the Tribulation of those days in that prodigious irruption of Vesuvius in Campania the woful effects whereof were felt not only in Rome and Italy but in a great part of Africa in Syria Constantinople and in all the adjoyning Countries Vid. Dion Cass. lib. 66.68 but it is apparent that our Saviour here prophesies of the Judgment of Ierusalem as it was a Type and Representation of the general Judgment so that though his Prophesie respects Ierusalems doom immediately yet through this it looks forward to the final Doom of the World and therefore as in foretelling the former he prefigures the later so in foretelling the foregoing signs of the former he prefigures the foregoing signs of the later And since he here intended the signs of Ierusalems dooms-day only for Types and Figures of those signs which shall forerun the dooms-day of the World and seeing that Types have always less in them than are in the things which they typifie and prefigure there is no doubt but those signs which shall forerun the last judgment will be much more eminent and illustrious than those of Ierusalems judgment which were intended only to Typifie and prefigure them and accordingly St. Ierom tells us of an ancient Tradition of the Jewish Doctors to which our Saviour in this Prediction seems plainly to refer that for fifteen days together before the general judgment there shall be transacted upon the Stage of Nature a continued Scene of fearful Signs and Wonders the Sea shall swell to a prodigious height and make a fearful noise with its tumbling Waves the Heavens shall crack day and night with loud and roaring Thunders the Earth shall groan under hideous Convulsions and be shaken with quotidian Earthquakes the Moon shall shed forth purple streams of discoloured light the Sun shall be cloathed in a dismal darkness and the Stars shall shrink in their light and twinkle like expiring Candles in the Socket the Air shall blaze with Portentous Comets and the whole frame of nature like a funeral Room shall be all hung round with mourning and with Ensigns of horrour and when these fatal symptoms appear upon the face of the Universe then shall the Inhabitants of the earth mourn and the Sinners in Sion shall be horribly afraid being loudly forewarned by these astonishing Portents of the near approach of their everlasting Doom Having thus briefly shewn what shall be the Signs of our Saviours coming to Judgment I proceed to the III. The Third general which was to shew the manner and circumstances of his coming and here we will first consider the place from whence he is to come Secondly the State in which he is to come Thirdly the Carriage on which he is to come Fourthly the Equipage with which he is to come Fifthly the place to which he is to come I. The place from which he is to come which is no other than the Highest Heavens where he now lives and reigns in his exalted and glorified Humanity for him must the Heavens receive till the time of the Restitution of all things Acts 3.21 in that bright Region of eternal day that Kingdom of Angels and of spirits of just men made perfect he is to reign in Person till the last and terrible day and from thence he is to begin his Circuit when he comes to keep his general Assizes upon earth for he is to be revealed from Heaven with his mighty Angels 2 Thess. 1.7 and to descend from Heaven with a shout 1 Thess. 4.16 so that in the close of those dreadful Alarms which he will give the World by the preceding signs of his coming he will arise from his imperial Seat at his Fathers right hand and descend in person from those high habitations of inaccessible light and every eye shall see him as he comes shooting like a Star from his Orb and the sight of him shall affect the whole World with unspeakable joy or consternation the righteous when they see him shall lift up their heads and rejoyce because they know he is their Friend and brings the day of their redemption with him they shall congratulate his Arrival and welcome him from Heaven with Songs of Triumph and deliverance but as for the wicked they shall shreik and lament at the sight of him as being conscious to themselves that by a thousand provocations they have render'd him their implacable Enemy the sense of which will cause them to exclaim in the bitter Agonies of their souls O yonder comes he whose mercies we have spurned whose Authority we have despised whose Laws we have trampled on and all the methods of whose love we have utterly baffled and defeated and now forlorn and miserable that we are how shall we abide his appearance or whither shall we flee from his presence O that some Rock would fall upon us or that some Mountain would be so pitiful as to swallow us up and bury us from his sight for ever But wo are we within these few moments the Rocks and Mountains will be gone the Heavens and Earth will melt away and nothing will be left besides our selves for his fiery indignation to prey on Thus shall the sight of the son of man descending from his Throne in the Heavens to judge the World inspire his friends with unspeakable joy and strike his enemies with terrour and confusion II. We will consider the State in which he is to come which shall be far different from that in which he came sixteen hundred years ago Then he came in an humble and despicable condition clouded with poverty and grief and oppressed with all the innocent infirmities of humane nature but at the last day he shall come in his glorified state cloathed in that Celestial Body which he now wears at the Right hand of God. For so Acts 1.11 the Angel assures his Disciples This same Iesus which is taken up from you into heaven shall so come in like manner as you have seen him go into heaven that is he shall return to Judgment in that self-same glorified Body wherein you now see him ascend and what a glorious one that is we may partly learn from that majestick description of it Rev. 1.13 14 15 16. In the midst of the seven Candlesticks was one like the Son of man his head and his hair were white as wool as white as snow his eyes were as a flame of fire and his countenance was as the Sun shining in its strength And partly from his transfiguration on the Mount which was but a short essay and specimen of his Glorification for it 's said that his face did shine as the Sun and that his Raiment was white as the light white with those beams of Glory which from his transfigured Body shone through all his Apparel Mat. 17.2 When therefore he descends from Heaven to judg the World it shall be with this glorified Body this Body of pure and immaculate splendor with its hair shining like threds of light its eyes sparkling with
of Christ's Ministers for the preaching that Gospel to the World which he had taught them and of the Way and Method of their procedure in it in despite of all those oppositions they met with And as for the Epistles they are partly Comments and Enlargements on our Saviour's Actions and Discourses and partly Decisions of such Controversies as arose among them according to the Analogie of that Faith which our Saviour had before declared and revealed but in all these Writings there is no one Article of Faith but what was before declared and defined in the Sermons and Discourses of our Saviour And then as for the Primitive Writers who lived in or near the Apostolical Age and upon that account had much greater advantages of understanding the truths of Christianity than we who live at this remote distance they are at best but genuine Commentators on that Doctrine which our Saviour first taught and his Apostles afterwards more fully explained to the World but as for declaring any new Doctrines or defining new Articles of Faith that is an upstart invasion of Christ's Prophetick Office which they never so much as pretended to So that the Prophecy of our Saviour is the Fountain from whence all Christian truth is derived as containing in it a compleat and entire Sum of God's Will and Counsel concerning the Salvation of Mankind II. As he taught the whole Will of God so he proved that what he taught was the Will of God by sundry miraculous operations which are the great evidences by which God always demonstrated the truth of his divine revelations and which of all others are the most popular easie and convincing proofs that can be given of them For as for the Prophets themselves they might be very well assured that their Enthusiasms were divine by the vehement impressions they made on their minds which were such as did as fully satisfie them that they were from God as the strokes of the Sun beams on our eyes do us that it is day at Noon but no other man could be satisfied that what they spoke was by divine inspiration without either being divinely inspired himself or confirmed by them in the belief of it by some miraculous sign of the Divine Power which latter was the way by which the Prophets of Old did ordinarily confirm their Doctrines when they delivered any thing new to the World. And accordingly though our Saviour had all along sufficiently confirmed his Doctrines to the Iews by the Authorities of the Old Testament yet this confirmation of his Miracles he more particularly insists on and appeals to thus Iohn 10.25 The works saith he that I do in my Father's name they testifie of me And again vers 37 38. If I do not the works of my Father believe me not but if I do though ye believe not me believe the works and herein he places the inexcusable sin of their unbelief that they persisted in it notwithstanding he had done among them the works which none other man did John 15.24 And indeed well he might considering the miraculous powers he exerted among them for how often did he even before their eyes subpoena in whatsoever was in Heaven or Earth or Sea to give their testimony to his Doctrine he made the Angels minister to him and the Devils tremble and fly before him and the Plants and Animals the Winds and Seas obeyed him and Health and Sickness and Life and Death and the Grave did by their obedience to his Word bear witness