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of denying the Deity of our most adorable Saviour, who is proved to be a divine person, whether viewed in the glass of Adam's creation, (for Adam was created by his power,) or in the creation in general, (for the world was made by him,) or in the mirror of the resurrection at the last, ('for the dead shall hear his voice and live.') We therefore ascribe to the Saviour merely the honour which is his due, when we address him in the words so familiar to us, and which might be very appropriately applied to the Son of God, considered as the builder of Adam's wondrous frame:

'Hail! great Immanuel---all divine,

In thee thy Father's glories shine.'

Having thus considered the material part of man and the creation of the material part of Adam, we shall now, secondly, consider the creation and nature of his soul. Its infusion into Adam's lifeless body And the Lord God

is thus described, Gen. ii 7. formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul.' In Hebrew, the word is plural, the breath of lives; possibly because, as one remarks 'the soul of man enabled him to exercise the functions of all sorts of life, both of plants, of animals, and of men' it is called the breath of lives, not so much, we suppose, because man began to breathe as soon as he began to live, or because his life immediately discovered itself by the breath of his nostrils, as on account of the important offices which respiration

or breathing performs in the economy of human as well as of animal existence, a subject on which, without professing fully to explain, we shall nevertheless venture a remark. We premise, by observing then, what I presume we all know; that the blood is a vital stream, for, on its perpetual and healthy circulation through the body, natural life depends; and therefore as Solomon (Eccles. xii. 6) says, when 'the pitcher is broken at the fountian, or the wheel broken at the cistern,' a man dies; he speaks of the circulation of the blood, and the failing of certain vessels essential to its circulation.*

But you say: what has the circulation of the blood to do with our breathing? Much-for every breath we draw performs two important offices in respect of the blood. 1. It fits it to nourish the body. To this subject we have already alluded, and shall therefore, here, only briefly remark, that it seems to be now satisfactorily proved, that the air we breathe, is a mixture of certain gases, by inhaling of which, the blood, conveyed to the lungs for that purpose, undergoes a change, by which it is prepared to nourish the body. On this subject, the learned Paley observes: A necessity exists, that the air be introduced into a near communication with the blood. The lungs are constructed for this

By the pitcher,' it is thought Solomon means the artery or ventricle already mentioned, by which the blood is conveyed to the lungs; and by the wheel,' the other ventricle called Arteria Aorta, by which the blood, received from the lungs, is sent out into all parts of the system.

purpose. They consist of blood-vessels and air-vessels, lying close together; and, wherever there is a branch of the trachea or wind-pipe, there is a branch of the vain and artery, and the air-vessel is always in the middle between the blood-vessels. The internal surface of these vessels, upon which the application of the air to the blood depends, would, if collected, and expanded, be in a man, equal to a superficies of fifteen feet square.'

2. Besides its salutary influence upon the blood, which accounts for our breath being called 'the breath of life;' there is yet another beneficial effect of breathing in connection with the circulation of the blood, which has been noticed by men of science; for while they admit that the contraction and expansion of the heart is the great principle in the circulation of the blood, yet they say its circulation through the lungs is rendered easier by breathing.*

* In remarks on Eccl. xii. 6, Parkhurst in his Hebrew Lexicon, page 107, on this particular, quotes the observations of the learned Haller, which are these:-' in every inspiration of the lungs, the bronchia or branches of the wind-pipe are every way increased, both in length and diameter; at the same time the pulmonary blood-vessels, which are wrapped up together with the bronchia in a covering of the cellular substance, are likewise with them extended in length, and spread out from smaller into larger angles, by which means the circulation is rendered easier through them. While this is performing, the vescular substance, or flesh of the lungs themselves filled out with air, increases those spaces through which the capillary bloodvessels of the lungs make their progress; whereby the pres

Breath, you will perceive, from these hints, was, in certain very important respects, to man the breath of life, even when in a state of perfection. As it pleased God to form Adam, he could no more have lived without breathing than without eating. But let us now, at length, enquire, what is the nature of the soul? For it has been, and still is believed and asserted, by 'men of corrupt minds,' whose atheistical

sure of the vesicles upon each other, and upon those vessels adjacent is lessened: thus, therefore, the blood will flow with greater ease and celerity into and through the smaller and larger vessels of the lungs on the other hand, the effects of expiration are a compressure of the bloodvessels in the lungs—a reduction of the bronchia or branches of the wind-pipe into more acute angles—a pressure of the reticular small vessels by the weight and contact of the adjacent larger vessels; by which means part of the blood -hesitating in the capillary arteries, is urged forward through the veins to the left side of the heart; while at the same time, that part of the blood is resisted, which flows in by the artery from the right ventricle. In this manner, a fresh necessity follows for repeating the respiration, because the collapsed vessels of the lungs resist the blood repeatedly expelled from the right ventricle of the heart.' Mr. Parkhurst adds-But on the near approach of death, respiration becomes more and more difficult; the distensive power of the lungs diminishes; and the blood being impeded in its passage through them, concretes or becomes grumous; till after the last expiration, 'the wheel is broken at the pit,' the lungs become incapable of another inspiration, and so can receive no more blood from the right ventricle of the heart, and consequently, the circulation ceases, and the man dies.'

sentiments are worse, and more to be dreaded than 'the pestilence that walketh in darkness,' that the soul of man is rather a material than a spiritual being; that, (as the Sadducees said,) it is not immortal, nor intended to live for ever: in short, that it can no more live without the body, than the body can live without it: in other words, that what people (childish weakness,) call an immaterial and immortal spirit, is nothing but instinct existing in that most remarkable animal, man, in a superior degree to what it does in other animals! It follows, of course, according to this principle, that there is no future state of retribution; for how can he be rewarded or punished whose entire existence terminates at death? But for the desire that this might be the case-but for man's aversion to God and desire never to come in contact with him-but for the contrariety of his moral character to the divine perfections and revealed will, dislike of being answerable to God for his actions, and dread of a day of final reckoning and retribution: but for these affections, I say, which are natural to man, the spirituality and immortality of the soul had never been disputed, much less denied by those to whom are committed the oracles of God.' In general, it may be said, as the Apostle informs us respecting idolatry, viz. : that as it originated in men's 'not liking to retain God in their knowledge,' so may atheism in its diversified forms be traced to man's mind being alienated from God through the darkness and wickedness which are in him. Nor is it surprising, that he who loves, in so