them by Moses,-that they were not then slumbering in their graves? Most truly does our Accuser say, that the doctrine of the resurrection may justly be called the key-stone of the gospel dispensation *;" but to say, as this author does, that the doctrine of the resurrection of the body is so, is grossly to pervert the plain meaning of the gospel-teaching. This writer, in hìs zeal for his body of clay, goes so far as to affirm, that to deny, not the resurrection, observe, but the resurrection of the body, if it is not the sin against the Holy Ghost, is, in his serious opinion, something very near it ! † and then, as if determined to cut us off from all hope of salvation, he adds, "to hear Christ say, 'I will raise him up at the last day,' and then tacitly [as he means to say we do] to give Christ the lie,”—such is his shocking language!" must be a crime of no common description." But who that knows the use of language, would call the material body him? The Lord is not here speaking of the body, but of the man; "I will raise him up at the last day;" not, "I will send his soul from heaven to gather up the ashes of his body." And that man is not to slumber in a state of insensibility till the last day of the world, but that it is the last day with every man when he dies, is evident from the manner in which the Lord corrects Martha's mistaken notion respecting it. "Jesus saith unto her, Thy brother shall rise again. Martha saith unto him, I know that he shall rise again in the resurrection at the last day.§" Here Jesus perceives that she had in her mind only the notion of a distant resurrection: wherefore He replies, "I am the resurrection and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live, and he that liveth and believeth in me, shall never die." Here, because in the divine idea, no life but spiritual life is worthy of the name, the privilege of enjoying it is confined to believers; but of these the divine Saviour declares, that their life shall never be perceptibly interrupted. They have begun to live here, and they shall live on to eternity,—“ they shall NEVER die." To affirm, then, that there is no real resurrection but the resurrection of the body, and to apply all that is said upon the subject in Scripture to this imaginary resurrection; to affirm particularly, that it is the resurrection of the body which the Lord means when he says, "I will raise him up at the last day :"-I will not adopt the coarse and profane language of our adversary, by saying it is giving Christ the lie,—but I must say, it is not only directly contradicting him, but it is making him contradict himself. Jesus Christ affirms, that he who believeth in him shall never die; and to prevent men from wondering how this can be, when men do die, to all appearance, at the close of their life in the world, he assures them, that at the last day of this life they shall be trans• planted into life eternal :-Every one that seeth the Son and believeth on him, shall have everlasting life, and I will raise him up at the last day." That would be a strange sort of everlasting life, which was to be interrupted by an interval of no one knows how many thousand years. Even supposing that the body were to live again, it is quite evident that it is not the life of the body of which the Lord is speaking, when he speaks of everlasting life, since the life of the body, is not, upon any hypothesis an everlasting life : consequently, it is not the body of which he speaks when he says, "I will + P. 49, 50.

• Anti-Swedenborg, p. 48. Anti-Swedenborg, p. 50. The words at length are, "This is the will of him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life and I will raise him up at the last day."-(John vi, 40) Is it the body which thus seeth and believeth? John xi, 23. 24.

¶ Ver. 26.

raise him up at the last day." The whole declaration is only applicable to the spirit, which is the man himself, to which the body is only an instrument of service while he remains in a world and state where its services are required: "The flesh," as the Lord says in the same discourse, "profiteth nothing." The spirit only is the real man: it is of the spirit only that life everlasting can be predicated: it is this only that can be raised to the eternal world: and this resurrection, the Lord assures us, the spirit shall experience, not after a sleep of ages, or at best a state for ages of half conscious existence, but, in all vigour of true life, as soon as it is emancipated from the shell of clay."

We intend to give other extracts from this Work on future occasions, and to offer some general remarks on the publication.

Miscellanea.

WARWICK MEETING.

We noticed in our last, that the Warwick Meeting was held on the 4th of July.-We have seen the printed Report of that meeting. Charles Augustus Tulk, Esq., the President, delivered an appropriate address. After noticing the objects of the Meeting, he states

"It has been our custom at this meeting to draw up for publication in the journals of the day, a short statement of one or other of the New Doctrines, that the reader might be able to contrast them with the errors which unhappily prevail throughout the Christian world; but in doing this we have always endeavoured to express ourselves in the spirit of gentleness and of charity-speaking ill of no individual man, or classes of men, for holding this or that opinion, but addressing them as we should address brothers and companions, who being weary, faint and thirsty, we should invite to a fountain of Living Waters, at which we know by experience they would find refreshment and consolation for their souls. In the same spirit, and with the same end, have the Resolutions, which I am about to read to you, been drawn up; and I have to request your carnest attention to the momentous subject which they embrace, and to pray that the result of our deliberations may be hallowed by the Divine blessing.

