who will trust his own heart, or relax the vigilance and the constant watchfulness which the word of God enjoins? That disciple of Socrates, who would have betrayed his illustrious master to the Areopagus, and would have aided in procuring his condemnation, would have been execrated by the wise and good until the end of time. We even detest the comic poet Aristophanes, although his acknowledged foe, for ridiculing so virtuous and excellent a man in his comedy of the Clouds. But here is a greater than Socrates. Here is the most original, benevolent, sublime and godlike of even human teachers, before whose superior moral and intellectual effulgence, the clearest light of earth's sages grows dim and dark. Here is a great philosopher, moralist, prophet, philanthropist, and friend of man, combining in himself, and in the highest degree, whatever is in itself noble, and worthy of the homage of a rational creation; spending a life adorned with every virtue, and illustrated by every human and divine excellence; scattering around him blessings which will endure throughout eternity; yet this is the being whom professed friends deserted and betrayed, whom infuriated foes crucified and slew. How powerfully do these facts confirm the statements of Scripture concerning the depravity of the heart! And while the transcendant merits of the Saviour augment the guilt of his murderers, they also confirm the necessity that he, and he alone, should die for the sins of the world.

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CHAPTER XIV.

INTERPRETATION OF CHRIST'S DESCENT TO HADES.

THE last charge made by Modern Infidelity which deserves our notice, is that the Bible contains some mysterious and unmeaning passages, which no one has ever been able satisfactorily to explain. These are hence denounced as both useless and absurd, and made to tell against the general value of the Book. There is no one passage of this kind more generally censured than St. Peter's declaration respecting Christ's Descent to Hades. We will, therefore, endeavor to give such an exposition of it, as will prove it to be both rational and consistent, as well as highly instructive.

The Romanist believes in the literal descent of Christ to Hades, and contends that its main purpose was to deliver from the pains of purgatory those just men who were detained there. Or, in the words of Aquinas: "Christus post mortem statim descendit, et statim liberavit justos qui erant in limbo." Not, indeed, the damned, nor yet children, but solely all the just, who had been sufficiently purged by the cleansing flames, were to enjoy the efficacy of his delivering interference. The Romanist further holds that the spirit of Christ abode among the departed, as long as his body remained in the grave; or, in the words of the Angelical Doctor, "quamdiu corpus ejus fuit mortuum." This mode of interpreting the event, and of the declarations of Scripture concerning it, accords well with the rest of

their system, and, indeed, furnishes it with an able support and defence of purgatory, and the intercession of saints.

Ultra-Protestants, on the other hand, deterred by the gross and literal perversion of the Romanist, have gone to the other extreme, and denied that Peter (third chap. 18th verse, seq.) intends to teach the literal descent of Christ's Divine nature to Hades; but simply alludes to the abode of his body in the grave, and the absence of his spirit from the world. But this is evidently in opposition to the whole tenor of the passage, which describes, in literal terms, a literal event, in close connection with other historical circumstances, which were also literal, such as Christ's death. Either of these interpretations, we conceive, is widely removed from the truth, and the import of the Sacred Writer. We do not propose here to examine the various other expositions which have been given of this mysterious event; or attempt to exhibit either their truthfulness or their error. We design to propose another exposition which has suggested itself to us, and urge the proofs in its favor, which convince us that such exposition may be more successfully defended, is more natural, and less beset with difficulties, than those views which have been heretofore prevalent on the subject. We insert it here, in order to show that such an interpretation of this event can be given, which will have no objections to meet, on the ground either of impossibility or impropriety. We insert it, moreover, to prove that a theme which Modern Infidels have derided and opposed, as forming a strong argument against the Bible, may be so interpreted as to remove every difficulty, and at the same time be interwoven into the rest of the Christian system, and even be made to support and illustrate it.

The memorable passage in Peter's Epistle reads as follows: "For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the

just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit: by which, also, he went and preached unto the spirits in prison; which sometimes were disobedient, when once the long-suffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls, were saved by water." Notwithstanding the great difficulties which accompany the interpretation of this passage, the doctrine of Christ's Descent to Hades, which it is supposed to teach, has been literally held in all ages of the church, from apostolic times until the present day. This is proved by the fact that the doctrine is inserted in many and celebrated creeds, whose authority was extensively acknowledged. Thus the Apostles' creed says of Christ, descendit ad inferna; while the symbol of Athanasius says, descendit ad inferos. The precise date of these two creeds may be matter of dispute; but it is granted, on all hands, that belonging to the earliest ages of the church, they express a sentiment which was prevalent at a very early period. The heretical Arian creed, which was promulgated about the year, A. D. 350, employs the following expression: "And dying, he also descended to the subterraneous regions, and governing those who were there; whom the gates of Hades seeing, trembled." The symbols of Ruffin and Alcuin both insert descendit ad inferna, and that of Honorius Fortunatus, descendit ad infernum, and include this point among the principal items of their faith.

The same literal interpretation of the doctrine was inserted in the principal creeds of the Reformation. Thus the Formula Concordiæ of the Lutheran Church, says: "It is enough for us to know that Christ descended to the lower regions, that he humbled the powers of hell for all

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the faithful, and that we are delivered by his means from the power of death and the devil, from eternal damnation, and thus from the jaws of hell. But-by what means he accomplishes this we do not curiously inquire, but await the revelations of a future world." Thus one of the articles of the Anglican Church, as set forth under Edward VI., says, "As Christ died for us, and was buried, so also do we believe that he descended to the lower regions (ad inferos). For his body, reposing in the sepulchre until its resurrection, his Spirit having departed from it, was with the spirits which were detained in prison or in hell, (in carcere sive in inferno,) and preached to them as St. Peter declares." Without adducing further instances from these great standards of the doctrines set forth in the Reformation, we may say that the literal descent of Christ's spirit to the regions of the departed souls, is recognized and set forth by nearly all of them that none dispute the fact; though few pretend to analyze and explain it. Any attempts, therefore, wholly to spiritualize and sublimate the declarations of Scripture on this point, find no countenance whatever with the venerated standards of the Protestant faith.

With equal unanimity do the Fathers of the church teach the literal interpretation of Christ's Descent; and though their opinions are no more valuable than those of other wise and good men, they, however, deserve to be regarded with deference. Says Irenæus: "Our Lord obeyed the law of the dead, that he might become the first born of the departed, and delayed three days in the lower regions; whilst he remained in the midst of the shades of death, where were the souls of the dead," (1. v. in fine.) Says Clemens: "Our Lord preached to those who were among the lost," (Stromata, 1. vi.) Athanasius says: "The body of Christ was not laid in

vain in the grave,