The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1878-02-23
Doctrine of Endless Punishment
HENRY WARD BEEcHER on H DOCTRINE.
tFrom a recent Sermon in Plymouth Church


[From a recent Sermon in Plymouth Church
The human race has existed on the earth for
thousands and thousands of years, and has gone
on propagating and multiplying until all the
waves Of the ocean which had rolled III upon the
shores during these centuries do not contain drops
enough, nor the sande of the sea PARTICLES enough,
not all the figures Of the arithmetic numbers
enough, to compute the preface, to say nothing
of the body, of the great history of the human
race. The numbers of the human race are ac-
tually beyond computation, and for thousands
and thousands and thousands of years they have
been born in the world, lived and struggled and
finally died and gOne-where? If you tell me
that they have ali gone to heaven, my answer
would be that such a sweeping OF mud into
heaven would defle its purity, and L cannot ac-
cept that. If you tell me that they have all gone
to hell, then l swear by the Lord Jesus Christ,
whom | have sworn TO worship for ever, that you
will make an infdel Of me. The doctrine that
God has been for thousands Of years peopling
this earth with human beings, during a period
three-iourthe of which was not Illuminated by an
altar or a church, and in places where a vast po-
pulation of those people are yet without that
light, is to transform the Almighty into a mon
ster more hIdeOus than Satan himself, ana L
swear by all that is sacred that l will never wor-
ship Satan though he should appear dressed IN
royal robes and seated ON the throne OF Jehovah.
Men may say, - You will not go to heaven" A
heaven presided over by such a demon as that,
who has been ~reopling this world with millions
Of human beings, aud then sweeping them OH into
hell, not like dead flies but without taking the
trouble even to kill them, and gloating and laugh
ing over their eternal misery, is not such a heaven
as | want to go to. The doctrine is too horrible.
L cannot believe it, and l won't. They say
the Saints in heaven are so happy that they
do not mind the torments of the damned IN hell;
but what sort of saints must they be who could
be happy while looking down upon the horrors
of the bottOmless pit? They don't mind-they're
safe-they're happy! What would the mother
think of the sixteen-year old daughter who, when
her infant was lying dead in the house, should
come dancing and singing into the parlor, and
exclaim, "Oh I'm SO happy, mother | don't
care for the dead baby in the coffin - Would
she not be shocked And so with this doctrine !;
and by the blood of Christ | denOnnce it; by the
wounds in His hands and His side, l abhor it;
by His groans and agony, | abhOr and denounce
1t as the most hIdeous nightmare of theology.
CANON FARRAR ON THE DOCTRINE.
From a recent Sermon in Westminster Abbeyl
What of the reprobates? l know that for
these reprobates Christ died. The bigot may
Judge of their souls if he will. The Pharisee
may consigu them, with othordox equanimity, to
endless torrents; but | cannot-will not. Not
mine, at any rate, shall be to close against them
with impetuous recoil and jarring sound, those
gates Of hell, lest they should be more Justly
closed upon me; but L commend them with hum
blest hope, even after this life of hOpelessness, to
Him who did not loathe the whiteness Of the
lcper, and suffered the woman who was a sinner
to wash his feet with tears. Gods Spirit has
nowhere taught US that He who gave cannot give
back; that he who once made them innocent
children cannot restore their innocence again:
that He who created hem-He who wills them
TO be saved-cannot recreate them in his own
image, cannot obliterate all their viIeness in the
blood of Christ, and uncreate their sins. But
the vast mass of mankind belong to the third
class. They are not utter reprobates, they are
not perfect Saints. They try to face both ways.
They halt between two opinions. The angel has
them by the hand, and the serpent by the heart.
And it is those who try to be Gods children who
realize then own excessive sinfulness. Having
shown how many of the %saintliest and tenderest
souls have been driven even to madness as Cow,
per was, by the false view Of God which is given
by the pitlless anathemas of man, Canon Farral
asked his hearers if, when they buried friends OIL
relatives who had not been holy or religious
they dared consign them, even in their thoughts
to the u~nending anguish Of the popular Greco
they taught? An arbitrary inaiction of burning
torment, an endless agony, Il material hell Of
worm and flame, a doom to everlasting sin, anC
all this with no prospect of amendment, with nc
hope of relief, the souls transgression of a few
brief hours of struggling, tempted life, followed
by billions Of millenniums in scorching fire, anC
all this meant not to correct, but to harden, moi
to amend, but to torture and degrade,-did you
believe IN that for any one you have ever loved
Again, L say, God forbid Again, [ say, l fling
from me with adherence such a creed as that
Let every Pharisee gnash his teeth if he will; lG
every dOguatist anathematize; but that | can no
and do not believe; Scripture will not let me; my
conscience, my reason, my faith in Christ, the
voice of the spirit within my soul, will not let
me; God will not let me.