the sinner deserved; and, 2dly, the union between him and them, or the propriety of his being accepted in suffering, as the representative of the sinner Christ's bearing our punishment for us, is not properly meriting that we should not bear it, any more than, if it had been possible for us ourselves to have borne it all, that would have been meriting that we should not be punished any more. Christ's sufferings do not satisfy by any excellency in them, but by a fulfilment. To satisfy by a fulfilment, and to satisfy by worthiness or excellency, are different things. If the law be fulfilled, there is no need of any excellency or merit to satisfy it; because it is satisfied by taking place and having its course. Indeed, how far the dignity or worthiness of Christ's person comes into consideration, in determining the propriety of his being accepted as a representative of sinners, so that his suffering, when equivalent, can be accepted as theirs, may be matter of question and debate; but it is a matter entirely foreign to the present purpose.

18. The blood of Christ washes away sin. So it is represented in the Scripture, that we are washed from our filthiness in Christ's blood. Whereas, although the blood of Christ washes from our guilt, yet it is the Spirit of Christ that washes from the pollution and stain of sin. However the blood of Christ washes also from the filth of sin, as it purchases sanctification; it makes way for it by satisfying, and purchases it by the merit of obedience implied in it. The sacrifices under the law, typified Christ's sacrifice, not only as a satisfaction, but as meritorious obedience. They are called a sweet savor upon both these accounts. And therefore we find obedience compared with sacrifice, Psal. xl. 6, &c.

The sacrifice of Christ is a sweet savor, because as such it was a great honor done to God's majesty, holiness and law, and a glorious expression and testimony of Christ's respect to that majesty, &c. That when he loved man, and so greatly desired his salvation, he had yet so great respect to that majesty and holiness of God, that he had rather die than that the salvation of man should be any injury or dishonor unto those attributes. And then, 2dly, it was a sweet savor, as it was a marvellous act of obedience, and some expression of a wonderful respect to God's authority. The value of Christ's sacrifice was infinite, both as a propitiation, and as an act of obedience; because he showed an infinite regard to the majesty, holiness, &c., of God, in being at infinite expense from regard to those divine attributes.

§ 19. The sacrifices under the law are said to be most holy; but the sacrifice of Christ may properly be said to be infinitely holy, as it was an expression of an infinite regard to the holiness, majesty, &c., of God.

§ 20. Late philosophers seem ready enough to own the great importance of God's maintaining steady and inviolable the laws of the natural world. It may be worthy to be considered, whether it is not of as great, or greater importance, that the law of God, that great rule of righteousness between the supreme moral Governor and his subjects, should be maintained inviolate.

§ 21. If the threatening of death be not executed, the devil's horrid suggestion, and our first parents' wise suspicion, will be verified and fulfilled; viz., that God said otherwise than what he knew, when he threatened, Thou shalt surely die.

22. "Had God violated his word in the threatening of death for sin, he had justified the devil in his arguments for man's rebellion. The devils' argument is a plain contradiction to God's threatening. God affirms the certainty of death; the devil affirms the certainty of Gen. iii. 4, "Ye shall not surely die." Had no punishment been inflicted, the devil had not been a liar from the beginning. God would have honored the tempter, and justified the

charge he brought against him, and owned that envy the devil accused him of, and thereby have rendered the devil the fittest object for love and trust. As the devil charged God with a lie; so, had no punishment been inflicted, God would have condemned himself, and declared Satan, instead of a lying tempter, to be the truest counsellor. He had exposed himself to contempt, and advanced the credit of his enemy, and so set up the devil as God instead of himself. It concerned God therefore to manifest himself true, and the devil a liar, and acquaint the world, that not himself, but the evil spirit, was their deceiver; and that he meant as he spoke." Charnock, vol. 2. p. 934.

