Meet for Heaven. a State of Grace Upon Earth the Only Preparation for a State of Glory in Heaven. by the Author of Heaven Our Home.

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1864 Excerpt: ...possessing, in their disembodied state, very much of the form and appearance of the bodies in which they once dwelt. I do not say, that, in all things, vox populi est vox Dei: but may this universal, or at least almost universal belief, not be looked upon as one of those general doctrines of natural religion to which humanity gives an almost universal response; such as the existence of God, --in which all men seem implicitly to believe, till their minds become darkened, and their consciences hardened through the deceitfulness of sin; the immortality of the soul, --the belief of which has existed in the minds of men in every age and in every clime; the recognition of friends in heaven; the anticipation of a coming judgment? So far as I can learn from the Bible, the human form is the type and symbol, almost universally, of spiritual beings. Wherever mention is made of angels appearing to men upon earth, they do so in human form. I need not quote passages of Scripture to prove this. Many will at once occur to the reader. I am aware that some interpreters of Scripture put this construction upon all the Bible passages in which these visits of angels are described, --that angels, on these occasions, merely assumed the human form for the time, like an actor putting on a particular dress when entering upon the stage to play his part in the drama, and then to lay it aside again, and to put on his usual dress when the play is over. In like manner, these divines think that angels divested themselves of the human form when their part on the occasion of their appearance was acted, and then, in their own proper form and appearance, rose, and entered into heaven. In reply to such a view as this of these appearances of angels, I have to say, that it is merely the supposition