The very nature of probation, which everything shows is the leading idea of the present life, involves the element of limited duration. For what is the object or meaning of probation, (proving), unless there is something to be proved, viz, a destiny of weal or woe hanging on the decision? Probation involves decision as its complementary idea, and is incomplete and absurd without it. Probation then must terminate, and a resulting destiny, of one sort or the other, set in. The hour for repentance, therefore, will some time pass by.

The natural influence of probation on its subjects points in the same direction. The offers of pardon, the sweet invitations of love, the charms of holiness, and the terrors of the law, rejected and defied again and again,—what could be expected as the result, but a hardening of the heart which would soon carry the sinner beyond the reach of hope! How often do we see the illustration and terrible foreshadowing of this awful process, in the career of men, conscientious and sensitive toward religious obligation in early life, but hard as the nether millstone in age. And have we not seen, too, persons leave the world, under circumstances, and with feelings indicating, alas, too clearly, that their day of grace had been sinned away forever?

These considerations, moreover, derive force from the fact, that sin, as against God, is essentially a matter not of phenomena, but of substance, as nearly as moral character can be. Without saying that sin is metaphysically a nature, we may say, that it is as deeply and centrally embedded in the life and core of the soul, as a voluntary attribute can possibly be. Sinfulness of this sort, it is not unreasonable to suppose, may, when confirmed by a life of trial and privilege abused, fix its fatal grasp upon the hapless soul forever. In truth, on every natural principle, all hope of future repentance must be founded on the merest possibility, and can scarcely deserve the name of hope. No power or intelligence less than the Creator, can foresee or secure its realization; none less can legitimately be entitled to indulge it. And should he by any possibility cherish any such plan, it must be according to counsels which he has nowhere

revealed; and in no wise to be required at his hand, or supposed in advance of his assurance.

But are we sure that it requires the fact of the everlasting continu ance of sin, to seal the penalty upon the soul forever? Is there nothing of dark and fearful portent in the original sentence itself, considered as meeting the requirement of justice, and of the highest good of the universe? What finite mind can say exactly how much justice demands, considering the authority, the sanctions, the interest and obligations, against which the sin has been committed? Who can assure us that the conservation of virtue throughout the universe may not require a perpetual example of the consequences, a never silent judgment of the just penalty of sin? Certainly the motives drawn from the spectacle of everlasting woe, bearing upon the minds of rational beings, to dissuade from sin, are unspeakably greater than all that we can otherwise conceive. Who shall assure us that God did not see it necessary, for the safety of the great whole, that these motives should be called into existence from the first advent of sin, and kept in exercise forever? Who knows but without this provision, the universe might suffer, on the whole, manifold more of evil than all that can occur under the commonly supposed system?

We know the feeling will still remain in many minds, that forebodings so dark cannot be well grounded,-that God never would have created a race of beings, which he knew would realize a destiny of such unutterable woe. We are no strangers to feelings like these. Who that thinks can be? But ah! what shall we say of the fearful array of principles above suggested; and which in all free and sober thought, we find it impossible to invalidate or escape? Turn whithersoever we will, they stare us in the face with eyes of stony glare. The great ends of punishment, we are forced to confess, are not merely the reformation of the offender, but higher, far higher than this, the conservation of virtue, and thus of the highest good of the whole universe of God; and yet higher, more sacred, more frowning and awful than this, we behold the dread majesty of Justice, spanning like the arch of heaven the whole compass of thought, and thundering like Sinai on

