Of course, the Sadducees could not have discerned the meaning of the prediction under review with that facility-or even an approach to it which we experience in our inquiry, in consequence of those apostolic explanations of the oracle; nevertheless they could understand this much most readily, that to whomsoever the reference was, his soul-or the Holy One-was to pass within the abode of the dead, go down to the grave; and that while a prisoner there he would be exactly so situated as all other men are when the thread of life is broken. For him, henceforth, no remembrance, no praises, no thought.

Without introducing the apostolic commentaries, our labour, however, would have been quite imperfect; and rather than leave it incomplete, and without the great luminous flood which the sermons at Jerusalem and Antioch cast on the ancient prophecy, we have deviated from the straight line of logic; but have thereby, we presume to think, made a rich gain in the evolution of our subject, without putting our Lord's antagonists to any disadvantage, which in any circumstances would be inexcusable.

Here is one of the few places in the ancient Scriptures in which the dead are represented as manifesting the intelligent functions of life; acting, in other words, as if they were alive and in the full possession of their faculties. Yet few, we apprehend, will for a moment suppose that they were really alive, especially after examining the unambiguous testimony already presented on the problem we are trying to solve. The scene is Sheol, the indefinitely expanded region of the dead. Into it the "King of Babylon" enters; he who had excelled in the work of oppressing God's chosen people to his heart's content; he at length crosses its dismal threshold, and as he makes his appearance-all the insignia of royalty and power stripped from his person-the vast congregation is moved at his coming, and the captains and satraps and sovereigns of the nations rise up from their places in the gloom-world to mock his fallen grandeur.

Let us quote the prominent verses, for never was a more magnificent picture drawn, and yet it is merely poetry; imagination ministering to a high moral purpose, viz., delivering a warning to all tyrants who tread down the feeble, and to those of them in particular who are the defiant enemies of God, and the ruthless persecutors of His chosen ones, either after the flesh or after the spirit:

"Hell (Sheol) from beneath is moved for thee to meet thee at thy coming: it stirreth up the dead for thee, even all the chief ones of the earth; it hath raised up from their thrones all the kings of the nations. All they shall speak and say unto thee, Art thou also become weak as we? art thou become like unto us? Thy pomp is brought down to the grave (Sheol), and the noise of thy viols; the worm is spread under thee, and the worms cover thee. How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations! For thou hast said in thy heart, I will ascend into heaven; I will exalt my throne above the stars of God; I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north. I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the Most High. Yet thou shalt be brought down to hell (Sheol), to the sides of the pit." To Sheol! where the worms cover poor man. The meaning is, thou

shalt be utterly destroyed. They that see thee shall narrowly look upon thee, and consider thee, saying, Is this the man that made the earth to tremble, that did shake kingdoms; that made the world as a wilderness, and destroyed the cities thereof; that opened not the house of his prisoners? All the kings of the nations, even all of them, lie in glory; every one in his own house." "House" here is equivalent to tomb, or

separate grave.

All the dead are in Sheol, but each of them in his own house, or pit, or burial place. "But thou art cast out of thy grave like an abominable branch; and as the raiment of those that are slain, thrust through with a sword, that go down to the stones of the pit; as a carcase trodden under feet." "Grave" in this verse is not Sheol in the original, and has the same meaning as house, or pit, or burial place. All graves are in Sheol, the domain, so to speak, of those who have vanished from earth, and each is in his own pit within its dark confines. "Thou shalt not be joined with them in burial, because thou hast destroyed thy land, and slain thy people" (Isa. xiv. 9-20). The very grave was not to be permitted to retain the conquered conqueror! He was to be cast out of it; there to lie exposed to insults from the passersby; nay, to be trampled upon as the vilest and most loathsome thing on earth's surface.

A similar, though very short passage, is contained in a later prophet, which, for its affinity to the one just considered, we shall introduce in this connection, and merely transcribe, being confident that no reader can experience the least difficulty in grasping its meaning:

"The strong among the mighty shall speak to him out of the midst of hell (Sheol) with them that help him: they are gone down, they lie uncircumcised, slain by the sword" (Ezek. xxxii. 21).

Before closing this assemblage of Scripture authorities on the point in hand, we would merely request attention to a form of speech applied to the departed, common more particularly in the earlier pages of Holy Writ.

