curse was manifested by death; for so it is said in Gen. iii.; "Cursed is the ground for thy sake; for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return."

But passing this by, and turning to another publication we shall find not only the fact of a material resurrection denied, but the reasons of the denial set forth in a strain of scoffing, little becoming so fearful a subject; these reasons depending, in a strange accordance with the worst species of infidelity, on the impossibility of the thing described.

"That no man can go to heaven or hell before the last judgement; that when the souls of men having returned into their bodies, the visible world will be burned up; the sun and moon be quenched in nature's night; and the stars, each surrounded with its own system of worlds having first fallen upon this speck of a globe, are to be wiped out of existence; these common but crude and unscriptural ideas have afforded the best subjects for scoffing at the Christian religion which the sceptic could desire. For he triumphantly asks, how can so vast a heaven, and so many stars, with sun and moon, be destroyed and dissipated; and how can the stars fall from heaven on the earth, when they are larger then the earth? How can men's bodies eaten up by worms, consumed by putrefaction, scattered by all winds, absorbed by vegetation, and again incorporated in other men's systems, be re-collected for their souls? What is this day of judgment? and has it not been expected for ages in vain ? These, together with many other such questions, [are] all pertinent, but to which the Church can give no rational answer.'

In another publication the same doctrine is propounded thus;

"We believe the true doctrine of the Scriptures upon the important question of the Resurrection to be this: "That man rises from the grave; not merely from the grave in the earth, but from the grave of his dead material body, immediately after death; that he then finds himself in a world not of mere shadows, but of substantial existences, himself being a real and substantial man, in perfect human form, possessing all the senses and powers proper to a man, though he is no longer visible to man in this world; whose senses and capacities of perception are comparatively dull and gross, owing to their being still shrouded over with a gross body of unapprehensive clay."+

Now in these passages, and they are only selections out of an infinite number of the same class, the reader must judge for himself, first, as to the confusion of ideas which prevails throughout them;

Swedenborg. His Life and Writings. White.
+Noble's appeal in behalf of the views of the
Eternal World. p. 34.

secondly, as to the awful nature of the infidelity betrayed in them. We are told that there can be no material resurrection of the body, because it is absurd to think "that the bodies of men dissipated by worms, and consumed by putrefaction, can be rejoined to the soul once separated from them." And at the same time that we are told what cannot be, we are told with the utmost assurance what must be; namely, that man rises from the grave immediately after death, and that he, not being a material body, for that is impos sible, yet finds himself a "substantial man" and "in perfect human form,and "possessing all the senses and powers proper to a man!" Now, surely, if man is man at all, he possesses first, as essential to the nature of man, a body; for it was in a body that ALMIGHTY GOD was pleased to create him; the sacred historian especially saying, "in the image of GOD created He him," and then, secondly, as superadded to the body, there is his spirit or soul; for Gop "breathed into his nostrils the breath of life." Body, therefore, and soul together constitute the perfect human form, and its essence cannot exist without the conjunction of the two. And yet we are told by the Swedenborgians that the "perfect human form" has no material body. Then again we are told that in the resurrection, man, although not having any material body, for that is considered impossible, still will find himself "possessing all the senses and powers proper to a man.' Now what are the senses proper to a man? If a man be a spirit only; if all that is man is his soul, then we can imagine a creation, such as the angelic order, which may have senses without a body; but if we know, and are perfectly assured that the senses proper to a man are the senses of his body, that is: smell, touch, hearing, sight; then the senses proper to a man, cannot exist without his body. But here we are told with one voice that there is no material body in the Resurrection; and with another, that a man in the Resurrection has all the senses and powers proper to a man! Such, alas, are the absurdities of those who strive in the enlightenment of philosophy to explain or define the doctrines of faith.

But we must not be content with merely shewing that the Swedenborgian doctrine is inconsistent with itself, we

must shew the ground of Holy Scripture and Church authority, upon which we maintain that their doctrines are heretical. The doctrine of the Church is distinctly and emphatically this: that there will be a Resurrection of the Dead, not as the Swedenborgians say, "immediately to each man after death," but at some future period, general, universal, and together. Thus the Athanasian Creed asserts: "At Whose coming, all men shall rise again with their bodies." It is always represented in GoD's Word as a general simultaneous event, to be brought about "at His coming;" and if it be granted that the LORD has not yet come,* then the resurrection of those already dead is still future. And this agrees with GoD's Word, which describes the rising of the dead conjointly with the taking up of the living, at one and the same moment. "We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump; for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed." 1 Cor. xv.

