are not from God the Most Holy, who even on earth has condemned gluttony and lust, and who is free from all change of character and will.

Some Muslim philosophers and commentators, such as Muhiyyu'd-din, have perceived that what is said in the Qur'an and in the Traditions about the kind of pleasures provided in paradise for pious Muslims cannot be literally correct, because such pleasures have in them nothing spiritual or ennobling, nay rather are degrading and debasing in the extreme. Hence these writers have declared that these verses and Traditions must be understood not literally but figuratively and in a spiritual sense. But, as a result, the great mass of Muslims have always considered Muhiyyu'd-din and his like wicked heretics and blasphemers. Certainly it must be confessed they have failed in their attempt to explain away the carnal nature of the paradise for which Muslims have always been taught to look. Whoever will fairly and honestly consider the teaching of the passages which we have quoted above will see that they cannot have a spiritual meaning, but must be taken with a very sensual and material significance.

What we have said in this present chapter, in accordance with the New Testament, regarding the good results obtained through accepting the salvation which Jesus Christ offers, amounts to this, that the true believer in the Lord Jesus Christ; through faith in Him, obtains forgiveness of his

sins, deliverance from the slavery of sin, the flesh and the devil, inward peace and spiritual joy and happiness, even amid the trials, sorrows and temptations of this transitory world. The flame of love towards God is kindled in his heart, and true trust and confidence in his Heavenly Father is bestowed upon him. His heart is enlightened and grows pure and clean, he draws near to God in spirit, he becomes an heir of true and eternal happiness and is conscious of enjoying the divine approval. In a word, all the glory and bliss which man lost through sin is restored to him through the salvation wrought out for him by the Lord Jesus Christ, so that all that is necessary to satisfy the yearnings of the human spirit and to the attainment of true and perfect happiness in both worlds is bestowed upon the believer in Christ through the atonement which the Lord Jesus has made in order to secure man's salvation.

It is sadly true that not every professing or even real Christian has yet attained to the degree of perfection which we have depicted as the lot of the true follower of Christ, nor have all Christians obtained all the grace and the blessings which are included in the gift of salvation through Jesus Christ. Yet every true believer in the Lord Jesus already shares in those spiritual gifts and heavenly blessings, and, eating of the fruit of the tree of life ¹ which is in the midst of God's spiritual paradise, he will