This, however, amidst all perplexities we may certainly rely upon with
perfect confidence, that whatever is finally decided, and whatever
punishment is finally awarded to any, will be in accordance with the
perfect will of "God, whose name is love;" so that all the true and
just, the good and loving in the universe, will, when they know all
the grounds of His judgment, sympathise with their whole soul in His
decisions, and see His glory revealed in them. We also know that there
will be "a multitude greater than any man can number" in God's family;
that they will be gathered "out of every nation, kindred, and tongue;"
and this we may hope for, that the number of the lost may be to those
who are saved fewer far than the number of those in penal settlements
and prisons are to the inhabitants of a well-ordered and Christian
kingdom.

But not only are our thoughts of future punishment naturally darkened
into deepest gloom by the assumed multitudes of those who will suffer,
but also by the nature of those sufferings which we also assume are
to be assigned to them. We literally interpret all those images of
unquenchable fire and the undying worm, borrowed from the constant
conflagrations and corruptions of the offal and carcases of dead
animals in the valley of Hinnom, (or Gaienna,) near Jerusalem, and
also the obviously metaphorical language used in the parable of the
rich man and Lazarus, as if necessarily teaching that worms or fire
would be employed to torture for all eternity the immortal bodies
of the lost. But what if there is to be no such bodily pain? though
possibly there may be some kind of physical suffering immediately
produced by sin there as well as here. What if the wicked shall be
punished only by permitting them to "eat the fruit of their own way,
and to be filled with their own devices?" What if, instead of the