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Transcriber’s Note:
This version of the text cannot represent certain typographical effects.
Italics are delimited with the ‘_’ character as _italic_.
Footnotes have been moved to follow the paragraphs in which they are
referenced.
Minor errors, attributable to the printer, have been corrected. Please
see the transcriber’s note at the end of this text for details regarding
the handling of any textual issues encountered during its preparation.
THE
STATE OF THE DEAD
AND THE
DESTINY OF THE WICKED.
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BY URIAH SMITH.
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STEAM PRESS
OF THE SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTIST PUBLISHING ASSOCIATION,
BATTLE CREEK, MICH.:
---
1873.
PREFACE.
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Questions of such absorbing interest to the human race as “The State of
the Dead,” and “The Destiny of the Wicked,” should command the candid
attention of all serious and thoughtful men. The Bible alone can answer
the inquiries of the human mind on these important subjects; and if the
Bible is the full and complete revelation which it claims to be, we must
believe that it has answered them. What that answer is, the following
pages undertake to show.
On the questions here discussed there is at the present time a
daily-increasing agitation in the theological world. The frequency with
which these topics come to the surface in the religious papers of the
land, is evidence of this. Not only in this country, but in England and
Germany, the views of Bible students on these points are in a state of
transition. The doctrine that there is no eternal life out of Christ,
and that consequently the punishment of the wicked is not to be eternal
misery, is now able to present an array of adherents so strong in
numbers, so cultivated in intellect, and so correct at heart, that many
of its opponents are changing their base of operations toward it, and
taking steps looking not only to a toleration of its existence, but to a
compromise with its claims.
In adding another book to the many which have been written on this
subject, the object has been to give in a concise manner a more general
view of the teaching of the word of God, the ultimate source of
authority, on this question, than has heretofore been presented. A
chapter on the Claims of Philosophy is appended to the Biblical
argument, more to answer the queries of those who attach importance to
such considerations, than because they are entitled to any real weight
in the determination of this controversy.
The interest that has of late years arisen on the subject of the state
of the dead, is timely. Spiritualism, with its foul embrace and
pestilential breath, is seeking to spread its pollutions over all the
land; and it appeals to the popular views of the condition of man in
death as a foundation for its claims. The teaching of the Bible on this
point is the most effectual antidote to that unhallowed delusion. Before
the true light on the intermediate state, and the destiny of the wicked,
not only spiritualism with its foul brood flees away, but purgatory,
saint worship, universalism, and a host of other errors all go down.
In this period of agitation and transition, let no man blindly commit
himself to predetermined views, but hold himself ready to follow truth
always and everywhere. Let him hold his sympathies entirely at its
disposal. This is the course of safety; for truth has angels, Christ and
God upon its side; and though it had but one adherent on the earth, it
would triumph all the same. So while truth can receive no detriment from
the combined opposition of all the world, its adherents, few in number
though they may be, will secure in the end an everlasting gain.
U. S.
BATTLE CREEK, _May 2, 1873_.
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MAN’S NATURE AND DESTINY.
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CHAPTER I.
PRIMARY QUESTIONS.
Gradually the mind awakes to the mystery of life. Excepting only the
first pair, every adult member of the human race has come up through the
helplessness of infancy and the limited acquirements of childhood. All
have reached their full capacity to think and do, only by the slow
development of their mental and physical powers. Without either counsel
or co-operation of our own, we find ourselves on the plane of human
existence, subject to all the conditions of the race, and hastening
forward to its destiny, whatever it may be.
A retinue of mysterious inquiries throng our steps. Whence came this
order of things? Who ordained this arrangement? For what purpose are we
here? What is our nature? What are our obligations? And whither are we
bound? Life, what a mystery! Having commenced, will it ever end? Once we
did not exist; are we destined to that condition again? Death we see
everywhere around us. Its victims are silent, cold, and still. They give
no outward evidence of retaining any of those faculties, mental,
emotional, or physical, which distinguished them when living. Is death
the end of all these? And is death the extinction of the race? These are
questions which have ever excited in the human mind an intensity of
thought, and a strength of feeling, which no other subjects can produce.
To these questions, so well-defined, so definite in their demands, and
of such all-absorbing interest, where shall we look for an answer? Have
we any means within our reach by which to solve these problems? We look
abroad upon the earth and admire its multiplied forms of life and
beauty; we mark the revolving seasons and the uniform and beneficent
operations of nature; we look to the heavenly bodies and behold their
glory, and the regularity of their mighty motions--do these answer our
questions? They tell us something, but not all. They tell us of the
great Creator and upholder of all things; for, as the apostle says, “The
invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen,
being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and
Godhead.” They tell us upon whom our existence depends and to whom we
are amenable.
But this only intensifies our anxiety a thousand fold. For now we want
to know upon what conditions his favor is suspended. What must we do to
meet his requirements? How may we secure his approbation? He surely is a
being who will reward virtue and punish sin. Sometime our deeds must be
compared with his requirements, and sentence be rendered in accordance
therewith. How will this affect our future existence? Deriving it from
him, does he suspend its continuance on our obedience? or has he made us
self-existent beings, so that we must live forever, if not in his favor,
then the conscious recipients of his wrath?
