Page:The Last Judgement and Second Coming of the Lord Illustrated.djvu/363

 peculiar to the first and ancient dispensations. It is a form adapted by its Founder to receive those principles, and to preserve their activity. In this form they possess a power which they never had before; and thus a means for their perpetuation which will never let them perish. All the internal powers of affection and intellect are exercised and continued by means of external activity and use. Consequently, in the last dispensation which the Bible reveals, all that was righteous in its predecessors will find a new power, and thereby a new means for perpetuation.

The good of love to the Lord constituted the celestial principle of the Church as it existed among the Adamic people; and the good of faith in Him constituted the spiritual principle of the Church as it existed among the Noetic people: but it is to be observed that those principles, as they existed in those Churches, were without their full and proper ultimate. The Lord in those times had not revealed Himself in all His mercy. God had not then become manifest in the flesh; and, consequently, in those periods, He had not adapted Himself to the apprehension of the lowest capacities of our nature. With men of the primitive times He was, as it were, a Being who dwelt on high. This was a conception consequent upon their own elevated states. When, therefore, their successors descended into sensual and corporeal loves, God still remained on high, and they retained only an imperfect knowledge respecting Him. Hence the idolatry of the nations and the profligacy of mankind. To meet the requirements of this condition, a new dispensation of Providence was revealed: Christianity was brought upon the scene of man's necessity, and to effect this, God became manifest in the flesh. Thereby He provided for the existence of an idea respecting Himself suited to the lowest perceptions of His people: for under this