this is solved, the meaning is obvious. So when the terms eternal, everlasting and endless are employed properly and grammatically they designate perpetual existence, or time always running on and never running out; but when they are used figuratively, they imply a cessation of being, or termination of time.

It is an admitted rule, we believe, in all languages and in all logical reasoning, that language and words cannot express more than their proper and literal meaning, but that they may express less, therefore, if the literal and proper meaning of the words, forever, eternal and everlasting, is nothing more than a limited time, or applied to perishing objects, then their figurative use must express even less, and they can never be applied with propriety and significance to the existence of God, the immortality of the soul, and the blessedness of heaven; yet we learn from the Bible, that they are thus applied, therefore this must be their literal and grammatical significance, and when applied to time and perishing objects, it must be their figurative use, inasmuch as language figuratively employed, is less comprehensive than when literally used.

If therefore these words and their original (aion, aionios) are ever applied to things of eternity, or express eternity itself, then this must be there proper use, for eternity and future things are more comprehensive than the things of time, or time itself; and when so applied, they convey their proper and grammatical meaning to whatever applied, and that meaning is perpetual existence, non-ending; and that they are thus applied is beyond successful, contradiction, and is even admitted by all believers in the oracles of God; therefore, when applied to express the existence of Jehovah, they express an endless, a never-ceasing existence; when applied to the happiness of the righteous in the future world, they express the same perpetual existence; so also.

when referring to the punishment of the wicked, they express the permanence and interminable nature and being of their misery-that their loss and ruin is irrecoverable.

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Because these words are applied to doors, gates, hills, priesthood and possessions as in Gen. xvii. 8. "an everlasting possession ;" Gen. xlix. 26. "the everlasting hills;" Num. xxv. 13. "everlasting priesthood;" Ps. xxiv. 7. everlasting doors;" therefore, it is argued, that they do not express perpetual being and infinite existence. This is begging the whole question; it is not the province of the advocates of punishment infinite in duration, to disprove that these terms ever express an indefinite period of time, or applied to perishable objects, for this they readily admit; but they deny that they are always used in this sense, and when so used, that it is in any other than their figurative character. When expressing their radical and literal meaning they are applied to things of an eternal existence. Even allowing, for the sake of argument, that these words are figuratively employed when speaking of punishment, they do not prove conclusively that future punishment will be finite. When everlasting is applied to hills, the word denotes, that the hills will last as long as the earth and time in which they exist; so the doors shall endure as long as the building to which they are attached-the Aaronic priesthood shall endure as long as the Mosaic dispensation, and then it shall only be exchanged for its antitype in the gospel dispensation; and Canaan which was given to Israel for an "everlasting possession," will afford room for argumentation in order to define the utmost limit of the word everlasting in this connection, for we cannot tell how long God designed they should possess this country, and how long they would have possessed it, had they not forfeited it by sin and rebellion against God. The promise is still left on record, that they shall again return and inherit the land of their fathers from the river Euphrates to the great sea.

And as it is typical of heaven, in the last change of the earth, it shall disappear in the more glorious reality of heaven, the resting place of all the redeemed of the Lord. So should we allow, that everlasting is figuratively applied to future misery, it must express, that the judicial punishment (dike tio. 2 Thess. i. 9.) inflicted upon the disobedient and profligate will endure, as long as the soul endures and eternity in which it exists-that the immortality of the soul, and the infinity of eternity will only be commensurate with the misery of the damned. According to this argument, the misery of the future world will be interminable.

After what we have written, we take the position, that whenever the terms are applied to eternity and the objects of that world, they are properly and literally used, and mean nothing less than ever-existing and endless. We read in Rom. xvi. 26. "according to the commandment of the everlasting God; this certainly means an ever-existing God. Rom. ii. 7. "To them, who seek for glory, honor and immortality, eternal life;" this must imply non-ending blessedness. In Matth. xxv. 46. "These shall go into everlasting punishment," can mean nothing less than endless misery. All these, God, life, and punishment, exist in the future world and are described by the same word and must in all these places have the same meaning. We read in Matth. xii. 32. "But whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, neither in the world to come." In Mark iii. 29, the parallel passage, we read, “But he that shall blaspheme against the Holy Ghost hath never forgiveness, but is in danger of eternal damnation." These passages not only prove future punishment; but the eternity of that punishment. This every unsophisticated reader would readily admit. We are aware that the Universalist attempts to avoid this conclusion, by giving the following translation: "Neither

in this age, neither in the age to come." The first he refers to the Jewish dispensation, and the second to the gospel. Whether this will serve his purpose to avoid the obvious conclusion of the text, a few remarks will only be required. The point to be proven is, whether the Savior meant the Jewish dispensation by the phrase, "in this world." Is this at all probable, since the Jewish age had already passed by, and the kingdom of Christ was ushering in; for the "law and the prophets were until John," after the kingdom of God was proclaimed? And if by the phrase, "in the world to come," the Savior referred to the gospel age, and declared that such blasphemers should not be forgiven in that age, pray, when would they be forgiven? Would it be after the mediatorial reign of Christ, and therefore after the resurrection? Even if this be correct, how many must now wail in hell, and continue in torment until after the resurrection. Even this would establish the doctrine of future punishment. In these passages, the Savior wished to teach that all such characters would never be forgiven, and must therefore endure "eternal damnation." This punishment will take place in the future world, and as all things are unchangeable and ever-enduring there, therefore this punishment will be endless. The apostle Jude, while speaking of Sodom and Gomorrah, declares that they suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.” They were suffering while Jude wrote, and as they had been swept from the world nearly 2,000 years before that time, therefore their suffering must have been after death and in the future world; and since it is "eternal," it will be infinite in duration. Paul declares in 2 Thess. i. 9. that the disobedient should "be punished with everlasting destruction," at the time when the Lord Jesus should be revealed from heaven, with his mighty angels, and when he should be ad-· mired in all that believe; therefore it must be in the future world.

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It appears to us that the argument drawn from the word and phrases employed to describe the punishment of the wicked, must be conclusive to every candid and docile mind. However, we are aware, that the caviler may find opportunity to equivocate and distort the truth, and therefore it is well, that Christ and the apostles have brought to light clearer and more decisive proof to establish the doctrine of the eternity of punishment. The next argument we shall advance is

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2. That the Scriptures represent the punishment of the wicked, and the happiness of the righteous in contrast, therefore opposite in character and equal in duration. has been said, that there is more certainty of the infinite blessedness of the righteous than of the infinite misery of the wicked, because it is described by different words. Eli Ballou says, on this point: "The words 'immortal, incorruptible, unfading,' are applied to an existence of happiness, but never to an existence of misery, and these terms give a positive assurance of the unending existence of the happy in heaven." Were these words applied to the misery of the damned, it would still be a question, whether they would afford a satisfactory argument to Universalists to prove endless woe. After all, does the Bible describe the misery of the damned in more equivocal terms than the blessedness of the righteous? Does not the language convey the idea of immortality, and an incapacity to decay. Read Mark ix. 43-48, where the wicked shall depart into hell, into the fire that is quenchless; "where the worm dieth not and the fire is not quenched." Where the gnawing misery of the damned "dieth not," it must necessarily be immortal; for the Greek words "ou teleutao," are just as expressive of immortality as the word "athanasia.". When the Scriptures declare that the misery of the damned is like "fire not quenched," is just as expressive of its "in