to the truth of his Doctrine By his powerful voice he shook the Heavens and sent down the Holy Spirit on his Followers he tore the Rocks and opened the Graves and at his command the bodies of his Saints arose and which was more miraculous than all he raised himself the third day after his Crucifixion and having finished his Course upon Earth ascended Triumphantly into Heaven in the view of a numerous assembly of Spectators All which were such illustrious demonstrations of his being inspired by God as nothing but an incurable infidelity could ever be able to withstand But whâ—t proper arguments these Miracles of his weâ—e to convince men and what evidence there is oâ— the truth and reality of them will be shewn at lâ—rge hereafter and therefore it will be needlâ—ss at present to insist any farther on this particular III. Therefore as a Prophet he gave us a perfect Example of Obedience to that which he had declared and proved to be his Father 's Will. He did not only reveal his Father's Will to mens Ear 's in his excellent Sermons and Discourses but he also set it forth before their Eyes in the glorious Example of his Actions For what he taught in Words he exemplified in Deeds and his Conversation was a lively Picture of his Doctrine wherein all that Humility and Self-denial that Temperance and Iustice that Charity and Heavenly-mindedness thâ—t invincible Constancy of Mind and generous Contempt of the World which he taught Mankind were drawn to the life and expressed in their fairest colours and proportions So that what he taught in Words he taught over again in Actions and explained his Rules still by his own Example for his Conversation was all along a most genuine Comment and Paraphrase on his Religion by casting their eyes on which those who did not fully understand the sence of his Precepts by his Words might very easily expound it by his Actions For there is no doubt but a good Example doth far more effectually instruct than good Precepts because it doth not only express the same vertues that the Precepts enjoyn but also expresses them with much more grace and Emphasis For whereas Precepts and Discourses of Vertue are only the dead Pictures and artificial Landskips and Descriptions of it a vertuous Example is Vertue it self informed and animated alive and in motion exerting and exhibiting it self in all its natural Charms and Graces And therefore as we know a man much better when we see himself alive and in action than when we only see his Picture so we understand Vertue much better when we see it living and acting in a good Example than when we only behold it described and pictured in vertuous Precepts and Discourse So that by giving us a compleat and perfect Example of Piety and Vertue the blessed Jesus hath far more effectually instructed us in our duty than by all those heavenly Sermons which he preached to the World because his whole life was nothing else but a continued series of living and moving Vertue or rather it was nothing but Piety and Vertue acting their several parts in their own proper Forms and exhibiting themselves to the Eyes of men in all their natural Graces And as the Holiness of his life did most effectually instruct men in their duty so it could not but very much confirm them in the truth of his Doctrine for it is certain if his Doctrine were false it was not a simple Error but a downright
beams of Majesty and its face displaying a most beautiful lustre and its whole substance shedding forth from every part a dazling glory round about it and this I conceive is that which he himself calls his own glory Luke 9.26 When he i. e. the Son of man shall come in his own glory that is the glory of that illustrious heavenly Body wherein he is now arrayed besides which bright and luminous Robe in which like a meridian Sun he shall visibly shine over all the World the aforecited Text tells us that he shall also come in the glory of his Father by which I conceive is meant that which the Hebrews call the Shechinah and the Scripture the glory of the Lord viz. a body of bright shining fire in which the Lord was especially present and with which as the Psalmist expresseth it he covered himself as with a Garment Psalm 104.2 for in 2 Thess. 1.8 we are told that he shall be revealed from heaven with flaming fire and so he descended on the Mount in fire Exod. 19.18 and that fire is called the Glory of the Lord Exod. 24.17 That fire therefore in which our Saviour shall be revealed from Heaven seems to be of the same nature with that fiery Shechinah or visible glory of the Lord in which he descended on Mount Sinai though doubtless it will be far more glorious as being designed to adorn a far more glorious solemnity And this Glory being added to the natural brightness and splendor of his glorified Body will cause him to outshine the Sun and drown all the lights of heaven in the conquering brightness of his appearance So that when he comes forth from his aetherial Palace and appears upon the Eastern heaven that immense Sphere of visible glory which will then surround him will in the twinkling of an eye spread and diffuse it self over all the Creation and cause both the Heavens and the Earth to glitter like a flaming fire III. Thirdly We will consider the Carriage on which he is to come which as the Scripture tells us shall be a Cloud so Acts 1.11 the Angels tell his Disciples who stood gazing after him as he was ascending into Heaven the same Iesus which is taken from you into Heaven shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into Heaven Now if you would know how that was the 9th Verse will inform you where it 's said that he was taken up and a Cloud received him out of sight and therefore as he ascended into Heaven on a Cloud so in like manner he shall from thence descend upon a Cloud also and accordingly our Saviour himself declares that we shall see the Son of man coming on the Clouds of Heaven in power and great glory Mat. 24.30 So also Mat. 26.64 Hereafter shall ye see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of Power and coming in the Clouds of Heaven and in this very manner do the Iews expect the coming of their Messias as appears by that gloss of one of their ancient Masters on Dan. 7.10 si meruerint Iudaei veniet in nubibus Coeli which Raimund Pug. fid thus explains If ever the Jews deserve that the Messias should come he shall come gloriously according to the Prophet Daniel that is in the Clouds of Heaven And then he tells us farther ideo moderni Iudaei dicunt Messiam non venisse quia non viderunt eum venire in nubibus coeli therefore do the modern Jews say that the Messias is not yet come because they never saw him coming in the clouds of Heaven and it seems very probable that the great offence which the high Priest took at our Saviours saying that they should hereafter see him coming in the clouds of Heaven Mat. 26.64 65. was this that it was a tradition among them that the Messias should so come and that therefore he look'd upon that saying of our Saviour as a blasphemous pretence to his being the Messias as much as if he should have said though I have done enough already to convince you that I am the Messias yet you shall hereafter see that very sign of my being the Messias upon which you so much depend and without which you will not believe viz. my coming in the clouds of Heaven which therefore I am apt to think is the sign of the Son of man in Heaven of which our Saviour speaks Mat. 24.30 For so not only the Iews do Character their Messias but also the Heathen their Gods cloathed in a Cloud Thus Homer Iliad lib. 5. represents God coming to Diomedes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with his shoulders wrap'd in a Cloud and so also Virgil represents Iupiter coming to assist Aeneas Aen. 7 Radiis ardentem lucis auro ipse manu quatiens ostendit ab aethere nubem i. e. shewing him a Cloud from Heaven flaming with rays of light and Gold. So that to appear in Clouds it seems was looked upon both by Iews and Gentiles as a divine sign and Character and accordingly this sign was given by our Saviour to the Iews in that glorious representation of a Captain with his Legions issuing out of the Clouds a little before the destruction of Ierusalem recorded at large both in Iosephus and Tacitus and will hereafter be given to the whole World in a far more glorious manner at the opening of the day of Iudgment for then as the Psalmist expresses it he will make the Clouds his Chariots and ride down from the Heavens on them in a triumphal procession shining with unspeakable Glory and Majesty So that as when he ascended a bright and Radiant Cloud was prepared to receive and carry him up to the Seat of the blessed so when he descends there will be a vast sheet of condensed aethâ—r in the form of a radiant Cloud and such it 's probable was that on which he ascended prepared to receive him and to waft him down from above to the place appointed for the general Asâ—izes and this very Cloud or bright aetherial substance on which he shall come will perhaps be that Throne of Glory in Matth. 25.31 on which he shall sit whilest he is administring judgment to the World for this substance being not only naturally luminous but also accidentally illuminated from the Sun of Righteousness whom it bears will to be sure be sufficiently Glorious to deserve the name of A Throne of Glory IV. Fourthly We will consider the Retinue and Equipage with which he shall come which as the Scripture tells us will consist of innumerable myriads of Saints and Angels for immediately upon the notice that he is going down to solemnize the general Judgment all those blessed spirits of just men made perfect whom he hath redeemed and glorified from the beginning of the World shall forsake their mansions of glory to attend him in his progress for so Enoch prophesied of old behold the Lord comes with ten thousand of his Saints to execute judgment on the ungodly Jude
