of retribution hereafter. Such are the conclusions of reason; and such, as we have seen, is the language of Scripture. The picture which St. John has here given us of the last day, is too much like what our consciences tell us it ought to be, to be in any important respect different from what will really take place. It may not, indeed, be an actual description of the scenes which will then be acted. Our present faculties may not be able to comprehend, in its full extent, the nature of the transactions of that solemn time; and so the apostle, in order to give us, (what is alone important) a right impression of the part that we shall have to act, and the consequences that we may expect, may have designed to bring heavenly things as near as possible to our comprehension by figuring them under the circumstances of an earthly tribunal. Still, the main particulars here stated, will certainly and literally take place. The dead, small and great, must stand before God, and sentence will be passed upon every man according to the things done in the body, 1 whether they be good, or whether they be evil. Then, also, the wicked shall go away into everlasting punishment; but the righteous, into life eternal. And if all this must really happen,-if it be indeed true that a day is coming, in which God will judge the world by that man whom he hath sent," what manner of persons, my brethren, ought ye to be, in all holy conversation and godliness 1?" For we must not forget that we are not merely to be spectators of the events of this solemn day; we are to be actors also. And the splendid array of the scene, awful as the very sight of it must be even to immortal eyes, shrinks into nothing when it is compared with the momentous questions which will then be decided for all eternity; and the general consideration as to what the doom of others will be, is again lost in the thought, that, amidst all those myriads of names called up for judgment, we shall, each individual among us, have to hear and tremble at the sound of our own! 1 2 Peter iii. 11. This startling description, then, is not given us merely for our information; it is intended mainly for our instruction, that we, knowing the terrors of the Lord, might be induced, as men who act upon their knowledge, to flee from the wrath to come; and if we were each impressed with a conviction of the absolute certainty, and the sure and sudden arrival of this awful day, what other argument would be needed, what other warning should we require, to keep us from the ways of sin, and guide us into the paths of godliness? And yet the text, (and the Scripture cannot be broken), assures us, that this day will come, not only suddenly, but soon:-" Behold," says our Lord," I come quickly." As ages are counted in eternity, the days of the world, protracted as they may seem to us short-lived beings, will be but as it were a span long-for time is but a drop in the vast ocean of eternity; and we seem to have Scripture authority for asserting that this day will arrive at a moment when the inhabitants of the world are least expecting it. It will come, we are told," as the flood came in the days of Noah '," when men were not only not looking for such a catastrophe, but were thinking and acting as if such an event were beyond the bounds of possibility: and may not an age like our own, of infidelity, and general laxity of principle, be that which, while it is least inclined to do so, ought to listen with the greatest alarm for the sound of the archangel's summons?" Where," say such men, "is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things remain as they were from the beginning"." But, without attempting to ascertain "the times and the seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power","-" that day and hour which no man knoweth, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but the Father," we know, at least, sufficient for our own good-namely, that it will finally come, and will not tarry. And we know also the object of that solemn array of justice-" my reward 1 Luke xvii. 26. 2 2 Pet. iii. 4. 4 Mark xiii. 32, 6 to is with me," saith the Judge, give every man according as his work shall be." None will be omitted, none will be forgotten-none favoured, and none oppressed. A recompence will be given to every man; and that recompence will be according to his works; that is, not for his works, or equal to them only; for then, though many might be severely punished, none could be highly rewarded; -but upon a scale infinitely beyond them in point of magnitude, yet that scale graduated in proportion to the deeds done by us severally in the body'. In the parable of the talents-the scale of reward is in proportion to the number of As far as the Author's recollection serves, the substance of this passage is taken from a very useful volume, entitled, "Parochialia: or, a Manual of Helps to the Parochial Clergyman;" by the Rev. Henry Thompson ;—a volume alike excellent in design and execution. The skeletons of sermons contained in it are the only ones which the Author has yet seen that can be safely and implicitly trusted; and he wishes to take this opportunity of earnestly recommending them to the attention of his younger |