Gospel Herald, 1859-09-24

              GOSPEL HERALD.
Devoted to Christianity, Morality, the Interests of Sa'bl>ath Scliools, Social Improveineiit, Tenaperanoe, Ediacation., and Greneral News.
VOL. 16.
"BEHOLD,   I   BRINfl   YOr   GOOD   TIDINGS   OF   OEEAT   JOT  ....   ON   EAKTH   PEACE,   GOOD   WILL   TOWARD   MEN.
^^^^^ DAYTON, 0., SATURDAY, SEPTEMBEir2471859.
NO. 20.
ORIGINAL POETRY.
Wriltenfor the Gospel Htrali.
On the death of Horace Mann.
KKV.
.Sec
I'rom Natrn'o's dome, loud peals Iho knell ot cf death,
With tone as solemn as tho dirge of Time! Some valiimthero, with expiring breath,
Y'ields to a mandate awfully sublime! It comes! it comes! like waves ot mighty force,
Urged onward by Omnipotence alone; Like sighs ot nations bending o'or a corse,
AVith wounded spirit and with smotherd groan.
What doleful accents fill the soul with dread,
As Zephyrns performs the requiem! Tho God of Hosts must surely have decreed
Some towering soul should yield life's diadem,— By Power Supreme, in plenitudo of strength,
.Should fall as mightiness alone can fall,— Though straggling like a god for rights, at length
Submits tho desperate conflict, yielding all; And its far-re,T,ching grasp of time, let go,—
Contract the soul's vast realm, and from the tower or nameless height, where intellectual glow Illumines all, resign the post of pow er.
"Such wa.s the sage," saith Choragus "who fell
When from tho dome tho lofty death-knell spake, AVlien Nature's energies awoke to tell
His death whoso life w.as spent for others' sake." A weeping cloud o'crsprcads the realm afar,
And mourning Nature swells the s.ad acclaim, As slowly move the train and funeral car
Othim, for whom this grand expression came, rar, far above, gleams a majestic bow
In glory wrought.    Pause thou my soul, and scan 1 A name ! a nanw ! The blaiiing letters glow I
There beams with light, tho name of HoKACK Maxk
CixcinnaH,  Ohio.
ORIGINALITIES.
WrUlenfor ihe Gospel Herald.
Will the  Thinking   Principle of Man ever be Annihilated?
BY 31.  LINDSEY.
Tliough the Deity is invisible .to mortal eyes, yet his existance is clear¬ ly proved hy his visible operfitions with mortal man, and he has not left us Yvithout witness to his goodness.
The year with its various changes, o£ heat and cold, seed-time and har¬ vest, is proof enough. He gives ns food and raiment, Ho sends rain on the just and unjust; aad He fills our hearts with joy and gladness. He has given us a thinking; principle, and though all flesh perish, that principle atill lives and will continue to live through all eternity. Q^liat the think¬ ing principle of man is immortal, was believed by tho Patriarchs, tho ancient Egyptians, Colts, Druids—by the cele¬ brated Eomans, Greeks, and by almost every nation and'tribe, that live or has lived. The thinking, living prin¬ ciple in the .Heathen bids him worship; and he being ignorant bows down to wood and stone. The thinking prin¬ ciple in tho Indian bids him pay his vows to the Great-Spirit.
If the soul of man bo immortal, then is it not necessary that it should be cultived, not only for what we call pro- sent life, but for the future? for the least neglect in this point may be at¬ tended with endless consequences. If tho thinking principle of man is not immortal, jJeath would be gain to the wicked man;'it would free him from liis body, soul, and hia vices. But the soul is immortal, and he has no moans of being forced from his vices on ly by becoming-good and wise; and to become good and wise he must follow the dictates of that living, thinking principle, which God has given him.
That thinking principle tells liim to obey God's laws it tells him when he does right or wrong.
