hath saved us and called us with a holy calling," and that this calling is now "manifest by the appearance of our Saviour Jesus Christ who hath abolished death, and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel." (i. 10.) The apostle here could not mean bodily death; for this is not abolished; but that spiritual death which is an extinction of the heavenly state in the soul through evil and falsehood! The death is abolished by a faithful reception and practice of the truths of the gospel. How calm, then, how bright and cheering is the death of a Christian! the fall of his earthly body is the rising of the man! The body,—a beautifully organized form, adapted to the soul's properties while here, is but as the outward shell of his being, made beautiful by the life within; it is a house to dwell in; and when this can no longer answer the demands of its man, it falls to its earth: while the soul, a spiritually organized form, receptive of life from God—being the real man, imperishable and undying, springs upwards to his own home.
"Say, then, what is Life? 'Tis a delicate ray
That lights up a beautiful shell;
A beam from Divinity's Sun, to display
God's Image!—its wonders to tell.
When life in the soul has worked its own way,
The image of God to restore;
In brightness man enters the portals of day,
And the beautiful shell is no more!"
Blessed, then, are the dead who die in the Lord.
