We heard of a man who had heard Universalists occasionally, and gave them something when they were making contributions for their preachers. A preacher, who made one of his finest efforts to prove that all will be saved, inquired of him how he liked his argument. The man replied, “I did not like it at all.” The preacher, disappointed, said: “You believe our doctrine?” The man replied: “I do; but you tried to prove it by the Bible, and all intelligent people know that the Bible is against us from one side to the other. The way I prove it is this: _I deny the Bible, and then prove it by reason_.” This is certainly the more rational way. We care not who he is, nor where he comes from, nor what his attainments may be; but the man who attempts to prove Universalism _by the Bible_ opposes the common sense of mankind and the clearest language ever written. The man who rejects the Bible out and out, and is wandering in the darkness of unbelief, in the vagaries of those who reject the wisdom of God, might, in his philosophical speculations, try to show that all men would be saved, with at least some show of plausibility possibly; but there is not only no plausibility in anything that can be adduced from the Bible to show that all men will be saved, but clear statements of the Bible can not be true and all men be saved. It cannot be true that those “who believe not the Son shall _not see life_,” and that all men shall be saved. It can not be true, as stated in Scripture, that “these” (the wicked) “shall go away into everlasting punishment,” and _all men be saved_.
The man who affirms that those _who die in their sins_ shall be wholly and happy in heaven contradicts the clearest utterances of Scripture. When time shall end and God shall exclaim, “He that is filthy, let him be filthy still,” there will be no more repentance; yet some will be _filthy_—_unsound_.
Universalism had its day in this country; has run its course and is going by. There is not one-tenth as much of it in this country as there was thirty years ago. There is no argument of consequence about it any more. The only thing wanting to show what it is, will appear anywhere when they undertake to form churches, keep up Sunday-schools, keep up prayer-meetings, meet regularly on the first day of the week and worship. Let them undertake to enforce the clear requirements of Scripture on their people, and they will soon get a lesson. They will soon explain that _all will be saved_, and they will find that they will have no use for baptism, the Lord’s Supper, prayer-meetings, nor any regular worship.