(1.) The object of this vision, the face of God which is his glory represented, offered to view. And this objected or exhibited glory is twofold:-sensible, such as shall incur and gratify (after the resurrection) the bodily eye, and-intellectual, or intelligible; that spiritual glory that only comes under the view and contemplation of the glorified mind.

[1] A sensible glory (to begin with what is lower) is fitly in our way to be taken notice of, and may well be comprehended (as its less principal intendment) within the significancy of the expression; the face of God. So indeed it doth evidently signify, Exod. 33. 11. And if we look to the notation of the word, and its frequent use as applied to God, it may commodiously enough, and will often be found to signify, in a larger and more extended sense, any aspect or appearance of God. And though it may be understood (ver. 23.) of that chapter, to signify an over-coming spiritual glory, as the principal thing there intended, such as no soul dwelling in flesh could behold, without rending the vail, and breaking all to pieces; yet, even there also, may such a degree of sensible glory be secondarily intended, as it was not consistent with a state of mortality to be able to bear. And supposing the other expression "Thy likeness;" to signify, in any part, the objective glory saints are to behold; it is very capable of being extended so far, as to take in a sensible appearance of glory also, which it doth in these words, "The similitude of the Lord shall he behold:" (Numb. 12. 8.) yet even that glory also was transformative and impressive of itself: Moses so long conversed with it, till he became uncapable, for the present, of conversing with men, as you know the story relates. Ezek. 1. 28. Exod. 34, 35, &c.

Such a glory as this, though it belong not to the being of God, yet it may be some umbrage of him, a more shadowy representation, as a man's garments are of the man, which is the allusion in that of the Psalmist, That art clothed with majesty and honor: Thou coverest thyself with light as with a garment. Psal. 104. 1, 2. And inasmuch as that spiritual body (the house not made with hands, 2, Cor. 5. 1.) wherewith the blessed are to be clothed upon, must then be understood to have its proper sensitive powers and organs refined to that degree, as may be agreeable to a state of glory; so must these have their suitable objects to converse with. A faculty without an object, is not possible in nature, and is altogether inconsistent with a state of blessedness. The bodies of saints will be raised in glory, fashioned like Christ's glorious body; must bear the image of the heavenly; (1. Cor. 14. 43. Phil. 3. 21.) and this will connaturalize them to a region of glory, render a surrounding, sensible glory necessary

Cuilibet potentiæ activæ respondet passiva, sive objectiva: To every active faculty, there corresponds a passive or objective one.

and natural to them, their own element: they will, as it were, not be able to live but amidst such a glory. Place is conservative of the body placed in it, by its suitableness there. Indeed every created being (inasmuch as it is not self-sufficient, and is obliged to fetch in continual refreshings from without) must always have somewhat suitable to itself to converse with, or it presently languishes. By such a harmony of actives and passives, the world consists and holds together. The least defect thereof then, is least of all supposable in the state of blessedness. The rays of such a glory have often shone down into this lower world. Such a glory we know shewed itself upon the Mount Sinai afterwards often about the tabernacle, and in the temple; such a glory appeared at our Saviour's birth, baptism, and transfiguration; and will do at his expected appearance; which leaves it no unimaginable thing to us, and shews, how facile it is to God to (do that which will then be, in some soit necessary) create a glory meet for the entertainment and gratification of any such faculty, as he shall then continue in being. But,

