His revelations of a real and local Heavenly Home, and of a real and local Presence of Christ (such as our hearts crave for) in that Home, are real revelations; not cruel mockeries of hearts that love Him; not deceptive, well-sounding words that mean nothing.

And as is the Heavenly Home, so is the worship in it. It is a real and local worship, and inseparable from "the throne of God and of the Lamb." The heavenly beings worship in an infinitely glorious material place, and under infinitely glorious material forms, or physicospiritual manifestations. However immeasurably the heavenly world and its inhabitants and its worship. transcend all that we can know or imagine in our present state, we have every assurance of revelation and reason that they are as truly Objective Realities as this earth and its inhabitants and its worship are.

Immediately after death, the spirits of the departed, who knew each other in this world, will again recognise each other beyond the grave. The "rich man" of the parable recognised "Lazarus" in the spirit world. "In Hades he lifted up his eyes, being in torments, and seeth Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom." And the power of mutual recognition will continue, and will probably be increased, after the resurrection and glorification of the body. In the wondrous world of glory, our personal identity and the identity of our physical bodies will remain. On the Mount of the Transfiguration, Christ appeared in heavenly glory, in "majesty." "He was transfigured before them: and His face did shine as the sun, and His garments became white as the light."2 Nevertheless, He was recognizable as the same Christ: The disciples still knew Him to be the Lord.

The transfiguration of our bodies, in the world of 2 Matt. 17. 2; 2 Peter 1. 16, 17.

1 Luke 16. 23.

glory, will also transfigure our minds. They will still be the same minds: but with many new and glorious faculties, and with the old faculties infinitely enlarged and perfected. We know how dependent our mental powers and perceptions are upon the varying states of the body. Not only sight, hearing, and the other senses, but also memory, imagination, and judgment, can be enfeebled and paralyzed by bodily sickness; and will return to their former vigour with returning health. The glorious change, therefore, which shall hereafter take place in our bodies, may be the appointed means of quickening and enlarging the powers of our minds.1 All material grossnesses and impediments will be removed. By a divine "Ephphatha," the ears, now so dull, will be opened. The eyes, which are now unable to gaze upon the sun, will then look upon Him, as compared with Whose Uncreated Light the sun upon his burning throne at noon is as darkness. But our moral and spiritual faculties, which have suffered most by the Fall, will gain most by a glorious resurrection. Our knowledge, which is now so imperfect and dim in the moral and spiritual order of things, will then be perfect. "For now we see in a mirror, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know (know fully) even as also I have been known (known fully).” 2

Our life and worship in that world, although infinitely transcending our life and worship here, will in some measure resemble them. Both worlds are the work of the same Divine Author: and He has so constitued them, that our life and worship on earth are a fitting preparation for our life and worship in heaven. But like does not prepare for unlike: preparation implies continuousness of state, and a deep and real resemblance. There must be a close and vital unity and similarity 1 Abp. Whately's Future State, p. 96. 9 I Cor. 13. 12.

between the state of preparation and the state for which the preparation is made. As childhood is a preparation for manhood, so this life is a preparation for the eternal life which is to come. The same golden threads, which the Divine Spirit has woven into our life here, will there reappear in richer patterns of angelic glory and beauty of character.

This lower world and its worship were not the first world and the first worship which God created. The angelic world of glory in the heavens existed countless ages "before the world was." In the depths of the eternity that is past, God had created that world as the Sanctuary of His Presence, the Holy of Holies of the universe; and He had filled it with seraphim's and angels' worship. It was the First and Archetypal Temple, the "pattern" of all temples in lower worlds. And its worship was the first and most perfect expression of the eternal conception of worship which lay in the bosom of God. In the fulness of time, God created. this earth, and placed upon it inhabitants, made “in His own image," with hearts full of His own conception of a holy and perfect worship. And He gave them a holy day sanctified for holy worship. Thus God filled the earth with a worship which-excepting in so far as it was disordered by the Fall, and limited by the conditions of man's earthly existence-became everywhere a copy of the original worship in the heavens. We cannot doubt that this is the true account of the genesis of human worship, and of its relation to the Worship in Heaven.

Consciously or unconsciously, we copy and reproduce the Heavenly worship as best we can. We may call this Instinct perhaps it is more. As all our acts record themselves in Heaven; so it is conceivable that vibrations of Heaven's joyous melodies may reach us here,

and, when our dull hearts are attuned, may thrill our inner senses. But however this may be, we, at best, reproduce Heaven's worship very imperfectly; for we are "compassed with infirmity," and we see and hear and know only "in part." Whilst we are in our present phase of existence, the pure light of the Eternal Sanctuary is broken for us, and is tinged with the mists and shadows which surround us here.

PART III.

Worship in beatbenism.

CHAPTER XIII.

HEATHEN WORSHIP-Principles.

1. Expiation.-2. Prayer.-3. Tithes and Offerings.-4. Formalism.

1.-Expiation.

GOD, having created and beautified Worship in Heaven, and made it the crowning glory around His throne, the highest, purest, and most beautiful efflorescence of the created universe, willed to fill this earth with a worship which should be, in its lower sphere and more limited measure of perfection, a copy of the eternal worship in the skies. And in order that men should accomplish this His Will, and worthily worship and adore His Everlasting Name, He has endowed them with an Instinct of Worship, and has, as saith an Eastern sage, spread abroad the green grass as an emerald kneeling carpet beneath all nations. "All the earth doth worship Thee, the Father everlasting." "Heaven and earth are full of the Majesty of Thy Glory." And as with the infinite glories of heaven, so with the countless

K