.II. IT IS FATHOMLBBB. "Bottomless plt." It is an abyss without a bottom. llolal evil is fathomless. 1. Who can fathom its origin I We can account for 111.n in lhw world on two principles. (1) On the pri,iciple of internal tendfflciB,, The human being, from the very commencement of its exiRtence, seems to have a disposition to go wrong. (2) On; tho gromul of eztemal inft'UfflCU. He comes into a world where all human beings are mure ur le,s tainted with sin; the moral atmosphere which he breathes is more or less corrupt. But in the case of the first sinner neither of these conditions existed; all his propensities were toward the right, and all external influences tended toward the right. 2. Who can fathom its issues I What are its bearings, ramifications, ultimate results? Problems these which the highest created intellect could, perhaps, never solve. Moral evil is, indeed, a "bottomless pit." Ill IT IS BURNING, "A great furnace." Sin, or moral evil, is fire; like all fire it exists in two states, latent and active. Where it becomes active it is consuming and transmuting; it consumes the good and transmutes its embers into evil, and in all it inflicts agony on the soul-the agony of moral regrets for the past, and terrible forebodings for the future. Every sinner has a " furnace ,. within him, a furnace that must break forth into awful activity sooner or later. IV. IT IS 01ll!CURING. "A smoke, ••• and the sun and the air were darkened by reason of the smoke of the pit." How great the obscuration of moral evil I It olouds all the moi;al stars of truth in the soul, and mantles the moral heavens in gloom. 1. HQ11) benighted men are on the etemal question of right! The foundations and laws of moral obligation are, in the daily course of human action, buried µi darkness. 2. How blinded mm are to the eternal conditions of W6ll-being I :Men look for happiness 'Ulithout instead of within; in the senses, not in the soul ; in matter, not in mind; in the creature, not in the Creator. Thus, in truth, our moral heavens are starless and our path is a wilderness. We walk in darkness and have no light. V. IT IS ALARMING. "And there came out of the smoke locusts upon the earth, and unto them was given power." It is here represented that from the fathomless abyss, burning and smoking, there issued a host of scorpion-locusts resembling war- horses, with orowns like gold, with the faoe of men, the hair of women, the teeth of lions, having breastplates as of iron, and the sound of their wings like the sound of cha.riots and of horses oha.rging to battle. In Oriental lands and distant ages nothing waa regarded with greater horror than an army of locusts; their numbers darkened the heavens, their wings rattled u thunder, and their mission was to devour What hellish Bll.ua.drons, to terrify and destroy the soul, issue from the fathomless abyss of moral evil! Terrible armies come in the memoriea of the past and in the apprehensions of the mysterious future. CoNOLUSION. Do not ask-Where is hell? Place it not in eome underground region, or in some burning planeta far away; the fa.thomlesa, burning, and tormenting pit le in the sool of every morally unrenewed man. Thank God, there are remedial means on this earth for the quenohing of ita fires, and the annihilation of all the squadrons of tormentors it sends forth.-D. T.
Ver, 6.-7"e ea;tremity of ,mguish. "And in those days shall men seek death, and shall not find it; and shall desire to die, and death shall flee from them," We take these words as a picture of the eg;tr6'TMSt anguish. Here we have- L A STATE or HISERY IN wmcH DEATH IS BOUGHT. 1. Death is uni'lm'sally regarded. WIIW'Agd men as the greatest evil. It is the "king of terrors." It gives terror to everv- thing ierrible in the world. The ravenous beast, the furious storm, the destruotive pestilence, the engulfing earthquake, are only terrible because death is terrible. 2. The nl.ief which mm generally seek in this world in th8ir au.fferings is from death. The mariner will forsake his ship with valuable cargo, the king will resign his kingdom, the wounded will suffer the amputation of every limb, if thought needful, to avoid death. Yet here we have a state of being where cleath is sought aa a rel.ieJ. II. A STATB OF IIUBERY IN wmoa DEATH 18 BOUGHT AS A BELIEF IN VAIN. "And death shall flee from them." It is miserable to seek relief in the most deeply felt evil, but to seek it in such an evil in n.l.n adds wondroUlly to the misery of the case. Fatigue, disaJ)pOintment, the conscioumess of lost energy, add to the anguish. Earth ru.na from death, hell runs after it and rune in vain. In conclusion, I infer : 1. T1icd cu:. s. 1-11.] THE REVELATION OF ST. JOB;N THE DIVIN}!!. 273
the fad Uiat mm aN ~ to such a atate of being .-implies :that smM. sad cat.a,~ ha, 116/allen our tiature. Could Infinite Goodness have created beitiga. desi~ .and fitted by their nature for sueh a e~tel/ Nay; deep within us has the Great ()p.e planted the love of life, and to seek death is to go against our nature. Sin explams it, •2. That thM"e is something in the universe to be dreaded l,y man more th,cm •danA,;· altd this is .sin. Death, thpugh an evil, is not to be compared to sin. , Sin, though robed in beauty and adorned with a thousand attractions, is the evil of evils. 3. P.IGt Ohristianity should be hailed as the only means to deliver us from this ednmU,, qt. anguiah.. It destroys sin, it" condemns sin in the flesh."-D. T. · ·