[2.] The intellectual glory, That which perfected spirits shall eternally please themselves to behold, calls for our more especial consideration. This is the glory that excelleth, hyperbolical glory, as that expression regaλions dóğns (2. Cor. 3. 10.) imports; such, as in comparison whereof, the other is said to be no glory: as the apostle speaks, comparing the glory of the legal with that of the evangelical dispensation, where the former was, we must remember, chiefly a sensible glory, the glory that shone upon Mount Sinai; the latter a purely spiritual glory; and surely, if the mere preludes of this glory, the primordia, the beginnings of it, the glory-yet shining but through a glass, (as he there also speaks of his glory) were so hyperbolically glorious, what will it be in its highest exultation, in its perfected state? The apostle cannot speak of that, but with hyperbole upon hyperbole in the next chapter. Καθ' ὑπερβολὴν εἰς ὑπερβολήν. (2. Cor. 4. 17.) as though he would heap up words as high as heaven to reach it, and give a just account of it. Things are as their next originals. This glory, more immediately rays forth from God, and more nearly represents him. It is his more genuine production. He is styled the Father of Glory: (Eph. 1. 17.) every thing that is glorious is some way like him, and bears his image. But he is as well the Father of Spirits, (Heb. 12. 9.) as the Father of Glory; and that glory, which is purely spiritual, hath most in it of his nature and image as beams but in the next descent from the body of the sun. This is his unveiled face, and emphatically, the divine likeness. Again, things are as the faculties which they are to exercise and satisfy; this glory must exercise and satisfy the noblest faculty, of the most noble and excellent creature. Intellectual nature, in the highest improvement it is capable of in a creature, must here be gratified to the uttermost; the most

enlarged contemplative power of an immortal spirit find that wherein it terminates here, with a most contentful acquiescence. It is true it must be understood not totally to exceed the capacity of a creature, but it must fully come up to it. Should it quite transcend the sphere of created nature, and surpass the model of a human understanding (as the divine glory undoubtedly would, did not God consider us in the manner of exhibiting it to our view) it would confound, not satisfy. A creature even in glory is still a creature, and must be treated as such. After the blessed God hath elevated it to the highest pitch, he must infinitely condescend: it cannot otherwise know or converse with him. He must accommodate his glory to the weaker eye, the fainter and more languid apprehensions of a poor finite thing. I had almost said nothing, for what is any creature, yea, the whole creation in its best state, compared with the I AM, the being (as he justly appropriates to himself that name) the Ail in All. We must be careful then to settle in our own thoughts such a state of this glory (in forming that indeterminate notion we have now of it) as may render it (though confessedly above the measure of our present understandings as to a distinct knowledge of it) not manifestly incompetent to any created understanding whatsoever, and as may speak us duly shy of ascribing deity to a worm, of affixing any thing to the creature, which shall be found agreeing to the blessed God himself alone. Their expressions therefore who over-magnify (even deify) the creature assumed into glory, must be heard and read with caution and abhorrency, as the high-swelling words of blasphemous vanity. Is it not enough that perishing wretches, that were within one hand's breadth of hell, are saved, except they be also deified too? that they become happy, unless they also become gods? The distance even of a glorified creature from the glorious God, is still infinitely greater, than between it and the silliest worm, the minutest attom of dust.

And by how much more we shall then know of his glory, so much more shall we understand that distance. Yet as he shall then enlarge the capacity of the soul he glorifies, to a very vast comprehension, so shall the exhibition of his glory to it, be fully adequate to its most enlarged capacity. They are as yet but obscure glimmerings, we can have of this glory; but so far as, without too bold curiosity, we may, and wherein Scripture-light will give us any pre-apprehension of it, let us consider a while, the nature and the excellency of it. We cannot indeed consider these separately; for we can no sooner understand it to be glory, than we conceive it excellent; glory, in the proper notion of it, being nothing else but resplendent excellency, the lustre of excellency, or real worth made conspicuous. Yet as there is an excellency conceivable in the nature of it, that excellency whereof it is the splendor and brightness; so we must conceive

a peculiar excellency of that very radiation, that splendor itself, wherewith it shines unto blessed souls. In its very nature it is the brightness of divine excellencies: in its present appearance, it shines in the highest excellency of that brightness; in its nature it excelleth all things else: in its present exhibition, compared with all its former radiations, it excelleth itself.

