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us, that with regard to some, it is fearful in anticipation, even here, and that hereafter, it is followed by that fiery torment, of which Judas and the rich man have already a foretaste, and which awaits all God's adversaries. The unpardonable offender is said to have" a certain fearful look"ing for, of judgment, or damnation,a and fiery indignation, "which shall devour the adversaries.”

When my opponent insists that we must not look forward so far for this condemnation, but that it takes place in this life; I admit, that before man sinned, angels were condemned; and since that event, he that believeth not is condemned already. But if this condemnation be confined to this life, and reach not beyond the grave, why does the Apostle say, "it is appointed unto men, once to die, but after this the judgment ?" Our Saviour assures us, that after men are dead and buried, "all that are in the graves shall hear his "voice, and shall come forth; they that have done good, unto "the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil unto "the resurrection of damnation." Although fallen angels are already condemned or bound over to punishment, there is yet a great day of accounts before them, which shall be so far from relaxing their bonds, that the chains, by which they are reserved for that dreadful reckoning, are expressly declared to be everlasting. "And the Angels which kept not "their first estate, but left their own habitation, he hath re"served in everlasting chains, under darkness, unto the "judgment of the great day." That these everlasting chains bind over to everlasting punishment, is plain from the declaration of our Saviour, that "he that shall blaspheme against the Holy Ghost, hath never forgiveness, but is in "danger of, deserving of, bound over to, eternal damnation."e

The amount of the evidence, under this word Gehenna, is, that this is a place of punishment for the soul, after death, and for the soul and body, after the general judgment; that it is a state in which the impenitent and unbelieving are tormented in unquenchable fire, with everlasting destruction, under eternal damnation. May God, for Christ's sake, preserve you from a presumptuous defiance of such a fate.

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4.

TARTARUS.

The word Tartarus is not literally used once, in our common Greek Scriptures, from Genesis to Revelation. Yet both parties admit that it is virtually used there, as one of its participial conjugates is found, among the irağ λɛyouɛva (words once spoken) of the New Testament. The word is iartarosas from the verb tartaroun. This is literally rendered by the French abimer, and the Italian abissare; which last word is used for this purpose, in the Italian New Testament, circulated by the British and Foreign Bible Society. The Popish and Protestant French New Testaments, published by the same Society, have rendered it, correctly enough, by a circumlocution; although that language affords a verb exactly corresponding with the original. What they did from choice, we have done from necessity. In this we follow the Latin of the Vulgate and Beza, the German of Luther, and many other examples. Instead of manufacturing a new verb for the occasion, our Hebrew New Testament, now in use, renders it, "cast them down to Sheol ;" and even the modern Greek, which we should suppose, was not deficient in this respect, renders it, "cast them into Tartarus."a In the Classical Greek writers, the verb and the circumlocution are used interchangeably. Concerning the same persons, Apollodorus says, in one breath, that they are "intartarated," and in the next, that they are "cast into tartarus.”b

That the Greeks and the Romans considered this a place of punishment for the wicked after death, need not be elaborately proved. Evidences of this are found in all the books. "Virgil, in his sixth Æneid, where he probably has a particular reference to the representations made of a future state in the mysteries, as well as to those made by Homer, represents several sorts of persons, who had been guilty of very heinous crimes, as adjudged to grievous punishments in Tartarus. Vers 565, et seq." Among the Greeks, the testimony of Plato deserves notice. In the conclusion of his Phædo, he introduces Socrates, in one of his most serious and solemn discourses just before his death, talking after the manner of the Poets, of the judges after death, of Tartarus, Acheron, the Acherusian lake, Pyriphlegethon, and Cocy

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tus: that some, after having gone through various punishments, shall be purged and absolved, and after certain periods, shall be freed from their punishments: 'But those who 'by reason of the greatness of their sins, seem to be incurable, who have committed many and great sacrileges, or un'just and unlawful murders, and other crimes of the like nature, shall have a fate suitable to them, being thrown down into Tartarus, from whence they never shall escape.' The like representation is made at the latter end of Plato's tenth Republic, in the story of Erus Armenius. In his Gorgias also he supposes the wicked, and those who were incurable, to be sent to Tartarus, where they shall be punished with endless torments, as an example to others: and he approves of Homer, for representing wicked kings who had tyrannized over mankind, among those who shall be so punished."

