are misapplied from inattention to this. People have associated with the word soul, the idea of the spirit, or immortal part of man, and hence conclude that this must be its meaning when they meet with it in reading the Bible. It is true that in many places of scripture, it is used so obviously for the mere natural life, that none can mistake.— But in others, and in the passage we are now considering, this false association is still continued, contrary to the context and scope of the writer. Unless we attend to the scripture usage of words, and the context in which they are used, to see what is the intention of the writer by his use of those words, we are not likely soon, if ever, to come to a correct understanding of the Bible. Let us come to it, and let it be examined on the same fair and honorable principles of interpretation, as we would examine any other ancient book, and I have no fear for my Bible.

2d, But what we have made the above quotation chiefly for, is to show that the word psuhe, or soul, goes to Hades, or the grave, as well as the body. The Saviour's psuhe, or soul, was not left there. Or rather is not the word soul used here for the person of our Lord, and the meaning simply is, that he was not left in the state of the dead? At any rate, it had no reference to his spirit, which he commended into the hands of his Father. Does not this confirm what has been stated already, that the phrase soul and body spoken of in this passage, is a mere Hebrew idiom? or that soul is used as an expletive? If it is not, let it be shown that the soul is the same as spirit, or the immortal part of man, and that body and spirit both go to Hades. If the psuhe, soul, or life, is said to go. to the grave, and to be left there, if the person is not again raised from the dead, why may it not with as much propriety be said, that the psuhe, soul, or life, is cast into

or destroyed in Gehenna? It has no reference to the spirit, or immortal part, unless we believe that the spirit goes to the grave at death, and is left there until, with the body, it is again raised from the dead.

That a distinction is made between the psuhe, soul or life, and the pneuma, spirit, we shall now proceed to show. Paul, in his epistle to the Hebrews, chap. iv. 12. makes a distinction between psuhe and pneuma, or soul and spirit, "dividing asunder of soul and spirit." And in 1 Thess. v. 23. says, "And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly and I pray God your whole spirit, (pneuma) and soul, (psuhe) and body, (soma) be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ." Here is a distinction not only between the body and soul, or natural life, but between both these, and the spirit, or immortal part. When Stephen prayed,-"Lord Jesus receive my spirit," he did not pray,-" Lord Jesus receive my (psuhe) soul," but "Lord Jesus receive my (pneuma) spirit." When Jesus said,-" Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit," it was not his psuhe, (soul) but his pneuma (spirit) which he commended into the hands of his Father. See Luke xxiii. 46. And when he bowed his head and gave up the ghost, it was not his (psuhe) soul, but his (pneuma) spirit, he yielded up. John xix. 30. Matth. xxvii. 50. Besides, believers are not said to be come to the (pshuhai) souls of just men made perfect, but are said to be come to the (pneumasi) spirits of just men made perfect. Heb. xii. 23. For more examples, see 1 Peter iii. 19. Luke viii. 55. and xxiv. 37. 39. and 1 Cor. v. 5.

That a distinction between soul, body and spirit is made in scripture, is too obvious from these passages to be denied. Concerning this distinction, Whitby, on 1 Thess. v. 23. thus writes :

"Your whole spirit, and soul, and body. Here the apostle justifies the ancient and true philosophy, that man is, as Nemesius styles him, a compound of three different parts. This was the doctrine of the Pythagoreans, as we learn from Jambilicus, who having told us that man consists of soul and body, adds, that the soul consists of two parts, one endued with reason, and one without reason. This also was the philosophy of the Platonists, as we learn from Nemesius, Sallust, and Laertius, who inform us, that there is in man a soul irrational, which follows the affections of the body, and a mind which useth the body as its instrument, and fights against it. This also was the doctrine of the Stoics; whence Antoninus saith, the three constituent parts of man are the body, soul and mind. Irenæus, and Clemens, of Alexandria, and Origen, say the same. M. Le Clerc here is very positive that this philosophy is false, and that there is nothing in man but his body and his reasonable soul; but he saith nothing to sustain this confidence against those two excellent philosophers, Gassendus and Dr. Willis, who have established this philosophy beyond all reasonable contradiction. Nor can the conflict betwixt the mind and spirit, and the flesh, mentioned, Rom. vii. 14-25. and Gal. v. 16, 17. be explained; nor can any man tell what the ro agxov, or ruling principle in us, is to govern, without admitting this inferior soul as the fountain of all our sensual appetites; or even tell us what it is to die, unless it be to make this inferior soul, which consists in the motion of the animal spirits, and the sensitive appetites they produce in us, to cease, to act, or move, as formerly. He will have on here to signify life, as indeed it doth in other places, but never where the constituent parts of a man are enumerated, as here they are; and seeing the spirit and the body are unquestionably the constituent parts of a man, it is reasonable to

