But, why do not infidels make an ado about infidels falling? They never fall! They have never attained to anything from which they can fall. They are at the bottom and there is nothing below them to which they can fall. We know of a case where an infidel has recently covered himself all over with slime, but nothing of consequence is said about it. Why not? If he had been a preacher of the gospel his case would have been published half round the world before now. But he is an infidel, and the idea of purity is not associated with infidelity, in the public mind. There is no noise about it. His brethren, infidels, bring him to no trial, call him to no account, appoint no committee, and have no examination of the case! Why not? He professed nothing, and they profess nothing. Such things do not disgrace them, or bring scandal on them.
[SPEAK PLEASANTLY.]
THE opponents of the truth will catch every unkind or unpleasant word; every unlovely expression or harsh sentence, and comment on it, in the absence of argument, and even divert attention from the main matter. We should, then, simply study how to present the truth, in the clearest, most agreeable and acceptable manner; how to show people the truth, convince them and enlist their souls in it. This is the great matter to study, and not how to avoid differences and not discuss them at all. We are studying how to practice this, and we desire all the friends of the Lord to study it and give the adversary no advantage.
[VARIOUS KINDS OF SCEPTICISM.]
SCEPTICS float in thin ether, if not some times in pure vacuum, in vast, unknown and unknowable regions of pure fancy and idle imagination. They roam in everlasting inquisitiveness in the immense realms of intangibles and invisibles. They are variously styled in New Testament terminology, “clouds without water,” “wandering stars,” “filthy dreamers,” etc., etc. They spend their time, confuse themselves and shatter their brains, in explaining “degrees in glory,” “degrees in punishment,” “different spheres,” “the possibility of holding converse with departed friends,” “the origin of sin,” “how God will overrule evil for the good of man and his own glory,” “the origin of the devil, if there be any,” or, “who made the devil,” or, “whether he is a real being, or only a personification of evil,” “whether God did not know, when he created man, that he would sin,” “why he created man, knowing that he would sin,” “whether he did not know, when he made man, who would be saved and who would be lost,” and, if he did, “why he created those he knew would be lost,” “whether angels are a distinct order of beings from men,” “whether we shall know each other in the eternal state,” “with what body the dead will be raised,” “whether the righteous and wicked will rise at the same time,” “where the spirit is between death and the resurrection,” “whether it is conscious, or can exist separate from the body,” “when the end of the world will be,” etc., etc.