IMAGE EVALUATION 
 TEST TARGET (MT-3) 
 
 
 .<= c?< 
 
 .^'^ 4^ ,# %' 
 
 / 
 ^ 
 
 1.0 
 
 I.I 
 
 1.25 
 
 
 lia 
 
 zo 
 1.8 
 
 1-4 ill 1.6 
 
 V] 
 
 <^ 
 
 /a 
 
 ^l. 
 
 
 /A 
 
 fii 
 
 ''W 
 
 7 
 
 Hiotographic 
 
 Sciences 
 
 Corporation 
 
 23 WEST MAIN STREET 
 
 WEBSTER, NY. M$80 
 
 (716) 872-4503 
 
 fV 
 
 4^ 
 
 ^^ 
 
 \ 
 
 \ 
 
 <K <^ 
 
 
 6^ 
 
 %^ 
 
 <^ 
 
 >> 
 
CIHM/ICMH 
 
 Microfiche 
 
 Series. 
 
 CIHIVI/ICMH 
 Collection de 
 microfiches. 
 
 Canadian Institute for Historical Microreproductions / Institut canadien de microreproductions historiques 
 
Technical and Bibliographic Notes/Notes techniques et bibliographiques 
 
 The Institute has attempted to obtain the best 
 original copy available for filming. Features of this 
 copy which may be bibiiographically unique, 
 which may alter any of the images in the 
 reproduction, or which may significantly change 
 the usual method of filming, are checked below. 
 
 □ Coloured covers/ 
 Couverture de couieur 
 
 [""Y^ Covers damaged/ 
 
 LjLJ Couverture endommag^e 
 
 □ Covers restored and/or laminated/ 
 Couverture restaurie et/ou peilicui6e 
 
 I I Cover title missing/ 
 
 D 
 D 
 D 
 D 
 D 
 
 D 
 
 Le titre de couverture manque 
 
 Coloured maps/ 
 
 Cartes gdographiques en couieur 
 
 Coloured init (i.e. other than blue or btaclt)/ 
 Encre de couieur (i.e. autre que bleue ou noire) 
 
 Coloured plates and/or illustrations/ 
 Planches et/ou illustrations en couieur 
 
 Bound with other material/ 
 Reli6 avec d'autres documents 
 
 Tight binding may cause shadows or distortion 
 along interior margin/ 
 
 La reliure serrde peut causer de I'ombre ou de la 
 distortion le long de la marge int6rieure 
 
 Blank leaves added during restoration may 
 appear within the text. Whenever possible, these 
 have been omitted from filming/ 
 II se peut que certaines pages blanches ajout^es 
 lors d'une restauration apparaissent dans le texte, 
 mais, iorsque cela 6tait possible, ces pages n'ont 
 pas 6t6 fiimdes. 
 
 L'Institut a microfilm6 le meilleur exemplaire 
 qu'il lui a AtA possible de se procurer. Les details 
 de cet exemplaire qui sont peut-Atre uniques du 
 point de vue bibliographique, qui peuvent modifier 
 une image reproduite, ou qui peuvent exiger une 
 modification dans la mtthode normale de filmage 
 sont indiquis ci-dessous. 
 
 I I Coloured pages/ 
 
 Pages de couieur 
 
 Pages damaged/ 
 Pages endommagies 
 
 n Pages restored and/or laminated/ 
 Pages restauries et/ou pellicul6es 
 
 I ~V Pages discoloured, stained or foxed/ 
 \Jl1 Pages d6color6es, tachetdes ou piqu6es 
 
 □ Pages detached/ 
 Pages d^tachdes 
 
 □ Showthrough/ 
 Transparence 
 
 □ Quality of print varies/ 
 Quaiitd indgale de I'impression 
 
 I I Includes supplementary material/ 
 
 D 
 
 n 
 
 Comprend du mat6ri9l suppldmentaire 
 
 Only edition available/ 
 Seule 6dition disponible 
 
 Pages wholly or partially obscured by errata 
 slips, tissues, etc., have been refilmed to 
 ensure the best possible image/ 
 Les pages totalement ou partieliement 
 obscurcies par un feuillet d'errata, une pelure, 
 etc., ont 6t6 filmdes h nouveau de fapon A 
 obtenir la meilleure image possible. 
 
 n 
 
 Additional comments:/ 
 Comrnentaires suppldmentaires: 
 
 This item is filmed at the reduction ratio checked below/ 
 
 Ce document est film6 au taux de reduction indiqu6 ci-dessous 
 
 10X 14X 18X/ 22X 
 
 
 
 
 26X 
 
 
 
 
 30X 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 y 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 12X 
 
 
 
 
 16X 
 
 
 
 
 20X 
 
 
 
 
 24X 
 
 
 
 
 28X 
 
 
 
 
 32X 
 
 
The copy filmed here hes been reproduced thenks 
 to the generosity of: 
 
 National Library of Canada 
 
 L'exemplaire film4l fut reproduit grAce A la 
 g6nAro«itA ds: 
 
 Bibliothdque nationale du Canada 
 
 The images appearing here are the best quality 
 possible considering the condition and legibility 
 of the original copy and in keeping with tKa 
 filming contract specifications. 
 
 Las Images suivantes ont 6^i^ reproduites avec le 
 plus grand soin, compte tenu de la condition at 
 de la nettet6 de Texempiaire filmA, et en 
 conformity avec les conditions du contrat de 
 fiimafe. 
 
 Original copies in printed paper covers are filmed 
 beginning with the front cover and ending on 
 the last page with a printed or illustrated impres- 
 sion, or the back cover when a)*propriate. All 
 other original copies are filmed beginning on the 
 first page with a printed or illustrated impres- 
 sion, and ending on the last page with a printed 
 or illustrated impression. 
 
 The last recorded frame on each microfiche 
 shall contain the symbol ^»- (meaning "CON- 
 TINUED"), or the symbol V (meaning "END"), 
 whichever applies. 
 
 Les exemplaires originaux dont la couverture en 
 papier est imprimte sont filmAs en commen^iant 
 par le premier plat et en terminant soit par la 
 dernlAre page qui comporte une empreinte 
 d'impression ou d'illustration. soit par le second 
 plat, salon le cas. Tous les autres exemplaires 
 originaux sont filmte en commenpant par la 
 premiere page qui comporte une empreinte 
 d'impression ou d'illustration et en terminant par 
 la derniAre page qui comporte une telle 
 empreinte. 
 
 Un des symbolee suivants apparaUra sur la 
 dernlAre image da cheque microfiche, selon le 
 cas: le symbole -^ signifia "A SUIVRE ", le 
 symbols V signifie "FIN ". 
 
 Maps, plates, charts, etc.. may be filmed at 
 different reduction ratios. Those too large to be 
 entirely included in one exposure are filmed 
 beginning in the upper left hand cornor. left to 
 right and top to bottom, as many frames as 
 required. The following diagrams illustrate the 
 method: 
 
 Les cartes, planches, tabiepux. etc., peuvent Atre 
 fiim^s A des taux de reduction diffirents. 
 Lorsque le document est trop grand pour Atre 
 reproduit en un seul cliche, il est fiimd A partir 
 de I'angle supirieur gauche, de gauche A droite, 
 et de haut en bas, en prenant le nombre 
 d'images nicessaire. Les diegrammes suivants 
 illustrent la mAthode. 
 
 1 2 3 
 
 32X 
 
 1 
 
 2 
 
 3 
 
 4 
 
 5 
 
 6 
 

 .i 
 
 
 (^itvlasting fuiu$hmrut> 
 
 Is the Popular Doctrine de Fide ? 
 And if not, is it True ? 
 
 cm.\.sii>m;ki:ii in 
 
 A LETTER 
 
 TO IIIK. 
 
 RIGHT HON. W. E. GLADSTONE, M.P. 
 
 r.Y TIIK 
 
 REV. F, N. OXENHAM, M.A. 
 
 11^ 
 
 TOROX'I'O : 
 Belford Brothers, Publishers. 
 
 i«S75. 
 PRICE '»'^""-'" 
 
V 
 

 7 
 
 (^mki^ting f uni$bm^nt« 
 
 V 
 
 /s the Popular Doctrine de Fide? 
 And if not ^ is it Trite? 
 
 CONSIDKRKI) IN 
 
 A LETTER 
 
 TO THE 
 
 RIGHT HON. W. E. GLADSTONE, M.P. 
 
 \ 
 
 BY THE 
 
 REV. F. N. OXENHAM, M.A. 
 
 "l 
 
 Of" 
 
 ? 
 
 \ 
 
 V 
 
 TORONTO: 
 Belford Brothers, Publishers. 
 

 
 
 kici 
 
 TIapdyyeWe ravra xai diSadxe. 
 
 I. Tim. iv. lo, ii. 
 
 " Behold, we know not anything : 
 1 can but trust that good shall fall 
 At last— far off— at last, to all ; 
 
 And every winter change to spring." 
 
 fn Afcttion'itm, Canto Lili. 
 
 i 
 

 CONTENTS. 
 
 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS lo 
 
 § I. 
 STATEMENT OF DOCTRINE 21 
 
 §11. 
 SIX QUESTIONS 15 
 
 I. Does the word alwpio<i necessarily and always mean 
 
 " endless " ? 15 
 
 II. Is there any other word used in Holy Scripture 
 
 which has this necessary and invariable meaning ? 16 
 
 III. Is there any statement in Holy Scripture which 
 
 must of necessity mean the popular doctrine ? 
 
 IV. Is there any decree of the Universal Church which 
 expressly asserts or evidently and necessarily 
 presupposes that doctrine ? . . . . 
 
 V. Is there any express " consensus " on this exact 
 point, such as to leave no room for doubt as to 
 the mind of the whole Church ? . . . 
 
 VI. Is there anyj necessity, known to us, or even any 
 probability, arising from the nature of the case, 
 which would sustain th^ popular doctrine ? 
 
 § III. 
 S. AUGUSTINE'S ARGUMENTS 
 
 17 
 20 
 
 25 
 
 39 
 
viii Contcvis'. 
 
 §IV. 
 S. THOMAS AQUINAS' ARGUMENTS 
 
 §v. 
 
 DR. PUSEY'S ARGUMENTS . . • • * 
 
 §VI. 
 CONCLUSION. . . . • • • 
 
 ^ APPENDIX (A). 
 THK FORMULARIES OF THE CHURCH OF ENG- 
 LAND 
 
 APPENDIX (B). 
 THE CANONS OF THE HOME SYNOD . 
 
 39 
 48 
 
 68 
 
 70 
 
 72 
 
39 
 
 48 
 
 68 
 
 G- 
 
 • 70 
 
 72 
 
 A LETTER 
 
 TO TIIK 
 
 RIGHT HON. W. K. GLADSTONE, MP. 
 
 SlR,- 
 
 When I asked your permission to place on record the 
 following considerations in the form of a letter to you, it 
 might have been sutHcient to recollect that no question of 
 deep and general public interest could be without its claims 
 upon you, and that such claims were certain to be met with 
 no grudging response, more especially if the matter in 
 question was inseparably bound up with the advancement 
 of religion in tins country. But beyond this, you yourself 
 have lately referred^ to the part which you took many 
 years ago on a public occasion, when the question of human 
 futurity was under discussion, and this reference would lead 
 your readers to conclude that the subject on which you are 
 permitting me to address you, is, at least, not foreign to 
 your mind, and possibly that that aspect of the question 
 which Tennyson has brieily described as " the larger hope," 
 is not altogether unwelcome. 
 
 For these and otliei' reasons I accept very gratefully your 
 permission to inscribe this letter to you. But, in saying so 
 much, I am ncjt venturing to assume any assent on your 
 part to anything which 1 shall say. How far you would 
 admit, or question, or deny the correctness of any statement, 
 or the force of any argument here advanced, which may be 
 open to question, I am wholly unaware. You are, of course, 
 
 1 Contemporary Kcz'ieii', July, 1875, PP* 201-2. 
 
10 
 
 Introducfitvy Remark!*. 
 
 in no sonso rosponsilde for any part of this L«'tt(M', nor for 
 any of its results. 
 
 1 will |)i()rt('ii now to the (|U<\stions wliich my title-})age 
 Huflk'iently indicatos — " Is i\\v popular doctrine of' Kverlast- 
 int,' Punishment' de tide ? and if not, is it true ^ " The first 
 of these questioiis is the most important, and to it I wish 
 more especially to call attention. [ am not concerned to 
 discuss the truth of this ptijiular doctrine, as an opinion, so 
 nnich as to show that it is only an " opinion," liowevi-r 
 wide-spivad, and notliin<( more. I am content to h-ave this 
 doctrine to stand or fall on its own merits, if it is allowed 
 to be only an ojtinion. I am most earnestly anxious to 
 show that it cann(»t ri;4htly claim to he anythin<i; more than 
 an " oi)inioir" And i am anxious to show this, becpuse of the 
 sad and ruinous work which tliis doctrine is doing among 
 thoughtful and iniiuiiing men in our day. It sini})ly repels 
 them utterly iVom any belief in a (Christianity which in- 
 cludes among its articles vH necessary faith this terrible 
 doctrine. Partly for these I would plead, and partly too, 
 and even more, iVtr those who would give all they have, or 
 ho[)e lor here below, rather than be disloyal to their Chris- 
 tian faith : the simple and faithful, to whtmi the love of 
 God in C!n-ist is the centre of all hope and joy, by whom 
 the I'cvelation of truth in 8cri})ture and through the Church 
 is accepted in unhesitating acijuiescence. And yet to many 
 of these this po])ular doctrine is as a horror of great dark- 
 ness, into which tliev scarcely dare to look, lest the seeminjLj 
 distortion of all that they have believed and loved should 
 make shij)wreck of their faith. 
 
 An able contributor to one of our leading monthly period- 
 icals, in discussing the dilHculties which beset, or threaten 
 to beset, the ])rogress of Christianity, suggested that, with 
 the view of winning the thoughtful and intelligent to a 
 readier acceptance of the Christian faith, certain commonly 
 received doctrines should be withdrawn as far as possible 
 into the shade. He proposed as a probable success "a 
 course of authoritative pieacliing from ten thousand pulpits 
 persistent for an entire generation, wluch, without contro- 
 
 '; 
 
 i 
 
IvtroiJuetory Remarks. 
 
 11 
 
 ^' 
 
 i^i 
 
 versy or ostentatious neglect, should allow Original Sin and 
 Imputed Righteousness, the legendof the Fall and the story 
 of the Incarnation, Baptismal Regeneration, Eternal Punish- 
 ment, the Trinity, and the Atonement gently to fall into the 
 shade as mysteries which it is vain to seek to penetrate, 
 and regarding which silence is our least injurious aud most 
 respectful course.' 
 
 I should shrink from using some of the ex})ressions con- 
 tained in this ])assage, though they may not, perhaps, beat 
 all intended amiss. I should questions how far all the 
 doctrines, hero thrown together on an cc[uaiity, have really 
 an equal claim to be considered essenii ^ »tcms in the Faith 
 of Christendom ; and I should very serinusly demur to the 
 suggestion of allowing all these mr^tters to be r>assed ove/ 
 in silence, e. g. and eminently, the Incariiati'^ii. Christian- 
 ity 'vlthout the Incarnation would c tainly be such a 
 Christianity as has not nithcrto been caught, or known ; it 
 would be " another gospel," not merely cyMuv, but 'irfpov- 
 
 There is, however, one among the mattei's heve enumer- 
 ated, as to which very many persons would join in the wi'^.h 
 that silence might be kept, if indeed, silence on all sides 
 could be kept; but such silence has not been kei)t, it has 
 Ijeen l)roken on all sides. The doctrine of Etornal Punish- 
 ment has not Vjeen treated respectfully " as a mystery which 
 it is vain to seek to penetrate ;" on the contrary, it has been 
 often enlarged upon ; it has sometimes been set forth in 
 lanji'anre which cannot be read without a shudder ; it is 
 jn'ominently in our day betoi'e the eyes ol all thoughtful 
 persons who are interested in religious matters, and it is, to 
 say the least of it, to many of them, a very serious difficulty ; 
 it is not a matter which can be passed over in silence ; it is 
 not a matter which can be removed out of sight. We had 
 better look at it calndy and steadily and see wh at itreally 
 is, see how far the poj^ular doctrine is indeed a part of the 
 Christian faith. 
 
 I A'oih A/it'(i(/,\\. l\. Grkc, Cmtemporary Revird\ August, 1874 
 
(12) 
 
 §1- 
 STATEMENT OE DOCTRINP:. 
 
 I becrin bv statins: the main factors in this whole " doc- 
 trine," from wliich the chief dithculty in accepting it arises, 
 so far as I am aware. I understand this doctrine (as popu- 
 larly held) to include the belief 
 
 ("') That there is no place for repentance or amendment 
 beyond the grave ; or at least, that if there be repentance, 
 however deep and real, it will be futile / and 
 
 {ft ) That the torments of the lost will literally neuer 
 come to an end, that their misery and their wickedness will 
 be hopeless and endless. 
 
 {/) There is another factor in this doctrine very generally 
 received, viz, that the great majority of mankind will be 
 lost, a small minority only saved. It certainly seems 
 difficult, on the face of such a statement as that in S. Mat- 
 thew's Gospel (vii. 13, 14), to deny on Scriptural grounds 
 the doctrine that the " lost " (whatever that term may 
 mean) will be " many," and the " saved " " few," 
 
 Now these statements are diilicult to believe, because 
 they scan at least to imphi 
 
 («) The charge against God of amazing cruelty and in- 
 justice. I say ""scon to imply," because it is quite possible 
 that our estimate of what constitutes "cruelty" or " in- 
 justice " may be mistaken ; it is quite possible that we ma.y 
 be inaipahle of Jiih/ing what is "just," or " unjust " in re- 
 lation to matters wliich involve many mysteries of which 
 we know little or nothing. 
 
 1 " Dicvmt ctiam uri dolore animi .srr(i atque iufntctuosc pa-nitentis eos qui 
 fucrirl a regno Dei sopaiaU." — S. AuGUbTINE, Dc Civ, Dei, xxi, 9, 
 
 r 
 
I 
 
 Staffment of Doctrme. 
 
 18 
 
 (fS) The failure, to a very great extent,^ not merely ap- 
 parent and temporary, but a most real and etexTial failure, 
 to redeem and save mankind ; i. e. the failure of that one 
 great purpose which God designed " from the foundation 
 of the world," which our Lord (.'Xpended all the treasures 
 of His love, and laid down His life to carry out, which is 
 the centre and substance of His revelation to us. 
 
 (v) That good will never fully overcome evil and destroy 
 it, but that good and evil will be alike everlasting. That 
 God will never fully and finally subdue or reconcile His 
 enemies; but that His enemies and Himself will be eternal 
 together. And further, (5) if this (r) be true, that the 
 Almighty and All-merciful lacks either the power, or the 
 will, to save His creatures from misery — not sorrow, or 
 sutfering temporary, corrective, purgatorial, didactic, re- 
 fining, or serving emu other conceivjible ultimate purpose 
 of mercy to the suiferer, or to anyone else ; but misery 
 utterly fruitless for good to tJie sajferer, because it will be 
 endless; utterly useless to nUotlicrH, because their unalter- 
 able lot in happiness or in woe will be already fixed. 
 
 For these reasons {inter alia) the common doctrine of 
 *' everlasting punishment " is at least very hard to be 
 believed ; and as that doctrine is supposed to rest on very 
 express and repeated testimony of the Bible, it is important 
 to ask aiid carefully to examine the rpu^stion, Do the words 
 of Holy Scripture nceessdrihi me£»n what they are commonly 
 supposed to mean ? 
 
