ith
innocence to start with in this life a man does not become godly, what
prospect is there that in the next world, starting with sin, there
would be a seraph evoluted? Surely the sculptor has more prospect of
making a fine statue out of a block of pure white Parian marble than
out of an old black rock seamed and cracked with the storms of a half
century. Surely upon a clean, white sheet of paper it is easier to
write a deed or a will than upon a sheet of paper all scribbled and
blotted and torn from top to bottom. Yet men seem to think that,
though the life that began here comparatively perfect turned out
badly, the next life will succeed, though it starts with a dead
failure.

"But," says some one, "I think we ought to have a chance in the next
life, because this life is so short it allows only small opportunity.
We hardly have time to turn around between cradle and tomb, the wood
of the one almost touching the marble of the other." But do you know
what made the ancient deluge a necessity? It was the longevity of the
antediluvians. They were worse in the second century of their
life-time than in the first hundred years, and still worse in the
third century, and still worse all the way on to seven, eight, and
nine hundred years, and the earth had to be washed, and scrubbed, and
soaked, and anchored, clear out of sight for more than a month before
it could be made fit for decent people to live in. Longevity never
cures impenitency. All the pictures of Time represent him with a
scythe to cut, but I never saw any picture of Time with a case of
medicines to heal. Seneca says that Nero for the first five years of
his public life was set up for an example of clemency and kindness,
but his path all the way descended until at sixty-eight he became a
suicide. If eight hundred years did not make antediluvians any better,
but only made them worse, the ages of eternity could have no effect
except prolongation of depravity.

"But," says some one, "in the future state evil surroundings will be
withdrawn and elevated influences substituted, and hence expurgation,
and sublimation, and glorification." But the righteous, all their sins
forgiven, have passed on into a beatific state, and consequently the
unsaved will be left alone. It can not be expected that Doctor Duff,
who exhausted himself in teaching Hindoos the way to heaven, and
Doctor Abeel, who gave his life in the evangelization of China, and
Adoniram Judson, who toiled for