Pettingell, J. H. The Unspeakable Gift: The Gift of Eternal Life through Jesus Christ our Lord; With an Introduction, by Rev. Edward White. Yarmouth, Me.: I. C. Wellcome, 1884. Second Edition. [10535]
Black cloth with gilt decoration to front and spine, worn an dull, small wormhole in front joint, 7 3/4 x 5 1/4 inches. former's owner's signature on tp and first preface page. 565 pp. plus recommendations and publisher's catalogue. Good. Hardcover.
The author argues that eternal life is a gift of God, and is only for His people through Jesus Christ; the immortality of the soul is not a Bible doctrine, and the wicked will be destroyed.
The publisher, Isaac C. Wellcome, was a member of the Advent Christian Church, or Second Adventists, a branch of the spiritual descendants of William Miller of the Great Disappointment of 1844 fame.
"Both Nelson H. Barbour and Charles Taze Russell were originally affiliated with the Second Adventists (Advent Christian Church). Russell helped begin the Bible Students movement, from whence Jehovah's Witnesses arose." - note a the Internet Archive for Wellcome's History of the Second Adventist Movement (1874).
John Hancock Pettingill (1815-1887), Congregational minister. He was a Yale graduate (1840); taught in NY in the Institution for the Deaf and Dumb (1838-43), studied at Union Theological Seminary (1839-41). He was the pastor of several churches in New England, and a district secretary for the A. B. C. F. M. at Albany (1853-60) ,during which period he visited the missions of the American Board in Serbia, Turkey, and Greece. From 1866 to 1873 he was the chaplain of the Seamen's Friend Society at Antwerp, Belgium, and his efforts on behalf of those sick with cholera in 1866 were recognized by the Belgian government. His later years were devoted chiefly to literary work.
"He wrote principally on the science of religion, and was the first American teacher to propound the doctrine that eternal life was dependent upon knowledge and faith in Christ as held by the primitive Church up to the time of Plato. He was subjected to great losses by the reasons of his teachings, and his books were not received with favor even after he had succeeded in having them published. Finally they grew in favor and were reprinted in several continental languages, and at his death he had a large number of disciples." - The Biographical Dictionary of America online.