 It must, I think, be allowed that at first sight they seem 
 to do so ; that the common interpretation of many passages 
 in Holy Scripture is the most ol)vious and natural ; but 
 where there are so many and so strong reasons for sup- 
 posing that the most obvious meaning cannot be the true 
 one, we are fully justified in looking carefully for some 
 other. 
 
 • VidcA L APIDE on Apocalyp. vii. g ; "Ex dictis nestimare licet quod in 
 fine mundi omnium omnino sanctorum et electorum, qui quovis saeculo 
 ubivis gentium vixeruni, numerus aliquot centenos ', milliones conficiet : 
 rcproborum vcro longe major rrit ftirba, qua; plures non tantum centenos, 
 sed et millenos miiliones efficiet. Sccpe enim ex mille hominibus, imo ex 
 decern millibus vix unus salvatur." 
 
14 
 
 Statement of Doctrine. 
 
 I may be met here i?i limine by the objection that the 
 commonly received doctrine does not depend on the force 
 of this or that pai-ticuhir word or phrase, but is imphed in 
 " the whole tenor " of revelation as to our future life. To 
 this I can only reply, that the popular doctrine aj>pears to 
 me to be utterly denied by *'the whole tenor" of all that 
 God reveals to us about Himself. 
 
 It might be said further, that although "the whole tenor" 
 of Holy Scripture does lead us to suppose (and a great part 
 of Holy Scripture is unintelligible without the supposition) 
 tiiat evil-doers will meet with terrible misery beyond the 
 grave, as surely as they that have done good will reap their 
 reward of joy, yet there may be nothing to necessitate, or 
 even to warrant, the further " supjiosition " that this misery 
 will never end; this "further suj^position " must rest on 
 the necessary nieanhv) (as it is thought) of certain special 
 words and sentences ; and it may fairly be asserted, that 
 a doctrine so awful and tremendous must (if it is to be be- 
 lieved) rest on something more solid than " implication." 
 It must be stated so clearlv that there can be no room for 
 misconception, or else it may not rightly be laid down as 
 a necessary article of Christian faith. I would therefore 
 ask, although the inquiry will lead me to traverse some 
 ground already frequently trodden, the following questions : 
 
 i 
 
 I 
 
 
 11 
 II 
 
T 
 
 ( ir> ) 
 
 ^ § n. 
 
 SIX QUESTIONS. 
 
 1. Does the word alo6vio<i nfcessdrili/ and ahrajifi mean 
 " endless " ? 
 
 2. Is there any other word used in Holy Scripture which 
 has this necessary and bivar'uOile meaning? 
 
 3. Is there any statement in Holy Scriptm-e which must 
 of necessity mean the popular doctrine ? 
 
 4. Is there any decree of the Universal Church which 
 expressly assorts or evidently and necessarily presupposes 
 that doctrine? 
 
 5. Is there any express "consensus" on this exact 
 point, such as to leave no room for douht as to the mind 
 of the whole Church ? 
 
 6. Is there any necessity known to us, or even any pro- 
 hahihty, arising from the iK.ture of the case, which \. -aid 
 sustain the popular doctrine ? 
 
 This last question, though it needs to bo distinctly put, 
 will have to be practically and fully answered when we 
 come to consider Question 5. 
 
 If all these questions can truly be answered _ in the 
 negative, is there any ground remaining on which any 
 Christian man can ]>e required to accept the common 
 doctrine of " endless punishment " a^^ " dcjide" and make 
 it part of his religious belief ? I know of none. 
 
 To take these questions seriatim : 
 
 I. 
 
 (k 
 
 Does the word alojyio^ necessarily and always mean 
 endless'?" 
 
 wm*- 1 
 
16 
 
 Fimf Question. 
 
 The word rnVJ^jos is used in Holy Scripture " ut sub- 
 stantivum nr/^V, dc qnociinque tempoj'ls spatio,'^ says 
 Schleusner, " ita ut quale sit judicari debent in singulis 
 locis ex orationis serio et mente scriptoris, rebus adeo et 
 personis de quibus sermo est." He gives instances of the 
 word being used as referring to (a) "quod fuit superiori 
 tempore;" (/^) "quod est linis expers ;" (y) "quod sui 
 finem et initium agnoscit." The word, therefore, does not, 
 in Schleusner's opinion, nccessdrihj mean " expers finis," 
 although he himself assigns that meaning to it when used 
 with nvp, xpi'dfi, h6X(x<ji?, etc., in the New Testament. 
 
 Bishop Wordsworth, on S. Matt. xxv. 46, ol)serves, that 
 " the radical idea in aVoJi', as used in the Holy Scripture, 
 is indefinite time : and thus the word aioov comes to be fitly 
 applied to this world, of which we do not know the duration, 
 and also to the world to come, of which no end is visible, 
 because that world is eternal;" he i.dds, that "this con- 
 sideration may perhaps check rash speculations concern- 
 iiig the duration of future punishments."^ 
 
 Whatever, then, may be the meaning assigned by any 
 commentator to the words aioSv or aicovioi when used with 
 reference to future misery, it would seem to be admitted 
 that the meaning " endless " is not the only meaning which 
 those words may l)ear. Question 1, therefore, is sufficiently 
 answered in the negative. 
 
 II. 
 
 " Is there any other word used with reference to the 
 destiny of the wicked in Holy Scripture, which has this 
 necessarj/ and inrariable meaning?" 
 
 There is another word used twice in the New Testament, 
 and translated in the Authorized Version in one place 
 " eternal,"'- and in the other^ " everlasting." This word 
 
 ' Vide A Lapide on alcov in Hebrews i. 2. " Gra'cum aiaov respondit 
 Hebneo olam, et propria significat sctculum, levum et tempus decurrens, 
 subique succedens." 
 
 * Rom. i. 20. :' S. Jude 6. 
 
 i 
 
 ■u 
 
Srcoifil (^iiffflioit. 
 
 17 
 
 ^.' 
 
 ai^ib? might be expected, from its root aei to mean " ever- 
 lasting," in the strictest sense ; and such is its force in 
 ''/''Rom. i. 20, where it is apphedto the '' power and divinity" 
 of God ; but in S. Jude the duration to which it refers is 
 not merely doubtful, and possibily not crcrlasting in its 
 literal sense, but a definite limit is expressly assigned : the 
 angels are " reserved " in their " everlasting chains," not 
 for ever, but f/5 }(pi6iv /n^ycf^v^ j'/.ut/m?^ i. e. yntil a definite 
 time. What will occur afterwards we are not told. I am 
 not aware of any other single word in which the doctrine 
 in question has been thought to be contained. Question 2 
 is therefore answered in the negative, and we may proceed 
 
 to 
 
 III. 
 
 " Is there any statement in Holy Scripture which must 
 of necessity mean the popular doctrine *? " 
 
 There are certainly several which are commonly so 
 understood ; we must look into them one by one. I take 
 first (oc) S. Matt. xii. 31, 32, ''All manner of sin and 
 blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men ; but the blasphemy 
 against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven unto men. 
 And whosoever sijeakcth a word against tlie Son of Man, 
 it shall be forgiven him ; but whosoever speaketh against 
 the Holy Ghost, it shall not he forgiven him, neither in 
 this world (aic^yi), neither in the world to come,"^ where 
 our Lord himself is thought to have asserted most expressly 
 the endlessness of future punishment in hell. Now, on 
 this verse I observe first, that our Lord says nothing about 
 hell ; and secondly, that what He does say bears on ex- 
 amination no reseml)lance to an assertion of the popular 
 doctrine of endless misery. Our Lord declares that there 
 is a sin against the Holy Giiost for which there is no ci(pt6i^ 
 either here or hereafter. He uses the words ix(pe6ii and 
 acphj^i, the root-meaning of which is "sending away," 
 ** getting rid of." He declares of this sin that it can never 
 be got rid of, i.e., something of the sin, its character, its 
 
 ' Vide also S. Mark iii. 28, and S. Luke xii. 10. 
 
18 
 
 Third Qitcfition. 
 
 consequences, will last on always — this is what He really 
 says ; and is it beyond the reach even of our present under- 
 standin,;:; to conceive that the penal consequences of wilful 
 sin against the Holy Spirit, viz. e. g. loss of capacity to 
 know and to love the truth and Him who is truth, may 
 well be irremediable either here or hereafter ? How great 
 such a penalty would be, or in what manner it would be 
 felt or received, we liavo no means of knowing ; but we feel 
 at once that this penalty is something wholly different from 
 what is commonly meant by eternal punishment : it is 
 compatible with existence in heaven. 
 
 i/i) I pass on to another set of texts, S. Matt, xviii. 8, 9, 
 S. Mark ix. 43, 44 ; and I quot.) from S. Mark, both be- 
 cause his words are tlie most express, and because they 
 tell us where to look for their true explanation.' '* If thy 
 hand offend thee, cut it off; it is better for thee t^ enter 
 into life maimed, than having two hands to go in a hell, 
 into the iu'c that never shall be quenched : where their 
 worm dieth not, and the i'lve is not quenched." 
 
 On these verses it should be remarked, first, that the 
 words "never shall be quenched " are an incorrect trans- 
 lation : there is no word or idea in tlie original corres- 
 ponding to ''never." Our Lord simply says, t6 itvp t6 
 d6fte6Tov, '* the lire which is not quenched." He makes 
 no assertion that the fire will " never " be quenched. No 
 inference, therefore, as to eternity can safely be drawn 
 from this mistranslation. But then the words which follow 
 seem to endorse the meaning of this mistranslation as 
 commonly understood. Tliese words, however, ''where 
 their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched," are a 
 quotation from the prophet Isaiah, who uses them with 
 reference to the carcases of the slain lying without he 
 walls of Jerusalem, where, evidently, the " worms " were 
 not " erc'r-lasting," nor the " fire '\for ever unextinguished. 
 Maldonatus, in commenting upon this passage in S. Mark, 
 admits (as, indeed, he could not have denied), that the 
 
 'Isaiah Ixvi. 24. 
 
 •JnaUm^ - 
 
Third Question. 
 
 19 
 
 **worm" and til 'Mire" spoken of by the prophet were 
 both short-lived ; but he thinks that our Lord " accom- 
 modated " these phrases to suit the matter of which he 
 was speaking, and must l)e supposed to have meant that 
 the '*fire" and the '' worm " to whicli He referred would 
 devour and burn for ever. But there is no ground what- 
 ever for any such " supposition," beyond the necessity of 
 making this passage support a preconceived theory. If 
 the common doctrine be true, tlwii, of course, these, and 
 all other of our Lord's words must be " supposed " to agree 
 with it. But the doctrine itself is not provecl to he true, nor 
 even shown to be probable, by any number of passages 
 which are wrested from their natural meaning and 
 arbitrarily "supposed" to assert it. It is quite certain' 
 that in their original use and in their primary meaning 
 (in Isaiah Ixvi. 24), the "worm" and the "lire" meant 
 instruments of punishment which did not " die " and were 
 "not extinguished" until theiv work was fully done ; but 
 when that work was done, the worm did die, and the lire 
 was extinguished. Why should it be "supposed" that 
 our Lord in using the same words meant something essen- 
 tially different ? 
 
 ir) There are two more texts which are sometimes quot- 
 ed to show that the fire of future punishment will be end- 
 less. [" He will throughly purge His floor, and gather 
 His wheat into the garner ; but He will burn up the chaff 
 with imquenchable fire." S. Matt. iii. 12 and S. Luke iii. 
 17 in almost the same words.; On these it may be 
 enough to say (i) that the original v>'ord {a6fte6roi) does not 
 mean "unquenchable," but simply " unquenched," and 
 therefore implies nothing as to duration ; (ii) that if any 
 inference as to duration may be gathered from the simile 
 of " chaff" burnt up, it would be that the process referred 
 to would be as speedy as it would be effectual ; very soon 
 done and over, rather than lasting on for ever. There are 
 six other passages — S. ^latt. x. 28 ; xvi. 2G ; xxv. 41, 46; 
 S. Mark xiv. 21 ; 2 Thess. i. 9 ; and Eev. xx. 10 — bearing 
 on this subject which will require close inspection fiu'ther 
 
20 
 
 Fourth Question. 
 
 on ; for the present, therefore, I leave the consideration of 
 these. I am not aware of any other short texts besides 
 those ah'eady quoted or referred to (and a few others, so 
 similar that the same remarks would apply to them), 
 which are thought to express the popular view on this 
 question.^ As to the general tenor of long passages, or 
 whole hooks of Holy Scripture, or the tacit assumptions 
 which may be thought to underlie some arguments in the 
 Apostolic Epistles or elsewhere, it would be evidently 
 impossible within brief compass to deal with this side of 
 the question ; but it would, I believe, be found that the 
 " general tenor " of Holy Scripture, and not a few " tacit 
 assumptions," tell fatally against the common doctrine. 
 
 Leaving then the direct arguments from Holy Scripture, 
 we come to the two next questions proposed, both of which 
 require an answer at some length. 
 
 s 
 
 IV. 
 
 " Is there any decree of the Universal Church which ex- 
 pressly asserts or evidently and necessarily presupposes the 
 doctrine in question ? " 
 
 I am well awar^ tliat there are many persons, and not 
 irreligious persons, to whom this question will appear of 
 small moment, if not altogether superfluous, persons \/ho 
 regard the decrees of ancient councils, whether local or gene- 
 ral, as nothing better than historical records of more or less 
 interest, expressions of religious opinions more or less 
 widely accepted and believed at the time when such decrees 
 were agreed to. On the other hand, there are persons, and 
 their number includes not only all Catholics, but many who 
 would not usually call themselves Catholics, who believe 
 that the decrees of general councils are something very 
 much more than expressions of contemporary opinion ; per- 
 
 ' There is a long paragraph in Pearson On the Creed, Art. xii., in which 
 these and several other texts are quoted, and supposed — but only supposed 
 — to support the popular view ; they are repeated one after another as if 
 there could be no doubt of what they all meant. 
 
 I 
 
 i 
 
Fourth Question. 
 
 21 
 
 of 
 ides 
 so 
 
 [this 
 ,, or 
 lions 
 
 ^ 
 
 sons who would feel that, if any doctrine had been explicitly 
 accepted or condemned by any general council, and subse- 
 quently so received throughout the Church, there could be, 
 at least for thein, no further doubt upon the subject. For 
 such persons it is of vital interest to know whether the 
 Church is, or is not, so committed to the popular doctrine of 
 endless punishment. I will, therefore beg you^ sir, to follow 
 me while I inquire somewhat closely, though as briefly as I 
 can, into the facts of the case. 
 
 It is often asserted that the doctrine of the non-endless- 
 ness of future torments was condemned by the Church at 
 the fifth (Ecumenical Council. ^ Now what are the facts ? 
 Origen's name is certainly mentioned, together with several 
 others who are condemned as heretical by one of the decrees 
 of this fifth Council. Origen was condemned certainly, but 
 obviously it was not intended to condemn all his opinions, 
 and it remains to inquire whether his opinion on this par- 
 ticular question was one of those which the Council did 
 intend to condemn. Origen held several strange opinions 
 unconnected with future punishment, for any one of which 
 it is "not unreasonable to suppose that he might have been 
 condemned ; but hapj^ily we are not here left to mere sup- 
 position. There are in existence records of what was done 
 at the fifth (Ecumenical Council, of the decrees then made, 
 and also of another Council held twelve years earlier, and 
 of its decrees. There are also two letters of the Emperor 
 Justinian, stating the circumstances which led to the calling 
 of that earlier Council, and the purpose which he desired it 
 should effect. Those records are amply sutRcient to put us 
 in possession of the main facts of the case. 
 
 In t]ie 3^ear A.D. 541 a council was called to meet at Con- 
 stantinople, for the express purpose of passing anathemas 
 on (Ji i:,^on and on his heretical opinions.^ Justinian, who 
 summoned the Council, in his letter to the Patriarch Men- 
 
 I Vide S. Augustine, De Civ. Dei, xxi. 17: and Mosheim's Ecclesiastic 
 <)!/ ///ji'i?; J (Maclaine's translation ; London 1826), vol. ii. p. 121, note. 
 2 Vide Cave's Ilistoria Literaiia (Basle, 1 741), p. 558. 
 
22 
 
 Fourth Question. 
 
 nas, eular«^es at great lengtli on the folly, impiety, and heresy 
 of Origens opinions, wliicli he specifies one after another; 
 and he has a long passage condemnatory of the opinion 
 that the torments of the damned would ever come to an 
 end.^ The Council, which had no sort of pretensions to be 
 an (I'cumenical council, and is known as " the Home 
 Synod," met and passed fifteen canons. 1 have given these 
 canons at length in an Appendix, for a reason which I will 
 presently mention. Twelve years later^ i. e. A.D. 553, the 
 fifth (Ecumenical Council met also at Constantinople ; it 
 was summoned exju-essly for the purpose of condemning 
 certain Nestorian errors, contained in writings known as 
 Tlie Three Chapters} The Council met and passed fourteen 
 canons, of which the only one that contains any direct 
 reference to Origen is this : " Si quis non anathematizat 
 Arium, Eunomium, Macedonium, Ai)oUinarium, Nestorium, 
 Eutychen, Origenem cum impiis eorum conscriptis, et alios 
 omnes htt'reticos (pii condemnati et anathematizati sunt a 
 sancta Catholica et A])ostoliea Ecclesia, et a prsedictis Sanc- 
 tis quatuor conoiliis, et eos qui similia pnedictis hsereticis 
 sapuerunt vel sapiunt, et usque ad mortem in sua impietate 
 permanserunt vel permanent, talis anatheuja sit." 
 
 All fourteen are given at length by Labbeus, ^ Not one of 
 these canons makes the smallest allusion to the doctrine of 
 everlasting punishment ; but together with the Acta of this 
 Council, held a.d. 553, the fifteen canons passed by the 
 Home Synod, a.d. 541, together with the letters of Justinian 
 addressed to that Synod, have been inserted and confused. 
 
 That the insertion of these documents among the Acta of 
 the fifth CEcumenical Coimcil is simply a confusion and an 
 error is shown clearly, but at too great a length to be here 
 quoted in full, by Cave in his Historia Literaria (p. 558), 
 to which I have already referred. He points out, among 
 the reasons which naturally account for confusion arising 
 between those two Councils and their respective canons, 
 
 1 Labbeus, Sacrosaucta Concilia (Paris, 1671), vol. v. pp. 635 et sq. 
 
 2 Mosheim's Ecc. Hist., vol, ii. p. 121. 
 
 3 Sac, Con., vol. v. pp. 568 cf. sq. » 
 
Fourth Question. 
 
 23 
 
 that both wero hold at Constantin(>i)lc, both were summoned 
 by Justinian, and, moreover, botli were " the fifth. Council 
 of Constantinople." The Home Synod of A.D. .541 was the 
 fifth of those councils which met at Constantinople. The 
 Council of A.D. 55.S was the seventh of tliose councils which 
 met at Constantino])le ; but it was the fifth (Ecumenical 
 Council, and it met at (Jonstimtinoplo, so that both were 
 called (though in different .i4e:i ^es) " the fifth Council of 
 Constantinople." As to the evident distinction between 
 these two Councils and their ies})ective d(^crees, Cave says, 
 " In hac (i. e. the Syn(xl of 541), sola causa Origeniana ; in 
 ilia (i.e. the Council of .")53), Trium Caj)itulorum causa unice 
 agitata est ; nee Origenis vel Origenistarum nisi capitulo xi. 
 vel levissima mentio ; multo minus causie istius plenaria 
 cognitio." (p. 558.) 
 
