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them that had received the mark of the Beat; and they were caft alive into a lake of fire burning with brimftone. Rev. xix. 20. Their punishment is thus hinted at by Ifaiah: Tophet is ordained of old, fays he, by the King [who reigns in righteoufnefs] it is prepared or if we follow our tranflation, it is prepared for the King, the most furious of the antichriftian Powers, called by St. John Antichrift, the Beast, the falle Prophet, &c. The matter of it is fire and much fuel, and the breath of the Lord, like a fream of brimftene, doth kindle it: Ifai. XXX. 33. And the fmoke rofe up for ever and ever, or during all the ages of the Meffiah's Kingdom, Rev. xix. 3.

(6) At the fame time that the ministration of condemnation will powerfully work upon the fears of mankind to keep men in the way of duty, an occafional difplay of the miniftration of righteous mercy will work upon their hopes. low will thofe hopes be fired when they fhall fee the Lamb of God ftanding on the mount Sion, and with him his hundred and forty four thoufand Worthies having his Father's Name [divine Majefty, irrefiftible Power, ineffable Love, and Blifs inexpreffible] written on their foreheads? Rev. xiv.

But (7) what will peculiarly tend to keep men from relapfing into rebellion against God, will be the long life of the Godly, and the untimely death of those who fhall offer to tread the paths of iniquity. The Godly fhall attain to the years of the antediluvian Patriarchs and the wicked fhall not live out half their days, they shall not live above an hundred years, or to speak after our manner, they fhail die in their childhood. This feems to be Ifaiah's meaning in the following defcription of the days of refreshing. Behold, I create new heavens, and a new earth; and the former fhall not be remembered. But be you glad and rejoice for

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ever in that which I create: for behold I create Jerufalem a rejoicing, and her people [to be nothing but a joy. And I will rejoice in Jerufalem, and joy in my people, and the voice of weeping shall no more be heard in her: There shall be no more thence [a burial of] an infant of days, nor a godly old man that hath not filled his days for the child shall die an hundred years old, but the finner being an hundred years old, shall be accurfed. And it shall come to pass that before they call I will anfwer, and while they are fpeaking I will hear. The very beafts of the field will partake of the happinefs and glorious liberty of the Sons of God: For the Wolf and the Lamb fhall feed together, and the Lion shall eat ftraw like the Bullock, and they shall not hurt nor deftroy in all my holy mountain, faith the Lord. Isaiah lxv. 17, 25.

Having dwelt fo long upon the account which the evangelical Prophet gives us of the day of vengeance, and of the days of refreshing, I fhall dififs this part of the fubject by giving two or three fhort extracts from fome of the remaining Prophets.

DANIEL fixes in the days of Mcffiah the Prince, the great tribulation, which fhall come upon the ungodly, of which the deftruction of Jerufalem was but an emblem; God's judgments begining at his own house. And when the Meffiah fhall thus have fitten in judgment, and fhall have confumed and destroyed the wicked, or bruifed the Serpent's head in the perfon of antichrift and his adherents, the Kingdom under the whole heaven shall be given to the people of the faints of the moft High, of Jehovah Shiloh, whofe kingdom is an everlafting kingdom; and all dominions shall ferve and obey him, [according to the decree recorded in Pfa. ii. 7.] Dan. vii, 26, 27.

JOEL defcribes alfo, in the most lively manner, the work of the Meffiah, both as He is the Lion

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of the tribe of Judah, and the peaceful Shiloh, to whom the gathering of the people fhall be. Speaking of our Lord under the first of these characters, he fays, In thofe days when I fhall bring again the captivity of Judah: I will alfo gather all nations and will bring them down into the valley of Jehofhaphat,* [the valley of judgment] and I will plead with them there for my people, whom they have fcattered. Affemble yourfelves, and come all ye heathen. Come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat: for there will I fit judge all the heathen faith the Son, the mighty God, to whom all judgment is committed, as he is Son of man.] Put ye in the fickle, for the harveft is ripe, the prefs is full, the fats overflow, the wickedness of the earth is great. Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decifion for the day of the Lord is near in the valley of decifion. The Lord alfo fhall roar out of Zion, and utter his voice from Jerufalem, and the heavens and the earth fhall fhake: For, as the Apos tle expreffes it, in fpeaking of our Lord, He hath promifed, faying, Yet once more, I fhake not the earth only, but alfo heaven. Heb. xii. 36. Joel iii. 1, 2,

11, 16.

