CHAPTER II.

THE ROYAL PREACHER HATH SAID.

Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it.-ECCLES. xii. 7.

IN the divisions of creation, commonly called the mineral, vegetable, and animal kingdoms, we see a wonderful economy or arrangement; we behold one thing joined to another, until all are crowned by man, who, in his natural and perfect condition, was made a living reasonable soul, in an exquisitely formed body, with senses more refined and perfect than the other animals possessed-for he was the image of God in a body, God's president over the natural forms of creation; a being possessing a body, soul, and spirit—which triple unity sin, by death, hath dissolved and separated, but not destroyed. Death hath not destroyed the personal identity of any man, for his spiritual part exists awaiting the resurrection. of his body. This alone can be declared of man, not

of other creatures. Why? We have no proof of a living reasonable soul existing in other animals; and, indeed, Revelation forbids us so to think; therefore there can be no need of a resurrection, or a union of two separate parts, for these do not exist in inferior animals, as in man. Our present powers of mindour spiritual and perceptive faculties, the capacities of thought or reason, the memory of the past, the desire of good through the inward affection of our being-do not wholly depend upon the brute matter in our gross bodies; they can alone be manifested thereby to the organs of sense in the way of perception. Death destroys the power of sensation, but does not destroy the powers of the reflective spirit resident in the human soul. It passes with all that it contains, to the region of the invisible. It departs to God as the God of the spirits of all flesh. Now, with regard to the beast, the life of the beast is in its blood, and all its natural perceptions by the organs of sense; cease for ever when its natural life is poured out whereas in man there is a reasonable soul, which, though acting in a body, and revealing its powers by means of his spirit therein, yet this inward man, or personal identity, does not cease to exist when the body is destroyed, but on the contrary, retains its proper and peculiar functions. Thus, as it has been

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truly said, there are two states in which we may said to exist-one called a state of sensation, the other a state of reflection. To explain this more fullyhow often does disease suspend the actions of the body without hindering the action of the soul through her intellectual powers. Again, sleep does not destroy or weaken the mind, on the contrary, it tends to refresh and renew it. Sleeping in Jesus implies the

safe keeping of the soul in Him who is the Saviour; and more, it implies that He uses it as a means of refreshing and invigorating the inward man thus sustained in Him. God, who is a spirit, can therefore feed and sustain the spirits of the just in the invisible region-yea, and perfect them in Jesus. He thus preserves man as a spirit independent of his body, in order, that by resting in Jesus, he may be thus refreshed and renewed, and grow in Him, and by this, his continual feeding and sustentation of his powers, man in due time may be restored to consciousness in the possession of a body fitted for its reception, which will exhibit outwardly to the senses the blessed and healthful beauties of eternal youth, and have dominion over the visible and invisible creation. Thus we say,

according to the teaching both of nature and of Revelation, that as natural sleep is used of God as a means of refreshing and renewing man's wearied

energies, so in like manner He uses the state of sleep in which the departed are said to exist as a means of refreshing, as a state of sweet preparation for the awakening up of the soul in a body of glory prepared for its reception in the morning of the resurrection, so that when the departed awake, their past sleep in Jesus will indeed have been sweet unto them, being a sleep in the consciousness of the Holy Ghost-like the sleep of the prophet of old. From this may we not reasonably conclude that the more spiritual part of man's being, called his inward man, his reasonable soul, his personal identity (which spiritual existence is the creation of God), assimilates him more immediately to God Himself, who is a spirit in the way of spiritual communion; and that he should be held in existence and be sustained by God when that which is called the outward man, the present gross and vile body, is removed or taken away, the covering that surrounds closes in, and holds up to view the person called, ego, I myself? Such is the conclusion of the Apostle Peter, as recorded in his Second Epistle, chap. i. 14. Hence we infer that man is not merely like a vegetable, or brute beast, or flying fowl, but that he is a living, intelligent, responsible agent, having powers of perception as well as of sensation, so that the withering of a flower, or the death

of a beast, cannot be compared to the dissolution of a man-a living responsible agent created in the image of God. Thus, saith the Spirit of God, by Job, “ man cometh forth like a flower-that is, in mortality-and is cut down-i.e., by the scythe of death-he fleeth forth also as a shadow, and continueth not; " i.e., in the visible world. Here is a double figure, the outward man compared to a flower cut down, he no more stands in the beauty of health, erect upon the earth, but his inward man fleeth forth also as a shadow—i.e., as a shadow passeth-and is no more visible; so man goeth to his appointed place, he continueth no longer visible on the earth. When I shall go (said the Psalmist) into the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil (because these are my support), thy rod and thy staff, they shall abundantly comfort me. The Bishop and Shepherd of our souls never leaveth His flock as a prey to the enemy.

Man is a living agent, a person whom we cannot trace or follow with the bodily eye beyond his acting or working in a body, because of the action of the soul that views its object according to the laws of optics. This is no argument against the existence of man when he passeth beyond the laws of sight and sense; i.e., when he is gathered to his fathers; soul to souls, spirit to spirits, according to their powers, communion or fel