fitness for immortal life. On the earth, for instance, as well as on all primary planets, there is continual change, such as summer and winter, day and night, excitement and repose, all of which is favourable to dissolution; the sun, on the other hand, is free from all these changes produced by diurnal and annual revolutions; and not being subject to the friction of excitement and repose, it is favourable to immortal life. On earth seasons of repose for the body are necessary, because the soul in its activity out-labours and tires the body its fellow; hence night and rest for the body are provided in the arrangement of the earth's diurnal revolutions, that its exhausted stores may be replenished. On the sun, however, no such seasons are afforded, and hence it is concluded that they are there not needed, and that their absence makes it strongly probable that these are the abodes of immortal life.

To this theory, plausible as it seems to be made by a number of scientific probabilities, I must offer a few formidable scriptural objections.

The Jews reckoned the sun, which is thus made our first heaven, as well as all the visible planetary worlds to the second heaven; whereas the heaven which the scriptures represent as the abode of the blest, is "far above all heavens"-and hence even beyond the third heaven, and separate from it. The place into which Paul was caught up, and into which the Saviour as

cended, is beyond the bounds of all that is visible. In that place the Saviour now is, and in that place he was at the time when the apostle said that to be absent from the body was the same as to be present

with the Lord. If the saints, then, when they leave the body, are to be taken to the place where Christ is, and if Christ is beyond all heavens, then there is no room for the idea that the rational beings of the primary planets will first be assembled on their respective suns, and after some time be again advanced higher. The same considerations also which have been urged against the theory of successive ascensions in a previous section, lie with equal force against this theory.

If it be argued, however, that the sun is only one stage of the soul's ascension, and that as the sun and its systems revolve around some other centre, so the soul will in due time be promoted to the central sphere as its final home;-then we answer that the scriptures, although they do not discountenance the idea of such a central world, around which all subordinate worlds move, do nevertheless every where discountenance such a gradual.promotion of the spirit. It will hereafter be shown that, according to scripture, the souls of the saints pass immediately at death to their final home; that they go to the place whither the Saviour ascended, which is the place highest in glory and honour in the universe of God. He went beyond the veil into the holy of holies, which is heaven itself. There is the place which he has prepared for us, from whence he will come and receive us to himself, that where he is, we may also be.

SECTION III.

HEAVEN UNSEEN AND UNFELT AROUND US.

There is another theory or conjecture offered by the same writer,* which will, no doubt, strike the reader with still greater surprise. According to this conjecture, it is considered probable that the spirit world is unseen and unfelt around us. "That within the space occupied by the visible and ponderable universe, and on all sides of us, there is existing and moving, another element, fraught with another species of life-corporeal indeed, and various in its orders, but not open to the cognizance of those who are confined to the conditions of animal organization-not to be seen, nor to be heard, nor to be felt by man. Our present conjecture-remarks the author in another place-reaches to the extent of supposing that within the space encircled by the sidereal revolutions, there exists and moves a second universe, not less real than the one we are at present conversant with; a universe elaborate in structure, and replete with life; life agitated with momentous interests, and perhaps by frivolous interests; a universe conscious perhaps of the material spheres, or unconscious of them, and firmly believing (as we do) itself to be the only reality. Our planets in their sweep do not perforate the structure of this invisible creation; our suns do not scorch its plains: for the two collateral systems are not connected by any active affinities."

*Physical Theory of another Life, chap. 17.

This would bring "the things which are not seen," indeed near to us and around us. To enter the other world would not be so much a removal in space as just to be made loose from, or to become insensible to, the conditions of this life. Death will be only the destruction or disappearance of human and earthly affinities, and directly we shall be surrounded by affinities adapted to our new state of existence, and shall find for ourselves a congenial home in and around our present habitation.

Much is argued in favour of this theory. It is said in no place to interfere with scripture, but rather to be countenanced by incidental hints and allusions. It is said to be made highly probable by the known truths of physical science. An unseen world, in all respects material, inhabited by corporeal beings, it is said, is possible. There are material elements which are not cognizable to any of our senses, except by a round of research and experiment, and then only in their remote effects, as, for instance, electricity. The atmosphere also, and light, are material, and yet so subtle as almost entirely to evade our unassisted observation; and may there not be still others as yet to us unknown? We are related to, and become acquainted with, the external world by the medium of the five senses; but who will say that there are not other senses hidden in possibility in our nature which may by means of other affinities communicate with a world far more refined in its constitution, with which we cannot now come in contact? Science has discovered living animalculæ in the solidest substances; the air we breathe, and the water we drink, are the homes

of myriads of beings, and though unseen by the naked eye, these elements are swarming with miniature life! It seems to be God's motto, "multum in parvo" —life in life, world in world, universe in universe! With these known facts in science before us, may we not, it is asked, consider the above theory probable?

It is farther supposed that this invisible world around us is the after stage of the present life; and as it is a stage of being in all respects superior to this, it may be that its inhabitants have a knowledge of us, though we have not of them, just as we are acquainted with grades of animalcule life beneath us, when it can hardly be supposed that they know any thing of our existence. Hence, too, in some exceptive cases it may be possible for them to break through the veil of separation and appear in various ways unto men on the platform of human life. In this way we might account for the various appearances of supernatural beings which are reported by popular belief, and which are in some cases substantiated by evidences almost too strong to be set aside. The origin of presentiments and tokens is also accounted for on this supposition. Thus, also, the dead which appeared in Jerusalem at the resurrection of Christ may be supposed to have crowded too earnestly upon the precincts of sublunary life, and thus passed in upon it in their astonishment and joy. Then we are indeed "surrounded by a cloud of witnesses" who stand around, or bend over us, and look with deep interest upon the struggle of life, and when they see it unequal in the case of the saints, they break through in