SLEEP. 



injurious effefts of rain, or noAurnal dews. But fuch is 

 feldom the cafe with leaves, except incidentally, as in Lotus 

 ormthopodloldes, which plant firlt led Linnsus to attend par- 

 ticularly to the fubjecl before us. 



Sleep of the Soul, in Theology, denotes that infenfible, 

 unconfcious, and inactive ftate, into which fome have fup- 

 pofed that mankind are removed at death, and in which they re- 

 main till the period of the general refurreftion and laft. judg- 

 ment. The term deep has been ufed by way of contradiilinc- 

 tion to that which has been commonly called the intermediate 

 or feparate Hate. Of the advocates of this opinion, fome have 

 allowed the eflential diftinftion between body and fpirit, and 

 the natural immortality of the human foul ; fo that, being a 

 fubftance and not a mode, it will go on to exift, till by fome 

 pofitive a(ft of the Creator it is annihilated. They cannot 

 admit the fuppofition, that the whole man becomes extinft. 

 at death, or that death dettroys or annihilates the thinking 

 fubftance ; becaufe, they fay, the refurreftion on this 

 hypothefis, will not be a relurreftion, but a creation of a 

 new fet of beings : if death annihilates us in this fenfe, 

 there can be no future itate ; becaufe, a being who has loft 

 his exiftence cannot be recovered. Accordingly, they main- 

 tain, that what happens to the foul at death can be no more 

 than a fufpeniion of theexercife of its faculties, or an inca- 

 pacitation, from which it will, by the power of Chrift, be 

 delivered at the refurreftion : and they allege, that there is 

 an infinite difference between the annihilation of the foul at 

 death, and its incapacitation ; becaufe, one who believes 

 the former, could not poflibly entertain the hope of a 

 future itate ; but one who believes the latter, might rea- 

 fonably entertain fuch a hope. Death, they fay, is a dif- 

 trefs in which our fpecies has been involved by extraor- 

 dinary caufes, and from which we have obtained the hope 

 of being faved by the moft extraordinary means, <vi%. by 

 the interpofition of Jefus Chrift, who, taking upon him 

 our nature, and humbling Limfelf to death, has acquired 

 the power of deilroying death, and is on this account Ityled 

 the Saviour of the world. However, molt of thofe who 

 deny the notion of an intermediate ftate of confcious percep- 

 tion between death and the general refurreClion, rejeft the 

 fuppoiition of two diltinft natures in man, and confider that 

 principle, which is called the foul, not as a fpiritual fub- 

 ftance, but as a quality, or property, either fuperadded to 

 matter by the creator of our frame, or refulting from the 

 organization of the human body, and particularly of the 

 brain. See Sour,. 



Accordingly, they allege, that when the organized fyf- 

 tem, to which the power of thinking, Sec. is annexed, on 

 which it depends, and from the organization of which, as 

 fome maintain, it neceflarily refults, is diftolved by death ; 

 all the percipient and thinking powers of man, all his ca- 

 pacities of adtion, and of fufferiiig, or of enjoyment, 

 muft be extinguifhcd, and ceafe of courfe. And if the 

 property of thinking neceflarily attends the property of 

 life, as fome apprehend, nothing can be requifite to the 

 rcftoration of all the powers of the man, hut the re- 

 lloration of the body (no particle of which can be loft) to a 

 ftate of life. Whatever is decompofed, it is faid, may cer- 

 tainly be recompofed by the iam-- Almighty power that firlt 

 compofcd it, witii whatever change in its conltitution, ad- 

 vantageous or diladvantageoii,;, he (hall think proper ; and 

 then ttie powers of thinking, and whatever depended upon 

 them, will return of courfe, and the man will be, in the 

 moft proper fenfe, the fame being that he was before. 

