2. The next point was, that the woman had been the wife of seven husbands, "Therefore, in the resurrection, whose wife shall she be of the seven? for they all had her."

As remarked, the mistake of the Sadducees consisted in transferring to the future existence, the relations and conditions of the present existence. This error the Saviour confutes, by a distinct annunciation, that the future life is not like this in its conditions and circumstances; that we are not there as we are here; but changed into the heavenly likeness, and fitted to the character and mode of our new spiritual existence.

"Jesus answered, and said unto them, Ye do err, not knowing the Scriptures, nor the power of God. For in the resurrection they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels of God in heaven-neither can they die any more; for they are equals unto the angels, and are children of God, being children of the resurrection."

Observe, there are two specifications made by our Lord: 1. Their ignorance of the Scriptures. 2. Their ignorance of the power of God.

The first refers to their ignorance of the Mosaic record, where God says "I am the God of Abraham," &c., and which he quoted in refutation of their denial of a future life. This has already been explained above.

The second refers to their ignorance of the power of God so to change and adapt mankind to the heavenly existence, as to avoid the difficulties they had started regarding the woman with seven husbands.

The Sadducees fell into the common error, common

even in our own time, that there is no change after death, that we carry with us into the future world, the feelings, preferences and characteristics of this world; that what we desire here, we shall desire there; and what we do here, we shall continue to do there.

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All this the Saviour positively and plainly denies, and shows that such reasoning is false, that the law of analogy does not hold to this extent; because this life is earthly and that will be heavenly; this life is in a material body, and that will be in a spiritual body. The difference in character and condition, in desires and pursuits, in the elements which go to make up our happiness, will be equally great. In this world we are mortal in that, we shall die no more. In this world we are men, subject to all the frailties and infirmities of human nature. - in that world we shall be as the angels, children of God because we are children of the resurrection. In this world, we are under the influence of the desires, the passions, the love of self, which characterize the flesh-in that we shall be freed from these, and acknowledge the love, the law and dominion of the spirit; the conflict between the flesh and the spirit being forever at an end.

The expression "children of God, being children of the resurrection," has immense weight in it. It is a direct assertion of the fact that the change wrought by the resurrection is moral and spiritual, and transforms the subject of it into the Divine likeness. The phrase "son of" or "children of," is a Hebrew form of speech, signifying, among other things, "in the likeness of," "similar to," "resembling." As ob

served in a previous note, we have equivalent forms, as a "son of temperance," to designate a temperance man; a "daughter of charity," for a kind and benevolent woman; "sisters of mercy," &c. "Children of light," in the New Testament, are those enlightened by the truth; "children of the evil one," are wicked persons, or those resembling the evil one; "children of God," are godly persons, or those in the likeness of God.

Now the Saviour says that the resurrection works such an entire change in man, so purifies and exalts his soul, lift him so entirely out of the earthly into the heavenly, that he becomes, by this very anastasis or transformation, a child of God. Of course this establishes the fact that the resurrection has to do with more than the body. It is growth to the soul, enlightenment, instruction, education; and, through these, the lifting it up, leading it up, helping it to rise up, into that spiritual perfection, that "image of the heavenly," reaching which it becomes the child of God in the highest and divinest meaning of the term. We are children of God in this sense, being, or because we are children of the resurrection; or in words of the same import, to be in the likeness of the resurrection is to be in the likeness of God.

All the other phraseology is to the same point. The Saviour is explicit and direct beyond mistake, and beyond controversy. The children of the resurrection are "equal unto the angels," they "are as the angels which are in heaven," or "as the angels of God in heaven." Now, these varied forms of expression, are only so many ways of saying that, when the resurrection has completed its work on man, he

becomes angelic. Can anything be more conclusive in evidence of the fact, that the change is a moral and spiritual one? that it is a result brought about by moral and spiritual agencies, through which the soul is corrected, informed and raised up to heaven, and "changed into the same image, from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord." 2 Cor. iii. 18.1

The language of Paul, in 1 Cor. xv. 22, is often quoted as proof, that the resurrection state is not a state of holiness and happiness for all. "But every

man in his own order; Christ the first fruits, afterward they that are Christ's at his coming." This is supposed to imply, or teach, that there are two orders in the resurrection beside Christ, the righteous and the wicked; and that the righteous are raised first, and afterwards the wicked.

'See the subject continued in the next section. I have made no mention of the words recorded by Luke," accounted worthy to obtain that world, and the resurrection of the dead," for two reasons: 1. Because the resurrection of all the dead is the acknowledged doctrine of the New Testament. 2. Because the Evangelists could not have attached any great doctrinal importance to the expression, inasmuch as two, out of three recording the conversation, omit it. If it was intended as a declaration of partial resurrection, or of annihilation, or of a difference in the destiny of those raised, they would neither have forgotten it, nor have neglected to report it. What was the precise thought the Saviour may have intended to convey by the words, it is not easy to determine. Perhaps this is the idea,-Those whom God judges worthy of a resurrection, i. e., worth being raised from the dead; those having a mental and moral nature which gives them a title to a future existence-in a word, his intelligent creatures, made in his own image; in distinction from the lower orders of creation.

But this idea conflicts with the common doctrine, that the resurrection of all the dead is simultaneous, "in a moment, at the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump." If the dead are all raised in the end of the world, at the same moment, then there is no precedence of the righteous over the wicked, in point of time.

And the position is equally in conflict with the doctrine of a progressive resurrection; for if the resurrection is immediately subsequent to death, then a wicked man dying before a righteous man, is raised before him. And so, on neither hypothesis is the difference of character distinguished by a difference of time in the resurrection.

But in a matter of so much importance, it is not safe to trust to implications; it is not reasonable to suppose the Holy Spirit would leave the truth to be inferred, instead of stating it in plain speech. If, in the resurrection, there are three orders, First, Christ; Second, The Righteous; and Third, The Wicked'; why did not Paul, if he was guided by the Spirit of God, say so? That would have put the subject at rest forever. It would have ended all debate and doubt, on the most momentous question in the whole range of divine revelation. If Paul had said, "But every man in his own order; Christ the first fruits; afterwards, they that are Christ's at his coming; and after these the wicked;" then the subject would have been put beyond all controversy. And if it really be so, can we doubt, for a moment, that he would have stated it in this form, or in terms equally positive and definite?

But he has done nothing of the kind. He has not