Journal: Bibliotheca Sacra
Volume: BSAC 17:65 (Jan 1860)
Article: Objections From Reason Against The Endless Punishment Of The Wicked
Author: Clement Long

BSac 17:65 (Jan 1860) p. 111

Objections From Reason Against The Endless Punishment Of
The Wicked

Clement Long

In the following discussion it is proposed to consider, first, the proper source of information on the subject of future punishment; secondly, the bearing of the scripture testimony; thirdly, the force of the objections to endless punishment; and fourthly, the proper mode of overcoming objections.

I. Who but that Being to whom all the future is present, and who will determine the awards of the judgment, can inform us whether the retributions of the righteous and the wicked will be, alike, eternal? We cannot be so certain of the duration which justice must assign to the punishment of the unbeliever, as to be able to affirm that it cannot be continued without end. We cannot pretend to have, in our reason, any positive knowledge of the condition of the lost, like that founded on the testimony of a competent witness, that we should place it in competition with the word of Him who can neither falsify nor be deceived. The speculations of the pure reason, concerning the facts of another world, might be allowed some weight, in the absence of all reliable means of information; but to set them in opposition to the divine testimony, would be the same error in theology, as the denial of the facts of astronomy would be in physics, because inconsistent with the Ptolemaic system. It is no more the province of reason to supply the facts of the world to come, than it is to furnish the facts of the natural world. Man is but the interpreter of nature; and it was just when this truth began to be recognized, that the first decided impulse was given to the science of nature. So likewise is man only the interpreter of a revelation; it does not belong to him to make a revelation, or to revise and improve that which has been made. The philosophy, falsely so called,

BSac 17:65 (Jan 1860) p. 112

which determines, in advance, the facts of a new dispensation, in a world without end, is like those natural philosophies which were framed before the phenomena of nature had been studied. We might guess, as well as we were able, what is likely to happen hereafter, if the only mind that is directly cognizant of the everlasting future, had not furnished us with all needful information. But having the sure word of prophecy, we do well that we take heed to it as to a light shining in a dark place. Our guesses can no more withstand the light of his testimony, than the Ptolemaic system could withstand the true system of nature. If it could be supposed possible that a number of finite minds should be present to all the future, and directly observe the eternal punishment of the wicked, their testimony would dash all opposing theories in pieces. How much more frail must all ...