 1 will not say more on this point, partly because I believe 
 the insertion of these fifteen canons, together with the 
 Acta of tlie fifth Qilcumenical Council, is now generally 
 allowed to be a simple mistake, and partly for another rea- 
 son. It is urged that although these fifteen canons are not 
 probably any part of the Acta of the fifth Council, never- 
 theless they must have been well known to the Fathers who 
 met in A.D. 553, and the}' were probably implicitly accepted 
 and endorsed under the head of the general anathema 
 passed upon Origen and others, by the eleventh decree of 
 the Council. In answer to this, it might be amply enough 
 to say that something more than " inference " and " proba- 
 bility" may fairly be demanded before we can be required 
 to believe that any doctrine, and much more such a doctrine 
 (if, indeed, there is any other "such") as the one now in 
 question, has received the solemn and final sanction of a 
 general council ; but for the purpose of this present argu- 
 ment I am willing to yield this point; I will allow the 
 sufficiency of this "inference," and this "probability;" I 
 will admit that the fifth General Council did accept and 
 endorse all these fifteen canons of the Honu Synod. What 
 then ? " Why, then," it will be said, " you have lost your 
 cause, you have admitted that a general council did con- 
 
24 
 
 Fourth QueMion 
 
 deiim the very doctrine wliich you are trying to defend !" 
 I answer, " Not at all ; and for this reason, because there is 
 not in any one of those fifteen canons the I'eniotest reference 
 to the doctrine which 1 am tryin<^ to defend I " Baluzius 
 gives them all in liis Xovit Colled io;^ Origen's heretical 
 doctrines are minutely recited in these canons, and seriatim 
 condemned; but among the doctrines so condemned, the 
 opinion that future punishment will not be everlasting is 
 nowhere to ])0 found. 1 have extracted these fifteen canons, 
 as Baluzius gives them, and printed them in an Appendix, 
 that tliey may be at hand for any one who cares to read 
 them. Now, sir, unless there are forthcoming some other 
 and strangely diHerent records of these two Councils, I be- 
 lieve that in reply to my fourth question — " Is there any 
 decree of the Universal Church, which expressly asserts or 
 evidently and necessarily presuj)poscs the doctrine in ques- 
 tion ? " — I am justilied in answering "Certainly not." 
 This might seem to be sufficient on this part of the subject ; 
 but since I have troubled you to follow me so far into an 
 historical question, I will not resist the temptation of ask- 
 ing you to come one step farther. It has been shown (a) 
 that the fifteen canons, so often referred to, have no oecu- 
 menical authority ; (/^) that, if they had such authority, 
 they are nihil ad rein as to the doctrine of " everlasting 
 punishment," because they do not mention it. But this is 
 not all. Justinian in his letter to Mannes,^ to which I 
 have already referied, enumerates at great length — the let- 
 ter fills twelve folio pages of Labbeus — the errors of Origen, 
 and among them this opinion, that the torments of tlie lost 
 would not endure for ever. He cites some extracts from 
 Origen's writings in proof of the charges made, and then 
 proceeds to dictate the ver}^ words in which he desires that 
 Origen and his errors should be condemned. " His igitur 
 ita se habentibus, factisque omnibus palam Origenis blas- 
 phemiis, anathematismum in ipsum sic fieri convenit," and 
 then follow nine formal canons, one of which runs thus : 
 
 1 Paris, 1707. Pages 1548, cf st/. 
 2 Labueus, Sac. Oon.f vol. v. pp. 635 d sq. 
 
 [t 
 
 a 
 
T 
 
 » » 
 
 Fifth Question. 
 
 25 
 
 ] 
 
 m 
 
 " Si ([uis dicit aut sentit ad teinpus esse diuiiioniiiii ct impi- 
 orum horninum suppliciuui, ejustjue liuoin aliqiiaiitlu I'utu- 
 riiin, sivo restititutiouein ot redinte^^iatioiKMii tore dtvinoiium 
 aut iinpioruui hoiniiuun ; aiuitlioiiui yit." Besides tliis letter 
 to Meimas the Patriaicli, Justinian sent another letter, ad- 
 dressed to the Synod itself,* in vvhieh he ex^horts tlie Fathers 
 there collected to read diligently his " exposition " of Ori- 
 gen's errors, and to " condemn each one " of them. The 
 Synod accordingly met, and no doubt did ' diligently read 
 the Emperor's exposition;" at all events, they enumerated 
 Origen's heretical opinions in their fifteen canons with care- 
 ful minuteness, and condemned them. But there was one 
 opinion wh'^'h they did not condemn, to which, indeed, they 
 made no a. sion, and that one is the opini(m that future 
 punishment will not be everlasting. 
 
 It appears, then, that this Council w'as specially sum- 
 moned to consider and condemn the errors of Origen ; that 
 those " errors " were distinctly set out before them ; that 
 an opinion as to the duration of future puni.shment Wtisone 
 of those " errors " which the Emperor expressly desired and 
 required the Council to condemn ; and that the Council did 
 not condemn that " error.'' 
 
 If the foregoing relation is historically true, and not a 
 mere perversion of history, I trust we may not again be 
 told that the popular doctrine of everlasting misery rests on 
 the authority of the fifth CEcumenical Council, or indeed, 
 on the authority of any council at ail. 
 
 I pass to the next question : 
 
 it," and 
 thus : 
 
 V. 
 
 " Is there any axpress consensus on this exact point, 
 such as to leave no room for doubt as to the mind of the 
 whole Church ? " 
 
 I do not hesitate to answer this question also distinctly 
 in the negative, for reasons which I will presently show. 
 
 I Sat: Con., pp. 679, t-i S(/. 
 
2G 
 
 Fifth Question. 
 
 1 ! 
 
 But I must at once admit that an answer in the affirmative 
 mif^ht certainly bo given with some considerable appearance 
 of plausibility ; and further, I allow — and I must dwell in 
 some detail upon this point — that a true ansv-rer might be 
 given to this question which would supply the strongest 
 argument that exists in support of the popular view ; for 
 there can be (I suppose) no doubt that the great bodj' of 
 Catholic theologians from the first, and of Protestants also 
 in later times, have either expressly upheld this doctrine, 
 or at least have used words and quoted passages of Holy 
 Scripture usually thought to involve this doctrine, apparently 
 assenting to, certainly not disclaiming the common inter- 
 pretation. 
 
 Some account, therefore, must be given of this fact, 
 unless we are prepared to accei)t the obvious conclusion 
 that a doctrine so accepted and indorsed is sure to be true. 
 I am not prepared to accept that conclusion, for reasons 
 which in general I have already br' ^ily given ; but on this 
 special point I venture to submit me following considera- 
 tions : 
 
 (i) This doctrine was not a matter of controversy (at 
 least not to any considerable extent) until the time of 
 Origen, and consequently it was not stated with that care- 
 fulness and precision, by which in later times disputed 
 doctrines Avere guarded from misconception and accurately 
 defined. There was a general unquestioned belief in a 
 " resurrection both of the just and of the unjust," in 
 a separation of the one from tlie other " on the right hand 
 and on the left," in a retribution " to every man according 
 to his deeds," after his trial time here on earth should be 
 ended. The word aUUnoi was found applied to the future 
 judgment, the future world, the future punishment, the 
 future joy ; it was applied indiscriminately to all these ; one 
 special meaning, notoriously (not its only, not its original 
 meaning) seemed clearly to belong to it when applied to the 
 future world, or futurity ; it tacitly assitrticd to bear the same 
 meaning in all tlie other applications. " Assumed," I say, 
 not carefully considered; for a moment's consideration would 
 
 ij 
 
S*" 
 
 Fifth Question. 
 
 27 
 
 [native 
 jarance 
 well in 
 ight be 
 I'ongest 
 ew ; for 
 body of 
 nts also 
 loctrine, 
 of Hol}^ 
 parently 
 on inter- 
 
 t,his fact, 
 onclusion 
 ) be true. 
 ,r reasons 
 it on tbis 
 considera- 
 
 o\ersy (at 
 e time of 
 that care- 
 i disputed 
 accurately 
 
 3elief in .a 
 unjust," in 
 rigbt band 
 n according 
 \v should be 
 o the future 
 ihment, the 
 11 these ; one 
 t its original 
 pplied to the 
 )ear the same 
 med." I saV' 
 ,ration would 
 
 s 
 
 show that at least when applied to future " judgment " 
 nicovios could not j^ossihly have exactly this same meaning. 
 A "judgment " cannot " last for ever ; " its results may 
 conceivably last for ever ; but not the xpvSi? itself, which is 
 essentially an act done and over. However, aioovioi being 
 rightly taken to mean " lasting for ever " in some (and those, 
 perhaps, the most important) passages in which it had been 
 used, was supposed to mean the same thing elsewhere, and 
 from long, customary, unquestioned use of words and phrases, 
 which might and naturally would bear the meaning 
 afterwards distinctly assigned to them, the doctrine of 
 " eternal punishment," as signifying " punishment which 
 would last literally for ever," gradually came to be, not 
 thought out and well ascertained, but simply and quietly 
 assumed. 
 
 It must be remembered, then, that to quote the statements 
 of ancient theologians on this question, who wrote before it 
 had become a question of controversy, is liable to be as 
 misleading, as the quotations that might be made from ante- 
 Nicene writers touching the 6/uoovdiov controversy, which 
 appear decidedly > heretical in the light of the Nicene 
 decrees. Yet they were not heretical.^ 
 
 When a theological term has received a definite, acknow- 
 ledged, technical meaning, it is reasonable to assume that 
 theologians, if they use that term, use it in its received 
 sense ; but when any word has not been so defined, when it 
 has notoriously several meanings, it is entirely unreasonable 
 to single out one of those meanings, and say as to any given 
 passages that the word 77iust have that meaning, and no 
 other. 
 
 (ii) The wide acceptance of the popular doctrine on 
 eternal punishment may well be accounted for, in great part, 
 on the ground that it has been commonly assumied to follow 
 of necessity in the train of certain other doctrines, the truth 
 of which is not denied by any Catholic, but rather very 
 jealously guarded and maintained : and hence it has come to 
 
 I Vide Newman's Aruin's, cap. v. sec ii. 
 
 I 
 
28 
 
 Fifth Question. 
 
 pass that when men have ventured to doubt, or to deny this 
 doctrine about eternal punishment, they have been at once 
 suppesed to doubt or deny some, or perhaps all, of these 
 other <loctiines, and they have been rebuked, or reproached, 
 pitied, or condemned accordingly. 
 
 Let me i distance some of these " other doctrines," from 
 which the popular doctrine under review is supposed to 
 follow as of necessity. 
 
 («) The doctrine of the final judgment, at '' the end of 
 all things " (whatever that phrase may mean), when " we 
 must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that 
 every one may receive the things done in the body, accord- 
 ing to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad."^ This 
 will be (so it is held) the /(.:•(' judgment. No review of its 
 sentence is to be attempted, no reversal will be possibly ever. 
 Tlie sentence then passed will be absolutely final. Let it 
 be so. But I would ask, does it follow that the penalty 
 imposed hy this " final " sentence must itself be final in the 
 sense of lasting for ever ? that the punishment infiicted by 
 the " unchangeable " judgment must be itself " unchange- 
 able " in the sense of unending ? Most assuredly not. We 
 s})eak of judgments given by earthly tribunals as being 
 "final," or "irrevocable :" we do not mean that the penalties 
 they assign are never to come to an end, but simply that 
 they are finally ])ronounced, that there is no appeal nor 
 esca})e. Why should we think otherwise of the judgments 
 of tiiat last and greatest " court," which wo allow to be in 
 the fullest sense of the word absolutely " final " ? 
 
 ( ) The popular doctrine is thought to follow from that 
 separation of the evil from the good of which Holy Scrip- 
 ture s} leaks, and to the awful reality, the just necessity of 
 wliich our hearts bear, whether willingly or unwillingly, 
 their irrepressible witness. " When the Son of Man shall 
 come in His glory, and all the lioly angels with Him, then 
 sliall He sit upon the throne of His glory : and before Him 
 shall be gathered all nations : and He shall separate them 
 
 I 2 Cor, V. 10. 
 
Fifth Questiov. 
 
 29 
 
 Ly this 
 b once 
 f these 
 )ached, 
 
 , " from 
 osed to 
 
 end of 
 len " we 
 ist, that I 
 
 , accord- 1 
 
 '"I This 
 j^v of its 
 ibly ever. 
 L. Let it 
 Q penalty 
 nal iri the 
 .tlicted by 
 unchange- 
 
 not. We 
 s as heing 
 ic penalties 
 ;imply that 
 ^ippeal nor 
 
 judgments 
 
 ,w to be in 
 
 ^ from that 
 Holy Scrip- 
 necessity ot 
 
 unwillingly' 
 of Man shall 
 b Him, then 
 ,d before Him 
 separate them 
 
 one from another, as a shepherd dividcth his slicep from 
 the goats: and He sliall set the sheep on His riglit liand, 
 but tlie goats on the left. Then shall the King say unto 
 them on His right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, 
 inherit the kingdom prepannl for 3'ou from the foundation 
 of the world. . . . Then shall He say also to them on the 
 left liand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into eveilasting 
 {(xiwviov) fire, prepared for tlie devil and his angels." If 
 these words are true — and no Catholic doubts them — heie 
 is a separation most real, true, and terrible : but is it said, 
 is it implied, that the separation is to last for ever ? 
 
 I The sentence consigns some to great gladness and others 
 
 =:;, to bitter grief ; to these it is condemnation, to those it is 
 I acquittal. Certainly : but what then ? Two men stand in 
 our assize court, accused before the judge : the trial is over, 
 the sentence is pronounced. The two men have left the 
 court, one is acquitted, the other is condemned. One goes 
 i his way to life and liberty and jo}', innocent, and reaping 
 the reward of innocence ; his acquittal is final, he is free, 
 free for ever. The other goes his way in custody, pei'haps 
 in fetters, to the darkness of a prison, or the degradation of 
 I a convict's doom, to bear " in misery and iron " his heart- 
 I consumino- solitude, or to work out in hard and fruitless 
 toil, among companions more wicked, it may be, than him- 
 self, the long years of his appalling punishment. Is there 
 not here a separation between the evil and the good, " real, 
 true, and terrible " ? But will it last for ever ? Is it not 
 possible that that convict, now in his chains, may be one 
 day a free man, his sentence worked out, his i)unishment 
 endured, his crimes blotted out from any further legal re- 
 cognition, himself, perhaps, a new man in the highest and 
 truest meaning of those words ?^ with all the rights restored 
 of freedom and of citizenship, standing, perhaps, side by side 
 with him from whom he had long been parted by a separa- 
 tion most real and terrible, but not hopeless, not heai't- 
 crushing, not utterly despairful, because vof endless. If 
 
 I J'lWc tlic story of Jean Valjean in J.rs Miserahles. 
 
30 
 
 Fifth Question. 
 
 this is man's mercy in punishing, shall God's be less ? At 
 least, is it impossible to believe fully and unreservedly in a 
 separation of the evil from the good at the final judgment, 
 and yet to hope that that separation will not be endless, 
 that it will last so long as the evil are evil, but no longer ? 
 Is it unreasonable, is it unchristian so to believe, or at least 
 to hope ? But I do not press the reasonableness or the 
 Christianity of this hope ; I am only concerned to show 
 here that it is not inconsistent with the full belief in that 
 " final " separation which is commonly but inconsiderately, 
 and (I believe) untruly supposed to preclude any such hope 
 
 at all. 
 
 {r) There is a statement in the parable of the Rich Man 
 and Lazarus which is often quoted as proving the unaltera- 
 ble, and therefore (as it is urged) endless condition of " the 
 saved " and " the lost." Abraham is represented as saying 
 to the rich man that there is " a great gulf fixed " between 
 them, and that it is impossible to pass across that gulf 
 
 either way. 
 
 Now on this statement, viewed as an argument bearing on 
 the question before us, I would plead (i) that this parable 
 manifestly speaks of a time 'prior to the final judgment, and 
 not subsequent to it ; for Dives' five brethren were still liv- 
 ing on this earth when he addressed himself to Abraham ; 
 therefore no statement in the parable has any proper or 
 necessary reference to that state and condition which will 
 be, not before, but after the last judgment ; and (ii) that it 
 does not follow of necessity (though it may be speculatively 
 probable) that the same " gulf," or one similar to that which 
 divides the evil from the good before the day of judgment, 
 will also divide them afterwards. Still less is it necessary, 
 or even speculatively probable, to assume that the "gulf" 
 (whatever sort of division or distinction that figurative ex- 
 pression may imply) which is impassable during one parti- 
 cular period, will continue to be impassable always. In 
 sliort, I would plead that no certain conclusions at all, as to 
 the eternal conditions of the evil or the good, can safely be 
 drawn from anything said in this parable. 
 
Fifth Question. 
 
 31 
 
 I At 
 ^ in a 
 ment, 
 idless, 
 ►nger 1 
 ,t least 
 or the 
 3 show 
 in that 
 erately, 
 ch hope 
 
 ich Man 
 maltera- 
 
 of " the . 
 
 IS saying ' 
 
 \)etween 
 
 that gulf 
 
 Dearingon 
 is parable 
 rment, and 
 :e still liv- 
 Abraham ; 
 r proper or 
 which will 
 . (ii) that it 
 )eculatively 
 ) that which 
 f judgment, 
 it necessary J 
 
 the " gnlf 
 igurative ex- 
 ng one parti- 
 
 always. In 
 IS at all, as to 
 
 can safely be 
 
 (5) Next it is urged that our final destiny is fixed at the 
 hour of death, that our trial time is over, that for weal or 
 woe our lot is cast. Pages of exti-acts from Holy Scripture 
 might be quoted pointing this way — exhortations to work 
 " while it is day," " before the night cometh ;" to " walk in 
 the light, while we have the liglit ; " to repent while " the 
 day of grace " lasts ; not to lose opportunities ; not to 
 reckon on the morrow ; to remember that " the covenant of 
 the grave is not showed " to us. All this, it is argued, im- 
 plies necessarily that man's destiny in the future is fixed 
 unalterably at the hour of death. It would certainly seem 
 so. I have no wish to deny or question it. His destiny for 
 the future will l)e fixed finally unalterably. Let it be so. 
 But I ask, " What destiny ? " Why not— for the wicked— 
 the destiny then inevitable, the sentence then irrevocable, 
 that he must suffer x -\- \ number of years or centuries of 
 sorrow and suffering, the just penalty for his sins, the neces- 
 sary issue of his earthly life ; x -\- 1 number of years or 
 centuries of bitter memory and keen self-reproach, " weep- 
 ing and gnashing of teeth." Years or centuries of painful 
 waiting, of profound affliction, while the habits and desires 
 of evil are denied and crucified and crushed and cast away ; 
 while the deep stains and memories of sin are burnt out or 
 washed away ; while the horror and misery and degrada- 
 tion of sin are felt to the uttermost, and all its seductive 
 pleasantness is for ever gone ; while the far off calm and 
 joy of the land of light is seen in the immeasurable distance, 
 and the sufferer again and again assails himself with the 
 irrepressible ejaculation, " But for m}^ sins, my own misera- 
 ble sins, I too might have been there I " 
 
 Why not this destiny of sorrow and travail, to endure we 
 know not how long — for there is no known measure of 
 duration beyond the grave — before the end which God 
 "willeth" for "all men?" Why not this destiny then, at 
 the hour of death, at the day of judgment, finally, irrevoca- 
 bly fixed ? I do not presume to say this will be so : I only 
 ask» " Why not?" Is not such a supposition, such a belief 
 quite in keeping with the truth that our future destiny ia 
 fixed at death ? 
 
32 
 
 Fifth Question. 
 
 Surely it does not necessarily follow that a sentence irre- 
 versibly passed must assign a penalty which shall be end- 
 less ; nor that a destiny inevitabh'^ incurred must be destiny 
 to a condition which is unchangeable for ever. 
 
