Their most refined malice cannot reach our fpirits; no weapon that can be formed by the utmost art of man can pierce or wound our fouls; they can drive us out of this world, but they cannot purfue us into the other fo that at the worft the grave will be a fanctuary to us, and death a fafe retreat from all their rage and fury."

But the wrath of God is not confined by any of thefe limits. Once hath God spoken, (faith David, by an elegant Hebrew phrafe to exprefs the certainty of the thing), once hath God spoken, and twice have I heard this, that power belongs to God, Pfal. lxii. 11. He hath a mighty arm, and when he pleaseth to ftretch it out, none may ftay it, nor fay unto him, What deft thou ? He hath power enough to make good all his threat enings; whatever he fays he is able to effect, and whatever he purpofeth he can bring to pafs; for his coun fel fhall ftand, and he will accomplish all his pleasure. He need but fpeak the word, and it is done; for we can neither refift his power, nor fly from it: if we fly to the utmost parts of the earth, his hand can reach us, for in his hand are all the corners of the earth; if we take refuge in the grave, (and we cannot do that without his leave), thither his wrath can follow us, and there it will overtake us; for his power is not confined to this world, nor limited to our bodies: After he hath killed, he can deftroy both body and foul in hell.

And this is that wrath of God which is revealed from heaven, and which the Apoftle chiefly intends, viz. the mifery and punishment of another world. This God hath threatened finners withal; to exprefs which to us, as fully as words can do, he heaps up in the next chapter fo many weighty and terrible words, indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish, upon every foul of man that doth evil; in oppofition to that great and glorious reward of immortality and eternal life, which is promifed to a patient continuance in well-doing.

So that the wrath of God, which is here denounced against the impiety and unrighteoufnefs of men, comprehends all the evils and miferies of this and

the

the other world, which every finner is in danger of whilft he continues impenitent; for as, according to the tenor of the gospel, godliness bath the promife of this life and of that which is to come, fo impenitency in fin expofeth men to the evils of both worlds, to the judgements of the life that now is, and to the endless and intolerable torments of that which is to come. And what can be more dreadful than the displeasure of an almighty and eternal Being, who can punish to the utmost, and who lives for ever, to execute his wrath and vengeance upon finners? fo that well might the Apostle fay, It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

Confider this, all ye that forget God, that neglect him, and live in continual disobedience to his holy and righteous laws; much more thofe who defpife and atfront him, and live in a perpetual defiance of him. Will ye provoke the Lord to jealousy? are ye ftronger than he? Think of it ferioufly, and forget him if you' can, defpife him if you dare; confider this, left he take you into confideration, and roufe like a lion out of fleep, and tear you in pieces, and there be none to deliver. This is the firft obfervation, the infinite danger that a wicked and finful courfe doth expofe men to, the wrath of God, which doth not only fignify more than all the evils that we know, but than all those which the wildest fears and fufpicions of our minds can imagine..

II. The next thing obfervable, is the clear and undoubted revelation which the gospel has made of this danger: The wrath of God is revealed, &c. By which the Apostle intimates to us, that this was but obfcurely known to the world before, at least in comparison of that clear difcovery which the gospel hath now made of it; fo that I may allude to that expreffion in Job, which he applies to death and the grave, that bell is naked before us, and deftruction hath no covering.

Not but that mankind had always apprehenfions and jealoufies of the danger of a wicked life, and finners were always afraid of the vengeance of God purfuing their evil deeds, not only in this life, but

