enough to believe they never will be saved: But till then, we have great reason to think, they will finally be restored, when they have suffered the due reward of their deeds. Can the breath of the Almighty be extingnished, and go out or that which is immortal die? Reason & Scripture forbid it. Were men made out of nothing (as some have inconsiderately supposed) they would return to nothing again. But this is not the truth: For all things were of God, as well as to him. Besides, Psalm, cvii. 20. we read of the wieked being saved from their destructions, as well as from their sins: and is their no force in that?-What though it be temporal destruction the Psalmist meant in that place, it will hold equally true of a greater for is any thing too hard for the Lord? The perdition and destructions of the Old Tes tament, never ended in the extinction of the destroyed it banished them out of sight, out of present favor, out of house and home; but not out of being and existence. They still were somewhere found--they yet were under the promise. All which was typical of greater destructions, and of future salvation therefrom. Neither is this mere argument alone—we have Scriptures, as well as other facts, in favor of the idea. Jerusalem was destroyed; but will again be restored, and rebuilt. The Jews were cut off from being any longer the Elect, the distinguished people of God: but they still exist, and are to be restored to their God and their own land again. Trouble upon trouble will befal them first, and affliction will be added to : grief; but it shall issue well, and end in their deliverance and return. In foresight of this time, and the calamities that should precede it, we hear the weeping prophet say, (chap. xxx. 7.)" Alas! for that day is great, so that none is like it! It is even the time of Jacob's trouble; but he shall be saved out of it." The prodigal was lost, but found again. Kingdoms, and em pires do fall, families are extinct, and individuals come to ruin but from all this they arise, and spring forth, and come forward into being.. Again, numbers and numbers are dead and buried, and lie slumbering in the dust; who all shall revive, and rise from their graves, and stand up, an exceeding great army.-Even the Pagans teach Restoration fabulously, in the account they give us of the phoenix; who after being burnt, they represent as arising from her ashes in her young. But to come still closer to the point, Sodom and Gomorrah, with the inhabitants thereof, were reduced to ashes, for their sins; had a terrible overthrow; perished, and came to a fearful end; and are set forth as an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal. fire. But we hear of their Restoration. Ezek. in his 16th chapter, speaks of this prophetically, at the 53d, 55th, 61st, and 63d verses: he tells us, that she, with her daughters, or connected cities of the plain, should, when Samaria and Jerusalem are restored, come also into favor again; be brought to shame and repentance, and have God pacified towards her. This has never yet taken place; but will, in a period to come, after that new and future covenant is made with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah, spoken of Jer. xxxi. 31--34. and other places. Now this is after they have perished, and been destroyed; which makes it an argument of Restoration, in opposition to Extinction, or endless Perdition. This latter view though specious, and not without something in its favor; yet hardly seems worthy of God. His wisdom, goodness, power, and love, are not so fully seen, if he annihilate the work of his hands; nor the reason of his raising the wicked-dead at all, if they are to return to non-existence. If it was not to answer a better end than to shame, confound, and punish them, in a formal and open manner; one cannot but think, his mercy would have inclined him to let them forever sleep in He is not a vindictive Being; nor does he take pleasure in vexing and tormenting his creatures, & putting them to shame, without it answer some good end to themselves. Man, passionate revengeful man, sometimes chastises out of caprice and humour, and for his own pleasure; but God never: He for our profit, that we may partake of his holiness. It is the amendment, and return, of his rebellious creatures, that he means and aims at, by all his corrections and inflictions, whether present or future; not their destruction or extinction. This all along appears, from his own word, and his own declaration. Punishment he calls his strange work, his strange act, Isa. xxviii. 21. their graves. * If any one would see this cleared of all reasonable objection, and set in a fuller and more persuasive light; they would do well to read the last of those Dialogues, mentioned in two former Let ters, from page 197 to page 201. not what he delights in. Sinners would have no strokes hereafter, if in this life, they so heard the rod, and who had appointed it, as to return to him that smites them. But dying here incorrigible, they meet with it hereafter, and must have stroke upon stroke, till they yield, and willingly submit themselves. If final extinction were God's design, how easy for him, hay-ing got them in their graves, to keep the wicked there. It is hardly consistent with his known revealed character and will, to suppose he would bring vast numbers of intelligent creatures into being-preserve them in well-being ---make provision for their future welfare and salvation-foresee, after all, they would miss of it-and yet make no provision for this. If it magnifies the grace of God to save any, not-withstanding all the difficulties, obstacles, and dangers, that are found in the way of it; much more to save all. If the power, wisdom, and goodness of God are eminently seen and display-ed in rescuing some sinners, now in this life, from all the virulence, inveteracy, and deep ma lignity of their sins, and so to kill and crucify these as to save those alive; how much more are these perfections manifested, on the supposition he both can and will, in due time and order, when justice has had its course, so destroy and remove all sin out of all his works, that every sinner shall be restored, and all the guilty world of angels and men, shall be brought in such subjection to the Father of spirits, as to live! This most certainly ennobles our idea of God,. as an amiable Being ! & is more likely to gain our present attention and affection to him, than all the representations of him in his justice, boliness, majesty, and greatness; though these allhave their use, and are highly serviceable, in reducing rebels to their allegiance.-Mercy is the darling attribute of the Deity, and is said to rejoice against judgment. And if in this life, why not in that which is to come? It is no where said, the judgment-seat of Christ is a seat of judgment, without mercy, even to the wicked. It will be said, perhaps, that annihilation, or perdition, is this mercy to them.. Comparatively, it would be so, if endless extinction were the truth; as non-existence is better than miserable existence, if it is never to have an end. But besides this being negative mercy only, and not any thing positive, or of happiness in it; we must reverse Scripture, in many places, to ad-· mit annihilation true. Upon his own sense of Scripture-expression, the Extinctionist loses his cause. He agrees the word everlasting, when applied to the future punishment of the wicked, is to be taken in a strict and endless sense. When they are said to arise to shame, and everlasting contempt, it cannot be strictly true respecting themselves; if the greatest part of their future punishment consist in utter silence, insensibility, and oblivion. For where is there any shame and contempt but what they previously undergo, if they are extinct, and brought to nothing, in the sense these persons contend for? It cannot therefore be everlasting, if they suppose it respects |