The first example is in Gen. xxv. 8, where we read that "Abraham gave up the ghost (that is, expired), and died in a good old age. .. and was gathered to his people." The like is written about Ishmael in verse 17 of the same chapter; it occurs also in the death records of Isaac, Jacob, Aaron, Moses, and other notable characters, as the Hebrew story proceeds from stage to stage. It is sufficient to dwell for a moment on its significance as employed concerning the Father of the Faithful himself. Well, he gives up the ghost-the spirit-the lifebreath; in a word, he dies, and is gathered to his people. "Thou shalt go to thy fathers in peace" (Gen. xv. 15). His being gathered to his people cannot mean his burial in a hereditary family fault, for he was entombed in a cave wherein no one but Sarah, his wife, reposed. Where were his ancestors? All in the dust; all in Sheol, the spacious realm of the dead, wherever their place of individual sepulture might happen to be. Like David long afterwards, Abraham "slept with his fathers; and in the time of the apostolic Peter, David had "not ascended into the heavens," but his sepulchre was with them in Jerusalem unto that day.

The thought may not have suggested itself to the reader that it becomes a rather startling intimation if we give what may be called an

orthodox turn to the words "gathered to his people." If we suppose his gathering to his people in dying or after death means his soul's passage into their company behind the rampart of blackness that divides the visible from the unknown, where do we locate the pious patriarch? With his people, of course. And what while in this world were they? Idolaters till the end of their lives, enveloped in the folds of heathen ignorance and impiety. Where does orthodoxy collect all such unholy members of our race? Did Abraham join their fellowship when he departed from this scene? If they were in heaven, are we to believe that the vast millions of idol-worshippers have been received into paradise? If they are at the other extreme of future being, what is Abraham doing in that fiery and tempestuous region? What! Abraham the faithful! Abraham the friend of God, among the lost! No, verily; he was to join the society of his ancesters "in peace," and in Sheol, where they were and where he was to repose along with them; "the weary are at rest."

Looking then at the Old Testament representation of man's condition when under the oppression of Death, we are obliged to concede that the questioners were not without a defence; and indeed, with records so clear, positive, and abundant, we are unable to discover what other view they could, on Scriptural grounds, have entertained.

All this array of evidence and argument was indispensable to the distinct understanding of the matter before us. For this cause: till we apprehended beyond a doubt what they believed concerning man in death, and had placed their view side by side with the Bible in their hands-with which on this point, as we judge, they entirely correspond -we could not, in a satisfactory mode, determine the meaning of their interrogation, and be prepared for an intelligent and accurate comprehension of the reply that immediately followed. In fact, without fixing what they meant by death, we could not determine in what sense they employed the phrase, "in the resurrection," which stands in their inquiry, "in the resurrection whose wife of them is she? for seven had her to wife." It matters nothing whether they regarded a resurrection as possible or impossible, that is what they understood by resurrection, should such an event, in the history of our world, at any time transpire through immediate Divine action. A castle built of diamonds may be pronounced an impossible structure in our world, for a most obvious reason, yet there is no barrier to our understanding of the terms themselves. We just take them at once in their simple and literal acceptation; castle meaning a strong building, and diamonds, precious stones; and the words always designate the same thing the world over. And so with "resurrection," when spoken by men who contemplated death as the Sadducees did. It is no less easily definable, and assuredly can have no import but the one we have assigned it, since its interpretation must be regulated and bounded by their understanding of death.

Thus in their question, with resurrection as its central idea, there was no complexity, no juggle of words, no haziness, no uncertainty, or indefiniteness. It was, as we may contend, a fixed quantity, beyond dispute, so far as related to the meaning of its terms. When fully expressed, their demand was this: If, as you teach, there is to be a resurrection of dead men, or a return of human beings from the grave to

a new period of conscious existence, tell us whose wife then this woman is to be among the seven ?

