and natural inseparable life in them, which shall continue and subsist perpetually of itself, without the help of meat and drink, or any such foreign support; without decay, or any tendency to a dissolution, of which our Saviour speaking, (Luke xx. 35.) says, "They who shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world, and the resurrection from the dead," cannot die any more; for they are equal to the angels, i.e. of an angelical nature and constitution. We may also refer on this subject to Phil. iii. 21. I add a note made by the author alluded to before on the forty-second verse: The time (says he) that man is in this world, affixed to this earth, is, his being sown; and not when being dead he is put in the grave, dead things are not sown; seeds are sown, being alive, and die not, until after they are sown." So closely apposite to our present purpose are the lines of an old Christian poet, who wrote upwards of two centuries ago, (George Wither, born 1588, died 1667,) that I cannot resist the pleasure of transcribing them, more particularly as they appear to make no unsuitable conclusion to this little compilation. The wheat, although it lies a while in earth, Much more shall man receive, whose worth is more; When we are born, to death-ward straight we run ; And by our death, our life is new begun. THE END. George Wither, 1640. |