$72. CONDENSATION OF LIFE.

CHRIST disclosed, in his last prayer with his disciples, the inner mystery of his scheme for making known to men his divine character and mission and for conquering the world. It appears from the language of that prayer, that his ultimate reliance was not on the excellence of his doctrines, nor on his physical miracles, nor on the preaching and writing of his followers. His anxiety was not that they who believed on him should become zealous and importunate in direct assaults on the kingdom of darkness. He evidently did not expect to establish his character in the world by words and works of propaga tion, after the manner of those who give more of their strength to proselyting labors, than to internal culture. His last and most earnest petition for his followers was That they all may be ONE; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us; that the world may know that thou hast sent me; and he adds-The glory which thou gavest me, I have given them, that they may be one, even as we are one: I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them as thou hast loved me.' John 17: 21-23.

The idea of Christ manifestly was, that the spiritual unity of believers with himself and his Father, and with each other, and the perfection which would thence result, would make that effectual impression on the world, which was the object of his mission, and which no preaching or miracles or outgoing works could secure. This idea deserves much consideration. Let us endeavor to understand the philosophy of this unity, and the nature of its operation on believers, and on the world.

In spite of the logic of the anti-materialists, who would reduce spirits to nonentities, the Bible compels us to think and speak of life as an actual substance. We take the liberty to affirm, (appealing to the whole tenor of the New Testament and to every believer's consciousness for evidence,) that personal spirits are real things, having interiors and exteriors, attractions, receptivities, and capacities for combination. When it is said that the Fa ther and the Son are one,' we understand this in no figurative, mystical, or unreal sense, but in a sense as substantial and as clear as that in which we understand that the Siamese twins are one. The Father and the Son, though they are spirits, are two substances, joined, intermixed, combined, as really as light and heat are combined in a sunbeam. Their union does not destroy their distinct personality, for it will be observed that in the passage we have quoted from Christ's prayer, it is assumed that the union of believers with God and with each other is to be precisely the same as the union of the Fa ther and the Son-a decisive testimony that the Father and the Son, though one, are distinct persons-unless indeed we go so far as to deny that believers will retain their distinctness of persons in their final unity. Our idea is, that the Father and the Son, though distinct persons, are present not only to each other, but within each other—that their lives are not like solids, capable only

of lateral contact, but like fluids, or like the imponderable elements, pervading each other in the most intimate combination possible.

We have said that spirits have interiors and exteriors. From this it results that individual spirits are capable of two distinct forms of compaction. They may be filled, and they may be enveloped. As the two great wants of the body are food and clothing, or nourishment of the life, and good surroundings, so the two great wants of spirits are, to be filled, and to be enveloped with conge nial life. These two wants are the grounds of all specific desires and passions. Every susceptibility and every form of enjoyment, may be referred either to the interior or to the exterior want of life. The interior want, or the desire to be filled with life, is necessarily also a desire to envelop life; and on the other hand, the exterior want, or the desire to be enveloped with life, is also necessarily a desire to fill life. These two generic forms of desire are symbolized in the organizations of the sexes. The desire to be filled and to envelop, is female. The desire to be enveloped and to fill, is male. Love, in its highest form, is the reciprocal and satisfied attraction of these two forms of desire.

The fact that life has interiors and exteriors, and corresponding attractions, is that which makes it possible that one life should dwell in another. If spir its had but one surface, and were either all male or all female in their capa cities and attractions, external juxtaposition only would be possible. But the universe of life, as it is, male and female, is capable of concentric infoldings and perfect unity. To begin with the highest forms of life, the Father and the Son are concentric spiritual spheres. Their relations to each other are those of male and female. The Father fills the Son and is enveloped by him. The Son envelopes the Father and is filled by him. Though in a subordinate sense it is true that each fills and each envelopes the otherthat the Son dwells in the Father as well as the Father in the Son, (for to a certain extent in all combinations of spirits there is an interchange of relations and functions,)-yet in a general sense it is evident from scripture that the Father is the interior life and the Son the exterior. Thus in the prayer of Christ the order of indwelling is indicated in these words-That they may be one as we are one; I in them, and thou in me.' The Father is the indwelling life of the Son, as the Son is the indwelling life of believers. That the relation of the Father to the Son is that of interior to exterior, or male to female, appears also from these words of Paul-The head of every man is Christ, and the head of the woman is the man, and the head of Christ is God.' 1 Cor. 11: 13. It is obvious that in all combinations, the interior life must be more compact and therefore stronger than the exterior. The female capacity is in its very nature negative. Weakness makes room for strength. Deficiency embraces fullness. Hence the Father takes precedence of the Son. My Father,' says Christ, is greater than I.'

