Christ? Have not the disclosures of the past on this subject been made for the purpose of foreshadowing the realities and glories of that coming day of our Immanuel, when He shall be revealed in His power and kingdom, and all His saints with Him?

We have not undertaken to show what the range of existence and power is to the resurrection body. We have no means of determining its limits. We know that it is not bound down to the laws of the present corruptible body, but can soar on lofty pinions. The universe itself may be the boundless theatre of its movements.

In thus dealing with the doctrine of the resurrection, we have indulged in no speculations. We have confined ourselves strictly to the facts of the Divine record-facts given for our instruction on this very subject-facts embodied in the resurrection of Him who is our forerunner, and presented to God already as the first-fruits of the coming harvest-and facts in the case of some who have anticipated the great day of the Lord, and whom the grave could not hold unto that eventful hour. The wonder, too, with many may be, that these obvious facts have to such an extent escaped our observation; and that the resurrection state has had such a dim and shadowy existence to our apprehension, when such truths as these lay before our eyes. With such facts, too, in our possession, we have no inclination for speculation on this theme. There is no occasion for it. We may build our faith on the clear records made concerning our living Redeemer, who hath triumphed over the foe, and will come ere long to bring us off conquerors too.

We have, in truth, been afraid to retain any thing material for the resurrection body, because we have despised this creation of God, and these bodies, as a part thereof. We have been taught to regard it as of inferior value, reserved only for the fires of the last day, and to

be given up to utter destruction. We have not conceived that this earth was fit to be redeemed, or that God would deem it worthy of preservation. We have not cared whether it continued or not, our only desire being to be released from it, to dwell in some transcendant, far distant sphere; while the old heathen idea has been inculcated, that God made these bodies of the dust of earth, in order to humble us, as if the union of the soul with this inferior body was an ill-advised arrangement, and degrading to man's higher and spiritual nature. We have looked upon it as we do upon an unfortunate marriage, in which a noble woman throws herself away upon a man who is greatly her inferior. We pity her, and feel almost indignant at the unhappy connection. So has our theology taught us, though we have not dared to assert it, in so many words, that God made some sad mistake when He bound down the immortal soul to this clod of earth. Under the influence of this theology, our interest in the continuance of these bodies is, for the most part, gone, and their resurrection has lost its true hold and power upon our affections. All our ideas of heaven and happiness have been connected with the soul.. For the redemption of the body we have cared comparatively very little. Such theology, however, most clearly, is not the theology of the Bible. We have been drifting out of our course by some powerful secret undercurrent of error, which has changed to us some of the most precious relations of truth in the system of redemption.

This presentation of the subject shows us how inappropriate is the question of the possibility of recognizing friends in the future state.

The starting of such a question is striking evidence how we have spiritualized almost to nothing the doctrine of the resurrection, and destroyed well nigh all its reality and power. We have reduced it to such a shadow, that

there is hardly a substance left, and we are at a loss to know whether we shall preserve our own identity, or recognize the forms with which we have been familiar here on earth. When we learn to get back from this dim land of ghosts and shadows, to read the facts of the resurrection state as they lie upon the pages of the Bible, we shall perceive how foolish it was even to have started such an inquiry as the one now referred to, and that it never would have been suggested if we had studied these facts aright.

Again. We do not undertake to assert what the extent of the glory is in which the resurrection body will be arrayed.

We have collected certain facts illustrating the resurrection state, as we find them recorded upon the inspired page. That these are all, or more than the smaller part, we are not to imagine. These are but glimpses into that other world; enough, indeed, to confirm our faith, yet not to satisfy our knowledge. We have not asserted that Christ was clothed with the full glories of His resurrection state during those days of His manifestation unto His disciples. They were, in a measure, still hidden. It was apparent, indeed, that He was not what He had been, when under the curse. He had passed forever beyond that state, to die no more. But the full glories of that resurrection body were not disclosed to their sight. What the range of power belonging to those spiritual bodies is, and in what additional beauty and glory they may be clothed, we have no certain means now of knowing. Surpassing glories shone around the Saviour upon the mount of transfiguration, and when revealed to John in Patmos, in the midst of the golden candlesticks. Yet there was still the same human form in all its Divine lineaments; and that humanity is ever to be retained, however beautified and endowed with new and immortal powers. The Apostle

characterizes it as a "spiritual" body, by which he does not mean to deny its materiality, or assert that it is itself spirit. But as the "natural" body is one, endowed with animal life, and adapted to the present condition of the soul, and the physical constitution of the world which it inhabits, so a "spiritual" body is one, adapted to the use of the soul in its future glorified state, and the moral and physical condition of the heavenly world-or that constitution of things when all shall be made new.

Are we to question or deny that God can thus glorify this now corruptible flesh? "Thou fool," says the Apostle, "that which thou sowest is not quickened, except it die. And that which thou sowest, thou sowest not that body which shall be, but bare [naked] grain, which God raises up in new and wonderful forms of beauty. The rough piece of charcoal presents no attractions, and we shun its defilement even. But let it be raised by Divine power from this condition, and crystallized, and with what delight do we now gaze upon the sparkling diamond, an incorruptible, we might almost say, a spiritual body!

May not God cause as great and glorious a change to pass upon the elements entering into this nobler creation. of our humanity, dying and corruptible though it now be? Did He not give His own Son to die for it? And what is that resurrection body other than this mortality crystallized, and made to reflect forever the image and excellency of the infinite godhead.

May it be ours to attain to this honor-ours the high ambition to say with the Apostle, "If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of [from among] the dead."

CHAPTER XXXVI.

THE REIGN OF CHRIST.

IN tracing out the history of redemption and providence, we have reached that joyful era for which earth has so long waited-the coming of Christ in His kingdoin and glory, when Satan shall be cast out and bound, and this groaning creation shall enter into the privileges of the sons of God. We have already described the judg ments connected with that day of the Lord, when the haughty, persecuting powers, which have so long ruled the world, and trampled upon the righteous, shall themselves be trodden in the wine-press of Jehovah's wrath, and the cup of vengeance shall be pressed to their lips, that they may drain it to the dregs. We have also described the resurrection of the saints-another event to mark "that great and notable day of the Lord." And now has come that time of restitution of all things, of which prophets have spoken from the beginning. There shall be new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness. "None shall have need to say to his brother, Know the Lord; for all shall know him from the least unto the greatest." "Thy people shall be all righteous."

This is the promised year of jubilee, when Christ shall have broken every yoke, and put all enemies beneath His feet. Satan shall be allowed to vex no more; and an hour of joy and redemption to earth indeed it will be, when that cruel Adversary shall be removed, and his malignant influence no more felt through all these realms. This, too, we conceive to be the teachings of the Scrip