the guilty sinner's ear. And as for the mode, we can scarcely doubt that it must be chiefly spiritual, and find its principal arena in a future spiritual world. We see clearly too, that it cannot consist in the natural results of sin merely, but must speak the wrath of an offended God, in tones that almost the dead might hear. And when we think of the Degree of punishment which may be expected, we know that it must be such as to accomplish its object, be that more or less. We know it must be such as to meet the call of Justice, as well as to guard effectively the well-being of society. We see that to do this it must bear a measure proportioned to the degree of guilt which it condemns. And this must be determined by such elements as the greatness, and worth, and authority of the God who is sinned against; and the extent, and depth, and continuance of the absolutely unspeakable evils threatened by sin to society. Alas, when we think of these things, we do not feel sure that the just penalty of sin will be as light and limited as might at first be supposed. And when we face the last, most momentous inquiry of all, the Duration of Divinely inflicted woe, our soul sinks at the thoughts which absolutely force an unwilling acknowledgment of their truth! It is but too plain that the fire must burn, while the dark, poisonous elements which feed it still gather in the soul. And, who will tell us when these shall cease? We turn to the free will, and find there a deep which no plummet has yet sounded. How can we build eternal hopes on idle conjectures of its action through eternity? We turn to God;-"who by searching can find out God"! or by feeble, human vision foretell, where he has not told all that he can, or will, or designs to do! Nor, more fearful than all,-can we stop here. We cannot measure the penalty which, even were sin to cease, justice might yet demand! We think of the position and claims of God; we think of the principles, the infinite and eternal principles between which this war of sin and holiness is waging; we think of all those fearful auguries which have already been presented, and we tremble at the prospect, even were we sure of a future repentance. We remember that we are but interested and partial judges in our own case: that it

is of the very nature of sin to be insensible to its own enormity and just desert; and if, notwithstanding, so much of terrible import we can but see to be true, what may not the whole truth be!

And all this time there is falling on our ear, like the heavy roll of distant thunder, those threatening voices which nature utters, groans and premonitions of coming woe,-in certain facts, not opinions, or reasonings, but stubborn, relentless facts, which point like a prophet's finger to the shadow of approaching fate. God has created a race which he knew would become steeped in sin, and shame, and woe. He has done it in this world; where is the assurance that he will not let the drama go on in the world to come? Is he too good and wise?: Why was he not too good and wise to do it here? Do you say that these evils here are of limited duration, and therefore more conceivable! But that begs the very point in debate These evils exist now; who has proved that they will die, and that they were permitted only as being of limited duration? Besides, the God who could permit such evils for a day, much more for thousands of years as in this world, without the best of reasons, would be a malignant being. Is it said that such reasons doubtless existed in relation to the present world; who, then, shall assure us that they may not exist in relation to the world to come! Here is the deep fatal dilemma, in which all reasoning upon this point at last must terminate. If God admitted sin and woe without reason into this world, he is malignant, and will do it again. But if good reason for it existed here, it may exist elsewhere and forever. Like a pining captive, groping around the walls of his cell for some ray of light, some crevice through which a gleam of hope might enter, we roam around the imprisoning terms of this relentless dilemma, and find no escape. Nor, we fear, have the annals of human thought revealed one yet.

But hark! What voice is that? Serene and majestic as the music of the spheres; yet deep and awful as the earthquake's rumbling roar. It is the voice of God, walking as once "in the cool of the day," through the pages of his revealed word. And what are the accents which salute our astounded ears?

"Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." "Take therefore the unprofitable servant, and bind him hand and foot, and cast him into outer darkness; there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." "Strive to enter in at the straight gate, for many I say unto you, will seek to enter in, and shall not be able." "Wherefore God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie, that they all might be damned." "As therefore the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so shall it be in the end of the world." "Where the smoke of their torment ascendeth up forever and ever." Are not these words of solemn, awful import! Tell me not that the Bible is of doubtful authority,—that the question of inspiration is not yet settled. It may not be settled in all its points; but there is one thing that is settled,that the Bible is a book such as the world has not elsewhere seen; that it in some way contains a revelation from God, such as he has not elsewhere given;-a Divine light, shining to guide and instruct mankind. Whatever may be said, or disputed, respecting the mode, degree, or uniformity of the inspiration of the Scriptures, there is really no rational question,— no respectable doubt, that a supernatural element is contained within them; and this, the daily progress of every branch of human knowledge and thought is rendering more and more evident. The consenting testimony of almost every page of such a book, on a theme like this, he would be bold indeed who should venture to disregard; and that, too, on no better grounds than the merest possibilities, which are certainly all that, at the most, can be established against the commonly received opinion; and in the face of the varied and awful premonitions with which reason herself points to the future!

On the whole, in all reason, in all freedom of thought, yes, in the name of all true philosophy, we ask, When has the world seen such madness as in the case of him who perils his eternal all, on grounds so utterly unworthy-yes, worse than unworthy,-presumptuous;-a criminal convicted and confessed, usurping the seat of the judge, and prescribing the law for his own case,-turning his back upon offered reconciliation, and a sure and easy hope-a hope which nothing but a