ferred. For since the felicity conferred by God must be perfectly consistent with his nature, it can only find repose in a bosom which has received the impression of his image. Without this likeness there can be no union; where there is no union, there can be no concord; where there is no concord, there must be infelicity and

woe.

But since God is, and necessarily must be, devoid of all moral evil; and since man in his present condition is subject to its influence, the consequence is inevitable, that an agreement under these circumstances can have no existence. It therefore follows, that either God or man must change, before they can possibly meet together. For certain it is, that those qualifications which are pleasing to man in his present state, are such as God cannot possibly bestow through the holiness and perfection of his nature; while it is equally certain that even the glories of heaven could communicate no felicity to man, on account of the corruption and depravity reigning in his heart. Consequently a radical change must be undergone before man can derive felicity from his Maker.

Inasmuch as God is immutable and perfect, it is evident that He cannot change, and that his nature cannot include moral evil; and since heaven is a place of happiness, to which the souls of the righteous shall be admitted, and happiness, under existing circumstances, cannot

be communicated, it is obvious that the necessary change must pass upon man. And as it is moral evil which has sunk him beneath his primitive rank in the scale of created excellence, and thus rendered him unfit for the felicity which he hopes to enjoy hereafter, so, it is only by the removal of moral evil that he can be restored to his native dignity, and rendered meet to partake of that felicity, which the Divine Being will confer in another world. The certainty, therefore, of future rewards demonstrates the fact, that from all who are admitted to a state of happiness, moral evil will be done away.

But we have intimated, and every one must be prepared to admit the correctness of the proposition, that death is occasioned by moral evil. If then moral evil be destroyed, how can that of which moral evil is the primary cause continue to exist. By what can it be perpetuated, except by that which gave it birth? To suppose that effects can remain, when the cause which produced them has been done away, is to suppose them effects and not effects at the same time; or in other words, is to suppose a palpable contradiction. Since, therefore, moral evil is the cause of death, and that cause, in as far as relates to all the righteous, must be done away, it necessarily follows, if no natural effect can survive its cause, that death, on the annihilation of moral evil, must cease, and the body rise again.

If death can remain in existence after moral

evil shall have been destroyed, it is impossible for us to imagine from what cause this continuance of such an effect can proceed. It cannot result from moral evil, because, by the supposition that is now destroyed; and the notion of a transfer of power to something else, were a notion replete with absurdities, and too ridiculous for serious refutation. And since we can no more conceive of the continuance of an effect without a cause, than we can conceive of its origination without a cause; and since the cause in which the effect is presumed to have originated has been destroyed, and no transfer of power can possibly have taken place, through which the continuance of this effect can be supported, the continuance itself vanishes from our sight, and the consequence is, a liberation from the confines of death.

As the primary existence of the cause was necessary to the primary production of the effect so the continuance of the cause, must be necessary to the continuance of the effect. For to conceive of an effect as continuing without an adequate cause, would be to make a contradictory supposition;-it would be to suppose the continuance of an effect, and not the continuance of it at the same time, which is absolutely impossible. As, therefore, a contradiction cannot be admitted, and as no effect can continue without an adequate cause; as the cause of death is moral evil, and this cause in all the righteous

must be destroyed, the effect will discontinue as a natural consequence, through the destruction of the cause, and issue in the event we are contemplating, namely a resurrection of the body.

We are perfectly aware that this argument is only partial in its application. It has been advanced, in favour of the resurrection of the righteous, and of them alone; and if its validity in that particular reference be admitted, we ask for nothing more. In proof that the bodies of the unrighteous will be raised again, a few considerations will be adduced presently. Natural evil may, in the progress of its continuance, be changed in the modes of its application and existence; and as it is dependent upon moral evil for its being, we may rest assured that while moral evil continues in existence, natural evil, in some or other of its modes, will also remain undestroyed. All we have contended for is, that moral evil and natural evil being indissolubly connected together, if the former be done away, the latter must expire.

5. We appeal once more, in behalf of our doctrine, to that justice which every one must allow to be an attribute essentially characteristic of the Moral Governor of the Universe. We can have no satisfactory conceptions of the Divine Justice, without having recourse to another life; and we can have no conception of another life, without including in our idea of it,

that of rewards and punishments as awaiting the righteous and the guilty.

If rewards and punishments be administered beyond the grave, they must be administered to man; and if administered to man, they must be administered both to soul and body; because the two natures are indispensable to his complete existence, and identity and entireness of person cannot be preserved without the union of them. The resurrection of the body is, therefore, a necessary result of our very being; and unless we take it into our account, we leave man in a state as remote from natural perfection, as we should place the justice of God in a moral point of view, by denying the certainty of future rewards and punishments.

Our souls and bodies are so intimately connected in the present life, that they exert a mutual influence upon each other; and owing to the mysterious union which subsists between them, a variety of actions are performed, of which neither soul nor body would be capable in its separate state. Hence, a supposition inducing us to believe, that the soul alone, shall be rewarded or punished in another life, for actions, which, as a simple substance, it neither did nor could commit, were not only irreconcileable with all our ideas of equity and justice, but utterly repugnant to them. If, therefore, rewards and punishments be administered in another