GENERAL REMARKS. 



did not study tho geometry of Euclid, who seem 

 ed to him too p.ain and simple, and unworthy of 

 taking up his time. He understood him almost 

 before he read him ; and a cast of his eye upon 

 the contents of his theorems, was sufficient to 

 make him master of their demonstrations. 

 Amidst all the sublime investigations of phy 

 sical and mathematical science in which he en 

 gaged, and amidst the variety of books he had 

 constantly before him, the Bible was that which 

 he studied with the greatest application ; and 

 his meekness and modesty were no less admira 

 ble than the variety and extent of his intellectual 

 acquirements. /. Philip Barrutier, who died 

 at Halle in 1740, in the twentieth year of his 

 age, was endowed with extraordinary powers of 

 memory and comprehension of mind. At the 

 age of five, he understood the Greek, Latin, 

 German and French languages ; at the age of 

 nine he could translate any part of the Hebrew 

 Scriptures into Latin, and could repeat the 

 whole Hebrew Psalter ; and before he had com 

 pleted his tenth year, he drew up a Hebrew lexi 

 con of uncommon and difficult words, to which he 

 added many curious critical remarks. In his 

 thirteenth year he published, in two volumes oc 

 tavo, a translation from the Hebrew of Rabbi 

 Benjamin s &quot; Travels in Europe, Asia and Af 

 rica,&quot; with historical and critical notes and dis 

 sertations ; the whole of which he completed in 

 four months. In the midst of these studies, he 

 prosecuted philosophical and mathematical pur 

 suits, and in his fomteenth year invented a me 

 thod of discovering tho longitude at sea, which ex 

 hibited the strongest marks of superior abilities. 

 In one winter he read twenty great folios, with 

 all the attention of a vast comprehensive mind. 

 Such rapid progress in intellectual acquire 

 ments strikingly evinces the vigour and compre- 

 nension of the human faculties ; and if such 

 varied and extensive acquisitions in knowledge 

 can be attained, even amidst the frailties and 

 physical impediments of this mortal state, it is 

 easy to conceive, with what energy and rapidity 

 the most sublime investigations may be prosecu 

 ted in the future world, when the spirit is con 

 nected with an incorruptible body, fitted to ac 

 company it in all its movements ; and when every 

 moral obstruction which now impedes its activity 

 shall be completely removed. The flights of the 

 loftiest genius that ever appeared on earth, when 

 compared with the rapid movements and com 

 prehensive views of the heavenly inhabitants, 

 may be no more than as the flutterings of a mi 

 croscopic insect, to the sublime flights of the 

 soaring eagle. When endowed with new and 

 vigorous senses, and full scope is afforded for ex 

 erting all the energies of their renovated facul 

 ties, they may be enabled to trace out the hidden 

 springs of nature s operations, to pursue the courses 

 of the heavenly bodies, in their most distant and 

 rapid career, and to survey the whole chain of mor 



al dispensations in reference not only to the human 

 race, but to the inhabitants of numerous worlds 



I shall conclude this part of my subject with 

 an observation or two, which may tend to illus 

 trate and corroborate the preceding remarks. 



In the first place, it may be remarked, that 

 our knowledge in the future world, will not be 

 diminished, but increased to an indefinite extent. 

 This is expressly declared in the Sacred Records. 

 &quot; Now we see through a glass darkly, but then 

 face to face. Now we know in part, but then 

 shall we know, even as also we are known,&quot; 1 

 Cor. xiii. 12. This passage intimates, not only 

 that our knowledge in a future state shall be 

 enlarged, but that it shall be increased to an 

 extent to which we can, at present, affix no limits. 

 And if our intellectual views shall be immensely 

 expanded in the realms of light, we may rest as 

 sured that all those branches of useful science 

 which assist us in exploring the operations of the 

 Almighty, will not only be cultivated, but carried 

 to their highest pitch of perfection. For the 

 faculties we now possess will not only remain 

 in action, but will be strengthened and invigora 

 ted ; and the range of objects on which they will 

 be employed will be indefinitely extended. To 

 suppose otherwise, would be to suppose man to 

 be deprived of his intellectual powers, and of 

 the faculty of reasoning, as soon as he entered 

 the confines of the eternal world.* When we 

 enter that world we carry with us the moral and 

 intellectual faculties, of which we are now con 

 scious, and, along with them, all those ideas and 

 all that knowledge which we acquired in the 

 present state. To imagine that our present fa 

 culties will be essentially changed, and the ideas 

 we have hitherto acquired totally lost, would be 

 nearly the same as to suppose that, on entering 

 the invisible state, men will be transformed into 

 a new order of beings, or be altogether annihi 

 lated. And, if our present knowledge shall not 

 be destroved at death, it must form the ground 

 work ot all the luiure improvements we may 

 make, and of all the discoveries that may be un 

 folded to our view in the eternal state. 



Again, the superior intellectual views which 

 some individuals shall possess beyond others, 

 will constitute the principal distinction between 

 redeemed men in the heavenly state. The prin 

 cipal preparation for heaven will consist in re 

 newed dispositions of mind in the full exercise 



An old Welch minister, while one day pursuing 

 his studies, his wife being in the room, was suddenly 

 interrupted by her asking him a question,which has 

 not always been so satisfactorily answered&quot; John 

 Evans, do you think we shall be known to each other 

 in heaven ?&quot; Without hesitation he replied,&quot; To be 

 sure we shall, do you think we shall be greater fools 

 there, than we are here.&quot; If the reader keep in mind 

 that our knowledge in heaven will be increased, and 

 not diminished ; or, in other words, that we shall 

 not be &quot;greater fools there than we are here.&quot; he 

 will be at no loss to appreciate all that I have hither 

 to stated on this subject. 



