Thessalonians that the day of judgment was not near at hand. This, of course, cannot refer to the judgment which takes place at death; for such an idea would turn the whole passage into nonsense. Nor can it refer to the destruction of Jerusalem: for, 1. Christ did not visibly and personally appear at that time. 2. The destruction of that city was near at hand when Paul wrote, and actually occurred some twelve or fifteen years after this. 3. The Thessalonians had no particular interest in knowing when the Jewish city should be sacked. 4. But v. 3 shows the impossibility of referring this passage to that event. "That day," says Paul, “shall not come unless there be a falling away first." What falling away is here referred to? Not a falling away of Christians before the destruction of Jerusalem; for such an apostasy was in no way connected with that event. Nor could it mean a falling away of the Jews: for they had already sufficiently fallen away to insure their destruction; Luke xix. 40, 41. The event of the Saviour's coming, here spoken of, has therefore not yet occurred.

The passage in 2 Tim. iv. 1, is equally explicit: "I charge thee before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and kingdom." The word for appearing is here inipávɛia, and is never employed figuratively in the New Testament; see ver. 8, and 1 Tim. vi. 14; 2 Tim. i. 10; 2 Thess. ii. 8; Tit. ii. 13, which are the only places in which it occurs. Now Christ has not yet personally appeared to judge the living and the dead, and therefore the event here referred to (as well as in most of the texts just named,) is yet to occur.

The next passage to which we shall refer is Heb. ix. 27, 28: "And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment: so Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation." This passage has been often supposed to refer only to the judgment which takes place upon the soul immediately after death, as in the case of Dives and Lazarus, in Luke xvi. This, however, is not in accordance with the text. For outw xai in ver. 28, is plainly illative, and refers to the particles of comparison xao' ősor in ver. 27. The argument of the apostle is that " as it is appointed to men once (äña§) to die, and after this (uerà Touro) it is appointed that they should be judged; so also Christ having died once (äraž,) will ap

pear again to be the Judge." The judgment, therefore, to which man is appointed after death, is the judgment of the great day! for which great transaction he awaits either in paradise or hell: and this judgment is to take place when Christ the Judge appears, the second time (personally and visibly as he appeared the first time,) not, however, as a sin-offering, but to the saving of those whom he had redeemed with his blood. See also 1 Pet. i. 7, 8, and 1 John 'iii. 2, (compare Ps. xvii. 15,) and 1 John ii. 28, which last passage clearly implies that some will be "ashamed before him at his coming," and who, of course, will receive according to their deserts.

The apostle in 2 Pet. ii. 4, announces that the fallen angels are to be judged at the great day: "For if God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment," or to "the judgment of the great day;" (see Jude 6, compare 1 Cor. vi. 3, and Matt. viii. 29, and xxv. 41.) This protasis, it is true, has no grammatical apodosis; but a reference to the previous verses will show that Peter intended to convey the idea, that "If God did not spare angels, much less will he spare these false teachers." But there can be no mistaking the import of παρέδωκεν εἰς κρίσιν τηρουμένους he delivered them over us those who (now) are kept for (or until) the judgment"— even the judgment of the great day. And, as we have remarked already, if angels are thus reserved to judgment, though already confined in hell, the same is doubtless the case with sinners who die impenitent: and if there is to be a day for judging sinful angels, there is also to be a day for judging sinful man. And this judgment in the case of man, can no more be resolved into the sentence which he meets with at death, than the future judgment of angels can be resolved into the sentence which was formerly passed upon them when they fell.

The argument in 2 Pet. iii. 3-17, respecting the "coming of the day of God," ver. 12, and of the "coming" of the judge, (ver. 4,) which the skeptics derided, might be here discussed, did not our limits absolutely forbid. It is a serious consideration, however, that Professor Bush virtually justifies these scoffers, who say, "Where is the promise of his coming?" and who seem to think that Christ will never come to judgment: for, as if in answer to this very query

of theirs, his theory replies, that there is no such promise, and that Christ will not thus come to judgment, &c.

Omitting other passages, we proceed to Jude 14, 15: "Behold the Lord cometh with ten thousand of his saints, to execute judgment upon all," &c. The meaning of this passage cannot be mistaken; for, whatever may be the import of saints here, it is evident that the Lord has never appeared thus attended, nor has he ever thus judged the world, or all mankind. The prophecy, therefore, is yet to be fulfilled.

The term saints (ayías) has occasioned some little discussion; and Dr. Duffield, in his late work on "Prophecy,” has egregiously misapprehended its import; and to sustain himself, would even translate ȧyyénos by messenger, and refer it to mankind in Matt. xiii. 39, &c. But this is wholly inadmissible; nor did his argument require any such harsh dealing with the Scriptures; a mode of dealing which must involve the whole doctrine of angels in inextricable confusion. This mode of translation is a discovery claimed by the editors of the "Improved Version," who have given us many ludicrous specimens of it; (see e. g., their rendering of Gal. iii. 19; 1 Tim. iii. 16, and v. 21; Heb. i. 4, 5, 7, and ii. 2, and xii. 22; 1 Pet. iii. 22; 2 Pet. ii. 4, &c., and their annotations thereon,) but they have, as yet, left Matt. xiii. 39, 49, &c., undisturbed.