 (e) There remains one more truth, often supposed, often 
 expressly asserted, to include of necessity the never-ending 
 punishment of the wicked; I mean, the never-ending reward 
 of the righteous. It is frequently urged that any denial or 
 even doubt as to the former implies also doubt or denial as 
 to the latter; and on this point — the sure and certain 
 " eternity," in its largest meaning, of future bliss — all Chris- 
 tian people are agreed that there is no doubt. It would be 
 perhaps impossible to tind this su])position expressed more 
 clearly anywhere than it is in the following verses, 
 and here stated not as a mere rigid theory, l)ut as the 
 solemn, sad conviction of a profoundly and tenderly religious 
 mind. Mr. Keble, in his hymn for the Second Sunday in 
 Lent, has written — 
 
 m 
 
 iiii 
 
 ij 
 
 " Eut where is then the stay of contrite hearts ? 
 
 Of old they lean'd on Thy Eternal Word, 
 But with the sinner's fear their hope departs, 
 
 Fast linked as Thy great Name to Thee, O Lord ; 
 
 That Name, by which Thy faitlifuloath is past, 
 That we should ciidh'ss be, for joy or woe ; — 
 
 And if the treasures of Thy wrath should waste, 
 Thy lovejs must their promised heaven forego." 
 
 I have quoted these words, trenchant and telling, as well as 
 tenderfy touching and persuasive, rather than many others 
 which I might have chosen to the same general eii'ect, be- 
 cause I desir^ to meet the argument here advanced in its 
 strongest form, to give it every possible advantage, to admit 
 to the full the power of its appeal to the faith and the hopes 
 of Christian men, to their loyal and unshrinking acceptance 
 of all that God has distinctly declared. 
 
 (1) Now, on these two verses I would remark, that in 
 lines one and two it is implied that " contrite hearts '' could 
 no longer lean on God's " Eternal Word," if it should appear 
 
>, 
 
 c ivre- 
 e en(\- 
 lestiny 
 
 I, often 
 -ending 
 reward 
 enial or 
 icnial as 
 certain 
 ai Chris- 
 ,vould be 
 sed more 
 o- verses, 
 it as the 
 
 r leligio^^ 
 Sunday in 
 
 (T, as well as 
 Sany others 
 a etiect, he- 
 anced in its 
 ^ase, to admit 
 
 ,nd the hopes 
 ng acceptance 
 
 mark, that in 
 hearts " could 
 should appear 
 
 Fifth Question. 
 
 33 
 
 that " woe " was not "' endless." This, of course, is simply 
 assuming the whole (piestion at issue, and, therefore, aslong 
 as the question \f,hvI) jitdice, the appeal of these two lines 
 cannot be admitted as an argument. 
 
 (2) In the third line it is implied that the " sinner's fear " 
 will " depart " if the " woe " which threatens him should be 
 thought anything short of " endless ;" but this is an assum- 
 ])tion as contrary to reason as it is opposed to all experience. 
 Why, a priori, should any one cease to fear pain or punish- 
 ment because it will not last for ever ? Do we not shrink from 
 pain, and take trouble to avoid it, though it would last but 
 a few minutes if it came ? Do we iind in our criminal 
 
 Wji records that the fear of cidprits has " departed," because 
 they knew that their punishment would be over when they 
 had received a given number of lashes, or spent so many 
 months or years in prison, or in the hulks ? Is it not rather 
 true, on the contrary, and so well known as to need no 
 mention, that fear of such finite pains and punishments is 
 very keen and lively ; that for the vast majority of mankind 
 it always has acted, and always does act, as a powerful and 
 stringent restraint upon those who are tempted to do evil ? 
 Why should it be otherwise ; why will men do violence to 
 all experience and all reason by insisting that it shall be 
 otherwise, when the threatened " woe " lies bej'^ond the con- 
 fines of this world, dark indeed, and terrible beyond all that 
 words can say, but yet not utterly liopeless because nob 
 endless ? 
 
 It is, of course, true that the fear of an endless punishment 
 would be much greater (so far as it is possible to compare 
 the infinite with the finite) than tlie fear of a punishment 
 which was not endless, i.e. it would be more horrid and 
 heart-crushing ; but it may well be doubted whether it 
 would be morally effectual for good ; and this is a " doubt " 
 (to say the least of it) which has not, I think, been 
 sufliciently considered by those who press the argument 
 here used by Mr. Keble. 
 
 (3) A further argument of a different kind is found in 
 lines five and six, an argument which, if admitted at all, is 
 
34 
 
 Fifth Question. 
 
 ii! 
 
 f \ 
 
 jjii i 
 
 unanswerable by those who believe the Bible. It is stated 
 that the great Name of God is pledged on oath to the fact 
 that " woe " as well as "joy " shall be "endless ; " 
 
 *' That Name by whicli Tliy faithful oath is past, 
 That we should endless be, for joy or woe." 
 
 If this were true, my pen would drop from my hand, all 
 further argument would be worse than vain ; but I ask 
 respectfully, and before such a tremendous assertion as this 
 is made and maintained there ought to be forthcoming a 
 very clear reply to the question, " When and where was such 
 an ' oath ' passed ? Where is the record of any such 
 * oath ' ? " I find it nowhere in the pages of Holy Scripture ; 
 and I know, and can conceive, no other record in which to 
 search. That lue ourselves shall be " endless " is no doubt 
 generally admitted to be a truth of God's revelation. I 
 know of no " oath " even for this ; but it is a very different 
 thing to assert that " woe " will be endless because we, 
 some of whom that woe awaits, are endless ourselves. On 
 these two lines I must venture, with all reverence for him 
 who wrote them, to say that they contain an assertion so 
 terrible and so momentous as to demand imperatively for 
 its justification the most distinct and express testimony of 
 Holy Scripture in its support, whereas no word of such 
 testimony is at all to be found. 
 
 (4) Once more, as to these two verses ; the last two lines 
 imply that if the " wrath " of God were not endless His love 
 could not be endless either.^ 
 
 "And if the treasures of Thy wrath could waste, 
 Thy lovers must their promised heaven forego," 
 
 But why ? Where is the authoiity, ground, or reason for 
 such an inference ? Why must we suppose God's wrath to 
 
 \ Vide also S. Thomas, "Summa" Pars iii iii., Supplemenlum, 
 QujEstio 99, art. ii. *' Ejusdem enim rationis esse videtur bonos angelos in 
 Kterna beatitudiue permanere, et malos angelos in aetemum puniri, Unde 
 sicut ponebat doemones et animas damnatordm quandoque a pcena liberandas ; 
 ita ponebat angelos et animas beatorum quandoque a beatitudine in hujus vitse 
 miserias devolvendas. " He is speaking of the supposed opinions of Origen. 
 
Fifth Question. 
 
 35 
 
 bated 
 ; fact 
 
 nd, all 
 1 ask 
 as this 
 lining a 
 ras such 
 Ly sucb 
 ripture ; 
 yrhich to 
 ao doubt 
 
 sttion. 1 
 different 
 
 ;ause we, 
 sres. On 
 e for hi«i 
 sertion so 
 ttively for 
 jtimony ot 
 •d of such 
 
 t two Vmes 
 ess His love 
 
 3. 
 
 )> 
 
 or reason for 
 3d's wrath to 
 
 of Origen. 
 
 adine 
 
 be endless and inexhaustible, because His love is everlasting ? 
 We are informed in Scripture^ that God's " wrath " is His 
 " strange work ; " but His love is the very essence and out- 
 come of Himself. God would cease to be what He is, if He 
 ceased to love, for " God is love ; " but it is nowhere said 
 that " God is wrath." It is surely an unwarrantable con- 
 clusion to assume, that because that which is natural and 
 necessary will be perpetual, therefore that which is strange 
 and abnormal will be perpetual also. 
 
 ' (5) And this leads me to the last remark I would make 
 on this argument in support of the popular doctrine ; it is 
 this, that the two conditions here referred to, compared, and 
 assumed to be anaolgous, are not really analogousjat all ; 
 one is God's known and declared will for mankind, the other 
 is the contravention, the reversal of His will. He is " the 
 Saviour of all men."^ He " will have all men to be saved, 
 and to come to the knowledge of the truth. "^ It is nowhere 
 said that He is "the Destroyer of all men," or that He 
 " will have all men to be lost." Salvation, therefore, and 
 destruction, the joy of " the saved " and the sorrow of " the 
 lost," are not analogous, they are utterly disparate. And 
 more than this, " salvation " is not merely God's known 
 will in the abstract, but it was the very end and purpose of 
 that great work of redemption, which is the centre and 
 substance of Christian revelation ; at least, if we will allow 
 the testimony of that revelation to speak for itself. " Christ 
 Jesus," we are told, " came into the world to save sinners."* 
 And as far as sinners " saved " (whatever may be the exact 
 meaning, the whole contents of that expression,) so far the 
 one purpose of His coming is gained. As far as sinners are 
 " lost " (in the popular sense of that word,) so far God's 
 purpose fails. 
 
 Is it possible intelligently to believe in Almighty God, 
 and also to believe that His purpose — His greatest purpose 
 ever made known to us — will be finally, fearfully, and ever- 
 lastingly a failure ? That He may work out that purpose 
 
 linions 
 
 I Isaiah xxviii. 2i. 
 4 I Tim. i. 15. 
 
 2 Tim. iv. 10. 
 
 3 Ibid. ii. 4. 
 
36 
 
 Fifth Quest iov. 
 
 to its final issue, its sure acconiplislimcnt, by means utterly 
 mysterious to us ; that He, with wluun " a thousand years 
 are as one day," may l)e tied to no limit of time in the 
 achievement of what He wills to do — this is conceival)le ; 
 but that He should fail finally is inconceivable — inconceiv- 
 able unless we are prepaied to resign our belief in " one God 
 the Father Almighty," and fall back, in company with the 
 ancient heathen, into a dim conception of some " fate " 
 superior to the gods : the darkest and most dismal 6f all 
 creeds.^ 
 
 1 have examined thus at length this particular argument, 
 and laboured to show in some detail its unsatisfactory 
 nature, because it is so frequently advanced as being per se 
 conclusive on the question at issue, and because it does 
 make at first sight an appeal both strong and touching to 
 our hopes as well as our fears ; an appeal often, no doubt, 
 quite honestly used, but one which never ought to be used, 
 since it is wholly groundless and delusive. There are then 
 these five points of doctrine: the doctrines of "the final 
 judgment," " the separation of the evil from the good," 
 " the impassable gulf," " destiny, fixed at death," and " the 
 never-ending bliss of the righteous;" all of these have been 
 
 2 I take the liberty of appending here, and further on in a note, the 
 observations of a friend, which appear to me to be much to tlie ])urpose. 
 
 " It must be borne steadily in mind that the Christian revelation depicts 
 Jesus Christ as claiming aU the kingdoms of the world, and aU souls and 
 bodies therein, as His rightful domain, and as combating for their recovery 
 with the evil spirits who have usurped them in part or entirely. To allege, 
 then, that He can secure, as the result of this conflict, only an infinitesimal 
 fraction of the objects contended for, leaving the incalculable majority to be 
 the spoil of Satan, is to strip His title and crown of Victor from His brow, 
 and to proclaim his utter, crushing, and irremediable defeat. The Calvinist 
 argument, that the exceeding preciousncss of the handful of ransomed souls is 
 such as to outweigh a thousandfold the value of the innumerable lost, .simply 
 evades the fact of the ttiiiiursalify of Christ's claim, and is besides an expres- 
 sion of the most inflated and arrogant spiritual pride. 
 
 " It may be added here, by way of illustration, that a king, who contended 
 with a rebel chief for the possession of his wide hereditary realm, would cer- 
 tainly not be thought victorious in the issue of a war which left him but a 
 small canton of territory, even if exceptionally fertile or rich in mineral 
 wealth, while his revolted subject lorded it over densely-peopled provinces, 
 of vast extent albeit of inferior productiveness." 
 
k 
 
 Fifth Question. 
 
 37 
 
 tterly 
 years 
 in the 
 vaV)lc ; 
 )nceiv- 
 ne God 
 itli the 
 " fate " 
 ,1 bf all 
 
 gument, 
 isfactory 
 
 (f per «e 
 
 It does 
 idling to 
 lo doubt, 
 , be used, 
 
 are then 
 
 the final 
 he good," 
 
 and "the 
 have been 
 
 a note, tlie 
 purpose, 
 ilation depicts 
 d <r// souls and 
 their recovery 
 y^ To allege, 
 :in infinitesimal 
 majority to be 
 rom His brow, 
 
 The Calvnnst 
 nsomed souls is 
 1,1c lost, simply 
 ;sides an expres- 
 
 , who contended 
 aim, would cer- 
 h left him but a 
 rich in mineral 
 'Opled provinces, 
 
 
 generally held and believed by all Christian writers, of 
 every sclnjol and every age, and all of them are connnonly 
 su))posed to involve of necessity " the everlasting punish- 
 ment of the wicked ;" hence that doctrine has " crept in 
 unawares," often when it has not been deliberately accepted 
 and defended ; and its defenders have taken advantage of 
 this common acceptance, and of this supposed connection 
 with other leceived doctrines, to construct new defences. 
 I believe this consideration goes far to explain the fact 
 (which certainly cannot be denied), that the great majority 
 of theologians — or I .should prefer to say of writers on 
 Christianity — have expressly, or implicitly, accepted and 
 endorsed the popular view. It nuist, however, never be 
 forgotten, that there is nothing like an unbroken chain of 
 evidence, nothing like universal consent ; for from the days 
 of Origen, in the third century, down to our own day, 
 amoni; the innumerable multitude of writers of sermons 
 and commentaries, who have been content, without inquiry, 
 to assume and then to improve ujjon the doctrine of endless 
 misery, there have been here and there thoughtful and 
 learned men, who have not been content so to assume, who 
 have considered and examined a (question so full of terrible 
 interest ; and again and again the issue of inquiry has 
 been that they have disclaimed and rejected a doctrine 
 which certainly appears to be more utterly and hope- 
 lessly dishonouring t(3 God than any other which it 
 is possible to conceive.^ I am not aware that there 
 exists any ancient record in detail of such an in- 
 quiry. We know the conclusions to which these men 
 have come, we know little of the train of thought, or argu- 
 ment by which these conclusions were reached. But we do 
 know a great deal on the other side ; we possess lengthy and 
 elaborate arguments advanced in support of the popular 
 doctrine. We are at no loss wdiatever to know on what 
 grounds, and by what sort of arguments, that doctrine has 
 been asserted and maintained ; and it might fairly be said 
 
 I. Vide a. catena of opinions on this subject in an Appendix to Mr. Juke's 
 interesting work on The Restitution of All Things, (Longman's, 1873.) 
 
^.jusaiia 
 
 I 
 
 ill ' 
 
 M: 
 
 98 
 
 Siccth Question. 
 
 that I harl failed satisfactorily to meet the difficulty raised 
 by the fifth Question, which I proposed to answer, if I were 
 not to examine in some detail the arguments by which 
 writers of learning and authority have defended that doc- 
 trine, which it is the purpose of this Letter to discuss. I 
 therefore j)roceed to make such an examination ; and as it 
 is evidently impossible to examine all writers upon this 
 subject, I will chose three, one ancient, one medineval, one 
 modem ; and I presume I shall not be charged with having 
 made an unfair selection, or chosen feeble champions, if I 
 fix upon S. Augustine, S. Thomas Aquinas, and Dr. Pusey, 
 as advocates who shall be called to maintain the popular 
 doctrine as best they can ; and few, if any, could hope to do 
 it better. I fix upon these three, partly because of the 
 learning, ability, devotion, and orthodoxy which character- 
 ise them all, and partly because I know of no others, 
 samples of their age and school, who have entered more 
 fully — or perhaps I should say more at length — into the 
 question, or taken more distinctly their side in the dispute. 
 But before I enter upon this examination, wliich properly 
 belongs to the answer to my fifth Question, I will briefly 
 recite and dismiss the sixth, viz. 
 
 VI. 
 
 " Is there any necessity, known to us, or even any pro- 
 bability, arising from the nature of the case, which would 
 sustain the popular doctrine ?" 
 
 I suppose it would be superfluoiip to argue that there is 
 no such " necessity :" if there har' boen, the defenders of this 
 doctrine need have been at no pains to search for other 
 arguments; known necessity would have been conclusive 
 alone. And as to any " probability " in favor of the popular 
 doctrine, enough has been said already, and more will 
 follow, to show that probabality is clearly all the other way. 
 And, so far as I know, no attempt has ever been made to 
 defend this doctrine on the ground of inherent probability, 
 much less of necessity. I will therefore say no more as to 
 this, but proceed to inspect the arguments of the three theo- 
 logians, just now mentioned, and first of S. Augustine. 
 
raised 
 [were 
 which 
 doc- 
 Uss. I 
 
 as it 
 )u this 
 al, one 
 having 
 ns, if I 
 
 Pusey, 
 popular 
 ;)e to do 
 } of the 
 aracter- 
 
 others, 
 id more 
 into the 
 dispute, 
 properly 
 il briefly 
 
 any pro- 
 ch would 
 
 t there is 
 ers of this 
 for other 
 conclusive 
 he popular 
 more will 
 other way. 
 a made to 
 )robability, 
 more as to 
 three theo- 
 stine. 
 
 I 
 
 I 
 
 \i 
 
 (39) 
 
 S. AUGUSTINE DE CIVITATE DEI. Lin. XXI. 
 
 Cap. i. to X. are occupied with questions not requiring 
 special notice ; e.g. whether bodies could bum in the fire for 
 ever without being entirely destroyed. 
 
 Whetlier the capacity to suffer pain does not involve of 
 necessity the liability, and sooner or later the certainty, of 
 death. Whether the pains of hell, arising from material 
 fire can affect incorporeal spirits. 
 
 Cap. xi. Here a (juestion of justice is raised, viz. 
 whether it is not unjust that sin&, however henious, com- 
 mitted in a short time, should incur an endless punishment ? 
 S. Augustine replies that even in this world sins which take 
 but a short time to commit, e. g. murder or adultery, are 
 avenged by long enduring punishments, therefore " it is not 
 unjust," etc. But to this argument there is the obvious 
 answer, that although the just proportion between a crime 
 and its punishment is not to be reckoned by duration of 
 time, yet there is a just ]:)roportion between the heinousness 
 of a crime and the severity of its retribution, and the justice 
 or injustice of any punishment invariably depends upon 
 that due proportion being kept ; but there is no proportion 
 between any temporal crime, however flagrant, and an end- 
 less punishment. It may indeed be true, as it has been said, 
 that " sin has a bearing on the world to come, on the condi- 
 tion of snirits, and the eternal relations between God and 
 the creature," and that "we have no line to fathom those 
 depths ;" but if so, we at least cannot be held responsible for 
 matters wholly beyond the ]iossible reach of our understand- 
 ing. 
 
