in the formation of the human body. A contemplation of its parts, and their difpofition, brought Galen upon his knees, in adoration of the wisdom with which the whole is contrived; and incited him to challenge any one, upon an hundred years study, to tell, how any the leaft fibre or particle could have been more commodiously placed, either for ufe, or beauty. While the world fhall laft, genius and diligence will be producing fresh proofs, that we are "fearfully and wonderfully made;" that "marvellous are the works," and, above all, this capital work of the Almighty; and that the hand which made it must needs be verily and indeed divine.

Into the body of man, thus conftructed, we learn from Mofes, that God, "breathed the breath of life, and man became à living foul." The question here will be, Whether thefe words are intended to denote the rational and immortal foul, or the fenfitive and animal life?

They are certainly fometimes ufed in the lower of these acceptations. "Ceafe ye from man whose breath* is in his noftrils. All creatures in whose nostrils was the breath of life + died by the flood.” By these texts it appears that the terms fpirit and breath‡ are used to fignify that animal life, which is fupported mechanically, by respiration through the noftrils.

But they are likewife used for the rational and immortal foul; witnefs those words of the pfalmift, adopted by our Lord, when expiring on the cross; "Into thy hands I commend my fpirit." So again

"The fpirit § fhall return to God who gave it." And "The fpirit of man ¶ is the candle of the Lord." ~ Spiritual

נשמת רוח חיים * נשמת and רוח ? נשמת אדם !

הדוח $

נשמה
רוחי!

Spiritual effences and operations come not under the cognizance of those fenfes, which, during the present state of probation, God has been pleased tomake the inlets of our ideas. They must therefore be represented and defcribed to us, in the way of comparison and analogy, by fuch language as is commonly styled figurative, or metaphorical. Of animal life, begun and continued by refpiration, we have a proper and fufficient knowledge.. From a contemplation of that life, and the manner in which it is fupported by the air, we are directed to frame our notions of an higher life, maintained by the influence of an higher principle. For this purpose, the terms which denote the former are borrowed to express the latter; and we find the words, tran-. flated Spirit, and breath, fometimes used for one, and fometimes for the other.

But when we confider, that man, as other Scrip tures do teftify, has within him a rational foul, an immortal fpirit, which, on the diffolution of the body, returns to God who gave it; that, in this original defcription of his formation, we may rea, fonably expect to find both parts of his compofition mentioned; and that a perfonal act of the Deity, that of infpiring the breath of life, is recorded with. regard to him, which is not faid of the other creatures; we can hardly do otherwise than conclude, that the words were intended to denote not only. the animal life, but also another life communicated with it, and represented by it; in a word, that man confifteth of a body so organized as to be sustained in life by the action of the material elements upon it, and a rational immortal foul, fupported, in a fimilar manner, by the influence of a fuperior and Spiritual agency.

We

We had occafion to obferve above, that when the knowledge of the Creator, furnished at the beginning by Revelation, had been loft in the heathen world, men paid to the works of his hands that adoration which was due to him. The material elements were invested with divinity and immortality, and worfhipped as gods. It may now be farther obferved, that to the foul of man, confidered as a portion of thefe elements, was attributed the fame divinity and immortality; and thus things natural were substituted in the place of things fpiritual, a proper notion of which could not then be attained, for want of that inftruction from above, which directs us how to transfer our ideas from one to the other, and to believe in the latter, as conceived through the medium of the former. So difficult has it ever been found, for the human mind, to pass the bounds of matter, and to explore the invifible wonders of the fpiritual world. And whoever observes the progrefs of that fcheme, which is once more fet up against Revelation by fome, in our own and a neighbouring nation, who affect the title of philofophers, in opposition to that of Chriftians, and whofe abilities one cannot but lament to fee employed in this manner, will perceive its tendency to introduce materialifm, and to carry us back again to that state of darkness from which it pleased the Father of lights, in mercy, to deliver us, by the Gofpel of his Son.

But to return to the Mofaic account of man, of whose distinguishing excellencies we are taught to entertain the most exalted fentiments, when we are told, that he was made in the image and likeness of God." For what more can be faid of a creature, than that he is made after the fimilitude of his Creator?

As "God is a fpirit," the fimilitude here spoken of must be a spiritual fimilitude, and the fubject to which it relates must be the fpiritual part of man, his rational and immortal foul.

To discover wherein such image and likeness confifted, what better method can we take, than to enquire, wherein confift that divine image and likenefs, which, as the Scriptures of the New Teftament inform us, were reftored in human nature, through the redemption and grace of Chrift, who was manifefted for that purpofe? The image reftored was the image loft; and the image loft was that in which Adam was created.

The expreffion employed by the penmen of the New Testament plainly point out to us this method of proceeding. We read of the new man" which after God is created;"* and of man being "C renewed after the image of him that created him ;" and the like. The ufe of the term created naturally refers us to man's firft creation, and leads us to parallel that with his renovation, or new creation, by which he re-obtained thofe excellencies poffeffed at the beginning, but afterwards unhappily forfeited.

And what were thefe ?-"Renewed in knowledge, after the image of him that created him-Put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true höliness, οσιότητι της αληθείας, the holines of, or according to truth." The divine image, then, is to be found in the understanding, and the will; in the understanding which knows the truth, and in the will which loves it. For when the understanding judges that to be true which with God is true, the man is " renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him;" when the will loves the truth, and all its affections move in the

* Ephef. iv. 24.

† Coloss. iii. 10.

the pursuit and practice of it, the man is "new created after God in righteousness and holiness." This divine image is reftored in human nature, by the word of Chrift enlightening, and the grace of Christ rectifying the will. These are, in the end, to render man what he was at first created, according to that paffage in the writings of King Solomon, which is the shortest and best comment upon the words of Mofes-" God made man upright"-the original word* fignifies ftraight, direct; there was no error in his understanding, no obliquity in his will. He who fays this, fays every thing. It is a full and comprehenfive account of man in his original state; nothing can be added to it, or taken from it.

Such, then, was Adam, in the day when God crowned him king in Eden, and invested him with fovereignty over the works of his hands, giving him "dominion over the fifh of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth."

It appears to have been the order of Providence, that while the flesh continued in fubjection to the fpirit, and man to God, fo long the creatures fhould continue in fubjection to man, as fervants are fubject to their lord and mafter. This original fubjection we must suppose to have been univerfal and abfolute. From the creatures man has much to learn, but nothing to fear. If, to answer the purposes of creation, or to convey to his mind ideas of his invisible enemies, any were at that time wild and noxious, with regard to him they were tame and harmless. In perfect fecurity he faw, he conVOL. I. fidered,

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