But setting aside the substance of the soul, another thing that will make any one doubt whether this your interpretation of our Saviour's words be necessarily to be received as their true sense, is, That it will not be very easily reconciled to your saying*, you do not mean by the same body the same individual particles which were united at the point of death. And yet, by this interpretation of our Saviour's words, you can mean no other particles but such as were united at the point of death; because you mean no other substance but what comes out of the grave; and no substance, no particles come out, you say, but what were in the grave; and I think your lordship will not say, that the particles that were separate from the body by perspiration before the point of death were laid up in the grave.

But your lordship, I find, has an answer to this, viz. ↑ That by comparing this with other places, you find that the words [of our Saviour above-quoted] are to be understood of the substance of the body, to which the soul was united, and not to (I suppose your lordship writ, of) these individual particles, i. e. those individual particles that are in the grave at the resurrection. For so they must be read, to make your lordship's sense entire, and to the purpose of your answer here: and then, methinks, this last sense of our Saviour's words given by your lordship wholly overturns the sense which we have given of them above, where from those words you press the belief of the resurrection of the same body, by this strong argument, that a substance could not, upon hearing the voice of Christ, come out of the grave, which was never in the grave. There (as far as I can understand your words) your lordship argues, that our Saviour's words are to be understood of the particles in the grave, unless, as your lordship says, one can make it out that a substance which never was in the grave may come out of it. And here your lordship expressly says, That our Saviour's words are to be understood of the substance of that body to which the soul was [at any time] united, and not to those individual ticles that are in the grave. Which put together, seems to me to say, that our Saviour's words are to be understood of those particles only that are in the grave, and not of those particles only which are in the grave, but of others also, which have at any time been vitally united to the soul, but never were in the grave.

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The next text your lordship brings to make the resurrection of the same body, in your sense, an article of faith, are these words of St. Paul: For we must all appear before the judgment-seat of Christ, that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad. To which your lordship subjoins § this question: Can these words be understood of any other material substance but that body in which these things were done? Answer. A man may suspend his deter

* 2d Answer. + Ibid. ‡ 2 Cor. v. 10. § 2d Answer.

mining the meaning of the apostle to be, that a sinner shall suffer for his sins in the very same body wherein he committed them: because St. Paul does not say he shall have the very same body when he suffers that he had when he sinned. The apostle says indeed, done in his body. The body he had, and did things in, at five or fifteen, was, no doubt, his body, as much as that which he did things in at fifty was his body, though his body were not the very same body at those different ages: and so will the body which he shall have after the resurrection be his body, though it be not the very same with that which he had at five, or fifteen, or fifty. He that at threescore is broke on the wheel, for a murder he committed at twenty, is punished for what he did in his body, though the body he has, i. e. his body at threescore, be not the same, i. e. made up of the same individual particles of matter, that that body was which he had forty years before. When your lordship has resolved with yourself what that same immutable he is, which at the last judgment shall receive the things done in his body, your lordship will easily see that the body he had when an embryo in the womb, when a child playing in coats, when a man marrying a wife, and when bed-rid dying of a consumption, and at last, which he shall have after his resurrection, are each of them his body, though neither of them be the same body, the one with the other.

But farther, to your lordship's question, Can these words be understood of any other material substance but that body in which these things were done? I answer, These words of St. Paul may be understood of another material substance than that body in which these things were done, because your lordship teaches me, and gives me a strong reason so to understand them. Your lordship says, *That you do not say the same particles of matter, which the sinner had at the very time of the commission of his sins, shall be raised at the last day. And your lordship gives this reason for it: + For then a long sinner must have a vast body, considering the continued spending of particles by perspiration. Now, my lord, if the apostle's words, as your lordship would argue, cannot be understood of any other material substance, but that body in which these things were done; and no body, upon the removal or change of some of the particles that at any time make it up, is the same material substance, or the same body; it will, I think, thence follow, that either the sinner must have all the same individual particles vitally united to his soul when he is raised that he had vitally united to his soul when he sinned, or else St. Paul's words here cannot be understood to mean the same body in which the things were done. For if there were other particles of matter in the body, wherein the things were done, than in that which is raised, that which is raised cannot be the same body in which they were done: unless that alone, which has just all the same individual + Ibid.

* 2d Answer.

particles when any action is done, being the same body wherein it was done, that also, which has not the same individual particles wherein that action was done, can be the same body wherein it was done; which is in effect to make the same body sometimes to be the same, and sometimes not the same.

*

Your lordship thinks it suffices to make the same body to have not all, but no other particles of matter, but such as were some time or other vitally united to the soul before; but such a body, made up of part of the particles some time or other vitally united to the soul, is no more the same body wherein the actions were done in the distant parts of the long sinner's life, than that is the same body in which a quarter, or half, or three-quarters of the same particles, that made it up, are wanting. For example, a sinner has acted here in his body an hundred years; he is raised at the last day, but with what body? The same, says your lordship, that he acted in; because St. Paul says, he must receive the things done in his body. What therefore must his body at the resurrection consist of? Must it consist of all the particles of matter that have ever been vitally united to his soul? for they, in succession, have all of them made up his body wherein he did these things: No, says your lordship, that would make his body too vast; it suffices to make the same body in which the things were done, that it consists of some of the particles, and no other, but such as were, some time during his life, vitally united to his soul. But according to this account, his body at the resurrection being, as your lordship seems to limit it, near the same size it was in some part of his life, it will be no more the same body in which the things were done in the distant parts of his life, than that is the same body in which half, or three-quarters, or more of the individual matter that then made it up, is now wanting. For example, let his body at fifty years old consist of a million of parts; five hundred thousand at least of those parts will be different from those which made up his body at ten years, and at an hundred. So that to take the numerical particles that made up his body at fifty, or any other season of his life, or to gather them promiscuously out of those which at different times have successively been vitally united to his soul, they will no more make the same body which was his, wherein some of his actions were done, than that is the same body which has but half the same particles: and yet all your lordship's argument here for the same body is, because St. Paul says it must be his body in which these things were done; which it could not be if any other substance were joined to it, i. e. if any other particles of matter made up the body which were not vitally united to the soul when the action was done.

