of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit himself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are children of God: and if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified with him.' And in another passage it is written: 'Blessed ¹ be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to his great mercy begat us again unto a living hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, unto an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you, who by the power of God are guarded through faith unto a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.'

Since believers in Christ in accordance with these promises know for certain that, after their departure from this transitory world, they will obtain in the next world eternal happiness and glory unending, therefore they are able to say with the Apostle: 'Who ² shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth; who is he that shall condemn? It is Christ Jesus that died, yea rather, that was raised from the dead, who is at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.'. Therefore true Christians are able to escape from fear of death. But, even if, in the hour of death, bodily pain and suffering and perplexity of mind beset them, yet with the eye of faith and of the spirit they behold that world's holy happiness.

Therefore they can say with the Apostle: 'Whether ¹ we live, we live unto the Lord; or whether we die, we die unto the Lord: whether we live therefore, or die, we are the Lord's.' And with him too each true Christian can also say of himself : 'To ² me to live is Christ, and to die is gain . . . . But I am in a strait betwixt the two, having the desire to depart and be with Christ; for it is very far better.' For it is written: ' We ³ know that if the earthly house of our tabernacle be dissolved, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal, in the heavens . . . . We are of good courage, I say, and are willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be at home with the Lord.'

Through the salvation which the Lord Jesus Christ bestows there awaits the believing Christian in the next world such glory and happiness as can neither be imagined nor described. Accordingly it is written in holy Scripture, in words so dear to us Christians that they are often on our tongues and still oftener in our minds: 'Things ⁴ which eye saw not, and ear heard not, and which entered not into the heart of man, whatsoever things God prepared for them that love him.' The Apostle Paul speaks of a man (perhaps himself), who in a vision was admitted to behold the glory of that world. He writes thus: 'I know ⁵ a man in Christ, fourteen years ago