The other doctrine maintains that God, having created the world and peopled it with inhabitants, will continue it in existence; and that though religion will in the "latter ages" decline, yet at length "the Lord will appear in the brightness of his glory," will destroy evil and false-hood among men,--restore the world to its first state of purity; and that it shall then for ever become one vast temple, from which a ceaseless song of praise shall continually arise; while its inhabitants, prepared and preparing for a higher state, shall pass in succession into the eternal rest of God; and that the earth shall therefore be a nursery for glory,--a place of trial for a continual race of candidates for heaven. This is a consummation worthy of the Creator,--worthy of the infinity of his nature and perfections,--worthy of the plan of redemption which He became incarnate to effect. It is agreeable to the dictates of the soundest reason, and in accordance with the hopes and wishes of every man who has not bowed down his reason to the idol of popular opinion. While the opposite tenet sets reason at defiance, makes the Bible teach what is practically absurd, and stands in opposition to the opinion of some of the most learned among its own advocates. We cannot conclude this little treatise more appropriately than in the words of a writer often quoted in these pages. "The doctrines or principles which I have stated and defended in this work, I believe to be the truths of God. Those against which I have argued, I believe to be either false or unproved. The doctrine which cannot stand the test of rational investigation, cannot be true. We have gone too far when we have said 'such and such doctrines should not be subjected to rational investigation, being doctrines of pure revelation.' I know no such doctrine in the Bible. The doctrines of the Scripture are doctrines of _eternal reason_; and they are revealed because they _are such_. Human reason could not have found them out; but when revealed, reason can both apprehend and comprehend them. It sees their perfect harmony among themselves, their agreement with the perfections of the Divine Nature, and their sovereign suitableness to the nature and state of man: thus reason approves and applauds. Some men cannot reason, and therefore they declaim against reason, and proscribe it in the examination of religious truth."