And again, the doctrine of the Church is, that the resurrection of the dead is not, as the Swedenborgians say, a resurrection of a mere spiritual or ethereal body, but a resurrection of the flesh. Thus it is in the Athanasian Creed: "Men shall rise again with their own bodies;" their own bodies, not other bodies to be newly given them, but those bodies which they possessed on earth; and as it is more closely said in the Apostles' Creed, which the Church uses at Baptism, "the Resurrection of the Flesh" taken from the Latin "Carnis Resurrectio," and from the Greek “σαρκὸς ἀνάστασις” which occurs in all the Creeds of the early Church. Indeed, it seems as if the Church in a spirit of prophecy, anticipated this very heresy, for it is said by Ruffinus, in his explanation of the Apostles' Creed, that they used the words, "the Resurrection of the flesh," lest by any possibility the expression "resurrection of the body," should be diverted into the mere idea of resurrection of a spiritual body.t

* The Swedenborgians however deny it; but this
must be taken under a separate proof.
+ So also S. Jerome. See Pearson on the Creed on
the Eleventh Article.

And with this agree the words of Holy Scripture: "Though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God, Whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold and not another."* Here Job distinctly says, that he himself shall see God in a raised body, that body being flesh; contra-distinguished to the first body, which shall have been destroyed by worms; and yet that it is the very same body. By what mysterious agency this body is so to be renewed unto life, is not in him to say, but still he identifies it with perfect certainty: "I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold and not another.' Then, further, passing by many passages which are usually cited from the prophets, let us go at once to the writings of S. Paul, as forming the principal witness of the New Testament. He uses, among many other places, the following remarkable words: " He that raised up CHRIST from the dead, shall also quicken your mortal bodies." Rom. viii. 11. Now, what is it that is here said to be "quickened," or made alive? Not our souls, for they never die; they are always alive, and will live for ever, and therefore can never be said as though mortal, to be quickened. What then is it that is to be quickened ? Our bodies. It is that only part of us which is mortal, i.e., is subject to death. He, ALMIGHTY GOD, shall restore life to our bodies that have been once dead. And again, S. Paul in another place speaks thus: "For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality." 1 Cor. xv. 53. Now what is there corruptible about us, or mortal? not our spirits; not our souls; for they are neither the one nor the other; but surely it must be our fleshly or corporeal part. This it is which S. Paul says, shall mortal part, i.e., that which was before be changed, revived, or restored; the subject to death shall now in the Resur

rection be no longer subject to death; and the corruptible part, ie., that which was before subject to corruption, shall now, in the Resurrection, be no longer subject to corruption. Its nature shall indeed be changed, but not by abolition, or substitution, but by adding to it something which it had not before. And so S. Jerome comments on this "When the apostle says, this corruptible' and this mortal,' he points to this very body, this very flesh, which then was seen; and when he says: puts on incorruption and immortality,' he does not mean that the body abolishes the clothing which it had before, but that the clothing which it had before as inglorious, it now makes glorious."*

Such is a brief summary of the doctrine of the Church and of Holy Scripture, interpreted by the Church, on the doctrine of the Resurrection of the Flesh. And what is it that the Swedenborgians oppose to it? On what grounds do they attempt on the mere authority of individual judgment, to set at nought that which is so very manifestly the Catholic doctrine?

First they say, it is impossible; and they look for this impossibility in the natural difficulties which surround the question. Will any one dare to say that there are not difficulties surrounding the question? Surely not; for it is difficult, it is mysterious, it is beyond our utmost human comprehension to imagine how the dispersed fragments of the human body, dispersed may be for centuries of centuries, turned and returned hither, thither; becoming dust, earth, gas, forming the flesh of animals, and they in turn of other animals, and they in turn of men again; how all this shall be brought back, and “clothed upon with our body, which is from Heaven;" how all this is to be effected, may indeed puzzle and bewilder the philosophy of men. But is there nothing else which is difficult, and beyond the comprehension of men, which notwithstanding, we are called upon to make a subject of our faith? Do not the Swedenborgians themselves, in their interpretation of a future state, put before their disciples matters of belief far more out of the range of possibility than any which the Church teaches? They do but substitute, by their own shewing, one impossibility for another.

*S. Hieron: Epist. Ixi ad Pammachium.

