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•0
%pnxl0u Mtk\t$.
LECTUEES
ON THE
BOOK OF HEYELATION.
BY
THE EEY. JOKN" CUMMmG, D.D.
OF THE SCOTCH NATIONAL CHURCH, AUTHOE OF LECTURES ON THE
PARABLES, DANIEL, ETC. ETC.
■ And I saw a new heaven and a new earth : for the first heaven and the first earth
were passed away." — Rev. xxi. 1.
PHILADELPHIA:
LI:N'DSAY Al^D BLAKISTOF.
1856.
:5S
i.?>
B-y%^
/
PEEFACE.
. This volume is an attempt to expound Apocalyptic pro-
phecies of scenes, events, and glory yet to come. The
Author believes that these are about to emerge far sooner
than many believe. He desires that more may be found
with their lamps burning and their loins girt, and ready to
meet the Lord. He longs to attract a greater number
from the too ardent pursuit of this world, to great, per-
manent, and all but instant things, by unfolding their
greater beauty, glory, and magnificence ; and thus dis-
placing the earthly preference by the appliance of heavenly
hopes.
It is his sincere prayer that the reader may enjoy a
portion at least of the pleasure felt by the writer in study-
ing and expounding these parts of the Apocalypse. His
only regret has been that time was so short, and that the
Apocalypse has an end. He trusts he has shown no pre-
sumption in endeavouring to expound parts of this blessed
Book, very little opened up, either in the pulpit or by the
press. He is sure that the precious truths he has unfolded
will, by the blessing of the Spirit of God, produce good
fruit ; and that the hopes, drawn from the future and the
1* 5
6 PREFACE.
heavenly, will refresh, as with the air and the aroma of
Eden, those who are covered with the dust and weary
of the din of this incessant and besetting world. We are
plunging into a state, in which the lights of the Apoca-
lypse will be pre-eminently useful. We shall soon see
scenes, events, and changes which will make those stagger v
whose minds have not been previously directed to this
Book. "I come quickly. Even so, come, Lord Jesus."
CONTENTS.
LECTUEE I.
FAGS
Christ's Many Crowns i?et;.xix.l2 11
LECTUBE II.
The CoNGREaATiosr or the Dead Eev.xxr.lZ 26
LECTURE in.
The New Jerusalem Rev.xxi.1-3; 10-21 41
LECTURE IV.
The Sorrowless State .Bet?, xxi. 3, 4 55
LECTURE V.
All things New ^ev. xxi. 5 69
LECTURE VL
The Conqueror ^cv. xxi.7 84
LECTURE VIL
The Unbelieving i?ct>.xxi.8 99
LECTURE VIIL
Endless Sufferers Rev.xsLS 117
LECTURE IX.
The Bride ..H.S^iV. i?ev.xxi.9j xix.6 128
1
8 CONTENTS.
LECTURE X.
PACIB
The Apocalyptic Temple Jiev.xxi.22 143
LECTURE XL
MiLLENKiAL LiGHT JRev.xxi.2Z 157
LECTURE XIL
Day without Night ^eu. xxi. 24-26 171
LECTURE XIIL
The Franchise of the Nett Jerusalem Eev.xxi.27 185
LECTURE XrV.
The River op Life «. ^cr.xxii. 1 201
LECTURE XV.
The Tree of Life ^ev.xxii.2 209
LECTURE XVL
No HORE Curse Rev.xxii.Z 213
LECTURE XVIL
Recognition in the Age to come liev. xxii.5 229
LECTURE XVIIL
Faithful and True Sayings ^er. xxii. 6 238
LECTURE XIX.
Romish Worship JRev. xxii. 8, 9 246
LECTURE XX.
Apocalyptic Sayings ^ev. xxii. 10 262
LECTURE XXL
The Eternity op Spiritual Character Eev.xxii.ll 270
LECTURE XXIL
The Judgment ^cr. xxii. 12 277
LECTURE XXIIL
The Great White Throne i?ev,xxii.l2; xx. 11-15 285
CONTENTS. 9
LECTURE XXIV.
PAGE
The Divinity op Chbist ^ev. xxii.l3 302
LECTURE XXV.
The Blessed Ones J?et;. xxii. 14 317
LECTURE XXVL
The Invitation Iiev.xxu.lt 331
LECTURE XXVIL
The Perfect Book iJev.xxii. 18 346
LECTURE XXVIIL
The Advent i?et7. xxii. 20 368
LECTURE XXIX.
Order op Advent Eev.xxu20 381
LECTURE XXX.
The Fall of Jerusalem i^ev.xxii. 20 401
LECTURE XXXL
The Man op Sin iJet;. xxii. 20 420
LECTURE XXXIL
The Vicar op Christ i?er. xxii. 20 : 2 Tkes8.u.A 436
LECTURE XXXtEL
1848; or, Prophecy Fulfilled ifev. xxii. 20 ; xvi. 17 455
LECTURE XXXrV.
The Consumption op Babylon Eev.xxn.20; xvi. 17 475
LECTURE XXXV.
The MARRiAaB-SuppBB op the Lamb ^ev. xix. 1 494
LECTURE XXXVL
The New Sono Eev.xiv.3 508
LECTURE XXXVIL
Conclusion ^ev.xxii.20 521
iVJTOEJ
^1
APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
LECTURE I.
Christ's many crowns.
" On his head were many crowns." — Revelation xix. 12.
The crown and cross of Christ are inseparable in our minds :
the crown has a retrospective reference to the cross ; the one is
the consummation and flower of the other. Christ had many
conflicts, and in each he triumphed, and therefore he is presented
to our view on this occasion as the wearer of many crowns.
Every struggle in which he took part was necessary : the cup
was given him to drink, and he drank it.
It is, therefore, with reference to his many past conflicts, that
we now notice the many crowns which he wears. He endured
all that the law denounced on us as sinners. It said, " The
soul that sins shall die," and He died, infinitely died. Not one
element was poured into that cup (and all bitterness was concen-
trated there) which He did not drink and exhaust ; there was not
one struggle into which he did not enter, and triumph most glo-
riously for us in it ; nor was there one conflict which did not lead
to a corresponding crown.
He fulfilled all the law demanded. It said, '^ Do and live.*'
He did it in our stead, and lived to give us life. He magnified
the law and made it honourable. Its greatest exactions received,
in his obedience, a glorious response; and a crown on his brow is
the evidence of his victory, and that victory is our plea at the
judgment- seat. He fulfilled all prophecies, and promises, and
types relating to the Messiah ; each prediction was successively
personated in him ; each promise found its echo, and each type
11
12 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
its counterpart in him. The accomplishment of these liabilities;
in his state of humiliation, was his victory ; and each obstruction
he surmounted, each step he made good, each position he gained,
terminated in a crown. His cross was the path to his crown —
his sufferings were the pioneers of his victories ; and his many
crowns are therefore the expressive memorials of his many trials,
and many triumphs. He undertook to represent Deity to man-
kind, and to bring God within the horizon of mortality. He
finished the portrait, he perfected the great enterprise. ^^We
beheld his glory as the glory of the only begotten Son of God,
full of grace and truth." ^' God was made manifest in the flesh.'^
*^ He that hath seen me hath seen the Father." In other words,
he accomplished this glorious apocalypse. He personated in him-
self all the splendours and attributes of God. He let God shine
and glow through humanity, in undimmed glory, and manifested
to mankind all that man or angel can reach or know of Deity ;
and having finished the sacred sculpture, he received the cor-
responding crown.
But besides these evidences of crowns, as far as these are
symbols of victory, he wears many diademsj which are also the
evidences of sovereignty. He is a king as well as a conqueror.
The crown of creation is his. " By him all things were made,
and without him was not any thing made that was made." "But
unto the Son he saith, Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever :
a sceptre of righteousness is the sceptre of thy kingdom. And
thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the
earth ; and the heavens are the works of thine hands. They shall
perish ; but thou remainest ; and they shall wax old as doth a
garment; and as a vesture shalt thou fold them up, and they
shall be changed : but thou art the same, and thy years shall not
fail." Heb. i. 8, 10-12. There is not a pebble on the shore, nor
a planet in the sky, which he did not create; whatever defies in-
spection by its minuteness, or exceeds our comprehension by its
magnitude — whatever attracts by its beatlty, or is fragrant through
its perfume — whatever is prized for its value, or venerated for its
antiquity — all were made by Christ. He wears the crown and
wields the sceptre of all. Not an earthquake rocks the globe, nor
a wave rolls on the bosom of the sea — not a flash leaps from the
CHRIST'S MANY CROWNS. |6
clouds, nor a bud peeps from tlie bough, wbicb he does not un-
prison and charter for their respective missions.
As all things were made by him, so all things reflect more or
less his glory. So full and overflowing is the earth with the
evidences of divinity, that the Pantheist says the word is God —
thus praising undesignedly, by his blasphemy, as much as the
Christian by his adoration. Pantheism is false, but Pan-Chris-
tianism is true. Creation is Christ developed; and yet its grand-
est scene is but a comma in the apocalypse of his glory. Every ob-
ject speaks of Christ, and reflects his beauty, his excellence, and
love ; the withered leaf driven by the whirlwind sparkles with his
glory; the dew-drop trembling on the rose-leaf, and the snowy
summit of the Alps, reflect alike the splendour of his majesty.
A chord of love runs through all the sounds of creation, but the
ear of love alone can distinguish it.
His glory shines from every ray of light that reaches us from
a thousand stars ; it sparkles from the mountain tops that reflect
the first and retain the last rays of the rising and the setting sun ;
it is spread over the expanse of the sea, and speaks in the mur-
mur of its restless waves ; it girdles the earth with a zone of light,
and flings over it an aureole of beauty. In the varied forms of
animal tribes, in the relations of our world to other worlds, in the
revolution of planets, in the springing of flowers, in the fall of
waters, and in the flight of birds, in the sea, the rivers, and the
air, in heights and depths, in wonders and mysteries, Christ
wears the crown, sways the sceptre, and exacts from all a royal
tribute to his sovereignty and glory. We can behold, but we
cannot augment it ; we cannot add one ray of light to the faint-
ness of a distant star, nor give wings to an apterous insect, nor
change a white hair into black. We can unfold, but not create ;
we can adore, but not increase ; we can recognise the footprints
of Deity, but not add unto them. All things were created by
him, and for him. Heaven was created by and for him — his glo-
rious humanity its central object, its Lamb upon the throne, its
illuminating sun. "Where he is," is heaven; angels are the
executors of his sovereignty. He is the head of angels ; they re-
ceive their embassy from him : they worship him ; he sends them
forth as ministering spirits to the heirs of salvation j all the
SECOND SERIES, 2
14 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
worlds througliout the infinitude of space were made by him to be
mirrors of his glory : they roll and beam in their orbits under
the impulse of his touch ; they glow in the reflected lustre of his
cross, and silently hymn redeeming love, while they gather round
our earth, and gaze and wonder at the mysterious scenes which
have occurred upon it. "The earth is his, and he made it."
There is not a multiplicity of gods, as the heathen dreamed, but
many crowns are on the head of the one Creator and Governor
of all.
Our life on earth is subject to the sovereignty of Christ. He
fixed the hour and place of our birth, and he will determine the
place and hour of our death. Every pulsation in the heart is the
rebound of his touch ; we grow old under his sovereignty, unable
to arrest the rapid influences of decay, to restore the youthful
colour to gray hairs, or to brush away the mists from the dim
eyes of age. We feel we are carried along on an ebb-tide, the
impulse and direction of which are derived from on high ; and
that when our places on earth are vacant, others will be sum-
moned, in the sovereignty of the King of kings, to fill them, and
to follow out their responsibilities. Our souls, too, are equally
subject to Him, on whose head "are many crowns." "All souls
are mine." Whatever of hope lights it up with the foresight of
immortality — whatever of joy, repose, progress, and perfection it
attains — whatever of sorrow it feels — whatever of regret, remorse,
repentance, it experiences — are all under his sway, and within the
range of his control. He only is able to redeem, regenerate, and
save it : it has sunk so deep in ruin, that divine sovereignty
alone can raise it; yet in its very aphelion it is not beneath the
notice nor beyond the reach of Christ.
Christ is the sovereign of the universe, and atheism is a lie, a
delusion, a folly. None are so truly objects of pity as those mo-
rally and mentally diseased souls who are guilty of renouncing
their belief in the existence of God. It is surely unutterable
folly to sacrifice hope and joy to some cold metaphysical abstrac-
tion, and to reject all that sustains the heart and supports the
head of weary humanity, at the bidding of a syllogism. Earth
sleeps under a paternal eye, and is safe within a sovereign arm.
Let mankind know it is the fool who says in his heart, " No God."
CHRIST'S MANY CROWNS. M
How glorious a spot is earth ! Over it are spread the shadows
of the cross and crown of Jesus. The sun and stars shine to let
us see where Christ lay. This nook of the mighty universe is
covered with a kingly lustre ; but kingly eyes alone can see it.
The image and the superscription of Christ are traceable on all
beauty and preciousness below. It is the glory of earth that
he found a cradle and a grave in it ; it is the safety of earth that
he reigns and rules it. How blessed will be that promised re-
storation of all things for which humanity groans, when the re- .
claimed earth shall emerge from the smoke of the last fire, fresh
and fair as when first the morning stars sang together ; when the
usurper shall be cast out, and all rebel elements shall be calmed
and subdued, and sin shall be expunged, and death dead, and life
alive for ever, and the wilderness be made glad, and the desert
blossom like the rose — wEen every atom of it shall glow as with
the glory of Deity — when the undulating hills, and the rooted
rocks, and the majestic mountains — when the virgin beauty of
the morn, and the matron dignity of evening, and the mystic
pomp of the starry night, and all stars above, and all flowers be-
low, and all spiritual beauty, and all moral excellence, shall com-
bine to adorn that crown which is only one of many on the head
of Him who is King of kings and Lord of lords !
Christ also wears the crown of providence, as well as the crown
of creation. He rules what he has created. '^ My Father worketh
hitherto, and I work." In fact, the very existence of earth is
the consequence of the rule of Christ. It exists because he wears
the crown. "When sin was introduced, all its springs were smit-
ten with terrible paralysis, and its just and deserved doom was
instant and entire disorganization and decay. Such would have
been its lot if Christ had not stepped in between the polluted
earth and its provoked doom, and arrested its ruin by interceding,
" Spare it yet another week ! I will die a victim on one of its
hills, and magnify a broken law, while I reclaim by forgiving a
guilty people ; and I will take on my head the crown, and on my
shoulder the government of earth thus respited." The existence
of man is, therefore, evidence of what Christ has done. Earth,
the home of generations of the living, and not the sepulchre of
the dead, is proof of its rolling under restraining and forbearing
16 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
grace. Our seed-time and harvest is no less so. The grouna
was cursed for man's sake, and the sky, if not brightened by the
rays of that Sun, would have become as brass ; and the earth, if
not restored by blood, would have been as iron to us. Those re-
freshing showers, those ripening suns, that prolific soil, are all the
purchase of atoning blood, and the product of the Redeemer's
crown. Apart from the mediation of Christ, God can no more
give a crumb of bread to an orphan than he can give a crown of
glory to a fiend.
All national and social vicissitudes, and revolutions, and
changes, are equally under his crown. Men act on their own
uninfluenced instincts, and subsequent ages discover they were
giving aid and impulse to everlasting purposes. Minds work out
their own designs, and they are subsequently seen to have been
working out the great thoughts and sovereign plans of God. He
touches not the freedom of their choice, and yet they work har-
moniously to one end. Napoleon thought he was the statuary —
he was only the chisel.
In all his ways, and works, and sovereign arrangements, we
see difficulties which to us are inexplicable ; but this arises from
their excess of light, and their vast intricacy and complexity of
movement. A child introduced to see complicated machinery,
fails to comprehend it — he sees all antagonism and entanglement,
and he wonders how it works at all. We are as unable to com-
prehend the arrangements of God. They exceed the grasp of
our intellect; we can just see enough to lead us reverently to
adore. Some of the difficulties that seem to a few inexplicable,
or inconsistent, if so be Christ wears the crown and wields the
sceptre of Providence, are such as these. Might not the Divine
Governor have prevented the admission of evil, rather than permit
it, and then prescribe, as in the New Testament, for its removal ?
This difficulty presses on the denier of revelation as truly as on
its advocate. Sin is in the world; this is matter of fact — it
needs no revelation to prove this. Did God originally make the
world a sinful and a sorrowful world ? The skeptic will not say
so, for this would make a holy being the author of sin, and a
benevolent being the source of sorrow.
Was it, then, originally created good, and beautiful, and
CHRIST'S MANY CROWNS. It
happy ? and did it plunge of itself into sin and misery ? and, if so,
has God left it to the issues of its first aberration, and are we a
forsaken family ? If this he so, the position of the Christian is
surely a more rational one than that of the skeptic, for we hold
and believe in the interposition of a Saviour. The skeptic leaves
all to welter in their ruins. Nor will it fare better if we put the
crown on the head of atheism; for, if all be chance, why are
disease and death so uniform in their action ? If all be accident,
surely there would occur, amid the tumbling centuries, some ex-
ceptions to the prevailing law, and years of immortality would
turn up in the evolution of events.
The existence of sin all admit; its entrance, and its nature,
and its removal, Christianity alone consistently explains. It tells
us man was created under law ; this was the evidence of his crea-
tureship. He broke that law, and now reaps its penalties by
nature. Perhaps you say — Might not a benevolent being have
passed no law at all in Eden ? This is impossible. Law is only
the expression of the duty, allegiance, and love man owes to
God ; and, expressed or unexpressed, it exists. But might he
not have made a law without penalties ? A law without power
in the ruler to enforce it, is not worthy of the name, as it pos-
sesses nothing of the majesty of law. But are there not laws,
and penalties, I ask, following on the violation of them, in our
own experience? If I open an artery, will not death follow?
If I leap from a precipice, shall I not be killed ? Does any one
argue that it would have been better if all men had been allowed
to violate these and analogous laws, and yet not suffer the penal-
ties? We can only reply — We accept the wisdom of God as
greater than all the wisdom of men ; and we feel that no objection
can be urged against him who wears the crown in the Bible,
which does not lie with tenfold force against every view of Provi-
dence that is not based in the Bible.
We see bad men frequently live long and grow rich. Does
this seem to indicate that the Lord wears the crown beneath
which this takes place ? The same spectacle perplexed David
many hundred years ago. He received the solution of it in tho
sanctuary, where we too must seek it. This world is not tho
2*
18 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
scene of retribution. A day is appointed in which God wih
judge the world in righteousness.
This long-suffering patience which follows the providences of
God, is the irresistible proof that he has not pleasure in the death
of the sinner, that he does not condemn till conversion is hope-
less ; and thus the tree spared may be a more instructive lesson
to the universe than the tree cut down.
But we sometimes see good men, full of promise, and fitted for
careers of increasing usefulness, cut off in their dawning or me-
ridian course. Is this compatible with the fact of that good and
benevolent government of things to which the text refers ? What
seems to us a reason for such men to be spared on earth, may be
the strongest for their being removed. Their very worth and
force of character may be their fitness for a more elevated sphere.
They did their work sooner than others, because more largely
gifted than others. They were wanted in heaven. Our loss is
their promotion. God will thus teach us how he can carry out
his great designs in the world, with or without instrumentality,
as to him may seem expedient.
Do we not find, remarks another, genius, and intellectual and
moral excellence, frequently wasting in obscurity, and thereby
prevented from irradiating and blessing mankind ? This does
apparently happen, but it may be our ignorance that conceals
from us the reasons of the fact. The ends of infinite wisdom are
not always visible to us. Great and precious fruits may grow for
the use of future generations, on trees all but hidden from us.
The sower may be unknown, and the fields he waters and tends
unvisited by us ; but other days may reveal benefits and blessings
for which whole nations may be thankful.
Such occurrences in providence are also in harmony with cases
in creation^ as is beautifully indicated by the poet : —
" Full many a gem of purest ray serene,
The dark unfathom'd caves of ocean bear :
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air."
It is also objected to the equity or benevolence of this adminis-
tration, that a very small part only of the human family knows
CHRIST'S MANY CROWNS. 19
the gospel at all. Wliy is the gospel, if it be so great a blessing,
not extended to the ends of the earth ? The fact is true, but the
fault may be in us, not in God. Our apathy, our want of energy
and sympathy as Christians, may be the reason why the gospel is
restricted to the few, and kept from the many. There may be
ulterior ends likewise in an arrangement which is not peculiar to
divine truth. Numbers of the human family are still unacquainted
with the best blessings of civilization, and social refinement, and
scientific discoveries. If the limited spread of Christianity be an
objection to the divine government of Christ, the limited range
of other blessings must be no less an objection to the government
of a supreme governor at all.
But the true reason lies not in the purposes of God, but in the
apathy of his people. Men are not universally Christians, just
because Christians are not universally missionary in their spirit,
and character, and sacrifices.
It is one remarkable proof of the sovereignty of Christ in
providence, and well worthy of notice here, that each new dis-
covery in science serves to show more palpably the truth and
divine origin of Christianity. Sciences which were once quoted
against the claims of the gospel, are now appealed to as its hand-
maids. Astronomy was once pronounced to be the foe of the
Bible. It is now felt to be one of its most impressive commenta-
ries. The nebulous matter which, according to recent specula-
tions, was the raw material of new worlds, into which it shaped
itself without the aid of a Creator, has been discovered, by Lord
Ross's telescope, to be clusters of worlds ; the evidences not only
of a creative power, but of a controlling hand. There is not a
speck in the sky, nor a ray from a distant star, nor a field of
vision laid bare by the telescope in the depths of immensity, that
does not cast new light on the sovereignty and crown of him who
is Lord of all ; and Newton, and Herschel, and their ablest dis-
ciples, are ready to attest it is so.
Geology was once described as a mine of disproof of the his-
toric accuracy of Genesis, and thereby of the divine origin of
the Bible. Christ's control was over it, and his wisdom in tho
hearts of its students ; and as it grew in accuracy, it grew in the
force and fulness of its testimony to Christian truth. The eye
20 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
of the skeptic may now read in rocks, and fossils, and ruptured
strata, the registry of the day on which God said, '^ Let there bo
light, and there was light." The evidences, too, are there, of the
windows of heaven having been opened, and the fountains of the
great deep having been broken up ; and thus the best and ablest
of the students of geology worship at the footstool, and are ready
to place or recognise the crown on His head on which already are
many crowns.
Chronology has also had its turn as a forced opponent to the
gospel. Infidel minds, whose hatred to Christianity outran their
respect for themselves, professed to have discovered histories of
men before Adam. In one of the Pyramids of Egypt there was
found an astronomical chart, called the Zodiac of Dendara, which
described the position of the heavenly bodies thousands of years
before the creation. Folios of evidence were insufficient to per-
suade these skeptics that Christianity was true, but an accidental,
dateless, anonymous chart was held by them abundantly con-
clusive against the truth of Christianity. Great, however, was
their disappointment, when it was ascertained, and could not be
concealed, that this chart was a toy — a thing done for amusement,
and incapable of any grave use, except in the hands of men who
regarded any thing as good which promised to aid them in their
unholy enterprise.
Physiology, too, has been arrayed against Him who wears many
crowns. The difierence of races, and the diversity of colours,
were referred to as evidence that the European and African were
not sprung from the first pair. This has been long ago disposed
of, and the maturest science has been demonstrated to be in
harmony with the word of God? These consecrations of all facts
and phenomena to a holy purpose ; these successive seizures of so
many weapons of aggression, and the transformation of them all
into elements of defence, and means of new lustre to the claims
of the gospel — this worsting of skepticism on the fields it selects
for its assaults, are all proofs of the providential government of
Him who wears on his head this, and many other crowns. All
the past is luminous with Christ's crown, and the future shall
be yet more so. A decree goes forth from Caesar Augustus, that
the whole land should be taxed. Each family goes to its own
CHRIST'S MANY CROWNS. 2|^
city, and Joseph and IMary to theirs, and a prophecy is thus
fulfilled: "Thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little
among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come
forth unto me that is to be Ruler in Israel/^ Caesar thought
only of taxes : an unseen but directing hand made unconscious
Caesar to fulfil prophecy. The crown was not on Caesar's head,
but on Christ's. A highly educated Pharisee goes on a journey
to Damascus, full of hatred to the name and people of Christ : a
voice from Him who wears the crown pierces his heart, and the
bitter Pharisee is transformed into the faithful preacher of the
cross. Domitian gratified his vengeance by banishing John to
Patmos 'j and Christ glorifies his own name by making that exile
a chosen instrument of imperishable good to all generations.
Cassar's prisoner is made Christ's prophet, and the wrath of man
is diverted to add new force to the cause of Grod, and kings guided
to promote the very ends for the extinction of which they com-
bined their crowns. Luther is sent to a convent to do penance,
and he finds the Bible. Printing was invented to do man's work,
and it fulfils the purposes of God. America was discovered to add
to man's empire, and it becomes more and more a province of
Christ's. Steam was used on man's mission ; it is already out on
God's errands. Thus infinite wisdom, love, and power, combined
in Christ, wears this crown, and wields this sceptre, and makes
all work together for good to the people of God, and toward the
spread and permanency of the principles of the glorious gospel.
Christ also wears the crown of grace and glory, as well as that
of creation and providence. He is "Prince of life,'' "King of
kings," " Lord of glory,'' the true Melchizedec — David and Solo-
mon in one. Such he was acknowledged to be in the cradle and
on the cross, and such he justly and truly assumed to be at every
period of his suffering life. His words were king's words.
Royalty was heard in his language and embodied in his life.
This kingdom, the kingdom of grace, is a spiritual one — ^ita
laws, its sceptre, its weapons, and its warfare, are all spiritual.
It is "not meat nor drink, but righteousness and peace and joy
in the Holy Ghost" — it is not an antithesis to any temporal
government, but to spiritual corruption.
Its subjects are regenerated men, and these only. The bap-
22 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
tized, as such, are members of the visible, but not therefore mem-
bers of the spiritual church. In one sense, all creatures are under
his sway, and those who will not give him glory as an offering,
must surrender it as a reluctant sacrifice; but the subjects of this
spiritual kingdom are willing subjects — their hearts throb with
loyalty and love to their King. The ambassadors and ministers
in the midst of it are purely spiritual men; they have no sovereign
power; they may no more assume Christ's crown than may kings
and statesmen — their office is pastoral, not royal — they are to
feed, not to lord it over Christ's heritage. The tendency in the
eighteenth century was to transfer Christ's crown to the state.
As King of grace, Christ reclaims the aliens, and strangers,
and slaves of sin and Satan to himself; he subdues a people to
his glorious purpose — he makes them willing in the day of his
power — attracting by his cross, inclining by his love, and com-
pelling by his Spirit.
He rules them by his word. It supersedes all the traditions
and commandments of men. Our directory, as the subjects of
Christ, is not the opinion of the wisest, or the tradition of the
oldest, or the voice of the most, or the judgment of the best; it
is the word of God alone. What it enjoins, is duty; what it for-
bids, is sin : it is our Magna Charta. As wearing the crown of
this kingdom, the Lord Jesus furnishes his church with ministers,
and appoints the ordinances requisite for the church's progress.
He has said, "Go into all the world, and preach the gospel to
every creature;" and, in the strength of this commission, the
glorious gospel has been proclaimed from year to year, and from
country to country. " This do in remembrance of me," is our
sacramental warrant till he shall come. On the baptismal font,
on the communion table, is the impress of royal authority. We
meet together, we pray together, we communicate, in obedience
to Christ the King. No voice in purely spiritual things has
force but his. It is as a king also he sends down his Holy Spirit.
The gift of the Spirit is the gift of the throne. The Spirit is his
only vicar on earth.
It is under his crown that his kingdom makes way. The stone
cut out without hands shall fill the earth. " In those days the
God of heaven shall set up a kingdom which shall break in pieces
CHRIST'S MANY CROWNS. ^
and consume all other kingdoms, and stand for ever." All things
are contributing toward this great result; a thousand Baptists
prepare the way for his advent, and nations rush into revolutions,
and kings, alarmed, abdicate their thrones, and mobs rise in vol-
canic force against lawful powers, unconsciously to make way
for his coming, and to lay down the rails along which the chariot
of his glory shall move more rapidly to its goal. All progress in
the past of pure and apostolical religion is the result of the royal
influence of the Prince of life. A king must be with the church
as truly as a priest in the church. His crown is as essential to
the maintenance and expansion of truth, as his cross was and is
to the salvation of souls. ^' Jesus died" is the life of the church.
*' Jesus reigns" is her strength and her hope. Our footing is on
his sacrifice; our hope is on his crown. The creation of life
comes from the one, the continuance of life flows evermore from
the other; we must accept both, in order to accept in all his
offices the glorious Lord who carried the one and wears the other.
Christ, as thus crowned, defends us. Sin has a footing within
us; Satan rages without; the world, like an encompassing atmo-
sphere, penetrates all the recesses of the heart : and these hostile
forces are in action by night and by day, and, had we not a
defender in Christ mightier than all that can be against us, we
should perish from the earth. He tells us from his throne, ^' I
give unto them eternal life, and none shall be able to pluck them
out of my hand." Against the kingdom, crown, and sovereignty
of Christ, every corrupt system of Christianity has ceaselessly
warred.
The Gnostic heresy, under the guise of rigid self-denial and
frenzied superiority to the senses, introduced deadly poison into
the visible church. The lofty speculations of the Platonists
undermined the faith and puff"ed up the intellects of many ; and
artfully combining both with other carnal and Satanic elements,
the Papacy set itself up, really a kingdom, against the kingdom
of Christ, though ostensibly its full and logical development.
What skill is displayed in that wonderful structure ! what grasp
of thought ! what cunning recognition of Christ as king, and yet
practical dethronization of him ! How truly is Judas out-Judased
in the pope ! How thoroughly combined the cunning of Satan
24 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
and the carnality of man ! It retains every doctrine of the gospel
only to subvert it ; it keeps the name only to cover its hostility
to the cause of Christ. ^* God is love ;'^ and under this glorious
banner it has built inquisitions, evangelized with the sword, and
deluged the earth with blood. "God is light;" and under the
beams of this it has hallowed ignorance as the mother of devotion.
" My kingdom is not of this world ;" and with these words sound-
ing in her ears she has built up an ecclesiastical despotism — a
pyramid of power and grandeur — a throne of pride, on which she •
sits as a queen, and says, " I shall see no sorrow."
So many and so ceaseless forces have conspired against the
kingdom of Christ, that we are constrained to infer that the
existence of a church on earth is the result of the sovereignty of
Christ. The spiritual church survives, a spark on the sea, a
flower amid frosts, an exotic in an alien soil. Had it been
human, it had perished long ago. Its existence is its eloquent
ascription, " Thou art the King of glory, Christ."
From the experience of the past, as well as from the promises
of Scripture, we gather the assurance of the safety of the people
of God.
Their palladium is not the shadow of a throne ; their shield is
neither their own riches nor the state's endowments. Their
shield is Christ on his throne, their girdle is the everlasting
arms, their glory their Redeemer's crown. Dynasties change,
and empires ebb, and races die, and kings oppose, and enslave,
and protect the visible church ; but Christians live, and love, and
flourish.
The prosperity of the church is not what the world calls so —
numbers, wealth, extension — but increase of spirituality and love,
new and noble victories over sin, greater sacrifices for Christ's
sake, yet more fearless recognition of his name and assertion of
his truth. The church of God is often most prosperous when she
has least in her cofiers, fewest in her temples, and nothing but
hostility in the world.
We are sure of the ultimate triumphs of the church of Christ,
just because on his head are many crowns. Greater is he that is
for us than all that can be against us ; the predictions of its suc-
cess are as sure as if already turned to performances. All forces
CHRIST'S MANY CROWNS. 25
shall aid his cause, all tongues shall praise him, every hill-top
and every hidden valley shall shine in the lustre of his crown.
To achieve this, the ministers of Christ need not call in the
militia of Cassar, a bishop need not assume the command of a
battalion of infantry, nor a cardinal charge at the head of a com-
pany of dragoons. Christ repudiates as auxiliaries alike the
bribe of the treasury, the bayonet of the army, and the craft and
subtlety of the world. ^^ Not by might, nor by power, but by my
Spirit, saith the Lord." Are you subjects of Christ ? Are you
believers in him ? Are you Christ's ? Is he yours ?
SECOND SERIES. ^
U^,,?J*,«^"
26
LECTURE II.
THE CONGREGATION OF THE DEAD.
"And I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, Write, Blessed are the
dead which die in the Lord from henceforth : yea, saith the Spirit, that they
may rest from their labours; and their works do follow them." — Revelation
xiv. 13.
I HAVE already unfolded several features of the family of God
I showed* you the state of the one hundred and forty-four thou
sand — the sealed ones — true Christians in the sight of God
^Hhey are without fault before the throne of Godj" that is
^^ there is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus ;'
they are "justified'' by him^ and have " peace with God." " Who
shall lay any thing to the charge of God's elect ? It is God that
justifieth.'' They " have washed their robes, and made them
white in the blood of the Lamb.'' Next, I described their prac-
tical conduct upon earth ; or the mode in which they visibly de-
velop, in their intercourse with the world, those great Christian
principles which they had received through grace : they " follow
the Lamb whithersoever he goeth." They follow him in the
great aim and end of his life — in his appeal to the only standard
of truth, the word of God — in his intercourse with the world,
sympathizing with him in all his sorrows, and reflecting all his
joys. You have thus, then, the state of Christians before God :
" without fault before the throne ;" you have, next, the practical
course before men : they " follow the Lamb."
Having thus read their biography in life, let us read and com-
ment upon the epitaph upon their tombstones. Their state is
justification before God ; their practical character is following the
Lamb; and the beautiful epitaph which may be inscribed upon
* See Lecture IV. of the Exeter Hall series, where the above also was
delivered.
THE CONGREGATION OF THE DEAD. 27^^
their tomb, and pronounced as the noblest requiem over the
ashes of the dead, is — " Blessed are the dead which die in the
Lord from henceforth : yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest
from their labours j and their works do follow them.'^ I allow
there is here a special reference to the first resurrection, and I
believe the blessedness to be associated primarily with their rela-
tion to this great event ; but its main truths are not affected by
chronology — they are always true.
Let us consider, first, those that are described as "the dead;"
secondly, their peculiar and distinctive relationship — " the dead
in Christ;" thirdly, the benediction pronounced upon them —
*' blessed are the dead f fourthly, the special reason of that
blessedness — "they rest from their labours;" and lastly, the evi-
dence of their entrance into that blessedness — " their works do
follow them." Let me endeavour, as fully as the time will per-
mit, to lay before you some remarks upon each of these several
divisions into which I have split the text, dwelling rather on its
general than on its special prophetic bearing.
" The dead." Where are they ? Where are they not ?
My dear friends, has the thought ever struck you, in looking
round the world, that its dead outnumber its living? A far
greater amount of the population of the globe is beneath the soil,
than there is at any moment treading and breathing above it.
Our churches, our homes, our thrones, the theatres and play-
houses of the world, are all built upon the dust and ashes of the
dead. Our cornfields and vineyards wave above the soil that
was once warm with life : " the toe of the dancer treads upon
the ashes of the dead."
" Where is the dust that hath not been alive ?
The spade, the plough, disturb our ancestors :
From human mould we reap our daily bread.
The globe around earth's hollow surface shakes,
And is the ceiling of her sons ;
O'er devastation we blind revels keep :
"Whole buried towns support the dancer's heel."
This great globe on which we dwell seems to be as much a sar-
cophagus of the dead as it is a home of the living. What are
all its graves, but various compartments in this one great and
28 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
silent mausoleum ! The ashes of Abraham mingle somewhere
with those of Martin Luther; and that of Martin Luther may
mingle somewhere with those of Napoleon ; and the dust of Na-
poleon may, in a few years, mingle with the dust of a far better
man that has recently passed from the stage of life to the stage
of glory — Thomas Chalmers. Thus the world is a vast sarcopha-
gus ; its graves are its chambers, or compartments ; and those
compartments are not able to prevent the dust of all from min-
gling together.
But not only the remains of those who never had a quarrel —
who lived in friendship, and died in peace — but of those who
were sworn and implacable foes, by a great law must mingle and
blend most peacefully together. The ashes of Martin Luther
and of Leo the Tenth, who hated him so heartily — the dust of
Wickliflfe and that of those who cast his body into the stream
which bore it to the silent sea- — the dust of John Knox and that
of Queen Mary, must blend and lie right silently and peacefully
together. Thus, not only the dust of friends, but of bitter foes,
as if to cast reproach upon their feuds, must blend and mingle
together in spite of all their repulsions.
It is now dead — disintegrated — mingling with all streams —
mixing with all elements — blown by all winds ; yet there is not
a particle of that dust, incorporated with trees, mingled with the
sea, or buried in the earth, that shall not hear the first tone of
the resurrection trumpet, and become instinct with a life that can
never end; for, when the trumpet shall sound, each one that
died, whether he died in Christ or not, shall, each in his own
order, come forth. Some shall rise from the depths of the
fathomless sea, and come ; some shall cast off their only winding-
sheet, the sands of the desert, and come. The Pharaohs shall
leap forth, when they hear that peal, from their pyramidal cham-
bers ; the Ptolemies shall start from beneath their marble monu-
ments; Napoleon, and those who fought and fell beneath his
banner at Jena, at Austerlitz, and at Waterloo, shall rise and
gather in shivering crowds around him; the dust of Martin
Luther shall be quickened at Wirtemberg, and put on the apparel
suited to a citizen of the New Jerusalem ; Calvin shall rise from
his grave, which is now unknown ; Oberlin and Felix Neff shall
THE CONGREGATION OF THE DEAD. 20
start from their Alpine repose — some rejoicing in the hope that
accompanies them to the realms of glory, others calling on
the hills to cover them, and on the mountains to conceal them ;
and all shall gaze as they gather together into that tremendous
infinitude, the eternity that stretches before them.
Brethren, you and I, if we never met in the congregation of
the living before, must meet together in the congregation of the
dead. Each atom of our dust "rests in hope again to rise/'
"for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall rise." And
when we stand upon that vast platform, amid that mighty surging
multitude — a multitude more countless than the waves of the
sea, or the leaves of the forest, or the sands upon the sea-shore —
and when we take a retrospective view of all we have passed
through — how poor and paltry will many things look which we
have fought, and struggled, and spent our health and strength for
on earth I My dear friends, seen from the judgment-seat of
Christ, the most brilliant crowns will grow pale, and the proudest
coronets will appear denuded of all their attractions; and
thousands shall feel that the gold which we worshipped, instead
of being fit to be turned into shrines and gods for us to adore,
was only worthy to be turned into a pavement on which our feet
should tread, in our passage to another, a better, and more glo-
rious repose.
This leads me to the second point that I wish to consider — that
there are not only " the dead," but, distinctively, " the dead in
Christ."
There are three expressions used to describe our relationship to
Christ. There is, first, to be "without Christ," the state of na-
ture. There is, secondly, to be "in Christ," the state of grace.
And there is, lastly, to be " with Christ," the state of glory. To
be "without Christ," is our state by nature; to be "in Christ,"
is our state by grace ; to be " with Christ," is our destiny, our
happy destiny hereafter.
It is here implied that there are but two distinctions upon earth
that are real — "in Christ," or out of Christ; and there is not a
tombstone in London, on which affection has written its varied
eulogy over the ashes of the beloved dead, if it had the inscrip-
^on which God would write upon it, that would not record —
3«-
30 .APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
" Dead in Christ/' or, " Dead out of Christ.'' Hence, after all,
what is the real value of many of those distinctions, which may
be expedient or inievitable, but about which men dispute and
quarrel ? How startled will the high-churchman be at the dis-
covered emptiness of those peculiarities in which he gloried ! I
mean high-churchmen in the popular sense, not in the true sense;
for, in the right sense of the word, I hold that I am a higher
churchman than Dr. Hook or Dr. Pusey. The high-churchman
is not surely the man that measures the church by the height of
the steeple, but he who belongs to the congregation of the re-
deemed. In this view, those who call themselves Dissenters
adopt a questionable name. If it apply to separation from the
Establishment, it is, at most, of no eternal moment; but if it
mean dissent from the true church, the church of the redeemed,
the name is a reproach. How startled will the Dissenter be, to
find his Shibboleth was a Shibboleth earth-sprung, and that it
died on earth, and has no place, or part, or mention at the judg-
ment-seat of Christ ! And there, amazed beyond expression, will
the Puseyite be, (for I trust that there are some of them who,
amid all the rubbish, hold the foundation,) when he discovers
that his section gave the fewest members to the church of the re-
deemed in glory ; and that his candelabras, and his genuflections,,
and his crosses, and his crucifixes, and his altars, were just so
much wood, hay, straw, stubble, which he piled upon the true
foundation !
It will not be asked, when we stand at the judgment-seat of
Christ, Whence are you? — but. What are you? It will be no
recommendation that you are a churchman — it will be no dis-
qualification that you are a Dissenter. These distinctions will
have dropped away, and perished as unreal in that light in which
reality only lives. You may have been baptized — you may have
belonged to the visible church — you may have been one of its
ministers — you may have been a communicant — you may have
been a liberal supporter of the ordinances of Christ — and yet
may not have been in Christ. I believe that what will be seen
and witnessed in the hereafter, will startle and surprise many par-
ticipants of it. You will miss many a bold professor, whose
voice you thought you would hear loudest in the choir of the
THE CONGREGATION OF THE DEAD. 81
redeemed; and you will find there many a suspected one, that
you in your ignorance shut out, or in your uncharitableness
anathematized, highest and brightest in the number of the saved.
You may find there some poor tonsured monk, with his shaven
crown and rope girdle, who looked in his cell beyond the crucifix
which he held in his hand, and saw in all his glory the Son of
Man nailed to the cross, the only atonement, and " washed his
robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.'' You may
find there some poor Jew, who rejected Jesus of Nazareth, the
Saviour, but who, in his deep humiliation, in his sorrow and sigh-
ing, and crying to be emancipated from the curse and taint of his
sins, and to be at peace with God, shall discover that he held the
Saviour in substance, while he recollects with sorrow that he re-
pudiated him in name. We shall find there many that we cast
out, whom we had no business to cast out ; and we shall miss
many whom we had no right to number among them at all. All
minor distinctions will then be done away ; the trappings of rank,
the disputes of party, the robes, the rules, and ceremonies, will
all be left behind in the grave ; and the only distinction that will
appear indelible for ever will be, the living in Christ, or the dead
out of Christ.
Then you may ask, (and surely, if you have any interest in
your own safety, you must ask earnestly,) " What is it to be in
Christ?'' The language, my dear friends, is most expressive.
If I am to describe it generally, I would say it is to look for sal-
vation through his blood alone : to feel that if Grod were to sink
me to the depths of everlasting ruin, he would not pronounce
upon me a sentence greater or more severe than I have deserved,
and yet to feel that if, in the name and through the righteous-
ness of Christ, he were to raise me to a glory too brilliant for
mortal eye to look on, and too magnificent for the human mind
to conceive, Grod would not bestow upon me a boon greater than
Christ's merits entitle me to. To be in Christ, if I may para-
phrase it, is to feel that Christ paid all we owed to God, and pur-
chased for us far more than God owed to us — that he is our only
way to know God, and the only way for God to receive us-^that
he is the only channel for us to reach God, or for God to come
down to us ; it is to feel that Christ's sacrifice is the only ex-
fuiriTEESiT?;
V^^oi
32 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
piatory sacrifice for sin, and that it is not only access to God,
provided by infinite wisdom, but that it is the very expression
and evidence of God's love to us. Our Saviour is precious, not
simply as making it possible for God to forgive us, (just as it is
made possible for the queen of England to forgive the sentence
of a convict, and to remit it, but, inasmuch as he shows that God
will not merely forgive us, and leave us to live the lives of for-
given convicts, at a distance, but that he will take us to his
bosom as justified, and redeemed, and converted, and adopted
sons.
The expression " in Christ'^ is a very peculiar one ; and I am
quite sure that you may see, by the simple contrast which I will
make, that it is not an ordinary expression, denoting merely, as
some think, that we are to follow Christ. We do not say a pupil
is in his teacher, a patient in his physician, a son in his father,
or a servant in his master ; we say the pupil follows his teacher,
the patient follows his physician, the son obeys his father, the
servant serves his master. Then if this peculiar expression, *'in
Christ," is constantly employed in Scripture, if the ordinary
phraseology of life is designedly outraged by a strange and un-
couth expression of relationship, are we not warranted in infer-
ring that there is some great reason for this change — something
more than the Sociniau means by following Christ ? The Scrip-
tures generally employ plain language ; and, when strange ex-
pressions are used, it is to describe a doctrine that is strange, or
far above the routine of mere humanity. It is, in short, one of
a series of phrases allusive, I believe, to known and expressive
symbols. I find that all in the ark were saved, while all out of
it were lost. What would have been the use of any antediluvian
sinner, a strong swimmer, determining to follow, but not to enter
the ark ? He might swim for a few hours, but it would not be
long before he sank. Now, an antediluvian sinner following the
ark by swimming, in order to escape drowning, is just like a So-
cinian sinner trying to be saved from wrath by merely following
Christ. The allusion may be to the city of refuge. The man-
slayer, outside, might be smitten down and destroyed, but the
moment he got inside he was safe ; while the criminal pursued
by the avenger of blood, was rushing to the city of refuge, if he
THE CONGREGATION OF THE DEAD. a^.
was caught on his way to it, he would be slain ; but the instant
he got into it, he would be safe. Thus following Christ is not
enough : you must be in Christ, as the criminal was in the city
of refuge, as Noah and his family were in the ark ; and then the
winds may blow, and the waters may rise, or the avenger may
pursue, but 'Uhere is no condemnation to them that are in
Christ Jesus.''
My dear friends, are you in this state ? Are you not merely
believers in Christ as a teacher, but ^' in Christ" as your glorious
sacrifice, your eternal refuge, your priest, your altar, your all ?
Are you connected with him as the branch is connected with the
vine — united to him, incorporated with him, one with him, in
life, in death, and in eternity ? Union with Christ is not a mere
figure of speech — it is not a metaphor : it is a reality ; so much
so, that whatever I do is done through Christ's life pervading
me. If I lift my hand to the right or to the left, upward or
downward, it is in virtue of that life which is in my body j and
if I give a penny to the poor, or subscribe to a school, or do any
other good work, it is in virtue of that life which is implanted in
my soul by Christ, and which enables me to say with the apostle,
" I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." Do you believe
that ? Can you feel this to be reality ? Can you peril your
everlasting prospects upon it ? If so, blessed are you when
living, and blessed shall you be when dead ; if you are not so,
you may be Churchman or Dissenter — you may be what you
like, or what you please to call yourselves — unhappy are you in
life, and" unhappy will you be in death — ^you are out of Christ.
This leads me, in the third place, to refer to the benediction
that is pronounced upon those who are here said to be in Christ.
Then, if the dead in Christ be blessed, they do not cease to be.
Some Christians have taken up the idea (and I think it is a very
absurd one) that there is a cessation of life at death till the re-
surrection-day — that when we die we cease to be until the body
is raised again from the dead. Certainly there is no warrant for
this in Scripture. Can you say they are " blessed" that cease to
be ? Passive repose, unconscious sleep, suspension of life, and
unconsciousness, are not surely elements of bliss. If this were
heaven, then I could not conceive the blessing pronounced to
34 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
apply to it. But I consider the idea of the future state to be a
very different thing to that. I cannot conceive of happiness
without conscious life. Annihilation is not blessedness. The
elevation of mind, the expansion of intellect, the enlargement of
all the powers, the removal of the shackles that confine them, the
spread of the souFs unfettered wings, to soar and revel in un-
ceasing life, and approach evermore to God without cessation —
this is happiness. But we believe that " absent from the body'^
is '^present with the Lord." An apostle said this by the in-
spiration of that Lord, and we must believe it. They are, then,
" blessed" that thus " die in the Lord ;" and to be so they must
live so.
When a Christian dies, the eye of the mourner looks on the
pale face of the dead, and weeps ; for there is nothing on earth
so unnatural, and sorrowful too, as a dead face. Death is not
natural : it is most unnatural — it was never meant to be — it is
an infraction of the laws of God's universe -, and the dead pale
face always seems to me to reflect the shadow of some great
disaster, and to have revealed on it the lesson — " The wages of
sin is death." The natural eye looks upon that face and weeps ;
but the Christian looks beyond the ashes of the dead, follows the
emancipated soul, as it rises on outspread and untiring pinion,
and exclaims, "Thanks be to God who giveth us the victory
through Jesus Christ our Lord." In the case of a Christian, the
scythe of death cuts down nothing but what he would leave be-
hind : it merely removes the restrictions and the limits that re-
press its energies, that the disenthralled and emancipated spirit
may soar and rise to God, as its eternal home.
"Blessed," then, "are the dead which die in the Lord."
Often have they been cursed when living; but now they are
" blessed" when dead. They met with many a trial, and encoun-
tered many an obstruction on earth. No man ever did any thing
that was good without meeting with terrible obstructions. The
price you must pay for every kindness you bestow is ingratitude ;
and the enduring of vicarious sacrifice or suffering seems to be
perpetuated still ; one generation suffering that its successor may
have privilege, or happiness, or peace. It is when the noblest
deeds are done^ and the holiest lessons taught, the greatest perse-
THE CONGREGATION OF THE DEAD. 35
cution breaks forth. But the anathema of the world never yet
put down or scathed the children of God. It has only made them
rise with a greater energy, and given to their spirit a nobler elas-
ticity, and nerved their high souls for more heroic enterprises.
In fact, persecution never yet, in the history of humanity, put
down a good cause, and it never built up a bad one. It is a law
which Qod himself has made, that the arrow which is shot from
the persecutor's bow shall rebound and pierce the persecutor's
heart. And hence, if the sword and the fagot are ever to be
employed in our warfare, let the one be unsheathed and the other
kindled by the foes, not by the friends of Jesus. The cause of
Christ disclaims them. " For the weapons of our warfare are not
carnal, but spiritual, and mighty through God." Well, if these
believers have been accursed of men, they have ^^died in the
Lord," and are " blessed'^ of God. We may have lost them, and
the^ rffay be lost to us ; but they are joined to God, to happiness,
and to heaven. When I stand over the ashes of the dead, amid
all the freezing doubts that the skeptic would cast, like cold sha-
dows, upon their grave — amid the torn feelings that relationship is
conscious of — amid the din and noise of the wheels of this world,
I can yet hear piercing the firmament, and reverberating from
the cold, dark chamber below, the " still small voice" — ^^ Blessed
are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth : yea, saith
the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours; and theii
works do follow them."
They are "blessed," for none can effectually condemn them.
Memory may remind, the law may pronounce, Satan may accuse,
conscience may smite. But it is only for a moment, for ^' it is
God that justifieth ; who is he that condemneth ?" "Who shall
lay any thing to the charge of God's elect ? It is Christ that
ditid, yea, rather, that is risen again."
They are " blessed," for they are removed to the distance of
infinitude from all evil. They are in the realms of infinite purity.
No corruption can stain them, no iniquity vex them, no foul pollu-
tions defile them; they can neither be tempted, nor tried, nor
suffer any more. The door that shuts the believer in, shuts out
all sin and sorrow for ever.
They are " blessed," for there will be there the restoration of
36 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
suspended intercourse with those they loved. Venerable fathers
whom they bore to. the tomb, will meet them there — their gray
heads literally " crowns of glory.''^ The babe that dropped from
*hy bosom, .Christian mother, like a premature fruit from the
le of life in spring, will meet thee in the realms of glory. The
lerished friends you loved will gather around you, and the broken
circles which you deplored will be completed ; and they will ap-
pear no longer capable of misconstruction, or open to any of the
imperfections common to humanity. Perfect happiness and per-
fect purity shall reign there. There will not be a spot upon
which you will be able to lay the finger and say — '^Here I
suffered.'^ The names ''widow'^ and ''orphan" shall not be
mooted in heaven, or recorded in the vocabulary of the blessed.
Not a tear is shed there — not a sorrow felt ; all is happy, because
all is holy 3 and over the fairest and most fragrant blossom hangs
the superscription of ''eternal." They are "for ever with the
Lord :" in Christ upon earth, and " with the Lord" in heaven.
It is added as an explanation of this blessedness — " They rest
from thair labours." This world is the scene of ceaseless labours ;
its highest are weary and heavy laden.
You recollect the passage — " There remaineth therefore a rest
for the people of God." In the original the passage reads —
" There remaineth therefore a Sahhatismos for the people of God;"
literally translated, " a Sabbath-keeping." Though another word
is used here, yet we may read it, " they Sahhatise from their
labours, and their works do follow them." In other words, h(?aven
is not the pagan elysium, or the Mohammedan paradise, but a
glorious rest, an everlasting Sabbath, for the people of God. Yet,
by a strange contradiction it is said — " And they rest not day and
night." They "rest," and yet they "rest not." It is a place
of endless repose, and yet a place of endless activity. Their
energy is their enjoyment. Our Sabbaths upon earth ought to
be, as they were meant to be, shadows cast upon the world as
from above, foretastes of the great Sabbath of eternity. I look
upon the Sabbath as a kind of bivouac preparatory to the battle
of the week; an occasional and recurring respite from Caesar pre-
liminary to the everlasting Sabbath that will be enjoyed by the
people of God I look on it as a beautiful island cast into the
THE CONGREGATION OF THE DEAD. 37'
roaring and restless torrent of immortality ; and standing upon
that island, we can look at the rush and listen to the din of the
eddying world, and see leaping down from above in undimmed
splendours the sunshine of heaven, and hear from afar the unspent
chimes of an eternal harmony. The Sabbath is too precious to
be given up } humanity will not surrender it, Christianity will not
let it go. It will be revered by the Christian as long as the world
shall last. The poor man would be the greatest sufferer, were
there no Sabbath. What ! would you give up that blessed day
of jubilee, on which the highest and lowest can assemble in the
house of G-od, and say, "We are peers;'' when the rich and the
poor can meet together, and feel the ennobling and kindling senti-
ment of a common brotherhood — " The Lord is the maker of us
all?'' Part with your beautiful cathedrals, but part not with
your precious Sabbath. Man built the cathedral, God hallowed
the Sabbath ; the one might be the injury of the beautiful — the
other would be the loss of the essential. An irreparable catastro-
phe, an awful judgment, a bitter bereavement; humanity and
Christianity together would weep over the extinction of the Sab-
bath, as the setting-in night of its brightest day. Architects can
build new and better cathedrals — princes can no more make the
Sabbaths than they can create the world. Make your Sabbaths
on earth, as far as influence, example, and advice can extend, to
be cherished by all that are dear to you, and your Sabbaths in
glory will be a ^' rest from your labours."
What, let me here ask, is the way to get the Sabbath best
observed? I think the interference of legislation is a good
method ; but it seems very strange to me, that the Christians of
this country should be always bothering the House of Commons
about these matters, when they hold the matter in their own
hands. Let the nation make the Sabbath visible, and no post-
office or parliament will touch its sacredness. Let us make our
Sabbaths what they ought to be, and the Legislature must make
them so too ; and I trust the day will soon dawn upon the world,
when, in the reflection and repercussion of all that is around us.
Sabbaths beautiful in your homes, and peaceful in your streets,
and hallowed in your sanctuaries, will make Sabbaths felt and
SKOOND SEBIES. ^
38 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
hallowed in the House of Commons, and senators afraid to utter
one word tending to their desecration.
But it is added; ^^ that they rest from their labours, and their
works do follow them."
What a precious truth is this ! " Their works do follow them !''
If a Romanist had written this, it would have been, ^' Their works
precede them 3" but God wrote it, and therefore ^' their works do
follow them." In other words, our works do not go before us to
heaven, because we enter there wholly through grace ] but " our
works do follow us," as the retinue that speaks to the universe,
that we have brought forth the fruits of the Holy Spirit of God.
We are admitted into heaven because of Christ's righteousness ;
we are seen to be fit for heaven by the fruits we have brought
forth. His righteousness imputed is our title — the Spirit's right-
eousness imparted is our qualification; Christ's work our right —
the Spirit's work our fitness ; and the fruits we bring forth the
evidence of both. We are justified by an imputed righteousness
— we are sanctified by an imparted righteousness ; these two are
inseparable. Our works, then, do not precede us — they follow
us. The only thing that goes before us to heaven is the Lamb ;
''these are they ihfit follow the Lamb;" and the only things that
come after us are our works. Thus you go to heaven between
two — Christ, the king of glory precedes you, to open its gates for
all believers — the good you have done follows after you, to give
evidence, from the light that is reflected from behind, that you
belong to the company of the redeemed, and are children of God ;
and fit to take your place and part in the choirs of the redeemed
around the throne.
Take care, then, you do not let these interchange places. When
you hear persons say, that we, evangelical ministers, are against
good works, tell them it is either a misrepresentation or a com-
plete misconstruction of our views. I insist upon good works and
almsgiving to every Christian cause — clothing the naked — feed-
ing the hungry — circulating the Bible — aiding missions, just as
strongly as any human being can insist upon them ; but then I
do not invert the pyramid, and try to make it stand upon its apex
instead of its base — I put things in their right place, Christ before,
and the works afterward. If you follow the works, you will bo
THE CONGREGATION OF THE DEAD. 0*
found among those to whom Christ shall say — " I know you not;"
for the fairest of them all has more of evil in it than you know ;
but if they follow you, they occupy their rightful place, and you
will thus necessarily follow Him who gave the works all their life,
their continuance and beauty, and you all your title to that rest
that remains for the people of God.
What a beautiful and blessed thing is the gospel of Jesus !
Precious is the Bible — more precious still the gospel it contains ;
precious are our Sabbaths — more precious still the everlasting
Sabbath. Love the gospel ; live under the influence of the gos-
pel ; spread the gospel ; if needs be, die rather than part with the
gospel. It teaches us purely to live — it teaches us peacefully to
die. An aged Christian's death has no terror in it — very little
cloud on it ; it is that beautiful evening twilight, that mingles so
imperceptibly with the twilight of the eternal morn, that the
night between is scarcely felt. ^^ Blessed are the dead which die
in the Lord from henceforth : yea, saith the Spirit, that they
may rest from their labours ; and their works do follow them."
How thankful should we be that we have been delivered from
the superstition and bondage of the Church of Rome ! Her best
and most exemplary members, according to her theology, must
enter at their death into a state of purgatorial torture, purifying
according to its intensity of agony and its length of duration.
Their best and holiest dead must enter into this middle state ; it
is this prospect that lies inevitably before them. Hence no
Romanist dies triumphant — no halo surrounds his head, no song
of victory escapes from his lips. The blazing fires, not the glories
of heavcL.^ burn before his eyes; and instead of resting from
labour at the h*ur of death, he feels that the keenest portion of
his sufferings is yet to come. It is not so with the true Chris-
tian, whose faith and hopes are drawn, not from the traditions of
men, but from the inspired oracles of God. He regards the
death-struggle as the last of his labours, and his exit from the
body as his instant entrance into peace. Whether he is cut down
in the midst of his days, or dies daily in long and lingering de-
cay — whether he slips the coil of life at once, or sees and feels it
gradually unwind, he cherishes the sure and imperishable hope
of an abundant entrance into joy. He sees on the last margin
40 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
of time, the interlacing margin of eternity; hears, borne from
afar, the sounds of his welcome, and tastes in the cup of death
the sweets of immortality and life.
Let us cleave to that blessed book which contains the gospel,
and serves as a lamp to our path through the valley of the shadow
of death. By its instrumentality, children now understand what
the greatest ancient philosophers had no conception of. That
blessed book rekindles in the heart extinguished love, and relights
and trims the lamp of immortality — it guides the judgment — in-
spires the affections — restores the Sabbath of the soul — it over-
arches the dreariest caverns of despair with the bow of promise,
and rings benedictions in the tombs of the dead. It alone opens
to us an avenue from earth to heaven, and plants in its darkest
and dreariest nook the radiant and imperishable inscription —
" Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord."
m ^ *jn^^w^WP-*"--
LECTURE III.
THE NEW JERUSALEM.
" And I saw a new heaven and a new earth : for the first heaven and the first
earth were passed away ; and there was no more sea. And I John saw the
holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a
bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a great voice out of heaven say-
ing, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them,
and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their
God. . . . And he carried me away in the spirit to a great and high mountain,
and showed me that great city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven
from God, havii^ the glory of God : and her light was like unto a stone most
precious, even like a jasper-stone, clear as crystal ; and had a wall great and
high, and had twelve gates, and at the gates twelve angels, and names written
thereon, which are the names of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel. On
the east three gates; on the north three gates; on the south three gates ; and
on the west three gates. And the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and
in them the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb. And he that talked with
me had a golden reed to measure the city, and the gates thereof, and the wall
thereof. And the city lieth four-square, and the length is as large as the
breadth : and he measured the city with the reed, twelve thousand furlongs.
The length and the breadth and the height of it are equal. And he measured
the wall thereof, an hundred and forty and four cubits, according to the mea-
sure of a man, that is, of the angel. And the building of the wall of it was of
jasper : and the city was of pure gold like unto clear glass. And the founda-
tions of the wall of the city were garnished with all manner of precious stones.
The first foundation was jasper; the second, sapphire ; the third, a chalcedony;
the fourth, an emerald; the fifth, sardonyx; the sixth, sardius; the seventh,
chrysolite; the eighth, beryl; the ninth, a topaz; the tenth, a chrysoprasus ;
the eleventh, a jacinth ; the twelfth, an amethyst. And the twelve gates were
twelve pearls ; every several gate was of one pearl : and the street of the city
was of pure gold, as it were transparent glass." — Revelation xxi. 1-3, 10-21.
The scenes first recorded in this chapter plainly follow tl|^
advent of Christ, and as plainly precede the long expected
Millennium.
First of all, as it seems to me, the earth will he purified hy the
last fire, as it is written in 2 Pet. iii. 10 : " The day of the
Lord'' — that is, the day in which is fulfilled the promise of hia
4*
42 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
coming — " will come as a thief in the night ;'' or as it is else,
where written, ^' Behold, I come as a thief/' What, then, takes
place on this day, " in which the heavens shall pass away with a
great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat ; the
earth also, and the works that are therein, shall be burned up ?"
The same startling event is also described in verse 12 : " Wherein
the heavens being on fire, shall be dissolved, and the elements
shall melt with fervent heat."
When this overflowing fire shall have wrapped the world, and
consumed all that is in it, and, having done its mission, has
passed away, Christ and his risen saints shall descend from their
aerial glory upon the purified earth, called in verse 13, ^' the new
heavens and the new earth j" and this descended company is here
described as " the Holy City, the New Jerusalem, coming down
from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her hus-
band." This glorious spectacle is just the fulfilmdfit of the pro-
phecy of Isaiah Ixv. 17 : ^' For, behold, I create new heavens
and a new earth. I create Jerusalem a rejoicing, and her people
a joy. And I will rejoice in Jerusalem, and joy in my people;
and the voice of weeping shall be no more heard in her, nor
the voice of crying." The Apocalyptic description in this
twenty-first chapter is also the fulfilment of a kindred promise
made by the mouth of Ezekiel, (chap, xxxvii. 24 :) " And David
my servant (i. e. beloved servant) shall be king over them, and
they shall have one shepherd : they shall also walk in my judg-
ments, and observe my statutes, and do them. ... I will set my
sanctuary in the midst of them for evermore. My tabernacle,
also, shall be with them : yea, I will be their God, and they shall
be my people."
This New Jerusalem coming down out of heaven, is just the
sealed ones out of every kindred, and tribe, and tongue ; that is,
the one hundred and forty-four thousand — those who had
'^ washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the
iamb" — the sackcloth-wearing witnesses, once all but extirpated
from the earth — " a woman," once concealed in the wilderness —
now coming down in their resurrection and holy bodies, like a
cloud of glory, to reign on that earth on which they suffered so
much and so long.
THE NEW JERUSALEM. 48
This scene is the realization of a vision thirsted for during
eighteen centuries, Rom. viii. 19 : ^^ the manifestation of the sous
of God/' ''the adoption, to wit, the redemption of the body;"
and als3 of John xvii. 21 : " That they all may be one; as thou,
Father, art in me, and I in thee ; that they also may be one lu
us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me;" anu
also of Gral. iv. 26 : "Jerusalem, which is above, is free, and iB
the mother of us all/' The old Jerusalem is thus forgotten in
the richer glories of the new, and the first paradise lost in the
lasting splendours of the second, and the ''vision of peace" is no
longer prophecy, but performance and blessed fact y all this erec-
tion of glory, magnificence, and beauty, shall rest and shine on
that very earth which Satan has usurped, and sin has harassed,
and clouds and darkness have hung over for so many thousand
years of pilgrimage and evil. Grod's ancient city, the dim type,
was called by expressive names: "the city of the great King;"
"city of God;" "beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole
earth." These expectations, it is plain, exceed the scene actual-
ized, even in Solomon's reign, in which they had no adequate
counterpart ; they were rays shot from the future ; they had their
rest on the then present, but their light from the future. Ancient
Jerusalem wrecked the divine idea of a cif?/, just as Adam wrecked
God's great idea of a man ; but God's purpose is frustrated in
neither — it moves over their respective ruins to its perfection, and
they both find that perfection — the one in Christ, and the other
in the New Jerusalem.
In this chapter of the Apocalypse, therefore, we have dim
ancient predictions fully realized, prelibations and foretastes of
distant blessedness fully met, shadowy outlines filled up, and the
deep yearnings of humanity, and the fervent prayers of saints,
responded to in music, in beauty, and in glory. It is at this
period that (Heb. xii. 22) " ye are come unto Mount Sion, and
unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to
an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly and
church of the first-born, which are written in heaven; and to
God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made per-
fect, and to Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant."
This city reveals its origin in our presenting its definition. It
44 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
is not an emanation from the earth, but something deposited on
it. It does not grow like a tree out of the earth : it comes down
like a divine thought, perfect in all its structure, radiant with
glory, the creation of God, a thing of heaven to adorn the earth,
a meeting place for Grod and them that are his. It is called a
Holy City. This is the secret element of its perpetuity, and
beauty, and excellence. Holiness is immortality. ^^ Nothing
that defileth can enter/' and, therefore, nothing that can ori-
ginate and feed decay can fasten it on. There is no weed, no
brier, nor thorn, nor upas-tree, in that regenerated soil; and,
therefore, there is no root of bitterness, nor bitter bud of wo. It
is called, also, by St. Paul, " the city of the living God." Athens
was the city of Minerva, and Rome of Mars, and were the cities
of dead gods ; but this is the city of the living God, supported,
sustained, and enriched by his presence, and pervaded throughout
its universal structure by his living energy and love. It is also
called in verse 10, ^^ that great city'' — great, not in its material,
but moral grandeur — great in the glory that hovers over and
around it, like a rainbow round a fountain \ having all the ele-
ments of enduring greatness, because inhabited by the ^' Great
King." It is described as Jerusalem^ or, as this word means,
the vision of peace. The first vision perished in the storms and
clouds of war, and even in its noonday splendour it was an im-
perfect type of this new and glorious scene. Then the Sun of
Righteousness had risen but a few degrees above the horizon, and
Jerusalem, and all its towers, projected a long and cold shadow
over the earth. But in the days of the New Jerusalem, that sun
has ceased to be horizontal, and has become vertical, and all sha-
dow is sunk beneath the glory that streams down, uninterrupted
by passing cloud, and yet neither scorching the earth, nor weary-
ing its inhabitants.
It is also called the New Jerusalem, not only as a contrast to
the old, but as ever continuing to be new. It is like the " new
song" which hovers perpetually round it, as musical and sweet,
after it has been heard a thousand years, as when it first sounded
in the sky. Infinite things alone never pall upon the taste, in-
iinite beauty never grows old, and infinite excellence never wearies.
Our homes on earth have but alloyed delights, and the fairest of
THE NEW JERUSALEM. 45
them all are not attractive enough to render change unnecessary ;
but the scenes and beauties of the future city shall never lose
their lustre, or diminish their attractions. At its commencement,
and in all its after cycles, this song shall be sung : ^' We have a
strong city. Salvation will God appoint for walls and for
bulwarks.''
It is next described as having in it "the glory of God/' this
is plainly the shechinah, or that bright glory that burned on the
mercy-seat between the cherubim in the ancient temple, and was
to th-e Jew the visible and standing evidence of the favour and
presence of God. It shone on the pillar of fire in the wilderness,
burned on Horeb in the bush, and was plainly a ray from Him
who is the brightness of the Father's glory, and the express
image of his person. There is, therefore, no doubt that the Lord
Jesus will be manifested in the New Jerusalem, in some such
glorious manner, so that every eye shall see him.
This idea is still more fully brought out in verse 3 : " And I
heard a great voice out of heaven, saying. Behold, the tabernacle
of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall
be his people; and God himself shall be with them, and be their
God.'' This is plainly an allusive reference to Ex. xl. 34 :
" Then a cloud covered the tent of the congregation, and the
glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle."
This dwelling of God with us in glory in the New Jerusalem,
is the fulfilment of a promise made 1490 years before the advent
of Christ, in Leviticus xxvi. 11 : " And I will set my tabernacle
among you ; and I will walk among you, and will be your God,
and ye shall be my people ;" and also of another, pronounced
587 years before the advent of Christ, in Ezek. xxxvii. 22 : " Ye
shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers, and ye shall
be my people, and I will be your God."
" He will dwell with them," is, literally, " He will be the she-
chinah among them ;" the word meaning strictly to be a dwelling.
Thus, the declaration in the commencement of the Gospel of St.
John, for instance, is a clear allusion to the shechinah : " The
Word was made flesh, and dwelt (or shechinaed) in the midst of
us." ^^ Go up to the mount, and I will be the glory," (i. e. the
46 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
shechinah.) Haggai i. 8. " That the glory may dwell," i. e
that the shechinah may be '^ in our land/' Psalm Ixxxv. 10.
Just as the glory took up its residence in the tabernacle, so the
Body, from which it was a reflected splendour, which is Christ,
the unquenchable shechinah, will take up his residence in the
New Jerusalem. This is " the glory to be revealed," to which
the apostle alludes ; and " the King in his beauty," of whom the
prophet speaks; and the fulfilment of the promise, or rather
hope, "we shall see him as he is." We have Christ in the
midst of us now in his special and gracious presence, and we see
him " through a vail darkly," as he is enjoyed by " two or three
met in his name ;" " whom, having not seen, we love, and whom,
though now we see him not, yet believing, we rejoice with joy
unspeakable and full of glory." Some saw him as the " man of
sorrows, and acquainted with grief;" others saw him in his re-
surrection body, all beauty and perfection. Stephen saw him
'^ at the right hand of God," in his own essential glory. Some
may be standing here who shall see him in his triumphant pro-
cession from the skies. " He cometh with clouds." " To them
that look for him he will come again the second time without sin
unto salvation."
In verse 11th it is said, " Her light was like unto a stone most
precious, even like a jasper stone, clear as crystal."
The word used for light is not ^a>? nor Xu/vog, the ordinary ex-
pressions, but <pa)ffT7jp. This last word means a luminary, and
involves the idea of rule. " The sun to rule the day," is an ex-
pression of its meaning. The word is also applied to the Urim
and Thummim, or precious stones on the breastplate of the high-
priest, on which the impinging rays of the glory that dwelt
between the cherubim disclosed the counsel of God in times of
perplexity and doubt.
The same word is likewise used in the sense of a window, or
lueans of transmitting light. So Christ is the medium of all the
light and glory that rest on the New Jerusalem ; then, as now,
the only means of intercourse with God. Not one ray of ever-
lasting joy, not one rivulet of living waters, not one blessing of
the throne or of the footstool will reach us even there, save through
THE NEW JERUSALEM. 47
the mediation of Him who is the great and only Mediator between
heaven and earth.
"A great and high wall'^ is declared to rise around the great
city ; a plain evidence that outside are foes^ who require to be
kept off the sacred enclosure which they would otherwise enter,
as Satan entered Paradise. These enemies are the same that are
alluded to in chap. xx. 8 ; and these walls are the literal accom-
plishment of the promise — " Salvation will Grod appoint for walls
and bulwarks.'^ " I, saith the Lord, will be unto her a wall of
fire round about, and the glory in the midst of her.'' Omni-
present love within, and omnipotent power without, are the pre-
rogatives of the New Jerusalem. Psalm xlviii. is literally her
glorious charter. ^' Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised
in the city of our God, in the mountain of his holiness. Beautiful
for situation, the joy of the whole earth is mount Zion, on the
sides of the north, the city of the great King. God is known in
her palaces for a refuge. For, lo, the kings were assembled, they
passed by together. They saw it, and so they marvelled; they
were troubled, and hasted away. Fear took hold upon them
there, and pain as of a woman in travail. Thou breakest the
ships of Tarshish with an east wind. As we have heard, so have
we seen in the city of the Lord of hosts, in the city of our God :
God will establish it for ever. We have thought of thy loving-
kindness, God, in the midst of thy temple. According to thy
name, God, so is thy praise unto the ends of the earth : thy
right hand is full of righteousness Let mount Zion rejoice, let
the daughters of Judah be glad, because of thy judgments. Walk
about Zion, and go round about her : tell the towers thereof.
Mark ye well her bulwarks, consider her palaces ; that ye may
tell it to the generations following. For this God is our God for
ever and ever : he will be our guide even unto death."
The twelve gates, or literally gate-houses, are the entrances by
which the righteous enter — all for entrance, but none for exit..
And that it may be seen that there is abundant access for the
representative number, 144,000, that is, for all the people of God,
these gates are stated to be twelve in number. There is no ele-
ment of exclusion anywhere but in man. There ia room in the
New Jerusalem — room in the twelve doors of access — room in the
48 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
affections of God — in the atonement of Jesus — in the welcome of
Calvary — in the offers of the gospel — and none are excluded save
they that exclude by incapacitating themselves.
There are also twelve sentinels. This alludes to the custom of
planting sentinels at the gates of ancient cities. Thebes, with its
hundred gates, had a hundred sentinels to keep watch and ward.
The temple of Jerusalem had its unceasing militia in its priests
and Levites ; and Paradise lost had over its approach the flaming
cherubim to resist all approach to its sacred enclosure. These
angel sentinels are there to defend the inmates from all hostile
elements without, and thus to fulfil, amid millennial glory, the
functions they now rejoice to discharge at present — of being
ministering spirits to the heirs of salvation.
These gates were so arranged, that three faced each point of
the compass ; and thus they fulfil by their distribution the promise
of our Lord — " They shall come from the east and from the west,
and from the north and from the south, and sit down with Abra-
ham, and Isaac, and Jacob ;'^ and these constitute that sublime
gathering which shall be " the manifestation of the sons of Grod."
The city had ^^ twelve foundations, and on them the names of
the twelve apostles of the Lamb." The apostles laid the founda-
tion of the Christian church ministerially, that is, they, proclaimed
Christ alone the foundation. ^^ Other foundation can no man
lay ;" and they themselves were the first laid upon it in the super-
structure that commenced at the resurrection of the Lord. In
former times, he who laid the first stone, identified himself with
the fabric, and was covered with a portion of its glory. Thus
Tacitus states, that when the Roman capital was built, all sorts
of persons took part in laying the foundation, that it might be
felt to be the protection and the pride of all. Yet the apostles
are not described as the foundations, but only as having their
names inscribed on the foundations; and even these names, so
justly venerated, are legible there, not in their own light, but in
the light of the Lamb. This is, perhaps, a response to the Re-
deemer's promise — " In the regeneration, when the Son of man
shall sit on the throne of his glory, they shall sit on twelve
thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel." Peter, we here see,
THE NEW JERUSALEM. 49
had no primacy in the first Jerusalem, and he has plainly none
in the second.
*' He that talked with me had a golden reed to measure the city."
This act is the symbol of taking possession. Thus, in chap. xi. 1,
the Reformed churches were separated from the Romish apostasy
by a measuring reed — a reed, frail and perishable, because it was
a separation only of a visible church from a visible apostasy —
the former having some sinners, and the latter retaining some
saints. But here a golden reed is used, to denote a perfect and
everlasting distinction between the saved and the lost. Thus the
mockery of sovereignty was once put into the hands of Jesus : the
unquestionable reality of authority, and power, and empire, will
be seen in his hand in the New Jerusalem.
" The city lieth foursquare. This is language significant of
stability ; a cube is firm in any and every position. Among the
Greeks, a man of firm resolution was called avi^p rerpdyajvoq,
literally a foursquare man. This is the city that hath founda-
tions that cannot be shaken, whose builder and maker is God.
No earthquake shall upheave it — no violence disturb, or enemy
enter it. It rests an immortal fabric on its everlasting site.
" The building of the wall was of jasper." The word ^vdufn)(n<;
is properly a bulwark; and as jasper is used to describe the Lord
Jesus, it is here implied that the Redeemer is its bulwark.
" The city was pure gold, like unto glass." Gold is the symbol
of incorrodibility and of value ; it is the most precious of all the
metals, and least afi'ected by decay ; but this is not sufficient to
express its full beauty ; it is also " clear as glass." In the visions
of the harpers on the glassy sea, we had the purity, but not the
permanence, of the church ; but here we have the purity, " clear
as glass," and the permanence too, "pure gold." These its
manifold glories are associated with that mysterious Urim and
Thummim, or precious stones in the high-priest's breastplate.
There are employed the blue sapphire — the variegated-veined
chalcedony — the green emerald — the dark-red sardonyx — the sea-
green and pale chrysolite — the blue-green beryl — the brilliant
topaz — the dark-tinted chrysoprasus — the deep-red hyacinth, and
the violet amethyst — -all sparkling in the splendours of the light
of the Lamb ; and dull, and dead, and colourless, except in re-
SECOND SERIES. 3
50 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
fleeting around his beams. The people of God are represented in
Scripture under various names. They are frequently compared
to living stones, and occasionally to precious stones. Thus it is
declared by Grod, " They shall be mine, saith the Lord of hosts,
in that day when I make up my jewels." These jewels, or
precious stones, sparkling in the same light, have each its own
peculiar characteristic. It may be designed to set forth this idea
by imprinting on each stone in the walls of the New Jerusalem
an apostle's name. If this be so, we may suppose that the name
of John will be upon the sapphire, the mild skylike lustre of
which expresses, best the character of the loved and loving John.
The brilliant topaz may bear the name of the splendid and im-
pressive Paul. The dark-red sardonyx may denote the glowing
zeal of Peter ; and the purple amethyst may be dedicated to the
grave and dignified James ; and the emerald, so agreeable to the
eye, the cultivated and holy Luke. It is thus that stones have
sermons, and gems a language ; and the twelve precious stones in
the foundation of the New Jerusalem, on which were inscribed
the names of the twelve apostles, may have a deeper meaning
than appears on the surface.
All that is beautiful in nature may have its counterpart in
something beautified by grace ; and these two strings — once disso-
nant — may be touched anew, and prove again harmonious chords
in the great and eternal harmony.
All the precious stones in the crowns of kings, and in the cabi-
nets of museums, are the scattered fragments of that explosion
which sin kindled in ancient Paradise, now strewn over the earth,
and buried frequently in its depths ; relics in short of its magnifi-
cence, and memorials of its catastrophe. In this city these
precious stones shall be exhibited in all their pristine glory ; in
masses, not in minute fragments ; brilliant and pure, not dimmed
and shaded. Ruby rocks and quarried diamonds shall be there.
Its floors shall be emeralds, and its dome shall be like sapphire ;
and its High Altar the Son of God, ^' the Pearl of great price,''
from which shall ascend perpetual incense, and around which shall
rise, as from innumerable hosts, a hurricane of praise for ever.
The very dust shall be of diamond, and the meanest thing where
all is magnificent shall be gold. Its soil shall be over fresh and
THE NEW JERUSALEM. 51
fragrant as the rose ; its sky around like the rainhow, and over
it all flowered with stars ; and its distant hills shall be for ever
alive with light. Darkness shall flee away from it like a doubt
before the truth of God, and no night shall draw its sable curtains
over earth's head. All space shall be full of Deity, the stars
shall be the scriptures of the sky, and the light of the Sun of
Righteousness the apocalypse of all. All sounds shall be har-
mony, and all mysteries light ; the universe itself shall be a glo-
rious hymn, and worlds the words in which it is written ; and
pine-forests, and palm-groves, the lichen and green fern, and the
giant oak, and the hill-tops visited all night with troops of stars,
shall overflow with the light of love, and life, and glory, and all
so pure that snow would stain, and dew defile them. A new and
yet more glorious genesis shall come upon our world. This poor
earth, for six thousand years a vast sarcophagus, shall recover
more than Eden life and beauty after its baptism of fire. It
shall be
«
"A cathedral boundless as our wonder,
Whose quenchless lamp the sun and moon supply;
Its choir the winds and waves, its organ thunder,
Its dome the sky."
Magnificent scene ! Yet more magnificent citizens ! The ante-
diluvian will be there, whose prospective faith, penetrating clouds
and darkness, reposed on the Lamb of God. The patriarch, who
saw Christ's day from afar and rejoiced, will be there also. Each
age of the world will contribute to this happy city; and that age
will be seen to have been the noblest and the best which poured
through these twelve gates the mightiest crowds of redeemed citi-
zens. Persons from every climate will be there. The African
from his burning sands, and the Laplander from his everlasting
snows ; the Jew from his wanderings, and the Arab from his tent.
All of the descendants of Ham, Shem, and Japhet, who have seen
and accepted Jesus as their Saviour, drawn by a great centripetal
attraction, shall meet in that New Jerusalem j and, like globules
of quicksilver, mingle in fact, as they have met in spirit, and so
be for ever with the Lord. Men from all ranks shall be there.
The monarch and mechanic, the prince and the peasant, denuded
of all circumstantial difi'ex'ences and distinctions, and glorious in
S^ APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
that common righteousness which humbles the heart while it
exalts the person of the wearer, shall there see in each other
brethren, and wonder they failed to see it before. Monarchies
and republics, schools and universities, sects and parties, shall all
present to this city happy citizens — the fruits of that living Chris-
tianity, which so many of them would neither understand, nor
patronize, nor thrust out. Such is our inheritance, incorruptible
and undefiled.
How should we rejoice in the prospect, the certainty, rather,
of spending a blissful eternity with those we love below ! to see
them emerge from the ruins of the tomb, and the deeper ruins
of the fall; not only uninjured, but reformed and perfected, with
every tear wiped from their eyes, standing before the throne of
God and of the Lamb, with palms in their hands, crying with a
loud voice, " Salvation be unto our God and to the Lamb for ever
and ever.'' What delight will it afford to renew the sweet coun-
sel we have taken together ; to recount the toils and labours of
the way, and to breathe, and to gaze, about fhe throne of God in
heaven ! nay, rather to join in the symphonies of holy voices, amid
the splendours and fruition of the beatific vision. To that state all
the pious on earth are tending. Heaven is attracting to itself
whatsoever is congenial to its nature, is enriching itself with the
spoils of earth, and collecting within its capacious bosom what-
soever is pure, permanent, and divine ; leaving nothing for the
last fire to consume but the objects and slaves of corruption;
while every thing that grace has prepared and beautified shall be
selected from the beauties of the world, to adorn that eternal city
which " has no need of the sun or moon to shine in it, for the glory
of God doth lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof." There
has existed in every age of the world a longing after a state on
earth more pure, permanent, and divine, than any yet realized.
Travellers have explored all realms, and poets have embodied their
highest presentiments, and traditions have handed down dim and
distant recollections of departed beauty as pledges of its return.
From Cain to Job, and from Job to Abraham, and from Abra-
liam to Columbus, weary humanity has been in pursuit of a city
that hath foundations, and "desiring a better country, that is a
lieavenly." This glorious city is the response to these yearnings;
THE NEW JERUSALEM. ^
it is the coronal of the brightest hopes — the consummation of the
grandest prophecies — the satisfaction of the deepest and most
earnest yearnings of the human heart.
It is plainly a literal city — a material as well as moral structure
— for risen bodies as well as regenerated spirits ; and thus matter
as well as mind and conscience will reach its perfection. This
city will show what a renovated earth is capable of; what an array
of glory, order, harmony, and perfection this chaos shall become
at the bidding of Him on whose head are many crowns. It will
be that brilliant focus on which shall converge all the beams of
material and moral glory which are at present scattered over all
the realms of Deity.
Its permanence, too, shall equal its perfection. There shall be
no waning moons, and setting suns, and enveloping night; no
flood, nor ebbing tides, nor drifting snows, nor frosts, to injure
the everlasting verdure of that scene. No lightning shall smite
its walls, or scathe its cedars ; nor whirlwind disturb its air, nor
fire leave its black footprint in any of its dwellings.
Earth, thus restored, with Jerusalem its sublime capital, may
be the great school of the universe, the sublime instructress of
other worlds, and thus it may play a part in the future that will
cover all the shame of its first aberration.
These are truths which we sh<ftild do well to study more. The
contemplation of its approaching glory would dim all earthly
lustre, and draw off our affections from things seen to things un-
seen, and constrain us to confess that here we are pilgrims and
strangers. We should feel, too, the force of the apostle's appeal :
" Seeing ye look for such things, what manner of persons ought
ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness?'^ Does the
prospect wing our souls with new zeal, and energy, and strength ?
Does it lift you above all that is grovelling and impure ? Just in
as far as it elevates, sustains, and sanctifies us, do we believe it,
and no further. Open your eyes to this brightness, and your
hearts to this warmth and love, as the expectants of such a home.
Its advent becomes nearer every day; all things hasten it.
Earthly cities are dissolving; kings are falling from their
thrones; nations are convulsed and agitated, as if struck suc-
cessively by irresistible tempests ; the bonds and joints of the
5*
54 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
social fabric are being loosened and dissolved. " The cities of
the nations fall." Great Babylon is coming into remembranco
before God. These are the ^' removing of those things that are
shaken, as of things that are made, that those things that cannot
be shaken may remain.'^
Oh, let it not be forgotten that our preparation for this glorious
city is not an acquaintance with its mineralogical or geological
characteristics, nor a poetic sympathy with its glory and pure
splendour. We may be poets able to sing all sweet songs, and
painters able to transfer to the canvas all bright scenes ; we may
be able to group and catalogue the stars, describe and classify the
flowers, and yet not be Christians. It is the pure in heart who
shall see God. It is they who are like Christ, who shall live
eternally with him. It is holy character that abides for ever.
The New Jerusalem is being prepared for those who have new
hearts, new affinities, new affections, and new natures. Corrup-
tion cannot inherit its incorruption. Unsanctified feet may not
tread its golden streets, nor impure eyes rest upon its beauty, nor
one unregenerate heart beat amid its blessedness. There is but
one essential franchise — a new nature : ^' Except a man be born
again, he cannot see the kingdom of heaven." No qualification
will be accepted as a substitute for this.
Make sure of a new heart, and you may safely calculate on an
entrance into this city. This is the only indispensable qualifica-
tion. It matters not how obscure, despised, or forgotten you may
now be ; you may be renewed, and sanctified, and made meet for
this " inheritance of the saints' in light," by that Holy Spirit who
is promised to all that ask. " If ye, being evil, know how to
give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father
in heaven give the Spirit to them that ask him I" It is no supe-
riority to the necessity of a vital moral and spiritual change, that
you belong to the very highest orders in the realm. " Ye must
be born again." Nothing besides is any other than responsibility.
This alone is meetness for the inheritance of the saints in light.
.)^i{r>^5i4 g^^T'- ^■
LECTURE IV.
THE SORROWLESS STATE.
"And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of
God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people,
and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. And God shall wipe
away all tears from their eyes ; and there shall be no more death, neither sor-
row, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain ; for the former things
are passed away." — Revelation xxi. 3, 4.
We have seen the descent of the New Jerusalem, and endea-
voured to describe that peculiarity of it — ^^ the tabernacle of God
with men/' or the disclosure of the shechinah in the midst of it :
I now proceed to consider the emphatic relationship which is to
be enjoyed by its people in the midst of it — " they shall be his
people, and he shall be their God." This promise has been re-
peated since the world began. Patriarchs, prophets, and apostles,
all have heard it. We are his by his own sovereign and everlasting
choice : " I have chosen you, ye have not chosen me /' " chosen
in Christ before the foundation of the world,'' thus we were the
objects of distinguishing mercy before the world began; and
eternity to come, our promised home, is only the response to the
aboriginal purposes of eternity past, the epoch of actualizing of
our predestination to "an inheritance incorruptible and unde-
filed, reserved in heaven for us."
I do not here make an attempt to explain this truth ; election
lies far above the reach of humanity; it is a mystery, and I
merely assert it as the unequivocal announcement of everlasting
truth, reiterated and repeated, calmly and clearly in Scripture, as
the expression of the mind and purpose ot God. Whether we
can harmonize it with our responsibility — another great doctrine
— or not, cannot affect its truth. God has said it, and it must
be true. As such, and on such authority, let us receive it ; and
" what we cannot see now, we shall clearly se^ and know here-
after." Man's responsibility and God's sovereignty arc truths—
66 APOCALYPTIC gKETCHES.
eternal truths ; their harmony is real, but not audible to us ; our
ears are too deaf, our perceptions too blunt. The epoch of their
contact — their focus — is not yet arrived : it will be ; wait pa-
tiently.
We are the Lord's by purchase; we are not our own, but
bought with a price, the precious blood of a Lamb without spot.
Nothing we have is freehold ; he has redeemed us and all we
have to himself. We are property, but not man's. The brightest
gem in the Redeemer's crown is the purchase of his precious
death, an evidence of its virtue, a trophy of Calvary, and a mirror
to an admiring universe of the majestic truth which placed it
there.
We are his by preoccupation ; he has sent his Holy Spirit to take
possession of his purchase — to inlay each soul with holiness — to
keep each body as a hallowed temple, and each heart as a shrine
of '^whatsoever things are true, and beautiful, and just, and
holy :" " If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of
his.'^ Christ in heaven prepares a place for us, and his Spirit
within us prepares us for that place. ^' This people have I formed
for myself" is the inscription on every soul that shall dwell for
ever in the New Jerusalem.
We are his by likeness. If this be so now, it shall be more so
then. Prejudices and imperfections stain the beauty and dim the
lineaments of that glorious likeness now upon us ; so much so,
that it is doubted, disputed, denied ; but then we know that we
shall be visibly like him, for ^' we shall see him as he is." The
sons of God are now hidden — 'Hhe world knoweth us not." But
then shall be the era of the " manifestation of the sons of Grod"
— that era for which creation groans; there shall then be no
difficulty in distinguishing whose we are, for Christianity's grand
autograph shall be legibly upon us. The great truths imprinted
in our hearts shall then have their illuminated counterparts upon
our faces, and our sonship shall be no more the conviction of
faith, but the realization of sense and sight; all the jewels shall
be seen — the living stones, the peculiar treasure ; the saints of
God shall be beheld no longer through a glass darkly, but face
to face.
It is also added, "God shall be their God," or as it might be
THE SORROWLESS STATE. ^
read, " God himself Immanuel, their God/' God shall be seen
in that present Christ so clearly, so fully, so gloriously, as we
have never seen him before. That love, that once wept, and
suffered, and died — that poured out itself in tears, in groans, in
agonies, in death — that sympathy, that wearied not in the sun-
shine, and that faltered not in the storm, and exhausted itself in
no circumstances; that mercy that absolved the guilty; that
power that calmed the hurricane, healed the sick, and raised the
dead — whatever in Deity is mighty, benevolent, gracious, good —
shall be luminous in the Lamb of God upon his throne ; and all
this shall be ours — -ours ever — unchangeably ours ! This is the
height, and essence, and coronal of all the promises; it is the
focal point in which they all meet; it is the fulfilment of our
deepest desires. That crown, that inheritance in light, that city
of God, shall be ours ! All this is good, but it is not all good
unless God shall be ours ; and it will be so. This is better than
all ; for it comprehends and exceeds all. If one say, " I will be
your friend,' ' we expect he will lend us all which that word com-
prehends; of the lawyer, the minister, the physician, who so
pledge themselves, we expect the enjoyment of the excellences of
each. Even so, if God say, ^' I will be to you a God," we expect
that all his attributes will be the wall around us ; and so it will
be : everlasting light and glory, and wisdom, and beauty shall
ever flow into us like a sea ; each face shall be more glorious than
the countenance of Moses. Nothing short of this would satisfy
us ; nothing less than God can fill the vast capacities of an im-
mortal soul. His gifts, and graces, and blessings cannot fill it —
Deity alone can. It was so meant at the beginning. This in-
heritance shall neither change nor fail. It is beyond the reach
of the tides and transformations of time : ^^ I am the Lord, I
change not :" the highest excellency of the creature may change
— " all flesh is grass;" — " the world, and the fashion of it, passeth
away." God remains an unchangeable, inexhaustible, and ever-
lasting inheritance; overflowing with joy after the lapse of a
thousand millenniums. Truly is it written, " Eye hath not seen,
nor ear heard, nor heart conceived, what God is to his people !
Happy art thou, Israel ! Who is like unto thee, people,
68 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
saved by the Lord, the shield of thy strength, and the sword of
thine excellency V
Do we so hope ? Can we feel and say so ? Is this our re-
lationship ?
And this Grod, who shall be our God, " shall wipe away all
tears from their eyes ; and there shall be no more death, neither
sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain/'
Such is a prophecy of the happiness of those who are the citi-
zens of the New Jerusalem. Whatever is expressive of human
enjoyment — of immunity from whatever grieves and disquiets
now — ^is here made tributary to this apocalypse of the future
glory. The removal of tears is a blessed promise; but mere
removal is not all that is here meant; the words are literally
rendered, " Grod shall wipe out Q^aXe)(pei) all tears (literally every
tear) from their eyes." This means that God will not comfort in
sorrow, or dry up tears as they start into the eye, which is our
experience here — life being alternately tears and transports, weep-
ing and rejoicing — but that 1^ will extinguish the springs, or
wipe out the very fountain of tears. Thus, tears cannot occur in
the New Jerusalem ; there are no springs of tears in that city,
no sources of weeping, no roots of bitterness, no elements of
sorrow.
In this dispensation tears have innumerable and inexhaustible
springs. No countenance gazes on the sky, on which tears have
not found a channel. " In the world ye shall have tribulation," is
a prophecy about the fulfilment of which there is no dispute ; it has
its fulfilment in all homes, and circumstances, and centuries, and
all sorrowfully attest it. Look where you like in this age, and
you will see springs of tears ; look where you like in the New
Jerusalem, and you will not find one single spring of tears. Those
losses and disappointments which are the occurrences of every day,
will be impossible in the Millennium. We shall no more behold
sunshine suddenly enveloped in clouds, and property the accumu-
lation of years of industry suddenly swept away, and the heirs of
plenty suddenly made orphans — beggars ! Here, an unexpected
turn in the tide of ever-fluctuating feeling leaves you on the sands,
an irretrievable wreck ; and props you thought permanent as the
rocks, melt away under unexpected and mysterious influences.
THE SORROWLESS STATE. 59
There is no spot here sheltered from the storm at every point of
the compass ; no pinnacle which, if raised above the floods of the
earth, is not therefore more exposed to the scathing lightnings of
the sky.
In the New Jerusalem, the spring and sources of uncertainty,
and injury, and decay, are utterly removed. Time does not waste,
and eternity does not impair, the inheritance in light ; the bread
of carefulness is no longer eaten, and thieves there do not break
through and steal ; the crown of thorns is exchanged for the crown
of glory, and the perishable tabernacle of this life for the " house
not made with hands," and the dim tapers of this dispensation for
the emerald glories of a better.
Another spring of tears on earth are the bitter bereavements
which checker the common lot. These are confined to no circle,
and prevented by no circumstances ; they are the experience of
humanity. Our relatives in eternity at this moment outnumber
our relatives in time — the memory of the oldest is the picture-
gallery of the greatest number of the dead. Widows and orphans
are here the lasting evidences of tears.
But " no tears" there, is the characteristic of the future. Sick-
ness shall not waste, nor years wear down, nor sin taint, nor cares
wrinkle, our immortal youth, nor Death find one victim for his
realms, nor Disease any food to feed on, nor Sorrow a subject.
No mourners shall be seen in the streets of the New Jerusalem ;
no hatchments on its walls, no funeral procession amid the aisles
of that cathedral whose size is all space, and no sound of weeping,
or of wo, or funereal chant, amid the songs of saints and the
anthems of seraphim. The deepest spring of tears shall not be
there.
Anxieties and vexations of innumerable kinds are our inherit-
ance here. Broken hearts are in palaces, and sleepless nights are
not unknown on beds of down, and bleeding hearts beat heavily
beneath royal purple, and cold shadows fall at times on the
brightest family. We are now too remote from the Sun of
Righteousness to be exempt from these. His rising is yet too
low. In the New Jerusalem these are all exiles for ever ; there
is no footing for them ; no word for them j they exist in recoUec-
60 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
tion only, and are neither felt nor feared in that new and pure
experience of the soul.
Tears, too, are shed in this dispensation, under a sense of the
presence of sin. There is felt here ^^ a godly sorrow :'^- — " the
good I would I do not'' grieves many a heart. This mourning
shall be audible till lost in the tones of that glorious jubilee;
these tears shall sprinkle the threshold of the gates of entrance to
the City of God, and then cease for ever ; the distance of infini-
tude shall stretch between sin and saints in glory. Nothing that
defileth can enter, or create fever in a single soul, or awaken
sorrow in any breast. Want shall not tempt to do wrongly, nor
passion to do rashly, nor prejudice to act blindly. There will be
nothing to repent of, or to confess, and therefore no tears of peni-
tence can start into light there.
Tears are now shed from looking at the state of the world
around us, " Rivers of tears run down my cheeks because men
keep not thy law." " Oh that my head were waters, and mine
eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep for the slain of the
daughter of my people !" Jesus even wept as he looked on
Jerusalem, and Paul grieved as he beheld Athens wholly given
to idolatry. The world, as it is, creates much sorrow in a Chris-
tian's heart. Such tears are impossible in that happier state :
there the wilderness shall rejoice, and every rock of earth shall
be a part of Eden, and every inhabitant holy as happy.
There are tears now at the limited spread of Christianity on
earth. We grieve that eighteen centuries of its existence have
left so faint an impress on the earth ; and we only lament the
more when we see the reason of it in ourselves, our disputes, our
selfishness, our sins.
There are tears, too, at the injury done to the gospel by the
inconsistencies of professing Christians. The loudest profession
is found out to be the most dexterous deception — Christianity is
used as a vehicle to power or wealth ; and skeptics blaspheme,
and worldlings are hardened; demons triumph, and Christians
weep.
There are tears because we can do so little good. We see
much to be done, and feel little able to do it ; our desires outrun
THE SORROWLESS STATE. ^
our possibilities of good, and we feel as if we were but cumberera
of the ground.
The world itself, too, is a fountain of tears : '^ we who are in
this tabernacle do groan, being burdened/' ^^This is not our
rest/' is written upon the earth that now is, by our tears; the
whirlwind is not the eagle's eyrie, the ocean is not the sailor's
home, nor the battle-field the soldier's rest, nor this world the
Christian's. We feel desires which nothing here can gratify;
capacities which created things cannot fill ; and longings aft er a
purity, a permanence, a beauty, and a glory, never realized since
the departing footsteps of Adam and Eve were heard at the gates
of Paradise. Our souls enlarge with our possessions ; the horizon
widens as we survey it, and we leave the earth just when our
minds are ripest. A thousand voices cry aloud. This is not your
rest ! — and responsive echoes within us repeat it. These tears
shall all be wiped away — these springs of tears shall be anni-
hilated.
This removal is by the Lord himself; that hand that was
pierced for us shall dry our tears ; he retrieved us from perdi-
tion, he sustains us in our course, and crowns the tender mercy
in which he first visited us, with the last act of loving-kindness —
*' he shall wipe away all tears from all eyes."
This removal is entire. Not one tear, or source of tear, shall
be left; and, like the spring, the power and pain of weeping
shall be put away.
It is as certain as it is entire. As sure as you weep now, so
sure ye shall be comforted. His love makes the promise; his
power performs it. All his promises are ^^yea and amen;'' and
such joys and consolations as you experience here — and these are
not few — are prelibations, and earnests, and foretastes of that
richer repast he is providing for you. A few more years of con-
flict, of prayer, and patience, and hope, and ye that " sow in
tears shall reap in joy" — and the glory of the result convince you
how truly the apostle calculated — " I reckon that the sufferings
of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the
glory that shall be revealed."
In that blessed state there shall not be seen the tears of despair.
Judas wept ; his tears fell like dew ; and no forgiveness carried
SECOND SERIES. 6
62 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
consolation to his soul, and no hand of compassion wiped awaj
tears from his eyes. Such tears are not known in the New Jeru-
salem. There is there no Judas's guilt, and therefore no Judas's
tears. Nor will there be there the tears of hypocrisy. We are
apt to forget that a tear, as well as a kiss, can betray ; there may
be as little sorrow in the one as affection in the other. Saul
might be found among the prophets to-day, and among the peni-
tents to-morrow, and a hypocrite in both. There shall be no
tears at a sense of sin in our hearts, for it shall be put away
utterly and for ever ; nor at the experience of plague and famine,
its stern avengers, for these have no place in that glorious city ;
nor even the feeling of an absent Lord, who seems often on earth
to withdraw himself, for there we are for ever with the Lord ;
nor at the wickedness of our own familiar friend, or the ingrati-
tude of the largest recipient of our bounty, for such manifesta-
tions are no part of that blessed apocalypse. The benediction
that came down upon us so softly here, " Blessed are they that
mourn, for they shall be comforted,'' is not heard in that state ;
there we shall not ^' look on him we have pierced and weep,'' nor
shall we ^^ weep when we remember Sion,'' nor " hang our harps
on the willows," nor sing with sighs the Lord's song in a foreign
land. Voices we have listened to with ecstasy shall never be
struck dumb ; forms we have beheld with admiration amid the
light of the Lamb shall never pass away. No sod shall hide
from our sight the dead we love. It shall not be true then,
" our days are like a shadow, and we are withered like grass.''
The transitory is lost in the eternal — the pains, the vexations,
the tears of this humanity, in the pleasures, the joys, the glories
of immortality. Years will heap themselves on years, and not
one symptom of old age shall appear. Twice ten hundred years
will roll round their millennial cycle, and there shall be no fear
of dying — all the sources of fear, of sorrow, of disquiet, shall be
dried up, and the grand temple of that scene where there is no
temple, shall never echo a groan, or glisten with a tear. In this
dispensation we are comforted in sorrow ; in the future we shall
be comforted from sorrow. Perhaps your tears flow down upon
the wrecks of what once was yours — precious and hard-earned.
** It is given you to suffer ;" '^ whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth,
THE SORROWLESS STATE. ^
and scourgeth every son whom lie receiveth/^ You are brouglit
to sorrow now, that you may hereafter sorrow no more : the loss
of your estate is perhaps the gain of your soul — the withering of
your gourd your inducement to seek after the tree of life. Are
your tears pressed out by a poignant sense of reproaches, heaped
undeservedly upon you ? Do you say now, " For thy sake I have
borne reproach ?" Are you therefore sad ? " If ye be reproached
for the name of Christ, happy are ye ; for the Spirit of glory and
of Grod resteth upon you.'' A day comes when all reproach shall
be rolled away like the clouds, and clear and beautiful as the
stars beyond shall your spirits shine in the firmament of the new
heaven. Those malevolent passions which have covered the wide
earth with wrecks — pride, ambition, revenge, envy, deceit, and
malice — shall be extinguished, and not one trace of the havoc they
Created shall outlive the last flame. The Napoleons, and Caesars,
and Alexanders of the earth are displaced, and the niches of re-
nown they desecrated by their presence are filled up and made
beautiful by the noble army of martyrs, the goodly fellowship of
the prophets, the glorious company of the apostles. There shall
exist among these not one malignant passion — across those calm
brows shall not sweep the shadow of a malevolent feeling — ^in
those happy hearts shall nestle no emotion but love. Reason
shall be illumined with perfect truth ; affection shall be wide as
love ; desire shall ever run parallel with duty, and the soul rise
and soar perpetually toward infinite perfection j and this harmony
of all things within with all things without shall leave no room
for tears and sorrow.
Names that are now memorials of glory shall be expunged
from our recollection ; battle-fields, and victories, and slaughtered
battalions shall be forgotten ; the discordant drum and the shrill
fife shall be hushed eternally; the red eye of battle shall be
closed, and the lightnings of war that have blazed over Europe,
and made cities volcanoes, and nations ashes, shall be quenched
for ever ; and mothers shall not weep over their slain sons, nor
widows bewail the conflicts of humanity, nor refugees see from
afar the ascending smoke of the flames of homestead and happy
rooftree. The cause of truth shall be transferred from an appeal
to the sword to peace and love.
64 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
Plague and pestilence shall not turn great capitals into tlie
catacombs of the' dead, nor bleak winds and premature frosts dis-
appoint the expectations of the husbandman. Hospitals for the
sick, and asylums for the aged, and refuges for the destitute —
these mingled memorials of the sufferings and the charities of
humanity, shall live only in our reminiscences. There shall be
no dread of death, nor any precursory disease. Life shall cease
to be tragedy in any. To live and to be happy shall be one.
Funeral chant, and grave, and cypress are gone ; a new genesis
has overtaken the earth. Eden ends, as Eden began, its history.
The Crescent, that has waved over so much crime and cruelty
— so much guilt in power, and so sore suffering in innocence;
that has treated conscience, and responsibility, and heart, and judg-
ment, as if these were meant to be the passive instruments of
tyranny, and neither to utter nor to feel the throbbings of indig-
nant protest ', which has called ignorance religion, and fanaticism
devotion, and cruelty the highest duty — shall be swept off the
earth from which it has so long intercepted the pure light of
heaven.
That fell apostasy which grew out of the corruption of the gos-
pel, and has rivalled Mohammedanism in some of its most iniqui-
tous characteristics, and has made the Crucifix and the Breviary
as significant of cruelty and wrong-doing as the Crescent and the
Koran J which has substituted blind credulity for enlightened
belief — substituted the decisions of synods for the truths of the
Spirit of Grod, and relation to the church for personal union to
the Lord j which has taught robbers to say the apostles' creed
before they sally forth on their unholy mission, and to render
thanks to the Virgin Mary over their plunder ; which stained the
streets of Paris with tears and blood on St. Bartholomew's day,
and the stones of Smithfield on earlier occasions ; which has made
its places of power Aceldamas, and has furnished the materials
of the saddest chronicles in the history of nations — shall be cast,
like a millstone, into the depths of the sea, and thus cease to be
the scourge of men, the persecutor of the saints, and the dis-
honourer of Christ.
The Granges shall no more bear to the sea the ashes of widows
consumed on the funeral pyre of their husbands ; nor shall tho
THfi SORROWLESS STATE. ^•
car of Juggernaut crush its wretched devotees ; nor shall the gory
cimiter, or the blazing torch, depopulate the hamlets of India.
This wo-struck earth shall be emancipated from this thraldom,
its groans shall cease, and its last pang be the birth-throe of a new
and more glorious scene.
The last shock that loosens all the kings of the earth from
their thrones, shall serve only to clear the way for the approach
of the Prince of the kings of the earth ; and the flame that wraps
this earth in its fire-shroud, shall only light believers to their
millennial rest ; and that holy hand which sweeps from the New
Heaven and New Earth every defiling element, and whatsoever
worketh abomination or maketh a lie, shall wipe away all tears
from all the eyes of them who are to gaze with unspeakable joy
upon that restored and regenerated creation, in which this song
shall be sung with an emphasis and fulness with which it has
never been sung before : " Make a joyful noise unto the Lord,
all the earth; make a loud noise and rejoice and sing praise.
Let the sea roar the fulness thereof — the world and they that
dwell therein. Let the floods clap their hands, let the hills be
joyful together before the Lord; for he cometh to judge the
earth : with righteousness shall he judge the world, and the peo-
ple with equity.''
^^ There shall be no more death.'' Here Death revels. The
dead in our world outnumber our living — there are more graves
than houses — the inhabitants below the soil are far more nu-
merous than those who are above it. Death is in the palace, in
the hall, in the hovel — the country and the city — in mountain
and valley — in all seasons and in all soils — ^in ripeness and decay
— ^in the withered grass, the blasted flower, the wasted rock, the
tideless heart. None are beyond his reach, and none are beneath
his notice. The brow that is smooth and beautiful to-day, shall
in a few years be grooved out with wrinkles, like the brown sea-
sand which the tide of life is leaving. Life, like water, finds its
level in the grave ; and its fall is just enough to turn the wheel
of life. But in that new and glorious state, flower and fruit shall
bloom in amaranthine beauty ; its loveliest thing shall last the
longest ; its streams shall flow in immortality, its people live for
ever. Widowhood and orphanage, and disease and death, are
6*
at APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
unknown. Life shall be the everlasting heritage of the saints of
God — a life of joy, of holiness, of happiness, and peace to all. The
cessation of tears is placed on this special ground, that ^' there
shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall
there be any more pain.^'
Death in this dispensation seizes on all things seen ; it collects
its spoils from youth and age, beauty and deformity. Its foot-
prints are to be traced in every department of the creation. The
geologist detects the proofs of his presence in the deepest excava-
tions, in subterranean chambers, in mines, in fossils, in petrifac-
tions, and in gigantic remains old as the history of the present
collocation of the earth.
The botanist hears annually his oft-proceeding footfall in the
shrill winds, and the dropping leaves, and the fading flowers.
Even the astronomer thinks he sees in the moon, not the beauty
of an untainted orb and an unfallen population, but evidences of
gigantic wreck and wide-spread ruin, as if the attendant of the
earth had felt the shock and shares in the fallen grandeur of the
superior planet. In our frame it needs not the eye of the physio-
logist to detect the seeds of death, or the multiplying proofs of its
approach. " All flesh is grass, and all the glory of man as the
flower of the grass ; the grass withereth, and the flower thereof
fadeth away, but the word of the Lord endureth for ever.'' ^^ It
is appointed unto all men once to die." ''Man cometh forth like
a flower, and is cut down ; he fleeth also as a shadow, and con-
tinueth not."
But these the findings of science, and these the assertions of
Scripture, shall cease to be true of that new and glorious experi-
ence into which the sons of Grod shall enter. The body shall de-
posit in the grave all it contracted by sin, and earth shall sur-
render to its last baptismal fires all it has inherited by sin, and
tree-like it ^hall flourish by the waters of life, and we shall be
ever happy under its shadow. Nor shall any thing occur in the
shining cycles of millennial felicity to remind us of death.
" It is a world where every loveliest thing
Lasts longest ; where decay lifts never head
Above the grossest forms, and matter here
Is all transparent substance ; the flower fades not,
THE SORROWLESS STATE. 67
But every eve gives forth a fragrant light,
Till by degrees the spirit of each flower,
Essentially consuming the fair frame,
Refines itself to air; rejoining thus
The archetypal stores where nature dwells
In pre-existent immortality.
The beautiful die never here —
Here are no earthquakes, storms, nor plagues.
The skies, like one wide rainbow, stand in gold—
The clouds are light as rose-leaves, and the dew
Is of the tears which stars weep, sweet with joy.
The air is softer than a loved one's sigh ;
The ground is glowing with all priceless ore,
And glistening with gems like a bride's bosom."
Nor shall there be any more sorrow — that secret and deep
sorrow which cannot find tears. Sorrow is the heir-loom of
humanity ; its records are found in the tapestry of royal halls,
and in the chronicles of hamlets. There are aching hearts where
no tears are seen, and sorrows too deep for sighs; there are
martyrs without visible fagots and flames. This, too, shall be
done away, for there shall be no more sorrow. What sorrow has
been felt in the hearts of parents at the wayward and criminal
conduct of children ! What sorrow has circled round and crusted
the spirit of ardent philanthropy, as it received ingratitude for
its recompense from those for whom it suffered and sacrificed !
Who has not been forced at times and under circumstances of
singular misfortune to exclaim with the patriarch, "All these
things are against me I" And even those voices of consolation
that have cheered and sustained us, have been voices crying in
the wilderness, and bearing on their wings the wilderness air.
Under its most favourable aspects — in circumstances of wealth,
of honour, of freedom ; under purple, ermine, and lawn, there
are heavy hearts which sorrow penetrates as does the dew the
soil, and each knows best its own bitterness. Many a hand holds
a cup filled from that which overflowed in Gethsemane — hesitat-
ing to lift it to the lips that pray, "0 my Father, if it be possi-
ble, let this cup pass from rne.^' There are brows still, about
which are crowns of thorns ; and Christianity still takes up its
cross and follows Jesus. Many a Shunamite woman, when asked,
" Is it well with thee ? is it well with thy husband ? is it well
68 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES;
with thy child ?" answers, ^' It is well," while her heart is break-
ing. The sorrows of men are as varied as their circumstances.
But in this new age, as no tear will rush into the eye, no sorrow
will vex the heart. Here joy enters into the heart; there the
heart shall enter into joy. Our days, like the hours on the sun-
dial, shall be measured by sunshine. "The ransomed of the
Lord shall come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon
their heads ; they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and
sighing shall flee away.''
The whole brood of sin shall be excluded. Whatever it
brought into the world shall be swept out of it; whatever man
forfeited shall be restored, and that restored estate more beautiful
and more precious a thousandfold. And this shall add intensely
to every element of joy, that there shall be no possibility of
apostasy, nor temptation to it.
Set your affections on this future apocalypse of joy, of beauty,
and of happiness. It is revealed, not as a specimen of poetry, or
for the gratification of mere human feelings of delight, but to
draw up our hearts to its clear and unclouded sunshine ; to enable
us to look with comparative indifference on the gilded toys and
bright glare of the things of this life, and so pass as strangers and
pilgrims, looking for a city that hath foundations.
Sustained and inspired by so bright a hope, we may well bear
patiently the afflictions of this present life. These will only
render the future more welcome, and, if possible, more beautiful
by contrast. The weary traveller enjoys best his home; the child
sleeps sweetest after crying. The weary Christian, who ex-
perienced no respite from his conflicts on earth, and descended to
the grave exhausted and all but overcome ; who passed through
much tribulation ; who bled, fainted, and failed by the way — will
enjoy the refreshment of that rising morning, and feel it worthy
of the name by which he had often anticipated it on earth, " the
rest that remaineth for the people of God."
Tell others of its prospects. Show them the way. If it be
precious to us, let us not try to monopolize it. We shall enjoy
it just in proportion as we labour to extend it to others ; it grows
by diffusion ; it decreases by hoarding.
69 lA
LECTURE V.
ALL THINGS NEW.
** He that sat upon the throne said. Behold, I make all things new. And ho
Baid unto me^ Write : for these words are true and faithful." — Revelation xxi. 5.
These words indicate the vast material transformation of
which our earth will be the subject during the millennial epoch —
our resurrection bodies shall not undergo a greater change. The
Creator of earth, who sits on the throne, is here declared to be
its Regenerator ', and by referring to Rev. v. 6, we ascertain the
permanent character in which he sits upon the throne : " And I
beheld, and lo, in the midst of the throne stood a Lamb as it
had been slain,'' (wq iGUiayixho^j^ as if just slain in sacrifice.) It
is therefore the Lamb upon the throne who thus makes all
things new. This throned one is the most august and wondrous
spectacle in heaven or earth. It is the symbol of suffering
continued amid the pageantry of royal rank. He who hung
upon the tree reigns on the seat of empire ; the hand holds the
sceptre that once clenched the nail ; the brow wears many crowns
around which was a wreath of thorns ; he who could barely find a
grave has found a throne ; he whom men execrated rules over
all. The crucified is seen in the glorified; the man of sorrows
is not hid in the majesty of the King of kings.
Thus Jesus retains within the vail, and will retain for ever,
the marks of suffering. These traces in Him who is on the
throne are the memorials of the most solemn fact ever done in
time; the epochal hour of time, the central act of Providence —
the crucifixion. His last cry on Calvary is thus perpetuated in
multiplied echoes ; the destroyer of death is ever associated with
the death by which he destroyed it. His sacrifice is too stupen-
dous a fact ever to be forgotten. It remains an eternal pheno-
menon. This is honour. This shame is higher, holier, brighter
70 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
than all honour. These wounds were the weapons of his victory;
this suffering was the battle that ended in our salvation. Heaven
is not ashamed of it, should we ? We are thankful he is thus
u- throned, as he was once a crucified, Christ. If he had never
« *ed, no mercy would be possible; if he had never risen and
ivigned, none could reach us. His death makes our salvation
possible, his life renders it actual. He bestows from the throne
what he purchased on the cross, so making good as a king what
he merited as a priest. It is thus that every blessing we receive
is a throne blessing as well as a crown blessing. The cypress
and the palm, battle and victory, shame and glory, death and
life, cross and crown, are the warp and woof of that robe of
righteousness which is the only costume of the Millennium.
Humanity in its tenderest aspect is thus in the closest presence
of Deity. The Incarnate One is there. My flesh is there. I
have not only relatives — parents and children — but my Elder
Brother, yea., closer than a brother, preoccupying a seat, and
preparing all things new for me. It is he who says, " I make
all things new.''
" By Him all things were made," sin excepted, which is a
blot, an interpolation. All things — rock, mountain, river, sea,
star, moon, and sun — emmet, eagle, elephant — heathbell, oak,
and forest — all were made by him, and still bear indelible traces
of his power, benevolence, and Godhead. We still hear his
voice in the thunder, and see his glory in the lightning, and feel
the pulses of his life in all that lives. At first all things were
made ^'very good.'' Sin, however, entered, and death by sin,
and these have marred and mutilated the fair face of things.
The bright mirror is broken, but its fragments show how beauti-
ful it was. The glorious temple is unroofed, and the shechinah
is quenched, and its altars are cold, and weeds luxuriate in it,
and all venomous reptiles crawl and breed in it ; but its dilapi-
dated walls, and its broken columns, and the live sparks that
leap occasionally from the smouldering ruin, indicate in some
degree what it was.
