feem a more difficult work for the AImighty) to mould the human body into its present admirable texture and compofition, than to recall it from its state of difperfion, in the appointed season of his Providence.

BUT this comparison, it may be imagined, is not exact: the perished body resembles not a machine, merely disjointed and taken to pieces. Its parts lose their tone, and alter their whole form and texture. It rather resembles fuch works of art, as, by a total decay of perishing materials, become in time incapable of restoration. But this is a vulgar prejudice. Not a fingle particle of matter can perish.* The mafs may be continually altering and varying its forms, to answer the purposes of nature,

LUCRETIUS with his ufual exuberance of fancy, beautifully illuftrates this obfervation, and concludes, HAUD igitur penitus pereunt quæcunque videntur: Quando alid ex alio reficit natura, nec ullam

Rem gigni patitur, nifi morte adjutam aliena. Lib. 1. 263.

but

but not a fingle atom can be loft out of the world, but by the power of God, who is the fovereign difpofer of the whole, in all ftates and changes.

To be fure, the parts of dead bodies are fometimes difperfed far and wide through the creation, mingled with all the elements, and blended and incorporated with other bodies. But this cannot fruftrate or obftruct the purposes of a Divine Agent, whofe knowledge pervades all nature, and whofe power knoweth no refistance. Every thing lies naked and open in his fight, and is perfectly fubfervient to his command. His eye attends, and his hand difpofes, every particle of matter in all its revolutions and stages of tranfmutation. And it is eafy to conceive, that fuch a Being will rather prevent all fuch changes in the course of things, as tend to defeat his purpose, than finally fuffer his promise to fall to the ground.

THE doctrine of the refurrection, I

am fure, is not as amazing, as the unbelief of a rational creature, having an opportunity, every day of his life, of obferving fo many fimilar inftances of Divine Power, in the common appearances of the material world. When you look at a caterpillar, upon the first view you can hardly think, that fuch a crawling infect, loathfome, and hideous to the fight, should, in a certain time, become a new creature of distinguished rank and order. * Attend him a little longer, and your disbelief increases. He

*FOR the information of fome readers, it is necessary to obferve, that many genera of flies pafs through three states, the first of the worm or maggot, the second of the nympha or aurelia, and the third of the fly or papilio. In the nymphal state the animal makes a shell of its own fkin, which hardens and becomes brown or reddish, while the whole of its body becomes detached from it; and, after having lain fome time in form of an oblong ball, apparently without fenfe or life, and without any vifible parts of the future creature, acquires by degrees the form of a fly and all its limbs, Supplem. to Chambers. Article NYMPH. And what is ftill more curious, the real fly, or higher nature, was fecretly contained all the while in the two subordinate stages. See Article FEVE.

feemingly

#

feemingly lofes all fenfe and motion: he

falls into a torpid state And yet, behold, a few days paft, he really rifes a beautiful winged creature, magnificently arrayed in colours, beyond the tints of art: the ftudy and admiration of the curious. Look at the face of things in the cold inanimate state of winter. It is all one vaft wafte: all things lie blended in confufion: fruits and flowers no longer preserve their diftinctions: what the industry of man fows, feems loft and overwhelmed in the general wreck: fuch vegetables, as require not human culture, have given their feeds to be the sport of winds, and they seem totally lost amidst the ruins of nature-But, behold again, the Almighty Ruler fends forth the genial breezes of the spring: nature ftarts, as it were, from fleep: earth refumes its verdure and fruits and flowers spring

up

in all the richness of colours peculiar to their respective species.

WE,

B

WE, poor short-fighted creatures, fee nothing wonderful in this change. It is a fight quite familiar to us: the feafons revolve in regular fucceffion: and we are taught by experience to wait for their ftated returns. And yet, in fact, there is nothing more in the future renovation of man. This fpiritual revolution, though flower, yet is as certain, as the revolutions of the natural world. At prefent we fall into the dust; and there we lie in one promifcuous mafs, blended and undiftinguished-But when the arch-angel of him, who hath ordained the viciffitude of feafons, gives the fignal for the revival of man; then, where is the wonder, that mankind fhall alfo ftart up in their proper forms, and perfons, to answer the purposes of his moral Providence?

HERE is no difficulty, but what we create to ourselves. We cannot conceive, that there can be a proper refurrection, unless the fame exact quantity of matter,