st the beloved city, they were _devoured by
fire_ from God out of heaven. Accordingly their destruction is
identical with the second death.

2 Peter ii. 20, 21, is a passage of like import to that just
considered. It is therein asserted of those who are overcome by the
pollutions of the world after having escaped them through the knowledge
of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, that "it had been {84} better for
them not to have known the way of righteousness, than, after they have
known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered to them." This
may be taken to signify that the punishment in the day of judgment
consequent upon sin and error arising out of ignorance, will be "more
tolerable" than that which will be inflicted on those who have
knowingly apostatized from the way of truth.

What is said in Matt. xviii. 6, "Whoso shall offend one of these little
ones that believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were
hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the
sea," may be accounted for on the principle that any form of death of
which the body is susceptible in this world is rather to be endured,
and less to be feared, than the punishment which, through the judgment
in the world to come, awaits the enemies of Christ who put a
stumbling-block in the way of them that humble themselves as little
children and believe on him.

Analogous principles may be applied to account for the declarations
made in Scripture respecting blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. In St.
Matt. xii. 31, 82, it is recorded that our Lord said, "All sin and
blasphemy shall be forgiven to men, but the blasphemy of the Spirit
shall not be forgiven to men. And whoever speaketh a word against the
Son of man, it shall be forgiven him; but whoever speaketh against the
Holy Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him, {85} neither in this world,
nor in the world to come." The same doctrine is thus expressed in St.
Mark iii. 28, 29: "Verily I say to you, all sins shall be forgiven to
the sons of men, and all blasphemies whatever wherewith they may
blaspheme. But whoever shall blaspheme against the Holy Ghost hath
never forgiveness," but is subject to the judgment in the future _aion_
(_enochos estin aioniou kriseos_). From the latter evangelist we also
learn that our Lord spoke these words because the scribes from
Jerusalem had said, "He hath an unclean spirit." It is particularly to
be noticed that both passages declare