The subject of future punishment is one the consideration of which
gives mental pain. We naturally shrink from it, would prefer to leave
it alone, and to think, as we say, of something else.
But the question won't leave us alone, and we must think about it. It
forces itself on our notice, and that, too, in our most thoughtful and
sober moments. We cannot read the Scriptures without the dark vision
passing before our eyes with more or less gloom. Conscience whispers
to us about it. It recurs to our thoughts amidst the penitential
confessions and earnest prayers of public worship. The theme is
constantly discussed in works and periodicals widely read, and not
even professedly theological.
There are few, we presume, who will assert that every man, whatever
his character may be when he leaves the world, shall after death
immediately pass into glory, and be received into fellowship with God
and His saints. With such a belief earnestly entertained, suicide
would cease to be an evidence of insanity, and murder would become
philanthropy.
Most men are prepared rather to believe, apart altogether from any
Scripture statements on this momentous subject, that punishment of
some kind or other must be awarded to crime at last, and in some
degree proportionate to the character of the criminal,--that somewhere
or other, by some means or other, not yet discovered or revealed,
reformation if at all possible must necessarily be effected in order
that peace and happiness may be secured. Man's undying sense of
righteousness, and what _ought_ to be, is not satisfied by the
prosperity which, in spite of every drawback, so frequently attends
the most selfish and unprincipled villain to his grave. Like the
Psalmist, we all are disposed to exclaim when contemplating such
histories, "As for me, my feet were almost gone; my steps had
well-nigh slipped. For I was envious at the foolish, when I saw the
prosperity of the wicked. For there are no bands in their death, and
their strength is firm; neither are they plagued like other men....
Their eyes stand out with fatness; they have more than their heart can
wish.... And they say, How doth God know? and is there knowledge with
the Most High?"
But when we open the Word of God, it is impossible for any honest
man to deny, that whether its teaching be true or false, the fact of
future punishment is an essential portion of what is taught. By no
conceivable perversion of the words of Christ, so often repeated on
this subject, and by no interpretation of His parables, can it be
denied that it was His intention to give the very impression which the
universal Church has received, that there is a "wrath to come," and a
state of being which to some is "cursed," and so very dreadful that,
with reference to one of His own disciples, who is called "the son of
perdition," the Saviour said that it would have "been good for that
man had he never been born."
I must presume that this general statement regarding the teaching of
Christ himself, not to speak of that of His apostles, requires no
proof to any one who has ever read the Gospels. Punishment of some
kind awaits the wicked after death. Yet if this much is admitted, we
have surely already reached a conclusion which ought to fill with the
most solemn awe the mind of every man who has any reverence for the
Divine authority of Jesus Christ; or who even believes that He who
represented Himself as saying, "Depart from me, ye cursed, into
everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels,"--"Depart from
me, I know you not, all ye workers of iniquity," and who narrated such
a parable as that of the rich man and Lazarus, was one incapable of
all exaggeration or evil passion, and one who possessed the only
perfect love which was ever manifested in humanity. The apostles, who
express in language as strong and unhesitating the certainty and dread
nature of future punishment, were men also who, more than any who have
ever lived, loved their fellow-men, wept like their Divine Master for
their sins, and devoted their lives, with untiring unselfishness, to
rescue them from present evil and future woe. Now, if this be so far a
true, if not a full, representation of the teaching of Christ and
His apostles on this momentous theme, I may be permitted to put
two questions of a practical and personal kind to my reader. One
is,--Whether the knowledge of the character, apart from the authority,
of Jesus and His apostles, who spoke in such language of the future
history of some men in another world, ought not to make us pause with
becoming self-distrust and reverence, if disposed to exclaim against
the possibility of so terrible an ending as a thing "unjust,"
"revengeful," and "revolting to benevolence?" Who are we, what have
we been, or what have we done for our fellow-men, that we should thus
presume to have a more tender regard for their well-being than
the Lord Jesus Christ or His apostles had, and to be incapable of
entertaining or of uttering such "harsh thoughts" as they did about
their future state?
The other question which I would humbly suggest for consideration is
this:--What is your real belief in reference to man's future state?