 Cap. xii. to the same purpose. S. Augustine urges that 
 we now cannot know how wicked ((quantum nefas) the first 
 
I 
 
 
 Ml 
 
 40 
 
 S. Augustine. 
 
 sin was, which deserved endless punishment, and involved 
 all oa^ us in that fate. But (passing over the question of one 
 man's sin " deserving " punishment finite or infinite for all 
 his descendants) it is always held to be of the essence of sin 
 that it should be consciously committed ; the guilt, therefore, 
 of a sin cannot be, subjectively to him who commits it, 
 greater than the sinner knows it to be, ©r might have known 
 if he would ; and consequently, to speak of an infi.nite pen- 
 alty being justly due to any sin, because it was infinitely 
 worse than the sinner knew, or could have known it to be, 
 ife to pervert the true idea of sin, and to destroy utterly all 
 conception of responsibility. There can he no responsibility 
 for an act of which the doer does not and cannot know the 
 nature. In this same principle may be found the reply to 
 the argument, that since the guilt of a sin depends (partly 
 at least) upon the person against whom it was committed, 
 and since sin is against an infinite God, therefore .'^s guilt is 
 infinite, and its due penalty endless. The reply is that 
 " infinite guilt " is simply impossible in any act of % crea- 
 ture whose intelligence is not infinite, and therefore impos- 
 sible in cm?/ man. . ' 
 
 Cap. xiii. S. Augustine here notices the theory that all 
 punishments are for the amendment of the offender ; and if 
 so, of course not endless. He replies simply that there are 
 no doubt punishments, " causa purgationis," after death as 
 well as before, but that all such punishments are previous to 
 the Day of Judgment. This obviously is an assertion, not 
 aL argument. 
 
 Cap. xiv. XV. xvi. are not material to the question before 
 us. 
 
 Cap. xvii. S. Augustine proposes "a peaceable argu- 
 ment " with those who think that the pains of the damned 
 will not be endless. Ho observes that Origen thought this, 
 and with consistency thought also that the fallen angels 
 would be at some time restored. He does not argue the 
 question, but simply says, (i) that for tliese and other 
 opinions, " et maxime' " for an opinion on an entirely differ- 
 
S. Augustine. 
 
 41 
 
 nvolved 
 n of one 
 e for all 
 ce of sin 
 lerefore, 
 units it, 
 e known 
 lite pen- 
 miinitely 
 L it to be, 
 tterly all 
 onsibility 
 know the 
 e reply to 
 ds (partly 
 ommitted, 
 
 •^s guilt IS 
 
 Is that 
 
 '. crea- 
 
 ore impos 
 
 ry that all 
 Lei , and if 
 ,t there are 
 jr death as 
 previous to 
 sertion, not 
 
 jstion before 
 
 jeable argu- 
 the damned 
 bought this, 
 fallen angels 
 3t argue the 
 3 and other 
 itirely differ- 
 
 ent subject,^ " the Clmrcli condemned '' Origen (reprobavit 
 Ecclesia) ; how, or when, he does not say ; and (ii) that this 
 opinion is "against the plain Word of God" (contra recta 
 Dei verba) ; but here, also, he gives n(3 reference. He 
 allows that this opinion is " misericors," and does not see 
 why it should not apply to the angels as well as to mankind, 
 if to either. 
 
 Cap. xviii. He says he has known person who think 
 that the pains of the lost will be endless, because the saints 
 will surely intercede for them when they stand to be judged, 
 and God will surely hear their intercessions, and withdraw 
 His tlireat, just as He did in the case of the Ninevites. S. 
 Augustine makes here no answer to this argument (if it can 
 be called an " argument "), but passes on to speak of others, 
 viz. in 
 
 Cap. xix., that no one who has received Communion will 
 perish everlastingly, because of the promise, " He that eateth 
 of this bread shall live forever. "^ 
 
 Cap. XX., that no one who is a Catholic will perish for- 
 ever, because he is a member of" the body of Christ ;"^ or 
 
 Cap. xxi., because he has built upon " the one founda- 
 tion," and, therefore, has the pronusc that " he himself shall 
 be saved, yet so as by fire."^ 
 
 Cap. xxii., tliat no one who gives alms, and forgives his 
 brethren, will perish everlastingly, because of the promise, 
 " If ye forgive men their trespasses, your Heavenly Father 
 will also forgive you."^ A few other passages of Scripture 
 to a like effect are also quoted. S. Augustine concludes 
 this cap. by saying, " When I shall have answered all these 
 arguments, Deo donante, I shall bring this book to a conclu- 
 sion " ! ''All these arguments" ! Is it possible to suppose that 
 " these arguments " were " all " the arguments with which S. 
 Augustine was acipiainted ? or that he attached any but the 
 very slightest importance to " ai'guments " so pitifully feeble, 
 
 I " Et maxime propter alternantes sine cessotione beatitudines et statutis 
 sceculorum intervallis ab istis ad illas, atque ab illis ad istas itus ac reditus in- 
 terminabiles." 
 2 S. John vi. 58. 3 Ephe^. v. 30. 4 i Cor. iii. 15. 5 S. Matt. vi. 14. 
 3 
 
-mam 
 
 II 
 
 42 
 
 S. AufivMine. 
 
 and founded avowedly on Scripture quotations so manifestly 
 misapplied ? However, he replies to " all these arguments," 
 and we will see what he says. 
 
 Cap. xxiii. The opinion that the fallen angels, as 
 well as lost human beings, will be finally saved, if refuted 
 as being in contradiction to the words of our Lord in S. 
 Matt. XXV. 41 and 46, and to the statement of Rev. xx. 10, 
 and as obscuring the certainty of everlasting bliss. This ar- 
 gument has been already dealt with, except so far as regards 
 the inference with reference to the salvability of the 
 angels. On this it may be enough to say that it is the pur- 
 pose of revelation to make known to us God's dealings with 
 mankind, His dealings with the angels are only seldom, 
 briefly, and incidentally introduced. We are not, therefore, 
 justified in drawing conclusions about the angels 'pari 
 jmssa with our conclusions about ourselves. It would be 
 quite unwarrantable to conclude that the fallen angels Tiiust 
 he salvable because men are (if they are), since we know 
 too little about them to have any sure ground for such a 
 conclusion. 
 
 Cap. xxiv. The opinion that the wicked will be saved 
 from the full severity of a sentence to endless woe by the 
 prayers, then offered, of the saints, is met by the argument 
 that as the saints do not noiu pray for the devil and the 
 l(jst angels, so neither will they the7i pray for lost mankind ; 
 in short, that regarding the matter as finally settled, they 
 will not interfere with it. Several texts of Scripture, which 
 are supposed to show that God will have mercy on the lost, 
 are quoted in order to state that they do not mean this ; and 
 the idea that certain statements concerning the punish- 
 ment of the wicked must be taken to signify the punish- 
 ments which they deserve, not those which will be actually 
 inflicted, is cited and dismissed. S. Augustine takes occa- 
 sion here to state his belief in the salutary pains of 
 purgatory.^ 
 
 I " Sicut etiam facta resurrectione moi'tuorum, non deerunt quibus post 
 pcenas, quas patiuntur spiritus morluorum, impertiatur misericordia, ut in ig- 
 nem non mittantur aeternum." — Sec. ii. 
 
S. Augustine. 
 
 43 
 
 lifestly 
 naent's," 
 
 rels, as 
 refuted 
 L-d in S. 
 , XX. 10, 
 This ar- 
 i regards 
 ,r of the 
 the pur- 
 ngB with 
 r seldom, 
 therefore, 
 
 ^els p«,'»"i' 
 would be 
 igels must 
 we know 
 for such a 
 
 1 be saved 
 ^oe by the 
 
 argument 
 n\ and the 
 
 mankind ; 
 3ttled, they 
 )ture, which 
 
 on the lost, 
 fein this; and 
 the punish- 
 the punish- 
 l be actually 
 
 takes occa 
 
 ^ry pains 
 
 of 
 
 runt quibus post 
 ricordia, ut in ig- 
 
 Cap. XXV. S. Augustine refutes the notion that those who 
 are baptized, or who are communicants, or who are Catho- 
 lics, however evil their lives may be, will not perish ever- 
 lastingly, by reference to S. Paul's assertion, that " they 
 which do such things (i.e. 'adultery,' etc.) shall not inherit 
 the kingdon of God."^ If they shall not inherit " the 
 kingdom of God," then they must perish in hell, for there is 
 no " middle place." 
 
 Cap. xxvi. S. Augustine, referring to the argument that 
 those who have built on the one foundation, who have 
 Christ for their foundation (Christum in fundamento habent), 
 " will be saved, yet so as by fire," whatever there work may 
 have been, objects, that to have Christ as our foundation 
 means to put him before everything else, before all desires, 
 aims, and affections, and that those who prefer the pleasures 
 of sin to the obedience of Christ have not got " Christ as 
 their foundation," and therefore this promise does not apply 
 to them. 
 
 Cap. xxvii. And lastly he deals with the belief that 
 those only will perish everlastingly, who have given no 
 alms, or who have refused forgiveness to others, which l)e- 
 lief rests on the words, " He shall have judgment without 
 mercy who hath showed no mercy ;"2 and on the implied 
 promise of our Lord, when he teaches us to pray, " Forgive 
 us our trespasses, as we forgive," etc.^^ 
 
 To this S. Augustine replies at great length, touching 
 upon a number of collateral subjects, but chiefly to the 
 effect that alms and forgiveness of others are not the only 
 conditions of salvation ; alms may be quite in vain ; e.g., 
 " Though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, .... and 
 have not charity, it protiteth me nothing ;"^ and it is im- 
 possible to suppose that a man who persisted in all sorts of 
 wickedness would be forgiven simply because he forgave 
 the trespasses of others. Moreover, to whatever extent 
 alms and forgiveness of others avail to win pardon, they 
 avail to save us from being sent into condemnation, not to 
 bring us out of it after we have been sent there. 
 
 I Gal. V. 21. 2 .S. James ii. 13. 3. Matt. vi. 11. 41 Cor. xiii. 3. 
 
i 
 
 44 
 
 S. Augustine. 
 
 This chapter concludes the book. 
 
 Now it is evident that not one of the arguments here re- 
 futed (except that of Origeii) touches the broad question of 
 endless punishment at all. S. Augustine has simply replied 
 to a number of theories, more or less fanciful, which assert 
 that certain persons Avill, for this or that supposed reason, be 
 delivered from eternal woe. All these theories may have 
 been shown to be quite baseless, but the main question is 
 untouched. Origen's theory, the only one of real impor- 
 tance among all these shallow fancies, S. Augustine dis- 
 misses without argument, simply saying that it was rejected, 
 among many others, by the Church, and that it is contrary 
 to certain statements of Scripture. Both which assertions, 
 if true, would no doubt render " argument " unnecessary ; 
 but S. Augustine does not prove, or attempt to prove either 
 of them. 
 
 On the wliole, therefore, it must be admitted that this 
 lengthy treatise, to which reference is often made as if it 
 were quite exhaustive, does in fact leave all the main issues 
 of the question entirely untouched, except that one diffi- 
 culty about justice, which is got over and dismissed by 
 means of an analogy which has really no bearing whatever 
 on the case. 
 
 S. Augustine then, although he here accepts, and elabo- 
 rately defends the popular belief, has not attempted to 
 grapple with any one of the really grave difficulties by 
 which that belief is surrounded. 
 
 iMif 
 
 .3 1; 
 
 «<• 
 
(45) 
 
 ere re- 
 tion of 
 replied 
 
 assert 
 Lson, be 
 f have 
 tion is 
 
 impor- 
 ne dis- 
 •ejected, 
 oiitrary 
 sertions, 
 cessary ; 
 76 either 
 
 ,hat this 
 e as if it 
 lin issues 
 one diffi- 
 lissed by 
 whatever 
 
 nd elabo- 
 jmpted to 
 julties by 
 
 § IV. 
 
 S. THOM^: "SUMMyl^: PARS III. SUPPLEMENTUM," 
 
 QU^STIO 99. 
 
 " De Miscricordia et ^usiilia Dei respcdn Davinatorum.^^ 
 
 In the five " Articles " which fall under the head of this 
 " Question," S. Thomas discusses some arguments for and 
 against everlasting punishment. He follows so closely in 
 S. Augustine's steps tliat it will not be necessary liere to 
 repeat texts and arguments already produced in analysing 
 the twenty-first book of the Dc Civ. Del. To that book S. 
 Thomas constantly refers, and indeed his own short treatise 
 is little less than an abbreviation of S. Augustine's lengthier 
 work : the same objections started, the same replies given, 
 the same texts quoted one after another. There ai'e, how- 
 ever, some parts of this treatise which are not derived from 
 S. Augustine. 
 
 S. Thomas throws his discussion here (as he does all 
 through the " Summa ") into the form of a series of ques- 
 tions, to which a supposed o])poncnt answers in the nega- 
 tive, supporting his answer by such aiguments as he can 
 command ; S. "Thomas then replies to this negative answer, 
 and attempts to confute its reasoning. 
 
 The questions here proposed are the following, entitled 
 " Articles." 
 
 1. " Utrum ex divina justitia inferatur prena a3terna 
 peccatoribus ?" 
 
 2. " Utrum per divinam misericordiam omnis pa?na 
 damnatorum terminetur tam liominum quam dpemonum ?" 
 
 3. " Utrum divina miscricordia patiatur saltern homines 
 in seternum puniri ?" 
 
 4. " Utrum pcena Christianorum damnatorum per divi- 
 nam misericordiam terminetur ?" 
 
!,( 
 
 n 1 
 
 ( ^'^ ) 
 
 A SERMOxN, PREACHED BEFORE THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF OXFORD, BY THE Rev. E. B. PUSEY, D.D. 
 
 Oh the Twe?ity-Jirst Sunday after Trinity, 1864. 
 . • {Parker, 1864.) . 
 
 In this ver} .sti.r.mg sermon Dr. Pusey is not dealing 
 with the s\n)l)Osed ohjectors who confronted S. Thomas, 
 nor with the ini^^i)pl"'^4 texts of Scripture on which S. 
 Augustine has expeude'i so much toil. He is dealing with 
 real difncidties, which he endeavours to remove, and he is 
 urging very powerfully positive arguments in favor of the 
 popular theory of endless punishment ; although, as I shall 
 notice presently, when he comes near a definition of what 
 he himself means by " endless punishment," he speaks of 
 something very different indeed from the popular notion. 
 
 Dr. Pusey begins by strongly deprecating the rationalistic 
 tendency of conceiving for ourselves what God ought to be 
 and to do, rather than simply accepting what He has re- 
 vealed of Himself and his own purposes. " Is God," he 
 asks, " our Maker, or do we make our God ? Are we His 
 creatures, the work of His hands, absolutely at His disposal, 
 to whom He gives laws which at our great peril we must 
 obey ? Or is our God .... the conception of our intellect, 
 whose being and character v:e, are to regulate, who is not to 
 act otherwise than according to the laws which we assign 
 to Him, what conunends itself to ... . our moral nature ?" 
 
 Now, admitting at once the righteousness of this protest 
 against a dangerous tendency, I must ol)serve that those 
 who deny the ])opular docti-ine of endless punishment, do 
 so on th« £!;round that that doctrine is irreconcilably opposed, 
 
Arguments front Scri2)ture. 
 
 49 
 
 ^:rsity 
 
 D. 
 
 b dealing 
 Thomas, 
 which S. 
 ing with 
 and he is 
 or of the 
 IS I shall 
 I of what 
 speaks of 
 notion, 
 tionalistic 
 aght to be 
 le has re- 
 God," he 
 re we His 
 is disposal, 
 1 we must 
 r intellect, 
 10 is not to 
 we assign 
 L nature ?" 
 
 this protest 
 
 that those 
 
 Lshment, do 
 
 )ly opposed, 
 
 rLot to what they conceive, hut to what God has expressly 
 revealed as to Himself and His own purposes. It is, there- 
 fore, really quite beside the question to urge that we ought 
 to believe what God has told us, an;] not mould theories 
 about the future for ourselves — that is allowed on both 
 sides ; if there are any who ^Y\\\ not allow this, I for one 
 should differ from them as widely as Dr. Pusey does ; the 
 only question is, " What has God told us ?" If any theory 
 agrees with what He has told us, let it stand. If any 
 theory violently disagrees, then we reject it, not because we 
 dislike it, but because it is against God's truth.^ 
 
 Dr. Pusey 's arguments may be divided (though he makes 
 no divisions himself) into (I) arguments from express word;* 
 of Scripture. (II) Arguments from the writings and 
 actions of Christian people. (Ill) Speculative arguments. 
 We will take all these in their order, and first 
 
 Arguments from express Words of Scripture. 
 
 His first quotation is from S. Mark's Gospel (ix. 43-48). 
 The reasons why this text cannot fairly be taken as prov- 
 ing the popular doctrine have been discussed already in 
 this Letter, pp. 14 and 15. 
 
 S. Matthew xxv. 41 and 46 (to which I must return 
 j)resently) has already been referred to on p. 11, just so far 
 as the force of the word aioovioi is concerned. 
 
 Our Lord's declaration to Judas is next quoted, " Good 
 were it for that man if he had never been born,"^ and Dr. 
 Pusey argues that this must mean that the misery of Judas 
 
 I And in this connection it is not beside the made to observe that the 
 Calvinist system, which all Catholics reject, rests its claim to acceptance on 
 this very argument, that however repugnant to man's corrupt mind, it is yet 
 the revelation given by God concerning His own purposes and decrees. And it 
 can quote quite as many texts in its favour as can the theory of endless 
 punishment. Nevertheless, it has fallen as a creed, because of its incompata- 
 bility with the general scope of Iloly Scripture. 
 
 2 S. Mark xiv. 21. • 
 
( ^'^ ) 
 
 
 A SERMON, PREACHED BEFORE THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF OXFORD, BY THE Rev. E. B. PUSEY, D.D. 
 
 Ou the Twenty-first Sunday after Trinity, 1864. 
 {Parkn; 1864.) 
 
 In this \(}\'y striking seiiiion Dr. Piisey is not dealing 
 with the sii|)])ose'l objectors wlio cojifronted S. Thomas, 
 nor with tlie misa})plied texts of Scripture on which S. 
 Augustine has expended so much toil. He is dealing with 
 real difficulties, which he endeavours to remove, and he is 
 urging very [)owerfully positive arguments in favor of the 
 popular theory of endless punishment ; although, as I shall 
 notice presently, Avhen he comes near a definition of what 
 he himself means by " endless ])unishment," he speaks of 
 something very difl'erent indeed from the popular notion. 
 
 Dr. Pusoy })egins by strongly deprecating the rationalistic 
 tendency of conceiving f(n' ourselves what God ought to be 
 and to do, rather than simply accepting what He has re- 
 vealed of Himself and his own purposes. " Is God," he 
 asks, " our Maker, or do we make our God ? Are we His 
 creatures, the work of His hands, absolutely at His disposal, 
 to whom He gives laws which at our great peril we must 
 obey ? Or is our God .... the conception of our intellect, 
 whose being and character vje are to regulate, who is not to 
 act otherwise than accoi-ding to the law^s which we assign 
 to Him, what commends itself to. . . .our moral nature ?" 
 
 Now, admitting at once the righteousness of this protest 
 against a dangerous tendency, I must observe that those 
 who deny the popular doctrine of endless punishment, do 
 so on tliB £i;round that that doctrine is irreconcilably opposed, 
 
T 
 
 RSITY 
 
 lealing 
 'homas, 
 liicli S. 
 [O- with 
 id he is 
 of the 
 I shall 
 if what 
 eaks of 
 Dtioii. 
 >nalistic 
 lit to be 
 has re- 
 lod," he 
 we His 
 Us|)osal, 
 ,'e must 
 ntellect, 
 is not to 
 3 assign 
 lature ?" 
 
 5 protest 
 a,t those 
 iieiit, do 
 opposed, 
 
 AvguiaeiiU from So'ij^iare. 
 