As to the nature of this glory, it is nothing else but the conspicuous lustre of divine perfections. We can only guide our present conceptions of it, by the discovery God hath already given us of himself, in those several excellencies of his being, the great attributes that are convertible and one with him. When Moses besought him for a sight of his glory, he answers him with this, "I will proclaim my name before thee." His name, we know, is the collection of his attributes. The notion therefore we can hence form of this glory, is only such as we may have of a large volume by a brief synopsis or table; of a magnificent fabric, by a small model or platform; a spacious country, by a little landscape. He hath here given us a true representation of himself, not a full; such as will secure our apprehensions, being guided thereby, from error, not from ignorance. So as they swerve not in apprehending this glory, though they still fall short. We can only apply our minds to contemplate the several perfections which the blessed God assumes to himself, and whereby he describes to us his own being; and can in our thoughts attribute them all to him, though we have still but low defective conceptions of each one. As if we could at a distance distinguish the streets and houses of a great city; but every one appears to us much less than it is. We can apprehend somewhat of whatsoever he reveals to be in himself; yet when all is done, how little a portion do we take up of him! Our thoughts are empty and languid, straight and narrow, such as diminish and limit the Holy One. Yet so far as our apprehensions can correspond to the discovery he affords us of his several excellencies, we have a present view of the divine glory. Do but strictly and distinctly survey the many perfections comprehended in his name, then gather them up, and consider how glorious he is! Conceive one glory resulting from substantial wisdom, goodness, power, truth, justice, holiness, that is, beaming forth from him who is all these by his very essence, necesssarily, originally, infinitely, eternally, with whatsoever else is truly a perfection. This is the glory blessed souls shall behold for ever.

For the excellency of it, it is called by way of discrimination, "The excellent glory." 2. Pet. 1. 17. There was glory put upon Christ in the transfiguration; of which, when the apostle speaks, having occasion to mention withal the glory of heaven itself, from whence the voice came; he adds to this latter, the distinguishing note of the excellent. He himself was eye-witness of the honour, and majesty, and glory, which the Lord Je

sus then received; but beyond all this, the glory from whence the voice came, was the excellent or stately glory, as the word Meyaλorgeous imports. It is a great intimation how excellent a glory this is, that it is said to be a glory yet to be revealed; (1. Pet. 4. 13.) as if it had been said, whatever appearances of the divine glories are now offered to your view, there is still somewhat undiscovered, somewhat behind the curtain that will outshine all. You have not seen so much, but you are still to expect unspeakably more. Glory is then to shine in its noon-day strength and vigor: it is then in its meridian. Here, the riches of glory are to be displayed, certain treasures of glory, the plenitude and magnificence of glory. We are here to see him as he is; to know him as we are known of him. Certainly, the display of himself, the rays of his discovered excellency, must hold proportion with that vision, and be therefore exceeding glorious. It is the glory Christ had with the Father before the foundations of the world were laid; (John 1. 5.) into the vision and communion whereof holy souls shall now be taken, according as their capacities can admit; that wherewithal his great achievements and high merits shall be rewarded eternally; that wherewith he is to be glorified in heaven, in compensation of having glorified his Father on earth, and finished the work whereto he was appointed. This cannot but be a most transcendent glory. It is in sum, and in the language of the text, the glory of God's own face, his most aspectable, conspicuous glory. Whose transforming beams are productive of the glory impressed, the next ingredient into this blessedness, which will presently come to be spoken of, after we have given you some short account of,

(2.) The act of beholding: the vision or intuition itself, by which intervening the impression is made. Glory seems to carry in it a peculiar respect to the visive power (whether corporeal or mental, as it is itself of the one kind or the other); it is something to be contemplated, to be looked upon. And being to transmit an impression, and consequent pleasure to another subject, it must necessrily be so, it can neither transform nor satisfy but as it is beheld. And here the sensitive intuition I shall not insist on, as being less intended in the text, and the discourse of it less suitable to such as with a spiritual mind and design set themselves to inquire into the nature of the saints' blessedness. Yet, as this is the most noble, comprehensive, quick, and sprightly sense, so is the act of it more considerable, in the matter of blessedness, than any other of the outward man, and the most perfect imitation of the act of the mind; whence also this so often borrows the name of the other, and is called seeing. It is an act indeed very proper and pertinent to a state of glory. By how much more any sensible object is glorious (supposing the sensorium to be duly disposed and fortified, as must be here supposed), so much it is the fitter object of sight; hence when we