Rom. 8:38, 39. “For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, ... shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” It is claimed that death cannot separate us from the love of God; but, as God cannot exercise his love toward any but a rational and conscious creature, therefore the soul must be alive after death. (_Immortality of the Soul, by Luther Lee_, p. 111.) To what far-fetched and abortive reasoning will wrong theories lead intelligent men. We owe the reader an apology for noticing this passage at all. We should not here introduce it, were it not used as an objection to the view we advocate; and we should not believe it could ever be urged as an objection, had we not actually seen it. The reasoning of the apostle has to be completely inverted before any argument (may we be pardoned the misnomer) can be manufactured out of it for the conscious-state theory. For it is of our love to God, through Christ, and not of his to us, that the apostle speaks. It has reference, also, wholly to this life. Thus he says, verse 35, “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?” That is, shall these things which we have to endure in this life on account of our profession of the gospel and our love for Christ, quench that love in any wise? Shall we compromise the gospel, and alienate ourselves from the love of Christ, who has done so much for us, and through whom we hope for so much (see the whole chapter), to avoid a little persecution, peril, and distress? The separation from the love of Christ by death, of which he speaks, is the same as the separation by persecution, &c.; but tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, peril, and sword, do not necessarily kill us; they have respect to this life; the separation, therefore, is something which takes place here--simply an alienation of our hearts from him. And shall all these things, he asks--nay, more, shall even the prospect of death on account of our profession of Christ, prevent our loving and following him? No! is the implied and emphatic answer. Such we believe to be the view which any one must take of this passage, who does not find himself under the unfortunate necessity of making out a case. But looking at this scripture from the objector’s stand-point, the singular inquiry at once forces itself upon us, Can the immortal soul in its disembodied state suffer tribulation, distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, peril, and sword!? 2 Cor. 4:16. “For which cause we faint not; but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day.” Is this inward man the immortal soul? We answer, No; but the new man which we put on, Christ formed within _the hope_ of glory. See Col. 3:9, 10; Eph. 4:22, 24; 3:16, 17; Col. 1:27.