then they will be loathsome; dear companions in sin will then abhor each other; and the great and honourable men who were wicked, shall be no more regarded by their wicked subjects, their servants, their slaves, than the mire in the streets.

USE I. Of comfort to the people of God. The doctrine of the resurrection is a spring of consolation and joy unto you. Think on it, O believers, when ye are in the house of mourning, for the loss of your godly relations or friends, "that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope;" for you will meet again, 1 Thess. iv. 13, 14. They are but laid down to rest in their beds for a little while, Isa. lvii. 2; but in the morning of the resurrection they will awake again, and come forth out of their graves. The vessel of honour was but coarse, it had much alloy of base metal in it; it was too weak, too dim and inglorious, for the upper house, whatever lustre it had in the lower one. It was cracked, it was polluted; and therefore it must be melted down, to be refined and fashioned more gloriously. Do but wait a while, and you shall see it come forth out of the furnace of earth, vying with the stars in brightness; nay, as the sun when he goeth forth in his might. Have you laid your infant children in the grave? You will see them again. Your God calls himself "the God of your seed;" which, according to our Saviour's exposition, secures the glorious resurrection of the body. Wherefore, let the covenant you embraced comfort your heart, in the joyful expectation, that, by virtue thereof, you shall be raised up in glory. Be not discouraged by reason of a weak and sickly body: there is a day coming, when you shall be entirely whole. At the resurrection, Timothy shall be no more liable to his often infirmities; his body, that was weak and sickly, even in youth, shall be raised in power: Lazarus was healthy and sound, his body being raised incorruptible. Although perhaps, thy weakness will not allow thee now to go one furlong to meet the Lord in public ordinances, yet the day cometh, when thy body shall be no more a clog to thee, but thou shalt "meet the Lord in the air," 1 Thess. iv. 17. It will be with the saints coming up from the grave, as with the Israelites when they came out of Egypt. Psalm cv. 37, "There was not one feeble person among their tribes." Hast thou an uncomely or deformed body? There is a glory within, which will then set all right without, according to all the desire of thine heart. It shall rise a glorious, beautiful, handsome, and wellproportioned body. Its uncomeliness or deformities may go with it to the grave, but they shall not come back with it. O that those, who are now so desirous to be beautiful and handsome, would not be too hasty to effect it with their foolish and sinful arts, but wait and

study the heavenly art of beautifying the body, by endeavouring now to become all glorious within, with the graces of God's Spirit! This would at length make them admirable and everlasting beauties. Thou must indeed, O believer, grapple with death, and shalt get the first fall but thou shalt rise again, and come off victorious at last. Thou must go down to the grave; but, though it be thy long home, it will not be thine everlasting home. Thou wilt not hear the voice of thy friends there; but thou shalt hear the voice of Christ there. Thou mayest be carried thither with mourning, but thou shalt come up from it rejoicing. Thy friends, indeed, will leave thee there, but thy God will not. What God said to Jacob, concerning his going down to Egypt, Gen. xlvi. 3, 4, he says to thee, on thy going down to the grave, "Fear not to go down-I will go down with thee-and I will also surely bring thee up again." O solid comfort! O glorious hopes! "Wherefore comfort" yourselves, and " one another with these words," 1 Thess. iv. 18.

USE II. Of terror to all unregenerate men. You who are yet in your natural state, look at this view of the eternal state; and consider what will be your part in it, if you be not in time brought into a state of grace. Think, O sinner, on that day when the trumpet shall sound, at which the bars of the pit shall be broken asunder, the doors of the grave shall fly open, the devouring depths of the sea shall throw up their dead, the earth cast forth hers; and death every where, in the excess of astonishment, shall let go its prisoners; and thy wretched soul and body shall be re-united, to be summoned before the tribunal of God. Then, if thou hadst a thousand worlds at thy disposal, thou wouldst gladly give them all away, on condition that thou mightest lie still in thy grave, with the hundredth part of that ease, where with thou hast sometimes lain at home on the Lord's day; or, if that cannot be obtained, that thou mightest be but a spectator of the transactions of that day; as thou hast been at some solemn occasions, and rich gospel feasts; or, if even that is not to be purchased, that a mountain or a rock might fall on thee, and cover thee from the face of the Lamb. Ah! how are men infatuated, thus to trifle away their precious time of life, in almost as little concern about death, as if they were like the beasts that perish; Some will be telling where their corpse must be laid; while yet they have not seriously considered, whether their graves shall be their beds, where they shall awake with joy, in the morning of the resurrection; or their prisons, out of which they shall be brought to receive the fearful sentence. Remember, now is your seed-time; and as you sow, so shall you reap. God's seed-time begins at death; and at the resurrection, the bodies.

