the nature of the case would admit, is endless loss—or in other words endless misery! This is the result at which he arrives in support of the affirmative, by his second argument. I acknowledge God brings the strongest inducements to cause men to refrain from sin. Moreover, I am willing to allow that had he established it as an inflexible rule of his government, that every individual among men who violates in a single instance, his moral law, should with unfailing certainty, be punished with endless woe, from which there could be no possible escape-this would be the strongest restraint against sin, that could be addressed to man's fears!! But the doctrine of endless punishment is not preached in this manner. There is no such certainty of infliction connected with it. In all theories where that doctrine is found, it is a fundamental principle that however enormous or numerous men's sins may be, the endless penalty can be avoided by a timely repentance. This provision for escape this loop-hole through which the frightened sinner can readily slip away from all punishment-neutralizes most effectually, all the restraint which a threatening of endless woe might otherwise exert. This is so selfevident that none but the willfully blind can fail to see it. The working of such a principle can be tested by supposing it incorporated in human governments. Were our legislators to pass a law that the punishment for the crime of murder, should be death, and that, if at any time previous to the hour of execution, the criminal should repent of his wicked act, a full pardon should be extended to him, and he should be restored to the enjoyment of all his former privileges-what effect would such a law have? How much restraint would it exercise on those disposed to imbrue their hands in blood? So far from deterring them at all, it would open a highway for them to sin with impunity. And yet this, Elder Holmes alleges, is the highest restraint that God could bring against sin!

It is not the amount, nor the duration of punishment, that gives it a restraining influence, but its CERTAINTY!! A lighter penalty, to be inflicted with absolute certainty, will be much more effectual to deter from wickedness, than one far more severe, connected with a probability of escape. A law threatening the man guilty of highway robbery with death, but containing a proviso that in case he repents, he shall have the punishment entirely remitted, could not have a thousandth part, the restraining influence of a law which should sentence to ten years imprisonment, with no possibility of pardon! All can perceive the reasonableness of this position. The same principle applies to the divine government. The doctrine of endless punishment, preached as it is, and as it must be, with an easy way of escape, does nor exert the strongest influence to deter men from sin! Indeed we can see this practically illustrated, in the fact that ninety-nine hundredths of the most depraved wretches on earth, are believers in that doctrine. Hence all that my opponent builds on this assumption, falls to the ground?

The penalty by which God would deter men from sin, is not endless woe, with a proviso for an escape. The scriptures never threaten endless punishment, and never flatter the sinner that he can elude the just demerit of his sins. But they declare the guilty shall receive an adequate punishment, in accordance with the enormity of their crimes, from which there is no possible release. And yet there are higher influences to deter men from sin, than any to be drawn from punishment, or from an appeal to their fears, in any shape. Let them be properly instructed in regard to the nature of sin-let them be taught that it is in itself, a bitter, a poison, an evil of the darkest die-that it is alone the source of wretchedness and ruin, and is the only real enemy of man in existence-and it will exert an influence to turn them from wickedness, stronger than all appeals to fear of punishment.

The Elder insists I ought to prove that eternal loss, or endless punishment, is not deserved by the sinner! This is most remarkable! Is my friend really so bewildered as this declaration would indicate? Or does he imagine the audience is so dull of comprehension that they cannot detect at a glance, this shallow attempt to shift "the laboring oar" to my hands. I beg to remind him that he is in the affirmative of this question; and that instead of calling upon me to prove a negative, it is precisely his work to prove that any man does deserve to suffer endless loss! Instead of striving to shrink away from the affirmative, and managing to get into a negative posture, it would be more manly to come up to his work boldly, or acknowledge frankly his inability to maintain the position he has assumed!!

