again, we shall see it,--we shall be spirit, and beyond the dominion
of death and sin. He that is born of the flesh, _is flesh_, so long as
he lives; and he that is born of the spirit _is spirit_. As we now
"bear the image of the earthly" through a _natural_ birth, "so we
shall also bear the image of the heavenly" through a _spiritual_
birth. And as no man in this world is a spirit, so no man has in
reality passed the new birth. When we were born into this world, we
were brought from insensibility to an existence entirely new. So in
order to enter the kingdom of God, which is not of this world, we must
be born again from the insensibility of death into a new and happy
existence beyond the grave.

The question now arises, when does this new birth take place? We reply
when this mortal puts on immortality through a resurrection. When we
shall be aroused from the sleep of death to a precipient existence in
heaven--when we shall awake satisfied with the likeness of God. Paul,
in the xv. Chap. 1 Cor. Plainly states that the spiritual body is
prepared and put on after death. Birth then must _follow_, not
_precede_ that spiritual body. It is impossible that birth should take
place, till the body is first prepared. Man's natural body is
organized in the womb, and then born into this world. He drops to a
state of insensibility in death, a reorganization of the spiritual
body takes place to the natural eye imperceptible, and its nature
indestructible. It is gradually brought forward through a resurrection
similar to the grain of wheat to which Paul compares it, is awakened
to a conscious existence, and bears the image of the heavenly as it
once bore the image of the earthy. The resurrection is therefore every
moment progressing, and every man is raised in his own order of time.

But says the reader, if the resurrection be the new birth, then