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CHAPTER X.

UNIVERSAL SALVATION.

THE salvation of any soul is of unspeakable importance: How much more, therefore, should we be impressed with joy in the certainty of the salvation of ALL.

Yet, strange as it may seem, the doctrine of the salvation of all men, is not pleasing to the human mind. We, each one, desire our own salvation, and in the pride and self-esteem of our hearts, we think ourselves secure of a very favorable standing before the Lord. Our sins we extenuate, or soon forget them altogether. Such acts as we do, which are less evil in outward appearance than others we look upon with a satisfied eye, and we magnify all our virtues a thousand fold. Even persons who are severe in the judgment of themselves, are not willing that others should think and speak of them in the light in which they denounce their own offences, when they make a professed confession before God. Bad as they must really know themselves to be, they still hope that the mercy of our heavenly Father will both pardon and cleanse them. Yet this grace, which they so much need themselves, they are unwilling should be extended to others--more especially to others who remain in sin, after they themselves have made some reform in their profession or lives. What, say they, shall we, who have borne the burden and heat of the day, fare no better than these tardy workmen ? Had we known that a later repentance would have been accepted, we, also, would have remained in the delights and pleasures of the vices and crimes which reluctantly we have forsaken, and the remembrance and associations of which are yet grateful to us! Holiness has no charms to such persons, and they do not see that every thought and action of our daily existence, execute their own judgment and effect upon our spirits, and that the wages of sin is always death, and the wages of holiness is eternal life with God.

This disinclination to the doctrine of universal salvation, proceeds from the carnal hate and depravity of the unrenewed mind. It is nothing more than one form of the unsparing malignity with

men.

which, in all ages and climes, man has made war upon his brother man. What is it which incites bloodshed and conquests; which depopulates provinces, and overwhelms nations and empires in horrid and desolating despotism; which rejoices in the tears and groans of the helpless and bereaved; which enjoys a fiendish delight in witnessing or anticipating the tortures of the stake and fire, inflicted, in lingering and consuming torments, upon others; what is it, I ask, which is the author of all these demon works in the heart of man, but that same principle of unappeasable wrath upon which rests our repugnancy to the gospel doctrine, that every child of Adam shall finally be redeemed, and be made happy in Christ? If we search through history, we shall find every where, evidences of this same principle of exclusion, operating in all the concerns of One nation arrogates to itself the name of celestial, or some other title of eminence, and considers all other people as outcasts. or barbarians. The monarch claims his exclusive prerogatives, and will not acknowledge that other members of the human race, are formed of the same flesh and blood with himself. One class or caste of society usurps privileges over another, and then pretends that they are founded in nature. The Jews hated the Gentiles, and gnashed with their teeth, at the bare thought, that salvation might be preached to any but the descendants of Abraham. And so, from the earliest record of known time to the present day, and from one end of the earth to the other, in every nation, in every state of society, in every condition of domestic life, in every thought of unrenewed man, you will find this same unsparing, cruel, and fierce spirit of hate and exclusion; modified, indeed, by many circumstances, and by the medium through which it passes, but still always bearing the poisonous fruit of proscription and anathema.

Among religious exclusionists, the doctrine of the divine reprobation of certain men, and the unending duration of hell, is covered, as we might suppose, by very deceitful representations: for it would not do for Christian disciples, to avow the undisguised deformity of the principle which actuates them. I intend in the present chapter, to remove those disguises, and to exhibit the doctrine in its real character; for it is supported neither by humanity, by reason, nor by Scripture; but is directly opposed by all three. Indeed, how can any reflecting mind long retain the opinion, that a limitation of

salvation is consistent with the gospel of the blood of God, shed upon the cross, for the redemption of the world!

Suppose a person should persuade himself, that all the entire universe of creation, will be eternally damned, but himself! Here is limitation of saving grace; but would such exclusiveness evince the person's just conception either of himself or of the Deity? Imagine that the individual enlarges the strings of his heart, and believes that some ten or a hundred of his brethren will also share in salvation: how infinitely far is he yet, from the measure of the fulness of our Lord's redeeming love and mercy? But, now let him think, that the whole universe of intelligent beings will be saved, except one only-one miserable, solitary outcast, doomed forever to the burning heat and flames of an unquenchable fire; with his eyes writhing under torture, and his heart festered with blasphemy! Would not the sight of that unransomed lost one, leave a void in heaven? Is redeeming grace exhausted, that it cannot save all? And who is this fearful, wretched being? Is it the outcast spirit of your father or mother, or brother or sister, or child: one whom you loved dearly in life? Nay, is it you, yourself? Think of this! But in my opinion, it is impossible for any person, of tender and sensitive feelings, to realize the horrors of such a thought, without being driven to the verge of insanity. And yet millions of men, women, and children, who profess a love for the glory of God, are zealous in asserting the existence of an unending hell, and gladly picture to themselves a day, when all the affectionate relations of life shall be severed, and their nearest companions, friends and benefactors, shall be bound in eternal chains of darkness, and unmitigated anguish, forever and forever.

