The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-10-24

Editorial Opinions OF the Leading Journals
upon Current Topios-compiIed Every
Day for the Evening Telegraph.
HENRY WARD BEECHER ON HEAVEN
AND HELL.

AND HE'LL.
From the NJ Y. Sun.
II is lucky for Mr. Beecher that he is not
responsible for his behavior to any religious
body besides his own congregation. If he
were, his audacious assaults on time-honored
dogmas would have again and again brought
him to ecclesiastical trial, and doubtless to
condemnation. His recent sermons on hea-
ven and hell, for example, must arouse the
ire of many an orthodox believer, and make
him long for some means OF sealing mp Such
a fountain of heresy. Mr.. Beecher actually
dares to doubt that hell is place full of fire
and birthstone, and that heavenly joys con-
sist in one uniform and monotonous occu-
patton. He ventures to apply common sense
10 the consideration of the subject, and to
uive forth without fear the conclusions to
which it leads him.
It is quite evident that if the teachers of
religion would preserve q general belief in
heaven and hell, they must cease to repre-
sent them as having a local existence in the
material universe. For centuries pastastrono-
mers have been sweeping the sky in every
direction with their telescopes, but no one of
them has discovered any asteroid or planet
which at all fulhls the requirements of the
home of either the blessed or the miserable
after death. No miner or explorer of the
bowels of the earth has yet found the way to
caverns which would answer to the prison
house of the damned And then, besides,
the objection which Mr.. Beecher presented
with such force in his sermon on heaven
comes up continually: can a disem-
bodied spirit live and move and enj joy and
suffer in a material dwelling place? The
apostle tells us that flesh and blood cannot
inherit the kingdom of heaven. If SO, that
kingdom cannot be of a nature which flesh
and blood could inherit. The kingdom of
hell, it would seem, ought to be equally in
accessible to men still clothed with mortal
clay: and all attempts to fix it here or there,
in this planet or in that, are futile, and will
be regarded so by all who have not surren-
dered their reason to mere dognatism.
On the other hand, there is growing con-
viction, on which no doubt Mr.. Beecher counts
for support, that both heaven and hell are
within and above this material universe, and,
though invisible to the eyesght, which takes
cognizance of material objects, are appreci-
able by the senses, so to speak, of the soul,
when it is relieved of the flesh covering which
now envelops it. There are those, indeed,
who believe that, even before death, the veil
may be temporarily lifted, and the spirits of
the departed and the realm in which they
dwell made evident to specially favored
individuals; but most people are content to
wait till death finally releases them from
their imprisonment, and enables them to
enjoy their new state of being. To all such
heaven and hell are none the less real because
not material nor are the hope of happiness
and the fear of punishment any the less
powerful motives of action than they are to
holders of the old-fashioned notions. Indeed,
this bringing Of the future state closer to
their apprehensions, and impressing upon
them its intimate relations to ther own moral
quality, makes it easier to have O living faith
in it, and consequently gives it an importance
in their minds which it would not otherwise
possess.
MIR. Beecher's idea that there is variety,
and not uniformity, in the joys of Heaven,
also commends itself to intelligent minds.
1t is readily seen that human beings do not
cease to be human by the death of the body.
AS DR.. Franklin remarked more than CEN
tury ago, man is not a body animated by a
soul; he is soul clothed with body. When
the clothing is laid aside, the man himself
remains unchanged. What he loved he con-
tinues to love; what he hated he continues to
hate; and he retains all the peculiarities which
distinguished him from other men. II
Heaven is to be place of happiness at all,
its happiness must be adapted to human ma.
ture; and not only that, but to the peculiar
human nature of each individual. 1t is con-
trary to reason, as we'll as an imputation or
the resources of Almighty Wisdom, to sup
pose that the inhabitants of the heavenly
abodes are to be all moulded in one pattern
and permitted to engage in only one class O.
labors and pleasures.
Mr.. Beecher, therefore, in striking out OF
this apparently bold and hazardous line Of
thought, is running much less risk than Nigh
be supposed. He is not so much leading
public opinion as indicating the current il
which he has had the sagacity to perceive
is already running. AS has happened man,
times before in the history of intellectua
progress, he comes in at late day to prof
by the labors Of men who have preceded him
and who have suffered martyrdom for prema
turely promulgating the views he now advo
Gates with toleration if not applause.
SENATOR MORTON IN ENGLAND.
From the NJ J.. World.
The cable favors us with the following piec
of impertinence, put forth bya London news
rnanar Ktha Pnn MIL Gnzeffol ON tho rn,,,o