Clement of Alexandria: STROMATA (MISCELLANIES), Part IV, Complete

Translated by Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson.

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Page 101

What then? Did not the same dispensation obtain in Hades, so that even there, all the souls, on hearing the proclamation, might either exhibit repentance, or confess that their punishment was just, because they believed not? And it were the exercise of no ordinary arbitrariness, for those who had departed before the advent of the Lord (not having the Gospel preached to them, and having afforded no ground from themselves, in consequence of believing or not) to obtain either salvation or punishment. For it is not right that these should be condemned without trial, and that those alone who lived after the advent should have the advantage of the divine righteousness. But to all rational souls it was said from above, "Whatever one of you has done in ignorance, without clearly knowing God, if, on becoming conscious, he repent, all his sins will be forgiven him." [3277] "For, behold," it is said, "I have set before your face death and life, that ye may choose life." [3278] God says that He set, not that He made both, in order to the comparison of choice. And in another Scripture He says, "If ye hear Me, and be willing, ye shall eat the good of the land. But if ye hear Me not, and are not willing, the sword shall devour you: for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken these things." [3279]

[3277] Alluding apparently to such passages as Acts iii. 17, 19, and xvii. 30.

[3278] Deut. xxx. 15, 19.

[3279] Isa. i. 19, 20.

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