With what intense anxiety the mind turns to the future. What is to be
the issue of this mysterious problem of life? Who can tell? Nature is
silent. We appeal to those who are entering the dark valley. But who can
reveal the mysteries of those hidden regions till he has explored them?
and the “curtain of the tent into which they enter, never outward
swings.” Sternly the grave closes its heavy portals against every
attempt to catch a glimpse of the unknown beyond. Science proves itself
a fool on this momentous question. The imagination breaks down; and the
human mind, unaided, sinks into a melancholy, but well-grounded,
despair.
God must tell us, or we can never know what lies beyond this state of
existence, till we experience it for ourselves. He who has placed us
here, must himself make known to us his purposes and his will, or we are
forever in the dark. Of this, all reverent and thoughtful minds are well
assured.
Professor Stuart, in his “Exegetical Essays on Several Words Relating to
Future Punishment,” says:--
“The light of nature can never scatter the darkness in question. This
light has never yet sufficed to make the question clear to any portion
of our benighted race, whether the soul is immortal. Cicero,
incomparably the most able defender of the soul’s immortality of which
the heathen world can yet boast, very ingenuously confesses that, after
all the arguments which he had adduced in order to confirm the doctrine
in question, it so fell out that his mind was satisfied of it only when
directly employed in contemplating the arguments adduced in its favor.
At all other times he fell unconsciously into a state of doubt and
darkness. It is notorious, also, that Socrates, the next most able
advocate, among the heathen, of the same doctrine, has adduced arguments
to establish the never-ceasing existence of the soul which will not bear
the test of examination. If there be any satisfactory light, then, on
the momentous question of a future state, it must be sought from the
word of God.”
H. H. Dobney, Baptist minister, of England (Future Punishment, p. 107),
says:--
“Reason cannot prove man to be immortal. We may devoutly enter the
temple of nature, we may reverently tread her emerald floor, and gaze on
her blue, ‘star-pictured ceiling,’ but to our anxious inquiry, though
proposed with heart-breaking intensity, the oracle is dumb, or like
those of Delphi and Dodona, mutters only an ambitious reply that leaves
us in utter bewilderment.”
And what information have they been able to give us, who have either
been ignorant of divine revelation, or, having the light, have turned
their backs upon it? Listen to a little of what they have told us, which
sufficiently indicates the character of the knowledge they possessed.
Socrates, when about to drink the fatal hemlock, said:--
“I am going out of the world, and you are to continue in it; but which
of us has the better part, is a secret to every one but God.”
Cicero, after recounting the various opinions of philosophers on this
subject, levels all their systems to the ground by this ingenuous
confession:--
“Which of these is true, God alone knows, and which is the most
probable, is a very great question.”
Seneca, reviewing the arguments of the ancients on this subject, said:--
“Immortality, however desirable, was rather promised than proved by
these great men.”
And the skeptic Hobbs, when death was forcing him from this state of
existence, could only exclaim, with dread uncertainty, “I am taking a
leap in the dark!”--dying words not calculated to inspire any great
degree of comfort and assurance in the hearts of those who are inclined
to follow in his steps.
With a full sense of our need, we turn, then, to the revelation which
God has given us in his word. Will this answer our inquiries? It is not
a revelation if it does not; for this must be the very object of a
revelation. Logicians tell us that there is “an antecedent probability
in favor of a divine revelation, arising from the nature of the Deity
and the moral condition of man.” On the same ground, there must be an
equal probability that, if we are immortal, never-dying beings, that
revelation will plainly tell us so.
To the Bible alone, we look for correct views on the important subjects
of the character of God, the nature of life and death, the resurrection,
Heaven, and hell. But our views upon all these, must be, to a great
extent, governed by our views of the nature and destiny of man. On this
subject, therefore, the teachings of the Bible must, of consistency, be
sufficiently clear and full.
Prominent upon the pages of inspiration, we see pointed out the great
distinction which God has put between right and wrong, the rewards he
has promised to virtue, and the punishment he has threatened against
sin; we find it revealed that but few, comparatively, will be saved,
while the great majority of our race will be lost; and as the means by
which the perdition of ungodly men is accomplished, we find described in
fearfully ominous terms, a lake of fire burning with brimstone, intense
and unquenchable.
How these facts intensify the importance of the question, Are all men
immortal? Are these wicked immortal? Is their portion an eternity of
incomprehensible, conscious torture, and unutterable woe? Have they in
their nature a principle so tenacious of life that the severest
implements of destruction with which the Almighty can assail it, an
eternity of his intensest devouring fire can make no inroads upon its
inviolate vitality? Fearful questions!--questions in reference to which
it cannot be that the word of God will leave us in darkness, or perplex
us with doubt, or deceive us with falsehood.
In commending the reader to the word of God on this great theme, it is
unnecessary to suggest to any candid mind the spirit in which we should
present our inquiries. Prejudice or passion should not come within the
sacred precincts of such an investigation. If God has plainly revealed
that all the finally impenitent of our race are doomed to an eternity of
conscious misery, we must accept that fact, however hard it may be to
find any correspondence between the magnitude of the guilt and the
infinitude of the punishment, and however hard it may be to reconcile
such treatment with the character of a God who has declared himself to
be “LOVE.” If, on the other hand, the record shows that God’s government
can be vindicated, sin meet its just deserts, and at the same time such
disposition be finally made of the lost, as to relieve the universe from
the horrid spectacle of a hell forever burning, filled with sensitive
beings, frenzied with fire and flame, and blaspheming in their
ever-strengthening agony--can any one be the less ready to accept this
fact, or hesitate, on this account, to join in the ascription, “Great
and marvelous are thy works, Lord God Almighty; _just and true_ are thy
ways, thou King of saints”?