Have you any faith in our Lord's teaching? Any firm practical
conviction in the fact of future punishment? After you have made
every possible deduction from the weight of Scripture testimony, and
explained away every metaphor, parable, and dogmatic statement to the
lowest possible point short of absolute denial of their truth in any
fair sense of their meaning,--may I beg of you to consider what, or
how much, remains to be firmly believed as the truth of God? For it
does appear to me that there exists a wide-spread callousness and
indifference, an ease of mind, with reference to the fate hereafter of
ungodly men, which cannot be accounted for except on the supposition
that all earnest faith is lost in either the dread possibilities of
future sin or of its future punishment. Men seem to have made up their
minds that they have nothing to fear in the next world, whatever they
believe, whatever they are, or whatever they do in this. We are,
verily, not incapable of experiencing fear, but in a vast number of
cases we are great cowards, in spite of all our bravery,--cowards when
there is nothing actually present to alarm us; and each one of us
seeks to his very utmost to keep danger or suffering far away from
himself or from those he loves. Accordingly, the possible or
near approach of mere bodily pain, or of domestic sorrow, or the
anticipated loss of money--not to speak of such horrors as public
disgrace from loss of character, imprisonment, transportation as
a felon, or execution as a criminal--would induce thoughtfulness,
anxiety, wretchedness. Yet, strange to say, the very same persons who
would tremble for such calamities as these, treat with indifference a
coming punishment, which cannot, even in their own estimation, be less
terrible, and which, as sure as Christ's words are true, they may
themselves, because of their present character, be liable at any hour
to enter upon and endure.
But many of those readers, who, up to this point, may heartily
sympathise with me in my feeble efforts to quicken a more earnest
thoughtfulness on this subject, will be disposed to avoid its further
consideration. I would not blame them for so feeling. God knoweth I
have no wish to "dogmatise" on this subject, but to approach it with
real sympathy for the difficulties, the pains, the perplexities, which
the noblest, the truest, and the most reverential have experienced
when they have attempted really to believe in it What chiefly induces
me to submit a few thoughts upon a theme so solemn, is the "dogmatism"
and unworthy views of God which are attributed to all of us who cannot
discover sunrise beyond the gloom; and the conviction also that a
more thorough belief in the clanger of sin, as well as its inherent
vileness, and a wholesome "terror of the Lord," would tend to
"persuade men" to entertain with more earnestness the deliverance
promised in the gospel.
The idea which many have formed of punishment is that of a mere
arbitrary annexation of a certain amount of suffering in the next
world to a certain amount of crime committed in this--so many stripes
for so many sins; and, as if obvious injustice were inflicted on men,
by threatening them with coming woe for present wickedness, they
exclaim, "Surely such sins as these do not deserve such punishment as
that!" But if sin itself, by an eternal moral necessity, carries with
it its own punishment, even as the shadow accompanies the substance,
then the real question in regard to the possible ending of future
suffering is merged in the deeper one of the possible ending of future
sin. And if so, what evidence have we from any one source to inspire
the hope, that the man who enters the next world loving sin, and
therefore suffering punishment as its necessary result, will ever
cease to sin, and thereby cease to suffer? It must, remember, be
admitted as an indisputable fact, that life eternal can only co-exist
with a right state of the soul. "This _is_ life eternal, to know thee
and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent." Up to the moment in which the
spirit turns with filial confidence and obedience to God, there cannot
be a cessation either in the curse that must rest upon enmity and
disobedience, or in the pain which must be produced by so terrible a
malady. Some time or other, be it near or remote, in one year or in a
million, there must be repentance in the sinner, a turning away _from_
sin and _to_ God, as the only possible means of bridging over the
otherwise impassable gulf that separates the bad from the good, or
hell from heaven. There is no salvation for man but from sin; there is
no restoration for him but to love.
But if this change in the sinner is not accomplished in this world,
what evidence have we that it can be accomplished in any place of even
limited punishment? In what conceivable way, we ask with deepest
awe, is a moral and responsible being, who ends this life and begins
another at enmity to God, rejecting Christ, disbelieving the gospel,
dead in trespasses and in sins, hateful and hating, selfish and
vile,--in what way is he to be made holy after death, and before
entering heaven, by a temporary discipline of mere suffering?
