In view of modern knowledge regarding the nature of matter, and the fact that what is one person's body to-day, may be a part of another's to-morrow--that matter is constantly being converted and reconverted--that the universal material is used to form bodies of animals, plants, men, or else dwell in chemical gases, or combinations in inorganic things--in view of these accepted truths the "resurrection of the body" seems a pitiful invention of the minds of a primitive and ignorant people, and not a high spiritual teaching. In fact, there may be many of you who would doubt that the Christians of that day so taught, were it not for the undisputed historical records, and the remnant of the doctrine itself embalmed in the "Apostle's Creed," in the passage _"I believe in the resurrection of the body_" which is read in the Churches daily, but which doctrine is scarcely ever taught in these days, and is believed in by but few Christians--in fact, is ignored or even denied by the majority. Dr. James Beattie has written, "Though mankind have at all times had a persuasion of the immortality of the soul, the resurrection of the body was a doctrine peculiar to early Christianity." S.T. Coleridge has written, "Some of the most influential of the early Christian writers were materialists, holding the soul to be material--corporeal. It appears that in those days some few held the soul to be incorporeal, according to the views of Plato and others, but that the orthodox Christian divines looked upon this as an impious, unscriptural opinion. Justin Martyr argued against the Platonic nature of the soul. And even some latter-day writers have not hesitated to express their views on the subject, agreeing with the earlier orthodox brethren. For instance, Dr. R.S. Candlish has said, "You live again in the body,--in the very body, as to all essential properties, and to all practical intents and purposes, in which you live now. _I am not to live as a ghost, a spectre, a spirit, I am to live then as I live now, in the body_."