"Neither did Jupiter Olympus strike the tyrant Dionysius with a thunder-bolt; nor did Esculapius inflict any languishing disease upon him, but he died in his bed and was honoraby interred, and that power which he had wickedly acquired, he transmitted, as a just and lawful inheritance, to his posterity." "Thus far," says Plato, describing the last moments of his murdered master, "most of us were with difficulty able to restrain ourselves from weeping, but when we saw Socrates drinking, and that he had finished the draught, we could do so no longer, but in spite of myself the tears came in full torrent, so that covering my face I wept for myself, for I did not weep for him, but for my own fortune in being deprived of such a friend. Crito, moreover, had risen up even before myself, not being able to restrain his tears. And Apollodorus, who had not ceased weeping for some time before, then burst into an agony of grief, and weeping and lamenting, he pierced the heart of every one present." How much of this do we see, not only in our own circle of personal experience, but in the records of past ages. "Not this man, but Barabbas." "Crucify Him, crucify Him," are the hoarse notes which proclaim through the streets of Zion that Satanic skill, and human malice, and divine love, are each about to have their perfect work. "And so as to those who, unlike him in sinlessness, have yet endeavored to be like him in striving against sin." John the Baptist is in his dungeon, Herod in his palace. Paul is the fettered prisoner, Felix is his judge. He upon whose bosom. even Jesus leaned in affection, is sent off in his old age in exile to Patmos, while his earthly master, the black-hearted Domitian, sways the destinies of an empire. While Socrates is drinking his hemlock, and his disciples are weeping, the Sophists are rejoicing. Mark Antony is triumphant, and even a Roman mob is weeping at the Rostra over the dead hands and disfigured head of the murdered Cicero. And though it may be said, and said truthfully, that the good man, even in suffering, is better and more to be envied, and sometimes happier than the bad man in prosperity, yet this does not remove the essential difficulty. The very terms of the proposition, in which such attempt is made, imply that this good man, after all that can be said as to his consolation and self-approval,

is still suffering, that this bad man, after all the deductions that can be made through the absence of self-approval, is still prosperous. There is still to the one of these classes no small amount of depressing and wrongful, though not hopeless and comfortless affliction; to the other no small amount of guilty though it may be debasing enjoyment. In the one case virtue brings the suffering, in the other vice secures the guilty enjoyment. This state of things frequently continues to the last moment of earthly existence; the last act of life, with individuals of one class, like that of Herod the Great, being a crime of the most awfully malignant character; with those of the other, like that of the martyr Stephen, one of the highest exhibitions of human virtue. This is the difficulty; the apparently contradictory apportionment of these classes respectively, according to their character. It is not merely that the bad man is successful and prosperous to the end of his days. This, of itself, would be a great mystery. Nor is it merely that the good man goes through life, and even into the cloud and shadow of death, under the pressure of wrong and trouble. This, too, would be of itself no less a mystery. But it is these two facts combined and connected, the one sometimes springing out of the other, the guilty pleasure frequently being secured through the innocent suffering; this it is which complicates and increases the mystery. This it is which has originated that great and bitter cry from the perplexed conscience of humanity, for a life of retributive justice. And though it may be asked, in doubt and suspense, when, and where, and how, shall this retribution be manifested; though there may be nothing outward in its favor, and many things opposed, yet the mere fact that this its necessity is felt, that we are so constituted as not to be able to explain away this sense of necessity, yet to anticipate the fact which relieves it, constitutes a most important intimation of future existence. This, it may be said, is not sufficient to influence human action. Very true, so far as regards the large majority of men. But may not the fault be, not in the nature of the evidence presented, but in the state of those to whom it comes? This felt necessity of a future life, while it may be of no weight with a seared conscience, may come with the power of a moral demonstration, to one that is quickened and purified.

