it was open to pious Israelites to draw the inference that they too would be raised to participate in the benefits of His redeeming work. Still this is an inference only, and not a direct affirmation of a resurrection or of a judgment to come.

Further, this latter portion of the prophecy, from the fortieth to the sixty-sixth chapter, abounds with unmistakable allusions to the return of the Jews from Babylon, the rebuilding of Jerusalem and the temple, and the restoration of its worship, shortly after which events the glorious anticipations of the prophet were to receive their realisation; but they contain no direct affirmation respecting a future state or a resurrection. The utmost that can be said of them is that they may have suggested a hope to pious minds that they too would share in the glories of the Messianic kingdom.

The last utterance of the prophet requires a separate notice. After speaking of the glories of the restored Jerusalem and the destruction of its enemies he writes:

"And they shall bring [i.e. the Gentile nations] all your brethren out of the nations for an offering unto the Lord, upon horses, and in chariots, and in litters, and upon mules, and upon swift beasts, to my holy mountain Jerusalem, saith the Lord, as the children of Israel bring their offering in a clean vessel into the house of the Lord. And of them also will I take for priests and for Levites, saith the Lord. For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before me, saith the Lord, so shall your seed and your name remain. And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one Sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the Lord. And they shall go forth, and look on the carcases of the men that have transgressed against me: for their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched; and they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh." (Isaiah lxvi. 20—24.)

This, with its context, is a very remarkable utterance. It is evident that it was intended by the prophet to be a description of the Theocracy under the government of its Messianic king.

What, then, was the meaning which the prophet or his contemporaries would naturally attach to the entire passage? I answer that they must have viewed it as a description of a future kingdom of God, clothed in metaphors derived from the current conceptions of the day. This is evident, for its literal realisation involves an impossibility, except by the continual working of hundreds of millions of the most astounding miracles. I allude to the passage which affirms that all flesh shall come up every twenty-eight, and even every seven days, to worship at Jerusalem. This not only involves a worship pre-eminently local, a worship which our Lord has affirmed to be abolished for evermore in the kingdom of God, but a constant travelling to and fro, and the consequent withdrawal of all the inhabitants of the world from their various employments.

Further, it is affirmed that all those who thus come up to Jerusalem to worship shall go forth and look on the carcases of the men who have transgressed against God, whose worm shall not die, nor their fire be quenched, and who are to be an abhorring to all flesh. This has been actually understood to mean that the glorified saints shall from time to time be witnesses of and exult in the torments of the damned-an idea which is not only in itself horrible, but utterly unchristian. What, then, does this passage mean?

I answer that its imagery is evidently derived from that of the detested Valley of Gehenna, situated within a short distance of Jerusalem, where the filth and the corpses of criminals were either left to be consumed by worms or by a fire which was kept continually burning to consume the impurities of the city. Into this place, according to the prophetic delinea

tion, the carcases of those who had transgressed against God were to be thrown, where they would meet with a worm and a fire ever ready to consume them—a fate which in the eyes of the Jews was extremely terrible.

The passage, therefore, neither affirms a future state nor a resurrection. Taken with its context, the utmost that it could have suggested was a hope that the just who had departed this life would yet in some manner, which is not explained, participate in the glories of the kingdom of God, of which Jerusalem, and an enlarged Palestine, would be the last centre, and that the wicked would most ignominiously be destroyed. Nothing is more certain than that it does not teach or even hint at a doctrine of everlasting damnation, or even of punishment after death; for that which the prophet speaks of as destined to be the prey of the worm that shall not die and of the fire that shall not be quenched is not a living body, but a dead carcase. Surely by no rational interpretation of the words before us can a carcase mean a living being destined to exist in misery which will never end. It has been usual to interpret the words, "the worm which never dies," as meaning an ever-gnawing conscience; but that this was the thing intended the passage before us gives no hint. Certain it is that carcases are destitute of a conscience.

My general conclusion respecting the book which we have been considering is, that it contains no definitely formulated affirmation respecting a judgment to come, that all its descriptions of the future kingdom of God are deeply tinged with the localism of Judaism, and that while it contains numerous passages which are calculated to produce a hope in the holy that they shall participate in the blessings of this kingdom, even if they died before its manifestation, it consigns the wicked to simple destruction. Still further, so imperfect was the hold which the idea of a terrible retribution awaiting the wicked after death had on the prophet's mind, or on

that of his contemporaries, that although he, with all the other prophets, was a vehement preacher of righteousness, he has never once urged it on the sinner as a deterrent from sin.

THE PROPHET JEREMIAH.

It is very remarkable that there is no definite allusion to a future state or to a resurrection in this prophecy. The life of the prophet was full of trials, of which he bitterly complains, yet he nowhere consoles himself, like St. Paul, even with a hope that "his light affliction, which was for the moment, worked for him more and more exceedingly an eternal weight of glory." All his warnings addressed to his countrymen (and they are many) are sanctioned by considerations derived from the present life alone. To several of them I have referred already. They present a striking analogy to the ideas which were entertained by the Greeks, who held that for a dead body to be cast out to be devoured by dogs was the greatest calamity which could happen to man. So strong was this feeling, that those who were victorious in battle always granted to the vanquished a truce to enable them to inter their dead, and the refusal of such a truce was considered the greatest of impieties. Similar must have been the views of those whom the prophet addressed; for, as far as this prophecy affords any evidence of the belief of the prophet's hearers respecting a future state of retribution, it is apparent that they must have attached little weight to reasonings founded on the expectation of a judgment to come, although such reasonings, when urged by St. Paul, were capable of disturbing the conscience of so hardened a sinner as Felix. The prophet also was compelled by his disobedient countrymen to accompany them into Egypt. Yet, although in that country the symbols of a future judgment must have everywhere met their eyes, we meet with no reference to it even in the stern threatenings of his Egyptian discourses. It

has been urged as a reason for this want of reference to a future state of retribution in the prophetical writings, that the Jews are addressed in them not in their individual but in their national capacity, and that judgments can only overtake nations in the present world; but several of the threatenings which were uttered by this prophet were addressed to individuals. This, therefore, constitutes no adequate account of the silence of so earnest a preacher of righteousness respecting the punishments which await the sinner in the world to come. His silence is a fact, whatever may be its explanation.

THE PROPHET EZEKIEL.

We have already considered several important passages in this prophecy; we therefore need not repeat them. Speaking generally, the prophet's promises and threatenings, like those of Jeremiah, are derived from considerations which are limited to the present life. In a few passages, however, an important consideration is added. The sinner is threatened in them. not with simple destruction but with "dying in his iniquity;" yet, if death be viewed as the termination of man's conscious being, or if there was no definite belief in a state of retribution in the underworld, it would matter little whether a man dies in his holiness or dies in his sin. At any rate, the expression "shall die in his iniquity" seems to be a threatening to the wicked, not simply of destruction but of retribution for unrepented sin after death, and implies that the prophet was of opinion that the threat in question was capable of exerting some degree of moral power on those against whom it was directed.

The vision of the dry bones has been frequently referred to as a revelation of a resurrection. As it is well known it will be unnecessary to quote it; I shall therefore only draw attention to the Divine speaker's own explanation of it.

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