The end for which Christ prayed, was, that the unity which thus exists at the centre of all life, might be extended to the spirits of all who should be lieve on him. He came into the world that he might begin this work of concentration, by introducing himself into the interiors of men. To the Father he is the exterior or female life, but to man he is the interior or male life.

The life of the Father is the only spiritual plenum; i. e., he only is filled with his own life. In him alone, the interior want is supplied from his own resources. The Son is filled with the fullness of the Father, interiorly, and he seeks in man exterior envelopment. And so in the whole succession of infoldings from the father outward, each spirit or sphere of spirits is filled by a more central life, and enveloped by a more external life; i. e., each life is female to the life in advance of it toward the centre, and male to the life behind it toward the circumference.

Let us here glance at some of the representations which the New Testament gives of the relation between Christ and believers. 'As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by him, so he that eateth me shall live by me.' Jno. 6: 57. If Christ be in you, the body is dead,' &c. Rom. 8: 10. Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ? shall I then take the members of Christ, and make them the members of an harlot? God forbid! What! know ye not that he which is joined to an harlot is one body? for two, saith he, shall be one flesh. But he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit." 1 Cor. 6: 15-17. 'Ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular.' 1 Cor. 12: 27. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates?' 2 Cor. 13: 5. I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.' Gal. 2: 20. That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye may be filled with all the fullness of God.' Eph. 3: 17, 19. We are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones. For this cause shall man leave father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife; and they two shall be one flesh. This is a great mystery; but I speak concerning Christ and the church.' Eph. 5: 30-32. The mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to his saints: to whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles; which is Christ in you the hope of glory.' Col. 1: 26, 27.

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It is observable that Paul has two favorite symbols of the relation of Christ to believers. He represents the church on the one hand as the body of Christ, and on the other as his bride. In the first case the idea is, that Christ is in the church as the soul is in the body; and in the second case the same idea is preserved by representing the wife as the complement of the husband -bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh,-according to the saying, they twain shall be one flesh.' And since the man is really within the woman, in the true spiritual union of the sexes, as the soul is in the body, it is evident that the two representations are substantially identical, while the marriage symbol has this advantage of the other, that it sets forth the union of distinct persons, which the relation of soul and body does not. Indeed on this account the marriage relation, as it is partially expressed in externals, and as it exists fully in the spiritual sphere, is a more perfect illustration of the unity of the Father and the Son, and of the Son and the church, than any other. In common thought, eating, drinking, and immersion, (which are among the New Testament illustrations of the union of believers with Christ,) only conjoin a person to a thing-life to matter. But marriage conjoins two persons-life to life; and that is the form of conjunction which exists in all the central unities. We have, then, an idea of the two primary combinations of life-the unity

of the Father with the Son, and of the Son with the church. It remains to complete the view, by looking at the unity of believers with each other. The prayer that they all may be one even as we are one'-implies on the one hand that men in the carnal state are separate and isolated in spirit, and on the other, that it is possible for them to enter into that perfect unity with each other which exists in the Godhead. It is safe to conceive of all the friendship and fellowship which is known in the world of selfishness, as mere lateral, superficial contact. Where there is sin, there is necessarily a cold, dark reserve around the centre of life, which makes perfect entrance and infolding impossible. We have fellowship or absolute community [koinonia] with each other, only when we walk in the light as God is in the light;' and we thus walk in the light only when the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin.' See 1 John 1: 7. It is obviously impossible in the nature of things that the unity which we have defined should take place any farther than there is a perfect willingness in individuals to sacrifice self-conceit, and fall into the order of combination which the intrinsic spiritual value and capacity of each appoints. A series of boxes may be placed together laterally without settling the question of precedence. But if they are to be reduced to unity by being placed within each other, the order of their capacities must be ascertained. The inveterate hankering of the uncircumcised heart for precedence or equality may be consistent with the superficial combinations of this world, but not with the unity of heaven. Before that can be attained every spirit must rejoice to be not only male to a sphere without, but female to a sphere within. In the whole succession of spirits the weaker vessels' must consent to be filled by the stronger.