What subject is more important, and what has been more distorted by sensual views, until scarcely a vestage of the truth remains, than the Doctrine of the Resurrection and the Life after death? I will not dwell upon the gross opinions which prevail every where on this subject; which are taught every where in our pulpits, and enlarged upon in works professing to give the tenets of the Christian Religion. They are painful to think upon, because they shew a resistance to the Divine Influx, which, when suffered occasionally to operate, leads the mind, as it were, spontaneously to a widely different conclusion. To that right conclusion, unfolded as to its particulars, do the Doctrines of the New Church conduct us. The WORD OF GOD interpreted after a spiritual, and not a sensual manner, stamps it with the seal of truth, and reason instantly assents to it, and claims it as its own.

* John vi. 63.

By these doctrines we are taught, that when the body is deceased, the spirit of man, which is in fact the man himself, still retains the full consciousness of existence. The stream of life does not sink into the ground to emerge we know not when or where, and to be re-united with this perishable dust; but is continued uninterruptedly through that transition which is called by the fearful name of death. Cut off from the sight of a beloved object, the only appearance of death is with those who remain behind; for the good spirit who has passed that happy moment, and is free from the bondage of the body, perceives the change no otherwise than by the freer and fuller influx of the light of heavenly wisdom, and the quickening warmth of heavenly love. The present life of man is a state composed of natural affections, thoughts and sensations, distinct from, and yet connected as an effect with its efficient cause, with that future state, in the perception of which man is indrawn so soon as he is fitted for the change. Being in a natural state as to the apperceptions of his mind, he associates with those who, as to their apperceptions also, are placed upon the same plain of existence with himself: Indrawn from these, he straitway comes into a spiritual state of mind, and then he sees around him beings of like description with himself; he associates with those towards whom he is attracted by congenial ends of life, and has presented to him a world which is the representative form of his inward frame and disposition of mind. There is no break or chasm in creation; it is not made up of parts which bear no relation to one another, but is one harmonious whole, in which the two states of existence, called in common language the spiritual and natural worlds, are mutually dependent, and, as it were, so interwoven with one another, that, though unconscious of it, our very thoughts and affections in their inmost ground, are all derived by influx from our spiritual associates. With these views, we do not tremble at the thought of death, nor strive to banish it from our minds, as we would the horrid image by which it is falsely represented; so far from it, we delight to make it the cherished object of our thoughts; for it is no longer a dismal mystery which we dread to solve, but comes before us in a beautiful and majestic form, arrayed in the garments of heaven, to connect the two states of life together, and introduce us to the company of those we love.

But why, my Friends, should I detain you, by repeating that which you already know so well? In the reflections to which these few words may give rise, you will recal to mind some state of sorrow and distress, when views such as these brought consolation to your wounded hearts, and filled you with a heavenly peace you never felt before. Such recollections will serve to inspire you with fresh zeal to go forward in your work; that the same bright star of consolation may shine for others also, and that they too may adore their Lord and Saviour, when they shall spiritually see that the heavens are opened, and that the Angels of God are ascending and descending on the SON OF MAN." [John i. 51.]

After the last Warwick Reportw as read, the following Resolutions on the subject of a FUTURE STATE, were unanimously passed :Resolved,

I. "That it is a point of the first importance to every human being, to acquire a just and well-grounded idea of that invisible state, into which, on the dissolution of his mortal body, he is immediately to be introduced, that so, being well persuaded in his own mind, not only as to the existence

of such a state, but likewise respecting the principles which constitute both its happiness and misery, he may be led to explore and separate those principles in himself, and thus to provide most effectually for his own eternal well-being.

II. That on the ground of the above momentous subject of enquiry, the Theological Writings of the Honourable Emanuel Swedenborg, and more particularly his Treatise on Heaven and Hell, can never be sufficiently recommended to the serious perusal and diligent investigation of all ranks and descriptions of men, since in those writings, and especially in that Treatise, every satisfactory information may be found, in regard both to the reality of a future world, to the distinct characters of its bliss and woe, and at the same time to the qualifications necessary to secure the highest possible degree of the bliss, and to escape the lowest and every other possible degree of the woe.