conceive that the Juxy mentioned here, must be so also, especially since it is divided from the spirit and the body by the particle x,. Moreover, by following the motions of this brutish appetite, is a man styled uxos, the animal man; and by being animated and informed by this ux, is the body called owua fuxov, an animal body, 1 Cor. xv. 44, 45.; and by conveying of this ʊn, or inferior soul to his posterity, is the first Adam said to be made εις ψυχην ζωσαν, to convey this animal life to his posterity; though this at last may be only a strife about words, the animal spirits being included in the body."

In confirmation of this distinction, I also quote Parkhurst on the word pneuma, spirit. He says it means,"the human soul or spirit breathed into man immediately by God himself; see Gen. ii. 7. Rev. xi. 11. and expressly distinguished both from his body, roux, and from his Juxn, or animal soul, which he hath in common with the brutes, 1 Thess. v. 23. comp. Heb. iv. 12. Eph. iv. 23. Matth. xxvi. 41. Luke i. 47. Acts vii. 59. Heb. xii. 23. 1 Pet. iii. 19. 1 Cor. ii. 11. It is applied to Christ's human soul or spirit, Matth. xxvii. 50. Luke xxiii. 46. John xiii. 21. xix. 30. comp. Acts vii. 59."

On this quotation of Whitby's, I would only remark, did the inspired writers borrow this distinction between soul, body, and spirit, from philosophers, or did philosophers borrow it from them? Is this distinction a scriptural one, or is it like (psuhe) soul and (soma) body, a mere Hebrew idiom, or is the word spirit (pneuma) an expletive, like the word soul? Besides, how are the texts referred to, and the remarks of Whitby to be fairly met, on the supposition that there is no real and scriptural foundation for such a distinction.

But that (psuhe) soul in the passage before us, means the natural life, I shall illustrate by a few more exam

ples, in which all will allow that it can mean nothing else. For example, it is said, Acts xxvii. 22. "there shall be no loss of any man's life, but of the ship." Again, it is said, "they are dead which sought the young child's life," Matth. ii. 20. Again, Matth. vi. 25. it is said, “take no thought for your life what ye shall eat or what ye shall drink." Now in all these texts, and many more I might quote, the word for life is psuhe, the same as in the passages under consideration. But to put this matter beyond all debate, I shall quote an instance or two in point from the very context of the passages before us. Thus in Matth. x. 39. it is said, "he that findeth his life, shall lose it and he that loseth his life for my sake, shall find it." Here the word for life is psuhe, as in the passages we are considering. See also Luke xii. 19, 20. Had the word psuhe been translated soul instead of life in the last quoted text, it would have read thus:-"He that findeth his soul, shall lose it: and he that loseth his soul for my sake, shall find it." Could this be said of the immortal spirit? This no one will assert. This text, then, not only shows what psuhe, life, or soul, means, but it explains the texts on which we are remarking. They then read thus:-"Fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the life: But rather fear him who is able to destroy both life and body in hell." But it may be said, is not killing the body killing the life? To this I answer, in one sense it is, in another it is not. It is killing or destroying the life from this present world. This men may and can do. But their power reaches no further than this. Men may kill the body, but they cannot kill the life, so as to prevent its reanimating the body; but God can not only kill the body, but prevent its ever again living. God's power reaches to this; for he is able