14.15 and that by these ten Thousand he means the whole body of the Church Triumphant is evident by that passage of S. Paul 1 Thess. 3.13 where he prays that they might be established in their Christian course till the coming of the Lord Iesus with all his Saints and indeed since they are all to re-assume their bodies and to be made partakers of the Glorious Resurrection it 's necessary that they should all come down along with him and return to this earth where the old matter of those bodies lies wherein they are to be reinvested and to this illustrious retinue of glorified Saints shall be joyned the heavenly hosts of the holy Angels for so Christ himself tells us that he shall come in his own glory and in his Fathers and of his holy Angels Luke 9.26 and that he shall come in his glory and all his holy Angels with him Mat. 25.31 And S. Paul tells us that he shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty Angels 2 Thess. 1.2 And as the Angels shall come down along with him so in all probability they shall come in a glorious appearance cloathed in bright aetherial bodies in which to adorn the triumphs of that glorious day they shall be conspicuous to all the Inhabitants of the Earth Neither shall their coming with him be only for shew and pomp but the Scripture plainly tells us that they shall minister to him in that great transaction For at his issuing forth from the heaven of heavens these mighty hosts of Angels shall march before him with the Archangel in the head of them who with a mighty voice or sound like that of a Trumpet shall send forth an awakening summons to all the Inhabitants of the grave to come forth and appear before the Judgment Seat at which Tremendous voice which with an all-enlivening power shall be reverberated through all the vault of heaven and penetrate the most secret repositories of the Earth the dead shall rise and the living shall be changed and transfigured and all shall be set before the dread Tribunal to undergo their Trial and receive their doom For so 1 Thess. 4.16 For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout with the voice of the Archangel and the trump of God and the dead in Christ shall rise first and in 1 Cor. 15.52 the resurrection of the dead is made the consequence of the sounding this Trumpet for the Trumpet shall sound and the dead shall be raised incorruptible And so also Mat. 24.31 our Saviour tells us that at his coming on the clouds of Heaven he will send his Angels with a great sound of a Trumpet and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds from whence it is evident that the Angels then minister to him to raising the dead and assembling them to Judgment and hence that which is called the voice of the Archangel in the above cited 1 Thess. 4.10 is elsewhere called the voice of the Son of God John 5.25 because as it will be animated by his power so it will be pronounced by his authority and as they shall minister to him in raising the dead to be judged so shall they also in executing his Sentence and Judgment for so Mat. 13.41 42. He tells us the Son of man shall send forth his Angels and they shall gather out of his Kingdom all things that offend and them which do iniquity and shall cast them into a furnace of fire there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth From whence it 's evident that when he hath pronounced sentence on the workers of iniquity he will by the ministry of his Angels chase them into that everlasting fire whereunto he hath doomed and devoted them Thus when he comes to judg the World all his holy Angels shall come with him and that not only to contribute to the glory and splendor of his Circuit but also to minister to him in his Judgment so that his retinue shall consist of all the Inhabitants of heaven who shall all come forth together with him and bear him company in this his Triumphant progress through the skies by which we may easily imagine what an amazing spectacle his coming down from heaven will be to the Inhabitants of the earth when they shall see him descend from his Imperial Seat far above the starry Skies with all the Train-bands of heaven about him the Captain of the Angelical Host in the front of innumerable Angels marching before him and with his mighty Trump ringing a peal of Thunder through the Universe and with ten thousand thousands of the Spirits of just men made perfect following after him with Crowns of glory on their heads and Songs and Halelujahs in their moâ—ths O blessed Jesuâ— how will this glorious and dreadful sight confound thy Enemies and ravish thy Friends make those that hate thee tremble and gnash their teeth and those that love thee lift up their heads and shout for joy V. And lastly We will consider the place to which he is to come concerning which all that is certain from Scripture is this that when he comes down from Heâ—ven he will fix his Throne or Judgment Seat in the Air at such a convenient distance from the Earth as shall render him visible to all its Inhabitants For so 1 Thess. 4.17 it is said of the righteous that after their being raised or changed they shall be caught up in the Clouds to meet the Lord in the Air which is a plain argument that the Lord will sit in judgment on them in the Air since thither they will be caught up to him after they are raised and judged Thus in that very Air which is now the seat of the Devils Empire shall Christ fix his Throne to manifest to all the World the consummation of his Victory over the Powers of darkness There shall he sit in Majesty and Glory where now the Devil and his Angels reign and in the publick view of the World shall even in their own dominion spoil those Hellish Principalities and Powers and having chained them at his Chariot Wheels make a shew of them openly triumphing over them there where they now domineer and tyrannize over this wretched World shall he set his foot upon their necks and from thence shall he tread them down into everlasting darkness and despair Thus that he may expose himself to the more publick view and the Devil to the more publick shame and confusion he will choose to keep his general Assizes in the Air. Being therefore arrived into the airy Regions after a long and glorious progress from the highest heaven there he shall sit down upon the Throne of his glory as some think over against Mount Olivet the place from whence he ascended whither all People Nations and Languages shall be gathered before him to receive their everlasting Doom And now let us imagine with our selves in what a glorious and tremendous Majesty he will appear to the World from his
smallest threds and fibres of their hearts laid open and exposed to the view of men and Angels their own shame and the intolerable rack of their consciences will force them to confess their Charge and proclaim themselves guilty before all that vast Congregation of Spirits But O the inexpressible horror and confusion these wretched Souls will then be seized with when they shall see themselves thus publickly unmasked and turned inside outwards and be forced to stand forth like so many loathsom spectacles before God and his Angels without any excuse or retreat for their shame without any vail to hide their infamy and blushes when their filthy practices shall be no longer confined to the talk of a Town or a Village but be proclaimed in the hearing of all the rational World O now it would be happy for them if as formerly they could drown the retorts of their conscience in noise and laughter and forget its cutting repartees which were always uneasie to bear but impossible to Answer But alas those jolly days are gone and now in despite of themselves they must listen with horrour and confusion of face to what those two great Judges Iesus and their own Consciences unanimously give in charge against them Thus he whose piercing Eye doth now penetrate their hearts and ransack every corner of their souls will in that great day of discoveries bring forth all that secret filth that is there reposited and expose it for an infamous spectacle to the publick view of men and Angels IV. Another particular implied in this judgement of wicked men is their Sentence Their Trial being now over in which their guilt hath been sufficiently evinced and detected to their everlasting infamy and reproach they will by this time have received the sentence of death within themselves and stand condemned in the judgment of all the World the Righteous Iudg who is too great to be overawed too just to be bribed and too much provoked to be intreated whose Ears are now for ever stopped and whose Bowels are impenitrably hardened against all further Overtures of mercy will with a stern look and terrible voice pronounce that dreadful doom upon them Go ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his angels which though it be of a horrible import will appear so just considering the horrible things which have been charged and proved against them that it will be immediately seconded with the unanimous suffrage of all that bright Corona of glorified Saints that sit as Assessors round the Throne who with one consent will all cry out together Iust and righteous art thou O Iudge of the World in all thy ways But O the fearful shrieks and lamentations that will then be heard from those poor condemned Creatures For if A Lord have mercy upon thee A take him Iailor from an earthly Iudge be able to extort so many sighs and tears from a hardened Malefactor what will A go ye cursed do from the mouth of the Righteous Iudge of the World and when so many millions of men and women shall be all involved together in the same doom and all at once lamenting their dismal fate Lord what a horrible outcry will they make Now in the bitter Agonies of their souls they will cry to heaven for mercy mercy but alas poor souls they cry too late their Iudg was once as importunate with them to have mercy upon themselves but because when he called they refused when he stretched forth his hands they regarded not now when they call he will not answer when they cry he will not hear but will laugh at their