be proper for us charitably to believe that many who deny the plain instructions of Christ on this subject, are yet so far loyal to him in heart that they will be personally accepted by the heart-searching Judge as his true friends and disciples. But if called on to give our sanction to any one as a religious teacher or preacher of the gospel who denies this, or holds it so feebly and hesitatingly that he does not preach it, such charity is entirely misplaced. In his commission to his ministers, the Saviour says, "Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you." We cannot doubt that true loyalty to him will prompt careful obedience to his instructions; and that such obedience will demand, and will be seen to demand, from the professed teacher of religion the earnest declaration of the truth, as taught by the Saviour's own lips, that when the righteous are received to life eternal the wicked will go away into everlasting punishment. To call this in question is to the same extent to call in question the reality of a supernatural revelation. For nothing can be more preposterous than to admit the divine origin of the Christian religion and the infallibility of the Founder, and yet deny a doctrine which he taught so clearly and with such emphatic reiteration. And not less preposterous is it to suppose that an infallible Teacher, with a heart full of kindness to the race which he came to redeem, would employ the same word to describe the duration of punishment to the wicked as of life to the righteous, if it were not as truly his purpose to inflict the one as to bestow the other. Nothing could be more at variance with veracity and with the spirit of true benevo lence than to seek to frighten men with the threatening of evil that was sure never to come.

The earnest study of this subject can scarcely fail to convince every sincere inquirer after truth that no man is worthy to be approved or employed or listened to as a Christian teacher who has any misgiving as to the fact that the Lord Jesus Christ taught that the punishment of the wicked will be eternal, and that this doctrine is true.

This Table of References is intended to point out every verse which in the Hebrew Scriptures contains the word by, in any of its forms; and every verse in the New Testament containing the words αἰών, or αἰώνιος. The words sometimes occur more than once, in the same verse.

Micah ii. 9; iv. 5, 7; v. 2; vii. 14. 5
Zeph. ii. 9.
Hab. iii. 6.
Zech. i. 5.
Mal. i. 4; iii. 4.
Total,

Mark iii. 29; iv. 19; x. 30; xi. 14. 4
Luke i. 33, 55,70; xvi. 8; xviii. 30;
xx. 34, 35.

NOTES TO PRECEDING ARTICLE.

[The preceding Article was completed and sent to the printer before the occurrence of recent events which may seem to make it personal. The following notes have been prepared not by the author of the Article, but by another contributor to this magazine.]

1 While the classic Greek may be used as a source of much information in respect to the language of the Septuagint, still, in case of doubt, the decisive appeal is to be made to the Septuagint alone. The peculiarity of the subject among subjects treated in Greek, the fact that the work is a translation, which class of work never exhibits the pliability of an original essay, and the evident ignorance of Hebrew displayed by some of the translators, make the Greek of the Septuagint almost an idiom by itself. Nor can the original Hebrew be always used as determining the meaning of its translation, so frequent are the mistakes of the translators.

Writers should be careful, in searching out parallel uses of Greek words in classic works, to get the popular uses of such words. The New Testament is eminently a book of the people. Christ spoke the language of the people, and so did his disciples. John's Aóyos is not Philo's Aoyos. True, there are technical terms in the Bible, λóyos is one, "life" is another, and there are many more. New Testament Greek is a "converted language." But biblical technics have their roots in the speech of the common people, and are to be explained in accordance with it. The schools had another set of technical terms, modelled upon their own ideas. Of these, as above said, we are to beware.

* There was a good deal of philosophy in the air in those days, which may have affected the common speech greatly, although insensibly. It is so to-day. Our missionaries in the Orient find among Armenian lads, who have never seen a book on that subject, or heard a lecturer, deep questions about development. These thoughts come from the mental environment of the age. If so now, why not so then? Yet the ideas are in these days popular in form, and are expressed in words which interpret themselves.

The philological interpretations of the Greek Fathers should always be respectfully listened to. Being Greeks, they could feel their mother tongue as we cannot. But their fancies are too likely to lead us astray, if we depend upon them further than this.

' Vide Lange's Com. Note by Rev. J. F. McCurdy, and Prof. Conant's translation.

