Richmond dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1884-1903, 1899-04-02
EASTER THOUGHTS.
THE GREAT QUESTION IS, "wITH
WHAT BcDys,
MILL THE DEAD REVIVE?
Not the First to Monrn-Many Others
At the Tomb--Naturc Responds 10
the seaxon-A Custom That In
Growing.
tcorrespondence Of the pIspatcb)


They who smile in Paradise since tho
Easter dawn OF last year; whose faces.
dimiy seen through binding tears. took
on the glory OF immortality from the
passing spirit: who. freed forever from
pain and sorrow. know the resurrection
OF an everlasting Easter! Mary Magda-
lene was Not the first nor the last OF our
race who went TO the tomb TO mourn.
What a COLI. narrow. dismal place it Isl
Here we bring our best beloved. one after
another. dust offerings 10 crumbling dust
ashes TO ashes, never more TO return
Here we shall at length be brought our
selves. Excluded from all that Is done
under the sun. as much as IL we had
never lived, here We are-senseless. dumb
unheeding-no voice. no motion, no HE!
"If n man die shall no live again.
A tree is cut dowII but the vital sap IS
In the root; quickly springs up the new
ness OF living shoots.
"Wnl the dead ever revive. Is ms
the end of him who was the earthly lord
of creation--corruptlo and the worm. is
there another life, ano, II 50. what are
3ts conditions? Weep. mournef, weep, at
the tomb. for the dead treading the lonely
way through that portai beyond "hlch
you may not go; for the living. TO whom
comes back no echo but the sullen eeho
Of hopeless grief.
Such was the tomb before the frst
God-given Easter; before Christ hiinselI
entered it, 10 rise again.
The whole subject OF death and another
life was involved in darkness among the
nations The first Easter brought lie
and Immortality 10 light; the first resur-
rection changed all the conditions OF
mans being. present and future, ana II
II were needed, is the GROWING PROOF Oh
mans divine origin, likened with CHRIST,
who said: "WheIe 1 am thele 9e sH"i'
be also
we come TO the sepulchre now. sorrow |
hearing her burden with reverept step |
hut we know that death is abolished
"oonformable unto His death" They !
whom we place here to sleep "shau DC |
made partakers Of His resurrection"
There is no other fact Of so much |
human interest as the death ana resuriec-
fion of Christ. His human life was short
three wears of teaching and ministry, and
an ignomnous death, attended with all
that we count of shame or humiliation
After that the rOck-hewn TOMB the
Roman soldier, and the marvellous mira
Gle Of the risen dead. The death which
IS well symbolized by the tiny seed, which,
diving. springs into harvest hundred
fold. Year after year the beautiful para
bile of the earth's resurrection repeats
itself. ,
NATURE RESPONDS.
In all nature there is nothing so typical
of the unity between the physical ana
the spiritual as this new and vernal resur-
rection with the coming of Easterude
the sere and wthered grass is replaced
NV fresh green shoots, the dryness and
decay of last years verdure covered over
and forgotten. The spruce and pine trees
are tipped with tassels Of living green the
robin sings his own welcome from every
budding branch, and 1t IS new, up
springing, resurrected world, whlch
Claddens the eye on every side. The rich,
bounteous gift of another life is about
US throughout the land.
And material--for all rcsurrected, new
life is material and organic. Why not
the resurrected body? ] think we are too
prone 10 decry the BODY.
While mere theories as TO the mode Of
our resurrection are guesses, some things
are known. We know there Will be
spiritual body That, l take it, is not SO
much a spirit body as a material body
adapted TO the wants of perfect spirit,
the chief characteristic Of which will be
It's freedom from grossness and sin. Said
Christ: Handle Me and see, spirit
hath not flesh and bones, as we see Me
have" inferring that spirits were OF FORM
without the cOrpOreal structure OF the
human frame. And Dives, looking up,
'beheld Lazarus in Abrahams bosom
Lazarus's form, OF course or he would
not have been thus recognizable.
While the Easter season brings TO us
80 1a. |
lion. which is the heritage of all, it leaves |
ever unsettled the question: with what
oody?" Such matters forever attract
mans thought. what is this resurrection
Of the body OF which we are told?
The elaborate books of systematic the |
ology pass over it briefly. st. Paul says:
Flesh and blood cannot inherit the king
dom of God" And again, that sit is
;own a natural body il is raised spirit
ial body"
on this subject it is so relevant to ask:
How can there be body that is not I
ieshly? Because the finite mind requires
1 finite form TO dwell upon; we feel the I
want Of "a body. touching which we can
say, "This is l."
The one thing that helps us is that af-
Ter his resurrection Christ had body
which must have been similar TO the one
aid In the sepulchre, for ii bore the nail
ind spear-marks of his hands and side.
Different though, that gloriiied body
must have been from its former hablta- ,
ion. for il appeared and vanished in an
ETHEREAL manner. l have been asked TO | .
write my opinion upon the kind of body
Ne shall have after DEATH" think every ,
arnest reasoner supposes that, after the
the souls Of men shall be ,
lothed in a body the same, and yet not !
Iuite the same, as the old body. j cannot !
hiuk there Is such thing as bodiless
oul any more than j believe now that
iod ever created a soulless body.
a PARADOX.
This body may not have the identity OF
material particles. And, by the way, did
ou ever think that an expression of this
ind is a paradox:
Locke, in his essay on Human Under {
landing" says: Identity is not material ]
ameness, for there is no such thing" l
because everything changes. Another
Philosopher writes: "All visible, material Q
hings are in a constant fluX." @
About this l once read an apt iilustra- |
lon. the exact words Of which l may not,
erhaps, recall: |
1--WE stand at West Point and look out B
pon the Hudson river and say: Wash U
ngton once stood here and beheld this c
cry scene But not drop of water,
lot a grain OF earth, not a leaf which I
vas within the limits of the picture which
ell upon the eye of Washington remains !
o-day."
In spite of that, the scene would be the a
anne. The central, identical lffo re-
Mains, connected with the same formative 4
a.. - |