vid was a prophet of God; he
must have known whether it would be ill or well for Amnon in the world to
come. What were the expressions of his heart? 'The soul of King David
longed to go forth unto Absalom: for he was comforted concerning Amnon,
seeing he was dead.'

"And what is the inference to be deduced from this language? Is it not
that endless suffering formed no part of his religious belief? So we
conceive; and here we discover a triumphant argument in support of the
more pleasing, more enlightened, more benevolent hypothesis of ultimate
universal purity and peace. He was comforted, seeing his son was dead. And
why so? Because by the eye of prophecy he could look forward into the
glorious future, and see that son far removed from all temptations,
released from the bondage and purified from the corruptions of sin, and
after being made sufficiently holy and enlightened, admitted to the
assembly of ascended and rejoicing spirits. His only comfort was, that in
being removed from the present state of sin and suffering, his beloved son
had gone where the loftiest breathings of the Holy Spirit would be shed
upon his darkened soul; where his mind would be unfolded to the wisdom of
heaven and the sweet raptures of immortal love, and thus prepared with a
sanctified nature to enjoy the rest and society of the heavenly
inheritance.

"In these thoughts we would be understood to believe that the salvation of
heaven depends upon nothing which we can do in this life; neither upon a
present change of heart, nor upon present belief, or a present profession
of religion."

Thus does the professed minister of Christ reiterate the falsehood uttered
by the serpent in Eden, "Ye shall not surely die." "In the day ye eat
thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods." He
declares that the vilest of sinners,--the murderer, the thief, and the
adulterer,--will after death be prepared to enter into immortal bliss.

And from what does this perverter of the Scriptures draw his conclusions?
From a single sentence expressing David's submission to the dispensation
of Providence. His soul "longed to go forth unto Absalom: for he was
comforted concerning Amnon, seeing he was dead." The poignancy of his
grief having been softened by time, his thoughts turned from the dead to
the living son, self-banished through fear of the just punishment of his
crime. And this is the evidence that the incestuous, drunken Amnon was at
death imm