Rev. Mr Spurgeon says that everywhere in hell will be written the words "for ever." They will be branded on every wave of flame, they will be forged in every link of every chain, they will be seen in every lurid flash of brimstone—everywhere will be those words "for ever." Everybody will be yelling and screaming them. Just think of that picture of the mercy and justice of the eternal Father of us all. If these words are necessary why are they not written now everywhere in the world, on every tree, and every field, and on every blade of grass? I say I am entitled to have it so. I say that, it is God's duty to furnish me with the evidence. In old times they had to find a place for hell, and they found a hundred places for it. One says that it was under Lake Avernus, but the Christian thought differently. One divine tells us that it must be below the earth because Christ descended into hell. Another gives it as his opinion that hell is in the sun, and he tells us that nobody, without an express revelation from God, can prove that it is not there. Most likely. Well, he had the idea at all events of utilizing the damned as fuel to warm the earth. Another divine preached a sermon no further back than 1876, in which he said that the damned will grow worse, and the same divine says that the devil was the first Universalist. Then I am on the side of the devil.
The fact is, that you have got not merely to believe the Bible, but you must also believe in a certain interpretation of it, and, mind you, you must also believe in the doctrine of the Trinity. If you don't understand it, it is your own fault. You must believe in it all the same. If you do not, all the orthodox churches agree in condemning you to everlasting flames. We have got to burn through all our lives simply with the view of making them happy. We are taught to love our enemies, to pray for those that persecute us, to forgive. Should not the merciful God practice what he preaches? I say that reverently. Why should he say "Forgive your enemies" if he will not himself forgive? Why should he say "Pray for those that despise and persecute you, but if they refuse to believe my doctrine I will burn them for ever?" I cannot believe it. Here is a little child, residing in the purlieus of the city—some little boy who is taught that it is his duty to steal by his mother who applauds his success, and pats him on the head and calls him a good boy—would it be just to condemn him to an eternity of torture? Suppose there is a God; let us bring to this question some common sense.
I care nothing about the doctrines or religions or creeds of the past. Let us come to the bar of the nineteenth century and judge the matter by what we know, by what we think, by what we love. But they say to us, "If you throw away the Bible what are we to depend on then?" But no two persons in the world agree as to what the Bible is, what they are to believe, or what they are not to believe. It is like a guide-post that has been thrown down in some time of disaster, and has been put up the wrong way. Nobody can accept its guidance, for nobody knows where it would direct him. I say, "Tear down the useless guide-post," but they answer, "Oh, do not do that or we will have nothing to go by." I would say, "Old Church, you take that road, and I will take this." Another minister has said that the Bible is the great town-clock, at which we may all set our watches. But I have said to a friend of that minister, "Suppose we all should set our watches by that town-clock, there would be many persons to tell you that in old times the long hand was the hour hand, and beside, the clock hasn't been wound up for a long time." I say, let us wait till the sun rises and set our watches by nature. For my part, I am willing to give up heaven to get rid of hell. I had rather there should be no heaven than that any solitary soul should be condemned to suffer for ever and ever. But they tell me that the Bible is the book of hope. Now, in the Old Testament there is not, in my judgment, a single reference to another life. Is there a burial-service mentioned in it in which a word of hope is spoken at the grave of the dead? The idea of eternal life was not born of any book. That wave of hope and joy ebbs and flows, and will continue to ebb and flow as long as love kisses the lips of death.
Let me tell you a tale of the Persian religion—of a man who, having done good for long years of his life, presented himself at the gates of Paradise, but the gates remained closed against him. He went back and followed up his good works for seven years longer, and the gates of Paradise still remaining shut against him, he toiled in works of charity until at last they were opened unto him. Think of that, and send out your missionaries among those people. There is no religion but goodness, but justice, but charity. Religion is not theory—it is life. It is not intellectual conviction—it is divine humanity, and nothing else. There is another tale from the Hindoo of a man who refused to enter Paradise without a faithful dog, urging that ingratitude was the blackest of all sins. "And the god," he said, "admitted him, dog and all." Compare that religion with the orthodox tenets of the city of New York.
There is a prayer which every Brahmin prays, in which he declares that he will never enter into a final state of bliss alone, but that everywhere he will strive for universal redemption; that never will he leave the world of sin and sorrow, but remain suffering and striving and sorrowing after universal salvation. Compare that with the orthodox idea, and send out your missionaries to the benighted Hindoos.
The doctrine of hell is infamous beyond all power to express. I wish there were words mean enough to express my feelings of loathing on this subject. What harm has it not done? What waste places has it not made? It has planted misery and wretchedness in this world; it peoples the future with selfish joys and lurid abysses of eternal flame. But we are getting more sense every day. We begin to despise those monstrous doctrines. If you want to better men and women change their conditions here. Don't promise them something somewhere else. One biscuit will do more good than all the tracts that were ever peddled in the world. Give them more whitewash, more light, more air. You have to change men physically before you change them intellectually.
I believe the time will come when every criminal will be treated as we now treat the diseased and sick, when every penitentiary will become a reformatory; and that if criminals go to them with hatred in their bosoms, they will leave them without feelings of revenge. Let me tell you the story of Orpheus and Eurydice. Eurydice had been carried away by the god of hell, and Orpheus, her lover, went in quest of her. He took with him his lyre, and played such exquisite music that all hell was amazed. Ixion forgot his labours at the wheel, the daughters of Danaus ceased from their hopeless task, Tantalus forgot his thirst, even Pluto smiled, and, for the first time in the history of hell, the eyes of the Furies were wet with tears. As it was with the lyre of Orpheus, so it is to-day with the great harmonies of science, which are rescuing from the prisons of superstition the torn and bleeding heart of man.