ing, although his mortal existence was prolonged and a mode of pardon instituted. (John xi. 26.) In case, then, this respite of the sinner is neglected, and the offered salvation is refused, the ultimate sentence of “Die thou shalt die" (Gen. ii. 17) must take place fully and completely throughout his entire bodily and mental constitution. What will be the

effect of this? Not his annihilation,—for we have seen that death, in scripture language, is a state, not an extinction; a mode, and not a cessation, of existence. A general resurrection, "both of the just and unjust," does not, therefore, interfere in any way with the final perdition of the ungodly. With these considerations in view, it may not be altogether impossible, to arrive at some analogical notions of eternal death.

(1) As regards the organic functions, we have seen that their death consists in the decomposition of their constituent parts, and the abandonment of their elements to the general laws of matter. Now, can this state be perpetuated indefinitely, and yet some kind of identity preserved-an identity, which in ordinary decomposition appears to be lost? Does nature show us any process in which all the particles of a material substance may be thoroughly dislocated, and separated from one another, and yet the substance not mix with surrounding matter and become extinct? The natural phenomenon most nearly realizing these conditions is fusion; and it is remarkable that the agency of fire is that which the language of Scripture on this subject emphatically recognizes. (Isaiah lxvi. 24.-Mark ix. 44, 46, 48.) Not that we would vulgarize scriptural phraseology, and force upon it a literality which it will not bear; for the resurrection-body, being in all probability imponderable, may be expected to present phenomena altogether inconceivable by us in this life. Enough that our Lord in speaking of Gehenna does not merely adopt the language of current fable, but of a profound analogical significance. The hell of organic life is corruption

* As Plato-see Phædon 58-62 and Gorgias 60; with Routh's notes on the latter.

(2) We must conclude that the eternal death of the animal functions will consist in the absence of all objects proper for their exercise, and in the exhibition of their contraries. In eternal animal death there will be inward sensation, but its only object will be pain; there will be outward perception, but its only objects will be the odious and the terrible; there will be volition, but its efforts to act will be fruitless. As regards inward sensation there will be the "torment" in the "flame." As regards outward perception, we remarked that in the present world light is its characteristic medium; when therefore hell is represented in Scripture as "outer darkness," it must needs convey the notion of perceptive organs searching for ever for objects fitted for their exercise, but searching in vain. “A land of darkness, as darkness itself; and of the shadow of death; without any order, and where the light is darkness." And under this darkness there are 66 chains;" it is the prison-house of souls, where all freedom of action is for ever at an end.

(3) We have next to look at the death of intellect. Here we must expect the ideas, which are the food of the mind, to be in a state of continual flux, like the particles of the burning body. Milton has represented a party of fallen angels discoursing on the higher themes of philosophy, and finding therein a relief from torment; and Dante's ghosts are full of converse. Actual perdition can know of no such relief. If the intellect were to retain its calm balance, its power to discuss truth, and to reap anything of satisfaction therefrom, where would be its own peculiar death? The reception, retention, and arrangement, of ideas constitute the life of the intellectual functions; so long therefore as these continue those functions must live: for, unlike animal life, but similarly to organic life (its correlate) we found that enjoyment forms no essential part of intellectual vitality, and consequently its loss, and the sufferance of pain, cannot alone constitute intellectual death. We arrive then at the conclu

sion that consecutive ratiocination is utterly extinct in the death of mind. The office of reason is to apprehend the Divine; refusing which, its faculties are forfeit, and its mission at an end. When, in place of a temple for the Holy One, unsanctified intellect builds its Babel tower of defiance, God shall come down and confound the builders. "The Lord shall smite thee with madness, and blindness, and astonishment of heart." There shall be a perpetual attempt to think; an effort to grasp and retain the thoughts which float up, and pass, and disappear again, leaving the wretch to the interminable despair of a conscious insanity-" a darkness that may be felt." Such a state, it must be remembered, can only take place with an embodied spirit ;-no objection therefore lies against the theory from any meaning which may be affixed to the parable of the rich man and Lazarus ;—the time of that being prior to the resurrection. Nor, similarly, from the present condition of the fallen angels, whose crowning woe is still future. (Matt. viii. 29.)

