Then, it will be one of the smallest privileges of the righteous, that they shall languish no more ; that sickness will never again show her pale countenance in their dwellings. Death itself will be 'swallowed up in victory.' That fatal javelin, which has drank the blood of monarchs, and finds its way to the hearts of all the sons of Adam, shall be utterly broken. That enormous sithe, which has struck empires from their root, and swept ages and generations into oblivion, shall lie by in perpetual uselessness. Sin also, which filled thy quiver, thou insatiate archer! -sin, which strung thy arm with resistless vigour ; which pointed all thy shafts with inevitable destruction-sin will then be done away. Whatever is frail or depraved will be thrown off with our grave-clothes. All to come is perfect holiness, and consummate happiness, the term of whose continuance is eternity.

O eternity! eternity! how are our boldest, our strongest thoughts, lost and overwhelmed in thee! Who can set landmarks to limit thy dimensions, or find plummets to fathom thy depths? Arithmeticians have figures to compute all the progressions of time; astronomers have instruments to calculate the distances of the planets; but what numbers can state, what lines can gauge, the lengths and breadths of eternity? It is higher than heaven, what canst thou do? deeper than hell, what canst thou know? the measure thereof is longer than the earth, broader than the seat.'

Mysterious, mighty existence! a sum not to be lessened by the largest deductions! an extent not to be contracted by all possible diminutions! None can truly say, after the most prodigious waste of

Isaiah, speaking of the new Jerusalem, mentions this as one of its immunities: The inhabitants thereof shall no more say, I am sick. Another clause in its royal charter rung thus God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes, And there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, heither shall there be any more pain.' Isai. xxxiii. 24. Rev. #xi. 4.

↑ Job, xi. 8, 9:

ages, 'So much of eternity is gone;' for, when millions of centuries are elapsed, it is but just commencing; and, when millions more have run their ample round, it will be no nearer ending. Yea, when ages, numerous as the bloom of spring, increased by the herbage of summer, both augmented by the leaves of autumn, and all multiplied by the drops of rain which drown the winter when these and ten thousand times ten thousand more-more than can be represented by any similitude, or imagined by any conception-when all these are revolved and finished, eternity, vast, boundless, amazing eternity, will only be beginning!

What a pleasing, yet awful thought is this! full of delight, and full of dread. O may it alarm our fears, quicken our hopes, and animate all our endeavours! Since we are so soon to launch into this endless and inconceivable state, let us give all diligence to secure our entrance into bliss. Now, let us give all diligence, because there is no alteration in the scenes of futurity. The wheel never turns: all is steadfast and immoveable beyond the grave. Whether we are then seated on the throne, or stretched on the rack; a seal will be set to our condition by the hand of everlasting mercy or inflexible justice. The saints always rejoice amidst the smiles of Heaven; their harps are perpetually tuned; their triumphs admit of no interruption. The ruin of the wicked is irremediable. The fatal sentence, once passed, is never to be repealed. No hope of exchanging their doleful habitations; but all things bear the same dismal aspect for ever and ever.

The wicked! my mind recoils at the apprehension of their misery. It has studiously waved the fearful subject, and seems unwilling to pursue it, even now. But 'tis better to reflect upon it for a few minutes, than to endure it to eternal ages. Perhaps the consideration of their aggravated misery

-Animus meminisse horret, luctuque refugit.-Virg.

may be profitably terrible; may teach me more highly to prize the Saviour, who delivers from going down to the bottomless pit;' may drive me, like the avenger's sword, to this only city of refuge for obnoxious sinners.

The wicked seem to lie here, like malefactors, in a deep and strong dungeon, reserved against the day of trial. "Their departure was without peace." Clouds of horror sat louring upon their closing eyelids, most sadly foreboding the, 'blackness of darkness for ever.' When the last sickness seized their frame, and the inevitable change advanced; when they saw the fatal arrow fitting to the strings, saw the deadly archer aiming at their heart, and felt the envenomed shaft fastened in their vitals-good God! what fearfulness came upon them! What horrible dread overwhelmed them! How did they stand shuddering and aghast upon the tremendous precipice excessively afraid to plunge into the abyss of eternity, yet utterly unable to maintain their standing on the verge of life.