We are here considering the possible future of one only who knows the
gospel of the grace of God, and we ask, what advantages will such an
one possess elsewhere for the attainment of piety that are denied him
here? If all that God has done to gain his heart has so far failed up
till the hour of his death, that he is morally unfit by his habits or
even desires for the society of God and His people, what appliances
can we conceive of more likely to influence the will and gain the
affections in a prison-house set apart for the reformation of the
impenitent? Can the sinner expect to meet, in this supposed place of
punishment and consequent reformation, more loving friends to win him
by such solemn counsels and tender ministrations as earth did not
afford? Does he anticipate daily returning mercies and sources of
enjoyment more rich and varied than those possessed here, in order to
bring him back to God? Will he possess a healthier body, a happier
home, holier society, a more beauteous world with fairer skies and
brighter landscapes, or any of those innumerable blessings which have
such a tendency to tame and soften the rudest nature? Shall means of
grace be afforded more powerfully calculated to enlighten the mind,
convince the understanding, influence the will, or draw the affections
of the heart towards God? Shall Sabbaths of more peaceful rest dawn
upon the troubled heart, or sacraments of more healing virtue be
administered? Can retreats be secured where God's Word may be read
and prayer enjoyed with more undisturbed repose? Will the gospel be
preached more faithfully, and a people be found more loving and pious
to assemble for public or private worship? Can a Saviour be offered
more able or willing to save, and the Spirit of God be poured down
upon the burning soil in more plenteous or life-giving pentecostal
showers? Is this how men picture to themselves the place in which they
expect to atone for past sins by limited suffering? Impossible!
They are thinking of a world better and more glorious than the
present;--not of a hell, but of a heaven!
Even if such a place were prepared for the impenitent and wicked, what
conceivable security is there that a new mind and spirit would be
the necessary result of those new and enlarged benefactions? We
must assume that the power of sinning remains, otherwise man's
responsibility would cease, and punishment thereby become mere
cruelty. If sin is thus possible, then why may not the sinner indulge
there in the same selfishness, disobedience, and rebellion which
characterised him here? Why may it not be with him as with many a man
who loves sin in the low haunts of profligacy and crime, but loves it
not the less when brought into circumstances of greater comfort and
among society of greater godliness? But should it be otherwise,
and the supposed place of future punishment have none of those
advantages,--and we are forced by the necessity of the case to assume
their absence, at least for a limited period, and to admit, in some
form or other, the presence of a dread and mysterious sorrow,--we
ask again, on what grounds is it concluded that this anticipated
punishment shall itself possess a healing virtue to produce, some time
or other, that love to God which, up till the hour of death, has never
been produced in the sinner? Men attach, perhaps, some omnipotent
power to mere suffering, and imagine that if hatred to sin and love to
God are all that is needed, then a short experience of the terrific
consequences of a godless past must insure a godly future. Why do
they think so? This is not the effect which mere punishment generally
produces on human character. Its tendency is not to soften, but to
harden the heart,--to fill it not with love, but with enmity. It
cannot fail, indeed, to make the sufferer long for deliverance from
the pain; but it does not follow that he thereby longs for deliverance
from the sin which causes the pain, and for the possession of the good
which alone can remove it. It is certainly not the case in this
world, that bad men are always disposed to repent and turn to God in
proportion as they suffer from their own wilfulness, and become poor
from idleness, broken in health from dissipation, alienated from human
hearts by their selfishness, or pass, with a constantly increasing
anguish, through all the stages of outcasts from the family; dwellers
among the profligate; companions in crime; occupiers of prisons;
members of convict gangs, till the scaffold with its beam and drop
ends the dreadful history. Such punishment as this, constantly dogging
the crime which at first created it and ever preserves it, only makes
the heart harder, fans the passions into a more volcanic fire,
and possesses the soul with a more daring recklessness and wilder
desperation. And arguing from this experience, to which men appeal, as
if it was truer than the Word of God, what more special virtue will
punishment have in the next world than in this? What tendency will
there be in that long night of misery to inspire a man with the love
of God, whose very character, and whose holy and righteous will, have
annexed the suffering to the sin? If the sinner's character is not
thereby reformed, and all the while he retains his responsibility,--as
he must do on the assumption that reformation is possible,--and if he
continues to choose sin with more diabolical hatred to the good, is it
imagined that such a process as this, of continued sin accompanied by
continued mental suffering, will at any period render him mere meet
to enjoy the holiness of heaven than when he first departed from the
world to enter upon his new and strange probation? Oh, the more we
think of it, the darker does the history grow,--the faster does the
descent of the evil spirit become, clown that pit which, from its very
nature, seems to be bottomless! If means are discoverable there more
suited to gain the end of moral regeneration than any which exist
here, let them be pointed out. We have searched in vain to find them
in the Word of God, or in the mind and history of man.