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We will not undertake here to bring to view the whole code of laws which must determine the combinations of individual spirits, but we will glance at two or three of the more comprehensive principles of heavenly order. 1. The distinction of male and female creates a dualty consisting of an inner and outer life. As the Father is the inner fullness of Christ, and as Christ is the inner fullness of the universal sphere of the redeemed, so man is the inner fullness of woman. This is said, not of the relations of individual men and women, but of the relation of the whole man-spirit to the whole woman-spirit. 2. The division of the church by the Jewish and Gentile dispensations, creates an other great dualty. The church of the first-born' will be the husband or interior sphere of the church of the second resurrection. 3. The same dual relation will exist between each spiritual laborer and that branch of the church which he has won to Christ. These may serve as examples of an infinite se ries and variety of combinations, by which believers will be compacted and knit together.'

The end will be, infinite repeatings and variations of the harmony of the Father and the Son; and God and man, male and female, Jew and Gentile, great and small, will be one. This is what we mean by the Condensation of Life.

The generic effect of the unity for which Christ prayed, will be to increase the power of life in the whole body of believers, and in individuals. The advantages of compact external organization in the various physical enterprises

of commerce, war, &c., are well known. But the world knows little of the energy which will result from the organization of spirits. In the first place, when the Father and the Son, man and woman, Jew and Gentile, shall become one by successive infoldings, the entire power and wisdom of the Godhead will be freely developed in every spirit which belongs to the great unit. Spiritual power applied by external baptism, and working from the circumference toward the centre, (which must be its form of action while intercourse is lateral,) can produce but small results, in comparison with those which are to be expected when life shall act in life, when God shall become in very deed the soul of the church, and shall distribute his energies from the centre outward, as the heart sends its power into all the extremities of the body.

In the next place, the condensation of life which we have defined, will effect a transfer and distribution of all that is good in human nature, which will make the gains of all past generations and the stores of the invisible church available to believers in this world. It is evident, from the New Testament representations of the atonement, that the power and wisdom of the Godhead could not take effect on human nature in the measure necessary to salvation, without assuming a human organization, as its conductor. The advantage which was gained by the incarnation of Christ, increases as his spiritual body increases by the addition of perfected human nature in the persons of his followers. In order therefore that we may estimate the energy of salva tion which will manifest itself in this world when the visible and invisible churches shall be condensed into one, we must consider how many regenera ted human members Christ's body gained at the first resurrection, and what amount of improvement has gone forward in that body during the eighteen hundred years of their glory. All that is gained at the centre, is gained for the whole sphere of concentric spirits. When the church of the first-born shall become the inner life of a church in this world, the visible advancement of human nature will take a stride of eighteen centuries in a single generation.

The physiologists tell us that the principle of hereditary transmission is the key to all the problems of human degeneracy and human improvement. They say that we of the present generation are the heirs of a bad organization, and cannot expect for ourselves any great ameliorations of character and condition. Their hope is, that in the course of several centuries, by a wise attention to the laws of propagation, a generation of men will be produced whose organizations will be adapted to millennial perfection. These are doubtless sober deductions from the facts which present themselves to scientific men, and would be sound doctrines if those facts were all the premises which belong to the case. But there is another and a mightier power than that of natural propagation, which can be brought to bear upon human nature. The deeper philosophy of the Bible bids us look to regeneration more than to generation, for the advancement of the race. The spiritual transmission of qualities which will result from the condensation of life, will modify human character, and human organization too, (for life determines the character of its envelope,) more effectually than hereditary transmission can do; and the process, instead of occupying centuries, and depending on the faithfulness of a series of faithless generations, will advance to its consummation as rapidly as men can be brought