Chapter 13: The Eighth Prerogative Royal

I proceed now to the next privilege which is to come, namely, the bodies of the saints shall be enameled with glory. In this life the body is infirm; physicians have much ado to piece it up; it is like a picture out of frame, or a house out of repair — every storm of sickness it rains through. O anima, quàm deforme hospitium nacta es! How does the excellent soul often lodge in a deformed body? The body is like a piece of rotten wood; diseases like worms breed there — fevers, pleurisies, aches, etc. But this body shall be made glorious at the resurrection; it shall neither have diseases nor defects; Leah shall no more complain of her bleary eyes, nor Barzillai of his lameness — there are five properties of the glorified bodies.

1. They shall be agile and nimble: the bodies of the saints on earth are heavy in their motion, and subject to weariness, but in heaven there shall be no elementary gravity hindering, but our bodies being refined, shall be swift and facile in their motion, and made fit to ascend, as the body of Elijah. In this life the body is a great hindrance to the soul in its operation: the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. The soul may bring its action against the body — when the soul would fly up to Christ, the body as a leaden lump keeps it down; it is vivum sepulchrum. But there is a time coming when it shall be otherwise; the bodies of the saints shall be agile and lively, they shall be made fully subject to the soul, and so no way impede or hinder the soul in its motion.

2. The bodies of the saints shall be transparent, full of clarity and brightness; as Christ's body when it was transfigured (Matthew 17:2), our bodies shall have a divine luster put upon them. Here they are as iron when it is rusty; there they shall be as iron when it is filed and made bright. They shall shine, tanquam Sol in fulgore, says Augustine, as the sun in its splendor; indeed, seven times brighter, says Chrysostom. Here our bodies are as the gold in the ore, drossy and impure; in heaven they shall be as gold when it sparkles and glistens. So clear shall they be, that the soul may sally out at every part, and sparkle through the body as the wine through the glass.

3. They shall be amiable; beauty consists in two things: 1. symmetry and proportion, when all the parts are drawn out in their exact lineaments; 2. complexion, when there is a mixture and variety in the colors, white and red — thus the bodies of the saints shall have a transcendency of beauty put upon them. Here the body is called a vile body: vile in its birth and production — de limo terrae, of the dust of the earth — the earth is the most ignoble element. And vile in the use that it is put to; the soul often uses the body as a weapon to fight against God. But this vile body shall be ennobled and beautified with glory; it shall be made like Christ's body (Philippians 3:21).

How beautiful was Christ's body upon earth — in it there was the purple and the lily; it was a mirror of beauty. For all deformities of body issue immediately from sin, but Christ being conceived by the Holy Ghost, and so refined and clarified from all lees and dregs of sin, he must needs have had a beautiful body, and in this sense he was fairer than the children of men. Christ's body, as some writers aver, was so fair by reason of the beauty and grace which did shine in it, that no painter could ever draw it exactly. And if it was so glorious a body on earth, how great is the luster of it now in heaven? That light which shone upon Saint Paul, surpassing the glory of the sun (Acts 26:13), was no other than the beauty of Christ's body in heaven — O then what beauty and resplendency will be put upon the bodies of the saints! they shall be made like Christ's glorious body.

4. The bodies of the saints shall be impassible, free from suffering. We read that Job's body was smitten with boils, and Paul did bear in his body the marks of the Lord Jesus, but before long our bodies shall be impassible. Not but that the body when it is glorified shall have such a passion as is delightful (for the body is capable of joy), but no passion that is hurtful, as cold or famine — it shall not be capable of any noxious impression.

5. They shall be immortal: here our bodies are still dying — quotidie enim dempta est aliqua pars vitae, and as life grows, so it decreases. It is improper to ask when we shall die, but rather when we shall make an end of dying: first the infancy dies, then the childhood, then youth, then old age, and then we make an end of dying. It is not only the running out of the last sand in the glass that spends it, but all the sands that run out before. Death is a worm that is ever feeding at the root of our gourds. But in heaven our mortal shall put on immortality. As it was with Adam in innocency — if he had not sinned, such was the excellent temperament and harmony in all the qualities of his body, that it is probable he had not died, but had been translated from Paradise to heaven. Indeed, Bellarmine says that Adam had died though he had not sinned; but I know no ground for that assertion, for sin is made the formal cause of death (Romans 5:12). However, there is no such thing disputable in heaven — the bodies there are immortal (Luke 20:36): 'Neither can they die any more.' If God made manna (which is in itself corruptible) to last many hundred years in the golden pot, much more is he able by a divine power to so consolidate the bodies of the saints that they shall be preserved to eternity (Revelation 21:4): 'And there shall be no more death' — our bodies shall run parallel with eternity.