calamity as they did at his counsel and mock when their fear and destruction is come upon them V. And lastly Another particular implied in this Iudgment of the wicked is the execution of their Sentence For immediately after their sentence is past by which they stand doomed to everlasting fire an everlasting fire shall be kindled round about them a fire which within a few moments shall spread it self over all this lower World and convert the whole Almosphere about us into a furnace of inquenchable flames For then all those fiery particles which are every where intermingled with these terrestial Bodies and have hitherto been kept within their proper limits shall be disintangled and set free from those more gross and sluggish ones that now bind and fix them and swarm together like so many sparks into one huge globe of Fire which from the lower-most centre of the Earth shall spire up and kindle upon all that Airy Heaven above and with one continued flame fill all the vast expansum all that fiery matter which is now dispersed up and down within the entrails of the Earth shall by degrees gather together into Rivers of Fire which rolling to and fro within to force their way into the open Air will perhaps produce those prodigious Earthquakes of which our Saviour speaks by which at length the Earth being cleft and torn it shall every where vomit out Torrents of Fire from its flaming bowels and at the same time the Sea shall boil and swell and roar like water in a seething Pot till 't is all evaporated by the strugling flames from below which having rarified its waters into vapours shall kindle those vapours into flames and at the same time also the Heavens above shall groan and crack with incessant Thunder accompanied with thick and fearful flashes of Lightning which joyning with those vast streams of Fire that will be continually issuing out of the Earth and Sea will make such a prodigious deluge of flames as will quickly overflow the whole World. For thus we are assured from Scripture that the Element shall melt with fervent heat and the earth and the works that are therein shall be burnt up 2 Pet. 3.10 So also St. Iohn in his Vision of the day of Judgment Rev. 20.11 I saw a great white Throne and him that sate on it from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away and there was found no place for them not that the matter of them shall be annihilated but the form of them shall be destroyed by their being converted into an everlasting Fire and in this Fire shall those condemned wretches live and suffer to eternal Ages Hence it is called the vengeance of eternal fire and we are told that it will be in flaming fire that the Lord Jesus will render vengeance to all that know not God and obey not his Gospel 2 Thess. 1.8 And that this flaming fire shall be the conflagration of the World that of St. Peter seems plainly to imply 2 Pet. 3.7 But the heavens and the earth which are now are kept in store reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men and being reserved unto fire against the day of perdition of ungodly men we may justly conclude that the fire it is reserved to will be the Perdition of ungodly men Thus upon our Saviours pronouncing
edifie our understandings and therefore for this reason among others Christ thought meet to assume our natures that so he might treat with us in such a way as is most accommodate thereunto and deliver his divine Doctrines to us in a humane form and voice that so being conveyed to us in the most natural and familiar manner they might not so alarm our dread as to confound our attention but might instruct our minds instead of scaring and amusing them And therefore he did not only qualifie the terrour and dreadfulness of his divine Majesty by putting on our nature but together with it he put on all the condescensions and sweetnesses of a most familiar and endearing conversation and conversed among men in such a generous friendly and courteous manner as charmed and enamoured all ingenuous minds and thereby attracted their attention to his Doctrine So that as Christ was the Son of God he perfectly understood his Father's Will and as he was the Son of Man he was perfectly fitted to reveal and declare it to Mankind And as by being God-man he was most perfectly accomplished to declare God's Will to us so he was also to give us a perfect Example of Obedience to it which as I shall shew hereafter was a necessary part of his Prophetick Office. For without assuming humane Nature he could never have been an example of humane Vertue which consists in acting sutably to the nature of a Man who is a Compound of Spirit and Matter Reason and Sense Angel and Brute from which contrary Principles there arise in him contrary inclinations and affections in the good or bad government whereof all humane Vertue and Vice consists How then could he have practised those vertues which consist in the dominion of spiritual and rational faculties over brutal and sensitive such as Temperance Chastity Equanimity and the like had he not assumed that nature which is compounded of both How could he have shewn us by his own example how to govern the Passions and conduct our selves in the Circumstances of men had he not communicated with us in the Passions and Circumstances of humane Nature He might have come down from the Heavens to us inrobed with splendor and light or have preached his Gospel to the World in the midst of a Choir of Angels from some bright Throne in the Clouds and it would have been more convenient for himself to have done so because more sutable to the natural Dignity and Majesty of his Person but he consulted not so much his own convenience as ours he knew well enough that his appearance among us in such an illustrious equipage would have been more apt to astonish than to instruct us to have amused our thoughts into a profound admiration of his glories than to have directed our steps in the paths of Piety and Vertue and that it would be much more for our interest that he should conduct us by his example than amaze us by his appearance and therefore he rather chose to appear to us in our own nature that so by going before us as a man he might shew us by his example what became men to do and trace out to us the way to our happiness with the print of his own footsteps So that his coming among us in our own nature was of vast moment to his Prophetick Office both in declaring his Father's Will to us and setting us an example of obedience to it III. And lastly It is farther to be considered that as he came down immediately from the Father to Prophesie to us in our own natures so while he abode among us he was always endued with the Holy Ghost the Spirit of the Lord from whom all Prophetick Inspiration proceeds rested on him and made its constant residence and abode in his humane nature So that whereas it descended upon other Prophets only at certain times and upon certain occasions by reason of which it was not in their power to Prophesie when they pleased but they were fain to attend the arbitrary motions of the Holy Ghost and like dead Organ Pipes were mute and silent as oft as he withdrew and ceased to breath into them his divine Enthusiasms our blessed Saviour had the Prophetick Influx at command and could Prophesie whensoever he pleased For the Holy Ghost resided in his mind and like an assisting Form or Genius was always present with his Understanding and being as was shewed before subordinate to him both by personal Property and Agreement with the Father it operated in him whensoever howsoever and whatsoever he pleased and was as intirely at his disposal as his own most voluntary motions So that whensoever he had occasion for a Revelation he no sooner willed it but the Holy Ghost immediately inspired it into him and whensoever he wanted a Miracle to confirm a Revelation he no sooner called for it but the Holy Ghost immediately exerted it by him For as I shewed before he did both Prophesie and effect his Miracles by the Holy Ghost that was in him and that was so entirely subject to him through the whole course of his Ministry that he could Prophesie and do Miracles by him whensoever he pleased and hence he is said to be anointed with the Holy Ghost and with power Acts 10.38 that is to be consecrated to the Prophetick Office by the descent of the Holy Ghost upon him by whom he was impowered to Prophesie and to confirm his Prophecy by Miracles for so it follows He went about doing good and healing all that were oppressed with the Devil for God was with him and accordingly at his Baptism he was solemnly consecrated the great Prophet of God by a visible Vnction of the Holy Ghost who as St. Luke tells us descended on him in a bodily form or appearance Chap. 3. ver 22. which St. Matthew thus expresses the Spirit of God descended like a Dove and light upon him Chap. 3. ver 16. not as if he descended in the form of a Dove but as it seems most probable he assumed a body of light or fire and therein came down from above just as a Dove with its Wings spread forth is observed to do and gathering about our Saviour's head crowned it with a visible Glory For so in the Nazaren Gospel as Grotius observes it is said that upon this descent of the Holy Ghost 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. there immediately shone a great light round about the place and Iustin Martyr tells us that when Christ was Baptized 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that there was a fire lighted in the River Iordan that is by the reflection of that bright and flaming appearance in which the Holy Ghost descended the River seemed to be all on fire So that as God did signalize his presence in the Old Tabernacle by a visible Light or Glory so the Holy Ghost by descending on our Saviour in this shining appearance declared him to be the Tabernacle of his divine Presence wherein he meant from