It shall not be left so for ever. The Creator is to come forth
again as its Regenerator. Deity will, as Deity alone can, remake
all. He will harmonize all its discords — allay its fever — and
ALL THINGS NEW. 71
(Bxpunge the foul blot of sin which was dropped upon Eden by
Satan, and has radiated to its circumference. Then his autograph
shall be written and made legible on all — the weakest thing shall
express his power, and the most defective thing his excellency.
The sea, ever gazing upward, shall mirror on its sleepless eye the
immensity of God. The dew-drops on every acre of grass shall
sparkle with his love, and earth itself shall be the bright jewel
on which his Name shall be visibly engraven ; and tree, and
plant, and flower — oak, and hyssop, and mountain daisy, shall
show whatever beauty they wear is borrowed from his smile, and
whatever fragrance they exhale is derived from his breath ; and
they shall render to him their thanksgiving, by consecrating all
they are to beautify the place of his feet ; and these new heavens
and new earth shall be one grand Eolian harp, over whose strings
the Spirit of God shall sweep, and draw out inexhaustible
harmonies. Thus Creation shall become a meet supplement to
Revelation, and Providence a commentary on both. The temple
shall be open day and night, and animate and inanimate nature
shall lift up ceaseless incense, and unite its thousand-voiced psalm
of praise. Time shall be a perpetual Sabbath, and all things
shall be worship. The sun shall have no spot, the sky no cloud,
the year no autumn, earth no graves.
" He said unto me. Write. '^ I showed you, in our exposition
of the chapter that describes the Reformation, that "write''
means hear, attend, take special notice; and "write not," means
disregard, despise the order. "Write," in this place, denotes
the absolute certainty of the fulfilment of these promises : it
teaches us that all obstruction shall be swept away — all opposi-
tion dissolved, as an icicle in the sun. Man's word may be
successfully resisted, but the word of the Lord endureth for ever.
It is now written — it shall soon be actual. Hope still, despond-
ing believer ! turn your weeping face eastward, and know that,
notwithstanding clouds, and eclipses, and evil auguries, the Orb
of day will rise in beauty, and reign for ever. " Earth shall be
full of his glory ;" " all nations shall be blessed in him ;" " ho
shall reign for ever." What is prophecy now shall soon be
performance — words and deeds are alike to Deity. " It is done"
— the prophecy is written ; the performance will soon overtake
72 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
it. The spectacle of the new heaven and the new earth shall
soon emerge from the last fire. All that obstructs it shall give
way. The name of Christ shall supersede every name. The
first name, Christian, pronounced in scorn at Antioch — written
frequently in blood — covered with reproaches, and mutilated by
sects, shall be heard in music in the everlasting jubilee — it shall
be inscribed on the throne, and in the light of the glory of the
Lord shine with imperishable beauty. The kingdoms of this
world are then the kingdoms of our God and of his Christ.
As if to convince us of the ability of Him who sits upon the
throne to accomplish all, he introduces himself under another
name : '^ I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and ending."
A shallow skepticism would seize on this as a contradiction.
How can one be alpha and omega, first and last, "beginning
and ending,'' at the same time ? So equally contradictory to us
is the sublime description of Deity, "which is, and was, and
which is to come." But are not all the ideas which relate to
Deity seemingly contradictory to us? Infinity, Eternity, the
Trinity, all overflow the earthen vessels that seek to contain
them ; and in our pride we pronounce that a contradiction which
we should only adore in humility and awe. Christ is the be-
ginning and ending of all — the archetype, and the agent, and
the issue of all. Whatever wisdom has been expressed by
combining the letters of the alphabet — whatever truth has been
told — whatever of true beauty poets have sung, or painters por-
trayed, or statuaries sculptured — whatever of science and litera-
ture sages have sought or universities have taught, — are all in
the great alpha and omega of time and eternity. Christ is the
beginning and the end of all, the harmony and perfection of all,
the light and the life of all ; and even those disclosures which
have been rashly quoted as inimical to his truth, and incompati-
ble with his word, shall be seen to have been misapprehended
by man, but never to have missed their course to his presence,
or failed in their contribution to his glory.
As Christ is the beginning and ending, all things shall praise
him as such ; and all his people consecrated to be his priests in
the New Jerusalem shall present all things to him as acceptable
incense. Then shall bis command be universally obeyed—
ALL THINGS NEW. 7^
"Give unto the Lord, ye kindreds of the earth, give unto the
Lord glory and strength. Give unto the Lord glory due unto
his name.''
" Christ will send us down the angels,
And the whole earth and the skios
Will be illumed by altar candles
Lit for blessed mysteries ;
And a priest's hand through creation
Waveth calm and consecration."
As all things are thus to be made new, I need scarcely repeat
that all the inhabitants of that new city must be made new
creatures too. " This great change begins on earth.'' It takes
place now or never. It is written, " If any man be in Christ,
he is a new creature ; all things are become new." If then we
are the prepared denizens of the New Jerusalem, we must have
passed through a great change. " We are born again." ^' We
are the sons of God." Let us try ourselves in the sight of God,
and by the light of his word. If in our experience all things
have become new, we have found a new object of worship. Self
became the centre of love and the object of worship at the fall.
^^ Ye shall be as gods !" was the successful temptation ; and ever
since, the aggrandizement, and elevation, and supremacy of " I"
has been the thirst of fallen nature. But now " I" gives place
to ^'I am that I am," — the law of self to the love of God; and
He who only is worthy fills the whole soul with his glory. A
new object of pursuit also turns up, and shines before us ; it is
no longer self-aggrandizement, but the glory of God. Man learns
and lives the first question in the catechism — "Man's chief end
is fo glorify God, and to enjoy him for ever." It is no longer
the grand question. Will this profit me ? but. Is this accordant
with the will, and conducive to the glory of God ? Whether he
eats or drinks, he does all to the glory of God ; and thus his
least and loftiest acts — his most public and most private — have
each and all a sublime aim, a holy significancy. Each day
grows into a Sabbath; each meal is covered with a sacramental
glory; and all his thoughts and actions and intercourse with
mankind become perpetual worship. He seeks first the king-
dom of God and his righteousness, and walks with new and
SECOND SEKIES, 7
74 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
beautiful feet the rugged paths of life, ever feeling, and ever
praying — " Not my will but Thy will be done."
This new creature, thus ripening for the New Jerusalem,
among other things become new, has new views of God. Once
God was present to his mind only as an enraged and avenging
Deity, whose footprints on earth were the traces of his travelling
to judgment. The waters of baptism to his eyes sparkled with
wrath ; the communion-table was darkened with an awful and
foreboding cloud; and every voice of God, in the sanctuary or
in the world, sounded to his ear like Sinai's trumpet. The only
happiness he felt was that which grew up in the chasm within
him, out of which he had expelled all the impressions of God :
to feel no God was his greatest peace — to run from him his
ceaseless effort — and the prospect of eternity was terrible, be-
cause it was the certainty of encountering God. Old things are
now passed away — all has become new. He sees in God no
longer the avenging God, but the reconciled Father; he hears
his voice, sweet and beautiful as is the music of the spheres ; and
round about his throne he sees the rainbow, and over him mercy
and truth are met together, and righteousness and peace have
kissed each other.
He has now confidence in God ; perfect love casts out fear.
God's law is felt to be perfect liberty ; his will, the happiness of
His people ; and all he has revealed, the expression of his ever-
lasting love. The presence of God, the new creature feels to be
its chiefest joy. It is from the very* heart that he cries —
*' Whom have I in heaven, but Thee ? And there is none upon
the earth I desire besides Thee." In all his ways he acknow-
ledges God; in all his experience he sees the shadow of the
hand of God, and from all depths and heights he praises Him.
In trouble he flees to God for comfort ; in prosperity he looks to
Him for direction ; and at all times he walks with God as Enoch
and Noah.
He in whose experience all things are become new, has new
views of the Lord Jesus Christ. Once he thought his name a
very musical close to a prayer; a charm in trouble; an ''Open
Sesame" at the doors of the kingdom of heaven, but no more.
He had no spiritual and scriptural views of His character, and
ALL THINGS NEW. J^
offices, and work; no right conception of what he had accom-
plished, or what his atonement had done for us. Now he sees
him and his work in a new light. He views him as the great
medium of intercourse between heaven and earth ; as the ransom
of our souls; the propitiation for our sins; the Lord our
righteousness ; in whom all the promises are yea and amen, and
all the attributes of Deity our defence, and all the law our
friend. His name is felt to be above every name in value, and
his work that precious result irrespective of which heaven had
been removed far beyond the hope of sinners.
Such a one has received new views of the person and work of
the Holy Spirit. Once he supposed the Spirit to be a mere
figure of speech — a name applied in common with many others
to God. Now, a new light has broken in upon his mind; he
feels he can neither think nor do what is good, or holy, or just,
unless by the inspiration of the Spirit of God, and that he needs
for salvation as truly the sanctifying energy of the Holy Spirit,
as he needs the atoning blood and justifying righteousness of
the Son of God. We soon learn that we have neither taste nor
capacity of pure and spiritual religion till He create it ; nor life,
nor saving light till He produce it ; and thus the work of the
Holy Spirit becomes to him who is the subject of its power, a
great, a living, and glorious truth ; his quickener, his comforter,
his teacher. He receives new ideas of the word of God. To
him the Bible was once a dull and uninteresting volume, in
which he could find little to enlighten his mind, or interest his
heart. He has discovered in it glorious truths; he has heard
sounding in it celestial music — the very voice of God, the very
accents of eternity. He sees it to be a storehouse of all his
soul needs; a sea, whose floor is covered with precious gems and
pearls, from which he that dives deepest and oftenest brings up
the greatest number; a book that surpasses all in interest and
importance. It is his study by day, his meditation by night.
He regards it as the very vicegerent of God ; the oracle he has
erected for us ; our Urim and Thummim ; our pillar of cloud in
the wilderness by day, and our pillar of fire by night. He tests
all religious opinions, sentiments, and theories by it. He listens
to the most eloquent preachers with "Thus saith the Lord''
76 APOCALtPTlC SKETCHES.
sounding in the depths of his heart; and what is not in tho
Bible he is convinced is not essential to our salvation, and what
is there he reverences as if he saw God bow the heavens, and
heard his words clearly and unequivocally from the sky.
Nor are his views of the Sabbath less altered. He recollects
when he felt it to be the most dreaded and the dullest day of the
seven, no less on account of its dreary services, than its distaste-
ful topics; and he rejoiced when the shadows closed upon its
eve, and gave him the prospect of six days of congenial employ-
ment. No change has passed upon the Sabbath ; it comes now
as it came in Jerusalem, in Antioch, and wherever saints have
met, and Jesus has manifested himself. But a change has
passed on the man — the Christian is a new creature; and the
Lord's day with other things has become new also : he hails it as
a respite from the world — a silent hour amid its din, when all
its wheels stand still — a foretaste of Eden — an acre of Paradise
saved from the mildew of the fall, and still blooming in its
primeval beauty, rendered yet more so by the consecrating touch
of Him who defined it anew, and made it the special hour of the
manifestation of himself to those whom he had chosen out of
the world.
Such a one has also new ideas of his own state. Once he
thanked Grod he was " not as other men •/' he now prays — ''God
be merciful to me a sinner \" Once he thought he had at least
a good heart, notwithstanding many faults; now he feels his
heart was then deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked,
and he prays still — " Create in me a clean heart, and renew a
right spirit within me." Once he said — '' All these things have
I kept from my youth upward ;'' but now, '^I have sinned in
thought, and word, and deed, and broken thy laws, and vexed
thy Spirit, and am unworthy of the least of all thy mercies, and
am the chiefest of sinners." It is when we see ourselves just as
sin has left us, and in the light of eternal truth, that we form a
right estimate of our real deserts. For pride and self-confidence
we learned humility — a grace least appreciated by man, and yet
most beautiful before God : —
"The bird that soars on highest wing
Builds on the ground her lowly nest ;
ALL THINGS NEW. I^f
And he that doth most sweetly sing,
Sings in the shade when all things rest.
In lark and nightingale we see
What honour hath humility."
Wherever beats the humble heart, there the Spirit of God has
built a temple for his residence.
Such a one has new and nobler views of others also. Once he
regarded others with positive hostility or indifference ; his cha-
rity, if it began anywhere at all, began where it ended, at home.
" Am I my brother's keeper ?'^ is the real expression of what he
felt ; and if at any time he spared a sympathy for others, it was
during some severe pressure, when, for the sake of appearances,
he was compelled to contribute to the necessity of others. Self
has ceased to be the circumference of his charity ; he sees in the
meanest a brother, and in the recipient of his beneficence the
outstretched hand of the Son of Grod. His heart thrills with
new sympathies, and glows with a divine love — a love that mi-
nisters alike to the spiritual and temporal necessities of mankind,
and feels how little is done while any thing remains to be done.
To be a fellow-worker with Christ — to make the widow's heart
sing for joy — to mitigate the ravages of sin even where he can-
not see the extirpation of its venom — to kindle on the weary face
of humanity the rays of hope and joy, and to light upon the
world a shower of blessings wherever he can be felt, is the new
and nobler desire that now actuates his soul.
His joys are also new in their origin and their nature too. His
former joys were either sensual, and expressed in " Eat and
drink, for to-morrow we die,'' or sinful, as derived from sinful
causes ; or merely intellectual, and arising from the cultivation
and exercise of intellect. Beyond such springs of joy he knew
none. He has now tasted the joy of the Lord, — the joy that
arises from the knowledge of Christ, and of the success of truth,
and the triumphs of grace. The tidings of the word of God
being translated into some new tongue — of the cross of Christ
penetrating the hearts, and drawing forth the love of some semi-
barbarous race — of the progress of pure religion — of disinterested
benevolence — of devotedness — of self-sacrifice, delight his heart;
it is thus he sympathizes with Christ in his joy, and proves him-
7*
78 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
self one training for citizenship in the New Jerusalem. His sor-
rows, too, are not the world's sorrows. He grieves at its sujBFer-
ings, but still more at its sins; he sees in human suffering a
termination ; but to human sin none but the second death. The
Redeemer's sorrow is his ; its springs are his also.
His hopes, too, are new. ' ^' Christ in him the hope of glory,"
is his blessed possession. This hope maketh not ashamed ; it
stretches beyond the stars, and clings to the throne of God when
earthly things are swept away; and derives nutriment from the
hidden manna when all sublunary sustenance is gone. It enter-
eth within the vail, and ends only in having. It is described in
1 Peter i. 3-5, " Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus
Christ, which, according to his abundant mercy, hath begotten
us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ
from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and
that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you, who are kept
by the power of God, through faith unto salvation, ready to be
revealed in the last time.''
Such must be the citizens of the New Jerusalem. It is a
new place for new men. None else are admitted: — "Except a
man be born again, he cannot see it." Dear brethren, is it so
with you ? Have all things become new in your experience ?
Nothing short of this will do? Every faculty, affection,
power, within us must be renewed; and none can thus trans-
form us, but God. He who made us, alone can remake us.
Revelation and creation are alike the prerogatives of Deity.
The minister, like the prophet's servant, may lay the staff on
the body of the dead, but the Master alone can quicken.
"Paul may plant, and Apollos water, but God only can give the
increase." Baptism may admit into the risible church, but
grace alone can admit into the true church. "Without holiness
no man can see the Lord." Have we "put on the new man?"
Do we " walk in newness of life V do we " partake of the
divine nature?" Have we experienced the washing of regene-
ration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost ? Do we evidence this
by likeness to Christ ? by hatred of sin ? by delight in the law
of God? by victory over the world? by righteousness? by
brotherly love ?
ALL THINGS NEW. ' 79
I need scarcely state how possible and how common it is to
be grievously mistaken in what constitutes the essential charac-
teristic of the new birth — this moral transformation of character
— this inner revolution of sympathy, and love, and light, and
joy-
Outward and virtuous conduct, even the most irreproachable,
is not regeneration. Externally you may appear all that is truly
beautiful, and just, and true, and yet within there may not beat
one pulse of a new heart. The foolish virgins were not out-
wardly distinguished from the wise. Saul the Pharisee, touch-
ing the righteousness of the law, was apparently as blameless as
Paul the apostle. The young ruler could boast that he had
kept ail these things from his youth upward; and the Pharisee
could thank God he was not as other men. The difference be-
tween this mere outward morality, and the Christian indeed, is
precisely that between a portrait in every respect perfect as a
likeness, and the living child, of the original of which it is the
copy. The aspect and features of the former are superinduced by
a hand from without; those of the latter are the expression and
efflorescence of vitality from within. In the mere moral man,
we have the effects of social and conventional influence ; in the
regenerated Christian, we have the results of the life of God.
The one is man-made; the other, God-made. The first yields
before the wear and tear of life, and ultima'tely disappears ; the
other grows in stature, and strength, and beauty for ever.
Great privileges are not the evidences of a new creature. The
Jews awfully and fatally deceived themselves in this respect.
They were "Israelites to whom pertained the adoption, and the
glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the
service of God, and the promises; and of whom, as concerning the
flesh, Christ came, who is over all, God, blessed for ever;" and yet
they were those for whom the apostle had " great sorrow in his heart."
Privileges do not commend us to God — they commend God to us.
They do not necessarily increase our piety; they increase our
responsibility. The tares received the rains and sunbeams as
copiously as the corn, and they remained tares still. Outward
seals are precious only as accompaniments of the written deeds
or will : alone, they arc worthless pieces of wax. We may fol-
m APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
low glorious pri\dleges as the Egyptians followed the pillar of fire
by night, to their own destruction. Tyre and Sidon sank amid
transcendent privileges. Privileges serve to augment the guilt
of them that perish amid them. They may, through our sinful-
ness, deceive us. We may rest in our privileges, instead of rest-
ing in God. We may love the Sabbath, and not the Lord of the
Sabbath. We may glory in the sect, and forget the Saviour;
yea, die for the church, and yet crucify the Lord of glory.
When the Jews were in danger, and that danger plainly the
punishment of their sins — they shouted, ^^ Bring us the ark
of the Lord V vainly supposing there was inherent in the out-
ward symbol a saving virtue adequate to protect their nation in
the conscious and palpable transgression of the laws of Grod.
Too many, in the same spirit, though under a different dispensa-
tion, on seeing the approach of death, and with no retrospect
of a life of devotedness to God, say with the dying Constantine
of the fourth century — '^Give me baptism!'' or with numbers in
the nineteenth century — ''Give me the sacrament !'' ''Send for
a priest!" This is the very essence of delusion; it is religion
perverted into a bane — it is Christianity desecrated to a charm,
and its glorious privileges turned into opiates which lull the soul
in peace! peace! when truth attests and God sees "there is no
peace at all.''
Nor are great gifts the evidences of a renewed and sanctified
nature. These co-exist with the greatest depravity. It is quite
possible to pray like a seraph, and preach like an angel, and yet
lead a life of sin. One may use all the phraseology of the
gospel, and have a memory stored with all its truths, and yet
live and die a stranger to its transforming influences. Light is
not always life, though life is always light. Judas was a
preacher, and Balaam was a prophet ; and Satan is thoroughly
aware of the falsity of every heresy, and as fully acquainted with
the texts and truths by which it may be met and scattered. He
has all knowledge, yet no grace, nor holiness, nor hope. He
has the archangel's wisdom combined with the fiend's malignity,
and the rush of many thousand years of experience over him
leaves him only more cunning.
Outward communion with the purest visible church on earth,
ALL THINGS NEW. iA ^
is not a necessary or infallible proof of renewal of heart. It is
desirable to seek this, but it is not salvation. Too much is said
at the present day about the comparative merits of systems, and
too little is felt of the power of real, living religion. We have
too many ecclesiastics and too few ministers: churchmen and
dissenters abound; Christians are still scarce. Pray do not teach
your children Episcopacy, and Presbytery, and Free-churchism,
or Relief-churchism, or if there be any other analogous ism.
They will soon enough learn to wrangle and dispute about these.
Teach them first of all Christianity, and to seek first the
kingdom of God and his righteousness. This is the root
and pith of Christianity; all else lies around it; this is itself.
Never mind if your children turn out defective Episcopalians,
or indifferent Independents, if they grow up children of God,
and patterns of Christian virtue. Would you not prefer
dissenting saints to church sinners? Better, surely, pass to
heaven through a Methodist meeting-house than plunge into hell
by the way of a cathedral. Surely, surely, it is better to be
uncanonically saved than to be canonically damned. Better,
beyond controversy, enter heaven right through a rubric, than
sink to ruin with ceremonial conformity to its minutest require-
ments. The kingdom of God — that is, true Christianity — is not
meat, or drink, or rubric, or rite, or ceremony, or church, or
dissent, but "righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy
Ghost.''
Nor is the testimony of others to our character an infallible
evidence that we are new creatures, ready for admision into the
New Jerusalem. Paul thought Deraas was a Christian; the
apostles deemed Judas an earnest and sincere fellow- worker with
themselves. Satan can paint a Christian as perfectly to our eye
as God can make one. Still less is our own persuasion evidence
either of the depth or reality of grace. A whole church once
thought of itself, "I am rich and increased with goods, and have
need of nothing," while its real condition was thus delineated by
the Searcher of hearts: "Thou art wretched, and miserable, and
poor, and blind, and naked."
Some will so far delude themselves, that they will enter into
the presence of the Judge, saying, "Lord, Lord, have we not
8^ APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
prophesied in thy name, and in thy name have we cast out devils,
and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will
I profess unto them, I never knew you; depart from me, ye that
work iniquity/' Two builders are described in Scripture, each
equally confident: the testing winds burst on their respective
fabrics — and that built upon the sand fell. It is not the strength
of our confidence, but the strength of the foundation, on which
we must rely; and on that foundation which is laid of God, none
but living stones can be reared, or any other than a holy super-
structure rise from the earth to heaven.
Christianity is not a religion of form, or circumstance, or cere-
mony, or of baptism, or of circumcision. With and without
-\ these it has flourished; for these are but its accidents — its tem-
porary and evanescent robes, the signs of its present state, and
not the inseparable accompaniments of its future glory. It is
the religion of the inner man, the life of the heart, the peace
of the conscience. Its dwelling-place, its sacred fane, its conse-
crated shrine, is the heart that has been hallowed by the Holy
Spirit of Grod. The gospel is not in tongue or in appearance,
but in the inward parts; not in word, but in power; not a name
to Jive by, but life; not a system without us, but a principle
within us; not the expulsion of one theory in order to make
room for another, nor a collection of dogmas, a vocabulary of
shibboleth, but holiness, and happiness, and truth. To eat with
unwashed hands, or to heal on the Sabbath-day, or to leave
unwashed the outside of the cup, are not the sins it selects for
reprehension. To he, not to seerrij is its requirement. ''To do
justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with God," are
its unpretending but fragrant fruits. " Uncircumcision is nothing,
and circumcision is nothing, but a new creature.^' There is
neither Jew, nor Gentile, nor Greek, nor barbarian, nor Roman,
nor Hun, nor Englishman, nor Esquimaux, nor plebeian, nor
noble, nor queen : Christ is all and in all to them that believe,
as their title, and Christianity is all and in all as their qualifica-
tion; all else is responsibility. What we require as a prepara-
tion for this new state, the procession of which already appears
above the horizon, emerging from the smoke of European ruins,
\% that all within us should be made new; that Jesus should
ALL THINGS NEW. 83
enter that desecrated temple, more precious in its wreck than
Solomon's or Herod's — the temple of the soul — and command
those brutal appetites — those wrangling passions — those crowds
of lusts, to retire — that it may be made no longer a house of
merchandise, a den of thieves, but our Father's house, a house
of prayer. Then shall we see within, and fiijally without also,
the evidence of the fulfilment of these words: "I will make all
things new."
84
LECTUKE VI.
THE CONQUEROR.
"He that overcometh shall inherit all things." — Revelation xxi.
War is the aspect of this dispensation ; earth is a battle-field ;
Christians are soldiers ; the Bible is our armoury ; victory our
hope.
We are encompassed with a cloud of enemies as well as of wit-
nesses; the whole fiield of our existence and action is covered
with them ; every hill, and dale, and valley ; every height and
depth; the past, the present, and the future, — all glisten with
their hostile array. The stamp of Satan has conjured up these
desperate squadrons, and they are prepared for victory or destruc-
tion. Sin is not the least powerful nor the least present enemy.
It has infected the air we breathe with hostile miasma ; it has left
its sear blight on every acre of the earth; it has distilled its
deadly poison into every heart, from royal height down to ple-
beian level ; it waits and watches for impress and victory at every
avenue, and even in a Christian's heart it is not utterly extirpat-
ed ; its condemnation is put away through the blood of Jesus,
and its power is broken by the Holy Spirit ; but it still vexes,
assails, and sometimes prevails against the believer. It is, indeed,
denuded of all its attractions in a Christian's eye, and arrayed in
its own inherent and essential hues; so truly so, that it comes to
him always as a foe, and is never welcome as a friend. Sin lives
in the Christian, but the Christian does not live in sin ; it exists
in him as an intruder, detested and extruded by every energy he
has, not as a lodger, either welcome from character, or tolerated
for profit. There is the same difference between sin in a con-
verted man and sin in an unconverted man, as there is between
poison as it exists in a rattlesnake, and poison found in the body
of a human being. In the one it is congenial to its nature, and
THE CONQUEROR. 85
cherished as its defence ; in the other it is felt as a foreign ele-
ment, and the system has no repose till it is expelled. In the
unbeliever sin overcomes the man ; in the believer the man over-
comes the sin. In the heart of the former, sin luxuriates an in-
digenous plant ; in that of the other it is cut down, and crushed,
and stunted as a poisonous exotic. Sin overcomes the child of
nature — sin is overcome in the child of grace.
The next enemy we have to overcome is the world. It is now
in all its phases and aspects the world — the enemy of the people
of God. The friendship of the world is enmity to God, and
whoever is the friend of the world is the enemy of God. " Love
not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any
man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him : for all
that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes,
and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but of the world." It
is, however, a disheartened, because a discomfited foe ; it wars
against the people of God, not as a confident and hopeful enemy,
but because it is incapable, from its instincts, of doing otherwise.
Its opposition is its necessity. It battles without hope, or rather
in despair. It must, however, be remembered that this victory
consists not in mechanical separation from the world, but in colli-
sion with it — in resistance, in protest, in spiritual victory over it.
The epicurean says, " Eat, drink, and be merry j for to-morrow
we die.'^ The Romanist says, " Fast, and starve, and stint, and
escape into a convent, for if you remain in the world it will con-
quer you." The Christian says, " Remain in the world, but be
not of it ; do not shrink from its responsibilities to avoid its perils.
Stand where God in his providence has placed you — patient in
sufi"ering, humble in prosperity. Christian in all things. Do the
good that requires to be done — avoid the evil that menaces you — •
treat the smile of the world as the passing sunbeam, and its
frown as a momentary cloud." " Endure as seeing Him who is
invisible."
We are called upon to overcome the world^s allurements. A
corrupt world crowds its temptations upon you ; places of sinful
amusement, and others of yet deeper evil, open their doors, and
light up their lamps, and display all their attractions. These are
the splendours of corruption — the phosphorescence of decay.
8BC0ND SERIES. S
86 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
Ambition bids you sink the Christian in the candidate for office.
Fame beckons you with her trumpet to lay aside simplicity of
life ; and wealth spreads its shining heaps, and invites you to be-
come its devotee. These are the world's basilisk eyes, its baits,
its snares. Withstand them in their beginning. Hear sounding
in your ears the Master's voice : " He that overcometh shall in-
herit all things."
We are called on to overcome the afflictions of the world. "In
the world ye shall have tribulations,'' is the law of our life here.
This tribulation has various manifestations. The loss of health,
of property, of relatives ; these either cry aloud to you, " Curse
God and die;" or whisper in the depths of the broken heart,
^' God hath forsaken you, and your God hath forgotten you."
Can you say, "The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away;
blessed be the name of the Lord ?" Does your Christianity shine
forth as the sun, heightened in effulgence and glory by the con-
trast? Do you pray in trouble, and praise in joy, and cling close
to God in all things ? Then its glare does not dazzle you, and
its scorn does not irritate you. You overcome. Still have faith
in God as your God, and in Jesus as your righteousness — in holi-
ness as perfect beauty — in love as true happiness.
Do you overcome the world by endeavouring to bless the world ?
This is the noblest victory. When you hear of whole lands lying
in darkness and in the shadow of death, do you respond to their
piercing appeal ? Does sympathy with souls loosen the attraction
of wealth ? Do you resist the suggestions of avarice, and lay
what you can on the altar of the gospel ? A religion that does
not finally overcome the world, and rise superior to it, is not of
God. " Who is he that overcometh the world ? It is he that
believeth that Jesus is the Christ," — who is born of God.
The next enemy we have to war with, and to overcome, is Sa-
tan. He is no figure of speech — he is a fact, a great and active
fact — a composite of a fiend and angel — cunning and craft,
and power and energy, enlisted against us. In all "sins there is
diabolical venom. Satan " filled the heart of Ananias." The
" god of this world blinds the minds of them that believe not."
Our salvation moves hell as much as heaven. Angels minister to it,
and Satan labours to undermine it. He varnishes vice with virtue
THE CONQUEROR. %^
— covetousness with the aspect of economy — pride with that of
self-respect — revenge with righteous retribution, and rejection of
the gospel with consideration. "We wrestle not against flesh and
blood, but against principalities and powers; against the rulers
of darkness of this world; against spiritual wickedness in high
places." There is a sympathy, too, between our hearts and Sa-
tan : each corrupt desire puts on his uniform, and serves in his
cause, and pleads with powerful eloquence for allegiance to the
usurper. Satan, too, has vast powers. He is strong in might,
and profound in cunning; he overcame even in innocence; he is
the prince of this world. His malignity is equal to his might ;
his only gleam of joy shoots from success in ruining, and hence
all the energies and efforts of his fiendish nature are concentrated
in efforts to contaminate. He vitiates in order to vanquish. None
are too high to be beyond his reach, and none too holy to defy it :
the more exalted you are in society, or in moral and intellectual
eminence, the more you are open to his fiery darts. And his per-
severance is equal to his power and enmity. He is never weary
of his work. In all places — the sanctuary, the exchange, the
sea, the garden, the bed — he tracks his victims as the wild beast
his prey. Our only safety under God is resistance in the strength
of the Spirit of God. Resist him, and he will flee from you.
He is a coward — a vanquished enemy — desperate only in the
agonies of certain defeat. Christ bruised his head, and he flees
from any that withstand his assaults in the strength of him who
overcame him at first. "Whosoever is born of God keepeth
himself, and that wicked one toucheth him not" — that is, so as
to overcome or destroy us. A stronger than Satan is on our side-
Divine strength is made perfect in weakness. Hence ours is the
victory of God. " Thanks be to God, who giveth us the victory
through Jesus Christ." We gain, and yet God gives the victory ;
we fight, but not at our own charges; we overcome, but not in
our own strength. By grace we stand.
It is " through Jesus Christ." In him we are accepted,
adopted, glorified. Through him our imploring look, our fainting
heart, our failing strength, send their appeal to God; and, in
return, we hear sounding in our hearts glorious promises — and
■ 'Am
88 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
invigorating our spirits, omnipotent strength — and cheering us,
the crown of life suspended in the future.
But we ought not to be discouraged because our victory is not
instantaneous. It is not the act of a day, but the accomplishment
of a lifetime.
Grod ^^giveth us the victory." There may be failures in
certain parts of the warfare. It may not be victory at every
point, and every hour of the battle of life; but its close will
assuredly be so. Thus Abraham overcame, and entered into that
city for which he looked, ^' whose builder and maker is God."
Thus Jacob ^^ gathered up his feet into his bed, and yielded up
the ghost, and was gathered to his people." Caleb '' wholly
followed the Lord," and said, " I am this day fourscore and five
years, and yet I am as strong this day as I was in the day that
Moses sent me." Moses was transplanted, like a glorious tree,
from the borders of the earthly to the sunshine of the heavenly
Canaan.
They too are there, having overcome, who '^ weep as though
they wept not, and who possess the world as though they pos-
sessed not, and use it as not abusing it." They too are vic-
torious who can say, ^' Whom have I in heaven but Thee ? and
in the earth there is none that I desire besides Thee." They
too who run the race set before them, looking to Jesus. They,
in short, who, by the might of weakness, fight the good fight,
and lay hold on eternal life.
In order thus to overcome the world, you must be a Christian
indeed. Any thing short of this will fail in the hour of conflict.
"Almost Christians" will be altogether lost. You must be a
convert, not a merely sober, and honest, and industrious person.
We, the ministers of the gospel, must be more anxious to see
around the pulpit, not crowds of curious inquirers after some-
thing new, but living, and thirsting, and praying converts, sub-
dued by the Spirit of God, and overflowing in sympathy with all
that is holy, beautiful, and true.
You must abjure all that stands between you and the full
reception of the truth. It matters not how dear, or old, or
popular, or profitable, this obstruction may be. Is it the absorb-
ing love of money — a love to which you sacrifice time, and
THE CONQUEROR. |^
religion, and duty, and privilege ? " Covetousness is idolatry."
"Ye cannot serve G-od and Mammon." Every true Christian
has the spirit that in Paul expressed itself thus : " Lord, what
wilt thou have me to do ?" — with money, as well as with
influence, ability, reputation, rank and power. Here the hottest
conflict is often waged; this is often the turning point to eternity.
A victory here is a thorough one — it gives impulse and impetus
to one's whole subsequent career ', the greatest surrender begins
here, and others are less difficult. We must conquer, and turn
every evil course to which years, and interests, and secular and
intellectual sympathies, may unite us ; we must look at such a
course, not in the light of the century, or climate, or country we
are placed in by the providence of God, but in the light of the
unerring oracles of Everlasting Truth. We must be honest be-
hind the counter; truth-speaking in the witness-box; impartial
on the tribunal of justice ; honest at home and abroad, in all the
duties, and relations, and offices of life. We are to colour the
circumstances of the world, not they us. We must move along
the direct and unbending line of duty, through, or over, or against
all opposition. Great battles are thus fought in individual
persons — great, and severe, and exhausting conflicts in shops
and closets, and where the ear of the world hears no din, and
where the eye of the world sees no smoke, and where the shout
of nations celebrates no illustrious victory.
This conflict will involve your abandoning all companions who
have no sympathy with the great and instant things of eternity.
They may have highly cultivated tastes; may be descended from
aristocratic families; may be great patrons of the drama, and
capable of pronouncing the most eloquent panegyric on the into-
nation of some Italian artiste, or on the notes of the Swedish
Nightingale, or the graceful steps of some accomplished danseuse;
but their title to be the selected companions of a Christian must
be far higher than these ; there must be Christianity, spirituality,
the impress of the character of Christ. We must sacrifice taste
to Christian duty ; we must give up the elegant and interesting
coterie for Christ's sake. These elegances may be ; but this
Christian character must be. The former is the accidental — the
agreeable; the latter is the essential — the indispensable. I
8*
90 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
speak of choice. We may be mixed up in public, social, muni-
cipal, political, or domestic circles, which we may not and dare
not renounce; this lot is given us, not elected by us; and so we
must take our part, and fulfil it. But when we have our choice
— be it of companion, or husband, or wife— we must make
Christian character a vital point, and the absence of it a bar to
all nearer and more intimate relationship.
'^ If any man come to me, and hate not his father and mother,
and wife and children, and brothers and sisters, yea, and his
own life also, he cannot be my disciple.^' "He that loveth
father and mother more than me, is not worthy of me.''
Be sure that so awful and solemn a sacrifice as this is required
of you, and you must not hesitate to make it. Home and
country, and houses and lands, are all as dust in the balance,
when weighed against clear duty. On this point the word of
God is most explicit, and here the Christian overcomes. His
address to the people of God must be substantially, "Where
thou goest I will go ; where thou lodgest I will lodge; thy people
shall be my people, and thy God my God." This was the
choice of him who counted all but loss for Christ; and it must
be the deliberate choice of all that overcome, and inherit all
things, as he overcame, and is now a participator of the glory to
be revealed.
We shall have to experience this conflict, if we are destined
to overcome, in the obligation we feel to renounce trade, or
traffic, or employment of the most lucrative nature, which is
plainly incompatible with Christian principle. Saul of Tarsus
renounced the most brilliant prospects in the world to become a
preacher of Christ ; the Ephesians burned their books of magic on
receiving Christianity; Luther left a university career, full of
promise, in order to lift up his protest against error ; and John
Newton ceased to be a slaveholder as soon as he began to be a
Christian. At this turning point there will be conflict, and, in
the case of every true Christian, victory.
Is extra time required for some of the avocations of Caesar,
avocations just and useful in themselves? Do not subtract it
from the Sabbath, or from the hours devoted to religious study,
and reflection, and prayer. Do the times require you to curtail
THE CONQUEROR. ft
your expenditure ? Do not lop off your contributions to works
of beneficence, and piety, and love; rather lay aside the splendid
carriage, lessen the great establishment a little, or diminish the
needlessly splendid retinue ; deny your taste its lawful gratifi-
cations, not your Christian sympathy the efflux of its tide in
expressive beneficence. You are called on to enter into conflict
with inner selfishness in all its retreats and developments. It
will resist your efforts to do good, to spread the gospel, to aid the
poor and the needy. This enemy is more powerful than Satan ;
he is ever within you — in league with all that is depraved
without, and evil within. It will weave a thousand plausible
excuses in its defence, ostensibly in yours ; it will gild its doings
with dazzling splendour ', invent new names for old sins ; and, in
the name of Jesus, advocate and spread every evil and abominable
work. Conflict, resistance, prayer, are the means of its expulsion;
an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not
away, is the reward of victory ; the close of struggle is the pro-
mise of Him who overcame, and is set down at the right hand
of God, and is King of kings and Lord of lords, the wearer of
many crowns.
" He that thus overcometh shall inherit all things. '' Scholz
reads, radza, these things — and not ridvra, all things. No doubt
the allusion is to those beautiful promises made to the Seven
Churches — on which it is my intention, if spared, to address you,
contained in the earlier parts of this book. *
Thus, the Redeemer's promise to the Church of Ephesus is :
" To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life,
which is in the midst of the paradise of God.'' To the Church
of Smyrna it is promised : ^' Be thou faithful unto death, and I
will give thee a crown of life." To the Church of Pergamos :
" To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden manna,
and will give him a white stone ; and in the stone a new name
written, which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it." To
the Church of Thyatira it is said : " He that overcometh and
keepeth my works unto the end, to him will I give power over the
nations ; and he shall rule them with a rod of iron : as the vessels
of a potter shall they be broken to shivers, even as I received of
my Father ; and I will give him the morning star." To the
92 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
Church of Sardis it is promised : " He that overcometh, the
same shall be clothed in white raiment 3 and I will not blot out
his name out of the book of life ; but I will confess his name
before my Father and before his angels." To the Church of
Philadelphia the beautiful promise is made: "Him that over-
cometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my God; and he
shall go no more out : and I will write upon him the name of my
God, and the name of the city of my God, which is New Jeru-
salem, which cometh down out of heaven from my God : and I
will write upon him my new name." To the Laodicean Church,
the last of the seven, it is promised : "To him that overcometh
will I grant to sit with me on my throne, even as I also overcame
and am set down with my Father on his throne."
These glorious promises are the component parts of the inherit-
ance promised in the text. More minute descriptions of their
excellence, and beauty, and glory, are presented in other parts of
the Apocalypse; such as, "They shall hunger no more, neither
thirst any more, neither shall the sun light on them, nor any
heat ; for the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall
feed them, and shall lead them unto living fountains of water ;
and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes.^'
Whatever is contained in the promises made to the conquerors
of the Seven Churches; whatever is promised to the redeemed
in the subsequent parts of the Apocalyptic drama ; whatever is
promised in the previous part of this chapter — all are pre-intima-
tions of that inheritance of all things which is the reward of him
that overcomes. Now you have a foretaste of the inheritance ;
hereafter you shall have the full enjoyment of it. Even now
" all things are yours, death, or life, or Paul, or Apollos, or Ce-
phas ; things present, and things to come, all are yours ; for ye
are Christ's and Christ is God's." A day comes when right shall
become possession ; when the most brilliant promises shall become
performances; and our glad hearts own that, glorious and ani-
mating as the former were,, they are exceeded inconceivably by
the weight, and splendour, and magnificence of the latter. " Eye
hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor heart conceived," the grandeur
of that state into which the Apocalypse flows — a perpetual stream,
standing in which we shall see all prophecy become history, and
THE CONQUEROR. 93
that history a dim and inadequate portraiture of what is experi-
enced.
If such be the scenes that lie beyond the horizon, reserved for
those that overcome; let us draw from the prospect present con-
solation and instruction. Be content with such things as you
have. Your real estate is not here; this world can neither con-
tain nor comprehend it ; it lies far beyond it. You have enough
to pay your passage-money : let this satisfy you who are moving
to a glorious estate. You are rich indeed; we estimate a man's
riches not by the amount of change in his pocket, or goods in his
house, but by his estates — his funded property. You have little
of sensible wealth in possession, but an inheritance of all things
in reversion. Draw from this fact compensatory joy amid the
privations of the world ; turn your future certainty into present
joy : present happiness is the interest legitimately accruing from
this funded wealth — these heavenly riches. Draw on the future
in order to enhance the beauty, and augment the weight and
wealth of the present. David said in faith, '^Grilead is mine,
and Manasseh is mine,'^ though he had not yet conquered them.
It is this that defines itself in the experience of the heart, and
shows the apostle's word to be an axiom needing no proof: "Faith
is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not
seen." By this faith we eat of the hidden manna, and drink of
the fountain of living waters, and taste the fruit and have the
service of the leaves of the tree of life, and walk the streets and
dwell amid the glory of the New Jerusalem, before we arrive at
the other side : " whom having not seen we love, and in whom,
though now we see him not, yet believing, we rejoice with joy
unspeakable and full of glory."
This promise ought, as it is designed, to animate and strengthen
us in this heroic conflict. " Put on the whole armour of God ;
fight the good fight." — " Be steadfast, immovable, always abound-
ing in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your la-
bour is not in vain in tlio Lord."
The eye of the Great Captain of the faith is on us ; he is deeply
interested in our efforts ; he will guide us with his eye ; he will
strengthen and uphold us. If we fight, we are sure of victory ;
it is a conflict that ends in conquest — a battle whose laurels are
94 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
certain. From this let our hearts draw new and glorious energy,
and our hopes their buoyancy, and our courage its inspiration and
its life.
Nothing can be surer than this inheritance to them that over-
come. God's promises are true as history — his prophecies real as
performances; there is no precariousness or contingency in the
words of God ; what he has said is " yea and amen." We may
therefore act upon the promise of God, regarding it just as good
as if the day it is due were past. The kingdoms of this world
rise and fall like the ever-ebbing and ever-flowing tides of the
I sea; but the testimony of God remains as the rock — unseen to-
day amid the froth and foam of the waters ; but visible to-mor-
row, strong in its foundations, and unscathed and undiminished
from the collision. In the presence of all created things, God
rises above them in majesty and glory, and in their decay he re-
mains.
This inheritance which is promised to the victor is possessed
of transcendent excellences and beauty. The "all things" in-
clude " the tree of life," and " river of life," and "crown of life;"
it is uncorruptible and undefiled, and fadeth not away. There is
no worm in any of its cedars ; no rust or tarnish upon its gold ;
no moth in its garments ; no pain, or disease, or death amid its
inheritors ; nor any monuments left of sorrow, of suffering, or of
death. Every joy that blooms in it is everlasting — it "fadeth
not." A little pleasure that endures long, is preferable to much
that is evanescent; on the least and greatest of the joys of hea-
ven is the stamp of eternity. It is an " everlasting rest," " eter-
nal in the heavens." It is beyOnd the breath of sin, the mildew
of mortality, the wear of age, the influence of decay. It lies
beyond and above the tide-mark of time, and is not wasted by
the waves of eternity.
The certainty and clearness of this revelation is no ordinary
element of victory. A perfect state was as much the pursuit of
heathenism as a perfect man. We have no need now to visit the
Nile, and the Pyramids, and the Ganges, in quest of some lin-
gering ray from the future yet unquenched. All immortality is
clearly brought to light in one clear Apocalypse. It is now partly
let down from heaven.
THE CONQUEROR. 95
Let us be encouraged also by the shining roll of those who
have overcome and inherited the promises. How radiant with
these conquerors is the eleventh chapter of the Hebrews !
^'- By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet,
moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house; by
the which he condemned the world, and became heir of the
righteousness which is by faith. By faith Abraham, when he
was called to go out into a place which he should after receive
for an inheritance, obeyed; and he w^ent out, not knowing whither
he went. By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a
strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob,
the heirs with him of the same promise. For he looked for a
city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God.
Through faith also Sarah herself received strength to conceive
seed, and was delivered of a child when she was past age, be-
cause she judged him faithful who had promised. Therefore
sprang there even of one, and him as good as dead, so many as
the stars of the sky in multitude, and as the sand which is by
the sea-shore innumerable. These all died in faith, not having
received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were
persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they
were strangers and pilgrims of the earth. For they that say
such things declare plainly that they seek a country. And truly,
if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came
out, they might have had opportunity to have returned : but now
they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly : wherefore God
is not ashamed to be called their God, for he hath prepared for
them a city. By faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered up
Isaac : and he that had received the promises offered up his only-
begotten son, of whom it was said. That in Isaac shall thy seed
be called : accounting that God was able to raise him up, even
from the dead ; from whence also he received him in a figure. By
faith Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau concerning things to come.
By faith Jacob, when he was a-dying, blessed both the sons
of Joseph; and worshipped, leaning upon the top of his staff.
By faith Joseph, when he died, made mention of the departing
of the children of Israel; and gave commandment concerning
hia bones. By faith Moses, when he was born, was hid three
§^ APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
months of his parents^ because they saw he was a proper child ;
and they were not afraid of the king's commandment. By faith
Moses, when he was come to years, refused to be called the son
of Pharaoh's daughter; choosing rather to suffer affliction with
the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a
season ; esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the
treasures in Egypt: for he had respect unto the recompense of
the reward. By faith he forsook Egypt, not fearing the wrath
of the king: for he endured, as seeing him who is invisible.*
Through faith he kept the passover, and the sprinkling of blood,
lest he that destroyed the first-born should touch them. By faith
they passed through the Red Sea, as by dry land : which the
Egyptians essaying to do were drowned. By faith the walls
of Jericho fell down, after they were compassed about seven
days. By faith the harlot Rahab perished not with them that
believed not, when she had received the spies with peace. And
what shall I more say? for the time would fail me to tell
of Gedeon, and of Barak, and of Samson, and of Jepthae,
of David also, and Samuel, and of the prophets : who through
faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained pro-
mises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the violence of fire,
escaped the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong,
waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies of the aliens.
Women received their dead raised to life again : and others were
tortured, not accepting deliverance; that they might obtain a
better resurrection. And others had trial of cruel mockings,
and scourgings, yea, moreover, of bonds and imprisonment.
They were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted, were
slain with the sword : they wandered about in sheep-skins and
goat-skins; being destitute, afflicted, tormented; (of whom the
world was not worthy :) they wandered in deserts and in moun-
tains, and in dens and caves of the earth. And these all having
obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise :
for God having provided some better thing for us, that they
without us should not be made perfect."
In each of these, faith was the victory that overcame the
world; and the fruition of the inheritance, and the fulfilment
of the promise was the corresponding reward. Nor did the
THE CONQUEROR. 97
overcoming ones cease from the earth when these disappeared.
The bequests they made have served successive generations, and
the glorious succession continues. Polycarp, immediately after
the apostles, when summoned to renounce his Saviour, beauti-
fully said, '^ Eighty and six years have I served him, and he has
done me no wrong. How can I blaspheme my king who has
saved me?'^ When tied to the fagots, and enduring the slow
torture of the kindling fire, he thus victoriously prayed: ^'0
Father of thy beloved and blessed Son Jesus Christ, through
whom I have received the knowledge of thee, God of angels
and powers, and of the whole creation, and of the whole family
of the just who live before Thee, I bless Thee that thou hast
thought me worthy of this day and this hour, to obtain a por-
tion among the martyrs in the cup of Christ, for ths resurrection
of both soul and body to eternal life in the incorruptibleness
of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, and for all things, I praise Thee,
I bless Thee, I glorify Thee, through the eternal High-priest,
Jesus Christ, thy beloved Son, through whom be glory to Thee,
along with him in the Holy Spirit, both now and ever. Amen."
The Paulicians protested faithfully in the east; and the Wal-
denses, amid the fastnesses and caves of the Cottian Alps, with-
stood the influx of superstition and error for centuries, and pre-
served their faith, like their own Alpine snows, in its virgin
purity and beauty. Wicklifi"e and Huss fought manfully, and
fell before the sword of the enemy on earth, to rise and reign
amid the white-robed throne in glory. Luther overcame where
few had long stood; the church and the world rose against
Luther, and he boldly grappled with both; burning the pope's
bull; despising the threats of princes; and claiming for man-
kind the privilege given them from on high, of reading an open
Bible, and worshipping God in spirit and in truth. Latimer,
too, overcame, lighting in England a candle not yet put out.
Oberlin overcame cold, and distance, and weariness, and spread
among ignorant and uncultivated tribes the blessings of pure
religion. In what Christian language are not the names of Knox,
and Bunyan, and Felix NefF, and Henry Martyn, and Eliot the
apostle of the Indians, now heard? They were not a few of
them ^'in perils by the heathen, in perils of the city, in perils in
98 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
the wildernes3, in perils in the sea; in perils among false bre-
thren, in weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in^
hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness;"
but they overcame and entered into glory. '^Wherefore, seeing
we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses,
let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily
beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before
us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who,
for the joy set before him, endured the cross, despising the
shame; and is set down at the right hand of the throne of
God."
99
LECTURE Vn.
THE UNBELIEVING.
" But the fearful, and unbelieving, and tlie abominable, and murderers, and
whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part
in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone : which is the second death."
— Revelation xxi. 8.
I SELECT unbelief as the root and fountain to whicli all other
sins are traced in Scripture. Unbelief prevented the entrance
of the Israelites into Canaan. Paul, as one who was taught its
heinousness by the Holy Spirit of God, addresses his Hebrew,
converts thus : — " Take heed lest there be in any of you an evil
heart of unbelief in departing from the living God.^' It is a
heart disease. Disease in the finger, the eye, the ear, is not
fatal ; but disease at the heart is not only fatal itself, but morally
it is the prolific parent of the dark progeny enumerated in this
verse.
It has been made matter of complaint by persons of a skeptical
mind, that heaven and hell should be made contingent on belief
or unbelief; as if mere belief were the highest virtue, and the
want of it the greatest sin. Faith in Scripture, however, is not
mere intellectual evidence : it is, properly, confidence in God, or
accepting his truth and promises, and all he is, as real, and
placing implicit and unwavering confidence in his word, more
than in the works of men. Is it no injury to human institutions
to be denuded of all confidence ? What becomes of a bank or
insurance office, if confidence in their stability and substance be
removed ? Ruin lights on all. Destroy confidence between hus-
band and wife, patient and physician, client and lawyer, and you
paralyze every possibility of good. Exhaust from our social and
commercial world all confidence, and you will soon find the whole
system a rope of sand, destitute of cohesive power, and ready to
fall to pieces. •
100 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
This unbelief, or, as I liave called it, want of confidence, while
it is so mischievous, is at the same time the most subtle, evasive,
and secret. It lurks under the affections like a caterpillar amid
leaves, or a worm in a rosebud, and gnaws and wastes them.
Other sins are easily seen : it is not so ; but its existence can be
detected by its effects — it always develops itself; the sins, in fact,
in this very verse exude from it, and appear upon the surface.
It shows itself in the least subtle, and therefore most easily de-
tected shape — viz. in positive rejection of Christianity; this is
vulgar infidelity, according to which the Bible is a fable, and
Christ crucified folly. It gazes on the Christian firmament, and
sees no sun or stars ; or on the earth, the ocean, and the forest, and
the landscape, and sees in none of these the footprints of Deity as
upon the sands of time ; or in its more recent and perhaps perilous
formula — American and Grerman Pantheism — it rushes to the
opposite pole, and sees every thing so overflowing with Deity,
that it calls the proof of God's existence God, and every thing
part and parcel of God. It is thus that the Pantheist in his blas-
phemy undesignedly praises God, by acknowledging every thing
a vessel full of divinity. But in all its shapes, extravagances,
and pretensions, its air is that of the dungeon, its dogmas icicles,
its element the night, and its doom dissolution before that warm
tide of light and life which shall overflow the earth.
This unbelief develops itself also in practical unbelief, combined
with theoretical acceptance of every truth. Such persons profess
to believe every truth of Christianity ; they assail nothing, they
dispute nothing; they are married, and their children are bap-
tized according to the rites of Christianity ; they enter the sanc-
tuary full of apathy, and they retire having lost none of it
These are the most unmanageable of all persons ; they are not to
be laid hold of, there is no handle about them ; they present per-
fectly smooth surfaces, and all appeals glide off, like water off the
wing of a waterfowl. One longs to hear them contradict, or dis-
pute, or deny, but they are incapable of this ; and yet if you say
they are unbelievers, they will repeat the apostle's creed and the
ten commandments without a single omission. But the gospel
has no hold of their hearts, no control over their affections, no
echo in their conscience ; its great voice has no music for their
THE UNBELIEVING. 10]
ear, and its sublime liopes no attraction ; they remain just what
they would be if Christianity never had been proclaimed in the
world. On them it has left no evidence of its presence. Dis-
guise it as they like, they are unbelievers.
There is another class, who like much in the Bible, and are
mightily pleased with a great deal of its theology, and so far
think it inspired. But there are certain parts they do not like —
great exceptions, they think ; and they insist on it that their ac-
ceptance of the Gospel of St. John does not imply their belief in
the Pentateuch, or their reception of the Apocalypse. They
want, as they say, to weed the Bible ; that is, really and truly,
to make their taste, or convenience, or conscience, the Procrustes-
bed to which the Bible is to be fitted. These seem to forget, that
if this be admitted, every transgressor will fit the Bible to his
case ; and when each has cut off from the Bible what he dislikes,
or what rebukes his sin, there will be found a very small residue
of influential or useful matter. This cannot be. We must re-
ceive the whole Bible or none of it. It is God's truth or Satan's
lie — it is nothing between. It all rests on one basis ; it assumes
for all the same original ; it is the highest truth, or the greatest
blasphemy ; it must remain unmutilated and unaltered. Our life
must be brought up to its pitch ; in short, we must be evangelical
Christians or cold skeptics.
They, too, evince this spirit of unbelief, who reject particular
truths of Christianity because they cannot comprehend them.
Some reject the Trinity, because they cannot comprehend it ; and
for the same reason, the atonement and incarnation also, forgetting
that they receive as facts and truths a thousand things in this
world which they cannot comprehend. Every man acts, for in-
stance, upon the principle, that by the volition of the will he can
move his arm up or down, right or left, just as he pleases. Can
you, for instance, explain this wonderful mystery — that thought
— a thing which cannot be detected, which the chemist cannot
analyze, which the anatomist cannot hold on his scalpel, which
you cannot touch, weigh, or measure — that this imponderable,
and intangible, and mysterious thing — thought — can make all
the nerves and muscles of the hand cross and intertwine without
delay in any direction it may prescribe ; or how it can move all
9*
102 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
the fingers of the hand upon the keys of a piano-forte, cr on the
strings of a violin, with such amazing precision, that it is the
nearest possible approach to a miracle ? Can you comprehend
this mystery? And will you tell me you cannot receive the
truths of the Bible because you cannot comprehend them, while
you receive many equally as incomprehensible things in every-day
life? It will be quite time enough to reject Grod's word or its
doctrines because they are incomprehensible when you have re-
jected every thing in creation, and every day's experience, be-
cause it is no less so.
Another form of this unbelief is, the dislike of a simple, spi-
ritual worship. I do not wonder that so many people become
Roman Catholics, nor is it any matter of surprise to me that so
many clergymen have become priests. My only surprise is, that
every unregenerate and unconverted man does not become a
Roman Catholic; and I declare, if I were not a Christian, I
would become a Catholic myself. It is an externally beautiful
and convenient form of religion. You can sin on one side of the
street, and procure absolution on the other; its ritual services
are fascinating to the senses, its incense fragrant to the smell, its
music attractive to the ear, its architecture most gorgeous, its
ceremonial grand, its robes splendid. If you are poor, your
poverty will get you to heaven; if you are rich, your riches will
help you to heaven ; if you are fond of solitude, you may merito-
riously retire to the cell or the convent ; if you prefer splendid
society, you can mingle with cardinals, popes, prelates, and other
high occupants of power. I confess I wonder that every uncon-
verted man is not allured and charmed, into becoming a Catholic.
But it is impossible that any man who knows what spiritual
Christianity is — in whose heart there are throbs of the new life —
should ever become a Roman Catholic. He knows in his heart,
not by information, but by inwrought and sensible experience,
that '^ God is a Spirit, and that they who worship him must
worship him in spirit and in truth." It is their merely out-
side Christianity that explains the fact, that many of our own
people, our Scottish people, when they come to London, are the
fii'st to follow the attractions of a more ritual worship ; and not
unfrequently they who have been the most staunch supporters
THE UNBELIEVING. 103
of a severe but scriptural form, have subsequently become the
most outre Tractarians. So it will be : the most unsanctified
must have elaborate gratification of the senses. But the spiritual
heart, while it is delighted with the best music, the best architec-
ture, and the best forms, provided there is no interruption to thai
true spiritual worship which seems to me to be the grandest wor
ship, feels that God himself, and God's word, and God's worship
.need but to be seen just as they are, to be presented in their greatesr.
beauty. Such is another instance, then, of this unbelief. It alsw
robes itself in pride and presumption, rushing irreverently where
angels vail their faces ; or, if not, it falls into despair. The eye
of pride scarcely sees God at all ; the eye of presumption looks at
his mercy alone ; the eye of despair, at his justice alone.
I must now notice unbelief in its special attitude of departing
from the living God. God was, and is now, the great centre of
the universe; and before sin was induced into this universe,
every thing — every living and inanimate thing (if I may
use the expression) — had the Deity for its centre of attrac-
tion. Every thing came from God : every thing moved onward
to God, and found in him its repose, its happiness, its peace.
Sin entered the world, and smote all the springs of things ; and
every thing has since this intrusion received a centrifugal tend-
ency. At first all things were centripetal — that is, seeking the
centre ; now all things are centrifugal — that is, flying from the
centre 3 and every object, therefore, which once carried man to
God, now, through sin in it and in man, carries him from God )
or he rests in the object instead of upon God, or he has gone with
the object to a distance from God. If man had never fallen, the
rich man would have been led by his wealth up to Him who is
enthroned on the riches of the universe ; and the man of great
intellect would have been led by that intellect to seek more and
more for light to enable him to decipher the inscriptions upon all
things wiitten by God's finger, and thus to be brought nearer and
nearer to God ; and the man of great rank would have felt his
station but the reflection of the dignity of God, and have seen
God in it, and by it ; now all these things, through man's sin,
carry him away from God, or become to him substitutes for God.
The wealthy worship their wealth ; the intellectual worship Intel-
104 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
lect; the great worship greatness; and all things, smitten by
sin, have lost their original centripetal tendency, and, by their
acquired centrifugal force, carry all they are and have away from
God, and plunge man into departure from the living and true
God. Now, the great tendency of the gospel is just the reverse
of all this : it brings man back again to God. All religion lies
in this : " nearness to God.^' All irreligion, whatever be its
shape, name, or form, lies in this : '^ departure from God."
To be with, or to approach to God, is real religion ; to be with
God is happiness ; and to be in God is safety. To depart from
God, this is sin ; to be without God, this is irreligion and misery.
We approach God on the wings of faith and love ; we depart
from God by the leaden weights of unbelief, sensuality, and sin.
And strange it is that man, though he thus departs from the
living and true God, yet ceases not to have a god. There is no
such thing as atheism in the world : there may be atheism, cer-
tainly, in the sense of being without the true and living God ; but
there is no such thing as atheism in the sense of being without a
god. As soon as a man has lost the living God, that moment he
begins to set up a dead god. And is not this attested by the
history of the whole world ? Athens, though without the true
God, was yet not without a god, for she had her Minerva.
Rome, too, could not do without a god, and therefore she had her
Mars. The Romanist, having lost the true God by the interven-
tion of priestly darkness and corruptions, cannot do without his
god, and, therefore, he adores the saints, his guardian angel, the
host, &c. The rich irreligious man, too, has his god. True, he
may not bow his body before it — that is a mere form ; he may
not speak the very words, " Oh, save me, my wealth !" — this is
mere lip ; but his heart bows, his heart speaks : it is the heart
that worships ; and the heart of that wealthy man really says to
his gold, " Gold, thou art my god ! — I worship and adore thee V'
That which a man draws his main happiness from, is his god ;
and whenever he loses the living God, he must have another god
in his stead, because man's soul was made to be a shrine and a
temple of the Deity. You may as well try to produce a vacuum
that will be permanently so in the midst of our atmosphere, as to
produce a moral vacuum in a man's mind that is to expel all re-
THE UNBELIEVING. 105
ligion. He must have a god within : some other god he must
have, if he depart from the living God : he deserts a great, glo-
rious, eternal, omniscient, and omnipotent God ; but he is not,
therefore, without a god : he admits another — an idol.
And you will find that just in proportion as a man departs
from the true God, in the same ratio does the god he makes be-
come monstrous and degrading : there is a progressive descent.
Take, for instance, the first departure from the living God — the
poor superstitious member of the Church of Rome. The moment
he has lost the true God, or Father, that moment he begins to
project from himself a god, or to form a god out of his own dark,
superstitious mind ; and that god a very terrible and vindictive
one. He lacerates his flesh, mutilates his body, pines in poverty,
lives in solitude, wretchedness, cold, and hunger, wears a painful
dress ; and all this he does in order to propitiate a god that he
has made for himself. Just as, if you go, while the bright sun
shines high in the firmament, into those deep dens and caverns
of the earth into which its rays never penetrate, you there find
all sorts of poisonous and sickly weeds growing rankly up ; so,
just in the same proportion as you depart from the sense and
presence of the true God, do the poisonous weeds and offshoots of
fanaticism and superstition grow and luxuriate in the heart of
man. Let me explain what are symptoms of this departure from
God, this unbelief, this mother sin, and endeavour to speak what
may be practical and profitable to you. And first, there is the
suspicion whether God has actually spoken what the preacher
proves unequivocally to be the word of God. Do you recollect
the earliest commencement of Eve's departure from God? this
will afford you an illustration of what I mean. When Satan
came to Eve, he did not dare to say, '' God never said so, or pro-
nounced this;" but he put it in the shape of an interrogation:
" Hath God said so ? Are- you quite sure that these were God's
words ? May you not have mistaken his meaning ? May it not
be a misapprehension of yours V And then, again, he taught
her to look at it in the light of expediency, as if he said, " Is it
likely that God, who made so beautiful a being. Eve, as you are,
would visit you with death merely for touching a tree — that beau-
tiful tree, the rich fruit of which diffuses so grateful a perfum©
106 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
through Eden, and the taste of which is you know not how
sweet? Is it possible? do you not mistake? have you no
doubt ?" And she, thus tempted, looked upon the fruit, and saw
it was fair to the eye, and pleasant to the senses ; and regarding
its fruit as a fruit that would make her wise, (there was yielding
to expediency !) plucked an apple, broke the commandment of
God, and so brought death upon herself and all her posterity.
Whenever a suspicion of the truth of Grod's declarations is in-
jected into your minds, remember it is your only safety to resist,
repel, and protest against it. Open the Bible : what you find
plainly written there, receive; what you do not find there, reject
as unessential.
The next evidence of his departure from God, will be difierence
of sentiment with God. "We say. We agree with this and with
that, and. Here are some things we cannot agree with. God says,
" Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all,
other things will be added unto you.'' But you say, " In the
house of God, and on the Sunday, it is right to seek God first;
but surely the passage does not mean more than this.'' And you
will perhaps say, "Are we required to seek God's honour and
glory first in the warehouse, the shop, the bank, the mart, the
house of commons, the house of peers, the palace, on the seas, in
the field of battle ? — are we to seek God's glory first there, as
well as in the sanctuary, and every week-day as well as on the
Sabbath ? This will never do : it may be very philosophical,
very beautiful, but we could not get on in this way, nor live by
it; it will not serve our turn, it must be a mistaken view of
Christianity, or an obsolete prescription, or a Jewish one." Then
again, we read, " Those who honour me, I will honour" — that if
we seek to obey his will first, God will do every thing for us.
You say, ^' That may have been all very well for the apostles, but
it will not do for us; it may have been most admirable in the
apostolic age, but it is altogether unsuited for the nineteenth
century, when competition is so keen, and competitors so many.
If we shut up our shops on Sunday, we shall go to ruin : if we
do not read the newspapers on Sunday, we shall lose the last news
from the Continent; if we do not go to the news-room on Sunday,
we shall fall behind our neighbours in political information.
THE UNBELIEVING, a 107
"Christianity must be adapted to the nineteenth century," you
say, " and not the nineteenth century to Christianity.'^ My dear
friends, the religion of God is unchangeable, like God himself: it
is meant for all ages and all countries ; and you will find it true,
believe me, in all centuries, that if you seek God first, and honour
and serve him first, all the information you really need you will
have time to gather, and the wealth you can truly want will be
bestowed on you, and all the happiness that is good for you will
be superadded to you.. Make the experiment. It is not for per-
sons to say, "This will not do:" make the experiment : take God
at his word : try it, and you will see it will stand true, for the
God of truth has pronounced it. This alone is the secret of all
wavering, halting, hesitating — the not putting confidence in his
truth, as God's own truth ; a constant feeling that it is only man's
word : you want that clear, distinct, unhesitating conviction that
God has spoken, and that the Bible is his autograph ; the very
echo of the voice which resounded through the trees of the garden
of Eden.
Another symptom of departure from God, is not only difference
of sentiment, but faltering in our walk with God. Perhaps we
are outwardly walking with God, but we begin to falter. Some
one whispers in our ear, " You are over-zealous, you preach too
often, you speak too much ; you go to church too often, you read
the Bible too much : your health will suffer, you cannot stand it,
you must be moderate." My dear friends, what is moderation ?
Did you ever hear of moderation in honesty ? If it were preached
to you, would you not understand it to mean, "Be a thief?"
And if you were told to be moderate in speaking the truth, would
you not understand it as, " Tell lies ?" Well, then, if moderation
be so intolerable in keeping the sixth, or seventh, or any other of
the commandments, how can it be tolerable in keeping the first
commandment ? " Love God a little, but not too much !" Hear
the law : " Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart,
with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and thy neighbour
as thyself." There is no fear of our being too enthusiastic, too
zealous in religion. In fanaticism we may be so, in superstition
we may be so ; but in real religion there is no risk of this — all the
108 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
risk lies in the opposite way: there is not the slightest fear of
expending all one's energies in the service of God.
But, strange to say, so constituted is this world — or, rather,
so corrupted is it — that the same man who condemns want of en-
thusiasm in a physician in the cure of his patient — in the lawyer,
in labouring for his client — in the member of Parliament, in
pleading for free-trade, or restriction, or some other earthly
dogma — the man, in short, who condemns the want of enthusiasm
in the things of Cassar, that very man comes forward and repro-
bates the possession of it where it ought to burn with the in-
tensest light, and glow with the greatest splendour — in the service
and in the sanctuary of Grod. Thus unbelief shows itself in falter-
ing in our walk with God, and hesitating to advance.
It also shows itself in the suspension or diminution of our con-
fidence in G*>d. The Christian walks with God as a child walks
with its father. It is rarely that a child suspects or fails to con-
fide in its father; and as it grows up to years of thought, its
confidence in its parent is gradually deepened and strengthened.
Now, take the confidence of the child in its father, and multiply
it by the immense — the infinite; and, removing the alloy and
imperfection attaching to creatures of the earth, then you will
have some slight idea of the extent of what should be the true
Christian's confidence in his heavenly Parent. When the Chris-
tian looks upon God in this light, he walks with all the childlike
confidence of a son with his father ; but when he loses this confi-
dence, he walks like a slave after his master, crouching and
trembling behind him : he looks to God in the sanctuary, but is
frightened if God should look at him in his place of business,
at his hearth, or his place of amusement. He begins to walk,
not as a son with his father, but as a maniac with his keeper —
in dread, slavery, and dismay. And whenever this feeling takes
the place of confidence, there is a departure from God, and an
evidence of an evil heart of unbelief in thus suspecting God.
This is the secret of much of the prevailing feeling respecting
the communion-table. Much of it has prevailed long in the
Scotch churches, and more or less in all other Christian com-
munities. Men have had a constant conviction that the Lord's
table is a sort of snare or trap — a sort of opportunity which
THE UNBELIEVING. 109
God takes for pouncing upon the unwary, the un watchful, and
infirm, to destroy them. It is not so : this is all a delusion. A
communion-table is spread for the humble, hoping, trusting, be-
lieving Christian : it is meant for those who desire to be Chris-
tians, if they cannot say they are more. It is spread on Calvary,
not on Mount Sinai. And yet, communion Sabbath after com-
munion Sabbath, only four or five hundred persons come to the
Lord's table. Why do you not all come? It is nothing on
Grod's part that prevents you, but something in yourselves: in
short, an evil heart of unbelief leads you to depart from Grod ;
you have lost the impression that Grod is your Father, and gathered
the conviction that he is only your keeper and master ; and you
are, therefore, afraid to meet him. You grow into a state of dis-
satisfaction with God altogether. Strange, that the eye should
be dissatisfied with the purest light, the ear with the noblest
harmony, and the heart with the holiest worship ! But so it is ;
and simply because the heart is seared with unbelief.
And, lastly, you stand still. You faltered in your walk with
God, you suspended your confidence in him, you became alto-
gether dissatisfied with God, and now you stand still. This is
the progression described in the first Psalm : " Blessed is the man
that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in
the way of sinners; nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.''
First, you go among the '^ungodly;" that is, excellent moral
men, who have no real vital religion : then, when you have com-
panied with them awhile, you go with " sinners ;'' that is, the
openly wicked : and when you have gone with them awhile, you
reach the company of the ^^ scornful ;'' those who scoflf at all
sacred things. First of all, you ^' walk in the counsel of the un-
godly '/' that is you take the advice of the ungodly. By-and-by
you " stand in the way of sinners -/' you think you can stand and
look on without getting any harm by it. And by-and-by you
^'sit down in the seat of the scornful." Such is the declension
or departure of a man from God. You have too much conscience
at once to retreat wholly, and too little faith to advance. You
dare not give yourself wholly to the world, and will not give
yourself wholly to God. You will not renounce your sins, and
dare not renounce your religion. You dread your skepticism,
SECOND SERIES. 10
110 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
lest it should fail you ; you dread your religion, lest it disquiet
you. You have neither the peace of the world, that is but for a
season, nor the peace of God, which passeth all understanding,
and is the blessed possession of the true believer; and, therefore,
you are the most miserable of men. You occupy an incessantly
disputed ground. In the history of this country, we read of the
men who walked, lived, feasted, and slept in their armour, with
sword in hand, and all accoutred and prepared for battle. These
were the borderers of Teviotdale, and Nithsdale, and Eskdale.
Their lives were the most harassed and disquieted, because they
were always exposed, on both sides, to the incursions of the foe.
So in spiritual things : the man who has got religion enough to
drag him to the sanctuary on the Sabbath, but love of sin enough
to take him to the playhouse next day — the man who dare not
keep away from public worship, but cannot keep away from all
the sinful follies of a sinful world — that man is the most wretched
and miserable of all. The thorough reprobate has his heart
hardened, and enjoys a degree of peace } the thorough Christian
has perfect peace 3 but intermediate persons, who are now nibbling
at heaven, and now revelling in the earth, and taste, each by
turns, the cup of the Lord and the cup of the world, are men in
a ceaseless fever, who know neither the world's peace, which is
the devil's, nor the Christian's peace, which is Grod's.
I care not so much to what denomination of Christians a man
belongs — that is circumstantial ; but it is of most vital importance
whether he receives Grod's truths as the Bible reveals them, or
the lies which obscure and hide them. For instance, it is not of
eternal moment whether you be a Churchman or a Dissenter ; but
It is so whether you be a Socinian or a Christian. It is not, I
gay, of eternal moment, whether you be of the Church of England
or the Church of Scotland ; but it is of eternal moment whether
you are a Roman Catholic, or a Protestant or evangelical Chris-
tian ; because the differences between the several denominations
of the Christian church are not so great as they thjnk them, who
constantly apply the microscope to those differences, and try to
magnify and make them as great as possible. And, depend upon
it, those men who do so are conscious of something wrong; in
short, that there is no real difference, and, therefore, the little
THE UNBELIEVING. HI
that there is they must try to make as great and momentous as
they can. I believe that Episcopalians, Presbyterians, Inde>
pendents, Baptists, and Wesleyans agree in essential, vital, last-
ing truths. Look at the points upon which they dijBfer from each
other, and make your election ; but remember, it is an election
in circumstantials, not in vital and essential truths. Indiflerence
to vital truth or to deadly error is a very different thing. The
world may call this liberality and enlightenment ; but Christ will
look upon it as latitudinarianism and lukewarmness. Essential
truth is essential to salvation ; circumstantial truth, to complete-
ness or comfort. We may err in the latter, and yet be saved ;
if we err in the former, we cannot be saved. Socinians and
Roman Catholics, as such, cannot be saved. I do not say of
those who are Socinians or Koman Catholics, that they cannot
and never will be saved; but this I do say of each, that it
must be, if there be truth in the Bible, in spite of their creed,
and not in consequence of it; and salvation will be more or
less probable to them, just in the same ratio in which they
abjure their peculiarities of doctrine, and learn that the arm
of salvation is not an arm of flesh, but the arm of God manifest
in the flesh.
• Another evidence of departure from God, or unbelief, is not
making progress. If there be no increase, the presumption is
that there is decrease ; if there be no progression, the presumption
is that there is retrogression. I cannot find in the Bible the
least evidence that I may stand still. But, of course, there are
two or three ways of growing : you may grow downward in
humility, as well as upward in holiness and conformity to
God; and it is quite possible that we may be growing down-
ward in humility simultaneously with our growing upward in
holiness and likeness to God. If we are growing in our ac-
quaintance with our own weakness, our own sinfulness, our own
nntrustworthiness in ourselves and of ourselves, we are growing in
the right direction ; or if we are growing in greater victory over
sin, greater conformity to the image of Christ, greater supe-
riority to the attractions and allurements of the world, having
our hearts more in heaven, then we are growing in another and
no less heavenly direction. But the Christian must either grow
112 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
and approach to, or retrograde and depart from, the living God ;
he is never stationary.
A great sign of unbelief is the love of this world. This is the
great source of apostasy to many. As long as you were without
the riches of this world — when you were making your way, and
just gaining enough to live by, and had nothing to spare — you
were Christians, spiritually-minded men, devoted men; but at
length the world begins to smile upon you, wealth begins to flow
in, and in proportion as you become rich and prosperous, how
true is it, in many cases, that you depart from the living God !
We all long for more than we have -, but we have to bless God
through the endless ages of eternity, that God never made us
what we wished, but what he, in his infinite wisdom, saw fit to
make us. The smiles and blandishments of the world are often
the stings and poison of the Christian life and character : you
cease to place your affections on God, and place them on the
world ; and you begin to love, and serve, and worship, and
finally die in and with the world. By the world I do not mean
mere external nature. The Christian is not called upon to have
a distasteful eye or a tuneless ear, to wear a gloomy visage or
exhibit an austere and sombre air ; nor is he called on always to
speak theology or teach its doctrines, or dispense his prescription*
(if he be a physician) amid a cluster of texts, or to sell doctrine
(if he be a trader) along with his commodities. But when the
world says, "Do this," and Christ says, "Do that," he then
shows his Christianity by proving he has no choice. If Christ be
his Master, he will follow him ; if the world, he will follow it.
It is more in the quiet decision of the Christian heart that true
Christianity exists, than in all the noise and confusion you often
hear in the world. I do not think the loudest professor the
greatest believer. The very reverse of this is often the case.
The great deep stream, as it rolls on its course, till it disembogues
itself in the main, does so silently and softly. The brawling
little mountain-brook, fed by a thunder-shower, makes a noise as
its waters rush along its stony shallow bed, soon to leave it dry.
It is often the soil which is scarcely fertile enough to bear grass
upon its surface, that conceals rich veins of gold in undug mines
below. So, often, under the most rugged and uncouth, or the
THE UNBELIEVING. 113
most quiet and apparently taciturn aspect, there lives the sustain-
ing principle of true religion. Be slow to conclude that the
loudest professor is the greatest Christian ; be slow to conclude,
that when you see nothing without^ there is nothin within.
This departure from Grod, the great accompaniment of unbelief,
is the commencement, unless arrested, of endless ruin : just as the
approach to God is the commencement, unless stopped, of endless
happiness. Remember the last words, addressed by our Lord to
the two great classes of mankind : he says, *^ Come, ye blessed
of my Father,'' to the one class ; and to the other class, " Depart
from me, ye that work iniquity.-' The word " Come," addressed
to the weary and heavy laden on earth, will also be repeated from
the judgment-throne; the word "Depart," that strong charac-
teristic of the unbelieving here, will also be repeated from the
judgment-throne. And thus heaven is, as I have often told you,
but a ceaseless approximation to Grod the centre; each being
there is touched with a centripetal impulse, and brought nearer
to God in light, happiness, holiness, knowledge, and joy. And
hell, again, is just an eternal departure from God, each step
in that departure deepening the agony felt, and darkening the
dread and terrible eclipse.
Departure from God is the twilight of darkness and everlasting
wo ; approaching to God is the morning twilight that ushers in
a day of everlasting glory and felicity. It rests with you, my
dear hearers, under God, to take your choice — departure from
God, or approach to God — ^hell with its misery, or heaven with
happiness. It rests with you, under God, to choose this day
which shall be your portion for ever and ever. I call on you to
cleave to the word of God. Do not admit any thing supple-
mental to it, nor subtract any thing that is necessary to it.
God's word, as I have already told you, is the very autograph of
Deity ; it is the only vicar and vicegerent of God that we have
upon earth ; it is God's voice perpetuated in music and multiplied
echoes. He still speaks in it, as he spoke in paradise to Adam
and Eve. Cleave to this book, then ; hold it fast as the voice
of God. What it condemns, shrink from; what it applauds,
cleave to. Take it as your chart sent from heaven, to guide you
10»
114 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
through your journey on earth; take it as your lamp in life, as
your hope in death, as your pathway to Jesus, to immortality,
and the skies.
Maintain communion and fellowship with God ; walk with and
live near G-od. Miss not the house of prayer; forsake not the
assembling of yourselves together. Do not let it be said that
while a bright day fills the church, a wet day empties it ; that a
little headache, which would not detain you from the exchange,
keeps you from the sanctuary. Do not make the Sabbath a day
for recruiting your body : rather take a day from Caesar for that
end. Make the Sabbath a day of communion and fellowship
with God. Do not show that you are punctual in the things of
Caesar, but careless in the things of God. Be thankful for yout
Sabbaths, for you know not how long they will last. Be thank-
ful for the Bible, for you know not how long it will be open be-
fore you. Be thankful for your privileges, for you know not how
long they will be continued to you. Work ye while it is yet
day, for the night cometh in which no man can work. And,
further, look upon all that surrounds you in this perishing world
as transient, ephemeral, evanescent ; all its glory is approaching
to an eclipse ; all its grandeur is soon to pass away, like as a fleet
ship glides swiftly past us at sea. All that men call high, will
soon be of low estate ; all that men pronounce to be little, will be
seen to be great and glorious. Look around you, and you see the^
long-established institutions of the nations tottering, and crash-
ing, and falling to pieces. Even in our own country, men's
hearts are failing them for fear, and for looking after those things
which are coming on the earth. We are now quiet, at peace — •
comparative peace ; like a beautiful gem, placed in the bosom of
the mighty waters, our throne, and our country, and our people
are secure ; but it is, I solemnly believe, because upon that gem
the name of Jesus is legibly inscribed, and that here among ua
his truth is more or less reverenced and prized. But, however
long these privileges of ours may last, we know that our country
must be moved ; the shocks which shake the world cannot leave
Great Britain unmoved. The day is fast hastening, I am per-
suaded, when all human institutions will be more or less
THE UNBELIEVING. 115
loosened; let us, therefore, look up, and learn to place our
hearts upon that throne which cannot be shaken ; and we shall
hereafter have to bless Grod for dethroning kings, scattering
dynasties, shattering thrones, and convulsing the world ; for the
shaking of things here will thus have led us to look to the things
which never can be shaken or removed.
And, dear friends, let us walk with Grod. Let me give as the
last prescription, ^^ Love to walk with God.^' Learn more and
more to see God. We always carry so much atheism with us
when we travel into different countries, or go forth into the
fields, or stroll by the seaside. Try not only to see nature, but
to ^^rise from nature up to nature's God." Try to realize God
m the less perspicuous book of nature, as well as in the more
perfect page of revelation. Let the stars that shine in the firma-
ment be to you as the eyes of the omniscient, omnipresent Deity.
Let the tints of flowers, and their fragrance too, be to you but as
visible creations of the smiles and breath of God. Let all
nature's sounds proclaim to you his love ; all scenes reflect to
you his glory and greatness. And, whether the thunder-cloud
overshadow you with its lowering darkness, or heaven's golden
sunshine beam upon you in all its effulgence, you will have no
awful forebodings of the future, no paralyzing reminiscences of
the past. Every hill shall be to you a Tabor, every day a
Sabbath, every house a sanctuary, every table a Lord's table;
the bright orbs and worlds above and around you, as God's
shining footprints in the immensity of space. You will taste
of the grapes of Eschol in the wilderness, and see a door of hope
in the valley of Achor. You shall hear the voice of God in all
sounds, and realize the presence of a heavenly sunshine in the
tents of Mesech, and the tabernacles of Kedar.
And, above all, pray for that Holy Spirit who is needed to
create that confidence, arrest this departure, and give us a new
impulse to carry us to God. And may that Spirit descend
on us all, and make us earnest, loving, consistent, devoted
Christians !
I have thus tried to analyze the mother sin, of which the
Bins enumerated in verse eighth are but the progeny. It may
116 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
be that these sins are here enumerated as the special charac-
teristics of the antichristian and Roman apostasy. They are,
unquestionably, the historical characteristics, and, I believe,
necessary fruits of that system. But whether there or here,
unbelief is the parent. Faith is the cure : it worketh by love —
purifieth the heart — overcometh the world ; it is the gift of God,
and the privilege and possession of them that pray.
117
LECTURE YIII.
ENDLESS SUFFERERS.
" Which is the second death." — Revelation xxi. 8.
I HAVE already addressed you on previous Sunday eve Lings
from the subject of " the New Jerusalem coming down from God
out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband ;'' and
also on its peculiar accompaniment, " The tabernacle of God is
with men, and he shall dwell with them ;" and we have rejoiced
together at the promise of the final extinction of all tears and
sorrows in the hearts of God's people, for God shall wipe away,
and wipe out the fountains of all tears from their eyes. I noticed
the creative intimation, ^' Behold I make all things new,^' and
the free invitation addressed to all : ^'I will give unto him that
is athirst of the water of life freely/' lastly, I stated that all
these promised good things are to be the inheritance of "him
that overcometh,'' an expression which involves conflict, weapons,
a leader, and victory.
My object this evening is to show that the notion held by some
in the present day, that the sufferings of the lost will not be
eternal but temporal, is erroneous, and without any scriptural or
reasonable foundation. Before entering upon my subject, I will
read a short quotation from Archdeacon Paley. He says, " It is
very difl&cult to handle this dreadful subject properly ; and one
cause of the difficulty is, that it is not for one poor sinner to de-
nounce such awful terrors and appalling consequences upon
others.'^ In stating that the pains of the lost are not temporal
but eternal, I am aware that I take the unpopular and, to many,
the unpalatable view; but the truth of a doctrine does not de-
petid on its agreeableness, or upon the many or the few that hold
it : " To the law and to the testimony ! if they speak not accord-
ing to this word, it is because there is no light in them."
118 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
As far as I can conceive of the state of the lost, I think the
expression in the text, ^'ihe lake thatburneth with fire and brim-
stone,^' is figurative. I do not think it is here implied that there
will be a material fire, or a literal gnawing worm, to torment the
lost ; these are the expressive, and it may be inadequately expres-
sive, vehicles and symbols of their intense and untold agony.
Besides these there are elements of wo enough in hell. Let a
virtuous and delicate mind, to allude only to one, conceive what
it would feel, were it condemned for a time to the company of
persons selected from the bridewells or the penitentiaries of the
earth. Would not the scene be a painful one ? Would not their
blasphemous oaths strike terror into the heart, and their impure
words create disgust and abhorrence in the pure and delicate soul ?
And yet, to be placed in such a hell on earth is but a faint sha-
dow of the realities of that literal hell : here, amid all the varied
forms of depravity, redeeming traits are thrown up, mitigating
and relieving elements of aboriginal beauty shine forth; but
among the lost there is no softening element at all, nothing but
unmixed sin, unmitigated and unmingled evil in its various de-
grees.
In the state of the lost, too, those evil passions which so often
rankle latent in bosoms here, and develop their powers with
years and opportunities, we have reason to believe will there be
released of every restriction, and left unshackled to revel in full
and exasperated expansion for ever. " He that is holy, let him
be holy still; he that is unholy, let him be unholy still." Hea-
ven is the full and unfettered expansion of those noble principles
of holiness, and buds of happiness, that God has implanted ia
the renewed heart; and hell is the eternal growth and expansion
of the poisonous passions and rankling elements of misery formed
in the natural heart. Thus a sinner sinks to hell as a natural
consequence of his past conduct ; it is not God who has doomed
a soul to hell, it is not his fiat that sends him there, but sin,
which has ripened the soul for it, weighs it down and buries it
there. I gather from the Scriptures, that whatever of beauty
and splendour, and ennobling motive, and inspiring hope, sur-
vive here, are emanations of the Almighty. But there will bo
with the lost God's curse concentrated ; no trace of beauty with*
ENDLESS SUFFERERS. 119
out, no trace of joy within — an ever-gathering and seething
sense of wo, casting over the length and breadth of hell one dark,
terrible shadow, crushing the soul, yet never filling its capacity
of wo — the whole past distilling bitterness, the future evolving
from it not one ray of happiness or hope ; but down the terrible
steeps of hell the cataract of God's wrath shall precipitate itself
over palpitating piles of men, and no intimation heard that one
drop of the water of life shall flow to cool or quench the burning
flame.
The lost will be in the possession of all their faculties. Me-
mory will be there, as we see in Abraham's address to the rich
man : " Son, remember that thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy
good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things." Memory will
record salvation past like a ship at sea, seen for a moment and
gone for ever ; a preached Saviour rejected, and offered mercies
the most precious then perished.
" Which way I climb is hell, — myself am hell ;"
and then will be the consuming recollection, " I might have been
rejoicing with the redeemed in heaven, but now I am to suffer
eternally in hell, not because there were no invitations in the
gospel addressed to me, or any unwillingness in God's heart to
receive me, but because I did it all myself."
The conscience will be fully alive in hell. You have only to
imagine man's conscience in full unfettered action, all the opiates
of earth withdrawn, and around it a sea of overflowing evil, to
conceive what a hell man bears in his bosom : " Which way I
climb is hell, — myself am hell," will indeed be true. A man
may carry coiled up in his heart so terrible a prestige of hell, that
it needs but the hand of death to uncoil the life, and the intense
agony symbolized by " the consuming fire" and "gnawing worm"
will be produced.
" So writhes the mind remorse hath riven.
Unfit for earth, undoom'd to heaven.
Darkness above, despair beneath,
Around it flame, within it death."
Have any of you committed some terrible crime against society ?
If so, do you not remember the burning shame and agonizing
120 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
self-reproach that followed that act? Wherever you went the
recollection haunted you ; to escape from it was impossible ; it
stung you from every point. This is but a faint shadow of the
power of conscience in the regions of the lost. We need not the
doctrine of eternal reprobation in its popular sense. Whatever
good is in man, comes from God } whatever of evil, comes from
man ; the lost plunge into hell solely by their own personal course
and choice ; each sin one indulges in is but a budding wo, and
perseverance in the wicked practices of sin is just travelling on
the high road that leads to destruction, while the renunciation of
it and return to God would restore him to the pathway to eternal
happiness.
But I do not delight to dwell on the misery of the lost. Blessed
be God, my message to all is an offer of eternal life, and that
without preparation on your part, or any delay : no preparation
is necessary ; you are invited to come just as you are to Him
" who is the resurrection and the life." I do not believe that the
terrors of the law, or a description of the miseries of the lost, are
God's consecrated instruments for the salvation of souls. The
weapon that is all but omnipotent to convert, is the manifestation
of the love of God in Christ, the preaching of '^ God so loved
the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever be-
lieveth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.'' " He
who knew no sin was made sin for us, that we might be made
the righteousness of God in him." These are God's appointed
and effectual means of converting the sinner, and when applied
by the Spirit of God they cannot fail.
But the chief object of inquiry this evening is. What is th6
duration of the state called " the second death ?" Is it temporal
or eternal ? for a little, or endless ? Some able divines are of
opinion that its duration is temporary, and this idea is gaining
ground in the present day. I humbly think that it is the grace
of God alone that keeps the holders of this opinion from Socini-
anism, and not the consistency of their own logic. They are amid
the rapids — let them watch, and tremble, and fear.
I will now lay before you several theories that have been
broached on this subject, founded on the idea that the sufferings
of the lost will be temporary.
ENDLESS SUFFERERS. 121
Some think the wicked will be annihilated, either at death, or
after suffering a season, and that immortality is the special gift
of the gospel ; others that they shall be transferred to heaven
after being punished a season. To confute these opinions, I
would quote such texts as these : " Many shall come from the
oast and the west, and shall sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and
Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven j but the children of the king-
dom shall be cast into outer darkness, there shall be weeping and
gnashing of teeth." ^' The Son of Man shall send his angels,
who shall gather together all things that offend, and them which
do iniquity, and shall cast them into a furnace of fire." " Cast
ye the unprofitable servant into outer darkness." ^' Where
their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched." Notice the
very strong expressions here used to describe the miseries of the
lost. " Outer darkness," without a hint of a future ray of light ;
^'a furnace of fire," without the promise of a cooling drop of
water; 'Hheir worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched."
Do these expressions denote no more than a merely temporary
punishment ?
Again : ^^Then shall he say to them on his right hand,
Come, ye blessed, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from be-
fore the foundation of the world ;" to those on the left, " Depart,
ye cursed, into everlasting fire." Heaven and hell are here
beautifully represented by the terms "come" and "depart."
Heaven, here described by "come," is the application of the cen-
tripetal power, each movement of the Christian drawing him
ever nearer to Christ his centre ; and hell, here embodied in the
word "depart," is the continuance of his centrifugal force, by
which every unbeliever is carried to a greater and greater distance
from Christ, throughout the gloomy cycles of a ceaseless eternity.
"These shall go away into everlasting punishment, but the
righteous into life eternal."
The same language that describes the duration of the punish-
ment of the wicked, limits also the happiness of the righteous;
the duration of the one is in the same words as that of the
other, since the same word is applied to both. If you hold
that the state of the lost here described is temporary, you
must admit the state of the righteous to be temporary also;
SECOND SERIES. 11
122 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
if the term " everlasting" stamps eternity on the one, on what
grounds can you determine that '' eternity" stamps temporal dura-
tion on the other ? If there be any limitation in the time, there
would surely have been a glimpse of it given here ; tut no such
limitation appears. ^' Who shall be punished with everlasting
destruction from the presence of the Lord ;" " shame and ever-
lasting contempt;" or, in the Apocalyptic description, " the smoke
of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever ;" not one intima-
tion of an abatement of wo is discoverable : no dim dawn, no vista
of deliverance. The Greek word, ei<; rohq alwvai; tujv aiujvwvj
here translated ^^everlasting," signifies literally '^unto the ages
of the ages," ale) <hv, ^'alwa^'s being," that is, everlasting, cease-
less existence. Plato uses the word in this sense when he says,
" the gods that live for ever." Eut I must also admit that this
word is used several times in a limited extent — as, for instance,
'' the everlasting hills." Of course this does not mean that there
never will be a time when the hills will cease to stand ; the ex-
pression here is evidently figurative, but it implies eternity. The
hills shall remain as long as the earth lasts, and no hand has
power to remove them but that Eternal One which first called
them into being; so the state of the soul remains the same after
death as long as the soul exists, and no one has power to alter it.
The same word is often applied to denote the existence of God'—
" the eternal God." Can we limit the word when applied to
Him ? Because used occasionally in a limited sense, we must not
infer it is always so. *' Everlasting" plainly means in Scripture
''without end;" it is only to be explained figuratively when it is
evident it cannot be interpreted in any other way.
The view entertained by some is, that the lost, after endur-
ing for a period unspeakable wo, will be ultimately annihilated.
Others, as I have stated, think that the soul derives its immorta-
lity from God as the Redeemer, not from God as the Creator ;
they regard immortality as Christ's purchase, the gift of the gospel,
not the soul's inherent attribute ; so that the soul that believes
the gospel is immortal, while the soul that rejects the gospel
thus rejects immortality, and meets with annihilation as the de-
merit of sin, under which sentence all are who are in a state of
ENDLESS SUFFERERS. Igg
nature : they object to the resurrection of unbelievers at all, and
think they cease to exist after death.
I cannot admit the doctrine of annihilation, either immediately
or eventually, unless there be an express assertion of it in Scrip-
ture. No man can specify any thing that he knows to be annihi-
lated. The flax that grows in the field, when woven into linen,
wears quite a different appearance; the linen, cut into a thousand
pieces, is changed into another substance, and becomes paper ; the
paper is put into the fire, and rises out of it in the form of smoke;
the smoke is exhaled into the clouds, and descends in rain to
moisten the parched earth, or in dust and carbon to fertilize the
exhausted soil : not one particle of the original flax is lost, although
there be not one particle that has not undergone an entire change :
annihilation is not, but change of form is. It will be thus with
our bodies at the resurrection. The death of the body means not
annihilation. Not one feature of the face will be annihilated, but
every feature of the countenance which we have seen glow with
joy here, will glow with yet intenser rapture in heaven. Our
Lord says, " They shall sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and
Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven.^' This implies they shall
realize the fact that Abraham is there; and, like the rich man who
beheld "Abraham afar off" and Lazarus in his bosom," they shall
recognize that it is Abraham. If the body does not cease to be,
is there any evidence that the soul will cease to be ? There are
passages which show that, in a certain sense, even now the sinner
is dead. ''The hour is coming when the dead shall hear the voice
of the Son of God, and they that hear shall live.'' ''And you
hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins." And
so the death of the soul means it is the victim of sin ; and the se-
cond death is only an intenser development of this state. The
words descriptive of the state of the lost are, "punished with
everlasting destruction ;" this implies they are conscious of the
destruction; their souls, therefore, could not be literally annihi-
lated. "He that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the
wrath of God abideth on him." "The worm that never dieth,
and the fire that shall never be quenched." Such language
must imply the perpetuity of the punishment of the lost, and
the consciousness of this punishment which they endure.
124 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
It has been objected, that it militates against the goodness of
God, to suppose that any of His creatures shall be visited with
eternal or ceaseless misery. But I answer, we are not the best
judges of what militates against the goodness of God ; we can only
judge from what He has revealed. We know but a little nook of
the universe; and it may be that for the greater exhibition of His
goodness, God has allowed sin to remain in the world, and will
vsuffer it to be visited with eternal punishment hereafter; it may
be that, as the inhabitants of far distant orbs learn from our world
lessons of God's transcendent goodness, never to be forgotten
throughout the countless ages of eternity, and that from Calvary
truths rise and reach new worlds every hour, that electrify their
tenants, — so, instead of this great demonstration of perpetual
punishment being incompatible with God's goodness, it may per-
haps more clearly exhibit its intensity, and purity, and love.
Again, it has been said, it militates against God's justice to
suppose he would visit an eternal punishment upon a temporary
disobedience. To this I reply, we are not competent judges of the
evil of sin. It may be that what murder and theft are to us, and
appear to us in a material world, malice, revenge, and covetous
desires are seen to be just as frightful in a world of spirits. We
have only one standard by which we can estimate its inherent
evil : — it is this — if it is true that nothing less than the shed blood
of Incarnate Deity could atone for sin — if it was necessary for the
Creator of the Universe to leave his throne of glory and majesty,
and, separating himself for a time from the adoring anthems and
praises of holy angels, to take upon him our nature, and, after
enduring a life of scorn and derision, to be shamefully crucified
by the very men he came to save, that he might offer himself an
acceptable sacrifice before a single sin that Adam brought into the
world could be expunged — if we remember this, we can easily
conceive that an eternal hell is not too terrible a punishment for
that which necessitated such a sacrifice, or for those who "reject
so great salvation."
Our Lord, whose tones were ever tones of unutterable love, ex-
cept where rebuke was a strong necessity, once said these remarka-
ble and awful words : *' It were better for that man if he had never
been born." I can conceive that to be no ordinary calamity which
ENDLESS SUFFERERS. 125
makes the fact of one's birth to be a curse, and one's existence a
regret.
Again, some have objected that the continuance of the exist-
ence of sin throughout eternity in any part of God's universe is
very difficult to conceive of. I admit the difficulty, and that it
seems strange that such a state should be perpetuated; but I must
not reject it because I cannot fathom it — it is plainly revealed in
the Bible. I confess that it would appear far more consistent
with our ideas of what is beautiful and desirable, if sin and its
attendant evils were to be finally expunged from the universe, and
all God's creatures were to unite in one harmonious chorus of
loyalty and allegiance to their Creator. But it is not for our
limited minds to speculate on what would be desirable in the go-
vernment of God's universe j we have simply to receive with faith
what he has graciously revealed. Yet, if it exist at all, the du-
ration of its existence is a subordinate difficulty.
But others have asked. Is there no sign in the Bible that the
gospel will be preached in hell, and that its wretched inmates,
after enduring for a time some of the punishment due to their
sin, will have a final ofier of full and free salvation ? ' The Bible
tells me of no rainbow of covenant mercy that shall span the
concave of hell; it gives no intimation of an offered Saviour to
mitigate the miseries of the damned. I read only of the worm
that never dieth, and the fire that never shall be quenched.
If the Saviour is preached to the lost in hell, and they embrace
the gospel, then the manifestation of God's grace will be far
greater there than in this world; for in this it failed, in that it
succeeds. But we are taught in the Bible to look for the mani-
festation of God's grace in this world only. Our Lord says,
*'I must work the works of Him that sent me while it is day;
the night cometh, when no man can work" — evidently referring
to death. " Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy
might, for there is no device nor labour in the grave." He that
blasphemeth against the Holy Ghost hath never forgiveness,
neither in this world, nor in that which is to come.'^
These texts appear to me a convincing proof that the atone-
ment shall never be preached in the regions of the lost. AJl
probation ceases with time : "My spirit will not strive any more."
11*
126 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
If the Spirit strives with the lost in hell, then it was not true
that he ceased to strive with the antediluvians. But the misery
which the lost shall undergo, will exercise upon them, it is
alleged, a purifying power, and after a lengthened period their
souls shall be completely purged by suffering and purgatorial
fire, and made fit for heaven. There is no evidence, I reply, that
punishment can purify the heart. No man was ever made a
Christian by suffering; that change can be effected by the Holy
Spirit of God alone. Sufferings may show what sin is, not what
the beauty of holiness is: if any amount of suffering on our
part could save a soul, why did the Saviour bleed and die ? Is
it at all likely that so great a sacrifice as God Incarnate would
have been offered if man could have been saved by suffering
without it? Besides, the intense appeals of the gospel imply
there is no hope hereafter. "Why will ye die?'' *^ Ye will not
come to me that ye might have life.'' "Come unto me, all ye
that are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest."
" Ho ! every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters." " To-
day, if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts." Lan-
guage seems to exhaust all its force in entreating sinners to be
saved ; its very intensity indicates the awfulness of the state from
which Christ would snatch us. The views that the lost in hell
will finally be saved, seem to detract from the power of the gos-
pel. If hell can be the birthplace of glorified spirits, why was
Calvary ever heard of, or that innocent, spotless Lamb made a
victim for sin ? My dear friends, heaven endures for ever, and
hell endures for ever; but here is the unspeakable comfort, that
this night the Lord Jesus invites you in loving accents, Believe
on me, trust in the sacrifice I have once offered for the sins of the
world, and ye shall be saved from the unutterable wo of the one,
and shall enjoy with angels the inconceivable bliss of the other —
ye shall reign with me eternally in glory.
This great idea, eternity, is the weightiest word in human
speech j it changes mightily whatever it is attached to. Suffer-
ing which is eternal suffering, and joy which is eternal joy, are
states of infinite moment. Sin that is not productive of eternal
torment would seem not to necessitate an interposition of Infinite
Worth. A love without retribution would be connivance at sin.
ENDLESS SUFFERERS. 127
Given any one vital doctrine of Christianity, and the everlasting
sufifering of the wicked is a corollary plainly deducible from it.
I can come to no other conclusion than that to which our Re-
formers came — which apostles taught — which the Holy Spirit
inspired— viz. that heaven and hell are eternal states — the one
endless joy, and the other endless misery and wo and sufifering.
128
LECTURE IX.
THE BRIDE.
"And there came unto me one of the seven angels which had the seven vials
full of the seven last plagues, and talked with me, saying, Come hither, I will
show thee the bride, the Lamb's wife." — Revelation xxi. 9.
"And I heard as it were the voice of a great multitude, and as the voice
of many waters, and as the voice of mighty thunderings, saying, Alleluia: for
the Lord God omnipotent reigneth. Let us be glad and rejoice, and give
honour to him : for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made
herself ready. And to her was granted, that she should be arrayed in fine
linen, clean and white : for the linen is the righteousness of saints. And he
saith unto me. Write, Blessed are they which are called unto the marriage-
supper of the Lamb. And he saith unto me, These are the true sayings of
God." — Revelation xix. 6.
This relationship, viz. of bridegroom and bride, is so fre-
quently employed by the sacred penmen to illustrate the great
spiritual truth of the believer's union to Christ, that we cannot but
conclude it is not only appropriate, but replete with instructive
meaning. It occurs in the following among other passages: —
*' For thy Maker is thy Husband, (the Lord of Hosts is his
name;) and thy Redeemer the Holy One of Israel, the God
of the whole earth shall he be called." Isa. liv. 5.
^' He that hath the bride is the bridegroom." John iii. 29.
^' I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you
as a chaste virgin to Christ." 2 Cor. xi. 2.
^' Husbands, love your wives, as Christ also loved the church,
and gave himself for it, that he might sanctify and cleanse it
with the washing of water by the word, that he might present it
to himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle, or any
such thing ; but that it should be holy and without blemish."
Eph. V. 25-27.
" Blessed are they which are called to the marriage-supper of
the Lamb." Rev. xix. 9.
THE BRIDE. 129
'^ The holy city . . . prepared as a bride adorned for her hus-
band/' Rev. xxi. 2.
This, and other analogies, so common in Scripture, show us
that Creation and Providence are full of meaning, and cast light
on the relationship of the higher world — a light that will one day
reveal the common origin and end of both. Even now creation
is perpetually striving to express its inner and glorious truths ; it
is big with divine and mysterious doctrines; it groans and tra-
vails in pain, waiting to be delivered. In its present disordered
state, creation bodies forth majestic shadows of the superior
world; and they who deal with it, if spiritually unenlightened
on eternal things, hold in their hands a valuable casket, full of
precious gems, which they are unable to unlock, much less ap-
preciate ; they are the admirers of the mere typography, but have
no conception of its inner meaning ; they study and understand
the mechanism of the instrument, but neither hear nor believe in
its sleeping tones of heavenly music. It is, I admit, mutilated
and marred by sin ; it is covered with dark spots of plague, and
breaks forth at times in terrific struggles, in volcanos, and earth-
quakes, and thunder, as if in agony to speak out all its eloquent
burden. During the millennial day, the earth, like the snake in
spring, will cast off its old and wrinkled skin, and appear beauti-
ful and peaceful like a restored angel. Nature, which means
" coming to the birth," will then be born, and the New Earth
will be the fair and beautiful offspring, radiant with immortal
youth, and eloquent as the evangelists and apostles of spiritual
truths. The week-day and soiled garments will be consumed in
the last fire, and the new and glorious robes that become its ever-
lasting Sabbath shall be worn, ever new and ever beautiful, by
all creation, which as a holy Levite shall minister before the Lord
perpetually. It shall then be seen that our sweetest joys were
but imperfect and diluted foretastes of higher and purer, and that
they were meant to lift us far above themselves to those sublime
and unalloyed pleasures which our eyes have not yet seen, nor
our natures yet tasted. So this holy relationship of bridegroom
and bride is the type and shadow of a kindred but more glorious.
In this relationship, there is first of all the privilege of selec-
tion, which is peculiar to the bridegroom. So it is in the spiritual;
130 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
the first movement is toward us, not by us; from Christ to us,
not from us to Christ. Our love is the reflection of his, our re-
sponse is the result of his attraction ; we are deaf till he speak,
dead till he quicken, disinclined till he draw us, and destitute till
he enrich us.
In the experience of this world, the aiFection of the bridegroom
is created by some excellence or beauty which he perceives in the
bride ; in other words, ours is a created love, contingent on some-
thing external to itself, and fed from that external influence per-
petually. But Christ^s love is essentially sovereign ; it is created
by, and dependent on, nothing external to itself. We love, be-
cause we see something beautiful or good in the object loved :
Christ loves the unlovely by nature, to make them lovely by
grace. We love the object because it is beautiful : Christ loves
the object to make it so. We love as creatures, he loves as God ;
deity is in his love, humanity in ours; his is the fountain, ours is
the heart filled from it.
Deuteronomy vii. 7 is the just exposition of the love of Christ,
and of the reason of our interest in it : " The Lord did not set
his love upon you, nor choose you, because ye were more in num-
ber than any people, (for ye were the fewest of all people,) but
because the Lord loved you." And again in Ezekiel xvi. 8,
" Now when I passed by thee, and looked upon thee, behold, thy
time was the time of love, and I spread my skirt over thee, and
covered thy nakedness ; yea, I sware unto thee, and entered into
covenant with thee, saith the Lord G-od, and thou becamest mine.
I washed thee with water, and I anointed thee with oil. I
decked thee with ornaments, and I put bracelets upon thine hands,
and a chain on thy neck. And thy renown went forth among
the heathen for thy beauty ; for it was perfect through my comeli-
ness which I had put upon thee, saith the Lord God."
But the intensity of this love is not sufl5ciently seen in its
lighting upon us in our misery. We must estimate it by the
greatness of the Saviour's sacrifice, by endeavouring to gauge the
humiliation, and sorrow, and sense of wo he sank into, in order to
redeem the bride from her ruin, and raise her to her forfeited in-
heritance. We must see him leave the throne of glory and the
realms of blessedness, and, borne on the wings of a love which
THE BRIDE. 131
could see nothing in our nature to alight on, that was not fitted to
repel it, identify himself with our woes, and miseries, and weak-
ness, and wants, and ruin ; and thus emptied, endure our curse,
drink to the dregs our bitter cup, pursue lost and sinking huma-
nity to the farthest depth of its degeneracy and departure, seize
it in the arms of everlasting love — redeem, sanctify, ennoble, and
finally glorify it, till it became his bride, and companion, and co-
heir with the Bridegroom himself — a glorious thing without spot
or wrinkle. Truly, such love has height and depth we cannot
measure.
According to the usages of this life, the bride is given away to
the bridegroom by one who has authority, from relationship or
otherwise, to do so. This earthly fact is a shadow let down from
the heavenly. So the Saviour saw and expressed it. ^^ Thine
they were," says Jesus, in his sublime intercession, " and thou
gavest them me.'' " All that the Father giveth me shall come to
me." They were thus given to him by him who made them, and
they only are his bride.
The husband endows the wife with all his goods : she becomes
a copartner with him. Has not our everlasting Husband done
so ? Has he not clothed us with righteousness and salvation, and
adorned us with jewels, and made us morally beautiful through
the comeliness he has put upon us ? Has he not robbed heaven
and earth, all the kingdoms of nature, all the stores and treasures
of grace, in order to build up a house beautiful as his bride, and
meet for her dwelling; bringing the jewelled lights of a thousand
mines, and the brilliant tints of the iridescent spar, and the awful
glory of a brighter sun, to beautify the place of her residence ?
All his are hers, and all hers are his.
In this world the husband is the representative of his wife's
responsibility : her debts and liabilities become his. This, too,
is a shadow of the heavenly. Our representative — the represent-
ative of our responsibilities as well as persons, is our everlasting
Husband. He has fulfilled the law we had broken ; endured
the penalty we had incurred ; paid all we owed to God, and pro-
cured infinitely more than God owed to us. " On Him was laid
the iniquity of us all ! He hath borne our griefs and carried our
sorrows." Our responsibilities repose on him ; we have sinned,
132 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
but he has suffered ; we are guilty, but he is righteous ; we have
renounced our name by nature, and are called by his — we are
Christians. His name, and ours, too, is ^' The Lord our Right-
eousness." We are detached in all respects from the first Adam,
and attached by indissoluble ties and affinities to the Second. We
have changed alike our state and our nature; we have heard
and obeyed the summons addressed to her in the 45th Psalm :
^' Hearken, daughter, and consider, and incline thine ear; for-
get also thine one people, and thy father^s house. So shall the
king greatly desire thy beauty, for he is thy Lord, and worship
thou him. She shall be brought unto the king in raiment of
needlework ; the virgins, her companians that follow her, shall be
brought unto thee. With gladness and rejoicing shall they be
brought; they shall enter into the king's palace. Instead of thy
father's shall be thy children, whom thou mayest make princes in
all the earth."
Perfect confidence is the very air that husband and wife must
breathe; that confidence which mitigates the sorrows, and en-
hances the joys of life; which quenches suspicion, and dissipates
the gloom of reserve. This confidence belongs to the higher re-
lationship also. Jesus says, *'I call you not servants, for the
servant knoweth not what his Lord doeth ; but I have called you
friends, for all things that I have heard of my Father, I have
made known unto you." He courts our implicit confidence in
return ; he asks you to lay aside all distrust, distance, suspicion,
and to feel that none are so near you as the Son of God ; and to
none may you unbosom with greater confidence your wants, and
sorrows, and trials, and fears. He is ^' touched with the feeling
of our infirmities;" he sympathizes with us as no angel about
the throne, and no saint before it, can. Trust in him at all
times; he bids you — it is your safety, your joy, your peace — it is
his command.
Obedience is the duty of the wife : *' Wives, submit yourselves
to your own husbands, as the church is subject to Christ." Such
is our duty — rather, it is our delight; for this obedience is not
the exaction of law, but the offering of love. "If ye love me,
keep my commandments." Our obedience will be in proportion
to our love ; its strength and its tone are the expression of the
THE BRIDE. 133
intensity of our love. Its life, and beauty, and progress, anu
victories, is love. Emptied of this inspiring element, all service
is mechanism, and all obedience a dry husk. It is in this rela-
tionship we may confidently expect the supply of every want.
^' He will supply all our need according to his riches in glory."
We are poor, and blind, and naked; and he is, for all who accept
him, righteousness, and wealth, and life, and light, and raiment
white and clean.
He will heal all our wounds. " By his stripes we are healed."
He is alike the balm and physician ; from the crown of the head
to the soles of the feet, there is in us no soundness at all. But
he is our physician as well as our husband. He healeth all our
diseases. He will enrich us with unsearchable riches, and finally
transfer us from this scene of trial, and vicissitude, and pain,
and tears, to the new Jerusalem that cometh down from heaven,
the city of the living God, the home of saints, the beauty of the
universe ; the preparation of Infinite Wisdom and Love.
In the passage on which I have been commenting, we read,
'' I will show thee the bride, the Lamb's wife." She requires to
be shown. This indicates a fact which is implied in all portions
of Scripture, that in this dispensation the true church is hidden,
vailed, concealed ; and only on the millennial day, when the sons
of God are manifest, will she be seen in her true and imperish-
able beauty. "Our life is now hid with Christ in God." '^ We
are God's hidden ones.'^ It is written, " The world knoweth us
not, as it knew not him." The outward world neither sees, nor
comprehends, nor appreciates the children of God — the hidden
Dride, the kings in disgiiise. The world can understand civil
rank, not spiritual dignity; political power, not holiness; wisdom,
and might, and nobility after the flesh, and base things, and
things that are, but not that inner and true beauty which is the
inspiration of God, which outlives all, and never fades. The
tabernacle in the wilderness, was covered with rough skins, and
fastened with coarse ropes ; and to those eyes that had seen the
magnificent productions of Egyptian architecture, the porticos,
and columns, and temples of Egypt, the sanctuary of Israel must
have appeared a mean thing. But in the former were venomous
reptiles, the produoif *>f the Nile, and scarabean beetles, crawl-
^■r^o^rp pkrtks. 3 2
134 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
ing about their shrines, or raised on pedestals, and receiving tho
adoration of intelligent men ; while under the plain exterior of
the latter, were the mercy-seat, and the ever-beaming glory be-
tween the cherubim, and the presence of Grod, and pure worship,
and holy worshippers. Thus the bride, like the Bridegroom, has
no beauty that men should desire her — she is now vailed, mis-
construed, mistaken. But the day of her manifestation comes.
^'' The church," says Archbishop Leighton, ^'is called the
' king's daughter,^ (Psalm Ixv. 13 ;) but her comeliness is invi-
sible to the world, 'she is all glorious within.' Through sorrows
and persecutions, she may be smoky and black to the world's eye,
as the ' tents of Kedar ;' but in regard of spiritual beauty, she
is, 'comely as the curtains of Solomon.' And in this the Jewish
temple resembled it aright, which had most of its riches and
beauty in the inside. Holiness is the gold of this spiritual house,
and it is inwardly enriched with that. The glory of the church
of God consists not in stately buildings, of temples, and rich fur-
niture, and pompous ceremonies; these agree not with its spiri-
tual nature. Its true and genuine beauty is, to grow in spiritual-
ity, and so to be liker itself, and to have more of the presence
of Grod, and his glory filling it as a cloud. And it hath been
observed, that the more the church grew in outward riches and
state, the less she grew, or rather the more sensibly she abated,
in spiritual excellences."
We have seen her in days of her exposure to persecution, suf-
fering martyrdom, covered with such shame and reproach as the
world could heap upon her, lying among the pots, sojourning
amid the persecuted Paulicians of th^ east, and the suffering
Waldenses of the west, a widow and a weeper. We have caught
glimpses of her amid the flames that consumed her, and under
the smoke that rose from her ashes, or in the cells and dungeons
prepared for her by the Apostasy, in which she shed forth a
supernatural glory that often awed her enemies. But at the
epoch described in the text, she is to be presented to the Bride-
groom a glorious church, unvailed and visible to heaven and
earth, having laid aside her weeds of sorrow, her ashen garments,
and put on her coronation robes, and standing forth a monument
of grace, the masterpiece of Christ, the joy of the whole earth.
THE BRIBE. 135
Previous to the presentation of the bride, we are toid, chap. xix.
7, that '' she had made herself ready.'' This preparation is now
going on, and at the coming of Christ the professing church will
be divided into two great classes — one, the mere pretender; and
the other, the true church, the Lamb's wife. So it is written in
Matt, sxv. 1-13 : " Then shall the kingdom of heaven be
likened unto ten virgins, which took their lamps and went forth
to meet the Bridegroom. And five of them were wise, and five
were foolish. They that were foolish took their lamps, and took
no oil with them j but the wise took oil in their vessels with
their lamps. While the Bridegroom tarried, they all slumbered
and slept. And at midnight there was a cry made. Behold, the
Bridegroom cometh; go ye out to meet him. Then all those
virgins arose, and trimmed their lamps. And the foolish said
unto the wise. Give us of your oil, for our lamps are gone out.
But the wise answered, saying, Not so; lest there be not enough
for us and you ; but go ye rather to them that sell, and buy for
yourselves. And while they went to buy, the Bridegroom came ;
and they that were ready went in with him to the marriage, and
the door was shut. Afterward came also the other virgins, say-
ing. Lord, Lord, open to us. But he answered and said. Verily
I say unto you, I know you not. Watch, therefore, fo* ye know
neither the day nor the hour when the Son of man cometh.''
We have, in the five wise virgins, the Lamb's wife — the bride
made ready for the Bridegroom; and their preparation corre-
sponds to that which is said to be the characteristic of the Apo-
calyptic bride having made herself ready. The woman seated on
the scarlet-coloured beast had her peculiar readiness, for ^^ she
was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold,
and precious stones, and pearls." But the true bride has no such
meretricious finery. She has " washed her robes, and made them
white in the blood of the Lamb;" she has heard the cry that
now sounds forth, " Behold, the Bridegroom cometh ;" and to her
who thus looks, and longs, and prays for him, he will soon
" appear the second time," on the lightning's wing and in the
clouds, " without sin unto salvation." The present movements
of the nations of the earth are all designed to stir up the bride
to meet the Bridegroom; and these convulsions, which shake
186 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES. *
tlie kingdoms of this world, tend to detach her aiFections mora
and more from things seen, and to lift them to things unseen and
eternal — to her future home — her watching Lord. The true
church will become more and more united, pure, and spiritual,
as the time draws nigh. She will lean less on an arm of
flesh, and look more to her husband, Christ. She will act
out with greater simplicity of purpose and energy of heart
the apostolic prescription, to ^'buy as though she possessed
not, to weep as though she wept not, and to use the world as not
abusing it.'^
It is after the bride has made herself ready, and the Bride-
groom has come, that the glorious festival described in these
words, "The marriage of the Lamb is come," is celebrated. It
is very remarkable that in this book alone Christ is called so
often the Lamb: (''the Lamb's wife," and "Blessed are they
which are called to the marriage-supper of the Lamb.") The
reason of this Apocalyptic expression may be, that the Saviour's
greatest and most glorious character is that which is most pre-
cious to sinners upon earth — that our salvation and his glory are
bound up together — that eternity to come shall celebrate his
cross, as eternity previous predicted and prefigured it — and that
his triumph on Calvary was his greatest act, and its results his
richest honour, and its remembrance the illumination of the
future.
