10. So far is this "hope" from being a new doctrine, that I have shown it to be far more primitive, and far more catholic, than that by which in the last three centuries it has been superseded. It has been in every age of the Church demonstrably permissible.1 It has been held by some of the greatest teachers of the Church. It has been held in the earliest days of the Church. It was never directly or indirectly condemned,-though it was known to be most widely prevalent,-by any decree of the four œcumenical councils, whose decisions are alone recognised as valid by the English Church. It has never been condemned by any decree of any œcumenical council.5 In some form or other it enters into the faith of by far the greatest part of Christendom, being involved in the belief of some intermediate state between death and judgment, both in the Greek and Romish Church. It is therefore a doctrine, not only in better accord with man's instinctive belief in the justice and mercy of God, but also far more scriptural and far more catholic than the later views of

1 See pp. 159, 166.

2 See pp. 156-183.

3 See p. 155, and the Pastor of Hermes, iii. 278.
5 See p. 159. 6 See p. 179.

4 See p. 166.

号

the condition of the lost which mainly became current in the Church through the arguments of St. Augustine. These later and darker views, with many terrible accretions and inferences, are more hopelessly unalleviated than those which even St. Augustine did but waveringly maintain. It is a matter for sincere regret, and it is a grave source of future peril, that these views in their darkest form should now be dogmatically urged, not only by competent divines but even by those who are wholly incapable of understanding the merest elements of the controversy; and not only as matters of opinion-which they are-but as matters of faith, which most unquestionably they are not.

ST. MARGARET'S RECTORY, WESTMINSTER,
April 12, 1878.

PREFACE TO THE FIRST

EDITION.

THE complaint of Origen as to the misrepresentation of his real views alike by friends and opponents, which stands on the title-page of this volume, will exactly express my reason for publishing it. Most unexpectedly, most reluctantly, I find myself entangled in a controversy into which I should not have voluntarily entered without buckling on armour of stronger temper and securer rivets than I can, at this sudden call, find ready to hand. These sermons were never intended for publication. They were preached in the ordinary course of my duties, and I refused multitudes of requests to give them a wider publicity, until it became necessary to do so in simple self-defence against the many perversions of my real views, which were prevalent among those who had not heard the sermons,

or those who reported them imperfectly and errone ously. The notes and appendices were not prepared beforehand, but written in the very brief and incessantly occupied space of time which intervened between my decision to publish them and their actual appearance. Of the truths here propounded I have never since my early youth had the slightest doubt; but had I intended any controversial defence of them, it would have been far fuller and more impregnable than I now can make it. If, in mere collateral matters, I have made any slips, the candid reader (and to such only I

1 In drawing them up I have received some assistance from books which have since been kindly sent me, mostly by their authors, but not one of which I had previously read. Of the arguments of these writers I have made little or no use, but I have borrowed some of their quotations. Among these I may mention especially Mr. Jukes's Restitution of All Things, a singularly calm, devout, and thoughtful treatise; Dr. Dewes's Plea for a Rational Translation; the Rev. H. N. Oxenham's Catholic Eschatology; and the Rev. C. Clemance's Future Punishment. The Rev. S. Minton kindly sent me his Glory of Christ, and other publications; the Rev. E. White his Life in Christ; and I have also had lent to me The Perishing Soul, by Mr. Denniston; the Rev. Prebendary Constable's Duration of Future Punishment; and numerous pamphlets, for which my best thanks are due to the authors.