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which are "ornaments of great price in the sight of God!" Pet. iii. 3, 4. Such as may command the respect of angels, and reflect honor upon Christ in that solemnity!

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I confess we dwell in flesh and blood, and human nature in the best of us is too much imprest by things sensible. When we see a train of human pomp and grandeur, and long ranks of shining garments and equipage, it is ready to dazzle our eyes, and attract our hearts. Vain pomp, and poor equipage, all this, when compared with the triumph of our blessed Lord, at his appearance, with an endless army of his holy ones; where every saint shall be vested, not in silks and gold, but in robes of refiued light, outshining the sun, such as Christ himself wore in the mount of transfiguration. Millions of suns in one firmament of glory. Think on that day, and the illustrious retinue of our Lord: think on that splendor that shall attract the eyes of heaven and earth, shall confound the proud sinner, and astonish the inhabitants of hell: such a meditation as this will cast a dim shadow over the brightest appearances of a court, or a royal festival; it will spread a dead coloring over all the painted vanities of this life; it ..will damp every thought of rising ambition and earthly pride, and we shall have but little heart to admire or wish for any of the vain shows of mortality. Methinks every gaudy scene of the present life, and all the gilded honors of courts and armies, should grow faint, and fade away, and vanish, at the meditation of this illustrious appearance.

IV. This text will give us also two hints of caution.

First. You that are rich in this world, or wise, or mighty, dare not ridicule nor scoff at those poor weak christians, in whom Christ shall be admired and glorified in the last day. You that fancy you have any advantages of birth or beauty, of mind or body here on earth, dare not make a jest of your poor pious

neighbour that wants them, for he is one of those persons whom Christ calls his glory, and he himself has given you warning, lest you incur his resentment on this account, Matt. xviii. 6. "Whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a mill-stone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea." Perhaps the good man has some blemish in his outward form, or it may be his countenance is dejected, or his mien and figure awkward and uncomely: perhaps his garments sit wrong and unfashionable upon him, or it may be they hang in tatters; the motions of his body are perhaps ungraceful, his speech improper, and his deportment is simple and unpolished; but he has shining graces in his soul, in which Christ shall be admired in the last day, and how darest thou make him thy laughing-stock? Wilt thou be willing to hear thy scornful jest repeated again at that day, when the poor derided christian has his robes of glory on, and the Judge of all shall acknowledge him for one of his favorites?

The second hint of caution is this, You that shall be the glory of Christ in that day, dare not do any thing that may dishonor him now. Walk answerable to your character aud your hope, nor indulge the least sinful defilement. Say within yourselves, "Am I to make one in that splendid retinue of my Lord, where every one must appear in robes of holiness, and shall I spot my garments with the flesh? When I am provoked to anger and indignation, let me say, doth wrath and bluster become a follower and an attendant of the meek and peaceful Jesus? When I am tempted to pride and vanity of mind, will this be a beauty or a blemish, to that assembly that shines in glorious humility? Or perhaps I am wavering, and ready to yield, and become a captive to some foolish temptation; but how then can I expect a place in that holy (IV.)

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triumph, which is appointed for none but conquerors? And how shall I be able to look my blessed General in the face on that day, if I prove a coward under his banner, and abandon my profession of strict holiness, at the demand of a sinful and threatening world?"

V. The last Use I shall make of the text, is matter of consolation and joy to two sorts of christians.

First. To the poor, mean, and despised followers of Christ, and in whom Christ himself is despised by the ungodly world; read my text, and believe that in you, Christ shall be glorified and admired, when, with a million of angels, he shall descend from heaven, and make his last appearance upon earth; mean as you are in your own esteem, because of your ignorance and weakness in this world, you shall be one of the glories of Christ in the world to come: little and despicable as you are in the esteem of proud sinners, they shall behold your Lord exalted on his throne, and you sitting among the honors at his right hand, while they shall rage afar off, and gnash their teeth at your glory: when the eye of faith is open, it can spy this bright hour at a distance, and bid the mourning christian rejoice in hope.

Secondly. There is comfort also in my text, to those who mourn for the dishonor of Christ in the world; those lively members of the mystical body, who sympathize with the blessed Head, under all the reproaches that are cast upon him and his gospel, who groan under the load of scandal that is thrown upon Christ in an infidel age, as though it were personally thrown upon themselves. It is matter of lamentation indeed, that there are but few of this sort of christians in our day, few that love our Lord Jesus with such tenderness; but if such there be among you, open your eyes, and look forward to this glorious day. This day, to which Enoch, the first of all the prophets, and John, the last of all the apostles, directs our faith, Read their

own words, Jude 14, 15. Rev. i. 7. " Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousand of his saints, to execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them, of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all the hard speeches, which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.--Behold, he cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see him, and they also which pierced him: and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him." Bear up your hearts, ye mourners, and support your hopes with the promise of our Lord. " Again, a little while and ye shall see me;" ye shall see the "Son of man sitting on the throne of his glory." Matt. xxv. 31. "Then shall your hearts rejoice" in his honors, and in your own, and this "joy no man taketh from you." John xvi. 19, 22. And while he repeats this promise with his last words in the Bible, surely, I come quickly," let every soul of us echo to the voice of our beloved, "Amen, Even so come Lord Jesus."

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THE WRATH OF THE LAMB.

REV. vi. 15, 16, 17. .

And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every freeman, hid themselves in the dens, and in the rocks of the mountains; and said to the mountains and rocks fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: for the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?

WHEN some terrible judgment, or execution of divine vengeance, is denounced against an age or a nation, it is sometimes described, in the language of prophecy, by a resemblance to the last and great judgment-day, when all mankind shall be called to account for their sins, and the just and final indignation of God shall be executed upon obstinate and unrepenting criminals; the discourse of our Saviour in the xxivth of Matthew, is an eminent example of this kind, where the destruction of the Jewish nation is predicted, together with the final judgment of the world, in such uniform language, and similar phrases of speech, that it is difficult to say whether both these scenes of vengeance run through the whole discourse, or which part of the discourse belongs to the one, and which to the other. The same manner of prophecy appears in this text.

Learned interpreters suppose these words to foretel the universal consternation which was found amongst the heathen idolaters and persecutors of the church of Christ, when Constantine, the first christian emperor, was raised to the throne of Rome,