made was in such circumstances, and bore such an infamous character, Jesus confirmed it with the asseveration, verily. As if he had said, I, the Amen, who am truth itself, solemnly declare that what I have promised shall certainly be fulfilled this day.'

The different punctuation and sense of the text, that are given by those who adopt the sleeping scheme, appear far-fetched, strained, and jejune. They contend that the words ought thus to be pointed, I say unto thee, to-day thou shalt be with me in paradise. As if our Lord had not the least intention to fix the time, when the converted malefactor should behold his glory; but only declared, by the expression to-day, the certainty of what he promised. To which forced, unnatural, and insipid interpretation of the passage, it may be justly objected, That as the thief could not be ignorant of the time when the gracious promise was made, so he had no occasion to have that particular distinguished and confirmed in so solemn a manner. Nor is it the expresssion to-day, but the word verily, which indicates the truth of what was affirmed, and the certainty of enjoying the promised blessing. For as to-day, in our Lord's answer denotes a precisely limited time, so it evidently corresponds to the adverb when, in the thief's petition.

This hypothesis appears not only uncomfortable to the real Christian, and anti-scriptural to the impartial examiner of the sacred records, but also unphilosophical. For as the soul is a thinking being, if, when the animal frame is dissolved, it were to be entirely deprived of thought and consciousness, it must, for aught appears to the contrary, lose its existence.

But if so, instead of a resurrection at the

last day, there must be a new creation; which is contrary to the analogy of faith, and to the hopes o saints in every age. A mind without thought and consciousness, and matter without solidity and extension, are equally absurd ideas.

The separate spirits of saints, therefore, being lodged in eternal mansions, and abiding at the source of all felicity, enjoy inconceivable pleasures. They are completely released from all troubles of -every kind; from all sins and sufferings; from all temptations and sorrows. Moral evil, with all its attendants, is eternally banished from those bright abodes: for the people that dwell there are all perfectly righteous; nor shall any of the inhabitants of that land say, I am sick. Their garments are always white; their harps are always tuned. Being with Christ, according to his promise, they behold his glory, and are delighted with his beauty. The infinite excellencies of Jesus the incarnate JEHOVAH, are illustriously displayed in that exalted state.Those divine and mediatorial perfections, of which, while here below, we can form but very low conceptions, beam forth on the holy and happy spirits in a blaze of glory. With adoring gratitude and pleasing astonishment they reflect. This is HE that once raised a feeble cry in the stable at Bethlehem ! This is HE that spent his life in one continued series of beneficent actions, when surrounded with meanness and poverty, with reproaches and sorrows! This is HE-but, O how changed!-who made his exit on Calvary, under every mark of infamy, under the severest sensations of pain, both in body and soul; and all this to accomplish our salvation To view HIM eye to eye, who was once a man of sorrows

and sufferings to the highest degree; to behold HIM who is their husband and head, after all the abasement and misery to which he submitted on their account, thus exalted and glorified, must fill their souls with ecstatic bliss.

Nor are they mere spectators of his glorious exaltation. They not only behold their beloved, and have intercourse with him, as loyal subjects with an exalted sovereign, but he entertains and rejoices over them as his friends and brethren, as his bride and portion. This we may learn from the friendly freedom he used with his disciples while here on earth. For though, as their sovereign Lord, he required supreme respect, and accepted profound adoration, yet he did not keep them at an awful distance, but conversed with them in the most familiar manner. Doubtless, then, he does not behave with less freedom, or keep them at a greater distance, because of his exalted state, but rather takes them into a state of exaltation with himself.— For though he is exalted above all blessing and praise, yet not as a private person, nor merely for his own sake, but as the Head of his numerous family, and as the Saviour of all his people. The advancement of him, the head, could not be intended to remove the members to a greater distance; for there is the same relation, and the same union subsisting between him and them. Consequently, they must be honoured and exalted with him. Beholding his infinite glory, their adoring regards are heightened; but this is far from diminishing their nearness to him, or their delight in him. It only serves to increase their astonishment and joy, as they find him still condescending to admit them

into such familiarity with him, and so liberally communicating his glory to them.

When, in this lower world, they discerned the signatures of Deity in the works of creation and of providence, they beheld yet brighter displays of Jehovah's glory in the operations of grace, and in the amazing effects of his love, in the gift of a Saviour, and in his death on the cross. But now, having their intellectual powers abundantly strengthened, they have manifestations of his infinite excellence, compared with which all their previous discoveries of divine perfection, by the material creation, and all the happiness they enjoyed in the church militant, were poor and mean, were low and languid beyond expression. For they are surrounded with the opulence of God, and eternally enriched with his munificence.

If Paul, ravished with the more obscure appearances of divine wisdom, could not forbear exclaiming, O the depth of the riches, both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! what holy transports of wonder must it afford the spirits of the just made perfect, to have the counsels of heaven laid open to their view! The contemplation of divine power, under the conduct of infinite wisdom, and leagued with boundless goodness, must heighten their pleasure. How delightful to behold, in the light of glory, that power which raised the vast frame of nature, and from the beginning sustained all things -that power, which turned the mighty wheels of providence in every age of the world, through all the revolutions of time-that uncontrollable power, which restrained legions of malignant spirits and accursed fiends, in ten thousand different instances,

from perpetrating their malicious designs, and from filling the world with mischief-which wrought upon the obdurate hearts of rebellious creatures, caused them to acknowledge divine sovereignty, and made them willing to accept salvation in the appointed way-- that power, which, having formed their souls anew, preserved them in the midst of innumerable dangers that continually lay in their way to the regions of happiness, nor ever intermitted its guardian agency till it brought them safe to glory!

If the power of God, as beheld by the saints in light, be so delightful a subject of contemplation, what exuberant joy must the views of his love afford! For as love is the noblest passion of the human breast, so it is the brightest beam of divinity that ever irradiated the wide creation. Love is a pleasing theme, and the meaning of that divine sentence, GOD IS LOVE, is there unfolded to the very life. The happy spirits are no longer obliged to learn Jehovah's love from his names and works, for they now behold it as intimately essential to his being. The day they had long expected, that happy day which is appropriated to the full discovery of divine love having dawned upon them, they take their fill of loves. Now the immortal spirit is invigorated in all its powers-enlarged in all its faculties, on purpose to render it capable of taking in more copious views, and of receiving abundantly larger emanations of divine love than it could possibly before enjoy. They have now traced up the streams to the eternal fountain-the beams to the very sun of love. The bosom of their Father, where the thoughts of love were lodged from ever