As Joel hath thus defcribed the Meffiah as Son of David, fhaking and destroying his adverfaries the wicked, fo he reprefents him also as Son of Solomon procuring days of peace and prosperity to the Ifrael of God. Be glad ye children of Zion, and rejoice in the Lord your God, for the Lord will do great things for you. Fear not, for whosoever fhall call on the name of the Lord fhall be delivered; for in mount Zion and in Jerufalem fhall be deliverance. Egypt fhall be a defolation; and Edom shall be a defolate wilderness, for their violence against Judah: But Judah fhall dwell for ever, and [the new] Jeru falem from generation to generation: For I will cleanse.

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The word Jehoshaphat means God is the Fudge,

the Judgment of God.

their

their blood which I have not cleanfed, for the LORD [Jehovah Shiloh] dwelleth in Zion. And the Prophet defcribes the means of this cleaning, in this noted Promife, I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh, and your Sons and your daughters fhall prophecy, &c. A capital promife this, of which our Lord gave an earneft on the day of Pentecoft, when he sent a gracious shower on his little vineyard, as a pledge of the mighty rivers of righteousness, which will, by and by, cover the earth as the waters cover the fea: Joel ii. 21, 28, 32, and iii. 19, 21.

Should you deny, Sir, that THE LORD, who will thus roar out of Sion, and then pour out his fpirit on all flesh, is the Meffiah, the mighty God defcribed by Ifaiah, I prove it by the following reafons, which I intreat you never to forget. (1) The bruifing of the Serpent's head belongs to the wonderful Seed of the woman, to the child born to us whose name is the mighty God, and not to the Father who hath committed all judgment unto the Son: If you deny this, Sir, you not only reprefent Chrift as a mere man, but as a man who renounces one of the Meffiah's titles, which is the true and faithful Witnefs; for he hath expressly laid down, in John, the Propofition on which I built my argument: (2) The 19th Chap. of the Revelation contains a description of the Lord's ftrange work in the place, which Joel calls the valley of decifion or of Jehoshaphat; and that terrible work is there declared by St. John, to be specially the work of the Son, whom he calls the Word of God. (3) Joel promifes that whofoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be delivered, and St. Paul in Rom. x. 12, 13. applies the words to our Lord Jefus Chrift, as appears from the Apostle's doctrine in Rom. i. 16, and Acts xvi. 31. (4) The LORD, who in Joel acts the part of a Deliverer is the Lord who shall call the remnant of the Jews, and

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and shall at laft reconcile Jews and Gentiles in himfelf; and therefore is indubitably the Shiloh, unto whom the gathering of the people fhall be, Comp. Joel ii. 32, with Gen. xlix. 10. And (5) The Lord who dwelleth in Zion, and who cleanseth the blood and fins of mankind by pouring out his spirit upon all flesh is certainly the Methiah, or Jehovah Shiloh, to whom the very words of Joel, are applied by St. Peter, in Acts ii. 16, 33.

Hoping, Sir, that you will not lofe fight of these five arguments, I proceed to fhow you how fome of the other leffer Prophets speak of the Meffiah's days of vengeance and of refreshing.

AMOS, as the other Prophets, fhews the apof tafy of the church, foretells her fifting punishment, her prefervation during the great tribulation, and the day of vengeance, in which God with us, the Meffiah will deftroy all the wicked.

When the Church shall thus have been cleansed, and the wicked destroyed, the times of refresh ing will come, which are thus foretold by this Prophet: In that day I will raife up the tabernacle of David that is fallen, and clofe up the breaches thereof, and I will raife up his ruins, and I will build. it as in the days of old, [as in the days of Solomon, a type of the Prince of peace, who is the mighty God, the Lord of David as well as his Son.] Then fhall the profperity of God's people keep pace with their righteoufnefs and overflow their peaceful habitations. They fhall poffefs the remnant of Edom and of all the heathen, who are called by my name, faith the Lord who doth this: Then fhall the plowman overtake the reaper, and the treader of the grapes, him that foweth the feed, and the mountains fhall drop fweet wine. I will bring again the captivity of my people Ifrael, and plant them in their own land [rendered like the garden of Eden, And they Shall no more be pulled out of it, faith the Lord God: [Immanuel,

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