what must the structure itself have been when in thorough repair? Or say rather, if that original order was but the commencement or foundation of a state that we have yet in view, what must that state exhibit in perfection? Why, if a man could only be growing towards the perfection of the beginning, it would be much for him; how much more, to be growing beyond it by a superior accession of light in the same magnificent design! He might then be truly "going on unto perfection" (Heb. vi. 1), as the apostle writes. "And he shall be like a tree planted by the waterside that will bring forth his fruit in due season" (Ps. i. 3). To such a one the intervening state between an earthly and an heavenly paradise will appear, to be sure, like a great gulf, or a very considerable breach, however, but not impassable. And so this period may be generally regarded by the children of the resurrection, with reference to the past and the to come; while with others, on the contrary, the present life shall be every thing.

Indeed, no one scarcely can be aware of his own blind partiality to himself in this transitory scene, and in how many ways it is shewn; so that not only in matter of fact, but also in reading and information, every trifle concerning the present will have an unaccountable charm, and command an interest that the gravest concern of the past can not, nor of the future either, unfortunately. For a preference of that which is passing in our day before that which is gone by may be naturally attributed to self-love, but it must be owned an odd sort of self-love that can make a man love his little finger beyond his whole body, or dictate a preference of the concerns of this short period to those of the eternity by which it is succeeded. One thing may be said for it, that while eternity looks blank like a smooth ocean through its simple continuity, time is magnified by distinction: and thus, to say nothing of its continual division and subdivision into years, months, days, hours, and minuter intervals, (which seems, however, but a poor argument to ac

count for so great and ghastly an effect,) from the same general criterion of occurrence before mentioned, or the natural order in which subjects are deduced from their beginning to the maturity assigned them, and to the warning which thence succeeds, making the present state almost a nullity, we derive a very clear distinction of the same, and one that has also been pretty generally adopted, namely, into two principal parts, portions or periods, called Youth and Age, or Growing and Declining. As for the staid state of manhood, it can hardly be ascribed to a creature that “fleeth as it were a shadow, and never continueth in one stay." But those two are worth remembering, as more sensible periods of the present life; also as including both the internal and external relations of the same, and bearing a similar relation to each other with that of life and death. For it is not unusual to consider life as a journey, "The journey of life." In Scripture it is called "walking," with various qualifications, as "walking in uprightness,” “in the fear of the Lord," &c., on one hand; or “walking in darkness,” “in deceit," &c., on the other. So death is considered as the end of our journey; and youth and age, the periods in question, as its two principal stages or portions,-that, over a smiling country with a very sanguine or very thoughtless population; this, over one altogether as barren, and made more wretched by the sufferings, disappointments and endless complaints of travellers slowly wending their way towards "the valley of the shadow of death"; our ears greeted as we descend continually with the lamentations of our cotemporaries, sounds which in our younger days we were hardly aware of.

And if this language should be thought romantic, it may be thought still more so, to talk of an intermediate state, of a state between the present and future, or of any beginning of a future state, other than such as is well understood by the state, and more properly expressed by the shadow, of death. But such a state is however talked of

by many; and that in two ways, 1, as the state of the subject intire; 2, as the state of the subject in parts. To speak of these two in succession;

1, If there be for the intire subject any sort of intermediate state other than what is simply meant by death, or its shadow, whatever the same may be like when complete, the entrance to it is known by experience to be a state of insensibility, "from whose bourne" many a traveller has returned certainly, whether he had to repass the Stygian flood for that purpose, or was not got beyond it. But there is no room for concluding from their report the presence of any other distinction in that incipient state, "where the prisoners rest together" (Job iii. 18), than is commonly observed in our prisons, between "the weary and the wicked" before trial: neither does it appear consistent; as, to suppose a distinct existence for these two parties, like Purgatory and Paradise, e. g. in death, were in effect to suppose a prejudication, or rather no death. So it is rather, to suppose even a sort of neutral state for some of the departed, while others should be writhing in purgatory; as this distinction also implies a judgment for both parties, with a life worse than a temporary death for one; also a violent interfering with the course of nature, which, if one may be allowed, one should rather suppose, would be suffered to run on her course quietly to the Great day.

