566 THE GLORY OP CHRIST AS GOD -MAN. result the safety and immortality of that body, and its prodigious vital activity on the material world. Our safety would be in our own power, and our influence amazing, if we could place every atom of our bodes in what form we chuse, and keep it there during our pleas re. And then surely we may allow the glori- fied soul of our blessed Saviour to be possessed of this power in a much superior degree, and to exert it in a far more transcen- dent manner: And thus the Sunof Righteousness, even in the operation of his human nature, may answer all the parallels of this illustrious metaphor. The natural powers of his body thus sublimated and refined may move, for ought we know, as swift as sun-beams, which may travel many thousands of miles in a mi- nute : It may diffuse its influences like the sun in a most exten- sive sphere : It may reach our world, and the moon almost the same moment, and penetrate earth to the centre. If the face of our Lord on the mount of transfiguration did shine as the sun, and his raiment as the light; Mat. xvii. 2. If his body appearing to St. Paul was dressed in such a lightfrom heaven as exceeded the brightness of the sun at mid-day; Acts xxvi. 13. What diffusive and distant influences may such a glo- fled body be capable of on theelementaryworld of air, earth and water, under the command of such a glorified soul as that of our Saviour ? I cannot deny myself in this place the pleasure of publishing . to the world a very beautiful resemblance, the first hints and notices whereof I received formerly in conversation from my reverend and worthy friend Mr. Robert Bragge, whereby the personof Christ as God-man in hisexalted state may be happily represented. The sun in the heavens is the most glorious of all 'visiblebeings : His 'sovereign influence lias a most astonishing extent through all the planetary globes, and bestows light and heat upon all of them. It is the sun that gives life and motion to all the infinite varieties of the ánimal world in the earth, air and water : It draws out the vegetable juices from the earth, and covers the surface of it with treks, herbs and flowers : It is the sun that gives beauty and colour to all the millions of bodies round the globe, and by its pervading power per- haps it forms minerals and metals under the earth, Its happy effects are innumerable ; they reach certainly to every thing that has life and motion, or that gives life, support er pleasure to ulanlcind. Now suppose God should create a most illustrious spirit, and unite it to the body of the sun, as a human soul is united to a humanbody : Suppose this spirit had a perceptive power capa- eious enough to become consciousof every sun -beam, and all the influences and effects of this vast shining globe, both in itslight, beat and motion even to the remotest legion : Ang suppose 4.
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