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extent: to the extent, that is, of rendering them no longer the objects of moral discipline, which must be the case if their punishment be not corrective or to the extent of excluding them from the care of benevolence, since they must retain their sentient nature. To suppose, therefore, that a period can ever come when the punishment of the erring creatures of humanity will not be corrective, and when the benevolent Father of those creatures will cease to regard them with a father's tenderness, is both without reason and contrary to reason.

Matt. xxv. 46: "These shall go away into lasting chastisement, but the righteous into life eternal."

The word translated punishment in the Received Version, is xoλaσis, a term which is universally allowed to signify chastisement or corrective punishment. It is used in this sense by the Heathen philosophers: "Dicemus ergo in pœnis respiciant utilitatem ejus qui peccarit, aut ejus cujus intererat non peccatum esse, aut indistincte quorumlibet. Ad horum trium finum primum pertinet pœna quæ philosophis modo, νοθεσια, modo κολασις, modo παραινεσις, dicitur. Paulo jurisconsulto, pœna quæ constituitur in emendationem, owQgoviσews evexa Platone, Plutarcho largela uxns animi medicatrix, quæ hoc agit ut eum qui peccavit reddat meliorem me

dendi modo qui est per contraria."* Grotius de Jure Belli et Pacis, lib. ii. cap. 20, sect. 6.

Simpson observes on this word, "Our Lord, in the awful and impressive description of the proceedings of the last judgment of mankind, has selected the term xoλaois, in no other place in the New Testament applied to the future state, in order to explain with the greater precision the final recompence of the sinner. There seems in Matt. xxv. 46, to be an evident allusion to the Septuagint translation of Daniel xii. 2, which was commonly used in Judea, when our Lord appeared. The expression on a, is literally adopted in order to express the recompence of the righteous. But instead of any αισχύνην αιωνιον, the expression κολασιν αιώνιον, appears to have been purposely substituted, as comprehending that variety of painful chastisement, both in kind and degree and duration, which the highest ideas of the perfections of the

* We observe, then, that punishment regards the benefit either of the offender or of the offended; or, indeed, of any other persons. The punishment which respects the first of these three purposes, is called by philosophers sometimes veσia, sometimes κολασις, and sometimes παραινεσις. According to Paulus, a lawyer, the punishment designed for amendment is by Plato said to be σwppoviσews eveкa, for the sake of making wiser. And it is called by Plutarch aтpia xns, the healer of the mind; because, agreeable to the art of healing, it renders him who has sinned better by means of contraries.

Supreme Parent and Ruler naturally lead us to suppose he will inflict upon his children and subjects, according to the nature and magnitude of their offences. Even in human governments, a wise and good magistrate would employ temporary corrective chastisements for the reformation of criminals, that they might be restored to usefulness and happiness in society, in preference to capital punishments, if he could devise proper ones, and secure success in the use of them. Now, with respect to the Supreme Lord and Parent of all, there is unerring wisdom to contrive infallible means, boundless goodness to incline him to employ them, and almighty power to accomplish every end that infinite perfection proposes."*

7. The final Purity and Happiness of all mankind is favored by those passages which represent the benefits resulting from the obedience and death of Christ, as co-extensive with and even exceeding the evils produced by the disobedience and fall of Adam.

1 Cor. xv. 22: "As through Adam all die, so likewise through Christ shall all be made alive." In this passage, the evil produced by sin is compared with the benefit received by Christ, and it supposes, that the life imparted by him is a blessing but if the wicked are to be raised

* See Essay, p. 68.

from the slumber of the tomb, only to be visited with severe and protracted punishment, and then destroyed, or to be kept in endless misery, the restoration of their existence, instead of a benefit, is an unspeakable disadvantage.

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Rom. v. 15: "That as the offence, so is the free gift for if through the offence of one, i πολλοι, woλ201, the many (that is, the great body of mankind,-Newcome) have died, much more the favor of God, and the gift which is through the favor of one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded, εις τις πολλές,

is te woes, unto the many. If by the offence of the one, death reigned by this one, much more those who receive the abounding of favor, and of the gift of justification, shall reign in life by the one man Jesus Christ. So then, as by the offence of one, judgment came upon all men to condemnation, so likewise by the righteousness of one, the free gift hath come upon all men to justification of life. For as by the disobedience of one man the many were made sinners, (or treated as such, by undergoing death,) so likewise by the obedience of one, the many will be made righteous: that where sin abounded, the favor of God has much more abounded: that as sin has reigned unto death, so favor likewise might reign by justification to everlasting life, by Jesus Christ our Lord."

Nothing can be more evident than that it is the apostle's intention, in this passage, to repre

şent all mankind, without exception, as deriving greater benefit from the death of Christ, than they suffer injury from the fall of Adam. The universality of the apostle's expressions is very remarkable. The same many who were made sinners by the disobedience of the one, are made righteous by the obedience of the other. If all men are condemned by the offence of the one, the same all are justified by the righteousness of the other.

These universal terms, so frequently repeated and so variously diversified, cannot possibly be reconciled to the limitation of the blessings of the gospel to the elect alone, or to a part only of the human race.* Unless the wicked are reformed by their punishment, can there be any truth in the declaration, that the favor of God by Christ abounds much more than sin and death? If the great majority of mankind are to continue in sin and misery through all eternity, or at some remote period to be blotted out of existence, it is they that triumph: they are infinitely more extensive than the abounding of favor. According to both of these doctrines, therefore, the reasoning of the apostle in this passage is totally inconclusive.

The passages which have been quoted, appear decidedly to favor the doctrine of the Ultimate

* See Improved Version, note in loc.

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