of your past life? A moment. What will be the amount of your life which is yet to come? Another moment. And then you will be summoned to the judgment.

4. How awful must be the final interview.

How awful is the character of him, to whose presence our souls will be summoned! From him we derived our being. By him we are continued in being. On him, we are dependent for every blessing and every hope. To him, we are accountable for all our conduct. Of that conduct he has been an eyewitness from the beginning. He is the God against whom we have sinned; who infinitely hates sin; and who has recorded all our transgressions in his book. He is our Judge: he is our Rewarder: his frown is hell: his smile is heaven.

How amazing is the end for which we shall appear at this interview! It is no other than to settle for ever the concerns of the soul. It is to fix our condition throughout the ages of immortality. It is to render an account of all that we have done in the present life, that we may be rewarded according to our works. On this account are suspended endless happiness, and endless misery.

How affecting must be the situation of the soul at this interview! It stands in the presence of God, the Judge of all, alone; without a friend to help, without an advocate to plead its cause; its all depending; itself to be disposed of for ever!

Let me solemnly ask this assembly, Are you prepared for this awful event? Is your account ready? Is it such an account as you are willing to give? Is it such an one as you believe your Judge will accept? Would you be willing to render it this day? Are you willing to hazard your souls upon it-your acceptance-your immortality? Or is it an account which will cover you with shame, agony, and despair? Have you lived hitherto only to do evil, to treasure up wrath,' and to enhance your ruin? Is the great work of your life yet to be begun? Will it be still to be begun to-morrow-the next year-in old age-on a dying bed? Has your whole course hitherto been directed, shall it through life be directed, towards perdition; and not a single step taken towards heaven?

! SERMON CLXV.

THE REMOTER CONSEQUENCES OF DEATH.

THE RESURRECTION.

FOR IF THE dead rise NOT, THEN IS NOT CHRIST RAISed.
1 CORINTHIANS XV. 16.

In the preceding Discourse I considered the immediate consequences of death; in this I shall begin an inquiry concerning its remoter consequences. The first of these is the resurrection of the body.

The subject of this chapter is the Avaσradis, or future existence of man. This word is commonly, but often erroneously, rendered resurrection. So far as I have observed, it usually denotes our existence beyond the grave. Its original and literal meaning is, to stand up, or to stand again. As standing is the appropriate posture of life, consciousness, and activity, and lying down the appropriate posture of the dead, the unconscious, and the inactive, this word is not unnaturally employed to denote the future state of spirits, who are living, conscious, active beings. Many passages of Scripture would have been rendered more intelligible, and the thoughts contained in them more just and impressive, had this word been translated agreeably to its real meaning. This observation will be sufficiently illustrated by a recurrence to that remarkable passage which contains the dispute between our Saviour and the Sadducees, Matt. xxii. 23. Then came to him, says the Evangelist, the Sadducees, who say there is no

resurrection:'un vai avacao, that there is no future state, or no future existence, of mankind. The objection which they bring to Christ against the doctrine of a future state, is founded upon the Jewish law of marriage, which required that a surviving brother should marry the widow of a brother deceased. In conformity to this law, they declare seven brothers to have married, successively, one wife, who survived them all. They then ask, Whose wife shall she be in the resurrection?'- —εν τη αναστασει. in the future state? They could not suppose, that she would be any man's wife in the resurrection: a momentary event; and of such a nature as to forbid even the supposition, that the relations of the present life could be of the least possible importance, or be regarded with the least possible attention, during its transitory existence. Our Saviour answers them, In the resurrection,' or, as it should be rendered, In the future state, they neither marry nor are given in marriage; but are as the angels of God in heaven. But as touching the resurrection of the dead, have ye not read that which was spoken unto you by God; or, as it ought to be rendered, Have ye not read that which was spoken unto you by God, concerning the future existence of those who are dead, saying, I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? God is not the God of the dead, but of the living.' This passage, were we at any loss concerning the meaning of the word avasaris, determines it beyond a dispute. The proof, that there is an avasaris of the dead, alleged by our Saviour, is the declaration of God to Moses, I am the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob;' and the irresistible truth, that God is not the God of the dead, but of the living.' The consequence, as every one who reads 'the Bible knows, is, that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were living at the time when this declaration was made. Those who die, therefore, live after they are dead, and this future life is the avasaris, concerning which there was so much debate between the Pharisees and Sadducees, which is proved by our Saviour in this passage, and which is universally denoted by this term throughout the New Testament. Nothing is more evident, than that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had not risen from the dead; and that the declaration concerning them is therefore no proof of the resurrection. But it is certain, that they were living beings;

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and therefore this passage is a complete proof, that mankind live after death.