God by way of Intercession for Mankind And hence his bloud is called the bloud of sprinkling which speaks better things for us than the bloud of Abel Heb. 12.24 which is a plain allusion to the High Priest's sprinkling the bloud of the Sacrifice before the Mercy-Seat on the great day of Expiation by which action as I shewed before he interceded with God to be propitious to the People in consideration of that bloud which he there presented in their behalf And therefore as the Holy of Holies was a Type of Heaven Heb. 9.24 and the High Priest's entering thereinto after he had slain the Sacrifice a Type of our Saviour's entring into Heaven after the Sacrifice of himself Ibid. verse 7 11 12. so the High Priesâ—'s sprinkling the bloud before the Mercy-Seat was also a Type of our Saviour's presenting his bloud to the Father in Heaven and there pleading it in our behalf and hence he is said to have entered into the Holy place that is into Heaven the Antitype of the Holy of Holies and to have obtained Eternal Redemption for us neither by the bloud of Bulls and Goats as the Jewish High Priest did but by his own bloud Heb. 9.12 where the High Priest's entering into the Holy of Holies with the bloud of Bulls and Goats is plainly opposed as a Type to its Anti-type to Christ's entering into Heaven with his own bloud and therefore the High Priest's interceding for the People in the Holy of Holies in vertue of the bloud of their Sacrifices must necessarily be Typical of Christ's interceding for us in Heaven in the vertue of his Thus as God cast and contrived the Rites and Ceremonies of the Jewish Law in general into a prefiguration or visible Prophecy of the Mysteries of the Gospel that so by those Emblematical Predictions he might intimate before-hand those glorious truths to pious and inquisitive minds which he intended afterwards more plainly to reveal vid. Col. 2.17 and Heb. 10.1 so particularly in the Jewish Priesthood he drew a rude draught and representation of the future Priesthood of our Saviour that so by that figurative Sacrifice and Intercession he might visibly foreshew and intimate to the World the Sacrifice and Intercession of our Saviour For thus it is evident from Philo that the Jews understood their High Priest to be a Type of the Eternal Word or Messias for thus in his Allegories he makes the Temple to be an Emblâ—m of the World 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in which God's first-born Divine Word is the High Priest and in several other parts of his Writings he makes the High Priests Crown and Vestments to be Types and Representations of the dignity and perfections of the Eternal Word by which it is evident that by their Typical High-Priesthood the Jews were in some measure instructed in the nature of the Priesthood of our Saviour Thirdly and lastly I shall now proceed to explain the Priesthood and Priestly Acts of our Saviour corresponding to that ancient Priesthood in which they were prefigured In General therefore the Priesthood of our Saviour corresponding to that ancient Priesthood consists in offering up himself a Sacrifice for our sins and in presenting that Sacrifice to God in our behalf and thereby interceding with him to be merciful and propitious to us So that the Priesthood of our Saviour consists in these two acts First In offering up himself a Sacrifice for our sins Secondly In presenting that Sacrifice to God by way of Intercession for us of each of which I shall discourse at large SECT IV. Concerning the Sacrifice of our Saviour IN handling the first of these viz. the Sacrifice of our Saviour I shall endeavour first to shew that the death of Christ had in it all the requisite conditions of a most real and compleat Sacrifice for sin Secondly To make appear how effectually God's exacting such a Sacrifice in order to his being reconciled to sinners conduces to their reformation First That the death of Christ had in it all the requisite conditions of a real and most compleat Sacrifice for sin Now to make both a true and perfect expiatory Sacrifice there are five things indispensibly necessary First That in being sacrificed it should be substituted in the room of an Offender to be punished for him in order to his being released from his own Personal obligation to punishment For in all those Legal expiations which prefigured this great Expiation of our Saviour the killing of the Sacrifice was as I shewed before a real transferring and inflicting upon it the punishment due to the Offender that offered it in order to his being excused from suffering it in his own person Secondly Another necessary condition of an Expiatory Sacrifice is that it should be pure sound and unblemished and indeed this condition is required in all kinds of Sacrifices whether Expiatory or Eucharistical that they should be pure or Legally clean and that they should be sound and without blemish For so Lev. 22.20 But whatsoever hath a blemish that shall ye not offer for it shall not be acceptable for you and ver 21. It shall be perfect i. e. sound and entire to be accepted there shall be no blemish therein and then he goes on to particulars it shall not be blind or broken or having a Wâ—n or scurvy or scabbed verse 22. Now though the legal uncleanness and the natural blemishes here forbidden in Sacrifices had nothing of sin or immorality in them yet the prohibition of these natural blemishes in Sacrifices that were incapable of moral ones denotes the necessity of a moral cleanness and unblemishedness in that great Expiatory Sacrifice for the sins of the World which they Typified and prefigured and hence Christ is called A Lamb without blemish and without spot 1 Pet. 1.19 Thirdly Another necessary condition to a perfect Expiatory Sacrifice is that it should be of such an intrinsick worth and value as that its death may be in some measure an equivalent Commutation for the punishment which the Offender deserves For the end of punishing whether it be the Offender himself or another in his stead is to secure and maintain the Authority of the Law in order whereunto it is highly requisite that the punishment should ordinarily be equivalent to the demerit of the Crime otherwise it will not be a sufficient motive to warn and deter men from committing it And herein consisted the imperfection of the ancient expiatory Sacrifices that what they suffered was much short of what the Offenders they suffered for deserved for they only substituted the life of a Brute in the room of the life of a Man which is of far greater worth and value and therefore by how much less valuable the life of a Beast is than the life of a Man by so much less was the punishment transferred upon the Sacrifice than the guilt contracted by the Offender Fourthly Another necessary condition to the making of a true and perfect Sacrifice was that it
sacrificed body to the Father he did what the High Priest did when he sprinkled the bloud of his Sacrifice i. e. he interceded for us with God and indeed he interceded more prevalently by this significant action than if he had used all the Eloquence of Men and Angels For his wounds are vocal and his bloud speaks yea and not only speaks better things for us than the bloud of Abel spoke but also expresses what it speaks far more powerfully and emphatically than it is possible for any verbal Oratory to do So that by the presenting to his Father his wounded and bleeding body which carries with it an inexhaustible fountain of Rhetorique and Persuasion he makes the most moving and pathetical intercession for us the sense of which is this though the full force and Emphasis of it no Language can express O my Father behold this sacrificed body of mine which by thy consent and approbation hath been substituted to bear the punishment which was due to thee from Mankind and through the wounds of which I have chearfully poured out the precious bloud of God as a ransom for the sins of the World for the sake of this bloud therefore be thou so far propitious to those miserable sinners it was shed for as upon condition they shall repent to accept it in exchange for the lives of their Souls which are forfeited to thee to release them from the Obligation they are under to die eternally and upon their final perseverance in well-doing to crown them with eternal life and that this bloud which at thy command I have willingly shed for them may not through their inability to repent and persevere be utterly ineffectual to them O send thy Holy Spirit to assist their weak faculties to excite their endeavours and co-operate with them This is the Language of Christ's sacrificed body in Heaven and these are the better things which his bloud bespeaks for us For his bloud bespeaks those good things for us in Heaven for which he shed it upon Earth i. e. the remission of our sins and our eternal life of which blessings his bloud being the price that God had promised to accept his presenting it to him in Heaven not only speaks for but humbly demands them as carrying with it the unanswerable claim of an accepted Price to a stated Purchace So that this address which Christ makes for us to God in heaven is not performed by him after the manner of a prostrate Supplicant with bended knees up-lifted hands and lowly supplications but in such a manner as comports with the Kingly Majesty he is advanced to and so as at the same time to assert his own right of purchace in the blessings he addresses for and yet to acknowledge God to be the supreme fountain and disposer of them And this the Scripture tells us he performs by appearing in the presence of God for us and presenting his sacrificed body to him as a standing motive to prevail with him to be propitious to us and to crown us with all those graces and favours in consideration of which he laid down his life for us And accordingly he is said to offer himself to God for us in heaven Heb. 9.25 and to offer his one Sacrifice i. e. to God in heaven for sin for ever Heb. 10.12 By which offering or presenting his Sacrifice to God he doth at once claim for us by the right of his purchace all those good things for which he paid down the price of his bloud and also by