82 Texts to be weighed, not counted. CHAP. 



one. The most obvious interpretation of the Messi- 

 anic prophecies of the Old Testament, for instance, 

 was that the Messiah should reign in warlike might 

 and glory or in peaceful splendour ; l it was by no 

 means obvious, until the prophecies were fulfilled, 

 that He would at first appear, not in the royal 

 majesty foretold by David, but in the guise of the 

 suffering Servant of God foretold by Isaiah ; 2 if 

 texts ought to be merely counted and not weighed, 

 the Jews were right to whom a crucified Christ was 

 a stumbling-block and an offence. 3 So it is with the 

 doctrine of a final restoration. If we are merely to 

 count texts, the doctrine of Holy Scripture is that the 

 future state is hopeless for the rejected of the present 

 dispensation ; that in them shall be fulfilled the 

 prayer of the Psalmist, " Let the sinners be consumed 

 out of the earth, and let the wicked be no more ; " 4 

 that their end shall be destruction of soul and body 

 in Gehenna; 5 not, indeed, endless existence in a state 

 of punishment, but final and hopeless destruction by 

 the vengeance of God. 6 But if we weigh texts instead 

 of merely counting them if we look below the sur- 

 face, and endeavour to read their inner meaning 



1 See Psalms ii. Ixxii. and ex. - Isaiah 1. and liii. 



3 See The Larger Hope, a sequel to Salvator Mundi, by 

 Samuel Cox, D.D. 



4 Psalm civ. 35. 5 Matt. x. 28. 



6 See Edward White's Life in Christ, which shows that the 

 great majority of the passages of Scripture where future judg- 

 ment is denounced, appear to teach that God's vengeance on 

 sinners will be finally and utterly destructive. 



