ceptible, and we trust, pardonable. We do love to fill our minds with the conceptions of that grandeur to which the West shall finally attain. At such moments we tremble. This battle-field, grander than a thousand Waterloos, these hosts, which Milton's pen could not describe, that consummation in victory, more joyful or woful, than ever perched on a conqueror's standard-these invest the West with solemn sublimity. And the wise man will not close his eyes against the mute yet striking lessons, which these foreshadowed events teach. But be this destiny joyful or woful, ELOQUENCE, a mighty spirit from heaven or from hell, according as she is subsidized, sweeping sensitive cords in a million hearts, eliciting notes which might charm an angel or delight a demon, binding those million hearts with the sweet, yet omnipotent chains of fraternal love, or driving them fiercely asunder to contend as friends, for supremacy-Eloquence, the mighty Incantator of all this, shall lead the great West up the pathway of life, or force it down the steeps of death.

ARTICLE IV.

PROFESSOR BUSH'S ANASTASIS REVIEWED.

By Rev. D. D. TOMPKINS MCLAUGHLIN, New-York.

In the Divine administration nothing, perhaps, is more adapted to strike us with surprise, than the methods adopted by Infinite Wisdom in the accomplishment of its glorious purposes. Agencies, which human penetration would have marked as wholly destitute of efficiency, or as directly and powerfully tending to the subversion of truth and virtue, have been chosen by God, as the best adapted of any within the range of his universal observation and summons, to the illustration and final establishment of the grand principles of faith and duty. From the hour when, in Eden, the Prince of

Darkness arrayed himself in opposition to the testimony of the Father of Lights, what has the history of our world presented but the constant antagonism of virtue and vice, of truth and falsehood; and however error and sin may have triumphed for a season, the issue will abundantly prove that "the foolishness of God is wiser than man, and the weakness of God is stronger than man." The assaults of enemies, and the mistakes of friends, by which the ark of the covenant has apparently been endangered, have all been made contributory to the settlement of Zion on an immovable foundation.

We have been led to these reflections by the interest awakened in the churches in favor of the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead, from the recent attempt made by Professor Bush to undermine the popular belief. Never, except on a single occasion, had we listened to an argument from the pulpit on this important topic. We had often noticed with astonishment, the rigid silence maintained on this point by the Christian ministry, when in the first ages of the Church, such prominence was given to the doctrine. It was necessary that something should transpire to break up this lethargic state, and excite the believer to a thorough examin ation of the nature of his faith, and of the evidence on which it rests. The belief in the resurrection of the body might otherwise become a dead letter in the creed of Christianity. But, thanks to Professor Bush, or rather to that Providence which brings good out of evil, an impulse has been given to the public mind, which will not soon spend itself; and we may thus indulge the hope, that the doctrine will hereafter be better understood, and more highly prized than it has been since the apostolic days.

In the latest work of our author, entitled, "Bush on the Resurrection of Christ," an attempt is made to invalidate the argument drawn from the resurrection of the material body of our Lord, against the theory of a spiritual resurrection, as developed in the Anastasis. We are not surprised that he has felt the necessity of guarding more thoroughly a point, where his theory is, if not the most indefensible, at least the

most easily assailed. He has accordingly, in the treatise before us, thrown around his position a double line of circumvallation. The inner is constructed as follows: "Our Lord's resurrection was a pledge, but not a pattern of ours," p. 80. And at an earlier stage in the discussion, "How far the resurrection of Christ is to be regarded as an exact pattern of the resurrection of the saints, can only be determined by determining how far, from the nature of each, the conditions of the one could find a parallel in those of the other. It is certain that the body of Christ did not 'see corruption.' It is certain that the bodies of the saints do see corruption. This establishes at once an immeasurable diversity, in this respect, between the two. In the one case, a body is made the subject of a change called resurrection, while its organic integrity remains unimpaired; in the other, if the common view be admitted, bodies which have been dissolved, dissipated, and formed into countless new combinations, are to be reconstructed, and vivified anew by their respective souls or spirits, and thus made to live again as the identical bodies which died."

