elling scenes and midnight revels. But the worst man inhabitating the lowest purlieus of sin stands a better chance of reformation by being transferred to better moral environments. England for the last fifty years has been transporting her criminals to Australia. This class of persons includes, of course, the most depraved portion of her population — the outcasts of society, those who are guilty of every species of crime, and dangerous to the safety of the community. Banished from their native country, they form a colony of their own in a distant island. The result is that this criminal class are morally benefitted by the change. In their new homes, under new circumstances, they become, as a whole, orderly and upright citizens. A decided change takes place in their moral characters. Conceding, therefore, that the moral condition of the soul is precisely the same after, as previous to its introduction into the immortal life, are we not in our estimate of its future course to give due weight to the amazing difference of its surroundings in that life compared with its terrestrial environments? Should we not wisely take into the account the wonderful contrast in modes of life and organization that follow it to its new abode ? We must assuredly admit that a great and remarkable change has occurred in these respects, if in no other. And in a moral point of view the change is decidedly to the advantage of sin-burdened humanity. The soul has entered upon an entirely new existence an existence that is as much unlike the present as light differs from darkness, or the spiritual from the material — a world of new opportunities, new powers, grander helps and possibilities. And is all this to count for nothing in our theological computations? Are we to say that these furnish no evidence or prophecy of a moral renovation? It seems hardly possible that any candid mind that seriously contemplates the stupendous transformation of these psychological, to say nothing of moral relations to which the emancipated spirit is subjected, can fail to escape the conviction that such a complete revolution must carry with it certain elements and forces of a moral and sanitary nature. All the tendencies of such a radical change of worlds, are in the interest of righteousness, all its conditions favorable to moral victory, all its scenes and voices conspire to incite and assist its subjects in an upward direction. As we have already hinted, the course that vitiates the whole process of ratiocination on this question, is the assumption that the future world is simply a counterpart of the present; that man will be liable to the same errors, beset by the same forms of evil, possess the same desires in the one life as in the other. The stereotyped form of stating the question is, that since man is a sinner in this life he will therefore be a sinner in the life to come. Archimedes could move the world had he a place on which to rest a lever. But the advocates of post mortem sinfulness in their theological feat of proving the truth of their theory, set at defiance these cool calculations of the Greek mathematician; they attempt to move the world of thought on this subject without any fulcrum or base at all. Any kind of opinion can be established in the realm of truth, provided there is solid data on which to build the superstruc ture of an argument. Certainly no deduction can be more sound, than that if the immortal life is anything like the mortal, then the same moral conditions will exist, and the same consequences will follow there that we witness here. But unfortunately for the validity of the argument the immortal life is totally unlike the mortal. The contrast between the two states of being is vast and incomparable. From the nature of things they cannot bear the slightest analogy to each other. In all their essential constituent qualities, forms, and structure, they must differ as the terrestrial differs from the spiritual. Wherein then is the justice or logic of the statement that since certain events occur in this world they must necessarily transpire in the next? We should deem that person not far from the verge of lunacy who should assert that since the inhabitants of Greenland hunted the walrus and clothed themselves in heavy furs, being conveyed to Borneo or Brazil, in the regions of the torrid zone, they would there28 NEW SERIES. VOL. XXIV. fore live and dress in the same manner. And what would be thought of the declaration that because a man pursued a certain secular employment on this globe, if by any process he should become a resident of the planet Uranus, he would therefore follow the same employment? His long training, tastes, and habits, might induce him to take up his old occupation in that distant world. But on his arrival there he might possibly find an entirely new state of affairs, a complete change of physical conditions, a new class of people with dif ferent wants and ideas, and therefore no demand whatever for anything in his former lines of business. What then, would this emigrant be likely to follow his old calling in his new home? By no means. And why? He is substantially the same person that he was on this globe. The circumstances, however, are not substantially the same; and this consideration changes the whole aspect of the case. And finding no use for his brain or hands in the old channels, his talents will develop on new lines, and his tastes blossom into new forms of action. These are but faint illustrations of the untenable nature of the proposition that since certain transactions happen in this earthly state under certain circumstances, therefore similar events must occur in the future life under new and altogether different conditions. The dullest comprehension must discern the weakness of such logic. And yet this is the common ground on which the hypothesis of the existence of moral corruption in a purely immortal life is maintained. But as it will be seen, the force of the argument consists chiefly in the amount of courage that is displayed in assuming all the necessary data. Not admitting, however, the validity of the assumption which makes the future world a propotype of this corruptible state, we arrive at a widely different conclusion. There is enclosed, we believe, in the grand fact of immortality, a mighty significance, which, when considered in all its aspects and disclosures - when, indeed, its full light is turned on to certain theological traditions, it must scatter them as the mists and spectres of the night are driven before the rising sun. A change which strips the soul of these mortal vestments and clothes it with a spiritual body, that removes it from the dominion of its earthly appetites and infirmities, and translates it to a sphere of new forces and new revelations and realities, can have no insignificant influence upon its moral status. Such a change not only implies a transformation of worlds, but also, in many important relations, a radical change in ideas, desires, motives and activities. This failure to give due weight to the natural possibilities and indications of a life that is immortal, and from the nature of the case insensuous, is a prolific source of many errors existing in the Christian church on this general subject. The church has been slow in throwing off a long list of doctrinal corruptions that it has inherited from an uncivilized age and half savage races. Among these is this material conception of the future state-that a change of worlds causes no particular change in modes of thinking and living. This is the barbaric notion. The untutored Indian believed on his exit from this life that he should go to pleasant hunting grounds, and retain the faithful company of his dog. The ancient inhabitants of Hispaniola located their elysium in a fertile valley abounding with grass, delicious fruits, cool shades, and murmuring rivulets. The Patagonians held that the stars are their translated countrymen, and the milky way is a field where they hunt ostriches. Scandinavians believed that those who died in battle were the chosen of Odin, "In whose halls of gold The steel clad ghosts their wonted orgies hold. In clamorous fray they grasp their gleaming swords, By turns renew the banquet and the fight. But without further quotations we can aver in fact that these material and sensuous conceptions of a future state were common among all barbaric races of men. And this idea that the future world is simply a duplicate of the present, built upon the same plan, run in the same grooves, a repetition of crime and wrong, only on a more extended and hope less plane, that pervades much of Christian theology, bears a striking resemblance to these savage ideas. And it is hardly necessary to add that not until more consistent views are entertained concerning the mode of existence beyond the grave -views more in keeping with its immaterial structure and spiritual atmosphere, can there be in these visions of hope that entereth within the vail any increased beauty or brightness, or in the theology of the church any great improveRev. Varnum Lincoln. ment. ARTICLE XXVII. Lawbreakers' Rights and Wrongs. HE upon whom the law had its grip was, in the old day, in the worst possible straits. The officers of the law had no further thought than to secure him, and he must depend upon his friends for the comforts, even the necessaries, of life. He had no rights which any were bound to respect. As soon, however, as Christianity became a power, efforts were made to ameliorate the condition of those in prison, through legal enactment. In 320, A. D., Constantine directed that "those accused of crimes should be examined with promptness, and not be detained in con finement, while those arrested should be confined in a humane manner. The cells should be furnished with means for light and air. Persons under accusation should not be put into jails, nor scourged, but placed under military arrest, and in a prison open to the light." Twenty years later a law for bade the commingling of the sexes in a common jail. Later still, local magistrates and church officials were directed to visit the prisons regularly and inquire into their management. Thus early was a good work begun, but for centuries it languished. Compare the condition of the prisons of Europe in the middle of the eighteenth century with those of Rome in |