The marriage-supper is the arrival of that epoch which the
redeemed of every age have anticipated. It has been the longed-
for day of patriarchs, the glowing prediction of prophets, the
burden of songs, the hope of the church, the era for which
creation groans and the sons of God pray. The widow does not
moi3 desire her husband, nor the bride her bridegroom, than the
people of God desire this day.
When this era arrives, there will be greater scope for the love
of the people of God toward their Saviour. They can say now,
"Whom having not seen we love;" but when the object of faith
shall become the object of sight, and when they shall see him
as he is, they will love him as they ought. Their enlarged
capacities and purer nature will be capable of feeling and express-
ing an intenser love; and those feelings of gratitude which wa
THE BRIDE. 137
have long felt too big for utterance, will then find a channel for
their egress adequate to their ardour and magnitude. We shall
see the King in his beauty; we shall feel how little we have
loved and served him, how little our largest sacriuces have been,
how feeble our deepest gratitude, how faltering our holiest walk,
how poor our richest offering. This supper will be the scene
of great and unspeakable joy — ^joy unutterable and full of glory:
at God's right hand is fulness of joy — it is no wonder that it
will be so. It is creation's deliverance — the festival of Chris-
tianity — the coronal, and close, and victory of the redeemed,
after ceaseless struggles. Here joy enters unto us — there we
shall enter into joy; "as a bridegroom rejoice th over the bride,
so will thy God rejoice over thee.'' "He will rejoice over thee
with joy," "He will rest in his love, he will joy over thee
with singing:" and angels, witnessing the grand festival, and
catching by reflection some rays of its joy, and hearing its sub-
lime song, will also sing, "Let us be glad, and rejoice, and give
honour to Him, for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and his
wife hath made herself ready."
The transition from this scene of conflict, and trial, and faint-
ness of heart, and feebleness of service, to this royal festival —
this day of recovery of all we lost in Adam — this concentration
of all joy — this commencement of unending and growing bliss,
will awaken within us emotions of ecstasy such as our faint hearts
and narrow spirits are now of necessity strangers to. Enlarged
as our capacities will be, we "shall be satisfied." We shall reap
nothing but bliss, know nothing but truth, feel nothing but love,
and do nothing but righteousness. But here, as in all the privi-
leges proclaimed in this book, there is implied the necessity
of present character to fit us for this future felicity. " Blessed
are they, also, which are called to, the marriage-supper of the
Lamb." They are those of every kindred, and nation, and peo-
ple, and tongue, who have accepted the promises and ofi'era
of the everlasting gospel, and who have believed God's testi-
mony concerning his Son — "who have washed their robes, and
made them white in the blood of the Lamb" — who are "chosen
in Christ before the foundation of the world, unto salvation,
through sanctification of the Spirit, and belief of the truth"—
12*
188 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
who are, in short, the bride, the Lamb's wife. I believe that
the redeemed company who gather together to celebrate this high
festival will be a great majority of every generation of the human
family. It is true that, in every age, there are more that des-
pise or neglect the gospel than there are that accept it. But it
is a fact all admit, that half the human race, and, of course,
of each generation, dies in infancy; and if all infants dying in
infancy are saved, altogether iiTespective of the will of the
parents or the rites of the church, as I believe them to be, then
there will be a majority of mankind saved. This majority will
constitute that *^ great multitude which no man can number,'^
who sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the king-
dom of God J who join in the marriage-supper of the Lamb.
There will gather around that august and glorious festival per-
sons of every age. The antediluvian who saw the Saviour
through the vista of four thousand years, the patriarch of Ur of
the Chaldees, and the patient sufferer of the land of Uz. The
prophet will find there his most glowing predictions all realized,
and the evangelist will see the Sufferer his pen delineated now
seated as the King and Conqueror whom his hopes expected.
The martyrs that cried, " Lord, how long I" and entered his pre-
sence through the fires of martyrdom- — the witnesses who re-
mained faithful amid all but universal apostasy — the intrepid
reformer — the babe of yesterday and the man of to-day — all will
take their places at the marriage-supper of the Lamb. Indi-
viduals, too, of every climate will be there; each zone of the
earth shall render up its tribute, every latitude its treasures. The
African from his burning sands, and the Laplander from his per-
petual snows ; the Arab from his tents, and the Druse from his
mountains; all the descendants of Shem, Ham, and Japhet,
bound together by the mysterious links of love, and forming one
great and true brotherhood, shall meet together at this feast, and
see each in each a brother, and all in Christ the Bridegroom ; and
in those he has gathered and presented to himself, the bride — the
Lamb's wife. Men, too, from every civil and ecclesiastical
economy, will swell the ranks of these happy ones. The stern
republican and the accomplished royalist; the subjects of civilized
governments, and the victims of barbarous and cruel ones 5 the
THE BRIDE. 139
conquerors of the world, and those they enslaved ; all whom a
divine ray reached and raised from darkness to light, shall sit
down with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and prove that no ex-
ternal circumstances can intercept the entrance of the glorious
gospel, or form an impassable wall between the Saviour and the
sinner.
Men, too, of every rank and class of society — those at the
apex, and those at the very basis of the social pyramid-— the
monarch who reigns over many millions, and the mechanic who
knows but two things — his business and his Bible ; the noble who
looks back upon a lineage stretching into ancient times, and the
peasant whose home is the circumference of his family, and
whose lineage is soon read on the fly-leaf of its only heirloom
and crest and ornament — the Word of God; the sufferer from
his bed of sickness ; the martyr from his flame-shroud ; the mis-
sionary from his lonely grave; the soldier from his gory bed;
and the sailor from his sea-tomb, shall come together, having
nothing in common but love and likeness to Christ, and share in
the sacred festivities of the marriage-supper of the Lamb.
Castle and camp, and royal palace, and noble hall, shall each
furnish guests ; each rank and degree of life shall have its repre-
sentatives before the throne. However these may have difiered
in gifts, in privileges, in circumstances, on earth, they have all
one great family likeness ; and so it will be seen, when the masks
of earth have all dropped ofi", and the divine features of a re-
generated nature shine forth in infinite variety, but with im-
perishable lustre.
At this marriage-feast there will be enjoyed perfect rest. The
labourer rests at eventide, the warrior rests after the battle, and
the Christian at the close of his pilgrimage. Each faculty and
affection will enjoy its peculiar Sabbath, and every capacity will
receive its suitable nutriment, and every feeling its divine and
elevating ecstasy; and the whole man will enjoy a festival which
the most expressive symbols only enable us to see through a glass
darkly. Those perplexities which bajffled our researches upon
earth will all be unravelled, those difficulties which we could not
master here will be dissolved in that pure sunshine ; and mys-
teries seen to be so now will cease to be so there, and providences
140 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
as inscrutable as they are painful in this dispensation, will then
find their solution in a flood of glory ; and the sacred page on
which we have found clouds and darkness, will be seen clear and
beautiful in that holy light. Then will be creation's jubilee —
the church's triumph — the Redeemer's glory.
A large portion of those who have made themselves ready is
now in the more immediate presence of the Lamb. The locality
they now live and worship and rejoice in, we do not know — it
may be much nearer us than we are aware — but, wherever it be,
there is no family on earth that has not an interest in it — that is
not linked to it by indissoluble ties — that has not amid its shining
numbers a representative waiting for the hour that restores to
them those they left on earth.
A large portion of its predestined inheritors is still unborn;
many are now living, but not yet born again. Many are now
the sons of God, walking worthy of their high calling. Those
within the vail and those without, the in-door and out-door ser-
vants, are alike constituents of the church of the redeemed ; and,
in due time, the whole family in heaven and earth shall sit down
with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, at the marriage-supper of the
Lamb.
My dear brethren, we are all now on trial for this sublime and
glorious destiny. Each year, as it rolls away, is so precious, be-
cause it carries us either to this great gathering or away from it.
Each minute is replete with infinite value, for it contributes to
the formation of a character which shall outlast the dissolution
of all things, and be darkened with an everlasting eclipse, or bo
resplendent with the rays of glory. Every thing we now do or
say stretches into this solemn future. Every word and act has
its echo hereafter. What we now sow we shall hereafter reap, in
gladness or sorrow, in joy or tears. The queen upon her throne,
the prime-minister before her, the peer, the clergyman, the phy-
sician, the merchant, the tradesman, the Protestant, the Roman
Catholic, the infidel, the atheist, are all rushing, with speed that
can neither be retarded nor arrested, into that awful future which
divides them in two great classes — one for the festival of the
Lamb, the other for the wrath of the Lamb. Extinction is im-
THE BRIDE. 141
possible. The soul is a word that cannot be unspoken — a leaf
that cannot be annihilated.
Whether we smile or wee^'^
Time wings his flight ;
Days, hours, they never creep,
Life speeds like light.
Whether we laugh or groar,
Seasons change fast;
Nothing hath ever flown
Swift as the past.
Whether we chafe or chide.
On is Time's pace ;
Never his noiseless step <
Doth he retrace.
Speeding, still speeding on,
How, none can tell ;
Soon will he bear us
To heaven or hell.
Dare not, then waste thy days^
Reckless and proud ;
Lest while ye dream not,
Time spread thy shroud.
It is the desire of God that all whom I now address should rise
and share in the hallowed hospitalities of the Lamb. He has
spread before every eye the sacred page from which remonstrant
flashes, like the flame-sword of the cherubim, warn us from the
paths of ruin. Every week he sends us the Sabbath, like a mes-
senger from the skies, to reveal afresh the sanctuary, the ordi-
nances of the gospel, the message of love, the means of grace,
the hopes of glory; there is no speech where its voice is not
heard ; its line is gone out through all the world ; it bids you
prepare for the marriage-supper of the Lamb.
God's providential dealings incessantly impress the same truth.
He awakens the sleeping judgments which he has in store, and
charges them to strike that they may stir us up to reflection and
forethought. Sickness and bereavement, the shrouds of our
142 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES-
"babes and the graves of our fathers, the arrow by day and the
pestilence by night, the surges of a nation's wrath and the ripples
of an individuaFs sorrow, are the trumpets of Grod sounding in
our ears our growing responsibilities, and urging on us piercing
motives to arise and make ready, for "Behold, the Bridegroom
Cometh."
143
LECTURE X.
THE APOCALYPTIC TEMPLE.
"And I saw no temple therein : for the Lord God Almighty, and the Lamb,
are the teynple of it." — Revelation xxi. 22.
This sounds like a discord in the harmony of heaven — it looks
as if it were the projected shadow of " No God !" — it seems out
of place. " No tears/' one can easily admit as an Eden feature,
and joyfully anticipate as a blessed fact; but " no temple" seems
a gap in the landscape — a stain on the glory — a cloud on the
bright sky. Take away the house of prayer, and our peaceful
Sabbath, and our public ordinances, and our village spires, and
the chimes of Sabbath bells, and the hill of Zion, the ascending
crowds of solemn worshippers, and the songs of praise, and the
rich, deep calm that still overflows, as with the light and love of
the better land, our Sundays, even in England, — and you seem
to me to despoil earth of half its beauty, time of its most bril-
liant gems, and humanity of its sweetest and most precious birth-
right. This negative, too, seems to contradict other Apocalyptic
sketches. We read in one place, ^^ The temple of God was
opened ;" in another, ^' The temple was filled with smoke /'
and in another, " They serve Him in his temple." In these
passages it seems to be intimated that the wide earth shall
then be one glorious temple; but in the passage under con-
sideration, it appears to be thought that the millennial age shall
have no temple at all. There is no contradiction — there is real
harmony between these statements, if we will only listen ; a little
reflection and discrimination will bring it out.
It will be granted by every Christian, that during the coming
era, when the gospel shall universally prevail in its highest,
deepest, and purest influence, there will be no skeptic, infidel, or
Socialist temple. Such are and have been in this dispensation ;
but in the New Jerusalem, law, order, and love shall be the air
144 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
and sunshine of all space : wild and sensual dreams shall hare
passed away like exhausted clouds ; unbelief shall have perished
from the earth; skepticism, that airy, cold, and unsubstantial
frostwork — that Iceland of negations — shall have been utterly
dissolved under the sun of light; one trace, fragment, or me-
morial of it shall not remain.
There shall be no Socinian temple there, nor shall there
be any one holding Socinian sentiments in the New Jerusalem.
I listen to the fore-heard echoes of its song, and I hear none
disowning or leaving out, but all proclaiming clearly and per-
petually the essential deity of the Son of God.
In Rev. V. 12, it is written that "ten thousand times ten thou-
sand, and thousands of thousands, say, Worthy is the Lamb that
was slain, to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength,
and honour, and glory, and blessing. And every creature which
is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as
are in the sea, and all that are in them, I heard saying, Blessing,
and honour, and glor}^, and power be unto Him that sitteth upon
the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever.^' And again,
in Kev. vii. 9, " After this I beheld, and lo, a great multitude,
which no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and
people, and tongues, stood before the throne, and before the
Lamb, clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands, and
cried with a loud voice, saying, Salvation to our God which
sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb." The atonement
thus gives colouring to their songs, and emphasis to their grati-
tude. The deity of Jesus is there universally felt, acknowledged,
glorified. He is the object of universal worship.
There will be no Romish temple there. Here " the man of
sin sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is
God ;" but there Christ is the only high-priest, and his praise the
censer of ever-burning incense. The Virgin Mary is there, not
a goddess on the altar, or a queen, but a worshipper before the
throne; and the apostles, and martyrs, and saints receive no
religious service, but give ceaseless adoration, and thanksgiving,
and glory, and honour, " to Him that loved them, and washed
them too from their sins in his own blood, and made them kings
and priests unto God.''
THE APOCALYPTIC TEMPLE. 145
There shall be there no Turkish mosque or temple — the Crescent
has then and there waned and disappeared before the Cross ; the
channels of tjie Euphrates have been filled with the streams of
that "river that makes glad the city of our God;" the minaret
is buried in the decay of past ages ; the fallen firmament al star
has no orbit in the millennial sky, the locusts of Egypt no ad-
mission into the New Jerusalem, and the Koran is unknown,
and the cave of Mecca is merged in the bottomless pit for ever.
There shall be no denominational temple there. Those dis-
tinctions which have crept into the worship of God in the lapse
of years, shall all melt away in that flood of light and glory that
lights up with everlasting splendour our new Jerusalem; the
names and distinctions of Episcopacy, Presbytery, Independency,
and Wesleyanism, with their peculiar crotchets, parties, quarrels,
and framework, shall all be swept away; and the name which
was first pronounced in scorn at Antioch, shall alone be heard in
the choirs of the redeemed, and gloried in as their noblest dis-
tinction. Names so musical now will then be heard no more at
all ; glories so radiant now, will be quenched, or rather supersed-
ed then. Christ shall be all and in all, and man shall be glo-
rious only in his glory.
There will be no material or local temple there. No place will
be sequestered and set apart for the special worship of God ; * the
scaffolding comes down when the edifice is complete ; the disci-
pline which is temporary, gives way to the communion of saints
which is eternal ; the canonized urn is gone, for the fountain and
river of living waters are disclosed. The whole earth shall be
holiness to the Lord; the hand of the great High-Priest shall
wave consecration over it, and Christ himself shall be the temple
of the universe.
The absence of a material temple is, in short, the expressive
symbol of the departure and decay of all those auxiliary means
and ordinances which are of so great value here ; there will then
be no sacraments, as the great substance of them, the Son of
God, will be present. '^ Till I come,'' is the close of the eucha-
rist; "in remembrance of me," cannot be said of one actually
and bodily present ; these, therefore, are both left behind, as the
calyx or corolla when the fruit is ripe.
There will be then no stated weekly Sabbath, because time will
8EC0NP SERIES. 13
146 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
be a perpetual Sabbath ; the little bright pools reflecting at inter-
vals in the march of clays the splendour of the skies, will be
covered by the rising tide from which they have been always fed,
and will collect in purer and intenser lustre the glories of the
New Jerusalem. The evening star will hide its head on the rise
of that sun, and the occasional rest will merge into everlasting
repose.
There will be no ministry of the gospel. There will be no
teacher, because all will be taught ; or rather, the Great Teacher
will take on himself the functions which he now delegates to
men, and thus fulfil his own promise, " All thy children shall be
taught of God,^' and, " they shall no more teach every man his
neighbour.^'
In Ephesians iv. 11, 12, the limits of the existence of the
ministry are declared to be, " He gave some apostles, and some
prophets, and some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers,
for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for
the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come, in the unity
of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a
perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of
Christ.^' This last attainment, this perfection and unity, will
take place at the millennium ; and then the gift of teachers, now
enjoyed, and inadequately valued, will be withdrawn.
There will be no prayer. It will then be unnecessary — entirely
so ; it is peculiar to a dispensation of wants, weaknesses, imper-
fections, ignorance. In the New Jerusalem, there will be no
wants, and therefore there can be no prayer, which is the ex-
pression of them. Prayer has its root in this world, amid wants
and tears; and its flowering in praise and sunshine and fulness
of joy in the world to come. Thus, then, in the coming age
there is no preaching, for all will be converted ; no prayer, for
all wants will be supplied ; no faith, for all will be fruition ; no
hope, for all will be having. Now, more or less perfectly, the
universe is the temple of God. Then, God will be the temple of
the universe, — its walls, the attributes of Deity, — its roof, the
majesty of the Eternal, — its gate, the incarnate Lamb; — and
successive generations shall kneel around the throne, like zones
of glory, and praise him for ever ; then all creation shall be holy,
©yery spot of earth consecrated, every hour canonical ; exhaustion
THE APOCALYPTIC TEMPLE. 147
and fatigue shall be utterly unknown ; ^^ they shall run and not
weary, walk and not faint/'
These facts, so true of the coming dispensation, so attractive
features in it, imply that there are and must needs be temples in
this. They exist now by divine prescription, by necessary laws,
from tried experience : " Forget not the assembling of yourselves
together ;" " Where two or three are met together in my name,
there am I in the midst of them." No one can read with ordinary
care the Acts of the Apostles, without seeing that social worship
was held to be of Scripture obligation, and shown to be apostolic
and Christian practice. We need continuously revived our im-
pressions of eternal and future realities ; we require our love to
God, our reverence for truth, our patience, our peace, our repose,
strengthened and nourished ; and surely nowhere are the springs
of these more abundant, or more fully revealed, or more over-
flowing, than on the Sabbath in the house of prayer, and amid
the exercises of the sanctuary. There is excitement, a holy and
precious excitement, in the living voice of the living ambassador
of God, in the listening auditory in the place where past genera-
tions have worshipped and gone upward ; and above and beyond
all these, is the special promise, the sure pledge of the Lord of
the Sabbath, the King of Zion, to hallow by his peculiar and dis-
tinguishing blessing the place where he records his name, and
where his people meet.
I find no special geographical locality, or latitude, or soil,
assigned for a Christian temple in the word of God ; nor can I
trace any intimation respecting its aspect, its shape, or its size ;
but surely the least attentive reader of the word of God cannot
fail to discover the divine sanction and scriptural precedent for
the fact of public and social worship, and of one day selected
from the current of days for the special time of such worship
definitely fixed, and therefore of divine obligation. It is true,
some say every day is holy, and there is now no necessity for one
to be selected from the rest and made peculiarly so : — the divine
warrant for such a day is a sufficient answer to such an objection;
man is not wiser than God ; and all the practical results of such
a theory, wherever it has been attempted, are no less decisive evi-
dence of its inherent evil and irreligion. "We can read at homo
148 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
a far better sermon than we can hear at church/' is also perfectly
true ; but it is just as true, and as extensively true, that in almost
every case where such an objection is urged, there is neither
prayer offered nor sermon read at home ; and if there were both^
there still remains what is no light argument in favour of the
duty of waiting on the public preaching of the gospel — the fact,
that it is the ordinance of God, and, as such, is honoured of God,
and has impressed upon its observance the promise of his special
presence and enriching benediction. We need no sacraments,
say others, to remind us of that death which is in every pulse of
our new life, or of that divine and glorious Saviour who redeemed
us by love, and will come again to receive us unto himself, whom
we cannot forget. God knew best what we should require, and
has appointed these visible symbols, to remind us of facts we are
ever prone to undervalue or forget; if there be no cup, the wine
will be spilt ; if there be no ordinances, religious impressions will
evaporate : and it is matter of fact that, whenever the outward
forms and ordinances and obligations of Christianity have been
despised or neglected, the inward life has lost much of its energy,
and a cold freezing atmosphere has spread its benumbing influence
in every direction, and over every portion of the Christian body.
But it is no less important, it may be here proper to remark,
to guard ourselves from the opposite and equally mischievous
extreme, so prevalent in our day, which rushes from the skep-
ticism that tramples under foot the ordinances of God, to the fana-
ticism which canonizes and worships them as idols in the room of
God. We know not which is most injurious; the one which
would evaporate every right into a transcendental mystery, or an
empty metaphor and figure of speech ; or the other, which would
condense them into gods, and make the church a new Pantheon,
a place of innumerable shrines and altars for their adoration, till
a crucifix becomes more precious than the atonement, an altar the
Saviour, and a wafer their God.
Thus it is that sensual pride would idolize, and intellectual
pride would scorn the sacraments — a pulverizing skepticism would
destroy them, and a sensuous superstition would canonize them.
God will meet neither the pride of a darkened intellect, nor that
THE APOCALYPTIC TEMPLE. 149
of a depraved heart ; but he condescends to the weakness of man,
and mercifully and wisely provides for all its requirements.
Man needs a temple. His nature shows it : were he pure in-
tellect he could dispense with it — were he mere animalism he
could not rise to it, still less above it; but as soul and body, im-
mortality and mortality wed together, he finds in the appoint-
ments of God, his word, his house, his ordinances, all that is
requisite in this dispensation to aid, to stimulate, improve, and
fit him for a nobler and more glorious destiny.
Sinners need temples. They require to be arrested, roused,
awakened, or they perish in their sins ; their minds require light,
their judgments facts, their consciences conviction, their whole
nature regeneration, improvement, and elevation ; and no process
has been shown or felt in the history of mankind to have been so
fraught with power, as that of a faithfully preached gospel.
Saints need temples no less than sinners. They are the corn
in the field, the flowers in the garden, the branches of the vine,
and they must have the dew-drops and sunbeams of the sky to
fall upon them, or they wither; they are dependent, they live on
influences from above. G-race is an exotic ; it is implanted from
on high, amid an inhospitable and uncongenial world, and it must
be sustained and invigorated from the source of its birth ; and it
has been invariably and uniformly found, in all places, ages, and
circumstances, that the greater our growth in grace, the greater
becomes our appetite for the means of its maintenance and in-
crease — the exercises and influences of the sanctuary of God. It
was no sentimental poet, but holy David, who wrote the eighty-
fourth psalm : '' How amiable are thy tabernacles, Lord of
hosts ! My soul longeth, yea, even fainteth, for the courts of the
Lord. Blessed are they that dwell in thy house : a day in thy
courts is better than a thousand : I had rather be a doorkeeper
in the house of my God, than to dwell in the tents of wickedness."
The soul grows in capacity with its progress in knowledge and
truth ; one satisfaction delighting it awhile, indeed, but preparing
it also to thirst for new and more glorious draughts from the
fountain of living waters ; and hence, wheresoever the invitation
is sounded forth, on the highway, or amid sacred furniture, from
the pulpit or on the hill-side, " Ho, every one that thirsteth, como
13*
150 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
ye to the waters/' it hears in such words sounds full of melody
and irresistible attraction, and resolves, at all hazard or expense,
to be there. The " company'^ of the people of God is a Chris-
tian's "own/' the scene, the source, the kindler of fellowship,
sympathy, communion ; and therefore they who have made the
greatest progress in conformity to the divine image, are they who
seek most, and frequent oftenest, the house of Grod, the assembly
of the saints, and enjoy its ennobling exercises with greatest de-
light and largest benefit.
" People of the living God,
I have sought the world around,
Paths of sin and sorrow trod,
Peace and comfort nowhere found.
Now to you my spirit turns.
Turns a fugitive unblest ',
Brethren, where your altar burns,
Oh, receive me into rest !
Lonely, I no longer roam,
Like the cloud, the wind, the wave.
Where you dwell shall be my home,
Where you die shall be my grave ;
Mine the God whom you adore,
Your Kedecmer shall be mine ;
Earth can fill my heart no more.
Every idol I resign."
Society requires temples. The Christian church is the nursery
of a Christian people. A society that springs from the mosque,
the Socialist's den, the Romish temple, will be found unmanagea-
ble, unquiet, unprosperous, the mere slaves of a designing priest-
hood, the creatures of democratic or rather ochlocratic turbulence,
and destitute altogether of that nobility of nature which imparts
obedience to laws and lawful authority without servility, and
creates a manly, independent character without the least tendency
to disrespect and insubordination. The house of God is the sacred
platform which levels none and elevates all — -on which liberty,
equality, fraternity, truly so called, grow up as branches of the
tree of life, instinct with true vitality, and loaded with real fruits ;
where our common and aboriginal nature is felt by all hearts to
be our common condition, and acknowledged amid all the trap-
pings of rank and the vails of circumatance ; where rich and poor
THE APOCALYPTIC TEMPLE. 151
meet together, and see and cherish the ties of a common but not
ignoble brotherhood.
Society cannot become compact till wedded by Christian love :
and it can attain its culminating greatness only when it is uni-
versally illuminated and inspired and directed by the wisdom that
is from above. All government in this world requires temples.
Be it a monarchy, a republic, or an aristocracy, there can be little
righteous rule above, and less loyalty and obedience below, where
the restraining, guiding, sanctifying truths of Christianity are not
ij|)re'ciated. Conscience is the fountain of power ; it must be
touched. In the house of God, and through the instrumentality
of the truth of God, this faculty is reached, and awakened, and
replaced upon its legitimate throne ; and man then thinks and
plans as before God. We may be assured, houses of prayer, where
such results follow, are far more important contributions to the
stability and safety of the state than prisons ; and the lessons of
Christianity than stringent laws ; and love and loyalty, the inner
inspiration of the soul, than the fears created by penal codes, or
the obedience forced from without by an Argus-eyed police.
Loyal subjects, and wise and just and merciful rulers, are not the
wild shoots of nature, growing on the commons of the earth, but
divine plants, the planting of the Lord, and requiring divine
nutriment. I never can believe that the social order, all but uni-
versal allegiance, and enthusiastic reverence for our institutions
in this great land, are merely the results of commercial calcula-
tion of loss by their removal — or of Saxon doggedness, or of pure
habit, or of traditional veneration. Their roots have struck, no
doubt, into the convictions and hearts, but deeper and stronger
still, I believe, into the consciences of our people. A jus hu-
manum in itself thus rises to the rank and strength of a jus
divinum; and in the blow levelled at the ordinance of man, they
see a stain aimed at the honour of God. The true charter of our
social liberties is the word of God ; and the place where its words
are read, and its responsibilities impressed — call it cathedral,
church, or chapel — is a place on which the state mightily de-
pends. It is the Bible that exposes all forms of tyranny and
falsehood, and by bringing before the mind the types, and images,
and formulas of immortal truth and spiritual freedom ; by dis-
162 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
placing the authority of the church by the authority of Chtist;
by annihilating the decretals of popes by the voice of God. Put
away our Bibles, and pull down our sanctuaries, and how long
would our institutions remain ? The Bible is the palladium of
our constitutional freedom : with the Bible, we can never be en-
slaved, without it we cannot remain long free ; what is brightest
in our history is reflected from it; what is most powerful, pure,
and holy in our constitution is inspired by it.
In the future dispensation, in which, as asserted in the passas
under review, there will be no temple, it may be proper to
there will be no necessity for a temple. In the ancient temple
of Jerusalem — the special and peculiar residence of Deity — were
the Urim and Thummim, the Shechinah and the mercy-seat, and
the overshadowing cherubim. But in the coming dispensation,
the temple will be co-extensive with the city, the church and state
be one ; the very walls will be built of those precious stones, frag-
ments of which were placed on the breastplate of the high-priest;
and the glory of the Lord, that dwelt between the cherubim of
old, will cover with its splendours every spot of the holy city.
Then all citizens will be Christians, all rulers spiritual ; and the
great idea of Dr. Arnold, so forcibly and eloquently rendered by
the Duke of Argyll, in his recent work* — impossible in this dis-
pensation — will be actualized, and church and state will be melted
into one in the New Jerusalem, inseparable and undistinguishable
for ever. All will be priests unto God.
Such temples as exist on earth will be unnecessary in the future
age, because all space will be holiness to the Lord. In the an-
cient economy, certain rules and acts of worship were so restricted
to the temple of Jerusalem, that it would have been sin to attempt
to perform them in any other place. Thus it is written in Deu-
teronomy xii. 14, ^' Take heed to thyself, that thou offer not thy
burnt-offerings in every place that thou seest; but in the place
which the Lord shall choose, in one of thy tribes, there shalt thou
offer thy burnt-offerings, and there shalt thou do all that I com-
mand thee.^'
•* "Presbytery Examined, or an Essay, Critical and Historical, on the Eccle-
siastical History of Scotland since the Reformation." By the Duko of Argyll.
Moxon, Dover street.
THE APOCALYPTIC TEMPLE. 15^
In 2 Chronicles vii. 12^ it is written, ^' And the Lord appeared
unto Solomon bj night, and said unto him, I have heard thy
prayer, and have chosen this place to myself for a house of sacri-
fice/^ And in this present dispensation, though the type is
merged in its antitype, and the whole earth is fit in itself for
sacred rites and spiritual worship — as it is declared by our blessed
Lord, "The hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers
shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth, for the Father
seeketh such to worship him ;'" " Ye shall neither in this moun-
tain, nor yet at Jerusalem, worship the Father;" — ^yet every spot
is not in fact suited for assembled worshippers, owing to the din,
and conflict, and interruptions of the world.
Mammon has preoccupied one part; the conflict of political
parties, another ; the competition of trade, another ; and unless a
spot be selected and separated from the surrounding worldliness,
and hedged and walled round, and visibly and legibly devoted to
sacred and spiritual things, there could scarcely be a visible church.
This arises from abounding worldliness, from the imperfections
and sinfulness of our position, and from the usurpations of Satan,
which become more intrusive as the hour of his ejection draws
nigh. But in the New Jerusalem — the better, and purer, and
perfect age — a Sabbath-calm shall float over a redeemed earth —
the whole earth shall be retrieved, as it is already redeemed, and
every acre shall be holy; every pulse of every heart shall be
worship, and every breath shall be as fragrant incense, and the
floor of that temple shall be the whole earth, and the worshippers
all living men, and time a perpetual Lord's-day ; there shall be
no world to keep out, no intrusion to prevent — no distinction
between house and house, service and service, spot and spot possi-
ble ; all scenes will be salvation, and all sounds praise. Christ
shall be the temple of the Millennium, and all redeemed saints
"pillars in the temple of my God.'^ All hours, too, shall be
canonical, all seasons high festivals, and all affections at all hours
in tune. All space shall be temple-space, and all days temple-
days.
We gather from these revelations of the future, what are the
elements of fitness for its sublime and holy employments. Delight
in the service of God is the characteristic of all its inmates, and
154 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
this delight is not originated there, it is begun here, in individual
hearts; it is nursed and developed amid all the means of grace;
and unless we have some consciousness of its presence within us
now, and give some evidence of its intensity, and power, and in-
crease, we do not possess that internal character which fits us for
the enjoyments and exercises of the people of God, in the presence
of the throne of God and of the Lamb. It is a prepared place for
a prepared people ; its citizens were made so here, their franchise
is received only here, their fitness is generated here. We must
be born before we can breathe the air, behold the light, or engage
in the duties of this present life; and we must be "born again,''
before we can enter on the scenes, inhale the air, or join in the
harmonies of the age to come. According to a principle that runs
through all of the universe that we know, the inhabitant is fitted
for his habitation, the bird for the air, the fish for the waters, the
ox for the earth, man's body for the earth that now is, and so
man's soul and body for the earth and age and scenes to come.
To produce, hasten, and mature this grand moral and spiritual
adaptation, is the great end of all our ecclesiastical scafi"olding —
our Lord's-days, our prayers, our Bibles, our sanctuaries. Do we
possess it? Is the kingdom of God, which is "not meat, nor
drink, but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost,"
within us ?
If these things be so, what a bright prospect is here unfolded
for the people of God ! Those imperfections which cleave to all
we think, feel, or do; those interruptions which break in on our
most sequestered and solemn communings with God ; those specta-
cles of sin and sorrow and death, which cry aloud with piercing
eloquence, "All have sinned," and " The wages of sin is death;"
those inner conflicts of St. Paul, repeated in every heart in which
the Spirit of God dwells ; those groanings^ waiting to be delivered;
those conceptions that fade as we try to realize them ; those pur-
poses, that perish in practical development — shall all cease on the
very threshold of that state, in which the Lord God Almighty and
the Lamb are the temple. In the words of Mr. Birks, one of the
ablest and acutest of living interpreters of prophecy, " The king-
dom of peace and righteousness must dawn at length on the earth :
what though the worship of Mahuzzin shall long defile even the
THE APOCALYPTIC TEMPLE. 155
Cbristian church with foul idolatries, and flatterers, who cleave to
a faith which their hearts never welcome, may usurp the name of
the Catholic church, to crush under holy titles the faithful wit-
nesses of the Lord — it is but a little time, and the tyranny shall
cease, and the delusion shall pass away. The sanctuary of God
in these latter days must be cleansed from its many defilements ;
the flatterers of the outer court exiled from the assemblies of
Christ j and a pure and virgin church be prepared to welcome the
returning Bridegroom. What though the scoffers of the last days
may exult in their vain boasts of a light which is not of heaven,
and of a knowledge in which the only Saviour of sinners is for-
gotten and despised — what though the multitudes may gather
under deceitful watchwords of Liberty, Light, and Progress, and
the worship of man, self-regenerate by his own wisdom, for one
last confederacy of Grentile unbelief ; they shall still come to their
end, and none shall help them, though statesmen may exclude
the truth of God from their counsels, though philosophers may
speculate on all the depths of history without once discovering
their own need of a Saviour, and build up a new Babel in the last
days of human liberty and equality, and imaginary triumphs of
reason ; though divines may invent a gospel without Christ — and
metaphysicians, a world without the living God ; this record, like
a firmament of unalterable, ineffaceable truth, is above them and
around them, to rebuke their folly, and confirm the faith of all the
servants of the Lord. In the strife of modern parties, amid the
fever of commerce and trade, it reminds us of a counsel which is
ever advancing swiftly to its bourne, of angel ministries that are
unceasingly around us, and of a solemn resurrection which draws
nearer .and nearer, and, like a thief in the night, may break in
suddenly with a wild and strange surprise upon all the schemes
and projects of worldly men. The prophecies that we now trace
dimly and painfully with the eyes of the flesh, and amid the thick
mists of a fallen world, will then start out before us in their clear
and unvailed beauty, and awaken perpetual songs of wonder and
praise and adoration in the hour of the resurrection, and through-
out everlasting ages in the kingdom of our God.''
Our clearest conception of that templeless, because all-temple
state, are dim, faint, and unworthy. We see it through a glass,
156 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
darkly. This glass shall be cast away on the confines of the age
to come ; the eye shall he purged of its weakness and its film ;
the air shall be light — that light the glory of Deity ; and the
future vision realized by John in Patmos from the bosom of the
Egean sea^ shall be seen by us, stretching out before us a glorious
panorama — a present fact — the completement of the past — the
commencement of an ever-brightening future — the fulfilment of
all prophecy — the realization of all promise.
Let us love and be thankful for Christian temples upon earth. .
They are its chiefest beauty, the springs of its peace, the nuclei
around which the forlorn hopes of humanity may cluster and find
support. Let their hallowed exercises be dear to us ; let us ac-
custom ourselves to their air and associations ; let us prefer the
" swallow's nest" in the rafters of the humblest, to the sheen of
palaces or the pageantry of courts. They have been the nurseries
of past generations — the springs in the valley of Baca, dug by
our forefathers, and filled from the fountains of heaven, from
which weary pilgrims have drunk and gone on refreshed, as from
strength to strength, till they appeared before God in Zion.
May God, when he takes from us many precious things, in just
judgment for our iniquities, spare to us our sanctuaries; and
when these fail, may heavenly and better buildings receive us
into everlasting habitations !
157
LECTURE XI.
MILLENNIAL LIGHT.
"And the city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it :
for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof." —
Revelation xxi. 23.
There are some portions of Scripture which are surrounded
by great acknowledged difficulties ; and yet there is a solution of
them which it is our duty to attempt, by concentrating on them
all the light we can command. Difficulties must not discou-
rage us.
The Spirit of God, in all he has written, designs our instruc-
tion ; and our text and other passages, although admittedly beset
with difficulties, are revealed by him, and not to be avoided by
us. We ought rather, in a spirit of humility, teachableness, and
prayer, to seek the guidance and direction of that Spirit who is
promised to teach us '^ things to come," that he would enable me
to unfold, and you to understand them. I desire, first, to show
you that our text relates to the future in time, not in eternity.
I believe there is scarcely a promise contained in the Apocalypse
that shall not be actualized on earth. I believe it is, from fii'st
to last, mainly a description of the church triumphant below —
not the church triumphant in heaven. I believe that every por-
tion of it relates to believers in that glorious resurrection state in
which they shall appear when Christ shall come and call them to
himself, and that this New Jerusalem is the descent of Christ's
people from the air into which they had been caught, and that
this their settling upon earth will be the great picture and por-
trait of what grace can gather from the wrecks and ruin of the
fell. He says, " I saw a new heaven and a new earth,'' (that is,
a new outward visible economy,) " for the first heaven and the
first earth were passed away." And he then says, " And I, John,
saTT the holy city, New Jerusalem," (which we are now de-
SECOND SERIES. 14
158 APOCALYPTIC SOTCHES.
scribing,) ^^ coming down from Grod out of heaven, prepared as a
bride adorned for her husband." And then he adds, " And I
heard a great voice out of heaven, saying, Behold, the tabernacle
of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall
be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and shall be
their God.'^ The term Shechinah, the visible glory between the
cherubim on the mercy-seat, is derived from a word which means
^' to dwell." Thus, then, where it is written, " the Word dwelt
among us," may be read, "the Word, the Shechinah of glory,
was in the midst of us." I believe that that glory which blazed
in the bush on Horeb, which shone on Mount Sinai, glowed in
the pillar of cloud by day, and the pillar of fire by night, which
guided the Israelites across the desert — the glory which finally
rested on the mercy-seat, and between the cherubim, and shone
in unearthly lustre from the precious stones on the breastplate
of the high-priest, revealing things past, present, and to come,
was nothing else than the manifestation of the Lord Jesus Christ,
who is " the brightness of the Father's glory, and the express
image of his person." We know not now what may be the ap-
pearance of Christ ', we know not what will be the nature of his
future personal appearance among us : he will probably come in
some bright manifestation like that which shone between the
cherubim, and with an eff"ulgence full of glory, which our eyes
shall then be prepared to gaze on, of which we can form but a
dim and inadequate conception, amid the clouds and shadows of
this dispensation. I have called your attention to the character
of those who shall dwell in that city. I then endeavoured to
assign reasons for its having gates at the east, west, north, and
south, corresponding with that beautiful promise, " Many shall
come from the east and the west, from the north and from the
south, and sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob in the
kingdom of heaven." I noticed the character of the city — " it
lieth four-square ;" and showed, by reference to classic writers,
that the Greek word translated " four-square," was used to
denote strength and solidity; in classic phraseology, "a man
to be trusted, a man of stability, permanence, and strength,"
is literally a four-square man; and the city so described,
to indicate its permanence and strength. I then referred tp
MILLENNIAL LIGHT. 159
tlie precious stones that are to be its foundations, and showed
that they might have been designed to teach us that all the
wrecks of the fall shall be restored; that those precious and
beautiful fragments, which we now value as gems, and which
were cast forth and shattered by the great explosion which took
place in Paradise, shall all be regathered and restored } and that
the earth, so long defaced and marred by the presence of sin,
shall again reflect, with a new and everlasting lustre, the bright-
ness of Him who made it once, and reconstructed it again. I be-
lieve that the outward material framework on which we live shall
undergo a process of change as great as our own bodies ; and that
the resurrection of our bodies is the nearest representation of what
shall be the change which the earth shall experience, when it
shall be consumed by the last flames, and restored, renewed, re-
adjusted by the presence of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
I showed, too, that on each stone — ^precious stone — there was in-
scribed (as we are told) the name of an apostle — the twelve
apostles of the Lamb ; they were not the foundation, for Christ
is the foundation; but their names will be inscribed on these
precious stones. I have sometimes wondered if it was the design
of the Spirit of Grod to teach us the character of the apostles by
the character of the stones on which their names are to be in-
scribed. If it was so, we might suppose the sapphire, mild and
beautiful in its lustre, to be the representative of John. We
might suppose the glowing topaz to be the representative of Paul.
We might thus represent each apostle's peculiar excellence, by
analyzing the character of the stone. But perhaps this is mere
fancy, and not the design of the Spirit of God ; if so, it is better
let alone. And then it is added, (as I explained last Lord's-day
evening,) " I saw no temple therein, for the Lord God Almighty
and the Lamb are the temple of it." I endeavoured to explain
this. I showed that it seemed as a gap in the celestial land-
scape ; as if the removal of our temples from the earth were like
the removal of the very stars from the o'erarching sky, or of the
flowers from the summer scene ; for if there be one thing more
beautiful than another here below, it is our groups of churches
and worshipping assemblies, and the extinction of them would be
like the extinction of the brightest and most lovely features in
160 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
the whole moral landscape. But 1 showed the meaning to be,
not that there should be no worship, but that there should be no
visible sequestered temples for the performance of it ; in a word,
that the whole earth will be one vast temple, and all its in-
habitants but one great body of holy and happy worshippers.
First I said there would be no Socinian's temple in heaven; if
he get there it is in spite of his Socinianism, and the reason why
[ say so is not from any uncharitableness, but because I notice
that in all the songs and anthems of the redeemed around the
throne, every one ascribes to Jesus glory, and honour, and thanks-
giving — an ascription in which the Socinian can never join. It
is plain, then, that there are no Socinian songs in heaven, but the
very reverse : therefore there can be no Socinian temple or worship
there. I noticed also that there would be no Romish temple
there, for the very obvious reason that the accent '^ Ave Maria' ^
is not once uttered by the worshipping hosts. " Abba, Father,"
is the burden of their song : they give no honour either to saints or
angels : it rises undividedly and exclusively to Jesus: "Worthy
is the Lamb that was slain to receive power, and riches, and
wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing.'^ I
showed, too, that there would be no denominational temples —
no Wesley an. Episcopalian, or Presbyterian temples in heaven —
not one. These names are all merged in the splendour of one
name — the first name by which our Lord's disciples were desig-
nated upon earth, that is, " Christians;" and thus the name pro-
nounced in scorn, or otherwise, at Antioch, shall be pronounced
with hosannahs in the New Jerusalem. " Christian" shall be the
unique, the all-absorbing, all-comprehending name ; and sect, and
party, and denomination shall be for ever discarded and cast
away. Neither will there be any stated hours of worship there,
for every hour shall be holy ; nor stated places of worship, for
the whole earth shall be holy. Now, the universe is the imper-
fect temple of God ; then, Grod shall be the glorious temple of the
universe. Now, the worshippers are few : they who despise him
many; then "all shall know him, from the least even to the
greatest; and a mighty multitude, which no man can number,
bearing palms in their hands, shall give honour and thanksgiving
and praise to our God and to the Lamb for ever and ever." And
MILLENNIAL LIGHT. 161
now we have arrived at the verse which I have this evening read
to you: ^^And the city had no need of the sun, neither of the
moon, to shine in it : for the glory of God did lighten it, and the
Lamb is the light thereof I do not know if I shall present a
just and scriptural exposition of this passage, but I shall en-
deavour to do so.
It is not asserted here that there will be no sun or moon in the
firmament over and around us : there is no prophecy of the anni-
hilation of the sun, moon, or stars. The idea of annihilation, like
atheism itself, is an utter absurdity ; there is no such thing indi-
cated in Scripture or proved in science. It is not, then, here
predicted that the sun or moon shall be extinguished, but the
prophecy is, that they shall be superseded — that there will be no
need of them ; and for this obvious reason, that a richer, intenser,
and more brilliant glory shall overflow with an universal flood of
light the whole of the New Jerusalem, the city of our God. Now
we shall perceive this, perhaps, more distinctly, if we recollect
that the sun and the moon are not fountains of light; they are
but reflections of light. The moon has long been known to be an
opaque body, and the sun is now ascertained to be opaque also;
and the light which they both give is not self-derived, but
borrowed. The earth's light at midnight is borrowed from the
moon ; the moon's is borrowed from the sun. The earth's light,
at midday is borrowed from the sun ; and the sun's light, again,
is not self-derived, but borrowed from some more central sun,
around which a thousand suns and a thousand systems perpetually
revolve ; and we, perhaps, from facts like these, which the pro-
gress and improvements of modern astronomy are daily disclosing
to us, may form some faint conception of the greatness of that
Being who made and lighted up all the hosts of heaven. When
I gaze upon the lofty firmament on a star-lit evening, and behold
the countless lamps that burn there with unfading brilliancy —
when I reflect that all these are but the outposts, the sentinels
(as it were) of a vast innumerable army which lies behind them
— that these suns and centres of vast systems are themselves but
planets, all deriving their light from yet larger and more central
suns — I see all nature teaching the absurdity of polytheism — all
things proclaiming the being, the unity, and glory of God ; and
14*
162 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
giving a display of the grandeur and magnificence of Him who is
enthroned amid the riches of the universe, that overwhelms the
imagination in every endeavour to grasp or conceive it. They
have no need, then, of the sun or moon — that is, in this millennial
day of glory and beauty, there will be no necessity for borrowed
luminaries, because the great Original will be there. On this
earth we need not the stars at noonday, nor can we at that hour
perceive them ] yet the stars are not then extinguished : they are
only lost in the blaze of the brighter luminary of noon. There
will be no need of the sun, moon, or stars, in the millennial reign ;
they will all then be superseded, not extinguished; their dim
lustre will be lost in beams of greater splendour. That sun which
now shines in its meridian glory shall wax pale and dim in the
presence of that greater and brighter Sun from whom all its rays
are borrowed and derived ; and this teaches that there is some
identity between the moral glory which shone between the cheru-
bim, that is, '' Christ," and the literal and physical light that
shines through the universe which encompasses us. The one is
not the contrast of the other, but the complement of the other;
the moral and spiritual light is the perfection of the natural light.
The Shechinah will possess a glory far eclipsing the glory of the
stars : from between the cherubim will radiate a glory that will
make pale a thousand suns; and that new light will reveal objects
and disclose hues which to us are quite imperceptible in the light
that now is. Let me try to show you in what ways it will do so.
First, I believe that that new light will reveal all things beauti-
fal with far greater intensity. The light which now reveals to us
the tints and colours of flowers, the beauties and splendours of
the stars, of gems, and of the rainbow, shall die : but the new
light, which is to supersede it, will show us all these things with
intenser brilliancy ; and display to us beauties in them which we
have never yet seen — hidden splendours, as yet concealed or dis-
guised — and will prove that this earth, the workmanship of God,
has beauty and glory and magnificence within it, which eye hath
not yet seen, nor man's heart ever yet conceived. In that new
light all the discoveries hitherto made by science will appear as
nothing when compared with the disclosures that will then bo
brought within the horizon. Mines of interesting discovery,
MILLENNIAL LIGHT. 163
stores of richer grandeur will be laid bare, and more exquisite
harmonies, now silent, will evolve from creation : and we shall
find that all which science and research have yet done, was but
to bring us to the margin of the mighty ocean of mystery and
beauty, whose contents and treasures remain to be fully and
clearly comprehended. Then the tree of knowledge will no
longer be separated from the tree of life; both shall own the
same root and blossom on the same soil. The light which is to
be will also reveal what the light which now is cannot do. The
light of our sun reveals to us colour — material colour, and ma-
terial shapes, but nothing more. The new light that is to super-
sede it will reveal not only these, but also moral and spiritual
character; showing us that holiness is essential beauty, the great-
est purity the greatest brightness. It will reveal to us a glory in
holy character far surpassing that possessed by sun, moon, or stars ;
by flower, fruit, and all things beautiful on earth. We shall then
see that the highest beauty in this world is but a dim exponent
of that excelling moral beauty to be disclosed in the New Jerusa-
lem. But this new and glorious light will also cast its rays over
all the history of the past, and will emphatically fulfil the words
of the Lord — "What I do, thou knowest not now, but thou shalt
know hereafter.'^ At present how much in our life is there
involved in mystery and darkness ! How many things have
happened to us, the meaning of which we cannot comprehend I
That dark and freezing cloud, which now casts its shadow on
your heart, and which you cannot understand, has its mission, and
the new light will disclose it. That stroke which smote down
your firstborn and fairest, has a meaning and an issue, though
you could not understand it ; and that blow which you cannot
think of now without shedding tears of bitterness, will then be
seen to have been but the touch of a Father who loved — a stroke
inflicted by the hand that was nailed to the cross for you. That
labyrinth, now inexplicable to you — that mystery now unfathoma-
ble — those dealings of Providence which you cannot now compre-
hend, will then be seen distinctly by you to have had an aim and
a bearing, which shall awaken in you new songs of gratitude, and
inspire you with deeper thankfulness to Him who led you all the
way through the wilderness, and placed you there. Then shall
164 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
you see all things to have been working together for your good,
and that the darkest cloud had ever a smiling face behind it, and
that the bitterest cup had in it a secret sweet. The great chain
of mystery will be then lifted above the stream : every link will
be luminous, and you will be convinced in glory of what you so
much doubt or disbelieve on earth, viz. that you received not one
stripe too many, endured not one pang too severe, were subjected
to not one visitation that was not as essential to your ultimate
happiness, as that Christ should have died on the cross, and
washed and sealed you with his own precious blood. This new
light will not only diffuse splendour over the past, but I believe
that it will place us in a position for solving mysteries, and eluci-
dating truths, which we cannot now comprehend. For instance,
you often dispute about the harmony that subsists, or ought to
subsist, between predestination, or election, and the doctrine of,
free-will. You read plainly that we are chosen before the founda-
tion of the world; you read as plainly — '^Why will ye not come
unto me : why will ye die ?" — you are satisfied from the one pas-
sage of the sovereignty of Grod ; from the other, of the freedom of
the human will, as well as our responsibility. You are staggered,
and cannot reconcile them ; they appear to you altogether dis-
cordant. But, amid the light that shines in the New Jerusalem,
both will be seen to be not only great truths, but the one shall be
shown to be in perfect harmony with the other. Take another
truth : salvation by grace, and yet th^ necessity for good works.
You cannot comprehend now how good works should have nothing
to do with salvation, and yet that we should be called upon to be
fruitful in every good work. You will then see that the two are
essentially connected; that the one is as indispensable as the
other. Now we see truths only in fragments : then we shall see
them as a complete whole and in full. Now to us truth seems
an apocrypha ; then it will be an apocalypse. Now we see the
greatest truths surrounded by the greatest mysteries, as the lofti-
est mountains ever cast around them the broadest shadows ; tJien
the sun will be vertical, and no truth shall have a shadow. All
things that we now see "through a glass darkly" shall then be
seen "face to face:" every thing will be luminous in the "New
Jerusalem.'' The sovereign purposes of God, which neither you
MILLENNIAL LIGHT. 165
nor I can grasp mw, we shall comprehend in some degree then :
the Trinity we shall then in some degree unravel ; and, although
it must for ever continue to be a truth above us, it will be in-
finitely more luminous and transparent then than it is now. The
atonement, the incarnation, the necessity for the death of our
Saviour, the introduction of evil, the influence of the Holy Spirit
— these are all truths which are more or less wrapped up in mys-
tery now ; but they shall all be robed in clearest light then ; and
in that clearest light all things shall be seen clearly. We shall
then see that in this light will be fulfilled all the glorious promises
which Grod. has made. For instance, our Lord says himself, "I
am the light of the world.'' He is so now really, but not uni-
versally : then he shall be so universally ; then shall be fulfilled
that beautiful promise made in Isaiah — " Arise, shine, for thy
light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee. For,
behold, the darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the
people; but the Lord shall arise upon thee ; and his glory shall be
seen upon thee ; and the Gentiles shall come to thy light, and
kings to the brightness of thy rising." Then shall be fulfilled
that promise — " To you that fear my name shall the Sun of Right-
eousness arise, with healing in his wings." Then that light
which sparkled in types and glowed in promises — which appeared
in the cradle at Bethlehem — which shone on the cross, and illu-
minated the grave, shall no longer be restricted to any particular
nook, portion, or region of the globe ; but shall overspread and
overflow with its radiant splendour the whole habitable world ; and
there shall break upon the view a scene such as man in his hap-
piest imaginings has never yet dreamed of: then shall be seen iu
that light the true unity of the Church of Christ. It shall then
be seen not to be what sectarians set it down to be, nor what ex-
clusionists pronounced it. It shall be seen to be not a material
uniformity — not a ceremonial identity, but a great and hallowed
likeness of each to each, and all to Christ : all being one in Christ,
and, therefore, one with each other. Then shall we recognise
each other as we are. In the light which now is, we can see each
other's countenances, and judge each other's actions, although we
rften misinterpret and misapprehend them : but in that light, I
believe, hearts shall be visible, affections luminous, and charaetdy
166 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
shall show, and write, and record itself; and we shall know not
each other's countenances only, but each other's thoughts and
hearts even as we know ourselves. Then in that light all creation
shall be made glad : there shall be no plaintive tone amid all its
sounds ; no sob for the dead shall there break upon the ear : all
earth shall be paradise, all voices shall be jubilee, and, basking
in a sunshine without cloud, and on an earth without decay, the
world shall close, as the world commenced, with paradise. But
we shall see in that light, what we now ought to see more — the
preciousness of man's soul. I was trying to teach this last Sab-
bath morning, from the text, ^'What shall it profit a man if he
shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul. Or what shall
a man give in exchange for his soul V^ How few of us feel this
weighty truth as we ought to feel it ? The part that is ^^ myself '
— that part that lives for ever — is not what the eye can see, or the
hand touch. That part of our being, whose happiness we ought
to study as our supreme object and primary aim, is the immortally
precious soul, and yet it is now the least valued of all. That
which ministers to its safety is least appreciated now, but then we
shall see that one soul in glory far transcends a thousand stars,
and outweighs, in its magnificence and preciousness, ten thousand
worlds. Then we shall see that text luminous to a degree we
never saw before — ^'What shall it profit a man if he shall gain
the whole world, and lose his own soul V And then we shall
know it — not by the soul's everlasting loss, but by its everlasting
gain. This light, which shall make so many things plain, is a
light that will be still mediatorial — for the text is remarkable :
"The Lord God shall lighten it, and the Lamh shall be the light
thereof.'' The literal translation is, " The Lord God shall lighten
it, and the Lamb shall be the lamp thereof;" meaning that Christ
is the medium of transmission for all the light which illumines
the New Jerusalem. And he alone shall be that medium ; minis-
ters, sacraments, and ordinances are the lights noio, but these
shall all be swept away : all stars shall be merged into the bright
Morning Star; all suns into the Sun of Righteousness. Christ
shall literally be '^ the all in all"— the medium through which
all light comes from God to us, and by which all praise rises froi^
lis to the ear of God, for ever and ever. In one brief sentence : — •
MILLENNIAL LIGHT. 167
The light that shall then illuminate the New Jerusalem, shall be
moral and s]3iritual light — the perfection of the light that now is;
and in that new and more glorious light, we shall see what is
mastery to us now, and see more clearly things but dimly revealed
to us now. Let me ask, therefore, in concluding my remarks
upon this passage — Are you the children of the light ? Are you
walking in the light ? Are you transformed by the light into the
likeness of God ? Is your heart in heaven ? Does your imagina-
tion unfurl its wings, and visit often that blessed and glorious
scene, and evoke in your heart the aspiration of the Psalmist of
old : " Oh ! that I had wings like a dove, for then would I fly
away and be at rest I" Does the contemplation induce you to
set your heart, not on things that are seen, but on those which
are unseen ? Do you feel that all on earth upon which men trust
is passing away ? Do you not, from the spectacle of the over-
throw of dynasties, the downfall of thrones, the tremblings and
convulsive throes of the nations — in a word, from the shaking and
uncertainty of all that is around you, learn to lay hold upon
things that will and must last for ever ? The true way, I believe,
to dislodge wrong principles and preferences, is to try to implant
sound ones ; we shall never sit loose to this world, by being told
that it is bad, or raise our affections above it, by being told that
it is unworthy of them. The proper way to dislodge the love of
the world that now is, is to unfold and press upon our apprehen-
sion the glories of the world that will be. And just as the sun
at noonday shining upon the grate, puts out the fire, and just as
the sun at day-dawn, shining in the sky, puts out the stars, so
the splendour, and beauty, and magnificence of the heavenly
Jerusalem will make so poor and dim all the glories of the world
that now is, that kings shall look on their crowns as pale and
worthless, and see beauty nowhere but in a crown of glory that
fadeth not away. Do you, dear brethren, endeavour not only
to rest your ' affections upon that better and brighter scene, but
do you endeavour to make it known also to others ? If we are
living in the light ourselves, we shall try to illuminate others.
In proportion as a man is a Christian, in the same proportion is
he a missionary. The intensest light casts its rays the farthest ;
wo are made Christians, that we may feel as stewards and trustees;
1B8 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
we receive the unction of tlie saint, that we may engage in the
duties, and undertake the responsibilities of the servant. Depend
upon it, that just in proportion as a man is illuminated with the
heavenly light himself, in the same proportion will he ligliten
others. The intensest luminary spreads its rays the farthest : the
greatest Christian is always the greatest missionary. He who is
the greatest receiver of light from God, will be the greatest re-
flector of that light among his fellow-men.
Are you in the number of those who alone shall see and enter
the New Jerusalem ? Are you among " the pure in heart,'' for
they alone shall see Grod ? Are you holy men ? Have you new
hearts, that have been touched, and thereby transformed by the
Spirit of God ? Speculations about prophecy will not serve us.
Satan knows more about the Apocalypse than all the commenta-
tors from the Christian era to this day. It is not an increase of
intellectual light, so much as it is a need of an increase of that
new, transforming, illuminating, sanctifying light, which comes
from the Sun of Righteousness, that we require. ^^ Except a
man be born again," (we are told,) " he cannot see the kingdom
of God." And, my dear friends, it is not difficult to ascertain if
you are destined to become citizens of the New Jerusalem. Let
me ask you what interest you feel in those foretastes of it to be
had here below? If the Millennium be a Sabbath of a thou-
sand years, they only to whom the Sabbaths on earth are sweet
will be fitted for its enjoyments and employments. What, then,
let me ask, is the Sabbath to you ? Is it the sweetest day of the
seven ? Can you part with any day but not with the Sabbath ?
When you are ill, do you take a day from Caesar, or from Christ,
for the use of the means of recovery ? Let me ask, what day of
the week comes round to you with the greatest delight, and occa-
sions you the greatest happiness? Do you love the house of
God ? If the New Jerusalem is to be a city of perpetual song,
thanksgiving, and praise — if there will be perpetual progress
there in the knowledge of God, of Christ, and of all things holy,
and of all things mysterious, do you now love the study of such
themes ? — do you love the Bible which unvails them to you ? Do
you prefer a day in God's house to a thousand within the gates
of sin? What is the house of God to you?— a happy place,
MILLENNIAL LIGHT. 169
wbither you come with a glad and thankful heart, or a place to
perform a melancholy duty to pacify your conscience, or rather
to do penance in atonement for sin, than to partake of those spi-
ritual pleasures and employments which God has vouchsafed in
it ? If you love the Sabbath in this world which passeth away,
you will love the eternal Sabbath which will succeed the six
thousand years of this world that are now drawing to a close. I
believe that these six thousand years, according to the most an-
cient and best calculation, are very near their accomplishment.
I believe that we are at the opening of the pouring out of the
seventh vial, and at the commencement of scenes which will not
last very long, but which shall be tempestuous and stormy beyond
all parallel ; the din, discord, and confusion of which, however,
shall be like the preparation of the instruments of a great concert
for the harmony and jubilee that will prevail over all the earth.
And if this be so, let us set our hearts on things above, let us sit
loose to this world, let us so pass through the things that are seen
and temporal, that we may direct our attention mainly to the
things which are unseen and eternal. I need not remind you
that many of the things to which we looked forward, as predicted,
have actually taken place. I told you, not more than six months
ago, that when the seventh vial was poured out, the whole conti-
nent of Europe would be convulsed, shattered, and torn : I told
you that, during that crisis, Babylon would come into remem-
brance before Grod, and her judgments begin to descend upon
her ; and, strange enough, a few weeks ago, we were informed by
reports in the newspapers, that the present pope would be the
last occupant of the pontifical chair, and then the gratifying re-
sult would be, that there would be no sovereign pontiff for us to
renew diplomatic relations with. And soon after this, he was
actually made a prisoner in his palace, for refusing to declare war
against Austria. These momentous events have already taken
place ; and it is now not improbable that the usurped spiritual
dominion of Babylon will also soon be broken up ; and when that
IS broken up, the Jews will then march forth to the land of their
fathers; and though excluded (justly or unjustly) from the par-
liament of the nation, God's ancient chosen people will be in-
vested with far nobler honours, and higher dignities, when they
SECOND SERIES. 15
170 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
become visible members of the visible church of the living God.
These are events we anticipate with joy. They are the burden
of a thousand prophecies — the aspiration of many hearts — the
hope of the universal church.
We are upon the eve of a grand response. The spreading
anarchy of nations is opening up a clearer and nearer view of that
city whose gates are praise, and its walls salvation. It will soon
emerge from the chaos in all its predicted beauty — the envy of
those that are without, the admiration of those that are within —
the rosy eve of departing time — the auspicious twilight of open-
ing eternity.
Jerusalem, my happy homo,
Name ever dear to me ;
When shall my labours have an end.
In joy, and peace, and thee !
When shall mine eyes thy heaven-built walls
And pearly gates behold ;
Thy bulwarks with salvation strong,
And streets of shining gold !
Apostles, martyrs, prophets, there
Around my Saviour stand ;
And soon my friends in Christ below,
Will join the glorious band.
Jerusalem, our happy home.
Our souls still long for thee ;
Then shall our labours have an end,
When we thy joys shall see.
171
LECTURE XII.
DAY WITHOUT NIGHT.
" And the nations of them whicli are saved shall walk in the light of it : and
the kings of the earth do bring their glory and honour into it. And the gates
of it shall not be shut at all by day : for there shall bo no night there. And
they shall bring the glory and honour of the nations into it." — Revelation
xxi. 24-26.
These words seem to iadicate a national existence during the
millennial age. There is nothing necessarily sinful in those ties,
and bonds, and affinities that make up what is called a nation.
Rule for Christ and obedience in Christ, if perfectly developed,
would be a noble and glorious spectacle. It may, perhaps, be
true that those divisions and intersections of the great family of
man, which are found in the age that now is, may be of divine
origin, and of a destiny no less divine. It may be that, instead
of being dislocated and broken up in the dispensation to come,
they may be only more thoroughly consolidated ; and being per-
vaded and cemented by love and truth, nations may endure in
the after-ages of the earth ; and these shall be testimonies then
that national existence is a holy and heavenly ordinance — to be
purified and perfected, not dissolved with frameworks of merely
earthly origin.
If this shall be so, then the New Jerusalem shall be the great
metropolis of the earth, reposing in the light and beauty of an
unsetting sun, and the crowns, and sceptres, and thrones of in-
numerable kings, reflecting the rays of the Shechinah, shall give
the glory of all they are to Him, whose are their thrones, and for
whom they rule. Laws shall then be leaves from the tree of life,
love shall be the secret and the source of allegiance, and perfect
liberty and light the possession and the enjoyment of all.
But however possible such national existence may be, it is not
necessarily implied in the words before us. The Grreek word
172 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
eO'joq means frequently a multitude, without any implied re-
ference to organization of any class or kind; thus, we read in
the Iliad of Homer, eO^M)q sraipwv^ a body, or number of com-
rades } eO'^oq Xacou, a multitude of men ; sOvea [lektffdaajv, swarms
of bees : and, in harmony with this, we may render eOvoi
ffw^ojjLsvwv, multitudes or companies of the saved. The re-
deemed will not be a few, nor easily counted j they will be ''a
great multitude, which no man could number." " The saved,'^
are those referred to in Acts ii. 47 : " The Lord added to the
church daily (rohq ffw^o/is'^ouq, the saved ones, literally) such as
should be saved." They are saved from the curse and condemna-
tion of sin, by the blood of Jesus; and from the power, do-
minion, and tyranny of sin, by the Holy Spirit of Jesus ; from
the penal consequences of sin, by the sacrifice of Christ; and
from the prevalence and predominance of sin, by the Spirit of
Christ; and that, too, in the future age, perfect, finally, for ever.
Their distinguishing possession is salvation — a salvation re-
ceived in time and perfected in eternity — begun now, and con-
summated in the age to come. Its fountain is in God ; " in the
Lord our God is the salvation of Israel ;" it is through Christ
alone. " Neither is there salvation in any other, for there is
none other name under heaven given among men whereby we
must be saved." It was announced in Paradise — prefigured in
sacrifice — proclaimed in promises — preintimated in prophecies —
portrayed in shadows, and types, and ceremonies ; " but is now
made manifest by the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ,"
who was raised up its " Captain," and is exalted a Prince and a
Saviour to bestow it. It comes in grace, and ends in glory ; be-
gins in individual hearts, and terminates in multitudes of the
saved. It is described in Scripture, and acknowledged by
believers to be "great," "glorious," "to the uttermost," from
"generation to generation;" having prophets for its inquirers,
and angels for its students, and preachers for its advocates, and
the Scriptures for its channel, and the sacraments for its seals,
and happiness for its issue. Saints are chosen and appointed to
it before the foundation of the world, " are kept through the
power of God unto it — realize the assurance and earnest of it" —
'< receive it as the end of their faith" — ^rejoice and glory in it ;
DAY WITHOUT NIGHT. 175
and, finally, constitute together, amid the light of the millennial
state, a great multitude of the saved, with palms in their hands,
saying, Salvation unto our God and to the Lamb. These com-
panies of the saved will all walk, and thus make progress in the
light of the New Jerusalem, guided by the unerring beams of
that glory which originally dwelt between the cherubim, now no
longer the monopoly of a few, but the possession and the privi-
lege of " a great multitude which no man can number." The
church, which they compose, shall no more be local or national,
but catholic, in the strictest sense of that misused and perverted
word. The whole earth shall be filled with the glory of God,
and its humblest and its highest tenantry shall follow no longer
the fitful flashes of human passion, or the meteor-lights of ill-
regulated fancy, nor the guesses at truth of wavering reason, nor
the dim lights of patristic or ecclesiastical tradition ; but the
pure and perfect guidance of the Lamb. Every province of na-
ture, every path of the saved, every work of Providence, or pro-
duct of grace, shall reflect the glory of God, and each inmate of
that sacred and sublime metropolis shall walk, i. e. make progress
in the light of it, rising evermore on untiring wing to loftier
heights of knowledge, and drinking ever fresh and ever multi-
plying delight from every new Apocalypse of the glories and per-
fections of him who is King of kings and Lord of lords.
The kings of the earth, it is here stated, shall bring their glory
and honour into it. So it was predicted, many hundred years
before John, in Isa. Ix. 11 : " Therefore thy gates shall be open
continually, they shall not be shut day nor night, that men may
bring unto thee the forces of the Gentiles, and that their kings
may be brought. The glory of Lebanon shall come to thee, the
fir-tree, and the pine-tree, and the box together, to beautify the
place of my sanctuary, and I will make the place of my feet glo-
rious." Again, it is written, ^' The sons of strangers shall build
up thy walls, and their kings shall minister unto thee;" and
again, *^A11 they from Sheba shall come, they shall bring gold
and incense;" and again it is written, "Thou shalt also suck
the milk of the Gentiles, and shalt suck the breast of kings."
In Ps. Ixxii. it is also written, " The kings of Tarshish and the
isles shall bring presents : the kings of Sheba and Seba shall
15*
174 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
offer gifts. Yea, all things shall fall down before him, and all
nations shall serve him." And in 1 Kings x. 24, we have a
typical picture of the splendour of the true Solomon, the king of
peace : '' And all the earth sought to Solomon, to hear his wis-
dom, which God had put in his heart; and they brought every
man his present, vessels of silver, and vessels of gold, and gar-
ments, and armour, and spices, horses, and mules: and the king
made silver to be in Jerusalem as stones, and cedars made he to
be as the sycamore trees that are in the vale, for abundance."
This prediction of kings consecrating their glory in the millennial
age, may refer to those who are now kings ; that is, who are so
previous to the Millennium, and who shall then bring what is
their present glory and honour into it. Some such reference
seems to be indicated in 1 Cor. xv. 24 : ^^ Then cometh the end,
when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the
Father ; when he shall have put down all rule, and authority, and
power; for he must reign till he hath put all enemies under his
feet. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is Death." We
must, of course, understand by the expression, ^^ they shall bring
their glory and honour into it" — not any earthly royalty, adding
one ray to the splendour, or one atom to the magnificence nf the
New Jerusalem, for this is impossible. They derive all their
glory from it, and can add none to it. But in the same way as
we give glory and honour to God, by acknowledging all we have
to be the borrowed reflection of his beneficence, and requiring to
be devoted to him as its legitimate and proper use; so these
kings and nations shall see all they are and possess in the light
of the New Jerusalem, and shall trace on every honour, and bless-
ing, and power, with which they have been endowed, the super-
scription of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world,
and lift up to him alone ceaseless praise, as the author, and
owner, and sovereign bestower of all. They will sing in their
songs — "These crowns which we wear derive all their lustre, and
these sceptres which we wield their sway, and these thrones on
which we sit their strength and stability from thee, who art tho
Prince of the kings of the earth. These flowers receive from
thee their existence, their fragrance from thy breath, and their
tints from thy smiles; and these gems are beautiful because thou
DAY WITHOUT NIGHT. 175
lookest on them, and this scene is so glorious because thou art in
it." A?.l above, around, below, will be luminous with the light
of the Lamb. These redeemed ones will sing with new voices
David's song, in 1 Chron. xxix. 10 : " Blessed be thou, Lord God
of Israel our Father, for ever and ever. Thine, Lord, is the
greatness, and the power, and the glory, and the victory, and the
majesty ; for all that is in the heavens, and in the earth, is thine;
thine is the kingdom, Lord, and thou art exalted as head above
all. Both riches and honour come of thee, and thou reignest
over all; and in thine hand is power and might, and in thine
hand it is to make great, and to give strength unto all. Now
therefore, our God, we thank thee, and praise thy glorious
name."
It is also added in this beautiful vision of the future glory,
"And the gates of it shall not be shut at all by day," or, as it is
predicted in Isaiah, " Thy gates shall be open continually, they
shall not be shut day nor night." According to the usage and
idiom of ancient times, open gates were the recognised symbols
of the existence of national peace ; and shut gates, the established
and felt evidence of the outbreak of war. Thus Ovid describes
the heathen heaven as being apertis valvis, with open gates ; i. e.
in a state of perpetual peace. So also Caesar says, portas
dauserunt, they shut the gates, or declared war. This New
Jerusalem, therefore, into which all kings bring their glory, will
exist in perpetual peace — perfect peace within, and unbroken
peace without. There will be no bulwarks, for there will be no
possibility of assault. There will be no soldiers, for swords will
have been turned into ploughshares, and spears into pruning-
hooks, and the nations will learn war no more. Thus perfect
light and perpetual peace shall embosom the Apocalyptic city, and
gladden the risen and redeemed saints who constitute its in-
habitants.
It is also added, " There shall be no night there :" as the Mil-
lennium will be the Sabbath of the earth, it will be followed by
no night. By referring to Genesis, we find these words at the
close of the account of the creation of each day : " And the even-
ing and the morning were the first, second, third, fourth, fifth,
sixth day." But in the account of the creation of the seventh
176 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
day, it is not added at the close, ^^ The evening and the morning
were the seventh day." As if the seventh day were to be the
complete type of the seventh millennary, and that millennary to
merge without an intervening night into everlasting noon. The
negation, " no night," seems at first view a flaw, for, when we are
weary and exhausted with the fatigues of the week-day work, we
hail the approach of the shadows of even, as the precursor of re-
pose and refreshing sleep. " No night," now, would be to us all
the exhaustion of energy, and health, and life : but a little reflec-
tion will show us that what would be a calamity in our present
imperfect state, will be one of the greatest blessings of that new
and glorious condition of which we have at present but a dim and
distant prospect.
Now, night is associated with fatigue ; the body, worn out and
weary with the labours of the day, recruits its strength, and re-
covers its expended energies by the repose of night. The mind,
too, just as susceptible of exhaustion as its earthly tabernacle,
worn out by its excursions in the regions of thought, folds its
wing, and is restored and refreshed while it sleeps beneath the
soft broad shadows that envelop it. But in the New Jerusalem
these restorative processes will not be required. The resurrection
body shall be capable of action without exhaustion, and of labour
without fatigue j we shall run and not be weary, we shall walk
and not faint. Corrupt, it is raised incorruptible ; mortal, it is
raised immortal. The spirit shall be willing, while the flesh shall
not be weak ; our bodies shall be wings, not weights to the soul,
and the mind itself, returned and restored, shall pursue its excur-
sions into realms of beauty and of glory on untiring pinion, and
with purged eye ; reason will not weary in its pursuits, nor ima-
gination in its excursions, nor the heart in its throbbings : '^they
rest not" (and yet they rest) day and night, saying, '^ Holy, holy,
holy, Lord God Almighty !"
Night is now associated with insecurity. We adopt precau-
tions against the thief and the robber, because it is during this
season, when darkness conceals them, that the evil disposed lie in
wait for their prey. There, there shines perpetual light ; as there
live none but holy ones there, no thief shall break through to
steal, for its walls will be salvation and its gates praise, and all
DAY WITHOUT NIGHT. 177
will enjoy the consciousness of perfect security beneath the out-
stretched wings of Him whose they are, and whom they serve.
Night is also in this dispensation the symbol of ignorance. It
hides from the eye alike the pitfall, and the precipice, and the
landscape. But in that dispensation it shall not be so. We shall
know in whole, and not in part. The glass through which we
now see darkly, shall be broken : there shall be no cold shadow
from above, nor mist or exhalation from below : our eyes shall be
brighter, our whole soul readjusted ; all controversies shall be set-
tled : there will no dim medium, nor second-hand knowledge ; we
shall have strength to look and patience to learn each scene and
wonder that each successive hour brings within the horizon of our
view. The Sun of Righteousness shall no longer be horizontal,
casting broad shadows, but vertical, and creating none. Our hori-
zon shall widen as we live; past providence, with its ups and
downs, and labyrinthine turnings, shall be fully revealed to us ;
and redemption with its glories and its wonders shall spread all
luminous before us, with scarcely i3ne undeciphered mystery or
unexplained hieroglyph.
We shall then no longer see through a glass darkly. Those
objects which it requires the microscope to make visible in our
present state of imperfection and weakness, will then come clearly
into our view, and thus wonders, mysteries, and traces of wisdom,
benevolence, and power, which are at present vailed from our eyes,
shall then become luminous and visible ; and in these unseen and
unsounded depths, — the mere surface of which the most powerful
microscopes have revealed, — we shall see such proofs of design,
so distinct footprints of Deity, such marvels, that we shall feel
that the sometimes alleged want of evidence of the existence of
G-od was owing not to any deficiency in reality, but to our igno-
rance, and weakness, and prejudice, and passions. In what we
now see of the minute, there is overwhelming proof of the fact
and presence of Deity. In what we shall see when there will be
no night, that evidence will be glorious beyond conception.
Nor will the telescope reveal less impressive proofs of the power,
and greatness, and resources of Deity. Of these we have at pre-
sent no weak conception; and the loftier the height to which
the latest telescope carries .our vision, the more numerous and
178 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
magnij¢ are the disclosures of the greatness of God. " The
imdevout astronomer is mad/' is a line that has passed into an
axiom, and is universally admitted to be so. If this be true of
the astronomer on earth, how impossible will all undevoutness be,
when his observatory shall be the walls of the New Jerusalem,
and the light in which all things shine, the glory of God and of
the Lamb : and the eye that looks as free from speck as is the
heart from passion and the mind from prejudice.
All creation will then lie in the light of revelation, and text
of Scripture, and facts of nature, glorify together " the Lamb of
God, that taketh away the sins of the world." The original har-
mony between God's two great oracles, suspended and interrupted
by sin, shall be restored, and all things, made fearfully and won-
derfully at first, and all truths inspired by the Holy Spirit of
God, shall reveal their common birth, and accomplish their in-
tended mission.
In the words of a living and truly eloquent divine : — " Al-
though it be true, that night now discloses to us the wonders of
the univesre, so that to take from us darkness were to take the
revelation of the magnificence of the creation, whence comes this
but from the imperfection of faculties — faculties which only en-
able us to discern bodies, and under certain circumstances, and
which probably sufier far more to escape them than they bring to
our notice ? We speak of the powers of vision ; and very amaz-
ing they are — giving us a kind of empire over the vast panorama,
so that we gather in its beauties, and compel them, as though
by enchantment, to paint themselves in miniature through the
tiny lenses of the eye ; but, nevertheless, how feeble are they !
Bodies of less than a certain magnitude evade them. The micro-
scope must be called in, though this only carries the vision one
or two degrees farther ; while other bodies, ethereal, for example,
or those which move with extraordinary velocity, are either
altogether invisible or only partially discerned. And is it not on
account of this feebleness of power, that the eye seeks the sha-
dows of night before it can survey the majestic troop of stars ?
That troop is on its everlasting march, as well when the sun is
high on the firmament, as when he has gone down amid the
clouds of the west; and it is only because the eye has not
DAY WITHOUT NIGHT. 179
Btrength to discern the less brilliant bodies in the presence of the
great luminary of the heavens, that it must wait for night to dis-
close to it the peopled sea of immensity. I glory then, once
more, in the predicted absence of night. Be it so, that night
is now our instructor, and that a world of perpetual sunshine
would be a world of gross ignorance; I feel that night is to
cease because we shall no longer need to be taught, because
we shall be able to observe the universe illuminated, and not
require, as now, to have it darkened for our gaze. It is like
telling me of surprising increase of power : I shall not need night
as a season for repose ; I shall not need night as a medium of in-
struction ; I shall be adapted in every faculty to an everlasting
day — a day whose lustre shall not obscure the palest star, and yet
shall paint the smallest flower, and throughout whose perpetual
shining I shall have the universe laid open to me in its every
section, in its every recess, presenting me with fresh wonders,
and preparing me always to understand them."
It is then, too, that all disputes on many interesting and im-
portant subjects shall be set at rest for ever. Of many a revealed
truth we can only say now, " It is ;" but we can neither compre-
hend nor say how it is. We now lean on the Omnipotence we
cannot understand, and repose in the guidance of wisdom we can
neither fathom nor comprehend. When our present night shall
be rolled away, we shall not indeed comprehend the infinite, or
understand the inscrutable ; for the larger the circle of light in
which we stand, the broader and denser the encompassing sha-
dow I but we shall see then what human eye has not yet seen,
and hear what human ear has not yet heard, and conceive what
human heart has not yet conceived. Now, " we know only in
part, but when that which is perfect is come, then that which is
in part shall be done away. For now we see through a glass
darkly, but then face to face : now I know in part, but then shall
I know even as also I am known."
Night is associated with sin. '■'• They that be drunken," says
the apostle, " are drunk in the night." Again, " Cast off the
works of darkness, and put on the armour of light." Again,
" Men love the darkness more than the light, because their deeds
are evil ;" but in the New Jerusalem there shall b# no night, be-
180 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
cause there shall be no presence or possibility of sin. He who
put away sin by the sacrifice of himself, is there ; they whom he
presents to himself, " a glorious church, without spot or wrinkle,'^
are there ; the pure in heart, the single of purpose, the loyal in
allegiance, the sanctified, the holy, the undefiled, are there ; there
shall in nowise enter it any thing that defiles ; there shall be no
sin to tarnish the beauty of that place, nor any passion to wound
the peace of its inhabitants. Perfect holiness will be seen to be
the perfect light.
In this dispensation, night is associated with privation and
solitude ; all the grandeur of creation, either in the firmamental
ceiling over us, or in the green and beautiful earth beneath us, is
as if it were not, in the darkness of night ; and the harmonies of
nature are unheard by the ear of the sleeper ; and society is prac-
tically shut ofi" from us; and consciousness, recollections, and
hope, except in shadowy dreams, are for the time extinguished ;
and privation of all that constitutes active enjoyment is thus the
shadow that flits on the footsteps of night. But in the age to
come, there will be no deprivation of society, for we shall come
^Uo an innumerable company of angels, and to the spirits of just
men made perfect, and to the general assembly of the church of
the firstborn, and to Jesus the Mediator of the new covenant, and
to God the Judge of all.^^ Nor will there be any deprivation of
happiness where there is fulness of joy, and where tears and
pains are exiles for ever and ever. There will be no interruption
of consciousness, for we shall see, and know, and perpetually
worship ; nor any suspension of bliss, and his servants shall serve
him ; and not one voice, but ten thousand times ten thousand,
and thousand of thousands cry aloud, " Salvation to our God, and
to the Lamb for ever and ever.'^
At present, night is associated with death : thus we read of
the sleep of death. The Saviour, too, speaking of his own death,
says, " The night cometh.'* This is a world of death : the dead
outnumber the living. There are more graves than houses on
the earth ; they that are below the sod are more than they that
walk above it. Death moves in the palace and in the hovel, m
the country and in the city, in all seasons, and amid all circum-
stances. H% withers the grass, and blasts the flower, and wastes
DAY WITHOUT NIGHT. 181
the rock, and stills the heart. In this world, ripeness and decay
come from the same sources ; but in the New Jerusalem, there
shall be no death. Flower, and fruit, and tree shall bloom in
amaranthine beauty; no caterpillar shall gnaw the flower, nor
spider weave its web amid its trees. The loveliest thing shall be
the longest ; its very streams shall flow with immortality. All
hearts shall be bounding, and none breaking; no disease shall
poison, nor death destroy. Chains, prisons, sick-beds, widow-
hood, and orphanage, are words not written in the vocabulary of
the blessed. The doors that shut the Christian in will shut out
all sin, imperfection, disease, death ; God himself shall be our
portion, incapable alike of change or decay. This happy state
shall be the morning twilight of the everlasting noon ; the Mil-
lennium shall merge into the greater glory of the skies. There
shall be no possibility of falling ; we shall have " meat that en-
dureth to life eternal,'' " raiment that moth shall not consume,"
a '^ treasure that thieves shall not steal," ^^ a house not made
with hands," " a city that hath foundations," '^ a crown of glory
that fadeth not away."
How consolatory is such a prospect in the midst of present
painful suffering ! One who had been ''in hunger, in thirst, in
nakedness, in peril by land, in peril by sea, and in perils among
strange brethren," seeing from afar the nearing glories of this
promised inheritance, exclaimed, '' I reckon that the sufferings
of this present life are not worthy to be compared with the glory
that is to be revealed." This accurate, because inspired, arith-
metician, had made the estimate in the exercise of a calculus
which we are not so competent to go through ; and his corollary,
if we may borrow an allusion from another branch of the same
science, is the reckoning which we have just stated. The same
apostle says, " Our light afliiction, which is but for a moment,
worketh out for us a far more exceeding, even an eternal weight
of glory." He knew his afflictions, as we believe them to have
been, heavy; but, placed in the scales with the "weight of
glory," they seemed to him light. " Light aflliction" is weighed
against a " weight of glory ;" and " light affliction, which is but
for a moment," against an " eternal weight of glory ;" and so
rapidly and exceedingly does the latter preponderate, that he
SECOXD SERIES. 16
182 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
judges the former too light to be placed in the same scale with
it. It is the same experienced Paul, too, who exclaims, ^^All
things work for good to them that love God, and are the called
according to his purpose." The highest wave lifts them only
nearer to their rest ; the strongest tempest only wafts them more
rapidly to their haven; and the sorest persecutions that light
upon them serve but to quicken their pace to the New Jerusalem.
AVell may they exclaim, ''What shall we then say to these
things? if God be for us, who can be against us? He that
spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how
shall he not also freely give us all things ? Who shall separate
us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or
persecution, or nakedness, or peril, or sword ? Nay, in all these
things, we are more than conquerors, through him that loved us.
For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor
principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,
nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to
separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus.'' Bear
up patiently, my brethren, in the beating storm, for the haven is
near. In due time we shall reap, if we faint not.
In the next place, set your affections on these bright things.
We were made to hope. Our eyes are in our foreheads ; these
glorious features, so magnificently delineated by the seer of Pat-
mos, have transcendent excellences and irresistible attractions.
Let us bring onr hearts beneath them, let us fasten our eyes
upon them, and doubt not at the same time your certainty of suc-
cess, if you only seek them. In earthly things, the battle is not
always to the strong, nor the race to the swift. In this course,
" I run not as uncertainly ; so fight I, not as one that beateth the
air." Every day that closes, brings believers nearer to the Mil-
lennium- The glorious apocalypse is now upon its way from
above. All occurrences, and controversies, and strifes, and revo-
lutions, and wars, are clearing the air for its approach. The par-
tition-wall between this dispensation and the next is growing
thinner every day. I can see scattered rays of its beauty, and
hear snatches of its songs : " Behold, I come quickly, and my
reward is with me." " It is high time to awaken out of sleep,
for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed."
DAY WITHOUT NIGHT. 183
There arc some here, perhaps, who take no interest in these
great and important truths. If you have previously felt no in-
terest in the things that belong to your present peace, it is hut
natural to suppose you will feel little in the prospects which
crown a life with which you have no sympathy. But great and
solemn responsibilities are on you. " How shall you escape if
you neglect so great salvation ? He that despised Moses's law
died without mercy. Of how much sorer punishment, suppose
ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the
Son of God, and hath counted the blood of the covenant where-
with he was sanctified an unholy thing, and hath done despite
unto the Spirit of grace ? It is a fearful thing to fall into the
hands of the living God.^'
The Bible says that we are lost and perishing, and that our re
storation and reception to the marriage-supper of the Lamb is
suspended on our faith in the Son of God. It does not disclose
to us a heaven and hell to speculate on, but as the infinite and
antagonistic extremes, to one of which we are rushing. It is this
fact that throws over the Bible, the sanctuary, the ministry of the
gospel, so sacred, so awful an interest. It is this consideration
that renders an assembled congregation so solemn a spectacle.
Processes of conviction, that end in conversion, or increased re-
sistance, are going on. You are, my dear hearers, under the ne-
cessity either of receiving or rejecting the gospel. There is no
middle or neutral course. The instant you know God's will, you
must obey it or disobey it. From that pew you must answer,
" I will," or " I will not." The lips may remain dumb, but
the heart speaks, and says distinctly, "Yes," or "No.'^ This
gospel, too, which you hear, must prove to you the savour of life
or the savour of death. Every moment a character is being
formed on which death will stamp immutability and immortality.
Rains and suns do not more certainly add to the growth of the
tree, than ceaseless influences add to our character. Every hour
a hardening or softening process is going on ; we are growing
more susceptible of lofty impressions, or less so. God's truths
heal or kill. Appeals augment or part with their power — mo-
tives; their force — terrors, their dread — ^and hopes, their attrac-
184 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
tiou ; and thus you are travelling to, or receding from, the mar-
riage-supper of the Lamb.
None are loaded with so terrible a guilt as those who know
and reject the truth. On none does there hang a heavier account-
ability. " They know their Lord's will, and do it not.'' In face
of warnings, remonstrances, obstructions, crowding around them,
they continue in rebellion against the King of kings.
It is no excuse at all, that your heart is not right. Surely it
is no excuse in a disobedient child, for some act of contumacy,
that his affections were not favourably disposed toward his parents.
If there be no duty unless there be a right disposition, all obliga-
tion is at once relaxed, and immunity to crime becomes the in-
evitable result. Duty remains in all its force, unaffected by the
liking or disliking of its subjects. " Thou shalt love,'' binds
wherever it is heard. " Repent," " Believe," are obligatory on
every human being. Nor is it possible to denude ourselves of our
responsibility, any more than of our immortality. Both cleave
inseparably to us all ; we cannot run from either. If we could
cancel all the recollections of the past, we could not thereby
cancel our obligations.
But, in truth, there is no excuse that will bear one moment's
analysis for rejecting the invitations of the gospel of Christ.
Duty ceases where a valid excuse begins : both cannot coexist.
Be not deceived ; God is not mocked. Brethren, very soon other
scenes than those you now witness will burst upon your sight.
The rising dead, the descending Lord, the blazing earth, and the
darkened and eclipsed sky, will strike every soul, and " every eye
shall see him, and them that pierced him."
Do not put off or put away these appeals — these near and sure
realities — these personal and personally interesting facts. We
are on the dark mountains, and our feet will either stumble on
them, or be guided over them by the rod and staff of the Son of
Jesse. Centuries are crowding into days, and days into minutes,
and all things are rushing to the last crisis.
185 ^^^
LECTURE Xm.
THE FRANCHISE OF THE NEW JERUSALEM.
" And tliere shall in no wise eiiter into it [that is, the Now JerusalemJ au^
thing that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination, or maketh a lie :
but they which are written in the Lamb's book of life." — Revelation xxi. 27.
We have seen a few of the grand characteristics of the Apo-
calyptic New Jerusalem. We have traced such of its features as
are contained in the twenty-first chapter, and are still to trace its
more glorious features as they are embodied in the twenty-second.
It is encouraging to see that, amid the most glowing pictures, full
of poetry and beauty, there are interspersed those great spiritual,
moral, practical truths, which come home constantly to our hearts.
The New Jerusalem must be tenanted by a new people : the new
song must be sung by those in whom all things have been made
new by the Holy Spirit of God. We have here in this passage
the counterpart of what was stated in the eighth verse : " But the
fearful and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers,
shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire/^ *'Any
thing that worketh abomination'^ might be rendered, " they who
are guilty of idolatry,^' for the word ^' abomination" in Scripture,
very often means "idolatry.^' On the other hand, those who
shall enter the New Jerusalem, and be its inhabitants, happy and
holy for ever, are those whose names are written in the Lamb's
book of life ; or (as is further depicted in the thirteenth chapter)
^^ in the book of life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of
the world.''
Now, without entering upon the special sins that are enume-
rated in this passage — sins the nature and evil of which we can
easily comprehend if we have only learned to repudiate their con-
tamination — I proceed to observe, first of all, there is hero stated
10*
186 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
a disqualification for the New Jerusalem ; and, secondly, a quali
fication for it. First, then, there are those who are disfranchised,
and never can be citizens of that glorious city. These are " the-
fearful, the unbelieving, the abominable, murderers, whoremon-
gers, sorcerers, liars, and idolaters." And secondly, there are
those who are enfranchised and qualified citizens of the New Je-
rusalem ; and these are " those whose names are written in the
Lamb's book of life." In noticing, first of all, the disqualifica-
tion, let me call your attention to this by no means unimportant
fact, that this disqualification is in no respect or degree circum-
stantial. It is not stated that the rich will be admitted and the
poor excluded — that nobles shall be there and plebeians shall not.
These are but circumstantial distinctions; and though when seen
from the stand-point of this world, they seem to be important,
and look magnificent and real, yet when viewed at the right angle,
and seen in the light of the New Jerusalem, they become so dim
and insignificant that they are lost amid its splendours : they
then and there disappear like straw-built huts, before the influx
of that mighty tide which bears upon its bosom only the pure and
holy, and repudiates all contact with *^ the fearful and unbeliev-
In the second place, this disqualification is not denominational.
It is not said that churchmen only will be there, and dissenters
excluded; nor is it said that dissenters only will be there, and
churchmen excluded. Nor is it said that Episcopalians, Presby-
terians, Independents, Baptists, or Wesleyans, are there, or aro
not there. These distinctions are also to a great degree circum-
stantial : they lie only on the surface : they look big only in the
light of this world, and are magnified by the uncharitableness of
our hearts. But in that better and brighter state, the name of
churchman or dissenter will be utterly unknown. Ecclesiastical
distinctions, that have rent and torn society with their havoc, the
great shibboleths that resounded on earth till they reverberated
from sea to sea, will there be totally unknown or joyfully forgot-
ten. The men who shall be excluded there are not dissenters : the
men who shall be admitted there are not churchmen. These ec-
clesiastical distinctions shall be lost in the great first and last
name ; the name that was pronounced in scorn at Antioch, shall
FRANCHISE OF THE NEW JERUSALEM. 187
be that name which shall be sounded in the Jubilee of the New
Jerusalem; and "Christ'' and "Christians'' shall be then all and
in all.
This disqualification is 'purely and entirely of a moral charac-
ter. God looks within when he estimates a man, and not loiihout,
G-od does not look at what a man wears, or what he pretends, or
what he professes ; but His omniscient eye sends its penetrating
glance into the very nooks and secret recesses of his heart, and
as a man is and is seen to be in his hidden heart, so is he in the
sight of God. Earthly distinctions will not survive the death of
the body. Moral and spiritual distinctions shall eternally outlive
its decay, and all others shall be lost in the brightness and reality
of these. Riches cause responsibility, and so does rank; but
neither of them constitute the qualification or disqualification un-
der consideration. They who are excluded are they that are
morally corrupt ; and they who are included (as we shall soon
perceive) are they that are morally pure. God judges of the tree
by its fruits : the good tree is fitted to be transplanted to a more
congenial soil : the bad tree, however abundant its leaves, or the
tree which bears the upas fruit of poison, can have no place in
the second Paradise — the garden of the Lord. The first remark
which naturally occurs to us is — Why should moral deficiencies
disqualify some for the New Jerusalem, and moral excellence
qualify others ? Let me show how the immoral, such as idola-
ters, liars, and all other classes of sinners recapitulated here, whose
various sins are simply the fruits of inward depravity, must
necessarily be disqualified for admittance to the New Jerusalem
In the first place, sin is the seed of all the wretchedness that ex-
ists in hell. Hell is but that monosyllable "sin," repeated,
re-echoed, reverberated for ever. Sin is the seed that produces
all the misery — is the germ of all the agony and wo of those
whose doom is among the regions of the lost. And to retain
that germ which necessarily extinguishes happiness in the bosom,
is thereby necessarily to be disqualified for that better, holier, and
happier state, where happy hearts only will beat, and holy hearts
only live. Sinners must be disqualified, in the next place, be-
cause they are unfit for the joys, the songs, and sympathies of
those who dwell in the New Jerusalem. The man whose par-
188 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
tialities are all depraved — whose feelings and affections are of the
earth, earthy — cannot sympathize with pure thoughts, or take part
in a holy choir, or unite in the anthem peal that rises from the
company of the saints of God and the Lamb who sits upon the
throne. How shall the idolater, the abominable, the sorcerer,
and depraved, join in the beautiful hymn — '*Thou art worthy to
take the book and open the seals thereof; for thou wast slain, and
hast redeemed us to God by thy blood, out of every kindred, and
tongue, and people, and nation V How shall they whose hearts
are all discord, and incapable of any perception or appreciation
of holy harmony say, " Worthy is the Lamb that was slain, to
receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honour,
and glory, and blessing V The man who is unholy cannot join
in this song. Such songs must be grating to his ear, they must
only awaken agony in his heart. The moral character of such
persons must be a moral disqualification, and thus unfit its sub-
jects for singing the new song, or holding communion with the
inhabitants of the New Jerusalem. Can a civilized European
feel any delight in the conversation of a barbarian ? Can the
wild New-Zealander and the cultivated Englishman have any
interchange of sentiment that is satisfactory to the latter? We
know it is impossible. There is in all the kingdoms of God a fit-
ness between the place and the inhabitants : the New Jerusalem is
suited for new men, and new men are adapted for the New Jeru-
salem. It is a prepared place for a prepared people j and unless
we are so prepared, we cannot constitute a portion of its te-
nantry.
Again, it is a law obvious in earthly things — if earthly analo-
gies may be admitted — that there must be an adaptation between
the sphere for living and those who live in it. For instance, in
this world, the eye of man is plainly fitted for the light. If
light came with greater velocity than it does, man's eye could
not bear it : if it were less than it is, it would not be sufficient.
There is an obvious harmony between the natural eye and the
light which streams from the sun, so exact, that it is evident the
one must have been adjusted to the other. It is precisely so with
the ear of man. It is made for our voice; and the voices of
others are of that pitch and tone which exactly fits them for the
FRANCHISE OF THE NEW JERUSALEM. 189
ordinary ear that listens. Tf our voices were much more power-
ful tnan they are, they would pain the ear : were they less so,
they would not be distinctly audible. There is thus an adapta-
tion between our ear, and all the sounds and melodies and har-
monies of the world around us. So much is this the fact, that
if a man were lifted to another orb, where (as astronomers tell
us) the air and composition of the planet are of a different density
from that of this earth, he would require a different constitution
and organization altogether to enable him to exist. This is not a
mere conjecture, but a demonstrable truth — that were we lifted
to another world with our present senses of seeing, hearing,
tasting, smelling, and touch, just as they have been adapted to
this planet, and with our present circulation, we could not live
in it; the atmosphere would be too heavy, its density too great;
our destruction would be inevitable : our whole apparatus of
physical sense and organization must be altered, ere we could bo
inhabitants of Jupiter, Saturn, the moon, or any other planet.
"What holds true in ph^^sical nature does so also in spiritual
things. There must be a fitness for the scene of the millennial
joys — a change of heart, state, and character. We are to enter
a new world, to breathe a*new atmosphere, to hear new sounds,
to come in contact with new objects, to behold intenser splen-
dours, and brighter visions of joy and glory; and we must be
fitted for it by the Spirit of God, before we can enter to enjoy
its happiness, or sing its songs, or breathe its air, or gaze upon
its glories. Therefore the analogies we have before us show,
that our spiritual nature must be changed, or we shall be dis-
qualified for inhabiting the New Jerusalem.
But some, perhaps, will say, "Does not death effect this
change? If we be not fit now, will not death make us fit?"
My dear brethren, there can be no greater misconception than
this. Death will not operate any change in the spiritual and
moral character of him who is its subject. Death tramfers — it
does not transform the soul. It presents a man before God just
as he dies: it does not present him before God different from
what it finds him. In other words, death does not form a new
character, it merely fixes that which we have acquired upon
earth. Do not, therefore, deceive yourselves with the delusion —
190 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
for it is a gross delusion — that death will transform you, as by a
magical touch, into the likeness of God. As you are when death
visits you in time, so will you be when you appear before God
in eternity. If death finds you unsanctified — with hearts the
scenes of corrupt and conflicting passions, full of avarice, lust,
evil, wickedness, then all that death does is to usher you, so
furnished, into the presence of your final Judge; and the sen-
tence of that Judge will be, "He that is unjust, let him be unjust
still ; and he that is unholy, let him be unholy still."
I need not the additional element of material fire to give me
a true conception of the fearful hell that will be your everlasting
abode. Just withdraw the attractions and counter excitements
of this world — withdraw the surrounding influences that make
up the atmosphere of indirect Christian influence from the sub-
jects of depravity, and I can well conceive what torments — what
a hell, a man's passions — unbridled, unchecked — not qualified or
mitigated by any restraining influence, will kindle and create
within, above, below, and around him. We then conclude that
death will not operate any change in our character; this world
is simply a process of preparation for that which is to come.
Our character becomes here what it will for ever be. "It is a
solemn thing to die,'' it has been well said: it is a more solemn
thing to live. Temporal hues stamp on us an eternal cast:
things that perish as they pass leave an eternal impress upon us
behind them. It is said that not a cloud passes over this green
earth which does not operate some change on its face. Not
an event we have heard of — not a company we mix with — not a
book we read — not a sermon we hear, fails to leave on us an
influence that shall become only more clear, vivid, and legible,
through the cycles of an endless heaven, or the epochs of an
everlasting hell. This world is but the preparation for that
which is to come — the spring-time of eternity — the seed-time
of the future harvest. As you sow now, so you shall reap for
ever. Childhood is the discipline for boyhood — boyhood, the pre-
paration for manhood — man's life does not close here : it is only
a preparation for the world to come. Mind is then and there
stereotyped — character is then made a fixture : and as a man is
found at his decease, so will ho either be found disqualified for
FRANCHISE OF THE NEW JERUSALEM. 191
that citizenship, or, what is unspeakably blessed, qualified and
fitted for it by God's Holy Spirit. We have in the Levitical
economy this disqualification symbolized. The priest pronounced
the leper to be unclean, and then he was excluded from the camp
for ever. This was a typical exclusion for a typical disease,
teaching a moral exclusion from that moral and spiritual economy
shadowed forth by the New Jerusalem. Again, the same dis-
qualification is pointed to by the ancient prophets. Isaiah says,
" It shall be called the way of holiness ; the unclean shall not
pass over it;'' and referring again to this epoch, it is said,
"Awake, awake; put on thy strength, Zion; put on thy beau-
tiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city : for henceforth there
shall no more come into thee the uncircumcised and the unclean.''
Our Lord himself points to the same disqualification when he
says, " 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 in the Epistle to the Galatians, the
apostle tells us what are the grounds of disqualification from the
kingdom of God. He says, "Adultery, fornication, unclean-
ness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emula-
tions, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunk-
enness, revellings, and such like : of the which I tell you before,
as I have also told you in times past, that they which do such
things shall not inherit the kingdom of God." We thus see,
then, that depraved or unsanctified character is the only disquali-
fication : nothing else can unfit for a residence in the New Jeru-
salem : this alone is ruin — this alone is indestructible — character,
good or bad, is immortal. If you are disqualified, it is not God
who has taken your title or your fitness from you : you have done
it yourselves. God invites you to accept the glorious franchise;
he ofi'ers you the price of entrance to the New Jerusalem — he
offers you the Saviour's sacrifice and righteousness, and tells you
that if you do perish, it is simply because you will not accept
that which alone is the ground of your acceptance.
Having looked at the disqualifications, and seen how scriptural
and natural — how coincident with all analogy they are, let us
now turn to the more gratifying side of the picture — the obverse
of the medal — and examine the franchise for the New Jerusalem.
192 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
It is said, they are qualified for it whose names are recordea
" in the Lamb's book of life/' Who are they ? Has any one
pierced the sky, and perused the pages of that mysterious volume ?
Has any one obtained a transcript, or published an earthly edition
of that book ? Has any one been shown how we may read, or
the process by which we can decipher, its heretofore hidden
hieroglyphics ? Did Paul, when he was caught up into the third
heavens, peruse it ? Can any one expound its contents, or pub-
lish one chapter of the mysterious record? No; none are able
to do this. We know not whose names are registered upon its
pages ; and it is well we do not. We know not who are predes-
tined to everlasting life, nor can we pronounce who are chosen in
Christ from before the foundation of the world. We cannot deci-
pher its chapters. It is folly to attempt it. It is mere pretence to
say that we have heard even the echo of the utterance of our names
read from it; and that man deceives himself, or may deceive him-
self, who says, "I am one of the elect, and therefore shall never
fall;" for he has not had the privilege accorded him, which is de-
nied to all others, of reading the names enrolled in the Lamb's
book of life. Then how shall we ascertain who they are who are
thus qualified? I answer, in this way. The book of revelation
below is all but a reprint of the Lamb's book of life above. God's
written book is the nearest transcript of his unseen book. The
difference only lies here: the Lamb's book of life contains the
names of the saved; the book of revelation contains the cha-
racter of the saved. And if you find your character correspond
with the character of the redeemed, as stereotyped in the Bible,
you may rise from a knowledge of God's book without to a know-
ledge of that icithm; and conclude that your name too is entered
in the Lamb's book of life, because your character is legible as
that of the saved in the book of Kevelation. If you can trace
your character here, you need not doubt that your name is there :
if you can catch the echo, no doubt you will hear the original.
If you are among those who are described as the heirs of the
kingdom of God, you need not scruple, resting on these clear,
incontrovertible premises, to believe that your name will be pro-
nounced before the assembled universe, and by Him whose pro-
nunciation of it is to communicate to it a music which tongue
FRANCHISE OF THE NEW JERUSALEM. 193
cannot tell, nor hath it ever entered into the heart of man to
conceive-. Thus, therefore, we may come to a right conclusion
as to those who are in the Lamb's book of life, and who are 7iot
there.
I may notice here, as under the previous division, that the
learned, the noble, the rich, the great, are not, as such, necessa-
rily there. No man may say, " I am a rich man, and therefore
my name is in the Lamb's book of life ;" or, " I wear a crown
now, and therefore I shall wear a crown of glory.'' I have told
you these are mere circumstantial distinctions, and perishable as
the clouds that sweep athwart the skies; while moral distinctions
will be alone abiding, like the bright stars which remain over-
head beyond. It is not, then, the noble, the great, or the wise,
as such, who are called. Nor, secondly, is it all who are baptized ;
because the baptized may not conclude, from the simple fact of
their baptism, that their names are written in the Lamb's book
of life. You may have been baptized by man, and yet be un-
baptized by God; you may have the baptism which consists in
being sprinkled, or, if you like, dipped, in water — and yet be
altogether destitute of that inner baptism which alone qualifies
for the kingdom of God. Your baptismal name may be in the
registers of the church below, and not in those of the church
above. It is possible to be a Jew outwardly, and not a Jew in-
wardly. It is possible to have the sign, and not the substance,
of life. It is a miserable delusion to trust in the cleansing efii-
cacy of the outward water, instead of making sure of the inward
power of the Holy Spirit. In the next place, all communicantH
are not in the Lamb's book of life; all communicants may not
conclude that their names are written in the Lamb's book of life.
You may be recorded on the communion-roll; your names may
be mentioned by the minister as communicants; you may have
satisfied man, but you may not have satisfied the Master; you
may have been admitted to the church below, and yet be excluded
from the church above. You may not conclude, that because
you have been baptized, or are a communicant, or a seat-holder,
or because you are a regular worshipper at the sanctuary, that
you are all safe now, and that all will be happy with you through-
Dut the ages of eternity. Those who are written in the book
SECOND SERIES. 17
194 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
are not all those who even take an interest in religion. Many
who helped to build the ark perished in the waters which bore it
to Ararat. You can attend religious meetings, hold forth from
their platforms, applaud the sentiments of the speakers; you may
read religious newspapers, contribute to the erection of churches
and schools, and support the dissemination of the gospel, and
the circulation of the Bible — and this ye ought to do, and, if
God's people, this ye will do — and yet do it all from corrupt
motives, and for wrong ends ; and therefore you will not on this
account have your names written in the Lamb's book of life.
Who are they, then, whose names are inscribed upon it ?
First, God knoivs: all things to him are naked and open:
" the Lord knoweth them that are his." You may be con-
demned by man, or canonized by man — you may be praised by
ministers, or proscribed by synods — it matters not. God looks
not at the anathema of the priest, or the excommunication of the
sect, or the exclusion of the minister; but to the heart — the
inner man of the individual. And as a man is there, so God
knows him to be. But, in the second place, others may know
if we are in the Lamb's book of life. We may misapprehend
one another: we sometimes think fewer, and sometimes think
more, of the members of our congregations are recorded there
than are actually so. We often think the silent, unobtrusive
man has no real religion, because he makes no loud or osten-
tatious profession; and we as often mistake the mere profes-
sor, and judge from his loud and showy professions that he
is a sincere and thorough disciple of the lowly Jesus. But
there are tests, as there are fruits, of character : we may know
if our fellow-men have their names written in the Lamb's
book of life, if ^ they let their light so shine before men that
others, seeing their good works, may glorify their Father who
is in heaven. The world, it is said, took notice of the dis-
ciples, " that they had been with Jesus." And let me ask you,
dear brethren, if, when you go out into the world, any one can
infer from what you are, and do, and how you act, that you have
been with Jesus ? Is there any thing about you, or upon you,
that would lead the man of the world to say, " This man is a
Christian ?" And yet it ought to be so : not, however, as if it
FRANCHISE OF THE NEW JERUSALEM. 195
were your duty to stand forth and preach, or proclaim, I am a
Christian, or publkjly repeat the Creed or the Ten Command-
ments. But there is a something in the silence and meekness
of indomitable Christian principle, which must make itself felt.
It may be disliked, but it cannot be denied. You may be stoned
and trodden down, as in bygone ages, while we live in the midst
of a world that knows us not; and yet that world may see us
the while, as lights shining in the midst of it — protesting against
its sins, exemplifying in our lives the Christian character, and
pointing mankind to something better, and beyond all that sur-
rounds them in this lower world.
But you may know it yourselves. I said that God knows it : —
the world — that is, men in the world, your fellow-christians —
may know it; but I say, in the next place, that you may know
it yourselves. It is not so difficult a matter to know if a man be
a Christian. If we think it is so, it probably all proceeds from
our secret consciousness that we are not Christians ourselves.
If we have put our trust and confidence in Christ, our names
not only are, but are felt to be, written in the Lamb's book
of life. You know if Christian principle sustains you in trial,
or sanctifies you day by day, or enables you to overcome tempta-
tion, and to sacrifice the highest gains rather than surrender
your trust in Jesus, or forego your obedience to all his will, or
your respect for all his commandments. A man may know
whether he is a Christian or not. The man whose heart throbs
with love for Christ, whose conscience is inlaid with Christ's
principles — the man who can say, "I count all things but loss,
save living, real religion'^ — the man who would part with his
fortune rather than his Bible — with his carriage rather than his
conscience — with whom principle is supreme, and expediency
subordinate — who cleaves to God and to Christianity when his
fortunes seem falling, and his star is either stained with blood or
is hidden by darkness — the man who stands staunch for God, who
walks with God, who trusts in God, and who hopes to be with God
for ever — that man is a Christian, and he himself knows it; and
this knowledge is the spring of his sweetest joy and brightest hopes
He can say, " I know in whom I have believed, and He is able"
(as he is willing) " to keep that which I have committed to him
196 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
against that day." How worthless, when looked at in the right
light, and from the right point of view, is all»that man pursues
and prizes of this life ! How dim and fading is all the glory
and magnificence of the world, in comparison with those moral
and spiritual distinctions which constitute men Christians, and
Christians heirs of 'Hhat city which hath foundations, whose
builder and maker is God !"
But, in the next place, the names which are written in the
Lamb's book of life are those who have been <^ chosen in Christ
before the foundation of the world," that they should be holy.
They are those who are spoken of again as purchased by the
precious blood of the Lamb without spot or blemish — as inhe-
ritors of that which has been prepared for them before the
foundation of the world. By any examination that we can
make of God's sealed book, we cannot tell whether we are
chosen or not. I state election simply as a scriptural charac-
teristic. But we may know the following : — that the names in
the Lamb's book of life are those who have fled to Christ for
the forgiveness of all their sins, and who have sought their
title to the New Jerusalem in Christ; — those who say, "Lord
Jesus, our hearts and consciences condemn us; but we know
that all we owe to God has been paid by thee, the spotless Lamb,
and all we deserved of wo endured by thee, our precious sacri-
fice. "We know that in our stead, in our room, clothed with our
responsibilities, thou didst bear God's judgments, and ex-
hausted the penalties of God's law, and didst bring in an ever-
lasting righteousness. We rest on this great fact — hope in it —
and lay the stress of our soul's expectations upon it; and we
desire to love thy laws, and walk in thy ways, and to show forth
our gratitude in our life, and our peace in our death." The
man who can say this — not with his lips — that is easily done :
for many say prayers who never pray, and many pray who never
say prayers; for it is the throbbing heart that is the true peti-
tion at God's throne — he that can pray so, and that because he
feels so, may be assured that his name is written in the Lamb's
book of life, as if a ray shot from that mysterious page, and
with daguerreotype precision, inscribed his name in light letters
on his brow, or on the surface of the earth.
FRANCHISE OP THE NEW JERUSALEM. 197
In the next place, they are recorded therein whose bodies are
" temples of the Holy Ghost." What a solemn expression is
this ! I feel often anxious to clothe such sublime truths in dif-
ferent language from that in which you are accustomed to hear
them J because you have heard the beautiful metaphors of Scrip-
ture so long and so often, that you have ceased to feel their
weighty import as you ought ; they go in at the one ear, and
pass out at the other, leaving no impression behind. A Chris-
tian, then, is what ? "A temple of the Holy Ghost !" What
a statement ! Weigh the expression. If it be not true, then,
it is the most terrible blasphemy. K it be true, how glorious,
that my heart, with all its sins and infirmities, with all its alloy
and corruptions, is a shrine of Deity — a consecrated fane of the
Holy Spirit ! And yet, my dear friends, it is even so, if we are
Christians : and he that cannot say that it is so, just says that
he is no Christian. And what a beautiful and glorious temple
is the true Christian's heart ! Yonder cathedral pile, with its
tall spire tapering to the skies, its magnificent roof, its clustering
columns, its glorious arches, and all its monuments of the re-
sources of human skill, grow poor and contemptible and worth-
less, when contrasted with the magnificence and grandeur of the
temple of the Holy Ghost who dwells within you, which God
himself has consecrated by his august and mysterious presence.
^^Know ye not that our bodies are the temples of the Holy
Ghost r'
But let me give you another characteristic of those whose
names are written in this book. They are they (and is not this
very plain?) who keep Christ's commandments. Christ himself
said, " Ye are my disciples if ye keep my commandments."
*' Hereby shall all men know if ye are my disciples, if ye love
one another." " If ye love me, keep my commandments." I
told you on a previous occasion of the beautiful badge worn by
the Christian. Common customs seem to call for a badge to dis-
tinguish the various orders and classes of men. The priest has
his shaven crown, the monk his cowl, the noble his coronet, the
queen her crown. And the Christian has his badge too. Christ
himself has appointed a badge; but what? If Christ had been
a mere earthly teacher — if he had been the mere founder of an
17*
198 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
academy, like Plato, or Socrates — or of an ecclesiastico -military
company, like Ignatius Loyola — then he would have laid it down
that we should wear a cross, or crucifix, or crown of thorns, or
something of that kind. But he did not do so. He has given
us a badge which cannot be taken from us by man or devil,
which moth nor rust doth corrupt, which thieves cannot break
through or steal, — which time will not deface, nor eternity de-
stroy. ''By this shall all men know if ye are my disciples, — if
ye love one another.'^ Here is the grand badge, then, of your
Christianity; herein is the evidence of your names being written
in the Lamb's book of life. Do you love Christians ? Can you
forgive churchmen their churchmanship, and dissenters their
dissent? — the Baptist his antipgedo-baptism, the Wesleyan his
Arminianism, and the Calvinist his Calvinism ? — and feel that
Christian love is the cement that binds Christian to Christian,
and Christians to Christ; moulding men's character after Christ,
and bringing the human will into harmony with the divine ?
There is another evidence of our names being written in this
book. The names of those are there who cleave to God's word
and adopt it as their only rule of faith. This is a most import-
ant test. It may be that those who cling to tradition as having
a copartnership with God's revealed truth may be saved : there
are grains of gold which the stream of tradition has carried down
from Calvary ; but they are few and far between, and there is
sand and stone and much alloy mixed with them. The pure
gold is the word of God. It may be that the man who holds
tradition to be coequal with revelation will be saved, because the
human vail may not have wholly darkened the divine glory, and
the man who receives the Apocrypha may not have Excluded by
it all genuine truth from his mind; but we know that those who
cleave to the Bible as their chart on earth, their guide to heaven,
their lamp in life, and hope of glory — we know that such persons
possess the strongest possible outward evidence that their names
are written in the Lamb's book of life.
And, lastly, let us notice, that those whose names are written
there look for Christ's second advent. From the commencement
of the New Testament to its close, we are never, never, I think,
80 much as once warned to embrace salvation by the prospect
FRANCHISE OF THE NEW JERUSALEM. 199
and the fears of death; but we are constantly (and it is most re-
markable) admonished to be prepared for the second coming of
our Saviour. " Unto them that look for him will he come a
second time without sin unto salvation." I do not mean that they
only will be saved, as some have rashly and unhappily sometimes
taught; but I believe that they will have more joy, as they
now give evidence of much grace.
We are taught not to look for our personal happiness by itself,
but for a personal joy contemporaneous with that catholic happi-
ness which all the redeemed shall share when Christ comes a
second time without sin unto salvation. Hear what the apostle
says: — "For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath ap-
peared to all men ; teaching us that, denying ungodliness and
worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in
this present world, looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious
appearing (or Epiphany) of the great God, even our Saviour
Jesus." We are to look upon Christ as to come : we are to have
the eye of faith riveted upon his cross, and the eye of hope rivet-
ed upon his crown : we are to view him in his sorrow, and look
for him in his joy — in his affliction, as in his triumph — as the
sacrifice offered once for our sins, as well as our victorious king —
as, in a word, our all and in all. And herein lay the mistake
of the Jew : the Jew of old looked for Christ to come as a con-
queror, and passed by the prophecies of his advent as a sufferer.