Again, your lordship says, "That you do not say the same individual particles [shall make up the body at the resurrection]

which were united at the point of death, for there must be a great alteration in them in a lingering disease, as if a fat man falls into a consumption." Because, it is likely, your lordship thinks these particles of a decrepit, wasted, withered body would be too few, or unfit to make such a plump, strong, vigorous, well-sized body, as it has pleased your lordship to proportion out in your thoughts to men at the resurrection; and therefore some small portion of the particles formerly united vitally to that man's soul shall be reassumed, to make up his body to the bulk your lordship judges convenient; but the greatest part of them shall be left out, to avoid the making his body more vast than your lordship thinks will be fit, as appears by these your lordship's words immediately following, viz. "That you do not say the same particles the sinner had at the very time of commission of his sins; for then a long sinner must have a vast body."

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But then pray, my lord, what must an embryo do, who dying within a few hours after his body was vitally united to his soul, has no particles of matter, which were formerly vitally united to it, to make up his body of that size and proportion which your lordship seems to require in bodies at the resurrection? Or must we believe he shall remain content with that small pittance of matter, and that yet imperfect body to eternity, because it is an article of faith to believe the resurrection of the very same body, i. e. made of only such particles as have been vitally united to the soul? For if it be so, as your lordship says, "That life is the result of the union of soul and body," it will follow, that the body of an embryo dying in the womb may be very little, not the thousandth part of any ordinary man. For since from the first conception and beginning of formation it has life, and "life is the result of the union of the soul with the body," an embryo, that shall die either by the untimely death of the mother, or by any other accident, presently after it has life, must, according to your lordship's doctrine, remain a man not an inch long to eternity; because there are not particles of matter, formerly united to his soul, to make him bigger, and no other can be made use of to that purpose: though what greater congruity the soul hath with any particles of matter which were once vitally united to it, but are now so no longer, than it hath with particles of matter which it was never united to, would be hard to determine, if that should be demanded.

By these and not a few other the like consequences, one may see what service they do to religion and the Christian doctrine, who raise questions and make articles of faith about the resurrection of the same body, where the scripture says nothing of the same body; or if it does, it is with no small reprimand to those who make such an inquiry. "But some men will say, How are the dead raised up? and with what body do they come? Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not quickened, except it die. And that which thou sowest, thou sowest not that body that shall

* 2d Answer.

+ Ibid.

1 Cor. xv. 35, &c.

be, but bare grain, it may chance of wheat, or of some other grain. But God giveth it a body, as it hath pleased him." Words, I should think, sufficient to deter us from determining any thing for or against the same bodies being raised at the last day. It suffices, that all the dead shall be raised, and every one appear and answer for the things done in his life, and receive according to the things he has done in his body, whether good or bad. He that believes this, and has said nothing inconsistent herewith, I presume may and must be acquitted from being guilty of any thing inconsistent with the article of the resurrection of the dead.

But your lordship, to prove the resurrection of the same body to be an article of faith, farther asks, *" How could it be said, if any other substance be joined to the soul at the resurrection, as its body, that they were the things done in or by the body?" swer. Just as it may be said of a man at an hundred years old, that hath then another substance joined to his soul than he had at twenty, that the murder or drunkenness he was guilty of at twenty were things done in the body: how "by the body" comes in here, I do not see.

Your lordship adds, " And St. Paul's dispute about the manner of raising the body might soon have ended, if there were no necessity of the same body." Answer. When I understand what argument there is in these words to prove the resurrection of the same body, without the mixture of one new atom of matter, I shall know what to say to it. In the mean time this I understand, that St. Paul would have put as short an end to all disputes about this matter if he had said, that there was a necessity of the same body, or that it should be the same body.

The next text of scripture you bring for the same body is, "If there be no resurrection of the dead, then is not Christ raised." From which your lordship argues, "It seems then other bodies are to be raised as his was.' I grant other dead, as certainly raised as Christ was; for else his resurrection would be of no use to mankind. But I do not see how it follows, that they shall be raised with the same body, as Christ was raised with the same body, as your lordship infers in these words annexed: "And can there be any doubt, whether his body was the same material substance which was united to his soul before?" I answer, None at all; nor that it had just the same distinguishing lineaments and marks, yea, and the same wounds that it had at the time of his death. If therefore your lordship will argue from other bodies being raised as his was, that they must keep proportion with his in sameness; then we must believe that every man shall be raised with the same lineaments and other notes of distinction he had at the time of his death, even with his wounds yet open, if he had any, because our Saviour was so raised; which seems to me scarce reconcileable with what your lordship says, § of a fat man falling into a consumption, and dying.

* 2d Answer. † 2 Cor. 15, 16. + 2d Answer. § Ibid..