: stage is " Kesisting^ the^ IIoly_Spirit." Then, thirdly, there comes cu^^ ^)
I the awful state in which the Spirit of God is " quenched." JC^^ ^) ;
' Grieve, resist, quench ! These three sad words "mark the progress along this path of evil, this path of sin, which ultimately brings men into a state where their sin is unpardonable. When that is done, and not until that is done, the unpardonable
; sin has been committed. Here, then, we see the nature of
■ this sin. It is a stubborn and conscious unwillingness to fulfil ' the conditions of pardon. If a man brings himself into a state
in which he at first will not, but which ultimately becomes a state in which he cannot, fulfil the conditions of pardon, how can I he be pardoned ? It is not that God is unwilling to pardon ? him ; it is not that God's forgiving grace is incapable of bringing j him forgiveness ; it is that he has brought his own soul into such I a state that it is impossible for him to fulfil those conditions
■ upon the fulfilment of which alone God can grant forgiveness.^
3. The Freedom of the Will. — Those who hold that the will of man is absolutely free, should remember that unlimited freedom is unlimited freedom to sin, as well as unlimited freedom to turn to God. If restoration is possible, endless persistence in evil is possible also ; and this last the Scripture predicts. Whittier :
What if thine eye refuse to see.
Thine ear of Heaven's free welcome fail,
And thou a willing captive be. Thyself thy own dark jail?
r 1 W. A. Challacombe.
ST. MARK 125
Swedenborg says that the man who obstinately refuses the inher- itance of the sons of God is allowed the pleasures of the beast, and enjoys in his own low way the hell to which he has confined himself. Every occupant of hell_ prefers it to heaven. Dante, Hell, iv. : ^
All here together come from every clime.
And to o'erpass the river are not loth. For so heaven's justice goads them on, that fear
Is turned into desire. Hence never passed good spirit.
The lost are Heautontimoroumenoi, or self- tormentors, to adopt the title of Terence's play.
I ^ The very conception of human freedom involves the 'possibility of its permanent misuse, or of what our Lord Himself 'calls " eternal sin." ^
^ Origen's Eestorationism grew naturally out of his view of human liberty — the liberty of indifference — an endless alterna- tion of falls and recoveries, of hells and heavens; so that practically he taught nothing but a hell.^
^ It is lame logic to maintain the inviolable freedom of the will, and at the same time insist that God can, through His ample power, through protracted punishment, bring the soul into a disposition which it does not wish to feel. There is no compulsory holiness possible. In our Civil War'"Fhere was s"ome talk of "compelling men to volunteer," but the idea was soon seen to involve a self-contradiction.^
^A gentleman once went to a doctor in London to consult him about his health. The doctor told him that, unless he made up his mind to give up a certain sin, he would be blind in three months. The gentleman turned for a moment to the window, and looked out. Clasping his hands together, he exclaimed, "Then farewell, sweet light; farewell, sweet light!" And turning to the doctor, he said, "I can't give up my sin." He was blind in three months.*
4. The Irrevocable. — How easy it is after a time to lose the sense of sin in this world ; to substitute for it outward propriety of conduct, to transgress which is immorality; to substitute the opinion of the world, good or bad, to go against which is bad taste ; to look at the world around us as affecting duty, benevolence, and the like ; and to make our relationships
* Denney, Studies in Theology, 255. ' Shedd, Dogmatie Theology, ii. 669.
• J. C. Adams, The Leisure of Ood. * Henry Drummond.
126 THE GREAT TEXTS OF THE BIBLE
1 towards this the test of character, whereby we may be known as good or bad.
Thou little child, yet glorious in the might Of heaven-bom freedom on thy being's height, Why with such earnest pains dost thou provoke The years to bring the inevitable yoke, Thus blindly, with thy blessedness at strife? Full soon thy soul shall have her earthly freight, And custom lie upon thee with a weight Heavy as frost, and deep almost as life!^
Taught in the school of propriety, reared on utility, and pointed to success, by degrees the sense of sin may become faint and dim to him, until out of the ruins of respectability and the desolation of his inner life, he is brought face to face with an eternal sin. The figures of existence have deceived him ; he has made the addition of life, omitting the top line, and not allowing for deductions — he is face to face with an utter loss, an eternal sin.^
I ^ The laws of God's universe are closing in upon the
'impenitent sinner, as the iron walls of the mediaeval prison
closed in, night by night, upon the victim, — each morning there