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Doctor will fay, that the inconscious ftate is probationary. This he will not affirm, I hould humbly conclude; neither will he plead for any future probation. and confequently, he is not intelligible, if the refurrection, or the day of Chrift, does not inftantly fucceed our probation.

Contiguous with the time of each man's death. is very exprefs and determinate; i. e. if language is intelligible. a refurrection fo contiguous, is what I am pleading for.

This is the last day, emphatically the last day, when our Lord will raife up all his difciples. fee John vi. 39. And this is the will of him that fent me, that of all which he has given me, I should lofe nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day.

Ver. 54. whofo eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath everlasting life, and I will raife him up at the last day.

Ver. 44. No man can come to me except the father draw him: and I will raife him up at the last day.

Ver. 40. And this is the will of him that - fent me, that every one which feeth the son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life, and I will raife him up at the last day.

St.

St. Paul teacheth us to expect, that the judgment will immediately follow the death of this body. Heb. ix. 27, 28. And as it is ap pointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment, fo Chrift was once offered to bear the fins of many; [in this end of the world, or ages, he has appeared for this purpose] and unto them who look for him shall be appear the fecond time, without fin unto Salvation. without any tokens or marks of mortality, either upon them, or himself. — He is employed in thus putting away fin, or the confequences of it, in the immortality which he is conferring on all who are looking for him. He, by the grace of God, did tafte death for every man.

Heb. ii. 9, 10. For it became him, for whom all things, and by whom all things, in bringing many fons to glory, to make the captain of their falvation perfect through sufferings. And in this bleffed fociety of them whom he raiseth up, and gives an inheritance among the fanctified, this is his language to the Father, ver. 12, 13. I will declare thy name unto my brethren, in the midst of the church will I fing praife unto thee. and again, behold I and the children which God hath given me.

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Thus we are informed it is, that through death he does deftroy him that bath the power of death, that is the devil. and delivers them who through fear of death were all their lifetime fubject to bondage.

The Gofpel-fyftem and scheme, has, in this view of it, a glory that is transcendent ! and nothing in it abfurd, inconsistent, dark or unintelligible. the whole defign, in all its execution, deserves the highest esteem, the animated thanksgivings, and the never-ceafing praise of man.

JOHN

Here I would take fome farther notice of those former Letters of the Rev. Mr. STEFFE upon the fcripture proofs, which in their principal defign are not wide of my conceptions. with spirit and judgment has he confidered and stated the fcripture teftimony against the foul-fleeping hypothefis. And I am confident, he can take no offence, at an attempt to remove from the view of a future ftate, the abfurdity of the vulgar and orthodox opinion; which would contend for a feparate exiftence of the foul, and a future reunion with the body.

We differ in our conceptions on this point. for he fais, That the foul may be happier in a Jeparate

Separate fate, than when united to its earthly body, will eafily be granted; but not therefore happier than when united to its heavenly one. And again, Now that the departed Spirit will be as compleatly happy before the refurrection as after, is contrary to the whole ftream and current of the infpired writings, which conftantly reprefent the happiness attending the refurrection, as the highest, and nobleft object of a chriftian's hope, and therefore as the great argument to virtue and obedience, a

It is readily owned, that the Soul will be happier in the future ftate than it was when united to this mortal body; but then we are of opinion, the spiritual body is immediately given. And though Mr. Steffe has the idea of a distant refurrection, in which the foul's happiness will be complete; we will not deny but there may be fomething of an additional felicity fuppofeable on our own hypothefis, when the mediatorial kingdom shall have its final finishings, when Jesus shall deliver up the kingdom to the Father; and himself do homage, that God may be all in all.

T 4

a See his five Letters, p. 27, 28,

This

This may be the time of the chriftian's enjoying, what the most ancient fathers and writers of the chriftian-church did conceive of, as the beatific viñion in the highest heaSo that the intermediate ftate may be denominated the veftibulum, or porch of that high and holy place. the numerous manfions of good men, who are with their Lord, waiting the illuftrious feafon.

ven.

During this intermediate ftate, I could not fuppofe the Soul exifting without its fpiritual body; becaufe of its being present with its Saviour, beholding his glory, whe is in human form and figure, which requires fome fimilitude and resemblance in the refurrection-body, in order to the more eafy and familiar fociety and enjoyment. Doctor Thomas Burnet, as I remember, has fomewhere faid, a vehicle will then be needful to our contact with the created fyftem.

Mr. Macknight thus paraphrafes John xiv. 2. if it were not fo, I would have told you. If there were no ftate of felicity hereafter, into which good men are to be received at death, I would have told you, and not have amufed you with dreams of things which fhall never happen. I go to prepare a place

for

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