"Thou shalt call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people FROM THEIR SINS." Is this quibbling? or rather is it not quibbling to hold forth the terrors of a future hell for the promotion of love to God, and vir tuous actions here, while you aver that the saved are absolved from the very sufferings which you have denounced? It is certainly a little remarkable, that one who apparently triumphs in scripture authority for his assertions, and vauntingly inquires, "But what says the Bible?" should, after all, forget to quote a single word from it in support of his bare, his barren assertions. In so long a paragraph, containing so many assumptions, surely a small mixture of Bible, even if it were mutilated, might be fairly expected. But not one word of this appears. Your extreme sensibility prevents you from giving "a formal definition of these terms. "I feel that it would be insulting your understanding? Their true meaning is understood by every child who is capable of reading his Bible." I ask now in my turn, "But what says the Bible?" Ans. "Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God; speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem, and ery unto her, that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned: for she hath received of the LORD'S hand double for all her sins."-Isa. 40: 1, 2.

Now, sir, if you can read your Bible, will you be pleased to answer the question to yourself, Is pardon "deliverance of the guilty from the due punishment of their sins?" Should you wish to learn further what the Bible says, it shall be at your service. Let the community judge who perverts "the plainest words in the language."

In examining your second letter, I find so much. generalizing, so much indefinite and common-place assertion, with no small share of the leaven of sophistry, that it may with propriety be considered as a

mong the incurables. I shall now notice but one expression.

"As to the doctrine being opposed by the prejudices of men, this is so far from true, that it is every way adapted to please and gratify the desires of the natural heart."

Do you really believe, that when Mr. Murray was stoned in Boston for delivering his message of Peace on earth, and good will towards men, a total destitution of prejudice was the cause? If so, the aggressors had most unnatural hearts.

Speaking of the consequences of the doctrine, you

say;

"It denies the mercy of God, and sinks the grace of the gospel into an empty parade of high sounding words. It is asserted by Universalists that the "wicked receive a punishment proportioned to their crimes,—that all the hell there is, is inevitably cer tain to the wicked,"-" their portion in the lake of fire and brimstone, in the sorrows of death and pains of hell, is and ever will be in exact ratio to the measure and magnitude of sin."

We are pretty uniformly accused of granting too much mercy to the Creator. But we understand mercy as perfectly consistent with justice, and not opposed to it.

"Also unto thee, O Lord, belongeth MERCY-forthou renderest to every man according to his work." Do we deny the mercy of God, in the afflictive dispensations of his Providence, intended to promote our good, and bring us back from the wilderness of error, to the paths of virtue and peace? If we do, the prophets and apostles are most deeply implicated in the charge, and you are at liberty to consider them "either incapable or dishonest," as you deem other Universalists.

We do say, indeed, that the "wicked receive a punishment proportioned to their crimes ;" and Jesus Christ, and his apostles, taught the same doctrine.— Christ informs us, that with what measure we mete, it shall be measured to overflowing, and that the measure shall be rendered by men into our bosoms. Nor are the writings of the apostles silent on the subject. We learn of them, that every man shall be recompensed, without respect of persons; and that he who soweth to the flesh, shall of the flesh reap corruption -not incorruptible fire and brimstone. If what we sow we shall reap, where shall we reap it-in the field where it is sown, or in a distant region where we have not sown, and what we have not sown? But perhaps I am perverting "the plainest words in our language."

I shall now transcribe a small paragraph from your third letter, in the way of comparison. It is not brought merely to exhibit the tissue of contradictory assertions with which your Letters abound, though that is sufficiently obvious, but to give another con-clusive proof, that error and inconsistency are cause and consequence.

"Those persons who have been awakened to a sense of their guilt and danger, and as often relapsed into a stupid, or irreligious state, and who are annoyed always and irritated by the doctrines of grace, are much inclined to seek rest at the universalist's meeting, and there get their consciences quieted by hearing that there is no day of judgment, AND NO PUNISH- · MENT for the wicked."

"Doctrines of grace",-Yes; and yet, come what will in the future world, it will be well with the righteous, though, according to the doctrines of grace, "if they are not elected, they must indeed perish. doctrines of grace, and day of judgment-punishment for the wicked-all-all in the same paragraph? tru

But

ly this is astonishing. Is it true, to the non-elect the entrance into life is blocked up, and that they were reprobated "from all eternity," and yet must they suffer as wicked, when they were predestined, not merely to sin, but forced to sin" that they might justly be punished!" Leaving this absurdity, let us try for once, to find a point to your declamatory paragraph. You assert that some "get their consciences quieted by hearing that there is no day of judgment, and no punishment for sinners," and all this at a universalist meeting house! Perhaps you can name the place, or the speaker, where, and of whom, this is true, but it looks too much like an attempt to throw the odium of inconsistency upon Universalists, which shall be written in capitals on your production. We do not deny a day of judgment, but we speak of it as being simultaneous with the preaching of the gospel. Judgment is decision, a judicial sentence, and when this occurs, it is that man's day of judgment who is judged, or punished. If we do really hold the doctrine that there is "no punishment for the wicked," it is a little singular, that you should dwell so long on the impossibility of saving one who has been sufficiently punished. It is certainly a singular charge to bring against us, that we deny punishment for sin, while you say that those only, who are not punished, can be saved; while the recipients of salvation, who have not been punished in this world, may justly be in the coming world! Such appears to be your zeal in contradicting Universal Salvation, that you have run into the opposite extreme of universal damnation.

To you, who are so perfectly familiar with inconsistency in theory, it may not be necessary to make an apology, but I feel myself in duty bound to render a reason for obtruding another badge of error' upon the reader's notice. Mr. Scott, the commentator, says, "A very small proportion of men's actions is directed

by personal knowledge, demonstration, or by the higher degrees of probability." It is a maxim which daily observation verifies, and it is therefore I would press the inconsistency of your assertions home to the business and bosom of every one, who has a mind to understand, and a heart to feel. The quotation to which I allude is the following;

"If the righteous and the wicked are to fare alike in the future world, why is salvation always promised conditionally?"

"And on this principle, I must say that although those passages which either directly, or by implication, teach that future happiness is suspended on present conduct, and is to be attained only by compliance with certain specified conditions, appear to me entirely unmeaning and absurd.”

If, after what has already been advanced, any thing found in your letters should be able to furnish matter of astonishment, it is the utter incoherence of the present declarations, compared with others heretofore cited. That salvation is always promised conditionally, is precisely as consistent with your definition of the nature of salvation, and the signification of pardon, and forgiveness, as to say that the sun emits light and darkness, or that all the parts of a body are not equal to the whole. By your own rule of argument, it is absurd to speak of salvation, as being experienced by one who is not obnoxious to punishment; but is the law against the obedient? If man be obnoxious to punishment, and salvation be deliverance from punishment, or the curse of sin, then conditions must be out of the argument, or he saves himself by compliance, in which case deliverance of the guilty can have nothing to do with the subject. Any other conclusion renders language more vague than the Delphic Oracle. Whether the course which have pursued, in the zigzag windings of modern or

you