BELKNAP TO HAZARD.

Dover, February 19,1783.

My Dear Sir, — Your favours of the 17th and 29th ult. are arrived with the enclosed papers and books, for which I beg you to accept my thanks and those of my children. Your very kind attention to me and my concerns keeps a constant stream of gratitude and respect flowing from my heart.

As to Mr. Aitken, I am fully apprized of the superiority of his workmanship, and revere his moral character as you have delineated it. I wish he would pursue the Magazine or Register plan, and shall be ready to contribute my mite towTards it. If he would undertake the printing of my History, I should be fully satisfied that it would receive honour by coming out of his hands; and I know no person to whom I could entrust the correction of the press with fuller security than Mr. Hazard. I expect this week an answer from Mr. Hall, of Salem, who is the next best printer that I know of on this continent; and, when I hear from you again in answer to the queries I sent you about three weeks ago, I shall be able to come to some determination. But there is one point which must be settled: you ask, and I suppose Mr. Hall will ask, "How many would sell in N. II. and Massachusetts?" and this cannot be determined with any precision without a subscription. My present thought upon that matter is this: after I have received both yours and his answers, I will get subscription papers printed at my own expence, and circulate them through this and the neighbouring State; and I will send some of them to you, and, if you will disperse them by means of the mails into all parts where you think it probable the matter may meet with attention, I shall be under additional obligation to you. I will also set a time for their return into the office at Philadelphia, or the post-offices at Boston and Portsmouth (if the gentlemen who conduct those offices will give me leave), — perhaps three months, — by which time it is probable I may hear from England; and, when this is done, the way will be cleared for entering into an engagement about the printing work.

I beg you to return my respectful compliments to Ulysses (the father of Telemachus), for his very kind notice of me and my sentiments. That controversy is still carried on at Boston. Mr. Eccley has written in favour of the common doctrine a modest, sensible pamphlet, entitled "Divine Glory displayed in the Condemnation," &c. I have not the book, or would send it you. He has said some things very handsomely on the subject, and ad rem. Nothing has yet appeared on the side of the restitution since the first pamphlet, but the Murrayites are bestirring themselves, and reprinting "Kelly's Epistles." If there are no Greek types to be had in the country, I am afraid we shall not have Dr. C.'s MS. printed till it can be sent to England. The Plain gentleman I hear is about writing in the controversy. As to Dr. Sprout's objection, which Ulysses mentions, it is fully answered in Dr. C.'s MS.; but, as I have not now by me the minutes which I took from it, cannot give it to you; only in general I think he has said enough to convince anybody that the matter cannot be decided by criticism on ald)v and alcbvLos, or any combination of these famous words. For my part, I have no objection to the word eternal and everlasting in the most extensive sense that 'tis possible to affix to them when joined with fire, because I believe that the fire by which the future punishment will be effected was kindled at the creation, and is now subsisting within the globe, frequent ebullitions of it being seen in volcanoes; and that it will produce an universal conflagration, which by the Apostle Peter's description is intended for "the perdition of ungodly men;" and, after this perdition is effected, the same fire may continue (as the water has ever since Noah's flood), though under restraint, and may serve the most salutary purpose to the restored earth, as well as a memento to the redeemed of their salvation, and of the wrath of God due to sin; and, if there is a resurrection from the second as well as • the first death, the subjects of that event will receive a "late," indeed, but lasting, benefit by their resurrection, sufficient to warrant a benevolent Apostle in expressing his " hope" that there should be "a resurrection both of the just and the unjust'' To pursue this thought a little further, viz., that the eternal fire is no metaphor, I would observe that the descriptions which are given of future punishment in the Scripture are to my apprehension clearly illustrated in Sir William Hamilton's Description of Vesuvius, and Brydone's of Etna. What is "fire of brimstone " but the literal state of the earth when turned into an universal volcano? What is "blackness of darkness" but the smoke arising from the numberless apertures that will then be made? What is " the bottomless pit" but the continuation of the craters, and their union, so far as we know, in the centre of the globe? What is the "melting of the elements" but the discharge of liquid lava. What is the meaning of the wicked's " feet stumbling on the dark mountains" (Jer. xiii. 16) but their wandering among the volcanoes, void of light, and involved in darkness; and what other idea could Moses have when he wrote (Deut. xxxii. 22)? If it be said these are all metaphorical expressions, whose antetype may be the fire of volcanoes, I ask whether the conflagration described in the 2d Peter is a metaphor? And, if not (as I think it cannot be without reducing Noah's flood to a metaphor also), then I see no reason for departing from the literal sense of all those passages where the judgment of the last day is described by fire, and its known operations and effects on terrestrial bodies. You will ask, Where will

