The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1886-07-10
THE UNIVERSALISM OF SISTER
CHURCHES.

CHURCHES.
The pastor emeritus of st. Johns
Independent Methodist Church, of Bal
timore, Md, is one of the most venera-
BILE and scholarly of the clergy of that
communion. He is now in his eight
ieth year, and whenever it is announced
that he is to preach, the church is al
ways well filed. 1t was my pleasure
to hear him some time since upon a
subject of very great interest, and to
subsequently address him the following
letter:
REV. AND DEAR SIR Il attended
with great pleasure and satisfaction the
services at st. Johns Church, last Sun
day morning, as l always do whenever
I can have the opportunity of listening
to you. am Universalist, but
often attend Episcopalian or Methodist
churches, because I hear the blessed
truths of Universalism preached with
greater power and emphasis from their
pulpits than elsewhere. Your able ex-
position of the first eight verses of the
twenty-first chapter of the Revelation
Of st. John was one of the clearest 7
have ever listened to, and would have
been unexceptionably consistent if you
had not lost sioht of the premises Won
first laid down. that ssthe whole chan
ter has reference TO the present and
not the future 1ife.,, If you will read
the chapter AGAIN. by this light. not
anly ia the eighth. but to the twenty
seventh verse, think you will find it
perfectly consistent with these prenni-
sesof yours, and perhaps a new light viii
shine 0llt from II which you have never
before suspected. You have very evi-
IDENTIFY found the ''new heaven" and
the new earth, and am anxious now
that you should discover that there is
''no more sea-" | have myself been
pursuing an occupation for more than
forty years, and find that every day L
have something to learn, and bless God
for it I; for it lends my pursuit relish,
and in a measure reneWs my youth.
Some very simple facts L have recently
learnt from the observations OF my own
pupils; and L feel, dear sir, that you
will not turn aside from suggestion
made in all sincerity, and with respect
full Difference, by one who is always
happy to learn from you-a child OF
the same God, a son of the same Uni
versal Father.
To a Universalist this term, s'the
second death,'' has equal reference to
the present life, with the first death
announced in the seventeenth verse of
the second chapter of Genesis; and
neither have anything to do with that
physical dissolution so beautifully al
luded to by you as ''falling asleep"
etc., and which was so lovingly illus
trated by a learned bishop of your
church, recently, at Mt. Vernon Church
in this city, to be beneficent condition
of life. Both these first and second
deaths are evidently moral conditions
lakes burning with fire and birthstone
in which the fearful and unbelieving vol
UNFAIRLY engulf themselves, together
with all the workers of iniquity, ''see-
ing that they cruelty to themselves the
Son of God afresh." | beg you to see
to it, my dear sir, that at your advanced
age you are not classed with these fear
full and unbelieving. "Fear hath tor
ment." but there is "joy and peace in
believing, if we believe the promises
of God.
Rv tho tbirteantb versa of tho chan.
Tor inmediate,v nrecedino vopr text II
annears that Ct John saw both death
ond boIl cast into the lake of fire Rpt
T spnnose no biblical scholar believes
that this .slake of fire. into which