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after it too; and though they had turned the punishments of another world into ridiculous fables, yet the wifer fort of mankind could not get it out of their minds, that there was fomething real under them ; and that Ixion's wheel, which by a perpetual motion. carried him about; and Sifyphus his ftone, which he was perpetually rolling up the hill, and when he had got it near the top tumbled down, and fill created: him a new labour; and Tantalus his continual hunger and thirft, aggravated by a perpetual nearness of enjoyment, and a perpetual difappointment; and Prometheus his being chained to a rock, with an eas gle or vulture perpetually preying upon his liver,. which grew as faft as it was gnawed; I fay, even the wifer among the Heathens looked upon thefe as fantaftical reprefentations of fomething that was real, viz. the grievous and endlefs punishment of finners, the not to be endured, and yet perpetually renewed, tor、 ments of another world: for in the midst of all the ignorance and degeneracy of the Heathen world, mens confciences did accufe them when they did amifs, andi they had fecret fears and mifgivings of fome mighty danger hanging over them from the difpleafure of a fuperior Being, and the apprehenfion of fome great mischiefs likely to follow their wicked actions, which fome time or other would overtake them; which be cause they did not always in this world, they dread. ed them in the next. And this was the foundation of all thofe fuperftitions, whereby the ancient Pagans endeavoured fo carefully to appeafe their offended deities, and to avert the calamities which they feared they would fend down upon them. But all this while they had no certain affurance, by any clear and express. revelation from God, to that purpofe, but only the jealoufies and fufpicions of their own minds, naturally confequent upon thofe notions which men generally had of God; but fo obfcured and depraved by the lufts and vices. of men, and by the grofs and falfe conceptions which they had of God, that they only fer ved to make them fuperftitious, but were not clear and Arong enough to make them wifely and seriously reli

gious. And to speak the truth, the more knowing and inquifitive part of the Heathen world had brought all thefe things into great doubt and uncertainty, by the nicety and fubtility of difputes about them; fo that it was no great wonder that thefe principles hack no greater effect upon the lives of men, when their apprehenfions of them were fo dark and doubtful.

But the gospel hath made a most clear and certain revelation of these things to mankind. It was written before upon mens hearts, as the great fanction of the law of nature; but the impreffions of this were in a great measure blurred and worn out, fo that it had no great power and efficacy upon the minds and manners of men; but now it is clearly discovered to us ; the wrath of God is revealed from heaven; which ex-' preffion may well imply in it thefe three things.

1. The clearness of the difcovery: The wrath of God is faid to be revealed.

2. The extraordinary manner of it; it is faid to be revealed from heaven.

3. The certainty of it; not being the refult of fub-' tle and doubtful reafonings, but having a divine teftimony and confirmation given to it, which is the proper meaning of being revealed from heaven.

1. It imports the clearness of the discovery. The punishment of finners in another world is not fo obfeure a matter as it was before; it is now expressly declared in the gospel, together with the particular circumftances of it, namely, that there is another life after this, wherein men fhall receive the just re compenfe of reward for all the actions done by them in this life; that there is a particular time appointed, i wherein God will call all the world to a folemn account, and those who are in their graves flrali by at powerful voice be railed to life, and those who fhall then be found alive, fhall be fuddenly changed;. when our Lord Jesus Christ, the eternal and only begotten Son of God, who once came in great humility/ to fave us, fhall come again in power and great glory, attended with his mighty angels, and all nations fhall be gathered before him; and all mankind fhall be fe

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parated into two companies, the righteous and the wicked, who, after a full hearing, and fair trial,. fhall be sentenced according to their actions, the one to eternal life and happiness, the other to eyerlasting; mifery and torment.

So that the gospel hath not only declared the thing to us, that there fhall be a future judgement; but for our farther affurance and fatisfaction in this mat-ter, and that these things might make a deep impreffion, and ftrike a great awe upon our minds, God hath been pleased to reveal it to us with a great ma ny particular circumftances, fuch as are very worthy of God, and apt to fill the minds of men with dread and astonishment, as often as they think of them.

For the circumftances of this judgement revealed to us in the gofpel, are very folemn and awful, not fuch as the wild fancies and imaginations of menwould have been apt to have dressed it up withal; fuch as are the fictions of the Heathen poets, and the extravagancies of Mahomet; which though they be ter rible enough, yet they are withal ridiculous; but fuch as are every way becoming the majesty of the great God, and the folemnity of the great day, and fuch as do not in the leaft favour of the vanity and light nefs of human imagination.

For what more fair and equal, than that men fhould be tried by a man like themfelves, one of the fame rank and condition, that had experience of the infirmities and temptations of human nature? So our Lord tells us, that the Father hath committed all judgement to the Son, because he is the Son of man, and therefore cannot be excepted againft, as not being a fit and equal judge. And this St Paul offers as a clear proof of the equitable proceedings of that day: God (fays he) bath appointed a day, in which he will judge the world in righteousness, by that man whom he hath ordained.

And then what more congruous than that the Son of God, who had taken fo much pains for the falva tion of men, and came into the world for that pur pose, and had used all imaginable means for the reformation