a silent desire pray to God to bestow them upon us whereby he acknowledges him to be the sovereign disposer of them So that this significant action of Christ's presenting his sacrificed body to God is both a Claim and a Prayer or rather it is a Prayer backt and enforced with a rightful claim to the blessings he prays for For so for that particular blessing of the Spirit he himself tells us I will pray the Father and he shall give you another Comforter that he may abide with you for ever John 14.16 not that he offers up any other Prayer to the Father but what his wounds and bloud continually make which with incessant importunity do move and solicite God in our behalf but his meaning is this by presenting that Sacrifice to my Father in Heaven which I am going to offer on the Cross and by which among other blessings I shall purchace of my Father his Holy Spirit for you I will pray him to send his Holy Spirit to you I will pray him by my wounds and bloud which are a thousand times more moving and eloquent than any vocal Prayer I can offer in your behalf for while they pray him to send his Spirit to you they lay an undeniable claim to what they pray for as being the dear and inestimable price by which I am purchasing his Spirit for you From all which it is evident that this address which Christ now makes for us to his Father in Heaven consists in the presenting his sacrificed body to him by which he both prays to him and claims what he prays for III. It is by the continued and perpetual oblation or presentment of this his sacrificed body to the Father that Christ continues and perpetuates this his address or intercession in our behalf For the fiâ—st presenting or oâ—lation of his sacrificed body in Heaven was the beginning and commencement of his intercession and the whole progress of his intercession is nothing but that same oblation continued and perpetuated For as the High Priest was interceding for the people all the time that he was presenting the bloud of the Sacrifice before the Lord so Christ is interceding for us all the while that he is presenting his sacrificed body in Heaven For it is by the presence of his sacrificed body that he intercedes and therefore so long as his body is present in Heaven so long he must be interceding by it in our behalf So that between the Iewish High Priest's Intercession and Christ's there is this vast difference that the former presented himself in the Holy of Holies with his Sacrifice and consequently interceded by it but once a year viz. on the great day of Expiation whereas the latter continually presents his Sacrifice in Heaven and so doth continually intercede by it and whereas the bloud which the High Priest presented was so mean and inconsiderable that the whole vertue of it was still spent in one Act of Intercession as not being available enough for him to intercede with it twice insomuch that in every new act of Intercession he was still fain to present new bloud the bloud of Christ was of that infinite moment and value as that though he makes a continued and perpetuated Intercession by it yet the vertue and efficacy the power and prevalency of it with God remains fresh and unimpaired so that he needs not sacrifice again that so he may have new bloud to present but with that
swim how would it be possible for it in such a vast and unknown Continent ever to find its way to the Seat of the blessed without the conduct of some experienced guide And who can be better experienced in that Celestial Road than those winged Messengers of the Almighty King who in the execution of his high behests are always travelling to and fro between Heaven and Earth And therefore our Saviour hath committed the separated Spirits of his faithful Subjects to these most skilful and faithful Guides who in pursuance of his Commission are some or other of them still attending upon every good man's decease to receive his Soul into their Custody as soon as ever it is expired and to guard it against evil Spirits as it passes through the Air and thence to conduct it through all those spacious fields of Aether which extend themselves far and wide beyond all the visible lights of Heaven to those happy abodes which the divine goodness hath prepared for glorified Spirits VII And lasty Another instance of the Ministry of Angels to our Saviour in his Kingdom is their attending and assisting him in the great solemnity of the day of Iudgment for thus in all his most solemn and conspicuous works of Providence our Saviour hath still been pleased to make use of the Ministry of his holy Angels so when he came to ratifie his Covenant with Iacob the mysterious Preface of that great solemnity was a Ladder reaching from Heaven to Earth and the Angels ascending and descending upon it which was doubtless intended for an Emblem of that Everlasting Covenant by which Man was to ascend to God and God to descend to Man so also when the Law was delivered by him upon the Mount the Angels descended with him and pitched their Tents about it in Circles of flaming fire to signifie to the People those flames of vengeance that would certainly pursue and seize them if they were not obedient to those words that were thence delivered to them so also when he was born into the world the holy Angels came down to sing his Christmas Carol and at once to proclaim and celebrate his Nativity and it is the opinion of some learned men that that multitude of the heavenly Host which St. Luke speaks of and who sang that Anthem of Glory be to God on high at our Saviour's Nativity Luke 2.13 contained the whole Nation of Angels because in Heb. 1.6 it is said that when God brought in the first begotten into the world he said let all the Angels worship him that is as they understand it when our Saviour was born God gave order to all the Angels of Heaven to come down and do homage to him who was ere long to be their Sovereign Lord under the most high Father Thus also a little before Ierusalem was destroyed Iosephus tells us that the Heavens were spread with Troops of armed men who without doubt were the blessed Angels that by their phantastick combats in the Air did presignifie the ensuing Tragedy of that bloudy City It is no wonder then if the great solemnity of Doomsday of which Ierusalem's desolation was only a mournful Type shall also be adorned and illustrated with the presence and attendance of the holy Angels For this great Transaction is to be the winding up of the vast bottom of divine Providence over the whole Race of faln and degenerate Mankind and the close and conclusion of the Mediatorial Kingdom of our Lord and Saviour and therefore will without doubt be performed with the greatest Grandeur and Magnificence This is to be the great Day of our Saviour's Triumph wherein his Friends shall be Crowned and his Enemies made his foot-stool and such a solemnity may well deserve the attendance and Ministry of all the heavenly Angels who accordingly shall then descend with our Saviour from the highest Heavens in bright aetherial bodies such as shall render them gloriously conspicuous to all the lower world and so fit to adorn the Triumphs of that glorious day for so the Scripture assures us not only that he shall descend from heaven with a shout with the voice of the Archangel and with the Trump of God 1 Thes. 4.16 but also that he shall come in his glory and all his holy Angels with him Matt. 25.31 and that he shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty Angels and that he shall come in his own glory and in his Father's and of his holy Angels Luke 9.26 and in a word that he shall come in the glory of his Father with the holy Angels Mar. 8.38 But what their Ministry is to be in that great Day I shall hereafter have occasion to shew when I come to discourse of that solemn transaction And now having explained the Ministry of the good Angels under Christ I proceed to treat of the Ministry of the evil Angels to him which principally consists in these four particulars First In trying and exercising the vertues of his Subjects Secondly In chastening and correcting their faults and miscarriages Thirdly In searing and hardening his incorrigible Rebels Fourthly In executing his vengeance on them in another World. I. The Ministry of evil Angels to Christ consists in trying and exercising the vertues of his Subjects for this being the state of our trial and probation wherein we stand Candidates for those everlasting preferments in the other World our blessed Lord hath thought meet to surround us with Difficulties and Temptations that so being in continual conflict with them we may never want opportunity to exert and exercise our vertues and to give the most glorious proofs of our Courage and Constancy For difficulty is the Spur of Endeavour and the Whet-stone of Vertue without which the fairest Graces that belong to Humane Nature would be altogether Vseless Worthless and Vnactive such as Faith and Patience Temperance and Equanimity Courage and Resignation to God all which would scarce deserve the name of Vertues if they had not some difficulties to contest withal Now one of the greatest difficulties with which our blessed Lord tries and exercises these Graces of our Nature is the Temptations of evil Spirits who as so many assisting Geniuses to the corrupt inclinations of our Nature are permitted by him to rove about the World in innumerable swarms to Tempt and Elicite those inclinations into action and these being Spirits have a much nearer access to the Souls of men than any material Agents whatsoever for though they are totally debarred from all kind of intercourse with the immediate operations of the reasonable Soul and can no more look into its thoughts than we can into the bowels of the Earth yet our Fancies and Imaginations lying open to them there is no doubt but they can and oftentimes do make what use they think fit of the Animal Spirits there and dispose and order and distinguish them just as the Painter doth his numerous Colours that lie confusedly before him in their several Shells into the Pictures