Therefore, as we generally believe in the future destruction, if not in the remodelling of the present order of things, which even now is ripening to that end, it would be more consistent, though it may not be always so profitable in certain respects, to talk of a mundane and ultramundane futurity in relation to its subjects, than of Lethes and Purgatories, and temporary or short-lived Paradises.

2, But the question is not so properly of a whole intermediate state, as of half, i. e., of a separate state of existence; a state in which one set of constituents shall keep together, and be all on the alert, while another is dissolving or qui

escent. And who can tell us more of this than we know, little as it is? If the eye sees nothing less than itself, and every man is a stranger now to his own face, one might be excused for some ignorance of one's self, or of what one is to be in such a state, if state it might be called, as passes between one life and another. For one hardly knows how to call that a state, in which there is so much unmaking, and which is so full of dissolution.

In Scripture we never read of any rest but one, which is the final condition of the just: much less do we read of a rest for one part of him before another, as for the body before the soul, e. g. That text of Ecclesiastes which mentions one sort of spirit going upward, and another downward (Eccl. iii. 21), is authority only for a dissolution of the subject, and not of a separate state of existence: no more is that of the dust returning to the earth, and the spirit to God who gave it (Ib. xii. 7) by the same: no more is that striking verse of the Psalmist, "When the breath of man goeth forth, he shall turn again to his earth: and then all his thoughts perish" (Ps. cxlvi. 3): with much more that might be adduced to the same effect, as well from the Psalms as from other parts of the Old Testament. And in the New Testament, that very text which has been thought most conclusive for both, namely, for both an intermediate and separate state of existence, is as far as any from authorizing a belief of either, being our Saviour's reply to the thief on the cross, "To day shalt thou be with me in Paradise" (Luke xxiii. 43). For his words were not, "To day shall thy soul," a part of him; but "Thou," that is, the whole man, both body and soul; as it happened no doubt either in necessity, or else by "a new thing," like the Saviour's own resurrection, with the sinner's belief. For in any other way than this even Jesus himself could not have been in paradise that day, nor yet the next.

Comparing the notion of such a separate state of existence occurring between the present and the future, by such

means and criterions as the Almighty has kindly afforded us of judging between things that differ, and approving the more excellent (Phil. i. 10); we shall find it, 1, very unphilosophical, if that can be of any consequence with those who maintain it; as implying either a partial interruption of the steady process going on between creation and futurity, or else a partial dissolution of a subject that exists by the concurrence of its principles, or ingredients, and these hardly to be distinguished in effect, as before observed. And, 2, whether this be of any consequence too or not, even people's own experience might teach them what to think of this matter: so that seeing as the breath of man goeth forth, first his thoughts perish with his senses, if not before; then there goes the colour, and then the substance turns again to earth, they might easily conclude for themselves that so perfect a dissolution as that above signified is now really taking place. Or, 3, if they pay no more deference to the testimony of their own eyes than to the deductions of reason, it is hoped, they will hearken to the Word of God, as soon at least as to the inventions of superstition and priestcraft; as they may find in that sacred repository authorities enough to prove a perfect dissolution by death, if those above cited should be deemed insufficient.

The soul, or inward life, as far as it had been developed or proceeded, would be as though it were not, or at least like its own latent properties, those which still remained to be developed, in this state of suspension or insensibility. And as for the outward life or body, any one who has ever looked into the common prison or receptacle of "the weary" and "the wicked" may guess what is going on there. In the general dissolution or expansion of principles by death, it is not neccesary to suppose, that any train of thought, or any single perception either should be lost with our breath, any more than the air that we breathe, or any evil act any more than a good. Perhaps some man * Page 144.