But this moral argument, however forcible as suggested by what we see in the experience of others, is still. more so, as derived from the experience of our inward nature. This capability of sitting in judgment upon our own conduct, of condemning and approving ourselves, of doing this in reference not to what is expedient or inexpedient, but in view of what is right and wrong, of experiencing remorse as distinguished from regret, self-approval as distinguished from self-congratulation, this capability in the very fact of its individual operation, is a silent prophecy of future existence. When Plato, for instance, speaks of the intrinsic loveliness of virtue, and describes the heart of the tyrant as cut and torn by contending passions, and when, again, in the person of his murdered master, he asserts that it is better to suffer the punishment of an evil deed than to escape it, that he would choose rather than act unjustly to suffer unjustly, and when the great orator of his city, not many years afterwards, in spite of the advancing power of Philip, reminded his countrymen that the "true and the just" were the only stable basis of human action, they made their appeal to this inward principle of our nature which in all seasons of moral disorder instinctively and ever looks forward to a scene of final and perfect adjustment. A couple of extracts revealing the personal experience of individuals, will bring this testimony before the reader more clearly, perhaps, than any amount of abstract reasoning. "In another walk to Salisbury," says Izaak Walton, "Mr. Herbert saw a poor man, with a poor horse, that was fallen under his load; which, perceiving, he put off his canonical coat, and helped the poor man to unload, and after to load his horse. The poor man blessed him for it, and he blessed the poor man ; and was so like the good Samaritan, that he gave him money to refresh both himself and his horse; and told him that if he loved himself he should be merciful to his beast.' Thus he left the poor man and at his return to his musical friends at Salisbury, they began to wonder that Mr. George Herbert, who used to be so trim and clean, came into that company so soiled and discomposed; but he told them the occasion: and when one of the company told him, 'He had disparaged himself by so dirty an employment,' his answer was: 'That the thought

of what he had done would prove music to him at midnight; and that the omission of it would have upbraided and made discord in his conscience whensoever he should pass by that place; for if I be bound to pray for all that lie in distress, I am sure that I am bound so far as it is in my power, to practise what I pray for. And though I do not wish for the like occasion every day, yet, let me tell you, I would not willingly pass one day of my life, without comforting a sad soul, or showing mercy; and I will praise God for this occasion.'" "I feel," says Coleridge, when speaking of the vicious habit which had been the bane of his life, "I feel with an intensity unfathomable by words, my utter nothingness, impotence, and worthlessness, in and for myself. I have learned what a sin is against an infinite and imperishable being such as is the soul of man. I have had more than a glimpse of what is meant by death. and outer darkness, and the worm that dieth not, and that all the hell of the reprobate is no more inconsistent with the love of God than the blindness of one who has occasioned loathsome and guilty diseases to eat out his eyes, is inconsistent with the light of the sun." Now, alike, in the words and thoughts of light and of gladness with which one of these extracts is filled, as in those of bitterness and woe which overflow the other, do we read this prophecy, which the individual conscience distinctly utters, as to the individual's future destiny. This remorseful consciousness of having done what is known to be wrong, as also the self-approving sense of having done what is known to be right, is of a complex character. The present discomfort of remorse is not the whole of such remorse. There is combined with this present discomfort, naturally springing out of it, and reflexively heightening it, the anticipation and dread of something beyond and future: "a fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation." So also in regard to the opposite feeling of self-approval. It goes beyond the present, and instinctively anticipates future good. These feelings go with us through life; they overshadow or enlighten the valley of death; and, in their every experience, remind of a future and perfect adjustment, to which they look forward. It is only upon the supposition that the ordinary course of nature as well as man's moral instincts play him false

that this intimation can be disregarded: a supposition as derogatory to the moral nature of God as it is to that of man. "There is no peace to the wicked." "A good man is satisfied from himself." There may be some difficulty in ascertaining who belong to these two classes respectively. But that question being settled, natural conscience at once recognizes the truth of these statements, feels it with peculiar keenness in view of their personal application: will admit, whatever may be the present exceptions, that somehow and somewhere, there must, and can not but be a final adjustment.

V. But there is still another sphere of man's nature, in which we may look for intimations upon this subject. The argument here finds its force in the supposition of a moral system of things-may, therefore, in some respects, be classified with the one just presented, and yet the fact upon which it is based, looked at purely in its relation to man, as a social being, is eminently important and suggestive. That fact is the influence of this doctrine, as it is firmly held, contrasted with an opposite state of things, under the influence of an opposite opinion. The present influence for good, of belief in man's immortality, we have already suggested, as a reason for the candid and serious examination of arguments offered in its favor. We now go further, and say it forms a part of that argument. The good and the true are moral correlatives. Grapes are not to be expected from thorns, nor figs from thistles. Falsehood can not bring forth goodness and purity; nor can truth, evil and pollution. Looking over the surface of human society, we can see various individuals, who stand in different relations to this fact of immortality. By some it is denied and disbelieved, except during certain terrible moments of alarm and apprehension, in view or suspicion of what may come hereafter. By others, it is assented to, or rather not denied; but as by those just spoken of, only occasionally realized. By others again, it is really and constantly believed, but the belief is so distracted with other objects of interest that it exercises but little practical influence. By others, it is fully believed and constantly realized to be a fact, all-important, and of the deepest interest. The same phenomena, and in all these varieties, will be exhibited on a larger scale, if we extend