There Paul beheld many souls of sinners plunged, some to the knees, some to the loins, some to the mouth, some to the eyebrows; and every day and eternally they are tormented.  And Paul wept, and asked who they were that were therein plunged to the knees.  And the angel said, These are detractors and evil speakers; and those up to the loins are fornicators and adulterers, who returned not to repentance; and those to the mouth are they who went to Church, but they heard not the word of God; and those to the eyebrows are they who rejoiced in the wickedness of their neighbor.  And after this, he saw between heaven and earth the soul of a sinner, howling betwixt seven devils, that had on that day departed from the body.  And the angels cried out against it and said, Woe to thee, wretched soul!  What hast thou done upon earth?  Thou hast despised the commandments of God, and hast done no good works; and therefore thou shalt be cast into outer darkness, where shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.  And after this, in one moment, angels carried a soul from its body to heaven; and Paul heard the voice of a thousand angels rejoicing over it, and saying, O most happy and blessed soul! rejoice to-day, because thou hast done the will of God.  And they set it in the presence of God. ...  And the angel said, Whoso keepeth the Sunday shall have his part with the angels of God.  And Paul demanded of the angel, how many kinds of punishment there were in hell.  And the angel said, there are a hundred and forty-four thousand, and if there were a hundred eloquent men, each having four iron tongues, that spoke from the beginning of the world, they could not reckon up the torments of hell.  But let us, beloved brethren, hearing of these so great torments, be converted to our Lord that we may be able to reign with the angels.

HENRY WARD BEECHER (1813-1887)

A very great orator must be a thoroughly representative man, sensitive enough to be moved to the depths of his nature by the master-passions of his time.  Henry Ward Beecher was a very great orator,—­one of the greatest the country has produced,—­and in his speeches and orations inspired by the feelings which evolved the Civil War and were themselves exaggerated by it to tenfold strength, we feel all the volcanic forces which buried the primitive political conditions of the United States deep under the ashes and lava of their eruption.  Words are feeble in the presence of the facts of such a war.  But what more could words do to suggest its meaning than they do in Mr. Beecher’s oration on the raising of the flag at Fort Sumter, April 14th, 1865:—­

“The soil has drunk blood and is glutted.  Millions mourn for myriads slain, or, envying the dead, pray for oblivion.  Towns and villages have been razed.  Fruitful fields have been turned back to wilderness.  It came to pass as the prophet had said:  ’The sun was turned to darkness and the moon to blood.’  The course of the law was ended.  The sword sat chief magistrate in half the nation; industry was paralyzed; morals corrupted; the public weal invaded by rapine and anarchy; whole States were ravaged by avenging armies.  The world was amazed.  The earth reeled.”