 49 
 
 not to what they conceive, hut to what God has expressly 
 revealed as to Himself and His own purposes. It is, there- 
 fore, really quite liesido the (piestion to urge that we ought 
 to believe what God has told us, an^ I not mould theories- 
 about the future for ourselves — that is allowed on both 
 sides; if there are any who will not allow this, I for one 
 should differ from Ihem as widely as Dr. Pusey does ; the 
 only question is, " What has God told us ?" If any theory 
 agrees with what Ee has told us, let it stand. If any 
 theory violently disagrees, then we reject it, not because we 
 dislike it, but because it is aixainst G(xrs truth.^ 
 
 Dr. Pusey s arguments may be divided (though he makes 
 no divisions himself) into (I) arguments from express word^ 
 of Scripture. (II) Arguments from the writings and 
 actions of Christian people. (Ill) Speculative arguments. 
 We will take all these in their order, and first 
 
 I. 
 
 Arr/uments fron express Words of Scripture. 
 
 His first quotation is from S. Mark's Gospel (ix. 43-48). 
 The reasons why this text cannot fairly be taken as prov- 
 ing the popular doctrine have been discussed already in 
 this Letter, pp. 14 and 15. 
 
 S. Matthew xxv. 41 and 46 (to which I must return 
 ])resently) has already been referred to on p. 11, just so far 
 as the force of the word aloavio'i is concerned. 
 
 Our Lord's declaration to J udas is next quoted, " Good 
 were it for that man if he had never been born,"^ and Dr. 
 Pusey argues that this must mean that the misery of Judas 
 
 I And in this connection it is not beside the mark to ohserve that the 
 Calvinist system, which all Catholics reject, rests its claim to acceptance on 
 this very argument, that however repugnant to man's corrupt mind, it is yet 
 the revelation y;iven by God concerning Mis own purposes and decrees. And it 
 can quote quite as many texts in its favour as can the theory of endless 
 punishment. Nevertheless, it has fallen as a creed, because of its incompata- 
 bility with the general scope of Holy Scripture. 
 
 2 S. Mark xiv. 21. 
 
ill I 
 
 50 
 
 A rijvracvts from Scripture. 
 
 I 
 
 would be absolutely endless, because if he were ever " to be 
 restored and to behold (iod," then it would be "good" for 
 him to have been l)orn, since he woidd in the end be happy 
 after whatever ages of misery, (pp.19, 20.) Now if these 
 words about Judas are pressed rigidly to the utmost extent 
 of their possible meaning, they do certainly appear to 
 involve some such conclusion as Dr. Pusey draws. But is 
 it allowable so to ])ress the meaning of these words in such 
 a way ? Are we prepared to treat other passages of a 
 similar character in the same way ? e. g. oui* Lord in one 
 place declares tliat " it were better " for a man " that a mill- 
 stone were han<xed round his neck and he drowned in the 
 depth of the sea," rather than that he should offend one of 
 these little ones."^ This is very similar to the statement 
 about Judas ; and wl at is the conclusion that an inexorable 
 logic would compel us to draw ? . Nothing short of this, 
 viz. that to give offence in any way — for there is no limit 
 assigned to grave or permanent offence — to one of Christ's 
 people is so terrible and condemning a sin, that a man had 
 '* better " be suddenly killed with any number of other sins, 
 it may be unrepented and unforgiven, that he had " better " 
 be cut off from all hope of penitence and amendment, from 
 all further opportunities and offers of grace, I'ather than live 
 to commit this one sin ; that no repentence, however deep 
 and sincere, no power of God's absolving and then sanctify- 
 ing grace, no subsequent growth in holiness — no ! not if the 
 man lived all the rest of his life in truest penitence and 
 humblest, heartiest obedience, could suffice to restore him to 
 so good a position (with a view to the future^ as he had 
 occupied before he was guilty of this particular sin. For 
 if not, if he could ever become a better man than he was 
 before he did this sin, then it would not be good for him to 
 be drowned in the sea ; it would be " better for him " to be 
 allowed to do this sin, and then to live on to repent of it 
 and rise higher; but our Lord declares it would not be 
 better. Where is there any escape from this dilemma ? 
 
 1 S. Matt, xviii. 6. 
 
Aiyiiiaents from Scripture. 
 
 51 
 
 " to be 
 Dd" for 
 i happy 
 if these 
 ; extent 
 3ear to 
 
 But in 
 in vsuch 
 38 of a 
 
 in one 
 , a mill- 
 . in the 
 
 one of 
 itement 
 xorable 
 of this, 
 10 limit 
 Christ's 
 lan had 
 ler sins, 
 better " 
 t, from 
 lan live 
 deep 
 inctify- 
 »t if the 
 ice and 
 
 him to 
 
 he had 
 For 
 he was 
 
 him to 
 
 ' to be 
 it of it 
 not be 
 
 mma ? 
 
 1. 
 
 Where, indeed, would there be any escape from a thousand 
 dilemmas, contradictions, and falsehoods in which we should 
 be involved, if we chose to take isohited ])assages, specially 
 those of a rhetorical character, and insist upon all their 
 strict looical conclusions ? It would not be too much to 
 say that this text, of which Di*. Pusey makes so much, has 
 really no bearing at all on the c[Uestion of endless misery. 
 That misery, which is terrible, does await the wicked after 
 death, this the text no doubt implies ; but that it will be 
 endless misery it does not imply, on any fair principles of 
 exegesis. 
 
 The same remarks, mutatis mute ndls^muHt ho, applied to 
 Dr. Pusey s use of the next text which he cites : " What 
 doth it profit a man to gain the whole world, and lose his 
 own soul ?"^ Here evidently some " loss " in the next world, 
 far outweighing any possible "gain" in this world, is 
 referred to ; but must the loss be endless misery ? Dr. 
 Pusey argues that "to 'save his soul,' and to 'lose it,' are 
 plainly contradictories. Such an one (i.e. one who should 
 be in the end restored ') would have saved his soul. It 
 must mean something else, something ii-reparable, to lose 
 it." (p. 21.) No doubt, to "save" and to "lose" are 
 " plainly contradictories." To escape an awful misery, and 
 to suffer it, are " plainly contradictories," whether the 
 miseiv is " endless or not. And even aTautinij that the loss 
 must be "something irreparable," Dr. Pusey has himself just 
 pointed out to us, only in the next preceding page (p. 20), 
 that such an " irreparable loss " is quite possible for a soul 
 which is (in the common phrase) " saved " and in heaven. 
 " A stunted soul," he writes, " although full according to its 
 measure, has still not the same capacity of knowiag or 
 loving God, or containing the overfilling ocean of His iove. 
 So far he is subject to great irrejmrdhle loss." Here then 
 is a " loss," which, on Dr. Pusey 's own .showing, satisfies 
 the necessary meaning of the text ; but this " loss " is a 
 very different thing from being " lost for ever," in the 
 
 1 S. Matt. xvi. 26. 
 
52 
 
 A I'liainf'nfs J'roin S>'i''i i>iure. 
 
 ( 
 
 I 
 
 popular ino,anin<,' of that phrase. Tf, however, wo are hent 
 upon pressing to the utmost this statement about h)9ing his 
 own soul, let us mark carefully the conclusion to wliich we 
 are coming, and to which Dr. Pusey actually does come in 
 dealing with the next tliree ]>assages of Scripture, which lie 
 quotes, viz. Matt. x. 28, and 2 Thess. i. 7-9, and Rev. xx. 10, 
 which two latter " do but say in other words the self-same 
 truth " as the first, which is as follows : " Fear not them 
 which kill the body, but arc not able to kill the soul : but 
 rather fear Him which is able to destroy both soul and body 
 in hell." Upon which Dr. Puse}'' remarks, " Death is 
 opposed to death, destruction to destruction, a destruction 
 which is l)ut partial, of this body, in this fleeting life, to a 
 destruction which is complete, of body and soul, in hell. 
 Temporary suffering is not destruction. Not until the last 
 torturing pang had crushed out the last quivering remains 
 of life, had men killed the nuirtyr's marred and shapeless 
 body. What, then, can destruction of soul and body mean, 
 but that deathless death from which all life is gone ?" 
 (p. 21.)^ 
 
 All life gone ! Ts that to be the destiny of the wicked ? 
 That is a theory which certainly is not new, and it might, 
 })erhaps, possibly be reconciled with Scripture ; Ivat there is 
 one thing with which it could not possibly be reconciled, 
 and that is the popular theory, or indeed any theory of end- 
 less punishment and endless suffering ; for where " all life 
 is gone," both from body and soul, there cannot be con- 
 ceivably any capacity for " suffering " of any sort. Con- 
 scious existence without life is a contradiction in terms, and 
 without consciousness there can be no "suffering." "All 
 life is gone!" this is simply the theory of annihilation. It 
 is not to be supposed that Dr. Pusey intends seriously to 
 support this theory ; the whole drift of his sermon is against 
 it ; but that he should have been led in this passage ex- 
 pressly to assert a theory, absolutely fatal to the position 
 which he is labouring to maintain, is a striking instance of 
 the danger of pressing particular words and phrases of 
 
Ar<imne7iis from Script'nr., 
 
 are bent 
 losinnj bis 
 vliieh we 
 
 come in 
 wbicb 1)0 
 IV. XX. 10, 
 self-same 
 not tbem 
 ^oul : but 
 and body 
 Deatb is 
 istriiction 
 life, to a 
 1, in hell. 
 1 the last 
 ■ remains 
 shapeless 
 dy mean, 
 
 gone 
 
 r 
 
 wicked ? 
 it might, 
 t there is 
 conciled, 
 y of end- 
 " all life 
 
 be con- 
 t. Con- 
 rnis, and 
 " " All 
 ion. It 
 ously to 
 
 against 
 5age ex- 
 position 
 tance of 
 rases of 
 
 Scripture with a rigid and ruthless literalism which can 
 only lead in the end to a mass of contrmlictions and absur- 
 dities. This is the instance to which I reftiircd (p. 51)), 
 where Dr. Pusey " comes near a detinition " of the destiny 
 (if the wicked, and nearly defines something very widely 
 dirt'erent from the conception of p<)})ular theology. 
 
 These are all the texts of Scripture which Dr. Pusey cites. 
 That none of them do necessarily assert the popular <loc- 
 trino of endless suffering I have endeavoured to show; and 
 as to the three last (quoted, Di'. Pustiy himself declares that 
 they all teach a doctrine \vholly irreconcilable with the 
 ])opular view. Nevertheless, he ])roceeds in support of that 
 ^•iew to make some remarks " on the meanini; of the sincfle 
 word xldrnrt^'' on Mdiich he says the doctrine of ever- 
 lasting punishment depends very little. " Not that there is 
 any doubt as to that word." (p. 22.) Scholars tell us that 
 there is not "any doubt," i.e. there is not any doubt that 
 rilu)vto<; is used in other senses besides that of " endless." 
 But this is, of course, the opposite of what Dr. Pusey means. 
 I have already referred (pp. 15, IG) to Schleusner's article 
 on auovio'^, in which he gives exami)les of three different 
 senses in wliich that word is used in Scripture. But as Dr. 
 Pusey says that " to a Grecl," the word " had no other 
 meaning" than endless (p. 23), I would here refer any one 
 who wishes to prosecute a philological inquiry to the article 
 on aloiv (the kindred substantive to alwvLo^) in the 
 Scajmlos Lexicon,'^ where three different senses are attached 
 to that word, and references given to classical authors ; that 
 "endless " was one of those senses no one thinks of deny- 
 ing. It is needless here to dwell longer on this special 
 point; but it is necessary emphatically to enter a protest 
 against the assertion that auovio<i "had no other mean- 
 ing" than "everlasting;" because, although the popular 
 doctrine is not supposed by learned advocates, such as Dr. 
 Pusey, to rest at all exclusively on the necessary meaning 
 of that single word, yet the passages in which it occurs are 
 
 I Clarendon edition, 1820. 
 
m^ 
 
 if 
 
 54 
 
 (1 "i 
 
 i 
 
 li l! 
 
 i 
 
 Arguments from Scripiure. 
 
 constantly and habitually resorted to as the mainstay of the 
 popular theory, and often (e.g. by S. Augustine and S. 
 Thomas in the works just now analysed) quoted as of them- 
 selves having force to answer and demolish all opponents. 
 There is, however, one passage alrea<ly referi-ed to in 
 which amvio(i is used, and on which Dr. Pusey founds an 
 argument that requires special notice, (pp. 23, 24.) In S. 
 Matt. XXV. 46 we read, and they aie the words of Christ 
 Himself ' These shall go away into everlasting punish- 
 ment " (et<? \'/A.i5-,:' aloviov)'. "but the righteous into life 
 eternal " {?k Kwhv alan'ioi'). Dr. Pusey argues, and the 
 argument is familiar, that this word aim<io<:, here used 
 twice over in two evidently parallel clauses of the same 
 sentence, must be taken to bear the same meaning in one 
 clause as it does in tlie other. This must in fairness cer- 
 tainly be admitted. But what then ? There is more than 
 one possible issue of this argument. 
 
 Dr. Pusey would argue "ciVow-o? certainly means ' endless' 
 in the second clause, therefore it must mean ' endless' in the 
 first;" but it might ])e argued on the other hand, with at 
 least equal reason and force, "auovto^^ cannot mean ' end- 
 less' io the first clause, therefore it must not be pressed to 
 mean 'endless' in the second." No doubt you cannot in 
 any fairness force the word to mean more, or less in one 
 clause than it does in the other; and therefore the Tninmiuin 
 of necessary significance is all that you have any right to 
 insist upon in either clause. The word might mean more; 
 the statement might be quite true if the word did mean 
 more in one clause, or in both : but we are not concerned 
 with what the statement m^ "'lit mean, but only with what 
 it must mean; and therefo . .ince aUi-tr: does not always, 
 or necessarily mean " end .^s," you have no right to insist 
 that it shall bear that meaning in either of the above clauses, 
 however plain it may he that that meaning would be very 
 proper and true^in'one of them. 
 
 Dr. Pusey urges the necessity, for our own peace and 
 comfort, of excluding all doubt as to the absolute endless- 
 
Arguments froni Scripture. 
 
 55 
 
 ness of the joy of heaven, " Heaven could not ])e heaven, 
 unless they (i.e. the blessed) were fixed in good." (p. 10.) 
 I believe the endlessness of that joy as much as Dr. Pusey 
 does, but I do not ground my belief on the forced inter- 
 pretation of this, or any other particular text. I believe in 
 the endlessness of joy and goodness, because that belief is 
 in full accord with the revealed character-, and the known 
 will and purpose of God. I disbelieve the endlessness of misery 
 and wickedness, because that belief is (to my mind at least) 
 irreconcilably contrary to all that we know of God's will, pur- 
 pose, and nature. 1 say, I "disbelieve ;" I do not say, I " deny." 
 That is a step farther, and requires more evidence, more 
 perhaps than we can gain on this side of the grave. There 
 is, indeed, a certain speculative view as to the endlessness 
 of misery and wickedness, which I am not prepared to say 
 I disbelieve, because it is, I think, speculatively possible. I 
 mean the view that, since man is a moral and responsible 
 being, and since " responsibility " involves the freedom to 
 choose ill, or well, it must be speculatively possible for man, 
 being for ever a moral and responsible creature, to go on for 
 ever choosing evil. But this is simply a speculation ; and it 
 invites a further speculation as to wlietlier it is not most 
 likely that God would take some effectual means of inducing 
 all men, sooner or later, to choose good and liappiness, in- 
 stead of persisting for ever in tlie choice of evil and misery. 
 
mm 
 
 56 
 
 Thf Gp.neral Belief of Christie 11.9. 
 
 h 
 
 I'' i 
 
 II 
 
 Arguments from the Writinr/s and Actio7is of Christian 
 
 People. 
 
 We now come to Dr. Pusey's second set of argume^^g, 
 i.e. arguments from the writings of the Fathers, and .ne 
 acts of the martyrs. Pie says that a belief in endless 
 punishment was general among Christians of old. '* The 
 converted world," he writes (p. 20), "ever believed that 
 wrath to come, from which they had fled." No doubt they 
 did ; but does it follow that they had considered the ques- 
 tion of whether "that wrath " would last on unabated for 
 ever, and had arrived at the conclusion that it would,? That 
 all Christians (and many others, who were not Christians) 
 have " ever believed " in a future retribution on sin, or, to 
 use the phrase which Dr. Pusey quotes, in " wrath to 
 come," no one thinks of questioning ; but it is surely most 
 unwarrantable to assume that all these people believed also 
 that that " wrath " would inflict upon its victims a punish- 
 ment which would never end, and a misery which would 
 be utterly hopeless. When we venture to step beyond the 
 grave we are on dangerous ground, which need cautious and 
 reverent treading, and we cannot allow ourselves to be 
 hurried along by rash and wholesale assumptions. " Wrath 
 to come " and future punishment for sin are no doubt 
 articles of the Christian faith ; but that this wrath shall 
 never be appeased, and that this punishment shall never 
 end, b. a mere popular assumption, " grounded upon 
 no warranty of Scripture, but rather repugnant to the 
 Word of God," an assumi)tion which appears more and 
 more improbable the more it is looked into. 
 
 Dr. Pusey passes from the general belief of all Christians 
 to the special testimony of the martyrs, who " in the sim- 
 
TcMhnony of Martyrs. 
 
 57 
 
 plicity of their faith, when they allowed themselves to be 
 torn and mangled and burnt, their flesh shredded by the 
 iron hooks, or scorched by the red-hot iron chair, sooner 
 than incm*, as they said, eternal death by denying Christ, 
 were better witnesses to the tn.th which they believed, than 
 the erratic, siDeculative mind " of Origen. (p. 26.) AVould 
 it not be more correct to say that they were " witnesses to 
 what theif hcUeved to be the truth " ? Their willing and 
 noble sufferings bore conclusive witness to the strength 
 and the sincerity of their belief, but not to the positive truth 
 of ivhat they helieved. Some men have suffered death 
 because they believed in the doctrine of transubstantiation; 
 others have met their death because they refused to believe 
 it. The faith of each may have been equally strong and 
 equally sincere, but obviously one or other must have been 
 mistaken. The natives of India who sacrifice their lives 
 beneath the wheels of an Idol's car are no doubt "wit- 
 nesses to what they believe to be the truth," but Dr. Pusey 
 would be among the first to deny that "' what they believe" 
 is thereby proved to be " the truth. "^ 
 
 *' Who," asks Dr. Pusey, "are the witnesses that our 
 Lord meant what He said ? Not a single speculator (how- 
 ever original his genius), but the poor, rich in faith, who 
 received simply what was simply said." (p. 25.) Just 
 so: as many a "simple" Christian has understood many 
 statements of Scripture in a literal sense, and has "simply" 
 believed that sense — as many Christians in apostolic and 
 sub-apostolic time believed the near approach of Christ to 
 judge the world, understanding " simply " such statements 
 as that of S. James,^ " The coming of the Lord draweth 
 nigh ; " although as a matter of fact " the coming of the 
 Lord" (as they understood it) was not by any means 
 drawing " nigh " (in the ordinary sense of that word) — so 
 
 ' It is a significant fact that Origen himself went down to the grave 
 marlted with the scars of horrible tortures cheerfully borne in his old age 
 for the Name of Christ, albeit he did not hold that everlasting misery would 
 have been his lot if physical anguish had forced an unwilling recantation 
 from his lips. — VUfr Eusebius, Hist. Eccli's. biok vi. cap. xxxix. 
 
 ■' S. James v. 8. 
 
m 
 
 .kS 
 
 Testimony of "simple'' Faith. 
 
 the Christians of old believed " simply" in bliss, the sure 
 result of righteousness, and punishment, the certain con- 
 sequence of sin ; and if they used a customary word or 
 phrase which was capable of the meaning which popular 
 theology has attached to it, we have no right to assume 
 that they had considered and accepted all the necessary 
 issues and accompaniments of a doctrine, which was pos- 
 sibly contained in their phraseology, but probably quite 
 foreign to their ** simple " faith. 
 
