to prove what it does not say? Does this indicate any established rules for interpreting Scripture? But I spare him. I have no pleasure in torturing a man as upon the rack; and were he not identified with the errors he supports, and did not a sense of duty to the cause of truth and righteousness compel me, I should not have said so much as I have. One thought, however, spoils his conclusion from this text.-If, as he supposes, the text relates to the consummation of the heavenly society, it is a period subsequent to the casting of the wicked into hell; which will account for no mention being made of the inhabitants of those regions joining in the general chorus of praise to God and the Lamb.

;

I have only one argument more to notice, and that is built upon the law which requires us to "love God with all our heart," &c, in connection with our Saviour's words, "heaven and earth shall pass away; but one jot or tittle shall not pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.". When he says "that this law is binding on all the children of God," he speaks a great truth but when he adds, "And-Christ declares that all mankind shall fulfil it," he speaks a greaterror. This law has been binding," not only "on all the children of God," but on all mankind since the world began; but we know that all have not fulfilled it; and if my opponent's faith that it will be fulfilled by all mankind rest upon that phrase "shall not pass-till all be fulfilled," then his faith rests on no better foundation than a mere Hebraism; and he might

just as well suppose that the man who was cast into prison because" he had not to pay," could nevertheless, in close confinement, pay a debt of "ten thousand talents," because it was said "he should not come out till he should pay all that was due."

I had intended to go farther with this answer, and to follow my opponent's proofs with a large list of threatenings, declarative of the penalty of the Divine law, and calculated to throw light on our subject, by showing that both promises and threatenings, expressed in universal language, are generally figurative and conditional. The threatenings of the law are expressed in terms as general as the promises, and are, no doubt, as true. I had intended also to state arguments against the doctrine I oppose, which have not been brought into view, and perhaps will not be in the course of this discussion. But this answer being much longer than I expected, I am compelled to close.

Nov. 15, 1827.

ANSWER III.

Remarks on Mr. Paige's Reply to Answer II. "He that believeth shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned," Mark xvi, 16.

As the discussion on the conditions of salva'tion has taken a wide range, and embraced some foreign matter, it is now thought best to confine it to the original question as far as possible; in

to take a gene

order to which it may be proper ral view of my second lecture, that we may have before us the several points to which the arguments on both sides should be directed.

In the first place, in that lecture, I laid down the doctrine of free agency as the basis of moral holiness, and to show that the obedience of man to the Divine command is the condition of his salvation. I then produced a variety of Scripture passages to show wherein his obedience, as a free agent, is required, as in repenting, believing, &c, and to show that his salvation is suspended on such obedience, within a space of time allowed for this purpose from which it results, that if he refuse the required obedience during that time, he most surely fails of salvation. And to show this with the greatest certainty I apply the conditions of salvation to the sinner at his last moment in this world; and to strengthen the evidence in this case, I consider him as destroying his own life, or dying in a state of drunkenness, &c, in which cases any obedience is clearly impossible, and salvation without obedience, equally so, both on account of the Divine threatening, which God cannot consistently with his honour rescind, and because he cannot make a free agent holy without his own agency. These results grow out of the premises; and to get rid of them the premises must be disproved. But if the premises are sustained by direct evidence, no evidence can be admitted against them, seeing that indirect or inferential evidence can never supersede that which is direct.

My opponent, instead of attacking my castle of conditions, built upon the command of God and the free agency of man, goes to work by inquiring what we are to understand by salvation? And though we do not approve of this method of investigating the subject, we shall follow him to prevent his saying that we do not notice his objections and arguments.

What is salvation? Is it forgiveness of sins, remission of punishment, deliverance from evil propensities, and the implantation of holy affections? We say that salvation, in the sense in which we now use that term, means all these. My opponent, however, excludes remission of punishment due for actual sins, and lays this down as a fundamental principle, that every one must suffer, in his own person, his whole desert of punishment. And till now we did understand him to imply that our actual sins are not pardoned, but punished. We can now no longer misunderstand him on this point, as he expressly avows the sentiment that our sins are pardoned. Now here is a very singular case-a man's sins are pardoned, but his punishment is not remitted! A debtor is forgiven all demands against him, and yet he is holden pay all he owes! A murderer is pardoned by the governor, and yet he is hung! God fully pardons the sinner, and yet holds him to suffer the whole penalty of the law for all his sins! Pray, how is he pardoned? What is pardon but a revocation of the sentence of condemnation, and thereby a remission of the penalty of the law?

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We can form no other idea of pardon than this; and the reason is because sin,-I speak of the transgression of the law,—is an action, not a substance, and therefore it is untangible, and you cannot treat with it, either to forgive it, or to punish it, apart from the agent which commits it. A sinner is pardoned just so far as his punishment is remitted to him, and no farther. Thus in pardoning sin God revokes the sentence of condemnation, and thereby releases the sinner from his obligation to suffer the penalty of the law as it relates to the future state, but reserves in his own hands the right to inflict so much of the penalty in this life as his wisdom and goodness see his children will need in this state of trial, and as he sees he can overrule for their greater good. This, under the influence of his grace, constitutes a wholesome and necessary discipline for his children. And this discipline may be more or less severe, as their wants may require. In this case their punishment is not a curse, but a blessing. And this may sufficiently explain that poetic passage in the Psalms, "Thou wast a God that forgavest them, though thou tookest vengeance of their inventions," Psa. xcix, 8.

If my opponent can give any other account of pardon, it will behoove him to bring it forth, and tell us how a sinner is pardoned who is held to suffer the whole penalty of the law; and if he cannot do this, let him cease to complain that we misrepresent his doctrine in this point. But he thinks the " express declarations of