luvians to be all so easily and soon converted, for our Lord's mission there could not be above two, or at most three days. But unfortunately, we are not told that a single damned spirit was released from this prison in consequence of his preaching, if even this view of the passage was proved to be the truth. If Mr. Hudson indeed believes, that Peter referred to a prison, or place of punishment for disembodied spirits, Christ was the only missionary that ever visited the regions of the damned; nor does the Scripture warrant us to say, the sound of salvation will ever be heard again within the walls of their prison. All the world, the uttermost parts of the earth, are the limits of apostolic preaching, Mark 16. Matt. 28. Acts 1. I doubt if Mr. Hudson has faith enough in his own doctrine, that he would willingly go there as a missionary.

66

But it will no doubt be asked, how dia-Christ go and preach by the spirit of God by which he was raised from the dead, to persons in prison, or in a state of ignorance and wickedness? I answer, by Noah, for Peter assures us, that Noah was a preacher of righteousness." 2 Peter 2: 6. The passage does not say Christ went and preached in person to them. No, but "by which spirit he went," the spirit of God by which he was quickened or brought again from the dead. It is well known, that Christ is said to have come and preached to the Ephesians, chap. 2: 17, when we are sure he did this, not personally, but by others. But Peter again informs us, chap. 1: 10, 11, that it was "the spirit of Christ, or spirit of God, which was in all the ancient prophets." And in his Second Epistle, chap. 1: 21, declares, that "the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man, but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." If Noah preached at all, it was then by the spirit of God, un

less it is affirmed, that he spoke a vision out of his own heart. But these things will be confirmed by considering the remaining part of the passage.

In

"Which sometime were disobedient when once the long suffering of God waited in the days of Noah while the ark was a preparing; wherein few, that is eight souls, were saved by water." Well, let us ask, Ist. When were the persons disobedient to whom Christ preached? It is answered in these words: "When once the long suffering of God waited in the days of Noah while the ark was a preparing." one word they were the Antediluvians. Well, let us ask, 2d. When did Christ go and preach to them by the spirit of God by which he was quickened? Was it while they were disobedient in the days of Noah? No, says Mr. Hudson, it was some thousand years after their life of disobedience in this world. had ended. But I am disposed to make the appeal to Mr. Hudson's own good sense. Is it not more ra

tional and Scriptural to conclude, that Christ preached to them during the days of their disobedience, than to assume it, that he went and preached to them in the prison of hell so many ages after their life of disobedience was ended? What time so suitable as this to preach to them, if the preaching was designed to bring them to repentance? The passage certainly does not intimate, that the time of his preaching was an age, or even an hour after their disobedience in the days of Noah. The whole scope of the passage, rather intimates, that the time of the preaching of Christ by the spirit, and their disobedience was one and the same time. What leads him to his view of the passage is this: he assumes it, that the spirit by which Christ preached was his disembodied spirit, and this must have been several thousand years after the Antediluvians were swept from the earth, as Christ could have no disembodied spirit,

but while he was in the state of the dead. Again, he assumes the spirits he preached to must have been disembodied spirits, and then he takes it for granted, that the prison where he preached was hell in a future state. Thus one error leads to another. We hope Mr. Hudson will come to see, that his views founded on this text are a tissue of mistakes.

In concluding my remarks on this passage, the following facts and observations, strongly confirm the views which I have given of it. 1st. If Jesus Christ went to hell, or preached to spirits in prison as Mr. Hudson asserts, Luke can hardly be called a faithful historian. He calls his gospel a treatise "of all that Jesus began both to do and teach, until the day in which he was taken up." Acts 1: 12. But surely Christ's going to the prison of hell, was a very important part of what he did, and his preaching there, was a no less important part of what he taught.Now, if all this was true, how happened it, that Luke takes no notice of it. It must have been well known in those days, if Peter teaches it in this passage. If Luke is a faithful recorder, of all that Jesus did and taught until the day he was taken up, he omits all mention of his mission to the damned, yet it is alleged it was accomplished before he ascended. Luke says, he received his information, from persons who were "eye witnesses and ministers of the word.". But I ask, who saw our Lord go to the prison of hell, or heard his discourses, or could inform Luke concerning this? And I ask, how came Peter by his information, if such be the doctrine he teaches in this passage? Was it from our Lord after he returned from this mission? We are told, Acts 1: 3, "That he showed himself alive after his passion by many infallible proofs, being seen of them forty days, and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God." But did he say a word to them about his

having gone to hell and preached to the damned? Or will any man affirm, that this was one of the things which pertained to the kingdom of God? If it was, we think the other Scripture writers would not have been silent on the subject.

2d, When Christ gave up the ghost on the cross, he said "Father into thy hands I commend my spirit." And why? Because God was to bring him again from the dead the third day; for he was not to leave his soul in Hades or hell, nor suffer his holy one to see corruption. Allowing for a moment that Christ's spirit existed in a disembodied state, will any man affirm, that when Christ commended his spirit or himself into the hands of his father, that God dispatched him on a mission to spirits in hell? If this were true, instead of his saying "Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell," we might expect him to pray "Lord leave my soul in hell until I accomplish the release of all the damned." This would only be in unison, with the compassionate spirit of the Saviour.

3d. That Noah preached to the Antediluvians, by the spirit of God, is allowed on all hands, so that my views are agreeable to this fact. But observe, there is another fact with which my view of this passage agrees. The history of Noah does not say a word about the success of his preaching, or, that one sinner was brought to repentance by it. This precisely agrees with this passage, for it says nothing about the success of the preaching. But had our Lord gone and preached to damned spirits, yea, as some affirm, converted and delivered all who perished in the flood, is it probable Peter would have been silent about such a remarkable event? Of what use was it to inform us that Christ preached there, yet leave us ignorant of its success? Our Lord converted very few personally on earth. Peter does not

say he converted any by his preaching in prison. No other place says missionaries are to be sent to hell. Cold encouragement for Mr. Hudson's universal emancipation of all the damned.

This is the only text in the whole Bible, from which it is alleged, that Christ preached in the prison of hell, or that the damned will ever be preached to again. Now, I leave it for Mr. Hudson and every judicious man to say-is it not much more likely he misunderstands this text, than that no other sacred writer teaches this doctrine? If he says it is not, then he has less candor than I expected, and it is a hopeless task for me to convince him of his mistake. A misunderstanding of this solitary text is easily accounted for, and that I have given a rational and scriptural interpretation of it, I hardly think Mr. Hudson will dispute.

The terms preuatikos and pneuatikoos occur and are rendered spiritual and spiritually. Hence we have the following peculiar forms of expressionspiritual things, 1 Cor. 2: 13. 9: 11. Rom. 15: 27. Spiritual gifts, 1 Cor. 14: 1. Rom. 1: 11. 1 Cor. 12: 1. Spiritual songs, Eph. 5: 19. Col. 3: 16. with others similar in the following passages; 1 Cor. 2: 5. Eph. 1: 3. 1 Cor. 10: 3, 4. Col. 1: 9. Gal. 6: 1. 1 Cor. 3: 1. 2: 15. 14: 37. 15: 44, 46. Eph. 6: 12. 2 Cor. 2: 14. Rom. 7: 14. Rev. 11: 8.

There are a few more texts where the term spirit occurs, but as they are supposed to teach the doctrine of ghosts, or disembodied spirits, appearing to the living, we reserve them to be considered in the next Section. Perhaps it will be said, allowing all the texts in the Bible given up, where soul and spirit are mentioned, yet there are others which prove the immortality of the soul and its suffering and enjoying in a disembodied state. We should think this could not be true, for in what texts could we