The reason which gives to this word _aeonian_ what I do not scruple to call a _dreadful_ importance, is the same reason, and no other, which prompted the dishonesty concerned in the ordinary interpretation of this word. The word happened to connect itself--but _that_ was no practical concern of mine; me it had not biassed in the one direction, nor should it have biassed any just critic in the counter, direction--happened, I say, to connect itself with the ancient dispute upon the _duration_ of future punishments. What was meant by the _aeonian_ punishments in the next world? Was the proper sense of the word _eternal_, or was it not? I, for my part, meddled not, nor upon any consideration could have been tempted to meddle, with a speculation repellent alike by the horror and by the hopeless mystery which invest it. Secrets of the prison-house, so afflicting to contemplate steadily, and so hopeless of solution, there could be no proper motive for investigating, unless the investigation promised a great deal more than it could ever accomplish; and my own feeling as to all such problems is, that they vulgarize what, left to itself, would take its natural station amongst the freezing horrors that Shakspeare dismisses with so potent an expression of awe, in a well-known scene of 'Measure for Measure.' I reiterate my protest against being in any way decoyed into the controversy. Perhaps I may have a strong opinion upon the subject. But, anticipating the coarse discussions into which the slightest entertainment of such a question would be every moment approaching, once for all, out of reverential regard for the dignity of human nature, I beg permission to decline the controversy altogether.