"Tell me," said Tertullian, to a heretic of old, disputing on disputing on this question; "Tell me how thou wert created, and then thou mayest enquire how thou shalt be raised." The wonders of the formation of the human creature in the womb, the creation of the original man with all his bodily functions out of the dust of the earth; his growth, his sustenance, the change which he is continually undergoing; all this is equally unaccountable and mysterions. It is said by those who have studied the subject, that in every seven years or thereabouts, there is a total change of all the parts of the human body, the chemical portions of his frame gradually departing into the air, and other and newer portions growing on; but nevertheless, the identity of the body is perfectly preserved. Why then is it in any degree more wonderful, (all things being possible with GOD,) that the bodies of the dead should be resuscitated or restored; although to human eyes and knowledge, the portions of them may have been dissipated and scattered into what they call nothing? The daily analytical chymistry of the world within our personal knowledge ought surely to lead us by analogy to the acceptance of similar things however apparently wonderful, provided they be taught us of GOD. And just upon this very ground it is, (I mean, the chymistry of Nature,) that S. Paul argues on this subject, with the Sadducee of old: "But some man will say, how are the dead raised up, and with what body do they come? Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not quickened except it die." And then from the analogy of the seed, he passes on to the resurrection of the flesh; not, be it observed, the resurrection of any spiritual or invisible, or intangible body, but flesh: and he says there are many kinds of flesh, and though it may very possibly be, that the flesh of the risen body, which is glorified, may not be the same flesh as the decayed and corrupted body which died; yet it shall be identified as the same body; and so he concludes: "There are celestial bodies, and bodies terrestrial; the glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the terrestrial is another." "So also is the resurrection of the dead."

But can we not say something more than this? Is all the argument for the

resurrection of the body to depend merely upon its being possible with GOD? No. There are many direct and visible proofs which are set forth to us as such in the teaching and the history of our Blessed LORD. When the daughter of Jairus was dead, JESUS said: "Tabitha Cumi, damsel arise; and her spirit came into her and she arose." At the gate of the city of Nain, there was a dead man carried out, and JESUS said: "Young man, I say unto thee arise; and he that was dead sat up." Ah! but say the philosophers. There is no corruption there. It was but a few hours preceding the resuscitation. Death had not begun to do its work. And therefore in these cases there is no difficulty. can we possibly define the precise moment when corruption begins to do its work? Can we say to Almighty GoD: "up to this or that particular point it is possible, but after that it ceases to be possible." Is that for man to say to GOD?

Now

But suppose it be granted that in these two cases, corruption, as we call it, had not begun to do its work, still what shall we say of Lazarus, dead four days, so that his sister said: "LORD, by this time he stinketh." And what of the resurrection of the saints who, at the Crucifixion, arose in multitudes from their graves, men who had been dead years and years. Were not these signs and proofs of the great Resurrection to come? And what, lastly, of the Resurrection of JESUS Himself? Upon this, as declared by S. Paul, hangs every other argument and proof of the general Resurrection; for He is expressly called "the first-fruits of them that slept." He arose from the dead three days. He arose, and was for forty days conversing with His disciples as when He was among them before death. He shewed them His hands and His feet. They bore the very marks which they saw in His crucified Body on the tree. He said: Handle Me and see, for a spirit hath not flesh and bones as ye see Me have." He was not a spirit, but a body. He was not an ethereal, spiritual emanation, but a material body, which He invited them to handle and look at. What was this but putting before them in the last and most conclusive form, not only that there may be, but in order to the consistency and truth of God's holy Word and promise, there must be a material resurrection of

grave,

the bodies of men.

A material substance need not of necessity involve that corrupt and depraved nature which here surrounds us in the thousand sins, diseases, mutilations, and foulnesses of our present body! Surely not. The "corruption" of life, as well as of death, is to put on "incorruption." It is very possible that the very act of dying may place the human body under some natural chemical transformation, which is in itself a purification. Through the chemical change it may come forth in another aspect pure, as the corrupt seed by the act of corruption shoots forth the living blade, pure.

Even in our blessed LORD's case, though His pure Body was not depraved by sin, but spotless in every sense, still it appears as though It had been glorified by the Resurrection, and made different from what It was before. It passed through doors and walls, and presented Itself unheard and unseen at distant places by some mysterious power which before It did not possess. And yet it is said to be the same Body by the prints of the nails on the hands and feet. So in our own case, glorified, purified, exalted, no doubt our body will be in some ineffable manner; but still the same body. The same, but by the solemn purgation of death brought nearer to God; the same, but by the ineffable influence of the Holy Spirit, purified and exalted, so as to be nearer to Him in the region of the holy angels who for ever abide around His Throne.