As to any objection that may be made against the force of the foregoing arguments, from the practice of all, and even the wisest of human legislators, their dispensing with their own laws, and forbearing to execute them, and pardoning offenders, without any one's being made to suffer in their stead; the case is vastly different in the Supreme Lawgiver and subordinate lawgivers, and in the Supreme Judge and subordinate judges. The case is vastly different in them that give rules only to a certain small part of the commonwealth of moral agents, and with relation only to some few of their concerns, and for a little while-in lawgivers that are weak and fallible, and very imperfect in the exercises of a limited, subordinate, and infinitely inferior authority; from what it is in him, who is the great, infinitely wise, omniscient, holy, and absolutely perfect, Rector of all; to whom it belongs to establish a rule for the regulation of the whole university of beings, throughout all eternity, in all that concerns them in the exercise of an infinitely strong right of supreme, absolute dominion and sovereignty. The laws of men may be dispensed with, who cannot foresee all cases that may happen; and, if they could, have not both the laws and the state of the subject perfectly at their own disposal, so that it is possible for them universally and perfectly to suit one to the other. And moreover, there is a superior law, i. e., the divine law, that all are subject to, and a superior tribunal, to which all are obnoxious; to which inferior tribunals, when the exigence of affairs, or any thing extraordinary in the case requires it, may refer offenders, dispensing with inferior subordinate laws made by men. But there is no wise and good law, but that care should be taken that it ordinarily be put in execution: and the nearer any human law approaches to the supreme or divine law in perfection, and in extent of jurisdiction, the more care should be taken of its execution: the wisdom of nations teaches this. And besides, persons' repentance may be proportionable and answerable, at least in some measure, to offences against men. And as to the public truth which is to be upheld in execution of the threatenings of human laws, there ought to be great care to uphold it, according to the true intent and meaning of those threatenings. If all that is meant by them, and all that, by the very nature of the public constitution (that is the foundation on which all their laws stand), is to be understood by those threatenings, is, that the punisment shall be inflicted, excepting when the exigence of the public requires otherwise, or when the pleasure of the prince is otherwise; then the public truth obliges to no more; and this being done, the public truth is maintained.

CHAPTER III.

CONCERNING THE ENDLESS PUNISHMENT OF THOSE WHO DIE IMPENITENT

§ 1. OBJECTIONS of modern libertines against the Scripture evidences of future punishment, taken from an anonymous pamphlet on that subject.

The word Gehenna signifies only the Valley of Hinnom. That fire was said to be everlasting, because it was kept burning night and day.

time.

The words ever and everlasting the Greeks understand for an age.

The word everlasting is commonly used in the law of Moses for a limited

That fire is said to be durable, or everlasting, that goes not out till the fuel is consumed.

The fire that consumed Sodom and Gomorrah, is called eternal fire.

If the fire is everlasting, it will not follow, that what is cast into it is everlasting. But the wicked are compared to chaff and stubble, which is quickly burnt up.

The Scripture often uses very hyperbolical expressions.

§. 2. The objections of Mr. Whiston; several of which are the same with those mentioned above.

That the words in the New Testament, translated everlasting and eternal, are sometimes used concerning things of a temporary duration.

That the use of the same word in both cases, viz., in both the future reward of the saints and punishment of the wicked, does not imply the equal duration of the punishment and the reward. Because some of the precepts of the law of Moses are called everlasting, that are moral, and shall continue to the end of the world; others are so called, using the same word, that were only to last till the Christian church was established.

That if the words eternal and everlasting do signify a proper eternity, when applied to the punishment of the wicked, it may mean only an everlasting privation of being.

That the fire, and smoke, and worm, &c., may be eternal, and yet the pain not be eternal, because the wicked may be consumed, and so their pain be at an end. That Christ speaks of them that blaspheme the Holy Ghost, as those that shall not be forgiven, neither in this world, nor the world to come; implying that others shall be forgiven in the world to come.

That Christ went and preached to the spirits in prison, i. e., preached the gospel to the departed souls of the wicked, in order to their salvation.

That door in the New Testament signifies an age; that aures voor morar signifies, ages of ages.

That adios is used for a limited time, when, in Jude 6th, the devils are said to be reserved in everlasting chains; where the chains spoken of last no longer than the day of judgment.

That some shall be beaten with many stripes; others with few: which must naturally mean, that some shall suffer longer than others.

That eternity of punishment is inconsistent with the divine attributes, and therefore cannot be proved by any pretended revelation.

That the eternal misery of sinners can be no advantage to God, to them. selves, or to others.

That it is inconsistent with God's mercy.

That it is inconsistent with justice, to punish men eternally for their sinning during this short life.

That the threatening such a punishment will do no good, because, if men will not be deterred from sin by the expectation of a great temporary punishment, neither would they by the expectation of eternal misery.

§ 3. Evidences of the doctrine.

The word everlasting is used in the very sentence of the Judge at the last day, whom we cannot suppose to use rhetorical tropes and figures. The punishment of the devil will doubtless be eternal. But the wicked shall be sentenced to the same everlasting fire.

The wicked that are finally impenitent, are represented as wholly cast away, lost, made no account of, &c., which is quite inconsistent with their punishment being medicinal, and for their good and purification, and to fit them for final and eternal happiness.