He is still looking for Christ as a conqueror : and we tell him,
that we too look for Christ as a king ; but we look at his crown
through his cross; we must take our stand upon Calvary, to gain
a view of his throne in the New Jerusalem ; we must be mem-
bers of his spiritual church, and be baptized and sealed with
his Spirit, before we can hope to behold him when he shall come
in the clouds, in the glory of the Father, with an innumerable
company of angels. The apostles, when they beheld their
Master borne upon a cloud and ascending to heaven, were ad-
dressed, *'Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up iato
heaven? This same Jesus, which is taken up from you into
heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go
into heaven." How can I interpret this? I must do it thus:
that as Christ rose upon a cloud, and disappeared in the bright-
200 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
ness of the shechinah or glory, so Christ shall come ^' with
clouds; and every eye shall see him, and they also which pierced
him ; and all kindreds of the earth" who rejected him " shall
wail because of him ;" but unto us who looked for him, he shall
come a second time, without a sin oflfering, to everlasting salva-
tion. If the sailor looks with joy to the end of a long and
dreary voyage — if the soldier, amid the din and shock of battle,
anticipates his tranquil, happy home — if the orphan longs for
his father, and the bride for her bridegroom — then, may not
believers, resting on the Redeemer's sacrifice, look forward with
joy and hope and glowing expectation to the day when their Re-
deemer shall come again and receive them, that where he is,
there they may be also? So earnestly did the early Christian
church look for the Redeemer's second advent, that he no sooner
had disappeared from the earth and ascended to the Father, than
the cry at the commencement of the Apocalypse, " Come, Lord
Jesus !" and which is repeated at its conclusion, " Even so, come
Lord Jesus !" was the aspiration of every heart.
In one word, those whose names are written in the Lamb's
book of life are they who can say, " Thou wast slain for us, and
we are redeemed by thy blood j" and (if I may allude to what
I have addressed to you at our Friday evening lectures) those
whose names are recorded in that book are those who are so
beautifully described in St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans,
^^ Who are in Christ; to whom there is no condemnation;" and
who may say in truth, whether they are able to say it with assur-
ance or not — ^^Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?
Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or naked-
ness, or peril, or sword ? Nay, in all these things we are more
than conquerors through him that loved us."
201
LECTURE XIV.
THE RIVER OF LIFE.
"And he shofl ed mc a pure river of water of life, cle.ar as crystal, proceedings
out of the throne of God and of the Lamb." — Revelation xxii. 1.
All the imagery in this passage is extremely picturesque, as
well as expressive. Earthly things are plainly shadows — not by
accident, but by preadjustment and design — of the heavenly;
and dim as they are since the introduction of sin, they afford us,
notwithstanding, some faint idea of those bright and glorious
things that lie folded up in the future, unseen and eternal. The
Arabs have an old traditional belief, that there is a perpetual
fountain in heaven, and that all who are permitted to drink of
the waters of the river that flows from it, drink in the elements
of immortality and perfect happiness. This tradition is a rem-
nant of ancient truth. This river may be here employed to de-
note that full and ceaseless supply of spiritual life and joy and
peace, which flows from the throne of God and the Lamb ; or it
may be the sacred symbol, in this as in other parts of Scripture,
of that Holy Spirit who communicates every blessing of which
the believer, in heaven or earth, is the recipient. This last idea
is confirmed by a reference to Ps. xlvi., in which we read of a
river whose "streams make glad the city of our God;" and
again, in John vii. 37, "This spake he of the Spirit;" and per-
haps the same great truth may be embodied in that beautiful pro-
mise, "They shall drink of the rivers of thy pleasure." The
figure here employed is plainly fitted to suggest the idea of abun-
dance. A cistern is limited in size, and is very soon exhausted
of its waters ; it receives all, and originates none ; the largest
fountain, however teeming, holds but little and may be emptied ;
but here there is set before us a deep, clear, and glorious stream,
its fountain above the skies, rolling onward silently to the main
202 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
In this dispensation we have springs and streamlets, their contents
borrowed and easily exhausted; hut in that dispensation we have
access to the river itself. Past generations, of every clime and
age, have drunk of it, and have been refreshed; and future gene-
rations will continue to drink of it too. Adam, Abraham, Isaac,
Jacob, Peter, Paul, and Polycarp, Augustine, the Waldenses and
Paulicians, Luther, Knox, and Latimer, have all drunk of it, and
derived from it refreshment and peace ; and yet it rolls with un-
diminished flood, and countless myriads are welcome to drink of
it, and sure to be satisfied from it, still. As light may be divided
into its colours, this river may be divided into its component
streams. These streams are named in Gal. v. 22, 23 : " But the
fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsufFering, gentleness,
goodness, faith, meekness, temperance ;" and they deposit in their
channels, as they run, far more precious things than the fabled
sands of the ancient Pactolus.
This river, too, is perfectly '^pure." Nothing in this dispensa-
tion is so. The trail of the serpent has polluted all : the purest
gold has an alloy; the brightest iron contracts rust; the fairest
landscape is not without defects; the loveliest flower has blight on
it, and the ripest fruit is first insect-stung ; and where all the ex-
terior sparkles to the eye with glistening beauty, we have only to
penetrate within, and we shall find quicksand upon quicksand,
and depth after depth, — in one word, ^^ the heart of man deceitful
above all things, and desperately wicked.^' In these waters,
however, these is no mixture of uncleanness of any kind. The
pure channel pours along a pure current, and the inhabitants of
the New Jerusalem drink of its unadulterated waters, which are
lit up as they run with the glory that shines from between the
cherubim. Neither Abana, nor Pharpar, nor the Tiber, nor the
Isis, pour into its flood one drop of their tainted waters. These
celestial streams retain through endless generations their abori-
ginal excellence, and remain pure as their fountain, perennial as
the throne.
This stream is also described as being " clear as crystal ;" a
characteristic perfectly distinct from that on which we have just
been speaking. Purity denotes its substance — clearness, its ap-
pearance. It is on the bosom of this river that we behold, as in
THE RIVER OF LIFE. 209
a glass, the glory of the Lord. Milton admits this mirror-use of
a river here referred to, when he describes Eve looking at herself
in the crystalline streams of Paradise —
I laid me down
On the green bank, to look into the clear
Smooth lake, that to me seem'd another sky.
As I bent down to look, just opposite,
A shape within the watery gleam appear' d,
Bending to look at me : I started back ;
It started back; but pleased, I soon return'd;
Pleased, it return'd as soon ; with answering look
Of sympathy and love.
This river, which broke forth so fair and beautiful in Paradise,
now runs often underground, and is shaded and darkened by the
existing scenes through which it flows. But in the New Jerusa-
lem it will break forth from the Rock of ages in more than its
pristine beauty and purity, and rush along like molten silver,
evermore reflecting from its bosom ^' mercy and truth that have
met together, and righteousness and peace that have kissed each
other,'^ — once more the perfect mirror of a holy God and a per-
fect universe.
It is also called the "water of life.'' Life is the great charac-
teristic of that state — a life of holiness, and happiness, and joy.
There will be none of the dead : all things will live ; a living
people, a living glory, a living home, a living G-od. Its tree is
the tree of life, its river is the river of life, its book is the book
of life ; and this river bears upon its bosom downward from the
throne, all that can make life happy and keep it so without end.
No frosts shall bind it with their chain, no sultry suns shall de-
prive it of its freshness, and every soul upon its banks shall sus-
tain his immortal and happy life by drinking of it perpetually.
We see from this passage that the Father and the Son have but
one throne : the river is said to proceed from the throne '^ of God
and of the Lamb." Our Lord himself says, "I am set down
with my Father on his throne." The first and second persons in
tlie Godhead have thus coequal and coeternal dignity and glory.
The evidence of the deity of Jesus is strong as that of the ex-
istence of God. Our nature, too, is seated on the throne, as a
204 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
first-fruit and earnest of wbat shall be ; having been carried from
the grave wherein sin had laid it, to such dignity and glory and
perfection, by our Head and Representative. It is interesting
also to observe that He who sits with the Father on the throne is
designated there by the same epithet, bearing which he suffered
here — " the Lamb." And so he will remain for ever. In his
designation he is " the Lamb slain from the foundation of the
world." In his manifestation, ^^ Behold the Lamb of God that
taketh away the sins of the world." In his humiliation, ^' he
was led as a lamb to the slaughter ;" and in his exaltation, the
character that clave to him so closely in the past will not be re-
nounced by him at any time in the future, for he is still " the
Lamb on the throne." It will also be perceived here, that the
river, or the Spirit of G-od, as we have already shown, proceeds
from the Father and the Son : ^'All things that the Father hath
are mine f " Because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit
of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father." The lan-
guage of this Apocalyptic text has for its parallel the evangelical
promise in John xiv. 26 : " But when the Comforter is come,
whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the spirit of
truth which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me."
And also in John xvi. 7 : ''I tell you the truth; it is expedient
for you that I go away ; for, if I go not away, the Comforter will
not come unto you ; but if I depart, I will send him unto you."
This river, therefore, in this its glorious procession, reveals at
once the will of the Father and the work of the Son. We also
learn from this passage, that the Holy Spirit is the gift of the
enthroned Lamb. It is thus we read, " The Holy Spirit was not
yet given because Christ was not yet glorified." The gift of the
Spirit is a royal act ; this river is a royal river, its gift is one of
Christ's crowns : if he had not been crucified, no Spirit could
have been promised ; if he were not throned, no Spirit could be
actually given. It is a stream from this river that we now need ;
for though Christ be manifested love and fulness of light, yet so
opposed are we to all that is holy, pure, and good, that we are
gtill ready to exclaim, " Not this man, but Barabbas." But when
the Holy Spirit "takes of the things that are Christ's, and shows
them unto us," we then see and appreciate their excellence. In
THE RIVER OP LIFE. 205
this dispensation the Spirit excites a new character within us ; in
the coming dispensation, he will sustain that character.
Wo see in this Apocalyptic portrait the harmony and unity of
the whole Trinity. The Father is here represented as the foun-
tain-head of all love, and life, and happiness; the Son, as the
golden channel through which all must flow ; and the Spirit, as
the river of life that rolls down that channel from the throne,
God the Father is set before us as sovereign love, God the Son as
redeeming love, and God the Holy Spirit as sanctifying and effi-
cacious love : and thus we see that every blessing upon earth is a
Trinity blessing. Pardon is sovereign from the Father, is pur-
chased by the Lamb, is sealed and sent by the Spirit. There are
three that bear record in heaven — the Father, the Word, and the
Spirit; and all Christianity is but the manifestation of a Triune
Jehovah .
If God be nothing more than one, a child can compass the thought ;
But seraphs fail to unravel the wondrous unity of three.
One verily He is, for there can be but One who is Almighty ;
Yet the oracles of nature and religion proclaim Him three in one.
And where were the value to thy soul, miserable denizen of earth!
Of the idle pageant of the cross, where hung no sacrifice for thee?
Where the worth to thine impotent head of that storied Bethesda,
All numbed and palsied as it is by the scorpion stings of sin ?
No ; thy trinity of nature, enchained by treble death,
Helplessly craveth of its God Himself for three salvations :
The soul to be reconciled in love, the mind to be glorified in light,
While the poor dying body leapeth into life.
And if, indeed, for us all the costly ransom hath been paid.
Bethink thee, could less than Deity have owned so vast a treasure?
Could a man contend with God, and stand against the bosses of His buckler,
Kendering the balance for guilt, atonement to the uttermost ?
That this great truth, a Triune Jehovah, is shrouded in myste-
ry, no one can deny. But surely we do not profess to disbelieve
a fact — a phenomenon — an occurrence in the world, all the sides
of which we cannot see at once. Even so we should here be
humble in our ignorance, and lean on the truth we cannot com-
prehend, and glory in Him whose greatness is incomprehensible.
We learn from this passage the stability and permanence of
millennial blessings. This river shall only cease to run when
SECOND SERIES.
18
206 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
Christ abdicates his throne, but ^' Thy throne, God, is for ever
and ever :" earthly kings are forsaken of their subjects — their
thrones melt away beneath them — and dignities, and ranks, and
titles disappear like snow-flakes on the tempestuous torrents of
revolution ; but this throne is not convulsed by the agitations of
earth ; it controls all, and is controlled by none ; it is far above
the tide-mark. God is an everlasting king, and his kingdom a
kingdom that cannot be moved.
It is by this river we rise to and reach the fountain. The Spirit
will be the Great Teacher then as now ; the persons of the glori-
ous Trinity will never abdicate their functions ; and therefore we
may expect that the Spirit will ever open up to our minds new
and glorious mysteries, and ever extend to the focus of our vision
with the enlargement of our horizon. We shall depend on Fa-
ther,. Son, and Holy Spirit, as much and as truly in the future as
in time past. Glorified creatures will be creatures still; depend-
ency will be then, as now, our element, even as independence is
now felt to be a curse and a calamity, just in the ratio of its at-
tainment.
The blessings and glories of the millennial kingdom will come
to us through Christ. The Lamb will still be the key-note of our
harmony, the burden of our gratitude, the medium of our joys,
the connecting link between a holy God and a happy universe :
it will be true then, as it is true now : " No man cometh unto the
Father but by me.''
The highest honour conferred on a subject in ancient times,
was to be allowed to eat at the king's table : thus David refers to
this practice in 1 Sam. xx. We shall be children enjoying the
hospitality of our heavenly Father — we shall be subjects seated
at the table of the King of kings, glorious in his glory.
We learn from this passage, that the whole Trinity will be
then, as now, communicative : the river proceeds from the throne
of God and of the Lamb. All the joys of those around that
throne, as well as those tasted by us who serve at his footstool,
are tbe efflux of Triune love. To give, is the joy of Deity ; selfish
monopoly is the canker, as it is the curse of man. Hence it is
written, " It is more blessed to give than to receive :" for thus we
act more godlike. Man's greatest enjoyment is not merely benevo-
THE RIVER OF LIFE. 207
lence, but beneficence : the joy of the universe is realized in mi-
nistry ; he is greatest of all, who is servant of all, and the deepest
happiness surrounds sacrifice as with a halo.
Let us see in this passage the unity of the church of Christ,
both now and then. This river, like a sparkling chain, connects
in one all its parts ; it refreshes, first, the saints in glory, and,
next, the saints on earth. One drinks where there is no inter-
mingling taint, and the other where all around is imperfect and
impure.
Your departed infants, and your parents who have preceded
you, and are now within the vail, drink of the same living stream
that you drink of, only a little higher up and nearer the fount —
amid greater light and less shadow. And in this vision we see
also the real and only element of true unity and union among
believers upon earth. It is not uniformity of size or thought,
but unity of faith, of sentiment, of joy, of life, of hope. Uni-
formity exists in the lower creation, unity in diversity of develop-
ment in the higher. There is uniformity in a street with continu-
ous brick buildings all of one shape and size ; there is unity in
the varied architecture of Bruges or Antwerp. It is one spirit that
makes one body. It is the pervading vitality of the Spirit of God
that creates relationship, and makes of twain one. It is the
spirit of adoption that makes us sons. It is drinking of this river
that makes Jew and Uentile, Greek and barbarian one . In the
absence of this grand element, all outward colouring, all obliga-
tion of ritual, rubric, liturgy, and ecclesiastical government, are
but masks concealing internal antagonisms, diversities, and dis-
putes. The most splendid forms are hollow hypocrisies, or the
trappings of death, in the absence of this throne-river. A stream
from it will make the most rugged external forms and ordinances
fair and beautiful.
Let us learn, in the next place, what constitutes a Christian's
happiness : it will be nothing in the Millennium but what is
known now : it will be different in degree, but the same in kind.
The fountain is the same. Its waters they are that flow around
the footstool, and make glad the tabernacles of the city of our
God. Our entrance into the immediate presence of God is not a
208 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
total change of element, but only an entrance from one degi'eo
into a higher.
Let us learn, in the next place, that the true end of a visible
church, in all its ordinances, is to convey this living water to the
souls of its people. It should be written upon its very lintels
and doorposts, " There is a river whose streams make glad the
city of our God;" and its ministers should stand and perpetually
cry, " Ho ! every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters ;"
and they alone who drink of this water below, shall drink of it
above. ^'He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life."
The fellowship that will last for ever, is a fellowship begun below.
We have the earnest now of what we shall be. Do we feel the'
necessity of the presence and power of this Divine Teacher ?
Do we wait on a ministry that glorifies the Spirit ? Do we place
ourselves amid the means that derive all their efficacy from Him ?
Do we ever pray Him to come from the four winds and breathe
on us ? Were there more of fervent prayer among the hearers,
and more spiritual preaching among ministers, there would be
fuller and more frequent real revivals of true religion. Revelation
is complete, but religion is only in its infancy. The first was
finished when the Apocalypse was written ; and the latter will
make progress, " not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit,
saith the Lord of Hosts." Do we defer to that Spirit, and
sacredly follow his monitions ? He speaks to us from the depths
01 conscience, from the pages of the Bible, from the sanctuary,
from revolution, affliction, the sick-bed, the grave, from every
point of the compass : " If any man thirst, let him come and
take of the water of life freely."
In all parts of the year in which we live, are heard voices and
thunderings premonitory of that vast spiritual revolution which
is at our doors. The chaos is now rolling and fermenting on the
eve of a new genesis. Nature (as natura means) groans and
travails, about to come to the birth. Blessed be God, that we
know that, while all things disintegrated and disorganized are.
dashed against each other by the tempest that beats up,on them,
the Rock of ages remains.
209
LECTURE XV.
THE TREE OP LIFE.
*'In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was thcr<*
the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every
month; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations." —
Revelation xxii. 2.
The first mention of the tree of life in the word of God occurs
in Gen. ii. 2 : ^^ Out of the ground the Lord made every tree to
grow that was pleasant to the sight and good for food : the tree
of life also in the midst of the garden." Its use, in the unfallen
and sinless world, is also subsequently described, or rather im-
plied, in these words : ''Lest he put forth his hand and take of
the tree of life, and eat and live for ever ; therefore the Lord God
sent him forth." We read also, that the cherubim and the
flaming sword were appointed " to keep the way of the tree of
life." Thus things continued, as far as we can ascertain, till
the deluge. Man was kept within sight of Eden, and the flaming
cherubim, and the tree of life, visible to all that looked, as if to
teach him, that having lost the original righteousness which en-
titled him in his unfallen condition to gather the fruit of that
glorious tree, he must now be provided with a righteousness at
least as perfect as that which he had lost, before his access could
be restored, and thus only could he recover the condition of joy,
and freedom, and life which was forfeited.
The second paradise, we are sure is the counterpart of the first,
only fairer and more beautiful by far ; the second Adam, who is
the Lord from heaven, and his ransomed and spotless bride, shall
re-enter and dwell in that predicted and nearing paradise, in
which blight, and death, and decay, shall be strangers for ever.
The tree in the midst of it shall not be the monopoly of a few,
18*
210 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
but the privilege and possession of all — the sacrament of our
immortality — the symbol of our dependence — the evidence of
our creatureship, and the testimony to a witnessing and surround-
ing universe, that God alone is the fountain of all being, the
source of all happiness, and that on Him the universe depends.
The word translated " the tree of life/' is literally " a word of
life :" the word is ^u?.ov, and seems to be associated in Scripture
with the cross of Christ, for it is the same word which is used in
Acts V. 30, " whom ye slew and hanged on a tree f and also in 1
Pet. ii. 24, " He bare our sins in his own body on a tree.'' May
not this Apocalyptic symbol convey to us some grand exhibition
of the great doctrine of the atonement, as the standing character-
istic of the age to come — the prominent and central thing in the
midst of it? May it not mean that the atonement shall be, and
be seen to be, in heaven, what it has been felt to be by believers
on earth, the source of all spiritual life ? Thus the instrument
of death becomes the source of life — the emblem of shame, that
of honour : and Paul may sing in glorj, what he so heroically
proclaims in grace — " God forbid that I should glory, save in the
cross of Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I
unto the world."
The fruit of this tree is declared to be produced every month.
The trees of the earth at present bear fruit once a year ; this tree
shall bear its fruit once a month. This remarkable characteristic
may perhaps denote the infinite and unceasing abundance of all
that is good and happy, which shall be realized in the New Jeru-
salem by the people of God, and the utter absence of all the
efi"ect3 and influences of vicissitude, of season, and clime, and
change, which are so destructive in this world. Certainly there
will be enough of the elements of life and happiness for the
144,000, the Apocalyptic symbol of the redeemed — the bride of
' *the Lamb. It is for this consecrated band that it bears its fruit ;
it is for them the cross was raised on earth ; and it is for their
sakcs and use that it shall be transferred to glory, and shine
there in richer lustre. This tree will not, indeed, give life,
but it will perpetuate it; it will not create life, but it will
maintain it.
THE TREE OF LIFE. 211
The word "fruit" is derived from the Latin fruor, to enjoy,
and means here the blessings and enjoyments of the gospel
reaped in the future, when things now seen and temporal shall
have passed away. "No condemnation," "no more curse," "no
night," " no tears," " nothing that defileth," — the absence of all
evil, the enjoyment of all good, the banishment of all sin, and
the universally felt and recognised presence of God himself, —
are some of the fruits that grow upon this tree, and are
accessible to the hands, and constitute the enjoyments, of the
people of God.
The leaves also of this tree are said to be " for the healing of
the nations" of the earth. The Greek word O^parMa, which is
here translated "healing," ought properly to be rendered "ser-
vice :" laffiq means medical treatment, but Ospaiziia means strictly
" care" — Latin, cura — cure and care being closely related — ser-
vice, attention. Hence, in Matt. xxiv. 45, we find that the word
here used is translated "household:" "Who then is a faithful
and wise servant, whom his Lord hath made ruler over his house-
hold ?" — kTti r^q dspairitaq. The promise, therefore, implies that
the leaves of this tree will be in glorious contrast with the fig-
leaves which Adam formed into a raiment for himself in order to
hide his sin, but which, in his and all other cases, perished in the
using. The leaves of this tree shall possess everlasting verdure,
fragrance and beauty ; and be evidence to all the millennial com-
pany that there is nothing in creation which sin has blasted
which God has not retouched, restored, and beautified. The
leaves of trees are useless to man nowj the fruit alone is of ser-
vice to him : but in that better state nothing shall be supernu-
merary, nothing useless ; there shall be nothing that does not
serve; all shall be precious in itself, and practically minister to
the joys of the people of God.
This tree is placed on the street, the izXarita, or market-place —
or, as it might be rendered, the forum, the palace of the people,
the Louvre of the citizens. No interdict shall surround it, nor
flaming sword bid away from it. The faces of the cherubim shall
shine for us, and not against us ; and love, not the wrath, of
Deity shall be projected over the length and breadth of a re-
212 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
claimed world; and the fruit of this tree shall be reached and
enjoyed by all. Here, blessings which are accessible to all are
not accepted by all ; but there the gospel shall be catholic in the
strict sense of that epithet. We learn from these promises the
communicated virtue of all things in the paradise of God. No-
thing there grows, or lives, or moves for itself; every thing is
ministry, every being has his mission ; the Lamb himself is the
glorious temple, and the precious stones which form the walls of
the city reflect the splendours they receive from the shechinah.
'The throne of God and of the Lamb ever more dissolves itself
into a ministering river, and that river refreshes all that live be-
side its channel, and reflects all bright things.
If this tree of life be, as some regard it, the symbol of Jesus
Christ himself, then it sets forth him as the origin and fountain
of life to all living beings. ^'In him is life," says the evangel-
ist. Every creature now receives life from him — alike the
meanest reptile and the mightiest angel ; but especially may we
suppose that this tree represents the Lord of glory, as the great
fountain of spiritual life to his believing people. The life of
justification is not the least important blessing that we receive
from him. Being justified by faith, we live; yet not we, but
Christ liveth in us. " Whoso eateth my flesh hath everlasting
life." In him, too, we derive a life of holiness. Because he is
the Holy One, we are saints. He makes us holy upon earth,
that is, like himself; and presents us spotless to himself, when
we shall see him as he is. God's life in the heart now effloresces
into holiness of character then, so that the outward man becomes
the reflection and exponent of the inward soul! Christ also is
the fountain of our life of happiness. " I sat down under his
shadow, and his fruit was sweet to my taste." He will open to
us visions of happiness and joy, such as angels have never seen.
The air we breathe and the waters we drink shall be happiness.
He is the fountain also of a life of dignity and royalty. We
shall be kings and priests unto God. We shall wear, not the
perishable crowns that are found in human palaces, but crowns
of glory that fade not away. He also will be to us the source
of progressive life. This is the essential characteristic of real
THE TREE OF LIFE. 213
life. All living things grow; and surely that divine life shall
not be an exception.
Endless ages will add to, not diminish or dilute, the happiness
of the people of God. May we seek more sincerely and heartily
a place in that glorious land, a worshipping-place in that august
temple — the meanest seat, if there be such where all is magnifi-
cent — before the throne of God and the Lamb; and so sit
securely and sweetly beneath the shadow, and eat of the pleasant
fruit, of the tree of life.
214
LECTURE XVI.
NO MORE CURSE.
"And there shall be no more curse : but the throne of God and of the Lamb
Fhall be in it ; and his servants shall serve him." — Revelation xxii. 3.
The first question that may be asked after reading these words
is this, " What is the curse V The answer to this question is
found in these words, Gen. iii. 16-19 : ^' Unto the woman he
said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception ; in
sorrow thou shalt bring forth children ; and thy desire shall be to
thy husband, and he shall rule over thee. And unto Adam he
said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and
hast eaten of the tree of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou
shalt not eat of it : cursed is the ground for thy sake ; in sorrow
shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life. Thorns also and
thistles shall it bring forth to thee ; and thou shalt eat the herb
of the field. In the sweat of thy face thou shalt eat bread, till
thou return unto the ground : for out of it wast thou taken : for
dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return." A curse, like-
wise coextensive with the crime, was pronounced upon the ser-
pent, corresponding to its nature as the instrument of Satan in
seducing our first parents. Some seem to think that a change
actually occurred in the physical organization and outward aspect
of the serpent ; that once it stood upright, as it were, upon its
feet ; or, if without feet, perfectly erect, and was the most beauti-
ful as well as glorious creature in the brute creation. It is cer-
tainly plain, from fossil remains, and geological strata formed
prior to the creation of man, that there appears no trace of the
serpent ; and in all the vertebrated animals found in these strata
prior to the creation of man, none are found without feet ; the
serpent, therefore, without feet, is an anomaly; its existence,
therefore, was plainly coeval with that of man, and thus it may
he presumed from science alone, that it lost its beauty and its
NO MORE CURSE. 215
perfection at the fall of man. Certainly, the instincts of man
attest his sense of a curse having scathed the serpent, or a contro-
versy of some sort between him and it. We look upon a serpent
with a horror and dislike with which we do not regard the tiger,
the lion, or the elephant; as if the original enmity, the conse-
quence of the curse, still perpetuates its poison, and proves the
truth of Scripture in its account of the fall of man, of the suffer-
ing that followed, and of the explanation of its origin. There is
every reason to believe, too, that all the rest of the brutes of the
field, the birds of the air, and the fishes of the sea, underwent a
total change, not of shape or plumage, perhaps, but of disposi-
tion, at the fall. Is it possible to believe that the whole brute
creation was originally constituted as we now find it ? — that crea-
tures called into being by benevolence, and beautified with all
the resources of infinite wisdom, devoured each other in Para-
dise ? — that man's eyes, in innocence, were forced to gaze on
bloodshed, and witness the horrors of a battle-field ; and his ears
to hear, amid the melody of brooks and the music of winds, the
cries of creation groaning in pain, and seeking to be delivered ?
God made them all beautiful, peaceful, and happy; sin altered
their very nature, and modified, it is probable, even their physical
organization; and the predictions of the future paradise imply
the disastrous change that passed upon every thing connected
with the first : *' The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, and
the lion shall eat straw like the ox ;'' the curse shall be rolled
away, the incubus of evil shall be withdrawn, and all things re-
stored to their pristine perfection. It may here be asked, how-
ever, if it was reasonable or just to curse the animals because
man had sinned ? If God has recorded it as fact, we may be
perfectly satisfied it is alike reasonable and just. But the reason
seems plain : the creatures were made for man, to beautify his
home, to minister to his wants, and to obey his royal behests.
Man's sin spread its eclipse over all the earth, and turned the
obedient birds of the air, the submissive beasts of the earth, and
the fishes of the sea, into enemies, that fly from him in terror, or
turn upon him in fury. The lord of creation fell, and all his vas-
sals fell in him and with him.
In that part of the curse which especially relates to man, the
216 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
woman is first singled out as its subject; first in tlie transgression,
she was doomed to be first also in suffering. Her sorrow is de-
scribed in Scripture as the keenest which human nature feels — a
sorrow that brings her sometimes to the grave, and leaves only
the motherless memento. The next punishment denounced upon
the woman is her dependence on man, or the surrender of her in-
dividual freedom, in order to accomplish the ends of her exist-
ence upon earth. The whole history of our race is the clear, and
often the painful evidence of this. True it is, this subjection is
illuminated where Christianity prevails by compensatory glories ;
and the loss of liberty is forgotten in her inheritance of love, so
that, inferior as she is by nature, she rises to an equality by
grace. But this blessing is not of nature, but from the gospel;
and woman, in Christian lands, does not present the complete
fulfilment of the curse denounced originally upon her. In hea-
then lands the curse is visibly struck into her experience ; for
there she has neither the dignity of woman, nor the protection of
the slave, nor the joys of the mother. Woman remains in India
just as she was left at the fall — the inheritor of a corroding and
consuming curse, which cleaves to her like life itself.
The next portion of the curse fell upon the ground : it was
once created beautiful, prolific, and good ; but when sin fell upon
it, like a blot radiating from the centre to the circumference, the
curse of barrenness followed immediately. It is now sown thick
with graves. The cypress grows where the tree of life stood ;
and melancholy requiems and moaning and groans have taken the
place of its primeval jubilee. The rose that Eve carried forth
from Paradise withered in her hand, and turned to corruption ;
and the sun that rose so beautifully that morning, set in storms.
The rolling thunder and the rending lightning still leave wrecks
behind them. The yawning earth occasionally gulps down great
capitals, and buries a mighty population in a common tomb.
The roaring flood sweeps away corn, and cattle, and villages, and
all man's husbandry, to the main; and the unsatiated sea still
buries proud navies in its waters, and roars for yet nobler vic-
tims ; and hailstones descend like destroying angels from the sky,
and blast the choicest fruits of the soil ; and famine, and pesti-
lence, and plague still indicate their common parentage — the
NO MORE CURSE. "^ 217
curse. These groans of creation are the echoes of the judgment
pronounced in Eden — these seared and blasted deserts are made
so by the sirocco of sin ; the infected house proves the presence
of the infected tenant; disorders in the estate give evidence of
moral disease in the owner of it. The world lost its beauty
when man parted with his innocence ; thorns sprang from sin-
seeds, and earth grew barren because her lord had become
guilty ; and we have only to see disorder in the elements, to be
satisfied that there is a difference between man and God. Earth
becomes rebellious, selfish, avaricious — must be ploughed and torn
by instruments of iron, and watered with the tears of man's eyes,
and fertilized with the sweat of man's brow, before it will yield
him any sustenance. Of itself, it produces only weeds that are
worthless, or fruits that are poisonous, and always insects that
eat up what we sow — as if nature were indignant with man, and
desirous of avenging her wrongs upon him. Man rose against
God, and that instant all creation rose against man. And " we
know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain
together until now." See the slave in the mine, the husband-
man in the fields, the sailor on the ocean, the soldier in battle,
and the labourer in the workshop, in order to perceive the re-
bound of man's sin in Paradise ; and where there is less physical,
there is more mental wear and tear • and where wealth is the
greatest, it is only the glittering mask that conceals the agony
within. The curse cleaves close to the human heart — corrosive,
consuming, defying all antidote but one; sometimes covered,
sometimes gilded, but never extirpated, except in. the experience
of the child of God.
" In the day thou eatest thou shalt die ; for dust thou art, and
unto dust shalt thou return," is a no less obvious result of the
primeval curse. Disease, consumption, fever, gray hairs, and
death, constitute the long, dark procession from the gates of
Paradise, and disappear only in the receptacle which none can
stave oif — the grave. Infants and aged patriarchs die ; kings on
their thrones, and judges on their tribunals, die ; and no sanc-
tuary or altar-horns can protect from the stroke of death. No
beauty or birth can bid away the king of terrors'; the Methuselah
of a thousand years, and the infant of yesterday, must die.
SECOND SERIES. 19
^>» «> V W ^fll « c
^1^ APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
Adam bore patiently the calamities of the fall till he saw for the
first time death, in the cold limbs and pallid face of Abel. Death
is the image of sin, the portrait of our guilt, the wages of
iniquity.
Banishment from Eden was also a portion of the primeval
curse, for it is written, " He drove out the man." Eden lost
its attractions, for man had lost his susceptibility of them.
The tree of knowledge waved its branches from afar, but it was
as the memorial only of our crime. The tree of life lost
not its magnificence and glory, but man had no access to it.
He who lived the one day beneath the wing of angels, wan-
dered the next day under a roofless world ; beginning that dis-
tance from God, the utmost aphelion of which is hell. The
curse fell on man's intellect also. Once his soaring thoughts
reached the presence of the seraphim ; and ever as they rose in
the heights, or descended in the depths, he saw in the one the
image, and in the other the footprints of Deity. This great
intellect is now darkened, distorted, enfeebled; and its powers
frequently lavished on ignoble and unworthy objects. Has not
genius frequently aided the assassin, and become the ally of the
robber ? Has it not carried ambition to thrones through a sea
of blood, and avarice to fortune through all kinds of tortuous
and wicked courses ; manifesting itself as the drudge of sin, the
hack of Satan, the pioneer of accumulated evil? In poetry,
which ought to sing only the good, the beautiful, the true, how
much of evil has genius manifested ? If Milton has celebrated
in song the glories and also the exiles of Eden, has not Shelley
gilded with its charms what he had depravity to imagine — souls
without hope, and a world without Grod ? If Cowper has covered
with new beauty domestic life, and real religion, and Christian
worth, has not Byron withered with infidel sai-casm whatever of
divine holiness or human happiness he was permitted to touch ?
Nor has science escaped the universal curse. Has not geology
emerged at times from its subterranean researches, and shouted
in triumph, " No God ?'* Has not astronomy risen on outspread
pinion, and, after visiting suns and systems, alighted on the
earth, and told mankind that in the vestiges of creation there is
no vestige of a Creator ? Have not Volney and others visited the
NO MORE CURSE. 219
east and the west, and opened the sarcophagi of ancient kings,
and explored pyramidal chambers, and traced the Nile, and
crossed the Jordan, and sailed upon the sea of Galilee, and
walked in Grethsemane, and stood on Ararat, Zion, and Calvary,
and denounced the everlasting gospel as a fable ? Have not
naturalists gazed upon the light of morn beautiful as an infant,
and on the shadows of evening mellowed like age, and on the
buds of spring, and on the falling leaves of autumn, and on the
drifted snow, and on the driving showers, and alleged that they
saw nothing higher than the balancing of the air, the motion of
the earth, the evaporation of the waters ?
But this, the curse on man's mind, as well as every other ves-
tige of its presence, shall be no more at all. The vast universe
shall yet glow with Deity; creation shall be seen to be the
chamber of his presence,, the dwelling-place of his power, the re-
ceptacle of his designs, the autograph of our Father ; and astro-
nomy, and literature, and geology, and chemistry, and poetry,
shall hear with arrested ears and delighted hearts the ^'Lord
walking in the garden" of creation '^ in the cool of the day."
Isaiah Ix. shall become actual : — " Arise, shine, for thy light is
come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee. For, be-
hold, the darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the
people ; but the Lord shall arise upon thee, and his glory shall
be seen upon thee. And the G-entiles shall come to thy light,
and kings to the brightness of thy rising. Lift up thine eyes
round about, and see : all they gather themselves together, they
come to thee : thy sons shall come from far, and thy daughters
shall be nursed at thy side. Then thou shalt see, and flow to-
gether, and thine heart shall fear, and be enlarged ; because the
abundance of the sea shall be converted unto thee, the forces of
the Gentiles shall come unto thee. The multitude of camels
shall cover thee, the dromedaries of Midian and Ephah ; all they
from Sheba sliall come : they shall bring gold and incense ; and
they shall show forth the praises of the Lord. All the flocks of
Kedar sliall be gathered together unto thee : the rams of Nebaioth
shall minister unto thee : they shall come up with acceptance
on mine altar, and I will glorify the house of my glory. Who
are these that fly as a cloud, and as the doves to their windows ?
220 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
Surely the isles shall wait for me^ and the ships of Tarshish
first, to bring thy sons from far, their silver and their gold with
them, unto the name of the Lord thy God : and to the Holy One
of Israel, because he hath glorified thee. And the sons of stran-
gers shall build up thy walls, and their kings shall minister unto
thee : for in my wrath I smote thee, but in my favour have I had
mercy on thee. Therefore thy gates shall be open continually ;
they shall not be shut day nor night, that men may bring unto
thee the forces of the Gentiles, and that their kings may be
brought. For the nation and kingdom that will not serve thee
shall perish; yea, those nations shall be utterly wasted. The
glory of Lebanon shall come unto thee, the fir-tree, the pine-tree,
and the box together, to beautify the place of my sanctuary ; and
I will make the place of my feet glorious. The sons also of them
that afflicted thee shall come bending unto thee ', and all they
that despised thee shall bow themselves down at the soles of thy
feet ; and they shall call thee. The city of the Lord, the Zion of
the Holy One of Israel. Whereas thou hast been forsaken and
hated, so that no man went through thee, I will make thee an
eternal excellency, a joy of many generations. Thou shalt also
suck the milk of the Gentiles, and shalt suck the breast of kings :
and thou shalt know that I the Lord am thy Saviour, and thy
Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob. For brass I will bring
gold, and for iron I will bring silver, and for wood brass, and for
stones iron : I will also make thy officers peace, and thine exactors
righteousness. Violence shall no more be heard in thy land,
wasting nor destruction within thy borders ; but thou shalt call
thy walls Salvation, and thy gates Praise. The sun shall be no
more thy light by day, neither for brightness shall the moon give
light unto thee : but the Lord shall be unto thee an everlasting
light, and thy God thy glory. Thy sun shall no more go down ;
neither shall thy moon withdraw itself: for the Lord shall be
thine everlasting light, and the days of thy mourning shall be
ended. Thy people also shall be all righteousness : they shall
inherit the land for ever, the branch of my planting, the work of
my hands, that I may be glorified. A little one shall become a
thousand, and a small one a strong nation : I the Lord will
hasten it in his time.'' . . ,._.,■ -.
NO MORE CURSE. 221
The curse, too, has fallen on man's heart and conscience. How
great must be that depravity which renders the motives, the
hopes, and fears of eternity absolutely inefficacious till they are
applied by Grod himself! It must be an all but infinite curse
that needs an omnipotent hand in order to remove it. Fallen
man has worshipped the things he made — turned his very vices
into gods ; and architecture has raised a Pantheon for their re-
ception, and poets have sung their depravity as sublime heroism.
What a concentration of the curse was there in that one man,
Voltaire ! — a man to whom the love of man and the fear of God
were a nullity; whose joy consisted in tearing from the human
heart its best hopes, and from the social system its only cement ;
who gloried only in wreck ; whose favourite weapons were sar-
casm and lies. Experience, in his case, confirms the divine testi-
mony, " The heart of man is deceitful above all things, and des-
perately wicked.^' Inspiration has asked and answered the ques-
tion, *' Whence come wars and fightings among you ? Come they
not hence, even from your lusts that war in your members ?"
Lands intersected by a narrow path abhor each other. Moun-
tains interposed make enemies of nations, who had else, like
kindred drops, been mingled into one. The curse, too, as we
have already seen, lies sore and heavy on man's body. We need
not enumerate the diseases " that flesh is heir to,'' or prove that
these are the offspring of the curse. This body is now as often a
hinderance as it is a help to the soul. Often is it a strong ob-
struction to communion with God ; and by all of us it is felt to
be the battle-field between heaven and hell.
This curse, however, shall be lifted away : " This mortal shall
put on immortality."
" One Lord, one Father : error has no place ,•
That creeping pestilence is driven away."
The curse shall be lifted away from all places on which it now
lies : it shall be no more on Ebal, nor on Jerusalem, nor upon
Sinai. No Balak shall say, " Come, curse me Israel ;" it
shall no more be said, " If any man love not the Lord Jesus, let
him be anathema;" nor, ''if any man preach any other gospel,
let him be anathema." The offence shall be impossible, and the
19*
^22 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
curse unknown ! It shall no more be written, ^^ Cursed is the
man that trustetli in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose
heart departeth from the Lord/^ Deut. xxviii. 16-19 shall be
repealed; it shall no more be said, "Depart, ye cursed," for
there shall be no more utter destruction. In that day shall there
be upon the bells of the horses, " Holiness unto the Lord ;" and
in that day there shall be " no more the Canaanite in the house
of the Lord." There shall be no more Papal curse, which has
so often been thundered from the seven hills, and terrified the
nations, and made Christians wonder that a church professing
Christianity could deal so little in blessing, and delight so much in
cursing. The Pontificale Romanum, the compendium of these
curses, shall have perished with the proud ecclesiastics that com-
posed it. Nor shall there be any more Protestant curses ; for
those proscriptions and exclusions, and sectarian denunciations,
and excommunication of brother by brother, are only the curses
of the popedom diluted by the atmosphere into which they have
been brought. Let us, then, hail that blessed day when there
shall be no more curse above, below, or around, in heaven or
earth, on body or soul. Let us begin now to sing by anticipation —
" There is a land of pure delight,
Where saints immortal reign ;
Eternal day excludes the night,
And pleasures banish pain.
There everlasting spring abides,
And never-with'ring flowers j
Death, like a narrow sea, divides
That heavenly land from ours."
Creation, at that day, shall lay aside the ashen garments which
it has worn for many thousand years, and put on its Easter
robes. It, too, has its TtaXiyytveaia ; like some nurse of a royal
child which it has reared, she shall be remembered and raised to
dignity when he mounts his throne. The first Adam lost the
garden, and inherited the wilderness. The second Adam took up
the battle just where the first left off; and in the wilderness
fought the foe, and won back Paradise for man ; and a foretaste
and earnest of final victory was presented in his wonderful worka
NO MORE CURSE. 223
Each miracle was a germ of Paradise, and triumphant evidence
that all creation was soft and pliant in his hand. Each miracle
was a foretoken, and forelight, and first-frnit of the restoration
of all creation. When he healed the sick, that cure was a fore-
light of the sickless state. When he raised the dead, that act
was a foretoken of the first resurrection. When he calmed the
storm, there was seen a first-fruit of that everlasting calm which
his priestly hand shall wave over all creation. That pierced hand
of the Babe of Bethlehem shall seize the sceptre of the universe,
and lay its touch upon the ocean's main ; and his word, like a
resistless spell, shall go down to nature's depths, and up to na-
ture's heights, and hallow all space to be a temple of Deity.
Earth shall become a glorious Gerizzim ; there shall no more be
in it the common or the unclean ; there shall be no more curse,
for Christ was made a curse for us.
But it is added, ^' The throne of God shall be in it." This
presence of the throne of God is evidence that there shall be no
more curse. If in the camp of Israel an accursed thing were pre-
sent, the visible token of the presence of God was withdrawn, as
may be seen by reference to Ex. xxxiii. 7. In this kingdom of
emerging glory and beauty, there will be found nothing to which
the curse can cleave ; there will be none to merit or to fulminate
anathemas there. The throne of the popedom may be set in
curses, but the throne of God and of the Lamb is embosomed in
benedictions. In that land there will be no throne, as far as a
throne is the symbol of despotism. The cruel tyranny of Nero,
the ambitious and restless throne of the Macedonian or the
Swede, the merciless sceptre or the iron crown of Napoleon, shall
neither be felt nor recollected there. The sceptre of the Lord's
kingdom is a sceptre of righteousness; justice and judgment are
the habitation of his throne. Nor will there be there any pon-
tifical throne ; there shall be none " sitting in the temple of God,
showing himself as if he were God ;" stealing rays of glory from
God, and arrogating infallibility for man ; fulminating the seven
thunders, forging decretals, or evangelizing with the sword.
Crozier, tiara, and pontifical throne have perished in the flames
that have consumed great Babylon. Nor will there be any
Satanic throne : the prince of the power of the air rules now in
224 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
tlie children of disobedience ; but at that day his head shall be
bruised, and his doom shall be the irretrievable perdition of the
bottomless abyss. Yet there will be a throne; for order, law,
and love are the aim and the happiness of the millennial and the
everlasting state. There shall be " liberty, equality, fraternity,^'
and yet a throne, yea, because a throne and these graces shall
live and flourish in common, with innumerable others, because
fed and refreshed by the living waters that flow from the throne
of God and of the Lamb. It is, as I have said, the throne of
God and of the Lamb; sovereignty is thus associated with sacri-
fice, and the crown of glory with the cross of the sufi"erer, and
the throne on which Christ sits with the Calvary on which
Christ hung between two thieves. We read in the New Tes-
tament of the throne of grace : it is the same throne, approached
now by faith, but then by sight — seen now through a dimmer
medium, but beheld then in the bright splendours of unutterable
glory. We read also of the throne of justice, of which righteous-
ness and judgment are pronounced the habitation. Faithful and
just is God to forgive us here, and faithful and just will God be
to glorify us there. We read, too, of the throne of holiness :
God sitteth on the throne of holiness, and angels prostrate before
him cry continually, " Holy, holy, holy. Lord God of Hosts.''
All within the throne is holiness, and therefore all around that
throne is happiness. The throne of glory is the last and crown-
ing epithet of that seat on which God and the Lamb sit. Glory
is the intermingled attributes of Deity. Thus Moses said, " Show
me thy glory ;" and the Lord passed by and said, " The Lord,
the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suff"ering, abundant in
goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving ini-
quity, transgression, and sin." Christ is the concentrated bright-
ness of that glory, and this throne is the radiating centre of all
the beams of beauty and felicity that fall upon the redeemed
tenantry of the universe. Who can doubt the essential Deity of
the Lord Jesus ? Who can be ashamed of Him who sits upon
the throne ? Who can tremble for the safety of the church that
has such a defender ? Who can be afraid of God, who knows
that he is the Lamb ? Can any one sink under tribulation, who
knows that that tribulation comes down from the throne of God
NO MORE CURSE. 225
and of the Lamb ? The Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are seated
on that throne. The absolute God is the hidden and mysterious
ore which we can neither see nor use. Father, Son, and Holy
Ghost upon the throne — the Father electing, the Son redeeming,
the Holy Ghost sanctifying — the Father condemning sin, the
Son expiating sin, the Holy Ghost extirpating sin — is that same
gold in glorious currency.
The same throne is described in Rev. iv. 3 : " There was a
rainbow round about the throne, in sight like unto an emerald -/^
and also in Kev. v. 6 : '^ And I beheld, and, lo, in the midst of
the throne, and of the four living creatures, and in the midst of
the elders, stood a Lamb as it had been slain." The first men-
tion of the rainbow occurs in Gen. ix. 12 : '^ And God said. This
is the token of the covenant which I make between me and you
and every living creature that is with you, for perpetual genera-
tions : I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token
of a covenant between me and the earth : and the bow shall be
in the cloud; and I will look upon it, that I may remember the
everlasting covenant between God and every living creature."
The bow was, therefore, a proof to all generations, that God will
send no similar flood to depopulate the earth. Pronounced after
sacrifice, it was the pledge of future blessings. So, the atone-
ment of Jesus is our great sacrifice ; and, " no condemnation to
them that are in Christ Jesus," is the promise that follows after
it. The rainbow was the pledge, also, of the immutability of the
covenant with N*. ah : this rainbow round about the throne of the
Lamb is the pledge of the immutability and perpetuity of the
blessing inherited by the people of God. The rainbow proves
the presence of the sun : there can be no rainbow where there is
no sunshine. The rainbow round the throne, therefore, proves
the presence, as it is the refraction and reflection of the glory of
Jesus. The rainbow is declared to be " round about the throne."
In this world, the rainbow appears less than a semicircle, and
only on ascending a lofty mountain does the semicircle approxi-
mate to completion. In the New Jerusalem, we shall stand upon
a loftier height than man ever rose to. Our horizon shall be
vastly enlarged, our vision purified and expanded, and things that
arc now seen incomplete shall be beheld in absolute perfection,
226 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
and truths that are now seen in fragments shall then be seen as
whole. Thus, on all sides of the great central object in the
millennial state, shall be hung this beautiful bow, as if to inti-
mate that the mercy of a covenant God brought us there, and
that the power of a covenant God keeps us there; while its
predominating tinge shall seem to be, not the azure of the
sapphire, nor the blaze of the diamond, but the soft and sober
tints of the emerald. Those around the throne are variously re-
presented. In one place they are described as seated : this de-
notes repose, reception to special favour, and participation of fes-
tive joy : as it is written, '^ Many shall come from the east and
from the west, and from the north and from the south, and sit
down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of
God.'' In another place they are represented as standing, to de-
note their readiness for service, and their delight to execute the
will and carry the embassy of the Eternal. In other parts they
are represented as falling down before the throne, to denote wor-
ship, abasement, reverence. They cast their crowns before the
throne of Him from whom they received them.
In that blessed state we shall see Christ as he is : the hope of
Job : "In my flesh shall I see God ;'' and the hope of David :
" I shall be satisfied ;'' the hope of Isaiah : " We shall see the
King in his beauty ;" and of John : " We shall be like him/'
will then and there be perfectly realized. Our state shall also
be that of great dignity. We shall shine forth in the kingdom
of our Father; our raiment like the snow, and our crowns of"
gold; and all reproach shall be rolled away from them who
have been constituted kings and priests to our God and his
Christ. We shall also be in a state of perfect security. The
light shall never be shaded ; that fountain shall never be dry ;
" ever with the Lord" shall be always realized. Our inheritance
will be " incorruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not away."
These words, " This is life eternal, to know thee, the only true
God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent," shall be pronounced
with a new emphasis. That state shall be characterized by per-
fect unity. All false centres of union shall be scattered; all
shibboleths of sect and system shall be utterly extinguished ; and
the throne of God and of the Lamb, the centre of the created
NO MORE CURSE. 227
universe, shall be the centre of God's redeemed people; and
around it never-ending concentric zones of worshippers shall gaze,
and wonder, and worship perpetually. There will be ^^rnany
mansions," but one house — many streams, but one river — many
branches, but one tree — many worshippers, but one God and the
Lamb.
Then, too, shall Psalm Ixvii. cease to be prayer, and become
fulfilment : " God's way will be known upon the earth, and his
saving health among all nations. The people will praise him,
yea, all the people will praise him. The nations will be glad
and sing for joy ; for God will judge the people righteously, and
govern the nations upon earth. The earth shall yield her in-
crease, and God, even our own God, will bless us." Psalm
Ixxii. shall cease to be promise, and become performance. '^ The
mountains shall bring peace to the people, and the little hills, by
righteousness. . . . They shall fear him as long as the sun and
moon endure, throughout all generations. He shall come down
like rain upon the mown grass, and as showers that water the
earth. He shall have dominion from sea to sea, and from the
river unto the ends of the earth." " The kings of Tarshish and
of the isles shall bring presents : the kings of Sheba and Seba
shall offer gifts. Yea, all kings shall fall down before him : all
nations shall serve him." "His name shall endure for ever:
his name shall be continued as long as the sun : and men shall
be blessed in him : all nations shall call him blessed ;" and
" the whole earth shall be filled with his glory." The vision of
Daniel shall then be fulfilled : " I saw in the night visions,
and, behold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of
heaven, and came to the Ancient of days, and they brought him
near before him. And there was given him dominion, and glory,
and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, should
serve him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall
not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be de-
stroyed. And the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of
the kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people
of the saints of the Most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting
kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him." This is
that city for which Abraham looked : that kingdom which cannot
228 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
be moved; whicli was lost in Adam, and is re-establislied in
Christ ; which Alexander and Napoleon tried in vain to rear from
the ruins of the fall ; which cometh down from heaven, prepared
as a bride for the bridegroom. " We then receiving a kingdom
which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve
God acceptably with godly fear.^' Let us sit loose to earthly
things ; let us set our affections upon things that are above.
Even now let us begin to lay aside the sackcloth of the fall, and
to put on our coronation robes.
229
LECTURE XVn.
RECOGNITION IN THE AGE TO COME.
" There shall be no night." — Revelation xxii. 5.
This text occurs in the previous chapter ; and in discussing it
in a previous lecture, I viewed it as a prediction of the perfec-
tion of that state to which the church is progressively approaching.
On this occasion, I am anxious to look at the prediction in ano-
ther of its aspects, and to answer, in this light, the question,
Shall the saved, in their resurrection bodies, and amid millennial
light, recognise each other just as clearly and distinctly as they
do now?
The reunion of all the people of Grod, before the throne of Grod
and of the Lamb, is an admitted fact. The Millennium is, in short,
the rendezvous of all the people of God, — the " rest that remain-
eth" for them, — the hour of '^ the manifestation of the sons of
God.'^ ^^I go," says the Saviour, ^'io prepare a place for you;
and I will come again, and receive you to myself, that where I
am, there ye may be also." And again, he prays — ^^ Father, I
will that those thou hast given me be with me, that they may
behold my glory." We are to be gathered together unto him,
and to be presented " a glorious church, without spot or wrinkle,
or any such thing."
The resurrection, whether it respects the lost, or the people of
God, is not a re-creation of humanity, or the restoration of man-
kind in the mass, but the resurrection, or rising again, in purity,
in beauty, and in glory, of all that was deposited in the grave.
The same body that fell, . shall rise : this mortal shall put on im-
mortality — this corruptible, incorruptibility : all that constitutes
me, be it moral, mental, or physical, shall rise again at the last
day. And just as the body which Jesus laid in the tomb was
the same body with which he rose from the dead, so shall it be
with ours.
SECOND SERIES. 20
230 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
Now, if all our faculties be raised, memory will be restored and
resuscitated with the rest. Its essential function is recollection.,
its aspect is retrospective. It deals only with the past : it is a
storehouse of facts. If in the future there be no recollection of
the past, we shall have no memory, and shall thus be raised with
mutilated powers ; or some wave of Lethe, of which we have no
intimation in the oracles of truth, shall have washed away and
expunged all our reminiscences of departed scenes. But there is
abundant evidence that there will be remembrance, and therefore
memory, in the age to come. G-ratitude, which will then be so
deeply felt and vividly expressed, implies recollection of bene^Js
received. The parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus indicates
that memory will have its part and its power in the punishment
of the lost : it is surely not unreasonable to suppose that it will
have a share in contributing to the joys and felicities of the
blessed. The words of our Lord, addressed to his own, "I was
hungry, and ye gave me meat — thirsty, and ye gave me drink/*
is an appeal to the memories of his own. Shall we recollect the
truths that first kindled in our hearts the joys of heaven, and
have no recollection of the instrument, however humble, that con-
veyed them to our hearts, and interested us in them ? Can we
have walked together to the house of God, and taken sweet coun-
sel together, and yet have no recollection of voices that were
familiar to us as household words, and features with which we
were intimately acquainted as with our own ? If, then, we recol-
lect in the future dispensation those we knew and loved in the
present, shall we be prevented from seeing them ? Will any
change in them, or in us, prevent us from recognising them ?
Shall the future be merely successive tiers of separate cells — piles
of solitary prisons — a scene of isolation and solitude? Will
memory preserve the shadows of the dead, but our eyes fail to
recognise them when living ? Are we not told that death shall
be destroyed ? But if those bonds which were broken at death
are not restored again in the realms of life, death is not annihi-
lated ; one of its deepest wounds survives ; its heaviest blow is
felt throughout the successive cycles of a futurity to come. But
this cannot be. I look on the future as the restoration of scattered
families, of suspended friendships, of broken circles ; the reanima-
RECOGNITION IN THE AGE TO COME. 231
tion of departed images ', the apocalypse of faces we gazed upon
below, when channelled by floods of tears, then bright and radiant
with joy, where tears are no more shed. It was not good to be
alone in the first Paradise — surely it cannot be better to be alone
in the second. Night shall be rolled away, alike from the memo-
ries, the horizon, and the days of the blest. But there are express
instances in Scripture, that prove the conviction of the saints of
God that they shall rise again and recognise each other in the
regions of the blest. Thus in G-en. xxxvii. 35, it is related of the
patriarch Jacob, that he refused to be comforted, and said, ^^For
I will go down into the grave unto my son mourning." The
Hebrew word is not that which is strictly translated "the grave,''
but sheol, which means the place of departed spirits. That it
could not be the literal grave which the patriarch meant, is ob-
vious from the fact that he knew his son was not buried, but
devoured, as he was told, by an evil beast ; and besides the cessa-
tion of his sorrow, which he expected, must have been by the
very nature of his hope contingent on his restoration to the
presence of his son, which he so ardently desired.
In 2 Sam. xii. 22, we read, David said, " While the child was
yet alive, I fasted and wept : for I said. Who can tell whether
God will be gracious to me, that the child may live ? But now
he is dead, wherefore should I fast? Can I bring him back
again ? I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me." If
the expected consolation of David arose from the prospect of his
being buried in the earth with the body of his child, we absurdly
suppose his extracting consolation from what was essentially and
wholly the cause of his distress. What was the spring of David's
sorrow ? Plainly, separation from this child. What could com-
fort him under such sorrow ? Clearly, reunion with, and recogni-
tion of, his child. David cherished the hope, and has furnished,
in his language, satisfactory evidence that he, too, believed that
the nightless land would be the land of reunion, restoration,
recognition.
Again, we read in Jer. xxxi. 15 : " Thus saith the Lord, A
voice was heard in Ramah, lamentation, and bitter weeping;
Rachel weeping for her children refused to be comforted for her
children, because they were not. Thus saith the Lord : Refrain
232 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
thy voice from weeping, and thine eyes from tears : for thy work
shall be rewarded, saith the Lord; and they shall come again
from the land of the enemy/ ^ This prophecy is declared to have
been fulfilled in the slaughter of the children of Bethlehem, and
in the weeping of Rachel for her offspring. The dead infants
are represented by the prophet as captives in the realms of death :
their resurrection is set forth as the restoration to their bereaved
mothers ; and this hope, which implies their mutual recognition,
is declared to be their sustaining comfort.
In Matt. viii. 11, we read, ^' Many shall come from the east
and west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob,
in the kingdom of heaven.^' What is here the distingilishing
element of the happiness promised by our Lord ? Surely it is
the enjoyment of the presence, and the recognition of the per-
sons, of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. If we fail to know them,
we shall have no proof that the promise is fulfilled, nor any in-
crease of satisfaction and delight from the fact that such will be
our sublime companionship. Can we for one moment suppose
that Abraham will be seated with his son amid the brightness of
unclouded glory, and yet fail to recognise him ? or that Isaac will
be seated in the presence of his father, and the father of the faith-
ful, and regard him merely as a stranger ?
In Matt. xvii. 1, it is written, " And after six days Jesus taketh
Peter, James, and John his brother, and bringeth them up into
an high mountain apart, and was transfigured before them, and
his face did shine as the sun, and his raiment was white as the
light; and behold, there appeared unto them Moses and Elias
talking with him. Then answered Peter, and said unto Jesus,
Lord, it is good for us to be here ; if thou wilt, let us make here
three tabernacles, one for thee, and one for Moses, and one for
Elias." Plainly, Moses and Elias knew each other; the disci-
ples, as plainly, knew and distinguished them as pointed out to
them : and thus the essential identity of their persons in the
resurrection state with their persons in their earthly state is
clearly indicated. In Matt. xix. 28, it is written, "And Jesus
said unto them. Verily I say unto you, that ye which have followed
me in the regeneration, when the Son of Man shall sit in the
throne of his glory, ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging
RECOGNITION IN THE AGE TO COME. 283
the twelve tribes of Israel." We cannot conceive any fulfilment
of this promise, except in the apostle recognising the tribes, and
the tribes the apostles, and the apostles each other, in the age to
come.
In Matt. XXV. 40, we find these words : " And the king shall
answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as
ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye
have done it unto me.'' These words suppose the actual presence
of all the recipients of the bounties bestowed in the name of
Christ by the saints of God. They also imply the recognition of
them as such recipients in the past ; and the judgment is the
manifestation and the evidence of such deeds before an assembled
world. In Luke xvi. 9, we read : " Make to yourselves friends
of the mammon of unrighteousness, that when ye fail they may
receive you into everlasting habitations.'' Riches are here called
the mammon of unrighteousness, from the manner in which they
are too frequently employed ; and the exhortation of our Lord
impresses the duty of consecrating to holy and beneficent ends those
elements of power which are too frequently prostituted to the
worst of purposes : and the words of our Lord plainly imply that
the objects of the compassion and the beneficence of the people of
God — the naked they clothed, and the hungry they fed, and the
ignorant they taught the lessons of the gospel — having preceded
them to glory, will stand at the gates of the New Jerusalem and
welcome them within, honouring them as the instruments of good,
while they give all the glory "unto Him that loved them and
washed them in His blood, and made them kings and priests
unto God."
In Luke xvi. 22, we read as follows : " And it came to pass
that the beggar died and was carried by the angels into Abra-
ham's bosom : the rich man also died and was buried ; and in
hell he lifted up his eyes, being in torment, and seeth Abraham
afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom." From this it is plain that
the rich man recognised in the light of the other world the poor
beggar whose person he recollected to have often seen at his
gates ; and felt fulfilled in his bitter experience that awful pre-
diction of our Lord, " There shall be weeping and gnashing of
teeth, when ye shall see Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and all
20*
234 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
the prophets, in the kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust
out/' In Col. i. 28, we read : "Whom we preach, warning every
man, and teaching every man in all wisdom, that we may present
every man perfect in Christ Jesus.'' These words represent the
minister of the gospel as presenting the members of his flock at
the judgment-day, as trophies of the grace of God, and evidences
of the faithfulness and efficiency of his instrumentality in build-
ing up the temple of the Lord ', and this view is confirmed by the
words of Paul in 1 Thess. ii. 19 : "For what is our hope, or joy,
or crown of rejoicing? are not even ye in the presence of our
Lord Jesus Christ at his coming?" — language which certainly
implies that the minister will recognise the flock, and the flock
the minister. In 1 Thess. iv. 13, we read these beautiful and
consolatory words : " But I would not have you ignorant, bre-
ren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not even
as others which have no hope : for if we believe that Jesus died
and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God
bring with him. For this we say unto you by the word of the
Lord, That we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the
Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep ; for the Lord him-
self shall descend from heaven with a shout, and with the voice
of the archangel and the trump of God, and the dead in Christ
shall rise first. Then we which are alive and remain shall be
caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in
the air, and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore, com-
fort one another with these words."
The subject on which comfort is here required, is the death or
removal of beloved friends and relatives. The consolation specially
announced is not the resurrection, but the reunion of departed
friends, and the restoration of suspended or interrupted inter-
course. The apostle proceeds upon the supposition that the
resurrection is an admitted fact; and shows that there will be
superadded to that resurrection this special consolation, viz. the
recognition of our risen relatives and friends. Were some beloved
relative, or child, or parent, about to depart to a distant land,
would it be sufficient comfort to tell you that you also would bo
carried there in due time, but to a different part of that beautiful
land ; so that while you would be aware that your beloved ones
RECOGNITION IN THE AGE TO COME. 235
were on its face, yet you could neither see nor hold communion
with them ? This would be dispersion, not gathering together.
There would be no comfort in this. The real comfort would be
the prospect of reunion; and the summons not to sorrow, and
the promise that you would be taken there, would all imply the
restoration of the fellowship, and the recognition of the persons
of those you loved below.
Bishop Mant says, " When we reflect on the pleasure imparted,
to our minds of being admitted, after long separation, to the
society of those we have known and loved from early years, and
from the special delight we experience in renewing, in com-
munion with them, old but dormant affection, retracing in con-
verse events and scenes gone by — a delight which the formation
of no new acquaintance is capable of conferring — it is probable
that among future associations, as constituents of the happiness
of the blest, those they have formerly loved and cherished will
be comprehended." The universality of this hope in every age
of the world is presumptive evidence in its favour.
It is no objection, that, every seven years, every constituent
part of the human body is dislodged and changed. Great trans-
formations pass on mind and body together in the lapse of years;
but there are certain fixed points in the one, and permanent
features in the organization of the other, which are ineffaceable
by change, by climate, or by age. You meet a person you have
not seen for twenty years ; you fail, at first, to recognise him :
you gaze a little longer ; the vail of the stranger passes off like a
cloud, and you recognise the companion of your earlier days.
Peter, John, and Luke will be as marked in glory as they were
in grace : the distinctive idiosyncracy of each was not destroyed
by inspiration, and it will not be extinguished in glorification.
Nor can we listen to the objection, that our certainty of miss-
ing before the throne some whom we expected to find there,
will, if earthly recollections be retained, mar the perfect felicity
of the blest. Such an objection is purely speculative ; natural
enough, but not suitable for our minds to entertain. This only
we know — that our wills and convictions shall be brought so en-
tirely into unison with God's glory, and purposes, and will, that
no fact, recollected or seen, will diminish our joy, or create a
236 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
momentary pang. "We see Christians in this world acquiesce in
the will of God when that will is singularly painful. This is an
earnest and approximation here to what will be hereafter : our
conclusion in the New Jerusalem will be, "He hath done all
things well."
What deligbt will it be to meet Adam and Eve, Noah and
Abraham, the good and the great, the pure of heart, and the holy
of purpose, and converse with them on scenes and transactions in
which they played, all so momentous, and many so brilliant a
part ; when the chasms of history shall be filled up, and its per-
plexities unravelled, and its diflSculties explained, and night rolled
away from the long and then luminous chain that extends from
the first man to his last descendant upon earth, and from our first
conviction to our final joy !
Such a prospect should influence us in the formation of our
friendships upon earth. We ought to seek the circle of our
friends in the circle of Christians. We should found our friend-
ship, not mainly on identity of taste or pursuit, but mainly on
Christian character. Baxter says, '^ The expectation of loving
my friends hereafter, principally kindles my love to them on
earth. If I thought I should never know them, and consequently
never love them, after this life is ended, I should number them
with temporal things, and love them as such ; but I now converse
with pious friends, in a firm persuasion that I shall converse with
them for ever. I take comfort in the loss of the dead or absent,
believing I shall shortly meet them in heaven."
This expectation should also influence yet nearer and dearer
relationships. "Be not ye unequally yoked with unbelievers,"
is an exhortation that extends its echoes far beyond the grave.
To such your adieu at death is an eternal one ; no present rank
is an equivalent for such a calamity — no advancement of worldly
interest can prove a compensation for the blasting of bright hopes,
and the poisoning of mental peace, still less for the agony of end-
less separation.
This prospect should make Christians labour for the conversion
of their immediate relatives, " warning every man, and teaching
every man, that we may present every man perfect in Christ
Jesus/' Next to the salvation of our own souls is the duty of
RECOGNITION IN THE AGE TO COME. 237
saving the souls of our relatives ; and if we are the saints of God,
we shall feel this duty to be pleasure and privilege together.
How fitted is this prospect to help us to live in concord, unity,
and peace with all that love the Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity
and truth ! The expectation of meeting in the future those we
disputed with on earth, should lead us to feel less bitterness and
alienation of spirit, and to speak in less acrimonious and un-
brotherly words; to attach less weight to minor differences, and
to give weightier expression to our common love, and life, and
truth. It is " the night'^ that blinds our eyes to the excellences
of a brother, distorts his faults, and dims our perception of our
own ; and when that night shall be rolled away, we shall see with
amazement, if not with regret, how hollow and insignificant were
the questions about which we spoke so often unadvisedly with our
lips, and how weighty were the truths and bonds which we valued
highly in our hearts, but sinfully failed to express and glory in,
in our intercourse with each other !
It becomes us, in such prospects, to wean our affections more
and more from things now seen. We love the town, the village,
the city, in which dear friends dwell, for the sake of the inhabit-
ants. These are day after day being separated the one from the
other, and all from us : they precede us to take possession of the
"rest," and to preoccupy the New Jerusalem. Hence each
spot loses daily its charm, each early home every year its attrac-
tions : the present becomes more blank, the future grows in our
estimate, as it is peopled with the objects of our love. Let our
heart and our treasure be in heaven. "Now are we the sons of
God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be ; but we know
that when He shall appear, we shall be like him, for we shall see
him as he is ; and every man that hath this hope in him, purifieth
himself even as He is pure.^'
" A few short years of evil past,
We reach the happy shore,
Where death-divided friends at last
Shall meet to part no more."
238
LECTURE XVIII.
FAITHFUL AND TRUE SAYINGS.
"And he said unto me, These sayings are faithful and true: and the Lord
God of the holy prophets sent his angel to show unto his servants the things
which must shortly be done." — Revelation xxii. 6.
This book closes, as it began, with solemn attestations to the
truth and grandeur of the theme with which it is replete. The
first ten verses embody the attestation and evidence of its inspi-
ration; from the tenth to the sixteenth verse, we are presented
with encouragement to study and to understand it ; and in the
remainder of the chapter, the Apocalypse, and, perhaps, the
whole New Testament, is guarded from substraction, addition, or
mutilation. In this verse, it is plainly the same angel that
speaks, who made the revelations that precede. If it should be
asked why angels are employed in so great and responsible an
office, we answer, God works by means and ministers in this dis-
pensation. The laws of creation — winds, and rains, and sun-
beams — as well as the angels whom he commissions from his
throne, are the agents of his purposes, as well as ministering
spirits to the heirs of salvation. An angel was employed to
smite the hosts of Sennacherib ; and another was commissioned
to breathe in the face of the first-born of Pharaoh ; and on this
occasion, another angel is commissioned to talk with John and
show him the things which must shortly come to pass. In any
ease, God can work with, or without, or above, or against means.
But he is not less glorious in power when he is pleased to work
by means. The testimony which is here enunciated — viz. "These
sayings are faithful and true" — is given, no doubt, lest the very
magnificence and splendour of the vision of the New Jerusalem,
and the glory in which it lies, should appear too dazzling to the
ordinary eye, and provoke skeptical rejection where cordial ac-
FAITHFUL AND TRUE SAYINGS. 239
ceptance was designed by the Spirit of God, or lest it should
appear too good to be thought true. Christ himself is called
^' Faithful and True ;'' the gospel also is elsewhere called the
'^faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptance. ^^ Christ is the
gospel personated, and the gospel is Christ unfolded.
The heathen oracles of old were full of equivocation and false-
hood ; they gave forth their responses only to deceive : but these
sayings are true as Christianity itself, and worthy of acceptance
as the oracles that contain them. Are not these sayings faith-
ful? — "Unto Him that loved us, and washed us in his blood,
and made us kings and priests unto God, even the Father, be
glory!" No less faithful and true is the saying, "Be faithful
unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life.^^ Faithful,
also, and worthy of adoption as our song, is this saying: "Great
and marvellous are thy works. Lord God Almighty: just and
true are thy ways, thou king of saints. Who shall not fear
thee, and glorify thy name? For thou only art holy." And
again: "Blessed are the dead from henceforth which die in the
Lord; for they rest from their labours, and their works do fol-
low them." The present condition of the seven churches of Asia
answering to the prediction pronounced many years before ; the
reward, or punishment, alighting upon each as God had declared
it; the woes enunciated in the seven trumpets, let loose from the
seals, and poured out from the vials, have all fallen at the
appointed time, and proved to the most incredulous, that the
sayings of God are faithful and true. And ever as the prophe-
cies effloresce into performances, the evidence of the faithfulness
and truth of these sayings becomes more and more vivid. The
rush of time, which wastes and weakens all earthly things,
brightens and brings out the sayings of this book. Man's works
die : God's words endure for ever. All man calls great, perishes :
all that God pronounces true, abides. We must build little on
the one — we may rear the superstructure of our eternal hopes
upon the other. What is true of the sayings of this book, is
no less true of the whole word of God. The state of the de-
scendants of Shem, Ham, Japhet, and Ishmael, as verified by
facts obvious to the world — the molten bricks and desolate ruins
of Babylon, where the nettle and the brier grow undisturbed,
240 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
and the cry of the screech-owl and the wild beast is heard —
Tyre, with its rocks, on which the fishermen spread their nets —
Jerusalem, in which every nation except the Jew has a home —
the Jews themselves, trembling and scorned fugitives in all lands
— are the fulfilment of prophecy, the performance of promises,
the evidence that God's sayings are faithful and true. How
satisfying is this fact ! We rest our knowledge of the unseen,
our hopes of the future, our acceptance with God, our sense
of safety, not upon the wavering results of conjecture, proba-
bility, or human syllogisms, but upon the everlasting word, the
faithful and true sayings of God. Our religion is not a result
which man reasons out, but a revelation which God makes known.
It is not a discovery made by man, which man can expand, but
a revelation that comes down from heaven, which man can neither
add to nor may subtract from. Let us be thankful for that
blessed book which contains these sayings of God — that book
which has changed the aspect of the world, and left upon the
current of the ages impressions that can only be effaced by the
last flame. It is still the breath of the good, the joy of the
pious, the hope of the desponding. It has exalted the poor,
broken the shackles of the slave, dotted the wide earth with
temples like the sky with stars, arched the tombs of the dead
with the rainbow of hope, and made the paths of the pious liviug
more smooth and beautiful. It has turned the war-whoop of the
savage into the voice of psalms, and supplanted the clang of bat-
tle and the confused noise of war by the chimes of mercy and of
peace. Each of these sayings is a precious pearl, and the Bible
is the sea whose floor is covered with them ; and he that dives
deepest and oftenest, brings up the greatest number to the light
of day.
It is added, "The Lord God of the holy prophets sent his
angel to show unto his servants the things which must shortly
come to pass.'* The Lord God of the prophets is none else than
the Lord Jesus Christ, as is plain from the 16th verse of this
same chapter: "I, Jesus, have sent mine angel to testify unto
you these things in the churches. I am the root and the off-
spring of David, the bright and morning star." And were
there no other evidence, this alone would prove the supreme
FAITHFUL AND TRUE SAYINGS. 241
divinity of him who is throughout the Apocalypse the object
of ceaseless praises, the burden of a thousand songs, the focus
of uncreated glory. But he is not only the author, but the sub-
ject also of all prophecy. Moses spake of him ; Isaiah predicted
him; and all prophets, from the beginning to the end, derive
their light from that Sun of whom they spake. And whether
they delineate the Man of Sorrows, or the Prophet, or the
Mighty Grod, or the King of kings, Jesus is still the object and
the subject of all. This angel sent by Jesus was evidently one
of the most exalted of the heavenly hierarchy, as John is repre-
sented, in one of the verses that follow, to have been so over-
powered by the glory of his person, that he fell down to worship
him. Indeed, if that angel had been possessed of no lustre
of his own, the message which he came to deliver would have
clothed him with supernatural glory. It is also stated that the
message was sent by Jesus to show unto his servants the things
that must shortly be done. Like the whole Bible, this book was
not sent to the priest, or the church, or the minister, to be doled
out at their discretion to the people ; but it is addressed directly
to the laity, or the servants of God. The Bible is their lamp,
and charter, and sword; it is their privilege to hear Christ speak
in the Scriptures in his own blessed voice, and not in spent
echoes, diluted and confused by man.
The things here specially made known are declared to be
those "that must shortly come to pass." Each age has its
peculiar events; and each generation of the servants of God,
the special things for which they are to look. In the first cen-
tury, the things that were shortly to come to pass were the
destruction of Jerusalem, the dispersion of the apostles, the
spread of Christianity, the rise and development of the Apostasy,
and the escape of the true church into the wilderness, where she
was to be, " time, times, and half a time." Next, history of the
witnesses, their duties and trials, and encouragements, and ulti-
mate deliverance. Afterward, the Reformation, with its reap-
pearing sun, and its attendant stars, and its glorious results;
and after this, the pouring out of the vials, extending from the
French Eevolution of the eighteenth century onward to the
seventh vial, the first sprinklings of which seem to have fallen
SECOND SERIES. 21
242 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
on the nations of Europe, and the first response to which are the
revolutions which now convulse it to its centre. Plainly, there-
fore, it is the office of the Spirit of God to reveal, not only things
past, and obligations present, but things also to come. In fact,
the Holy Spirit is expressly promised in the Gospel according to
St. John, (xvi. 13,) in these words: ''When he, the Spirit
of truth, is come, he will guide you unto all truth; for he shall
not speak of himself, but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he
speak; and he will show you things to come." The Sun of
llighteousness shines on the past, the present, and the future,
and makes all luminous to his people. We are to gather facts
from the past; duties, privileges, responsibilities from the pre-
sent; joys, consolations, and hopes from the future. It is natural
to desire to know something of the nature of the things to come :
it is scriptural to gratify this desire as far as God has revealed it.
We feel, and see, and hear ruin in creation, sin in the world,
weakness in the church, strength and progress in Antichrist. Is
it not natural to"*ask. Is creation to wear its weeds of sorrow for
ever? Is sin still to mar what was holy and beautiful? Is the
church to be for ever weak, and Antichrist to grow still strong ?
''Secret things," you say, "belong unto the Lord." Truly so;
but "things revealed belong to us and our children." If voices
come sounding from the future, is it not our duty to listen to
them? If the hand of God has drawn aside a portion of the
mystic vail that has curtained things to come from our view, is
it not our privilege to look and learn? If sagacious politicians
guess what shall be, and curious crowds receive their conjectures
with respect, and often with awe, shall we not accept those
"faithful and true sayings," significant of things to come, which
God has caused to be written for our learning, on whom the ends
of the world have come? What the Lord God of the holy
prophets saw it to be for his glory to reveal, the most gifted
of his servants must not think it inconsistent with his duty to
study, or beyond his reach to understand. "Behold, I come
quickly," is one of the sayings announced in this verse: accu-
mulating ages serve only to charge this word "quickly," with
accumulating interest. "I come quickly" has an emphasis to-
day which will increase with to-morrow, until it ceases to be
FAITHFUL AND TRUE SAYINGS. 243
prophecy, and is seen actualized in the sight of all mankind.
This advent of our Lord is constantly set before us as the great
hope of his church: he shall "come in his own glory;'' and
again, "When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall
we also appear with him in glory." "Behold, he coraeth with
clouds;" as "a thief in the night," so softly; "as the lightning
from the east," so brilliantly; "in flaming fire, taking vengeance on
them that know not God, and obey not the gospel of his Son,;*'^
so awfully; "to be glorified in his saints, to be admired in them
that believe," so joyfully; and "every eye shall see him, and
they that pierced him," But may we not ask, "Who may
abide the day of his coming? who shall stand when he appear-
eth?" Who? let me ask: Shall the infidel? His is not want
of light in the head, but want of love in the heart. " He that
believeth not is condemned already." Such a one will himself
admit, that if these sayings be faithful and true, he cannot stand.
Shall the worldling, he who lives for the world, and in, and
of the world, to increase his wealth — who exists as a mere pin
or wheel in the "money-power;" — a member of the aristocracy
of mammon — the friend of the world, and therefore the enemy
of God ? Shall the profligate sinner, " whose god is his belly,
whose glory is his shame, who minds earthly things" — whose
passion is the "lust of the eye" — whose glory is "the pride
of life" — whose element is "the lust of the flesh?" Such shall
not enter into the kingdom of God. Shall the hypocrite ? he
who has stood the scrutiny and earned the plaudits of mankind —
whose form of godliness has had currency on earth as if it were
the power — who has had a name to live by and has lived by it
though he be dead — he has already received his reward. Our
Lord has pronounced the wo which he has provoked: these
"shall cry to the rocks, Hide us," and they shall perish as chaff
before the whirlwind : " the ungodly shall not stand in the judg-
ment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous; for the
Lord knoweth the way of the righteous; but the way of the
ungodly shall perish,"
Is the promise of His coming music to your heart ? Do the
signs and portents of approaching events which cast their shadows
before, lead you to lift up your heads under the blessed assuranca
^M- APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
that "your redemption drawetli nigh ?'^ '^Blessed is he/' it i*
added, '^ who keepeth the sayings of the prophecy of this book/'
Such keep them in their memory ', sanctified by the Spirit of God,
it becomes the storehouse of divine truths, the safeguard of pre-
cious sayings. They keep them also in their hearts. " I have
hid thy word in my heart, that I offend not thee." They keep
them, too, as a precious treasure, as " apples of gold in network of
silver," defending them against all who would rob them of that
which is to them more precious than gold. These are blessed in
their souls. Peace is within them, and hope before them ; and
the blessing that maketh rich upon all they touch. They are
blessed in their trials, for all things work together for good to
them; and ''their light afflictions, which are but for a moment,
work out for them a far more exceeding, even an eternal weight
of glory ; while they look mDt at the things which are seen, but
at the things which are unseen." They are blessed in their mer-
cies, for Grod himself has promised, "I will bless thy bread."
They are blessed in their labour, for it is promised, " Thou shalt
eat of the fruit of thy labour." The blessing is on them in time
of trouble, for they possess their souls in patience, and are kept
from despair. It rests upon them also in the more perilous times
of prosperity, for they are kept from presumption and forgetting
Grod. Deut. xxviii. 1—15 is all realized in their experience.
"And it shall come to pass, if thou shalt hearken diligently unto
the voice of the Lord thy Grod, to observe and to do all his com-
mandments which I command thee this day, that the Lord thy
God will set thee on high above all nations of the earth. And
all these blessings shall come on thee, and overtake thee, if thou
shalt hearken unto the voice of the Lord thy God. Blessed shalt
thou be in the city, and blessed shalt thou be in the field. Bless-
ed shall be the fruit of thy body, and the fruit of thy ground,
and the fruit of thy cattle, the increase of thy kine, and the
flocks of thy sheep. Blessed shall be thy basket and thy store.
Blessed shalt thou be when thou comest in, and blessed shalt
thou be when thou goest out. The Lord shall cause thine enemies
that rise up against thee to be smitten before thy face : they shall
come out against thee one way, and flee before thee seven ways.
The Lord shall command the blessing upon thee in thy store-
FAITHFUL AND TRUE SAYINGS. 245
houses, and in all that thou settest thine hand unto : and he shall
bless thee in the land which the Lord thy Grod giveth thee. The
Lord shall establish thee an holy people unto himself, as he hath
sworn unto thee, if thou shalt keep the commandments of the
Lord thy Grod, and walk in his ways. And all people of the
earth shall see that thou art called by the name of the Lord, and
they shall be afraid of thee. And the Lord shall make thee
plenteous in goods, in the fruit of thy body, in the fruit of
thy cattle, and in the fruit of thy ground, in the land which
the Lord sware unto thy fathers to give thee. The Lord shall
open unto thee his good treasures, the heaven to give the rain
unto thy land in his season, and to bless all the work of thine
hand; and thou shalt lend unto many nations, and thou shalt not
borrow. And the Lord shall make thee the head, and not the
tail; and thou shalt be above only, and thou shalt not be beneath ;
if that thou hearken unto the commandments of the Lord thy
God, which I command thee this day to observe and to do them :
and thou shalt not go aside from any of the words which I com-
mand thee this day, to the right hand or to the left, to go after
other gods to serve them. But it shall come to pass, if thou wilt
not hearken unto the voice of the Lord thy God, to observe to
do all his commandments and his statutes which I command
thee this day, that all these curses shall come upon thee and over-
take thee." May this be our blessing also !
21*
246
LECTURE XIX.
ROMISH WORSHIP.
"And I John saw all these things, and heard them ; and when I had hoard
and seen, I fell down to worship before the feet of the angel which showed vuo
these things. Then saith he unto me. See thou do it not, for I am thy fellow-
servant, and of thy brethren the prophets, and of them which keep the sayings
of this book." — Revelation xxii. 8, 9.
This angel must have been clothed with unearthly glory.
The beams and coruscations which radiated from him so dazzled
and bewildered the seer, that he concluded it was the same being
who appeared in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks, our
High-Priest and Saviour, and accordingly fell down to worship
him. It is evident he did not give the adoration, but it is just as
evident that he intended to do so. Some think that this, like
many other acts recorded in the Apocalypse, was purely symbolic,
and that John personated another on this occasion. It may be
so. We have an instance of this in Rev. x. 4 : "I was about to
write, and he said unto me, Write them not ;" in which scene,
as I have shown in previous lectures, John represented Luther
at the era of the Reformation. So in Acts x. 9-15, we find
Peter used to personate the Jew : "Peter went up upon the house-
top to pray about the sixth hour, and he became very hungry
and would have eaten ; but while they made ready he fell into a
trance and saw heaven opened, and a certain vessel descending
unto him, as it had been a great sheet, knit at the four corners,
and let down to the earth, wherein were all manner of four-footed
beasts of the earth, and wild beasts, and creeping things, and
fowls of the air. And there came a voice to him — Rise, Peter,
kill and eat. But Peter said. Not so, Lord, for I have never
eaten any thing that is common or unclean. And the voice spake
unto him again the second time, What God hath cleansed, that
ROMISH WORSHIP. 247
call not thou common." But in whatever light we may regard
this scene in the Apocalyptic drama, we gather this conclusion,
that it is unlawful to give religious worship to saint or angel, or
any other creature in heaven or earth, however exalted ; and that
the Church of Rome sins grievously, if not fatally, in giving it.
The Council of Trent has come to a conclusion opposite to that
of Scripture; for it has decided that "it is good and useful to in-
voke in prayer the saints reigning with Christ, and to have re-
course to their prayers and aid :" a decision which is repeated in
the creed of Pope Pius IV., and carried out in all its details in
the practical worship of the Roman Catholic communion. If
praying to saints or angels be so useful as the Council of Trent
alleges, it is, to say the very least, exceedingly strange that the
apostles never discovered it, and that the Old and New Testament
give nothing like a hint either on the usefulness, the principle, or
the expediency of it. Roman Catholics, however, allege that
Scripture sanctions this practice. Let us weigh with respect and
candour the evidences which they quote. Luke xv. 10 is a fa-
vourite appeal: "Likewise I say unto you, there is joy in the
presence of the angels of God over one sinner that repenteth."
But this does not, surely, prove that angels hear us when we pray ;
or, if they know what is transacted upon earth, it does not prove
that they acquire such knowledge directly by the inherent excel-
lency of their nature. On the contrary, a comprehensive view of
the language of our Lord in this beautiful chapter proves the
fact to be just the reverse of that which the Romanist assumes.
The shepherd tells his friends and neighbours, who are otherwise
ignorant, "Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which
was lost." The woman " calls her friends and neighbours toge-
ther, saying," (what was news to them,) " Rejoice with me, for I
have found the piece which I had lost." "Likewise," adds our
Lord, that is, after the same manner, Grod tells the angels that a
lost sinner is found, and a hardened sinner repenteth; and they,
receiving the intelligence, rejoice.
Rev. V. 8 is also quoted by Romish divines, as evidence con-
firmatory of the worship of angels : " And when he had taken
the book, the four beasts and four and twenty elders fell down
before the I^amb, having every one of them harps, and golden
248 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
vials full of odours, which are the prayers of saints." First, let
it be observed, that if these be angels, and if it can be proved
that they here offer unto God the prayers of his people upon
earth, which they address to God, this would not prove that it
is lawful for us to pray to them. It is plainly, however, a vision
of the church or congregation of the saints in glory, and not of
angels; for angels cannot sing the new song which these living
ones are declared to sing, "Thou wast slain, and hast redeemed
us to God by thy blood, out of every kindred, and tongue, and
people, and nation, and hast made us unto our God kings and
priests ; and we shall reign on the earth." The prayers, in fact,
which they offer are their own prayers; they are described as
" the prayers of saints," or, literally translated, prayers of holy
ones, i. e. of themselves, the holy ones before the Lamb.
Rev. viii. 3 is another alleged evidence of the lawfulness of
angel worship : " And another angel came and stood at the altar,
having a golden censer; and there was given unto him much
incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all saints
upon the golden altar which was before the throne." The whole
scene, and the imagery with which it is clothed, proves that this
angel was the Angel of the Covenant, and not a creature. The
imagery is that of Christ, the High-Priest of his people. The
hi'gh-priest alone had a golden censer, aiid this would prove that
ChrisA is the personage here referred to. The high-priest alone
could oflficiate at the golden altar, as the angel does here ; and the
work assigned him, viz. to offer up the prayer of all saints in
heaven and earth, is confessedly such as Omnipotence alone
can do.
In Heb. i. 14 it is written, "Are they not all ministering
spirits, sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salva-
tion ?" This proves that angels minister to us, but does not fur-
nish the least evidence that we ought to pray to them. In Ps.
xci. 11, it is written, " He shall give his angels charge concern-
ing thee;" but he who is thus guarded does not pray to the angel,
but, on the contrary, is represented in verse 15 as praying ex-
clusively to God: ^^ He shall call upon me, and I will deliver
him."
Gen. xlviii. 15 is quoted as a proof that the patriarch sup-
ROMISH WORSHIP. 249
plicated an angel : '^ And he blessed Joseph, and said, God, be-
fore whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac did walk, the God
which fed me all my life long unto this day, the angel which
redeemed me from all evil, bless the lads;" but the most ordinary
reader must perceive that " the angel" is simply the expletive of
'^ the God which fed me ;" and this explanation is confirmed by
a reference to Hos. xii. 2 : ''The Lord hath a controversy with
Judah, and will punish Jacob according to his ways, according
to his doings will he recompense him. He took his brother by
the heel in the womb, and by his strength he had power with
God : yea, he had power over the angel, and prevailed ; he wept
and made supplication unto him ; he found him in Bethel, and
there he spake with us, even the Lord God of Hosts, the Lord
IS Ms memorial.^' This proves that the angel was the Angel of
the Covenant — Jehovah, the Lord God of the prophets.
Num. xxii. 31 is also quoted by the Romish Church as sanc-
tioning the invocation of angels: ''And the Lord opened the
eyes of Balaam, and he saw the angel of the Lord standing in
the way, and his sword drawn in his hand ; and he bowed down
his head and fell flat on his face." If this be an instance of the
worship the vindication of which is quoted, Balaam is surely not
a happy precedent ! But the truth is, bad as Balaam was, there
is no proof here that he worshipped the angel who appeared to
him ; for bowing and prostrating were acts of Eastern homage
totally disconnected with any thing like religious worship.
Another passage quoted in favour of this worship is Josh. v.
13 : " And it came to pass when Joshua was by Jericho, that he
lifted up his eyes and looked, and, behold, there stood a man over
against him, with his sword drawn in his hand ; and Joshua went
unto him, and said unto him. Art thou for us, or for our adver-
saries? And he said. Nay, but as captain of the host of the
Lord am I now come. And Joshua fell on his face to the earth,
and did worship, and said unto him, What saith my Lord unto
his servant? And the captain of the Lord's host said unto
Joshua, Loose thy shoe from off thy foot, for the place whereon
thou standest is holy. And Joshua did so." This was plainly
and undeniably religious worship; but the circumstances in
which it was given, prove that it was offered, not to a human,
250 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
but to a divine being. The Captain of the Lord's host is the
same who is elsewhere called the Captain of our salvation : the
leader of the Israelites — for such this angel was — is declared by
the apostle in 1 Cor. x. 9, to have been Christ: ^'Neither let
us tempt Christ, as some of them also tempted, and were de-
stroyed of serpents. '^ And the peculiar language, "Loose thy
shoe from off thy foot,'' is the same language which was address-
ed to Moses from the burning bush, by him who is expressly
called Jehovah. Not one, therefore, of the passages alleged,
proves that the worship rendered by the Church of Rome to
saints and angels has any warrant or precedent in the word of
God.
The presumptive disproofs of the propriety of the worship of
the Church of Rome are as numerous as they are conclusive.
One flashes from the face of the Decalogue itself: " I am the
Lord thy God which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt,
out of the house of bondage : thou shalt have no other gods be-
fore me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or
any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the
earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth ; thou shalt
not bow down thyself to them nor serve them."
It may be asked how the Roman Catholic Church continues to
escape the force of so decided a prohibition. She meets it in
her worship by keeping it from the eyes of the people, and in
her popular teaching by banishing it from the schools and cate-
chisms of the young.
It is also written. Matt. iv. 10, " Thou shall worship the Lord
thy God, and him only shalt thou serve ;" on which the Romanist
remarks, that only modifies serve, but not worship. If so, Satan
would have said. Worship God and me, but serve God alone : what
Satan required was worship — what the Saviour reprobated in his
answer was the worship of any creature, which was what he de-
manded. If the pope's explanation of the answer were the right
one, Satan might well reply, This is no reason at all for your not
worshipping me
In Col. ii. 18 we read, "Let no man beguile you of your re-
ward, in a voluntary humility and worshipping of angels, intrud-
ing into those things which h3 hath not seen, vainly puffed up by
ROMISH WORSHIP. 251
his fleshly mind : not holding the Head." Thus/ under the pre-
text of humility, was originally introduced, and is still upheld,
the worship of angels : a worship which, the apostle alleges, in-
volves the not holding of the headship of Christ. These last
words have been frequently quoted, most absurdly, to prove that
Christ is the head of visible churches, bishops, or synods, and
that these are the members of his body, which transmit his life
and his will to the remotest extremes of those ecclesiastical sys-
tems to which they profess to belong. But in this passage Christ
is represented as the head of the spiritual church, " the elect ac-
cording to grace,'' and them alone ; so much so that each saint,
as a living member of the body of Christ, derives life and energy
from Christ his glorious head : and so intimate is that union and
communion, that to interpose angel or saint by way of mediator
between the believer and his Lord, is to cut off the connection
that subsists between them, and to plant an obstructing element
in that channel along which life and holiness and happiness per-
petually flow.
In Acts X. 25 we have this practice reprobated in the strongest
terms by an apostle who, as Romanists allege, was the first pope
or bishop of Rome: "And as Peter was coming in, Cornelius
met him, and fell down at his feet and worshipped him. But
Peter took him up, saying, Stand up; I myself also am a man.''
In Acts xiv. 13, a similar attempt is reprobated by two
apostles in the strongest manner : " Then the priest of Jupiter
which was before their city, brought oxen and garlands unto the
gates, and would have done sacrifice with the people ; which when
the apostles Barnabas and Paul heard of, they rent their clothes
and ran in among the people, crying out, and saying, Sirs, why
do ye these things ? We also are men with like passions with
you, and preach unto you that ye should turn from these vanities
unto the living God, which made heaven and earth, and the sea,
and all things that are therein." And if we require a prohibi-
tion of such worship, strong as language could convey, we have
only to refer to the text. The Romanist alleges that John thought
the angel was Christ; but if he was rebuked for attempting to
worship Christ under the appearance of an angel, much more may
we suppose would he have been rebuked for worshipping an angel
252 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
as such. It is also alleged by the champions of angel worship,
that this angel refused what was really due to him out of reverence
to Christ; an explanation which implies the absurd supposition
that the angel passed a compliment to the Saviour^ and repudiated
the offer from courtesy, and for no other reason. Another expla-
nation has been given, to the effect that the angel refused it from
the beloved disciple, but would have accepted it from any other
apostle ; but the reason assigned "by the angel is applicable to any
and every apostle. Bellarmine gives the boldest solution of all, .
namely, " If St. John thought him to be an angel, and yet wor-
shipped him, why are we reproached for doing what John did ?
Do Protestants know better than St. John whether angels are to
be worshipped V ( De Sant. lib. i. c. 14, p. 406.) We answer,
John did not worship him : and we too ask a question. Do Ro-
manists know better than the angels, who expressly forbade it ?
The last and most summary treatment of the text is contained in
one of the popular Roman Catholic catechisms, where, among
reasons assigned for the worship of angels, the words are given,
" I fell down at his feet to adore before him,'^ and the succeeding
words, " See thou do it not," are wholly omitted. We cannot but
notice, in reverting to this prohibition, that the sin rashly and
ignorantly attempted, is twice forbidden in terms of great vehe-
mence, and on the ground that the loftiest angel is but a fellow-
creature with man, and that the worship of God only, and none
besides, is the duty of his rational offspring. In fact, the Romish
worship, as it would be easy to show from their most popular de-
votional works, is plainly the same as that which is reprobated by
the apostle in Rom. i. 21 : '^ Because that when they knew God,
they glorified him not as God, and changed the glory of the incor-
ruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and
changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served
the creature more than (or, as it should be translated, 'additional
to,' the preposition being -Kapa) the Creator, who is blessed for
ever. Amen."
One great safeguard from such antichristian worship is the free
and unrestricted circulation of Holy Scripture. Idolatry can never
stand in its light : the worship of the creature can have no place
where the word of God is well known : nearness to Christ will
ROMISH WORSHIP. 253
prevent any thing like undue homage to the creature. It is at a
distance from or in the absence of the sun, in deep ravines and
sequestered valleys rarely touched by his rays, that rank and
noxious vegetation abounds : just in proportion as we retreat from
a realizing sense of the presence and glory of Deity, do we ap-
proximate to an idolatrous worship of created beings. From the
commencement of Scripture to its close, prayer is always assumed
to be direct address to God ; as in that beautiful prescription,
" When ye pray, say, Our Father,"
A right apprehension of God in his paternal relationship to us
as our Father in Jesus Christ, and of our privilege to approach
him as such, would prevent the very possibility of saint or angel
worship. When we think of God only as a tyrant, we become
alarmed, and our terror projects a worship that needs the interpo-
sition of creatures to give us any hope of acceptance. He is not,
however, a remote and a hostile avenger, but a near and dear Fa-
ther. Therefore we will arise and go, not to saint, or angel, or
cherubim, but to Him who is better than all the host of heaven,
our Father ; and when he sees us even a great way off, he will
meet us and embrace us and welcome us home. But there is no
room for the intervention of angels in our approach to God. Sin
made a chasm between a holy heaven and a fallen earth : Christ,
the living way — God and man the perfect Mediator — spans and
unites together the opposing sides of that terrible gulf. As God,
he reaches the Father, being one with the Father, and can neither
admit nor require any one between him and his Father. As man,
he reaches the lowest of our race, is one with man, so that none
2an interpose between Him and us; from the depth, therefore,
into which sin has precipitated us, to the height to which grace
may lift us, we need none, and can receive none, additional to
Him who is all and in all — by whom the guiltiest may go to the
Father, and without whom the holiest cannot see him.
Our Saviour is not an imperfect Saviour : he is " able to save
to the uttermost all that come unto God by him, seeing he ever
liveth to make intercession for us.'' "Through him we have
access by one Spirit unto the Father," and " boldness to enter into
the holiest." He too is the Husband of his church. She is his
beloved bride : her application to any other for the blessings she
SECOND SERIES. 22
254 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
needs, would imply disunion and strife, not sympathy and love.
Christ, too, has issued his reiterated commands, "Come unto me,''
*^Ask in my name;" and the apostle tells us, "We have received
the spirit of adoption, whereby we cry," not "Ave Maria," but
"Abba, Father." The appearance of the sun puts out the stars; the
presence of the queen in the audience-chamber arrests all eyes.
" Whenever two or three are met in my name, there am I in the
midst of them." He is not absent; why seek to others ? He is
not distant ; why beg the introduction of others ? How can any
one angel hear ten thousand times ten thousand Roman Catholics,
as in the Missal, confessing at the same hour, "I confess to
blessed Mary, and to Michael the archangel V^ How can they
be sure that Michael is not engaged in some absorbing ministry,
or that Mary is not employed in worshipping before the throne ?
or, if perfectly disengaged, how can one creature, however ex-
alted, attend to the many wants of many men in many places of
the world? But such worship is below the dignity of man, fallen
and sinful as he is. He has none but God above him, and none
but God is worthy of the worship of his heart. Wlien we give
religious honour to an angel or a saint, we advance the creature
we worship above his proper level, and debase ourselves below
ours. Contact with the creature lowers ; communion witli God
ennobles. Let us not live in candlelight, if we have access to
sunshine. The greatest perfection of religion is nearness to God;
and the greatest barrier to the enjoyment of it is the acceptance
of a creature in his room. " Lord, to whom can we go but unto
thee?" "Thou hast the words of everlasting life." " There is
none other name under heaven given among men whereby wo can
be saved." " I am the way, the truth, and the life : no man
cometli to the Father but by me." I cannot accept the broken
cistern, while I am bidden to the fountain : I cannot take the
twinkling taper, while the Sun of Kighteousness shines in the
firmament. Saints and angels must all take their stand at the
bottom of the mount, while, like Abraham and Moses, I go up
and commune with God alone. Like the ascending eagle, I must
rivet my eye on no other luminary than the sun.
Having thus shown the unscriptural nature of any worship
rendered to angels or saints, or any created being, I now proceed
ROMISH WORSHIP. 255
to show — First, the object of true worship. Second, the nature
of the worship. Third, the place of worship. And lastly, the
times of worship.
The object of worship is God the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.
There is, however, a strong tendency in all our minds to give
shape to Deity, and to seek, or conceive, or make a visible and
tangible form in which to adore him. We are prone to feel, as
if to pray to the unseen God is to pray to nothing — as if in an
exhausted receiver, in which we could neither breathe, nor spread
the' wing, nor soar. So felt the Indian when he said, " How
shall I serve God without an image? Where shall I put the
flowers? Where shall I burn the incense?" The difference we
are to make is between an idea, and a conception of God. I have
an idea of electricity, but I have no conception of it as a shape.
Thus I can form an idea of God, but I cannot and may not che-
rish a conception of him. In the language of the Confession of
Faith, " There is but one only living and true God, who is infi-
nite in being and perfection; a most pure spirit, invisible, without
body, parts, or passions, immutable, immense, eternal, incompre-
hensible, almighty, most wise, most holy, most free, most abso-
lute, working all things according to the counsel of his immuta-
ble and most righteous will, for his own glory : most loving, gra-
cious, merciful, long-suffering, abundant in goodness and truth,
forgiving iniquity, transgression, and sin ; the rewarder of them
that diligently seek him, and withal most just and terrible in his
judgments, hating all sin, and who will by no means clear the
guilty." But it may be asked. Is not God manifest in the flesh ?
Truly so, but not to the eye, but to the mind ; not to the sight,
but to faith ; in the Bible, not in the world. Gather into one
focus all the scattered rays of the Son of God as these shine in
the sacred page, and you will find a height and depth, a breadth
and length, embracing the immense, and stretching into the ever-
lasting, which the pen of inspiration, not the pencil of man, could
portray. Moses makes a stroke, Malachi narrates a fact, Isaiah
predicts a feature, the Baptist describes a condition ; John de-
clares his Deity in the Apocalypse, and his humanity in the Gos-
pel ; and it is the combination and concentration of all, that con-
stitute the Christ. Hence, supposing pictures of the Saviour,
256 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
such as those of Rubens at Antwerp, and Yandyck at Malines,
and other acknowledged masterpieces, to be perfectly consistent
with the second commandment, they are all grievous failures
and blemishes, in my view. They are embodiments of human
suffering, but not portraits of Christ ; they are conjectural frag-
ments of agonized humanity, not authentic exhibitions of the
Saviour of sinners. They paint one crucified, but so were the
thieves — they paint outward sufferings, but not his inward agony
— the accursed tree, but not the curse of the law — Christ bearing
a cross, but not the sins of the world. As an ear, a lip, an eye,
even when accurate, are not pictures of me, so these portraits of
Christ, even if pictorially true, are but fragments; the inner, not
the outer man, is the Christ of God. His greatest sufferings
were invisible, his greatest agony was within. God manifest in
soul and body and spirit is my Lord ; and his Spirit alone has
faithfully portrayed him. But the great number of pretended
pictures of the Saviour are so bad, that one feels rising within
him all the iconoclastic passions of John Knox, when doomed to
look at them ; and when once a church has given way by admit-
ting such portraits in its interior, holy coats, and crowns of thorn,
and true wood of the cross, and nails, and reeds, and holy sponges,
follow in succession ; and, instead of nourishing devotion, we
shall only increase the profits of vendors of old stores ; and a
crucifix will soon attract the glory of the cross — sense will take
the place of faith, and a sensuous and superstitious worship will
be substituted for true devotion, and a meretricious drapery for
the beauty of holiness. Let spiritual worship be our ascending
incense, a holy life our sacred vestment, and sincerity and can-
dour the golden mitre on our brow. The object of our worship
is the Omnipresent, the Unseen, the Father who speaks to us by
his Son. Where is he ? It may rather be asked, Where is he
not ? ''0 Lord, thou hast searched me, and known me. Thou
knowest my down-sitting and mine up-rising : thou understandest
my thought afar off. Thou compassest my path, and my lying
down, and art acquainted with all my ways ; for there is not a
word in my tongue, but lo, Lord, thou knowest it altogether.
Thou hast beset me behind and before, and laid thine hand upon
me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me ; it is high, I can-
ROMISH WORSHIP. 257
not attain unto it. Whither shall I go from thy Spirit ? or whi-
ther shall I flee from thy presence ? If I ascend up into hea-
ven, thou art there : if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art
there. If I take the wings of the morning, and dwell in the
uttermost parts of the sea ; even there shall thy hand lead me,
and thy right hand shall hold me. If I say. Surely the darkness
shall cover me : even the night shall be light about me. Yea,
the darkness hideth not from thee ; but the night shineth as the
day : the darkness and the light are both alike to thee.'' Ps.
cxxxix. is an imperfect exhibition of His omnipresence ; he is in
the flowers of summer and the fruits of autumn ; in the snows
of winter, in our joys and our griefs, our falls and victories, in
the highways of the universe, and in the hidden by-paths of in-
dividual experience, covering creation with new glories, and re-
newing its tints on the petal of the minutest flower. He is nei-
ther the philosopher's idol, sculptured by intellect, nor the artist's
sentimental heau ideal, nor the Stoic's granite god, nor the Epi-
curean's sensuous idol, nor the Romanist's Madonna; but our
God, in whom we live, and move, and have our being ; to know
whom in Christ Jesus is to have everlasting life.
With respect to the nature of the worship, we observe that in
the New Testament there is prescribed no absolute form univer*
sally binding on true worshippers. The nearest approach to such
prescription is the Lord's prayer; yet in Matt. vi. 9, and in Luke
xi. 2, the introduction to it is varied by him that taught it : in the
former it is written, ^^ After this manner pray ye :" in the latter
it is written, "When ye pray, say." In one of the earliest
Christian writers, Justin Martyr, who died A. d. 165, extempo-
raneous prayer seems to be referred to as then the nature and
the shape of public Christian worship. He says, " The presid-
ing minister offers up prayer and thanksgiving, offt) hbyaiwz abzipj
i. e. as well as he was able, or, as explained by Tertullian, ex
jproprio ingenio. In the third, fourth, and fifth centuries, the
Lord's prayer was universally used as a part of the public wor-
ship of the church; and, as far as we can collect, the only fixed
and stated expressions that were used in public worship, from
the very earliest period of the Christian era, were Hosanna,
Hallelujah, Kbpte UseUov, Gloria Deo in excelsis, Pax vobiscum,
22*
258 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
and Amen. This last word, according to Justin Martyr, '.vas
pronounced by the whole congregation at the close of the minis-
ter's extemporaneous prayer. In the praises of the church, the
Psalms exclusively were used in the first three centuries, and
these were chanted. Chanting, I may add, is the adaptation
of man's music to God's word; whereas singing from a metrical
version is the adaptation of Grod's word to man's music. The
preponderance of the Psalms, and the partial use of suitable devo-
tional hymns, would seem to be the most reasonable usage. Or-
gans or instruments of music in the public worship of God were
not introduced till nine centuries after the birth of Christ; and
if you were to read the fervid protests made by the monks
against their introduction, you would suppose you were listening
to fierce Puritans or excited Covenanters. At praise, the early
Christians always stood : at prayer, they stood on Sundays, and
knelt on other days. And here I may suggest a primitive prac-
tice for the special benefit of the Tractarian divines, who seem
to have overlooked it; namely, that the hearers were in the habit
of testifying their approbation of the preacher's sentiment by
acclamation and stamping of their feet. During Chrysostom's
delivery of his homilies in the fourth century, the audience tossed
up their plumes and shouted, " Well done !"
Pomp and splendour seem foreign to the genius of the Chris-
tian worship. These tend to darken and diminish the real beauty
of evangelical worship, which, like that of the church itself,
should be within, and not without. God looks at the heart
rather than the ceremony; he accepts the worshipper before he
will receive the worship : the most fragrant incense may conceal
a carnal heart, and the most splendid temple may be but a mau-
soleum of the dead, and the richest outward ornament may be
only the embroidery of the shroud. When such ornament is
carried to excess, the worshipper comes to be more delighted
with the form than with the substance, and to look at the wor-
ship instead of Him worshipped. The ancient worship that was
accepted in the temple of old was from an altar of unhewn
stone.
The great requirement of worship is, " in spirit and in truth."
God permits us to bow the knee, or to lift the eye, or to adopt a
ROMISH WORSHIP. 259
form, but he insists on "in spirit and truth." He says, "My
son, give me" — not thine eye, thy knee, but — "thy heart."
Worship is not a performance for a man to be charmed with, oi
the eye and ear to admire, but the expression of deep wants, the
cry of broken hearts, the adoration of humble spirits. Nothing
in the language of prayer should attract attention to it; there
should be nothing in the music to make it take the place of the
praise. Music may be carried as a clothing of devotion to the
highest pitch : painting and poetry are intended to produce im-
pression on the mind from without; music is designed to be the
expression of the feelings of the overloaded heart from within.
This, however, must be our regulating recollection in all our
worship — viz. "in truth." It must not be offered for parade, or
ostentation, or eclat; nor to oblige God, or merit favours at his
hand: but in truth, and from deep feeling, inspired by the
Spirit, and presented through the Saviour, and accepted of the
Father.
Let us now look at the place of worship. It ought, say the
Romanists, to have a roof at the right angle, a crucifix on the
altar, and the bones of some saint beneath it. In the Tablet
newspaper there was inserted an advertisement, the other day,
from one who has discovered the skull of Thomas k Becket, for
a reliquary of gold in which to deposit it. How much wiser
the pope seems to be than God ! Of Moses it is written, God
buried him, and "no man knoweth of his sepulchre to this day."
The pope would have placed his remains in a consecrated urn, as
they wish to do with the pseudo-skull of the refractory Thomas
of Canterbury. A human skull without brains is a meet type
of the system which sets such value on it. The earliest name
given to the place of public worship was Kuptaxbv. The early
Christians boasted they had neither temple nor altar, and there-
fore refused to apply the word vabq to the place of Christian
worship. Their place of meeting was often an upper room, a
crypt, a catacomb, or desert. As their temples grew in splen-
dour, their worship decreased in purity; till we come ^ to the
eleventh and twelfth cBnturies, when the noblest cathedrals
of England were built, and the sacerdotal despotism of Hilde*
260 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
brand, the fierce fanaticism of the Crusades, and a cruel mid-
night superstition, stained the whole of Europe. In very early
centuries, the communion-table and the pulpit were placed in the
East — some think, in contrast to the Jewish temple, whose holy
of holies was in the west. A place of Christian worship ought
to be chaste, beautiful, and fairly proportioned; but let the idea
of God^s presence, not the magnificence of the decorations, be
depended on for impression. If I want to feel the most over-
powering religious impression from aught beneath and short
of God, let me gaze on that high roof, the starry sky, or kneel
on some rock while the tempest roars among the hills, and the
thunder echoes, and the lightning writes God's glory on the con-
cave of the sky. So shall I worship in God's own cathedral, and
with God's own ritual. The noblest temple is built up of living
stones. The holiest place on this side of God's throne, is where
two or three are met together in the name of Jesus. There is
no spot in the universe where God hears not the voice of the
humble, be it the publican's first cry, or the penitent's only
prayer, or the criminal's last breath; in the deepest mine or sub-
terranean cave, or silent crypt, God hears his sons; on the
Alpine peak, on the sea-shore, in the desert, in the silent glen, in
height and in depth, there is consecrated ground if there be
the true worshipper. The voice of Shadrach, Meshach, and
Abednego rose from the fiery furnace, and entered the ears
of the Lord of hosts. The cry of conscious want soars faster
than angels can fly, and higher than archangel can soar. The
still small voice of true devotion from the chancel of a holy heart
is heard in heaven, more distinctly than the crash of the ava-
lanche or the voice of the seven thunders.
The times of worship it is unnecessary to enlarge on. The
Sabbath was long the only, and has always been the chief day,
for the exercises of devotion and the Christian instruction of the
people.
In conclusion, worship is not a form, or extemporaneous
prayer — it is not a liturgy, nor the want of one — nor standing,
nor kneeling — nor cathedral, nor church, nor chapel. And he
is destitute of taste who does not admire the cathedral, but he is
ROMISH WORSHIP. 261
destitute of Christianity who thinks there is no worship out of it.
Nor is it of Grerizzim, nor Calvary, nor Zion; it is the worship
of the only God, in the Spirit, and through Christ. Let us have
no creed but truth, no service but love; let God be seen and felt,
within us and by us; let him be the Alpha and the Omega of
our life; to him let us give the undivided homagu of the soul;
and having worshipped imperfectly below, we shall fce admitted
to worship perfectly and perpetually above.
r-t.. 262
LECTURE XX.
APOCALYPTIC SAYINGS.
" And ho saith unto me, Seal not the sayings of the prophecy of this hook :
for the time is at hand." — Revelation xxii. 10.
The command, ^^ Seal not," is equivalent to, Proclaim — as of
instant and extraordinary importance, as entitled to special and
universal attention, on all occasions and to all men. The solemn
issues in which these sayings shall terminate, and as they are
appended here, are alone evidence of the duty of publishing
abroad, pressing home, and attentively pondering the sayings of
this book. These *'' sayings,'^ unlike those of man, are of so pre-
cious a description, and so replete with practical direction, en-
couragement, warning, that it becomes more and more the duty,
as it will be the joy of the minister of Christ, to unfold and en-
force them as the time draws nigh. The cross of Christ, the
consolations of the gospel, the greatness of a Saviour's love, the
fulness of his gracious promises, the duties of the living, the
blessedness of the dead, the responsibility of nations, the near-
ness of the judgment, and the dawn of the approaching sun, are
the substance, and the burden, and the sweet music to man's
heart, of many of the sayings of this book.
We are called upon not to seal, but boldly to proclaim these
sayings, as far as they relate to us as a nation. God speaks to
nations, and they must listen. Britain was " the tenth part of
the city,'' or that one of the ten kingdoms which '' fell," i. e.
separated from the Papacy at the Reformation. This falling was
its rise. We do not applaud the morality of the great persons,
or the purity of their designs, by whose indirect and undesigned
instrumentality this glorious result was precipitated. The li-
centious purposes of Henry VIII., and his quarrels with the
reigning pontiff, not certainly on the score of evangelical religion,
were not sanctioned, any more than the sanguinary proscription
« APOCALYPTIC SAYINGS. 263
of Mary ; but overruled by the providence of God to tlie eleva-
tion of Britain as the Pharos of Europe, the grand national wit-
ness for Christ, the central missionary of the whole earth. Her
retaining this position has been, and will be, her safety and her
duty. Her glory has brightened as her protest has become pure ;
and her separation from the Apostasy has been felt in her ex-
perience, and proved in her unrivalled annals, to be separation
from misfortune, degradation, and decay. But, alas ! one cannot
but notice the accumulating signs of approaching surrender of
this high and holy position. Good and patriotic men, pained at
the calamities of Ireland, and believing that quiet and order are
to be secured only through the medium of the priesthood of the
vast majority of that people, and by securing the good- will of the
sovereign pontiff, propose to grant endowments for the one, and
to open up diplomatic intercourse with the other. Step by step,
we have been verging to this crowning sin during many years
that are past ; and though each step has plunged us into more
terrible disasters, yet is the infatuated policy still pursued of at-
tempting to propitiate, by partial concessions, a system whose
whole history proves it incapable of satisfaction till absolute su-
premacy has been secured for its ambitious hierarchy. Each
precedent has cried to us at the beginning of the next, Do it not
— the very next year has witnessed it done with greater daring.
It is our duty to tolerate, but not to endow and thus nationally
recognise the Antichristian system. If we shall establish the
Papal Church, against which God has spoken so much in his
word, in any portion of these realms, or by any grant from our
property, we shall then have left our position of strength and
safety made good at the glorious Reformation, and have partaken
of the sins, and so begun to receive of the plagues that are in
store for Babylon. And I believe, that as soon as we shall have
identified ourselves as a nation with the mystery of iniquity, the
shield over us will be withdrawn, and we shall be sucked into the
revolutionary vortex, and share in the ruin with which the
ploughshare tears up the continent of Europe. One only won-
ders that sagacious statesmen, who may not be able to see sacri-
fice of prirrciple in the endowment of the Papacy, do not foresee
how certain of failure such policy must be, and thus how inexpe-
264 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES. •
dient the measure is. Rome will be satisfied with nothing short
of supremacy — she does not disguise it. She takes every inch
that is given her, as an instalment; and every new position
which our latitudinarianism or hollow expediency yields her, she
turns into a platform on which she stands more prominently, and
thunders with greater plausibility for yet greater concessions.
Her conduct is perfectly consistent with her character ; and her
policy has been as wise, or rather subtle, as it has been, un-
happily, successful. The pope claims to be above Queen Victoria;
the tiara never yet suffered itself to be merged in the shadow of
the mightiest crown. Papal bulls will attempt again to do what
they have done j3efore — supersede the laws of Britain ; and a
camarilla of cardinals dictate statutes to the parliament of our
country.
These sayings are also fraught with instruction to the church,
as well as to the country. If the church had maintained its
purity, and done its duty, our country had now been placed in a
far nobler and more imposing attitude. But in the Church of
England, the Tractarian party have surrendered every inch of
ground on which we could successfully do battle with Rome. They
have done more to give prestige and popularity to the Romish
Apostasy during the last ten years, than all the political enact-
ments of Parliament. They have betrayed the citadel, corrupted
the faith, and poisoned the springs and streams of the spiritual
well-being of thousands; and instead of being excommunicated,
as they ought to have been, they have been complimented, flat-
tered, and conciliated, till they stood upon the very verge of as-
cendency. I blame the Church more than the State — and the
ecclesiastical rulers far more than our senators — for the humbled
position which we now occupy, and the sad prospects that are too
plainly before us, with reference to the future condition of Popery
in Ireland.