[TO BE CONTINUED.]

THE PRAYER-BOOK. (Continued from page 351.)

THE order and the place, the ministers required, and the ornaments necessary to a due and solemn administration of the Blessed Sacrament, were at length understood, and, I hope, appreciated by our friend, John Dobson. And so I fondly hoped that our hoped that our next interview would bring us fairly into the service itself. But not so. There were one or two preliminary points even yet, which seemed to hang by him; and as our object was to leave nothing unexamined, I exhorted him to tell me what they were.

66

"Well," said he, I have a great difficulty in regard of the time. It seems to me, that from the very name which the

Ordinance has received, namely a 'Supper,' and from the time being night, at which it was instituted, that the evening instead of morning ought to be the time of its celebration.

Vicar. What you have observed, John, is not without weight, and those persons who pride themselves upon an exact following of the letter of the Scripture, without regarding Church authority, have nothing to say in their defence when they attempt to celebrate, what they call the Sacrament, at any other time than night. But "THE CHURCH," as we are taught, "has power to deeree rites and ceremonies,' and that upon her own authority, so long as what she ordains be not repugnant to God's Word. And the Church for very good reasons has always appointed, from the very beginning, the early morning for the celebration of the Holy Sacrament.

John. What are the reasons?

Vicar. I will tell you. In the first place you must turn to 1 Cor. xi, You will there see how very soon an abuse grew up among Christians, in turning the Blessed Sacrament of the LORD'S Body into a profane and ordinary feast.

The

circumstance to which S. Paul alludes was this. Following too implicitly the idea that the Sacrament was to be "a Supper," and not remembering that it was merely so called, because of its being a transference from the Jewish Paschal Supper; the Corinthians had attached and added on to the breaking of bread, what they called an "Agape," or LoveFeast. This love-feast, or literally "Supper," at which men ate and drank as they would at their meals, entirely destroyed the spiritual meaning of what our LORD had taught; and from one thing to another, grew on and on, until actual scenes of drunkenness took place. This is what S. Paul alludes to when he says: "What! have ye not houses to eat and drink in, or despise ye the Church of GOD, and shame them that have not ? For in eating, every one taketh before other his own supper, and one is hungry, another is drunken." From this no doubt it was, that the Church, observing the probability of anything like common eating and drinking becoming an abuse, abolished this "Agape," or Love-Feast, and contracted the time of the celebration

of the LORD's Supper, to the hours of the morning. You must not be guided by the title "Supper." That is only given because, as I just said, of the Paschal Supper, from which it was transferred and made a Christian Sacrament; nor must you have any regard to the actual time of our LORD's eating It with His disciples. The sole principle to regard is, the adaptation of our LORD's command by Church authority, in concurrence with apostolic

use.

John. Did the Apostles then celebrate the LORD's Supper early in the morning? Vicar. It is most probable that at first they implicitly followed the time at which our LORD Himself instituted It; but though we have no direct authority to prove it, yet the Apostolical tradition is that very soon the time was changed from night to the early morning. Pliny the younger, Proconsul of Bithynia, in the commencement of the second century, addressed a letter to the Emperor Trajan, in which he says that his attention had been drawn to certain people, who met together early in the morning before the light of day.

"They affirmed that the whole sum of that sect or error lay in this, that they were wont upon a set solemn day to meet together before sun-rise, and to sing among themselves to CHRIST as GOD, and to oblige themselves by a Sacrament not to commit any wickedness."

John. But surely there is no danger now of people doing what the Corinthians did.

Vicar. No danger of their doing precisely what the Corinthians did, but very great danger of their doing something like it. People could not indeed bring common food into GoD's House now, but they could very easily, and no doubt would, after eating and drinking at their own houses, force themselves into the House of GOD, and if not profane the very Sacrament Itself by partaking of It, yet might create scenes of confusion, and so disturb and pollute the sacredness of the service.

John. You think that the few hcly and good who might receive a blessing from the idea of its being the night-season at which our LORD instituted the Sacrament, would be disturbed by the intrusion of the wicked.

* Plin: Lib. x. Ep. 97.