the saints be all this while? I answer, "caught up in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air/' somewhere out of reach of the devouring element till its fury is abated, and the "new heavens and earth" formed. Then the "New Jerusalem" will "come down from God out of heaven."

Is there any thing unnatural, unphilosophical in this interpretation? Is not the globe the proper habitation of man? Was it not, at first, a Paradise? Was it not once turned into a place of punishment for its inhabitants? and is it not now "kept in store" for the same end, and is it not capable of reverting to its ancient primitive, paradisaic state, and then to be an " habitation of righteousness "? — and all this only by undergoing such changes as can be effected by material agents, already in being under the direction of the great Author, the? moral purpose of which is to advance his glory and the full establishment of his Son's kingdom. A word also on this subject. The kingdom of Christ is said to be "everlasting," i.e. it shall never "be destroyed," nor "pass away;" yet we read of its " end," 1 Cor. xv., and " delivering up to the Father." May not the meaning be to contrast the kingdom of Christ with the kingdoms of this world? They are made by the power and strength and wisdom of man, as the image of Nebuchadnezzar was an artificial production, but the kingdom of Christ was " cut out without hands." Thus they are unlike in their original; so they are in their event. Temporal kingdoms are set up (forgive me the expression) by way of experiment; but, as they do not answer the moral ends of government, but degenerate into tyranny, cruelty, &c, they are destroyed and come to nought. But the kingdom of Christ will answer these ends, will overcome all evil and advance all good in a moral sense, therefore it will end in a different manner, i.e. will end in complete perfection; for, when "all enemies are subdued," the object will be attained, and universal rectitude, peace, and happiness be the final result. These are some of my present thoughts. You can, I believe, pick out my meaning; and, if you find any thing repugnant to Scripture or Philosophy, I beg you will point it out.

Letitia has attacked a respectable body with weapons more powerful than the thunder of cannon. How they will defend themselves I know not. I hope it will not be by prosecuting her for a libeller. Female virulence, edged by disappointment, and supported by truth, is indeed no contemptible adversary.

I am much obliged by your account of the different sects of Presbyterians, and explanation of some of the cabalistic terms in your newspapers. I wish there was less party spirit, and more of a public one. Dickinson is certainly a fine writer; and, if (as I hope) he has an honest mind, he may rest satisfied with saying what he has. His answer to the 1st charge containing the reasons against Independence (at that time) is a proper state paper. I wish I could see something that was said in the debate on the other side of that famous question. Pray, is this Mr. Dickinson a son of the first president of N. Jersey College?

The papers about the Louisbourg Expedition will afford me a hint, and J shall soon return them.

I might have taken into my description of the eternal fire the electric fluid, which is known to be a most powerful as well as universal principle of dissolution to terrestrial bodies, and which will probably co-operate to produce some of the mentioned effects at the last day, particularly the poifyhov (2 Pet. iii. 10) or " great noise " in the heavens. This remark may also help us to understand what is said of Sodom and Gomorrah suffering the vengeance of eternal fire. In short, the word eternal has an aspect both ways, or, as the Schoolmen express it, a parte ante and a parte post; and, if eternal fire be understood as coeval

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