"Again, it is clear that the divine-human constitution of our Lord's person must be the ground of an immense difference in the condition of his state and that of his people, both after and before his resurrection. We cannot justly reason from the one to the other. It does not follow, that because man, from the laws of his nature, goes into a resurrectionstate as soon as he dies, without reference to his gross material body, that the same holds good of the risen Jesus.' Nor can any thing be more unjust than to attach such a consequence to a train of reasoning designed to show that the true doctrine of the resurrection of mankind does not involve

or imply the resurrection of the same body." pp. 6, 7.

'How Mr. Bush can here attempt a comparison between the believer passing into a state of death, and "the risen Jesus," we see not, especially when an apostle affirms that "Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more."

Of the principles thus laid down, the Professor seems not to avail himself in this essay. Whether it is because he regards these principles as so obvious, that no one will be found bold enough to call them in question, or rather, because he holds them as the acropolis to which he may retire, if his outposts are driven in, we leave to be determined by time. It is indeed certain that the resurrection of Christ is not "to be regarded as an exact pattern of the resurrection of the saints," since the one "did not see corruption," while the others "do see corruption." But does it follow, that it may not have been so far the pattern of the saints' resurrection, that, supposing it to have been a revivification of his material body, their resurrection will likewise be that of the material body? To such as deny the possibility of this, because the bodies of the dead "have been dissolved, dissipated, and formed into countless new combinations," we simply propound the inquiry, "Do ye not therefore err, not knowing the power of God?"

From the leading principle above presented, we do not dissent so much, as from the application it will receive in the hands of Mr. Bush. We dislike not so much that which is said, as that which tacetur, is passed over in silence: implied, and that in such a manner as to bear strongly in some minds in favor of the Professor's argument. We have no intention, however, to enter here on a discussion of the implied use of any of these principles. Before his application of them is entitled to any weight, he is bound to show that the diversity in the conditions is of such a nature, as to preclude the idea of a material resurrection in the case of the saints, even though it may have occurred in the case of the Redeemer. Till Professor Bush advances an argument in defence of his position, we shall not feel ourselves called upon to enter an argument, but shall simply oppose assertion to assertion, and the belief of the Christian world to that of an individual. The onus

probandi certainly devolves on him who assails the popular

faith.

But there is an outer line of circumvallation, which our

author has labored strongly to fortify. It is the spiritual resurrection of the Lord Jesus. Here he has erected munitions of an imposing aspect, which, if well founded, would render his position impregnable. It is incumbent, therefore, on those who conscientiously adhere to the belief in a material resurrection, to examine candidly and thoroughly the nature of the proofs adduced. The grand question at issue is this, Of what nature were the post-resurrection appearances of our Lord? Were they the exhibitions of a veritable human body, that body of flesh and bones which hung upon the cross? Or were they the manifestations of a spiritual body, invisible and undiscoverable by the physical organs of sense, and which could be known to be present only by a subjective change in the beholders, which the Professor terms "the opening of a spiritual eye"? The latter hypothesis is that which he adopts. "The supposition of the unconscious development of a spiritual sense in the spectator, affords the most probable solution of the problem. It is a question scarcely yet considered in man's philosophy, whether the human eye can see any thing that is not material. If an angel is seen in human form, it must either be converted to a human being, with its solid organisms, or it must be seen as it is by an internal eye, adapted to take cognizance of spiritual objects." p. 17. Accordingly he maintains that in all the theophanics and angelophanies recorded in the inspired volume, this opening of the eye of the spirit occurred, and urges in support his opinion not only "the improbability of a bona fide transformation of an angelic into a human being," but also a peculiarity in the diction of the inspired penmen, by which a certain form of expression is appropriated to these manifestations, separating them in an undoubted manner from cases of physical vision. "The usage of the original on this subject is altogether peculiar, and opens a field of philological deduction, of the importance of which biblical students appear to have been hitherto very little aware. It may, I think, be clearly made to appear that there is an appropriated form of expression in relation to the whole subject of theophanies and

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