?" It is not the easiest thing in the world for us to believe this.

3d. It is an indisputable fact that the apostles of our Lord never said a word about hell to the Gentiles. If they knew that hell was a place of endless misery for the wicked, and thought it such an excellent antidote against licentiousness, why did they never make use of it? They must have either been ignorant of such a doctrine, or very culpable in not preaching it, to deter men from crime; or they did not consider it so efficacious as the objector imagines. The Gentile nations in the apostles' days were very licentious. And it appears

from Chap. 1, Sect. 3, that they were also believers in the doctrine of eternal misery in Tartarus. But we see

that the belief of this doctrine did not turn them from their licentious courses. Nor did the apostles of our Lord think the preaching of eternal misery, either in Hades, or Gehenna, would effect this; for they do not say one word to them about punishment in either of those places. Let the objector then account for it, if the apostles were of his mind about this, why they did not preach this doctrine to prevent wickedness in their day. And let him account for it, why the Gentiles, in believ

ing it, should be so licentious. If the prophets, Jesus Christ, or his apostles, did not teach eternal torments in hell to promote holiness, ought not their doctrine to be charged with a licentious tendency as well as mine? There is no way of evading this, but by proving that they did teach this doctrine to mankind. This we think never can be done. If I am then to be condemned, how are they to be cleared? And if their doctrine did not lead to licentiousness, how, in justice, can the views I have advanced be charged with it? I shall not feel much ashamed at being found in such company. These facts are sufficient to put down this objection forever. Nor need we be alarmed that the doctrine will produce an increase of iniquity, when the inspired writers never used the opposite doctrine to check the progress of sin in the world. They had certainly something left to deter men from sin, and which they deemed so efficacious as to supersede the necessity of the doctrine of hell torments.

It is

4th. Let us inquire what that was which they deemed sufficient without it. Paul says, "the goodness of God," and not hell torments, leadeth men to repentance. "the grace of God," not hell torments, which teaches men to deny ungodliness and worldly lusts. It is the "love of Christ," not hell torments which constrains men not to live to themselves, but to the glory of God. All who are acquainted with the Scriptures know to what extent I might here refer to texts of a similar nature, showing the same thing; but I forbear. Here, then, was the sovereign remedy, which they proposed to cure a licentious world. If this failed, they had no other to propose. All other remedies which people have tried, have been like the woman, who spent her all on the physicians, but rather grew worse. The love of God in the gift of his Son is that which when believed, and its influence felt, constrains to love and to good works. Everything else to effect a cure without this is only religious quackery, and this we deem the very worst kind of quackery. But,

5th. Those persons who aver that if the doctrine of hell torments is done away, there is nothing left to deter men from the commission of every crime, must certainly think that where this doctrine is taught, it greatly tends to prevent wickedness. I believe that this will be strongly contended for. Is this then true? Can it be established by sufficient evidence? Has the preaching of hell torments to mankind produced such glorious effects as such persons would have us believe? Our actual observation of its effects, we admit, is very limited. But we have

seen a little of it, at least in two quarters of the globe, and we think facts will warrant us to say that hell torments and heathenish morality have been preached to people until they have been preached into the grossest immorality. Was not this tried for ages among the Gentile nations, but did it turn them from sin to God? No; it was when the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. Besides, our own actual observation does not lead us to think that where the doctrine of hell torments is most preached, there the people are most holy.*

6th. But admitting that the preaching of hell torments deters men, in many cases, from the commission of crimes, what opinion are we to form of the morality

* It would be well for those who think that there is a peculiarly saving power in the doctrine of endless torture to consider the following facts. 1. It has been generally believed by the heathen world. 2. It was the general doctrine of the Jews in the time of Christ. Perhaps it will be said, these facts do not present the case fairly; for though these nations held the doctrine in question, it was so associated with errors as to prevent its efficacy. To this we reply, 1. The Jews grew corrupt in proportion as the doctrine of endless misery gained credence among them. 2. Christians have been the most corrupt when this doctrine has had the greatest ascendency over them. This is true in regard to the Catholics, and the oldest Protestant sects. In proof, we refer to the dark ages, to the Episcopal church, and the Presbyterian church. Besides, while some of the worst men bearing the Christian name have been zealous advocates of endless misery, some of the best men of the church have been Universalists.

O. A. S.