Lord here fays, the Dead fhall rife. And if it be faid, but why is God call'd their God then while they are Dead? To this St. Luke anfwers, that all live to him: Not in any fuch Senfe to be fure as to ruin the Argument, which our Saviour draws from hence for a Refurrection, but that they all live to him in his Purpofe, Defign and Intention, to whom Things determined, are as Things accomplish'd, and Things which are not, counted as Things that are.

I must confefs, fays THEOPHILUS, that

you seem to have hit fo well on the Sense of this Paffage, that I am not forry I happen'd to mention it. But what can you make of the Words of our Lord to the penitent Thief?

It is fo eafy, fays PHILANDER, to get over these, and to fhew them all of a Piece with the rest of our Saviour's Promises, that it is but pointing the Words a little differently, and understanding to Day to relate to the Time of Chrift's Speaking, and not to the Time when the Thief fhould be with him in Paradife, and the Objection is anfwer'd at once without any more Trouble, and yet the Request of the Thief more than answer'd too into the Bargain. For as the Thief's Requeft to him was, that he would remember him when he came into his King

dom,

dom, or at his judging the quick and the dead at his appearing, as St. Paul fays, [ii Tim. IV. 1.] and his Kingdom: Our Lord, as more than granting his Request, instead of only a Promife of future Remembrance, gives him for Answer a prefent Affurance. I do not only tell you, as if he had faid; that I will remember you when I come into my Kingdom, but as a prefent Reward for your unfhaken Faith, and as a prefent Support against your approaching Death, I think proper to affure you now, this very Day, that fees us both expiring on a Crofs, that you shall be one of those that shall be with me in Paradife. Nor is it at all likely from the Nature of the Thief's Request, that the Thief himself would understand it otherwife; or worth while, juft at that Time, to fet him to rights, if he had.

You feem indeed, fays THEOPHILUS, to have got rid of these Words pretty dextrously; but what will you do with his Dying Words a little afterwards, Father, into thy Hands I commend my Spirit? It appears to me, fays PHILANDER, both from this, and fome parallel Places, that the Spirit here mention'd is only that Spirit of Life by which Man was made at firft a Living Soul, and which our Lord here depofts at Death in the Hands at his Father,

till

till he should be pleas'd to reftore it again to him; committing the keeping of his Sond to him, as St. Peter fays, [1. Pet. iv.] as to a faithful Creator; and who is able to keep, as St. Paul fays, [ii.Tim. 1. 12.] what is committed to him against that Day; that well-known Day of future Retribution; [ii Tim. iv. 8.] when they that have kept the Faith, fhall be crown'd with a Crown of Righteoufness, and redeem'd from the Power of Death to die no more. And therefore when he had said this, as the Evangelift tells us, he gave up the Ghost, that is, breathed out his Spirit, or died. To which may alfo be added as a further Answer, not only to this, but to your last Objection, that he not only speaks of his Death as a Night that he could not work in: but that we likewise find him declaring after his Refurrection, [John xx, 17.] that he had not yet afcended to his Father. And it must be allow'd, I believe, a much greater and noble Sacrifice to suppose our Lord and Saviour thus to die for us, than meerly to make it consist in his leaving his Body, and taking a Journey for two or three Days into Paradife.

But what can St. Paul mean then, says THEOPHILUS, [ii. Cor. v. 8.] by being abfent from the Body, and prefent with the Lord?

And

And his having a Defire to depart, [Philip. i, 23.] and to be with Chrift.

As I cannot fuppofe, fays PHILANDER, he means to be inconfiftent, I can for this. Reason understand him no otherwife, than, as meaning the fame Time bere he does: elsewhere and that he therefore connects thefe Things with one another, not because they immediately follow without an Inter-. val, but because that Interval is deem'd as: nothing, and is in Fact with regard to the. Dead of no Account, to whom fo many: Years are no more than as fo many Moments, as a Sleep or a Watch in the Night, and the Coming of Chrift is alike expeditious to all,: whether thofe before the Law, or fince the Gofpel. The Words I grant, will well enough bear your Senfe of them, and confider'd apart by themselves may feem to favour it; but he that duly weighs the. Apostle's Sentiments, both as exprefs'd in his Writings to thefe and other Churches, muft plainly fee this cannot be his meaning; fince even the Antedeluvians according to him are not yet made perfect, nor fhall be, as he says, [Heb. xi. ult.] without us; which may alfo ferve as a Proof, that the Spirits of just Men made perfect, of which we read in the fucceeding Chapter, and which are so frequently brought as concluding against my

Opinion,

Opinion, are rather when rightly confider'd an Argument for it, as not being expreffive, as commonly thought, of their State at prefent, but of what it shall be at the ReJurrection, when we shall all be made perfect together, and the now fcatter'd Church be conjoin'd in a general Affembly. To which allow me to add, that even they that believe this State, are yet obliged to acknowledge it to be far from perfect; and tho' they fometimes speak of it in the loftiest Strains, yet when they come to fhew the Use of a Refurrection, its Happiness then is dwindled almoft to nothing, and the Glories of Paradife lavish'd and thrown away on fuch as have not Senses to difcern them.

"In the Heavenly State," fays one, [Dr. Manton on Philip. iii, 11] "there are many Objects, which can only be difcern'd by our bodily Senfes, as the human Nature of Christ, the Beams of the heavenly Manfion, wherein the Bleffed have their Refidence; with other the Works of God, which certainly are offer'd to our Contemplation. Now if God find Objects, he will find Faculties: How fhall we fee elfe thofe Things which are to be seen, or hear those Things which are to be heard, unless we have Bodies and Bodily Senfes ? +

"It is only the Soul," fays another, [Dr.

Watts