knowledge the TYPE of their separation from heavenly nature, and union with sin, dust, and grovelling mortality. The earth at large was their place of confinement and punishment. The laws of God, to which Man gave the name of nature, provided for its continuance and general order; while, divided into sexes, the fallen spirits continued the preservation of their species in animal form; each spirit after death re-entering another shape, and having pursued its allotted career, again enduring the separation of immaterial from material frame, and appearing at the judgment seat of heaven, claimed a superior or inferior state of suffering in its next stage of trial, as the reward of its increased or diminished subjection to the dominion of sin. The irrevocable fiat had gone forth, and heaven itself was no longer open to that once glorious host; but mercy yet pleaded for alleviation of suffering for those who (although late) made the law of God their rule, and the subjection of their passions their study.

The Immaterial Spirit could not be subjected to the dominion of Time.-Coeval and coeternal with God himself, the existence of the offending archangels could not be annihilated, though the dominion of sin had reduced them to an eternal state of suffering. It is an immutable law of God, that matter, however divisible or compressible, cannot be forced out of existence: and, though outraged and offended, He still in mercy adhered to this law in his spiritual as in his temporal kingdom; and, having once permitted their existence, doomed them not to utter extinction; thus, however various the shapes

it

they might assume, or the changes they might undergo, the actual number of offending spirits neither increased nor diminished with the lapse of age. Thus, although in the commencement Adam and Eve formed the only two endowed with human shape, it was not that two spirits alone had erred; nor when, at the period of the deluge, the world was peopled in all its quarters, and Man had multiplied to infinity, it was not that an increased number had been added to the offending hostwas, that many, who had been doomed at first to a still meaner sphere, were at last permitted to assume the name of Man, and though ever varying, increasing, dividing, and disappearing to the palpable sense, the number still, in fact, remained the same, and so for ever must have remained, had not the blood of a heavenly Redeemer at length re-opened the gates of life, and offered a sacrifice of sufficient magnitude to atone for even the crimes of demons! Many ages, however, passed, and Man, so far from being worthy of redemption, or profiting by the past mercies shewn him, displayed the vices of his original nature to so revolting a degree, that, heartstruck, Mercy fled from the direful scene, while rigid Justice had well nigh doomed the world to the original chaos from whence it sprung, to form, perhaps, another, still more replete with torture, and fitter for condign punishment. One family yet remained, whose paths were not the paths "of darkness," and for that one family the voice of mercy still prevailed against the tempest of wrath and desolation, and pleaded not in vain. Noah and his sons received the divine command

which preserved themselves and a certain number of other species of the offending host from death, while the rest were swept away in that horrific flood which brought extermination and destruction on an universe at large ! Chaos thus again became the doom of the disembodied spirits, until the earth, being cleared of the waters, and the promise made to Noah, that no such inundation should a second time deform the fair face of creation, they were once more permitted to return and prove their repentance for the past by amendment for the future. It was one addition to their punishment that the spirit, (which received the name of soul from Man,) could not communicate its previous state to the corporeal frame. Mind was limited to the understanding of Time alone, nor were the secrets of Eternity permitted to be revealed to it; thus, although the attendant Spirit was indivisible until Death, from the substantial form to which it was chained, it could not impart to that form any knowledge of its previous condition, and Man was left free to choose between good and evil, and follow the laws of God or Sin, but ignorant of the source from whence he sprung, or the evil to which he owed his origin. Pride, which caused the fall of the Archangel, was equally a marked feature in the character of Man. Ever unwilling to acknowledge a superior, or own a Sovereign Lord and Master, Obedience and Humility were lessons which the severest tuition could scarcely impress on his untameable spirit. The sphere from which he had fallen was still the object of his passionate desire, and with the lapse of ages another attempt to reverse the decrees of

the Omnipotent, gave evidence of how much these chil dren of wrath had yet to learn of their degradation and feebleness. The building of the Tower of Babel, originating in a sacrilegious wish to scale to Heaven, which they had proved themselves unworthy to enjoy, only ended in their utter and well-merited confusion; for, although a holy promise guaranteed them from a second deluge, an omnipotent power was yet equal to disconcerting their plans and overwhelming their futile attempts to dare his authority and dispute his will; divided among themselves by the confusion of tongues, which was the only notice God deigned to their folly, it became necessary to separate and give up a scheme which was as remarkable for the daringness of its intent, as the means of its failure-a proof at once, of the extravagant and undue pride of the creature, and the merciful forbearance of the Creator. The mighty host was now compelled to form divisions, which, strangers among their kind, spread over the face of the earth, and attaching themselves to particular portions of territory, gave rise to the various nations which bear their name, or speak their language. The spirit of evil, however, was far from quelled-increase of numbers afforded security of possession; and as severity of labour diminished, the tide of passions and original guilt increased, until the avenger's hand was once more called for, to stay the progress of a flood which threatened to sweep away all the bounds of moral restraint in its furious career. The congregation of multitudes ensured security to guilt, and the once proud cities of Sodom and Gomorrah became lament

able instances of the depravity to which angelic nature, in its fallen state, could attain. The intercession of a less erring spirit had obtained a promise from God, that, were ten righteous men alone to be found within their walls, these devoted cities should be spared for their sakes! But, alas! not even ten in all that throng of guilty sinners, could be found worthy to avert the course of divine wrath; and their destruction by fire and brimstone held them up as a terrible example to all posterity of the enormity of guilt and the certainty of retribution. Acts of aggression, rapine, and injusticehostility, cruelty, war, and murder, told a fearful tale of the prevalence of evil on earth, and the spirit of sin in Man; some, indeed, are spoken of in Bible history who were less criminal than the others, but (as we may reasonably infer,) were termed righteous and just from the COMPARATIVE inferiority of guilt, rather than entire devotion to virtue, as many of their acts still spoke of the original taint, and ever expose them as the frail erring creature with whose very nature the laws of God and holiness were at variance; and to whom it was as laborious a penance to do right, as it was to the fabled Hercules of old to achieve the performances of his twelve gigantic labours. The conduct of Abram and Sarai towards Hagar and her child-that of Lot and his daughters, who alone were judged worthy of preservation from the devouring element which spoke the anathema of God against Sodom and Gomorrah-that of David towards Uriah and his wife-and many such instances of the deeds of the Men of God in the earlier