The appropriate Greek word for resurrection is Eyepois, as in Matt. xxvii. 52, 53; Many bodies of the saints which slept arose, and came out of the graves after his resurrection;

μετά την εγερσιν αυτο

The avasaσis is the thing mentioned as having been denied by some of the Corinthian Christians. See verse 12th of the context. How say some among you, that there is no resurrection, (no future life, or existence) of the dead?' A person who reads the Epistles to the Corinthians with reference to this object, will easily perceive, that there was at least one heretical teacher at the head of the faction in the Corinthian Church, who refused submission to the authority of the apostle. This man seems evidently to have been a jew, and was most probably a Sadducee, as he brought over several members of this church to the great sadducean error, the denial of a future state. To remove this error from that church, and to prevent its existence ever afterwards, was obviously the design of St. Paul in writing this chapter. Accordingly, he shows its absurdity in the most triumphant manner, in the first thirty-four verses; and, with equal success, elucidates and proves the contrary doctrine. In the remainder of the discourse he dwells extensively on the nature of the body with which those who are dead will be invested at the final day; declares the change which those who are living at that time will experience; and concludes with a song of triumph over death and hades, and a solemn exhor tation to Christians stedfastly to abound in the service of God.

I have remarked, that the doctrine denied by some of the Corinthian Christians was, strictly speaking, that of a future existence in another world. As this existence will in fact be connected with the future existence of the body, and therefore with the resurrection, properly so called, St. Paul, in order to remove the objections of such as opposed it, and the difficulties and doubts of others, and to disclose the truth concerning this interesting subject, has entered into an extensive discussion concerning the resurrection. The future existence of the soul will in fact be connected with the future existence of the body, to give a just and comprehensive view of the former

of these subjects, it was necessary therefore to enter into a particular consideration of the latter. Accordingly, St. Paul commences, his examination of it in the thirty-fifth verse, by putting an objection against a future state into the mouth of an opponent, derived from apprehended difficulties concerning the future existence of the body. The objection is indeed without weight; as it is merely an expression of the objector's ignorance concerning the subject, and his inability to imagine what kind of body, or by what means any body, can be united to the soul in the future world. Still, it is the objection which probably rises sooner, and in more minds, against the doctrine, than any other which can be alleged. It was therefore suggested by St. Paul with the utmost propriety.

In considering this objection the apostle not only removes it, but unfolds also many truths concerning it, of the most edifying and glorious nature. Indeed, this chapter is one of the first specimens of that expansion and sublimity of intellect for which St. Paul is distinguished above every other writer. Nothing in heathen antiquity can be found among poets, orators, or philosophers, which in loftiness of conception, or extensiveness of views, deserves to be named in comparison with this discourse. From the very proposition of the subject, the writer begins to ascend; and with an eagle-wing rises higher and higher, throughout all his progress, until he lifts himself, and elevates the mind of his reader, to the heavens.

In the text the resurrection of the body is asserted and proved. The proof alleged is the resurrection of Christ; and the argument may be advantageously exhibited in the following manner. Christ predicted his own resurrection, and actually rose in the manner predicted. He has thus proved both his power to do every thing, and his veracity in all his declarations. But he has declared that he will raise up at the last day all that are in their graves. Thus his own resurrection is a complete proof of the general resurrection of mankind.

This doctrine has, in one manner and another, been opposed by various sorts of men, in most ages of the world. The Sadducees denied all future existence to man. The Athenian philosophers, when Paul preached to them Jesus and the avaσragis, said, What will this babbler, (this scatterer of words) say?' In modern times, infidels extensively have de

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