Having thus determined the sense, and the only sense, in which the questioners could use the term "resurrection," we deem it not altogether unnecessary to observe, that we expect their inquiry to be answered in its own sense, or as they understood their own words, interpreting their language by the avowed tenets of their sect. To respond to their question, using "resurrection" say in a new or modified sense, or not exactly in their sense, would dissatisfy an upright and a candid mind. Such a method of procedure would be more like shunning a difficulty than meeting it squarely. But when we consider Who is to answer them -"the Faithful and True Witness". we may repose in the absolute certainty that, notwithstanding their mocking temper, the reply will commend itself to every sincere person, and awaken gratitude and praise in every devout, truth-loving heart.

Let us therefore with subdued feelings listen to Him who has "the keys of Hades and of death in His hands," when He opens up the secrets of the grave, and the counsels of Eternal Wisdom, and the purposes of Eternal Love.

(To be continued.)

A VIOLET.

YOD does not send us strange flowers every year.

Go

U When the Spring winds blow o'er the pleasant places

The same dear things lift up the same fair faces ;

The violet is here.

It all comes back-the odours, grace, and hues ;
Each sweet relation of its life repeated;

No blank is left, no looking-for is cheated;

It is the thing we knew.

So after the Death-winter it must be ;

God will not put strange signs in the heavenly places;
The old love shall look out from the old faces;

Veilchen,* I shall have thee!

"BUT

THE MASTER.

Ὁ ΜΟΝΟΣ ΔΕΣΠΟΤΗΣ.

UT how in conjunction with inevitable democracy is indispensable sovereignty to exist: certainly it is the hugest question ever before propounded to mankind?" The solution, he says, will yield work for long years and centuries, but the secret of it is "to make the despotism just."

"Little Violet." Name in German for the "viola odorata."

The above is from an obituary article on Mr. Carlyle, in the Standard, of the 7th February.

If this cry of humanity for help had not, long ago, gone up to the ears "of the Lord of Sabaoth;" if Jesus of Nazareth had not been born in Bethlehem; if He had not gone down to death on behalf of men; if the Christ of God had not been raised again by the mighty power of God, and seated at His right hand till the set time shall come, how terrible, how awful would be the future of this world. But the Lord has heard the cry, and His "Mighty One" is coming. "The spirit of the Lord spake by me, and his word was in my tongue. The God of Israel said, the Rock of Israel spake to me, He that ruleth over men must be just, ruling in the fear of God: And he shall be as the light of the morning when the sun riseth, even a morning without clouds as the tender grass springeth out of the earth by clear shining after rain " (2 Sam. xxiii. 2-4).

"Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion" (Psalm ii. 6.) "Lift up your heads, O ye gates; and be ye lift up ye everlasting doors; and the King of glory shall come in. Who is this King of glory? The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle. Lift up your heads, O ye gates; even lift them up ye everlasting doors; and the King of glory shall come in. Who is this King of glory? The Lord of hosts, He is the King of glory" (Psalm xxiv. 7-10).

"And the seventh angel sounded: and there were great voices in heaven, saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of His Christ, and He shall reign for ever and ever (Rev. xi. 15).

"He cometh to judge the earth; with righteousness shall he judge the world, and the people with equity" (Psalm xcviii. 9).

"The Lord reigneth, let the earth rejoice" (Psalm xcviii. 4).

G. J. v. S.

WHEN WILL THE PRESENT AGE CLOSE AND A NEW AGE OPEN ?*

A

(A SEQUEL TO "THE 144,000 SEALED ONES," IN FEBRUARY.)

MAN can receive nothing except it be given him of God, but with the promise expressly given for "the time of the end," that "the

* The paragraph on Asher, in Mr. Starkey's paper in February being inadvertently dropped, is here supplied :-In like manner, seeing that Asher is one who walks on happily and prosperously, we should expect to see such find favour with the sealing angel, for already they have found favour with God, and in the light and life thereof are thus pursuing their course happily and prosperously. Prosperity and happiness are seldom divorced, never if their nature is spiritual, but like twin graces compass and fill their possessors with joy through evil and good report, teaching them while sorrowful to be always rejoicing in God as their unchanging, because unchangeable, Father. And like Him who, for the joy set before Him, endured the Cross, despising the shame. having His Father's promise (and how long He has waited its fulfilment ! What a lesson of patience it contains for us!), "He shall see of the travail of His soul and shall be satisfied;" like Him they wait the joy and crown of rejoicing to be given them in that day. Therefore are they reckoned among the overcomers, and become as servants of our God sealed in their foreheads.