O search for proofs of man's immortality in the nature of his physical constitution is, indeed, to seek for the living among the dead. The word of God declares that man has forfeited the high privilege of life, his original birthright,* whereby he partook of an existence little inferior to that of the angels of heaven; and has become a creature naturally subject to corruption, condemned by an inevitable law, and by a change now inscrutable to us (though once it must have been well known, since it was experienced), sooner or later to return to the dust from whence he was taken and no physical investigation of the structure of man, or of the nature of the living principle within him, can afford any solid reasons for believing, that the sentence, which was to render man perishable, has not taken full effect. Man is indeed mentally superior to

* His original birth-right, not as a creature of dust, but as the possessor of Eden.

An endeavour is made, in the next Book, to show that the curse of death, denounced upon Adam, takes full effect until

the brutes, and endowed with a bodily frame which is far more perfect than theirs, though less commensurate with the desires of its occupier; but in a large part of his compound nature he is evidently akin to them; and possessed too of passions and instincts which are so intimately interwoven and blended with his highest faculties on the one hand, and those which are universally admitted to be merely animal on the other, that no line of separation can be drawn between these faculties, marking off any portion as not of the earth nor earthy, and entitling us to assert that some have a different essence from the rest, and will survive the general destruction, or at least complete suspension, which will certainly befall all animal powers.

But we may avail ourselves of a further and better light, in the inquiry into these mysteries, than any which can be admitted in merely physical researches; the light of the moral faculties; which are far superior to the intellectual, and incomprehensible by them; less mechanical in their operations, less complex in their nature, and more spontaneous in their activity; and which, as they appear to be more immediately derived from a celestial source than any other faculties which the Father of lights has conferred on man, seem peculiarly calculated to assist in

the general resurrection :-the redemption of man, and victory of Christ over death not being completed till then: nor having, before that day, any other counteracting, except in conferring a spiritual life on men, during their sojourn in this world.

the investigation of the more abstruse and mys-
terious part of His designs and may reveal to
our hopes, though dimly and doubtfully at best,
things beyond the reach of mere intellect; but
which revelation alone can fully disclose. When
by the aid of these faculties, we discern, in part,
the character and counsels of the Supreme Maker,
and come to understand, in some degree, the
true moral condition of man; and his relations
to God, not as a Maker only, but as a Moral
Governor, who interferes with all events, in the
history both of nations and of individuals; and,
notwithstanding the apparent abandonment of
all the details of that history to the operation of
blind natural causes, brings about in the end,
through their instrumentality, great moral pur-
poses of his own; and when, rendered more con-
fident by this addition to our knowledge, we
attempt to decide for what ends this human race,
seemingly so perishable, was called into existence,
we are led to extend our views beyond this world,
and the hope of immortality becomes no longer a
baseless vision.* "Man we believe to be im-
mortal," says the eloquent author of the "
sical Theory of Another Life," "man we believe
to be immortal, (revelation apart) not because his
mind is separable from animal organization; but

Phy

The line of argument here alluded to is followed out by Dr. Chalmers in his Bridgewater Treatise, in the Chapter-On the Capacities of the World for making a Virtuous Species Happy.

because his intellectual and moral constitution is such as to demand a future developement of his nature. Why should that which is immaterial be indestructible? None can tell us; and on the contrary we are free to suppose that there may be immaterial orders, enjoying their hour of existence, and then returning to nihility."

In contemplating man as a moral being, we are raised, as it were, above the graves and charnel houses that furnished only proofs of his mortality; we breathe a purer air, and command a wider prospect. Our concern is not now with the essential qualities of mind and matter, the connection of body and soul, the dependence of consciousness upon indivisibility, or with any of those properties of the human constitution which come within the province of physiology, and demand for their successful investigation an exercise of intellect alone. We are to contemplate man no longer as an animal being, but as possessed of faculties which, however perishable in their nature, are in their functions so noble, as to separate him from the inferior creation by an impassable line. We may thus ultimately obtain, though not without many occasions of misgiving, more ample and encouraging views of the Divine economy, and see reason to think that man was created for purposes which cannot all meet their accomplishment in this world, and will find it in another; and to conjecture that after death the Creator may again put forth His power, in order to restore the spirit that had returned to

him,* and rebuild the structure that could not
preserve itself from decay.

It has been beautifully argued by Dr. Paley,
at the commencement of his admirable treatise
on Natural Theology, that any one possessing a
sufficient knowledge of mechanism, would be con-
vinced on the examination of a watch,-even
supposing that he accidentally met with that
machine, for the first time, in crossing a barren
and solitary heath,-that it was the work of in-
telligence and contrivance. At this conclusion
he would certainly arrive, even though he failed
to discover the end for which the watch was
made, the measurement of time. It would be
evident to him moreover that the watch, however
skilfully put together, and however regular in its
rate of movements at the time of his examining it,
could not move for ever: that from the very
principle of its construction, it must go down at
last. And if he could obtain no knowledge of
the maker, and it exceeded the skill of the me-

९

*It is strange that any one should consider the predicted "return of the spirit (or life) to God who gave it," as an assurance and promise of immortality. As long as the breath of life remains in them, (for "the spirit" means no more) His creatures live; when the Giver resumes it, they die. So in Job, chap. ii. $4. "The spirit of God hath made me, and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life." And (chap. xxxv. 14,)" If God gather unto himself his spirit and his 5. breath, all flesh shall perish together, and man shall turn again unto dust." The breath of life breathed into the nostrils of Adam was animal merely. For compare Genesis, chap. vii. 13. "All [animals] in whose nostrils was the breath of life, of all that was in the dry land, died."