Now, as the dying declaration of him who is the way, the truth, and the life, announces that he should be, upon the very day he here resigned his breath, received into paradise, (Luke xxiii. 43,) we may with certainty conclude, that the holy place portrayed by the law, and the paradisaic realms revealed by the gospel, to be one and the self-same region. For our blessed Lord does not, when granting pardon to his suffering petitioner, alone assure him that he should be conveyed into a state of happiness, but that He should be with him in paradise. Had He not been thus explicit, we might have supposed some little distant world allotted for the happy purpose of receiving the departed spirits which daily migrate from our earthly clod: but in this most comforting assurance, a constellation of mercies is included. It establishes, both by the New as well as Old Testament, a point of nearest, dearest interest, the certainty not only of the soul's existence in its separate state, but also of its holiness and happiness, by pointing out the sacred clime destined for its reception, affixing thereunto the epithets of holy place' and paradise,' which signifieth pleasure. And still further illustration of this blessed truth is derived from the book of Revelations, (vi. 9;) I saw under the altar (that is, the golden incense altar,) the souls of those that were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held and as these were required to rest a little season under the altar in the holy place, without the parting vail, we may with certainty conclude,

that ours will do so also. Our heavenly Teacher, when He, in parabolic form, describes the departure of the pious beggar Lazarus from off our earthly clod, does not tell us that he was carried by his celestial guardians unto his heavenly Father, but that he was safely lodged in the patriarch Abraham's bosom-into the state of all the pious dead, who we may from hence infer, are with the father of the faithful, progressing in holiness, and enjoying bliss in this pure peaceful realm.

From the dictates of right reason it does appear improbable that our imperfect spirits, just escaped from sin and death, should be, immediately on their dislodgment from their clay abode, advanced to fruition of their final promised bliss; or, till purified and perfected, admitted to the presence of their pure and perfect God. They are the spirits of the just made perfect, (Heb. xii. 23,) who will be finally received into the third and highest kingdom. The nobleman travelled into a far country to receive for himself a kingdom, and then to return. (Luke xix. 12.) It is on his return He ratifies his stipulated treaty: Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you." (Luke xix. 12.) It is not till we become the children of the glorious resurrection, that we attain equality with angels. (Matt. xxii. 30.) It is on the resurrection day that we receive our crowns. (2 Tim. vi. 8.) But though

* We do here but very slightly touch on this important point, as we shall have occasion very fully to canvass it hereafter.

upon the liberation of our heavenly spirits they do not gain admission to supreme felicity, the animating hope contained in the blessed promise is consoling and sublime. We shall be with Christ in paradise; when absent from the body, we shall be present with, and ever with the Lord. (2 Cor. v. 8.) Some seeming contradiction does, however, here occur. If our exalted Saviour be already entered through the last parting vail, for ever seated at God's right-hand on high, and in our intermediate state we do not obtain access to beatific vision, how can we be ever present with our dear and blessed Lord? We could more satisfactorily have answered this question, subsequent to our intended inquiry into the nature of Deity, but must here remark, that the Scriptures are a fabric, one stone of which cannot be touched without overthrowing the whole erection; their foundation is Jesus Christ; and he assumed equality with Deity.* The prosecution of our noble subject itself, compels us to accredit this his lofty testimonial; we cannot subtract from or diminish its full force; for the offices he fills, and the acts which he performs, exemplify omnipotence. Upon this truth the prophets and apostles both have built, and on its truth the edifice must ever stand or fall. But how can these things be? This question forms part of a

"For other foundation can no man lay, than that is laid, which is Christ Jesus." (1 Cor. iii. 11.) As the various other passages which prove the truth of the assertions above stated, will all be given and commented on hereafter, we forbear to state them here.

conversation which, having commenced with the following just deduction, "Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher come from God, for no man can do those miracles that thou doest, except God be with him," (John iii. 2,) engaged the attention, and obtained the indulgence of our blessed and sapient Lord; who, in the course of it, graciously condescended, by an elegant simile from nature, to show his cautious inquirer that what we do not see or understand may yet be; at the same time gently reproving his ignorance: "The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth; so is every one who is regenerated by the mighty operation of the energetic spirit. Art thou a master in Israel, and knowest not these things? Verily, verily I say unto thee, we speak that we do know, and testify that we have seen, and ye receive not our witness. If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe if I tell you of heavenly things? And no man hath ascended up to heaven but He that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven." Ponder the legal types. Sanctioned, therefore, by this great example, and assured also by the word of God, that the invisible things of God, from the creation of the world, may be clearly seen and understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead, (Rom. i. 20,) we shall not, we trust, be deemed presumptuous, for very humbly attempting to avail ourselves of the above assurance, and endeavouring,

through a similar medium to that employed by our unerring Teacher, to form some idea from those things which we do see, that those things may be which we do not see. The object which reason points out as best adapted for this purpose is our great celestial luminary. "Philosophers observe upon that glorious ocean of fire, the sun, that God appears to have concentrated in that magnificent star, all the most proper marks of the Divine perfections. As God, he is alone; all lesser lights seem annihilated, and disappear when he appears; he diffuses his influence throughout our system, reviving all that he illumines; nothing can escape his light, or will subsist without his heat, and his penetrating fire even extends unto those places where his rays can never be felt." † And by that sacred light which alone can conduct us to the Father of all lights, we find the element of fire most frequently selected for the purpose of conveying ideas, by material similitude, that those spiritual and immaterial things which we do not see, may yet be. The burning bush, the flaming Sinai, the bright and glistering raiment of the transfigured Saviour, the light that shone above the brightness of our sublunary sun, the countenance which shineth as the sun in his full strength, (Matt. xvii. 2; Exod. iii. 2, 4; xix. 18; Luke ix. 29; Acts xxvi. 13; Rev. i. 16,) all coincide to show, that the best light by which to contemplate the glory of our God, is his own glorious work.

* Psalm xix. 6. "There is nothing hid from the heat thereof." + Spectacle de Nature.