such as the disciples coming and holding him by the feet and worshipping him—his commanding them to handle him and see that it was he himself, and not a mere intangible spirit void of flesh and bones-his commanding Thomas to put his hands into his wounded side—and his eating a piece of broiled fish and an honey-comb. In all this we have no difficulty in recognizing a miraculous adaptation of the visible phenomena to the outward senses of the disciples, who were to be fully assured of the great fact of their Lord's resurrection, and of the identity of his person. But as the Saviour's true personality did not reside in his material body, any more than ours does in ours, so the proof of it could not really depend upon the exhibition of that body, although it be admitted that the requisite evidence could not reach their minds, while under the conditions of mortality, except through the medium of the outward senses. The wisdom, and even the necessity, of this is apparent, from the effect which his sudden appearance among them produced, even while his form and aspect were predominantly human. They were, it is said, "terrified and affrighted." How much would their terror have been increased had he appeared as a purely spiritual entity, were that possible, without at all disguising his unearthly being! As to the act of eating, it is certain that it could not be from any necessity of sustaining his body by material food. It was doubtless an optical act, like that of the three angels that came to Abraham-of whom one, by the way, was this same Jesus in his pre-incarnate state—and partook of the entertainment which he served up to them. The resurrectionstate of Jesus was unquestionably the same with that of his glorious or Shekinah-state before he tabernacled in the flesh; and if the one was consistent with his appearing to eat of the ordinary food of mortals, so doubtless was the other.*

*Josephus, speaking of this incident in the history of Abraham (J. A. B. I. c. 11), says, dóžav air@ napícxov icbióvrov, they presented to him

And when we consider the object to be attained by such an illusion, we see nothing inconsistent or unworthy the divine impersonation of Truth in having recourse to it. A miracle, it is clear, must be admitted on any view. If his risen body was material, it must have been miraculously rendered spiritual when he suddenly appeared in a room closed and barred, and when he as suddenly vanished from sight. If it was spiritual, it must have been miraculously made to assume material attributes on the same occasion. Between these alternatives we are left to take our choice. For ourselves we do not hesitate a moment. Adopting the former view, we are compelled to the conclusion, that, as our Lord did not ascend in a material body, he must have put it off either at the ascension itself, or at some time previous during the forty days of his sojourning on earth, of the proof of which we have not the slightest trace except what is involved in the hypothesis itself. On the other ground, the necessity of such a change is precluded. He rose in the same body in which he ascended, and in that body still lives as "the resurrection and the life" to all his believing followers.*

(4.) When Mary came at an early hour to the sepul

an appearance of eating. The term doğa, show, appearance, seeming, is precisely the term which we think applicable to our Saviour's act on this occasion.

'Prof. Müller alleges that Christ arose from the tomb with the same material body which he had before his crucifixion. As a proof he adduces the fact that Christ ate, and that he showed Thomas the marks of his wounds. But very many proofs of an opposite kind may be alleged, the most important of which is his ascension into heaven. To the ascension belongs a glorified body, which had from the earth only that which is imperishable. Might not a glorified one eat, while the food was transformed by an inward, higher, living energy into a superior element, or be chemically evaporated? And could not the wounds in the body be verified by marks in the resurrection-body ?"-Lange, in Germ. Select. Andover, 1839. P. 288.

chre, and looked down and saw only the two angelic messengers sitting within, as she turned round she beheld Jesus, and mistook him for the gardener. He must, therefore, have been clothed, and in habiliments appropriate to a gardener. But whence were these clothes obtained, on the theory of the revival of the material body? His ordinary garments had been distributed by lot among the Roman soldiers at his crucifixion. His grave-clothes were still lying in the sepulchre. If, then, the material body had emerged from the tomb, it must, we should suppose, have left all its sepulchral investments behind it. Whence then, we ask again, did the risen Saviour obtain the garments in which he appeared to Mary? The instantaneous reply will no doubt be, that they were miraculously supplied; nor would we intimate that a material body could not have been thus furnished from the wardrobe of Omnipotence, as well as any other. But we are still firm in the belief, that the impression is far more spontaneous that the whole was miraculous, the apparent body as well as the apparent garb. We have, we think, no evidence that the purely spiritual body of Christ, any more than any other spiritual body, could be seen by the natural eye. Consequently there was an absolute necessity that if the risen Saviour manifested himself at all, it should have been by the temporary assumption of a body cognizable by the natural senses. That there was something miraculous in his several appearances after his resurrection is to be inferred from Mark 16. 12: "After that, he appeared ina nother form (év éτega μógon) unto two of them, as they walked, and went into the country." This certainly implies a transformation of some kind, such as we may easily conceive to pertain to a spiritualized body.