Eternal punishment is not eternal annihilation. Surely they will not be raised to life the last day, only to be annihilated. "The words used to signify the duration of the punishment of the wicked, do, in their etymology, truly signify a proper eternity; and if they are sometimes used is a less strict sense, when the nature of the thing requires it, yet that can never pass as any reason why they are not to be understood absolutely, when the subject is capable of it. They are terms the most expressive of an endless duration, of any that can be used or imagined. And they always signify so far positively endless, as to be express against any other period or conclusion, than what arises from the nature of the thing. They are never used in Scripture in any other limited sense, than to exclude all positive abolition, annihilation, or conclusion, other than what the natural intent or constitution of the subject spoken of must necessarily admit. The word atovios, which is the word generally used by the sacred writers, is, we know, derived from the adverb aɛ, which signifies forever, and cannot without force be used in any lower sense. And particularly, this is the word by which the eternal and immutable attributes of Deity are several times expressed." Dodwell's Sermon in answer to Whiston, p. 15, 16.

Those words which Christ spoke concerning Judas, are a demonstration of the eternity of the misery of hell" Good had it been for that man that he had not been born," Matt. xxvi. 44.

On the supposition that God intends finally to deliver all mankind from misery, and make all intelligent creatures eternally happy at last; and that to suppose the contrary (viz., the everlasting continuance of the torments of hell) is so extremely derogatory to God's moral character, and represents him in such black and odious colors, and as so cruel a being: why have not Christ and his apostles, who have revealed a future and eternal world so clearly, and brought life and immortality to light; I say, why have they not declared this doctrine, when speaking of future punishment, and clearly revealed this glorious doctrine of such a universal eternal salvation, so much more evangelical and agreeable to the office of Christ as a Saviour, and the design of his coming into the world?

§ 4. Axiom 1. If the torments of hell are purifying pains, that purge the damned from their sins, it must be by bringing them to repentance, convincing them of the evil of sin, and inducing them to forsake it, and with a sincere heart to turn from sin to God, and heartily to choose and walk in the ways of virtue and holiness. There is no other way for sinners being purged as moral agents; and, if hell fire is the means of any other purification, it cannot be

a moral purification. These flames do not purge from sin, and bring to virtue of heart and life, merely as a hot fire purges metals from dross, and senseless dead lumps of matter from material filth. But the defilement which they purge from, is defilement of heart or will; and the purity which they bring to, must be purity of will, intention, choice, and the active faculties and principles.

Axiom 2. If the wicked in hell are the subjects of torments there, in order to their purification, and so being fitted for, and finally brought to eternal happiness; then they are the subjects of a dispensation, that is truly a dispensation of love, and of divine and infinite goodness and benevolence, towards

them.

Axiom 3. If the design of the pains of hell be that of kind and benevolent chastisement, to bring sinners to repentance, and a yielding to God's authority, and compliance with the divine will; then we cannot suppose that they will be continued after the sinner has repented, and is actually brought to yield and comply. For that would be to continue them for no purpose; to go on using means and endeavors to obtain the end when the end is accomplished, and the thing aimed at is fully obtained already.

§ 5. If the damned, after many ages suffering extreme torment in hell, are to be delivered, and made perfectly and eternally happy, then they must be in a state of probation during this long season of their confinement to such extreme misery.

If they are not in a state of probation, or on any trial how they will behave themselves under these severe and terrible inflictions of wrath, but are to be delivered, and made eternally happy at the end of a certain period; then what restraints are they under from giving an unbounded loose and license to their wickedness, in expressions of enmity against God, in cursing and blaspheming, and whatever their hearts are inclined to? And if they are in such a state as this, wherein they are thus left to unrestrained wickedness, and every curb to their most wicked inclination is taken off, being nevertheless sure of deliverance and everlasting happiness; how far is this state fit to be a state of purgation of rational creatures and moral agents from sin, being a state wherein they are so far from means of repentance, reformation, and entirely reclaiming and purging them from sin, that all manner of means are rather removed; and so much is every restraint taken off, that they are given up wholly to sin, which, instead, of purifying them, will tend above all things that can be conceived, to harden them in sin, and desperately establish the habits of it?

A state of purgation of moral agents, that is, a state to bring sinners to repentance and reformation, and not a state of trial, is a gross absurdity. If any should say, that, though we should maintain that the pains of hell are purifying pains, to bring sinners to repentance, in order to their deliverance and eternal happiness; yet there will be no necessity of supposing, either that they may sin with impunity, and so without restraint; or that they are properly in a state of probation for they have no probation whether they shall finally have eternal happiness, because it is absolutely determined by the benevolent Creator, concerning his intelligent creatures, that they shall finally be brought to a state of happiness: but yet their circumstances may be such as may tend greatly to restrain their wickedness, because the case with them may be thus, that the time of their torment shall be longer or shorter, according as they behave themselves under their chastisements more or less perversely; or that their torment shall be raised to a greater height, and addi