 Thole who hold this opinion maintain, that, according to 

 the fcriptures, life and iminovtalitv were brought to light by 

 the gofpel of Chi ill, in a fenfe cxclulive ot all other teachers, 



and all other revelations, at leafl; from the birth of MofeR 

 downwards ; cxclufive, likewife, of all information from 

 the light of nature, or the refult of philofophical difquifi- 

 tion on the fubftance or qualities of the human foul. They 

 hold, moreover, that the fentence pronounced upon our firlt 

 parents, imported a total deprivation of life, without any re- 

 ferve, or faving to the life of the foul ; and confequently, 

 that eternal life, or a rettoration and redemption from the 

 confequences of this fentence, was efFetled for, revealed, 

 configned, and infurcd to man, in and through Chrift, and 

 will be accomplilbed in no other way than that fpoken of by 

 Chrift and his apoftles, who, they fay, have left no room to 

 conclude, that there is a feparate or intermediate life for the 

 foul, when difunited from the body. 



The learned Dr. Law, bidiop of Carlifle, having, with 

 a particular view to the controverfy concerning the interme. 

 diate ftate, enumerated the feveral paftages both in the Old 

 and New Teftament, in which the words, that are tranflated 

 loul or fpirit in our verfion, occur, mamtains, that none of 

 them ever Hand for a purely immaterial principle in man, or 

 a fubftance wholly feparable from, and independent of, the 

 body ; and after examining the account which the fcriptures 

 give of that ftate to which death reduces us, he obferves, 

 that it is reprefented by fleep, by a negation of all life, 

 thought, or adion ; by reft, relling-place, or home, filence, 

 oblivion, darknefs, deftruftion, or corruption. He adds, 

 that the fcripture, in fpeaking of the conneftion between 

 our prefent and future being, doth not take into account 

 our intermediate ftate in death ; no more than we, in de- 

 fcribing the courfe of any man's aftions, take in the time 

 he fleeps : and that, therefore, the fcriptures, in order to 

 be confiftent with themfelves, mult affirm an immediate con- 

 neftion between death and judgment. As for thofe texts 

 that are ufually alleged on the other fide of the queftion, 

 which he has cited and endeavoured to accommodate to his 

 own opinion, he thinks that they are quite foreign to the 

 point, or purely figurative, or capable of a clear and cafy 

 folution on the principle which he adopts, ws. that the 

 times of our death and refurrcdion are coincident ; and that 

 they cannot be fairly oppofed to the conftant, obvious 

 tenor of the facred writings. With refpeft to philofophical 

 arguments, deduced from our notions of matter, and urged 

 againft the poffibility of life, thought, and agency, being 

 fo connected with fome portions of it as to conititute a com- 

 pound being or perfon, he imagines that they are merely 

 grounded on our ignorance, and that they will e(jualiy prove 

 againft known fa£t and obfervation, in the prodndion of 

 various animals, as againft: the union of two fuch hetero- 

 gencous principles as thofe of the foul and body are fup- 

 pofed to be. With refpcd to the confequences of either 

 opinion, he fays, that on the one fide, there is nothing more 

 tlian a temporary ceftation of thought, which can hurt no- 

 body, except tlie felf-interefted papift, or the fclf-fnfficient 

 deift ; but on the other fide, there is a manifell derogation 

 from, if not a total fubvcrfion of, that pofitive covenant, 

 which profed'es to entitle us to evcrlalling life. He adds, 

 that all proper and confiftent notions of death, returrcAion, 

 and a future judgment, are confounded, and in fine, all 

 tiie great fanftions of the gofpel rendered unintelligible or 

 ufelefs. 



The dortrine of tlie New Teftament, fays another writer 

 againlt a feparate itate, is that man (hall become immortal, 

 by the way of a refurredioii of the dead, a relloration of 

 the whole man to life ; and the New Teftament is fo far 

 from acknowledging any intermediate conlcioufncfs in man, 

 between death and the refurrcftion, that it always fpeaks 

 of that interval as a deep, which implies a fulptnlioji of 



S 2 the 