The scrijJtures give us proof enough of the immortality of the soul. God has prepared a future residence for the soul of man. In the Bible we learn that on the resurrection day the righteous go away to enjoy the man¬ sions prepared for them at the bcgin- ing, and the unrighteous to receive their just reward,
St, Paul believed in the immortality of the sonl, ho said, to him to die was gain;—he believed that after death, the thinking principles he possosed, would never die, Christ said, "in my fathers house are many mansions; if it wero not so, I would have told you, I go to prepare a place for yon; and if I go and prepare a place for yon, I will come again, and receive you unto my¬ self; that whore I am, there ye may be also." With respect to Abraham, he informed us that he expected a city which had a foundation, whose build¬ er and maker is God. He obtained no such a city on earth, therefore, he must have directed his views beyond the confines of the present. In Genesis 25th, it is said "Abraham gave np the ghost, and was gathered to his people." This expression is not to be viewed as iinj)orting that lie was buried with his fathers; for the fathers of Abraham were buried several hundreds of miles from the cave of Machpelah, in which Abraham's mortal remains were de¬ posited;—some of them in the land of Chaldea; and some in the country of Mesopotamia. The true meaning must therefore be, that ho was gathered to the assembly of the righteous. And again, it is said, "Many shall come from the east and the wast, and shall sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Ja¬ cob, in the kingdom of heaven." Con¬ sequently Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob luuts be living and intelligent beings, in another state.
Job, that illustrious example of pa¬ tience, believed in the immortality of souls. "I know" says he "that my Ee- deemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth; and, after I awake though this body shall bo destroyed, yet in my flesh shall I see God,"
The prophets speak decisively of a future state. Hence at the end of time, after the body has mouldered to dust from whence it came, the soul, the living thinking principle of the righteous man," will inhabit tlvo man¬ sion prepared for it.
The soul of the wicked wo leave with a just God, who will give him a suitable reward.
It is unreasonable to believe that the thinking principle of man will ever be annihilated. If we deny the future existence of tlie sonl, we deny theteaeh- ings of Divine Truth. Of all the woi'lds which are dispersed through the im¬ mensity of space, history does not give lis ono instance of one of them, or that one atom, has over been annihi¬ lated. We might more reasonably Bupjios-e that God is still creating now worlds, to fill tho void of space, and those worlds are inhabited by intelli¬ gent beings, capable of loving and serv¬ ing their creator and preserver.
We admit that changes are contin¬ ually taking place through nature; such as mountains sinking and valleys
rising, tho Ocean changing its bound¬ aries. The atmosphere' is a scene of changes; the spots of the sun, the belts of Jnpitor, and various other changes are continually taking place. Yet these changes, do not produce annilii- lation. God is under no necessity to annihilate the soul of man for want of power to support it. With him there is nothing that is impposaiblc. Al¬ though the body will be disabled the soul contains no princi]Dle of dissolu¬ tion. God will preserve it, ancl it will flourish in immortal youth. We may reasonably conclude that it is sinful to think that the thinking ]5rinciple of man which, is immortal, will ever die. Fletcher, Ohio.
IVritten for tlie Goapel Herald.
Divine Origin of Christianity-No, 2.
BY JAMES MAPLE.
3. The necessity of a divine revelation. The necessity of a divine revelation from heaven is obvious from tho fol¬ lowing considerations,
1. Prom the works of nature alone wo cannot learn tho true ch aracter of God. In the material universe we behold marks of wisdom, power, and good¬ ness ; but there are seeming irregular¬ ities and imperfections that the light of nature alo?ie cannot remove. Clouds and darkness hang around this subject that the light of reason alone cannot dispel. The history of the philosoph¬ ical world confirms the truth of this sentiment. Some of the ancient phi¬ losophers asserted the existence of a God: others openly denied it: others embraced tho idea of a multiplicity of Gods celestial aerial, terestial, and in¬ fernal : while others represented the De¬ ity as a corporeal being united to mat¬ ter, by a necessary connection, and subject to an immutable fate. And with their most exalted and sublime conceptions of the divine Being we find mixed up the most ehildieh and ]3re- posterons absurdities. The grossest polytheism swayed a universal sceptre from the Tiber to the ends of the earth. The material universe, cdone, cannot re¬ veal to us the infinite perfection of .Te- liovah, the true relation that he sus¬ tains to the human family, and his ul¬ timate design in all his works.