participation of the blessed immortality of Heaven so also Rev. 3.21 To him that overcomes will I grant to sit with me on my Throne even as I have overcome and am sate down with my Father on his Throne And he promises the Bishop of the Church of Smyrna in particular Be thou faithful to the death and I will give thee a crown of life Rev. 2.10 In all which places he expresly declares his Royal Authority to reward his faithful Subjects when they leave this World with the joys and felicities of the World to come and this Authority he is continually exercising in his heavenly Kingdom For when ever any faithful and obedient Souls depart from their bodies he presently sends forth his Angelick Messengers to conduct them safe to the immortal Regions and there to lodge them in some one of those blissful Mansions in his Fathers House which he went before to prepare for them where free from all the disturbances of flesh and blood and of a vexatious and tumultuous World they live in continued ease content and joy wrapt up with the ever-growing delights of contemplating loving and imitating God and of the most wise and amicable Society and Communication with each other in the enjoyment of an endless bliss and pleasure for so we are assured from Scripture that the happiness of the righteous doth commence from the moment of their departure hence So Rev. 14.13 Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord from henceforth yea saith the Spirit that they may rest from their labours and their works do follow them and with St. Paul it was the same thing to depart from hence and to be with Christ Phil. 1.23 which necessarily implies that upon his departure he expected to be immediately with Christ and elsewhere he teaches that to be at home in the body was to be absent from the Lord and to be absent from the body to be present with the Lord 2 Cor. 5.6 8. neither of which can be true if the Souls of good men go not to Heaven immediately when they go from hence but that they do so is as plain as words can express it in that promise of our Saviour to the Penitent Thief Verily verily I say unto thee this day shalt thou be with me in Paradise Luke 23.43 From whence it evidently follows that even in the very Article of a true Penitents death Heavens joys do attend his departing Soul to receive it immediately when it is dislodged from the body Thus in the very moment of its departure hence the Pious Soul is transported to those blessed abodes beyond the Stars which are the proper seat and pure Element of Happiness where the blessed inhabitants live in a continued fruition of their utmost wishes being every moment entertained with fresh and enravishing Scenes of pleasure where all their happiness is eternal and all their eternity nothing else but only one continued Act of Love and Praise and Ioy and Triumph where there are no sighs or tears no intermixtures of sorrow or misery but every heart is full of joy and every joy is Quintessence and every happy moment is crowned with some fresh and new enjoyment But of this blessed state I have given an account at large Part. 1. Chap. 1. and 3. And this is that blessed reward with which our Saviour crowns his faithful Subjects immediately upon their departure hence so that he doth not permit them to lie sleeping in the dust unrewarded till the end of the World but as soon as they have finished their work upon Earth admits them to the joy of their Master to all the felicities that their separated spirits are capable of in those several degrees and measures of perfection which they there arrive to in which happy state they remain during their separation from the body expecting the farther completion of their happiness in a glorious Resurrection by which their Bodies and Souls being reunited their whole Humane Nature shall be filled with bliss to the utmost stretch of its Capacity And now having shewn what those Regal Acts are which Christ hath always performed and doth always continue to perform I proceed in the III. And last place To shew what those Regal Acts are which are yet to be performed by him before he surrenders up his Kingdom and these are reducible to three Heads First He is yet farther to extend and enlarge his Kingdom by the Conquest of its enemies Secondly He is yet to destroy Death the last Enemy by giving a general Resurrection Thirdly He is yet to judge the World. I. He is yet farther to extend and enlarge his Kingdom by a more universal conquest of its Enemies For if we consult the ancient Prophesies concerning the vast extent of our Saviours Kingdom we shall find that there are a great many of them which as yet were never accomplished So Psal. 2.8 9. Ask of me and I will give thee the Heathen for thine inheritance and the uttermost parts of the Earth for thy possession thou shalt break them with a Rod of Iron thou shalt dash them in pieces like a Potters Vessel whereas hitherto it is certain Christ was never possessed of the uttermost parts of the earth nor did he ever yet break his incorrigible opposers with a Rod of Iron or dash them in pieces like a Potters Vessel so also Dan. 7.4 it is foretold of Christ that there should be given him Dominion and Glory and Kingdom that all People Nations and Languages should serve him and that all Dominionâ— should serve and obey him ibid. ver 27. so also Dan 2.34 35 44 45. that the stone cut out without hands by which all agree is meant the Kingdom of Christ should become a great Mountain and fill the whole earth and that it should break in pieces and consume all those other Kingdoms Thus also it is foretold that the Lord should be King over all the Earth Mich. 5.4 and that there should be but one Lord and his name one Zech. 14.9 and that he should have Dominion from Sea to Sea and from the Rivâ—r to the 〈◊〉 of the Earth Psal. 72.8 and that all Kings should fall down before him and all Nations serve him ibid. ver 11. and that all the ends of the earth should remember and turn to the Lord and all the kindreds of the Nations worship before him because the Kingdom shall be the Lords and he shall govern among the Nations These and sundry other such like Prophesies there are which as yet it is certain were never accomplished according to the full import and intent of them Wherefore we may certainly conclude that there is a time yet to come before the consummation of all things wherein our Saviour will yet once more display the victorious Banner of his Cross and like a mighty man of War march on conquering and to conquer till he hath confounded or converted his Enemies and finally consummated his victories in a glorious Triumph over all the Powers
and general account of it in Scripture where we are only told that they shall awake to everlasting shame and contempt Dan. 12.2 and that they shall come forth to the Resurrection of Damnation John 5.28 and that upon their Resurrection they shall be judged according to their works and cast into the Lake of fire Rev. 20.13.15 from whence it is apparent that they shall be raised for no other end but to be punished to endure that vengeance which shall then be rendered to them even the vengeance of eternal fire for that will be their doom Depart ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his Angels Since therefore their Resurrection will be only in order to their being fetched from Prison to Iudgment and sent from Iudgment to Execution to be sure their bodies will be raised in full capacity to suffer the fearful execution of their doom that is with an exquisite sense to feel and an invincible strength to sustain the torment of eternal fire For since they must suffer for ever they must be raised both passive and immortal with a sense as quick as lightening to perceive their misery and yet as durable as Anvil to undergo the stroaks of it which to all eternity will be repeated upon them without any pause or intermission Thus shall they be raised with a most vivacious and everlasting sense of pain that so they may ever feel the pangs of death without ever dying so St. Cyril Catech. illum 4. p. 26. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e. wicked men shall be cloathed with eternal bodies that in them they may suffer the eternal punishment of their sins and so they shall have strength to suffer as long as vengeance hath will to inflict and therefore since it is the will of divine vengeance that they should suffer eternal fire the divine power will furnish them with such bodies as shall be able to endure everlasting scorching in that fire without being ever consumed by it for at their Resurrection their wretched Ghosts shall be fetched out of those invisible Prisons wherein they are now reserved in chains against the Judgment of the great Day to suffer in that body wherein they sinned and that therein they may be capable of lingring out an eternity of torment they shall be reunited to it in such a fatal and indissoluble bond as neither Death nor Hell shall ever be able to unloose And this is all the account we have from Scripture concerning the change that shall be made by the Resurrection in the bodies of wicked men viz. that from weak and corruptible bodies they shall be changed into vigorous and incorruptible ones and be endued with a quick and everlasting sense of all that everlasting punishment which they are raised to endure Thus having given an account at large of this second Regal Act which our blessed Saviour is yet to perform viz. Raising the dead I proceed to the III. And last viz. his judging the World. In treating of which great and fundamental Article of our Faith I shall endeavour First To prove the truth of the thing that our blessed Saviour shall judge the World. Secondly To give an account of the signs and forerunners of his coming to judge it Thirdly To shew the manner of his coming Fourthly To explain the whole process of his judgment I. I shall endeavour to prove the truth of the thing viz. that our Saviour shall judge the World than which there is