A Victorian’s Religious Beliefs

THE DURATION OF GOOD REWARDS

The reward for Good is immediate, continuous and endless. This is different to the reward for Evil. Evil, not as an act, but as an influence diminishes, and finally dies. It is this difference between the principles and influences of Good and Evil that allows man to be an endlessly progressive being. Man’s very nature is to strive to forget his evil deeds, but he never strives to forget his Good deeds. If man should never forget his evil deeds he could never go on towards perfection! And if he should ever forget his Good deeds he could never become perfect, as his Father in Heaven is perfect. For the forgetting of evil deeds will reward and enlarge man’s higher nature, and give birth to still more nobler good deeds. Death – claims Evil. Death is its wages. Life – claims Good life, Eternal life.

During man’s continuous existence in this world, and the world to come, his evil will be finally rewarded with its own natural death. But life, and good, can never die. Therefore its rewards are everlasting “and fadeth not away”.

George Burgess – June 1899