That the writers of the New Testament adopted many words from the Greeks, in whose language they wrote, is as easily accounted for, as it is willingly admitted: but that the doctrines connected with these words in the New Testament, either originated with the Heathen, or are entirely conformable to their views of religion and philosophy, is denied. There is a degree of similarity between Plato's account of Tartarus, as given above, and the Scriptural account of the same place: so there is some resemblance between the Inspired and the Platonic description of Hades. Both contrast it with heaven, and both represent it as a place of future punishment. The latter is done by the Philosopher in the following words, viz. "They that have sinned more frequently and more heinously, shall fall into the "depth, and into those lower places, which are called "Hades." Again he says to the transgressor, "Thou shalt "suffer a suitable punishment, either whilst thou remainest "here, or when thou goest to Hades." That the author of these declarations, differed from the Scriptures, in his views of a future retribution, is evident from the falsehood and folly which he has mixed with his assertions. The Philosophers also differ from the scriptures, in the account which they give of the origin of this doctrine. The Scriptures never once insinuate as they do, that it was borrowed from uninspired human tradition. It is true, the Universalists assert this for them but the inspired writers uniformly de

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c Leland's Advantage and Necessity of the Christian Revelation, vol. 2. pp. 267. 265. Finley's edition, Philadelphia.

d Leland, vol. 2. pp. 318. 319.

liver it, upon the same authority with all their other instructions: they give it as the word of God, and not of man. But when Plato tells us of the punishment of sin being required by the justice of God, he says expressly, that this is " as ancient tradition teacheth."e Doubtless, this tradition was as ancient as the word Sheol, or the language to which it belongs: but although the heathen world received it from the polluted streams of tradition, the church received it, first and last, from the pure fountain of revelation..

As the Church of Christ, whether inspired or uninspired, knows that this doctrine came from the source of truth, they have always treated it as a solemn and eternal truth: How different the treatment which it has received from the Heathen and Heretical world! Plutarch in speaking of the Epicurean philosophy, says that the generality of the heathen were ready to admit what he calls "the fabulous hope of immortality, but that they had no fear of the punishments said to be in Hades." Thus they used the words Hades and Tartarus, to denote a state of punishment hereafter, while in reality, the doctrine of future retribution was, with them, an object of derision. That Mr. Balfour was, in some measure, aware of this, will appear from the following extract, viz. "Though punishment after death in Tartarus was be"lieved by the heathen generally, yet the better informed "among them did not believe in the fables of hell, but turn"ed them into ridicule. Juvenal took no part in those "opinions of the vulgar; and Virgil says, it was the pro"vince of philosophy alone to shake off the yoke of custom, "rivetted by education.' Is it not then strange, that a doc*trine, which was invented by heathens, and treated with #6 contempt by their own wisest men, should be a fundamental article in the faith of christians ?"g

That this doctrine was invented by the heathen, is itself a late invention: since the ancient heathen writers testify that it was not formed by invention, but received by tradition, from a still more remote, and to them, inscrutable antiquity. That their would-be wise-men rejected the doctrine, is admitted. To the names of Virgil and Juvenal among the Romans, might be added those of their poets, orators, historians, and philosophers in general, with the great Seneca and Cicero at their head. To the name of Plutarch, the

e Leland, vol. 2, p. 364. f Leland, vol. 2, p. 391. g Chap. 1, sect. 3.

latest of the Greek philosophers, may be added, (strange as it may seem,) the more ancient and eminent Plato and Socrates, Epictetus, Aristotle, and Pythagoras, neither of whom was a real believer in future punishment. With these, the body of the philosophical sects, of Epicureans and Peripatetics, Cynics, Cyrenaics, and Stoics, generally agreed. Mr. Balfour intimates that this rejection of future punishment was among the wise men, while the people generally held our doctrine. It is the opinion of many that on this subject, these Philosophers maintained an esoteric and an exoteric doctrine; the two opposite systems of Universalism and Orthodoxy; the one for the wise men, and the other for the vulgar; a system of policy which Mr. Balfour attributes to Dr. George Campbell. If this be true, then, according to his scale of morality, they must not only have been wise men, but "the very best of men." They taught a doctrine publicly, which they inwardly despised, and privately ridiculed. Mr. Balfour is heartily welcome to the suffrages of all such wise men as these, whether ancient or modern. I would not exchange the testimony of one poor heaveu-taught martyr, without a name; for that of a regiment of blinded philosophers, without a conscience.

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Any enlightened Christian, who considers the gulph of moral degradation, into which sin had plunged these Unitarian wise-men, will not wonder that they resorted to the soothing fables of Universalism or Atheism, to relieve their fears. While they were willing to restrain the vulgar with the fear of God's punitive justice, they were obliged, like modern Universalists, to avert their own guilty faces from his indignant frown. Neither the heathen nor the heretical world can endure the doctrine of God's anger against sin. Although Cicero approves of paying some regard to an oath, says that this should not be done "out of the fear of the anger of the Gods, for there is no such thing." He declares that "God is never angry, nor hurteth any one:" and concerning this doctrine, he positively asserts, that "it is a principle universally held by all the Philosophers." Concerning the Gods, Seneca declares, "they neither will, nor can hurt any one." As the sufferings of every day, under God's providence, contradict this empty assertion, my opponent will adınit that God can and will hurt some, though it will be in this world only. For this he has pointed to the house of the foolish woman and has assured us that in the haunts of revelry and debauchery, we will find hell with its ten-fold

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