The design of Love is to reform the sinner. If his punishment here has been insufficient to reform him, the Final purpose. good man's Heaven would be a hell to the sinner. They who know not purity and affection by experience, can never find bliss in the blessed company of Truth and Love, simply through translation into another sphere. Science reveals the necessity of sufficient suffering, either before or after death, to quench the love of sin. To remit the penalty due for sin would be for Truth to pardon error. Escape from punishment is not in accordance with God's government, in which Justice is the handmaid of Mercy.
Jesus endured the shame, that he might pour his dear-bought bounty into barren lives. What was his earthly Reward. reward? He was forsaken by all save a few women, bowed in silent woe beneath the shadow of his cross. The earthly price of spirituality in a material age, and the great moral distance between Christianity and sensualism, preclude Science from finding favor with the worldly-minded.
A selfish and limited mind may be unjust; but the unlimited and divine Mind is the immortal law of Retribution. justice, as well as of mercy. It is quite as impossible for sinners to receive their full punishment this side the grave, as for this world to bestow on the righteous their full reward. It is useless to suppose that the wicked can gloat over their offences up to the last moment, and then be suddenly pardoned and pushed into Heaven, or that the hand of Love is satisfied with giving us only toil, sacrifice, cross-bearing, multiplied trials, and mockery of our motives, in return for our efforts at well-doing.