We have already shown that when our Saviour appears in judgment, he will be attended with all the holy angels. Their appearance will characterize his second advent, and, had he wished it, they were ready to attend him during his first. (Matt. xxvi. 53, compare Heb. i. 6.) 'Ayios is a frequent name for angels; see Matt. xxv. 31; Mark viii. 30, 38; Luke ix. 26; Acts x. 22; Rev. xiv. 10; 1 Thess. iii. 13; (compare 2 Thess. i. 7;) and in the LXX., Dan. iv. 14, 20, and viii. 13; Psalm lxxxix. 5; and Job v. 1. And even in our text, a number of the old authorities read μvgiáoiv ἁγίων ἀγγέλων, and μυριάσιν ἁγίαις ἀγγέλων, and μυριάσιν ȧyyéλwv. Now Christ has never yet appeared thus attended to judgment, and, therefore, the prophecy is still unfulfilled.

There are a number of passages in Revelation, as for example chap. vi. 12-17, and xix. 11-16, which might be made the subject of remark in this connexion; but we omit them, in order to refer to Rev. xx. 11-15, in conclusion.

The passage has been already quoted on a former page, and we therefore need not quote it here. Professor Bush, as we may easily suppose, has been exceedingly perplexed by it; but a few observations will be sufficient to show how utterly he has failed in his attempt to set aside its testimony.

His remark, that "bodies" are not here spoken of, we have already considered; and a single quotation will serve to show the nature of his attempts at evasion. Says he, in relation to this passage: "The true doctrine of the resurrection affords the true key to the symbolic problems before us." p. 317. We have seen what his "true doctrine of the resurrection" is-that man rises from the dead at deathand the fact that he attempts to explain this passage in ac cordance with this notion, will, of itself, evince what, must be the nature of his attempts at exposition. And it is while making this effort, that he contradicts himself so strangely, by first asserting that the judgment spoken of occurs at a stated and definite period, and then that it occurs at no such period, but merely takes place at death. He asserts, that "the judgment here described is not a visible judgment in the natural sphere," and, of course, the great white throne, and the heavens and earth, and the sea, are not "visible in the natural sphere." The sea giving up its dead "occurs," says he, "prior to the act of adjudication just mentioned above," i. e., prior to this judgment of the dead, which he speaks of; and, of course, if this "act of adjudication" is the one which takes place at death, then the sea must have given up her dead before the first of Adam's race died. But to pursue this subject would be to trifle with the patience of the reader. I may remark, however, that the reason why the sea is here specifically mentioned as giving up its dead, appears to be, because, as the resurrection of all who are in their graves, or in the dust of the earth, had been spoken of by the Spirit of inspiration, the resurrection of those in the sea is here expressly mentioned, that all may perceive that the resurrection of the whole human family will be complete, and that even the dissolution of the body which takes place in the waters, will present no impediment in the way of him who is the resurrection and the life. So that even though through Adam all die, yet through Christ shall all be made alive.

CONCLUSION.

THUS I have completed my investigation of the views of the resurrection and judgment asserted by Professor Bush, in common with Swedenborgians and others. I have carefully examined every position which he has advanced, and every attempt which he has made to impugn the received doctrine, or to sustain his own. He has in the last chapters of his book attempted to criticise at great length Acts iii. 19– 21, and 1 Cor. xv. 24-28; but as these passages have but an incidental reference to the main issue, I shall not follow him therein. I am not sorry that there is no necessity for doing so; for in his attempts to criticise them, he has fallen into not a few grievous philological errors, affecting, too, the very core of his exposition; and it would afford me no pleasure to expose them, as they do not seriously affect the fundamental doctrines of the Gospel.

Yet crude and inconsistent with scarce a parallel, as are the Professor's views, he cannot, without the highest degree of self-complacency, survey his efforts to establish them. In the conclusion of his remarks on the resurrection and judgment, he exclaims, with no little transport-"What then becomes of the scriptural evidence of the resurrection of the body? Does it not evaporate in the crucible of logical and philological deduction? And is it not inevitable that a great change must come over our estimate of the doctrine, viewed as a disclosure of holy writ? Can it hereafter present the same aspect to the reflecting mind as formerly, when conceived to involve the averment of the requickening of the inhumed relics of the corporeal structure? Especially, are we not presented with a new and all-important view of the central fact, our Saviour's resurrection? Can the evidence be resisted ?"-p. 347. I have sometimes half doubted whether the Professor could have been really serious. when he wrote this-for of all things in the world it appears the most unaccountably strange that a man should soberly expect to effect an entire revolution in the views entertained by the Christian church on the most momentous subjects, by means of such efforts as this of Professor Bush. He has