Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1881-09-14
Future RetributiOn.

We are often asked, says Professor Phelps,
how can you bear TO believe in an eternal hell2
Why does it not craze you How can you
call such God as can create a hell benev-
olent2 To us he seems satanic in his nature.
Yes, your God is my devil. Whenever l go
from my home to the city of Boston pass
by building which reminds me Of the Cas-
tie of Giant Despair. 1t is constructed of
heavy granite blocks TO the very roof. 1t is
surrounded with lofty granite walls, and
these are surrounded with iron spikes. /
see doors of massive iron riveted with iron
bolts. / see windows barred with iron. Be
hind those iron bars 1 have seen pale, de-
spairing human faces-faces.whic have re-
appeared to me in my dreams. know that
underneath those walls, in dungeon cell,
there lives man, manacled hand and foot,
who has clanked his chains there for seven
teen years. Sometimes more than five hun
dred Of my human brothers are locked
within those walls of living death. have
been told that over against certain window
there, on the opposite side of the street,
there lives pale-faced woman who never
smiles. Every morning she places on her
window sill blooming flower, where GER
tain man behind those bars can see it, and
can know that a loving woman is thinking
VI Hlms Gu L occ III q uuiltb ou buOSc walls,
man in uniform with rifle at his shoul-
der, who, if he sees that brother man trying
| to Chamber over the wall and touch the hand
of that loving woman, is instructed to shoot
him down like dog. Why do | not cry
out against the malign power which keeps
asunder that suffering wife and husband
| Why do not tramp the streets of Boston,
pleading with the crowds to go with me and
level that Bastile to the ground? Why do
| not move heaven and earth against the in
fernal tyranny which has devised, and the
cold-hearted cruelty which tolerates that
granite hell ? What is it that sustains my
humane sensibilities and yours at the sight
of such an anomaly of despair, in a world
where robins are singing in the spring time,
and violets are blooming on the hill-sides,
and little children are laughing in their
| glee? Answer me this, and | will tell you
what is it that sustains benevolent universe
in beholding, and a benignant God in devils
ing an eternal hell for the confinement of
eternal guilt. And you must prove to me
that it is not so, before you can charge God
with satanic wrong in tolerating such a
place as hell within the bounds of his de
minions. The question which all such sus-
picions of Gods rectitude bring back like a
boomerang upon the inquirer is, What els,
shall God do with eternal guilt = Shall he
forgive 1t? Shall he, by one grand act Of
amnesty, proclaim liberty to the damned, tc
the devil, to his angels, aud to men like
them ? But how would that help the mat
ter, sin remaining unrepented of and unfor
saken Free grace proclaimed in hell for
ever would not quench for one moment its
lurid fires, if sin were still pregnant there
Sin is hell. "Myself am hell, says Millions
Satan. Guilt is itself damnation:. Agair
the question returns, therefore "What els,
shall God do with it ?" Shall he give re
pentance, and then forgive? But that il
the very thing he has been offering from tn,
first, and will offer forever and ever. Neve
will man or devil see the moment when h,
cannot repent if he would. But that is tn,
very thing from which the incorrigible sin
ner recoils. He will have none of that. Re
pentance means submission. Better hel
than that. Such is the relentless choice o
the doomed one. Doomed because self
doomed. Doomed by the fearful omnipo
tence of his own free-will. Such is sin
once chosen, and implanted, and indurate,
in the very nature of man, by life of abuse'
probation, in which the grace of God ha
been scorned and the blood of Christ out
ragged. Once more, then, the question come
back unanswered: "What else shall Go,
do with it Z" Through all eternity that i
the question which Infinite Benevolence will
ask of an awe-struck, yet satisfied and ador
ing universe "Whdt else shall God do ,cih il ?