(4) Finally, with respect to the spiritual functions, it is to their failure that we have traced the cause of all the woe. But this failure must be something more than a negation. The spiritual functions of a lost soul are not absent, as in an irrational animal, but they are dead. If then their vitality consists in an assimilation to, and communion with, the Divine mind, what can their death be but the impious reverse thereof? The finite at war with the Infinite? A frantic resistance to Omnipotence? There is no ground for assuming that the lost acquiesce in their fate-for that would include a power of far-seeing reason and divinely-enlightened conscience, which heaven could only rival and not surpass. Rather is it to be concluded that, as the happiness of heaven consists in loving God, so the misery of hell is consummated in hatred to Him. We see in the words, "Depart from me, such an utter and indescribable estrangement from the Deity as includes, not only moral contrariety, but also the most absurd misconceptions of His nature, and the most blasphemous fallacies respecting His character and government;

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which indeed must be the necessary result of the intellectual death just considered. "They gnawed their tongues for pain, and blasphemed the God of heaven."

Our remaining subject of inquiry is eternal life-in what

will it consist?

(1) Organic life would seem to be rather consummated than eternized. Analogy teaches that the particles of the resurrection body of the saint will be eternally fixed, unsubject to that permutation of decay and replenishment which the present life exhibits. These two inferences appear fairly deducible from Scripture. First: That there will be no more waste. The grand agent of decomposition is water. In the dissolution of organized bodies three conditions are usually present; moisture, atmospheric air, and a certain temperature. But of these the first only is essentially necessary. It is not difficult therefore to descry the analogical truth conveyed by the Scripture which tells us that in the new earth of apocalyptic vision "there was no more sea. Secondly: If there be no longer disintegrating influences, the necessity of food ceases :-accordingly we read, "meats for the belly, and the belly for meats, but God shall destroy both it and them."

خود

(2) The animal functions will doubtlessly be perpetuated; for they are the channels whereby a soul attached to a body discourses with the outward world: but perpetuated in a way totally different to that which we now see. St. Paul tells us that there is a soul-body and a spirit-body. Not that

a body can be spiritual in essence-for that were a contradiction—but in character and adaptation. In the present state the body subjects to a great extent its spiritual inhabitant to its own instincts. And in the phenomena of temperament, and the acknowledged influence of cerebral development, we see how largely the intellectual and moral welfare of man is affected by the natural, or psychical, body. In opposition to this the resurrection-body is represented as spiritual; a body which, instead of influencing its heavenly inmate by its own constitutional tendencies, shall itself be ever ready to receive

spiritual impulses, and ever tuned to pulsate in harmony with spiritual emotions, There is a body which communicates its propensities and passions to the soul; and there is a body which receives its propensities and passions from the soul; and this is the eternal victory of mind over matter. In the first humanity the soul was added to the body—" the first Adam was made a living soul;" in the second humanity, at the resurrection, the body is added to the soul--" the last Adam was made a quickening spirit."

But what shall constitute the endless vitality of the animal functions? Undoubtedly their infinite removal from those two sources of injury and evil, which we heretofore considered; so that they shall be incapable of conveying wrong impressions, and not liable to be deceived by false media of perception. The former will be secured by the perfect and undecaying organism, of which we have already spoken; the latter by a sublime provision made by the Creator, "whereof we cannot now speak particularly." We saw that light was the grand characteristic vehicle of perception; in the new order of things this light will not exist. "The city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon to shine in it; for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof." Light has been called "God's shadow: what will it be when such a shadow gives place to such a reality!

(3) The intellectual functions will receive a deathless vitality. It cannot be otherwise, when their two great enemies, evil passion, and imperfect information, are for ever done 66 away. Then," saith St. Paul, "I shall know even as also I am known." The omniscient eye of God will be the organ of His people's perceptions. We have called truth the essential food of the intellect; here will be The Truth,—the Eternal Wisdom which was with the Father "before the world was." Here will be primeval truth; not elicited as now from created phenomena, but seen in the Divine mind, as it existed therein from everlasting, before the earth and heavens were stretched out ;-" answering His great idea." Now we have to do with material types, of which we can