Friend Holmes contends that as punishment has been necessary thus far in the world, it will be necessary hereafter and forever! The sophistry of this argument, is too transparent to mislead any but the most shallow minded. Has it been necessary in human affairs, to punish any one man from the beginning of the world to the present time? If this had been rightfully done, it might afford some proof that a long punishment might be necessary hereafter. But even this would fall infinitely short of proving the necessity of inflicting endless punishment! If my opponent could prove that men will sin forever, then he would show good reason for believing that it will be necessary for punishment to endure forever! But this proof he cannot furnish. Neither the Bible, nor reason, sanction the thought that men will continue forever in wickedness when they have the power to turn from it, as the Bible teaches they always have. How can they sin forever, when St. Paul expressly asserts that a time shall arrive, when God's spirit shall be in all men-yea, shall be "ALL in ALL!!!"-(1 Cor. xv. 28.)

The third argument which Mr. Holmes introduces in the affirmative, is drawn form the Analogy of Nature. When we consider the nature of the doctrine my opponent is attempting to sustain the awful state in which it asserts a vast proportion of mankind

will fall, as the result of the creation their heavenly Parent voluntarily bestowed upon them-the dark imputation which it casts on the character and name of the purest and best of beings-the deep and utter blasphemy it utters, in case it is not true-together with its marked violations of the first principles of reason-when these things, I repeat, are taken into consideration, it is astonishing to notice the character of the arguments introduced in its support. To say they are far-fetched and strained to an unprecedented extent, is but to declare that which is visible to all eyes! When men take a far-off, round-about way, to get to a certain point, it shows they see no direct path which leads to it. When a controversialist brings forth arguments which at least, can bear on the question discussed, only by weak and uncertain implication, it proves a marked absence of sound and direct evidence. I beg the audience to scrutinize this argument from the Analogy of Nature. Allowing my opponent all he can legitimately claim for it, his most interested friends must acknowledge that it yields but a very feeble and uncertain support to the affirmative of the question before us. The argument, if I have been able to obtain its drift, is this-That God's laws are similar in all worlds-and that he deals with men in another state of existence, on the same principles as in this life. From these premises, he seeks to arrive at the conclusion, on the principles of analogy, that Jehovah will torment some of his offspring forever!! Such an argument must necessarily abound with great fallacies; and we find them in abundance. The conclusion is not warranted by the premises. Has he shown, or made the slightest attempt to show, that God deals with his creatures in this world, on any principle which makes it necessary for him to plunge them into endless agony while they are still on earth? If he could prove any thing like this, in the present world, then there would be legitimate ground for an analogical argument in support of endless suffering hereafter. But inasmuch as this is wholly wanting-inasmuch as he does not pretend that God places any creature while in this existence, into a condition of torture which shall know no end, the argument that he will do so hereafter, is a sheer assumption, without the slightest possible evidence.

My friend asserts that in the future world, mankind will be subject to the same law, as in this life. This I acknowledge, adding, however, that his law in the next existence, in comparison with this, will be so modified as to be adapted to the different conditions and circumstances in which the children of earth will exist hereafter. He adds, moreover, that when we see the law of God producing certain results in this life, we must believe similar results will flow from that law in the future world. Here, too, I perfectly agree with the affirmative. But when he goes on to draw from these premises, the conclusion that unless God counteracts his laws as now established, in their operations in another

existence, then punishment hereafter must be endless, I decidedly demur, and deny its correctness! He has failed to show that God's law, as now established, inflicts upon men in this life, a punishment which is endless; and wanting this vital prop, his argument is groundless!

How does he attempt to prove by analogy, from things in this life, that punishment hereafter will be endless? It is by comparing the Divine law with human laws. Men's punishments, he says, are sometimes without remedy. From this he attempts to draw the conclusion, that if God allows men now, to be punished without remedy, he will allow them to be punished without remedy, or endlessly, hereafter! Here is a rare specimen of logic and consistency! In the first place, this kind of reasoning violates all true principles of analogy. A legitimate analogical argument, would be to reason from the operation of God's law here, as to what its operations will be hereafter. But my

friend, with a sophistry of the most naked description, shifts the analogy, and makes it consist in a comparison between the operation of man's laws here, and God's law hereafter!! If he has done this ignorantly, it shows a marked lack of the first elements of a sound logician. But if it was designed, what can it be but a cool and willful attempt to deceive the audience?

