that he is well satisfied with his condition in life, and could hardly be induced to exchange it for another. He has doubtless fulfilled the purpose of his being in the world, and unable to cope in the struggle for existence with a superior civilization must succumb to the latter which is better fitted to endure, a sad but impressive lesson which is the teaching of every chapter of the world's geologic story.

LIVING SOULS.

A1

LL things were made by the Word of God. In this Word was life, spirit or energy. Without it was not anything made that was made. Hence, says Elihu, "the Spirit of God hath made me, and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life," or, as Moses testifies, "the Lord God formed man, the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of lives; and man became a LIVING SOUL.

Now, if it be asked what the Scriptures define a living soul to be, the answer is a living natural, or animal body, whether of beasts, birds, fish or men. The phrase living creature is the exact synonyme of living soul. The words nephesh chayiah are in Hebrew the signs of the ideas expressed by Moses, nephesh signifying creature, life, soul, or breathing frame from the verb breathe, and chayiah, a noun from the verb to live, of life. Nephesh chayiah is the genus which includes all species of living creatures. In the common version of the Scriptures, it is rendered living soul, and, therefore, under this form of expression they speak of all flesh which breathes in air, earth and sea.

From the evidence adduced a man then is merely a body of life in the sense of his being an animal or living creature-nephesh chayiah adam. Therefore, as a natural man, he has no preeminence over the creatures God has made. Moses makes no distinction between him and them, for he calls them all living souls, breathing the breath of lives. His language, literally rendered, says, "and God said, the waters shall produce abundantly sheretz chayiah nephesh the reptile living soul;" and again, “kal nephesh chayiah erameshat every

living soul creeping." In another verse, "let the earth bring forth nephesh chayiah the living soul after its kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after its kind," and lekol rumesh ol earetz asher bu nephesh chayiah to everything creeping upon the earth which has in it living breath," that is, the breath of lives. And lastly," whatsoever Adam called nephesh chayiah the living soul that was the name thereof."

Not even are quadrupeds and men living souls, but they are vivified by the same breath and spirit. Neshemet chayim, or the breath of lives, and not the breath of life as the text of the common version has it, is said to be in the inferior creatures as well as in man. Chayim in the Hebrew is in the plural number, and therefore the words neshemet chayim should be rendered as above. Thus, God said, "I bring a flood of waters upon the earth to destroy all flesh wherein is ruach chayim spirit of lives." And in another place, "they went in to Noah into the ark, two and two of all flesh, in which is ruach chayim spirit of lives." And all flesh died that moved upon the earth, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of beast, and of every creeping thing, and every man; all in whose nostrils was neshemet ruach chayim, BREATH OF SPIRIT OF LIVES. Now, as has been previously affirmed, it was the neshemet chayim with which God, according to the testimony of Moses, inflated the nostrils of Adam. If, therefore, this were a particle of the divine essence, as it is declared, which became the immortal soul in man, then all other animals have likewise immortal souls, for they all received breath of spirit of lives in common with him. Begotten of the same Invisible Power, and formed from the substance of a common earth mother, man and beasts were animated by the same spirit, and constituted to be living breathing frames, though of different species, and in God they lived, and moved, and had their continued being.

Returning to the philology of our subject, it is to be remarked that by a metonymy, or a figure of speech where the container is put for the thing contained, and conversely,

nephesh, breathing frame, is put for neshemet ruach chayim, which, when in motion, causeth the frame to respire. Hence nephesh signifies not only breath and soul, but also life, or those mutually affective, positive and negative principles in all living creatures, whose closed circuits cause motion of and in their frames. By Moses these principles, or qualities of the same thing, are apparently styled the Ruach Elohim, or by Timothy the Spirit of Him "who only hath immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto, whom no man hath seen, nor can see," and which, when the word was spoken, first moved upon the face of the waters, and afterwards disengaged the light, evolved the expanse, gathered the waters together, brought forth the green vegetation, manifested the celestial universe, vitalized the breathing frames of the dry land, the firmament and the seas, and formed man in His own image and likeness. This ruach, or spirit, was the instrumental principle commissioned by the glorious Increate for the elaboration of the natural world, the erection of this earthly house, and its equipment with living souls of every species; and it is this same instrumentally formative power that, together with the neshemeh, or breath, that keeps them from perishing, or returning to the dust. "If God set his heart against man, He will withdraw to himself ruachu veneshemetu, that is, His spirit and His breath; all flesh shall "perish together, and man shall turn again to dust." "By the neshemet el," or breath of God, "frost is given." Speaking of reptiles and beasts, David saith, "thou withdrawest ruachem-their spirit—they die; and to their dust they return. Thou sendest forth ruheck-thy spirit-they are created."

From this cumulative evidence it is manifest that the ruach is all-pervading. It is in heaven, in sheol, or in the dust of the deepest hollow; in the uttermost depths of the sea; in the darkness as well as in the light; in all things animate and inanimate. In the broadest, or I may say, in an illimitable sense, it is an universal principle. It is the substratum of all

REPRESENTATIVE LIFE OF WESTERN ASIA.
Illustrating the Scriptural Idea of Living Souls.

motion, whether manifested in the revolutions of the planets, in the ebb and flow of the sea, in winds and storms and tempests, or in the organisms of plants and animals. The atmospheric expanse is charged with it; but it is not the air. Animals and plants breathe it, but it is not their breath; yet without it, though filled with air, they would die. Neshemet el, or atmospheric air, is the breath of God, as Job puts it, or the mighty expanse, as affirmed by Moses. What the ruach, or spirit, is, none with certainty can say. Extending from the centre of the earth, and thence in all directions through the immensity of space, is the Ruach Elohim, whose existence is demonstrable from the phenomena of the natural order of