One cannot fail to see also the progress and growth of a tend-
ency, both in England and Scotland, to identify the claims of
the true and spiritual church with those of the visible eccle-
siastical corporation to which that name is usually given. Christ
is not the head of any one visible church, or of the whole visible
church, in the sense in which he is the head of his body, the
APOCALYPTIC SAYINGS. 265
churcli of the first-born. Yet upon this confusion of things per-
fectly distinct, by good and able men, under temporary delusion,
controversies have been kindled, separations created, and occa-
sionally excommunications fulminated worthy of the times of
Hildebrand himself. Wherever this confusion prevails, it is only
the piety of the individuals, not certainly the principles they
avow, which restrains them from developing their church into an
Apostasy.
These ^^ sayings" are also addressed to Romanists and Tracta-
rians, of every shade and shape. "If any man worship the
beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in
his hand, the same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God,
and shall be tormented with fire and brimstone, and the smoke
of their torment ascendeth up for ever." " Come out of her, my
people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive
not of her plagues; for her sins have reached unto heaven."
This cry has peculiar emphasis now ; it is emphatically the warn
ing cry of the age. It is thundered in our ears from every nation
on the continent of Europe. It is the saying we do well to hear.
May God grant that every one that listens to it may hear it, and
act upon it !
These sayings in the Apocalypse are addressed to individuals
also ; to you— to me — to us all. Are we sealed by the Spirit of
God ? Can we say, " Thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to
God by thy blood?" Are we clothed with white robes? have we
washed them and made them white in the blood of the Lamb ?
Have we been taught the new song ? Are we redeemed from
among men, being the first fruits unto God and to the Lamb ?
Do we follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth ? Do we fear
God, and give glory to him ? Shall we be among the dead who
die in the Lord, and who rest from their labours ? Are we the
sons of God, and do we know that when he shall appear we shall
be like him? Do we look for his appearing? Have we the
wedding-garment? Are we among those who are persuaded of
the promises, and have embraced them ; and confessed that we
are strangers and pilgrims on the earth, desiring a better country,
that is, an heavenly ?
"The time," it is added, "is at hand." What time? The
SECOND SERIES. 23
266 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
time of the judgments so often predicted in the word of God as
the characteristics of the last day ; when " there shall be great
tribulation, such as was not from the beginning of the world to
this time, no, nor ever shall be." If the storm show itself in
the distance, and the first mutterings of the thunder are audible,
it is a warning to seek shelter. The sounds of the coming storm
are echoed from every capital of Europe, and already intimate to
us the instant necessity of escaping for safety to the only asylum,
the Lord Jesus Christ. Under the shadow of that great Rock,
and amid the securities of that everlasting Refuge, we may hide
ourselves till the judgment be overpast. Whoever grasps the
horns of that altar, and none else, shall never be moved. No-
thing that can come shall separate such an one from the love of
Grod that is in Christ Jesus.
The time of separation is at hand. Parties are becoming more
sharp in their outline, as well as more decided in their action.
Christ's true followers are emerging into greater light, and the
adherents of Antichrist are growing more bold and scornful.
The world is getting ready for its doom and the church for her
glory. Who is on the Lord's side ? sounds from the sky ; and
the response is echoed from every quarter of the earth. Each
soldier is falling into his rank ; each battalion is taking up its po-
sition; each principle is putting forth its polarity; and all the
stir and agitation of the earth is only the rapid preparation for
the crisis that comes with increasing speed upon mankind.
The time of trial is at hand ; testing times plainly draw near.
The eve of the last conflict will try every man's principles :
wealth, preferment, and rank will probably be offered to com-
promise; poverty, contempt, and neglect may once more be the
lot of the people of God. Ships that have long moved majestic-
ally, with streaming pennants, will founder in the storm — much
that has been received as precious will be discovered to be vile;
much worthless currency will be exposed, and perish like dross
in the crucible; but yet^he fine gold will come out brighter and
more resplendent with the reflected image of Him whose super-
scription is stamped upon it.
The time of great and pernicious delusions is at hand. Lo
here ! and, Lo there ! will be sounded again in the streets of
APOCALYPTIC SAYINGS. 267
every city. New and plausible systems of theology will be elo-
quently pressed on the acceptance of mankind. Great eternal
truths will be diluted or explained away. Indifference will be
called largeness of heart ; latitudinarianism will be popular under
the name of Christian liberality. Hatred to the great Apostasy
will be branded as fierceness ; and attachment to Protestant truth
will be denounced as bigotry. Compromise will be called charity,
and concession true prudence. Even now it is attempted to show
that the Church of Rome is not the counterpart of the antichris-
tian apostasy so frequently and fully portrayed in the Scriptures;
and under the shelter of this protection, extended to her from
a quarter whence it was least to be expected, that gigantic con-
spiracy against the rights and privileges of man and the glory
of God puts forth her claims at the present moment with un-
paralleled audacity, and multiplies her cathedrals, churches, and
chapels, with a liberality that seems to have no limits.
The time of disorganization is at hand, prosecuted under the
pretext of a new and purer organization. The vessel of human
society creaks and strains in the tempest. Its bolts and joints
are torn asunder, its cohesion gives way, each fragment becomes
more and more isolated ; we are unquestionably amid the rapids,
and there is only one pilot that can guide us to a haven — the
King of glory.
The time of wars and rumours of wars is at hand. What has
been the history of the last nine months ? What, at this moment,
are the prospects of Paris, of Vienna, of Berlin ? Why do the
old casements of the world rattle so audibly ? — why do the gates
of palaces creak upon their hinges ? — why does confusion fall so
frequently on councillors and statesmen ? It is the forethrown
waves of the nearing storm — it is the sound of approaching foot-
steps ; it is the voice, " Once more I shake not the earth only,
but also heaven.^' It is the cry, <^ The time is at hand V The
aberration in the system reveals the approach of a new star, and
that the Bright and Morning Star. " Blow ye the trumpet in
Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain : let all the in-
habitants of the land tremble : for the day of the Lord cometh,
for it is njgh at hand ; a day of darkness and of gloominess, a
Tlay of clouds and of thick darkness, as the morning spread upoa
268 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
the mountains." Joel ii. 1, 2. ^'The great day of the Lord is
near, it is near, and hasteth greatly, even the voice of the day of
the Lord : the mighty man shall cry there bitterly. That day is
a day of wrath, a day of trouble and distress, a day of wasteness
and desolation, a day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds
and thick darkness, a day of trumpet and alarm against the fenced
cities, and against the high towers. And I will bring distress
upon men, that they shall walk like blind men, because they have
sinned against the Lord." Zeph. i. 14-17. "Immediately after
the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the
moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven,
and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken : and then shall
appear the sign of the Son of Man in heaven : and then shall all
the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of Man
coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory."
Matt. xxiv. 29. "For yourselves know perfectly that the day of
the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night. For when they shall
say. Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon
them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall not
escape." 1 Thess. v. 2, 3. "And to you who are troubled, rest
with us; when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven
with his mighty angels, in flaming fire taking vengeance on them
that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord
Jesus Christ." 2 Thess. i. 7. Awful eclipse ! the night of
nature, the cloud of darkness, that shall disclose, on its breaking,
unearthly splendour.
This, too, will be the time of the restoration of Israel. They
will hear from the heavens the summons of their great Deliverer,
"Strike your tents and march homeward." The empty channel
of the Euphrates will bo their pathway, and resuscitated Jerusa-
lem their resting-place. "Seal not," then, but enunciate with
greater energ}^ and boldness, " the sayings of this book." Urge
on every man not to shut his eyes to adamantine facts, to nearing
immortality, to awful responsibilities. Unvail the Apocalyptic
portrait of Antichrist : warn the nations of their peril, the church
of her duty, all men of their transgressions. Reiterate and re-
peat what the real church is; not an earthly sect, but ^ heavenly
society ; not an ecclesiastical corporation, but the body of Christ ;
APOCALYPTIC SAYINGS. 269
not a synod of contentious divines, but a company of redeemed
saints. Above all, seal not the sayings that relate to Jesus as
the refuge of sinners, the hope of saints : '' Behold the Lamb of
God, that taketh away the sin of the world/' "Look unto Jesus;"
" Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and ye perish from the way,
when his wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all they that
put their trust in him.'' Let your anchorage-ground be under
the shelter of the Kock of ages ; set your affections upon things
that are above. Watch ! the time is at hand
23*
270
LECTURE XXI.
THE ETERNITY OP SPIRITUAL CHARACTER,
" He that is unjust, let him be unjust still : and he which is filthy, let him
be filthy still : and he that is righteous, let him bo righteous still : and he that
is holy, let him be holy still." — Revelation xxii. 11.
Two great classes are here recognised as standing on the
threshold of the age to come; and these alone. There is no
mention of any intermediate class beheld by the seer, or hinted
even most remotely in the sacred narrative. The whole popula-
tion of the earth is, there and then, divided into two great classes
— disguised and intermingled frequently on earth, but separate
and perfectly distinct before the Lord. The features, too, by
which they are characterized, are purely moral and spiritual. No
conventional distinction survives the grave, or rises either with
the first or the last resurrection. There is no mention here of
rich and poor, of noble and commoner, of king and subject; for
these, which are the glittering and tinsel distinctions of the age
that now is, have perished from existence, as earthly, temporary,
artificial. Nor is there any recognition of denominational pecu-
liarity on the millennial platform. One would suppose, from
reading what is here narrated, that Episcopacy, Presbytery, In-
dependency, Apostolical Succession, Erastianism, and Non-in-
trusion, had never occurred in the language, or entered into the
minds, of any portion of the human family. Not a hint is there
given of the existence of sect or system : like thin clouds these
petty things are dissolved — like dew-drops shed down in the cold-
ness of the night, they have evaporated before the first ray of the
rising Sun of Righteousness. Moral and spiritual elements alone
— these only are weighty, and will endure for ever. Let us then
examine the epithets that are here given, and the fixity of them
in the world to come. *< Unjust/' does not mean simply dis-
THE ETERNITY OF SPIRITUAL CHARACTER. 271
honourable conduct in tlie dealings of the world, nor deliberate
purpose not to pay every one his due, nor merely stealing, rob-
bing, and housebreaking : these are crimes of which Ipiman laws
take cognizance, and which are branded as hateful in the sight
of mankind. The highest injustice is that which is committed
against the Most High. It is injustice to refuse what he de-
mands; to fail or falter in loving Grod with all the heart; to
refuse to respond to his command, " Give me thy heart ;'' or to
withhold from him, for one moment, one atom of the honour and
worship that are eternally his due. Thus you may give every
one on earth what you owe him, and emerge triumphantly from
every investigation, and gather idatj and your name be pro-
nounced with eulogy from every class of society, and yet all the
while be unjust, criminally unjust, to the highest creditor, to
whom you owe, not fifty, but five hundred pence. — The next class
is described by the epithet " filthy," than which no word can be
more expressive of a hateful state before Grod. Thus it occurs in
Job XV. 14-16 : "What is man, that he should be clean ? and he
which is born of a woman, that he should be righteous ? Behold,
he putteth no trust in his saints ; yea, the heavens are not clean
in his sight. How much more abominable and filthy is man,
which drinketh iniquity like water V^ In Ps. xiv. 3, in that pas-
sage quoted by the apostle, it is said of mankind, " They are all
gone aside, they are all together become filthy." Thus, too, Lot
vexed his righteous soul with the filthy conversation of the wicked.
Thus, too, the apostle says, " Let us cleanse ourselves from all
filthiness of the flesh and spirit." This is one of those harmonies
between the moral and material worlds, which, because of the in-
seiisibility of our minds, we are at present barely able to detect.
Were our spiritual eye clear with light, we should see in sin all
the repulsiveness and ofience which the natural eye sees in the
most polluted things of the world : yet, conversation and allusions,
too justly entitled to this epithet, are tolerated by many, and are
the delight of coarse and unsanctified minds. Strange it is, also,
a man whose language and life are essentially " filthy," who has
ruined unsuspecting innocence, and polluted domestic virtue, pre-
tends to be, and is even held to be, a "man of honour." Tell
him of the wrongs he has done, and the miserable fool will glory
272 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
in them. Say something which he calls reflecting on his honour,
and he will challenge you to fight a duel.
The decision of the future is the fixture and perpetuity of the
tastes and the passions, and impure sympathies and desires, that
haye been generated in the present. Let the unjust and the
filthy, "be unjust and filthy still. Let the passions kindled in
time, hum and blaze for ever. Let the habits of the present life,
in which they sought their satisfaction, be the springs of the
miseries which shall torment them for ever. Whatever be the
material elements of the future misery of the lost — and these we
neither deny nor dispute — it must still be obvious that the main
agony is a moral one ; that the nature which is stung and wounded,
is the soul ; that the scourges of it are scorpion passions — which,
created here, will be continued there, and with increased intensity
and fury ; and, having no objects wherewith to satiate them, their
explosions, and collisions, and pining after rest, will be the con-
stant facts and the terrible torments of the lost. That remorse
which you feel at intervals, gnawing the heart as you recollect
some great sin — that revenge, that wrath, that hatred, which some
of you feel — that fierce lust — that burning shame — that sense of
rejected mercy and forfeited happiness, which are occasionally
experienced now — shall be then felt in all their bitterness ; and
the subjects of these terrific passions, thrown together with no
mitigating influence amid them, and no restraining law over them,
will kindle and keep up a hell, whose agony is feebly described
by the fire which is not quenched, and by the worm which dieth
not. Thus, the seeds of hell are sown now. As we sow so shall
we reap. There is an eternal echo to every evil action j and con-
science, like a whispering gallery, will send it back multiplied
for ever in crashes of thunder, in reverberations of remorse, and
righteous retribution. The most silent sin you perpetrate in
secrecy now, will make itself heard hereafter. Each parting sin
gives up a ghost which will haunt you for ever. The state of the
lost is just the reproduction for ever of the state of sinners now.
The fire which burns perpetually is kindled' here. The worm that
gnaws and never di^s, is quickened here. Hell is not a creature
of God ; it is that dead and deep, and ever-moaning sea of ill,
which is fed by rills of evil from individual souls that have their
THE ETERNITY OP SPIRITUAL CHARACTER. 273
origm and impulse in time. The desires that will never be sated
nor cease their frenzy, are nourished and fed here. The drunk-
ard, the voluptuary, the unclean, the unjust, the filthy, feel now
in their individual bosoms the presages and the preparations of
that dreariness of soul, that dismal sense of wo, that weight of
wrath, which will lie upon them a cold and leaden weight for
ever. That sin which delights the senses now, is a seed of future
agony and remorse, which the stir and amusements of the world
will fail to hide for ever. Just as solitary confinement is the
most terrible punishment, and the reign of terror the result of
the destruction of law ; so in the realms of ruin, there will be no
curb, nor palliative^ nor counteracting element, but each will feel
the concentrated essence of solitude and the surrounding misery
of spirits like his own.
We pass over, right gladly, to the obverse of the picture, or
the description of the '•^ righteous" that are to be righteous still,
and the " holy" that are to be holy still. There is a twofold
righteousness to be possessed by man, and both descending from
above ; viz. imputed and imparted, external and internal : the
first the act of Christ, the second the work of the Spirit : the
one our perfect title, and the other its accompanying fitness.
These two great doctrinal truths are never separated in the prac-
tical experience of the people of God. They are twin graces.
God has formed, and man may not sever them. There never
occurs an instance, in our experience in the church, of a justified
man, who is not also more or less, though always progressively
so, sanctified. God never justifies any whom he does not sanctify
through the truth, and by the Spirit of truth. He never en-
franchises any whom he does not qualify for the city of God.
The one is the inseparable companion of the other, and the twain
are incapable of dislocation. So truly is this the fact, that we
are taught to believe that sanctification of the heart and nature is
the truest and most unequivocal proof of the prior existence of
justification also. The change of character always follows a
change of state. He whose position is altered by Christ Jesus,
in relation to God, feels also his nature, and sympathies, and
feelings altered by the Holy Spirit of God. "Through the
obedience of one, many are made righteous," is the description
274 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
of justification. " The Lord our righteousness/' is that alone in
which we can stand or appear before God. By this alone our
state is changed.
The other epithet^ '^ holy," which describes a character, is the
special inspiration and creation of the Holy Spirit of God.
^' We are his workmanship, created unto good works.'' '^ Ho
works within us, to will and to do of his good pleasure." ^^ With-
out holiness none shall see the Lord." This noble element is the
air, the light, the beauty of the child of God. His taste, his
principles, his sympathies are all upon its side. His song is,
" Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of hosts." It is not outward ap-
pearance, but inward purity. It is not cleaning the outside, and
leaving the inside untouched. It is not the adjusting of the
robe, but the regeneration of the heart. The future state will be
the impress of power stamped upon this ; and superadded to that
impress there will be the impulse of endless development, ex-
pansion, progress ; and at each stage of this development will be
tasted the richest joys of the saved. In holy character, I believe,
are mines of precious wealth, springs of refreshment, elements
of joy, out of which holy and happy men are built up for ever.
So truly is this the case, that no material beauty, or wealth, or
outward circumstances, can constitute happiness now, if there be
within the possessor disquiet, envy, malice, avarice, and ill-wiy.
On the other hand, let there be a cold climate, and an ungenial
soil, and no hostile feelings, or jealous competitorship, or envious
emotions — but love in all hearts, and worship, and peace — and
there, in spite of every undesirable physical eleinent, there will
prevail substantial happiness and joy. I can conceive a Millen-
nium without sunshine, or clusters of flowers, or walls of jasper,
or floors of emerald, or fountains of water, or palms, or ever-
sounding harmonies ; but I cannot conceive the very possibility
of a Millennium without holiness, and goodness, and purity, and
truth, and Christ in the midst, the living fountain of them all.
The first may be, and I believe will be. The last must be.
Spiritual and moral excellence can erect a paradise in the Sahara;
whereas, moral turpitude would exhale a very pandemonium in
"Araby the blest." .
Holiness is not a mere preparation for heaven — it is heaven —
THE ETERNITY OF SPIRITUAL CHARACTER. 275
it is of the essence of salvation — it is happiness — it is joy. How
unfounded is the charge we sometimes hear adduced against the
distinctive and blessed doctrine of justification by faith alone in
the righteousness of Christ, that it leads to immorality! The
word of God, and every faithful expounder of it, insist as strongly
on fitness for the presence of God, as on a title to the rewards of
glory. Forgiveness of sin, through the shed blood and perfect
sacrifice of the Son of Man, is not a substitute for holiness, but
the removal of an obstruction to its growth, development, and
progress. We insist on holiness of nature, not simply as evi-
dence of faith, but as the essence of the happiness into which
believers will be admitted. The unsanctified are not in the num-
ber of the justified. The new state into which reconciliation
brings us is the birthplace of a new heart. Forgiven much, we
love much; for love is the fulfilling of the law — the germ of
holiness — the nutriment of it — the spring of its highest attain-
ments. We have an ear open to all the commands of God; and
the highest requirements fall gently on the heart of him who
has been taught to love God as his great benefactor, his reconciled
Father.
How intimate is the connection that subsists between time and
eternity ! The one is the efiaorescence of the other. Time is the
twilight of an everlasting noon to come, or of an everlasting
night to fall. As the one is, the other will be. Influences which
are received every day by all of us, gentle in their approach, but
mighty in their action, are leaving efiects behind which will be
felt for ever. Death, which ends time and begins eternity, is not
the arrest or alteration of our course, but the continuance of it.
The body is dropped as the tent is struck, or buried; and the
spirit pursues its journey, gazing into that unsounded futurity
that stretches far and wide before it. If our character be
righteous and holy now, it will advance in the same direction for
ever — blooming in greater beauty — exhaling richer fragrance.
The pilot who has steered it safely through the rapids of time,
will conduct it to the peaceful haven of eternity, and perfect it
there. He who is Priest, and Prophet, and King, will guide us
from grace to glory, and make us like himself, for we shall see
him as he is. How great is the importance which this considera-
276 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
tion stamps on all we say and do now ! We are building up an
immortal nature — we are accepting impulses before which we
shall move for ever — we are imbibing influences and hues fixed as
our being. For heaven or hell — for happiness or misery — all
things are preparing us, and every step is taking us. Every
analogy or experience we become acquainted with, teaches this
lesson. Habit is the act of yesterday, added to the act of to-day
- — an accumulating force gradually building up a character which
will endure for ever. Youth makes manhood, and manhood old
age ; and we can read the earlier in the later, the young man in
the old. The same law of continuity runs beyond the world ;
and in the joys of the saved, or in the miseries of the lost, we
may read the character acquired and exhibited here. The one is
the reproduction of the other for ever and ever. What we shall
be is just what we are ; and the difference is purely in degree.
If holiness be the very essence of heaven — the substance of
Christian character the only fitness for the presence of Grod —
how earnestly should we desire it ! — how fervently pray for it I
What should we not be ready to surrender and sacrifice, in order
to have our very hearts inlaid with that holiness without which
none shall see the Lord ! By this test we may try all the em-
ployments and pleasures of life. What influence do they leave
on us ? What improvement do they produce ? What is the na-
ture and amount of the impression they leave behind ? Thus we
shall look on this world in the light of the upper, and render it
subservient to higher and more enduring things.
277
LECTURE XXII.
THE JUDGMENT.
"And, behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give every
man according as his work shall be." — Revelation xxii. 12,
This announcement is the same as that described under the
s^eventh trumpet, in Revelation xi. 18 : " And the nations were
angry, and thy wrath is come, and the time of the dead, that
they should be judged, and that thou shouldest give reward unto
thy servants the prophets, and to the saints, and them that fear
thy name, small and great.^'
We have also delineated another division of the same great
event, depicted under the striking simile. Rev. xx. 11 : " And I
saw a great white throne, and him that sat upon it, from whose
face the earth and the heaven fled away.'^ This last occurs at the
end of the Millennium, when the whole family of Adam are
gathered together, and the last awful doom is pronounced upon
the guilty. An allusion to this solemn ordeal is also contained
in 2 Cor. v. 10 : " Fqr we must all appear before the judgment-
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."
This last is likewise referred to in Romans ii. 6-10 : " Who will
render to every man according to his deeds, &c. — to the Jew
first," because he had greater privileges, and therefore greater
responsibility, " and also to the Gentile." It is again written,
^' For the Son of Man shall come in the glory of his Father, with
his angels ; and then he shall reward every man according to his
works."
These are some of the prominent passages that indicate the first
and last judgment of the quick and dead.
That there will be a judgment-day, may be concluded even
from the light of nature. The existence of God necessarily im-
SECONB SERIES. 21
278 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
plies it : for the creation of the world implies the government of
the world, and that government, law ; and if there be law there
must be trial, and that trial followed by reward or penalty, or it
is no law at all.
It is evident to every man, that in this world the good occa-
sionally suffer, and the wicked triumph. In this dispensation, it
is no less clear that this is perfectly incompatible with justice, if
there be not a day to come when all wrongs shall be righted, and
when all that is beautiful and holy shall have its necessary re-
ward. We might therefore conclude, from natural reasoning
alone, that there will be a day of judgment. Again, in every
bosom in this assembly there is an inferior court or tribunal;
and often without any outward accuser or counsel to defend, or
instant judge to condemn, there is felt within a deep and cor-
roding sense of guilt, an awful presentiment of demerit, an in-
cipient sense of the wo pronounced at the judgment hereafter.
You have, thus, in man's conscience an inferior tribunal, whose
judgments and decisions are the reverberations of that pro-
claimed or prefelt in the higher court, telling us, in tones that
we may somewhat muffle, and by sensibility that we may deaden
by the opiates of the world, that there is a Judge in the future
who will " give to every man according as his work shall be.''
But I need not use arguments drawn from nature, and man's
natural conscience, to convince yoii of this truth ; to you who are
believers in the Bible, I must use an argument far more decisive,
as well as welcome, than any other : " Thus saith the Lord" is an
instant and conclusive answer to every objection. It is because
of this, that when I am endeavouring to substantiate a doctrine,
I have q, shriuking fear lest I should appear to make an attempt
at proving the truth of it. If it be plainly declared in Scripture,
it is already proved : it is the minister's duty, indeed, to unfold
a truth clearly enunciated, and to show that it is a note from the
great harmony of divine revelation ; but he is never required to
prove that v»^bat God hi^s stated is true : it is absurd to attempt
it ; it is supererogation ] it is folly. It is written, " We must all
appear before the judgment-seat of Christ ;" and this alone de-
cides the question. God has bowed the heavens to announce it,
and so ends the controversy. As for as the fact is concerned,
THE JUDGMENT, 'j/. 279
never shall we know, indeed, what perfect peace is in the pos-
session of the knowledge of the gospel, until we can sit down like
little children, reposing in unquestioning security and confidence
upon the simple word of God. The sun may grow weary, and
the moon falter in her silvery way — the stars rush out — heaven
and earth may pass away ; but not one jot or tittle of Grod's word
shall pass, until all be fulfilled.
This judgment-day, so clearly enunciated in the text, is no less
plainly alluded to in parts of the Old Testament. It is declared
that "God shall bring every work into judgment, with every
secret thing, whether it be good or whether it be evil.'' That
deed which you do in a sequestered nook, where no eye can see,
and no ear hear, God's bright eye is fixed on, and God's right
hand will bring into judgment; that thought of impurity or
deceit, which flits across your mind with the speed of the light-
ning's flash, and which has passed from your recollection, was not
only seen by God, but noted down by him ; and you will read it
at the judgment-day, either in flame-letters, with horror and dis-
may, when it cannot be forgiven, or in grateful and adoring
ecstasy, with these precious words written across the record —
'' The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin." No thought,
however foul — no deed, however secret — escapes his cognizance.
How striking are the words, " Thou knowest our thoughts afar
off !" God knows the dim and shadowy conception, as it looms
into view, before we have clearly comprehended it ourselves, or
moulded it into a tangible shape.
All nations will be there, not one exempt. " When the Son
of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him,
then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory ; and before him
shall be gathered all nations j" bond and free, black and white.
"We read of the results of that judgment, that the unbelievers
" shall be cast into a lake of fire," and suffer irretrievable ruin,
but " the righteous shall shine as the sun in the kingdom of their
Father." " It is God that justifieth : who is he that con-
demneth?" We therefore maintain, not by a dubious process
of reasoning, but by the distinct word of God, that there will be
a judgment-day ; that it will extend to every thought and every
28{d APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
action ; that all nations will be gathered to it. It is the great
assize, the dawn of doom.
We must now inquire, Who is to be the Judge f We read
that this judgment will be exercised by the Lord Jesus Christ j
for '^ the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judg-
ment to the Son.'^ " It is he (Christ) who is ordained of God to
be Judge of quick and dead." ^^We must all appear before
the judgment-seat of Christ." Thus, he who will be our Judge
is our Redeemer : the Lamb that pleads our cause before the
throne will pronounce the doom of righteous retribution ; his first
advent was announced by angels, and his Second coming, we read,
will be with them too, " when the Son of man shall come in his
glory, and all the holy angels with him." How impressive will
the spectacle be to man ! The pillar of fire, which was splendour
to Israel, but darkness to Egypt, is a striking type of this scene,
as beheld by opposite parties. How terrible will be Christ's ap-
pearing to unbelievers, who have said, ^^ We will not have this
man to reign over us !" — to the skeptic, who has scoffed at the
gospel, and repudiated it ! How dreadful, " I am Jesus," to the
sinner who has defied it ! But " to them that look for him shall
he appear without sin (or a sin-offering) unto salvation." If I
address any who are in error — fatal error ! — about the Deity
of our Lord, not believing him to be, as I know he is, God, let me
remind you, that if there be a work that demands the interposition
of God, it is the final judgment. If the Judge be one " from
whose face the earth and the heaven fled away," who can this be
but God ? Where can you expect to find the Deity, if not upon
the throne of judgment, where a sentence is to be pronounced,
carrying the issues of an eternity of happiness to some, and of
everlasting wo to others ? If God be not there, where can he be ?
He must be " very God of very God," from the fact that he has
to deal with every thought and every action of each individual in-
habitant of this globe, from Adam downward. Can any being,
not possessed of omniscience (the attribute of Deity alone) exer-
cise the solemn prerogative of universal Judge, which needs in-
finite knowledge, and exercises universal scrutiny ? Can we be
wrong in giving to such an one the attribute of Deity ? No
doubt he is man — no doubt he is also God, Such is stated to be
THE JUDGMENT, 281
the office of Christ. Is it possible that a created being can occupy
such a position ?
All men will hear these words-^-" Arise, ye dead, and come to
judgment!" the instant they are uttered from that throne; and
this command will be obeyed as quickly by the king as by the
beggar. Greatness will not exempt the mighty, nor obscurity
vail the little. Each grave will give up its dead. In those
graves that are the unsounded depths of the sea — of those whose
inmates have for winding-sheets the untrodden sands — ^in village
churchyards, where the green sod is the only covering, or in
cathedral aisles, and beneath monuments of bronze, and stone
altars — in the silent urns of the ancient dead — in p3rramidal
chambers — in subterranean cemeteries — wherever, in short, is
dead dust, that voice will be heard, and all will arise and rush to
the judgment-seat. And what an array of faces, gazing into eter-
nity, will be there ! Sodom and Gomorrah, Babylon, and Jeru-
salem, Rome, will pour forth their myriads for the last assize.
Waterloo, Marengo, and Austerlitz — Pharsalia, Marathon, and
Thermopylae — and Paris, and Berlin, and Vienna, will start to
life, and their dead cast off the shrouds of death, and march to
the judgment-seat. And thou, too, my brother, my sister, and I,
too, shall be there. We must meet again; you, to answer for
the use you have made of the appeals you have heard ; and I, to
answer for the honesty and faithfulness with which I have preached
to you. Oh, what happiness, if I should meet there thousands to
whom the gospel, as delivered from my lips, has been the savour
of life ! And, on the other hand, how unspeakably dreadful, if I
should see there those with whom I have taken sweet counsel,
but who have had the name of Christianity without its power ;
and be constrained to hear that awful farewell, which will be the
knell of a separation to last throughout eternity ! What a separa-
tion ! what a loss ! — a lost soul ! We can scarcely conceive of its
awful import: and yet nothing is more common; not because
there is not efficacy in a Saviour's blood, or welcome in God, but
because men are determined to gratify their lusts, and expend
them on a world that is quickly passing away.
Did we not read, the other day, of a great leader in the political
world, (whether right or wrong in politics, it is not for the pulpit
24*
282 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
to pronounce J ) who last Sunday was in as good health as any of
us to-day, full of hope, of promise, of renown ? He walked out
on his journey perfectly well; in one instant his body was a cold,
untenanted ruin, and his soul stood before the judgment-seat of
God. It is not he, or she, but " loe must all appear before the
judgment-seat of Christ.^'
A lost soul ! I have no words of my own with which to describe
it : a loss that can never be repaired. My money, my estate, I
may lose and retrieve ; but if I lose my soul there is no repara-
tion. If I lose my sight, I may get some compensation by a more
keen and delicate sense of touch -, but if I lose my soul, there is
no compensation.
A lost soul! Robert Hall alone could and did describe it.
^^ What, if it be lawful to indulge such a thought, what would be
the funeral obsequies of a lost soul ? Where shall we find the
tears fit to be wept at such a spectacle ? or, could we realize the
calamity in all its extent, what tokens of commiseration and con-
cern would be deemed equal to the occasion ? Would it suffice
for the sun to vail his light, and the moon her brightness ; to
cover the ocean with mourning, and the heavens with sackcloth ?
or, were the whole fabric of nature to become animated and vocal,
would it be possible for her to utter a groan too deep, or a cry too
piercing, to express the extent and magnitude of such a catas-
trophe V And yet it is true of every unregenerate man, that
" except ye repent, ye shall likewise perish.'' Such will be the
assembly at the judgment-seat of Christ; all that have lived,
breathed, and played their part on the stage of this world, shall
be there ; and Christ says, '^ My reward is with me, to give every
man according as his work shall be."
Observe the term, ^'my reward.'* Great difficulty has been
found in explaining this expression. By Roman Catholic divines,
and those whose doctrines have that tendency, it has been stated,
that it teaches that in certain suffering there is an expiatory
power ; that certain deeds are meritorious and gain a reward, and
that all Christ does for us is to help us to do good works. I
feel that the reasons that lead me to conclude there can be no
merit in any thing man can do, are irresistible. I owe to God
all that I can do, an my Creator; but more particularly as my
THE JUDGMENT. 288
Redeemer, lie claims my 'perfect obedience. I owe to God to
love him with all my soul, and mind, and strength. If I have
loved him without suspension, served him without faltering, and
in every thought and action sought his glory, I have simply done
my duty. To pay what we owe is not the merit, but duty. But
our purest thoughts are tainted, according to God's own state-
ment ) the truest act of beneficence is mixed with sin ; the night-
shade of death mingles with the most beautiful bouquet we can
oiFer; our holiest deeds are but splendid sins ; and when we come
to die, we can only bring our good deeds and our bad deeds to
Jesus, and say, ^' Lamb of God, that takest away the sins of
the vrorld, take away our sins.^' Again : whatever sympathy we
feel with the holy and beautiful, whatever loyalty and devoted-
ness to God, whatever grace and love are in our hearts, they are
the inspiration of God, and therefore cannot be any merit of ours ;
our sins are our own, and they shame us ; our good deeds are
not our own, therefore they cannot honour usj we must bri^g
both to the throne of grace, to be forgiven or restored.
Again : any action, to be meritorious, must not only be done
hy man and of himself, it must also not be due before it is per-
formed ; it must be done by man alone, so as to profit God. But
when we have done all, we are unprofitable servants ; our good-
ness extendeth not to Him.
In one word, the sentiment which has stood the test of a thou-
sand years, is still true — " By the deeds of the law shall no flesh
be justified in his sight.''
Seeing, then, the judgment-day is a great and coming reality,
and that you and I must render our account to God, may I not
reasonably ask. What are the hopes on which you build ? What
is your standing ? What preparation are we making for it now ?
Our life hangs upon a hair, so does His coming. The last great
earthquake has begun, and its vibrations are felt from Paris to
Frankfort, from Frankfort to Naples ; whatever be the issue, they
are sounds from the skies, reverberating upon the earth in solemn
tones, "Prepare to meet thy God." If He who is to come quick-
ly, come and find us absorbed in the things of the world, and
careless about the things of eternity, what an awful scene, what a
dreary prospect for us ! I am speaking the true word of God,
284 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
when, in the prospect of the judgment-seat, I ask you to turn from
all you have done and suffered as the ground of acceptance, for
your good deeds can avail you nothing, to "the blood that
cleanseth from all sin ;" and to do all that is holy, and benevo-
lent, and generous, being taught by the Holy Spirit, as the evi-
dence and result of your acceptance. Thus, families so feeling
and united and affectionate here, instead of being severed at the
last day, the one to stand at the right hand and the other at the
left of the throne, shall be made yet more united, affectionate,
and beautiful, ever rejoicing before the throne of God and the
Lamb.
286
LECTURE XXIII.
THE GREAT WHITE THRONE.
"Behold, I come quickly : and my reward is witli me, to give every man ac-
cording as his work shall be." — Revelation xxii. 12.
"And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face
the earth and the heaven fled away ; and there was found no place for them.
And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were
opened : and another book was opened, which is the book of life : and the dead
were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to
their works. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and
hell delivered up the dead which were in them : and they were judged every
man according to their works. And death and hell were cast into the lake of
fire. This is the second death. And whosoever was not found written in the
book of life was cast into the lake of fire." — Revelation xx. 11-15.
I THINK I do not misappreliend the meaning of tlie passage?
I have read, when I assume that the 12th verse of chapter xxii.
describes the judgment of the saints of God, and of these alone;
and that chapter xx. 10 describes the judgment of unbelievers,
or those who are found not to be the people of God. The first
passage describes the destiny of those who are in the Lamb's
book of life. The second contains the doom of those whose
names were not found in the Lamb's book of life. The first is a
statement of the rewards of the righteous; the second, of the
judgments on the unrighteous. In my last discourse upon the
former, I showed you that we have many premonitory warnings
of a future judgment; that the certainty of a future judgment
arises from the existence of a God, the existence of a law, the
necessity of obedience to that law — rewards, penalties, decisions.
I showed you that we have another premonition or preintimation
of a judgment, in the existence of conscience. It is the inferior
court that points upward to a superior one, by its very existence ;
and, as it reasons of righteousness, temperance, and judgment, it
warns us of that day when these things shall be taken open and
286 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
exact cognizance of. The judgment-day is clearly predicted in
the Old-Testament Scriptures. " He cometh to judge the earth.'''
^'He shall judge the world in righteousness.'' The day is fixed :
" For that he hath appointed a day in which he will judge the
world in righteousness." He will take cognizance in that day of
all the actions of men : he will bring every work into judgment,
and every secret thing, whether it be good or bad. That judg-
ment shall be universal : ^' Before him shall be gathered all na-
tions, and he shall separate them one from another." We read
that believers shall stand in the judgment, to receive rewards, in
the language of the first text, according to tlieir works ; and that
those who are not found in the Lamb's book of life shall also re-
ceive judgment, and be rewarded according to their works. This
judgment shall be administered by Christ. "The Father judg-
eth no man, but hath committed all judgment to the Son."
Again : " To the Son he hath given authority to be the judge of
quick and dead." Again, in Acts : " Christ, who is ordained of
God to be the Judge of quicksand dead." Again, in 2 Cor. :
"We must all appear before the judgment-seat of Christ." I
have argued from this that Christ is God ; for if God be not on
the throne of judgment, where can he then be? If there be a
throne that demands the presence of a God, it is that throne. If
there be a scrutiny that necessitates the exercise of omniscience,
it is the scrutiny of that day. If the sentence then to be pro-
nounced is to carry glorious prospects in the one direction for
ever, and consuming and unending judgments in the other, it
seems absolutely required by the momentous nature of the sen-
tence, that a God should pronounce it. Christ is God, and "we
believe that he will come to be our judge." I hkve described the
persons to be judged. These are said, in chapter xx., to bo
"small and great." We must all — ^you and I, whatever be our
country, our circumstances, our rank, our character, our condition
— we must all appear to receive sentence according to the deeds
done in our body. But we now come to consider the expression,
" to reward every man according to his works." Some persons
belonging to the Romish communion have built upon this idea,
that there is absolute merit inherent in our works ; that all that
Christ does for us is to help us to do good works, which, without
THE GREAT WHITE THRONE. 287
him, we could not do ; and that those good works will be the
grounds of our acquittal at the judgment-seat of Christ. But
this is impossible. TVe owe to God every feeling of love, of pu-
rity, of loyalty, of holiness, which we ever felt; and therefore
there can be no merit in aught we feel or do. When a man pays
his debts, he does his duty merely, he does not create a fund of
merit, or lay his creditor under obligations. Our purest thoughts,
however, are tainted, and our best deeds mingled with alloy, and
both need to be forgiven ; and therefore they cannot, surely, de-
serve to be rewarded. Besides, whatever love we cherish — what-
ever sympathy with the true, the beautiful, and the holy, we feel
— whatever loyalty we reciprocate — whatever devotedness to God
we show in our life, our conversation, and our conduct in the
world, are all, not self-originated, but the inspirations of the
Spirit of God. The fountain is not our own, and therefore its
streams can have no merit. Our sins are our own, and they
shame us : our virtues are not our own, and therefore they can-
not purchase for us. We must bring all, our best and our worst
things, to the throne of the heavenly grace, and ask frank for-
giveness for them all, and acceptance for ourselves, only through
the blood of Jesus. But, you say, still the word " reward^' car-
ries in popular apprehension the idea of merit. It has suggested
to many that idea ; does it really mean so ? I answer. If happi-
ness be the just and adequate reward of good works, then, of
course, good works are properly meritorious in the sight of God.
But if I show you that the word '^ reward,^^ in Scripture, is used
not in its strict sense, but in its loose or popular sense, then you
will conclude with me, that it is not necessary to attach the idea
of essential merit to the use of it by the Spirit of God. The
word hu^, for instance, is used in Scripture not in the sense of
giving money as an equivalent ; as in the following quotation :
" Ho ! every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters ; yea, come,
hui/ wine and milk tvithout money and without price." The
merely popular and forensic use of the word means, to give so
much money for so much goods; but it is obviously used by the
Spirit of God to denote, more sensibly, the excellency of the
things we receive ; and, in order to detach from it the idea of
equivalent, there are ever superadded to the words, "without
288 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
money and witliout price.'' We find the word ^^ reward" used in
the same way : thus it is said of Nebuchadnezzar and his army,
that '^ Egypt shall be their reward.'' Again : "Ye shall receive
the reward of the inheritance." But it is plain, from this last
passage, that if heaven be an " inheritance," it cannot be a "re-
ward," in the strict and literal sense of that term. We read in
the final sentence, " Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the
kingdom :" now this word inherit disposes of all idea of per-
sonal desert. For instance : a nobleman dies ; his son is a profli- -
gate, but still he inherits his father's coronet, not because of any
thing he has done or deserved, nor by any thing he has undone,
but simply because he is the son, and therefore the legal heir
of his father. So we receive heaven as the sons of God and
joint-heirs of Christ, and not as the reward of any merit or ex-
cellence of ours. And so, in this passage, reward does not neces-
sarily imply receiving that which our virtues have earned, or our
merit procured. Other passages of Scripture justify this inter-
pretation, and show that no idea of merit is implied. Scripture
says, "By the deeds of the law shall no flesh be justified." And
again, " A man is not justified by the works of the law, but by
the faith of Christ." And again, " By grace are ye saved
through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God ]
not of works, lest any man should boast." And again, " Who
hath saved us and called us, not according to our works, but ac-
cording to his own purpose and grace." And again, "Being jus-
tified by His grace, we are made heirs of God, according to the
hope of eternal life." Thus, these and kindred passages clearly
prove that there can be nothing of merit in us, entitling us to the
joy and felicity of everlasting life. And yet, while Scripture
thus distinctly puts good works away from any share in our title,
and separates from them every thing like merit, in the judgment
of God, it insists upon them, through all its books, in the most
eloquent and earnest terms. Thus, "We are created in Christ
Jesus unto good works 3" again, " thoroughly furnished unto all
good works ;" again, " rich in good works ;" again, " careful to
maintain good works;" again, "prepared unto every good work j"
so that we cannot fail to see perfectly consistent, what at first
seems a contradiction — good works depreciated on the one page, and
THE GREAT WHITE THRONE. U%U
inculcated on the next ; dispensed with in one view, insisted upon
in another ; declared to he nothing in one chapter, and pronounced
to be essential in the next. How do we explain this ? The
answer is plain : the exclusion of good works from one great doc-
trine of the gospel, does not imply the extinction of good works
in the Christian character. The exclusion of all good works
from our title to heaven, does not imply the extinction of all ne-
cessity for good works in our character and qualification for
heaven. In other words, in the matter of justification, our own
works must all be pronounced as filthy rags, utterly unavailing ;
whereas, in the matter of sanctification, they are the evidence of
our growing fitness for the kingdom of heaven. It is as essential
that the Spirit of God should make me fit for the company in
which I am to spend eternity, as that the Son of God should im-
pute to me his righteousness, and wash me from my sins, to en*
title me to dwell in the presence of God and of the Lamb for
ever. And, therefore, just with the same earnestness with which
the inspired writers insist upon the absolute exclusion of all our
good deeds from the matter of our justification, they insist upon
the continual practice of all good works, as the exponent and evi-
dence of our fitness or qualification for heaven. Some, however,
have thought that there is one passage at least, in one of the gos-
pels, which seems contradictory to the view which I have en-
deavoured to prove — namely, that whidi describes the young
man who came to our Lord, and asked the question, ^^Good Mas-
ter, what must I do to inherit eternal life?^^ Jesus said unto
hinj, '^ Why callest thou me good ? there is none good,^' in that
absolute sense in which the Jews used it, " there is none good
but God •/' (and therefore, Jesus said, Your addressing to me the
epithet good, is truly attributing to me the character of God.)
^' Thou knowest the commandments — Do not kill ; Do not steal ;
Do not bear false witness; Honour thy father and thy mother."
And he said, " All these things have I kept from my youth up."
Perhaps he did not know his own heart well enough -, but our
Lord took him at his word; he said, ^'I will not now dispute
that you have observed all these from your youth." ^'And
Jesus beholding him, loved him, and said unto him. Yet one
thing thou lackest : go thy way, sell whatsoever thou hast and
SECOND SERIES. 26
290 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven : and
come, take up the cross and follow me/' You have observed
most strictly the six commandments of the decalogue which refer
to your conduct toward your neighbour. How do you treat the
first four ? Here is the turning point, where you are called upon
to show your love to God. The whole law is summed up in two
commandments ; first, " Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with
all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and
with all thy strength ;" the next is, " Thou shalt love thy neigh-
bour as thyself.'' The last you have done perfectly, you say ;
you are now called upon to show your obedience to the first. If
you have succeeded in the first as you have triumphed in the last,
you are a perfect character, and have a perfect title to the king-
dom of heaven. " And when the young man heard that saying,
he went away grieved, for he had great possessions." He could
not sacrifice all for Christ's sake. In other words, he showed by
this preference of the unrighteous mammon to the good God, that
he had broken the law in the first and weightiest commandment,
and therefore he could not deserve heaven by his own doings.
Our Lord tested, in order to humble, the young man.
It is, then, the Scriptural doctrine, that while there is nothing
of merit in the works performed by us, yet the rewards of glory
will have a reference to those good works as done by believers.
For it certainly cannot be without meaning, that we find almost
every reference to the judgment-day implying the reward of
works, and almost every statement of the apportionments of that
day meted out according to the nature, the amount, the character,
and the extent of those works. See that very beautiful passage
— " Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared
for you from the foundation of the world : for I was an hungered,
and ye gave me meat : I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink : I
was a stranger, and ye took me in : naked, and ye clothed me :
I was sick, and ye visited me : I was in prison, and ye came unto
me. Then shall the righteous answer and say unto him. Lord,
when saw we thee an hungered, and fed thee ?" and so on. '' And
these shall go into everlasting life." We have next the state-
ment in my text, that, (' He shall reward every man according to
his works." We also know the declaration of our Lord, that
THE GREAT WHITE THRONE. 29^
every one shall be rewarded according to his works. Then, we
read in 2 John ii. 8, *^Look to yourselves, that ye receive a full
reward." Again, in Matt. x. 40, there is a clear intimation of
the difference of reward : ^' He that receiveth you receiveth me ;
and he that receiveth me receiveth Him that sent me. He that
receiveth a prophet in the name of a prophet, shall receive a pro-
phet's reward ; and he that receiveth a righteous man in the
name of a righteous man, shall receive a righteous man's reward.
And whosoever shall give to drink unto one of these little ones a
cup of cold water only in the name of a disciple, verily I say unto
you, he shall in no wise lose his reward. ^^ Now notice the grada-
tions : first, the reception of Christ is spoken of as being followed
by the great reward; next, the reception of a prophet is followed
by the enjoyment of a prophet's reward; then the reception to
hospitality and homage of a righteous man is followed by a
righteous man's reward; and lastly, the gift of a cup of cold
water, given in the right spirit, and with the right motive, shall
not be without its corresponding reward. Thus, there are degrees
and grades of glory indicated here — there are diversities of re-
ward; "one star differing from another star in glory;" each vessel
full, but each vessel of capacity larger or less than the other.
Now it seems to me that there is nothing legal in coming to the
conclusion that the rewards of heaven will be proportioned to our
attainments upon earth. True, love is the great motive constrain-
ing us to whatever things are pure and just and lovely; but
because it is the great motive, it is not the exclusive one. Our
Lord looks for the noblest allegiance and sacrifice as the fruits of
love, but he fosters and stimulates the production of those fruits
by the prospects of reward according to the attainments we have
made. Union to Christ's body as a living member is our safety;
but the place which we are to occupy in that body, a hand or a
foot, is a place for which we depend, in some degree, upon the
progress and perfection to which we have risen by grace. So,
there are degrees of sufi"ering among the damned; for the servant
beaten with few stripes is the figure employed to denote a less
degree of suffering; and one beaten with many stripes, is the
figurative expression for a greater degree of suffering. In like
manner, we conclude there are different degrees of joy, felicity,
292 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
and reward among the saved; and there are degrees of enjoyment
differing according to the capacity of each vessel, and the fitness
of each character for it.
Having closed my remarks upon this verse, I proceed to the
consideration of that which contains a full description of that
dread judgment which is to take place at the close of the millen-
nial dispensation. First, it is plain that the great white throne
is the judgment only of the lost, and has nothing to do, as far as
I can gather, with the saved. We read here, that when Satan
was bound for a thousand years, and his rule among the nations
terminated, the New Jerusalem came down from heaven, the bride
made herself ready for the Bridegroom — during which Millennium
all this takes place. We read that at the very commencement of
the Millennium the dead in Christ shall rise. "I saw thrones,
and they sat upon them, and the souls of them that were beheaded
for the testimony of Jesus,'' (sowZs being used in Scripture as per-
S071S — "wherein eight souls,'' i. e. eight persons, "were saved by
water") — I saw the souls, i. e. the persons, "of them that were,
beheaded for the testimony of Jesus, and for the word of God;
and they reigned and lived with Christ a thousand years. But
the test of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were
finished. This is the first resurrection," or, as it is literally trans-
lated, "The resurrection, that (great one,) the first." Now, then,
we have set before us, first, Christ's glorious approach ; we have
then the resurrection of the pious dead, and the perfecting of the
pious living, constituting together the inhabitants of the New
Jerusalem, the perfect church, the bride adorned for the Bride-
groom. We have next described, at the close of the Millennium,
the last assize: "I saw a great white throne, and Him that sat
on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away ; and
there was found no place for them. And I saw the dead, small
and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and
another book was opened, which is the book of life : and the dead
were judged out of the things that were written in the books,
according to their works;" — that is, I conceive, the depraved
according to the degrees of their depravity ; just as the reward
mentioned in chap, xxii., on which I have been commenting,
bignifies the admission of the pious into different degrees of glory
THE GREAT WHITE THRONE.
according to their attainments below. ^^ And death and hell were
cast into the lake of fire :'^ and then it is added, that ^^ whosoever
was not found written in the book of life, was cast into the lake
of fire." Do you notice that there is not one word here intimating
the presence of a single child of God as a subject of judgment, or
the reward of one spiritual person ? There is no expression in
the whole of this remarkable passage, which indicates that a justi-
fied and sanctified one was there : there is not the least hint, even
the most meagre, of the reward of heaven, of admission into glory,
or of the reception of the inheritance. It speaks only of the de-
praved : it relates entirely to the lost : it describes only their
doom J and therefore I believe that this is the last condemnation
of the lost before an assembled universe, that it may be seen and
felt through the whole intelligent creation of Grod, that nothing
was left undone to recover them that Omnipotence could do, and
that all their guilt was spontaneous, and all their responsibility
their own ; and the conviction that it is so will rest for ever upon
themselves. I cannot, therefore, see that this judgment-throne
has any thing to do with the people of God.
In the next place, this last judgment-throne will not be set for
trial. There are very great popular misconceptions in this day.
Many have an idea that there is to be a hearing of witnesses, the
weighing of testimony, the judicial discussion of facts, and that
the sentence will be judicially pronounced accordingly. I do not
believe that this is to be the character of the last judgment. The
instant a saint dies, that instant a blessing is pronounced upon
his soul, and it blooms into a crown of glory and of beauty around
his brow. The instant that a sinner dies, the brand is stamped
upon his soul, and its corrosive punishment begins, and continues
for ever. Our sentence is fixed at death, irrevocably : the present
is the time of probation ; but the instant that we die, there takes
place the fixture of character : " He that is unjust, let him be
unjust still ; and he which is filthy, let him be filthy still : and
he which is righteous, let him be righteous still ; and he that is
holy, let him be holy still." Holiness culminates in eternal hap-
piness; sin sinks in eternal and illimitable misery. Therefore,
this great white throne is not for trying, for testing, for examining,
for hearing witnesses, but simply for proclaiming before an as-
25*
294 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
sembled universe the justice, the love, the faithfulness, the mercy
of Grod, in the condemnation of the lost — who were not murdered
by others, but remain suicides themselves — as well as his love,
his mercy, his faithfulness, his truth, in the acquittal of the
righteous, who were pardoned, not from any thing in themselves,
but only through the finished work of their Lord and Saviour
Jesus Christ.
In the next place, we read that at this great assize there will
be set a great white throne. I do not know that this is to be a
literal throne ; I do not know that these books will be literal
books. I think it is the imagery of an earthly assize, employed
to set forth the majesty of the last judgment. The thrones of
iniquity are all overturned, and this is raised triumphantly upon
their ruins. The thrones of kings are all dissolved and swept
away, and this throne alone remains. The throne of grace has
passed away. Sinners are not invited to this throne for mercy
and for grace, but are commanded to attend to receive a righteous
retribution. This throne is called the great white throne, because
it is connected with the great God; a great judgment, a great
eternity, and great results. It is spoken of as a white throne, as
if to teach us that from it every sin shall be reflected, and on it
every sinner shall read the righteousness of his own destruction.
There is no rainbow round that, as there was round a previous
throne described in the Apocalypse; there is no beseeching Father
upon it, saying, ^^ Be ye reconciled to me ;" but whatever character
death has left, and judgment finds, eternity shall fix irreversibly
for ever.
We read, next, of Him that sat on it. I showed you in a pre-
vious discourse that this is Christ : ^^ The Father judgeth no man ;
he hath committed all judgment unto the Son." What a change
is here ! He that hung upon the cross in shame, shall sit upon
that throne in glory. He who was spit upon and bufioted, and
of whom a whole city cried, ^' Away with him ! away with him V*
comcth in the clouds, " and every eye shall see him, and they
that pierced him, and all flesh shall wail because of him."
Wc read, in the next place, that " from his face the earth and
the heaven fled away, and there was found no place for them."
I do not think that this means that the earth and heaven were
THE GREAT WHITE THRONE. 296'
annihilated, for we read that a new heaven and a new earth had
superseded, or taken the place of, the former heaven and the for-
mer earth ; and^hcrefore, there was not a cessation of heaven
and earth, strictly and materially so called. It seems to me that
the expression is figurative ; for we read in another chapter of
this book, that *^ when the seventh trumpet sounded, the heaven
departed as a scroll, and every mountain and island were re-
moved out of their places.'^ I showed you that this was not the
extinction of this economy : it could not be so, for this economy
still survives ; and, according to the ^Vpocalyptic narrative, sur-
vives the incidents described in that chapter. So we read again,
that " every island fled away, and the mountains were not
found;" and yet we read of the earth existing afterward. I
think, therefore, that the meaning of this passage is, that a great
moral change will take place among the population that surround
the throne; that all social, political, and mundane distinctions
shall cease ; that whatever was conventional, in the way of dis-
tinction, between man and man — palaces, and halls, and thrones,
and sceptres, and coronets, and money — -all human glory, and all
human wisdom ; all the heights of ambition, all the depths of de-
pression — all shall be expunged and swept away ; and man shall
stand before that throne, shivering in the prospect of a terrible
retribution, with nothing upon him but his great and awful re-
sponsibility before God.
At that throne " were gathered small and great." The servant
was there, and his master too ; the subject was there, and the
sovereign that governed him too. The meanest slave and the
mightiest monarch shall be there : the greatest king shall leap
from his tomb as quickly and as obediently as the poorest peasant
who was buried by the wayside. Obscurity shall not vail the
little; greatness shall not exempt the noble. The small and the
great shall be there.
In the next place, '^ books were opened." These books, as I
have said, are not literal books; but they may be regarded as
samples or types of great and profitable realities. There may be
no literal volume, but yet all the past transactions of seven thou-
i»and years shall be brought as vividly before the eyes of the
296 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
assembled multitudej as if read by them, or pronounced in their
hearing.
The first book we may suppose to be opened will be the book
of Providence; the first leaf in that book wl be our birth.
Born in a land of Bibles, of pious parents ; having received Chris-
tian education ; placed within reach of holy influences ; having
sat for years under the teaching of a pious and devoted minister ;
had great talents, splendid opportunities; read good books; in
short, having every thing done for us that a gracious Grod could
possibly do — shall all be set against our names in this dread
book. And recorded also in it will be the opportunities we have
lost, the sins we have done, and the mercies we have trodden
under foot, the grace we have undervalued ; and all these shall
start in flames, and flash in the face of every guilty criminal, the
prospect of a speedy, eternal, and righteous condemnation.
The next book which we may conceive to be opened at that
day, will be the book of Conscience. That book receives every
day a fresh impression in its successive leaves. In the case of
the young, only a few of its leaves have been turned ; in the case
of those who have one foot in the grave, and the other on its
margin, all its leaves have been nearly turned over ; and as each
leaf is laid at night with the rest, and sealed, it has engraved
upon that closed page the deeds that have been done in the day,
the thoughts that have been thought, the affections and feelings
that have been felt, whether they have been good or evil. You
can silence it now ; you can almost drive it into quiet now ; and
if you fail to drive it, you can drug it into quiet ; but at that day
each leaf will be unrolled in succession; the opiate stupor in
which we now keep it will then be dissolved ; there will be no
opera to excite you, no playhouse to charm away the corrosive
thoughts that conscience sometimes creates within you ; and I be-
lieve the most awful spectacle in God's mighty universe will be,
the conscience of a lost soul unfolded and laid bare in that ter-
rible light that has no shadow, and before that dread tribunal at
which there is no forgiveness, and from which there is no appeal.
My dear brethren, never trifle with conscience ; when it rebukes
you, it is a tone from the very lips of God ; when it tells you,
" Do it not," it is the echo of God's command in heaven — " Do it
THE GREAT WHITE THRONE. 297-
not." "With all its disease, its weakness, and its susceptibility of
stupor, conscience is still a living power ; and many a one in this
assembly knows that many a time he has lain down in his bed,
and conscience, corroded within him, has created a fever that no
drug, or opiates, or physicians in the world could remove. Better
have cholera, and typhus fever, and earth's worst torments, than
the corrosive sore of a guilty conscience, uncleansed, unforgiven,
unsanctified, unsealed by God.
The next book that will be opened at that day will be the book
of God's Laiv. " They," says the apostle, ^' that were under the
law shall be tried by the law." And what does the law say ?
" The soul that sinneth, it shall die." My dear friends, this is
not an obsolete truth. It is not the temporary law of a pro-
visional economy that has passed away ', it is as true at this mo-
ment as that there is a Grod in heaven, that ''the soul that
sinneth, it shall die." "The wages of sin is death." Christ
does not destroy the truth of this sentiment ; on the contrary, he
treats it as unchangeable; he takes your place, and suffers and
dies for you, and delivers you from the curse, in order that, justi-
fied by him, you may have peace and happiness with God, while
the rescripts of Sinai remain. That law, then, that many have
thought to be justified by — that law that many said they could
keep, in all its requirements, from their youth upward — will
judge them at the last day.
The book of the Law of Nature will also be opened. I believe
the heathen will be tried, not by a gospel which they never
heard, nor by a law which they do not know, "but by that law
which is in their consciences, either accusing or else excusing
them." I dare not pronounce that all the heathen will be lost ;
I have no business to pronounce the doom of any nation, or tribe,
or kindred, or tongue whatever. The pulpit is not the great
white throne : it is the porch of the throne of grace. We are
here, not to determine men's destiny hereafter, but to preach sal-
vation to men's souls nov/. " Now is the accepted time, and the
day of salvation." But I have no reason to conclude that all the
heathen will be lost : I have no right to conclude any thing upon
the subject. Our business is to go and preach the gospel to every
nation under heaven : this is our duty ; and God will settle, on
♦298 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
principles of everlasting truth and goodness, wisely, and merci-
fully, and well, their eternal destiny. The heathen, then, I say,
will see the book of nature opened, and by it they will be tried ;
and the apostle says, that when tried by it they cannot stand.
Whether there be any plan by which the provisions of the gospel
may reach them, I cannot say.
There will be opened, too, the book of the Gospel; and I be-
lieve that this book, next to that of conscience, will be the most
awful that is opened in the hearing of the lost. They will hear,
standing before the judgment-throne, the echoes of those invita-
tions which were addressed to them, but which they wilfully and
criminally spurned away. They will then have their miseries
increased by the recollection of that faithful sermon preached on
one occasion; that startling appeal preached on another; that
solemn warning which they despised ; that earnest and pressing
invitation that was addressed to them without producing any
effect ; they will hear — and here will be the most awful foretaste
of the curse — they will hear those words from Him that sits
upon the throne: '^0 Jerusalem! Jerusalem!'^ — professing
church of the Most High — " how often would I have gathered
thy children as a hen gathereth her brood under her wings, and
ye would not !" And the recollection of this " would not" will
be the first pang of that worm that never dies — the first spark of
that fire that is never quenched, for ever and ever. My dear
friends, if you hear the gospel in this place, and are resolved not
to accept it and love it, pray leave this scene of responsibility — ■
pray do not continue here any longer. It is the most awful posi-
tion that human beings can occupy, to hear God speaking by his
word and by his ministers — to hear of their responsibilities and
duties — of God's offered mercy and ready pardon — and yet
turn their backs upon him that speaks to them : '^ W3 will
not have thee to reign over us."*' My dear friends, there is no
such thing as escaping from the house of God this evening
neutral. You cannot divest yourselves of the responsibilities you
have incurred by being here this night, any more than you
can divest yourselves of your immortality. What you have
heard to-night must rise to acquit you, or judge you at the last
lay. You need to bo stirred up. There is nothing, my dear
THE GREAT WHITE THRONE. 29^^
friends, so true as this fact, that habit accustoms us to every
thing. Persons who have been ill for twenty years, sometimes
become so accustomed to pain as to grow almost insensible to it.
Persons may get so accustomed to darkness, that they do not feel
their bereavement. While most men, if placed beside a water-
fall, would be kept awake all night, those that have slept beside
it for years will sleep sweetly all night long. And many sit
under the gospel, and hear great and all-important and eternal
truths, and will go away, just as many of you will go away to-
night, criticising the sermon, commending or caricaturing the
preacher, but untouched, unmoved by truths that, however
simply expressed, ought to electrify their very natures, and make
men's hearts thrill alternately with fear, and joy, and hope.
Let me tell you, that when this book of the gospel is opened,
it will remind many — alas ! too many — of lost opportunities, of
despised mercies ; and that terrible word, " Ye will not,'^ shall
be heard and re-echoed for ever. Every wicked act that a
wicked man does, projects a shadow that extends into an eternal
hell. Hell will be like the whispering-gallery of eternity : words
of wickedness and deeds of darkness said and done here, shall be
echoed and re-echoed in crashes of thunder for ever. I need not
a material fire, or a living worm, to be the misery of the lost.
Guilt, left alone, would people infinitude with spectres, and
create endless torment. Solitary punishment in this world is
found to prove to the criminal an intolerable punishment : it has
been known to deprive him of mind, and leave him a piteous
maniac. Try, if possible, to conceive what that tremendous soli-
tude must be, where the soul shall be turned in upon itself, to
recollect nothing but its sins, and to have nothing before it but
despair, with no sound of mercy to break upon it, no rainbow of
coming escape to girdle it with glorious hope.
But, my dear friends, I forget we are no"t now before the great
white throne : we are here at the foot of God's throne of grace.
Come, then, and let us '^ go boldly to the throne of the heavenly
grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time
of need."
And this leads me to notice that there is another book opened
there — the book of Life. Now, this might seem at first to imply;
800 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
that God^s people will be there, and not the guilty only ; but if
we look at what is said of it, we shall see that they will not be
there. This book was opened, not to ascertain the names of those
that were in it, but the names of those who were not in it ; for it
is not said, " Whosoever was found written in it was saved,'' but
'^ Whosoever was not found written in the book of life was lost;"
they shall be excluded, because they have unfitted themselves for
its eternal and glorious reward.
And we read that at that day " the sea shall give up the dead ■
that are in it.'' I think it is a fact known to every classic
scholar, that the ancient Greeks and Romans looked upon drown-
ing as the most awful of all deaths : we notice in Horace, and
many of the Latin poets, reference to drowned men, and they
always speak of them as of men who had no hope of ever being
admitted to the Elysian plains. They believed that drowning
was a special judgment of God, and that those who were drowned
would never rise again or live again. Here it is stated, that " the
sea gave up the dead that were in it." They that were a thou-
sand fathoms deep shall hear amid the chimes of the ocean's
waves this voice, "Arise, ye dead, and come to judgment."
They whose requiem has been the sound of the sea waves — they
whose bodies have been devoured by its fierce and untamed
tenantry — shall rise again, and particle shall come to particle,
and limb to limb, and the body that sank shall be the very body
that shall rise and join the soul, and stand before that throne.
" And death and hell gave up the dead that were in them."
Death is represented as the keeper of his prisoners : hell is a
wrong translation : the word is Hades ; which means separation
from the body, when the Spirit of God does not state whether the
separated soul has gone to heaven or hell ; i. e. it remains, in
happiness or misery, separate from the body, waiting for its full
happiness or its full "misery, when it shall be rejoined to the
body. It says that death gave up his dead ; and so Hades, or
the place of separate spirits (not a third place, but heaven or hell,
where souls are without the body,) gave up the dead that were in
it ; and when this was done. Hades, or the state of separation of
soul and body, is extinguished for ever, and death, the last
enemy, is oast into Gehenna, or the lake of fire.
THE GREAT WHITE THRONE. 301
Thus earth shall close, as earth began — with paradise; thus
man shall be cherished of God at the close, as he was cherished
of God at the beginning ; thus man shall have dominion over all,
for Christ shall reign until he has put all things under his foot-
stool ; and the end cometh, when he shall deliver up the kingdom
to God and the Father, and absolute Deity, as distinguished from
Christ, shall be all in all.
My dear friend, will you be at the first judgment, to receive
the reward of the righteous, or at the last, to hear the curse of
the lost ? I say it solemnly — I say it with every recollection of
the sovereignty of God and the helplessness of man — it rests
with you. True, you cannot change your heart — true, you can-
not grasp the Saviour in your own strength ; but this you can
do — you can pray to the Saviour — you can appeal to him.
^' Fear not him that can kill the body, but fear him that can kill
both body and soul in hell.^^ But I will not appeal to you on
such motives. Let me tell you, the great God has suifered that
we might be saved ; he hung upon a cross and bled for us that
we might not die. Can you fail to love him who so loved you ?
Are you not prepared to say — not from the fear of the penalties
of the damned, nor from the prospects of the joys of the blessed,
but because God so loved me that he retrieved me from my sin,
snatched me as a brand from the burning, and made me a son
and a joint-heir with Christ — I do feel, and I will feel, and, by
the grace of God, I will show, that I cannot but love him who so
loved me, and that no sacrifice can be too great to testify my
loyalty, devotedness, and love to him who is all my righteousness,
ray salvation, and all my desire.
SECOND SERIES. 28"
802
LECTUllE XXIY.
THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST.
" I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last."
—Revelation xxii. 13.
I HAVE only one object in selecting this text as the subject
of discourse, and that is to show Christians the reason on which
they conclude that He who assumes these attributes is God; and
to lead those, if any such should be present, who do not see that
it is so, at least to pause — and if to pause, it may be to come to
a better and a truer conclusion. I hold that the words here used,
" I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first
and the last,'^ are an assumption of deity ; and it seems to me
plain that He who said so, either rightfully claims the attributes
of God, or was guilty of blasphemy. In taking this, I shall have
little in the way of argument to adduce; it will be simply texts.
I do not suppose that Christians need to be convinced ; they feel
that Christ is God ; but they will need to be reminded of the
grounds on which so important a truth in our creed reposes. " I
am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and
the end;'' that is, *'I am God over all, blessed for evermore."
Let me now ask your attention, then, to the following simple
statement and comparison of texts, and see if our blessed Lord
be not distinctly declared in Scripture to be, what we believe him
to be, " God over all, blessed for evermore." We read in Isaiah
xl. 3, " The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the
way of the Lord." The word ''Lord," there, is Jehovah ; in the
corresponding passage in the Gospel of Matthew, (iii. 3,) it is said
of St. John Baptist, " This is he of whom it was spoken by the
prophet Esaias, saying, The voice of one crying in the wilderness,
Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight." Now,
recollect that the being of whom it is predicted in the prophesy
THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST. 303
that he should have his way prepared is called Jehovah ; the
whole passage, the relative position, and name and personal dig-
nity, are ascribed and applied to Christ in the Gospel. Either
the evangelist misquoted and misinterpreted the prophecy, which
we cannot admit, or he believed, what Isaiah proclaims, that Jesus
Christ is Jehovah the Lord of hosts.
Again, in Ps. xxiy. 10 : " Who is this King of glory ? The
Lord of hosts, he is the King of glory." Compare with this
1 Cor. iii. 9 : "They crucified the Lord of glory." In the Psalm
we have the distinct statement, that the Lord of hosts, i. e. Jeho-
vah, the name that a Jew would give to none but to essential
godhead, is the King of glory ; and in the Epistle to the Co-
rinthians we have the apostle expressly declaring that this King
of glory, or Jehovah, is the Lord Jesus Christ. In Isaiah xliv.
6 : " Thus saith the Lord the King of Israel, and his redeemer
the Lord of hosts ; I am the first, and I am the last ; and beside
me there is no God." Then read the words of my text perfectly
parallel to it, " I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the
end, the first and the last." We thus see the Lord Jesus Christ
in the Apocalypse assuming that he is the same as the Lord of
hosts, — the same attributes, the same dignity, the same glory, are
His ; I must, therefore, conclude, either that Jesus assumed to be
what he was not — and if so, all Christianity falls to pieces like a
rope of sand, without cohesion or consistency — or else that he is
the Lord of hosts, and that he proclaimed himself rightfully, and,
to us, most preciously to be so.
Malachi iii. 1 : " Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall
prepare the way before me : and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall
suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant,
whom ye delight in." Luke ii. 27: "Christ came by the Spirit,"
who inspired the prophecy, "into the temple :" "the Lord whom
ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple ;" and Simeon, who
was waiting for the consolation of Israel, i. e. looking for it accord-
ing to the prophecy, said, " Lord, now lettest thou thy servant
depart in peace according to thy word, for mine eyes have seen
thy salvation." Simeon and Anna had read the promise in Mala-
chi ; they believed and knew, as every Jew knew, that that pro-
mise referred to deity ; they took that promise, turned it into
304 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
prayer, and applied it to Jesus Christ; and we liave Simeon and
Anna, as well as the apostles, testifying that Jesus Christ is the
Lord of hosts.
In Joel ii. 32 : "And it shall come to pass that whosoever
shall call on the name of the Lord shall be delivered :" the word
" to call on" there, is ^^ to invoke," " to call on in worship." la
1 Cor. i. 2 :'" Grrace be to all them that call-on the name of Jesus
Christ our Lord, both theirs and ours."
In Ps. cii. 25—27 : "Of old hast thou laid the foundation of the
earth : and the heavens are the work of thy hands. They shall
perish, but thou shalt endure: yea, all of them shall wax old like
a garment; as a vesture shalt thou change them, and they shall
be changed : but thou art the same, and thy years shall have oo
end." Such is the language applied in that Psalm to Jehovah :
then the apostle Paul, in Heb. i. 10-12, thus applies these the
works of deity, and of deity alone, to our Lord Jesus Christ: —
" But unto the Son he saith. Thy throne, Grod, is for ever and
ever :" "Thou, Lord," addressing Christ, "in the beginning hast
laid the foundation of the earth, and the heavens are the work of
thy hands. They shall perish, but thou remainest; and they all
shall wax old as doth a garment ; and as a vesture shalt thou
fold them up, and they shall be changed : but thou art the same,
and thy years shall not fail."
Again, in Ps. Ixxviii. 56 : " They tempted and provoked" (in
the wilderness) " the most high Grod." In 1 Cor. x. 9 : " Nei-
ther let us tempt Christ, as some of them also tempted, and were
destroyed of serpents." Do you not see that the Being who was
tempted in the desert was the most high God ? and do you not
see also that the apostle Paul declares that that most high God
was the Lord Jesus Christ, whom they tempted in the wilderness?
Again, in Isaiah vi. we have the record of that sublime and glori-
ous vision in which the prophet saw " the Lord sitting upon a
throne high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple : above
it stood the seraphim, and each had six wings : and one cried unto
another, and said. Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts : the whole
earth is full of his glory." Now, notice how the evangelist John
views these very words, which he quotes from Isaiah — words that
involve the worship and the praise of the Supreme Jehovah, and
THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST. 305
which he refers to Jesus Christ, where he says, '' Therefore they
could not believe, because that Esaias said again, He hath blinded
their eyes and hardened their heart; that they should not see
with their eyes, nor understand with their heart, and be converted,
and I should heal them." What am I then to conclude from
this, but that if the evangelist be, what we believe him to be, an
infallible commentator upon infallible prophecy; he sees in that
prophecy a glorious manifestation of the Lord Jesus, and in his
gospel thus distinctly and unequivocally pronounces Jesus to be
Grod ? I must again conclude, either tbat the evangelist John
erred, as I said of the evangelist Matthew, and that therefore
tbeir writings are not inspired, or that Jesus Christ is God, what
they do not hesitate distinctly to declare.
Again, in Isa. viii. 13, 14. : ^'Sanctify the Lord of hosts himself;
and let him be your dread. And he shall be for a sanctuary ;
but for a stone of stumbling and rock of offence." Now compare
with this passage 1 Pet. ii. 7: "The stone which the builders
disallowed, the same is made the head of the corner, and a stone
of stumbling, and a rock of offence;" quoting the very words
which refer to the Supreme God, and applying them to Jesus
Christ. Again, Isa. xliii. 11: "1, even I, am the Lord, and be-
side me there is no Saviour." Compare with 2 Pet. iii. 18 : "But
grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour
Jesus Christ." God says, " I am, and beside me there is no Sa-
viour ;" Christ says that he is the Saviour, and, by fair and
honest inference, " I am that I am." Again : Rev. xxii. 6 :
"The Lord God of the holy prophets sent his angel to show unto
his servants the things that must shortly be done :" and in ver. 16 :
" I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify unto you these things in
the churches." The same sender; and therefore the Lord God
that sent his angel is Jesus Christ our Saviour. John iii. 29 :
"He that hath the bride is the bridegroom." Isa. liv. 5 : "Thy
Maker is thy husband ; the Lord of hosts is his name."
After comparing these passages, let me quote two or three
more as in themselves express and decided proofs of this point.
I am not supposing that any Christian in this assembly believes
that Christ is not God — far from it. Nor am I endeavouring to
convince a Christian mind that Christ is God : I might as well
26*
306 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
try to convince him that the Father is Grod; but I am showing
him that the great truth he holds so dear is not picked up merely
as an incidental expression here and there, but that it spreads
through, and pervades, and gives its tone, its life, its energy, to
every doctrine of Christianity, to every text in the word of God.
And if there should be those present who impugn this doctrine,
or believe it not to be true, from my heart I pity them : they are
in a worse condition than the Israelites at the base of Mount
Sinai : the on\j wonder to me is that they do not tremble : they
have got indeed a clearer revelation of a holy law, but they have
no greater strength to obey it : they have got a clearer intima-
tion of what Grod requires, and they have no increased power to
comply with it.
The first passage to which 1 will refer you is John xx. 28 :
" Then answered Thomas and said,^' (to Jesus,) " My Lord and
my God.^^ Jesus accepted it, he acquiesced in it as his true and
proper attribute; an angel repudiated, and Peter and Paul de-
precated similar worship offered to them. Rom. ix. 5 : "Of whom
as concerning the flesh Christ came, who is over all, God blessed
for ever." Again, Tit. ii. 13, this passage stands in our ver-
sion : " Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appear-
ing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ." But this
is, as every scholar knows, utterly incorrect : the right rendering
is, " Looking for that blessed hope, the glorious appearing of
Jesus Christ our great God and Saviour." So Jude 4 : '^ Deny-
ing the only Lord God our Saviour Jesus Christ." 2 Cor. v. 19 :
" God, in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself" 2 Tim.
iv. 1: "I charge thee before God and the Lord Jesus Christ,
who shall judge the quick and the dead." 2 Cor. v. 20 : "We
are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by
us : we pray you in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to God."
Again, 1 John v. 20 : " We are in him that is true, even in his
Son Jesus Christ. This" (this last-mentioned person, outo^) "is
the true God, and eternal life." And what makes it more re-
markable is, that immediately after the apostle has said in such
unequivocal terms that Jesus Christ is " the true God, and eter-
nal life," he adds the caution, " Little children, keep yourselves
from idols." One would have supposed that there was a direct
THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST. 307
sanction for idolatry conveyed in these words, if Christ were not,
as declared to be, the true God, and eternal life. Col. ii. 8 :
"In Christ dwelleth all the fulness of the godhead bodily."
An infinite capacity can alone comprehend the infinite fulness.
Isa. ix. 6 : " Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given : and
the government shall be upon his shoulder : and his name shall
be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty Grod." John iii.
16: "God so loved," &c. Eph. v. 25: "Christ loved the
church, and gave himself for it." If Christ were not God, this
would be blasphemji ' Eph. iv. 32: " Forgiving one another,
even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you." Col. iii. 13 :
" Forbearing one another, and forgiving one another : even as
Christ forgave you, so also do ye." " Who can forgive sins but
God only ?" In the one passage it is God who forgives us, in
the other it is Christ : the terms therefore are convertible, and
Christ is God. John vi. 38: "I came down from heaven, not
to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me." Matt,
viii. 2 : " There came a leper and worshipped him, saying, Lord,
if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean. Jesus put forth his hand,
and touched him, saying, I will } be thou clean." His will and the
will of the Father were one. John i. 8 : " No man hath seen the
Father at any time." John xiv. 8 : " Philip said unto him. Lord,
show us the Father, and it sufficeth us. Jesus said unto him,
Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known
me, Philip ? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father." Again,
Jude 24 : " Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling,
and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory."
Eph. V. 27 : " That he might present us to himself a glorious
church:" and therefore it is Christ who is spoken of in both
passages. Eph. iii. 2 : " The dispensation of the grace of God
which was given ; how that by revelation he made known unto
me the mystery." Gal. i. 1, 2 : "I neither received it of man,
neither was I taught it ; but by the revelation of Jesus Christ."
1 Kings viii. 39: "Thou, even thou only, knowest the hearts
of the children of men." Rev. ii. 23 : " All the churches shall
know that I am he that searcheth the reins and the hearts."
2 Pet. ii. 4 : " Exceeding great and precious promises, that by
these ye might be partakers of the divine nature." Heb. iii. 14 :
308 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
" We are made partakers of Christ/' the divine nature, " if wa
hold the beginning of our confidence/' i. e. in hi^ promises,
" steadfast unto the end."
Paul says, in Heb. vi. : " God sware by himself, because be
could swear by no greater." Compare with this Isa. xlv. 23 :
** I have sworn by myself, the word is gone out of my mouth in
righteousness, and shall not return. That unto me every knee
shall bow, every tongue shall swear." Then, Rom. xiv. 10:
" We shall all stand before the judgment-seat of Christ. For it
is written. As I live, saith the Lord, every knee shall bow to me,
and every tongue confess to God." Showing that it is Christ
who swears, and swears by himself, because he could swear by
no greater.
Psalm Ixviii. 18: "Thou hast ascended up on high, thou hast
led captivity captive : thou hast received gifts for men ; yea, for
the rebellious also, that the Lord God might dwell among them."
Eph. iv. 8 : " When he" (speaking of Christ) " ascended up on
high, he led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men." Zech.
xii. 10: "In that day, saith the Lord, they shall look on me
whom they have pierced." John xix. 27 : " They shall look on
him" (i. e. Christ) " whom they have pierced." Phil. i. 10 :
" That ye may be sincere and without offence, till the day of
Christ." 2 Pet. iii. 12 : " Looking for and hastening unto the
coming of the day of God." Isa. xl. 10: "Behold, Jehovah
shall come with strong hand, and his arm shall rule for him :
behold, his reward is with him, and his work before him." Rev.
xxii. 12 : " Behold, I come quickly, and my reward is with me."
John i. 3 : " All things were made by him, and without him was
not any thing made that was made."
I am aware that Socinians treat that chapter in a most uncere-
monious way : they see that, if it be true, it plainly proves the
deity of Christ; and therefore they slice it out. The Roman
Catholic lays God's words upon the church's tradition, and cuts,
and squares, and shortens, and lengthens it according to the
standard which he has laid down. The Socinian, or, as he is
called, the Unitarian, or Arian, (differing in degrees, but agreeing
in one great point,) again adapts God's word to his own reason :
wherever his own reason understands, there he says God's word
THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST. 309
is to be held true; wherever his reason fails to comprehend,
there he says God's word is wrong : that is to say, they measure
the infinite by the finite. They say that because they cannot
fathom the depths of the infinite, and span the breadth of the
eternal, that therefore the infinite and the eternal do not exist.
Can any thing be more absurd ? Let them take care lest they
come, as I shall show you they do come, under the guilt of one
or other of these two parties, in the sentence at the close of this
book — ''If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add
unto him the plagues that are written in this book : and if any
man shall take away from the words of the book of this pro-
phecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life."
I do not speak of these parties in language fitted at all to irri-
tate them. I do not mean it to be so; I wish only to speak
faithfully the truth : and it is because I love their souls, and
would do them good, that I speak the truth, and the whole
truth ; and when one speaks the truth, it need not be prefaced
by an apology : it does not require it : falsehood may require the
introduction of an apology; truth needs to be, and must be,
stated in all its grandeur and simplicity, and we must then leave
the issue to God. But those Socinians who take this part of
Scripture to be any thing worth, say that in this passage which
states that the worlds were made by him, the word signifies not
literal worlds, but dispensations; the dispensations were made by
him. But it happens that the word used is not 0i7.0v01j.ia, dis-
pensation, but y.b(Tixoq, which is applied always to the material
world. But, suppose the meaning of it to be, that the dispensa-
tions of the law of Levi, and of the gospel, were by Christ,
would this make Christ not appear to be God ? It seems to me
that by making Christ the author of the gospel, you make him
greater, if possible, than if you concede that he was the author
of creation. You lift him from the throne of the Creator, only
to place him on the yet higher, if possible, throne of the Re-
deemer. And if you say that he made the dispensations, that
he is the author of all their blessings, it is only to arrive at the
same great result, which is inevitable, as it seems to me, that
Christ Jesus is '' God over all, blessed for ever more."
There is another passage which appears to me explicit upon
310 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
this point. Phil. ii. 5 : "Let this mind be in you which was also
in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, thought it not
robbery to be equal with God, but took upon him the form of a
servant." The word used is iJ-opcprjj "form." Did Christ actu-
ally assume the form of a servant? He tells us that he did so.
Well, then, if he took the form of a servant — and that means
that he did really and truly become so — then we must conclude
that in the previous clause, the " form of God," implies that he
was really and truly God.
In other passages divine power is ascribed to Christ. Who
can it be but God of whom the apostle writes, Phil. iii. 21 :
"Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like
unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is
able to subdue all things to himself." Christ is here spoken of
as the author of the resurrection — as the regenerator of this
mortal frame — as making it like his own glorious body. Eternity
is ascribed to Christ: "Glorify me," he says to his Father,
" with thine own self, with the glory which I had with thee be-
fore the world was." Divine honour and worship are ascribed to
Christ : " That all men should honour the Son, even as they
honour the Father." And again: "Let all the angels of God
worship him." In Acts vii. 29 : " They stoned Stephen, calling
upon" (invocating in worship) "Jesus Christ, and saying, Lord
Jesus, receive my spirit."
Now then, is it possible to come to any other conclusion from
this simple comparison of Scripture than this, that the ancient,
the apostolic doctrine, the doctrine of our evangelical church, is
the declaration of the Bible, that Jesus Christ is God over all,
blessed for ever more ? But, I say, if there be any truth in the
great doctrines of Christianity, it follows that Christ is God.
Grant me the atonement, and I can prove that Christ is God.
Grant me the propitiation for sins, and it follows that Christ must
be God. God is infinitely holy, man is infinitely sinful; the two
parties are rent and torn asunder : who shall unite the infinitely
remote holy God, and the infinitely lost unholy creature? Can
a Socinian Christ do it ? will a mere arm of flesh be able to do
it ? It is a chasm which the wings of human love cannot cross ;
which the feet of human devotedness cannot wade. God alone
THE DIVINITY OP CHRIST. 811
can span the tremendous chasm, and bring God and man into
one, so of twain making one. Again, if you grant me the; atone-
ment, he who makes the atonement must be able to make repara-
tion for the violation of that law which we have broken. If God
should show mercy without an atonement, then where would be
his justice, his holiness, or his truth? And he who makes re-
paration must be able to fathom the depths of the fall, the inten-
sity of the guilt, the terrible nature of the crime. But who has
a right idea of sin but God? and none but he who by his omni-
science knows what sin is, can by his omnipotence give an ade-
quate atonement or reparation.
I notice in the next place, that he who made the atonement
must be able, not only to atone for sin, but also to alter the
moral condition of the sinner. It is not enough that I should
be forgiven by Christ if he were able to do so, but I must also
be renewed by Christ. He who expiates the guilt of my sin
must also be able to extirpate the power of sin within me : but
none but God can change my heart, and none but God can for-
give my sins. Jesus Christ, therefore, must be God. But if we
observe the transcendent nature of the blessing bequeathed to
us in Christ's blood, we shall iBnd that if Christ be not God, the
whole gospel is suited to make me love him, and idolatrously
worship him, and trust in him as God. Suppose, for instance,
a son has played the prodigal, and has left his father's roof, his
inheritance, all he had, and all he hoped for. The father refuses
to have any thing to do with him : the servant in the father's
house raises by intense labour, and at the greatest personal sacri-
fice, every penny that he can command, and goes and pays the
debt which the son has incurred, and for which he lies in prison,
and thereby extricates him : on whom will the son's gratitude
concentrate ? Not certainly on his father, for his father left him
to die in prison, but upon the servant; and that servant will
have all the gratitude and love and reverence of that son. If
our Lord Jesus Christ has come from heaven, and if he has died
for me, drunk my bitter cup, exhausted my wo, expiated my sin,
taken upon himself the pangs and agonies that would have con-
sumed and corroded my heart for ever : then I must look upon
him as my greatest benefactor, and love, revere, and adore him
S12 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
with my whole heart ; and, if he be not God, he must occupy
the pl^ce which God claims, and I must love him with all my
heart, and with all my mind, and with all my soul, and with all
my strength. Grand me the atonement, and I contend that none
but God in our nature was at liberty to make the atonement.
Suppose Christ were a mere creature, a high, holy, pure, and per-
fect creature, by all the laws of God's moral government, so far
as we know them, it would have been wrong to make such a
holy and innocent creature suffer for those who were sinful and
guilty. What is the law of the universe? It is that '' holiness
is happiness;" and it is so in every instance. But if a holy
creature had been made a victim, the law would have been re-
versed, for there would have occurred the spectacle of this holy
creature made an unhappy sufferer. And, in the next place, no
creature is at liberty to give his life as a sacrifice. The creature
who would submit to be sacrificed for others unbidden, as bidden
he could not be, would be a suicide. My life is not my own. I
have no power to lay it down nor to take it up. It is forfeited
by sin, and I can only give it up when God requires it: I cannot
voluntarily surrender it. I hold, therefore, that none but God
in our nature could make the atonement, because none but God
could be the innocent substitute for the guilty. And none but
God in our nature could make the atonement, because none but
he could voluntarily lay his life down, and take it voluntarily
again.
And, in the next place, we infer from all that I have quoted,
that if Christ be not God, the whole language of the New Testa-
ment is fitted to make men idolaters. Just look at it in this
broad, popular, comprehensive light. Read such texts as I have
read — in which he is spoken of as giving pastors to the church,
redeeming it by his blood, purifying it by his spirit, presenting
the church to himself: his name is wonderful, as the object of
our trust, as the ground of our salvation, our all and in all, in
whom we are to glory, and in him alone — if Christ be not God,
the whole tenor of this language is fitted to mislead, and to make
men worship the creature instead of the Creator.
But we know, my dear friends, and rejoice to know, that
Christ is indeed God over all, blessed for evermore. If he be
THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST. 313
not God, we have no glorious sacrifice, no atoning ransom, we
have only a second edition of Sinai — Sinai in greater brilliancy,
its thunders with greater power, its lightnings with greater force.
But what I need is not to have a holier law than that which the
ten commandments contain, for the law I have is beyond my
reach. I see that my nature cannot obey it, and if you give me
a purer law, you only plunge me in deeper despair. If a man
has lost the use of his limbs, and is lying by the wayside, what
is the use of going to that lame man, and saying to him, That is*
the road to London ? What he wants first is the use of his
limbs, and then he will ask the way to London. What is the
use of saying to a dead man. Here is bread to eat, or wine with
which to be refreshed, when he has no power to taste them ?
What he needs first is life. And what we need is a remedy, then
direction : a cure, then guidance: an atonement made by God in
our nature, then a law given by God on Sinai as the standard of
our obedience, the schoolmaster to lead us to Christ, the rule of
our life and conduct in the world.
But, if Christ be God, as I think I have shown him to be, then
what a glorious being is he ! In every tear he shed were the
bright beams of the ancient shechinah. In every agony of that
man of sorrow was emitted the glory of God. In every act was
the exaltation of a law, in every agony the exhaustion of a curse :
his humanity giving all suitableness, his divinity all sufficiency,
made him thus our perfect Saviour, our glorious ransom, the
foundation of our hopes, our all and in all. A divine Christ is
the central sun of Christianity : quench it, and all is *' confusion
worse confounded. '^ How solemn, then, is our conviction that
that condemned malefactor at Pilate's bar was the mighty God
who will summon Pilate to his. That babe in the manger was
the object of adoring cherubim : he that said, " The foxes have
holes, and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of man
hath not where to lay his head," was he who stretched out the firm-
ament, lit it up with all its lamps, spread the earth beneath your
feet, covered it with all its verdure. -The dead Christ was the
Prince of Life. That lowly Saviour was the Son of God, the
brightness of his glory, the express image of his person. He
must be God, ''Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the
SECOND SERIES. 27
814 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
first and the last/' before I can trust him. I have often told you
that, fallen as they are, our souls are mighty in their ruins. Any
one that sees a ruined soul can see it is no common ruin: it is not
the ruin of a little or an insignificant being : it is the ruin of the
most glorious production of the wisdom, the beneficence, and the
omnipotence of God. And the soul of man I feel to be so great,
even in its ruins, that I would not trust the greatest creature in
the universe with it. I would not risk it in an angel's hand, or
beneath the shadow of an archangel's wing. I must have God to
take my soul into his keeping, or none else shall touch it. There
is nothing above man but God, and there is none that man may
trust in but God. And he that trusts in Jesus, trusts in the Rock
of ages, and shall never be disappointed.
How awful is the lot of those who despise this Saviour ! How
awful the sin of those who turn a careless ear to his calls I "If
they perished under Moses' law who disregarded it, how much
more shall we ?"
And now, if I address any Unitarians, (and I know, by the
notes I have received, that such do come here,) let me beseech
you, take the texts I have quoted, and ponder them. Do not be
ashamed to lay aside your old convictions. I have laid aside
some convictions twice over. And what is an honest man ? One
who stands with his mind open to Scripture, reason, argument,
fact. Do not look over your shoulder to see if your present po-
sition will be consistent with the past. We have nothing to do
with consistency, we have only to be honest, we have simply to
do what God bids, what argument demonstrates, what fact con-
cludes. I call upon you to weigh these things : and if you can
reply to them, or show me that they do not bear out the conclu-
Bion to which I have come, I will renounce Trinitarianism and be-
come a Socinian. I do not think it is possible. I know it is im-
possible. I know that the deity of Jesus is a fact : I feel it a
conviction riveted in my soul, that Christ is God; and without
that conviction I should be plunged into the depths of a cold, a
freezing, a withering Atheism. But do not say. Do you not hold
three Gods ? I hold no such thing. I believe that the Father
is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Ghost is God, and yet there
is but one living and true God. You ask me, perhaps, to explain
THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST. 315
it. There the Socinian breaks out : I cannot explain all things.
There is a height, above which reason's wing will not spread;
there is a horizon where I must stop, look, and adore, and receive
as an obedient pupil, not reject as a philosophic questionist. And
ought you not to expect it to be so ? What is the Bible but a
picture of the Deitj ? But a picture of the Deity surely will have
some infinite lines in it. And can we expect that we, who are
possessed of finite minds, shall be able to comprehend what is in-
finite ? The thought is a contradiction. So much is this the
fact, that if the Bible did not contain many things which tran-
scend the grasp of my mind, I should say it was a very strong pre-
sumption that the Bible was not from God. True, much of it is
such as we can comprehend, but there is also much which we cannot
comprehend. I believe that eternity will be a constant extension
of our horizon. You know that when you stand upon the deck of
a ship at sea, or upon a hill, there is a certain space called the
horizon, which is the limit of your vision ; but if you go to the
range of that vision, you will see that its outermost circle is the
centre of another beyond, and so on in infinitum. Like as amid
Alps piled on Alps, one peak rising above another, you fancy that
if you can climb this one you can reach the mountain top, but
you find that the higher you climb the more remains to be climbed.
Socinianism is unphilosophical and irrational : it is worse — it is
unscriptural, it is soul-destroying. A Socinian may be saved,
but it must be in spite of his Socinianism, not by it. There may
be some chinks and crannies, even in a Socinian's creed, through
which the light of God's truth may enter, and carry salvation to
the poor soul that lies under its dark and freezing incubus. My
dear friends, again I say, weigh these things. Look at them ho-
nestly and fairly, and I am sure you will come to the conclusion
to which I have come, that the arm of the Kedeemer is the arm
of the living God, that the rock we trust on is Deity, and the
hope which cheers us is the hope of glory. And you, my dear
friends, members of my own congregation and of other Christian
bodies, be able or seek to be able always to give a reason for the
faith that is in you. You see that your creed is neither flimsy
nor lightly based. Accept the Bible, and you see how naturally
316 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
it follows that Christ is God. Reject the deity of the one, and
you must reject the inspiration of the other.
Let me ask you, in conclusion, are yoU trusting in Jesus ? Are
you leaning on him ? Are you saying at this very moment,
from the depths of your heart. My Lord and my God, I lean on
thee, I look to thee, I have no help, no hope, no refuge, in the
universe but in thee, my Lord, my Saviour, my all ; and when
heart and fleyh shall faint and fail, oh be thou. Lamb of God^ the
strength of my heart, and my portian for ever ! Amen.
LECTURE XXV.
THE BLESSED ONES.
"Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to
the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city." — Revelation
xxii. 14.
In the edition or translation of the New Testament adopted by
the Church of Rome these words are not given as I have read
them in our authorized translation. In what is called the Rhe-
nish New Testament, that is, a translation from a translation,
which is the standard of faith and authority and practice, as far
as it goes, in the Church of Rome, the 14th verse reads, unex-
pectedly in such a quarter, thus, " Blessed are they that have
washed their robes in the blood of the Lamb, that they may have
right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into
the city." And in looking at some various readings of the New
Testament text, I find that in one or two ancient MSS. this very
reading which the Church of Rome has adopted occurs; and Je-
rome, a Latin father, a very bitter and acrimonious writer, but a
very learned and accomplished scholar, translated the Greek New
Testament into Latin, or rather corrected the old Italic version
that existed before his time, and he has rendered the text from
the MS. he used, just as I have now read it in your hearing, and
very beautiful it is, if it be right reading : "Blessed are they that
have washed their robes in the blood of the Lamb, for they shall
have right to the tree of life, and shall enter in through the gates
into the city." We cannot fail to see that this very text, in the
bosom of the Roman Catholic Bible, condemns the tenets of the
Roman Catholic Church! How little does she rest upon the
blood of the Lamb ! how much upon the intercession of Mary,
the absolution of the church, and the merits, the excellences, and
the virtues of pseudo-saints ! But, beautiful as this reading is, I
do not think it is the true one ; and we must not hesitate to say
so : we must not bend texts to our theology, but we must bend
27*
818 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
our theology to texts. We must not read God's word in the light
of our creed, but we must read our creed in the light of God's
word. And what is plainly the word of God, and demonstrated
by unequivocal evidence to be so, that we must receive, whether
we can make it dovetail with our notions or not : whether we
receive it as a harmonizing element into our creed or not, is of no
consequence, if it is truth : because it is from the Fountain of
Truth, it is in harmony with all other truth ; and, if it do not
sound to us as if it were so, it is from the deafness of our ear, and
not from the dissonance of God's truths. I prefer, therefore, the
reading of our authorized version, because it occurs in every an-
cient MS. of any weight or authority whatever; and, moreover,
I believe as it stands in our Bible it is in perfect harmony with
the rest of the word of God.
The word " right'' may startle some : it is the translation of
the Greek word k^ooaia, which means, liberty, authority. It is
the very same word that occurs in that beautiful passage, " To as
many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons
of God." It does not mean "merit," it means liberty or au-
thority. Here it does not imply that they have a right to the
tree of life because they do the commandments of Jesus ; but it
teaches that their doing the commandments is the evidence of
their belonging to Jesus, and therefore, as the result of this
characteristic, they are made fit for, and have an entrance abun-
dantly administered into the gates of the city of our God. You
must often have noticed, in reading God's word, how completely
precept and privilege, doctrine and duty, are interwoven like woof
and warp into one glorious texture. God's word is not written
as if it were composed by men who had a scheme to support ] the
very fact that you find startling texts that seem to fly in the face
of your creed, is just presumptive evidence that holy men wrote
as they were inspired by God, not in order to keep all continuously
in harmony with a prearranged and preconceived creed, which
they had constructed in their own minds.
You will find then, I say, this — that the promise and the pre-
cept are continually interchanged, and occasionally change places.
Is there a promise of a crown? it is added, "Be faithful unto
death, and I will give thee a crown of life." Have we free justifi-
THE BLESSED ONES. 319
cation through the blood of Jesus ? it is added, " Shall we go on
in sin that grace may abound ? God forbid." Are we saved by
grace ? it is the reward of the inheritance : it is given for faithful
continuance in well-doing. The reward that crowns the duty is
constantly associated with the privilege which sustains and ani-
mates us in the discharge of that duty. In Christ is the Chris-
tian's title ; like Christ is the Christian's character ; resting on
the sacrifice of Christ is our position, doing Christ's command-
ments is our constant duty ; and character is inseparable from
the state j holiness is inseparable from forgiveness ; sanctification
is inseparable from justification : wherever there are forgiven men,
there there are holy men : wherever there are accepted men, there
there are those who do ^od's commandments and have a right to
the tree of life, and enter in through the gates into the city.
Now, who are those that do God's commandments ? — for the
whole meaning and application of the text lies in answer to this
question. They are exclusively forgiven, justified, and accepted
men. "By nature there is none that doeth good ; all have sinned,
and come short of the glory of God.'' They are ignorant of the
purity of God's law, and we are by nature disinclined to the duty
prescribed by God's law ; and therefore they who do this law,
who obey His commandments, are first sons, then they are ser-
vants ') their persons are accepted first, their offerings are welcome
next. They are delivered first from the curse of a law that con-
demns them, and then they accept the guidance of a law that
acquits and welcomes and directs them. They are emancipated
from the curse of the law, in order to be introduced into a nearer,
clearer, and more growing obedience to the duties of the law.
And obedience to the commandments of God is the evidence and
action of all the people of God. They see God's law in a new
light, they do it with a new delight; and the new obedience, and
the new heart, and the justified person, are all one and the same
in Jesus Christ.
Now it may be asked, in the next place, If they are Christians
who do God's commandments, and none else, what are the com-
mandments of Christ ? When we read the word commandments,
we are apt to leap to the conclusion that this means the Ten Com-
mandments, or the two epitomes of the commandments which I
320 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
read this morning, and which are perfect exhibitions of all the
commandments of God. But these commandments specified here
are not specially the commandments of Grod the Father, or of the.
Triune Jehovah, but they are especially and distinctively the com-
mandments of the Lord Jesus Christ. He introduces himself in
verse 13, saying, " I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the
end, the first and the last.^^ Then John, listening to the music
of these accents pealed from the upper sanctuary, adds, ^^ Blessed
are they that do His commandments" — the commandments of the
Alpha and Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and
the End.
What, then, are his commandments ? I will give you the very
first ; and how full of all that can touc^ and attract the human
heart is that commandment of his ! ^^ Come unto me, all ye that
labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." " Look
unto me, all the ends of the earth, and be ye saved." And how
precious is this fact, that He makes our safety to be our duty,
our salvation to be our instant obligation; and that he makes
our disregard of salvation not merely the rejection of our own
mercy, but also disobedience to his own royal and conclusive com-
mand ! It is thus that the cross is inseparable from the sceptre ;
and he that refuses to be saved, not merely rejects the mercy that
can forgive him, but disobeys the royal command of him who
would redeem him. "For this is his commandment, that ye
believe on Jesus Christ whom he hath sent." And, my dear
friends, is not that the character of all the commandments of
God ? God never commands his creatures as an arbitrary tyrant,
to gratify himself. Whatever he commands them to do is ne-
cessary to their own happiness and holiness, and progress to
heaven. Never forget, then, that when God commands you to
be holy, it is really his commanding you to be happy. When
God bids you accept grace, that is offered in his Son, he com-
mands you to accept that salvation which will make you happy
and blessed for ever.
But there are other commandments of the Alpha and Omega :
here, for instance, is a very precious one : " Seek first the
kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all else shall be
added." Seek this first in your heart; seek it first in your
THE BLESSED ONES. A 821
family. When you go to listen to a minister, seek first an evan-
gelical minister; an eloquent or learned one next. Be less
anxious that he is a man of talent ; be more anxious that he is a
child of Grod ; for I solemnly believe that the dry, closely com-
pacted and soldered essays that are sometimes delivered from the
pulpit, and fired, as it were, from the cannon's mouth, to hit in
some direction, are not what God will bless : what he will bless
is living truth coming from living hearts, spoken to the people —
the minister appealing to them in piercing tones ; not because it
is a duty, or in order to make the people cry, " How beautiful V
or '• How logical V but in order to make them cry out in the
agony of their hearts, " Men and brethren, what must we do to
be saved V You are to seek God and his righteousness first, not
only in selecting a minister, but in selecting a school. Do not
send your children to a school because it is cheap, or because
they will be taught the most elegant accomplishments ; because
they will be taught to play with great grace upon the piano, or
because they will be taught to dance with great beauty, and to
conciliate the applause and admiration of others. Make sure,
first, of having a Christian teacher, and then settle, in any de-
gree or proportion that you like, the accomplishments that are to
follow. " Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness,
and all else shall be added." And so in your reading, seek books
first that will make you wise, and holy, and happy, and then en-
joyment and pleasure will be added.
But let me give you another commandment : " Do this in re-
membrance of me." Who said that ? He that bore the curse
in his own body on the tree ; he that emptied the cup of its bit-
terness, and filled it with exhaustless sweetness. He says to you,
^^Do this in remembrance of me;" and next Lord's day I invite
you to do so. Did I not tell you in the morning what I look
upon as the most melancholy feature in this congregation ? — that
when the table of the Lord is spread, and the professed people of
God gather round it, two-thirds of the congregation turn their
backs and retire ; and, as I told you, the footfall of the retiring
crowd seems to whisper, nay, to thunder, in my heart, '^ We are
outcasts, we have no right to our Father's board, we are not fitted
for heaven ; we are not fitted for his table here, and, of course,
322 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
not fitted for his judgment-throne hereafter \ therofore we turn
our backs upon his table, and plunge into the world and the
world's revelry/^ What is that table? — is it a table around
which the thunders roll, and the lightnings of Sinai flash — from
which a man may pray to be hidden, lest he be consumed ? The
communion-table is a festival : it is a feast, not a fast : it is the
memorial of love that died for us : it does not speak of judgments
ready to consume and crush us : it is spread for the hungry and
the thirsty ; for the faint, and the fearful, and the weary, and the
expecting; the least grace, the least faith, he will no more reject,
than he will queneh the smoking flax, and break the bruised
reed. The only qualification for that table is just this : ^' I am lost,
and Christ is my Saviour; I desire to run from myself, and be
found in him ; and in life and in death to do his commandments,
and through his blood to look for admission into the gates of the
city, and a right to the tree of life.^^ Then, my dear friends, if
you are leaving out one commandment, you are not doing the
commandments of Christ.
Here is another command : ^^ Gro into all the world, and preach
the gospel to every creature.'' " Let your light so shine before
men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father
which is in heaven." " Be merciful, as he is merciful/'' " Love
your enemies, pray for them that curse you, and do good to them
which despitefully use you and persecute you." Such are some
of the commandments of Christ; blessed are they that do them.
The blessing is in the obedience, the reward is in the bosom of
the worker ; and it will be felt to be the sweeter, even where the
duty is the most arduous and difiicult. These commandments
are to be done in opposition to our own will. The first lesson a
Christian has to learn is, to do always, not what he likes best,
but what he ought to do ; not what he would, but what he should
do; and when you receive commandments from your blessed
Master, you must be prepared to hush all your passions, to sub-
due all your prejudices, and gird your loins for unfaltering obe-
dience to him, in spite of protesting passions and rebellious pre-
judices ; and do simply, whatever be the consequence, and how-
ever man may construe it, whatever you feel to be your duty, and
the commandment of God. But you are to do them, not only ia
THE BLESSED ONES. 823
opposition to your own will, when it rebels, but in opposition to
the will, the prejudices, and the opinions of other men. Many
adopt as a rule the traditions of the elders. Many persons say,
If I do this, what will this man say ? If I do this, that man will
say this ', and if I do not do it, this one will say something else.
My dear friends, if you let in such a method of reasoning, there
will be no end to your troubles and difficulties. If you look be-
hind you to see who is watching, or before to see who is obstruct-
ing, your course will be zigzag, and full of bends, and turns, and
crooked shifts. But if you have a single eye, and simplicity of
purpose, and a heart sanctified by the Spirit of God, your course
will be onward straight like an arrow, and the end of that course
will be the tree of life, and an entrance into the city of our God.
But let me notice, as another department of my subject, that
in order to do such commandments, we must clearly, fully, and
distinctly understand them. Where are these commandments to
be found ? They are to be found in that book which has become
with many an obsolete book — but, I trust, with increasing num-
bers, the man of their counsel — the word of God. He who
opens that book, and searches it as the Saviour prescribes, will
soon know of the doctrines and the duties, whether they be of
Christ ; and when we have recourse to that word, we must take
care lest we lose its practical excellence in admiration of its poetic
beauty ; or lest we be so charmed and captivated with its per-
suasive eloquence, and its glorious poetry, that we come to read
it as poets or critics, instead of accepting it as Christians. It is
my own lot — and a painful experience it is to me — to feel the
difficulty of getting rid of the minister in reading the Scriptures,
and of retaining only the Christian : while I study God's word,
the constant temptation comes into my mind, as I open it. How
shall I expound this ? By what means shall I illustrate that ?
And I have often to say to the pulpit, and the minister, and the
people. Stand aside, get thee behind me, and let me alone, that I
may listen to God, as a poor dying sinner needing teaching from
his Holy Spirit. My dear friends, we ought at such times to get
rid of all that is national or official, and retain behind only our
personal responsibility in the sight of God. Leave, then, all that
is beautiful in the poetry of Scripture, all that is persuasive in its
824 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
eloquence ; cross the thresliold, enter tlie sacred edifice, and wor-
ship there. Regard the Bible as an ocean whose floor is covered
with the most precious gems, where the man that dives oftenest
and deepest will bring up the richest treasures and the most pre-
cious possessions. Remember, that book was written and is pre-
served, not to conciliate their prejudices, or to arrest your ad-
miration, but with infinitely loftier ends — to enlighten your
mind, to reach your heart, to touch your conscience, and to make
you wiser, and holier, and happier, and better. The man who
takes the Bible as a book for criticism, instead of a pharmacopoeia
for prescriptions, acts like a man who receives a prescription from
a physician while he is ill, and instead of presenting it to the
chemist, getting it made up, and taking it, first of all discusses
the grammar of the prescription and the construction of the Latin
in which it is written ; and when he gets the medicine, puts it in
a crucible on the fire, or cuts it with a knife, in order to try its
composition; and so wastes his time, and gives strength to his
disease, by making experiments on its nature instead of trying
ite efifects by taking it as it was prescribed. Thus you are not to
treat Grod's word. Do not spend your time in cavilling at this,
or applauding that, or wondering at something else, but read it
as men who regard it as a pharmacopoeia that God has written ;
treat it as the tree of life ; gather those precious leaves which are
for the healing, and eat of its precious fruit which is for the food
and nutriment of the nations.
Having ascertained, then, what God's commandments are, let
us receive them with perfect submission : recollect that the Bible
is not a compendium of texts for discussion, or a bundle of theories
for analysis, or dogmas for testing; but a presentation of doc-
trines for simple, childlike, unquestioning submission. When I
hear a minister read a text, and say, I am about to prove this, I
could wish I were a hundred miles away. What ! prove what
God has said ? If God has said it, there is an end to all demon-
stration. But if he says, I will try to unfold its meaning, to
bring before you its perfect harmony with the rest of the Bible
and with the context, to explain their meaning, to break up its
mystery, and to pour upon your hearts its blessed truths, I can
understand that. If I find a truth impressed with Christ's im-
THE BLESSED ONES. 325
prhnatur, I have nothing to do but to take its simple testimony,
and act upon it as if it were one of the pillars that sustain the
universe ; for these may pass away, but not one jot or one tittle
of God's word shall pass away till all be fulfilled.
And, in the third place, we are to receive and do these com-
mandments with impartiality. There is a good deal of the old
Pharisaism in every character. They made the rigid observance
of one commandment an atonement for the violation of all the
rest. When a Pharisee wished special license to violate the
sevei^th commandment, he paid special attention and obedience
to the sixth ; or when he wished to violate specially the sixth, he
was sure to be found magnifying beyond all limits the fifth.
And there is still, with many, the idea that they may indulge in
this sin, provided they be rid of that ; and that they may do
what this man does, because they do something that this man
does not. Wherever there is such reasoning there is want of
grace, and want of thorough consistency of thought, character,
and conduct. Because, if you violate one commandment, how
can you keep any one? The same voice which sounds from
Sinai, " Thou shalt not commit adultery," is the same which ad-
dresses, in the same tones, " Thou shalt not steal. '^ If you vio-
late one commandment, what reason is there, except your own
superstition, for your keeping any commandment of God at all ?
You must not, therefore, select one commandment for special ob-
servance, and subject another to your own passion, or conve-
nience, or caprice. You must hear God's voice in all ; you must
see God's hand in all; you must read God's superscription in
all ; and you must do all — not, indeed, to be justified by doing
them, for that is deadly poison — but because your hearts have
been changed, and your natures renewed, and you do, as your
pleasure and delight, the will of your Father which is in heaven.
In the next place, we must do his commandments when we
cannot see the end or meaning of those we are called upon to do.
Many times are we called upon, in the course of God's provi-
dence, to do something or to suffer something, the meaning, the
mystery, and the issue of which we cannot exactly see. Let us
make sure it is God's will, and then unquestioning obedience is
«till our best and our wisest course. Be humble in your igno-
SKCOND SERIES. 28
APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
ranee, trustful in your love : weakness can lean on the Omnipo-
tence it cannot comprehend; and He who prescribes the duty
will be our support, when we cannot understand its mysteries or
see its issue. Let us be assured that he that knows all perfectly
will order all wisely, and that ^'in keeping his commandments
there is great reward."
In the next place, we must do his commandments resolutely.
Christ's commandments are in one respect easy, and in another
difficult. They are easy to a Christian; they are unspeakably
difficult to an unconverted man. Here is the difference between
Christianity and anti-Christianity. Anti-Christianity is delight-
ful to the natural man, but hateful to the Christian. Christianity
is delightful to the Christian, but hateful to the natural man.
Now, in order to do Christ's commandments resolutely, we must
first be sons : even when we are so, we shall be called upon
sometimes to bear what feels heavy, and to go through what
seems severe, and to obey what appears a hard command. But
has Christ deceived us ? He has not told us that all we shall
meet in life will be sweet and pleasant ; on the contrary, he has
said, " Through much tribulation ye must enter into the kingdom
of heaven." '^ Let any man that will come after me take up his
cross and follow me." '' In the world ye shall have tribulation."
And, in the last place, we must do his commandments, not in
our own strength, but in reliance on divine strength. And this
strange paradox, which the natural mind cannot comprehend,
Christians have felt to be gloriously true : " When I am weak
then am I strong." Never is the Christian so near victory, as
when he has the consciousness within him that he can do
nothing ; never is he so strong as when he says, " By the grace
of God I am what I am ;" never is he so capable of heroic sacri-
fice and of noble daring, of mighty and resplendent acts, as when
he can say, " I can do all things" — not stopping here, but add-
ing — "through Christ which strengtheneth me." My dear
friends, I do not ask you to make bricks without giving you
straw : I ask you to obey the commandments of Christ in the
strength of Christ, obedience to whom is perfect happiness —
happiness which is only the dawn of a nobler still. The darkest
pight shall have its sky illumined with it, as with unutterable
THE BLESSED ONES. 827
glory; and when you are alone, you shall feel that troops of
angels wait upon you continually, and minister to your wants.
But it is here said, that those who do his commandments — and
I beg of you not to forget that I am speaking of Christians, when
I speak of doing his commandments — that they have present
happiness. It is not said. Blessed shall they &e, but Blessed are
they. In the blessed language of Deuteronomy : '^ Blessed shall
be the fruit of thy body, and the fruit of thy ground, and the fruit
of thy cattle, and the increase of thy kine, and the flocks of thy
sheep. Blessed shall be thy basket and thy store." (xxviii. 4, 5.)
Why is there happiness and blessedness in keeping and doing
Grod's commandments? Because Christians are justified men.
And they that love to do Christ's commandments are brought
within the orbit of their natural attraction. The natural man
has broken loose from the attraction of the great Sun, and rolls
through infinite space, dashing against successive objects, un-
fruitful, miserable, unhappy ; but when Grod's hand is laid upon
him, and the stray star is brought back to its orbit, and comes
under the attraction of the great central Sun, basking in its light
and bathed in its splendour, then the creature is snatched from
the experience of wo, and placed within the sphere of attraction,
and happiness, and blessedness, or obedience to the command of
God. And you know, and experience teaches us, that there is
no blessedness or happiness anywhere else. Some have tried to
find happiness in wealth : we have all, I dare say, had a turn of
that passion ; it is the popular passion. They go out to Canton,
and to India, and to the ends of the earth, all of them seeking
happiness — not always in duty, but in money — as their idol and
their god. And they return home, and find their predecessors,
some of them grown rich, and yet not happy — others of them re-
turned poor, and yet not happy ; and they their successors have the
same experience to read over again, and to discover that all the
wealth of the Indies, and of Peru, is but a broken cistern that
can hold no water. I solemnly believe, my dear friends, that
there is no such thing as real happiness to be had at any point
in that pecuniary prospect that our imagination sets before us.
I am quite sure that we are not a whit happier with two hundred
pounds a year than we were with one hundred and fifty pounds ;
328 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
and we are not one whit happier with five hundred pounds than
we were with two hundred pounds ; and if we were to double that
sum we should not be a whit the happier still ; for what was re-
garded as a perfect luxury when we had one hundred and fifty
pounds a year, comes to be an absolute necessity with five hun-
dred pounds a year. Thus it is that luxuries in the distance be-
come necessities in possession, and our happiness is still a matter
of procrastination and postponement — not yet, but to be. My
dear friends, happiness is within, it is not from without; and
you may depend upon it that increase of knowledge and increase
of wealth is not increase of happiness. If we can only realize,
and pray as Agar prayed, "0 Grod, give me not riches, lest I
forget thee ; give me not poverty, lest I steal. Give me neither
poverty nor riches ; feed me with food convenient for me.'' The
shoe is best, not when it is too large, or when it pinches, but
just when it fits. We are strongest and ablest to walk, not
when we have too many sticks, nor too short a stick, but a stick
suited to our hand, and able to bear us. It is best when we
have what a Christian asks ; and have you ever thought of that
prayer, " Give us this day our daily bread ?" That is all we have
need . to ask, and to ask for more is to look beyond to-day.
Others have tried to find happiness, not in wealth, but in philo-
sophy, in study, in literature, in seclusion from the world, in
escape from duty, rather than in mingling with and performing
it. Others have tried to find it in gayety, in splendid parties, in
the sound of the pipe, and the tabret, and the dance. Have they
found it ? I believe, (though I have had no experience,) knowing
human nature, and from what others have said, that when the
smile has been upon the face, and the footstep has indicated
mirth and hilarity, there has been an aching void of dissatisfac-
tion, and misery, and envy, and jealousy, and chagrin within,
and that all the splendour of the exterior is but the gilded cover-
ing that conceals the hoUowness, and bitterness, and sorrow that
are within. Solomon drank of every cistern, smelled every
flower, gathered every blossom, learned all knowledge, under-
stood all science, practised all sin, and gratified all lust ; and he
came to this conclusion, from personal and painful experience,
*^ All is vanity and vexation of spirit." But he came to a better
THE BLESSED ONES. 329
conclusion tlian that : " Fear God, and keep his commandments
for this is the whole duty of man." Blessedness, or happiness
is to be found where it is stated in the text : it is to be found
according to history, according to the experience of the aged, ac
cording to the conclusions of Scripture, in doing the command
ments of God. And when we know that the curse is removed
that hell is closed, that heaven is opened, that the suspended
sword is sheathed, that God is our Father, then we begin to
be happy. When we feel that our passions are subdued — that
there is living water coming forth where was the gall of bitter-
ness before — that there is the service of God where was the
slavery of Satan — that there is within us the music of heaven for
the discords of the damned — that we have the feelings and aifec-
tion of sons, and not the crouching, craven terror of slaves — when
our whole heart is thus regenerated, and our whole man reformed,
and God's commandments become alike our duty and our delight —
then we know, we feel, indeed, what true happiness is. And if,
instead of visiting the east and the west, the north and the south,
to secure what you have not, you were simply to become Chris-
tians where you are, I believe you would feel happy just where
you are. People of the living God, let your Christianity be
seated in every counting-house, let it serve in every shop, let it
speak behind every desk, tread upon every Exchange, touch the
sceptre, speak in the senate, be heard in the republican congress
and in the royal cabinet — let Christianity inspire all, and gild
all, and animate all — and you will find a new halo begin to sur-
round humanity, and the heart that was breaking shall bound
with joy, and men shall feel that there is blessedness only in the
shadow of the tree of life, and in drinking of that river that flows
from the throne of God and of the Lamb.