O! what pale reviews, what startling prospects conspire to augment their sorrows! They look backward and behold! a most melancholy scene! sins unrepented of; mercy slighted; and the day of grace ending! They look forward, and nothing presents itself but the righteous Judge, the dreadful tribunal, and a most solemn reckoning. They roll around their affrighted eyes on attending friends. If accomplices in debauchery, it sharpens their anguish to consider this farther aggravation of their guilt, that they have not sinned alone, but drawn others into the snare. If religious acquaintance, it strikes a fresh gash into their hearts, to think of never seeing them any more, but only at an unapproachable distance, separated by the unpassable gulph.

At last, perhaps, they begin to pray. Finding no other possible way of relief, they are constrained to apply unto the Almighty. With trembling lips and a faultering tongue they cry unto that Sovereign

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Being, 'who kills and makes alive.' But why have they deferred, so long deferred, their addresses to God? Why have they despised all his counsels, and stood incorrigible under his incessant reproofs ? How often have they been forewarned of these terrors, and most importunately entreated to seek the Lord while he might be found? I wish they may obtain mercy at the eleventh, at the last hour. I wish they may be snatched from the jaws, the opened, the gaping, the almost closing jaws of damnation. But, alas! who can tell whether affronted Majesty will lend an ear to their complaint? whether the Holy One will work a miracle of grace in behalf of such transgressors? He may, for aught any mortal knows, laugh at their calamity, and mock when their fear cometh.'

Thus they lie, groaning out the poor remains of life; their limbs bathed in sweat; their heart struggling with convulsive throes; pains insupportable throbbing in every pulse; and innumerable darts of agony transfixing their conscience.

In that dread moment, how the frantic soul
Raves round the walls of her clay tenement;
Runs to each avenue; and shrieks for help;
But shrieks in vain! How wishfully she looks
On all she's leaving, now no longer hers!
A little longer, yet a little longer,

O! might she stay, to wash away her crimes,
And fit her for her passage! Mournful sight!
Her very eyes weep blood; and every groan
She heaves, is big with horror; but the foe,
Like a staunch murd'rer, steady to his purpose,
Pursues her close through ev'ry lane of life,
Nor misses once the track; but presses on.
Till, forc'd at last to the tremendous verge,
At once she sinks*.-

If this be the end of the ungodly, 'my soul, come not thou into their secret! unto their assembly, mine honour, be not thou united!' How awfully accomplished is that prediction of inspired wisdom! Sin, though seemingly sweet in the commission, yet at the last it biteth like a serpent, and stingeth like an

* See a valuable poem, entitled The Grave.'

adder. Fly, therefore, from the tents, O! fly from the ways of such wretched men.

Happy dissolution! were this the period of their woes. But, alas! all these tribulations are only 'the beginning of sorrows;' as mall drop only from that cup of trembling,' which is mingled for their future portion. No sooner has the last pang dis lodged their reluctant souls, but they are hurried into the presence of an injured angry God; not under the conducting care of beneficent angels, but exposed to the insults of accursed spirits, who lately tempted them, now upbraid them, and will for ever torment them. Who can imagine their confusion and distress, when they stand guilty and inexcusable before their incensed Creator? They are received with frowns. The God that made them has no mercy on them. The Prince of Peace rejects them with abhorrence. He consigns them over to chains of darkness and receptacles of despair, against the severer doom and more public infamy of the great day. Then, all the vials of wrath will be emptied upon these wretched creatures. The law they have violated, and the Gospel they have slighted; the power they have defied, and the goodness they have abused; will all get themselves honour in their exemplary destruction. Then God, the God to whom vengeance belongeth, will draw the arrow to the very head, and set them as the mark of his inexorable displeasure.

Resurrection will be no privilege to them; but immortality itself their everlasting curse. Would they not bless the grave, that land where all things are forgotten,' and wish to lie eternally hid in its deepest gloom? But the dust refuses to conceal their persons, or to draw a veil over their practices. They also must awake; must arise; must appear at the bar, and meet the Judge; a Judge, before whom 'the pillars of heaven tremble, and the earth melts