2 crown," is limited to this life, is frequently asserted, or insinuated in the New Testament. In the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, Abraham says: "Between us and you a great gulf is fixed, so that they who would pass from hence to you cannot, neither can they pass to us that would come from thence." These words intimate not only a local separation between the saints and the reprobate, but also the immutability of their respective conditions. In the parable of the Ten Virgins, five are admitted and five are rejected, never to return. In the parable of the wheat and the chaff, it is declared that our Lord "will gather the wheat into His barn, and the chaff He will burn with unquenchable fire."3 In the parable of the man who was expelled from the banquet because he came without a wedding garment, we never hear that he was restored to favor. All these parables, undoubtedly, refer to the kingdom of Heaven; and the obvious inference we have to draw from them is, that the sentence of the good and the bad after the separation is final and irrevocable. But you will say: Is not the punishment unjust, since a crime committed in a brief space of time, is visited with eternal retribution? I answer that, in the criminal jurisprudence of every civilized nation, there is no adequate proportion of time between the offence and its punishment. For a murder or an adultery committed in a moment 1I. Cor. IX., 25. Luke XVI., 26. 3 3 Ibid. III., 17. of passion, our judges not only deprive men during their natural life, of the society of friends and relatives, compelling them to consort with other criminals, but sometimes even condemn them to death. May not this punishment be regarded as eternal, since once the crime is expiated, life can never be recalled? If this code meets with public approval, as a vindication of social order, how shall we declare it unjust in the Supreme Judge to cast out once for all, from the City of God and the society of the Saints, impious men who have sinned against the majesty of the divine law? It is usually malefacfactors that have defied the law and that are punished for its violation who condemn our criminal code as too severe; and it is only such as choose to be rebels against God that insist upon calling Him a tyrant. Mathematical truths are never controverted, because they do not oppose our passions; but moral and religious truths are denied, because they often conflict with our natural inclinations. I admit, you will now say, that the punishment may be just, but how can you reconcile it with our ideas of divine clemency? God is, indeed, infinitely merciful, but His mercy cannot absorb His other attributes; it cannot run counter to His justice, His sanctity, and that moral order He has established in the world. The higher appreciation one has for benevolence, truth, chastity and moral rectitude, the greater is his antipathy to the opposite vices. Now, God whose love for virtue knows no bounds, must by the very nature of His . Being, have an immeasurable aversion for all iniquity, and therefore He can never be reconciled to the sinner, so long as he voluntarily clings to his sin. God exults not in the sufferings of His creatures, but in the manifestation of His eternal attributes. Again, God is indeed merciful, but He never forces His mercy on any man. He never does violence to our free-will, which is a precious, though a perilous boon. He wishes, indeed, the salvation of all men;1 but He wishes also that man's will should. remain free. He desires, therefore, our eternal happiness by every means short of destroying our freedom of action. He gives grace to incline our heart, not to coerce it. God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. But how can we hope to be saved, if repentance be wanting? The humble and contrite heart He will not despise; but if the heart is neither humble nor contrite, what can you expect? To the cry for pardon He ever listens, but what if that cry is never heard? And if a man will persistently rebel against the appeals of paternal love, he has no one but himself to blame for the consequences. If a drowning man refuses to seize the life-preserver within his grasp, he is solely responsible for his unhappy fate. And if a man prefers to be borne down by the tide of passion rather than listen to the inspirations of grace, he alone is to blame. The Prodigal Son never 11. Tim. II., 4. reproached his indulgent father, but himself for the miseries that followed his dissipated life. No one has ever presumed to say that God is unmerciful for creating some animals brute beasts instead of human beings. How, then, can He be regarded as cruel in permitting some men to abide in that moral debasement to which they have voluntarily reduced themselves? And if divine mercy is never impugned by the sinner's revolt in this life, why should it be held accountable if that revolt continues in the life to come? The clemency of God has never been disputed, on account of the eternal reprobation of the fallen angels, though they never had a second trial; why, then, should His mercy be questioned if rebellious man shares a similar fate after repeated ineffectual warnings and a lifelong probation? It is a great error to suppose that, because the mercy of God has no limits, it should be indiscriminately lavished on every one without regard to his merits or dispositions to receive it. The love of God, though infinite in itself, must be finite in its application. The measure of its communication depends on the capacity of the recipient. The sun can light up ten thousand rooms as easily as a single one. But that the flood of light may enter, it is necessary that the shutters be thrown open. If they are but partially opened, the rooms will admit less light. If the shutters are entirely closed, the rooms will be dark. And if the light is thus excluded, it is not the fault of the sun. In like manner, whil God delights to make all men on the face of the earth bask in the sunshine of His mercy, provided their hearts are open to receive His rays, He cannot force His love through a single heart that is sealed against Him. I shall now make an assertion, which may seem paradoxical, but which, nevertheless, is true, that if a man of corrupt life were admitted into heaven, he would not be happy there, and, consequently, that it would be no mercy to invite him to remain. The company surrounding him, the conversation in which they engaged, the praises of God which they sung, the pursuits which occupied them, would be utterly uncongenial and even repulsive to his frame of mind. He would find himself as much in a state of isolation as a profligate woman would be in a circle of pious maidens, or as a licentious youth when compelled by duty or custom to attend divine service in which he had no heart. An essential condition of happiness is to have a heart in the thing enjoyed. Swine feel much happier wallowing in the mire than if allowed to run at large through the chambers of Windsor Castle. Heaven is indeed a place of infinite delights, but only for the spiritually minded. "The sensual man perceiveth not these things that are of the Spirit of God for it is foolishness to him, and he cannot understand, because it is spiritually examined."1 The atmosphere of heaven does not transform a 1I. Cor. II., 14. |