But the chief blessedness, let me add briefly in conclusion, of
a Christian is in prospective, it is in reversion : " He shall have
a right to the tree of life, and to enter in through the gates into
the city :" — the city which Abraham looked for — the city which
is so graphically described in chap. xxi. of this book, and on
which I have already spoken — that city that was built by God,
and beautified and illumined and made ready for you — the city
(for all other cities have the dry-rot in their walls, and decay in
28*
330 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
all their elements, and graves in all their acres,) that hath founda-
tions, whose builder and maker is Grod. Such persons shall bo
admitted through its gates ; they have not an access to make,
they have no approach to excavate, no obstruction to remove, for
the gates are opened, the gates of glory into which the King of
Glory has entered : all they have to do is to follow Christ who
precedes them, their works following them, and so dwell for ever
in the presence of God and of the Lamb. I have explained the
tree of life in another sermon — or literally wood of life ; its leaves
for the healing, and its fruit for the food of the nations, or those
who approach that tree to eat its leaves, and participate in its
fruit — which gives them life, and is the sacrament of immortality :
we receive eternal life here, and we enjoy it there. There was a
tree of life in Eden, which was designed to teach our first parents
that their life was not an original one, but a derived one ; and so
we shall feel in heaven that our life is not an original life, but
one derived from God, and from whom, therefore, it perpetually
flows.
Such is the exposition of the beautiful passage I have read to
you; such is the blessedness of those who are justified by Christ;
such is the reward of them that do the commandments of God ;
such are the persons whom I invite to the communion-table next
Lord^s day : all that can say, "We lean upon the Saviour for ac-
ceptance with God, we desire to do his will, and follow in his foot-
prints till we appear before God. We have no wish but his will;
we have no desire that we would cherish which can clash with his
commandment; we desire to be found in him, and to be seen
serving him our whole life, and to be with him when time shall
be no more.
331
LECTURE XXVI.
THE INVITATION.
"Tke Spirit and the Bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come.
And let him that is athirst come : and whosoever •will, let him take of the water
of life freely." — Revelation xxii. 17.
I PASS by the 15th verse in the course of my exposition of the
successive verses of this chapter, because the main sentiment in
it is illustrated in the last verse of chap. xxi. I also pass the
16th verse, because the chief truth illustrated in it seems to be
proclaimed almost in the same terms in the previous verses of
the same chapter; and this evening I adopt for exposition the
most beautiful words contained, perhaps, in the Apocalypse; the
most precious invitation addressed to sinners in any part of the
gospel — addressed directly by Him who is the Alpha and Omega,
the First and the Last, and who is here represented in this his
glorious character, suspending for a little the picture of the fu-
ture glory, in order to appeal to the hearts of them that read, and
to the ears of them that hear: "The Spirit and the Bride say,
Come. And let him that heareth say. Come. And let him that
is athirst come : and whosoever will, let him take of the water
of life freely."
We are all, without exception, if I may believe the express
statements of Scripture, or regard the experience of humanity,
athirst. These words are not addressed to saints as such, who
thirst for the living water of the gospel, but unto all of every
class, tribe and tongue, and cast of mankind, who are without
Christ, and need to be saved. It assumes, what all who know
humanity will readily admit, that every man, without exception,
is more or less athirst. True, it is not for the living waters of
the river of life, because they do not really — saints only so thirst;
but there is in every man's bosom, from the time that sin first
332 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
dried up the pristine streams that flowed through man's unfallen
and holy heart, a burning and a parched sense of want — an
aching void, that claims to be supplied from some great source,
to ease his wants, and neutralize the bitterness of his lost condi-
tion. Every one has within him an inward and an aching void
— a deep sense of misery, dissatisfaction, and disquiet — created
by the departure of that living God whom he oflfended in Para-
dise, which is to be removed only by His return, and the reflux
of that river of life that proceedeth from the throne of God and
of the Lamb. I speak to every man in this assembly, when I
ask you this question. Have you not a sense of something want-
ing still to make you perfectly happy ? Is there not occasion-
ally experienced within you some feeling which is to your soul
what hunger is to the body — what fever is to the animal economy
— what thirst is to your every-day sensations? a consciousness
of want — a feeling of loss — an aching and an irritating chasm
which you cannot fill or destroy, and which, nevertheless, you
are ever trying to fill from such broken cisterns as you dig out
of the world ?
This being the state and experience of all mankind, we thus
see what is the great object of all their toiling, their striving,
and their labouring under the sun. It is to satisfy this thirst,
which every one feels more or less, that every man is running
with untiring feet, and toiling with unceasing hand, if peradven-
ture he may reach something at last which he hopes will remove
this aching sense, and enable him to feel perfect peace in the re-
trospect of the past, and a no less perfect repose in the prospect
of the sure and solemn future. That stream of living beings
that runs like a torrent every day along the Strand and Cheap-
side, is humanity driven by this inner sense of want, here and
there and everywhere, in search of something to remove it. The
ambitious man excavates thrones, and soars amid the stars, seek-
ing some fountain at which he may drink and slake it there ; and
the avaricious man sails to California, or digs mines wherever he
can find accessible an acre of the earth ; or waits for hours and
days on the Exchange, and watches the ups and downs of the
stocks, and all the movements of the money-market, if perad-
venture he may increase his capital, and add to his income, and
THE INVITATION. , 833
reach that point in pecuniary resources which will enable him,
as he anticipates, to defy the world, and feel independent of its
favour or frown. Every man, in short, whatever be his condi-
tion, his profession, his employment in the world, feels that
there is a want within him; and he labours night and noon to
remove it, and so fill the aching chasm, and quench the burning
and the fevered thirst.
My dear friends, it is the great evidence of our fall, that we
seek to satisfy the soul with things seen ; it is the great demon-
stration of our aboriginal grandeur, that there is nothing in the
universe but God that can satisfy that soul. It is the evidence,
I say, of the terrible eclipse that has passed upon us, that we
try to fill the infinite vacuity from broken cisterns : it is the
evidence of the vastness of that soul, that there is nothing in the
heights, nothing in the depths, nothing in pleasure, nothing in
possession, that can fill it and make it rest. It is written on
crowns and coronets, on thrones, on all that is great, magnificent,
and splendid, ^' Whoso drinketh of this water shall thirst again ;'^
but it is heard in the chimes of the waves of the river that flows
from the throne of God and of the Lamb, that was first unsealed
on Calvary, ''But he that drinketh of the water that I shall
give him shall never thirst, but it shall be in him a well of water
springing up into everlasting life.'' " Lord, evermore give us
this water." The only element that can satisfy this thirst is a
supply from that river, the virtues, the excellences, the source,
and the issue of which I endeavoured to describe when I preach-
ed to you from the first verse of this chapter : '* He showed me"
— for we cannot see without showing; all that we can see with
the outward eye is the outside of the gospel, the channel of
Christianity ; it needs him that inspired the Bible to open up and
show us the river within : — " He showed me a pure river of water
of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and
of the Lamb." I need not tell you that living water is used
throughout the Bible as the great symbol of the blessings of the
gospel; and if I translated symbolic language into plain prosaic
language, it would be this — that man has within him a want
which nothing but Christianity can meet, and truly and perfectly
remove. In order to convey these and kindred great truths more
334 • APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
vividly, God is pleased to uso symbolic language; and I need
not say that such language is consecrated by the habits and
usages of all nations. There is something, certainly, in an ex-
pressive symbol, that comes home to man's heart with very great
power, and not only conveys more vividly a great truth, but
opens up that mysterious and inner harmony between things
physical and things spiritual, which the blunted ear of common
humanity cannot hear, but which the ear that is circumcised by
the Spirit of God hears, and hears music in. And God varies
the imagery in which he speaks to man for the following purpose.
Almost every man, except the most prosaic of men, has some in-
cident in life that makes some figure extremely eloquent and ex-
pressive to him. Some one has been a traveller in distant lands;
he has been almost starved. The picture most eloquent to that
man is a picture of the gospel under the symbol of bread. An-
other has been in a storm, expecting a watery grave every mo-
ment; a vessel hove in sight, and that vessel saved him, and
carried him to a haven. How full of beauty must be, to that
man's heart, salvation ! Christ the author of it, the ark of sal-
vation that preserves his people ! And so I might go over
every symbol in the gospel, and show that each is thus suited to
meet a peculiar idiosyncrasy; so that no man will be able to
allege at the judgment-seat, that he missed the end of the gospel
by being ignorant and unacquainted with the mode, or symbol,
or imagery in which that gospel was conceived.
We find the figure in the text alluded to in such passages as
these : — Isa. xxxv. : " In the wilderness shall waters break out,
and streams in the desert. And the parched ground shall become
a pool, and the thirsty land springs of water." Isa. xli. 18, we
read: ^' I will open rivers in high places, and fountains in the
midst of the valleys : I will make the wilderness a pool of water,
and the dry land springs of water." In Isa. Iv. 1, we have that
beautiful invitation : " Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to
the waters, and he that hath no money ; yea, come, buy wine and
milk without money and without price." Again, in the Gospel
of John, we have the same beautiful idea set forth : " If thou
knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give
me to drink, thou wouldst have asked of him, and he would have
THE INVITATION. 335
given thee living water." And these are images employed by
various penmen, borrowed from rivers, or fountains, or springs,
to convey some deep sense of the mighty blessings of the gospel
of Jesus, and to teach all humanity, athirst as it-is, that there is
but one fountain that can satisfy it — the fountain of living
water. And yet, strange to say, the prophet says, men " have
committed two great evils; they have forsaken the fountain
of living water, and have hewn out to themselves broken cis-
terns.'^ How expressive is that ! They have forsaken the foun-
tain that is unsealed, that gushes forth at their very doors, and
have not gone to other cisterns that they found equally open ;
but rather than take God's living water freely, they have
laboured with pickaxes and hammers, and hewn out cisterns
which they find, one after another in painful succession, to be
^' broken cisterns that can hold no water.''
Now, having explained to you in a former discourse the nature
of that river, and the character of that water, I will dwell this
evening, as God may enable me, not upon the nature of the
blessings of the gospel, but upon the duty and the privilege, the
instant duty and the instant privilege, of coming and accepting
the blessings that are freely offered. If there be one idea that
is more than another impressed in my text, it is the invitation,
^^ The Spirit and the bride say, Come;'' that is one invitation;
" and let him that heareth say. Come ; and let him that is athirst
come; and whosoever will, let him take of the water of life
freely." You see, then, that the main drift of the text is to
urge and impress the duty — I will not say the duty, though it
is a duty; I will say the privilege, the unspeakable privilege —
of at once coming to the fountain unsealed by him that filled it ;
and of drinking at that fountain those truths, those hopes, those
promises, those blessings, that forgiveness, that peace, that joy,
which will enable you to look down upon the grandeur and mag-
nificence of the world as pale, mean, and worthless, and to thirst
again only for God, the living God. The invitation, then, is,
Come; the entreaty is, Believe and accept the gospel.
Let me just descend to the lowest ground on which it is possi-
ble to address you this evening. I have addressed those that
profess to be the people of God, who surrounded the communion-
336 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
table to-day. I would address this evening many who are either
strangers to the gospel in fact, or who feel in their own inmost
consciences that they are indeed truly so.
In speaking, then, to the great mass of those that are before
me, I have this to state, That your own solemn convictions —
your deliberate conclusions — yoursober and inmost judgment, are
all on the side of the gospel of Christ Jesus. There is not a man
in this assembly, the most thoughtless, the most ungodly, who,
as far as his own solemn deliberate judgment is concerned, does*
not believe that Christianity is true, and that I beg him to do
what is clear duty when I bid him become a Christian. True,
your heart may rebel, your lusts may protest, your will will not
bow — all this I admit; but in your judgment, you have made
up your mind that Christianity is true. Infidelity, or the deli-
berate rejection of the gospel, is not a thing reached in a moment :
it is generally a vast petrifaction of wickedness, and scorn, and
atheistic contempt. The man who has come to the conviction
that this gospel is a lie, is a man who has come to it along a
tortuous, dark, and miry course : it is as much the conclusion
of an unsanctified heart and a corrupt life, as of a prejudiced and
prepossessed judgment. But every man in this audience, I
solemnly believe, explain it as you like, whatever be his present
life, his character, has at bottom a belief — that sometimes bursts
forth with intolerable force, and reasons of righteousness and
temperance and judgment — that this book called the Bible, keep
it down as he may, is Grod's book ; and this religion called Chris-
tianity, hold it at arm's length as he can, has Grod for its author.
You know quite well — and now let your own consciences re-
spond to what I say — that your best judgment never applauded
you after tbe practice of a deliberate sin, or your escape from the
hearing of the gospel, or your rejection of the Bible, the sanctu-
ary — God. You know it is so. You know that in your calmest,
most deliberate, most unsophisticated moments, the conviction
was clear as a sunbeam though it may have been cold as an icicle,
that Christianity is true : it has subdued your intellect, though
it has not yet sanctified your heart; and the painful position in
which a man who has this conviction within him is placed, is this,
that he has incurred all the responsibilities of the gospel, and ho
THE INVITATION. 337
has reached the enjoyment of none of its joys and blessings. I
look upon that man as the most pitiable of all men, who has
strong purposes to become a Christian to-day, and as strong
counterpurposes to have nothing to do with Christianity to-mor-
row. They are the borderers between heaven and hell, feeling
now the torture of the one, captivated anon by the sunshine
of the other; they have neither Grod's peace nor the devil's
quiet; they have neither the opiate that the world can give them,
nor the perfect peace in which Grod will keep them whose minds
are stayed on him. Thus, then, your own deliberate judgments
perfectly concur with me. When I invite you to believe, I have
the support of your judgments : there is not a young man in this
assembly at this moment, whose judgment does not say, " That
preacher is right; and what he asks me to do is good, and what
he asserts is true;" but then — there is this obstruction, and
there is that difficulty ; and some way you get rid of the thought
as soon as you get out of the house of God; you flee to some-
thing else that will comfort you in the rejection of the gospel
of Christ.
But I have not only your judgment plainly with me, when I
urge you to come and accept the gospel; I have with me, on the
whole, your consciences. You know very well, that many a time
when you have gone to your home after some bacchanalian excess
— many a time when you have left the play-house jaded with its
excitement, or reached your closet from the opera with its tones
still sounding in the chamber of your souls, not fit to read and
still less to pray, and you have lain down upon your bed, you
have felt within a throbbing pulse that seemed to have some con-
nection with some higher power ; you have had deep and terrible
misgivings that made you feel. All is not as it should be; and
This sort of life will not do. Has not a stern judge within you
reasoned in awful tones of righteousness and temperance and
judgment, and called upon you with imperious accents to cease
to do evil and learn to do well? Your conscience, you know,
has cried to you in its agony, Drink of that water : your pas-
sions and your lusts have risen up, and cried. Are not Abana
and Pharpar, rivers of Damascus, better than the waters of Israel?
But still, this very struggle shows, that if the truth has its foes,
SECOHD SERIES. 29
S38 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
it has also its allies witbin you ; and those calls within, so deep,
so solemn, so piercing, are evidences that Grod has not utterly
forsaken you — that his great hand is yet upon you — that his
mercy is near — that he will not yet let you sink into the depths
of hell without some tremendous opposition, that will either re-
volutionize your present course, or leave you without excuse for
ever. My dear friends, when you have had time to think in
your own quiet chamber, has not sometimes a mysterious spirit
started up from the depths of conscience like a spectre from the
grave, and spoken to you great, deep, and solemn truths? And
how great was the difficulty you felt in getting rid of these
truths ! What manoeuvring to keep them down ! what manage-
ment to silence their voices ! I believe it costs a man ten times
more trouble to get to hell, than it ever cost the greatest saint to
go to glory. There is not upon earth a more troublesome or a
more wearisome, wearing toil, than that of trying to keep a live
conscience quiet. Yet you never succeed. You may stun it,
you may stupefy it, you may drug it, you may give it a moment-
ary opiate. You may apply counter-irritation, by turning all
your thoughts to an object of another description, but extinguish
it you never can. When you come to die, you will feel it quick
with life and eloquent with truth. I believe no man dies with-
out a deep presentiment that he is going to heaven, or to ever-
lasting ruin, because at that solemn hour the vail is partially
rent, the imagery that dazzled is faded, and the gilded glory
of time is worn off; things seen have lost their beauty, and are
felt to be but vanity, and the great sea of eternity rushing in
reveals its overpowering grandeur. I appeal to you. Is it not
the fact, that not only your best judgment in your most solemn
moments, but even your conscience, is on the side of truth, and
sustains me when I say. Come and drink of the water of life
freely ?
But I have another assistant within you ; I do not therefore
speak altogether to mere sources of antagonism when I speak to
natural men : there are many friends in the bosom of every one,
to back me when I beg you to believe in Jesus. Has there not
been at times in you all a sense of the need of forgiveness ? Why,
there is no man in this assembly — not the youngest, I believe,
THE INVITATION. 339
here — who has not recollections and sensations of the misery of
Bin; for no man ever commits a sin that does not perpetuate
itself. All sin, the instant it is perpetrated, awakens in the soul
echoes that do not sleep. Have you not in your solemn moments
had resuscitated a recollection of some great, palpable, and start-
ling sin — some sin that lies heavy upon your soul, like a piece of
lead upon your heart ? and ever as you recollect its facts, does
there not creep over your spirit a cold, freezing, chilling shadow,
that forces you to feel all is not right with you ; so much so that
you would give the whole world if you could catch any scapegoat
in the universe that would bear that sin away, or aught that would
neutralize its poison ? Hence it is that so many, at such a sea-
son, run, not to the true remedy, but to the nearest. It is this
that explains, for instance, the fact that the celebrated Schlegel,
the most elegaut and accomplished writer, perhaps, of th» last
century, lived a skeptic and died a Papist. Why so ? When ho
came to lie down upon his last sick-bed, the sense of his sin, the
noise of his convictions, and his enlightened mind, made him feel
that something was needed in order to give him peace with Grod,
and the prospect of happiness. He did not know of the peace
of the gospel ; the Romish priest was the nearest, his remedies
were the most plausible ; he came and pronounced his absolution
over him, and Schlegel felt peace — peace, when there was no
peace at all. Am I not right, then, my dear friends, — I appeal
to yourselves when I ask you if there are not those moments in
your experience, in which you have a sense of sin cleaving to your
conscience, so corrosive, that you would give the whole world if
you could get nd of it ? So far I have a response in yourselves
to my appeal : it is a voice chiming in with mine, and bidding you
come where my sins have been forgiven, and where yours too may
be blotted out ; where the greatest sinner has a welcome, and the
greatest sin has instant forgiveness. That voice within you bids
you fly with all the speed of thought, to lay the heavy load of
guilt upon the blessed Lamb who taketh away the sins of the world.
But I have another feeling that aids me, in the bosom of every
man ; namely, the need of consolation which every man is con-
scious that he feels. You have found scheme after scheme for
happiness miscarry, disappointment in quarters where you least
340 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES,
expected it, sorrow and scorn and rejection where you anticipated
a cordial welcome. You have tried literary pursuits, to give you
comfort, and they have failed — you have tried wine and the card-
table, and these have not comforted you — you have turned to ex-
citement, and pleasure, and gambling, and racing, and hunting,
and these have not satisfied you ; you have tried all schemes and
plans, and, like Solomon, your experience drives you to the de-
liberate conclusion — "All is vanity and vexation of spirit f and
you want still comfort — you want still something that will be a
balm to your bleeding spirit — that will heal your broken heart —
that will give you "beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning,
the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness." My dear
friends, there is but one remedy; the prescription which the Spirit
of God alone has written, and which the Son of Grod alone has
made up. The thing that will heal you is a leaf from the tree of
life ; the balm that will comfort you is the balm of Gilead. My
amazement is, not that I hear of disappointed men committing
suicide : the wonder to me is, that natural men do not more fre-
quently do so. I say, there is something so crushing in the great
reverses that occur every day, — there must be so terrible an anxie-
ty when a man's all is in his trade, or on the sea, and at the
mercy of wind and wave, or so situated that a single oscillation
in the market may leave him penniless to-day, who had thousands
the day before, — and when, in addition to all this, he has nothing
to look to above and beyond, and nothing to trust to when all is
swept away, — that I am not surprised that numbers feel any thing
better than the terrible and desperate solitude which such losses
must create in their hearts. I have, therefore, in your felt need
of comfort, a voice pleading for you, and urging you, in the lan-
guage of my text, to come. Are there not moments when you
take a very correct and almost scriptural view of the precarious-
ness and shortness of this present life — when you look at it just
as it is, leaving all prejudice, excitement, and sympathy with
things external, where they should be ? Our life, should it be
the longest, is very soon run out. But life does not always un-
wind itself gradually ; the spring sometimes snaps, and life un-
coils itself at once : many that rise beautiful like the sun in their
race, are eclipsed at noon : many a one that comes forth strong and
THE INVITATION. 841
able, and full of promise and of great age, is cut down like a tree,
" no sooner blown than blasted/^ If this life were all — if I had
nothing to hope for beyond it — I should pronounce the God that
created me a cruel being ; and feel that man had been made tea
thousand times more wretched than the lowest of the beasts of
the field. If I had no clear prospect beyond me of immortality
and glory' — no clear conviction that I have a home beyond the
skies, and a father in that home, where near and dear ones have
preoccupied seats of glory, I should curse the day when I was
born ; I should regard existence an absolute calamity, and I should
pronounce life itself, like the toils of life, to be vanity and vexa-
tion of spirit. Does not this conviction flash through your minds
at intervals — that there must be something more substantial than
this life, something better than this world, something more wor-
thy of man ? and is not this a call to hear the invitation ad-
dressed in my text, ^' Come — and let him that is athirst come V
I have thus noticed such auxiliaries and sympathies as lie
within you : let me now mention other voices which call upon you
to come and drink of the water of life freely. Grod the Father
in heaven bids you come. I do not believe that the gospel is only
addressed to the elect, as such ; I believe it to be carried to every
man's door, and that to every man under heaven it may be said,
^' Believe thou in the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.'*
I believe that it is true of every man that hears the gospel, that
if he perish within the sound of it, he perishes a suicide, an
eternal suicide; he plunges into perdition just because he would
not believe God and escape into the city of refuge. God the Fa-
ther asks you to come : he beseeches you to come. Nay, my dear
friends, I believe, that if it be possible to save every soul in this
assembly, God will save every soul. But it is possible only in
one way, and that is the way chalked out in the gospel ; and it
is impossible for us to be saved in spite of our own consent. God
never drags — he draws men to heaven : he never brings you there
against your will — he makes you willing ; we are first made will-
ing. He says to every man, "Keturn unto me, and I will have
mercy upon thee." Just try to realize this — that the great
God that made the sky, and sprinkled it with all those orbs,
some of them millions of times greater than our own — that God
342 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
who has merely to speak the word this night, and every heart in
this assembly will be still — that Grod who could crush you, in-
stead of seeking to conciliate you — that God who might sweep
you from the earth, and fill your place with holy and adoring and
happy beings — who might demand, instead of begging for, admis-
sion into every heart — in whom we live and move, and have our
being, — beseeches you ; and beseeches you to be what ? To be
happy — to be saved. He cries from heaven, and bids his ministers
cry upon earth, "Whosoever will, let him come and take of the
water of life freely." And Grod the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ,
bids you also come. He came into the world, not to condemn,
but to save mankind. Just read that beautiful biography — that
holy and perfect biography. Is there in it one instance of that
Saviour repelling a single sinner that came to him ? is there an
instance of his rejecting the entreaty of a single broken heart?
is there an instance of his ever quenching the smoking flax, or
breaking even a bruised reed ? My dear friends, I conceive that
the great cause why numbers of us live without the gospel, is
that we misapprehend the very nature of the gospel : it is not
something that you have to do, but every thing that you have to
receive. It is not a process that you have to elaborate, the issue
of which is to be heaven ; but it is a prize that you have only to
stretch out your hand and take, and be holy and happy for ever.
If I understand Christianity, it is not the minister standing upon
Sinai, and saying, "Do this, or thou shalt perish ;" but the Lord
of glory, from his cross and from his throne, saying to every one
here, " Here is to thee the price of heaven, the key of paradise,
the unsearchable riches, instant pardon, if thou wilt only be at
the trouble to take it/' Such is the evangelical message.
But it is added, in my text, that not only the Father and the
Son invite you, but it is added here, that " the Spirit and Bride
say. Come.'' The Spirit says, Come; the Holy Spirit of God
speaks to every man, and says, " Come." Have you read the
Bible ? it is full of invitations. He acts in providence, which is
full of warnings. He teaches the minister of the gospel, whose
cry continually is, " Come." It is the Spirit of God that touches
your conscience, and makes it throb : it is the Spirit of God that
makes you feci that aching vacuity, that irritating chasm within.
THE INVITATION. 34-3;
in order that you may think of^ and long for, and seek after
living waters to satisfy you : it is the Spirit of God that reasons
within you of righteousness, and temperance, and judgment. It
is the Triune Jehovah that cries from his throne, " Whosoever
will, let him come and take of the water of life freely." And
as the ambassador from God, " we beseech you, in Christ's stead,
as though God did beseech you by us, Be ye reconciled to God."
But not only does the Spirit bid you come, but it is added also,
*' the Bride says. Come." Most persons who have sought to ex-
plain this text, though it may seem almost too bold and daring
to say so — but we must read God's word in the light in which it
was written, not in the light of any man, however wise, eloquent,
or learned — have interpreted the bride to mean the church up ai
earth, inviting you to come by her ministers, her ordinances, iici
means of grace, and all the instrumentalities consecrated by
Christ in the visible church. I do not think that this is so. W*'
ought to be textual in our expositions, while we are faithful in
our exhortations. I believe the Bride is not the church upon
earth, but the church in heaven — the redeemed, the ransomed,
who are about the throne of the Redeemer. We find throu<j;h-
out the whole book of Revelation that this is the meaning of the
term: ^^The Bride makes herself ready." The true church
comes down from heaven like a bride adorned for the bridegroom.
It is that company called in one part, " the hundred and forty
and four thousand standing on Mount Zion ;" in another part,
" the two witnesses f in another part, " the woman hid in the
wilderness for a time, times, and half a time;" called in another
part, "the dead that die in the Lord;" and in another part, 'Mi is
servants that serve him day and night without ceasing;" and
now passed into heaven. Our blessed Redeemer says, God he
Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost bid you come ,
and the Bride — who has passed through your trials, tasted your
sorrows, is experimentally acquainted with all the springs of your
bitterness, has felt nil your ups and downs, and has conquered-
all, and more than conquered all, and is crowned as the conclu-
sion of all — adds her voice to the voice of her blessed Lord the
Bridegroom, and cries from her innumerable thrones in heaven,
to this conflicting, doubting, hesitating remnant upon earth,
344 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
" Come, oh come ; and let him that is athirst come and take the
water of life freely/'
In this, my dear friends, we have presented a touching and
beautiful view of what sympathy we have in heaven. Roman
Catholics say that saints in heaven know what is doing upon
earth. Perhaps they do. They say, too, that in consequence,
we should worship them, which we ought not to do: '' Worship
G-od.'' But this I do think is intimated here, that saints in glory
are intensely interested in the successive destinies of saints and
sinners upon earth. And it is not unreasonable nor unscriptural
to suppose, that if you have dear and near relatives — fathers,
mothers, sisters, brothers, babes — who have been snatched from
your circle upon earth, in order to hasten on completeness in
glory, and who now constitute parts of the number whose name
is the Bride — a son who has left thee, and over whose dust thou
didst weep so bitterly — that son, now in the realms of the blest,
leans down, and looks, and says in the voice of the Bride to thee,
^' My father, oh take of that living water : if you knew its sweet-
ness, its freshness, its preciousness, you would drink and be
happy, as I am happy too." And, mother in Israel, that babe
whom you clasped so tenderly — that babe over whose agonies
you hung many a weary night, with all a mother's anguish, and
prayed, '^ My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me"
— that babe who has preceded you to glory, and who now wor-
ships around the throne with a palm in its hand and a crown on
its brow — that babe leans from the higher firmament, and looks
to thee its mother, and cries, " Mother, come and drink of this
water freely. I drink of it just as it flows from the throne : thou
mayest drink a little farther down of the same hallowed stream ;
and, drinking of that stream, we shall be united in faith, until
we are united in fact ; and if we have lost the relationship of
men, we may still enjoy the communion of saints." And that
daughter that bloomed too beautiful for earth, and was cut down
by the scythe of the destroyer — nay, not so — that was gathered
like a fair flower fitted for planting by the hand of God — that
sister addresses her lister, and says, " Come : I am one of the
Bride that saith, Come ; and let him that is athirst come and
take of the water of life fraely." And, young man in this as-
THE INVITATION. 845
sembly, that mother who nursed thee on her knee — who tended
thy cradle in a far-distant home, amid those gray hills and de-
sert moors — amid whose prayers thou camest to this great me-
tropolis — from whom, like myself, thou hast derived thy first,
and deepest, and holiest impressions — that mother belongs to
that happy number ; she too forms a portion of the Bride, and
she looks down, it may be, and knows thee, and sees thee in thy
wanderings, thy struggles, and thy griefs, and cries, " My son,
my son ! Absalom, my son, my son ! oh come and drink of
this living water ; drink of it freely without money and without
price; turn from these broken cisterns, and, drinking of it, on
earth anticipate the time when thou shalt be holy and happy
with me."
Beautiful thought ! the discipline of the church is temporary
— -the communion of the saints is eternal ! The saints on earth
and the saints in glory are but one living and true church ; and
the voices of them in glory come down from the skies, too mu-
sical for me to utter, and too deep for language to express — and
mingle with those of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and His
ministers on earth say unto each, " Come : and whosoever will,
let him drink of the water of life freely." Believe not those
who say that river is not for thee; believe not those who say thou
art not welcome : all heaven waits to welcome you ; there is no-
thing to repel you but your own prejudices and passions. " Let
him that is athirst come, and take of the water of life freely."
Come, then, my dear brethren, let us listen to that voice. It
may be the last time you may hear it. And if it be true — 1
wonder if it be ! — if it be true that a father, a mother, a wife,
a husband, a sister, a son, a child, is actually seeing and knowing
us, with what intensity of feeling do they watch and await the
struggle that is passing in some bosom at this moment, waiting
and wondering if that struggle will issue in drinking of that
water of life freely ! Oh, may this be its issue ! And if it be
so, what a happy meeting shall we have in that place, where
there shall be no more separation — where we shall drink of that
river as it breaks forth in purity and splendour from the throne
of God and of the Lamb !
S46
LECTURE XXVII.
THE PERFECT BOOK.
"For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this
book, If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the
plagues that are written in this book." — Eevelation xxii. 18.
Last Sunday evening I addressed you on the text that follows
naturally in order, verse 17, and I then showed you the fulness
of the salvation which is provided in the Saviour, and the perfect
welcome with which you are invited to partake of it. I en-
deavoured to show you that great truth — which, indeed, you
scarcely needed to be shown, because in your own experience and
impulses and feelings, you have sufficient evidence of it — namely,
that all flesh is athirst, that every man in the world, whatever be
his profession, his age, his circumstances, or his condition of life,
is athirst : that there is in man's heart a depth that nothing but
the waters of the sanctuary can fill — a want that nothing but the
gospel can satisfy — an aching chasm that he has tried to remove
by going to broken cisterns which he has laboriously digged, and,
disappointed, has digged again and again ; yet he feels, when he
comes to the close of his pilgrimage on earth, that this text is the
true inscription for every thing upon earth : ''If any man drink
of this water, he shall thirst again ; but whosoever drinketh of
the water that Christ shall give him, shall never thirst, but it
shall be in him a well of water, springing up into everlasting
life.'' I showed you then, that to such as these the invitation is
addressed, " Come." The Holy Spirit bids you come ; the Bride,
the church in glory, that comes down, when complete, as a bride
ready for the bridegroom, bends down and bids you come. ''And
let him that heareth say. Come," — that is, exemplify the mis-
sionary spirit. Many Christians are disposed to cherish much of
the essence of Romanism, in looking to the minister as praying
for them, and spreading the gospel also for them : in short, they
THE PERFECT BOOK. 347
wish to do every thing by proxy, and to do nothing themselves.
The minister is your leader, not substitute. The moment that
any man becomes a Christian, that moment he feels that he has a
mission. There is no such thing as a selfish monopoly in the ex-
perience of a Christian. The moment he becomes a saint that
instant he feels the obligations and responsibilities of a servant.
And, therefore, ^^he that heareth'^ — the word here is used in
Scripture in the sense of hearing and accepting — ^'he that hear-
eth says. Come." Since I addressed you, have you done so?
Masters, have you said so, when you had opportunity, to your
servants ? Fathers, have you said so, when you had opportunity,
to your children ? Employers, are you prepared to wear out the
last sinew, and to take away and wear down the last atom of ex-
istence in the physical strength of the employed ; and yet, while
this is going on, have you not even whispered, ^^Come : let him
that is athirst come; and whosoever will, let him take of the
water of life freely ?"
I now come to a solemn warning, as important as it is solemn.
I testify to every man that heareth the words of the. prophecy of
this book, ^^ If any man shall add unto these things, God shall
add unto him all the plagues that are written in this book." This
primarily applies to the Apocalypse ; but almost every divine who
has looked at the text and offered an analysis of it, admits what
I think they rightly admit, that the text is a close to the whole
of the Scriptures of truth ; that as the Apocalypse is placed, not
only in the providence of God, but, I believe, in the express ar-
rangement of God, at the end of the New Testament, so this
solemn warning against addition to it implies and involves a no
less solemn protest against any addition to that book, which is
perfect and sufficient for the salvation of us all. I need not tell
you, that, in almost every age of the Christian church, there has
been a tendency in some " men of corrupt minds," as well as in a
few good men of weak minds, to add to the word of God. At
the close even of the second century, we read of other gospels —
literally and truly so. I dare say some of you have read of such
names as " the Gospel of the Infancy," ^' the Gospel of Nicode-
mus," and others assuming to be revelations of the mind and the
will of God, which it was attempted to add to the sacred canon.
m
348 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
You have also, I dare say, heard skeptics remark, that our four
gospels were selected from a number. Were it so, I venture to
assert that the best evidence of the absurdity of the additions,
and the clearest evidence of the inspiration of the originals, would
just be to read them. Those men who make the remark have
never read them. These false gospels were not heard of till the
close of the second or beginning of the third century ; they were
never quoted by a writer previous to that period. They were
never quoted by the enemies of Christianity ; and they contain
so many specimens of nonsense and extravagance, that if they
had been in existence, or had been received by Christians, the
bitter and sagacious enemies of the gospel would have rejoiced to
lay hold of them, quote them, and circulate them. If you ex-
amine them, you will find they contain anachronisms and absurdi-
ties so many and plain that the very reading of them will pro-
duce a smile. But, I repeat it, the best proof that the Bible is
inspired, and of its superiority to all human writings, is just the
study of the Bible. Let any man read the First and Second
Epistles to -the Corinthians by St. Paul, and the Epistle to the
Corinthians by Clement, a writer subsequent to the days of Paul,
and supposed to have been a fellow-labourer of Paul — let any
man, I say, just read the Pauline Epistles, and then those of the
primitive father, and he will need nothing more to convince him
that God inspired the one, and that the unaided genius of man
composed and indited the other. I may give you one very
striking specimen of contrast in style between an inspired apostle
and an early father. You have all heard of the name of Igna-
tius ; many of his writings are disputed, or disposed of as spu-
rious, but there is one sentiment of his very frequently quoted :
*'Do nothing without the bishop. The presbyters are in the
room of the apostles ; and the bishop, of Jesus Christ." I think
I quote correctly his words. Having thus read what Ignatius
writes about ministers, let us turn to the words of St. Paul on
the same subject : "Who is Paul, or who is Apollos, but minis-
ters by whom ye believed?" Do you observe the contrast?
With Paul, the minister is comparatively nothing, Christ is all;
with Ignatius, the minister is almost God, and Christ is lost in
his greater or equal glory. Ignatius substantially writes, that
THE PERFECT BOOK. 849
John must increase, but Christ must decrease ; Paul writes, that
John must decrease, that Christ may increase, and Christ be all
in all.
Such is a specimen of additions to the word of God — additions
that need but the influence of common sense, not any higher or
stronger one, to be seen and admitted to be the folly of man,
professing, blasphemously, if not ignorantly, to be the workman-
ship of God.
Another class of additions to this book which are condemned
in the solemn warning I have read, are all pretensions to pro-
phecy, all predictions of events that are future, under the pre-
tence that the parties predicting are inspired by the Spirit of
God to do so. Such prophets and prophetesses, I need not tell
you, have existed from the days of Simon Magus down to the
days of Joan of Arc, Joanna Southcote, and the Mormon pro-
phet. These parties professed to have a mission directly from
above; and to be able, not only to pronounce what is truth now,
extrinsic to the Bible, but also to be able to predict what shall
take place in the future, beyond the horizon of man's view and
the cognizance of man's mind. Such parties we at once denounce
as either deluders or deluded. There is no evidence that a pro-
phet exists in the church to whom God reveals things to come, or
that such shall be in this dispensation. If such a one were to
appear, we should at once, without testing his credentials, say.
You are adding to what God has given ; and, on the authority of
the God who inspired the Bible, we can have nothing whatever to
do with you. This, however, we are to distinguish: it is one
thing to form an estimate, more or less probable, of things to
come, from reading and soberly interpreting the prophecies of
God ; and it is quite another thing to assume to be a prophet,
and to predict, on the pretended strength of inspiration from on
high, things that are yet in the future. The first is a solemn
duty ; for " blessed is he that readeth, and they that understand,
the prophecy of this book :" the last is deliberate wickedness ;
for " if any man add to the things which are written in this book, ^
to him shall be added the curses that are contained in this
book."
To a third class of additions to God's perfect word, I have
SKCOND SERIES. 30 -V^-
850 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
called your attention sometimes before — the addition which tho
great Western Apostasy has made, of the books called the Apo-
crypha. You need not be told, I am sure, because most of you
are aware, that the books of the Apocrypha, as they are called — ■
the book of Ecclesiasticus, for instance, the book of Tobit, and
the two books of Maccabees, and some others, constituting what
is called the Apocrypha, the meaning of which is '^lidden,'^ as
distinguished from Apocalypse, which means ^^ revealed,^' — were
received by the Council of Trent, the sectarian synod which met
about the year 1564, and declared to be just as inspired as the
prophecies of Isaiah, or the Gospel according to St. John. Now
I conceive that the Church of Kome, from and after that council,
became fully developed as the great predicted Apostasy ; and this
is my great charge against that church. If the Church of Rome
were like the Grreek Church — a church that has erred, but is re-
formable — then I could think of it with less hatred of the dis-
honour it does to God, and brighter hopes of its restoration.
But, if I understand my Bible, that church is marked out as the
irrecoverable and hopeless Apostasy, doomed to destruction, not
destined to reformation. And I believe that one of the gravest
sins that that communion has committed, and one of the springs
of those grievous heresies by which she is defiled, is her tamper-
ing with that blessed word. For whenever a church tries or de-
sires to add a corruption to God's word, sooner or later she re-
ceives into her heart a curse from God's throne. That church
has added what is called the Apocrypha. Now is there any evi-
dence that these books are part of the word of God ? I believe,
on this day* many devoted men are calling the attention of their
flocks to the great principles of contrast between the Apostasy
and the gospel of Jesus ; and perhaps I may contribute to en-
lighten your minds, in these days when one needs to see one's
standing clear and to feel one's footing firmly, if I show you, by
a very brief recapitulation, that there is not the shadow of a
shade of ground for incorporating these Apocryphal books with
the word of God.
First of all, these books were not written in Hebrew, like the
* November 6.
THE PERFECT BOOK. 3^
rest of the Old Testament Scripture. One would say that this
was, at the outset, a presumption against their being canonical.
Ii^ the second place, these books are never once quoted by our
Lord, although he has quoted most of the other books of the Old
Testament. In the third place, they are not once quoted by an
apostle. In the fourth place, (and mark this,) they were never
accepted by the Jews as part and parcel of the word of God.
Now I lay much stress upon this. The Jews committed great
and grievous sins; but they were faithful in one thing: they
kept in its integrity, its purity, its simplicity, God^s most holy
word. They explained it away by their traditions, they neglected
it, they misunderstood it, I admit ; but they never added to or
subtracted from it. They were raised up for the special mission
of being the custodesj or guardians of the word of God ; and that
mission they discharged faithfully to the very letter. If the Jews
had originally received into their hands the Apocryphal books as
Scripture, and had willingly and wickedly excluded them at a
subsequent date, would not our Lord, when he accused them of
not reading Scripture, of misinterpreting Scripture, of making
void Scripture, have accused them also of leaving out five or six
whole books from the sacred canon itself? But he did not do so,
and therefore it is evident that the Jews justly repudiated them.
They are not received by the majority of the Christian fathers,
and only one or two books are alluded to by one or two fathers.
These fathers give whole catalogues of what are called the canoni-
cal books ] and not in one instance, during the first four centuries,
do they receive the Apocrypha as part and parcel of the word of
God. And at no general council previous to the year 1564 were
these books declared to be canonical. And what is strange
enough, and what I wonder how Pope Pius IX. (who probably,
as prospects indicate, will close the Popedom,) can get over, is
this fact : that Gregory the Great, the most distinguished pope,
perhaps, in the line, positively declares the Second Book of Macca-
bees not to be inspired. I wonder how any one can advocate and
defend the unity of a church, whose pope in the sixth century
declares the Second Book of Maccabees to be uninspired, and
whose pope in the nineteenth century swears that it is inspired.
This is a specimen of the unity that subsists in that church; and
352 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
this I may say, in passing — it will be time enougli for us to
answer the charges made by the Church of RomC; of our disunion,
when she has shown that she has even the shadow of unity herself.
I might also mention another disproof of the inspiration of these
books. They authorize the practice of lying ; they approve the
crime of suicide. It is said in one part, that some one fell upon his
sword, 'Hhus preferring to die a noble death" (suicide) <'than
to fall into the hands of his enemies.'' They also justify lying,
transmigration of souls, and prayers for the dead. But perhaps
the most triumphant disproof of their inspiration is the closing
sentence of the Maccabees. " And if I have done well," says the
writer, " and as is fitting the story, it is as I have desired : but
if slenderly and meanly, it is that which I could attain unto."
(2 Mace. XV. 38.) Can you conceive an inspired writer seeking
forgiveness for his errors, or begging his reader to overlook his
mistakes ? Why, the very close of the book itself is evidence
that the writer of it never pretended to be inspired, and,, I am
sure, would look with amazement at the decision of the Council
of Trent, pronouncing that to be inspired which he knew to be
the concoction of his own unaided mind.
Such, then, is another specimen of addition to this book ; and
such additions, I believe, bring the body which is guilty of them
under the terrible curse. And who does not know, by reading
the 17th and other chapters of the Apocalypse, how completely
Babylon is brought under the curses of this book ? And one of
her crimes, I doubt not, in the judgment of Grod, is her adding
to the things that are written in this book. But there is another
plan of adding to them : it is not necessary to fulfil the crime
mentioned in the text, to add other hooks; it is said, add other
things to the things that are contained in this book. For instance,
those teachers mentioned in the chapter we have this evening
read, who said that circumcision was essential to our acceptance
before God, were guilty of this sin. The distinction is this : —
If any church shall say. This rite or ceremony is proper for
decency, for order, for convenience, I think it is duty instantly
to acquiesce : but if any church in the universe, presbytery, synod,
or prelate, or pope, or general council, were to say that circum-
cision, or any such thing, instead of being merely a subordinate
THE PERFECT BOOK.
rite, or diseipline, or ceremony was essential to the salvation of
the soul, such church or individual would be adding to the things
that are written in this hook ; and it would he my duty to pro-
test against the addition, and the party so adding would be laid
under that terrible curse denounced against those who add to it.
Such addition, for instance, is made where transubstantiation is
added to the Lord's supper — the mass added to transubstantia-
tion — and the worship of the Virgin Mary to that of God — the
mediation of angels or archangels to that of Christ — the altar
added to the communion-table, or, to use the more technical lan-
guage, the communion-table developed into the altar ; the simple
sacrament ceasing to be a sacrament, and becoming a sacrifice ;
marriage ^^ honourable in all," pronounced to be dishonourable
in some ; and Peter, declared to be worthy of blame, pronounced
by a general council to be absolutely infallible, with all his suc-
cessors : — these are the additions of man to the things of God.
This is not development ; for there is no development reoognised
in Scripture except this — the development of Christian principles
in Christian practice, and holy men into servants and missionaries
of the Lord.
• But it is argued, as you will often hear, by those who add, and
confess that they add, to the things that are written in this book
— for the Church of Rome makes no secret of it — that the Bible
is an insufficient book. In fact, a great characteristic of that
church is finding fault with God's word, and trying to mend it
by the additions of men. She admits that she adds to the things
written in this book ; and the remark made by many of her advo-
cates and apologists — for the Church of Rome has not only advo-
cates within her pale, but apologists without, and where we should
least wish to find them — is. Surely it is less dangerous to believe
too much, than to believe too little. She says. We believe all
that you Protestants believe, and we just believe a little more ; and
if you are safe in receiving a portion, we are yet more safe ; for
it is better to believe too much with us, than to believe too little
with you. My answer to such reasoning as this is. Excuses may
be very injurious in this as in other matters. Is it not very in-
jurious to eat too much, at least as injurious as to eat too little ?
I appeal to those who are merchants, whether it would not as
30»
854 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
much derange your accounts; if in your summing up you were to
say that four and four make nine, as if you were to say that four
and four make seven ! It is perfectly plain, therefore, that you
may err in excess with as great detriment to the sum total or
result, as you may in deficiency. And if it be mere excess of
doctrine which the Church of Rome adds, it may be just as peril-
ous and mischievous as if she believed too little. But alas !
alas ! her additions are not simple additions ! Would to Grod
that they were ! If they were the mere rubbish of Rome added
to the gem of Grod's truth, it might be that the superincumbent
rubbish would blow off, or might be swept away j or chinks and
crannies might occur in it, through which some bright beams of
the inner glory might penetrate, and reveal to us the pearl of in-
estimable price that is hid within. But it is not so : it is not the
mere addition of other doctrines, but it is the addition of doc-
trines that neutralize, destroy, and utterly subvert the great
truths that she has already received. And therefore we say her
additions are not mere excess, but they are additions of that
which destroys and neutralizes what G-od has said.
My dear friends, we must take nothing that the church decides,
or the minister proclaims, as being a completing of, or an addition
to what Grod has perfectly, conclusively, and finally said. When
you are to hear God's voice, all the voices of science, geology,
astronomy, literature, reason, every voice in the universe must be
still, that you may hear no voice but God's. Recognise nothing
as divine but what comes from his throne. And when the minis-
ter preaches his sermon, it must not be the selecting of a text on
which to hang, as on a peg, a human discourse ; nor must it be
an adding to the text something in order to make it complete, to
make it tell ; but if the minister's sermon be what it ought to
be, the text will be the key-note, and all his illustrations will be
the harmonies that play and revolve around it. The text must
be the great original voice, and the minister's sermon the well-
defined and articulate echoes of that great original, commending
not themselves by their music, but commending the original to
the hearts of all that hear. And hence what we say from this
pulpit must not be additions to God's word, but expansions of it;
not making the book more plain, or the Bible more perfect, but
THE PERFECT BOOK. 355
trying if perad venture we may cast into your minds some new
light-beam, and drive from your judgment some oppressive and
dark prejudice.
We have a striking specimen of a warning almost the same as
that contained in my text, given by the apostle Paul, in Gal. i.
8 ; and it shows the harmony between the epistles of the New
Testament and this precious book. " If we,^^ he says, ^' or an
angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you, let him be
accursed.'^ It seems as if John and Paul had been consulting
together. No, it does not seem so; it proves that John and
Paul drew their inspiration from the same fountain, when they
breathed that inspiration in the same sentiment, only in varied
language. "If we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other
gospel than that you have received, let him be anathema V The
apostle supposes that there may be great eloquence in commend-
ing an addition to God's word, in advocating this other gospel;
for an angel's tongue is the symbol used by Paul for high elo-
quence. It may be the most gifted and eloquent minister that
ever spoke; he may array his thoughts in the most gorgeous
terms; he may make his ideas brilliant and vivid, like sparks
from an anvil ; he may speak with power that shall wrap you in
undisturbed and riveted attention ; and yet he may use all this
eloquence, and exhibit all this splendour, not to make you love
God's book more, but to make you feel the necessity of something
additional to that book — another gospel in order to make it per-
fect. But the apostle supposes not only that there may be great
eloquence, but that there may be also great moral excellence. He
does not say. If we, or a demon emerging from the depths of
hell ; but he supposes a heavenly hierarch to be just come down
from the unutterable glory, presenting a splendour that man's
unpurged eye can scarcely look on ; and he says this : If that
angel were to preach to you any thing additional to this book
as essential to its perfection, he not only would incur a curse
from God, but you would be warranted in saying, "Let him be
accursed." But the apostle supposes more; he supposes there
may be great official rank preaching another gospel, and trying to
add to the things that are written in this book : for he says. If
we — ^we the apostle, the recent convert at Damascus — we who
356 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
were in the third heaven — we who saw visions too bright for hu-
man pencil to depict, and too glowing for human language to ex-
press — if we, an apostle, were to preach any other gospel, let us
be anathema. If the apostle puts the hypothesis^ ^' If we preach
another gospel," may not I without uncharitableness vary the ex-
pression, and say, " If an apostle's successor preach another gos-
pel, let him be anathema V I care not who he is — T care not
what may be his rank, whether the humblest presbyter or the
highest prelate ] I receive his word only so far as it is the coun-
terpart of my Lord's ; and I accept what he says only so far as
he can demonstrate it to be borne out and sustained by that book
which is the balance which has no crookedness, the test that never
fails, the standard to which you must ever appeal. But the
apostle supposes something more in that passage ; he assumes that
you, the laity, know the things that are written in this book.
And he assumes yet more — that the laity are capable of knowing,
and searching, and determining whether the minister preaches
what is written in this book. I do not say that by that word is
meant all the baptized — I could not commit the matter to them ;
or that by that word are meant all communicants — I cannot com-
mit the matter to them ; I mean God's own people — God's re-
deemed, sanctified, holy, regenerated ones : they know the things
that are written in this book ; they are competent to say whether
a minister preaches the things that are written in this book ; they
will not be led away, though delusions come just of the kind
alluded to by the apostle ; and such delusions we may expect, so
dark and terrible that they will almost deceive the very elect ;
yet them they cannot deceive. And, therefore, "If we, or an
angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you, let him be
anathema." " And if any man add unto the things that are
written in this book, God shall add unto him the plagues that are
written in this book.'^
But perhaps you ask, Why is it that the Bible cannot be added
to ? I hold, that it follows from the very nature of the book,
that it cannot be added to : aiid I make a distinction between two
words ; and if you recollect the distinction, I think it will be a
great guide to you. The distinction lies between a revelation and
a discovery. The distinction between the two is very great. A
THE PERFECT BOOK. 357
revelation is something tliat Grod makes to man ; a discovery is
something that man makes for himself. For instance, Columbus
made a discovery of America ; Grod made a revelation of heaven.
"VYhat man makes, man can add to ; and hence a child now knows
more about America than Columbus knew ; but what God reveals,
God alone can add to. America we can visit ; we can measure
it, we can examine it, we can analyze it more by visiting and
travelling it more ; but this revelation comes from a land which
human foot has never trodden, and descends from a height to
which an angel's wing never soared ; it is an emanation from a
source which is infinite. Man's discovery may be improved and
added to by man's researches; God's revelation came down from
heaven, like the bride for the bridegroom, perfect in all its
glory.
Thus, then, by keeping this distinction before you, you can see
that addition is impossible ; at least impossible to one that knows
its nature and its character. If any man, therefore, should come
to you now, and profess that he had received some book from
God, some inspiration from the Almighty, to make known things
that are not in the Bible, you are not to be at the trouble to ex-
amine him. For instance, I have read of the book of Mormon,
an extravagant and absurd book got up in America: this is a
book that I would not be at the trouble of examining; the mo-
ment it is brought before me, I must say, I can have nothing to
do with it ; it is adding to what God has pronounced to be per-
fect; I will not trouble myself to analyze it; I repudiate and
reject it, the moment it is proffered me as a book from God,
and as adding to the perfection of holy writ. But if another
man comes to me and says, I have discovered in the Bible a
truth which I think you have not ; or, I have discovered in the
Bible a doctrine which I think for centuries has been missed by
laborious, pious, talented men — however improbable this must
seem, yet I might naturally and scripturally suppose that God
may have here vouchsafed greater light to greater painstaking and
more patient prayer; and I might think it possible that he
should have discovered these truths which I have overlooked.
Nay, while the saving, vital truths of Christianity are plain, and
are not to be neutralized or superseded, I do not know but there
358 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
may be depths and heights in this glorious volume to which we
have never yet risen, and, which will only be evolved in the
course of more patient, prayerful, and devoted inquiry. But if
any person comes to me with such a proposition, I do not treat
him as I should treat another bringing the book of Mormon. I
should say to him. You are taking the right course, you are act-
ing upon right principles ; produce a proof of what you say is
new from the book of God : I can meet you there : I am bound
to meet you and to deal with you, and either to disprove your
assertion and show you are not right by this book, or to hear the
proofs you are able to adduce in order to prove that they are writ-
ten in this book; and if you show your doctrine to be in this
book, then it is my duty to receive it as the word of God. Thus,
when a person comes with additions to it, professedly from God,
I recollect my text, and I recollect what Paul says : "God, who
at sundry times, and in divers manners, spake in time past unto
the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto
us by his Son,^^ — the final and conclusive speaking: and just as
we have a perfect atonement, so, I believe, we have a perfect
Bible.
Now all this teaches some lessons } one or two of which I will
touch upon this evening, reserving the others for next Lord's-day
evening.
First, that the Bible is the great foundation of our creed, the
exclusive source of our theology, the great fountain-head of all
our hope in the prospect of eternity. The Bible is the common
anchorage-ground of all true Christians : as long as we ride there,
so long we are safe. But the instant we leave that anchorage-
ground, the noblest vessels will make shipwreck; the Isis and the
Tiber cannot be substitutes for it; they are full of reefs, and
quicksands, and shoals, and many a fair ship has there made
shipwreck : the only sea in which you can sail securely, the only
anchorage-ground on which we can ride sweetly under the shadow
of the Most High, is the word of God, and the word of God alone.
Be thankful, most thankful, that the Bible is a written book ;
printed or written is one and the same thing. If the Bible had
not been written, if its sentiments had been left to oral tradition
or to oral transmission, I believe Christianity by this time would
THE PERFECT BOOK. 859
have become a caricature — tlie Bible would have been developed
into the Breviary, and the Apostolic Church merged in the Great
Apostasy. But the Bible remains still; it is a stereotype; it is
a great immutable and everlasting fixture ; its foundation is firmer
and deeper than that of the pyramids of Egypt : time cannot
waste it, the sands of the desert cannot engulf it. It is that
glorious mountain which stands firm when all around it oscillates
and shakes. And those controversies which you hear among
true Christians are not the thunders from within the mountain;
they are all outside the mountain : and when you hear them, do
not suppose that Christianity is about to crumble into chaos. I
believe that all the controversies and the disputes that take place
now, are merely the adjusting and righting of all confusions, dis-
agreements, and misconceptions, preparatory to that day when
the Bride shall be perfect and ready, and " the Lord shall come
down from heaven, even in like manner as we have seen him go
into heaven.'^ When, therefore, you see controversies, when you
hear of disputes, do not suppose that Christianity is in peril. If
a person who had never seen a mountain — and some such may be
present — were to go into the Highlands, and see one of these
great mountains with a cloud resting on its summit, he would
think, as he saw it, that the clouds must be part of the mountain;
and when the wind swept it away, he might suppose that a part
of the mountain had been swept away. But it is not so ; the
cloud has been merely dissolved, and the waters run down the
mountain-sides, to water the parched heath-bell, and to feed the
streams that rush onward to the main. The mountain is not
made nor marred by the cloud : it remains ; the cloud only is
gone. So it is with all disputes and controversies : the fume and
smoke of discussions are not part of the book ; they are outside
the book. And when they are over, it is not a part of the book
which is gone, but only the clouds which obscured and darkened it.
Be thankful, in the next place, let me say, that the Bible is
accessible to you. I think it is one of our greatest mercies, that
there is no book so cheap as the Bible, and no book that every
man may obtain so easily. My calm and deliberate conviction is,
that the Bible in the pew is the best antidote to all heresy in the
pulpit ; and that if every hearer had a Bible, it would be a better
860 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
guarantee for pure evangelical religion from the pulpit, than all
the presbyteries, general assemblies, bishops, and archbishops in
Christendom. Let the people have the Bible in their hands, and
the knowledge of it in their hearts ; and when the minister tries
to preach another gospel, he will find he has other materials to
deal with than he supposed.
In the next place, let me bid you be thankful, most thankful,
for the translation of the Bible. It was written originally in
Hebrew and in Greek ; it is translated in the form in which we
have it, and I do believe — I say it with the greatest consideration
— that the nearest approach to a miracle in modern times is the
authorized translation of the Scriptures. It has its flaws, and its
imperfections, but its perfections are inimitable and unspeakable.
There is something in its very language full of majesty, associated
as it is with our earliest and fondest recollections and sympathies.
And if those parts of it, let me add, which are mistranslated were
altered, it would only make more clearly — not more certainly —
seen its support of evangelical Christianity. For instance, there
is a passage in Titus, which I have before mentioned, " looking
for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God
and our Saviour Jesus Christ,'^ which properly translated would
be, '' the glorious appearing of the Lord Jesus Christ, our great
God and Saviour :" and there are five other passages where the
same expression occurs, and where it ought to be rendered in the
same way. Our translation is an admirable one, its enemies
being judges : and I have here a list of passages from the Roman
Catholic version, (published by Richardson, with notes by Dr.
Challoner, 1847,) in which, where their version differs from ours
in certain expressions in the text, notes are introduced substan-
tially from this very version of ours, which they continually con-
demn and repudiate. For instance. Matt. v. 18, in the Douay
version it is, "Amen, I say unto you;" in the note upon it, it
is "i. e. assuredly, in very truth;" the Protestant Bible has
embodied in its translation what they have put into a note, " For
verily I say unto you." In Matt. vi. 11 : " Give us this day
our supersubstantial bread." The note that they add says, " Su-
persubstantial bread. In St. Luke, the same word is rendered
^ daily bread.' " The Protestant Bible has it, " Give us this day
THE PERFECT BOOK. 361
our daily bread." I might go over the whole New Testament
and show you this.
The following are a few specimens, which might be greatly ex-
tended : —
Matt. X. 16.
Douay. "Be ye therefore wise as serpents, and simple as doves.**
Note. " Simple, that is, harmless, plain," <&c.
Protestant Bible. " And harmless as doves."
Matt. xi. 6.
J). "And blessed is he that shall not be scandalized in me."
N. Scandalized in me. That is, shall not take occasion of scandal or offence."
P. B. " Shall not be offended in me."
Matt, xviii, 6, 7, 8.
D. 6. " But he that shall scandalize one of these little ones."
7. "Wo unto the world because of scandals."
8. "And if thy hand or thy foot scandalize thee."
JV. "Scandalize, that is, cause to offend."
P. B. 6. "But whoso shall offend one of these little ones," &c.
7. " Wo unto the world because of offences."
8. "Wherefore, if thy hand or thy foot offend thee."
Matt. XX. 15.
D. "Is it not lawful for me to do ichat I will? Is thy eye evil," &c.
JV. " What I will ; viz. with my own, and in matters that depend on my own
bounty."
P. B. " Is it not lawful for me to do what I will with mine own ?"
Matt. xxvi. 17 ; Mark xiv. 1 ; Acts xii. 3.
D. "And on the first day of the azymes the principles came to Jesus, saying,"&c.
3f. " Azymes. Feast of the unleavened bread."
P. B. Now, the first day of the feast of unleavened bread, the disciples," &c.
Luke xxiii. 54 ; John xix. 14.
D. " And it was the day of the parascue, and the Sabbath drew near."
N. "That is, the eve, or day of joreparaizon for the Sabbath."
P. B. "And that day was iha preparation, and the Sabbath drew on."
John iii. 18.
D. "He that believeth in him is noi judged."
N. "Is not judged ; that is, is not condemned."
P. B. "He that believeth in him is not condemned.
John iii. 19.
D. "And this is the judgment ; because," &c.
N. " lh.0 judgment ; that is, the cause of his condemnation."
P.B. "And this is the condemnation," &Q.
SECOND SERIES. 31
862 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
John xiv. 16.
J). "And he shall send you another Paraclete."
N. ''Paraclete; ih&t is, a. Comforter."
P. B. "And he shall give you another Coviforter."
Acts ii. 24.
D. " Whom God hath raised up, having loosed the sorrows of hell."
N. "Having loosed the sorrows, &c. Having overcome the grievous jjat'ns of
death."^'
P. Ii. "Whom God hath raised up, having loosed the pains of death."
Acts xvi. 10.
D. " A certain girl, possessed with a pythonical spirit, met us."
N. "A pythonical spirit; that is, a spirit pretending to divine and tell of
fortunes."
P. B. "A certain damsel, possessed with a spirit of divination, met us."
Rom. i. 4.
D. "Who yf&% predestinated the Son of God in power."
N. ''Predestinated. Christ, as man, was predestinated to be the Son of God;
and declared to he so (as the apostle here signifies) first by power," <S;c.
P. B. "And declared to be the Son of God, with power."
Rom. vii. 1.
D. " Know you not, brethren, how the law bath dominion over a man, as long
as IT liveth ?"
N. " As long as it liveth, or as long as he liveth."
P. B. " As long as he liveth."
Rom. viii. 38.
B. " For I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels," &c.
N. "I am sure ; that is, I am persuaded ; as it is in the Greek, nirretcrixat."
P. B. " For I &m. persuaded that," <fec. '\
1 Cor. viii. 13.
D. "Wherefore, if meat scandalize my brother, I will never eat flesh, lest it
should scandalize my brother."
N. " If meat scandalize ; that is, if my eating cause my brother to sin."
P. B. " Wherefore, if meat make my brother to offend, I will eat no flesh, leH
I make my brother to offend."
1 Cor. ix. 16.
D. " For if I preach the gospel, it is no glory to me."
N. "It is no glory ; that is, I have nothing to glory of."
P. B. " For though I preach the gospel, / have nothing to glory of."
* It may be seen In the HamTnersmith Discussion with what indignation Mr. French re-
ceives the bare idea of Christ having suffered in hell, aud accuses Protestant writers of
blasphemy for mentioning such an idea. It is the Roman Catholic Bible that so teaches.
It says, " loosed the iurrowt of hell," while we say, "pains of death." The note is only a
Nubsequent addition.
THE PERFECT BOOK. 363
1 Cor. X. 13.
D. "Let no temptation take hold on you, but such as is human."
N. " Or, no temptation hath taken hold of you, or come upon you, as yet, but
■what is human, or incident to man."
P. B. " There hath no temptation taken you, but such as is common to man."
1 Cor. xiv. 12.
J). " So you also, forasmuch as you are zealous of spirits."
N. " Of spirits. Of spiritual gifts."
P. B. "Even so ye, forasmuch as ye are zealous of spiritual gifts."
2 Cor. viii. 2.
J). "And their very deep poverty hath abounded unto the riches of their
simplicity."
N. '' Simplicity ; that is, sincere bounty and charity."
P. B, " And their deep poverty abounded unto the riches of their liberality."
2 Cor. xi. 28.
D. " My daily, instance, the solicitude for all the churches."
N. "My daily instance. The labours that come in and press upon me every
day."
P.B. " That which cometh upon me daily, the care," «fcc,
2 Cor. xii. 9.
jD. "For power is made perfect in infirmity."
N. " Power is made perfect. The strength and power of God more perfectly
shines forth in our weakness and infirmity."
P. B. "For my strength is made perfect in loeakness."
Eph. i. 14.
D. "Who is the pledge of our inheritance, for the redemption of acquisitioUf
unto the praise of his glory."
N. " Acquisition ; i. e. a purchased possession."
P. B. " The redemption of the purchased possession, unto," &c.
Eph. iii. 15.
D. " Of whom all paternity in heaven and earth is named."
iV. *' All paternity ; or, the whole family, narpia."
P. B. " Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named."
Phil. ii. 6, 7.
D. 6. "Who being in the form of God, thought it not robbery himself to be
equal to God,"
7. " But debased himself, taking the form," &Q.
N. "Debased himself, (exinanivit,) made himself of no account."
P. B. " But made himself of no reputation."
APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
Thess. iii. 1.
D. " That the word of God may run, and may be glorified."
N. " 3Iay run; that is, may spread itself, and have/ree course."
P. B. " That the word of God may have/ree course, and be glorified."
2 Tim. i. 10.
D. "But now is made manifest hy the illumination of our Saviour Jesun
Christ."
N. "By the illumination; that is, by the bright coming and appearing of our
Saviour."
P. B. " But is now made manifest hy the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ."
Heb. i. 3.
D. "Who being the splendour of his glory and the figure of his substance."
N. " The figure, (^af afrijp :) that is, the express image, and most perfect re-
semblance."
P. B. " Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his
person."
Heb. i. 3.
JD. " Making purgation of sins."
N. " Making purgation ; that is, having purged away our sins by his passion."
P. B. " When he had by himself purged our sins."
Web. ii. 16.
J). "For nowhere doth he take hold of the angels : but of the seed of Abraham
he taketh hold."
iV. " That is, he never took iqwn him the nature of angels, but that of the seed
of Abraham."
P. B. " He took not on him the nature of angels, but he took on him the seed
of Abraham."
Heb. vi. 1.
D. " Wherefore, leaving the word of the beginning of Christ."
JV. " The word of the beginning. The first rudiments of the Christian doctrine."
P. B. " Therefore, leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ."
Heb. xi. 29.
D. "From whence also ho received him for sparable."
N. "Parable; that is, a, figure of Christ."
P. B. "From whence also he received him in a figure."
Heb. xi. 19.
D. "By faith he that is called Abraham."
N. " Or, Abraham being called."
P. B. "By faith, Abraham, when he was called," &Q.
THE PERFECT BOOK. 365
Hcb. X. 18.
D. "There is no more an ohlationfor sin."
N. " There is no more occasion for a sin-offering,"
P. B. " There is no more offering for sin."
Heb. viii. 13.
D. " Now, in saying a neio, he hath made the former old."
JV. " A neto, simply, covenant."
P. B. " In that he saith, a new covenant, he hath made the first old."
Heb. viii. 2.
D. "A minister of the ^oZtes.
N. " That is, the sanctuary."
P. B. " A minister of the sanctuary."
Jude 6.
D. " And the angels who kept not their principality.'*
N. "Principality ; that is, the state in which they xoere first created."
P. B. "And the angels which kept not their first estate."
Jude 8.
D. " And despise dominion, and hlaspheme majesty."
JV. " Blaspheme majesty, i. e. speak evil of them that are in dignity."
P. B. "Despise dominion, and speak evil of dignities."
Jude 9.
D. " But said, The Lord command thee."
N. " Or, rebuke thee."
P. B' " The Lord rehuke thee."
1 John iii. 4.
2>. "And sin is iniquity."
N. " Iniquity, (dvofita,) transgression of the law."
P. B. " For sin is the transgression of the law."
3 John 4, 5.
D. " I have no greater grace than this."
N. "That is, nothing that gives me greater jo?^.'*
P. B. "I have no greater joi/."
2 Pet. ii. 1.
JD. " Who shall bring in sects of perdition."
N. " That is, heresies destructive of salvation."
P. B. " Shall bring irt damnable heresies."
31*
866 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
2 Pet. ii. 11.
jD. " Whereas angels, though they are greater in strength and power, bear not
an execrable judgment against," «fec.
N. " That is, they use no railing nor cursing sentence."
P. B. *' Bring not railing accusation against," &c.
James i. 18.
D. " For of his own will hath he begotten us by the Word of truth, that we
might be some beginning of his creatures."
iV. " Beginning, i. e. a kind of first-fruits of his creatures."
P. B. " That we should be a kind of firet-fruita of his creatures."
Kev. xxi. 17.
D. " And he measures the wall thereof, a hundred and forty cubits, the viea-
sure of a man," &c.
iV. " i. e. according to the measure of men ; this seems to be the true meaning
of the words."
P. B. " And he measured the wall thereof, an hundred and forty cubits, ac-
cording to the measure of a man"
It will thus be seen that the note in the Romish version is just
our Protestant translation. Be thankful for our translation,
which was begun by Tyndal, and finished in the reign of James I.
in 1611 ; and, lastly, give that holy book supremacy in every-
day life, and character, and conduct. Build upon no man's
word : he that builds his creed on God's word will feel his foot-
ing sure when the world is convulsed around him. One text
from the Bible outweighs a thousand fathers ; and one " Thus
saith the Lord" is more conclusive to my mind than all the de-
cisions of all the councils in Christendom. With the Bible, you
can never be made slaves ; without the Bible, you will not long
remain freemen. With the Bible, our privileges, our freedom,
our faith, our hope, must rise or fall together.
Recollect, my dear friends, these things were written, this book
was inspired, that, believing, ye might have life through his
name. They were not written for our curiosity or for our de-
light, but " for our learning." When the manna fell about the
camp of the Israelites, they did not gather it as naturalists, to
classify it, but as hungry men, to live upon it. When the Is-
raelites looked to the serpent of brass, they did not look upon it
with mere curiosity, anxious to test the metal ; but they looked
upon it as dying men, to be healed by it. My dear brethren,
THE PERFECT BOOK. S67
take care of reading the Bible as critics, as geologists, as contro-
versialists, as philosophers. It is your Father's great voice :
listen to it. It is your Father's blessed prescription : take it to
your hearts. It is not something to be cavilled at, to be ana-
lyzed, to be disputed; but it is truth to be admitted into the
mind, grace to be received into the heart ; and if you will open
that blessed Book, and pray to Him that inspired it to teach you
its meaning, and rivet its truth upon your hearts, then you will
find it is not only the plainest book, but the best book. You
will bless Grod throughout eternity that you took "that lamp
from off the everlasting throne," which opened to you the way
of salvation, and gave you a response to the question, '^What
must I do to be saved V which no other oracle can give : " Be-
lieve in the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved."
868
LECTURE XXVm.
THE ADVENT.
" He that testifieth these things, saith, Surely I come quickly. Amen. Even
so, come, Lord Jesus." — Revelation xxii. 20.
I HAVE explained in previous lectures the manifold and
attractive glories of the heavenly Jerusalem ; and I have shown
you the characteristics of those who shall be excluded from, and
the characteristics of them who shall be admitted within, the gates
of the city — enjoy its sorrowless and its nightless state, and so be
for ever with the Lord. In this chapter I have dwelt also upon
additional warnings or testimonies that are added, under the in-
spiration of the Spirit of God, by John the evangelist. I have
shown you the invitation addressed to all in verse 17. The Holy
Spirit of God, — the bride — the redeemed church that is now
waiting to be complete by the accession of the saints that are now
on earth — say, " Come ) and let him that is athirst come, and
whosoever will, let him come." That is, let every man say to
another, Come : and thus it is a great mistake that only the
ministers of the gospel are to be the preachers of that gospel.
It is the great law of the Christian economy, that every heart
that receives the truth is to seek to communicate that truth.
There is no fear of the ministerial office being entered on by too
many, or of too much zeal in this blessed vocation : the risk is
all in the opposite direction. The Spirit says. Come ; the church
says, Come; and let every one that heareth, say, Come: let every
one that has felt the preciousness and the sweetness of these liv-
ing waters, proclaim to those who are ignorant of them, '^ Come
and drink and be satisfied, all.'' "And let him that is athirst
come, and whosoever will, let him come and take of the water of
THE ADVENT. 369
life freely/' There is no restriction, no limit ; there is no man
in this vast assembly who is not at this moment welcome to the
Lord Jesus Christ. There is no man at this moment between
whom and that blessed Lord there is any obstructing element,
except that man's unbelief and unwillingness to go to Jesus.
There is no curse upon you, like a vast load pressing you to hell,
when you would spread your wings and soar to heaven. There is
none that you will have to blame if you are lost. This, as I have
often told you, will be the corroding and terrible agony of the
lost: '* I did it all myself; I am a suicide, self-ruined: God did
nothing of it ; I did it all myself." " Whosoever is athirst,"
then, *' let him come and take of the water of life freely." — I
then showed you the guards that are placed upon this book, and,
indirectly, upon the whole word of God. " If any man shall add
unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are
written in this book ; and if any man shall take away from the
words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part
out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the
things that are written in this book." And then, to close all,
that glorious Redeemer, "who testifieth these things," saith,
" Surely I come quickly :" and then it is added, "Amen. Even
so, come. Lord Jesus." It is most remarkable, that the book
opens with this and closes with it. " Behold, he cometh with
clouds, and every eye shall see him." We too shall see him.
There is not an individual in this assembly who shall not gaze
upon the Lord of glory, no longer hanging in agony upon the
cross, but throned in ineffable grandeur upon the throne of his
glory : "And they also that pierced him ; and all kindreds of the
earth shall wail because of him." And the book concludes with
the same, as if that warning were of special moment, of great,
instant, and personal importance — " I come quickly. Even so,
come. Lord Jesus."
In this lecture I shall endeavour to show you how full the New
Testament is of what is called the second advent of our Lord,
whatever be the nature of it. You must not take my opinion of
the nature of it : you must not form your conceptions of that day
from any descriptions of mine ; but you must, like the Bereans,
search the Scriptures, and see if these things be so ; and if then
370 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
my voice is the echo of the voice of the Spirit of God, it is at
your peril that you reject it, it is your privilege to receive it.
Explain it as you may, no sooner was Jesus gone from his disci-
ples, than they felt it an irreparable catastrophe ; and every time
that Jesus gave them an intimation of his going away, the apostles
mourned over it, and they were comforted only by such words as
these, "It is expedient that I go away; for if I go not away, the
Comforter will not come unto you ; but if I depart, I will send
him unto you." Yet you must notice, that the Holy Spirit was
not to be substituted for Jesus, but a witness of Jesus. It is, I
conceive, a misapprehension of the nature of the evangelical econo-
my, to suppose that the Spirit of God has so taken the place of
Jesus that we can dispense with him, and look only to the Spirit.
If I understand his ojBB.ce, or if I have read the Scriptures that
proclaim it clearly, the office of the Spirit of God is, not to super-
sede the King of saints, not to be a substitute for his personal
coming, not to make us satisfied that he is gone, and careless that
he should come again ; but to testify of Jesus, to create in us an
intenser waiting for his advent, to cause us to cleave closer to him
in love, in truth, in sympathy, and to count all things but loss
for the excellency of the knowledge of him. In all the hardships
that the apostles suffered, the promise which he himself gave them,
" I will come again," seemed to be that which sustained them in
their toils, mitigated their sorrows, increased their patience,
brightened their hope, and made them to be ^' more than con-
querors." And, strange to say, Jesus had no sooner gone than the
cry was raised, " Come, Lord Jesus." And he has no sooner de-
clared, in the closing verse of this chapter, "I come quickly,"
than John instantly says, not as some would say, " Lord, we can
do without thee, for we have the Spirit. Lord, we do not need
thy presence, for the Comforter is with us :" but John adds, what
we too if we have John's spirit shall add, " Even so, come. Lord
Jesus." Nor are you to suppose that Christ's spiritual presence
is a reason for being indifferent to his personal presence. On the
contrary, faith, as it grows in strength, always approximates to
sight. Faith is not a grace that is to last for ever. Faith is the
telescope that we use to see, and catch some gleam of glory of the
distant personal Christ : this dispensation itself shall pass away;
THE ADVENT. S7l
and faiili, which is so precious now, shall be lost and merged in
sight. Faith here is but a temporar}'^ thing : it is but a substitute
for sight, it is not to supersede or render it unnecessary. So John,
the beloved disciple, who lived nearest to Christ, who leaned upon
his bosom at supper, John was so little satisfied with seeing Christ
by faith, that he longs, from the commencement of the Apoca-
lypse to its close, for seeing Christ by sight — *'Come, Lord Jesus."
The friend is not satisfied with epistolary intercourse with his
friend ; he longs to see him in the flesh. The bride is not satis-
fied that the bridegroom should be distant j she longs for his
presence. The Christian church is not satisfied that the Lord
should be beyond the horizon; she longs and prays, " Come, Lord
Jesus.'' Christ was manifested in the flesh, not merely to make
an atonement, though this was the first, the essential thing; "it
was needful that he should sufi"er;" but I conceive that a great
and ultimate design of the manifestation of Christ in the flesh
was to present to humanity a visible manifestation of the Godhead
— him whom we have not seen, and whom we cannot see except
as he is revealed in Christ Jesus. This dispensation, therefore, is
imperfect ; it is only preparatory to another, a higher and a more
glorious one, when hope shall evanish, and having shall take its
place — when we shall see Christ no more through a glass darkly,
but face to face — when, in the language of the evangelist, " We
shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is." But instead of
dwelling upon these points, I will lay before you what must be
more interesting to true Christians, though it may not be so to
others — those passages of Scripture which I have copied in suc-
cession, and which refer to the fact and nature of our Lord's ad-
vent. It was thus foretold by the ancient prophets. Dan. vii.
13 : " One like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven,
and came to the Ancient of days, and they brought him near be-
fore him. And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a
kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages should serve
him : his dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom
that which shall not be destroyed."* This has not yet been ful-
* If the reader desire to see the most attractive, able, and Christian com-
mentary on the whole of the Book of Daniel, let him read Mr. Birks' Comment-
ary on the Book of Daniel, a book of very great learning and instruction,
372 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
filled; it remains to be so. In Jude, verse 14, we read, " Enocli
also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Be-
hold, the Lord cometh with ten thousand of his saints.'^ All this
was after the first advent, and when Christ had arisen from the
dead. Again, it was predicted by our Lord himself, thus. Matt.
XXV. 31 : " When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and
all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit on the throne of
his glory ;'^ and again, John xiv. 3 : " I will come again and re-
ceive you unto myself ; that where I am, there ye may be also.'^
Christ has come in shame, but he has not yet come in glory : we
look for that, and we are assured by himself that it shall be.
Thirdly, this advent is proclaimed and predicted expressly by the
apostles. Thus, Acts iii. 20 : "And he shall send Jesus Christ,
which before was preached unto you. Whom the heaven must
receive, until the times of restitution of all things ; which God
hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world
began." Again, 1 Tim. vi. 14 : " That thou keep this command-
ment without spot, unrebukable, until the appearing of our Lord
Jesus Christ : which in his times he shall show, who is the bless-
ed and only potentate, the King of kings, and Lord of lords."
Fourthly, this advent was expressly proclaimed and predicted by
angels. Acts i. 10 : " Behold, two men stood by them in white
apparel ; which also said. Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gaz-
ing up into heaven ? This same Jesus which is taken up from
you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen
him go into heaven." This is plainly not a spiritual advent.
How did he rise from them ? He ascended from the mount ; a
cloud of glory, that is, the shechinah, received him out of sight.
" He shall so come in like manner." " Behold, he cometh with
clouds, and every eye shall see him." It must therefore be his
own personal advent.
Again, we have the manner of this advent described in the
second division of my subject, in such texts as the following.
He shall come with clouds. Matt. xxiv. 30: "They shall see
the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven, with power and
great glory." Matt. xxvi. 64: "Hereafter shall ye see the Son
of man coming in the clouds of heaven." In the next place, it
is said he shall come in the glory of his Father. Matt xvi. 27 :
THE ADVENT. 37S
"The Son of man shall come in the glory of the Father, with
his angels : and then he shall reward every man according to his
works." It is said also, "he shall come in his own glory." Matt.
XXV. 31: "The Son of man coming in his glory." It is said he
shall come in flaming fire. Thus, 2 Thess. i. 7 : " The Lord
Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels, in
flamiug fire, taking vengeance on them that know not G-od." It
is predicted that he shall come with a shout, and with the voice
of the archangel. We very often speak of archangels. There
is no such word in Scripture. It is never used in the plural
number. It speaks only once of the archangel, and then it is
used in the singular number. 1 Thess. iv. 16 : " The Lord him-
self shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice
of the archangel, and with the trump of Grod." It is next pro-
phesied that he shall come with his saints, i. e. with those saints
who have preceded us, and who are now in glory. 1 Thess. iii.
13 : " That he may establish your hearts unblamable in holiness
before God, even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus
Christ with all his saints." We are told also that he shall come
suddenly. Mark xiii. 36: "Lest, coming suddenly, he find you
sleeping." We are told also that he shall come unexpectedly.
Matt. xxiv. 44 : " At such an hour as ye think not, the Son
of man cometh." And, 1 Thess. v. 2. "The day of the Lord
Cometh as a thief in the night." AVhen men shall be saying,
Peace, peace, then shall he come.
We read, in the next place, of the accompaniments of Christ's
coming. In 2 Pet. iii. 10, it is said that the heaven and the
earth shall be burned up when he comes. "But the day of the
Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens
shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt
with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein
shall be burned up." It is also predicted that when he comes,
the dead in Christ shall rise first. 1 Thess. iv. 16: "The Lord
himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice
of the archangel, and with the trump of God." Most solemn
will be its accompaniment. Two graves shall be in the same
churchyard, both covered by similar green sods ; and when Christ
comes, one shall pour forth the manifested sons of God, the heirs
SECOND SERIES.
32
S74 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
of glory, the other shall remain just as the sexton left it. And
in families, when Christ comes, the father shall rise upon wings
mysterious and unexpected, and meet the Lord in the air, and
the mother shall be left behind. Or, the son shall rise, the
daughter be left behind. My dear friends, what a terrible sepa-
ration shall this be ! Let it be our prayer to God, that every
member of our household may be a child of God; and then the
separation that death makes shall only be a short and temporary
suspension of a communion which shall not be interrupted any
more.
We read next of the end and object of Christ's coming. He
comes to complete our salvation. Heb. ix. 28 : " Unto them
that look for him shall he appear a second time unto salvation. ''
1 Pet. i. 5: "Who are kept by the power of God unto salvation,
ready to be revealed in the last time." He comes also to be
glorified and admired in his saints. 2 Thess. i. 10 : "When he
shall come to be glorified in his saints, and to be admired in all
them that believe." He shall come also to declare all hidden
things. "Judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come,
who will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will
make manifest the counsels of the hearts." He comes, in the
next place, to judge. 2 Tim. iv. 1: "The Lord Jesus Christ,
who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his
kingdom." He shall come also to destroy death. 1 Cor. xv. 24 :
"Then cometh the end, when he shall have given up the king-
dom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all
rule and all authority and power. For he must reign, till he
hath put all enemies under his feet. The last enemy that shall
be destroyed is death." And he shall come, as we are specially
told, to destroy the man of -sin, i. e. the great Apostasy; and
this teaches us, that though he may be removed from Home, and
though that system may be, as I believe it will be, shortly broken
up, it will not be utterly extinguished till Christ come. And
my authority for this is not guess, but the plain declaration
of the word of God. " Then shall that wicked one be revealed,"
of whom we have the description in the previous verses, "whom
the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth" — that con-
BUmptioQ is now taking place — "and destroy with the brightness
THE ADVENT. 375;
of his coming;" i. e. the popedom is to suffer wasting and con-
sumption previous to Christ's advent; but its utter destruction,
dislocation, and extinction shall only be when Christ himself
shall come. We read again, that he comes to reign. Isa. xxiv.
23 : *^The Lord of hosts shall reign in Mount Zion, and before
his ancients gloriously." Rev. xi. 15: *^The kingdoms of this
world shall become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ,
and he shall reign for ever and ever.'' I cannot tell you the ex-
act characteristics and the accompaniments of this reign. Much
that is wicked has been said about it: much that is rash has
been uttered by good men. We know so little of the bright-
ness of that age, that where God has not spoken, it is best for us
to be silent. But this I do believe, that Christ shall come — that
his glorious footsteps shall again touch and consecrate our long
groamng and oppressed earth — that he shall be seen as he is by
every saint of God- — and that we shall hail his advent as the
extinction of all curse, the end of all sorrow and suffering,
of all night, the destruction of all death, and the dawn of a
glory that shall never be eclipsed, and the first tone of a music
that shall never be interrupted by discord.
We have, in the next place, what this advent is designated.
It is designated, ^' times of refreshing from the presence." (Acts
iii. 19.) It is called in Acts iii. 20, "times of restitution of all
things;" in Tit. ii. 13, "the appearing of our great God and
Saviour Jesus Christ." It is called in 1 Cor. i. 8, "the day of
our Lord Jesus Christ."
In the next place, all true believers not only hope for this day,
but are assured of it, and find in it their joy and delight. Job
could say, 1500 years before the first advent of Christ, "I know
that my Redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter
day upon the earth; and though after my skin worms destroy
this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God; whom I shall see for
myself, and my eyes shall behold, and not another." And all
true believers are represented as waiting for this event. 1 Thess
i. 10: "To wait for his Son from heaven." All true Christiana
are represented as looking for him. Phil. iii. 20: "Our con-
versation is in heaven, from whence also we look for the Saviour."
All true believers will be preserved unto that day. Phil. i. 6 :
376 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
'•He which hath begun a good work in 3^0U; will perform it until
the day of Jesus Christ/' 2 Tim. iv. 18 : ''The Lord will pre-
serve me unto his heavenly kingdom." Believers are represented
as not being ashamed of it. 1 John i. 28 : "Abide in him, that
when he shall appear we may have confidence, and not be
ashamed before him at his coming." Believers, it is said, will
then be preserved blameless before him. It is written, in 1 Cor.
i. 8, "That ye may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus
Christ." It is promised that believers shall be like him. Phil,
iii. 21 : " He that shall change our vile body, and fashion it like
unto his glorious body." "We shall be like him, for we shall
see him as he is." Believers are represented as receiving from
him a crown of glory. " Henceforth there is laid up for me a
crown of glory, which the Lord the righteous judge shall give
me at that day, and not unto me only, but unto all them, also
that love his appearing." 2 Tim. iv. 8. Again, believers are said
to reign with him. 2 Tim. ii. 12: "If we suffer with him, we
shall also reign with him." " They shall reign with Christ a
thousand years."
Now, I have quoted all these texts which allude to this event,
that you may see how full the New Testament is of it, and how
great a space this doctrine occupies in the New Testament. And
most remarkable it is, that we are rarely taught to prepare to
meet him by the prospect of death, but always by the certainty
of the second coming of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Now, having quoted these texts in reference to the second
advent of Christ, the relationship and bearing of which I shall
dwell upon next Lord's-day evening, let me now impress the
warning pronounced by the prophet — a warning which is of
specially pressing and instant moment in the day in which we
live. " Prepare to meet thy God, Israel." You ask me. Why
prepare to meet him? It is certain that he will come; all the
texts which I have quoted declare it. Are we ready to meet
him? Were the trumpet to sound, and the dead to rise, and
the earth to blaze, and the thrones to be set, should we be
ashamed, or happy, at his coming? My dear friends, it is a
question that most vitally affects us. Why, what can be in
men^s minds, what can have become of men's common sense,
THE ADVENT. 377
when they settle all questions, examine all disputes, decide all
differences, and leave unsettled the tremendous question, Am I
prepared to meet my Lord and my God, and to hail his advent
as that of the Lamb who has ransomed me; or to deprecate it as
that of an angry judge, who will finally and for ever condemn
me ? My dear friends, prepare, if you are not prepared already,
to meet him. It will be a solemn meeting ; we shall gaze upon
the very countenance of our risen Lord. We shall no more see
him through a glass darkly, but face to face : " whom having not
seen we love; in whom, though now we see him not, yet believ-
ing, we rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory.'' The
vail shall be raised, the glass shall be broken; and be you the
saint who waits for his glory, or sinner suspended over the gulf,
you must look Christ in the face, and Christ will look you in the
face ; and that look will either be the prelude to your everlasting
joy, or the first flash of eternal and unmitigated wo. Let me
ask you to prepare to meet him, because it will be too late to
make any preparation when he comes. The opinion, I believe,
that obtains at this moment so much in every portion of the
church is this: We do not intend to reject the gospel — God
forbid ! We do mean to become Christians ; we are well con-
vinced that Christianity is true, and we have no doubt that it
is our duty to embrace the gospel ; but then there is this trouble
not yet over — there is this lawsuit to settle — there is that little
difficulty to be disposed of: I must leave my situation of a ser-
vant, and become a master ; I must cease to be employed, and
become the employer; and then I intend to attend to the things
that belong to my eternal peace. This is a fatal delusion, from
the commencement to the close. It is the devil's plan of dead-
ening conscience and carrying you to destruction. It is a great
law, that if two forces pull at right angles, the body that is acted
upon goes neither the one way nor the other, but goes along the
diagonal. It is so in moral things : your duty was to embrace
the gospel; your convenience leads you to reject it: Satan steps
in, in the midst of the controversy, and suggests the diagonal or
intermediate course. You cannot reject the gospel at once, or
your conscience will scourge you; you cannot embrace the gospel,
or your sensual pleasures will be at an end. You say, therefore,
32*
378 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
you intend to accept the gospel, and you put it off to a convC'
nient occasion, when you will become Christians. That occasion
was once anticipated, and it never arrived ; and if the last trum-
pet should sound, and the last shock that follows the vibrations
we have felt take place, and the Lord of glory should come to-
morrow, or next week, or next year — (no man knoweth, not the
angels who are in heaven : and all we know is, that we are to
watch and be ready for his coming) — there will be no preparation
then. The man who has lost the seedtime, need not sow in the
harvest : the man who has lost the tide, need not try to float his
ship : the man is too late for the battle when the foe is in the
midst of the camp. To-day is for forming the character in which
you are to live for ever : and if we die without new hearts, we
have souls which are incapable of extinction, but which have
a terrible capacity of agony; and I should disguise, and conceal,
and dilute God's blessed word, if I did not say that, so living and
so dying, there is before us nothing but a fearful looking for of
judgment and fiery indignation.
Now, do not take my opinion on it; search the Scriptures,
whether these things are so. Surely it is a matter of such im-
portance that it must not be postponed or superseded. You are
called upon instantly, without the loss of a single day, to settle
this question. Is Christianity true ? Am I a Christian, or am I
not? Do not deceive yourselves by saying it is very difficult to
determine. It is very easy to determine. Is your trust in the
Lamb ? Is your nature regenerated by his Spirit ? Is your first
thought at morn, and your last thought at night, your soul, God,
eternity, the Bible? "Prepare to meet thy God." But how,
you ask, are we to prepare to meet him? And what is it to
be prepared to meet him ? The very first thing is to be recon-
ciled to him : '^ We are ambassadors from God, as though God
did beseech you by us; be ye reconciled to God." But you say,
''What, are we enemies to God — enemies to the God of the
Bible? Impossible!" The Bible says that the natural heart is
not only the enemy, but it is the concentrated essence of an
enemy, it is " enmity" to God. As long as we have a thought
that is not in unison with his, as long as wo kick at his laws and
revolt at his commandments, so long we are enemies to God. To
THE ADVENT. 379
be reconciled to Grod, means to acquiesce in the curse pronounced
on sin, in the propitiation he has made for us, in all that he ha?
said in his blessed gospel respecting himself and respecting us
But the next means of being prepared is being born again. Yon
may be the most distinguished Pharisee, or the most degraded
publican; you may be a nobleman, or you may be a plebeian; you
may be a senator in parliament ; you may be a great philanthro-
pist, beloved by all connections, respected by your country, ele-
vated in your state — it does not matter ; all these are circumstan-
tial and adventitious; — it is addressed to our queen, it is address-
ed to the highest and noblest that are around her throne ; it is
addressed to the lord mayor, and all the magistrates about him ;
to every tradesman, and merchant, and lawyer, and physician in
this city; to every good man, to every respected iian, to every
rich man, to every learned man — " Except ye be born again, yo
cannot see the kingdom of G-od."
Let me, then, ask you. Have you a new heart ? If you have
not, need I add that you cannot but be ashamed at Christ's
coming ? If there be truth in the Bible, you are unfit for hea-
ven. But you ask, How can I have it? There is nothing to
perform, promise, or pledge, but simply to pray to the God that
made your heart holy at first, that he would remake it ; that the
God who alone can regenerate .that heart, would regenerate it :
and no man ever yet cried in his agony, *^ God, give me a new
heart by thy Holy Spirit, for Jesus' sake" — never did a man ask
it truly, and go away without it. God waits to give, and delights
to give. Do you ask when you are to prepare to meet God ? The
answer I have already given — Now. Every description of death
I have read, every death I have witnessed, every promise in the
word of God — the certainty of that day, the nearness of that day,
the solemnity of that day — all proclaim. Prepare, now or never,
to meet thy God.
My dear friends, I have always said, to be Christians is the
greatest thing, to be with God the noblest privilege. I beseech
you, take what interest you please in politics, in trade, in com-
merce, in arts, in literature, in science, but, I beseech you by
the mercies of God, not separating myself iifhm. you. Prepare to
meet God. You know not but that heart of yours, the frailest
880 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
thing in the world, may stop to-night. You cannot keep it going
And then what takes place ? It is not an extinction of the man ;
it is only the soul leaping forth from its cold, dead tabernacle,
and rushing into the presence of that God before whose face the
heavens and the earth shall flee away : and for a soul to be so
placed, unsanctified, unregenerated, unrenewed — language fails
to embody what I feel, or what must follow. But if you can say,
Christ's blood is my sacrifice, his finished righteousness is my
title, his Holy Spirit is my sanctification, his Bible is my delight,
and his promised advent is my hope — then happy is that mo-
ther's son that can say so. Who shall separate thee, my brother,
from the love of God? I am persuaded that neither life, nor
death, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things pre-
sent, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other
creature, shall be able to separate thee from the love of God that
is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
881
LECTURE XXIX.
ORDER OF ADVENT.
*• Behold, I come quickly. Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus." — Revelation
xxii. 20.
Last Lord's-day evening I showed you how full the whole
New Testament is of what I called the second advent or coming
of our Lord. You will recollect how many passages I quoted,
each passage the nucleus of precious and edifying thought ; and
how I showed that, instead of being a doctrine that occurs only
here and there, it is constantly preached by the apostles — pre-
dicted by our Lord — the hope of saints — the joy of the whole
church of Christ. This evening I proceed to consider the order
of this event. Last Sabbath evening, I showed you simply the
fulness of Scripture in expressing the certainty of this event, but
this evening I will try, in dependence on Divine aid, to lay open
the order of this event ; in other words, to ascertain whether, ac-
cording to some, it shall precede the Millennium, or, according to
others, succeed it. All sections of the church of Christ are per-
fectly agreed in this, that Christ will come personally to our
world : there is no dispute about this ; there is no diversity of
opinion whether Christ will personally come ; the whole contro-
versy is upon the order, or what precedes, and what immediately
succeeds it. We have therefore no question about the fact
whether Christ shall come or not. Again, there is no dispute
in the Christian church if there will be a Millennium. You may
call it what you like ; a Millennium is derived from the Latin
word "mille,'' a thousand, and ''annus,'' a year, and signifies the
space of a thousand years : it derives its origin from Kev. xx.,
where we read of a thousand years during which Satan shall be
bound, and the whole church of Christ shall be holy and happy
and perfect j but call it what you please, there is predicted in
882 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
Scripture an era which shall exceed any thing that has been
realized on earth, in the holiness, in the happiness, in the joy
that shall be enjoyed by the saints, in the fertility that shall be
possessed by the earth, and in the communion that shall subsist
between a reconciled God, and a reconciled and rejoicing family.
There is no dispute, then, in the first place, whether Christ will
personally come; that is settled, that is the fixed belief of us
all : secondly, there is no question or dispute that there will be a
Millennium, an era of happiness, felicity, and joy, when earth
bhall close, as earth commenced, with paradise. About this there
is no dispute. The first point of difi'erence, then, is the order of
these events. One class allege that the Millennium will come
first, and Christ will come at its close : another class of Chris-
tians allege that Christ will come first, and the Millennium will
instantly succeed him. The one class say the Millennium will
usher in Christ ; the other say Christ will usher in the Millen-
nium. The one class say that missionary effort is to bring in the
Millennium, and that Millennium is to have Christ for its close ;
the other say that all existing missionary effort is to select a peo-
ple from the midst of the world for the Lord, and that Christ
shall come himself, like the sun standing at his meridian, and that
the Millennium will only be the sheen and splendour of that un-
setting sun. The difference is this : the one class look forward to
the Millennium as their hope, the other class look forward to
the coming of Christ as their hope. The one class asserts,
" Come quickly" means. Let the Millennium dawn speedily ; the
other class assert that "Come quickly" means, just what it natu-
rally implies, " Come, Lord Jesus, personally, and begin the Mil-
lennium." The one class, therefore, is looking for expanding
piety, increasing light, a growing church, and dying apostasy — a
progressively advancing Millennium of beauty, holiness, and
glory, and then Christ upon the judgment-throne. The other
class are looking for increasing confusion, abounding errors, mul-
tiplying sins, a world turned upside-down, denser darkness, tre-
mendous chaos, Christ interposing in the midst of it, and the Mil-
lennium bursting from the earth the moment that his footsteps
touch it. These, then, are the two points of difference. Among
these two classes, let me say, there is no difference about Christ's
ORDER OF ADVENT. 383
great work upon the cross ; that is settled. It is not Christian
and the world that differ ; it is Christian and Christian that differ,
not about what is of the essence of faith, but about its outworks,
its privileges, and its joys. There is no doubt that you will find,
in every section of the church of Christ, that two men equally
distinguished for piety, devotedness, and consistency, differ upon
this point. I have met with some who are perfectly furious
against what they call Millennarianism ; I have met with others
who are just as furious iu defence of it ; and the one is as much
to be blamed as the other. They both agree that the righteous-
ness of Christ is our only trust and title, and that Christ will
come again; but they quarrel where they ought only to agree to
differ till they have greater light, about the order and sequence
of the events that are to characterize the future. Now I wish
this evening to try if I can settle the order in your minds ; and I
ask you to lay aside all previous conceptions which you may have
formed from your earliest days ; I ask you to lay aside all preju-
dices that you may have taken up against those who are called
by the nickname — if such I may pronounce it — Millennarians.
I ask you simply to follow me through various passages of Scrip-
ture ; and if my inferences do not commend themselves to your
judgment as logical and legitimate, then the greatest justice you
can do me, and the greatest justice you can do yourselves, is to
reject them. But if the inferences I draw prove — and prove, I
think, they irresistibly do — that Christ comes first, and that the
Millennium comes next, then I am sure that Christian minds and
cool judgments will lay aside their earliest prepossessions, and
hear, not what man may plead for, but what Grod has said —
'^Thussaith the Lord."
I will refer you to passages in the Old Testament, where I
think this event is alluded to. The first passage I will quote is
Isaiah xxiv. 19-21 : "The earth is utterly broken down, the
earth is clean dissolved, the earth is moved exceedingly. The
earth shall reel to and fro like a drunkard, and shall be removed
like a cottage, and the transgression thereof shall be heavy upon
it, and it shall fall, and not rise again. And it shall come to pass
that in that day the Lord shall punish the host of the high ones
that are on high, and the kings of the earth upon the earth/'
384 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
And, passing to the 23d verse, we read, " Then the moon shall
be confounded, and the sun ashamed, when the Lord of hosts
shall reign in mount Zion, and in Jerusalem, and before his an-
cients gloriously." Now if we examine this passage, we shall see
that there is first the assertion of chaos, disorganization, and judg-
ment ; then there follows, without the intervention of any thing
like millennial bliss, the prediction, that in the midst of this
Christ shall come and reign in the mount Zion, whatever be the
nature of that reign, and shine before his ancient people, the Jews,
gloriously. After this, the 25th chapter follows, which is just a
millennial song : " Lord, thou art my God ; I will exalt thee,
I will praise thy name, for thou hast done wonderful things ; thy
counsels of old are faithfulness and truth." And at the 8th
verse of this song of the Millennium it is written, ^'He will swal-
low up death in victory, and the Lord God will wipe away tears
from all faces, and the rebuke of his people shall he take away
from off all the earth ; for the Lord hath spoken it."
In order to know when this victory shall take place, we have
only to refer to 1 Cor. xv. 54, where the apostle says, " When
this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal
shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the
saying" — What saying? '^The saying that is written," which
Isaiah has uttered here in chap. xxv. in a millennial song — " He
will swallow up death in victory." When is this to be ? Christ
first reigns in Zion, and shines before his ancients gloriously ;
and subsequent to this is the song of rejoicing, one of the predic-
tions of which is that " death shall be swallowed up in victory."
You go to an apostle in the New Testament to get light upon
the Old Testament chapter, and he tells you that the time when
the prediction in the Old Testament shall be fulfilled, is when the
resurrection comes, and " death shall be swallowed up in victory."
But when does the resurrection come ? After Christ has come.
That there may be a resurrection, there must be the presence of
Christ; and then "the trumpet shall sound, the dead shall be
raised :" and hence we infer from Isaiah, and from this passage
in Corinthians, alone, that Christ comes first, and shines before
his ancients gloriously; and the resurrection of the dead, the joy
of the saints, the happiness of the world, immediately and in-
ORDER OF ADVENT. 385
stantly follow. Again, in Isaiah xxxiv. we have another predic
tion which casts light upon this very subject. "VYe read at verse
4j after denouncing judgments upon the nations iu the second
verse, " For the indignation of the Lord is upon all nations, and
his fury upon all their armies ; he hath utterly destroyed them,
he hath delivered them to the slaughter. Their slain also shall
be cast out, and their stink shall come up out of their carcases,
and the mountains shall be melted with their blood ;'' and then
it is added, " And all the hosts of heaven shall be dissolved, and
the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll : and all their
host shall fall down as the leaf falleth off from the vine, and as a
falling fig from the fig-tree.^' Now, the question is. When does
this occur ? Turn to 2 Pet. iii. 10 ': " The day of the Lord will
come as a thief in the night ; in the which'' — quoting the very
words of Isaiah — " the heavens shall pass away with a great noise,
and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, and the earth also
and the works that are therein shall be burned up.'' It is plain,
therefore, that before Isaiah xxxiv. can be made actual, Christ
has come : then chap. xxxv. which immediately follows, is a song
for the Millennium : '^ The ransomed of the Lord shall return
and come to Zion with songs, and everlasting joy upon their
heads; and they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and
sighing shall flee away." '' The wilderness and the solitary place
shall be glad for them • and the desert shall blossom as the rose."
Now in both these chapters we have, first, the occurrence of fear-
ful judgments executed upon the world, and next, and immediately
after them, a new heaven and a new earth starting into existence :
we see an apostle in the New Testament showing you that the
creation of the new heaven and the new earth succeeds, not pre-
cedes, the advent of Christ j and in both the chapters of Isaiah
we have the evidence of the millennial blessedness following the
new heaven and the new earth. In other words, not first the
Millennium, with its bliss and its happiness, and the coming of
Christ next ; but Christ first, and the Millennium next. Again,
in Isaiah Ixv. 17, we have a reference to the same event : " Behold,
I create new heavens and a new earth : and the former shall not
be remembered, nor comeinto mind ;" and then, if we read what
SECOXD SERIES. 33
886 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
follows at the lOth verse, we shall find it is a description of millen-
nial blessedness : " I will rejoice in Jerusalem, and joy in my peo-
ple ; and the voice of weeping shall be no more heard in her, nor
the voice of crying/^ " The wolf and the lamb shall dwell to-
gether, and the lion shall eat straw like the bullock ; and dust
shall be the serpent's meat. They shall not hurt nor destroy in
all my holy mountain, saith the Lord/' This description of per-
fect happiness succeeds the event which is recorded in the 17th
verse, the creation of new heavens and a new earth. The ques-
tion is, When does that creation take place ? The apostle Peter
tells us that it takes place immediately after the coming of the
Lord Jesus Christ ', for he says, 2 Pet. iii. 13, " We, according
to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein
dwelleth righteousness." What promise ? Plainly that of Isaiah
Ixv. 17. But when does this promise take place ? St. Peter tells
us in verse 10, that ''the day of the Lord cometh as a thief in
the night •/' and instantly after his advent the earth and the ele-
ments shall be burned up; and immediately after, he proceeds
to say, '' Nevertheless, we look for new heavens and a new earth
wherein dwelleth righteousness." Christ comes first, the judg-
ment of the nations accompanies that advent; immediately suc-
ceeding it there emerge into view a new heaven and a new earth,
and all the bliss and beauty and glory of the millennial and per-
fect kingdom.
I refer to Dan. vii. 13 : ''I saw in the night-visions, and be-
hold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven,"
— (" Behold, he cometh with clouds, and every eye shall see
him") — "and came to the Ancient of days, and they brought
him near before him." Here is Christ coming first in the clouds
of heaven ; then hear what follows : " And there was given unto
him" — after his advent — '' dominion, and glory, and a kingdom,
that all people and nations and languages might serve him. His
dominion is ^n everlasting dominion, that shall not pass away,
and his kingdom shall never be destroyed." Now Daniel tells
us plainly that Christ comes first, in the clouds of heaven, and
the kingdom of happiness and holiness immediately succeeds, and
does not precede that event ; in other words, that the possession
of his kingdom is subsequent to his advent, and not prior to that
ORDER OF ADVENT. 887
event. Again, in Dan. xii. 1-3, wo have a very beautiful promise
of this event: ^^And at that time shall Michael stand up, tlie
great prince wliich standeth before the children of thy people, and
there shall be a time of trouble" — ^just as our Lord predicted —
^' such as never was since there was a nation, even unto that time."
The time of trouble already begun. " And at that time thy people
shall be delivered, every one that shall be found written in the
book :" whosoever is not found written in the book of life is not
saved ) — ^^ and many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth
shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and
everlasting contempt." I believe this is a description of the first
resurrection : the verse reads strictly, '^ some," that is, those who
awake, " to everlasting life ] and some," that is, those who sleep,
i. e. who still remain in their tombs, ^^ to everlasting shame and
contempt." And then it is added, ^^They that be wise shall
shine as the brightness of the firmament, and they that turn
many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever." Corre-
sponding to the words of our Lord : " The harvest is the end of
the world," when 'Hhe 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. Then shall
the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their
Father." Matt. xiii. 39, 41-48. Now the plain inference from
this passage is — that, first, there is a description of all anti-Chris-
tian powers ; secondly, there is the advent of the Son of Man,
the resurrection of many that sleep in the dust — " This is the
first resurrection :" then there is immediately after his advent,
^' They that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firma-
ment :" and the fact that a resurrection takes place, always in-
volves the prior fact that the Son of God is personally present.
There is no resurrection of the bodies of the saints till the Lord
of glory himself comes.
The next passage I ask you to look at is Hag. ii. 6 : ^^ For
thus saith the Lord of hosts. Yet a little while, and I will «}hake
the heavens, and the earth, and the sefl, and the dry land : and
I will shake all nations, and the desire of all nations shall come;
and I will fill this house with my glory, saith the Lord of hosts.
388 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, saith the Lord of hosts.
The glory of this latter house shall be greater than of the former,
saith the Lord of hosts : and in this place will I give peace." I
believe this has not been fulfilled. To say that this has been
perfectly fulfilled in the first advent of our Lord, seems to me to
quote a performance which does not cover the prophecy ; and the
best evidence that it has not been fulfilled is, not in comparison,
but the express assertion of the apostle Paul, when, in the Epistle
to the Hebrews, he says, ''Whose voice then shook the earth;
but now he hath promised, saying, Yet once more I shake not the
3arth only, but also heaven ;'' thus teaching us that this predic-
tion has not been fulfilled.
The time of our Lord's first advent was a time of the greatest
peace : it was the grand characteristic of that era, that the temple
of Janus was shut, the whole world was at peace; and in the
deep calm Christ came ; but the time when Christ is to come
again, is specified here as a time of commotion, shaking the king-
doms of the earth, and ''not the earth only, but also heaven.''
Then there is a reference to the emerging glory of this latter
period : the words descriptive of which are not fully rendered in
our translation. In the Septuagint Greek it is,,fxeydXTj earat 27
do^a TOO olxoUy t] iff^dzT] UTzkp ri]u TrpdiTfjv : which is, literally trans-
lated, " Greater shall be the glory of this house ; this latter glory
greater than the former glory." And it is plain that in the Old
Testament Scriptures the three temples of Solomon, Zerubbabel,
and Herod, were regarded as substantially one; and the latter
temple that I conceive to be referred to here, is that glorious
temple which I have endeavoured to describe in lecturing upon
the 21st chapter of Kevelation — where there is no temple, but
the Lord God and the Lamb shall be the temple thereof; which
needs neither sun nor moon. If this be so, then the shaking of
the earth and also of the heaven, is yet to come; and in the
midst of the troubles and convulsions predicted by the Spirit of
God, like the flash of lightning that bursts from the east and
illuminates the sky in its transit to the west, will the coming of
the Lord of glory be. ^""hen you will notice, that in this pro-
phecy it is predicted in verse 7, that " the house shall be filled
with glory ;" and in verse 9, that " there shall be peace." But
ORDER OF ADVENT. 389
our Lord tells us, that the characteristic of this dispensation is
war : ^^ I am come not to send peace on the earthy but a sword."
And therefore I conclude, that the whole of that prediction in
Haggai remains to be fulfilled ; that excitement and commotion
shall precede the advent of Christ, and peace, glory, and felicity
shall succeed it; that the Millennium shall follow Christ, not
Christ the Millennium.
Again, in Zech. xiv. 1, we have another prediction, the last
that I shall quote from the Old Testament Scriptures, which goes
to prove what I am now asserting : " Behold, the day of the Lord
cometh" — that day that cometh as a thief, that day to which
Peter refers in the passage I have already quoted — Christ's per-
sonal advent ; and then, in the fourth verse, ^^ And his feet shall
stand upon the Mount of Olives, which is before Jerusalem;"
and then, in the fifth verse, "And ye shall flee to the valley of
the mountains, for the valley of the mountains shall reach unto
Azab ; yea, ye shall flee like as ye fled before the earthquake,"
(speaking to the enemies of God ;) " and the Lord my God shall
come, and all the saints with thee." Compare this prediction
with that which is pronounced by the apostle in 1 Thess., where
he declares that Christ shall '' be revealed with all his saints ;"
then, immediately after this appearance of Christ with all his
saints, it is added, in verse 8, " and it shall be in that day that
living waters shall go out from Jerusalem, and half of them
toward the former sea, and half of them toward the hinder sea:"
("and I beheld, and there came from the throne of God and of the
Lamb a river of life, clear as crystal, proceeding from the throne
of God and of the Lamb :") — and then he goes on to say, at verse
9, "And the Lord shall be king over all the earth," i. e. after he
comes with his saints. "In that day shall there be one Lord,
and his name one :" sects shall cease, parties shall be absorbed ;
the name that was pronounced at Antioch in scorn, shall produce
the millennial glory ; Christ shall be all, and Christians shall be
the only characteristic and designation of his people. Then, in
verse 20, " In that day there shall be upon the bells of the horses"
— i. e. upon the most trivial and common things — "Holiness
unto the Lord ;" as it is stated in Revelation, " Nothing that de-
fileth shall enter into it, neither whatsoever worketh abomination
33*
390 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
or make til a lie, but they which are written in the Lamb's book
of life/'
Now, first of all, the passages which I have here quoted from
the Old Testament Scriptures prove, that when Christ comes,
instead of finding a world pervaded by holiness, happiness, and
peace, he will find a world full of controversy, disorganization,
judgment, calamity, dispute; and not till immediately after he
comes, will there follow unity, happiness, and peace. The in-
ference from all this is, that there shall not be first a thousand
years of millennial bliss, and then the Lord shall come in his
glory ; but that the Lord shall come first in his glory, at an hour
when we think not, and then, like the light that succeeds the
rising sun, there shall be a Millennium of felicity and joy over
all the earth.
I will turn to some New Testament passages which appear to
me to prove the very same thing ; and I would refer, in passing,
to Luke xxi., intending, on a subsequent evening, to show that
the predictions therein contained remain in their details to be
yet fulfilled. In Luke xxi. 24, it is thus written : ^' They'' (that
is, the Jews,) " shall fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be
led away captive into all nations." This fact needs no comment
of mine. " And Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gren-
tiles" — the Roman, the Arab, the Mohammedan, the Barbarian,
have successively trodden it down — " until the times of the Gren-
tiles be fulfilled." Then what takes place ? " And there shall
be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars." Does
it, then, say that when '^ the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled,"
then shall begin the Millennium? No; but ^Uhere shall be
signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars ; and upon
the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the
waves roaring ;" i. e. popular commotion ; ^' men's hearts failing
them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming
on the earth : for the powers of heaven shall be shaken." And
what next ? A Millennium ? No, not a syllable about it ; but,
" then shall they see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with
power and great glory. When these things begin to eome to
pass, then look up, and lift up your heads ; for your redemption
draweth nigh."
ORDER OF ADVENT. 391
Another passage which seems to me to prove the very same
order, is that prediction of our Lord contained in Luke xvii. 23,
where he alludes to his own advent, and says, "And they shall
say unto you, See here, or see there : go not after them, nor fol-
low them. For as the lightning, that lighteneth out of the one
part under heaven, shineth unto the other part under heaven ; so
shall also the Son of Man be in his day. But first must he
suffer many things, and be rejected of this generation." He
then proceeds to note what shall be at the end of the world :
"As it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be also in the days
of the Son of Man. They did eat, they drank, they married
wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noah en-
tered into the ark, and the flood came, and destroyed them all.
Likewise also as it was in the days of Lot; they did eat, they
drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they builded ; but
the same day that Lot went out of Sodom, it rained fire and
brimstone from heaven, and destroyed them all. Even thus shall
it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed."
Now, what does this teach us ? That instead of Christ coming
to a world prepared by a thousand years of preliminary millennial
bliss, he shall come to a world in which men shall be acting just
as they acted in the days of Noah, saying. Where is the promise
of his coming ? absorbed in the cares of time, charmed with the
pursuits of this life, multiplying their connections and relation-
ships in the world ; the last thing they anticipate, the advenf of
Christ ; the only things they think about, what they shall eat,
and drink, and wherewithal they shall bo clothed. And in the
midst of this, in an hour when the world is most apathetic, and
half the church, like the foolish virgins, steeped in slumber and
indifference, shall be heard the rush of chariot-wheels, like the
waves of the roaring sea, and shall bo seen at some midnight,
when every man shall be startled from his deepest sleep, the flash
of the last splendour, whose coruscations shall blaze through
heaven and earth, while all graves shall open, and all homes shall
be entered, and the day of trial begin, and the day of grace
close, and the day of glory dawn.
My dear friends, we know not but it may come next week,
next month, next year ', we know not when it may come. The
392 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
greatest symptom that it is just at our doors, is when the greatest
apathy prevails in a world that looks not for it. Suppose you are
placed at the gambling-table; what an awful position for the
Lord of glory to come and find you in ! Or, suppose you are ab-
sorbed in the excitement of a playhouse ; is not such a rery ques-
tionable position for the Lord of glory to come and surprise you
in ? I do not say that there is sin in seeing characters person-
ated ; I do not say that there is sin in hearing what might be a
perfectly unimpeachable play acted ', but is it not the fact, that
the playhouse is the centre of abomination ? and that if ^ou have
that moral force within you — your Christian and heroic sentiment
so strong — that you could go to a playhouse and come out of it,
and catch no contagion, are you sure that your daughter will
equally escape ? are you sure your son will do the same ? Mas-
ters, are you sure your apprentices will do the same ? You set
the example ; you have force of character to resist the contagion ;
but can you guarantee that a son, a daughter, an apprentice, a
friend, with less moral force, and greater susceptibility of kin-
dling passion, who will follow your example, will also inherit your
immunity ? In points of logic, you may take ten minutes to
consider, if the case requires it ; but in a question of conscience,
if there is a difficulty at the first blush, it is always safest to act
upon the holiest side. Pause in logic is wisdom ; pause in a mat-
ter of conscience is often the pathway to sin : the first impression
in moral matters is, in general, the most correct; hence, your
first conclusions in such matters are generally the most true.
But, to return to the point; when the Lord of glory comes,
where should you like best to be found ? By all means, trades-
men, behind your counter; merchants, in your counting-house;
senators, in the senate. If you are at the post of duty, and in
the path of righteousness, there to be found when He comes, is
to be found like a sentinel at his post by the commanding officer,
ready for all whenever the trumpet shall sound. But certainly
it is your best and holiest impression that the place of sin, the
place that is suspicious, the place that is questionable, the place
about which there is even a doubt in the minds of good men, is
the last place where you would like the King of Glory to find
yoTi.