Making every allowance for the real difficulties which beset this
question, and for the peculiar feelings, partly allowable, and largely
the reverse, with which it is entertained, we have no doubt that many
have been driven to the extreme of utter disbelief in the existence of
any punishment by the bold and presumptuous manner in which they may
have heard men consign all the heathen, and all Christendom, with the
exception of a very few, to this awful doom. Infants even have not
escaped the condemnation of some who, professing to have more orthodox
faith than their neighbours, have really little or any faith at all
in God, but utter mere words to which--in this case, fortunately for
themselves--they attach no meaning. For if they did, what would life
be to them, believing that it was possible for their babe, because of
Adam's sin, to be cast for all eternity into literal fire? But while
we have perfect confidence in the salvation of infants, and of many
more, we dare not condemn any. The living God, who alone knows each
man, may be dealing in ways beyond our comprehension with the most
lonely savage, whose inmost spirit He ever sees, and who is of more
awful value in His sight than all the stars of the sky. _How_ the
living and omniscient Spirit of God has access to the inner spirit of
man, I neither know nor could perhaps understand if it were revealed;
nor how He can teach that spirit without the gospel or the ordinary
means of grace, so as to bring it under law to God. But when I saw
a child (Laura Bridgman) who was born deaf, dumb, and blind,
marvellously educated by the genius and wisdom of her remarkable
instructor, I could not but feel how grand ends might be accomplished
in the human soul by means which before this experience I would have
pronounced as impossible;--and it suggested also to me how a poor
heathen even, like that blind girl, might be really taught by another
person, and be receiving light within, though for a time utterly
ignorant of either the name, the character, or the purposes of the
unseen and unheard teacher, who yet in his own way gradually was
training his scholar for fellowship with God and man.[A] We ignorant
and sinful men must confine our judgments as regards others to what is
right or wrong in their actions, and that solely to guide ourselves in
our personal duties towards God and one another. But as to deciding
the eternal fate of any man, that, thank God! can be done only by Him
to whom all men belong. When disposed to occupy the throne of the
judge, and to scrutinise human character with a jealous regard for the
righteousness of God, let us at once do so by summoning ourselves to
the bar!
[Footnote A: As an illustration of this, see a remarkable account of
a North American Indian, narrated by Brainerd in his Diary, date
September 21, 1745.]
This, however, amidst all perplexities we may certainly rely upon with
perfect confidence, that whatever is finally decided, and whatever
punishment is finally awarded to any, will be in accordance with the
perfect will of "God, whose name is love;" so that all the true and
just, the good and loving in the universe, will, when they know all
the grounds of His judgment, sympathise with their whole soul in His
decisions, and see His glory revealed in them. We also know that there
will be "a multitude greater than any man can number" in God's family;
that they will be gathered "out of every nation, kindred, and tongue;"
and this we may hope for, that the number of the lost may be to those
who are saved fewer far than the number of those in penal settlements
and prisons are to the inhabitants of a well-ordered and Christian
kingdom.
But not only are our thoughts of future punishment naturally darkened
into deepest gloom by the assumed multitudes of those who will suffer,
but also by the nature of those sufferings which we also assume are
to be assigned to them. We literally interpret all those images of
unquenchable fire and the undying worm, borrowed from the constant
conflagrations and corruptions of the offal and carcases of dead
animals in the valley of Hinnom, (or Gaienna,) near Jerusalem, and
also the obviously metaphorical language used in the parable of the
rich man and Lazarus, as if necessarily teaching that worms or fire
would be employed to torture for all eternity the immortal bodies
of the lost. But what if there is to be no such bodily pain? though
possibly there may be some kind of physical suffering immediately
produced by sin there as well as here. What if the wicked shall be
punished only by permitting them to "eat the fruit of their own way,
and to be filled with their own devices?" What if, instead of the
wrath of God being poured upon them to the utmost, it will be
inflicted in the least _possible_ measure, and only in the way of
natural consequence? What if the sin which makes the hell hereafter,
is, in spite of all its suffering, loved, clung to, even as the sin is
which makes the hell now? Nay, what if every gift of God, and every
capacity for perverting His gifts, are retained; and if the sinner
shall suffer only from that which he himself _chooses_ for ever, and
for ever determines to possess? I do not say that it must be so;
but if it is so, then might a hell of unbridled self-indulgence be
preferred then, as it is by many now, to a heaven whose blessedness
consisted in perfect holiness, and the possession of the love of God
in Christ, for ever and ever. Let, then, the fairest star be selected,
like a beauteous island in the vast and shoreless sea of the azure
heavens, as the future home of the criminals from the earth; and let
them possess in this material paradise whatever they most love, and
all that it is _possible_ for God to bestow; let them be endowed with
undying bodies, and with minds which shall for ever retain their
intellectual powers; let them no more be "plagued with religion;" let
no Saviour ever intrude His claims upon them, no Holy Spirit disturb
them, no God reveal Himself supernaturally to them; let no Sabbath
ever dawn upon them, no saint ever live among them, no prayer ever be
heard within their borders; but let human beings exist there for
ever, smitten only by the leprosy of hatred to God, and with utter
selfishness as its all-prevailing and eternal purpose; then, as sure
as the law of righteousness exists, on which rests the throne of God
and the government of the universe, a society so constituted must work
out for itself a hell of solitary and bitter suffering, to which no
limit can be assigned except the capacity of a finite nature. Alas!