no one Proposition more frequently and plainly asserted in holy Scripture Thus Acts 17.31 we are told that God hath appointed a day in which he will judge the World in righteousness by the man whom he hath ordained and that this man is Jesus Christ we are assured Acts 10.42 And he commanded us to preach unto the People and to testifie that it is he which was ordained of God to be the Iudge of quick and dead So also 2 Tim. 4.1 I charge thee before God and the Lord Iesus Christ who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his Kingdom And accordingly we are told that we shall all stand before the Iudgment seat of Christ Rom. 14.10 And all appear before the Iudgment seat of Christ that every one may receive the things done in his body according to that he hath done whether it be good or bad 2 Cor. 5.10 And to the same purpose our Saviour himself tells us that the Father judgeth no man that is immediately but hath given all judgment to his Son and afterward he gives the reason of it because he is the Son of man Iohn 5.22.27 that is because he dutifully complied with his Fathers Will in chearfully condescending to cloath himself in Humane Nature and therein to offer up himself a willing Victim for the sins of the World for so Rev. 5.9.12 Worthy is he alone to receive the Book of judgment and to open the Seals thereof because he was slain and hath redeemed us to God by his blood worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive the power and honour the glory and blessing appendent to his high Office of judging the World. From all which it abundantly appears that this great action of judging the World is to be performed by Christ. I proceed therefore to the Second general Head I proposed to treat of which was to give an account of the signs and forerunners of his coming to judgment For before he actually appears he will give the secure World a fearful warning of his coming by hanging out to its publick view a great many horrible signs and spectacles for thus the Prophet Ioel Ioel 1.30 31. I will shew wonders in the Heavens and in the Earth blood and fire and pillars of smoke the Sun shall be turned into darkness and the Moon into blood before the great and terrible day of the Lord which Prophesie of his is particularly exemplified by our Saviour Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the Sun be darkened and the Moon shall not give her light and the Stars of Heaven shall fall and the Powers of the Heavens shall be shaken and then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven Matt. 24 29 30. and more particularly Luke 21.11.25 Great Earthquakes shall be in divers places and Famines and Pestilences and fearful sights and great signs shall there be from Heaven and there shall be signs in the Sun and in the Moon and in the Stars and upon the Earth distress of Nations with great perplexity the Sea and the Waves roaring and then it follows then shall they see the Son of man coming It is true this Prophesie of our Saviour immediately respects the destruction of Ierusalem and was in part accomplished in it several of these very signs being a little before the Calamity of that City actually exhibited to the publick view of the World as both Iosephus and Tacitus assure us and several others of them were exhibited immediately after
and of our own form and shape which of all others is most familiar to and most beloved and reverenced by us and consequently of all others is most familiar to and most beloved and reverenced by us and consequently of all others is most apt to encourage our prayers and inflame our zeal and raise our admiration For in what sensible appearance could God have more powerfully affected our sense than in that which we are most inclined to love most prone to trust to and most accustomed to reverence and obey and than that in which alone we discern the Image of God and the reflections of those divine Attributes of Wisdom and Goodness and Truth and Justice for which we reverence and adore him There being therefore no visible substance in which God could more advantageously exhibit himself to us in order to the exciting our worship to him and determining it upon him than that of a humane form he thought meet to assume our natures into a personal union with his Divinity and therein to rule and govern us So that now the Humanity of our Saviour is the Tabernacle and Shechinah of God wherein the fulness of the Godhead dwelleth bodily and these two natures united in Person and Glory are the immediate object of our worship wherefore as the ancient Iews fell upon their faces and worshipped when they beheld the Shechinah or glory of the Lord their imagination being thereby assisted and their affections excited Levit. 9.24 So when we by our internal sense or imagination look up to the Glorified Humanity of our Saviour in Heaven it is our duty to raise up our affections to Heaven by that sensible Shechinah of God and thereupon to fall down and worship But as the Iews when they fell down before their Shechinah did not worship the visible light or glory separately from God but as it was united to and assumed into conjunction with him so neither ought we to worship our Shechinah viz. the humanity of our Saviour separately from his Divinity but in Union and Conjunction with it and in short as it was utterly unlawful for the Iews to worship God in any other Shechinah or sensible appearance either unshapen or shaped than in that Glorious one which he himself vouchsafed to them that being sufficient to affect their sense and thereby to raise up their minds and affections to him so is it utterly unlawful for us Christians to worship God in any other Shechinah Image similitude or visible appearance than that of the glorified humanity of our Saviour that being sufficient to assist our imaginations and elevate our hearts and devotions to him For though we cannot behold his glorified Humanity with our bodily Eyes now he is removed into Heaven yet so neither did the Iews the Glory of the Lord at least but very rarely after the Ark whereupon it sat was removed into the Holy of Holies which was a figure of Heaven yet as they being assured it was there could easily view it in their imaginations and thereby assist their devotion so we being assured from Scripture that Christs humanity is in Heaven can look up thither in our imagination and by beholding its glory there lift up our heavy minds and affections to the eternal Divinity that inhabits it so that if we Christians make any other Shechinah or Image to worship God in besides his own humanity which he himself made and wherein he now dwells above in the Heavens we are of all false worshippers the most inexcusable because by assuming our humanity God hath vouchsafed to us such an Image and Shechinah of himself as is of all others the most proper and effectual to excite and determine our Devotions III. God hath chosen to Govern us by his own eternal Son in our natures that he might thereby the more powerfully incourage us to obedience for now we have all the assurance in the World that the great design of his Government is to do us good and to advance our happiness and that under his blessed Empire we shall be sure to enjoy all the graces and favours that can be wisely indulged on his part or modestly expected on ours Had he Governed us immediately by himself we could not have been so secure of our interest in him as we have reason to be of our interest in his Son hypostatically united to our nature because the divine Nature considered purely as such is infinitly distant from ours and has no other relation to it than as it is the common cause of all things and being so distant in nature from us it would have been hard for us to imagine how he could be touched with the same tender and compassionate regard for us as he would be if he were nearer allied to us especially when we reflected upon our own demerit and considered that by our sins we had set our selves at a wider distance from him than we were by our natures this together with that anxiety which naturally arises in guilty minds could not but have rendered us very suspicious of Gods intentions towards us had he governed us immediately by himself but now that he governs us by his own Son cloathed in our own nature at his hands we may with full confidence expect a most gracious and merciful treatment For now we are assured we have a close and most intimate interest in him by reason of his kindred and Alliance to us in the same common nature which makes him every mans another self under different accidents and circumstances and his nature being perfectly happy and perfectly pure from all irregular passions and appetites cannot but be affected with a most tender regard to all the individuals of its own kind because being compleatly happy himself he can have nothing farther to desire for himself but that his kindred by nature who are all his own substance dilated and multiplied may be happy too and being intirely good he can have nothing of that sordid selfishness in him which doth too often contract and narrow our benevolence and cause us like Serpents to infold our selves within our selves and to turn out our stings to all the World besides Upon both these accounts therefore as he is a perfectly happy and perfectly good man he cannot but bear a hearty and universal good will to mankind and that he doth so he hath given us too many dear experiments to make the least doubt of it for while he was among us he all along prefer'd our interest before his own he made himself poor to inrich us exposed himself to contempt to raise us to glory took upon him our guilt to release us from punishment and willingly underwent a most miserable death that we might live happily for ever In all which he gave us the most Glorious demonstrations how infinitely dear the humane nature of which he participated was to him in all those numberless individuals into which it hath been multiplied The consideration of which is exceedingly pregnant with