

E-text prepared by Al Haines



Transcriber's Note:

   The Greek words in this e-book have been transliterated according
   to Project Gutenberg's Greek How-To.  Such words are indicated
   with surrounding underscores.  There are a couple of instances
   of author-transliterated Greek words.  Those words are bracketed
   and not italicized.  Underscores are also used to indicate
   italicization of words, but in this e-book such words are always
   English words.





THE GOSPEL OF THE HEREAFTER

by

J. PATERSON-SMYTH, B.D., LL.D., LITT. D., D.C.L,

  _Rector of St. Georges, Montreal, Late Professor
  of Pastoral Theology, University of Dublin_

  _Author of "How We Got Our Bible," "The
  Old Documents and the New Bible," etc., etc., etc._







New York ---- Chicago ---- Toronto
Fleming H. Revell Company
London And Edinburgh

Copyright, 1910, by
Fleming H. Revell Company

New York: 158 Fifth Avenue
Chicago: 17 North Wabash Ave.
London: 21 Paternoster Square
Edinburgh: 75 Princes Street




_To My Wife_




Contents


PART I

THE NEAR HEREAFTER

    I.  "I"
   II.  THE THREE STAGES OF EXISTENCE
  III.  WHAT THE BIBLE SAYS ABOUT THE NEAR HEREAFTER
   IV.  WHAT THE BIBLE AND THE CHURCH SAY ABOUT THE NEAR HEREAFTER
    V.  THE CRISIS OF DEATH
   VI.  "I" "MYSELF" AFTER DEATH
  VII.  RECOGNITION
 VIII.  THE COMMUNION OF SAINTS
   IX.  GROWTH AND PURIFICATION
    X.  PROBATION IN THIS LIFE
   XI.  MINISTRY IN THE UNSEEN LIFE
  XII.  CONCLUSION


PART II

THE FAR HEREAFTER

    I.  THE JUDGMENT
   II.  HELL
  III.  HEAVEN




Publishers' Note

This tenth American (and sixteenth British) edition has been carefully
revised and where necessary rewritten by the author.  We call special
attention to an interesting note on page 108.

This year a Norwegian edition has been published, translated by Judge
Hambro of the Supreme Court of Norway assisted by the Bishops of
Christiania and Trondheim.  Also request has been received for
permission to translate the book for readers in Holland.  But more
interesting is a letter from a Brahmin gentleman in India asking
permission to produce at his own cost an edition for his people and
dedicated on the front page, "TO MY SON, SEREM ALI, WHO IS NOW IN THE
NEAR HEREAFTER."




Foreword

The Lord is risen, but the people do not know it.  There is no death,
but the people do not believe it.  Human life is the most exciting
romantic adventure in the Universe, going on stage after stage till we
are older than Methuselah and then on again through the infinite
eternities--and yet men pass into the Unseen as stupidly as the
caterpillar on the cabbage-leaf, without curiosity or joy or wonder or
excitement at the boundless career ahead.

Instead of the thrill of coming adventure we have the dull grey
monotony of aged lives drawing near the close, and the horror of this
war is doubled and the torture of wife or mother as the beloved one
crosses the barrier.

What is the matter with us, Christian people?  Do we not know?  Or have
we lost our beliefs? or has imagination grown dulled by too frequent
repetition of God's good news?

      *      *      *      *      *

It was so different in early days when the world was younger, when
Christ's revelation was fresh.  Look at St. John, four-score years and
ten, like an eager boy looking into the Great Adventure: "Beloved, now
are we the sons of God, and IT DOTH NOT YET APPEAR WHAT WE SHALL BE."[1]

What we shall be!  What we shall be!  Is not that the chief delight of
being young?  Guessing and hoping and wondering what we shall be.

The dreariest thing in life is dulness--monotony.  The brightest thing
in life is outlook--vision.  And God has given us that.  Like St. John
we too can stand on the rim of the world and look out over the wall.

      *      *      *      *      *

Life is full of latent possibilities--of outlook, of romance, of
exciting futures.  God has made it so, if we would only see it.  God's
world