The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1877-1885, 1881-06-02
the RESURRECTION.
Dew. Mr.. TaImage's Idea Of the
Raised Body.

Heather Philosophers guessed at the
true immortality of the soul, but never
dreamed that the body would get up
and ioin it. This idea is exclusively
scripturai and beyond reasoning. In
Ja.d ALI analogies fail. You say, a.
the wheat is put into the grouhu Az
comes up, so will our bodies. reply,
ifthe wheat entirely rot asln the case o.
long protracted wet weather, there Is nc
resurrection of it. SO the analogy fails.
You say the caterpillar becomes the
Lutterfiy, and 50 our dead bodies
may a~tleast take on a splendlo
exaltation | reply that there IS no
int,rregnum OF life between the cater
nilI,r and the butterfly and, therefore,
the analogy fails. You say that there
is a perfect type of the r,surrectloh I'D
the trees in spring time. reply that
the tree does Not die III winter. IL 10
simply dormant; and. therefore, the
analogy fails. The body. though cut
NJ by dissecting-kniyes aud burned IN
furnace, shall come together. There
must forever be mysteries about this,
and the mystery increases as science pro
crosses. We find that comparatively a
small part of the body is reduced to
dust. There is very lite earthly sub,
stance in it. Ii is largely composed OF
fluids and gases, which evaporate or
.eparate themselves, leaving but very
little forrhe dust, 80 that the body be
comes widely scattered through earth
and air; and how it can be reorganlzed is a
question before which the chemist stands
confounjcd. But while there are IN
this theory Of the resurrection many
things above reasoning, there Is nothing
contrary to reason.
The directors say that the body IS
scattered to such = great distance 1t can
never be gathered. A man wen into
the Mexican War and lost a foot. He
come. to New York and by accident
loses a finger. He afterwards goes as
missionary to China, and there dies.
Will the loot come from Mexico, and
the finger from New Yoik, and Join
the body in China? | answer. it is no
harder for God to do that than to do
things he has already done. Your body
is already made up from all the of
the earth made up from the Ialslns OF
Italy, from the bananas OF Florida, from
the birds of the prairie, and from the
sugar from the far South made up
from Russia, Brazil and Oregon. Fruits
and plants from all these localities have
become a part of your body. The OBJ
jector says: Suppose a man be eaten
up by cannibals, how can his body be
brought back ? | answer that there is
no proof that the earthly part of the hui
man body ever can be absorbed in an
other body. | suppose God has power
to keep these bodies everlastingly dis
tinct. But suppose that Il Part OF the
body was absorbed in another body
could not God make a substitute
for the part that had been alb
sorbed in another body? The resur-
rected part of a good man would rather
have a substituted portion ofbody given
it than that part OF the body which 4
cannibal had eaten and digested.
But the directors say that a mans
body entirely changes every seven or
ten years, so that a man at seventy
years of age has had seven distinct
bodies. At the last day this idea
would imply that the man should have
seven heads and fourteen feet, and
other parts of the body corresponding
But We answer that the Bible distinctly
states that it is the body that goes down
into the grave, that will come upagain,
and not those portions that for many
years we've being sloughed off.
But how will these bodies look? The
bodies of the righteous will be glorious.
The most perfectly formed body. in
deed, is a mere skeleton to what it
would have been had not sin come.
Gods model of a face, Of a hand, of a
foot, of a body, We know not. If, after
an exquisite statue has been finished,
you should take a chisel and clip it,
and set the statue in an out-of-door ex
posture, Its beauty would nearly all be
gone, yet the human body has been
clipped. and blasted, and battered for
thousands of years. Physical defects
have been handed down from genera
ton to generation for six thousand
years, and We have inherited all the
bodily infelicities of all the past. But
when God takes the righteous out of
their graves he will refashion and i'm |
prove, and adorn according to the orig
lnal model, until the difference between
a gymnast and the emaciated wretch in
In the lazaretto Is not SO l eI 1t as that
between u present bodily structures
and our gloriously resurrected forms.
Their you will see the perfected eye.
out OF which, by the waters of death.
has been washed the last trace of tears
and study. Then you will see the per
fected hand, the knots on the knuckles
OF toll united; no more stOop of the
shoulders from burden bearing and the
weight of years. but all of us erect and
elastic-the life of God in all the frame
The most striking and impressive
thing on all the earth now is a human
face. Yet it is yelled 10 a black veil of
a thousand grlefs; but when God on the
resurrection morn shall put aside the
veil, L suppose that the face of the IL
In the sky is dull and stupid comp ,red
with the out flaming gi0ries of the
eOuatenances of the saved. | suppose
that when those faces shall turn to look
toward the gate, or up towards the
throne, 1t will be like the dawn Of "A
new morning on the bosom of the ever
sky.
The body will be immortal. The
physical system is perpetually wasting
away. 1t is only because we keep
in the fuel that the fur
mace does not go entirely out. Blood
vessels are only canals to carry bread
stuffs to the different parts. IF these
fail. we die. Sickness and
death Turk around to see if they cannot
get a pry under the tenement, and at a
slight push We tumble off the embark
ment of the grave. But the righteous
arisen shall nave an immortal BODY. 1t
will be incapable of disease. You will