 Dr. Pusey makes reference expressly to three of the 
 Fathers ; and his three references, if they do not serve his 
 purpose, will certainly serve mine, for they illustrate and 
 endorse the truth of three arguments which it has been the 
 purpose (in part) of this Letter to suggest; viz. (a) that 
 the use by ancient writers of customary words or phrases of 
 doubtful meaning is constantly referred to, as if they must 
 have used them deliberately in the sense which ive choose 
 to adopt : that this is an unwarrantable assumption, that 
 nothing whatever is really proved by an^'' number of such 
 references. Dr. Pusey supplies us with a sample ; he says, 
 " S. Irenasus, in paraphrasing the Apostles' Creed, dis- 
 tinctly mentions eternal punishment as a part of the 
 universal belief derived from the Apostles." He quotes a 
 long passage from Irenteus,^ At the close of this lengthy 
 passage Irenaeus states as part of the received belief, that 
 Christ would return in glory "the Saviour of all who are 
 saved, and the Judge of those who are judged, and casting 
 into eternal fire those who pervert the truth and despise 
 His Father and His coming " (" mittens in ignem aeter- 
 num"). This is all he says on the subject ; and what is 
 this, but just the accustomed use of a received phrase with- 
 out any allusion to the difficulties and uncertainties of its 
 possible meanings '? Of course, // the received phrases 
 could have but one meaning, then cadit qnccstio, it is not 
 worth while to quote this or that particular passage ; these 
 phrases occur perpetually ; but if they are capable of 
 more than one meaning, then it is useless to quote pas- 
 
 ' Adv. Har. iii. 4. 
 
Testimony of S. Irenceus. 
 
 59 
 
 sages, however numerous, and simply assume that the 
 writers must have intended your meaning. There is noth- 
 ing in the passage of Iren^eus, just quoted, to prevent our 
 understanding (Sternum (the Latin equivalent of aioivto^) 
 to mean " indelinite," and then- is nothing gained in the 
 way of proof by merely assuming that it means '* intermin- 
 able." 
 
 ift) Dr. Pusey's next reference illustrates and enforces 
 another argument already (in substance) suggested in this 
 Letter, viz. that for the ''simple" minds of the majority 
 in old times (and the same is true now) it was enough to 
 teach that sin would lead to punishment hereafter, and 
 that righteousness would bring its sure reward ; and that 
 this teaching and this faith was "received simplj^" and 
 " simply said,'' without touching on tlie perplexing question 
 whether the future punishment would be " infinite " or 
 "indefinite ; " alcovto^i might bear either meaning, and at 
 all events it meant something belonging to the ages to come, 
 to the future world, and that was enough. All that world, 
 its sorrows and its joys, lay far away, wrapped in im- 
 penetrable mystery. Men were told what it was good for 
 them to know, the sure futurity of punishment for sin ; but 
 Jioiv to be inflicted ? or when ? or where ? or for how long ? 
 or indeed what " how long " means when " time shall be no 
 more?" these were questions which "simple" faith was 
 not concerned to agitate. 
 
 Exactly to this effect Origen writes in a passage which 
 Dr. Pusey quotes,^ " All which might be said on this topic 
 it is not suitable to explain now, or to all. Nay, neither is 
 it without peril to entrust to writing the plain truth as to 
 such things. For the many need no further teaching than 
 that of the j^unishment of shmers.'" That was the simple 
 faith, which Origen thought sufficient for " the many," 
 without entering upon difficult questirns. It is true that 
 in the continuation of the passage, as Dr. Pusey quotes it, 
 he goes on to express an opinion tlifi it is unwise to dis- 
 turb the fear of endless punishment in certain people, 
 
 I Contra Celsus, vi. 26. 
 
60 
 
 Testimony of Origen. 
 
 because that fear acts as a wholesome restraint. " It is not 
 expedient," he says, " to go farther, on account of those 
 who scarcely through the fear of eternal punishment 
 restrain the outpouring into any amount of wickedness." 
 These words, Dr. Pusey argues, *' imply, of course, that 
 the eternal punishment was the belief of Christians." Cer- 
 tainly they imply that such was the "belief," or at least 
 the " fear " of some Christians ; but, so far as we gather 
 from tliis passage, they were not persons whose belief or 
 practice was much to be admired. But granting, for the 
 sake of argument, that a belief in the endlessness of future 
 panishment was a common popular belief, is it thereby 
 :!hown to be scriptural and true ? It was not merely 
 popular belief, but the formal judgment of the highest 
 ecclesiastical authorities, which, many centuries after 
 Origen's time, declared that the assertions that the earth 
 moved, and that it was not the lixed centre of the universe, 
 were both clean contrar^^ to Scripture. No reasonable man 
 now supposes that that judgment was anything other than 
 a mistake on both points, intended, no doubt, to be in 
 keeping with Scripture, but with Scripture misunderstood. 
 ir) Dr. Pusey next quotes a passage from the writings of 
 S. Jerome, which appears to make the belief of that great 
 divine quite unmistakable. Yet in this very passage S. 
 Jerome gives us a proof that it is not only in popular lan- 
 guage, but even in the writings of the most learned, that 
 we may find words of definite and tremendous import (if 
 rigidly pressed) used without any intention that they 
 should bear their full significance, used indeed where it is 
 plainly impossible that they can bear that full significance ; 
 this is the third of " three arguments " referred to at page 
 73 : but of this presently. The passag o which Dr. Pusey 
 quotes is this : '* If all rational creatures are alike, and if 
 out of virtues and vices they at their own free will are 
 cither raised on high, or sunk in the deep, and after a long 
 revolution and infinite ages there shall be a restoration of 
 all things, and the glory of all who have been on probation 
 be one, how will the virgin be removed from the prostitute .^ 
 
TeMhnony of S. Jerome. 
 
 61 
 
 1 
 
 What difference will there be between the Mother of the 
 Lord and (which to name is shame) the victims of the 
 common lusts ? Shall Gabriel then and the devil be all 
 one ? Apostles and demons one ? prophets and false 
 prophets one ? martyrs and persecutors one ? Invent what 
 thou wdllest, redouble years and times, and throng with 
 torments infinite ages, if the end of all is alike, all the past 
 is as nothing, for the whole question is not what we once 
 have been, but what we shall be for ever." (p. 29.) 
 
 Now on this remarkable passage there are several ob- 
 servations to be made. 
 
 (i) S. Jerome assumes that if there shall be "a restitu- 
 tion of all things," then " the glory of all " will be " one," 
 and that there will be no longer any ''difference; " as if 
 all who shall be finally " saved " must be equal in bliss and 
 glory. S. Paul, on the contrary, teaches^ that " as one 
 star differeth from another star in glory, so also is the 
 resurrection of the dead." The glory of the saved will not 
 be "all one." They will all alike be "saved" (whatever 
 thai may involve), but they will not all be equal, so says S. 
 Paul ; and Dr. Pusey himself has pointed out, at page 20 
 of this same sermon, how a soul which is finally saved 
 may yet suffer all through eternity '' great, irreparable 
 loss," because of past sins. Therefore if " the restoration 
 of all things " is denied on the ground that the supposed 
 necessary consequence of the final equality of all is in- 
 credible, it is only needful to point out that that conse- 
 quence is not necessary, nor even suggested. 
 
 (ii) And further, in reply to the question (very painful 
 and repulsive in its bare coarseness), "How will the virgin 
 be removed from the prostitute? What difference will 
 there be between the Mother of the Lord and (which to 
 name is shame) the victims of the common lusts ? " It 
 may be asked, " What difference was there between the 
 Mother of the Lord and that other ^lary, when they stood 
 together by the Cross of Him whose various grace had kept 
 the one ever pure from stain or soil, and had cleansed the 
 
 'I Cor. XV. 41-42. 
 
62 
 
 Testimony of S. Jevomp. 
 
 other from her manifold defilements?" They had been 
 once as different as two creatures could be, they were 7iow 
 alike the o1)jeuts of His love whom both had learned to love, 
 l)oth blessed in that love, both saved, though doubtless 
 with a deep difference within, which perhaps will never in 
 all eternity be effaced. So they stood together beneath the 
 Cross on earth, why not so also before the throne in 
 heaven ? 
 
 (iii) In the last sentence of this quotation S. Jerome is 
 arguing that long ages of torment are of no real account, 
 " if the end of all is alike ; " and, he urges, " all the past is 
 as nothing." It may be so ; but these long ages of torment 
 are not now " past " to us, they are yet to come. It may 
 be, possibly (though very improbably) that when a soul has 
 gone through these ages of torment, and is about to enter 
 into joy, all its past suffering may seem "as nothing;" 
 it does not the least follow that all these sufferings " seem 
 as nothing " when they are not past and gone, but still 
 darkly and fearfully awaiting us. 
 
 Surely it is idle, if not worse than idle, to argue that long 
 ages Mng before us " thronged with torments " are not 
 terrible, because at some time, we know not how distant, 
 tliey will come to an end. The evidence of all history, the 
 witness of our own hearts, the government of every nation 
 under heaven, contradict absolutely such a palpable false- 
 hood. 
 
 (iv) I have one more remark to make on this passage of 
 S. Jerome. I would point out that it supplies us with two 
 striking examples of that use of words bearing a definite 
 and tremendous meaning (if rigidly pressed) without any 
 intention on the part of the writer that such words should 
 bear their full significance, and even where such a signifi- 
 cance is evidently impossible. The words to which I refer 
 
 are these, "If after a long revolution and infinite ages 
 
 (infmitis ScBculisj the italics are mine] there shall be a 
 restoration," etc. " After infinite ages!'' How can there 
 beany "after," if the ages are really "infinite"? And 
 again: "Jnvcnt what thou wiliest, redouble ycar.i ^md times, 
 
Tcsfimovy of S.^Jryoiur. 
 
 
 and throng with tormonts liijiiiUc ag-'s (iufmitaH ictates) if 
 the end of all is alike, all the. j)i(st is as nothing," etc.? 
 How can there he any " f,*?/ J " to torments which endure 
 throughout "Infinite'' ages? How can "Infinite ages" 
 ever he all " past " ? It requires no argument to ju'ove that 
 S. Jerome must he using "infinite" as merely synonymous 
 with " indefinite ; " he cannot mean literally " endless," for 
 if so his words would l)e simply nonsense. 
 
 I would ask special attention to this use of the word 
 " infinite," hecause what S. Jerome has certainly done in 
 this passage is only what I helieve others have done — and 
 their name is legion — in a hundred and a thousand other 
 passages. They have used the words '* infinite," " eternal," 
 " everlasting," or their equivalents in Latin, or in Greek, 
 as applying to matters helonging to a future state, joy, 
 sorrow, judgment, justice, retrihution, punishment, often 
 probably simply as customary raid impressive epithets, 
 often certainly without tlie smallest intention of pressing 
 such words to their fullest possible meaning. But never- 
 theless these words have been used ; some of them may, 
 some in strictness must, mean absolutely "endless"; and 
 consequently the popular doctrine as to endless misery 
 (w^hich this use of these words has so largely helped to 
 foster and to spread) has to show in its support an impos- 
 ing list of authorities, a long catena of quotations, all 
 apparently agreeing to assert that the punishment of *' the 
 lost " will never end, while in reality very few of these 
 " authorities " intended to express any opinion at all on 
 that subject. I think tliis consideration deserves more 
 weight than it commonly receives, when we have to meet the 
 difficulty of a great consensus of authoritative opinion 
 apparently supporting the popular doctrine. It is an 
 appearance only, not a reality. 
 
64 
 
 Speculative A njanicnU. 
 
 III. 
 
 Speculative Anjuments. 
 
 I pass now to Dr. Pusey's third line of argument, which 
 I have called " speculative." He begins (pp. 6, 7, 8) with 
 a powerful pleading^ to convince his readers that punish- 
 ment is the " due reward " of sin. Unquestionably; nobody 
 doubts it ; but it has no bearing on the matter in dispute. 
 The sole question is, not whether sin deserves punishment, 
 but whether that punishment shall be " everlasting " in the 
 strictest sense of that w ord ; and not all the wise men in 
 the world, from Plato to Bishop Butler (both of wliom Dr. 
 Pusey quotes), who are agreed upon the former point, help 
 us in the smallest degree l)y any such agreement to settle 
 the latter. Admit that a criminal " deserves " to be flogged, 
 or sent to prison. It does not follow that he deserves to 
 be flogged continuously ad iiijiultiun, or to be kept in prison 
 for ever. 
 
 Dr. Pusey proceeds to advance some speculative argu- 
 ments in favour of the endlessness of future misery. 
 
 (1) He says that men go on sinning all through this 
 earthly life, and never turn from bad to good, but by the 
 grace of God ; and then he asks, '' Why, unless changed 
 even then (i.e. 'at the hour of death ') by the grace of God, 
 
 ' A like "pleading" to that here used by Dr, Pusey is advanced in a 
 very learned and elaborate essay in support of the popular doctrine of Ever- 
 lasting Punishment, by the Rev. G. C. Cazenove. (Mozley, 1868.) He is 
 arguing in favour of this doctrine on the ground of God's justice, and he 
 tells (p. 23.) the story of Prince Orloff, the murderer of Peter III., of his 
 deliberate treacherj', and his base betrayal of his own wife ; and then he 
 asks, " Would any man nvith human feeling be pleased to think that ♦his 
 monstrous act of perfidious cruelty should remain wholly iinptinishcd — that 
 the offender should depart scot fi'cc ? " (The italics are mine.) Of course 
 not : but what bearing has this question on the justice of everlasting punish- 
 ment ? Does a great criminal " depart scot free " because he is sentenced 
 to a penal servitude for twenty years, and no', for all the rest of his lift, 
 much less for ever ? 
 
iSpccaldUn'. A lyn incnl.^. 
 
 65 
 
 , which 
 8) with 
 piinish- 
 nobody 
 li82)ute. 
 hment, 
 
 in the 
 men in 
 )m Dr. 
 t, help 
 
 settle 
 
 'ves to 
 prison 
 
 argii- 
 
 this 
 y the 
 mged 
 ■ God, 
 
 ed in a 
 f Ever- 
 
 He is 
 
 ind he 
 
 of his 
 
 hen he 
 
 at 'his 
 
 -that 
 course 
 iinish- 
 enced 
 is life, 
 
 
 should it (i.e. u houI) chanjjje in eternity ? " ** Why should 
 it change?" An array of reasouB uiight easily be given 
 if this question is to be -looked on as a matter of pro- 
 bability ; e.g. because pro])ably it will desire and try to 
 change ; because pro])abIy sooner or later it will weary of 
 its wickedness, and wish for something better ; because 
 probably it will groan under its misery, and long to be set 
 free ; because probably the happiness' of goodness and the 
 wretchedness of sin will be far more evident in another 
 world than they are here, and will therefore produce a cor- 
 respondingly greater effect on our minds : and because 
 (leaving probability and passing to certiiinty) good is essen- 
 tially superior to evil ; because God is greater than the 
 devil; because God "will have all men to be saved;" 
 because this His will would be utterly, disastrously crossed 
 and crushed if the vast majority of mankind were not saved, 
 but lost for ever. These are some of the reasons which 
 might ba given in reply to the question, " Why should it 
 change in eternity ? " But surely it is not for us, from our 
 side, to be asked for any reasons at all. The advocates of 
 the popular doctrine come to us and say, *" Future punish- 
 ment shall be endless ; sinners (i.e. the majority of man- 
 kind) shall be horribly tormented for ever ; tliey shall never 
 change ; ivliy Hhoidd they ! " We may fairly presume to 
 reply, " There are ten thousand reasons why they should ; 
 but yoK, who make this awful assertion, are bound to show 
 why it is true, not ice. to show why it should not be true, 
 though that were easily done, if necessary." 
 
 (2) Next Dr. Pusey urges that " unchangeabless may be, 
 for what we know, one of the laws of eternity." (p. 10.) 
 And again : " It may be an equal law of our moral nature 
 that they who reject God in time, even to the end, will, by 
 a continuance of that same fixed will, reject him everlast- 
 ingly." (p. 11.) Possibly "it may be ;" certainly " it may 
 oiot be ;" either way there is here no sort of proof, not even 
 a probable presumption. Dr. Pusey is of course incapable 
 of writing on a grave subject otherwise than in the most 
 careful and reverend spirit ; but it is obvious that the wild- 
 
66 
 
 Spec ida t i vc . 1 / vy umenis. 
 
 est conceivable theories as to a future As^orld might Ix' started 
 and HU|)))()rted, on tlie ijroiind of the existence of st>me sup- 
 posed " laws of (itei'nity," wliich " may be, for what we 
 know;" l)ut this really is not argument. 
 
 (3^ Dr. Pusey goes on to recite the example of Satan 
 (pp. 11-14) as a specuhitiv<; argument hy way of analogy. 
 Satan's nuili^iiity and his punishnuait are perpetual and 
 changeless. He argues, therefore, the malice and the misery 
 of sinners will probably be cliangeless also. Now I depre- 
 cate this argument, and hold it inconclusive for two reasons, 
 (i^ because we know too little al)out Satan and Ids future 
 destiny to lie at all safe in any analogies j^rounded on such 
 slender and indistinct information ; and next (ii) because 
 the little which we do know goes far to invalidate this 
 })articular analogy on two accounts chiefly : 
 
 {(^) Because there is an immense moral disparity between 
 a being who had (as theologians tell us) no taint of original 
 sin without to incline him towards evil, no temper without 
 to lead him on ; a being " gifted (as Dr. Pusey says) with 
 most immense intelligence, once full of wisdom and perfect 
 in beauty," who " beheld God face to face/' who saw and 
 knew all tliat a creature could see or know of the love of 
 God, and the beauty and bliss of holiness ; and then, in the 
 light of all this knowledge, deliberately revolted and cast 
 his bliss away — there is an immense moral disparity be- 
 tween such a being as this, and us human sinners, however 
 sinful we ma}' be, who have never " seen God," who know 
 so little of Him, who live here below in the midst of doubts 
 and darkness and ignorance and infirmities, from within 
 inclined towards evil, and from without assailed by inces- 
 sant temptations. And if Satan's sin and ours are indeed 
 thus widely ditlerent, it is only reasonable to conclude tha^ 
 their consequences will be widely different also. Thi 
 one consideration which goes to invalidate Dr. Pust ;» 
 analog}'. 
 
 There is another ( ), of no weight, of course, with unbe- 
 lievers in Scripture, but of considerable force for any who 
 accept the Holy Scriptures as a revelation of the truth. I 
 
SprrnJafin' A r^jvincntfi. 
 
 67 
 
 .^ started 
 mo sup- 
 ^hat we 
 
 f Satan 
 
 ify 
 
 malo^^ 
 Lial and 
 ! nusory 
 depro- 
 reasons, 
 ! future 
 on such 
 because 
 ite til is 
 
 )etwecn 
 Di'iginal 
 •vithout 
 3) with 
 perfect 
 aw and 
 love of 
 
 in the 
 imX cast 
 ity be- 
 jwever 
 
 know 
 doubts 
 within 
 
 inces- 
 indeed 
 le tha^_ 
 
 rhi 
 
 use J 
 
 mean tins, that Scripture declnros that it was God's" eternal 
 purpose," and is s^ili His " will," that all men should be 
 saved. There is no such declaration as to the iinal destiny 
 of Satan. ^ lam not arguinf;- that such a pur])()se cannot 
 exist, because it is not revealiMl ; but 1 am ar'-Miinir that as 
 this purpo.se is emphatically and repeatedly declared as to 
 mankind, and never even intimated with reference to Satan, 
 the supi)()sed analogy Ijetwcien their future prospects, so to 
 speak, is hereby destroyed. Theivfore, granting that the 
 sin of Satan and his punishment will be endless, it does not 
 follow even in }>robability, much less of necessity, that 
 man's nature and his destiny will be the same. 
 