ORDER OF ADVENT. 898
But let me pass on to other passages. In Acts iii. 20, I find
these words : "And he shall send Jesus Christ, which befoie was
preached unto you : whom the heaven must receive until the
times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the
mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began. '^ We are
here told that heaven must retain Christ, till when ? Not, as
some read the passage, till all things are restored ; but till the
time of restitution of all things, of which time the prophets have
written; that is, when the time of prophecy is closed, and the
era that precedes the restitution of all things has arrived, then
Christ shall come and take possession of his kingdom. I read
also in Rom. viii. that '^ the whole creation,^' not only we our-
selves, but the whole creation, i. e. the material creation, the
earth, " groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now ; and
not only it, but ourselves also, which have the first fruits of the
Spirit : even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the
adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body." Now, what does
this passage prove ? That the fabric of nature shall continue till
the resurrection comes, here called "the redemption of our
body:'' but we are assured, in other portions of Scripture, that
the resurrection takes place after Christ has come; "for the Lord
shall descend from heaven with the voice of the archangel, and
the dead in Christ shall rise." Then it is plain from this, that
the creation groans and travails, endures the curse, and will con-
tinue to do so till Christ comes. Therefore we conclude that the
Millennium succeeds, not precedes, the advent of the Lord of
glory.
Then again, in that beautiful passage in Thessalonians which I
read last Lord's-day evening : " For this we say unto you by the
word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the
coming of the Lord, shall not prevent them which are asleep ; for
the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with
the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet of God; and
the dead in Christ shall rise first." The resurrection of the dead
shall take place after Christ has personally come; "then we
which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with him
in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air ; and so shall we ever
be with the Lord." And we read in Revelation, that when the
H94 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
marriage-supper of the Lamb has come, and the Bride hath mado
herself ready, happiness and triumph instantly follow.
If I turn to the parables, which you may read at your leisure,
and on some of which I have commented — the parable of the
tares and the wheat, for instance — we find that when some wished
to separate the tares from the wheat, i. e. the bad members from
the good members of the visible church, the Lord said, " No, let
both grow together until the harvest." He then explains what
is to take place at the harvest, which, as he tells us, signifies the
end of the world. ^^ The field is the world ; the good seed are
the children of the kingdom, the tares are the children of the
wicked one ; the enemy that sowed them is the devil ; the harvest
is the end of the world.'^ The tares and the wheat continuing
together till the end of the world : " Then the Son of Man shall
send forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom
all things which offend, and them which do iniquity, and shall
cast them into a furnace of fire ; there shall be wailing and gnash-
ing of teeth. Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in
the kingdom of their Father.'^ The parable teaches us that in-
stead of the church rising to its millennial state before Christ
comes, it shall be found in its mingled state, tares and wheat to-
gether; and till he make the separation, the tares and the wheat
remain together; and after his separation of them shall the
righteous shine forth in the millennial kingdom of glory for ever.
So it is in the other parable of the good and the bad fishes : when
the bad fishes are cast off, and the good retained, it is our Lord
himself who makes the division. So again, in the parable of the
ten virgins, on which I hope to address you in the course of my
Sabbath-morning lectures, when the Bridegroom came, five were
awake, and five asleep ; in other words, one half the church un-
believing, or tares and bad fishes, and the other half awake, rest-
ing on their Saviour's cross, and looking with joy for the Saviour's
crown. In the next place, the characteristics of this dispensa-
tion, as they are given in the Bible, show that there can be no
Millennium till Christ comes. The characteristic of the present
dispensation is election: ^'Many called, but few chosen;'^ "a
little flock j'' nations at war, the church a mixture, creation
groaning and travailing for its deliverance. It is the character-
ORDER OP ADVENT. 395
istic of the Christian in this dispensation, ^^ Through much tribu-
lation we must enter the kingdom of heaven/' The true church
is a woman in the wilderness } she is persecuted by Satan ; and
each member of it has a law in his members warring against the
law in his mind, making him the captive of sin and death. Thus
the world is to continue the world till the Redeemer comes ; the
church is to continue a mixed crowd — all baptized, but not all
regenerated — till Christ comes. In other words, there is to be
no millennial bliss before Christ's advent, but this millennial
bliss is instantly to succeed it. Again : the description of the
state of things at his coming given by himself to his apostles,
shows that there will be no Millennium till he comes : " When
the Son of Man cometh, will he find faith on the earth ?" This
does not show that he will come at the close of the Millennium.
^' In the last days," says St. Paul, " perilous times shall come,
for men shall be lovers of their ownselves, covetous, proud;" a
part only of a catalogue of dark and dismal characteristics of
those that shall belong to the last days. Again, we read that
there shall be manifested the development of the man of sin, and
the mystery of iniquity, which shall work until it is consumed by
the Spirit of the Lord's mouth, and destroyed by the brightness
of his personal coming. In other words, there is no break in the
dark interval; there is not the least intimation of millennial
bliss ; and if it do not come after Christ, most certainly the
Bible shows most distinctly that it does not come before Christ.
Then let me add, if there are to be first a thousand years of
bliss, and if Christ is to come in the very last year of the thou-
sand, we may be called upon to wait, but surely we cannot be
called upon to watch. We wait for that date which is fixed ; we
watch for that which itself is sure, but its time uncertain : but
if the truth be that Christ comes at an hour when we think not,
and prior to this millennial bliss, then the precept, " Watch !" is
as beautiful as it is important, as a duty devolving upon us all.
Again : during the sounding of the first six trumpets, all is dark,
dismal, and terrific ; it is when the seventh sounds, and Christ
comes, that the kingdoms of this world become the kingdoms ot
our Lord and of his Christ. Again : the three unclean spirits
come into action under the sixth vial ; and while they are in ac-
396 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
tion, polluting the earth with their trail, and preparing men^s
mind for all terrific and daring outbreaks, the words are heard,
*' Behold, I come as a thief; blessed is he that watcheth.''
Again : we are told that the Jews shall continue unconverted, as
a people, until the Lord himself shall come. I will quote only
one passage from the Psalm which we sang this evening : " When
the Lord shall build up Zion,'' i. e. restore the Jews to their land,
and Jerusalem to its glory, ^^then he shall appear in his glory.''
But let me now notice two or three objections to the whole
subject, which I have endeavoured thus briefly to illustrate and
construct from Scripture.
First, it has been argued by some who are opposed to the
order I have stated, that such a hope is incompatible with the
sentiment expressed by our Lord : " My kingdom is not of this
world.'' They say. If there is to be a reign of glory and of
blessedness with Christ, in some way unknown to us, manifest in
the midst of it, it would imply that Christ's kingdom is not of
this world. I answer, The objection is not a valid one. We
say, Christ's kingdom is in the world, but Christ's kingdom
neither is nor ought to be of the world. Believers now are in
the world, but it does not follow that they are therefore of the
world. What we contend for is this : that Christ's kingdom will
be manifested in the world, but that Christ's kingdom will not
then be — what it ought not now to be — a kingdom raised by
carnal weapons, defended by carnal men, and dependent upon
carnal motives for its maintenance, stability, and support.
The second objection I have heard is contained in Luke xvii.
21 : ^^ Neither shall they say, Lo here ! or Lo there ! for, be-
hold, the kingdom of God is within you." It has been argued
that there can be no kingdom of God without us, because the
kingdom of God is within us. I answer. Suppose we take the
words just as they are written, still this last inference does not
follow. The kingdom of God has in Scripture two aspects : one
as composed of principles, the other as composed of persons. As
composed of principles, the kingdom of God is not meat nor
drink, but righteousness and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost;
and as such that kingdom is within you. As composed of per-
sons or saints, heirs of God, the kingdom of God is necessarily
ORDER OP ADVENT. 397
without you; but the truth is, our translation conveys a wrong
impression — it reads as if our Lord had said, "Neither shall
they say, Lo here ! or Lo there V and then had added as a rea-
son, "Behold, the kingdom of Grod is within you." But the
last words, " Behold," &c., are a part of what the people say,
" Neither shall they say, Lo here ! or*Lo there ! for the kingdom
of God is within you." This is what they shall not say ; and if
they do so, you are commanded to pay no attention to it. Just
in the same manner as if they should say, " He is here in the
secret chambers, go not there; or, Lo, he is there in the desert,
go not after them." And therefore, •' The kingdom of God is
within you," is not a reason assigned by the Saviour for rejecting
the " Lo here ! or Lo there !" but it is part and parcel of the
sentiment of those who shall exclaim, " The kingdom of God is
here, or it is there !" and who, therefore, do not look for its ad-
vent, its spread, and its triumphs upon earth
Now, I admit, in closing my remarks on this branch of the
subject, many excellent men reject the order I have endeavoured
to prove. It is perfectly true, no one doubts or denies it ; but
we must not read the Scriptures in the light of excellent men,
but the creeds and sentiments of excellent men in the light of the
Scripture. The great law is, that our rule of faith is not what
the best men say, nor what the worst men say, but what God has
distinctly stated in his word. If you are satisfied, from the proofs
I have adduced, that Christ comes first, and is therefore the hope
of his, people, and his kingdom follows next, then you must not
mind that some good men reject it; but if a human element is to
be admitted, I may thus answer : If many good men reject it,
many good men, I need not inform you, accept it. Such excel-
lent men as Mr. Stratten, of Paddington, and Mr. Noel, late of St.
John's Chapel, are opposed to this order; but such no less excel-
lent men as Mr, Villiers, and Dr. McNeile, Mr. Bickersteth, Mr.
Birks, and many others, accept it; and therefore, if we are to
weigh one good man against another, you must remain perfectly
neutral. You must, therefore, read the Bible yourselves — ask
God's Spirit to teach you, and to lead you to the conclusion
which is truth.
SEC0I7D SERIES. 34
S08 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
Another objection is, that these prophetic views have led some
great men into grievous heresy. Was it the prophetic views that
led them into heresy, or their own wayward fancies ? It would
not be fair to say that the Bible leads to Socinianism, or to make
Christianity answerable for Popery. Sequence and consequence
are two different things : error may follow truth, but truth does
not necessarily generate error. Blame not prophecy, but human
infirmity.
Others have said, that all prophecy is meant to be studied only
after it is fulfilled. Suppose Adam and Eve had acted upon this
sentiment, they had lived and died ignorant of the gospel ; for
they had nothing but a prophecy to lead them to Christ : '■'■ The
woman's seed shall bruise the serpent's head.'' They believed
the promise — treated the promise as performance — and were
saved through the truth that it embosomed. Or suppose our
Lord's immediate disciples had acted upon this sentiment. Our
Lord told them what should befall Jerusalem, how they would
escape, and how they were to act. They received his prophecies,
acted upon his precepts ; and if they had waited till the prophecy
was ftllfilled, they had perished amid the ruins of Jerusalem. Our
Lord himself reproved the scribes and Pharisees for noticing the
signs of the sky, and not observing those of the times. He says,
" Ye say the sky is red, and it will be fine weather to-morrow ;"
and if you are so accurately acquainted with your barometer, why
not be better acquainted with your Bible ? You calculate what
shall be here to-morrow, from the aspect of the sky to-day : how
is it that you are ignorant of the signs of the times, which you
ought also to interpret, and see what they lead to ?
Others, again, have said, that such a Millennium as that which
I have alluded to — Christ in the midst of it, his people clustering
round like concentric zones of adoring worshippers, holy and happy
— is a carnal Millennium. If it be God's truth, it cannot be
carnal. I will not pause to discuss the objection, that it is carnal :
the great question is — Is it true ? Is it here ? If it be not here,
it is false, which is worse than carnal : it it be God's prophecy,
then depend on it there will be nothing caixal, or sinful, or sen-
suous, in it or about it.
ORDER OP ADVENT. 399
Others say, Has not Paul said, '^I determined not to know any
thing among you, save Jesus Christ and him crucified." Would
it not be much better to dwell on such a text as that, and not to
spend an hour and a quarter in endeavouring to prove the order
of events which God has left undetermined, and about which,
perhaps, absolute certainty is altogether unattainable ? True, the
apostle Paul did say, " I determined to know nothing among you
but Jesus Christ and him crucified." But the same apostle did
also say, " But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become
the first-fruits of them that slept. For as in Adam all die, even
so in Christ shall all be made alive. But every man in his own
order : Christ the first-fruits ; afterward them that are Christ's at
his coming. Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered
up the kingdom to God, even the Father ; when he shall have put
down all rule and authority and power. For he must reign till
he hath put all enemies under his feet. The last enemy that
shall be destroyed is death." And the apostle Paul, in remind-
ing his converts what he preached, and what was the efi'ect of his
preaching, says, ^'For they themselves show what manner of
entering in we had among you, and how you turned to God from
idols to serve the living God, and to wait for his Son from heaven,
whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus which delivered us
from the wrath of God."
Others again will say, " If these things be so, what occasion is
there for missions ?" And I was so misinterpreted in uttering
some of these sentiments before, that one told me he had heard
that I no longer took the least interest in missions, because I
believe this age is soon to close, and Christ is soon to come. The
facts are altogether the opposite : because the time is long, yoio
can afford to be slack ; because the time is short, ice can afford
only to be busy. Because this is the age for selection, for pre-
paring a people to meet the Lord, I feel that every energy of
heart and head ought to be concentrated. Now we must give
largely and make large sacrifices : the candle is nearly burned to
the socket — I must write quicker while the little light remains.
The paper is almost covered with writing — I must crowd what
remains with closer writing, more startling sentiments, . more
400 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
thrilling warniugs, more earnest exhortations. The age is draw
ing to a close; the shadows of the vrorld's eve are gathering
round ; the crash of thrones, the fall of dynasties, the shaking of
the earth, to be followed by the shaking of the heaven, are heard
as dread premonitory sounds booming over all the earth. We
know not, my dear friends, how soon the Lord may come. Let
every one, therefore, have his loins girt, and his lamp burning —
his foothold the Rock of ages, and his hope the crown of glory.
401 ;>|*
LECTUKE XXX.
THE FALL OF JERUSALEM.
"He which testifieth theae things saith, Surely I come quickly. Amen.
Even so, come, Lord Jesus." — Revelation xxii. 20.
In my first discourse on these words, I showed how frequently
the advent or second coming of our Lord is referred to in the
New Testament. In my second discourse, I endeavoured to show
you the order of this event; and I think the texts I adduced
clearly prove that Christ comes first to our world, and then the
Millennium, or the reign of happiness and joy and peace, shall
follow. In this lecture I wish to direct your attention, in con-
nection with this text, to the last prophecy of our Lord relating
to the destruction of Jerusalem : distinguishing how much of it
relates to that event which is mentioned in the text — the coming
quickly of the Son of Man. Next Lord's-day evening, if spared,
I will show you the other intervening event between the first and
second advent of Christ — the Man of Sin; and then, in the last
discourse I shall preach upon this portion of this book, I will
show you what are the signs and symptoms, as far as I have ga-
thered any fresh ones, of the nearness of that great and hoped-
for event. The prophecy .then — which I will illustrate as briefly
as I possibly can, by quoting illustrations of it — is contained in
Matt. xxiv. In that prophecy, so much, as I have told you, re-
fers to the destruction of Jerusalem, which was near ; so much,
to the advent of Christ, which was beyond it : this subject will
show us that nothing is to take place between the destruction of
Jerusalem and the coming of Christ, in the way of spiritual pros-
perity and happiness to the church universal ; but, on the con-
trary, the prolongation of the great tribulation which is to over-
take the Jew, and the ruins of his noble capital ; while all the
land of Israel will continue in a state of desolation until Christ
comes, and then, and only then, it shall cease. It appears, from
34*
402 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
the first verse, that Jesus went out and departed from the temple,
and his disciples came to him to show him the buildings of the
temple, and that Jesus said unto them, '^ See ye not all these
things ? Verily I say unto you. There shall not be left here one
stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down.'' He that
made such a prediction as this, amid the circumstances of
strength, of splendour, and of greatness which surrounded him
at that moment, must either have been a maniac, speaking in his
madness, or he must have been He to whom the past, the present,
and the future are equally luminous. It is added, " And as he
sat upon the Mount of Olives, the disciples came unto him." I
think it is important to explain this prophecy, because many
persons say that the predictions which relate to the downfall of
Jerusalem apply also to the second advent of Christ ; and others
apply the whole to the second advent of Christ, and overlook the
plain and palpable fact, that the great bulk of it was fulfilled in
the destruction of the Jewish capital and the Jewish polity.
They said, " Tell us, when shall these things be ?" I beg of you
specially to notice the words " these things," because they are
referred to again and again. " When shall these things be ?" is
the first question ; and, "What shall be the sign of thy coming,"
(jtapooaia^ personal appearance,) " and of the end of the world ?"
This is the second question. The word rendered "world" is not
xofffioq, which means the created world, but alwv, which means a
dispensation — When shall be the end of the age ? — aicov vDv,
" that now is," being the usual form for the present dispensation;
and alcDv /jMXwv, " the age to come," being the form for the mil-
lennial dispensation, described in Rev. xxi. xxii. There are here
three great questions stated : first, When shall these things be ?
secondly. What shall be the sign of thy coming ? thirdly, And
of the end of this dispensation which is now begun ? Jesus pro-
ceeds instantly to answer these three questions in succession ; and
in distinguishing the contents of the chapter, you distinguish
what is fulfilled from what remains to be fulfilled, and thus
gather what is to intervene between the destruction of the Jew-
ish capital, and the erection, the coming down from heaven, of
that New Jerusalem — " that city that hath foundations; whose
builder and maker is God."
THE FALL OF JERUSALEM. 403
Jesus thus proceeded to answer and explain them : "Take heed
that no man deceive you. For many shall come in my name,
saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many. And ye shall
hear of wars and rumours of wars : see that ye be not troubled ;
for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet.
For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against king-
dom ; and there shall be famines and pestilences, and earthquakes
in divers places. All these are the beginning of sorrows. Then
shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you ; and
ye shall be hated of all nations for my name's sake;'^ — addressing
plainly the disciples : the disciples asked the question, and to the
disciples, as representing the Christians, he addresses himself: —
"And then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another,
and shall hate one another. And many false prophets shall rise,
and shall deceive many. And because iniquity shall abound, the
love of many shall wax cold : but he that shall endure unto the
end, the same shall be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom
shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations ;
and then shall the end come. When ye therefore shall see the
abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet,
stand in the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him understand,)
then let them which be in Judea flee into the mountains: let
him which is on the house-top not come down to take any thing
out of his house : neither let him which is in the field return
back to take his clothes. And wo unto them that are with
child, and to them that give suck in those days ! But pray ye
that your flight be not in the winter, neither on the Sabbath-day :
for then shall be great tribulation, such as was not from the be-
ginning of the world to this time ; no, nor ever shall be. And
except those days should be shortened, no flesh should he saved ;
but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened."
(Verses 4-22.)
Down to this, he seems to me to refer specially to the down-
fall of Jerusalem ; then, from verse 23 onward, he guards them
against misinterpreting the signs of his advent. From verses
23 to 29, and from verses 30 to 41, he describes his own second
coming, and the end of the alwv, or age. To show you that his
predictions from verses 4 to 23 have been strikingly fulfilled, I
404 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
will read to you some extracts, made from different writers, which
will prove how strictly and literally the past has been fulfilled,
and how strictly and literally we may expect the future to be
fulfilled also.
The first sign he gave is the appearance of false prophets :
" Many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ." Now,
Josephus informs us that there were many who, pretending to
divine inspiration, deceived the people, leading out numbers of
them into the desert. He does not, indeed, expressly say that
they called themselves the Messiah or Christ, yet he says that
which is equivalent; viz. that they pretended that Grod would
there show them the signs of liberty, — meaning, redemption from
the Roman yoke, which thing the Jews expected the Messiah
would do for them. Among these was Dositheus the Samaritan,
who affirmed that he was the Christ foretold by Moses; Simon
Magus, who said that he appeared among the Jews as the Son
of God ; and many other examples are also given by Josephus,
of pretended Messiahs who appeared at that time. And this led
Tacitus to make the remark, that " there prevailed a common
opinion throughout the East, of some one who should be Lord
and Master of the world ;" the expectation of the Messiah lead-
ing many to put in a claim to be so.
The next sign was, that there should be " wars and rumours
of wars." The rising of nation against nation portended the
dissensions, insurrections, and mutual slaughter of the Jews and
those of other nations who dwelt in the same cities together ; as
particularly at Caesarea, where the Jews and Syrians contended
about the right of the city, which contention at length proceeded
so far that above 20,000 Jews were slain, and the city was clear-
ed of the Jewish inhabitants. At this blow the whole nation of
the Jews were exasperated, and dividing themselves into parties,
they burnt and plundered the neighbouring cities and villages of
the Syrians, and made an immense slaughter of the people. The
Sj^rians in revenge destroyed not a less number of the Jews, and
every city, as Josephus expresses it, " was divided into two armies."
The rising of " kingdom against kingdom" portended the open
wars of different tetrarchies and provinces against one another.
But, as Josephus says, ^^ there was not only sedition and civil
THE FALL OF JERUSALEM. 405
war tliroughout Judea, but likewise in Italy, Otho and Vitellius
contending for the empire/' So strictly and literally was this
prcdictinn fulfilled.
The third sign of the destruction of Jerusalem was "famine
and pestilence:" the fulfilment of this is even stated in the Acts
of the Apostles, xi. 28, as predicted by Agabus : it is also men-
tioned by Suetonius, Tacitus, Eusebius; and was so severe at
Jerusalem, that Josephus informs us many people perished for
want of food. Pestilences are the usual attendants of famines,
as scarcity and badness of provisions almost always terminate in
some epidemical distemper. That Judea was afflicted with pesti-
lence, we learn from Josephus, who says, that when one Niger
was put to death by the Jewish zealots, besides other calamities,
he imprecated famine and pestilence upon them all ; " which im-
precations God confirmed against these impious men."
The next sign is " earthquakes." If these mean literal earth-
quakes, as I believe they do, we read of one at Crete, in the
reign of Claudius, and others at Smyrna, Miletus, Chios, Samos,
and other places, in all of which Jews were settled. Tacitus
mentions one in the same reign, and says that in the reign of
Nero, the cities of Laodicea, Hierapolis, and Colosse were
overthrown, and that the celebrated city of Pompeii, in Campa-
nia, was overthrown and almost demolished by an earthquake ;
and another earthquake at Rome is mentioned by Suetonius, as
having happened in the reign of Galba.
The fifth sign was fearful sights and signs from heaven. Jose-
phus, who was not acquainted with the prophecy contained in
Matt, xxiv., records simply as an historian, irrespective of any
religious view whatever, the following facts. The Lord said
there should be sights and signs in heaven ; and this prediction is
repeated in the Gospel of Luke. Many prodigies are related by
Josephus, particularly " that in Judea, at the commencement of
the war, and before the siege of Jerusalem by Titus, there broke
out a prodigious storm in the night, with the utmost violence, and
very strong winds, with the largest showers of rain, with con-
tinual lightnings, terrible thunderings, and amazing concussions
and bellowings of the earth, that was in an earthquake. These
things were a manifest indication that some destruction was com-
406 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
ing upon men, when tbe system of this world was thrown into
such disorder -, and any one would guess that these wonders por-
tended some grand calamities that were impending." The same
historian, in the preface to his History of the Jewish War, un-
dertakes to record the signs and prodigies that preceded it, and
accordingly, in his sixth book, he enumerates them thus : " First,
A star hung over the city like a sword, and the comet continued
for a whole year. Second, The people being assembled to celebrate
the Feast of Unleavened Bread, at the ninth hour of the night
there shone so great a light about the altar and the temple, that
it seemed to be bright day. Third, At the same feast, a cow, led
by the priest to sacrifice, brought forth a lamb in the middle of
the temple. Fourth, The eastern gate of the temple, which was
of solid brass and very heavy, and was scarcely shut in the eve-
ning by twenty men, and was fastened by strong bars and bolts,
was seen, at the sixth hour of the night, opened of its own ac-
cord, and could hardly be shut again. Fifth, Before the setting
of the sun there was seen over all the country, chariots and
armies fighting in the clouds, and besieging cities. Sixth, At
the Feast of Pentecost, as the priests were going into the inner
temple by night, as usual, to attend their services, they heard
first a motion and noise, and then a voice as of a multitude, say-
ing, *Let us depart hence.' Seventh, what Josephus reckons as
the most terrible of all, one Jesus, a country fellow, four years
before the war began, and when the city was in peace and plenty,
came to the Feast of Tabernacles, and ran crying up and down
the streets, day and night, ' A voice from the east, a voice from
the west, a voice from the four winds, a voice against Jerusalem
and the temple, a voice against the bridegrooms and the brides,
a voice against all the people.' The magistrates endeavoured by-
stripes and torture to restrain him, but he still called with a
mournful voice, ' Wo, wo to Jerusalem.' This he continued to
do for seven years and five months together, and especially at
the great festivals; and he neither grew hoarse nor was tired,
but went about the walls and cried with a loud voice, ^ Wo, wo
to the city, and to the people, and to the temple;' and as he
added at last, ' Wo, wo also to myself,' it happened that a stone
from some sling or engine immediately struck him dead." Taci-
THE FALL OF JERUSALEM. 407
tus also, the Uoman liistorian, who is not suspected by skeptic
writers, but whose testimony is received in preference to that of
others, records that there happened several prodigies ; he does
not speak of the destruction of Jerusalem especially, bat of the
times. "There happened several prodigies; armies were seen
engaging in the heavens, arms were seen glittering, and the tem-
ple shone with the sudden fire of the clouds; the doors of the
temple opened suddenly, and a voice greater than human was
heard, that the gods were departing; and likewise a great motion
of their departing/' These are the words of Tacitus, the Roman
historian, who called the Christian religion exitiahilis superstitio,
" a pernicious superstition ;'' and who had not the least design of
confirming any prediction connected with it.
The next prediction was, that '^ they will lay hands on you
and persecute you, and deliver you to be beaten : and ye shall
be hated of all men for my name's sake." T need not quote
proof demonstrative of this : whether you read the Acts of the
Apostles, or read the historians of the time, you will find that
the war was a war against the very name of Christian, and an
effort was made to extinguish the religion. "Though a man was
possessed of every human virtue, yet it was crime enough if he
were a Christian." So hated was the name, and such was the
effort to proscribe and extinguish it.
The seventh sign was, that the gospel should be preached
among all the nations constituting the empire and known at that
day. This can be proved by distinct contemporaneous testimony :
the most strong is that of the younger Pliny, in his letter to the
emperor Trajan, A. D. 107, from which we learn, that during his
proconsulate in Pontus and Bithynia, the Christians abounded in
those provinces; that informations had been lodged against many
on this account ; and that he had made diligent inquiry, even by
torture, into the nature of the charge against them, but could
not discover any crime of which they were guilty, besides what
he terms an evil and excessive superstition. He adds, that he
"thought it necessary on this occasion to consult the emperor,
especially on account of the great number of persons who are in
danger of suffering ; for many of all ages and of every rank are
accused, and will be accused : nor has the contagion of this su-
408 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
perstition seized cities only, but the lesser towns also and the
open country;" and he further intimates that ^'the temples had
been almost deserted, the sacred solemnities discontinued, and
that the victims had met with but few purchasers." Then, if
we refer to Clement, and Justin Martyr, and others, we shall find
still further testimony to the spread of Christianity at that day.
We find another sign of the destruction of the temple pre-
dicted by our Lord — viz, ^' that the abomination of desolation
spoken of by Daniel the prophet should stand in the holy place."
This abomination of desolation is universally believed to have
been the Roman ensign and the Roman army. These entered
the very holy of holies, and the Roman eagle was actually raised
where the cherubim and the shechinah once were. "VVe read then
the command of our Lord, that those who were in Judea should
flee to the mountains. Josephus tells us, that in the 12th year
of Nero, Sestius G alius, the president of Syria, came with a
powerful army against Jerusalem, which he might have assaulted
and taken; but without any just reason, and contrary to the ex-
pectation of all, he raised the siege and departed. Immediately
after his retreat, many of the principal Jewish people forsook the
city, as men do a sinking ship. And a few years afterward,
when Vespasian was drawing his forces toward Jerusalem, a
great multitude fled from Jericho into the mountainous country,
for their security. Among them it is probable that some were
Christians. At this juncture, we are told, all who believed in
Jesus Christ, warned by this oracle or prophecy, quitted Jerusa-
lem, and removed to Pella and other places beyond the river
Jordan, and thus marvellously escaped the general shipwreck of
their country." And we read that not one Christian (which is
very remarkable) perished in the destruction of Jerusalem.
Another sign was the appearance of '' false Christs and fiilse
prophets." Josephus thus speaks : " The tyrannical zealots who
ruled the city, suborned many ftilse prophets to declare that aid
would be given to the people from heaven. This was done to
prevent them from attempting to desert, and inspire them with
confidence. In this manner, impostors, abusing the sacred name
of God, deluded the unhappy multitude; who, like infatuated
men, that have neither eyes to see nor reason to judge, regarded
THE FALL OF JERUSALEM. 409
neither the infallible denunciations pronounced by the ancient
prophets, nor the clear prodigies that indicated the approaching
desolation.''
We read next of the miseries that were to overtake that land.
Time would fail if I were to read the dreadful numbers slaugh-
tered at the siege of Jerusalem, or the terrible alternatives to
which they were reduced. To the extreme sufferings of the
Jews, Josephus bears most ample testimony. In the preface to
his history of the Jewish war, speaking generally of the calami-
ties that befell the Jews, he says, almost in our Saviour's words,
" that all the calamities which had befallen any nation from the
beginning of the world, were but small in comparison of those
of the Jews." We find that opposite factions filled all places,
even the temple itself, with continual slaughter. Mothers were
even found, in the dreadful famine during the siege, eating the
flesh of their own children ; and we gather from Josephus that
numbers, rushing into every lane, slew whomsoever they found,
without distinction, and burned the houses and all the people who
fled into them. And when they entered for the sake of plunder,
they found whole families of dead persons, and houses full of
carcases destroyed by famine. Then they came out with their
hands empty, and though they thus pitied the dead, they did not
feel the same emotion for the living, but killed all they met,
whereby they filled the lanes with dead bodies. The whole city
ran with blood, insomuch that many things which were burning
were extinguished by the blood. Thus were the inhabitants of
Jerusalem slain with the sword : thus was she laid even with the
ground, and her children with her. The soldiers being now
wearied with killing the Jews, and yet a great number remaining,
alive, Csesar commanded that only the armed and they who re-
sisted should be slain. But the soldiers killed also the old and
infirm : and taking the young and strong prisoners, carried them
into the women's court in the temple. Caesar appointed one
Fronto, his freedman and friend, to guard them, and to deter-
mine the fate of each. All the robbers and seditious he slew,
one of them betraying another. But picking out such youths
as were remarkable for stature and beauty, he reserved them for
the triumph. All the rest that were above seventeen years old,
SECOND SERIES 35
410 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
he sent into Egypt to be employed in labour there. Titus also
sent many of them into the provinces, to be slain in the theatres
by beasts and the sword. And those who were under seventeen
were slain ; and during the time Fronto judged them, a thousand
died of hunger.
But the falling by the edge of the sword is not to be confined
to what happened at the siege, in which not fewer than 1,100,000
perished. It also comprehends all the slaughter made of the
Jews in difierent battles, sieges, and massacres, both in their own
country, and at other places during the course of the war. Thus,
by the command of Florus, who was the first author of the war,
there were slain at Jerusalem 3,600 ; by the inhabitants of Caesa-
rea, above 20,000; at Scythopolis, above 13,000; at Ascalon,
2,500, and at Ptolemais, 2,000. At Alexandria, under Tiberius
Alexander the president, 50,000. At Joppa, when it was taken
by Sestius Gallus, 8,400. At a mountain, Amason, near Seppho-
ris, above 2,000. At Damascus, 10,000. In a battle with the
Eomans at Ascalon, 10,000. At an ambuscade near the same place,
8,000. At Japha, 15,000. By the Samaritans upon Mount Geri-
zim, 11,600. At Jobopa, 40,000. At Joppa, when taken by Ves-
pasian, 4,200. At Tarichea, 6,500, and after the city was taken,
1,200. At Gamala, 4,000, besides 5,000 who threw themselves
down a precipice. Of those who fled with John from Gischala,
6,000. Of the Gadarenes, 15,000 slain, besides an infinite number
drowned. In the villages of Idumea, above 10,000 slain. At
Gerasa, 1,000. At Machoerus, 1,700. In the wood of Jardes, 3,000.
In the castle of Masada, 960. In Greece, by Catullus the governor,
3,000. Besides these, many of every age, sex, and condition
were slain in this war, who are not reckoned ; but of these who
reckoned, the number amounts to above 1,357,660 ; which would
appear almost incredible, if their own historian had not so par-
ticularly enumerated them. And then the prediction is, that
"their houses should be left desolate, until the times of the
Gentiles should be fulfilled." This it needs no historical testi-
mony to corroborate, as it is perfectly plain before our eyes.
" The temple was a building of such strength and grandeur, of
such splendour and beauty, that it was likely, as it was worthy,
to be preserved, for a monument of the victory and glory of the
THE FALL OF JERUSALEM. 411
Roman empire. Titus was accordingly very desirous of preserv-
ing it, and protested to the Jews, who had fortified themselves
within it, that he would preserve it even against, their will. He
had expressed the like desire of preserving the city too, and
repeatedly sent Josephus and other Jews to their countrymen, to
persuade them to surrender; but an overruling Providence di-
rected things otherwise. The Jews themselves first set fire to the
porticos of the temple, and then the Romans. One of the soldiers,
neither waiting for command, nor trembling for such an attempt,
but urged by a certain divine impulse, threw a burning brand in
at the golden window, and thereby set fire to the buildings of the
temple itself. Titus ran immediately to the temple, and com-
manded his soldiers to extinguish the flames. But neither ex-
hortations nor threatenings could restrain their violence. They
either could not hear or would not hear, and those behind encou-
raged those before to set fire to the temple. He was still for pre-
serving the holy place. He commanded his soldiers even to be
beaten for disobeying him : but their anger, and their hatred of
the Jews, and a certain warlike vehement fury, overcame their
reverence for their general and their dread for his commands. A
soldier in the dark set fire to the doors j and " thus," as Josephus
says, " the temple was burnt against the will of Caesar."
When the soldiers had rested from their horrid work of blood
and plunder, Titus gave orders to demolish the foundations of the
city and the temple. But, that posterity might judge of the glory
and value of his conquest, he left three towers standing as monu-
ments of the prodigious strength and greatness of the city ; and
also a part of the western wall, which he designed as a rampart
for a garrison, to keep the surrounding country in subjection.
All the other buildings were completely levelled with the ground.
It is recorded by Maimonides, and likewise in the Jewish Tal-
mud, that Terentius Rufus, an ofl&cer in the army of Titus, with
a ploughshare, tore up the foundations of the temple, and thus
remarkably fulfilled the words of the prophet Micah : " Therefore
shall Zion for your sake be ploughed as a field, and Jerusalem shall
become heaps, and the mountain of the house as the high places
of the forest." (Mic. iii. 12.)
Now, it seems to me, that all that our Lord said; down to the
APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
23d verse, has been fulfilled. Here, we have had famine, pesti-
lences, earthquakes, wars, the abomination of desolation standing
in the holy place, the Christians escaping from Jerusalem and
rushing into Pella for safety, the gospel of the kingdom preached
in every nation. It is supposed that the apostle Paul even came
as far as Britain ; and it is matter of fact, that the rest of the
apostles went through the whole known world, preaching the gos-
pel of the kingdom. But, from the 23d verse, our Lord proceeds
to warn his hearers not to confound his second coming with the
destruction of Jerusalem, and says to them, '•'■ Then, if any man
shall say unto you, Lo, here is Christ, or, Lo there, believe it
not. For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and
shall show great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were
possible, they shall deceive the very elect. Behold, I have told
you before. Wherefore, if they shall say unta you, Behold, he
is in the desert ; go not forth : Behold, he is in the secret cham-
bers; believe it not. For as the lightning cometh out of the
east, and shineth even unto the west, so shall also the coming of
the Son of man be. For wheresoever the carcass is, there will
the eagles be gathered together/'
Now, some persons have said that the coming of our Lord was
fulfilled at the destruction of Jerusalem. Our Lord says, "I
warn you that it will not be ray Tzapouaia, my personal appearance,
my coming : many will come and say that it is ; but if any man
should say, Lo, here Christ is come, and is to be found here ; be-
lieve him not. If another should say, Lo, he is in the desert, go
out to meet him ; do not believe him. There can be no such mistake
about my coming; for so little liable shall my advent be to this
misapprehension, that it shall come with the rapidity and splen-
dour of the lightning, that bursts from the east, illuminates the
sky, and buries itself in the west ; and so little liability to mis-
take shall there be at that day, that as easily will the vulture with
outstretched wing pounce upon a stone, instead of descending
upon its prey, as the Christian take one for Messiah who is not
the Christ — the Messiah promised by the Father.^' So you see
these verses warn them that they are not to confound his advent
with the destruction of Jerusalem ; that when it does take place,
it will not be something that men may dispute about, but it will
THE PALL OF JERUSALEM. 41S
be so palpable that " every eye shall see him ;" and " they that
pierced him'^ so satisfied, that they " shall wail because of him ;'*
and they that loved him shall be like him, for they *' shall see
him as he is/*
After clearing away misapprehension about his advent, he
answers, in the twenty-ninth verse, the question, '' What shall be
the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world 'i" He tells
us what shall be immediately after the tribulation of those days :
" The sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her
light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of
heaven shall be shaken : and then shall appear the sign of the
Son of man in heaven : and then shall all the tribes of the earth
mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds
of heaven with power and great glory. And he shall send his
angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather
together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven
to the other." Now, this is the prediction or prophecy of Christ's
own personal advent, and the end of the aicbv, or age, or dis-
pensation. But you say. How is this consistent with the words,
" immediately after the tribulation of those days V I answer.
This tribulation, begun at the destruction of Jerusalem, continues
now, and shall only be closed with Christ's second personal ad-
vent ; for you perceive that it is so, by comparing what is said
by our Lord in this chapter with what is said by Daniel, referring,
I believe, to the very same event. It is said, ^' There shall be
great tribulation, such as never was from the beginning of the
world, no, nor ever shall be.'* If this relates only to the de-
struction of Jerusalem, it would imply that that was the greatest
tribulation that ever was or ever shall be. But the prophet
Daniel, speaking of the end of the world, and of what was imme-
diately to precede the very last scene in this dispensation, states
that there should be " a time of trouble such as never was since
there was a nation." But if the tribulation of Jerusalem was
greater than ever was or ever shall be, that would be directly
contradictory of the express prediction of Daniel, that the last
should be a time of trouble such as never had been and never
should be.
This tribulation, then, I conceive, began with the destruction
35^>
411- APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
Df Jerusalem, and it is contained in the fact that Jerusalem iH
still trodden under foot of the Gentiles; that the Jew is still
scorned, proscribed, and persecuted in every land ; and that upon
the whole of that people the tribulation lies with terrible pressure,
while every effort to lighten it has completely and successively
failed. No sooner did a pope, in the midst of Rome, supposed
to be the most enlightened and the most liberal of his class, at-
tempt to lighten the pressure of the Jew, than, not in judgment
for this, for I do not believe it was the cause, but for attempting
to reform what can only be revolutionized, he was swept from his
place, and is now — as I told you he was likely to be, if the views
of prophecy I explained to you be correct — a refugee, and, what
is not improbable, likely to seek shelter in the only asylum there
is in the world at this moment — the land of heresy, in his judg-
ment — the land of gospel light and liberty in ours. This tribu-
lation, then, extends to the coming of the sign of the Son of Man.
That this tribulation is a tribulation reaching from the destruc-
tion of the first Jerusalem to the building of the New or second
Jerusalem, is confirmed by a reference to the parallel passage in
Luke xxi. 24, where it is said, speaking of the Jews, ^^ They shall
fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be led away captive into
all nations '." here is the tribulation or punishment continued :
'^ and Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles ;" here is
the tribulation still continued : " until the times of the Gentiles
be fulfilled.^' What occurs after this period, this " time, times,
and half a time," has all been fulfilled.
We read what takes place immediately after. It is in one
passage, '^ Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun
shall be darkened,'^ &c. In Luke it is, after " the treading down
of Jerusalem," and the '•'' fulfilling of the times of the Gentiles,"
^^tlien shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven;"
showing that the two prior events to these signs are perfectly
parallel.
Now, all this, I believe, is what we are just entering upon,
when ^* there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in
the stars ; upon earth distress of nations, with perplexity ; men's
hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things
that are coming upon the earth." Then, out of all this terrible
THE FALL OF JERUSALEM. 415
chaos shall rise, in glory and in meridian noon, greater than that
sun that rose on creation first, the Son of God. *^ Then shall
they see the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven with
power and great glory.^^ "And when these things begin to
come to pass, then," Christians, " lift up your heads, for your re-
demption draweth nigh."
And does not all this confirm the prediction I endeavoured to
prove last Lord's-day evening, That all that precedes the coming
of Christ is tribulation and distress ? — that there is not the least
sign or symptom of a Millennium prior to the personal appear-
ance, whatever that appearance be, of the Son of Grod? In
verse 30 of this chapter in Matthew, we have it declared that he
shall " come with power." The evidence of that power shall be
in the heaven above, in the earth below, when it shall enter into
the graves of the dead, and into the homes of the living : he shall
come with a power that shall show itself in the rising bodies of
the first resurrection, in the changed living, in the opening graves,
in the departing firmament, in the desolated earth, in the trem-
bling, weeping, and mourning guilty. He shall come also with great
glory ; he shall come with the shechinah, the whole firmament in
flame, lighted up with a splendour that shall put out the sun and
the stars, even as the sun at his rising puts out the morning star ;
and he will " send his angels with a great sound of the trumpet,
and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds,
from one end of heaven to the other ;" that is, constitute his own
perfect, complete, manifested church.
Then there shall be what is called " the manifestation of the
sons of God ;" the visible church and the true church, coextensive
and identical the one with the other. „^ Then shall be the real
catholic church, for it shall consist of all nations ; then shall be
the real ancient church, for it shall be " chosen in Christ before
the foundation of the world." Then shall be the true united
church, all one company, Christ the centre, and his name all and
in all.
Our Lord next gives certain signs ; and in the thirty-third verse
he says, " When ye shall see all these things, know that it is
nigh, even at the doors." What things ? I conceive the things
mentioned in verse 2 : " When ye shall see all these things, then
416 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
it is nigh upon your doors," (i-£ rdc; Obpaq.') Now, some one
will say, that this is utterly incompatible with what you have
stated : when these things take place — this trouble, all these
judgments — to say Christ is nigh, even at the doors, is not cor-
rect. But is it not constantly stated in every chapter of the
Bible, " The Lord is at hand ?" Does not the apostle James use
the very same expression, in the fourth chapter of his Epistle :
^^ The Ttapouaia, the personal appearance of the Lord draweth
nigh ?" This just means, that the church of Christ should, from
this moment, assume this position — their foothold the cross, their
hope the crown ; looking for nothing upon earth so glorious, so
dear, so precious, so beautiful, as the return of Him who left
them, and who promised that he would come again and receive
them to himself; that where he is, there they should be also.
Then he adds, ^^ Verily I say unto you. This generation shall not
pass, till all these things are fulfilled." If you suppose " these
things" to refer to what he has stated about the destruction of
Jerusalem, it is perfectly explicable ; but there is another way
of explaining it also. The word here used is yevsdi. I have
looked into every dictionary I could lay hold of, and it is defined —
no doubt, to signify a generation — thirty years of time ; and if
these words apply to the destruction of the temple, it was literally
true, that during the lifetime of the generation then living that
temple was destroyed. The word yeveaj however, is more fre-
quently used, by Homer especially, to denote a race, a people ;
for instance, yevea [xeXidffdwvj the race or nation of bees; yevsd
dvdpwnov, the race of men, meaning the race as distinguished
from some other ; ysvsd (pbXXuiVj race of leaves ; and so yeved may
denote this race, this people — the Jews, as a race, shall not pass
from the earth until all these things be fulfilled. And if so,
there can be no difficulty in the way of the interpretation which
I have tried to establish, of the coming that is here alluded to.
Some have an idea that the expressions describing the coming
of Christ may not mean a personal coming; but wherever this
coming is alluded to, the word employed is Tzapooaiaj which means,
in all instances but one, (and that one may be explained,) a per-
sonal coming. You will see it by comparing verses 20 and 37
with verse 30; no one can doubt that it is our Lord's personal
THE FALL OF JERUSALEM. 417
coming : " Thcj shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds
of heaven/^ and in verse 37, ^^ As it was in the days of Noah, so
also shall the coming of the Son of man be.'' He is speaking
plainly of the same event. Now, if the Millennium is to pre-
cede the coming of Christ, things would not be as they were in
the days of Noah. But if the Millennium is to succeed it, then
the Son of Man will come upon a world that does not expect him,
and begin that state of felicity, holiness, and happiness, which
shall be merged in the glory and happiness of heaven for ever
and ever.
The practical lesson I will conclude with is contained in the
42d verse : " Watch, therefore : for ye know not what hour your
Lord doth come." And again, in verse 44 : ^^ Therefore be ye
ready : for in such an hour as ye think not, the Son of Man
cometh." It is very plain that the world will not be ready, in
the best sense, at Christ's approach. Men will be saying, All
these views are nonsense ; we have nothing to do with prophecy
until it has been fulfilled. If the Christians of Jerusalem had
said, " We have nothing to do with Christ's prophecies, we have
only to do with his precepts," they never would have left Jeru-
salem and reached Pella in safety. But why did our Lord give
them these prophecies respecting the destruction of Jerusalem ?
To guide them. Why has he given us prophecies ? why are they
written ? Surely, to be of service ; and if to be a guide, surely,
to be frequently studied ; and if to be studied, surely, in some
degree, to be opened, and, as the period approaches, to be more
and more thoroughly known. But that the great mass of men
will not be looking for such an event, is plain from what Peter
says, "that in the last days shall come scoffers, walking after
their own lusts, and saying, Where is the promise of his coming ?
for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were
from the beginning of the creation. For this they willingly are
ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old,
and the earth standing out of the water and in the water: where-
by the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perish-
ed : but the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same
word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judg-
ment and perdition of ungodly men. But, beloved, be not iguo-
418 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
rant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thou-
sand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not
slack concerning his promise, (as some men count slackness,) but
is long-suffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish,
but that all should come to repentance. But the day of the
Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens
shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt
with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein
shall be burned up." But, to you who are believers, the com-
mand is, " Watch :" be anxious about the time of his advent, but
far more anxious about personal preparation for it. The sentinel
does not care when his commanding ofl&cer visits him, if he is
always at his post. The servant does not mind when his master
overlooks him, if he is always busy at work. The porter does
not mind when his lord knocks, if he be waiting at the door and
ready to open. Thus, that Christian is sure to be right, whether
he understand things unrevealed or not, whose heart is right in
the sight of Grod, and whose«hope and confidence are in the Lord
his righteousness. Watch, then, against being surprised ; watch
against dereliction of duty; watch against every effort to withdraw
you from the post of duty, as if it were the post of peril and not
of safety : and be ye ready. You ask. How can we be ready ? By
being sure that you are standing on the right ground. Stand upon
the Rock of ages; your loins girt, and your lamps burning; Christ's
righteousness your title, Christ's name your watchword : and, come
what may, neither your hope nor your position can be overturned.
Be ready, also, by not only being in the right state, but by hav-
ing also the right character. We must not only be standing in
Christ as our sacrifice, but we must have our hearts sanctified and
prepared by the Spirit of Grod, so that we shall hail and rejoice
in his coming. It does not mean, by having such hearts, that
you are to leave your place. Two persons shall be grinding at
the mill, both engaged in duty; one's heart shall be in heaven,
the other's heart shall be in his mill. Two persons shall be found
in one shop; one shall have his hand in the shop but his heart in
heaven, and the other shall have his heart and hand both in the
shop. Be here discharging the world's duty, feeling the world's
responsibilities ; but let your hearts be in heaven, where Christ
THE FALL OF JERUSALEM. 419
your treasure is. Be ready also to resign tlie world whenever
you are bidden to do so ? Do not bury your hearts in it ; do not
let it absorb them ; do not think that this world is all ; discharge,
as I have told you, every obligation ; no man is to leave his
trade ; no man is to be less loyal, to be less dutiful, to be less
diligent in business ; but every man is to be more " fervent in
spirit, serving the Lord." Standing, then, upon the right ground,
having thus the right character, let us lift up our heads, and
know that the noise we hear from afar is only the rush of the
chariot-wheels of Him, who comes armed with destruction, in«
deed, for a world that rejects him, but full of mercy and peace
and welcome to them who wait for his coming.
420
LECTURE XXXI.
THE MAN or SIN.
"Ho ■which testifieth these things saith, Surely I come quickly. Amen.
Even so, come, Lord Jesus." — Revelation xxii. 20. (Connected with which you
will also read 2 Thess. ii. 1-17.)
Just before I enter on tlie more immediate subject of dis-
course, I am anxious to refer to a slight misapprehension — ori-
ginating, I believe, from a mistranslation — which occurred to the
minds of some in the course of my exposition of Matt, xxiv., last
Lord's-day evening. You remember that I tried to solve what
seemed an almost insurmountable difficulty — the distinguishing
what portion of Matt. xxiv. relates to the downfall of Jerusalem,
and what to the end of the world. As Jesus sat on the Mount
of Olives, his disciples asked him these three questions: *^Tell
us, when shall these things be ? And what shall be the sign
of thy coming, and of the end of the world?" I said that I
conceived the disciples asked three definite questions, and that
our blessed Lord gave in the chapter three distinct and ap-
propriate replies. The first question is, " When shall these
things be ?" viz. : the downfall of Jerusalem : I said that I con-
ceived the answer to this question was finished at the close of
verse 22. I then said that our Lord, in verses 23, 24, enters
upon his own personal coming, and he tells them that ^^ You are
not to suppose yet that I am come for judgment; for if any man
shall say unto you, 'Lo, here is Christ, or there; believe it not,'
for my personal coming will not be so mistakable a thing that
men will have any doubts about it; but, on the contrary, it shall
be ' as the ligl^tning that cometh out of the east and shineth even
to the west,' that all eyes may see it, and no man shall be able
to dispute it." Then he gives the signs of it. " Immediately
after the tribulation shall the sun be darkened, and the moon
THR MAN OF SIN. 421
shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and
the powers of heaven shall be shaken : and then shall appear
the sign of the Son of Man in heaven/' The next question was,
"What shall he the sign of the end of the world?'' Several
who listened to the explanation I endeavoured to give, were puz-
zled by the occurrence of the word "end," in verses 6, 13, 14.
For instance, they saw that the first twenty-three verses cannot
refer to the destruction of Jerusalem exclusively, because our
Lord says in verse 6, " The end is not yet :" therefore, they argue,
he is speaking of the end of the world. Again, in verse 13,
"He that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved:"
therefore, it is urged by those who make this objection, Christ is
speaking not merely of the destruction of Jerusalem, but of the
end of the world : and again, in verse 14, " This gospel of the
kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all
nations, and then shall the end come." It is argued by those
who doubt my interpretation of the first twenty-three verses as
descriptive of the downfall of Jerusalem exclusively, that the oc-
currence of these three expressions shows that our Lord in the
very beginning of the chapter begins to answer the question,
which I contend was only answered at the end, "What shall be
the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world?" Now,
on looking at the whole chapter on Monday, after I had preached
the sermon, and reading it in the original, I discovered this fact,
which I had not noticed before, that totally diiferent words are
used ; for instance, in verse 3, the question asked by the disci-
ples is, "What shall be the sign" ffovrehtaq rod aiaivoq? ("of the
end" — (jwzsXeia.) But the words used in verses 6, 13, 14, is not
GwreXeiay but rcAo<?, a different one. If the word had been the
same, then those w^ho object to my interpretation would have
done so with greater plausibility. The word used in verses 6,
13, 14, is the word riXoq, a minor and generally far less expres-
sive word. The question of the disciples is, What shall be the sign
of the (TuvriAeia of the world ? The statement in these verses is,
" Then shall the riAo?- come ;" "he that shall endure unto the
riXoc; shall be saved." The question is important, Is there any
difference between the words in point of signification? The fact
that the same word is employed in verses 6, 13, 14, is strong
SECOND SERIES. 36
422 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
ground for the presumption that these verses do not refer to the
same event as that referred to in verse 3, and described bj another
word. The word ffuvrihca is derived from the preposition <ruv,
together, and the verb TsXicu, to finish, and means the confluent
termination, not only of two or three, but of all the events and
prophecies, and things that were spoken of from the foundation
of the world: m sJiort, the consummation. For instance, it oc-
curs in Matt. xiii. 89 : now no one doubts that the event there
referred to is the end of the world, for our Lord says, ''The har-
vest is the (TwriXsta of the world. ^' But the word riXoq is ap-
plied to definite periods, to the termination of single events. I
admit it is sometimes used in a more extensive sense, but I say
that is its primary meaning : for instance, it occurs here, '' Christ
is the riXoq (the end) of the law;" again, ''Whose end (rUoq)
is destruction;" riXo^ signifies also the end of life; and it is
very remarkable that the same word is used by the apostle when
he says, " destruction is come unto the Jews, siq to riXoq, unto
the end, or to the uttermost." You see then that the question
of the disciples relates to the (ruvriXsia (finishing) of the alcbv or
dispensation; and the riXoe; that our Lord uses in verses 6, 13,
14, relates only to the downfall of Jerusalem : and the objection
therefore of those who doubt my interpretation, instead of prov-
ing their point, proves more strongly the position I attempted
to lay down. I conceive, the end, as, Ti?.oq, our Lord refers to,
is explained by himself, as when it is stated in Mark xiii. 7,
"The C72C? is not yet;" for our Lord says, "These are only the
heginning of sorrows." It is plain, therefore, to ray mind, that
the first twenty-three verses contain no reply to the question re-
lating to the end of the world, but merely a full exposition
of what should precede the downfall or destruction of Jerusalem.
And, next, we have the declaration that Jerusalem is to be trod-
den under foot of the Gentiles, and to be desolate and in ruins —
no Millennium to intervene; and the first great event imme-
diately before its restoration will be the appearance, like the
lightning in the sky, of the Son of Man; all those that have re-
jected and despised him mourning because of him.
I now come to another prediction of great significance. I
showed you, from the chapter on which I have been making
THE MAN OF SIN. 423
these preliminary remarks, that nothing like a Millennium inter-
venes between Christ's first advent and his second advent; but,
on the contrary, that he is to come suddenly, as in the days
of Noah, when no man expects him, and most men deny and re-
ject him. I now proceed to show you this evening, that there
intervenes between Christ's first and second advents, not millen-
nial purity or millennial bliss, but the dark apostasy of the Man
of Sin, who, w'j are told in the passage I have read, shall be
destroyed by nothing before the brightness of Christ's coming.
Now I wish you to look at this Second Epistle to the Thessalonians
attentively ; as, if I can identify the person spoken of in 2 Thess.
ii. 3-8 with the popedom, then I have proved that this apostasy
is to stretch from Christ's first advent even to his last ; and that
therefore a Millennium cannot precede, but must succeed, Christ's
second advent ; for the 8th verse expressly declares, " Then shall
that wicked one be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the
spirit of his mouth, and destroy with the brightness of his coming."
If this be the Man of Sin, he is to be first of all gradually con-
sumed by God's providence — by the spread of the Bible, by the
testimony of faithful men, by the preaching of the gospel, by the
circulation of tracts — and he is, lastly, and only then, to be
utterly destroyed, by what? By the brightness of Christ's per-
sonal coming, (Tzapooaia.') Then, if Christ is to come to this
world and destroy Babylon, it is quite plain that the Millennium
will not precede his advent, for Babylon shall be in existence,
and when he comes he shall destroy it. Do you not see the con-
sumption fulfilling ? I mean to show you by-and-by how com-
pletely the evidence has come out, since I last addressed you on
the seventh vial, that we are now under its influence. The evi-
dence is complete at this moment that the popedom is being con-
sumed, but the evidence is not yet come of his destruction, for
that will only be by Christ's personal coming. What can be a
stronger proof of this consuming, than that the head of the Holy
Roman Empire (which is the title of the emperor of Austria) is
obliged, after the most terrible convulsions in his kingdom, to ab-
dicate his throne ? and so cheap is that throne, that the heir will
not accept of it, and it is sent over to a remoter heir to take pos-
session of it. Here is the Eomish laity smitten in the head of the
424 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
Holy Roman Empire. Along with this, another phenomenon oc-
curs in the very same week. He whose pretensions I will unfold
to you this night, whose burning characteristics here will indeli-
bly cleave to him, was expelled from his throne by that people
who were to be models of Christian excellence. If Popery be
fitted to make a people holy, happy, moral, and submissive, what
people ought to be equal to those of the metropolis of the pope-
dom ? for it is a remarkable fact, that in that country, in the
Italian States alone, there are one pope, six archbishops, seventy-
two bishops, fifty thousand ecclesiastics, and in the city of Eome
there is a priest to every thirty people. If this system be so
civilizing, so moralizing, so elevating a system, that you have
only to make a nation of Papists to make the people happy,
loyal, all that is good — how comes it, that where, a few weeks
back, there could not be a Protestant church, and where I dared
not for my life say such things as I have been saying this evening
— how comes it, I ask, that there is no people on the face of the
earth so corrupt, so immoral, so degraded as those who surround
the very throne of the pope? So disloyal are they, that they
have swept the pope from his palace, and sent him that was Lu-
cifer, the sun of the morning, mightiest among the mighty, a
fugitive in a footman's livery, perched on the box of a carriage,
anxious to get safety anywhere from the people whom he had
exhibited as the models of Christian loyalty and love and light.
Surely this is the beginning of the consumption of the Man of
Sin. What has been the great object of the encyclicals of the
popes for the last few years. Gregory XVI. published an ency-
clical in 1844, denouncing the Bible Society. Pius IX. issued an
encyclical in 1846, the chief scope of which was denunciation of the
Bible Society : and I believe that that noble institution, the British
and Foreign Bible Societ}''; ia signally blessed of God to the wast-
ing and consumption of the popedom at this moment. The great
object of the popes was to denounce the circulation of the Scrip-
tures; but they have failed to check it. As well might they
stand on the shores of Ireland, and bid the Atlantic waves, press-
ed by the western winds, roll back to America, as try to arrest
the spread of that word, and the influx of light and life which
flows from the Fountain of Light and Life. The Papal power is
THE MAN OF SIN. 425
now undergoing the consumption to which it is doomed, but its
destruction will not be till Christ comes. I believe that the
pope will get back again to Kome, and that he will only lose, for
a time, his temporal power — that is, a very important part, and
in his estimate, a very vital part of his power — which will be
again restored until the lightning comes from the east, shining
even to the west, and Rome, his throne, and all that cleave to
him, will be destroyed in the brightness of the Saviour's coming,
by those judgments that await an apostate and a guilty church.
But I proceed to show, from the passage in Second Thessalo-
nians which I have read, that it describes the popedom ; and the
reason I attach so much importance to this proof is, that Rome
has, from the beginning, applied this passage to anybody and
everybody, rather than to herself; and the view which is taken
by some of her supporters is, that this Antichrist is some one to
appear in the last days in Rome. There is a sect, you are aware,
in the Church of England, called Puseyites or Tractarians, among
a few of the clergy — Papists without a head. Popery without a
pope : for that is their true condition. They have employed
great ingenuity and immense learning to show that this passage
does not refer to Popery at all, but, on the contrary, to some
other system j and some very pious men have, I regret to say,
fallen into their views. They say that, just three days and a
half before Christ comes — for they admit that Christ's coming
is to be personal — a great monster shall appear, of prodigious
human, corporeal dimensions, who is to be so daring as actually
to disown the very existence of God ; and to wield a power some-
thing like Satan's own, sitting in the literal Jerusalem and in
the literal temple of God; and then God shall come and destroy
him. I am sure the interpretation is so absurd and extravagant,
and unlike what seems to be the analogy of prophecy, that it
needs only to be heard in order to be rejected.
First of all, the apostle warns the Thessalonians not to be
" soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by
word, nor by letter, as from us, as that the day of Christ is at
hand.''
Now here, again, I must make some remarks upon our trans-
lation; and, in doing so, let me say, that while nothing can be
426 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
more noble or more complete than its general excellence, there
are points in it which might be very much amended. "Be
not troubled, as that the day of the Lord is at hand.^'
How, you may ask, do you reconcile this with the statement
of the apostle James, '^ The Lord is at hand ?'^ How do you
reconcile it with other passages where it is distinctly said, "The
day of the Lord is at hand?" If you turn to the original, you
will find the word used is hirrr-qxe. The word used by James
and Paul in the other passage is rjyyhq iffri, or rjyyi^e, is near or
approaches. Our translators have rendered them both "at hand.''
But the word here used ought not to be so rendered. For in-
stance, this word is the same as that used by the apostle in Rom.
viii. 38, where he says, "Things present (tveajffrra)." The same
word is used in Cor. iii. 21, 22, ^'All things are yours; whether
Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or
things present, or things to come.'" In other words, biavq-As
shows us that the meaning of the apostle is, "at this moment
present or in the midst of you:" "You are not to suppose that
Christ has come, and at this moment is in the midst of you;"
and what Paul says to them is, then, "You are not to think, as
by letter from us, that the Lord is in the midst of you, that the
Lord is actually present, that he is now truly and indeed come.'^
In other words. It is not true, " Behold, he is here, or there, or
in the secret chambers :" on the contrary, between the presence
in the flesh, of the Saviour, and his presence on the earth a
second time, when he shall shine before his ancients gloriously,
there shall intervene a long dark shadow, called the Apostasy,
the future signs and characteristics of which, says the apostle,
"I will now unfold to you.'' There will be between that sun
when he rose in clouds of sorrow, and that sun when he shall
shine in his splendour, a long dark night : — that there is a fierce
battle to be fought, a great enemy to encounter; and we are not
to expect his personal presence in the midst of us until we see
that great power called the Apostasy developed ; and then that
power shall be consumed gradually, after it is fully developed,
by the Spirit of his mouth, and will be destroyed by the bright-
ness of bis coming : — that its destruction and Christ's advent are
to be contemporaneous : you are not therefore to conclude that
THE MAN OF SIN. 427
the Lord biar^xs, is in the midst of you, or that he will be pre-
sent this very year. Now, if I can show that this prophecy is
fulfilled in the popedom, I not only do what the apostle did —
(for it seems that the apostle warned his people very much of it
— for he says, ''Remember ye not that when I was yet with you I
told you these things ?'' — "I told'' is in the imperfect tense,
which signifies the continuance of the action — ''I was wont to
tell you of these things;" just as he told the presbyters at
Ephesus) — but I shall also confirm the position which I have en-
deavoured for the last three or four successive Sabbath evenings
to establish, that our hope is not a millennium, but Christ to
come again in his glory : so that we shall see him as he is, and
be for ever with him.
I will refer, first of all, to the expression by which the apostle
characterizes the apostasy. He says, " Let no man deceive you
by any means, for that day shall not come, except there come a
falling away first." Here our translation is at fault again : the
word in the Greek is not a falling away, but '•Hlie falling away;"
not an apostasy, indefinitely, but tj aizoaxaaia^ the definite apostasy
of which I spoke when I was with you. In other words, it is
plain that the apostle refers to the apostasy of which he had spoken
on previous occasions, which they expected, and which God had
distinctly predicted in his word. So that the passage in the original
runs thus^ : " Let no man deceive you by any means ; for that day,"
when Christ kviffzrjxs is actully present in the midst of us, " shall
not come except there come i} aitoGraaia Ttpwrovj the apostasy first."
The next question is, What is the meaning of apostasy ? Some argue
that it means a political revolt, not a religious defection. The
right answer to this is, that throughout the Scripture it is invaria-
bly used to denote a religious defection. Thus, for instanoe. Acts
xxi. 21, it is said, Paul led the Jews to forsake" (literally trans-
lated, '' to apostatize from") " Moses." Now how did Paul meet
this ? Did he admit it ? No, he denied that he did. And what
does this prove ? That an apostasy does not necessarily mean
that the person apostatizing denies Christ; but, on the contrary,
that he may believe in Christ, and yet be guilty of apostasy. This
word is used in its neuter form, a-izoaraaio^^^ which denotes a bill of
divorcement. Thus, Mark x. 7, "a bill of divorcement;" in the
428 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES,
Greek, ^t^Xioi^ aTzoaraaiov, a paper, a writing of divorcement. And
this conveys to us another great proof that the pope is Antichrist :
he too has his church, which sits upon many waters; and Christ has
his church, that shall come down from heaven as a bride adorned for
the bridegroom. I have noticed that in the whole of the Apocalypse
all those things about which Christians quarrel are treated as
nonentities : they disappear in the splendour and magnificence of
that tremendous difference between Christ and Antichrist, between
the true church and the Apostasy. For instance, the scriptural
definition of the church of Christ is not Presbytery, or Episco-
pacy, or Independency; but it is this: "Wheresoever two or
three are gathered together in Christ's name, there is Christ in
the midst of them.'^ The definition of antichrist's church is,
Wheresoever two or three are gathered together in Antichrist's
name, there is the Apostasy, Antichrist, and his corrupt and apos-
tate church. The pope is divorced from Christ's church, and
wedded to a strange woman. He has lost his position in the true
church, and has become the head and husband of the great
Apostasy. This Apostasy is also described under another name,
— and I would allude to the description of the system before I
allude to that of the person — it is called " the mystery of iniqui-
ty. '' First of all it is called the Apostasy, then the mystery of
iniquity. And the apostle tells us that this " mystery of iniquity
doth already work.^' In what respect may the Romish system be
called " the mystery of iniquity V Just as Antichrist and his
apostate body are the opposite of Christ and his redeemed church,
so the mystery of iniquity is just the reverse of the mystery of
godliness. The regenerated Christian is in the mystery of godli-
ness, a member of a divine economy : the unrenewed man is in
the mystery of iniquity. The mystery of godliness consists in
this — that death gave life, that suffering gave joy, that a cross
leads to a throne. The mystery of iniquity consists in this —
that the truth ends in a lie, the Bible ends in the Breviary, the
light of heaven leads to the darkness of hell : that the stones set
apart of God for the construction of a temple which should be
vocal with his praise, and in which the blending tones of mercy
and truth should be heard together, have been gathered and
worked into a temple in which Antichrist sits, and in which the
THE MAN OP SIN. 429
cries of persecuted saints and martyrs have reverberated from
ago to age. The mystery of godliness is Grod manifest in the
flesh : the mystery of iniquity is Satan manifested as an angel of
light : the one distinctly distinguishable from the other. The
mystery of Romanism consists in this — that, under pretence of
reverence to his word, it renders that word null and void ; under
pretence of love to Christ, it persecutes his saints; under the
pretence of zeal for their salvation, it commits their bodies to the
flames ; under the pretence of creating purity among the clergy,
it prohibits marriage, and, as the consequence of it, sanctions the
greatest abominations of the earth. The peculiarity of the mys-
tery of iniquity is, that, starting from Christ, it ends in Anti-
christ; beginning with justification by faith alone, it ends in
justification by works alone. It excludes Christ, in order to raise
higher the Virgin; it magnifies the church, in order to magnify
the priest; and makes the man not the means of spreading Chris-
tianity, but Christianity a system for ministering to the pride of
man, to the pomp and vanity of a stupendous hierarchy.
Now, the apostle says, that this mystery of iniquity "doth
already work :" in the days of the apostle Popery began. I do
not hesitate to say that at that time the mystery of iniquity had
begun to work, but it was not then developed into its ultimate
and final results in the popedom. I will show you the evidence
of this from the writings of the apostle. For instance, in 1 Cor.
X. 4, "Voluntary humility and worshipping of angels" is one
of its seeds : in 1 Cor. iii. 3, " Strife and division'^ among Chris-
tians is another seed : in 2 Cor. ii., " Corrupting the word of
G-od :'' in 1 Tim. vi. 5, "Perverse disputings of men of corrupt
minds, supposing that gain is godliness :'^ that is another seed.
Gal. iv. 10, observance of fasts and festivals, making man for
fasting, not fasting for the man : that was another seed. False
philosophy and vain deceit, and traditions of men : that is another
seed. All these seeds were sown in the corrupt soil of the hu-
man heart, by Satan, the great sower ; they spread until they
rose into the overshadowing harvest of the mystery of iniquity,
and a vast majority of those that bore the Christian name abode
under the shadow of this terrible Apostasy.
Now, it is stated that out of the midst of this Apostasy was to
430 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
come him who is called the man of sin — the Antichrist. It waa
not the pope that was to make Popery, but Popery that was to
make the pope. It was not Napoleon that made revolution, but
the Revolution that made Napoleon : so, the pope is to be the
product of the system, and not to be merely the promoter of it.
This mystery, in its full and final development, is to be under a
great head called the Antichrist. We are told that we " know
what withholdeth that he should be revealed in his season.^' The
word in the original is 6 Trar^^wv, the withholding element, thing,
or system. ^' Ye know that withholding thing.'' Now, what was
that withholding thing ? Almost every one of the earliest Chris-
tian writers admits that it was the Roman empire ; and so deeply
impressed were the early Christians that the Roman empire was
the great obstruction to the development of the great Apostasy,
that they continually prayed that God would preserve the Roman
empire, that he might thereby delay the development of the man
of sin. Damian the monk thus addressed Hildebrand : — " Ego
claves otius universalis ecclesiae tuis manibus tradidi. Immo,
sublato rege de medio, to tins Romani imperii vacantis tibi jura
permisi." " I have committed to your hands the keys of the
universal church. The king of the Roman empire being taken
away, I have given to you the rights of this throne that is vacant."
An orator of 10th Sess. of Fifth Lateran thus addressed the
pope : — " Constantinus, Divina gratia afflatus, sceptrum imperii
orbis et urbis vero Creator! Deo et homini, in sede sua Romand.
Sylvestro Pontifici, in jure primaevo Christi eterni sacerdotis plene
cessit.'' " Constantino, inspired by divine grace, fully surren-
dered the sceptre of the world and of the city'' (i.e. Rome) ^Ho
the true Creator God and man, in his Roman seat, to Sylvester
the pope, in the ancient right of Christ the eternal Priest."
Again, I read in Machiavel's History of Florence : — " When
the emperor of Rome left Rome to dwell at Constantinople, the
Roman empire began to decline, but the Church of Rome aug-
mented as fast. Nevertheless, after the coming in of the Lom-
bards, all Italy lay under the dominion of emperors or kings.
Rishops assumed no more power than was due to their doctrines
or morals. But Theodoric, king of the Goths, fixing his seat at
Ravenna, and no other prince being left at Rome, the Romans
THE MAN OF SIN. 431
were forced to pay greater allegiance to the pope. The Lombards
having invaded and reduced Italy into cantons, the pope took the
opportunity, and began to hold up his head." So Gibbon, to
•whom I frequently referred on previous occasions, and from whom
I made this extract, I think, before : — " Rome had reached, about
the close of the sixth century, the lowest period of her depres-
sion. Like Thebes, Babylon, or Carthage, the name of liome
might have been erased, if the clergy had not been animated by
a vital principle which again restored her to honour and dominion.
The temporal power of the popes gradually arose from the calami-
ties of the times." And on the removal of the imperial seat
from Rome to Constantinople, the restraint on the ambition of the
man of sin was removed, and the Roman bishop shot up into a
great tf^mporal prince. This leads me to the consideration of the
Man of Sin himself.
First, he is called, " He that opposeth and exalteth himself
above all that is called Grod, or that is worshipped." The word
in the original is avrtxicixevoc;, literally, " lying over ;" and I may
here state, what is a very important point, that many persons, and
especially those who maintain that this passage does not describe
the pope, say, dvri means against ; and that the pope is not pro-
fessedly and avowedly opposed to Christ. Certainly he is not
professedly and avowedly opposed to Christ; but the proposed
interpretation of d>rt is an erroneous one : dvri, in composition
with a noun, does not mean against ; though we have the word
used in that sense in some compounds, as anti-paedobaptist, one
opposed to the baptism of infants. But this is not the classical
use of the word. The characteristic meaning of dvr^: in such com-
position is not "against," but, what is most important in this
criticism, "in the room of." For instance, avduTzaroq, not one
opposed to the consul, but a vice-consul ; dvzt^aaiXeoqj one in the
room of a king : d.vTirorLov does not mean " opposed to the type,
but a copy that corresponds to the original." Homer calls
Achilles dvnOioq, meaning not "opposed to God," but "like a
god — equal to a god." Homer also calls him d'^rdiwu, which does
not mean " opposed to a lion," but taking the place of, equal to,
having the strength of, a lion. Again, we read of anti-popes;
but the meaning of the term was not that they were opposed to
432 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
the pope, but that they were taking the place of the pope. So,
then, the Antichrist, avruiifievoq, is not one opposed to Christ pro-
fessedly, but one that takes the place, assumes the prerogatives,
wields the power, wears around his brow the diadem, and sits in
the place of the Lord Jesus Christ. And what does Antichrist
call himself? The Vicar of Christ, the vice-christ; the very
name that he assumes to himself is, unconsciously on his part,
the very name by which he is branded in prophecy — the anti-
christ, the vicar of Christ.
In order to show you that the pope does not take the place of
Christ, let me give some such simple instances as these :■ — Is
Christ the head of his redeemed church ? The pope calls himself
^' the head of the body;" he assumes this as one of his titles. Is
Christ the great high-priest t Peter of Arragon, quoted by Ranke
in the Lives of the Popes, calls the pope ^'the great crowned
priest." Has Christ the keys that open and no man shuts ? The
pope claims to have the keys of heaven and of hell. Is Christ
the Grood Shepherd ? One of the most celebrated bulls begins,
"Ego pastor bonus." Is Christ the Husband of the church?
The pope assumes to be the same. The common name by which
he is distinguished in the canon law is "the Husband of the
Church ;" and when the pope is consecrated, a ring is placed on
his finger, signifying that he is then wedded to the church. Does
the Lamb of Grod take away the sins of the world ? The pope
assumes the prerogative of taking away or absolving men's sins.
So far I have given evidence that the apostatizing one here men-
tioned, the Antichrist, is the Pope of Rome.
He is also designated by another epithet — the Man of Sin. This
has two meanings, either that he is the man who causes sin, or
that he is the man who is guilty of sin. Many of the popes have
been men of enormous turpitude of character. I believe, more
fearful abominations have been committed by popes than by the
most cruel of the Roman tyrants of previous times that ever
wielded a sceptre or sat upon a throne. Never, you know, does
impiety rise to so terrible a height as when religion is made a
road to consecrate its pollution. But I do not mean here to lay
much stress on the personal character of popes ; I shall rely more
upon their official character. Our blessed Lord is called the Man
THE MAN OF SIN. 433
of Sorrows ; i. e. a man whose whole life was vicarious suffering
or sorrow : and he is called the Man of Sin, whose whole life and
office and tendency is to spread sin, under the pretence of extir-
pating it ; to multiply its stimulants, under the pretext of absolv-
ing from it. Need I mention any other proof than this, that
there is no church upon earth but the Church of Rome that holds
the idea that sins are of two kinds, venial and mortal ? thus de-
fined in a celebrated Roman Catholic catechism : ^' Q. What is a
venial sin ? A sin that does not break charity between man and
man, much less between man and Grod : as a jesting lie, the steal-
ing of a pin, an apple, &c." And then it is said that venial sins
are forgiven by penance, absolution, and purgatory; and then
mortal sins, we are told, are those which condemn the soul for
ever : these are to be forgiven in another way. But venial sins
may be committed, according to this theology, to an almost infi-
nite extent, without acquiring the damning fiagrancy of a mortal
sin. Indeed, the question is even asked, " How much must a
man steal in order to create it mortal sin ? Answer : Our di-
vines are not agreed.''
Mankind are therefore divided into four classes — kings, nobles,
merchants, and poor. In the first class, to steal the value of sixty
pence would be a mortal sin. This would therefore imply that
any thing below that sum would be a venial sin only; but if a
great many venial sins are committed under that value, the venial
sins summed up at the day of judgment would amount surely to
a very grievous mortal sin. But is it not the tendency of
such a system to promote, foster, and encourage sin ? In a work
by Mr. Whiteside, the celebrated barrister, who has lately visited
Rome, and in Percy's and Seymour's also, it is said that you can
scarcely enter a church in Rome where you will not get absolu-
tion for the past, and license for the future. For instance, in the
church of S. Pietro in Carcere, there is this inscription : — " St.
Sylvester granted every day to those who visit it, 1200 years of
indulgence, and every day besides the remission of a third part
of sins." Again, in the church of St. Cosmo and Damien:
^'Gregory I. granted to each visiting this church 1000 years of
indulgence." On a marble slab near the door of the church of
St. Saviour di Therrais : " Indulgences conceded in perpetuity by
SECOND SERIES. 37
434 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES. %
high pontiffs in this church. Every day of the year th«^re are
1230 years of indulgence.'' On the inner wall of St. Sebastian,
on marble : ^' "Whosoever shall have entered it shall obtain plenary
remission of all his sins, through the merits of 174,000 holy
martyrs, and 46 high pontiffs, likewise martyrs interred here.''
I will not attempt the subtle explanations that may be given; but
I ask, must it not be the tendency of such inscriptions to create
a license for sin, and to lead the people to indulge in it ? To kiss
a crucifix is greater virtue than to speak truth ; to go a pilgrim-
age to Jerusalem is higher merit than to be a good husband or a
good wife. Have you not heard of frauds that are called pious ?
of ends that justify the means? of robbers that repeat the creed
before they go forth to seek their booty? Have you not read of
cathedrals, monasteries, and episcopal palaces built from the spoils
of the widow and the orphan ? of the greatest lies told, the great-
est wickedness perpetrated in the name of religion ?
I have touched on one or two points only; yet these are suffi-
cient to show that the Man of Sin — one whose principles, whose
patronage, whose system, encourage sin — is a burning brand
of the pope. His next characteristic is, ^Hhe son of perdition;"
i. e. as Judas is called the son of perdition, so he is destined to
be destroyed — he is one who is fixed by God for destruction. I
have mentioned already some signs of the approach of that de-
struction; the consumption is now going on; his utter destruc-
tion, I believe, soon will be.
I find that, though I have tried to speak as rapidly as possible,
I have not been able to say all I had intended to say : I must
therefore reserve the sequel for the next lecture. In the mean
time, let me add, the great cry that sounds from heaven at this
moment to all God's people who may be within reach of her con-
tagion, is, "Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers
of her plagues." You are called upon at the present day to lay
aside every rag of the popedom, every element of that system
that may cleave to your heart, or may tend to corrupt your prac-
tice. The great cry is, "Come out of her!" escape from her
pollution, that you may escape from her judgments. The day
comes when the Man of Sin, and all his priesthood and his
church, shall be cast like a millstone into the depths of ruin.
THE MAN OP SIN. 435
"We shall have no tears to weep over the spectacle; we shall not
grieve at it. If any one should be so sensitive as to feel an
emotion of pity or regret, all his recollections will rush back to
Smithfield, and to the Sicilian Vespers, and to St. Bartholomew's
day, and to all the slaughters which have been perpetrated in the
name of Christ by the Yicar of Christ; and, charged with in-
dignation, these sympathies and sensibilities will return again to
the scene of judgment, and, in common with the angels and the
choirs that are in heaven, they will say, "Salvation, and glory,
and honour be unto the Lord our God, for he hath judged the
great whore, and hath avenged the blood of his servants 'J' and
again they will say, Hallelujah ! and her smoke will rise up for
ever and ever. Till that system be consumed, man will not come
to himself, and Grod will not receive all his glory. Let us pray,
like the martyrs and the saints of old, for its destruction; let us
pray also for that bright and glorious advent, in the midst of
which it shall be destroyed. "Come, Lord Jesus; come quickly."
Amen.
436
LECTURE XXXII.
THE VICAR OF CHRIST.
"He which testifieth these things saith, Surely I come quickly. Amen.
Even so, come, Lord Jesus." — Revelation xxii. 20.
"Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is
worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself
that he is God." — 2 Thessalonians ii. 4.
You will recollect the explanation that I gave in my introduc-
tion of this remarkable prophecy. I showed you what must pre-
cede, and what it seems to me probable will succeed, the personal
advent of our blessed Lord : and one of my designs was to prove
that it is utterly impossible, taking the whole Scripture in order
to illustrate it, that a Millennium can precede ; it is all but certain
that a Millennium must succeed the personal appearing of our
Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. I showed you, in evidence of
this view, that memorable prophecy which relates to the downfall
of Jerusalem, and to the signs, as enumerated by our Lord, that
should precede his own second appearance. I showed you also,
by several texts which I quoted, that the great hope of the Chris-
tian church is not the expansion of the measure of Christian light
that now is into an everlasting or a millennial noon, but the fall-
ing of the light that now is into darkness ; and in the midst of
the terrible eclipse there shall burst upon the world, like the light-
ning that gleams from one end of the sky to the other, the bright-
ness of the coming of the Son of Man. I showed jou, too, that
this was confirmed by this remarkable prophecy of the apostasy
which is here predicted, if so be that this apostasy can be identi-
fied with the liomish system, which is to stretch, like a dark and
terrible cloud, from the commencement of the apostle's days to
the very close of this dispensation. Hence, this passage proves
that if Popery began 1800 years ago, and if it is not to be de-
THE VICAR OF CHRIST. 487
stroyed, broken up, and swept away, except by the brightness of
the Redeemer's iiapouaia, personal appearance, then the Millen-
nium cannot precede, but must succeed the personal advent of the
Son of God. I explained to you last evening the general intro-
duction of this passage. I showed you that the impression pre-
vailed among the Thessalonians that the day of the Lord, as it is
translated in verse 3, " was at hand.'' On first reading this pas-
sage, one would suppose it is a contradiction to others. For
instance, the apostle says, ^^The day of the Lord is at hand,"
iyji^st : and here the apostle says, you are not to be led away
with the delusion that the Lord is at hand ; but when you open
your Testament, and read the passage in the original, you will find
that when one apostle said, " The Lord is at hand,'' i/yh(; ^ffri, or
lyyi^st, the word is perfectly distinct from that used here : the word
here used is that which is translated in Romans " things present;*'
and again, the same word is translated in 1 Cor. iii. 22, ^'AU
things are yours, whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the
world, or life, or death, or things present, all are yours ; and ye
are Christ's, and Christ is God's." ' Therefore the meaning of
this is, you are not to be deceived as if the Lord were actually in
the midst of you ; you are not to believe when they say, " Behold
here he is ! or, Lo there ! go forth to meet him."^ You are not
to believe that the Lord is actually to come in the course of this
very year;* but you are to notice that there is, first of all, to in-
tervene a dark and terrible eclipse, a fearful wonder-working
apostasy^ After that apostasy has grown to its height of pride,
and blasphemy, and sin, it shall be destroyed by the Redeemer's
coming; so that his coming, which you think is now, will not be
till he comes to destroy the apostasy, which is its seminal state
now, and shall be in its full development then. I then said, that
if I can identify this prophecy with the Romish system, I not
only show a remarkable evidence of God in history, fulfilling what
God has written in prophecy, but I also show you the point from
which I set outjMihat the apostasy, not the Millennium, is to
stretch to the very eve of the Redeemer's personal advent.^ I
then pointed oat to you several words, not mistranslations, but
renderings deficient in conveying the full force of the original.
For instance, in verse 3, we read, "Let no man deceive you by
37*
438 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
any means j for that day shall not come, except there come ^
a-Koaraffia,^' not an apostasy, but the apostasy, the falling away.
I showed you that the word here used, anoGraaia, but especially
a neuter form of it, a-oaxaaiov^ is applied by our Lord to a
divorce ji and' if there be one branding feature by which the pope
is characterized more than another, it is this, that the bride
belongs to the Lamb, and the adulterous woman is the bride of
antichrist; and just as we have Christ in the midst of his people
constituting the true church, so we have antichrist, and those that
bear his mark, constituting the Apostasy. This is the divorce-
ment of the body from Christ, and its union to him who sits in
the place of Christ. I showed, in the next place, how truly he is
described as ^'the man of sin.^' If you take his doctrinal dis-
tinction of sin into venial and mortal sin, it is calculated to foster
sin ; if you take sin in its narrowest sense to denote idolatry, he
is emphatically the man of idolatry ; for the system is full of
idolatry from first to last. If you take sin, again, in its other
sense, to signify the encouragement of sin, by the pretended abso-
lution of it, we have the very same feature brought out. There
is not a church in Rome in which there are not inscriptions, ofi"er-
ing absolutions and indulgences for devotion at its altars, or for
prayers addressed to particular saints. I showed you that the
frauds which are called pious, the ends that justify the means,
the robber that repeats the creed, and goes forth to plunder,
the cathedrals and monasteries that have been raised by spoil,
treachery, and tyranny; 'the principle that makes the kissing a
crucifix greater merit than speaking the truth; 'that canonizes a
freebooter or a crusader to the Holy Land, and degrades or burns
an honest man— the head of a system that exalts the ceremony
to the skies, tramples morality to the earth, may be called em-
phatically the Man of Sin. I forbore to allude to the personal
character of popes ; unfortunately there have been bad Protestant
ministers whom the Papist can refer to ; we can quote dark cata-
logues of bad men in every communion under the sun ; but still
some of the popes have been criminal to excess : their gigantic
* The apostasy cannot mean an infidel power. See Septuagint version of
Deut. xxxii. 15 ; Jer. ii. 6 ; Isa. xxx. 1 j Dan. ix. 9.
THE VICAR OF CHRIST. 439
power has been followed by more gigantic sins ; and I would even
risk the identity of the prophecy on the personal character of the
popes alone ; but I did not do so : so strong is the other proof of
identity, that we can afford to omit this proof. I then showed
you in what respect he may be called " the son of perdition ;"
and also in what respect he is called the " antichrist.""^ I ex-
plained to you the misapprehension that prevails in supposing
that avrl generally means opposed to ; and I showed you that in
composition with substantives it means, generally, and here un-
questionably, put in the room of: thus d-vn-l^aadehe; is not one
opposed to the king, but one that takes the place of the king ;
avdbr.aroq is not one opposed to the consul, but the vice-consul
that takes the place of the consul; w>xilio}'^ does not mean one
opposed to a lion, but equal to a lion. So we read that, in the
Middle Ages, there were three infallible popes, each excommuni-
cating the other, and each pronouncing his decrees to be fallible ;
one called the other the antipope, not meaning that he was opposed
to the popedom, for so did he love the popedom that he strove to
possess it ; but meaning that he assumed the office, and pretended
to discharge its functions. So this antichrist, the Man of Sin, the
d.vrixii[xevoq, does not mean one who is opposed to Christ pro-
fessedly, for he is not ; he pretends to be the advocate, the vice-
gerent of Christ 'j and therefore, professedly, he is not opposed to
him. ^If you tell a Roman Catholic he is against Christianity, he
will repeat to you the Apostles' Creed. If you say he is opposed
to Christ, he will sign himself with the cross, and say that he
glories in it ; if you tell him that the pope is opposed to Christ,
he will show you that he is so far from it, that he sits in the very
temple of God, and assumes to represent Grod. The apostle,
therefore, does not mean that the pope will be professedly opposed
to Christ, but that he takes the place of Christ, supersedes him,
acts as his representative, or, as he calls himself, the Vicar of
Christ, i. e. the Vice-Christ, the mnypCffroq. I now proceed to
show you that he ^^ exalteth himself above all that is called G-od."
•*■ In answer to those who say " the man of sin," the " antichrist," must mean
a single person, I observe that the woman clothed with the sun, (Rev. xii.,) the
woman on the beast, (Rev. xiii. 3,) cannot be, never have been, interpreted by
any as single persons.
440 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
Now here again the objection has been raised, that the feature
of the Thessalonian Antichrist here predicted is not developed in
the Roman Antichrist. But this supposes that God means Deity.
But wheresoever in this very passage the word God is used with
this signification, as for instance, ^' He sitteth in the temple of
God," there the article is used (6 Oebq ;) but here the article is not
used ; and if we open the Bible to ascertain what is meant by
this, we shall find that the name commonly given to magistrates
and chief rulers is that of gods: for instance, the apostle, in
2 Cor. viii. 6, says, "There is but one God the Father;" but then
I he adds farther on, " There be that are called gods*' Now mark
the expression, " He exalts himself above all that are called gods,
whether in heaven or in earth." " There be gods many and lords
many," referring plainly to magistrates and rulers. Then, again,
if I open the book of Exodus, xxii. 28, "Thou shalt not revile
the gods,'' evidently the magistrates ; Ps. Ixxxii. 6, " I have said
ye are gods;" and our blessed Lord said, John x. 85, "If God
called them gods unto whom the word of God came," plainly
meaning church-magistrates, kings, and rulers, and not the Su-
preme Deity; or, if deity at all, it must mean the gods, the
daqio'Aa or titular gods of the heathen. Now it is matter of
history that the pope exalts himself above all magistrates, kings,
and rulers, above all authority, and rule, and law. Hear facts,
facts that I have gathered from original resources, and facts on
which you may implicitly rely.
Un the eighth century. Pope Gregory II. boasted to the Greek
emperor, "All the kings of the earth reverence the pope as God."j
Charlemagne received his title and his empire as a donative from
the pope. In the coronation oath of the Western emperors, they
swore that they would be submissive to the pope and to his Bo-
man successors. The emperors Otho and Radolphus both re-
ceived their imperial crowns as a grant from the pope. John of
England received his crown as a vassal of the pope. ' Adrian IV.,
(a. d. 1155,) on King Henry's petition, permitted him to subju-
gate Ireland, on condition of his giving to the Roman see a quit-
rent of a penny for each house in it.j On the discovery of
America, Prince Henry of Portugal applied to the pope to grant
to the Portuguese every country they might discover. A bull
THE VICAR OF CHRIST. 441
was accordingly issued, granting the petition, on the ground that
the heathen had been given to Christ, and the uttermost parts of
the earth for his possession. , Again, Pope Nicholas I. required
kings to hold the bridle of his horse, and Louis II., king of
France, and the emperor Frederic Barbarossa did so ; and up to
the sixteenth century kings kissed the pope's foot. It is a fact
at this moment that bishops are allowed to kiss his hand, but the
emperor must only kiss his foot. The emperor Henry having
oiFended Pope Gregory VII., better known by the name of Hil-
debrand, he waited three days and three nights in the depth of
winter, barefooted and clothed with sackcloth, in the trenches of
Rome, till the pope relented and forgave him. Pope Gelasius
made the remark in the fifth century, " There are two authorities
by which the world is governed, the pontifical and the regal; in
divine things' it becomes kings to bow the neck to priests, and es-
pecially to the head of priests." ^Pope Celestine III. (a. d. 1191)
kicked the crown off the head of the emperor Henry VI. ', and
Baronius states that this was to be a sign that the pope had the
power of deposing, as he alone had the prerogative of making
kings. , Pius IV. excommunicated Queen Elizabeth, and assigned
as a reason, " G-od hath set me up as a prince over all nations, to
root up, to pull down, and to destroy.'' ^ And not only does he
exalt himself above all that is called God, but also above all that
is worshipped. The word worship here is not the ordinary word
used in the New Testament; it is <7il3aff/ia, literally translated,
"above every thing worshipful." The word is derived from
ffefidO^o/xaij or the obsolete ail3ofj.at. It is applied to kings : for
instance, the Romans called their emperor Augustus ; whenever
the Greeks spoke of Caesar they called him ae^aabq^ " the wor-
shipful," a word of the same derivation, and which means the
same in Greek as Augustus does in Latin. Therefore, to say
that he exalts himself above all <Ti(iaa[xa, is to say he exalts
himself above every tie that unites the subject to the king, the
child to the parent, the servant to the master; all loyalty to
princes, all obedience to magistrates, is superseded and absorbed
in the supremacy of the pope over the souls and bodies of men.
Like the Berseker of the North, he destroys all relationships, and
442 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
develops in himself tlie power which he has stolen and absorbed
from others. So complete is the identity as far as we have gone.
But it is said, in the next place, '^he sitteth in the temple of
God, showing himself that he is God.^' The question arises
here, What is the temple of God ? I once had a conversation
with an excellent minister of the gospel at Heading upon this
subject, who had taken the new view of prophecy. He believes
that the temple of Jerusalem is here meant ; that the temple of
Jerusalem is to be rebuilt, and will be rebuilt by Antichrist. I
gave him one reply — I think it a conclusive one. In the first
place, the temple of Jerusalem was never once called the temple
of God after its destruction ; and, in the second place, if Anti-
christ build it, how can it be the temple of God ? It must then
be Antichrist's temple, built by Antichrist's hand, not one conse-
crating touch from Deity^ and therefore not in any sense to be
called the temple of God. But let us now endeavour to ascertain
what is meant by the temple of God. " Ye are the temple of
God." 1 Cor. iii. 16. "Ye are the temple of the living God;''
as God hath said, "I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and
they shall be my people, and I will be their God.'' 2 Cor. vi. 16.
"Ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow-citizens with
the saints, and of the household of God; and are built upon the
foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself
being the chief corner-stone ; in whom the whole building fitly
framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord; in
whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God
through the Spirit." It is, in other words, baptized men — men
professing Christianity, and men constituting the outward and
visible church of God, among whom Antichrist will sit ; and the
pope is now the head of the largest part of the professing body
in Christendom. And then, you will notice, the expression here
used for a temple is very remarkable ; it is not the usual word for
temple, the holy place ; but it is vadq.^ Now, the vad? of the
* There are upward of twenty places in the Acts where the Jewish temple
is called lepdv, not one where it is called vads. The words vads tov Qeov, in the
language of an apostle writing to Gentiles, cannot denote the Jewish temple,
and can only mean the Christian church.
THE VICAR OF CHRIST. 443
Greek temple (from which is derived our word nave) meant the
holiest place of the temple in which the image of the god was
placed ', so that when applied by a Greek to the temple of Jeru-
salem, it would mean the holy of holies, where God manifested
himself between the cherubim. It will therefore imply, that the
pope sits in the holiest place of what professes to be, or is com-
monly called, or is assumed and claimed to be, the temple of
God. I will show you that it is so in a few moments. Then it
says that he " shows himself that he is God V^ Now the ob-
jection has been made, the pope does not profess to be God;
but here it is not said that he pretends to be God ; but it is,
literally translated, " showing himself as if he were God f' i. e.
pretending to the functions, assuming the prerogatives, professing
to do_ things that prove that practically he assumes to be God,
while theoretically he repudiates the charge that he takes the
place of, or claims to be God ; and therefore this passage, literally
translated, would stand thus: ^'The vice-God, or the vicar of
Christ, sitteth" — and here is another point of identity ; the word
here translated "sit," is not the common word for "sit;" but
xadcffui, to " sit as a bishop," the same word from which is derived
the word cathedra, the chair on which the bishop sits ; hence the
building in which that chair is placed is called the cathedral, the
place of the bishop's chair. So it is here said that Antichrist
shall sit in the visible church, in the holiest spot of that visible
church, and that he shall sit like a bishop,* and shall show him-
self, by the functions that he assumes, as if he were the great
God himself.
Now, let us see what evidence there is of this. In the sixth
century, A. D. 501, by King Theodoric's command, a council met
to judge of the conduct of Pope Symachus. ^ The council urged
it had no competency to try a pope, as the pope was raised above
all human or ecclesiastical jurisdiction. Again, in a subsequent
synod, at which Symachus presided — and this was at the com-
mencement of the manifestation of the antichrist — he adopted a
*• KaOtaai ttj vadv, are words that denote motion ; and imply that he will con-
vey himself, or be conveyed, to sit as a bishop in the heart of the visible Chris-
tian church.
444 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
book written by Ennodius, in which he said, ^^ The pope is judge
in the place of Grod, and can himself be judged by none/' Again
we read, that when the pope is inaugurated, he is seated on the
spot on which the Roman Catholic believes that the flesh and blood,
soul and divinity of the Son of God is placed. (I use the words of
the canons of the Council of Trent.) He is seated in the church
of St. Peter's, on the high altar, i. e. the holiest and most sacred
spot in the whole of that vast and magnificent cathedral. How
true to the prophecy ! Just on the high altar does he sit epis-
copally, and there, in the ordinary words of the Eomish ritual, he
is adored. ' A French newspaper says, that at the inauguration
of Pius IX. in 1846, Pius received the adoration of the cardinals,
seated on the high altar. Eustace, a Roman Catholic priest,
says, evidently shocked at the blasphemy: "JVhy should the
altar of Grod be made the pope's footstaol ?'' j Here you have
point for point in history, coinciding point for point with the
prophecy : the one showing that Grod inspired the prophecy ; the
other, that Grod is in the world, superintending and promoting its
performance. Again : I have casts in my possession which illus-
trate this still further : they were taken by a clergyman of the
establishment, Dr. Nolan, an accomplished scholar and eminent
divine, who visited Rome last year : he purchased several of the
medals struck in the mint of the Vatican, and he was kind
enough to get plaster of Paris casts of these medals for me : one
represents on one side, Eugenius IV. Pont. Max. ; on the obverse
of the medal are two cardinals putting the tiara on the pontiff's
head, with the motto, '^ Quem creant adorant,'' " They worship
or adore him whom they create.''J On another medal is repre-
sented Innocent VIII. P. M. and a king kneeling at his feet with
his crown in his hand. The pope is seated on his chair, in the
act of blessing the discrowned king, and there is written over it
the words, " Ecce sic benedicetur homo,'' " In this way only shall
man be blessed ;" i. e. as God, he alone can bless men. ^ Again,
in the fourth session of Lateran, the Venetian prelates addressed
the popes thus : " Thou art our shepherd, our physician, in short,
alter Deus in terris — another God upon earth. 'j ^Tn the sixth
session of the Lateran, 1514, the Bishop of Modrusium called the
pope the Lion of the tribe of Judah : " Thou shalt reigu from sea
THE VICAR OF CHRIST. 445
to sea, and from the Tiber to the ends of the earth." ,' Lord An-
tony Pucci, in the ninth session of the fifth Lateran, said, ^^ All
kings shall worship thee, and all nations shall serve thee."^ Car-
dinal Bellarmine, the distinguished champion of Rome, says,
" The pope is the father of the faithful, the pontiff of Christians,
prince of priests, vicar of Christ, head of the body, foundation of
the building, bridegroom of the church.'^
How completely does the pope take the place and usurp the
offices of Christ ! The Bishop of Bitonto, in the Council of Trent,
said, "The pope has come a light into the world." ^ Pope Inno-
cent, in his 'decretals, says, "Deus, quasi Dei vicarius," "a god,
as it were the vicar of Grod.'j In a thesis dedicated to Paul V.,
" Paulo Quinto, vice-deo, et pontificiae omnipotentias conservatori"
is given as his title : "To Paul V., the vice-god and the con-
servator of the omnipotence of the pontificate." ' On the gate of
Tolentino, through which Paul III. was wont to pass, was this in-
scription : " Paulo Tertio, Opt". Max", in terris Deo :" " To Paul
III., the most excellent and greatest, a God upon earth." Baro-
nius describes John the patriarch of Constantinople, who opposed
the claims of the pope to the title of universal* bishop, as " an
apostate angel, rising up against the most high Grod." Is it not,
then, strictly true, that as God, he is sitting in the vao<r, the holiest
place of the temple ? — sits like a bishop, showing himself as if he
were God, pretending to the power, assuming the prerogatives,
and exercising the functions and the exclusive attributes of
Deity.
I now proceed to the next brand. He is called, in the next
place, " That wicked one." Now, here again you will find, by
opening a Greek lexicon, that the proper translation is not
" wicked," but " lawless ;" for the Greek word is avoixoq, which
is derived from <i, privative, and vo/io^, a law ; the literal transla-
tion then is, " the lawless one," or the man that acts without law,
or above law, or against law. You have only to open the de-
cretals, which contain their own sentiments respecting the claims
of the pope, and you will find in decretal i. 10, " Constitutions
* Pope Gregory, speaking of a universal bishopric, says, " Hanc elationem
primus Apostata invenit." — Ep. lib. viii. 27.
SECOND SERIES. 38
44§ APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
against the canons and decrees of Roman prelates are of no
force •/' and the canon law says, the pope judges all, and can be
judged by none. Dec. i. 19 says, "The decretal epistles are
numbered with the canonical books, and the pope's will is reason
and law to them.'' In them the pope alters the law of God,
gives dispensations from vows and ties : he omits in the com-
mandments the second ; he mutilates the fourth. He contradicts
Grod :** God says, " Marriage is honourable in all;" the pope says,
it is a disgrace to priests.j God says, " Drink ye all of this cup ;"
the pope says, " None but the oflGiciating priest must taste it."
God says, " The bread that we break ;" the pope says, " It has
ceased to be bread, and has become flesh and blood." The ex-
pression " legibus solutus," which is a Latin phrase equivalent to
avo/xo<; used here, " above all law," was applied to the Roman
emperors ; on which Gibbon remarks, " This expression was sup-
posed to exalt the emperor above all human restraints, and to
leave his conscience and reason as the sacred guide of his con-
duct.", Now, the very expression in the Extravagantes — that
is, compositions beyond or extraneous to the canon law — is,
*' Papa solutus est omni lege human^," " the pope is freed from
all human law."
In the next place, his coming is said to be " after the working
of Satan ;" i. e. the mystery of iniquity, the apostasy, is not to
be a human concoction : there may be much in our sects and
systems that is purely human ; but in the Papal system there is
little human. I believe it is mostly superhuman ; and the reason
why it is feared so little and favoured so much is, that it is not a
human thing ; it is superhuman : we have the power of the arch-
angel employed to construct it, and the wickedness of the arch-
angel fallen, and the cunning of the demon pervading, inspiring,
and animating it. You have an archangel's power and wisdom
grafted on the demon's depravity and wickedness, at the bottom
and in the heart of that terrible apostasy. It is eminently
Satan's own work. Christ is erecting a kingdom of righteous-
ness, peace, and joy, of which he is the head; Satan is busy
erecting a kingdom of wickedness, and falsehood, and crime, of
which Antichrist is the head.
Does Christ act in his body ? so does antichrist in his. Was
THE VICAR OF CHRIST. 447
Christianity established by miracles ? so it is assumed that anti-
christ's kingdom was established, and is carried on by miracles
too. Hence it is added, ^^ with lying wonders :" and he shall
come "with all deceivableness of unrighteousness/' and also,
'^ with all signs and lying wonders.'' Does this brand meet its
fulfilment in the pope ? Read the history of the popedom ; read
also the last books that have been written, describing what is now
going on : — Seymour's "Pilgrimage to Rome," Whiteside's "Italy
in the Nineteenth Century," the Hon. Mr. Percy's "Visit to
Rome" — books that are most important in these days, to enable
persons to become acquainted with these things.
At Florence there is a picture of the Virgin Mary, the face of
which is declared to have been painted by an angel. Here is a
lying wonder. At Lucca there is a representation of Christ made
by Nicodemus, who was ordered by our Lord to do so. Nicode-
mus, it is said, finished it perfectly, except the face; and, falling
asleep, he discovered on waking that our Lord himself had finished
it. There is another lying wonder. There is a handkerchief of
Veronica, with a miraculous impression of the face of our Lord,
which is brought before the pope and the cardinals on a certain
festival. In the church of S. Pietro de Montorio, there is a repre-
sentation of the Virgin and Child, with this inscription on marble :
" This sacred likeness of Mary and her Son is illustrious for mira-
cles more and more every day." In St. Peter's, at Rome, there
is a picture of the Virgin, with a mark under the left eye, having
this inscription : " This picture, having been struck by an impious
hand, poured forth blood on the stone, which is now protected by
a grating." These are the pictures around which the people
crowd to offer up their prayers and votive offerings. And to show
how completely these lying wonders are characteristic of the
Apostasy, I will refer you to an event which took place in 1835,
when the pestilence swept Rome, and every effort that was made
to arrest it failed. The history was drawn up by the Abbe
Menghi d'Arcole, dated 1835 ; and here is what he says : — " In
order to recount the miracles wrought by the intercession of the
Holy Virgin, when invoked under the auspices of her picture
venerated at the church of S. Maggiore, it would be necessary to
compile the records of all nations where these miracles are con-
^ffi APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
tained." " The pope could discover no means by wMch to arrest
the progress of the pestilence. Although the holy pontiff had
preached repentance, ordained prayers, made vows, the plague
ceased not its ravages, until he took the resolution of turning
altogether to the mother of Grod. Then he commanded the clergy
and people to go in procession to the church of Our Lady, called
Santa Maria Maggiore, and to carry the picture of the Holy Vir-
gin, painted by St. Luke, to the church of St. Peter's at the Vati-
can. The procession perfectly arrested the progress of the pesti-
lence. It was a delightful miracle to behold how the pestilence
ceased entirely along the streets through which the procession
passed. Enthusiasm was at its height. When the miraculous
picture appeared in its place in S. Maria Maggiore, the Viva
3Iaria at the moment reached even to heaven. They placed the
august picture on the pontifical altar. The litanies are chanted,
and the holy pope, assisted by Cardinal Odeschalci, high-priest
of the church, offers incense to it, and utters a prayer full of sweet
hope, when his countenance displayed the expression that Mary
had heard the vows and prayers of her people."
I need not quote more at length. I myself have a work, dated
1842, accompanied by a medal, which was printed at Paris, under
the sanction of the Archbishop of Paris and Pope G-regory XVI.,
recording one hundred miracles said to have been wrought by the
touch of that medal; and at a great railway accident which
occurred in France some time ago, several of the persons killed
were found with the medal at their lips, and others with the
medal in their bosoms. Only the other day the Virgin Mary was
said to have appeared to two peasants at Saletti, the history of
which appearance is written under the sanction of the Archbishop
of Paris. I need not remind you of the holy coat of Treves,
which, however, reminds us of a fact — Jesus once wore a coat
that was without seam. Strange it is, if relics were of virtue,
that four Roman soldiers were allowed to cast lots for it. If ever
there was any thing sacred, surely that was it in which the Son
of Grod had worked miracles, preached, and died; and yet the
Roman soldiers were allowed to cast lots whose it should be, and
probably it was sold by him who obtained it to some dealer in
cast-off raiment, and the money went to buy a little wine. Why
THE VICAR OP CHRIST. 449
was this ? Just for the same reason that Moses was buried and
no man knew of his sepulchre, lest the Jews should make an idol
of their dead lawgiver, : so the coat of Jesus disappeared, to teach
us to look not to the relic which was worthless, hut to the mighty
God, the Prince of Peace, the Saviour of sinners, who wore it.
And to show you how idolatry still prevails, I will read a very
short extract from a letter addressed by the present pope in
his exile to his rebellious subjects in Eome. First of all, he
says : " Pius IX. to the Roman people. Gaeta, Nov. 28, 1848."
What he states shows that Popery will not be reformed. It was
a great mistake of Pius IX. to think that the popedom could be
reformed, forgetting that a system which is founded upon false-
hood may be revolutionized, but it never can be reformed. ^' We
recognise in the ingratitude of these misguided children the anger
of the Almighty, who permits their misfortunes as an atonement
for the sins of ourselves and people.'^
What awful delusion ! In an angel's tear there is nothing
that can expiate sin; in a martyr's purest blood, shed where
martyrs bled and martyrs triumphed, there is nothing that can
forgive an infant's sin. There is no expiatory virtue in heaven
or in earth, in saint, or angel, or cherubim ; but only and ex-
clusively in that precious blood which still cleanseth from all sin.
What a pity that some one could not whisper to this pope, that
either it was judgment coming from God because of his sins, or,
if not, it was chastisement coming from a Father to make him
better ; but in neither case could it be an expiation or an atone-
ment for sin. Yet, such is the sentiment of the infallible head
of all Christendom. But this is not all : what is the close of his
letter ? This vice-christ is so completely the vice-christ still, that
he omits the name of Christ from the beginning to the end of his
letter ; but he does not omit what proves him to be the Man of
Sin — what proves where his hope is ; he says at the close of it :
— -" In the fulfilment of our duty as supreme pontiff, we humbly
invoke the great Mother of Mercy, and the Holy Apostles Peter
and Paul."
Does it need any thing else to prove to you that this is not the
gospel, but another gospel?; that he is not the Christ, but the Anti-
christ ? and that this system, instead of being mitigated by years,
38*
460 :apocalyptic sketches.
and ameliorated by truth, still remains as it was before, blasphemy
against God, unfaithfulness and cruelty to man ?
But it is also stated, further, that there shall be all ^^ signs and
lying wonders/' I believe I might mention great numbers of these.
The blood of St. Januarius still liquej&es at Naples. A chapel of
the Virgin, Our Lady of Loretto, was carried through the skies.
The two great pillars of the Jesuits — Ignatius Loyola and St.
Francis Xavier — wrought, it is said, innumerable miracles. Christ
expelled demons by word, Ignatius did it by letter. Christ walked
upon the sea once, Ignatius often walked in the air. Christ
amazed his disciples by his transfiguration on Mount Tabor;
Ignatius, when he entered the darkest room, lighted it up as if a
thousand candles were in it. Christ raised up three persons from
the dead, Francis Xavier raised up thousands. But to show that
these were " lying wonders,'' we have only to read the life of
Ignatius Loyola, written fifteen years after his death, by Ribade-
neira, which does not record a single miracle ; or that by Maflfei,
twenty-three years after his death, which does not mention any.
But one hundred years afterward, when he was about to be
canonized, it being necessary before a saint can be canonized that
he should be proved to have wrought miracles, then accounts of
the miracles he had wrought came out in abundance. ,
But I believe that all these miracles are not merely pretended
or lying miracles; I believe that there have been true super-
natural things done by the priests of Rome ; I believe that, ay
the kingdom of Christ had miracles to comi^ence it, so the king-
dom of Antichrist had miracles to begin it. If the archangerji
wisdom be in the scheme itself, why may not the archangel's
power be developed in many an instance for the spread and main-
tenance of that scheme ? ' I believe that before this dispensation
closes, there may be miracles wrought by Satan, such as we have
never yet seen ; and a miracle does not necessarily prove the truth
of a doctrine : it only proves an act above what man can do, or
superhuman. Tt proves that the man and his message are either
from heaven or from hell.^ The miracle demonstrates that there
is something superhuman ; and wherever there is any act super-
human, there is a call to hear the message : but if the doctrine
which is preached, and for which the miracle is wrought, does not
THE VICAR OP CHRIST. 451
tally with tlie law and the testimony, repudiate it.; For what
does the apostle say ? " If we or an angel from heaven preach
any other gospel unto you than that we have preached, let him
be accursed.'' ^
And does not our Lord himself say, That in " the last days
there will be signs and wonders so great and so many, that if it
were possible, they would deceive the very elect /' teaching us
that there is an exempted party, although others may be caught,
and captivated, and charmed by the delusion? I have thus
shown that miracles are not always from God, as it is said in
Deut. xiii. 1-3 : " If there arise among you a prophet, or a
dreamer of dreams, and giveth thee a sign or wonder, and the
sign or the wonder come to pass, whereof he spake unto thee,
saying. Let us go after other gods, which thou hast not known,
and serve them; thou shalt not hearken unto that prophet, or
that dreamer of dreams : for the Lord your Grod proveth you, to
know whether ye love the Lord your Grod with all your heart and
with all your soul ;" wherein it is shown us that wonders may be
done by a false prophet for a false end. I admit that many of
the miracles done in the popedom have been proved to be false
by the childishness of the occasion, the falsity of the claim, the
idle object for which they were done, the doctrine that was quoted
to sustain it ; and therefore in no respect are they to be placed in
the same category with the miracles wrought by our blessed Lord,
But do not be deceived : if I were to see a man come into the
world preaching that transubstantiation is true, and he were to
raise a dead man from the grave to prove it, I would not believe
him : I would say, " Let him be anathema.'' If I were to see a
man come into the world and make the tree that had been fruit-
ful barren at his word, and make sea-sand to blossom like the
rose, and then t^ll me that I was to worship the Virgin Mary, I
would say, " Let him be anathema." No power that can be put
forth can prove to me that any thing is truth which is contrary
to the plain, common-sense, honest interpretation of this blessed
book. Therefore, see the infinite importance of cleaving close to
your Bibles. There is no infallible directory but the word of
God — no expiatory atonement but the death of Jesus — ^no sancti-
fying power but the Spirit of God — Christ's cross without a
452 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
screen — his word without a clasp — ^the way to heaven without an
obstruction ; these are the elements, the substance; and the very
core of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
A few words more, and I will close. The next brand here
mentioned is '^ deceivableness of unrighteousness.^' He is not
only to come with " signs and lying wonders/' but to come with
all " deceivableness of unrighteousness.'' Roman Catholics have
often far more semblance of piety about them than Protestants,
but with it the substance of infidelity. „ To say a hundred pater-
nosters with the lip is far more meritorious than to breathe one
fervent ^' Our Father" from the bottom of the heart. To carry a
cross on one's shoulder is greater glory than to glory in the cross
of Christ 3 to make genuflexions with the bended knee is better
than to bow and break the unbended heart ; to fast severely in
Lent, after feasting heartily in the Carnival, is the greatest merit ;
abstinence from flesh, though no abstinence from lusts and pas-
sions, is the very perfection of this system of "deceivableness of
unrighteousness." , The apostolic prescription is, "If any man
will not work, neither should he eat." The priestly prescription
is, " Let him go into a monastery, and be fed as a beggar at the
public expense ;" if you be of a solitary and ascetic temperament,
there is a hermitage for you, or a whip with which to scourge
yourself, or an iron band to wear round your waist. So exqui-
sitely is the system adapted, that if you are poor, poverty can be
made the path to heaven ; if rich, your gold will pave the way to
heaven ; if ascetic, a whip will scourge you to heaven ; if a licen-
tious debauchee, you have only to cross the street, and you will
find the open confessional, and a sympathizing father within it to
give you absolution; if there be a blighted and disappointed
heart in its first and earliest affections, there is held out the
charming retreat of a nunnery, so beautiful in romance, so
sweetly delineated in Tractarian poems, but found to be in the
end the grave of the living, or the hell of the dead. Again, if
you are of an avaricious, cold temperament, scraping and gather-
ing all, and parting with nothing, you may draw upon this great
ecclesiastical corporation, and get a surplus of merits which you
may put in your cash-box, or enter in your ledger, as you may
prefer For the robber who has lived on the plunder of the
THE VICAR OF CHRIST. 453
honest, a tithe of his gains will half shrive him, and make his
Buffer? ngs in purgatory short. Or if you are tasteful and love
beautiful architecture, it will meet with your taste r^it is a fact
that Mr. Pugin was converted, by his architectural taste alone,
from being what is called a Protestant, to be, what he is, a real
Roman Catholic, j "I often wonder that more architects, and
painters, and poets, who are not spiritual men^ do not become
Roman Catholics, because that system encourages them to the
utmost; and not only encourages them, but gives them what
meets and gratifies their taste .j And if you are a sincere be-
liever, there is just as much Christianity left as will show you it
is not wholly cast out : a ray or two penetrates the gloom — a
beam of the unutterable glory pointing to the skies 3 so that in
the midst of that eclipse, in spite of its corruptions, you may
catch a light that will lead you to the Lamb, and lift you to the
skies.j Such, I say, is its " deceivableness of unrighteousness.^'
In whom is this manifested ? ^' In them that perish."
I have taken up much of your time, but I wish to close this
part of my subject to-night. There is to be no conversion of this
system, but the Lord is to consume it by ^^the Spirit of his
mouth ;" that is, as in another passage, '^ He shall smite the
earth with the rod of his mouth /' i. e. his own holy word.
That consumption is at this moment going on. Great Babylon
is now coming into remembrance before God. A person may be
far gone in a consumption, and yet alive; so Babylon is now
being gradually consumed, but it is only to be " destroyed with
the brightness of our Lord's coming." Does not this imply that
it will exist till Christ comes ? Bibles, tracts, political friends,
and political foes, may consume it, but he is to destroy, i. e.
utterly to end it, by the brightness of his coming.j I believe that
the pope, who is now a refugee, will return to Rome, but shorn
of much of his sovereignty ; the beast is being consumed, but he
waits for that day when'^the lightning that flashes from the east,^
shall kindle a conflagration in the central seat of great Babylon,
which shall then go down like a millstone into the fathomless and
fiery flood, and all heaven, and the saints above, and the saints
below, shall shout, ^' Babylon is fallen, is fallen. . , Hallelujah,
for the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth." My dear friends, I call
454 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
to you, "Come out of her, that ye be not partakers of her
plagues." Have no connection with her — no sympathy with her
Taste not her cup, wear not her garments, stand aloof from her,
lest, touching her, sympathizing with her, trying to form diplo-
matic intercourse with her, apologizing for her, seeking to endow
her, as if the money of kings and states could avert God's judg-
ments — lest you be sucked into the terrible vortex, and, being
partakers of her sins, be plunged into the fire of her ruin. But,
my dear friends, come what may, let us rejoice that Christ is our
King, not Antichrist ; that the Bible of Christ, not the Breviary,
is our law ; that the gospel, not another gospel, is our hope ', and
come life, come death, come signs, come wonders, come miracles,
come things present, things past, things to come — nothing,
nothing shall be able to separate us from the love of God that is
in Christ Jesus our IiOrd.j
:mm/ir 455
LECTURE XXXIII.
1848; OR, PROPHECY FULFILLED.
"He which testifieth these things saith, Surely I come quickly. Amen.
Even so, come, Lord Jesus." — Revelation xxii. 20.
" And the seventh angel poured out his vial into the air ; and there came a
great voice out of the temple of heaven, from the throne, saying. It is done." —
Revelation xvi. 17.