The real gist of this argument from analogy, is an attempt to determine the operations of God's government and laws, by the operations of earthly governments. In this, Elder Holmes has violated principles to which he has heretofore committed himself. In his article on Atonement in the Methodist Quarterly Review, he says "It is not safe to infer from the regulations men have established among themselves in this world, what would, or would not, be proper in a divine plan for the redemption of sinners. We may reason from the analogy of the divine government in this world, and here the argument [on the atonement] is in our favor; but we must not regulate the divine proceedings by the analogy of human governments!!"-(Quarterly for July, 1847, p. 432.) In this extract, my friend takes the precise ground I have just laid down, and condemns the principle of judging the government of God by human governments, which he is trying now to enforce on the audience. There can be no analogy between the operation of earthly laws, and the laws of God. The former are imperfect in their nature, their operations, and their design-the latter infinitely perfect in all these respects. Upon what reasonable principle can we presume to judge of the perfect, by the operations of the imperfect? True, some of the laws of men are without remedy-i. e.-beyond human remedy! And why? Because mankind in their ignorance, are unable, or have thought themselves to be unable, to frame better laws. This very fact that they are without remedy, is exactly the imperfect feature of these human laws. Shall we adopt that which is the most imperfect

part of man's laws, as the standard by which to judge of the perfect laws of a perfect God? How preposterous! I know the law of Capital Punishment in human codes, admits of no remedy. But I deny that God sanctions that law under the Christian dispensation, or that he has adopted any principle analagous to it in the Divine Government. I am aware that the Elder adroitly attempts to assume the sanction of Capital Punishment by the Creator, when he declares, that if God allows men now to be punished without remedy, he will allow them to be punished without remedy hereafter! But I trust our hearers are not quite so dull of apprehension, as to be deceived by this sophistry. The idea that whatever law God allows to exist in this world, he will, or may, allow to exist in the next, would lead to strange conclusions. He has allowed Catholics to enact and execute laws to torture Protestants on the rack, and burn them at the stake. He has also permitted Protestants to persecute, and put to death Catholics, and other classes of professing Christians. Now according to my opponent's analogical argument, as our Maker allows these different sects to execute such sanguinary laws upon each other in this life, he will allow them to do the same in the next world and forever!! Who can be misled by such fallacious reasoning?

The Creator in some instances, inflicts temporal death, or the death of the body, on his creatures, as a just punishment for their sins. He, and he alone, who gave life, has any right to require it, even as a punishment. When man so far presumes on the prerogative of the Most High, as to put his fellow being to death, he does indeed, inflict punishment that to him is without remedy! This constitutes the vital defect of the law of Capital Punishment. It has no remedy even when it sheds the blood of innocence, and when of all things, it most needs a remedial power. The very act of its infliction, places the victim of that sanguinary law, beyond the reach of its ability to bring greater evil, or to correct past mistakes. But the punishment of bodily death, or any other punishment in the hands of God, is not a penalty without remedy. It does not remove the criminal beyond the reach of the being who inflicts the punishment. So far from this, death brings him into his more immediate presence, to be subjected to such other influences as his amendment, purification and happiness, requires at the hand of the Righteous Ruler and Father of all!

In prosecuting his argument from Analogy, my brother Holmes instructs us that the happiness of man is contingent. This is true to a degree. The happiness of a human being, at any given period of his existence, depends to a certain extent, upon his own doings previous to that period. But at the same time, and at all times, the chief elements of his happiness are drawn directly from those blessings which he cannot earn, and which God faithfully bestows alike on all men, in every stage and state of their existI deny, however, that the happiness of man through eter

ence.