of the wicked, that were sown "full of sins, that lie down with them in the dust," Job xx. 11, shall spring up again, sinful, wretched, and vile. Your bodies, which are now instruments of sin, the Lord will lay aside for fire, at death, and bring them forth for the fire, at the resurrection. That body, which is now employed in God's service, but is abused by uncleanness and lasciviousness, will then be brought forth in all its vileness, thenceforth to lodge with unclean spirits. The body of the drunkard shall then stagger, by reason of the wine of the wrath of God poured out to him, and poured into him, without mixture. Those who now please themselves in their revellings, will reel to and fro at another rate, when, instead of their songs and music, they shall hear the sound of the last trumpet. Many weary their bodies for worldly gain, who will be loath to distress them for the benefit of their souls; by labour, unreasonably hard, they will quite unfit them for the service of God; and, when they have done, will reckon it a very good reason for shifting duty, that they are already tired out with other business; but that day cometh, when they will be made to abide a yet greater distress. Many will go several miles for back and belly, who will not go half the way for the good of their immortal souls; many will be sickly and unable on the Lord's day, who will be tolerably well all the rest of the week. But when that trumpet sounds, the dead shall find their feet, and none shall be missing in that congregation. When the bodies of the saints shine as the sun, frightful will the looks of their persecutors be. Fearful will their condition be, who shut up the saints in prison, stigmatized, burnt them to ashes, hanged them, and stuck up their heads and hands in public places, to frighten others from the way of righteousness, which they suffered for. Many faces, now fair, will then gather blackness. They shall be no more admired and caressed for that beauty, which has a worm at the root, that will cause it to issue in loathsomeness and deformity. Ah! what is that beauty, under which there lurks a monstrous, deformed, and graceless heart? What, but a sorry paint, a slight varnish; which will leave the body so much the more ugly, before that flaming fire, in which the Judge shall be "revealed from heaven, taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel?" 2 Thess. i. 7, 8. They shall be stripped of all their ornaments, and not have a rag to cover their nakedness: their carcases shall be an abhorrence to all flesh, and serve as a foil to set off the beauty and glory of the righteous, and make it appear the brighter.

Now is the time to secure, for yourselves, a part in the resurrection of the just: which if you would do, unite with Jesus Christ by faith, rising spiritually from sin, and glorifying God with your

bodies. He is the "resurrection and the life," John xi. 25. If your bodies be members of Christ, temples of the Holy Ghost, they shall certainly arise in glory. Get into this ark now, and you shall come forth with joy into the new world. Rise from your sins; cast away these grave-clothes, putting off these former lusts. How can any one imagine, that those who continue dead while they live, shall come forth, at the last day, unto the resurrection of life? But that will be the privilege of all those who, having first consecrated their souls and bodies to the Lord by faith, do glorify him with their bodies, as well as their souls; living and acting to him, and for him, yea, and suffering for him too, when he calls them to it.

PART IV.

OF THE GENERAL JUDGMENT.

When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory. And before him shall be gathered all nations; and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats: and he shall set the sheep on the right hand, but the goats on the left. Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed, &c.Unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, &c.—And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal.—MAtt. xxv. 31—34, 41, 46.

THE dead being raised, and those found alive at the coming of the Judge changed, then follows the general judgment, plainly and awfully described in this portion of Scripture; in which we shall take notice of the following particulars: 1. The coming of the Judge, "When the Son of man shall come in his glory," &c. The Judge is Jesus Christ, "the Son of man;" the same by whose almighty power, as he is God, the dead will be raised. He is also called the King, ver. 34, the judging of the world being an act of the royal Mediator's kingly office. He will come in glory; glorious in his own person, and having a glorious retinue, even all the holy angels with him, to minister unto him at this great solemnity. 2. The mounting the tribunal. He is a King, and therefore it is a throne, a glorious throne, "He shall sit upon the throne of his glory," ver. 31. 3. The appearance of the parties. These are, all

nations; all and every one, small and great, of whatever nation, who ever were, are, or shall be on the face of the earth; all shall be gathered before him, summoned before his tribunal. 4. The sorting of them. He shall separate the elect sheep and reprobate goats, setting each party by themselves; as a shepherd, who feeds his sheep and goats together all the day, separates them at night, ver. 32. The godly he will set on his right hand, as the most honourable place; the wicked on the left, ver. 33. Yet so as they shall be both before him, ver. 32. It seems to be an allusion to a custom in the Jewish courts, in which one sat at the right hand of the judge, who wrote the sentence of absolution; another at the left, who wrote the sentence of condemnation. 5. The sentencing of the parties, and that according to their works; the righteous being absolved, and the wicked condemned, ver. 34-41. 6. The execution of both sentences, in the driving away of the wicked into hell, and carrying the godly to heaven, ver. 46.

DOCTRINE. There shall be a general judgment.-This doctrine I shall, I. Confirm; II. Explain; and then apply.

I. For confirmation of this great truth, that there shall be a general judgment.

1. It is evident from plain Scripture testimonies.-The world has in all ages been told of it. Enoch, before the flood, taught it in his prophecy, related in Jude, ver. 14, 15, "Behold the Lord cometh with ten thousand of his saints, to execute judgment upon all," &c. Daniel describes it, chap. vii. 9, 10, "I beheld till the thrones were cast down, and the Ancient of days did sit, whose garment was white as snow, and the hair of his head like the pure wool: his throne was like the fiery flame, and his wheels as burning fire. A fiery stream issued and came forth from before him thousand thousands ministered unto him, and ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him: the judgment was set, and the books were opened." The apostle is very express, Acts xvii. 31, "He hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness, by that man whom he hath ordained." See Matt. xvi. 27; 2 Cor. v. 10; 2 Thess. i. 7-10; Rev. xx. 11-15. God not only said it, but he has sworn it, Rom. xiv. 10, 11, "We must all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. For it is written, as I live, saith the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue confess to God." that the truth of God is most solemnly pledged for it.

So

2. The perfect justice and goodness of God, the sovereign ruler of the world, necessarily require it, inasmuch as they require its being well with the righteous, and ill with the wicked. Yet we often see wickedness exalted, while truth and righteousness fall in