And Hell and Heaven are not the equivalents
Of earth’s iniquities and righteousness.
Can those who are idolators defraud
God of His worship? who adore the world,
Gold, or as savages, the stars and Heaven,
And Elements of Earth? None worship Him,
But with and in His spirit. Nought attains
His love but that proceedeth from it first.
His praise is everlasting in all worlds
And starry ages of eternity.
Can they who covet the world’s worthiest goods,
Wealth, honour, power, knowledge, rank, or aught
Merit eternal torment for a sin
Wherewith is bound the world’s prosperity
And human glory? Nought eternal is
But that which is of God. All pain and woe
Are therefore finite. Can the robber steal
From God or Heaven a thing or from the soul?
Or the deflowerer desecrate and undo
The espousals of the spirit with its Lord?
How weak is virtue, then, and vice, how vain!
How wretched human righteousness—and sin,
How despicable to the soul assured,
Since neither hath a recompense. The one
By Him destroyed who can alone unmake
That He hath made; the other perfected,
United, Deified in God the son
With His own nature. Infinite Universe!
Thou hast no like, no second favourite
To mortal man of God’s.
What mean the words
Of yonder fiendish chant, there?
Words and shaped
Are equally as soon assumed by spirits.
What mean my words to thee?
In sooth, I know not.
I am constrained to hear them.
As for these!—
It is a fire of soul in which they burn,
And by which they are purified from sin—
Rid of the grossness which had gathered round them,
And burned again into their virgin brightness.
All things work round like worlds. The orb of Hell
Hath yet its place in Heaven as thine and all.
But, as a spiritual quality,
As spirit is the substance of all matter—
Hidden or open, heatlike doth inhere
In all existence—or for good or ill.
Look at yon spirit.
What was it brought thee hither?
I was an angel once, ages agone;
But doing good and glorifying not
God, who empowered me, He sent me here
To fire the proud spot from my heart.
And when
Wilt thou do this, and own thou hast wronged God?
I do repent me, and confess it now.
I will not ask God now to let me be
What once I was; but might I only sit
A footstool for some other worthier far
Who owneth now my throne, I should be happy—
Far happier than I was in my proud prayers,
That God would give me worlds on worlds to govern,
And in receiving all their prayers and blessings.
God! remember me! O save me!
See!
I do believe there is an angel coming
This way from Heaven.
He comes to me—to me!
Hail, sufferer!
Sinner.
God hath bade me bring thee
Away to Heaven; thy throne is kept for thee;
And all the hosts of Heaven are on the wing
To welcome thee again.
I dare not come:
I am not worthy Heaven.
But God will make thee.
Spirit—farewell! and may we meet again
In better time and place.
Glory to God!
I go—farewell!—and I will speak of thee.
But, oh! repent! Be humble, and despair not. Angel and Spirit rise.
Oh! think, when all are judged, what hosts of souls
Will then be mine at last!—what wings of fire!
Deemest thou yet as mortal?
This is not
As thou didst speak of Hell, nor as I judged.
Hell is the wrath of God—His hate of sin.
God hates man’s nature; be it said of his
As of all beings!
How hate that He hath made?
The infinite opposition of Perfection
To imperfection leaves nor choice nor mean.
Thus the demeanour of thy world grieved God,
Till its destruction pleased Him, and its name
Was struck out of the starry scroll; thus all
Creation worketh infinite grief in Time.
When human nature is most perfect, then
Its fall is nearest, as of ripest fruit.
Man’s pleasure in the world—to both of which
His nature is made fit—is not of God,
Save theirs on whom His spirit He bestows,
As in a twilight between earth and Heaven,
A promissory Being unfulfilled—
But still how glorious to the stone-blind world.
This is in time, but in eternity,
He raises, remakes, adds to all He made
His own immortalizing love and grace,
Which keeps them ever pure as is the sea,
And incorruptible in godly will.
The bliss of God and man originates,
Unites, and ends in self—in Deity:
To whom is neither motive—good—nor end
Greater or less or other than Himself.
But how can the Creator glory find
In Hell, or creature, good—if God be Love,
Or man a being salvable? Oh, say!
But who comes hither?
It is the Son of God!—
Omnipotent! before whose steadfast feet
The thrones of Heaven, which hoped to have o’erthrown thine,
But now all strengthless, hopeless, Godless here,
Rose once and ebbed forever, even these
Deep in their fiery abyss of woe
Unbent, unbettered will again rush forth
In all the might of madness and despair,
To prove their hatred of Thee and Thy love.
Salvation is the scorn of Angels here.
What dost Thou here, not having sinned?
For men
I bore with death—for fiends I bear with sin;
And death and sin are each the pain I pay
For the love which brought me down from Heaven to save
Both men and devils; and the Father makes
And orders every instant what is best.
This is God’s truth: Hell feels a moment cool.
Hell is His justice—Heaven is His love—
Earth His long suffering: all tbe world is but
A quality of God; therefore come I
To temper these—to give to justice, mercy;
And to long-suffering, longer. Heaven is mine
By birthright. Lo! I am the heir of God:
He hath given all things to me. I have made
The earth mine own, and all yon countless worlds,
And all the souls therein; yea, soul by soul,
And world by world, have I redeemed them all—
One by one through eternity, or given
The means of their salvation: why not, then,
Hell?
Every spirit is to be redeemed.
Mortal! it has: the best and worst need one
And same salvation. There is nothing final
In all this world but God; therefore these souls
Whom I see here, and pity for their woes—
But for their
