rich man also died, and was buried; and in hell he lifted up his eyes, being in torments, and

been, that Roxbury has afforded more scholars, first for the college, and then for the public, than any other town of its big-seeth Abraham afar off, and Lazness, or it may be, of twice its bigness, in all New-England.

arus in his bosom. And he cried, and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me; and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue; for I am torRox-mented in this flame." Luke

Mr. Eliot, in addition to former proofs, clearly evinced his regard for literature by leaving a fair part of his own estate for maintaining the school in bury.

(To be continued.)

The State of Separate Souls.

WHE

xvi. 22-24. And to the thief on the cross, who presented his dying prayer to the suffering Saviour, Christ said, "To day shalt thou be with me in paradise." To the Corinthians the apostle Paul said, "We are always confident, knowing, that whilst we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord.-We are confident, and

HERE and in what condition are the souls of mankind, during the time which passes between the death of their bodies and the general resurrec-willing rather to be absent from tion ?

the body, and to be present with the Lord." And to the Philippians he said, "I am in a strait

A true and certain answer to this inquiry, can be obtained from no other source than divine rev-betwixt two, having a desire to elation. The souls of the dead depart, and to be with Christ; are unseen by us. If they still which is far better." exist, if they retain the powers 2. The scriptures plainly hold of thought and reflection, and a forth, that there will be no pascapacity for love or hatred, pleas-sing, after death, out of a state ure or pain, they are unseen by us, and in an invisible state. Therefore, so far as the word of God affords any light in this case; so far may we obtain a true answer to the proposed in-will be happy for ever, and such quiry, and no farther. as are miserable in their separate state will be miserable for ever.

I therefore proceed to observe, 1. It is plainly held forth in the scriptures that the souls of men are happy or miserable after the death of their bodies, and whilst their bodies lie in the grave.

of misery into a state of happiness, nor falling from a state of happiness into a state of misery; but that the souls which are hap py after the death of the body,

To the rich man's request, that Lazarus might be sent to cool his tongue, "Abraham said, son, remember that thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy good things, and likewise Lazarus

In the parable of the rich man, and of the poor beggar Laz-evil things: but now he is com arus, Christ said, "The beggar forted, and thou art tormented. died, and was carried by the an- And, besides all this, between gels into Abraham's bosom: the us and you there is a great gulf

fixed so that they which would pass from hence to you cannot; neither can they pass to us that would come from thence." Men are to be judged and rewarded at the last day according to their works, not the works which they performed after death, in their separate, unembodied state, but according to the deeds which they performed whilst here in the body. "For we must all appear before the judgment-seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad." 2 Cor. v. 10.

turn to the dust, and are in a state of lifeless insensibility under the power of death. But at Christ's second coming, their bodies will be raised and fashioned like to his glorious body. They will be raised in incorrup tion and glory, and put on immortality. To these incorruptible, glorious, spiritual and immortal bodies their souls will be united. Then will they stand before the judgment-seat of Christ, to be judged and rewarded according to their works.— Then will God render to every man according to his deeds-to them who, by patient continuThe doctrine of a purgatory, ance in well-doing whilst on the or a disciplinary punishment of earth, sought for glory, and hosouls after the death of the body, nor, and immortality, eternal to purge and purify them and life. Then will Christ, the sumake them meet for heaven, is preme Judge, say to them, totally unfounded and antiscrip- "Come, ye blessed of my Fatural. But the scriptures plain-ther, inherit the kingdom prely import, that the souls of the pared for you from the foundafaithful go into a state of happi-tion of the world." And the ness in company and fellowship righteous will then, in their with Christ, whilst their bodies whole persons, in consequence sleep in the dust; and that the of this blessed sentence, enter souls of the wicked, upon leav-into life eternal. So the scriping their bodies, enter a state of misery; and that there will never be an exchange of the one state for the other. Nevertheless,

Ro

tures represent the matter.
mans ii. 6-10. and Matt. xxv.
31-46.

Hence, Christians are said to be kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time." And the consummate

3. The scriptures plainly hold forth, that the state of both the one and the other will be greatly altered at the day of judg-glory and happiness of the heament, and very different, thenceforward for ever, from what it was before.

