sessed of different dispositions and feelings, to be actuated by different motives, to desire and seek different ends, would be to suppose them not thoroughly imbued with the spirit of the Gospel, not subject to the laws of the higher life as revealed in the Divine Word, not images and likenesses of the Lord, not children of the Heavenly Father, and therefore not his "ministering spirits sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation."
But what is the testimony of Holy Scripture on the subject? We have incidentally introduced some of it already; but we will consider this question more in detail, and answer it more fully, in the next chapter.
VII.
THE TESTIMONY OF SCRIPTURE.
THE next question to be considered is: Does this doctrine concerning the essential nature of heaven and the character of the angels as delineated by Swedenborg, agree with the teachings of the Bible? If not, devout and reverent souls will be slow, as they ought, about accepting it. But right here, is the place to say, that human rationality is as truly the gift of God as the Sacred Scripture. And before accepting such an interpretation of Scripture as would make the Bible contradict the clear intuitions of reason and all human experience, we ought carefully to consider whether it does not
