A brilliant French writer has suggested that even if the natural course of evolution does of itself necessitate the final destruction of the world, yet our race, judging from the magnificent achievements of science and art already reached, may, within ten thousand centuries, which will be long before the foreseen end approaches, obtain such a knowledge and control of the forces of nature as to make collective humanity master of this planet, able to shape and guide its destinies, ward off every fatal crisis, and perfect and immortalize the system as now sustained. It is an audacious fancy. But like many other incredible conceptions which have forerun their own still more incredible fulfillment, the very thought electrifies us with hope and courage.
And thus the conclusion in which we rest at the close of our investigation is the belief that the world is to last, and our race to flourish on it virtually forever. This conclusion is equally a relief from the frightful burdens of superstition, and a consolation for our own personal evanescence. The stable harmony of natural beauty and beneficence, amidst which we individually play our brief part and vanish, shall stand fast, blooming with fresh growths, and shining with fadeless light, and the successive generations of our dear fellow men shall grow ever wiser and happier, beyond the reach of our farthest vision into the future. And if we recognize in the great catastrophic myths and previsions of the poets and scientists the fundamental truth that the things which are seen are temporal, while the things alone which are unseen are eternal, the end being a regular and remote sequel in the creative plan of God, free from anger, retributive disappointment, or cruelty will not alarm us. For if souls are substantial entities, and not mere phenomenal processes, they will survive the universal crisis, and either at the lucid goals of their perfected destiny rejoice forever in a reflected individual fruition of the attributes of God, or else start refreshed on a new career with that redistribution of the cosmic matter and motion which in its gigantic and eternal rhythm of development and dissolution the ancient Hindu mind figured as the respiration of Brahm and which ambitious science now generalizes as the law of evolution.
CHAPTER II.
THE DAY OF JUDGMENT.
JUDAISM so largely supplied the circumstantial and doctrinal germs out of which dogmatic Christianity grew, that we cannot thoroughly understand the Christian belief in a final day of judgment, unless we first notice the historic and literary derivation of that belief from Judaism, and then trace its development in the new conditions through which it passed. The personal character, teachings, life, and death of Jesus Christ, together with his subsequent resurrection and career in the consciousness of ecclesiastical Christendom, constituted the crystalizing centre which, dipped in the inherited solution of ideal and social materials furnished by the Church, has gathered around it the accretion of faith and dogma composing the theoretic Christianity of the present day. To follow this process with reference to the particular tenet before us, analyze it, discriminate the appropriate in it from the inappropriate, the true from the false, maybe difficult; but it is necessary for a satisfactory conclusion. To this task let us therefore now address ourselves, putting away all bias and prejudice, invoking in equal degree candor, fearlessness and charity.
The Jews believed themselves to be a people chosen out of all the world as the exclusive favorites of God. By the covenant of Abraham, and the code of Moses, Jehovah had entered, as they thought, into a special contract with them to be their peculiar God, Guardian, and Ruler. In contrast with the depraved habits and idolatrous rites of the heathen nations, the Israelites were strictly to keep the moral law, and, at the same time, to pay a pure worship to Jehovah through the scrupulous observance of their ceremonial law. The bond of race and family descent from Abraham, the practice of circumcision, and the ceremonies of the Mosaic ritual, sealed them as accepted members of this divine covenant. So long as they were true to the duties involved in this relation, Jehovah would watch over them, defend them from their enemies, set them proudly above the alien Gentiles, and crown them with every spiritual and temporal blessing. The noblest representatives of the people believed this with unparalleled thoroughness and intensity. They looked down on the uncircumcised nations as wicked idolaters, destined to be their servants until they should be adopted into the same covenant by becoming proselytes to their faith. Jehovah was literally their direct, though invisible, King, Law giver, and Judge, palpably rewarding their fidelity by overt temporal blessings, punishing their dereliction by awful temporal calamities and sufferings.
Every signal instance of his providential intervention in their affairs they called a Day of the Lord, a Coming of Jehovah, a Judgment from heaven. Thus the prophet Joel foretells the vengeance which God would take on Tyre and Sidon and Philistia, because they had assailed and scattered his people. "Behold the day of Jehovah cometh, the great and terrible day. And I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood and fire and pillars of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood. Then whosoever calleth on the name of Jehovah shall be delivered: for upon Mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be deliverance. I will contend with the Gentiles for my people, and will bring back the captives.
The multitudes, the multitudes in the valley of judgment: for the day of Jehovah is near in the valley of judgment." In a similar strain Isaiah prophesies against Edom: "Draw near, O ye nations, and hear! For the wrath of Jehovah is kindled against the nations, and he hath given up their armies to slaughter. The stench of their carcasses shall ascend, and the mountains shall melt with their blood. And all the hosts of heaven shall melt away; and all their host shall fall down, as the blighted fruit from the fig tree. For my sword shall rush drunk from heaven: behold, upon Edom shall it descend. For it is a day of vengeance from Jehovah. Her streams shall be turned into pitch, and her dust into brimstone, and her whole land shall become burning pitch. It shall lie waste forever, and none shall pass through it. The pelican and the hedgehog shall possess it; the heron and the raven shall dwell in it."
Tremendous and appalling as this imagery is, it is obvious that the whole meaning of it is earthly and temporal, a local judgment of Jehovah in vindication of his people against the heathen. And kindred judgments are threatened against his own people when they lapse into wickedness and idolatry. "Thus saith the Lord, Behold, I will wipe Jerusalem as a man wipeth a dish, wiping it and turning it upside down." "Jehovah appeareth as a hostile witness, the Lord from his holy place. Behold, Jehovah cometh forth from his dwelling place, and advanceth on the high places of the earth. The mountains melt under him, and the valleys cleave asunder like wax before the fire. For the sin of the house of Israel is all this."
Thus the earliest meaning of the phrase, Day of the Lord, or Day of Judgment, according to Biblical usage, was the occurrence of any severe calamity, either to the Jews, as a punishment for their apostasy; or to the Gentiles, as a punishment for their wickedness, or for their violent encroachment on the rights of the chosen people. These visitations of military disaster or political subjection, though purely local and temporal, are depicted in the most terrific images, such as flaming brimstone, falling stars, heaven and earth dissolving in darkness, blood, and fire. Ezekiel, alluding to the barbarous invasion headed by Prince Gog, represents Jehovah as declaring, "I will contend against him, and will rain fire and brimstone upon him and his hosts. Thus will I show myself in my greatness and glory before the eyes of many nations, and they shall know that I am Jehovah." The highly figurative character of this imagery must be apparent to every candid critic.