2. Without the light of revelation wo can know nothing of the origin of the universe. The idea of a Creative pow¬ er that could create all things out of nothing is entirely above the natural conception of man. Prom, the light of reason alone he could never discover this sublime truth. The ancient Per¬ ipatetics held that tho world is eternal; .Democritus and his disoiples,thatit was formed in its present order and beauty by a fortuitous concourse of innumer¬ able atoms; Epicurians, that it was made by chance; while those who be¬ lieved that it had a beginning in time, knew not by what gradations, nor in what manner the univovso was raised into its present order, beauty, and har¬ mony,
3. Prom the light of nature alone wc conld never learn the origin of moral evil. Tho wisest philosophers among tho heathens saw and acknowledged tho universal tendency of man to evil; but they were ignorant of its true ori¬ gin. They were at a loaa to account for the fact that man, who possesses the noblest faculties of any being on
earth, should pursue his destruction with as mucli industry as beasts avoid it
i. The light of nature teaches us that we are sinners—that sin lias mar- ed the beauty of the soul—and there is a universal consciousness of guilt, and a fearful forboding of punishment; but reason does not point out the way in which we may have our sins liardoned, and be restored to the divine favour and imago. We find numerous pi ans devised by the heathens to appease their Gods ancl secure tho forgiveness of sins. Here arises the necessity of a divine revelation.
5. The light of nature cloos not af¬ ford us sufficient strength and assist- ence to build up tho kingdom of right¬ eousness, goodness, and truth in the soul. We have a solemn confirmation of this truth in tho history of the world. Some of the ancient philosophers for¬ bid men to pray to tho Gods to make them good, which they said they ought to do themselves; while others equaled themselves to the Gods; for there, they affirmed, "are what they are by nature; the wise man is what he ij3 by his own industry. The Gods excel not a "^viso man in happiness, though they excel him in the duration of happiiness."
G. JSTature alone cannot instruct ub in what tho .sutmnimi bo mira, or aupreme happiness of man consists. According to Cicero there was great disBonsion among tho ancient philosophers upon this point; and according to Vans there were nearly three hundred dif¬ ferent opinions concerning the chief good of man. The Stoics affirmed that virtue was the chief good of man, and its own reward; the .Peripatetics made the good things of this life a necessary ingredientof happiness; the Bpiciiriaiis set up indolence and freedom from pain as the chief good of man. Here arises the necessity of revelation to point out the true foundation of happineaa, and the supreme good of man.
7. The light of reason alone cannot give us any consistent, clear and per¬ fect idea of the nature and immoi'tali- ty of tho soul. Though in tho nature of the sonl wo behold evidences of its greatness and immortality; yet clouds and darkness hang ai'ound this subject which reason alone cannot dispel. The most giant minds among tho ancient philosopheris wore in doubts up>on this tbrilling subject; and were never able to arrive at any absolute certainty in regard to the immortality of the soul. Just before his death, Socrates, said to his friends, "I hope I am going to good men, though this I would not take up¬ on me peremptorily toassert; but, tha,t I shall go to the Gods, Lords, that aro absolutely good, this, ifl canafBrmany tiling of this kind I would certainly affirm. And for this reason I do not take it ill that I am to die, as othorAviso I should do; but I am in good hope that there ia something remaining for those who are dead, and that it will be much better for the good tlian for the bad." He afterwards expressed him¬ self with more doubt aiur said, "I am goiBg out of the Avorld, and you aro to. continue in it; but Avhich of us hath th© better part,, is a secret to every ono but God." What is true of Socrates is true in a great measure of Plato, tho most eminent of his di.sciples. Cicero, has justly been regarded as the most eminent  of the ancient philosophers