WOULD PREFER TO BE A FALLEN ANGEL.
By Uriah Smith
The old adage “out of the frying pan into the fire,” is well illustrated at the present time by the course of the advocates of the doctrine of eternal misery. Many of them have for some time given evidence that they felt themselves to be in the frying pan, and that it was becoming uncomfortably warm; but a more desperate leap to get out, and a more evident plunge into a hotter place we have never seen than is made by one J. P. Simmons in The Christian Standard of Jan. 6, 1877, published in Cincinnati, O. The great difficulty in the common view, of the crushing weight of which he seems to be fully sensible, is the infinite disproportion between the sins of this short life, and an eternity of suffering in the lake of fire therefor. Two short extracts will serve to express his views and feelings in this respect. He says:— “Would a God of such loving kindness and tender mercy, having also within himself all wisdom and foreknowledge, punish one of his own creatures eternally in hell [italics his] for the sins of this life? Our popular theory answers, Yes! but reason and revelation both answer emphatically, No.” Again: “The penal laws of all civilized countries recognize the fact that punishment for crime should bear some proportion to the offense committed; but in the case supposed there is none. Let me not follow the lead of an ignis fatuus which requires the belief that human laws are more wise, just or merciful, than ‘the law of the Lord.’” Having stated the difficulty, how does he propose to meet it? By modifying his views of the punishment, according to the statements of the Bible, so as to make it bear a just proportion to this life of sin? Not at all. The idea of eternal suffering is so precious that that cannot be modified at all; that must be retained at all hazards. What then shall be done? Man must be proved to be more guilty than he seems; hence he rashly adopts the conclusion (here he goes, into the fire) that we sinned before we came into this state of being! He says:— “There is most certainly some mistake here. We must either deny that God’s mercy ‘endureth forever,’ or [deny] the doctrine of eternal punishment, or admit that we had sinned before we came into this life.” Listen to these words also: “If we are new creatures, why is it that we will all, except the redeemed of earth, be finally sent for punishment to the same place (and for the same term) that was ‘prepared for the devil and his angels’?” And this: “If we never had any connection or association with Satan before, is it not wonderful that God should have put our progenitors directly under his influence in Eden?” Still further and still plainer: “If we could but admit that we are of the same family of rebels which followed Satan in his ‘war in Heaven,’ and who were ‘cast out into the earth’ with him, all such difficulties would vanish as the darkness of night before the morning sun.” Finally he says: “In my next it is intended to cite a few authorities tending to prove that this is not our primeval state, but that we are old sinners.” This is plain. We were associated with Satan in his original sin. We were cast out with him. We are fallen angels. Reader, did you ever imagine such a way out as this? But how is it that we are required to repent of the sins of this life only, to gain eternal life? Why are those former sins so completely shut out of our memory? Do they need no repentance? Are they set aside? If so, then why are we, if not redeemed, to be punished for them? And why does not the King say at last, Depart from me ye cursed into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels? Why does he distinguish so clearly between the wicked of this earth and the devil and his angels? But enough. This is too foolish to argue. We have seen men whom we thought strangely, yes, insanely, infatuated with the belief in eternal misery. But never did we expect to find one, who, rather than yield the doctrine, would prefer to write himself down a fallen angel.