"Is there a penny-post, do you think, in the world to come? Do people there write for autographs to those who have gained a little notoriety? Do women there send letters asking for money? Do boys persecute literary men with requests for a course of reading? Are there offices in that sphere which are coveted, and to obtain which men are pestered to write letters of recommendation? If anything of this kind takes place in the spirit-world it may, perhaps, be of a purgatorial nature, or perhaps be the fate of the incorrigible sinner. Here on earth this discipline never ends; and if it exists at all in the other world, it is of a kind which will, of course, never cease. On this account I am inclined to believe that the punishment for sin may be of endless duration; for here the annoyances and miseries which I have mentioned only cease with death, and in the other world, where there is no death, they will, of course, never come to an end." To another correspondent he writes:-- "How is it in the world to come? Will patience have had her perfect work in this sphere, or is the virtue to be exercised there, until we shall have acquired an evenness of temper which no possible provocation can disturb? Are the bores to be all penned in a corner by themselves, or are they to be let loose to educate the saints to the sublimest degree of patience of which our nature is capable? These are deep questions. I do not remember that you have given any special attention to the use of bores in the moral government of the world in your book on 'The Problem of Human Destiny.' I admit their utility as a class: they serve a most excellent purpose; but whether we are to be annoyed with them in the next world is the doubt. Some of them are most worthy people, and capital Christians, and cannot be kept out of Paradise; but will they be allowed to torment the elect there?"