thousands of millions." Darting across this whole period, as though it were but an instant, he cried, "Where shall I go then?" Paganism could not answer; and he died agonizing under the inquiry, "WHERE SHALL I GO LAST OF ALL?" The consummation of our being! This is the great question of the soul. And how is it answered? By Infinite Goodness. In all worlds, and with all beings, God is governed by this. In the future, as in the present, God's beneficence will not forsake his offspring. Existence shall prove to us a blessing. Truly hath it been written, and ever shall it stand, "Man's chief end is to glorify God and enjoy him forever." Let us turn to that revelation of the future given us in the Scriptures. And as we listen, let us remember, that the Bible does not design to make known any more concerning the future, than we, in our present constitution, are able to bear. It is not the intention of this Revelation to describe to us, minutely, that state of being. It is not meet that we here attain unto such knowledge. With all our advances, we know too little of our present mode of being. Enough of the future, however, is revealed to us, that we may be saved by hope; "which hope," saith the apostle, 66 we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which entereth into that within the veil ; whither the ; forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus." WHAT OF THE FUTURE? "If a man die, shall he live again ?” To whom shall we go for a solution of this question? Who will declare to us most clearly the doctrine of man's existence beyond the grave? What says the highest heathen wisdom of which we have any record in human history? Simonides sings: "Silence reigns in death darkness veils the eyes. All things come at last into one terrific whirlpool." And Anacreon: "Gray are my temples, and my head white. Gone is the loveliness of youth. O, pleasant life; little more remains; therefore I often sigh in dread of Tartarus; for that is the frightful den of Hades. Horrible is the descent, and whoever once goes down never returns." Sycophron complains: "When death is yet far off, the wretched, perhaps, wish life to end; but when the last wave rolls near, then we cling to life; for we can never satiate ourselves with it." Just so sang Homer long before: "I would rather serve with the poorest man, than be king over all the shades." Socrates speaks, as he is about to leave the scenes of the present life: “I hope I am now going to good men, though this I would not take upon me peremptorily to assert; but, that I shall go to the gods, lords that are absolutely good, this, if I can affirm anything of this kind, I would certainly affirm. And for this reason I do not take it ill that I am to die, as otherwise I should do; but I am in good hope that there is something remaining for those who are dead, and that it will then be much better for good than for bad men." Or, more doubtfully, again: "I am going out of the world, and you are to continue in it; but which of us has the better part, is a secret to every one but God." Cicero gives us his word, that, of the various opinions of philosophers concerning the nature and duration of the soul, "Which of these is true, God alone knows, and which is most probable, a very great question." And Seneca confesses, that to him, "Immortality, however desirable, is rather promised than proved by those great men." What uncertainty is here! Who could build any reasonable hope for the future life on such doubtful affirmations as these? The opinions themselves show the attempt of the mind to grasp the great thought of immortality, and to conceive of it as a reality. But where is the "solid ground to rest upon?" Listen, now, to a different word a stronger and more positive utterance, which we find in the Christian Epistles. "For we know that if this earthly house of our tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. If Christ be not raised, your faith is vain. But now is Christ risen, and become the first fruits of them that slept. For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. As we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So, when this corruption shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? Thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory, through our Lord Jesus Christ." The There is no language in all heathenism like this on the subject of immortality; because heathenism, never had the authority to speak such a word. apostle had. He appealed to Jesus Christ as the ground of hope for this future life; appealed to his coming into our world, to his divine authority, to his actual death, actual resurrection from death, the breaking of the power of death and triumph over it, and his ascension to the heavens. These heathen philosophers had no such authority to appeal to. They were feeling after that which Christ revealed, but they could not find it. No Jesus had come to them, as he had come to Paul, saying, "I am the Resurrection and the Life. He that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live again, and whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die." And so, they could not say, as he could say, "For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." The true answer to this question, If man die, shall he live again? can be answered only by the light of the Gospel of Christ. This light appears beyond the valley of the shadow of death, and reveals Life and Immortality to the race of mankind the whole body. The idea is not vaguely expressed, but the statement most explicitly made, in the contrast by the apostle of the present state and the future. is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption: it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power: it is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory: it is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body." "It Again we say, no heathenism reads thus, no highest wisdom of its philosophers. No word like this comes, but in the Christian Gospel. Let us hear, and believe, and rejoice. "HOW ARE THE DEAD RAISED UP?" THIS is another question asked in the Scriptures, and most clearly and fully answered there. "How are the dead raised up, and with what body do they come?" The inquiry is not, How did the dead leave the world? as though on the answer to this question, depended the immortal life of the individual. It is surely an important question, how the departing leave this world; deeply important to them, whether they have strong and sustaining and overpowering faith, or whether they are filled with doubts and fears and tribulations. But this is not the chief question when we are arguing concerning the future life. Nor is the inquiry here, How did the dead believe? The Scriptures nowhere inform us that the gift of a life of future immortal blessedness is suspended on a faith in the present, - - that faith or unbelief will determine the future condition. Nor is the question raised, How did the dead live? That is a great question always, in its place, as all life is valuable according to its righteous employBut that exclamation of Watts, ment. "Great God! on what a slender thread The eternal states of all the dead is not an apostolic one; has not its authority in the New Testament. What mortal is there who will ever pretend that he has done good enough to entitle him to endless rewards for his actions? or who among the sons of men can be so sinful as justly to incur the penalty of endless sufferings for his transgressions? There is no certainty in any answer we can give to |