nd liable to temptation. However this might be, we are assured
that they are confined in the infernal prison, and will continue
prisoners till the great day.

This is intimated by our Savior, when he warns the sinner to "agree
with his adversary quickly, while in the way with him--lest he should
be cast into prison"--because should this happen there will be no
release "till he shall pay the utmost farthing." This speaks the
state of impenitents, to be from the time of their death, that of
prisoners, who can neither break their prison, or obtain, so much as a
temporary release, till they shall have suffered all their demerits.

The same is intimated in the parable of the rich man Lazarus. The rich
sinner is represented as passing, at death, into a place of torment,
and confinement, and as despairing of even a momentary enlargement.
Other wise he would not have requested that Lazarus might be sent to
warn his brethren who were then living on earth, but rather that he
might have gone himself. Him they would have known; and he could have
given them a feeling description of the miseries which living in
pleasure, regardless of the one thing needful, will draw after it.
Many advantages might have been expected from this personal appearance
to his brethren, but he preferred no such petition.

His prayer that Lazarus might be sent, was probably intended to
intimate that departed spirits remember their former state on earth,
and the relatives and acquaintance whom they leave upon it; that they
retain a concern for them; that they know that good spirits are used
of God to transact matters relative to their spiritual concerns, and
that those who die in their sins are kept in confinement, and not
permitted to go forth; no, not to warn fellow sinners, whom they have
left behind them.

This agrees with what is said by St. Peter, respecting the
antediluvians. He speaks of those as being "spirits in prison" in the
apostolic age, "who were disobedient, when the long suffering of God
waited with them, in the days of Noah."

It farther appears that their imprisonment is a state of darkness.
"Cast ye the unprofitable servant into outer darkness? to whom is
reserved the blackness of darkness forever." This darkness is probably
a contrast to the light enjoyed by glorified saints. They are
doubtless let into the purposes of heaven--to them the mystery of
divine providence is opened. They see and admire the wisdom and
goodness of God, in