(5.) The evangelical narrative enforces the belief, that our Lord ascended to heaven first on the very day on which he rose from the dead, and subsequently in repeated instances before the expiration of the forty days mentioned by

Luke, Acts 1. 3.* The proof of this position may be thus stated:

a. The first appearance of the risen Saviour was to Mary Magdalen, of which a particular account is given by John only, ch. 20. 11-18. After mentioning her recognition of him, the writer proceeds: " Jesus saith unto her, Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father; but go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God." For this prohibition here uttered it is difficult to assign a reason, unless it be that our Lord was just upon the point of ascending, and therefore no time was to be allowed for the expression of those endearments to which her rejoicing affection prompted her. The word is in the present tense (avaßaivo, I ascend, i. e. I am just about ascending), and is, as it strikes us, entirely inconsistent with the idea that he announces an ascension which was to take place forty days afterwards. Why should so distant a removal to heaven be a reason for forbidding her now to touch him? Should we not suppose his language would rather have been, 'Touch me now, for if thou dost it not before my ascension, thou canst not hope to do it afterward'—especially when we consider that, in the after noon of that same day, he not only permitted, but required, the disciples to handle him, and see that it was he himself.' Is it replied to this that he was urgent to have his disciples immediately informed of his intended ascension at the end of forty days? But what could be the motive for such haste on this matter, when he was to see them himself on the same day, and could communicate that information at any succeeding interview? The true solution is undoubtedly very different. Jesus would simply certify to his disciples

* See on this subject a dissertation from the German of Kinkel in the "Bibliotheca Sacra," Vol. I. No. 1., Feb. 1844, where the question respecting the Ascension is argued with great ability. We are indebted to this essay for several of the ideas advanced in the present connexion.

the reason why he did not at once personally manifest himself to them. "Announce to them that however pleasant to them and to me would be an instantaneous meeting, yet a stronger attraction draws me first to my Father. Every human feeling gives way before this. Touch me not; I cannot tarry with thee, nor with my brethren; for I have not yet been with my Father, and there I must first be." Viewed in this light every thing is plain and easy.

b. A recurrence to the previous history confirms this interpretation. Our Lord had shortly before advertised his followers of his speedy removal from them to his Father, and of his subsequent speedy return to them. John 16. 16, "A little while, and ye shall not see me; and again, a little while, and ye shall see me, because I go to the Father;" i. e he was to go to the Father in the interval before their seeing him again. And again, when his disciples were surprised and confounded by his words, "Jesus said unto them, Do ye inquire among yourselves of that I said, A little while, and ye shall not see me, and again, a little while, and ye shall see me?" He then continues: "Verily, verily, I say unto you, that ye shall weep and lament, but the world shall rejoice; and ye shall be sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy. A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow, because her hour is come; but as soon as she is delivered of the child, she remembereth no more the anguish, because a man-child is born into the world. And ye now therefore have sorrow: but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice (xagoerai), and your joy no man taketh from you." Compare the prediction and the event. How sad and disconsolate was the little company at his death; how buoyant and rejoicing were they made by his re-appearance! Their sorrow was to continue till "he had been with his Father," and then was their joy to ccmmence, as we learn was the case: Then were the disciples glad (izάonoar) when they saw the Lord." Then it was, indeed, that a "man-child was born into the world," accord