319 / 674
SECT.
íI1.1
PROOF
OF
A
SEPARATE
STATE.
299
bath
done,
whether
it
be
good or bad."
Now
why
should
we
suppose,
that
St.
Paul
.
excludes
all
other
christians
besides himself,
and
his
brethren the
apostles,
from
the
blessing
of
the
8.
verse,
viz.
that
when
they
are absent
from
the
body,
they shall
be
present
with
the Lord," since the
verses all
round it are applicable to
all christians.
Answer
2.
These chapters
were
written
with
a
design,
not
only,
to vindicate
and
encourage the apostle
himself,
under
the
sufferings
and
reproaches,
which
he
met
with
but,
doubtless, to
give
encouragement
to
the
Corin-
thians, and
all
christians
under
any sufferings
or
re-
proaches, they might
meet
with
in the world
:
that,
as
he
expresses it a
little
before, they
might learn
"
to
walk by
faith,
and
to
look
at
the
things, which
are
unseen, which
are
eternal." And, indeed,
if
this
peculiar
blessing
of
the
happiness
of
a separate state
belongs only to the
apostles,
how
much are the comforts
of
the New
Testament nar-
rowed and
diminished, and the faith
and hope
of
com-
mon christians discouraged and enervated, and
their mo-
tives to holiness weakened,
when they
are
told,
they
have
nothing
td do to lay hold
upon
such
promised
favours, such revelations
of
grace,
because they belong
only
to
the apostles,
and not
to them
?
And, indeed,
how shall
common christians ever know,
what
part
of
the epistles they
may
apply to
themselves;
for their direction and
consolation,
if
they may
not hope
in such words
of
grace, where the
holy
writers
use
the
word
we,"
and
do
not
plainly
intimate,
that
they
be-
long
to
preachers or apostles
only
?
Answer
3.
When our
Saviour prays
for
himself
and
his
apostles, in the beginning
of
the
xvii.
of
St.
John,
he
comes,
in
the
20.
verse, to
extend
the
blessings
he
had
prayed for to
all believers.
Verse
20.
"
Neither
pray
I
for these
alone, but
for
them
also,
which shall
believe
on
me
through
their
word
:"
Verse
21.
"
That
they all
may
he one, as
thou, Father,
art
in
me,
and
I
in
thee,
that
they
may be
one in
us,
that
the world may
believe,
that
thou hast sent
me."
Verse
24.
Father,
I
will
that
they, also,
whom'
thou hast
given
me,
may be with
me
where
I
am,
that
they
may
behold
my glory,
which
thou
hast
given me."
Here it
is
evident,
that
our
Saviour
prays
that, those,
that
shall believe on him
through the