act of returning to their blissful home, having executed the commission on which they were sent. For, as the metropolis of the great creation, where the affairs of the immense empire of Jehovah are all conducted, where all its business is settled and arranged, and from which proceeds the energy to execute every plan and purpose of the Eternal Mind respecting it, heaven, in its outskirts, gives many indications of the busy and active character of the place itself, which indications are every where visible to the disembodied spirit. In one direction she sees the messengers of Him who maketh his angels spirits, and his ministers a flame of fire, proceeding on their high and important errand to some of the unnumbered worlds of creation; and in another, she sees a company of similar messengers, having discharged the embassy on which they were sent, returning delighted with the prospect of again beholding the face of their Father who is in heaven. Here she beholds a group of joyful angels conveying, from the dark and fallen world from which she came, a disembodied spirit like her

self; there she beholds another-flying with outstretched wings towards it, that they may wait upon some dying Lazarus, and, having received his now departing spirit, may bear it to their blissful home. In other directions the disembodied spirit beholds the ministers of Jehovah either proceeding on their embassy or returning from it-alone. But though alone, each one is the subject of unutterable felicity, and is either silently musing upon the glories of his Creator from whose presence he has just departed, or hymning to himself His eternal praises. But, oh! in the midst of all the indications of activity which are so visible in the outskirts of the empyrean heaven, the social and peaceful character of the world itself strikingly appears. For though each of the glo-, rious messengers around her is moving in his course with a celerity swifter than the light. which beams from heaven, yet, like the celestial bodies themselves, the whole of them are moving in perfect harmony with each other; and, as they move, fill the ethereal regions with the fragrance of their wings,-with a

music sweeter and more harmonious than that of the spheres themselves :

"Such concord is in heaven."

From beholding the empyrean heaven as one blaze of glory, the disembodied spirit is beginning to trace the outline of its figure, scenery, and adorning. As yet, indeed, the fair city of her God, whose wall is jasper, and whose every gate a pearl, does not appear; neither can she behold the spires of that awful temple where, enshrined in light, the dread Monarch of the universe is adored by the blazing host about him. All that she can as yet behold are the tops of the empyrean mountains and the dazzling of those lofty battlements over which Michael and his angels drove the apostate crew headlong to perdition. As she is darting upwards, other objects become visible and distinct. The borders of the empyrean land, together with the enchanting scenery with which it is adorned, are now distinguished by her. In a little while she beholds the hill of God-the towers of the New Jerusalem

-the city of the great King. A few more movements and she can distinguish the

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blissful beings who inhabit the ethereal soil. Their lofty mien,-their shining aspect-their snow-white raiment, like that which covered the Saviour upon the mount,-declare their exalted nature, their high position in the universe of God. At the sight of these glorious and exalted creatures the disembodied spirit is filled with a more eager and intense desire to enter among them; and, having increased the speed with which she has already darted to their blissful world, quickly alights upon it, shouting as she touches the summit of the everlasting hills, "Victory! Victory! through the blood of the Lamb.”

No. III.

THE MEETING; OR, THE SPIRIT GREETED ON THE BORDERS OF THE BLESSED.

ONE of the innumerable sources out of which the gratification and enjoyment of celestial spirits may be expected to arise, we may fairly presume to consist in a constant addition to their number by the arrival of intelligent and social beings from the different worlds of creation, and especially of redeemed and perfected spirits from our own. As, however, we know but little, if any thing, concerning the moral character and condition of any of the worlds (the one we inhabit being excepted) with which the universe is filled, although we may, with something like certainty, conclude that the whole of them are peopled with rational and moral creatures, we of course are