earth, in short, of the creation in flames; and all this, not in a connexion characterized by the excessive hyperbole of oriental poetry, but in the course of a plain and simple epistolary address. Accordingly, it will perhaps be contended, we ought to take the expressions, not as figures, and they too of the very boldest kind, but rather as literal descriptions.

There is, no doubt, much plausibility in this argument, and possibly some truth. Yet it should be considered, that both the writer and the believers whom he addressed, must, from reading the prophets, have been already accustomed to the same sort of imagery as the appropriate representations of any day of the Lord whatsoever; and that it was therefore natural enough that he should introduce it amidst the more simple language of his Epistle; that he pointedly alluded, in the course of the passage, to our Saviour's well known prophecy of the destruction of Jerusalem, which was to come as a thief in the night; and that he likened it, as Christ had done to the desolation of the flood in the days of Noah. Whoever considers these circumstances, will not find it very difficult perhaps, to account for the boldness of the figures, familiarized as they had been by prophetic usage, and associated, by explicit reference, with the like metaphors in Christ's predictions. Be this as it may, however, we must do no manifest violence to the author's earnest exhortation, unless we admit that he thought the day would come while his breth

1 See Matt. xxiv. 42-44.

2 Compare 2 Pet. iii. 5-7 with Matt. xxiv, 37-39.

ren yet lived, so that it behoved them to look for it with care, and be diligent that it should find them in peace, without spot and blameless.'

We have now finished the survey of the subject proposed. From the various examples adduced, which are nearly all that are to be found in the Bible, the reader has seen that the day of the Lord was a phrase used to denote any time of great and general calamity; and that such scenes were habitually described by metaphors the most dazzling and terrific that the imagination could conceive. A little care in tracing the context, will preserve us from any great mistakes in their interpretation; but to heedless readers, or to those who never read for themselves, it is not strange that they should convey the most extravagant and incorrect ideas.

ART. IV.

Jewish Usage of the Word Gehenna.

THE appearance of the Rev. Mr. Balfour's Inquiry into the import of the words Sheol, Hades, Gehenna, &c. produced at the first a strong sensation, which has not yet subsided, in the public mind. It was felt by all, that the main pillars of the common doctrine of hell had been shaken, and by many, that they had been removed. Different classes of the religious community were, of course, differently affected on the occasion. The dissenters and converts from the popular system, were gratified; its staunch adherents were alarmed. A reply soon appeared, with considerable pomp of preparation, from a Boston clergyman ; but it fell dead from the press, and was heard no more of, except through the counter-report of an answer. After an Interval, another, from the President of Bowdoin college, followed and shared the fate of its predecessor. A third, from one of the Professors at Andover, has since taken its way to Sheol. Without arrogating a right to pronounce thus summarily on the merits of the entire controversy, we may venture to say at least so much as this: that no respectable answer can be made to Mr. Balfour's work, which will subserve the doctrine of hell torments as held by the common people. Should an opponent even succeed in the final argument, still the acknowledged facts which he must concede at the outset, would

break up the popular foundation of the doctrine; and his only expedient then would be, to shift the long settled faith of the people over to new grounds to which they have not been accustomed. A hazzardous experiment on an old doctrine! Any direct attempt at such a transfer would endanger the doctrine itself; and its friends are probably aware that if so fundamental a reform once begins, there is no judging how far it will go, nor where it will end.

It is virtually agreed by the chief controvertists on both sides, that the Hebrew Sheol, from which alone the word hell is translated in the Old Testament, and the Greek Hades, from which it is often translated in the New, signify literally the state of the dead, and nothing more. We are indeed told that they may possibly have a secondary meaning; or rather, that it would be difficult absolutely to prove that they may not, to such as are already believers in future torment. This, however, is, in plain language, a most thorough concession, that no argument can be drawn simply from these terms themselves, in favor of that doctrine, which must first be granted before they can afford it any countenance, and even then only by a possible secondary application. Such is the result, with regard to Sheol and Hades.

It is on the word Gehenna, which occurs twelve times, all in the New Testament, that the principal reliance is placed. This, it is contended, corresponds fairly enough with the term hell in our present usage. But Mr. Balfour, on the contrary, points out the derivation of that Jewish word from the valley of Hinnom; and enters on a careful review of all the texts in which it is