 This is the sum of Dr. Pusey's pleading in support of the 
 po})uiar doctrine of endless misery. 
 
 And now 1 have completed an examination, Avhicli I be- 
 lieve has been full and fair, of these three illustrious advo- 
 cates. How often they have brought their great powers to 
 bear on questions whicii are (piite beside the main issue ; 
 how entirely S. Augustine and S. Thomas have passed by 
 the real dilhculties and left them untouched ; how fjxr Dr. 
 Pusey has succeeded in meeting tliose dilHculties, or has 
 jailed, I must leave others to judge ; I will only say, that if 
 there are any who are ready to believe this fearful doctrine 
 on the grounds here laid down, tliey must be (J think) per- 
 sons who are able to believe, not on the strength of suffi- 
 cient evidence, but in spite of it. 
 
 I F/</i- Epislle to the Epliesians iii. 11 ; and i. 9 10; aiul I Timothy, ii 
 4 ; and iv. 10. 
 
 unbe- 
 Y who 
 th. I 
 
 I 
 
(68) 
 
 § VI. 
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 Here for the present m}'' task is ended. I do not imagine 
 that I have even touched, much less that I have grappled 
 with, all the difficulties which have gathered ronnd a ques- 
 tion more profoundly interesting, and pei'haps more impene- 
 trably mysterous, tlian any other which could be raised. I 
 have simply made one small contribution towards the 
 consideration of that question.^ I have tried to show 
 that there are no sufficient grounds on which the 
 popular doctrine, here dealt with, can rightly claim 
 any place as a necessary article of Chrisiian faith : so 
 much and no more. Some arguments here used may be 
 thought to warrant conclusions beyond any which I have 
 drawn ; and I will not conceal my own belif that the wit- 
 ness of revelation, as of reason, does certainly point towards 
 a hope that all the " lost " will be restored. But I am very 
 far from presuming to say dogmatically that it will be so. 
 It may be so : I hope it will be so : I see much in favour of 
 that hope, not much against it. But there is so much be- 
 yond our sight that is perilous to be positive. I have only 
 ventured to assert, that the popular doctrine, if not certainl}'' 
 false, is certainly unwarrantable, that it is not " de fcle ; '' 
 and I have done so with the desire of helping to lift the 
 veil of hopeless misery, and to quiet the risings up of horri- 
 lied and indignant rebellion, which are two at least of the 
 sad but sure results of believing that the God of Scripture 
 
 I May I call attention again to an essay, to which 1 have already referred, 
 p. 8i, in support of the popular doctrine? It deals with sev'.:al points un- 
 noticed in this Letter. It is, I venture to think, most interestiu ^ n- showing 
 how completely fijrcat learning and labour have failed once again, as, indeed, 
 every eftbrl uui-^L uiil, to sustain a llicory which by it.-) necessary results either 
 dishonours God, or dethrones Him. 
 
Conclusion. 
 
 69 
 
 b imagirit) 
 grappled 
 i a ques- 
 
 im})ene- 
 aised. I 
 ii'ds the 
 to show 
 licli the 
 V' claim 
 lith : so 
 
 may be 
 
 I have 
 the wit- 
 towards 
 mi very 
 il be so. 
 bvour of 
 Lich be- 
 ve only 
 n-taiuly 
 
 fide ; " 
 lift the 
 f horri- 
 
 of the 
 riptiire 
 
 referred, 
 oints un- 
 showing 
 , indeed, 
 ts either 
 
 and of Christianity is such a God as this popular doctrine of 
 everlasting punishment represents Him to be. 
 
 Before I conclude I will add— and you at least will, I 
 trust, not blame me for adding — that, with reference to this 
 whole subject, as a believer in the Holy Scriptures, I desire 
 to submit ex animo to the testimony of those Scriptures, if 
 (per impossihile, as I think) they can be proved to 'be 
 against me. And, as a Catholic, I submit myself unreserv- 
 edly to the judgment of the Church, if (here, too, as I think 
 per impossihile) it should at any time be given in condem.- 
 nation of anything which I have here, or elsewliere written, 
 or said. And now I will tax youv patience no more. 
 
 . Believe me to ])e, 
 
 '^' Your very faithful servant, 
 
 F. N. OXKNPTAM. 
 
Tf 
 
 APPENDIX (A). 
 
 I HAVE in this Letter purposely avoided tlie question, How far, if at all, the 
 formularies of the English Church can be taken to be in favor of the popular 
 theory of everlasting punishment. I have done so for two reasons : first, 
 because I desired to take broader ground iii th.is discussioi ; and secondly, 
 because I am satisfied that if this theory is unsupp(-rted either by Scripture or 
 by the voice of the Universal Church, it cannot be tlie intention of the 
 Church of England to require belief in that theory from any of hei members. 
 But as to the intention of the Church of England in this matter, I wish here 
 to make two historical remarks. 
 
 (i) Among the Articles of Religion drawn up by Cranmer and some other 
 divines, in the reign of Edward VI., a.d. 1552, was one (the forty-second) 
 which condemned those who liold the opinion that the torments of the lost 
 would at some time come to an end. In Elizabeth's reign, a.d., 1562, these 
 Articles were submitted to the Archbishop and to Convocation. The 
 Primate, on his own authority, stnick out this forty-second Article to begin 
 with, and the bishops and i Icrgy in both Houses and of both provinces agreed. 
 The Articles have been reviewed again more than once since 1562, but 
 neither the Article then struck out, nor any one o( similar intent, has ever 
 been again received. 1 
 
 It has been argued, e.g. by the late venerated Principal of King's College, 
 London, 2 that this Article as well as some others, was omitted in 1562, 
 because the Anabaptists (against whom alone Dr. Jelf supposes the Article to 
 have been pointed) had dwindled into insignificance ; and he argues that the 
 "temporary necessity having passed away," this Article was no longer 
 needed. This is put forward in argument as a probable surmise unsup- 
 ported by any direct evidence. The measure of its probability may perhaps 
 be tested by the question. How far it is reasonable to call the need of deny- 
 ing an error, which had been in the Church since the days of Origen, a 
 "temporary necessity." The "error" had been in existence for at least 
 thirteen centuries : the denial lasted for ten years, and was then withdrawn. 
 
 (ii) There has been in our own day a decision of the Judicial Committee of 
 the Privy Council on this particular subject. I am not, of course, referring 
 to that decision as having any force whatever to determine the doctrine of 
 the Church of England ; but for a >iifferent ])urpose. 
 
 In the case to which [ refer, i.e. Fendall v. Wilson, 1S63-4, Mr. Wilson 
 was charged, among other offences, with denying (i) The full inspiration of 
 Holy Scripture ; (ii) the endlessness of future punishment. The Court judged 
 him not guilty on either of these charges ; and as to the second charge, their 
 Lordships say, "We are not required, or at lii^erty to express, any opinion 
 
 1 Cardwell's Sy/iodalia, vol. i. pp. 34 et sq. 
 
 2 Vide Grounds fir laying hffore the Coiincii of King's College certixin state- 
 m!nts^elc.,Y>\). ^zdsq. Parker, 1853. 
 
Ap'pewl'ix. 
 
 at all, the 
 he popular 
 ;ons : first, 
 
 secondly, 
 cripture or 
 oil of the 
 
 members. 
 '. wish liere 
 
 ome other 
 •ty-second) 
 of the lost 
 562, these 
 on. The 
 e to begin 
 :es agreed. 
 1562, but 
 , has ever 
 
 upon the mysterious question of tl: e eternity of final punishment, further than 
 to say, that we do not find, in thi. formularies to which this article refers, anv 
 such distinct declaration of our 'Jhurch upon the subject, as to require us to 
 condemn as penal the expression of hope by a clergyman that even the 
 ultimate pardon of the wicked, who are condemned in the day of judgment, 
 may be consistent with the will of Almighty God." Among the judges who 
 gave this decision were the Archl)ishops of Canterbury and York. Their 
 (jraces announced that they did not concur with the judgment so far as it 
 related to the charge touching inspiration. They expressed no dissent from 
 that part of the judgment which bore upon everlasting punishment. ^ 
 
 I disdain any wish to impute to these eminent persons any opinion which 
 they would disallow ; I am simply calling attention to the couise of conduct 
 which, on an important occasion and under the gravest responsibility, they 
 thought fit to take. They were asked to concur in the public judicial 
 declaration, that the formularies of the English Church do not condemn the 
 hope that the wicked may be finally forgiven, and they did concur. 
 
 1 Brookk's Pnvy Council Judgments^ p. 102. 
 
 College, 
 
 \\\ 1562, 
 
 Article to 
 
 that the 
 
 o longer 
 
 se unsup- 
 
 y perhaps 
 
 of deny- 
 
 Drigen, a 
 
 at least 
 
 thdrawn. 
 
 mittee of 
 
 referring 
 
 3ctrine of 
 
 Wilson 
 iration of 
 rt judged 
 ■ge, their 
 
 opinion 
 
 xin state- 
 
nrr 
 
 , 
 
 APPENDIX (B.) 
 
 THE FIFTEEN CANONS OF "THE HOME SYNOD.'i 
 
 Si quis fabulosam animarum pnxiexistentiam, quccque ex ilia consequitur 
 monstrosam restitutionem asseruerit, anathema sit. 
 
 II. 
 
 Si quis dixerit omnium rationalium productionem fuisse mentes incorporeas 
 et immateriales, absque ulk lumero ac nomine, adeo ut eorum omnium fuerit 
 unitas identitate substantice, potential et virtutis, atque unione et cognitioiie 
 erga Deum verbum, satietatem autem cepisse divinre contemplationis et in 
 deterius ablisse juxta uniu-.cujusque projwrtionem inclinationis in illud, et 
 assumpsisse corpora subtiliora vel crassiora, necnon accepisse nomen, et quod 
 sicut nominum, ita et corporum diflferentiiie sunt inter supernas virtutes, 
 hincque factum ut alii cherubim, alii seraphim, alii princij^atus et potestates, 
 vel dominationes vel throni et angeli et quotquol sunt ordines ccelestes, effecti 
 fuerint ac vocati, a. athema sit. 
 
 III. 
 
 Si quis dixerit solem et lunam astraque, insa quoque cum ex eadem ration- 
 alium unitate essent, ex deflexione in pejus, facta esse id quod sunt, anathema 
 it. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Si quis dixerit rationalia refrigerata a divina caritate, crassis corporibus, 
 qualia sunt nostra, illigata fuisse et homines vocati, alia vero cum ad summum 
 malitiie pertigissent, frigidis tenebrosisque illigata esse corporibus, atque turn 
 esse turn appellori ditmones sive spiritualia nequitine, anathema sit. 
 
 
 V. 
 
 Si quis dixerit ex angelico et arohangelico statu animalem statum fieri, ex 
 animali autem d?emoniacum et humanum, ex humano vero angelos iterum 
 
 1 Nova Collectio Conciliorttm, Baluzius (Paris, 1707), pp. 1548 ^/ji/. 
 
 Baluzius calls these canons " Canones Concilii V.," and he gives as their 
 superscription "Sanctorum CLXV Fatruni Constantinopolitana; sancta? 
 Synodi Canones XV.," from which it appears that he took them to be the 
 Canons of the Council of A.D. 553, and not, as in fact they were, the canons 
 of a previous council in a.d. 541. The history of this mistake has been 
 already referred to in this Letter, pp. 18 ct sq. 
 
 
YNOD."i 
 
 I consequit'.ir 
 
 i incorporeas 
 ninium fuerit 
 2t cognitione 
 lationis et in 
 
 in illud, et 
 ■nen, et quod 
 nas virtutes, 
 It potestates, 
 
 estes, effecti 
 
 dem ration- 
 t, anathema 
 
 corporibus, 
 ad summum 
 atque turn 
 
 ;um fieri, ex 
 ;elos iterum 
 
 I etsq, 
 
 ives as their 
 .na; sanctae 
 m to be the 
 the canons 
 e has l)een 
 
 ^m 
 
 Appendix. 
 
 doemonesque fieri, et singulos ordines crelestium virtutum, vel cunctos ex 
 inferioribus, vel ex superioribus, vel ex superioribus et inferioribus constitissc, 
 anathema sit. 
 
 VI. 
 
 Si quis dixerit duplex extitisse dcsmonum genus constans ex animabus homi- 
 num et ex prtestantioribus spiritibus in hoc delapsis, unum autem animum ex 
 omni utique rationalium unitate immotum mansisse ex Dei carilate et con- 
 templatione, qui Christus cum fiierit ex Rex omnium rationalium, universam 
 traduxerit corpoream naturam, cxlum ct terram, qunsque sunt intermedia, et 
 quod mundus antiquiora existentite suce elementa habens in se subsistenlia, 
 siccitatem, humorem, calorem, frigus, et ideam, ad cjuam efformatus est, ita 
 est factus, quodque sanctissima et consubstantialis Trinitas niundum non 
 creaverit, et ideo sit genitus, verum mens, quam aiunt creatricem, existens 
 ante mundum, ipsique existentiam largiens, genitum exhibuerit, anathema sit, 
 
 VII. 
 
 Si quis dixerit Christum in forma Dei existere dictum, et ante omnia secula 
 Deo verbo unitum, novissimis diebus exinanivisse semetipsum ad naturam 
 humanam, niisericordia ductum ob illam quam contigisse aiunt multiplicem 
 eorum qui in eadem erant unitate prolapsionem, cumque vellet ipsos resti- 
 tuere, per cuncta extitisse, et corpora diversa induisse, nominaque sumpsisse, 
 omnibus omnia factum, in angelis angelum, sed et in virtutibus virtutem, et in 
 aliis ordinibus aut speciebus rationalium conformiter ad singula transformatum 
 fuisse, postea eodem quo nos mode participem factum esse carnis et sanguinis, 
 et extitisse etiam hominibus horainem, neque confessus fuerit Deum verbum 
 exinanitum fuisse et hominem factum esse, anathema sit. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Si quis non dixerit Deum verbum ejusdem cum Deo et Patre cumque 
 Spiritu Sancto substantia;, incarnatum et hominem factum, unum sanctce 
 Trinitatis, proprie Christum esse, sed abusive propter illam quam dicunt 
 exinanisse mentem, ut ipsi Deo verbo unitam et proprie dictam Christum, sed 
 ilium propter hanc Christum, et hanc ob ilium, Deum, anathema sit. 
 
 IX. 
 
 Si quis dixerit quod non verbum Dei incarnatum carne animata per animam 
 rationalem et intelligentem descendit in infernum, idemque nusus asccndit in 
 ca;lum, sed quae ab iis dicitur mens, quam impii asserunt proprie Christum 
 monadis cognitione effectum, anathema sit. 
 
 X. 
 
 Si quis dixerit Domini corpus post resurrectionem a'thereum fuisse et 
 figura: spha:ricum, taliaque pariter fore reliquorum a rcsurrectione corpora, et 
 quod cum ipse Dominus prior proprium corpus deposuerit, ceterique eodem 
 modo, in nihilum redigetur corporum natura, anathema sit. 
 
Appendix. 
 
 XI. 
 
 Si quis dixerit per futurum judicium interitum oinnimodum corporum 
 significari, finemque conlicta." fabulse esse naturam materiae expertem, nihilque 
 in futuro sseculo materiale remansurum, sed nudam mentem, anathema sit. 
 
 XII. 
 
 Si quis dixerit sic absque ulla diversitate uniri verbo Deo cselestes virtutes 
 cunctosque homines ac diabolum cum spiritualibus nequitise quemadmodum 
 ipsa mens ab illis Christi nomine donata et in forma Dei existens, quaeque uti 
 aiunt semetipsam exinanivit, ad haec finem fore regni Christi, anathema sit. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 Si quis dixerit quod nuUam omnino Christus habebit differentiam ab ulla 
 creaturarum rationalium, neque essentia, neque cognitione, neque potentia et 
 vi erga universa, sed cuncti a dextris Dei erunt quemadmodum Christus eorum, 
 sicut et fuerant in fabulosa apud eos prce-existentia, anathema sit. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 Si quis dixerit universorum rationalium unam futuram henadem, hypostasi- 
 bus et numeris sublatis una cum corporibus, post cognitionem quoque circa 
 rationalia sequi mundorum interitum, corporum depositionem, nominumque 
 sublationem, fore cognitionis identitatem sicut et personarum, quodque in 
 fabulosa restitutione erunt soli nudi sicut et extiterant in ilia prse-existentia 
 quam delirantes inducunt, anathema sit. 
 
 XV. 
 
 Si quis dixerit vitam mentium eandem fore cum priori antequam decissis- 
 sent vel essent delapsce ut principium cum fine consentiat, finisque sit mensura 
 principii, anathema sit. 
 
 It will be seen at once, from reading these fifteen canons, that the Synod 
 which drew them was concerned with " errors " that have no more connection 
 with the popular doctrine discussed in this Letter than they have with the 
 ordinary interests and thoughts of Christian people in our day. The only 
 canon which could by any possibility be supposed to contain any reference to 
 the doctrine in question, is the first, which condemns a certain "monstrous " 
 theory of "restitution," that sprang from a belief in the "fabulous prse-exist- 
 ence ot souls." It is obvious that the condemnation of one particular " mon- 
 strous " theory can never be taken as the condemnation of anf other theory 
 on the same subject, and specially not of another theory which is utterly 
 different from the one condemned. How "utterly different" the theory that 
 the " lost" may, or shall somehor;, and at acme period be restored, is from 
 the "monstrous" theory of "restitution" which the Synod condemned, we 
 may easily see by reading the fourteenth of tliesc very canons, which tells us 
 what that " restitution " was supposed to be. It was to be the restitution "of 
 all rational beiP3s" to the condition of " naked" spirits without "substance," 
 

 Appendix. 
 
 'number " "bodies," or "names," into an ".identity of cognition and of ner 
 restore the lost ? Am I not then fully justified in saying that not one of thete 
 
 t 
 
n 
 

 SERMONS OUT OF CHURCH 
 
 X 
 
 — IIV — 
 
 \ ' 
 
 ; Is^ISS I^^TJIjOOK:, 
 
 Aullior of "Jolm Halifax, Gentleman," &c. Svo., 300 paj;t's very 
 heavy paper. Clolli, $l.on ; paper, 75 cents. 
 
 This is a book tliat we can conscientious!)' recommend to our 
 readers. Those who have read " John Malifax ' will reco;,Mii/,e with 
 pleasure Miss Mulock's pleasant style in her serious mood all throui^h 
 these SLvmons. They are six in number, and are devoted to impor- 
 tant and suu;gesuve subjects. In this age, when, notwithstanding the 
 death of most of the great novelists, a fresh novel a[)pears every day, 
 it is a relief to turn to something serious, sensible, instructive and 
 well-written — a something that will repay perusal, and not send one 
 away weary and disgusted. Those who have undergone the infliction 
 of " Bluel)eH " and kindred rubbish, will fmd a balm in Miss 
 Mulock's "Sermons Out of Church." — Toronto NatioiL 
 
 . " .' ' " ' . ' - . ■ - ■'' •■ '■ 
 
 " Sermons Out of Church," by the author of " John Halifax." 
 Six sermons are comprized in tliis volume, upon " What is Self- 
 SacrifKe ?"' "Our Often Infirmities," " How to Train u]3 a I'arent in 
 the Way he Should (io," " lienevolence — or lieneficjnce ?" "My 
 Brother's Keeper," " (lather in the Fragments." They should gain ' 
 many readers. — Publisher's Weekly. ,: 
 
 , BELFORD BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, 
 
 TORONTO, ONT... 
 
 \ 
 
 I