A False Issue on Hell and Insanity
In the Advent Herald of Dec. 17th, 1859, we notice an extract from Gerritt Smith's discourse on hell, embracing that portion in which he claims that a thorough belief in an eternal hell is sufficient to make a man insane, to which the Herald appends the following note: "The above is from a discourse given a short time since by Gerritt Smith on hell. He did not believe it and yet has gone crazy. His steps have brought up at the mad-house—showing that a disbelief of it is not a sure preventive of insanity."
It will be seen that the Herald has here raised a false issue. No one claims that the Bible doctrine of the destiny of the wicked is a preventive of insanity. It is only claimed that the popular view, when sincerely believed, tends to that result. There are many other causes also calculated to produce insanity. To say then that the belief of eternal misery is one of these, is altogether different from saying that a different belief on this question is a preventive. The latter does not follow from the former. This is what Whately would call the "fallacy of irrelevant conclusion."