ESSAY. The Departing Soul. SOME persons have been very solicitous to know how the soul' goes out of the body when a good man dies ; how it passes through the air and etherial regions ; and, leaving the stars 'behind, how it soars up 'to the third heaven. They are much at a loss to tell how long it is a going . this wondrous journey, and in what region of those upper worlds its final mansion is ; espe- cially since the new philosophy has found those regions to be so very vast, that a cannon bullet would spend many ages in travel- ling to the nearest star, or from one star to another. They are yet further puzzled to conceive whether a soul departing from any place, v. c. from London at noon, would find out itsfriendwho died there theforegoing midnight, since a direct ascent would en- crease their distance and separation, far as the zenith is from the .nadir, and they are as much puzzled to determine, whether the immense outmost space be their dwelling, or some one part of it only. I confess while we consider human souls united to bodies, we are wont to speak of their absence and presence, their places of residence and their removes according to the station, place and motion of those bodies to which they are united. This is the common language of all mankind ; nor is there any sufficient rea- son to alter it. It is evident, and without all controversy, that bodies must necessarily have relation to place : And when angels assume corporeal vehicles, the case is the same with them as with human souls ; they may therefore be said to move and fly from place to place. Gabriel being caused toffy swiftly ; Dan. ix. 21. touched Daniel in the evening. Angels have ,their places of re- sidence or removal in this respect. There is also certainly a loçal heaven, where the body of our blessed Saviour is, and Enoch and Elijah, who went from this world and carried their bodies with them ; and there are other saints that were the companions of their Lord's re- surrection, who doubtless ascended with him intoglory; Mat. xxvii. 52. Whether this heaven beone certain determined palace among the planets or near the stars ; or whether,it be this solar system wherein we dwell, through all parts of which they pass swift as sunbeams, and make this whole planetary world their palace; these things cannot yet be fully determined by us. I confess I much question whether the range of human happy beings extends through all the fixed stars.
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