the spirit that is without love to its God or to its neighbour is
already possessed by a power which must at last create for its own
self-torment a worm, that will never die, and a flame that can never
more be quenched!
* * * * *
And yet, when forced to come to this conclusion, especially after
reading the Scriptures, which in our judgment but confirm it, and give
it the sanction of Divine authority, who can, even then, with his
human heart silence a "timid voice which asks in whispers" many
questions suggestive of what would appear to be the brighter hope?
"Who can limit" (in some such form might those questionings be put)
"the resources of God's infinite love and wisdom? May there not be
found means, though yet to us unknown, and as yet unrevealed, by which
the good shall ultimately triumph over the evil,--when every being
whom God has originally made capable of love and joy will at last
fulfil His glorious purpose,--when every sheep lost to the Shepherd
will be found, and brought with rejoicing back to the fold,--when
every lost piece of money with the King's image, defaced, yet not
destroyed, will be recovered from the dust and restored to the King's
treasury,--and when every prodigal, weary of his wanderings, convinced
at last, through self-inflicted misery, of his folly, and remembering
a Father, will return to that bosom which never can reject a child
seeking there his rest and refuge,--until, finally, there shall not be
throughout creation even one sinner, but a mighty family of immortal
beings, who, after their terrible experience of the reign of self,
shall freely and joyfully accept of the reign of the blessed and
loving God? If it is _possible_, must it not be so? May we not, in
our darkness and difficulty, rely upon One who, knowing man's fallen
condition, yet said, Increase, and multiply, and replenish the earth?
upon One who declared it to be a legitimate source of joy to every
mother that a child was born to the world? upon One whose love to all
whom He has made is to our love as the light of the mighty sun to a
fire-fly's spark wandering in darkness?"
"Oh, yet we trust that somehow good
Will be the final goal of ill,
To pangs of nature, sins of will,
Defects of doubt, and taints of blood
"That nothing walks with aimless feet;
That not one life shall be destroy'd,
Or cast as rubbish to the void,
When God hath made the pile complete:
"That not a worm is chosen in vain;
That not a moth with vain desire
Is shrivell'd in a pent-up fire,
Or but subserves another's gain.
* * * * *
"So runs my dream: but what am I?
An infant crying in the night:
An infant crying for the light:
And with no language but a cry.
* * * * *
"I falter where I firmly trod;
And falling with my weight of cares
Upon the great world's altar stairs,
That slope through darkness up to God,
"I stretch lame hands of faith, and grope
And gather dust and chaff, and call
To what I feel is Lord of all,
And faintly trust the larger hope."
With deep sympathy for all who thus feel the weight and pain of the
subject, and who hope against hope, we ourselves are compelled to
abide in our first faith. We cannot forget that Jesus Christ, the Son
of God and the Son of man, who was perfect love, truth, and life, has
neither Himself, nor through His apostles, given us by one word the
slightest ground for hoping that any man who leaves this world an
enemy to God will ever repent and become a friend of God in the
next. The whole teaching of Scripture is one with what prudence and
principle would dictate:--Believe in Jesus; _now or never!_
Hear, in conclusion, God's Word:--"For God so loved the world, that he
gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not
perish, but have everlasting life.... He that believeth on him is not
condemned; but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he
hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. And
this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men
loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.... He
that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life; and he that believeth
not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him."
Hebrews ii. 1, 3:--"Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed
to the things which we have heard, lest at any time we should let them
slip.... How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation; which
at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto us
by them that heard him."