The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1878-01-17

strably grcaaadlees; aud, In the third
place, that for every one 60 qvoted two
can be adduced on the other sids. There
vaa an old, sensible, admitted rule OF
theology that phrases which belong 70
mataphor, TO imagery, ): 70 poetry, to emo
ton are not to be formulated into neces-
sary dcgmas or crysfalized into rigid
creeds. Ifthis rule be uzed to test them.
fnine-tenths of the phrases on which these
views are built fall utterly TO the ground.
But even were it othetwise, once more,
in the name Of Christian light and Chris.
tan liberty; once more, ia the name oi
Chfisfs promised Spirit, he protested
against the ignorant tyranny of iscle.ed
texti, which had ever been the curse OF
Christian truth, the glory of marrow in.
taiiccts, aud the catise of the worst errora
OF the worst days OF tho naoet corru,Aed
church. Ignorance had engraved texts
upon her sword, oppression had carved
them upon her pillars, cruelty had tied
texts upon her faggots, and ignorance,
again, had set kp ,wledge at defianee with
texts woven on he. flag. .t5sa
IF this awful doctrine had to be de-
cided by texts, then the original ian-
,guage must be appealed 10, and inter-
preted In its proper and historical signifi-
canoe. They would have to be intsyure,
ted not in that sense which makes them
convey thousand different notions
which did not originally belong to them.
Now, ask you," continued the preacher,
popular teachings about hell five calm
ly and deliberately erased from our Eng
lish Bibles the three words, 'Damnation,'
h..il,,.; hell" and Everlasting ?: Yet say pn.
right TO speak With the authority Of
knowledge-I say. with the calmeat and
most unh!nching sense of responsibility
Il say standing here in the aight of God
and, OF my Saviour, and, it may be, of the
angels and the spirits of the dead-that
not one of those words ought to stand
any longer in our English Bibles; and
that being, in our present acceptation of
them, simply mistranslations, they most
;unQuestionably will not stand in the re-
vised version Of the Bible if the revisers
have understood their duty"
After explaining the original meaning
of the Words he closed By saying thas
iiiidiiHg, neither IN Scripture sor say=
where, anything to prove that the fate Of
every man is az death irrevocably deter
mined, he shook OFF the hideous Incubus
Of atrocjous conceptions attached by fslse
theology to the doctrine Of final retribu-
ton. But neither could he speak dog
matically on the other aide. lie could
not preach the certainty of what was
called Universalism-tha all will finally
be saved-though that doctrine did, in
deed, derive much support from many
passages of Scripture, and had been held
by some of the early Fathers. Neither
could he accept the spreading belief in
conditional Immortality. His belief was
fixed upon the living God, and his an-
swer to the question, What Is the fate of
dead sinuerS3 was, with Thomas Ers-
k:ae, that Fs are lost here 81 siuch as
there, aud that Christ came to seek and
to save the lost. His hope was that the
vast majority of the lost would at length
be found. -hlns .Sp,-s et
If any hardened sinner, ,shamefully
loving his sin and despising the long suf.
fering of his Saviour, trihed with that
2octrina, it was at his own deep and
awful peril; but to those longing and
anxious. souls who were striving to CREEP
nearer to the light, he would say: Have
faith in God. There is hope for you
hope for you, even if death overtake you
before the final victory is won. "Say vi
to the righteous that it shall be we'll with
him, for they shall eat the fruit of theil
doings. Woe unto she wicked it shall
be ill with him, for the reward Of his
hand shall be given him." Butsay, also
as Christ's own apostles said, that there
shall be o restitution of all things-tha
God Wiiieth not that any should perish
that Christ both died, and rose, and re
yived. that He might be the Lcrd both
of the dead and CT the living-that as il
Adam all die, even 60 in Christ shall al
be made alive; and that the day shall
come when ell things shall ba subduet
unto Him, that God may be all in all.