This doctrine of an unending hell, can never change the heart, nor reform the actions of the world. For centuries after centuries it has been preached and believed, and the only effect of it has been, to sink men deeper into iniquity, to harden conscience, to render its advocates more Pharisaical, obdurate, hypocritical, and cruel, and to fill the land with oppression, crime, and death. Constantine, Justinian, and Theodora, with other most pious and Christian imperial defenders of the faith, believed, no doubt, in this doctrine of an endless hell, and they lived and died in sin. The Athanasians and the Arians believed and rejoiced in it; for they delighted in peopleing hell with their enemies. The Crusaders held this same doctrine,

and they went down to hell believing it. The blood-thirsty monsters, who committed the massacre of St. Bartholomew, experienced, we may suppose, a tenfold pleasure, in reflecting that their victims were doomed to everlasting flames. This doctrine, also, has armed inquisitors and persecutors, with keener weapons of torture; and instilled more venom and hateful malice into their hearts, than could have been engendered, by any other faith, in a bosom professing Christ. Christian nations, holding this belief, have, without remorse, carried on wars of ambition and rapine. A Christian clergy, who look upon this doctrine as a chief foundation stone in their creeds, are not deterred by it from extortion, and the plunder of the poor. And under this same profession of faith, in all communities, miscalled Christian, a SOCIAL SYSTEM has grown up, and is yet continued, at war with every principle of justice and benevolence; and whose inevitable tendency, if not counteracted by the preaching of the true gospel of our Lord, would most undoubtedly perpetuate the hell, which it has so largely contributed to make, and would render this present, actual, and fearful hell, at once eternal in duration, and infinite, and universal in dominion.*

But I may then be asked, do you pretend that God makes no distinction in the next world, between the righteous and the wicked, or that the impenitent believer can enter into heaven? Is not Tophet prepared of old for the unrighteous, whose "worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched, and they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh?" Does not Christ Himself say, "Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels?" And is it not right that the wicked should be consumed? We are here in a probationary state, and if transgressors will not * It is said of some comparative anatomists, that their skill is so accurate, if you show them a single tooth of an animal, they are able to restore the whole body.

So I would say, that if you should show to any one accurately skilled in spiritual anatomy, the great dragon tooth of eternal hell, taught by the present churches, he ought to have no difficulty in restoring the huge and deformed limbs of the Saurian beast, to which it belongs.

The doctrine, he would know, must have grown up in a church, ignorant of God, and averse to righteousness; prone to the belief of mysteries; contentious for words; of fierce, Pharisaical heart, and ravenous, revengeful, and unsparing temper. And as absurdities beget their opposites, he would perceive, that this doctrine of an unending hell, taught by some of the members of Anti-Christ, would also produce infidelity and blasphemy of entirely contrary kinds, in other of the many heads of the monster beast. Thus spiritual anatomy might picture before us, the discordant tongues and deformed limbs of the fierce Leviathan, whose unclean and terrible body, now overspreads Christendom.

turn and accept the offer of salvation tendered to them, in what other way can they be saved?

I am very far from holding or admitting anything like the doctrine, that either in the NEXT world, or in THIS, the Lord makes no distinction between the faithful and the unbelieving. On the contrary, now and forever, in this world, and in the next, eternally, the wicked are in death and hell, and the righteous in heaven. Between the spiritual Egypt and Israel, there is an everlasting gulf fixed, an impenetrable gulf of darkness and death, so that the two people, in spirit, cannot come near each other, and God always is seen, as a light, by His children, but as a cloud and as a terror and darkness by those who hate Him. The hell of the wicked is as eternal as themselves. Always the workers of iniquity ARE in hell; their faith and works, with the consequences thereof, are hell. "But if the wicked will turn from all his sins that he hath committed, and keep my, (the Lord's,) statutes, and do that which is lawful and right, he shall surely live; he shall not die: all his transgressions that he hath committed, they shall not be mentioned unto him; in his righteousness that he hath done he shall live."* The kingdom of heaven is set up upon earth; wherever believers are: it is within you. Also the kingdom of hell is set up upon earth, wherever the unbelieving are: the kingdom of Satan is within you; the heart of him who has not faith in God is a bottomless pit, and there arise from it smoke and scorpions, which darken the air. This death and hell now reign in the world, as is too fatally written upon every page of its history. No impenitent unbeliever, and no hypocritical professed believer, who says, "Lord, Lord!" but does not do the commandments of God, can escape from this hell. of iniquity are, and must eternally be in it. sincerely come to God, by faith, then you die to death and hell, or to yourselves, and you are a NEW CREATURE in Christ; you live to God, and instantly, by that fact, you ARE in heaven.

All the workers But, when you

Hell, therefore, is absolutely and literally eternal to the wicked. But the wicked are not eternally wicked. For to destroy wickedness was the very object of the coming of Christ. And He will not leave His work undone. When the wicked come to Him, by real faith, then their wickedness is at an end, and a new life begins. † Luke xvii. 21.

* Ezek. xviii. 21, 22.