6

The most the Hebrew can offer as analogous to the Greek oi aiŵves

קדֶשׁ קָדָשִׁים Tov atovov is the phrase

'The word "always" is used in our common speech with a similar modification of meaning. Take, for example, the cases quoted in Webster's Dictionary as illustrative of the same meaning of this word: "God is always the same," and:

"Even in heaven his [Mammon's] looks and thoughts

Were always downward bent."

What a difference of meaning! And yet who can mistake it? The latter, however, is a case of modification, and not the strict use of the term.

The application of researches made upon the digamma to this word has cleared many difficulties as to its variation in signification, and has settled the temporal reference of its derivative aiúvios. Alúv is derived from the root aɩF. This root appears in Greek as deí, always; in Latin as devum; in German as ewig; in English as ever. 'Atdios, the other word for eternal (Rom. i. 20; Jude 6) is from the same root (Vide Liddell and Scott, last ed.). The idea of time is, therefore, inextricably involved in the very origin of the word. With the idea of totality of duration as the primitive meaning, the word, if applied to a man, would easily come to mean lifetime, since it is then restricted like all similar words according to the nature of its subject. The meaning generation, arises in a similar way. Transition from lifetime to time of life is the same on any theory of the origin of the word. The meaning dispensation, world, that is, a long space of time peculiarly marked off, is obtained by the same process of restriction according to the nature of the subject. Such changes, as from lifetime, through life, principle of life, to spinal marrow become, explicable when the root idea is properly conceived. But even if these changes are inexplicable, no such meaning as spinal marrow, e.g. can be used as an irrefutable agument against eternity as the proper meaning. Absolute contradictions are found in two meanings of the same word, and yet neither can be denied. Who will explain to the perfect satisfaction of one who

demands to know all the steps of the change of meanings, the case of the Hebrew which means to know, and not to know? In fact, there are not always steps in these changes for language leaps.

9

E.g. Titus ii. 12; Heb. i. 2; ix. 26; xi. 3. Nearly always, some trace of the original distinction between κóơμos and aiúv can be seen.

66

10 The "element of duration" must be introduced; for it is in the very ground-work of the word. The absurdity of giving alúvios a qualitative force, instead of a temporal force, as is done by the advocates of restoration, is illustrated very forcibly by substituting this rendering in 2 Cor. xiv. 17-v. 1. The whole point of the passage is to be found in its contrasts between temporariness and eternity. For our light affliction which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding weight of glory in another world." This will pass, but is far inferior in force to our translation." While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen belong to this world, but the things which are not seen to another." Indeed! quite a piece of information! Now, can we believe that a sensible writer would say this?"For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, in the heavens, in another world.” That this is the sense is incredible.

11 Some, as, for instance, the late Canon Kingsley (see his Life, recently published), assert that, as the only office of fire or of the worm is to purify by consuming corrupted matter, setting the elements free to enter into new combinations, so the punishment of the future world is merely to purge the soul of sin. The fatal objection-to this interpretation is, that such is not the popular conception of fire and the worm. The man of science looks at them so; but the people think only of the destroying fire and the gnawing worm. Christ, in talking to the people, must have used popular language. This interpretation forces upon the words a meaning belonging only to the nineteenth century and science. It cannot stand.

12 Restorationists call attention to the fact that the rich man is said to be not in Hell (Téevva), but in Hades (Atons). They therefore declare that this concerns only the intermediate state, and cannot be used as an argument in this discussion. But it is not so certain that it is not properly translated Hell (vide Smith's Bib. Dict., Art. "Hell, Supplement, by President Bartlett.) At any rate, it is a Hades which will issue in Hell; for it is the region of torments, the lowest deep, whence Dives looks up. Waiving this point, we may further ask what light is here thrown upon the probability of repentance under future discipline? Not the slightest evidence of repentance can be presented. Dives wishes his agony may be relieved, but does not speak of sorrow for sin. He would send Lazarus to save his brethren from pain, but never a lisp is there of desire to save them from sin. Can better evidence be presented of the adamantine hardness of his heart than this, that, even under the wrath of a loving God, his only thought is of selfish relief?

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F. H. F.