III. That when it is considered how the testimony of the above writings is founded not only on the Divine Authority of the Sacred Scriptures, but also on rational and experimental evidence; how it in some measure, and probably for providential purposes, respecting the prevailing Sadducism of the times, draws aside the vail, which hath heretofore been interposed between the present visible world of shadows, and the invisible world of substances; how beyond that vail it presents, to the view of mortals, prospects the most animating and consolatory to the true Christian, and at the same time the most awful and alarming to the pretended one; how these prospects are shown to be alike reconcileable with the infinite mercy of the FATHER OF BEING on the one hand, and with every rational idea of His intelligent ereatures on the other, being calculated at once to excite every virtuous energy, and to check every vicious propensity; how, in short, the above testimony has a happy and powerful tendency to introduce man, even during his abode here below, into a blessed association in heart and life with those heavenly beings of whom it is written, that they "encamp round about them that fear the LORD," [Psalm xxxiv. 7.] and to rescue him at the same time from a miserable confederacy with those infernal foes, of whom also it is written, that they "go about as a roaring lion, seeking whom they may devour,"[1 Peter v. 8.]—it is scarcely possible to conceive any testimony either more interesting, more edifying, or more likely to engage the general attention of mankind, howsoever they may differ on other points of religious speculation.

IV. That this testimony, nevertheless, demands on the part of the reader a previous deliberate scrutiny as to his own purposes and ends of life, before he ventures on its perusal, since, if he hear not Moses and the prophets, Jesus Christ and his apostles, calling him to forsake his sins, and to enter on a new course of life, in such case it is more than probable, not only that he will altogether reject the testimony itself as visionary and groundless, but that it will also add to his condemnation, by hardening his heart in a more criminal and obstinate unbelief. Whilst therefore the real Christian is admonished and encouraged to open the door, and take a view of the astonishing and heretofore unknown objects, which the above testimony presents to his delighted eyes, it is equally adviseable that the mere nominal Christian should be on his guard, lest by admitting the light of that testimony separate from the life, he should plunge himself into a more terrible condemnation, and thus verify the words of the Great Saviour, where he says, "This is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men

loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.”

19.]

It was further

[John iii.

Resolved―That the Treasurers of the Printing Society in London, and of the Advertising Fund in Manchester, be requested to publish the above Resolutions in as many of the Public papers, and in such other modes, as the printing Societies may deem expedient.

The last report of the London Printing Society was then read, and the following resolution was passed unanimously :

Resolved-That the thanks of this meeting, and indeed of every member of the LORD's New Church throughout the earth, are justly due to the London Printing Society for their unwearied exertions in printing and circulating the heavenly doctrines of the New Jerusalem, and especially for the ardent zeal in favour of those Doctrines, by which, as is evident from their interesting Report, the London Society have been influenced in their important labours. This Meeting also think it right to recommend to the particular notice of the reader, the very just and edifying criterion of Truth as pointed at in the opening of the society's Report, and applied more especially to the truth now revealed to mankind in the Theological Writings of the enlightened Scribe of the New Church, the honourable Emanuel Swedenborg. For manifest and undeniable as it is, that the evidence of truth is not dependant on the number of its advocates, but only on its own intrinsic characters, it is yet lamentable to observe, especially in reference to the new doctrines at this day in circulation, that their authority is generally made to depend, not on the bright and consolatory conviction of their divine origin, which they impress on every well-disposed mind, but only on the multitude of voices raised for and against them, and thus on the many who oppose, rather than on the few who admit their testimony. It is therefore the devout prayer of this meeting, that, in agreement with the views of the London Printing Society, the testimony of the heavenly doctrines of the New Jerusalem may no longer be subjected to the misapprehensions resulting from a false estimate of the criterion of truth, but may rather be submitted to the scrutiny of that single [or simple] eye, of which it is announced by the GREAT SAVIOUR, "If thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light." [Matt. vi. 22,]; and also to the decision of that regard to the DIVINE WILL, of which it is again asserted by the same high authority, "If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine whether it be of God." [John vii. 17.]

In the evening of the same day, a most interesting letter was read from Mr. Willm. Malins, of No. 55, Newington Place, Kennington, near London, inviting the attention of this Meeting to a report of the proceedings of a special general meeting of the New Jerusalem Church Free School Society, which report having been read, it was agreed to adjourn the further consideration of it until the following morning.

THURSDAY MORNING.

The meeting was again opened by reading the portion of Psalms appointed for the morning service, and repeating the Lord's prayer, after which the following resolution was passed uanimously :

Resolved-That the proceedings of the Special General Meeting of the New Jerusalem Church Free School Society which were read in the evening of yesterday, meet with the entire and cordial approbation of this