When Christ appears the second time, it will be to the salvation of them that look for him. Heb. ix. 28. Before that time, their salvation is not complete. Their souls indeed are with Christ in a state of glory and happiness; but their bodies re

venly state, which they are final-
ly to enjoy, is called "the grace
that is to be brought unto them
at the revelation of Jesus Christ."
1 Pet. i. 5, 13.-Thus although
the souls of the faithful do, im-
mediately after death, enter a
state of happiness with Christ in
the heavenly paradise, and will
never fall from it into a state of
misery; yet they do not in their

though their souls are in torment; even as the fallen angels or devils are not now in the same state of punishment which they will be in after the judgment of the great day. For the apostle Jude says, "The angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness, unto the judgment of the great day."This account naturally suggests the idea, that the fallen angels are at present in a state resembling criminals reserved in

whole persons enter upon the full enjoyment of their glorious heavenly inheritance, as jointheirs with Christ, till the final sentence is passed at the day of judgment. And in regard to the wicked, the scriptures plainly hold forth, that although their souls are in misery and torment, immediately upon leaving their bodies and will never exchange the state of misery for that of happiness; yet it is at the day of judgment that Christ will reward them according to their works, when he will come in the glory of his Father, with his an-chains, in darkness, horror and gels. It is then that God will render unto them indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish. It is then that the supreme Judge will pass the awful sentence upon them, "Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels ;" and that they shall go away into everlasting punishment. That is the So likewise the souls of the time when they shall be cast in-wicked, after the death of their to the lake of fire, which is the bodies, are in a state somewhat second death-into hell fire, resembling that of criminals, where their worm dieth not, and who have been apprehended the fire is not quenched. and cast into prison, and fast bound in a dungeon, there to be reserved to the day appointed for their public trial, when they will be condemned and executed.

despair, unto the time, when they are to have their public trial and condemnation, in order to be punished according to the demerit of their crimes. Hence some of them said to Christ, "What have we to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of God? art thou come hither to torment us before the time."

A furnace of fire-everlasting fire-hell fire-a lake of fire and the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone, are terms used in the New Testament to signify and express the future But if this be the case, how state and punishment of the are we to understand what is wicked. Into this furnace or said of the rich man, that "in lake of fire they will be cast-hell he lifted up his eyes being into this everlasting punishment in torments ?"-From the parathey will go away, not before, ble in which these words stand, but, in consequence of their pub- it is evident, that the words have lic sentence and condemnation a figurative or metaphorical at the day of judgment, accord- meaning, and are not to be uning to the scripture representa- derstood in the strict, literal tions of the case. sense. For his body was then dead and buried. His soul only was then in torment. His eyes, Iii

Antecedent to this, their condition is considerably different, VOL. VI. No. 12.

But still it may be inquired, What is that hell in which the rich man's soul found itself in torments? I answer, The Greek word, Ads here translated hell, signifies, in general, the unseen world, the invisible state, into which the spirits or souls of men go, when they are separted from the body at death. The word is sometimes used to signify death and the grave, but more generally the state of the dead-the state into which the souls of the dead are gone.

When a man dies, we sometimes say, His soul is gone into the other world, or into the eter

and his tongue, and all the | tain even so small an alleviation members of his body, were to his distressed soul. then in the grave, in a state of perfect insensibility. Therefore, when it is said, "In hell he lifted up his eyes, being in torments," the meaning cannot be, that he lifted up his bodily eyes in the lake of fire. And when he is represented as saying, "Father Abraham, have mercy on me; and send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame;" the meaning cannot be, that his tongue, with which he used to speak, was then tormented in the flame of a material fire. But the whole account is manifestly a figura-nal world, or the invisible world, tive representation of the condition of the soul in its separate state, in the invisible world; and the general meaning of the aforementioned expressions is to this effect, that the rich man | died and was buried; and his soul in the invisible state, on a sudden, to its dreadful surprise, found itself in the keenest an-word Ads signifies the world or guish and torment, which may state which cannot be seenbe aptly represented to our ap- the invisible state. And to say, prehension, by a man's lifting a man's soul is in Ads, signifies up his eyes, with sudden and much the same as to say, it is unexpected surprise, in the in the eternal world. midst of a dreadful, flarning fire; and that to increase his torment, he had a view of the safe and happy state of Lazarus, and would have been glad to have receiv-Adrs they meant the invisible ed the smallest alleviation of his torment, even from the hand of him whom he formerly despised, though it were no more than night be represented by a man's dipping the tip of his finger in water and touching the tongue of one who is tormented in a flame; and yet could not ob

without determining whether he is gone to happiness or misery. For under this general term, we include the idea of a state of happiness, and a state of misery. In the invisible or eternal world, we conceive of some as being in a state of happiness, and of others in a state of misery. Now the

The Greeks said there were two paths or ways in Adrs, the one of the good, the other of the wicked. This shows that by

world of separate spirits in general, including both the good and the bad. And the Jews seem to have taken the word in the same sense. For Josephus, the Jewish historian who wrote in Greek, speaking of the Sadducees, says, "They take away both the rewards and the punishments in Ads:" because

they denied the existence of an- | For Ads, at the day of judggels or spirits in a separate state. And describing the opinion of the Pharisees, he represents them as holding, that there are punishments and rewards for souls in Ads. [See Pool's synopsis on Luke xvi. 23.]