Last Sabbath evening I stowed you that the reign of Anti-
christ was to endure from that moment when the mystery of ini-
quity began, in St. Paul's day, until that moment when the Lord
shall come again. I showed you on a previous evening that in
Matt. xxiv. there was the earliest intimation that Christ's advent
should take the world by surprise, and should come upon them
like the lightning that gleams from the east and spreads its corus-
cations in the west, and should find them as the flood found them
in the days of Noah, eating and drinking, marrying and giving
in marriage. On a previous evening, I showed you by a multi-
tude of texts that the great hope, as it seems to me, held out in
every passage of the New Testament, is that of Christ's second
advent ; and just as the devout Jew continually looked for his
first, so the devout Christian, leaning on the first as the founda-
tion of this hope, anticipates with joy the second as the substance
and realization of it. I drew fairly the inference, that no Mil-
lennium is to precede the advent of Christ, but, on the contrary,
to succeed it ; that he comes first to a world unprepared for his
advent, though to his church as to a bride waiting for the bride-
groom ) and that the Millennium will not be the dawn that pre-
cedes it, but the noon that streams from that risen and meridian'
Sun of Righteousness.
I now proceed to lay before you some proofs of the truth of
what I stated in my last lectures in Exeter Hall, announced as
456 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
prophecy in 1847, "but in 1849 performance. I believe that the
events which I then described and classified, as you may see by
referring to the lecture on the Seventh Vial, the fulfilment of
which I did not expect to be so instant, is at this moment poured
out from the angel's hand ; and the nations, like drunken men,
are reeling and staggering beneath its intoxicating power. The
statement of these things is not to gratify a vain curiosity ; on
the contrary, if I make good the points I have alleged, and show
history giving its comment on prophecy, and the Grod that wrote
the one acting in the other, I conceive that I am stating what is
fitted to solemnize, to stir up the energy that remains, and to
make us feel that if ever there was a crisis when men ought to
be sure what they are, and whither they are going, it is the crisis,
the strange and startling crisis, in which our lot is now cast.
Now just before the seventh vial was poured out, you recollect
what I stated in my former lectures upon this subject to be the
prelude to all the judgments that were to follow — that three un-
clean spirits were to go forth under the sixth vial and deceive the
nations. These three unclean spirits have been identified by Mr.
Elliott, and I perfectly concur with him on the evidence adduced :
he identifies them by showing that each proceeds from a source
which he had previously determined. Other commentators have
guessed what they are, but he has proved what they must be, by
referring to their origin : one from the mouth of the dragon,
another from the mouth of the beast, i. e. the wild beast of the
Apocalypse — the pope; the other from the mouth of the false
prophet, which last I have identified with that Popery that exists
without a pope, but not the less Popery on that account. Well,
if this be so, the three unclean spirits are — the spirit of infidelity
which I exemplified, and the action of which I pointed out; the
spirit of Popery, the spread, the power, and the pretensions of
which I also analyzed; and, lastly, the spirit of hierarchism,
known in more popular phraseology as Tractarianism, or, if I do
not use an ofi"ensive term, Puseyism, which is just Popery without
its head, not the less real and mischievous on that account. These
three unclet^i spirits, you observe, are termed '^ the spirits of de-
xdls" — whether that word ought to be rendered strictly devils or
1848: OR, PROPHECY FULFILLED. 457
demons, is a question which this is not the place to discuss —
"the spirits of devils working miracles."
I showed you last Sunday evening that miracles are not neces-
sarily evidence of truth. If Satan has an archangel's wisdom,
he may also have an archangel's power. It is probable there
may not only be pretended, but real, miracles — i. e. exertions of
power above what man can reach — ^but no miracle on earth can
prove to me that God's word is false ; and if a miracle were to
be wrought equal to raising the dead, and then the performer
were to say that it was to show that transubstantiation is true, I
should despise the miracle-worker, as I would reject the doctrine.
Thus " the spirits of devils working miracles ... go forth unto
the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them
together to battle to the great day of God Almighty." And re-
collect the cry that closes the sixth vial — " Behold, I come as a
thief," i. e. whatever comes next will come with startling effect,
unexpectedly come — will be the footfall, as it were, of the ap-
proaching Lord, the rushing and the sound of his chariot-wheels
as they approach from afar. " Behold, I come as a thief : blessed
is he that watcheth and keepeth his garments, lest he walk
naked." " And He gathered them together unto a place called
in the Hebrew tongue, Armageddon^" on which last I do not
now enter. These three unclean spirits were to prepare the way
for the action of the seventh vial ; and whatever takes place un-
der the seventh vial is to be the explosion of the elements with
which those spirits have impregnated the social system; and I
conceive that what has taken place in Europe during that re-
markable year which is now drawn to its tomb, is the result of
the action of these unclean spirits as the pioneers, and the im-
mediate effect of the pouring out of the seventh vial as the great
primary cause.
The period that immediately preceded 1848, was a period full
of new discoveries. We heard continually ringing in our ears
the most golden promises. The world, we are told, was to be
happy without Christianity, nations to flourish without wars ; and
Christians, echoing the sentiment, thought mankind had too much
good sense ever again to go to war. There never was a calm so
deep, so still, as that which preceded 1848 ; but in that calm,
SECOND SERIES. 39
(^^
J-
ujri7fiiii»5^Tr|
i|5S APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
during that peace, the unclean spirits were acting, working, leaven-
ing, undermining deep below the foundations of society. Prior to
1848, kings actually slept and nodded on their thrones, swords
were beginning to grow rusty in their scabbards, iron was with-
drawn from manufacturing cannon, and was turned to the manu-
facture of rails. The soldier was beginning to be regarded as a
being with an antique aspect, and as the last fading remnant of
a regime that had passed away. The navy was rotting in its
harbours; the cry was heard from every quarter of the land,
'^ Reduce the navy, disband the army;" and new improvements
in our laws about trade were to pacify, to civilize, and almost to
Christianize the world. Were not these the very sentiments that
were uttered ? the cries that intimated the anticipations of man-
kind? And religion itself was remarkably quiet. Professing
Christians quarrelled with each other apparently because they
had nothing better to do, and phantom grievances took the place
of real ones, and great hopes were introduced of the spread of re-
ligion, prophecies of the approaching Millennium were heard ; in
short, no language that I can employ is adequate to describe the
deep and auspicious quiet, the complete calm, that reigned for
many years over all the world for years prior to 1848. During
this, however, as I have shown you, the unclean spirits were
silently at work — Popery, and Puseyism, and Infidelity, each
with its respective retinue of minor parties and subdivisions
Sometimes, it is true, they quarrelled with each other, as Michelet
and Quinet, personations of the spirit of infidelity ; and Eugene
Sue quarrelled with the Jesuits and archbishops and priests of
France — but though rivals in renown, they were brethren in arms :
they were kindred spirits from different sources, tending to the
same great result — ^namely, sapping the foundations of society,
nourishing intellectual pride and sensual indulgence, and en-
deavouring to create a happiness without Christianity, and a re-
ligion without Grod.
Let me just give one or two extracts from the writings of one
of the master-spirits of the present movement in France,, as evi-
dence above ground what was working under. He is one of the
most popular writers upon Socialism ) his talents have made him
formidable, and his sentiments have made him terrible : I mean
1848; OR, PROPHECY FULFILLED. 459
Proudhon, the great head of the Socialist movement. I take
these extracts from his writings previous to the convulsions of
1848. " Property. Property is nothing in itself; it is merely
a privilege in circulation, as a toll on a river, a remain of feu-
dality, the abolition of which is the necessary completion of our
great and glorious revolution l" ^^ Family. It does not belong
to you, bourgeoisie, who buy your wives and sell your daughters,
without measure and without remorse, to speak of family. Family,
we have told you a thousand times, has become by property a
den of prostitution, of which the father is the souteneur ^ and the
mother entremettciiseJ' Religion. ^^ That horrible and detesta-
ble fraud.'' God. ^'Grod does not exist; and if he did, he
would, as represented by the priests, be a monster of tyranny.
Let the priest bear in mind that true virtue — that which renders
us worthy of eternal truth, is to struggle against religion and
against Grod. Grod is essentially hostile to our nature, and we
have no reason to submit to his authority. We arrive at science
in spite of him — at happiness in spite of him. Each step in
advance is a victory in which we crush divinity. Grod, behold
thyself dethroned and fallen ! Thy name, so long the hope of
the poor, the refuge of the repentant sinner, henceforth devoted
to contempt and anathema, will be scouted among men; for God
is folly and cowardice, hypocrisy, and falsehood, tyranny and
misery. God is evil. As long as humanity inclines before the
altar, humanity will be accursed. God, away with thee ! For
from to-day, relieved from the fear of thee and become wise, I
swear, my hand raised toward heaven, that thou art only the
hangman of my reason."
These are but a few of the horrible sentiments and expressions
of this ^' unclean spirit," or, as I called them, judging from the
source from which they spring, the croakings of one of the " frogs"
that go out and devastate the earth. And it is a remarkable con-
firmation of what Mr. Elliott thought, that as three frogs were
the ancient arms of France, the three unclean spirits should trace
their origin and commit their first and greatest devastations in the
midst of that country. How truly has it come to pass ! I need
not refer to the spirit of Popery or of the Beast ; I need not men-
tion the magnificent cathedrals it has raised ; the progress of ita
460 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
priests ; the popularity of its principles, in low places and in high
— with the multitude, and with many of the nobility. I need
not refer to the progress of the unclean spirit Puseyism, that
spirit which has tainted thousands ; and at this moment, though
its worst pretensions are softened, its real principles and power
and progress are substantially unchanged and unchecked. These
three unclean spirits, then, on the progress of which we do not
now enter, are actors in the same drama : " they are the spirit of
devils working miracles, who go forth to the kings of the earth,
to gather them together to the battle of that great day of God
Almighty."
I now come to the seventh vial," the description of which I read
to you from Rev. xvi. 19. You will notice that each of the pre-
ceding vials, as I showed you in my lectures in Exeter Hall, were
emptied upon particular parts of the Roman empire. As, for in-
stance, one was emptied upon the rivers, another emptied its
scorching contents upon the fountains of waters, and the sixth
emptied on only a third part of the Roman Papal empire. But,
as you will see, it is implied of this vial, that it ceases to be a
special, and becomes an universal judgment. The language used
respecting it is, that it is poured out upon the air ; and you
cannot open a newspaper without seeing allusions that indicate
how the air is used, as indeed it was used in ancient times. To
quote from papers — " Our social atmosphere" is the language of
one ; " Our political atmosphere" is the language of another ; and
this vial emptied into the air was to be followed by thunders and
lightnings; i. e. insurrections, convulsions, strange cries, awful
sentiments, all to be the effects of its influence, heard by the
whole population of the Roman, i. e. the ecclesiastico-political
Papal earth. The expression "poured into the air," indicates its
universality : the air is the medium of sound — is that element
which reaches to the highest, and descends to the lowest — binds
together into one the remotest of mankind : the air must be
breathed by all — by the queen upon the throne, and by the very
meanest and poorest of her subjects ; it enters the House of Lords
and the House of Commons, the General Assembly and the arch-
bishop's palace; it must be inhaled by every one, and out of it
humanity cannot exist : we may expect, therefore, that whatever
1848; OR, PROPHECY FULFILLED. ^l
be the influence of this vial, universality would become one of its
most striking and remarkable characteristics. You notice, too,
that when the vial was poured out into the air, a voice was heard
from heaven, saying, '^ It is done/'
These words, "It is done,'' are used in the Apocalypse to
denote the commencement of a new state of things. Thus, in
chap, xxi., which I have explained to you, we shall find that it is
said, at verse 5, " He that sat upon the throne said. Behold, I
make all things new ;" i. e. the new heaven and the new earth.
"He said unto me, It is done." The old heaven and the old
earth have passed away, the new heaven and the new earth are
come. The same words were used at the era of the Reformation :
" It is done ;" that is, one regime has passed away, and another
has now commenced : and, as I explained to you, we shall always
find whenever there is an Apocalyptic voice heard in heaven, it
has invariably its echo upon earth ; and you will recollect, every
extract that I made from history showed you, that whenever there
was such a voice uttered in heaven describing a transaction taking
place on earth, it found an echo from mankind — a counter-voice,
as it were, implying that that voice was heard and responded to.
Just see if what takes place here is not responded to. There is
a newspaper published in Italy called La Patria : an extract
from it is striking; it was written after the French Revolution
of 1848, and gives an echo of " It is done :" —
THE PROPHET. THE JOURNALIST.
"And the seventh angel poured out "Whoever looks beyond to-morrow
his vial into the air,* and there came a — whoever looks narrowly into the
great voice out of the temple of heaven, state of European nations — sees that
from the throne, saying, It is done, the heavens thunder from ahove, and
And there were voices, and thunders, the earth beneath quakes. Some causes
and lightnings; and there was a great of this lie on the surface, but others
earthquake, such as was not since men are deep beneath ; for the thought and
were upon the earth, so mighty an the heart of men were never so disturb-
earthquake, and so great." ed, never so ardent. For a long while,
they who governed the actions and
the consciences of men, prepared, and
at the same time delayed, this time of
ruin and of restoration. Now it can-
not either be prepared or delayed.
The measure is full : it overflows."
39*
462 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
Such is a human echo of the divine words, " It is done." The
Times is the newspaper which may be called the barometer
of public opinion — the newspaper which responds to the force of
public sentiment, and from which you may gather a faithful re-
flection of it. Hear its echo of *^ It is done." That paper says
(October, 1848) — " On the stage of Europe we witness the per-
formance of a drama more tremendous, and even more wild, than
even a melodramatist ever conceived. Capitals, empires, races,
are the personages of the wonderful plot : the most surprising
incidents naturally succeed one another ] and if we think we have
beheld the catastrophe, it only serves to fix our expectations on
something more terrible and universal. So great are the vicissi-
tudes of the principal personages, that it is already impossible to
recognise them. As for ourselves, with avalanches thundering
past our heads, we are only hoping that our turn may not come
next." And then, speaking of the future that is before us, the
same writer proceeds — " The next twelvemonth will add a quarter
of a million to the crowded and ill-employed population of this
island, with war and revolution around us, and a failing ex-
chequer among us. We will not insist on what is still impend-
ing — the visitation of a terrible epidemic. So far we are happily
distinguished from our neighbours, in being allowed some breath-
ing time, perhaps, to prepare." ,How just is this sentiment!
how Christian, whether meant so or not ! *' With sedition and
insurrection around us, and with the lesson of continental ruin
deeply impressed upon the minds of the people, we seem to be on
the still and solemn eve of important events, the good or evil of
which will depend on our own preparations.
You recollect that at the destruction of Jerusalem, and just
before the last shock which left it in ruins, there was a lull — a
respite given, and during that respite every Christian escaped
from Jerusalem, and found shelter at Pella. Now is the respite
before the destruction of the ten kingdoms, during which the cry
is heard, " Come out of her, my people." Every man is called
upon to shake himself loose from all connection with foredoomed
Babylon, and to stand ready to rise and soar far above the tre-
mendous scenes that will soon close upon us.
The same paper goes on : — " Should the storm reach us, no
1848; OR, PROPHECY FULFILLED. 463
policy but the popular policy will stand/' So far so well : the
right way to save institutions is thoroughly to reform them 3 and
every wise man should feel that this is a sacred duty devolving
upon him. There must be no abuses : these will not stand the
storm ; all must be thoroughly cleansed and made ready for the
issue. The same paper goes on to describe the extent of this
earthquake : — '^ There are Central and Northern Germany all on
the spring to grasp the duchies and despoil Denmark ; while the
old-fashioned (and to the Peace Congress Committee) highly dis-
tasteful intervention of diplomatists is paring the claws of Ger-
man ambition ; the burghers of those great seats of civilization,
Berlin and Frankfort, are cutting one another's throats. Not to
be beaten by the pacific citizens of Berlin and Frankfort, the
Viennese get up barricades, a siege, and a slaughter of their own,
with accompaniments of rapine, lust, and brutality, which nothing
but the presence of an armed soldiery is able to repress. Mean-
while, those admirable men, the modern Romans, with whom the
allies and friends of the Peace and Arbitration Congress have
been sympathizing and sonnetteering for the last forty years,
commit a ferocious assassination, which all Rome applauds, drive
the head of the Roman Catholic Church into ignominious exile,
and introduce a confusion and anarchy which defy all tranquilliza-
tion, except by an iron hand and a sharp-pointed sword. Nor do
Rome, Berlin, Frankfort, and Vienna bound the prospect of war
and civil contention. While Sclaves are combining against
Magyars, and Germans raving against Danes, an army of 90,000
men is protecting Paris against a repetition of the struggles of
February and June. It now, humanly speaking, depends upon
the whim of a party, the predilections of a province, the prestige
of a name, the integrity of a prefect, or an intricacy of accidents,
whether all France may not, within ten days of this date, be con-
vulsed by two sanguinary factions fighting on the side of Louis
Napoleon and Cavaignac.
^' That there are men in France who hate all war and detest
civil war — who recognise the loss, the ruin, the shame which it
entails — I doubt not. But is there any one single fact in the
published accounts of the latest emewtes, which can induce us to
believe that there are not in Paris 50,000 or 80,000 men ready
464 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
to fight in December with the same ferocity that they displayed
in February, in March, and in June ? At this moment, in the
capital of France, as well as in those of Austria and Prussia, the
existence of civil concord and the preservation of peace are iden-
tified with the firmness of military leaders and the vigour of the
forces they command/'
And to show how truly these recent shocks are the results of
the action of secret, unseen, and subtle principles, I will read the
following extract from the Times. The unclean spirits, as I told
you, were to prepare for these events which this writer has thus
delineated : — " A great English writer of the seventeenth century,
who drew with unsparing truth the dark picture of the civil broils
in which he lived, has remarked, that when it enters into the
counsels of Providence to humble the pride of a nation, and
break it up in confusion and changes, very mean and vulgar in-
struments may oftentimes serve such purposes as those. Such a
result needs not the greatness of an Alexander or a Cyrus, but
may be accomplished by a Masaniello or a John of Leyden :
' For,' said this writer, in a manner in which our readers will re-
cognise the age and the style of Cowley, ^ when G-od sought to
humble the Egyptians, he did not assemble the great serpents and
monsters of Afric, but a plague of locusts swept over the land,
and left it desolate.' The same plague of locusts has fallen upon
Europe. The ravage of the last ten months has been accom-
plished by men who were undistinguished even by their crimes.
A combination of hidden and minute causes has swept away all
resistance; or, to speak more correctly, men, in their lassitude
and their impotence, have abandoned themselves, without an
effort, to the torrent, which a single great man with dauntless
will and a good cause might, perchance, have stemmed."
This revolution, by the secrecy and subtlety of the springs of
its explosion, shows how correctly I interpret the Apocalypse,
when I conceive that the seventh vial is now being poured out.
Metternich, who is supposed to have been one of the most accom-
plished statesmen in the world, made the striking remark, that
after him there would be a deluge. After the first outbreak at
Paris in February, the Times made the observation — " It is by
no means unlikely that, in the present state of national feeling in
1848; OR, PROPHECY FULFILLED. 465
many of the provinces, and in the electrical condition of the po-
litical atmosphere'^ — (" And the seventh angel poured out his
vial into the air") — " all over Europe, the fall of central autho-
rity will be followed by a series of local explosions/'
These are the sentiments of the conductors, the collectors, and
the exponents of public opinion. As a corollary to the explosion,
as it is called by the Times, in February, the president of the
National Assembly said, on June 25th, after the frightful mas-
sacres that he had witnessed — "The immense loss of life . . .
never any thing seen like it in Paris." The Times says — "Such
a scene of slaughter was never witnessed since the massacre of
St. Bartholomew." And the Standard says — "Nothing in the
Revolution of 1789 at all comparable to it for amount of blood-
shed." And the Patriot newspaper says — "No similar political
catastrophe occurs in history. Great changes have been effected
by a single battle, upon which the fate of empires has been
staked; but, in this instance, the apparent inadequacy of the
cause, the suddenness and spontaniety of the movements, and
the extent to which the convulsive agency has propagated itself,
give to the European Revolution of 1848 the character of a pro-
digious phenomenon.^' Such is the language of men about the
Revolution — "an earthquake, such as was not since men were
upon the earth, so mighty an earthquake, and so great." God
cried from heaven, " It is done ;" newspapers, and those who col-
lect for them, and convey as the conduits, as it were, of public
opinion, cry also from the earth, " It is done."
In order to show how true is the statement of the papers, how
just is the language of the Apocalypse, or rather how applicable
to these events, I would notice the following distinctions : when
the sixth seal was opened, (Rev. vi. 12,) it is said, " there was a
great earthquake ;" but you recollect this earthquake represented
the fall of the Pagan power, which was gradually undermined by
the Christian religion, and fell like an avalanche into the depths
below, and melted away before the sun, leaving only fragmentary
wrecks behind. Again, at that glorious epoch, the ascent of the
Two "Witnesses, the Paulicians in the East and the Waldenses in
the West, when Great Britain separated from the ten kingdoms,
and became a protesting witness against them — namely, at the
466 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
period of the Reformation — we read that there was also a great
earthquake; and in its vibrations this country shook itself
free from all connection with the Apostasy. But this third
earthquake is described as such, and so great, that there never
was the like of it upon the earth. It is described by attributes
which show it to be quite distinct from others. Former revolu-
tions altered the framework of the social system ; this has dis-
organized and dissolved it. Former revolutions modified the ma-
chinery ; this one has broken it to pieces. Former revolutions
acted upon the surface, and scorched for an hour ; this one has
upheaved society from its depths, and disclosed its terrible abysms.
What fearful sentiments and scenes have been spread abroad!
Kings have been flung from their seats; their prime-ministers
have been murdered before their eyes. Laws it took centuries to
mature, have been swept away in an hour. Institutions, thought
fixed like stars, are dissolved like frost-work in the sun. The
gradations of prince, and peer, and peasant, are all macadamized
and beaten down by the wheels of this terrific revolution. It
seems as if a mysterious wind had smitten the earth, and bowed
the great, the mighty, and the royal as it passed by, as the flowers
of the grass are bowed before the storm. Austria and Prussia,
and France and Italy, and Switzerland and Spain, are all strug-
gling like dismasted ships in a tempestuous ocean, reeling ever
as the wind strikes them, and threatening every moment to sink
into the depths. All former revolutions were resistance to actual
or alleged oppression ; this revolution is contending for abstract
rights. In past revolutions the ideas of law and connection with
the past were all retained ; here they are abjured, the right of
revolution is legalized, and the only fixed principle that exists is
the duty of unfixing every thing upon the earth.
Such are the characteristics of this revolution ; yet all this is
but a sketch in brief of the dim and threatening shadows that
lower upon the horizon of 1849. Where, I may ask, at this day
are the armies, the ensigns, the standards, the kings, the laws,
the constitutions, with which 1848 dawned upon mankind?
What it took centuries to build, and used to take centuries to pull
down, have been dissolved in a single day. It seems as if all
the elements, long pent up in the bo.som of the earth, having
1848; OR, PROPHECY FULFILLED. 467
gathered strength from repression, had exploded with more de-
vastating fury, and borne every thing before them. In terrible
succession, Denmark, Sardinia, and Saxony began to agitate. A
feverish feeling influenced Europe at the commencement of this
year. In one night, Paris was a volcano ; the king and queen
were projected across the ocean by the explosion — its throne, its
constitution, and its charter illuminating the darkness by their
blaze. In June that volcano was quenched for a while, but not
extinguished, in the blood of citizens, who slew each other at
their own doors, and beside their firesides ; and, as if to show the
demoniac elements that were at work, they called this glory, and
baptized it ^' dying for their country." But this was not a mere
French, but an European earthquake. Berlin reeled under its
shocks ; Vienna felt them, and exhibited a scene almost equal to
those that had darkened Paris. Kings, and cabinets, and coun-
cils, finding no pillar to which to cleave, and no spot on which to
stand, fled as from impending doom, amid barricades and scenes
of blood, seeking shelter in more peaceful lands ; and Austria,
the overturning of which seemed as probable to the most saga-
cious statesmen as the overturning of the Alps — Austria, the last
crutch of the Papacy, the keystone, as it was called, of sove-
reignty in Europe — explodes in a day, and scenes of bloodshed
take place which even rival those of the French Revolution.
This vast empire holds in its grasp Italy, and Hungary, and Po-
land ; and, in one day, all these countries burst from their orbits,
and are flying loose from the central gravitation and control, and
the explosion convulses the kingdoms of the earth, till the distant
crash shakes the very heart of the Russian autocrat. The shores
of the Rhine, the Vistula, the Danube, and the Po, are covered
with ruins. In the hearts of these nations there is no restorative
element equal to the permanent reconstruction of them. There
is no religion left. Religion comes from a word, religo, which
means to bind together; binding man to God, and man to man.
There is no religion in these countries, in order to give us a hope
that these elements will be reconstructed. All authority ia
abandoned, all loyalty perished, all obedience prostrate. The
exchequers are empty, commerce is paralyzed, laws have ceased.
Thieves, and beggars, and heroes swarm the streets, plundering
468 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
where they can. The glorious liberty of the law is exchanged
for the bondage of licentiousness; and for the subjection to laws,
so necessary to the existence of society, they have the galling ser-
vitude of a despot more grinding and terrible than ever. Now I
ask you if ever, in the history of Europe or of the world, there
was such an earthquake, and so great, or any that could be com-
pared to it at all ? There will be, no doubt, a patching up ; I
have no doubt there will be a partial restoration ; but it is only
preparatory to the yet more terrible disorganization that precedes
the coming of the Son of Man. The Edinhurgli Review, in
speaking of the reconstruction of the German empire, says — ^' It
involves no less than the annihilation and absorption of thirty-
seven of the sovereignties of Europe, including two of the great-
est powers of the world, in a new and colossal state, under an
ancient title, but with such a character as in reality it never bore
before. It implies a pacific and bloodless conquest of as many
kingdoms as fell before the sword of Caleb, for the consolidation
of a dominion as mighty as the empire of the Caliphs." It
speaks of it as a complete and total revolution. I recommend to
your attentive perusal a discourse by the Rev. Gr. Croly, D. D., in
which he eloquently shows, by referring to recent instances, that
wherever there is national sin, there follows, as the bolt the ex-
plosion, righteous retribution. To take the case of France : Ta-
hiti had become one of the gems on the bosom of the sea. The
London Missionary Society had been instrumental in converting
to Christ its queen and its people, who had become not merely
professors, but Christians indeed. France cast its eye upon it, or
rather the Jesuits did so, and made France believe that what was
Jesuit ambition would be French glory, if they could seize that
country, and annex it to their own. They made the experiment;
the unoffending queen was treated with a savagism the most dis-
graceful, such as to cast a stain upon her assailant, whom we
should rejoice rather to act with and to love. Besides this, the
iniquitous war in Algeria was carried on with a ferocity almost
unparalleled in the history of modern warfare. It was an ag-
gressive war ; and whenever a nation plunges into aggressive war,
I conceive that that nation commits a sin. War in self-defence
is scriptural; or, at least, I say it is sanctioned by Scripture in-
1848; OR, PROPHECY FULFILLED. 469
directly ; but war as an aggression is a grievous iniquity in the
sight of God. In Algeria the poor Moors were persecuted with
sword, and fagot, and musket; and one horrible barbarity you
may have read of, in which unarmed men, and women with babes
in their bosoms, were crowded into a cave, when French glory
piled combustibles against the mouth, and in the morning four
hundred dead bodies of men and mothers with babes in their
bosoms, were found within. The prince of Algeria was made a
captive ; but he was no sooner locked up in his prison, and France
rejoicing at the glory that thus crowned her African crusade,
than the shock of the earthquake came, and the king and queen
of France were exiles on the shores of Great Britain. So true is
it that national sins draw down national judgments.
Among the striking scenes that characterize this revolution,
you may notice the strange reverses of the principal actors. La-
martine was the idol of the spring; his captivating eloquence
found an echo in every Frenchman's heart, and his bland and pa-
cific spirit made him the subject of universal admiration. He is
now cast out, like a sea-weed thrown upon the shore, to rot, high
and dry, beyond the reach of the waves of popular adulation.
Cavaignac was as much adored in June ; he was hailed as the re-
storer of his country — his sword was thought a glorious sceptre,
his stern work of blood was called patriotism; and the people al-
most smothered him with expressions of gratitude and love. I
need not ask you, where is he now ? Their favourite now is one
whose chief merit is the airy shadow of a mighty name — the name
of one who once shook the earth by his tread, and made thrones
quake by his footfall. As if to show the wild and intoxicating
nature of the revolution that has burst forth, Louis Napoleon is
now at the head of one of the greatest nations — great in numbers,
and great in its past history — upon the face of the earth. At a
time, too, when France should be solemnized and saddened by the
terrible events which it has witnessed, and the fearful convulsions
out of which it has come, the whole Parisian population is rush-
ing to a playhouse, in which is performed one of the most popu-
lar dramas ever exhibited in Paris, consisting- of a blasphemous
and obscene parody on God's holy word, — as if still further to
SECOND SERIES. 40
470 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
show tliat all this is ttie result of the action of an unclean and
filthy spirit acting from beneath.
Such, then, is the evidence of this earthquake. God has risen
from his place to punish the nations of the earth. If this earth-
quake of 1848 be not the earthquake of the seventh vial, you -will
agree with me that it is surely the greatest approximation to it that
ever occurred.
It is added in the description of the effects produced by the
action of the seventh vial, '^ there were voices, and thunderings,
and lightnings.'^ Some have said this may mean the successive
explosions ; but I think not : I think there is a separate meaning.
Is it not a fact, that voices and thunders o'f all descriptions are at
this hour echoing throughout Europe ? What are all those terri-
ble sentiments that we have heard, but the voices that follow on
the outburst of an earthquake ? What are all those voices under
which the mob marches to the havoc, and by which each club-ora-
tor electrifies his audience — " The rights of the people ;" " The
Red Republic ;'' '^ The sovereignty of the people ;'' " Liberty,
Equality, and Fraternity,^' and that voice which has not been
heard in Rome for a thousand years, ^^ Death to the pope,"
^^ Down with the pope ?" Of these, however, I shall speak on a
subsequent evening. Some of these, however, are more like
thunders than voices. " The age requires it ;" ^^ It is a political
necessity ;" " Vox Populi, Vox Dei," — a very profane sentiment :
the Vox Populi may be the Vox Dei, if it be the voice of a Chris-
tian people ; but the voice of the people is too often, '' Away with
him, away with him," " Crucify him, crucify him." In this
country we have only had the half-spent sounds of this earthquake :
we felt the vibrations of the central volcano, and saw its glare ;
but the flame, thanks be to God, had no fuel to feed upon ; we
are not among the ten kingdoms ; we shook loose from them at
the Reformation : we are a Protestant land witnessing for Christ.
We read next, that " the great city was divided into three
parts." I told you in another place, that the tripartite division of
Europe would be under the seventh vial, and would immediately
precede the downfall of Babylon the Great. I have sought out
the evidence of this tripartation taking place. Just watch some
of its indications. What is the leading ^' voice ?" Nationalism.
1848; OR, PROrHECY FULFILLED. 471
Every country is beginning to demand what is called nationalism.
*^ Italy for the Italians;" " Germany for the Germans;" ^^ France
for the French." You will find some of the papers noticing the
fact, that Europe seems dividing itself into three great family di-
visions ; and if you will watch the signs of the times, you will
find they confirm the statement. The outline of this division is
already discernible. Austria, Prussia, and all minor and subordi-
nate states of Germany, are to be consolidated into one grand
Germanic empire. France and her dependencies seem already
consolidated. TBen in Italy, all its petty sovereignties are at this
moment being fused and melted into one. Then Spain and Bel-
gium, according to their respective polarities, will join one of these
three. So that we have at this moment the outline of the tripar-
tite division of Papal Europe visible upon the surface of society;
and no one knows but that a day or a week may show the triparti-
tion complete. Whether we are to be included in it I know not.
Perhaps it depends on what Britain continues to be. I solemnly
believe — and I think it right that every one should disburden his
conscientious convictions, careless who applauds or who condemns
them ; for the time is come when we must have done with defer-
ence to the judgment which others may pass upon us — that if this
country endow the Popish priesthood in Ireland, then Great Bri-
tain will rejoin the ten kingdoms; and the instant that we rejoin
them we shall come under the tripartite division of the Papacy,
and shall perish among the wreck of nations. I forgive all that
is past, and I would forget it — may God bless us still ! — but if wc,
by a direct act, countenance, endow, support, and patronize Anti-
christ and Antichrist's error, then I do conceive we shall have com-
mitted a national sin as great as that of France, because amid
greater light ; and that we shall instantly draw down upon our
heads national judgments. But I hope and believe that this will
not be our crime : there are many good men in power — men who
have Christian hearts, and I hope that they will have the courage
to speak out; that they will shake themselves loose from all
trammels, and do what they feel to be their duty in the sight of
God to their nation, careless of what party may fall, or what side
may rise. All parties will soon be broken up except two — those
472 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
who are with Christ, and those who are with Antichrist ; they that
are for God, and they that are against him.
Then it is added — and this is the last point I shall notice to-
night — "The cities of the nations fell." The " great city" is the
politico-ecclesiastical corporation called Rome or the Popedom;
and as Rome is the great politico-ecclesiastical city which embraces
the ten kingdoms, " the cities of the nations" I believe are the
politico-ecclesiastical institutions, or the established churches. I
do not pronounce upon the principle that lies at their foundation ;
this is neither the time nor the place to discuss it : I am speaking
only of historic facts and of the fulfilment of prophecy. In all
Europe there is scarcely an established church left. In Prussia
it is all but dissolved. In Austria, the stronghold of ecclesiastical
despotism, it is all swept away, and the demand of the people is,
" Equality for all modes of worship." Hungary, Bohemia, and
Bavaria, are all moving in the same direction. In France the
merest thread of an establishment exists, if indeed it can be
called an establishment. Besides which, some sprinklings of that
vial haive lighted on our own land. The Church of Ireland is all
but gone : in the day when its duty should have been done, it
criminally neglected it, and its patrons badly patronized it, though
at this moment there are more devoted men in it than in any
other church upon earth. I need not tell you that the Church of
Scotland has been weakened, and is at this moment violently op-
posed by those who have seceded ; and the Church of England
is now literally burning and consuming at both ends. A pious
and excellent man, Mr. Noel, with whose evangelical sentiments I
can truly sympathize, has left the church on one side ; and Mr.
Newman, and a whole host, numbering some eighty or ninety
clergymen, have seceded and gone into the Church of Rome on
the other side. Here, therefore, we have this ancient establish-
ment consuming at both ends. I fear Mr. Noel is only the first
of a lengthened procession : I do not know what his principles
are, or express an opinion upon them ; I merely state the fact,
that here are some of the Evangelical party going forth at one
side, and the Popish party departing at the other ; and thus the
institution is suffering at both ends. I believe that all three es-
tablishments will ultimately be dragged down : the spirit of the
1848: OR, PROPHECY FULFILLED. 4^
age, be that spirit from above or from below, is insisting upon it,
and those who were supposed to be their champions are leaving
their championship.
But while I state these ominous facts, let me not conceal from
you that there are some bright points. God never sends us all
darkness without some gleams of sunshine. In Grermany the
censorship of the press has been abolished, and you may publish
there now what you please. Austria, which had the air of a dun-
geon, and whose custom-house rigidly excluded Bibles, tracts, and
evangelical preaching, is now thrown open, and there is free cir-
culation of the Bible. In Bohemia, the land of Huss — in Bavaria,
the most bigoted — in France, in Italy, and in Rome itself, the
word of God is circulated and the gospel may be preached. What
is this ? You may recollect that just before Great Babylon comes
into judgment, there is heard a voice saying, " Come out of her,
my people.^' These openings for the circulation of the Bible,
and for the preaching of the gospel, are the echoes of this voice,
" Come out of her, my people." Notice again the fact, to which
I can only briejQy allude, that the Jews are at this moment eman-
cipated in almost every country of Europe. In Prussia the Jews
were peculiarly oppressed ; in Austria they were ground down to
the very dust— in both they are free. In Home they were treated
like swine, and driven to the Ghetto ; they are now emancipated,
and may reside where they please. The great earthquake which
has shaken the whole world, and rocked dynasties, churches,
thrones, has broken the chains of the Jew, and set him free.
And we can see also the signs of greater activity and energy
among the visible churches. All are alive : every one seems to
be stirred up. What is a more interesting fact than this, that
just now, while all Europe is convulsed to its centre, and Popery,
Infidelity, and Tractarianism are working together with all their
might, the Church Missionary Society is celebrating its jubilee in
a state of prosperity almost unprecedented ; and our queen comes
down with dignity from her throne and adds her contribution, not
to the society of which Dr. Pusey and the Bishop of Exeter are
the exponents, but to that society which is so distinguished for
its evangelical Christianity, and on which the blessing of God haa
40*
4T4 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
SO signally rested. These are still, small, and musical voices amid
the thunders, the voices, and the lightnings of the world.
And now, my dear friends, let me ask. How stands it with you ?
Be not satisfied with beholding the panorama which I have en-
deavoured to explain, or with hearing the voices and witnessing
the lightnings to which I have alluded. Are your feet upon the
Kock of ages ? Is your trust and confidence in the Lamb of God ?
Be not clever to utter the last new shibboleth, or to wear the fa-
vourite ecclesiastical face ; but able to sing the song of Moses, of
God, and of the Lamb. We are in the midst of judgments that
are abroad upon the earth — let us learn wisdom while all is con-
vulsed around us ; let us remember there is one spot that cannot
be shaken, and standing on which, like the harpers by the glassy
sea, we may praise our God, and glorify him amid the fire — that
spot is the Bock of ages. Are we upon the Lord's side ? Whe-
ther we go to Christ, or Christ comes to us, is immaterial to our
everlasting state : if we are prepared for the one, we are ready for
the other; and if you are the Lord's, and if the Lord be yours,
then what is death to you ? A mere transfer from the scene of
thunderings, and voices, and lightnings, and a great earthquake,
to that bright sunshine, and to that sweet river whose streams
make glad the city of God.
"An heir of heaven," said Coleridge, very beautifully, in speak-
ing of his own death —
"An heir of heaven, I fear not death;
In Christ I live, in Christ I draw the breath
Of the true life ; let the earth, sea, and sky
Make war against me; on my head I show
Their mighty Master's seal; in vain they try
To end my life, that can but end my wo.
Is that a death-bed where a Christian lies ?
Yes — but not his : 'tis Death itself that dies."
475
LECTURE XXXIV.
THE CONSUMPTION OF BABYLON.
"He which tostifieth these things saith, Surely I come quickly; Amen.
Even so, come, Lord Jesus." — Revelation xxii. 20.
"And the seventh angel poured out his vial into the air; and there came a
great voice out of the temple of heaven, from the throne, saying, It is done."
Eevelation xvi'. 17.
I HAVE been unfolding in successive lectures the various scenes
that are to precede the advent of our blessed Lord : I have en-
deavoured also to prove that the Millennium, as far as the light
of Scripture leads us to conclude, is not to precede but to suc-
ceed the advent of the Lord, and the manifestation of the sons
of God. Last Lord's-day evening I showed you that one of the
great premonitory signs of the near advent of that great epoch
of which I have spoken so much, is the pouring out of the
seventh vial. It is the last of the judgments in the hand of the
angel. Before it, the warning cry is lifted up, "Behold I come
as a thief.'' After it, great Babylon comes into remembrance,
and the Bride makes herself ready.
I endeavoured last Lord's-day evening to identify what I had
preached as prophecy in 1847 with what I believe to be its per-
formance in 1848. We saw it then in the prospect, not knowing
that it was at our doors : we see it now, I believe, in its per-
formance ; and we are about to enter an epoch, I solemnly be-
lieve, the most testing, the most searching, the most startling
that ever fell upon the experience of the Christian church, or
of mankind at large. I gathered from the fact, that the seventh
angel poured out his vial, i. e. the symbol of judgment, into the
air — that, whatever was the nature of this judgment, it would be
universal, in other words, spread over the ten kingdoms that con-
stitute the empire constantly exhibited in the Apocalypse as that
476 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
in which the progress of Antichrist was to be developed. "We
may expect, therefore, that this vial will have an universal effect
upon these kingdoms, and probably upon all the kingdoms of the
earth. The air is that which every man breathes, which rises to
the highest throne and descends to the lowest cellar, without
which none can live, and which, tainted by miasma or not, all
must breathe. This vial, then, was to affect the air; probably
at this moment it is physically disorganized and deranged, and
malaria and seeds of disease, as attested by medical opinion, are
at this moment kept in solution in it : but surely we see on all
hands the evidence of its terrible moral and political derange-
ment. There is not a nation in Europe that has not felt the
shock; not one is spared; even we ourselves were slightly affect-
ed with the remote contagion of the day — as if to indicate to us
by feeling, as well as from prophecy, that the seventh vial is now
being poured out into the air.
The second great event that is to arise from it, is "a voice out
of the temple of heaven, and from the throne of God, saying, It
is done." You recollect I explained in my first lectures, that
wherever there was an intimation indicating a new phasis coming
from heaven, there was always in the history of the past a re-
sponse given from below responding to it. This I showed you
at great length. Then, I said it was our duty to show that, while
a voice in heaven cried, '^It is done," i. e. the last vial is emptied
and its action has begun, there would be gathered from the vehi-
cles of public opinion, the reflectors of public events, some evi-
dence that will prove to us a conviction in the human heart cor-
responding to the intimation from the heavenly throne that this
great event has taken place. One great characteristic of it is,
that there shall be ^ Voices, and thunders, and lightnings, and a
great earthquake, such as never was since men were upon the
earth." I quoted from newspapers the evidences of these.
There is nothing necessarily unholy in reading an extract from a
newspaper in the pulpit. The apostle Paul quoted from heathen
poets in his Epistles, because they helped him to illustrate a
great truth. And why should it be regarded as an invasion of the
most sensitive sense of decorum, that one should quote from the
collectors of public sentiment without, illustrations and evidences
THE CONSUMPTION OF BABYLON. 477
of the fulfilments of divine prophecy within ? On the contrary, T
think it is a duty to do so. I think the ministers of the gospel
are placed as watchmen on the towers of Zion, not only to reiterate
and repeat to all the saving truths of the gospel, but to look
around them, and to state whatever they see that will explain the
providential dealings or prophetic intimations of God, or instruct
mankind with more intimate acquaintance with his blessed will.
I showed you, from various papers, that the epithet all but
universally bestowed upon the recent explosion in Paris, the
vibrations of which have been borne forth in successive concentric
circles over Europe — or the very language used by secular writers
who have no theory of the Apocalypse, is, "this great earth-
quake.'' I showed you that they not only called it an earthquake
repeatedly, but they said that it never had a parallel. I quoted
such instances as these : — The Times newspaper, speaking of
what had taken place in June, said, " Such a scene of slaughter
has not been witnessed since the days of St. Bartholomew." The
Standard ^2i\^j "Nothing in the revolution of 1789 was at all
comparable to the revolution that has taken place in 1848."
This is the very language of the Apocalypse used by political and
newspaper writers. And extracts which I gave at still greater
length, confirm how truly, when Grod cried from heaven, " It is
done," every reflector of public opinion echoed the sentiment, and
said also, " It is done."
I then alluded to the other sign, " voices, and thunders, and
lightnings." These may be regarded as revolutions too — dis-
turbances, emeutes, as they are called, agitations, convulsions
among the people ; though, perhaps, " voices" may have a dis-
tinct meaning. Let any one now listen to the cries of the revo-
lution : " Liberty, equality, fraternity V — here is one voice ;
" The sovereignty of the people !" — here is another voice ; and I
could quote hundreds of similar cries uttered from Paris to Berlin,
and some in our land; all showing that, while the earthquake
thunders from beneath, and God witnesses from the skies, men
also are speaking in unison with the prediction of the Spirit, and
proving God's word to be truth.
I then referred to the tripartite division of " the great city."
The great city is the Church of Rome ; the great city in which
478 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
the witnesses were slain, " spiritually, Sodom and Egypt, was
divided into three parts,'' i. e. its decem-regal division, or its
division into ten kingdoms ; which, I have explained before, shall
cease after this great earthquake, and the whole of the ten king-
doms, France and Germany, with all the other kingdoms, Spain,
Belgium, Portugal, &c., shall be divided into three great sections.
This is the next thing that we look for.
Notice, however, what must take place first of all — disorganiza-
tion, chaos, desolation ; and do you not see, in the midst of all
this disorganization which now goes on, certain polarities begin-
ning to show themselves? The Germans insist upon German
unity, as if they were to constitute one great division ; the French,
again, insist upon their national integrity ; and the Italians are
shouting in the ears of the pope and of the Austrians, " Italy for
the Italians.'' It seems, therefore, extremely probable that we
shall have France, and Germany, and Italy, the three great divi-
sions of Europe, with their respective clustering dependencies,
Spain, Portugal, and Belgium, forming that grand tripartite
division of Europe which precedes the destruction of Babylon,
and is the preparation for the bright advent of the Lord of glory.
I only ask you to watch and read God's providential dealings in
the light of God's revealed and inspired word.
Then it is added, '■'' the cities of the nations fell." I showed
you that the word city, ^^ the great city," was taken in its politico-
ecclesiastical sense ; and we must understand by it the churches
established in the various kingdoms of the earth. I said they
would fall. The fact that it is prophesied they shall fall, is not
an intimation that they are either sinful or excellent in them-
selves. It is simple prophecy : it is neither to lessen the afi"ec-
tions of those that love them, nor to nerve the hand of those who
would throw them down. When God pronounces a prophecy, he
will take care to fulfil it. It is our business to cleave to duties,
never to attempt to fulfil prophecy : we have nothing to do with
the fulfilment of the prophecy ; God himself takes that into his
own hands ; we have only to do with the discharge of the duty
and responsibilities that are laid upon us. I need not say that
the evidence of this taking place is visible in our own land.
Who does not know that each of the ecclesiastical establishments
THE CONSUMPTION OF BABYLON. 479
has been weakened ? That of Ireland literally topples to its fall.
In England, as I have shown you, it is wasting like a candle that
is burned at both ends. Seventy or eighty of the Tractarian
divines, who ought never to have been in it, have emerged from
it into their congenial darkness, the Church of Rome. But we
see the commencement of secession at the other end. I have
read Mr. NoeFs reasons; I admire the man; I differ from his
chief positions. But it is grievous to add, that abuses prevail in
that great witness for the truth, the Church of England, to
whose scholars, to whose great and noble divines, that man who
does not feel himself indebted, knows little of scriptural theology
— I say, one grieves to know that there are in it abuses, painful
abuses ; but I fancy that if that esteemed and excellent man who
has lately seceded from it, and who proposes a series of movements
against it in the leading towns of the kingdom, had proposed only
its amelioration, or had tried a reformation instead of urging on
revolution, he would perhaps have done more for the glory of
God and for the spiritual good of this great land. However, he
has thought otherwise. The reasons are not new : they have
been argued, and discussed, and agitated a thousand times. I am
one of those who believe that an established church is right in
itself. I know I address some who differ from me. I believe
that this country is deeply indebted to an established church,
with all its faults and abuses. There is too much of a tendency
to go to extremes in this as in other things : one says, " We have
no use for a clock at all ; we have got the sun in the firmament."
Another says, " The clock is so infallibly right, that unless you
set your watch by it, you shall be burned amid fagots, or cast
into the sea." It seems to me that there is an intermediate
party who says, "The clock is a convenient thing; just oil it,
repair it, remove the dust and the cobwebs, set it by the sun,
and follow that clock only as far as it follows the sun." That
seems to me the right and proper course. However, without
entering on the principles that are here involved — about which I
do not wish to provoke discussion, lest such discussion should
divert from the great and mighty facts that are closing around
ua — I must note what is here stated : " The cities of the nations,'''
or the churches of the nations, "fell." There is scarcely an
480 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
established church at this moment in Continental Europe left;
all have been swept away, or the thin and airy ghosts of what
they were alone remain.
The last thing stated, on which 1 mean to make some remarks,
is, that Great Babylon — I shall not take up your time by proving
that this is Rome — "comes into remembrance before Grod/'
This is the next event : chap, xvii., which follows, describes the
consumption of Rome during the French Revolution, to which I
will briefly allude ; and chap. xvii. contains the destruction of
Rome, which is, I believe, impending at her very doors. You re-
collect in that prophecy in 2 Thessalonians it is predicted that the
Lord will " consume Antichrist with the spirit of his mouth, and
destroy him with the brightness of his coming.^' As a person
dies of consumption, he gradually wastes away till the last mo-
ment comes, when some sudden accident, a blood-vessel bursting,
a fall, or something of that nature, precipitates his complete de-
struction. So it is to be with Rome. First, there is to be a
process of wasting, and, lastly, there is to be a stroke of final de-
solation; and this last will be by the personal advent of the Son
of God. I believe, therefore, that the Church of Rome will last
till the Lord of glory comes in some vast providential shock, or
personally in that glory with which he promised to come again.
With respect to her consumption, I consider that it plainly began
at the blessed Reformation. She had '^ sat as a queen and known
no sorrow" till that day ; she was absolutely supreme. A monk,
despised by the mighty of the earth, spoke one great, living
truth — justification by faith alone in the righteousness of Christ ;
and that word was mightier than battle-axes, and swords, and
spears, and armed battalions. It was heard in the Vatican, and
echoed in the deepest dungeon-keeps of the Inquisition. It
startled Leo in his meridian splendour, and the nations felt that
a monk wielding God's truth was mightier than a monarch sway-
ing the greatest sceptre of the greatest empire upon earth. The
truth that Luther brought prominently forward was, justification
by faith alone in the righteousness of Christ; and this is the
true Way to destroy Popery. Those who persist in wielding
mere political weapons against it, fail. If the churches of this
land had done their duty in the days that are past, the statesmen
THE CONSUMPTION OF BABYLON. 481
of this land would never have dared to propose to endow it. The
blame lies not at the doors of our prime-ministers and statesmen,
but at the doors of the bishops and divines of every communion.
We have neglected our duty : can we wonder that statesmen
have forgotten theirs ?
A second consumption of Babylon took place at the French
Revolution. The first still went on — the living waters oozing
through its walls — the voice of truth sounding in multiplied
echoes to the utmost circumference of the earth ; and then came
that tremendous explosion in 1792, which shook all Europe, and
altered the boundary lines of almost every nation that composes
it. At one blow the endowments of the priests were swept away
in various other countries ; the rich property which filled their
monasteries, which they had secured by fraud, was taken away
by force; and the beast began to be burned by the infidelity
which itself had created, and to reap the results and rewards of
its own unfaithfulness to God. And during that consumption
subsequent to the Revolution, we read that Pius, the reigning
pontiff, was dragged a prisoner at the chariot-wheels of Napoleon,
and left the tiara vacant for a while ; but it was a vacancy very
different, as I shall show you, from that which now exists. And
the third wasting element that has been at work is that most ter-
rible foe of the Church of Rome — the Word of God. It has been
spread by the Bible Society, it has been read by the excellent
colporteurs employed by that society, and scattered through
every country in Europe. In Belgium, I was once seated at the
tahle cCTiote, where, according to the habit of the country, were
various persons of various creeds, and I was delighted when I
saw one of those laborious agents going with his pack of French
Bibles, offering them for sale at a low price, telling the people
their contents, and what good things they would find in them,
and I felt that that seemingly insignificant agency was under-
mining the strongest bulwarks of Rome.
But the last and final destruction is that which is indicated in
the striking words, " great Babylon came into remembrance before
God -'' and we find a description at length of this destruction in
chap, xviii. which follows.
I need scarcely tell you that the Jesuits are the most powerful
SECOND SERIES. 41
APOCALYPTIC SICETCHES.
supporters of the popedom. They have been its pioneers. I
have gathered from various sources during the last year evidences
of the gradual destruction, and, at this moment, except in Eng-
land, the extinction, to all outward appearance, of that formidable
body. Popes have repeatedly acknowledged their gratitude to
the society, and it was pressure from without, a dire necessity,
that compelled Clement XIY. to dissolve them. As soon as the
world became quiet, and the subject of Jesuitism vanished from
the public mind, the order rose again, received new sanction from
successive popes, and a few years ago, the Society of Jesus, as it
is called, reigned with a power and acted with an energy un-
equalled at any former period. In 1848, as I have endeavoured
to show, great Babylon came into remembrance before God, to
give unto her the cup of his wrath ; and the very earliest sprin-
kling of the seventh vial fell upon the Jesuits — the missionaries of
the Vatican — the most skilful rowers of the bark of St. Peter ;
and this terrible order at this moment has been driven to the very
ends of the earth. The first blow, I find, was struck in Switzer-
land. The reverend fathers of Loyola formed the Sunderbund,
commenced a crusade against a powerful party of opponents, put
arms in the hands of their followers, consecrated their colours,
distributed among the soldiers miraculous medals, and guaranteed
them a glorious victory. When the collision took place, the
Jesuits fled, their convents were destroyed, and their property
confiscated.
Pius IX. in order to save the papacy in Switzerland, appointed
a new ambassador — Bishop Luquet — ^who addressed a letter to the
Helvetic Diet, in which he stated that Rome always complies with
the wants of the times, and that the pope is ready to enter into
an amicable arrangement for secularizing the monastic order ; in
other words, giving up all the property of the regular clergy, in
order to save that of the secular priests. Thus the blow struck
on the popedom in Switzerland was felt on the very throne of the
beast at Rome.
In France, a Jesuit can scarcely show himself. At Lyons, the
commissioner of the republic ordered all the houses of the Jesuits
to be closed.
In Bavaria, to save themselves, they accused the king of im-
THE CONSUMPTION OF BABYLON. 483
morality ; which the reverend fathers connived at when they were
undisturbed, and rebuked only on the eve of their ruin. Maxi-
milian the king saw their perfidy, appealed to his people, and the
Jesuits speedily disappeared.
Prince Metternich received the refugee fathers in Austria. The
thunder-stamp of revolution sounded through the palaces and
streets of Vienna, and the Jesuits fled from that capital to find
an asylum elsewhere. They were next driven from Bohemia and
Hungary, and other countries; till, concentrated in Italy, they
hoped to enjoy beneath the shadow of the tiara a protection which
crowns and crowbars, and synods and diets had elsewhere denied
them. But there was no escape from the judgment that pursued
them. In Genoa the people rose against the Jesuits, en masse.
The fathers were forced to take refuge under the guns of the cita-
del, till night enabled them to flee like thieves from the spot they
thought peculiarly their own. Modena, Turin, and Florence
followed the example of Genoa ; and in Naples, though patronized
by the king, they were expelled by the people.
Home was their last retreat. Pius IX. was their patron and
their admirer, and, by visiting their monasteries, all but risked
his early popularity in expressing his sympathy with them. But
God's word is mightier than the pope's power. The degenerate
Romans rose against the Jesuits — in the streets the cries were,
" Down with the Jesuits !" The Abbe Giuberti exposed their
political crimes, and the indignation of the mob heightened and
increased in strength. In vain the pope issued proclamations in
their praise, and threats of punishing their opponents. The
oJB&cial gazette of Rome at last published the necessity of their
expulsion, in these words : — " His holiness, who has ever looked
with favour upon these servants of the church, as unwearied
fellow-labourers in the vineyard of the Lord, is deeply grieved at
this unhappy event. However, considering the growing excite-
ment, and the numerous parties which threaten serious trouble,
the pope has been forced to look at these dangers. He has there-
fore made known to the father-general of the company his senti-
ments, as well as the concern he feels on account of the difficulty
of the times, and the prospect of serious disturbance." Upoa
this announcement the father-general, after advising with his
484 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
counsellors, resolved to yield to the force of circumstances, fearing
icst their presence should serve as a pretext to tumult and blood-
shed, Roothan, the general of the order, and the monastic con-
spirators of which Ignatius Loyola was the founder, quitted Kome
to save the pope from a catastrophe which they postponed a few
months, but failed to avert.
In France, the bishops and priests who officiate in the churches
of that country, are fearfully humbled. They are dragged at the
heels of revolutionary skeptics to bless trees of liberty, and re-
duced to slavery in order to escape from ruin, while others are
forced to echo the very cries of the revolution in order to get
shelter under its wing. At a public republican banquet, soon
after the revolution, a Romish bishop said, " The new motto of
the nation, ^ Liberty, Equality, Fraternity,' was a Catholic motto
before it was written on the banners of France :'' and the pope
himself had to plead as a suppliant for the salaries of his priests
being continued by the republic. " To give up this support," he
says, ^^ would be to take from the clergy the resources which are
indispensable to their existence ; for, in some towns in France,
and in most villages, the poverty is so great that it would be
almost impossible to sustain the church and its ministers. It is
much to be feared that the sufferings of the clergy would in-
crease, to the great detriment of religion and of souls. Though
in the United States of America the Catholic faith makes daily
progress in the blessings of God, it would have produced much
more abundant fruits if there had been in those countries a nativo
clergy proportionate to the greatness of their population and their
spiritual wants."
Now, what a startling fact is this — that during the year which
is now drawing to its close, the Jesuits are not left in any coun-
try in Christendom, except the one — this free land of ours —
which opens her bosom as an asylum to all ! The only country
on earth in which they are suffered to exist, is that country whose
light they dread, and whose freedom they would crush if they
could, and whose air must be to them a purgatory on earth.
What an evidence is this that great Babylon is " coming into re-
membrance before God, to give unto her the cup of the wine of
the fierceness of his wrath !"
THE CONSUMPTION OP BABYLON. if^
But this is not the last of its effects. I need not tell you what
has ceased to be news — of the flight of the pope from Rome, in
the dress of a livery servant — (What a fall is here ! — what an
humbling of the king of pride !) — and his exile at this moment
at Gaeta. The first intimation of it is from the Roman official
paper :—^^' The provisional government has been proclaimed;"
the pope was declared to have forfeited all temporal power; and
there were heard stranger sounds than have been heard for a
thousand years in the streets of Rome. According to this paper,
the people, enthusiastic with joy at the expulsion of the pope
from temporal power, shouted in the streets of Rome, " Death to
the pope 1" " Death to the cardinals 1" Truly there were voices,
and " thunders, and lightnings, and voices," unparalleled in the
history of the popedom.
But, you will say, the pope has been a refugee before now.
True; but mark the difference. When the pope quitted his
throne in the days of Napoleon, he did so by the irresistible force
of an external power, which invaded his kingdom and dragged
him from his seat, tied him to his chariot, and brought him to
Paris to grace the splendours and consecrate the usurpation of
his imperial tyranny. But on this occasion, mark you, for the
first time in the history of the popedom, the people have resumed
the sovereignty which was originally theirs ; and in the exercise
of that same dread power, which is best in abeyance, and which
led this country in 1688 to change its dynasty, have risen as a
nation from within against the pope, and have severed the con-
nection between his temporal and spiritual power. You see, then,
we have a totally different event occurring in 1848 from any that
has occurred at any previous era ; and in order to show you still
further 'that the cry, applicable specially to this event, " It is
done," is resounded from the skies, and echoed by the reflectors
of public opinion, I will read a few brief extracts. The Tablet
newspaper of last Saturday, which is the organ of the Roman
Catholic body — a paper written with very great talent — attests
the consumption of the Beast : —
" An archbishop has been martyred, while preaching peace to
his flock ; another holy prelate has been cast into prison and con-
tumeliously exiled, for boldly defying the powers of this world ;
41-
486 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
a pope has incessantly laboured in the settlement of stupendous
affairs — the relations of the church in Protestant and schismatic
countries, as England and Russia. * * * "VYe have seen this pope
flying from Rome; but, no whit dismayed, speaking with au-
thority to the assassins who have usurped his dominions.''
And again, the same paper says, ** What shall we say of the
terrible intelligence from Rome ? In a few lines nothing worth
saying can be said. The guilt of the Romans, and generally of
the Italian Liberals, can hardly be exaggerated. The critical
position, not of the popedom — for that was never safer — but of
the pope, of the holy pontiff who a few months ago was the idol
of all the pretended worshippers of freedom, is too patent to re-
quire enforcing by many words." Everybody asks what will
become of the pope. This is the inquiry. Christ, the infallible
head of the church, placed by God at our head, never can be
removed. His throne remains the same yesterday, to-day, and
for ever : and while the poor Romanist is weeping over the de-
struction of his head, the Protestant rejoices and praises God that
Jesus reigns, and the dawn of his universal kingdom only begins
to emerge from the chaos of the nations of the earth. This poor
writer in the TaUet proceeds : — ^' What will become of the pope ?
Will he take refuge in France ? will he accept the hospitality of
England ? will he carry St. Peter's chair from the blood-stained
city — in old times the Babylon of the apostles — and transfer it to
the modern Babylon, from the inhuman ferocity of Rome afflicted
with a new paganism ? Will he ascend his spiritual throne in
the new world with the presence of his august pontificate ? These
questions are in. every mouth, and it is more easy to ask them
than to find any satisfactory solution of the great problem they
involve."
The vial is in the hand of the pope : he is drinking it to the
very dregs : and, as if to show that the whole of Roman Christen-
dom is startled and surprised by this event, the other day a meet-
ing was called in Dublin of all the leading Roman Catholics of
the country, '^ in order to succour the head of the religion, to
express sympathy with the pope under the unhappy circumstances
in which he is placed, and to pronounce that the possession of the
city of Rome is indispensable to the solemnity and preponderance
THE CONSUMPTION OF BABYLON. 48^
of the Roman Catholic faith ; and that, in order to secure its re-
covery to the holy see, no effort of the Roman Catholics of this
country should be wanting. For the purpose of more effectually
attaining these objects, and whatever other shall be deemed ad-
visable for the same purpose, a fund, to be called ' St. Peter's
Fund,^ was instituted, and placed in progress of collection."
Which is the last approximation to the old fund of St. Peter's
Pence,* which once agitated our country in its darkest days.
Again, not only does Ireland feel it, but France, another por-
tion of the Beast's kingdom, feels it. You are perhaps aware
that the President then acting of the French republic sent the-
pope the following letter : —
"Very Holy Father — ^I address this despatch, and another of
the Archbishop of Nice, your nuncio to the Government of the
Republic, to your Holiness, by one of my aides-de-camp.
" The French nation, deeply afflicted with the troubles with
which your Holiness has been assailed within a short period, has
been, moreover, profoundly affected at the sentiment of paternal
confidence which induced your Holiness to demand, temporarily,
hospitality in France, which it will be happy and proud to secure
to you, and which it will render worthy of itself and of your
Holiness. I write to you, therefore, in order that no feeling of
uneasiness or unfounded apprehension may divert your Holiness
from your first resolution. The Republic, the existence of which
is already consecrated by the mature, persevering, and sovereign
will of the French nation, will see with pride your Holiness give
to the world the spectacle of that exclusively religious consecra-
tion which your presence in the midst of it announces. It will
receive you with the dignity and religious respect which becomes
this great and generous nation. I have felt the necessity of giv-
ing your Holiness this assurance, and I heartily desire that your
arrival may take place without much delay.
"It is with those sentiments, Yery Holy Father, that I am
your respectful Son, General Cavaignac."
France is at its wits* end, and the politician, rather than the
♦ On Sunday, February 18, a collection was made in the various Eomish
chapels of London in behalf of Pius IX.
488 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
Papist, may be detected amid the verbose foliage of the eloquent
epistle thus addressed to his holiness.
Another document, extremely significant, is an address of the
French to the pope, dated December 18th, 1848. A rich speci-
men it is of the intense superstition and bigotry which have sur-
vived the storms of successive revolutions, and still animate
multitudes of the peasantry in France
"Most Holy Father,
" The Catholic world has murmured with painful indignation
on hearing of the attempt which Rome has witnessed carried into
effect against your Holiness. May the unanimity of public feel-
ing bring some consolation to the heart of our beloved Father.
"Your Holiness, with that kindness which you draw from
Divine sources, has heaped your benefits on Rome and Italy.
You have consecrated the rights of the weak, recalled to their
duties the strong. You have spoken to the nations; and the
nations, taking a holy enthusiasm from each of your words, trans-
mitted them to each other as a force and as a light for marching
more surely toward the future.
" The universe, moved by so high and tender a voice, learned
once again the civilizing virtue of that Chair of Rome, which sub-
stituted right for might, which created the Christian republic,
snatched Europe from barbarism and the world from chaos.
"The spiritual sovereignty of souls, drawing from the sove-
reignty of the city, twice a queen, its independence, its serenity,
its splendour, behold what it was that struck the soul, that was a
light for all consciences ! The supreme pontificate and the sacred
principality formed at Rome a glorious and necessary union ; for
it is good that there was, in this world, a throne where the prince
was a father — a state where men were less subjects than sons !
" This union, sealed by ages, frantic men have sworn to shatter.
They have sworn to destroy that temporal sovereignty of the Pa-
pacy, which is the guarantee of the independence of Catholic
consciences throughout the whole world. They have sworn it;
but their evil design will perish.
"The true Romans, reanimated by their ancient love, will
emerge from that torpor which freezes their courage ; they will
THE CONSUMPTION OF BABYLON. 489
return to you, to their father. Your enemies will fall under
universal reprobation.
" Most Holy Father, such is our hope ; hut if it were not to he
realized, your children of France would cry out to you — 'Come
to us!' or rather, 'Behold us, ourselves, our arms, our goods, our
lives. Speak, most Holy Father ; we wait, prostrate in our grief,
■at the venerated feet of the visible Chief of the Church, Spouse
of Christ.'
" We, as Catholics, are ready to follow you as Peter followed
the Lord j as Frenchmen, we desire to maintain the foundation
of Pepin and Charlemagne. It is the French tradition ! The
Papacy at Rome is not only Italy, it is Christianity I
" Meanwhile, with our brethren, with our pastors, we implore
of God, who touches the insensate and enlightens them, that
Kome may return to herself, that she may restore you, most Holy
Father, to her aifection, as when she marched in your train, ruling
over the whole world."
Again, to show how public sentiment is revealed, I read from
one of our morning papers : — ''Pius IX. is virtually, if not form-
ally deposed; the best ofl&cial servant he has yet chosen, stabbed
on the threshold of his own parliament ; his own palace-windows
riddled by the muskets of the citizens whom he had himself
armed and accoutred. Count Mamiana, or, for aught we know,
that excellent botanist the Prince de Canino, reigns in his stead.
. . . Quitted Rome ! You might as well talk of a man's quit-
ting his planet. The force of attraction which ties a disappointed
politician to the surface of the terrestrial globe, is hardly stronger
than that link which binds the pope to the locality consecrated
by immemorial tradition as the ecclesiastical centre of the habit-
able world. What new resting-place, which lies beyond the con-
fines of St. Peter's patrimony, will afford a footing to the ex-
truded pontiff? What modern Avignon opens her gates to the
successor of Clement V. ? Dublin, we know, has long put in her
claim to the honour of such a visit. Marseilles offers a shelter ;
so does Paris. But why not London? 'London, the needy
monarchs' general home' — the common refuge for destitute poten-
tates?" And, lastly, I read an extract from a letter of the
Archbishop of Paris, the recently appointed archbishop, to his
490 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
clergy. He says — "Monsieur le Cure, our soul is plunged in
grief. The church suffers in its chief. The capital of the Chris-
tian world is a prey to faction. Blood has been shed at home,
even in the palace of our well-beloved pontiff, Pius IX. The
Vicar of Christ has commenced his passion. He is drinking from
that bitter cup of ingratitude which he foretasted on that day
when his magnanimous soul resolved to effect, by confidence and
love, the redemption of his country. The father of the liberty
of Italy is, perhaps, at this moment, no longer at liberty himself.
The events which have ensanguined Rome, and clothed in mourn-
ing the Catholic world, are not yet fully known." ..." Let us
hope, moreover, that the Catholic nations will become aware of
the danger with which they are threatened, and which, at the
same time, threatens all the modern conquests of liberty and
civilization. Can France, above all, suffer herself to be attacked
in her belief, her traditions, her highest interests ? If Kome is
the head, France is the heart and arm of Catholicism. Let us
all pray, M. le Cur^ — the priests will every day at mass recite
the prayer — ^ Pro summo ^ontijice.^ Call upon the faithful to
join their prayers to yours. Let all men of holy minds unite
with us in holy communion. At a future day, if circumstances
require, we will ordain public prayers to be put up."
I read these, then, as evidences from the channels of public
opinion of what has taken place now — though I believe that
there may yet be a temporary patching up of this dislocated state
of things, and that the pope and Popery may yet make a last
spasmodic effort to regain their lost supremacy, and make that
last struggle which will begin Armageddon, and terminate the
last sigh and sorrow of humanity. And all this is but a sample
of the judgments described in chap, xviii., where it is said of this
very epoch, that a great angel, armed " with power," came down
from heaven, " and the earth was lightened with his glory." In
verse second we have the anticipatory cry, " Babylon is fallen and
is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul
spirit, and the cage of every unclean and hateful bird. For all
nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication."
Then, in verse fourth, we have the cry, which ought to be em-
bodied at the present day in every minister's sermon — " Come out
THE CONSUMPTION OF BABYLON. 491
of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that
ye receive not her plagues/' This is a warning addressed to
God's people in it, just like the warning cry of the angel to Lot,
upon the eve of the destruction of Sodom, or like the voice that
God sent to his own faithful children when the earth opened her
mouth and swallowed up Korah, Dathan, and Abiram ; or as the
warning addressed to the Christians in Jerusalem — "Let them
which be in Judea flee to the mountains." I believe that this
cry is partly literal, but mainly spiritual. I believe that the
recent shocks and vibrations of the great earthquake are partly
fulfilling it. All Englishmen, it is said, are escaping from Kome,
from Paris, and from the Papal nations of Europe, returning to
their own land and their homes, as if Great Britain were destined
to be the pillar of the nations, the sheltering asylum in which
refugees from the impending judgments upon Babylon shall find
peace beneath the overshadowing pinions of a pervading Chris-
tianity, and a blessing in communion with our Christian churches.
But I believe it is mainly spiritual, and that the cry that should
now be addressed to every one is, " Come out of her ;" have no
sympathy with her at all ; and if there be in any of the churches
of this land any remains of old Babylon, now is the time to con-
sume them. If there be any practical workings of the old leaven,
now is the time to cast it out ; if there be any points of identity
between existing churches, Protestant in name and Protestant in
the main, with the Roman Catholic communion, now is God's
last warning to cast all out that is antichristian, to cleave to all
that is evangelical, that, escaping the sins, we may escape the
plagues of great Babylon.
After this we read, as I explained to you in the course of my
remarks in previous lectures, of a new state of things taking
place. After stating, in the end of chap, xviii., that " in her was
found the blood of prophets and of saints, and of all that were
slain upon the earth," it is added, " after these things I heard a
great voice of much people in heaven, saying, Alleluia" — the
first Hebrew word that occurs after Armageddon, which has been
interpreted by the most competent divines to denote that about
this time, and at the destruction of Rome, God's ancient people
were to come forth from their bondage, and recognise Jesus ag
492 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
the Messiah; and to join in the song of the Gentile Christians,
^^ Salvation, and glory, and honour, and power, unto the Lord our
God/' Is it not right to repeat these things, which awaken songs
of joy in the skies ? Ought we to pass by, as unworthy of our
notice, great transactions, about which such songs are raised in
heaven ?
Then, immediately after the destruction of Babylon, we read,
at chap. xix. verse 5, that a voice came out of the throne, saying,
" Praise our God, all ye his servants, and ye that fear him, both
small and great;" and at verse 7, "Let us be glad and rejoice,
and give honour to him : for the marriage of the Lamb is come,
and his wife hath made herself ready. And to her was granted
that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white : for the
fine linen is the righteousness of saints ;'' i. e. the righteousness
of Christ himself, the bride being the component symbol for the
people of God. And thus then, after Kome shall have been
utterly destroyed — partly, as I believe, by providential judg-
ments, and partly, as I showed, by the explosion of those fearful
volcanic elements which pervade the whole of the Italian penin-
sula — after Rome shall have been utterly destroyed, and the voice
shall have been heard pealing from the skies, and re-echoed from
the earth, "Alleluia! Salvation, and blessing, and glory, and
honour unto the Lord our God," then Christ's bride will begin to
appear; the true church, which has never yet been seen, will
then be separated from the tares, and make itself manifest that
it is God's people collected out of every communion under
heaven, out of churches established and churches non-established
— many collected out of Rome herself; in Rome, but not of
Rome — all God's people, chosen in Christ before the foundation
of the world, who have washed their robes and made them white
in his blood — and shall assemble together in a glorious, white-
robed, and rejoicing band, and hail the advent of the Bridegroom,
and so be for ever with the Lord.
And now, my dear friends, let me say, the call to you, each by
himself, is " Come out of her." And what is the true way to
come out of Rome ? To rest upon Christ as your only sacrifice;
to look to his blood as your only expiation ; to glory in Christ
crucified as all your salvation and all your desire. The only inch
THE CONSUMPTION OF BABYLON. 493
of ground on which the plagues shall not come, and from which
every judgment shall be repelled, is the Rock of ages. Are you
standing on it? A year of judgments has closed; a year, it may
be, of more terrific ones is about to begin. Standing in the twi-
light of the evening of 1848, that is just about to blend with the
twilight of the morning of 1849, I ask you, at such a critical mo-
ment, Are you Protestants, not politically — Christians, not nomi-
nally, but living sons of the living God ? My dear friends, no-
thing but real, earnest, evangelical Christianity is consistency.
All else is irrational. Act decidedly. If you do believe that
this book is not Grod's book, and that this religion is a cunningly
devised fable, manfully say so ; treat it as such — despise the Bible
— resign your pew in the sanctuary — commit yourself to infidelity
— ^manfully avow what you deliberately and seriously hold. Be
consistent. But if not — if you Relieve that this book is God's
book — if you believe that the Lord of glory is your only Saviour,
then why hesitate? Why not commit yourself to him? why not
cleave to him ? why not determine that at all hazards, and at all
sacrifices, Christ shall be yours, and you will be Christ's ? Dear
brethren, thus close 1848, and thus begin 1849 ; and when the
world's last year and life's last day shall come, — and one or the
other will come right speedily, — you will begin in the New Jeru-
salem a new year and a new song, where all things are made new,
and the new year shall never have a close, and your new happi-
ness shall never experience a suspension.
SECOND SERIES. 42
494
LECTURE XXXV.
THE MARRTAGE-SUPPER OF THE LAMB.
"And after these things I heard a great voice of much people in heaven say-
ing, Alleluia, Salvation, and glory, and honour, and power, unto the Lord our
God." — Revelation xix. 1.
I THINK I explained to you in a previous lecture^ that the era
contemplated in this chapter is that blessed era when the tones of
the Jew shall mingle with hymns of the Gentile, and both in the
songs of the gospel, the song of all who constitute one redeemed
and manifested church. ^^Alleluia, blessing, and glory, and ho-
nour, and power, be unto the Lord our God/' The era when this
shall be realized is not yet come. We can only utter the notes
that constitute that song faintly and feebly, in anticipation of that
latter and more glorious epoch, when the voice shall be heard of
a great multitude, '^ as the voice of many waters, and as the voice
of mighty thunderings, saying. Alleluia, for the Lord God om-
nipotent reigneth." But if we now belong to that band who are
designated by the name of ^^ the wife of the Lamb," and who con-
stitute together members of that holy and heavenly company
whose corporate name is the Church — if we can now satisfy our-
selves, on ihQ clearest scriptural evidence, that our raiment is the
fine linen white and clean, which is the righteousness of Christ, —
then the Lord God himself is our husband, the Almighty his
name. If we now bear his name, and sympathize with his mind,
and are clothed with his righteousness, and animated by his spirit,
.then we nothing doubt that we, too, shall be seated at the mar-
riage supper of the Lamb, and shall be glad and rejoice; and shall
hear it recorded of us, as it is now true of us if we are the people
of God, "Blessed are they who are called unto the marriage-sup-
per of the Lamb." This saying is the true and faithful saying
THE MARRIAGE-SUPPER OF THE LAMB. 495
of God. I believe, as I have told you before, that the event which
is predicted here draws rapidly near — is very near. It is the event
which constitutes the hope of the church, the desire of saints, the
burden of the cry of the travailing and groaning earth and a wast-
ing universe. What is now accepted by faith shall then be seen
in fruit, — what is now prophecy is on the very eve of becoming
performance, — what we now read in the Apocalypse as a predic-
tion, we shall then enjoy at the marriage-supper of the Lamb as
a blessing that shall never cease to be.
There is here described the time when this solemnity, which
has been the subject of a thousand prophecies, — this festival, or
marriage-supper, such as that described inadequately in some of
the parables on which I have lately addressed you, — this festival
which crowns anxious days and terminates sorrowful ones, shall
close all our trials, and be the true prelibation of yet greater and
brighter joys ; from which there is no proscription for any that
will; to which we are invited by a voice from heaven: '^The
Spirit and the bride say. Come ; and let him that heareth say,
Come ; and whosoever will, let him come, and take of the water
of life freely." When this era, which is here the subject of pro-
phecy, shall come, then Christ's mediatorial work shall cease. He
too shall rejoice; for, as our trials are terminated, his mediation
for us shall be terminated also. He shall no more intercede for
us that our faith fail not; no more cry in tones of eloquent
remonstrance, " Spare it yet another year ;" no more stand between
the living and the dead to arrest the plague, for there shall be no
more death. " It is finished'^ is now true of his atonement ; " It
is finished'^ shall then be true of his intercession. The Lamb shall
be then the enthroned Lamb; the Man of Sorrows shall be merged,
yet apparent, in the majesty of The Mighty God. This dispensa-
tion shall be closed, all things shall be made new, and praise not
prayer shall be the constant employment of saints. All his peo-
ple then, when this era comes, shall be raised from the dead;
they shall appear in their resurrection bodies, replete with all holi-
ness, radiant with all beauty, meet homes for sanctified and re-
deemed spirits, capable of powers and of progress such as eye hath
not seen nor ear heard, neither hath entered into the heart of man.
In other words, we shall then be presented to him as the apostle
496 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
tells us : " Christ loved the church, and gave himself for it/'
(i. e. his bride,) " that he might purify and cleanse it with the
washing of the word, to present it to himself a glorious church,
not having spot or wrinMe, or any such thing, but that it should
be holy and without blemish before him."
Such, then, is the event here described as the marriage-supper
of the Lamb. What news will this be to the universe ! What
a thrill of ecstasy will vibrate through all holy beings, when the
trumpet shall sound, " Awake, ye dead," for the marriage-supper
of the Lamb is come ! I believe that, from the first patriarch to
"the last saint, all have anticipated this era ; that through all the
gloom and darkness of a thousand years — through the eclipse of
Calvary and Gethsemane — the scattered rays from this glad and
glorious festival shot backward, and lighted up the eye of Abra-
ham; awoke the sleeping tones of David's lyre; cheered the
saint in his suffering and the martyr in his agony, and made them
rejoice that they were counted worthy to suffer for the Lamb's
sake. It is evident in this, that the church has cried continually,
from the moment of Christ's ascent in a cloud to heaven, " Come,
Lord Jesus." No sooner had he left this earth, than she cried
and prayed for his return. This, it is true, is the dispensation
of the Spirit ; but take care lest, in your anxiety to glorify the
Spirit, you dishonour the Son. The Spirit is not a substitute for
Jesus. John, who lay nearest to his bosom, drank deepest of his
affections, and enjoyed the extraordinary and ordinary gifts of the
Spirit, was he that cried most eloquently and earnestly, '^ Come,
Lord Jesus." The Spirit is a present substitute, but not a com-
plete compensation for Christ. The Spirit supplies his place, if I
might so speak, inadequately for a season ; and the church, so
far from being satisfied that the Spirit should dwell in her as if
that were the ultimate thing, is taught by that very Spirit to
break forth into more eloquent and earnest prayer, '' Come, Lord
Jesus, come quickly." And when the marriage of the Lamb is
come, then this church, which has prayed as a widow, shall be
introduced as a bride, and so shall she be for ever with the Lord.
This day, which is here called the marriage-supper of the
Lamb, will be, as the very phraseology indicates, a day for the
manifestation of the greatest possible love. To love Grod is the
THE MARRIAGE-SUPPER OF THE LAMB. 497
flower and fruitage of Christianity. To love God is the fulfil-
ment of the law; the great end and the object of that love is to
restore humanity to its first state. " Whom having not seen/'
says the apostle, " we love ; in whom, though now we see him
not, yet believing, we rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of
glory.^' And when this marriage-supper of the Lamb is come,
then that love which has smouldered in our bosoms here, shall
break forth into a glorious flame, and blaze with a pure and per-
manent intensity, of which we have no adequate conception now.
Every thing that damps it will be withdrawn ; every thing that
represses it shall be removed; every sight and scene that can
stimulate it shall be presented to it ; and we shall no more say,
what we are constrained to say here —
" Weak is the effort of my heart,
And cold my ■warmegfc thought ;
But when I see thee as thou art,
I'll love thee as I ought."
Then we shall love him with our whole heart, and whole strength,
and whole soul, for " the marriage-feast of the Lamb is come, and
his wife hath made herself ready." Then also will be the mani-
festation of the greatest joy. Even in this dispensatian. Chris-
tians have felt joy in suffering, in sorrow, in sackcloth and ashes,
in desertion ; not from the absence of feeling, but when feeling
was intensest, acutcst, deepest. It is not true that Christians do
not feel when they suffer : they feel more than others ; but the
joy that shines forth conceals the depth of the feeling that is
within. But yet, all such joy as was felt by the early Christians
in the spoiling of their goods — all such joy as we feel at the com-
munion festival — all such joy as we may have felt when the Lord
has passed by and manifested his glory to us — will be but the dawn
in comparison of the noon — the dim shadow in contrast to the full
light. Then our joy shall expand into the infinite, the eternal,
the immense; and our joy, like our love, shall have fulness as
its characteristic, and be without suspension, alloy, or end.
When the marriage-feast of the Lamb is come, then there will be
a scene of the greatest love, there will be a spectacle of the
greatest joy. " I will come to you again," says the Lord, *' and
your hearts shall rejoice, and your joy no man taketh from you."
42*
498 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
In this world, when a man tries to rejoice, he feels there is
nothing in which he can root his heart, in order to let it bloom in
joy. When you have put forth your affections upon some created
thing, you find that created thing soon fail to supply and satisfy
them. It is not possible for any thing below to satisfy the wants
or create and sustain the joy of an immortal spirit. But when
you come to that blessed festival — when you are introduced into
the presence of the Lord himself — ^when you shall gaze upon that
countenance that was ^^ more marred than any man's," and hear
the beating of that heart which loved you with an everlasting
love — then you shall find an object on which your affections can
repose, you shall be introduced to a fountain of joy that shall ever
overflow; then, indeed, your joy shall be full, and that joy no
man taketh from you. " Let us be glad and rejoice," will be the
invitation then, ^' for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and the
bride hath made herself ready." But not only will God's people
rejoice, but the Saviour himself will rejoice. Our Saviour is
capable of human feelings, of human sympathy, and of human
joy. In heaven he continues the God, but he does not cease to
be the man. And we read in the New Testament, that " for the
joy set before him, he endured the cross, despising the shame."
And the prophet tells us, that " as a bridegroom rejoiceth over
his bride, so the Lord will rejoice over thee ;" and another pro-
phet tells us, " He will rejoice over thee with joy, he will rest in
his love, he will joy over thee with singing." And what will be
the element of that joy? He shall see his own, gathered from
innumerable lands, and from the eddies and the currents of six
thousand years, introduced into his presence; not one that was
given him lost; not one saint wanting; but all his family sur-
rounding that blessed board on which is celebrated the marriage-
supper of the Lamb. Angels, too, shall sympathize with that
joy; for if "the angels rejoice over one sinner that repents"
now, how intense shall be their joy when a reconciled universe
shall surround a rejoicing Lord, and " there shall be one Lord,
. and his name one !"
But without giving vague and general characteristics of the
scene, let us notice some of the special features of it. We here
read of her in whom we are most deeply interested — the bride.
THE MAKRIAGE-SUPPER OF THE LAMB. 499
And we have two or three great characteristics of this bride, i. e.
Christ^s church; not, as I have often told you, the man-bap-
tized, but the Spirit-baptized; not, as I have often said, the
sealed by man, but the sealed by Christ himself; those who are
redeemed by his blood, and regenerated by his Spirit, the heirs
of his kingdom in glory. We have here set before us, first, the
bride's state : " She was clothed in fine linen, clean and white ;"
and that fine linen is " the righteousness of saints.'' We have,
secondly, her relationship : she is Christ's bride — " the Lamb's
wife." We have, thirdly, her character: she "hath made her-
self ready." We have these three characteristics marked out.
Let us look at them ; and may the Spirit of God enable us to
search ourselves, in the prospect of a communion Sabbath, that
we may thus discover if we are the bride of the Lamb, before we
approach that table which is a faint but true foretaste of that
marriage festival for which the bride hath made herself ready !
First, then, we have laid before us the state of the bride. " She
is arrayed in linen, white and clean, which is the righteousness of
saints." We find an analogous form of expression in chap v. :
" which are the prayers of saints ;" that is, the prayers uttered by
the saints themselves — true Christians. We have here "the
righteousness of saints," i. e. the righteousness worn by saints or
true believers. In other words, the state of Christ's true church
is the state of justification, freely, wholly, solely through " the
fine linen," the perfect righteousness of the Lamb of God. He,
we are told, " was made sin for us, that we might be made the
righteousness of God in him." And this righteousness which is
here represented by a robe, which is put on like the wedding gar-
ment, or like the robe mentioned in the parable of the Prodigal
Son, (" Bring forth the best robe,") that robe is a perfect right-
eousness, or perfect title in the sight of God. It is now true, as
it was in Paradise, that a perfect righteousness is demanded of
every creature upon earth, before that creature can be accepted
of God. Do not suppose, my dear friends, as is very popularly
dreamed, that the gospel is merely the presentation of an inferior
righteousness to God, with which he is content to be satisfied
through Christ, instead of a perfect righteousness, the title to a
perfect happiness. God demands of me now, just as he demanded
500 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
of Adam before he fell, perfect righteousness, or he inflicts the
penalty of instant death. There is no medium ; it is, Do this,
present this, and live ; Do not, and die. You say, then, where is
the difference between the Gospel and the Law ? The difference
lies here : in the Law it is, Do this, and live ; in the Gospel, it
is, Receive this, and live. Here is the whole distinction. In the
Law, the creature had to perform the righteousness ; in the Gos-
pel, the creature has to accept the righteousness, and then obtain
the reward. But you say. How do we accept it ? I answer. As
it is revealed to faith in the Gospel. And the good news which
I am commissioned to proclaim to every creature is, that this day,
this very hour, that glorious robe comes down from heaven ; and
there is not a man or a woman in this assembly who is not sum-
moned and invited by the mercy of God to accept it freely, put
it on, and anticipate the hour when he shall be presented to the
Lamb " without spot or blemish, or wrinkle, or any such thing."
This leads to the inference — This righteousness, this perfect
righteousness, is im]^uted to us. I know that phrase has been
cavilled at; good persons have objected to it. Some one, who
was a Christian, said, that "imputed righteousness is imputed
nonsense." A rash expression ! it is worse — it is an unscriptural
one. I cannot understand that it is any other than an imputed
righteousness which is spoken of in that text : " He that knew
no sin was made sin for us, that we might be made the righteous-
ness of God in him." I ask, in what sense was Christ made sin
for us ? Was he personally sinful ? No man will dare to say
so. Then in what sense was he made sin ? The prophet tells
us, " Our sins were laid upon him, i. e. imputed to him." Well,
then, in the same sense we are made the righteousness of God by
him. As our sins were imputed unto Christ, and he endured the
curse of them, his righteousness is imputed unto us, and we in-
herit the blessing of it. And as it was just in God to pour forth
the expression of his wrath upon Christ for imputed sin, it is only
just in God to pour forth the expression of his glory upon us
because of imputed righteousness. When Christ died upon the
cross, there was nothing in him that deserved death ; and when
we shall be seated at the marriage-supper of the Lamb, there shall
be nothing in us that shall deserve happiness. Christ died, with
THE MARRIAGE-SUPPER OF THE LAMB. 501
nothing in him worthy of death : we shall live and be glorified,
with nothing in us worthy of life. Our sins dragged him to our
grave ; his righteousness shall lift us to his throne. Oh, blessed
truth ! that that by which we are justified, and by which we are
accepted, is nothing in us, nothing hy us, but wholly, exclusively,
what Christ has done /or us; who is made unto us righteousness,
sanctification, and complete redemption. Once the angels wondered
that One suffered death who had done no sin : soon will angels
wonder that a world should inherit happiness that had done no-
thing but sin. Once angels wondered that He should die who
is infinitely holy : angels will wonder for ever and ever that we
should be justified, who have been poor, and naked, and fallen,
and blind, and miserable, and destitute of all things.
But, blessed be God^s name, Christ has paid for us all we owed
to God, and purchased for us ten thousand times more than God
ever promised to us. Blessed be his name, that our sins were
laid upon him, and that the transference and the exchange is his
spotless righteousness laid upon us. The law was, "This do,
and live '" the dispensation that now is, is " Believe, and live f
the marriage-supper of the Lamb will be. Have, and live. Thus
the three great aphorisms that will characterize the three great
stages of God's great work will be, " Do and live ;" (all failed,
without exception :) "Believe and live/' (thousands daily triumph
here :) — but the characteristic of the dispensation that shall be,
will be no longer " Do and live," — " for by the works of the law
no one can be justified;" — it will not be ^^ Believe and live," for
faith shall be lost in fruition ; but it will be ^^Have and live, and
rejoice and be happy for ever." I am sure, my dear friends,
if we were to preach more of this, the heart Christiaiiity — to
make more clear, separating all human verbiage and human
speech from it, these great truths, our justification, our standing,
our perseverance, wholly by the righteousness of Christ, without
the deeds of the law — we should be more successful in sending
the ploughshare of truth through the foundations of Eome and
Tractarianism ; and semi-Popery and Popery would perish and
disappear before it. Let go your grasp of this great truth, justifi-
cation by the righteousness of Christ — and lean partly upon this
rite and partly upon that work, and — it does not matter what
502 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
you call yourselves — you are Papists in fact and in truth. Pro*
testantism is salvation and righteousness by Christ without us;
Popery is salvation by something in the church, or something in
the priest, or something in the man, apart and altogether dis-
connected with and separated from Christ. And not only ought
this justification to be our state now, but this will be our state for
ever. Angels stand because Jesus fell; saints in glory shall be
happy, just because Jesus suffered. And what is the reason that
throughout the whole of the Apocalypse — that book which is so
distinctively Protestant, if I might use such an expression of one
book of the Bible in contradistinction to the rest, which are all
Protestant — the constant songs of angels and saints are, ^^ Glory,
and blessing, and praise to the Lamb ?" The reason is this :
there is not a saint that joins in that song beside the throne, who,
when he looks at himself, does not say that the righteousness he
wears is not his own : there is not a saint that basks amid the
splendours of that august and unclouded vision, and takes a retro-
spect of the past, who does not feel that it was Christ's arm alone
that placed him there, and made him a pillar in the house of his
God for ever. Hence the song that shall rise as the anthem peal
for ever will be, " Salvation, and blessing, and glory, and power,
unto the Lamb, for thou hast redeemed us by thy blood out of
every kindred, and people, and tongue, and hast made us kings
and priests unto God, and we shall reign with thee.^^
I trust then, my dear friends, that from the explanation I gave
you this morning, and from the exposition I have given you this
evening, you see clearly that your safety, your standing, your title
to God's presence, is nothing in you, however important that
may be — nor any thing that you do now, however beautiful that
may be — but what Christ has done for you, and which is now
just as perfect to the weak faith that trusts to-day, as to the
strong faith that has trusted and triumphed for half a century.
I am quite sure that if we could only make more real, if we could
only actualize more in our own hearts this blessed truth, we should
have more happiness, more peace. To feel that, when my heart
trembles, my Saviour's righteousness is the same — that when my
fears crowd upon me, my Lord's righteousness remains — when my
flesh faints and fails, and my faith wavers, and my vision is
THE MARRIAGE-SUPPER OF THE LAMB. 503
clouded, and my love grows cold, to feel that that which is my
title to heaven is unshaken and unscathed, because beyond the
tide-mark — is enough to inspire new songs, and to make me sing
even now, " Grod is my refuge and strength, therefore I will not
be afraid."
I am quite sure that all our unhappiness and misery arise from
our constantly looking for a title within us. I know we.do not
theologically say so ; but we are constantly saying, " Oh, I have
this feeling, and I have that doubt, and this difficulty ; and there-
fore I shall not get to heaven." Perfectly true, if any thing
within you were your title; but it is something without you.
Tremble as Noah might when in the midst of the ark, the timbers
of the ark did not tremble with him. Doubt and fear as the man-
slayer in the city of refuge might, the walls did not shake with
him. And, let our fears, our doubts, our difficulties, be what
they may, blessed be God, Christ remains the Rock of ages, the
same yesterday, to-day, and for ever.
But I now turn your attention to the relationship of the Bride.
She is called here " the Lamb's wife." She is called, in those
beautiful chapters which I have recently illustrated — the twenty-
first and twenty-second — so beautiful that one regrets to have
done speaking and hearing of them — " the bride adorned for her
husband." In Isaiah this expression is frequently employed,
where we read, " The Almighty is thy Maker, the Lord of Hosts
is his name." " Thy Maker is thy husband, the Lord of Hosts
is his name, and thy Redeemer the Holy One of Israel." " The
Lord hath called thee as a woman forsaken and grieved in spirit,
and as a wife of youth when thou wast refused." ^' For a small
moment have I forsaken thee, but with great mercies will I gather
thee. In a little wrath I hid my face from thee for a moment; but
with everlasting kindness will I have mercy on thee." Now, what
is the nature of that relationship ? Husband and wife is the nearest
relationship that we know upon earth ; so that, in the solemn and
sacred language of Scripture, ^' they cease to be twain, and become
one." The wife, when married to her husband, loses all responsi-
bility to the civil law, and becomes represented in him : her debts
become his debts, and he stands liable for them all. What is
assumed in the earthly, is real in the heavenly relationship.
504 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
Whatever our debts were — and if it should be asked of us, " How
much owest thou unto my Lord T' we should have to answer, We
owe all, we are bankrupts — a bankruptcy more terrible than was
ever known on earth, or entered in the records of human law —
yet Christ is our husband — has taken our responsibilities. He
tells us that he is answerable for us ; and when we stand at the
judgment-seat of the Lamb, and when the law thunders " Do,"
our answer must be, " Christ has done it ;" when its unsatisfied
calls thunder " Suffer and die !'' our ansAver shall be, " Christ has
suffered and died for us." He is the husband ; we are repre-
sented in him. What he suffered, we are considered as having
suffered ; what he paid, we are considered as having paid ; and as
soon may Christ be struck from his throne, as the humblest child
of God be torn from that heaven to which Christ has entitled him
and made him ready for.
And as the wife resigns her own name, is detached from her
own family and incorporated in that of her husband, so it is with
the believer. Psalm xlv. is a beautiful nuptial song, in celebra-
tion of this sacred marriage — " Leave thine own household, and
the house of thy fathers, and accept him who shall be to thee
thine everlasting husband." And the wife not only resigns all
her own, and enters into a new relationship, but she shares in all
the sympathies of her husband's home : whatever is in it, is hers
as well as his ; whatever is there, she is made welcome to ; nothing
comes between them. And it is a right apprehension of this near
relationship, that shows the absurdity of all intercession of saints
and angels for the people of God. A husband and wife ought to
live in perfect confidence ; but would it not argue that there was
a cessation of that confidence, if the wife, requiring money for the
purchases of the week, should go to her neighbour and beg her to
intercede with her husband that she might receive what was ne-
cessary for laying in provisions for the week, month, or year ?
But it is not more absurd or unscriptural to suppose that we, who
constitute the Bride, should ask the highest angel in heaven to
intercede with our Everlasting Husband to give us the blessings
that we need. I could not condescend to ask an angel to inter-
cede for me ; I would not humble myself, or dishonour my Divino
Head, by begging the greatest seraph that is beside the throne to
THE MARRIAGE-SUPPER OF THE LAMB. 605
ask him to bestow a blessing upon me. He loves me with an
everlasting love, and has told me to ask and I shall obtain — to
seek and I shall find. Christian brother, this is your relation-
ship ; and, as long as you recollect it, there will be no risk that
you will ask angel, or archangel, or seraph, to intercede with
Christ in your behalf.
Here, then, is the relationship in which she stands — ^^the
Bride ;" and how beautiful are the Apocalyptic pictures of that
Bride ! Here, a woman retreating into the wilderness to escape
from her persecutors ; there, two witnesses prophesying and pray-
ing in sackcloth. But when the marriage-feast of the Lamb is
come, she "sings a new song^" she has "washed her robes and
made them white in the blood of the Lamb;'' she cries, " Salva-
tion to our God who sitteth on the throne, and unto the Lamb I"
and of her it is stated, that she " shall hunger no more, neither
thirst any more, nor shall the sun light upon her, nor any heat ;
for the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed her,
and shall lead her to living fountains of waters, and God shall
wipe away all tears from her eyes." And how beautiful is the
picture presented to us in the chapter from which my text is
taken ! The prophet hears " a voice of much people" — that is,
the voice of the Bride — "in heaven saying. Alleluia." That is
the first instance of a Hebrew word mingling in the Apocalypse
with the heavenly songs; thereby teaching us, that when this
great era comes, God's ancient people the Jews shall be restored,
and God's reconciled ones, the Gentiles, united to him; and both
togethear shall sing the one Hebrew- Greek song, " Alleluia ! Sal-
vation, and glory, and honour, and power, be unto the Lord our
God !" and blessed be his name, that
"Ten thousand thousand are their tongues,
But all their joys are one ;"
— "for true and righteous are thy judgments. And again they
said, Alleluia; and a voice came out of the throne saying,
Praise God, all ye his servants, and ye that fear him, both small
and great." And then " I heard as it were the voice of a great
multitude, and as the voice of many waters" — not unison, but
deep, rich, glorious harmony — " and as the voice of mighty thun-
ders" — echoing from the heaven, and re-echoed from the earth—
SECOND SEKIES. 43
606 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
" saying, Alleluia, for the Lord Grod omnipotent reigneth. Let
us be glad and rejoice, and give glory to him, for the marriage of
the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready. And
to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, which
is the righteousness of saints. And he saith unto me. Write,
Blessed are they which are called unto the marriage-supper of the
Lamb.''
It is also added, she "hath made herself ready.'' What is
meant by this ? The command was, " Be ye ready, for in such
an hour as ye think not, the Son of Man cometh." She heard
the summons, and is ready. The warning was, " Prepare to meet
thy God." She heard the warning cry, and she prepared to meet
him ; but she has done so, not in her own strength, but having
heard that Grod " makes us meet for the inheritance of the saints
in light," she has opened her heart to the reception of that which
she has heard, for his Spirit to sanctify it ; and that Holy Spirit
has made her meet for the inheritance of the saints in light. And
thus the Bride has not only a bridal dress, which is her title — like
the wedding-robe that we read of in the parable — but she has also
her bridal spirit, which is fitness for the kingdom of heaven. The
first thing required is a righteousness which is perfect, and with-
out us ; the second is that fitness which is progressive, and within
us. The distinction is this : Christ's work is an act — once done,
incapable of addition. The Spirit's work is a process, that goes
on from grace to glory. The first is perfect righteousness, the
second is imperfect. The first is without us, the second is within
us. The first is Christ's act, the second is the Spirit's work. The
first is imputed, the second is imparted. The one is our title, the
other is our fitness.
The bride has received the title, and the fitness too, for she
"hath made herself ready;" and hence it is pronounced,
" Blessed are they that are called to the marriage-supper of the
Lamb ;" not " Blessed shall they be," but " Blessed are they."
Blessed are you if you respond to his call. Blessed are you that
hope for that hour. Blessed are you that are united to Jesus.
Blessed are you, for you shall sit at the marriage-supper of the
Lamb. Often bridal feasts upon earth are followed by bitter
days; but that bridal feast shall only be the prelibation of richer
THE MARRIAGE-SUPPER OF THE LAMB. 507
and intenscr joy than eye hath seen or man's heart hath con-
ceived. The best and noblest festivals below have alloy in them.
The sharp sword suspended by the single hair hangs over more
feasts than that of the flatterer in ancient story ; but at that
great, that glorious festival, there shall be no sense of peril, no
apprehension of a dark and disastrous close to it ; but a deep and
universal feeling that it is but the morning dawn of a light that
shall advance until it is perfected in everlasting and blessed noon.
Blessed are they that are invited, for they have the earnest and
the foretaste of it. Blessed are they that aro invited, for they
have the hope of it. Blessed are they that are invited, for they
shall be made possessors of it. Blessed are they that are in-
vited, for they know that all things, prosperous and adverse,
past, and present, and future, ara only wafting them the more
speedily to the marriage-supper of the Lamb. And, dear
brethren, next Sabbath we approach a festival that commemorates
a sacrifice that is finished, and which is to us the tapering finger
that points into the future, and tells us of the marriage festival
of the bride and of the Lamb. I do not conceive that that man's
mind is right, or that man's trust where it should be, or that
man's character as Christianity demands that it should be, who
overlooks, or despises, or turns away from this festival below,
which is a faint foretaste of that more blessed and glorious festi-
val that is to come. " Do this in remembrance of me,'' says our
Saviour, for I bare your cross, and bequeathed to you " the fine
linen, white and clean, which is the righteousness of saints.'^ Do
this till I come, ^' for I will not leave you orphans : I will come
again and receive you to myself, that where I am there you may
may be also." The Lord's supper seems to me like a beauteous
rainbow, one end of which rests upon the cross, and, after span-
ning the mighty flood between them, the other end rests upon the
crown — binding in one bond of peace, and love, and harmony,
and union, things that are past, with all their pains, and things
that are to come, with all their joys; and teaching us, while
drawing our title from the first, to draw our hopes from the
second; when we shall rejoice, and feel that the marriage-feast
of the Lamb is come, ai:d we, too, have made ourselves ready.
508
LECTURE XXXVI.
THE NEW SONG.
"And they sung as it wero a new song before the throne, and before the four
beasts, and the elders : and no man could learn that song but the hundred and
forty and four thousand, which wore redeemed from the earth." — Revelation
xiv. 3.
This is the evening of the first Sabbath of a new year^ (1849.)
A new song becomes a new year ; and he who has entered on its
responsibilities with the truest heart, and has reflected on the
mercies of the past with the greatest gratitude, will be the
readiest to sing a new song, which, sung imperfectly below, shall
be rendered in all its force, its fulness, and its harmony above.
We read in Scripture of many songs that were sung on many a
glorious occasion. One of the earliest that we read of is con-,
tained in the book of Exodus — a song alluded to in the book of
Kevelation — where we are told that Moses and the children of Is-
rael sung this song, ^^ Sing unto the Lord, for he hath triumphed
gloriously, the horse and his rider hath h« thrown into the sea.''
A song of sublime poetry was this, sung, I have no doubt, with
no less sublime music, when, standing on the opposite coast, the
children of Israel looked back upon the passage they had made
— a passage for the children of Israel, a sepulchre for all the
hosts and the captains of Pharaoh. We have another instance
of a song sung on the occasion of a kindred victory, in the book
of Judges, V. 12, where we read, ^' Awake, awake Deborah;
awake, awake, utter a song : arise, Barak, and lead thy captivity
captive, thou son of Abinoam. Then he made liim that re-
maineth have dominion over the nobles among the people : the
Lord made me have dominion over the mighty," &c. Judges v.
12-81. Another very beautiful song, and one worthy of your
jareful perusal at your leisure, we have in the book of Psalms,
(Pa, xcvi.,) in which we are called upon to " sing unto the Lord
THE NEW SONG. ;;/ |^
a new song ; sing unto the Lord, all tlie earth ; show forth his
praise from day to day." And the song that is to be sung in
Psalm xcvi., which is called a new song, is declared to be sung
upon the eve of the manifestation of the Lord of glory; for it
concludes with this chorus : '^ Let the earth be glad, and all that
is therein ; then shall the trees of the wood rejoice before the
Lord ; for he cometh, for he cometh to judge the earth ; he shall
judge the world with righteousness, and the people with his
truth." We have also in Isa. xlii. 10, another new and beauti-
ful song : " Sing unto the Lord a new song, and his praise from
the end of the earth, ye that go down to the sea, and all that is
therein ; the isles, and the inhabitants thereof." In the former
case the song was sung on the prostration of all the enemies of
God ; and in the latter cases which I have quoted, the songs were
sung on the sound of the returning footsteps of Him who is to
take the reins into his hand, and guide the earth in its ancient
orbit of holiness, of beauty, and of peace.
Now, the new song which is sung here, which is stated in the
text to be sung ^'before the throne," is one which originated
from the glorious and impressive spectacle of a Lamb seated on
Mount Zion; that Lamb the symbol of suffering, crucifixion,
atonement, death, and yet seated on Mount Zion, the symbol of
glory, of honour, supremacy, dominion j the cross and the crown
blended into one; the garland of thorns that was around the
bleeding brow, and the many crowns that are upon the triumphant
head, woven into one ; it being impossible in heaven to see Christ
upon his throne without the reminiscence of Christ upon his
cross. The shadow of the atonement evermore flits before the
eyes of the worshippers, and is visible there ; a Lamb as if he had
just been slain constantly is prominent before the redeemed, in
order to teach us, or rather lest it should be forgotten, that there
is not a pulse of joy in one heart of the redeemed hosts, that
comes not from Him who was nailed to the cross for us; and
there is not a branch of palm in one ransomed hand, that derives
not its greenness from that tree of suffering; that there is not
one bright sunbeam on the face, nor one realized joy in the
bosoms of the blessed, which may not be traced to atoning blood
and expiatory suffering; and thus Calvary never shall be for-
43*
510 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
gotten, and the sufferings of Jesus shall be recollected while
heaven lasts and the currents of eternity flow. These were the
greatest phenomena that angels ever saw, or history ever en-
nobled; and those sufferings shall suggest the noblest poetry,
and inspire the sublimest minstrelsy, while there are happy
hearts around the throne to recollect and sing them. " I saw a
Lamb upon the throne, and with him one hundred and forty and
four thousand, with his Father's name written in their foreheads,
chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world.'^ '^His
Father's name !" how strange it is that those names, which are
with us so musical, in heaven are so utterly forgotten ! In the
Apocalyptic drama, those distinctions about which men fight,
those quarrels which agitate visible churches, are never mooted,
nor mentioned, nor recollected; there are no Churchmen in
heaven ; there are no Dissenters in heaven ; no Independents, no
Wesleyans ; none but Christians are there ; and it is in vain that
one is able to pronounce with the most exquisite beauty the shib-
boleth of the sect, if one has not written upon one's forehead the
name of our Father who is in heaven.
I have explained to you before, who these hundred forty and
four thousand are. They are the twelve times twelve thousand,
the visible Israel, the type of the true Israel. They are the
whole company of the people of Grod. " And I heard a voice
from heaven" — here is a description of the song, its fulness, its
majesty, its glorious and its mighty swell — "I heard a voice from
heaven, as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of a great
thunder : and I heard the voice of harpers harping with their
harps." These are not the harpers by the glassy sea who cele-
brated the triumph of the redeemed church at the revolution of
1792, but evidently harpers belonging to a different epoch in the
Apocalyptic history, and a subsequent epoch; for it is said,
"they sang a new song before the throne of God and of the
Lamb." They are those that follow the Lamb, that are re-
deemed from among men, in whose mouths is no guile, who are
without fault before the throne of God.
Now, why is this song called a new song? Briefly I have
touched upon this before : let me now explain why I think it is
a new song. It is so, I conceive, because it celebrates a subject
THE NEW SONa 511
ever new. The salvation of our souls is a fact so glorious, that
the more it is looked into, the more glorious it still appears. It
is well known that, when we look at the leaf of a tree with the
naked eye, it is very beautiful ; if we apply to it a microscope of
greater power than the eye, it will appear more beautiful still.
It is found that the greater the microscopic power you can bring
to bear upon it, the greater appear the wonders that Grod hag
treasured up in it, the demonstrations of his wisdom, beneficence,
and skill. I have no doubt that in heaven our intellectual
powers, which are now, like our vision, extremely dim, will be
strengthened and increased progressively, and that we shall see
evolving from every fact of the past, from every feature of the
skies, from every phenomenon of providence, from every triumph
of grace, from the cross and from the crown, from Calvary and
Mount Zion, from the soul and salvation, and from all that is
around, above, below, wonders accumulating upon wonders ; and
ever as they crowd within the horizon of our view, new emotions
of ecstasy, and admiration, and delight will animate us, and we
shall join in that new song, ever new, because its subject is,
which is like the voice of great thunder, and say, "Blessing and
honour unto God and unto the Lamb for ever and ever.^' Then
will be sung a hallelujah such as was never sung before. Then
shall be sung hymns which we now dimly and imperfectly com-
prehend. And I am sure, my dear friends, that we feel so dead
when we read the New Testament records just because our intel-
lectual vision and our spiritual powers are so faint and feeble. I
am convinced that, if we had ears attuned and hearts purified, we
should see good reason why angels desire to look into these
things. I have not the least doubt, that when we appear before
the throne we shall be amazed, and, if that be possible on the
threshold of heaven, we shall be horror-struck, that we heard
facts from the pulpit and read truths in the Bible which ought to
have electrified the universe, which yet fell upon our hearts like
sparks upon the cold snow, without producing the very least
effect. I say, then, it is a new song, because it celebrates a sub-
ject that will be ever new. It is called also a new song because
its theme, its substance, and its structure will be composed of
infinite excellence.
512 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
I liave told you beforej that here the sweetest things pall by
repetition. He that lives amid continual sweets, ceases to feel
their sweetness; he that hears very often even the sweetest
music, ceases to perceive its beauties. It is almost a law in
every thing in this world, that repetition takes away the novelty,
wears off the gilding, dims the beauty, and renders what was
captivating at the commencement, dull and cold afterward. Why
is this ? Because, probably, we reach the utmost range of what
is to be seen : we cannot see deeper to-day than we saw yester-
day. We have not the ever-increasing microscopic power of vision
which will enable us to see new beauties, that supply the place
of the old ones that have become dull and dead. But infinite
things, such as the atonement, the cross, prophecy, type, and
promise, and symbol, God's attributes, the New Jerusalem, the
tree of life, the river of life, are of inexhaustible excellence ; and
when we have beheld them to-day and admired them, we shall
look again to-morrow and find new beauty, and look again the
day after, and find new beauty still — our powers of sight rising
with the excellences of the thing. And I have not the least
doubt, that part of the enjoyment of heaven will be the constant
progression in acquaintance with these things, which are all but
hieroglyphics here — dimly, imperfectly, and inadequately seen.
I have not a doubt that there are wonders in blades of grass, in
trees, in flowers, in pebbles, in gems, in our own body, and,
above all, in that most wonderful thing of this wonder-filled uni-
verse — in our own mind, which we shall discover in the world to
come, which will surprise, electrify, and delight us beyond all
measure.
I do not believe that heaven will be passed merely in contem
plating redemption : it is the noblest theme, but not the exclu-
sive one. Creation has its wonders — providence its mysteries — ■
exceeded only by those of redemption. We shall see all clearly ;
and those things that seem dissonant here, shall, when we sing
that new song, be found to be perfect harmony.
This will be also a new song, because never so many joined in
it, or in the theme that it celebrates, before. The largest num-
ber that can join together in a song here are some four or five
thousand. I think, in the Free-trade Hall at Manchester, at a
THE NEW SONG. '^^' 513
Bible meeting, I once heard seven thousand sing, " Praise God
from whom all blessings flow/' It was noble, it was sublime :
probably there was very little scientific music in it, but there
were full hearts poured out into plain tones, and it had a grandeur
that nothing else could rival. But in heaven — in this better
land — the number that shall join in this song will be ten thou-
sand times ten thousand and thousands of thousands, the hundred
forty and four thousand, an assembly of an infinite number;
every creature redeemed, from Adam to the last man ; every one
saved from among men — " Every creature who is in heaven, or in
earth, or under the earth, and such as are in the sea, heard I
saying," says the seer, ^' Blessing, and glory, and honour, and
power, be unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the
Lamb for ever and ever." And no sound shall be discordant.
The insect upon the wing, and the cherub beside the throne, all
voices of sea and sky, and wind and wave, shall swell together
the mighty harmony of that mighty song, which is ever new be-
cause ever exhaustless in its subject.
This song may be called a new song, because it celebrates the
completion of all past dispensations. At present we are in the
midst of dispensations fulfilling ; then we shall stand and take a
view of dispensations fulfilled. We can only sing the song of the
Apocalypse now by anticipation : then we shall sing it with retro-
spective gratitude and joy. Not a promise will then be, which
shall not have not bloomed into performance; not a prophecy
then, which we shall not see perfectly realized ; not a shadow will
be then, that has not passed into its substance ; not a symbol
then, which has not met its full and ample illustration. Sinai
and Calvary shall have borne their burdens, and we shall behold
the wisdom and the love of God manifested in them ; and the
song which the angels sung by anticipation beside the manger,
" Glory to God in the highest, on earth peace, good-will toward
men," shall no longer be a song with prophetic bearing on the
future, but with retrospective reference to the past, for all will
then be completed. Glory to God then shall be in the highest,
on earth perfect peace, in men's hearts the expression of all abso-
lute good-will.
This song, too, may be called new, because it will celebrato
514 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
what we cannot now celebrate — not merely tlie completion of the
fact of redemption; but the completion of the jyrocess of redemp-
tion. Christ said, ^^It is finished;" that was applicable only to
the price of our redemption. " It is finished/' will then be said
and sung of the process of our redemption. The price was paid
1800 years ago — the process of the application of that price goes
on in the day in which we live. But then the number who are
contemplated by it shall be completed; the number of Grod's elect
will then be complete ; the true church, the hundred forty and
four thousand, shall then surround the throne of God and of the
Lamb. There shall be no more ruin for redemption to retrieve —
no more souls to be saved — no more sins to be forgiven — no more
transgressions to be blotted out, and no more hearts to be sancti-
fied. Death shall be destroyed; the grave shall be filled; the
number of Grod's own shall be complete ; and a song shall be sung
under new circumstances, so new and glorious that it may be
called indeed a new song.
It may also be called a new song, because then we shall have,
what indeed I have already alluded to, new and glorious dis-
coveries. The telescope of the astronomer, the researches of the
chemist, the excavations of the geologist, the scenes beheld by
the traveller round the globe, the wonders of mineralogy, the
mysteries of electricity — these are but sparks and scintillations,
that fly with lightning speed through our gloomy atmosphere,
revealing to us by those specimens the splendours and the glories
that will be unfolded in that unclouded noon. These things
we now see through a glass darkly ; but those things which the
dimness of our vision prevents our seeing now, or which the dis-
tance of our position prevents us from seeing adequately, shall
then come within the horizon; and ever as new glories break
upon the shores of that happy sea on which those harpers stand,
and ever as new visions of beauty and magnificence dawn upon
the sight, new ecstasy shall thrill each heart, and new poetry shall
pour from each lip, and new music shall swell that song which,
new thousands of years ago, shall be new when thousands and
millions have passed away in the future.
That song may also be called a new song, because we shall then
have new joys. Our brightest joys at present are clouded, our
THE NEW SONG. 51$
sweetest joys have bitterness in them : the purest gold has alloy
in it ; in fact, as a goldsmith told me, pure gold would be of no
use ; it is not 'available here below in Jts virgin state. It is so
with our joys in this world. Pure joys would be the new wine
that we could not stand ; they must be diluted, they must be
mingled, in order to be fit for us in this imperfect state : but then
the water will be separated from the wine, the alloy will all be
removed from the gold ; perfect men shall taste of perfect joys,
and a pure currency exist in a pure state. Here joy enters into us;
there we shall enter into joy. Joys of intellect as far as they are
pure, joys of sense as far as they are holy, joys of soul as far as
they are spiritual — blended into one, infinitely increased, and
made infinitely more intense, shall be the joys of those who sing
before the throne that new song.
This song may be called, in the next place, new, because there
will be there a new combination of voices. Here you can only
have the voices of those of the same age and nation. But sing-
ing that song will be Noah, and Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob,
and David, and John, and Justin Martyr, and Augustine, and
Peter Waldo, and Luther, Calvin, Latimer, Whitefield, Wesley,
and innumerable others. Men parted by centuries, severed by
oceans and by continents, and circumstances ecclesiastical, politi-
cal, social, shall meet together and constitute the perfect choir
that sing the perfectly new song. And then that song will not
be like the pope's song, unison ; but, as becomes a perfect song,
harmony. Unison is when a key-note is given, and all voices
sing that note precisely. Harmony is when a key-note is given,
and each takes his own part, and all blended constitute harmony.
In the popedom there is what is called unison. The pope gives
the key-note, and each priest's pipe sounds precisely the same
note. In Protestant churches Christ gives the key-note, and each
Christian, Churchman or Dissenter, or whatever he may be called,
takes his own part ; and all combine to constitute that harmony
which is only an imperfect introduction, scarce more than the
tuning of the instrument, preparatory to that glorious harmony
which constitutes that new song that is heard in heaven.
This song, in the next place, may be called a new song, because
it will be sung by new voices. I dare say you all know that
516 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
mental emotion always affects the voice. The connection between
our souls and senses is so complete, that as one's heart is, so one's
voice will very much be. I have no doubt that a practised eye
could detect a dishonest man by his walk ; and that a practised
ear could detect a sad heart by the tones which its voice pours
forth. At all events, this we know, that mental emotions affect
the voice ; and, however flexible the voice, or rightly managed,
the emotions of grief and of gladness tell upon the fulness and
firmness of its tone. Personal, domestic, social, spiritual feelings
and reminiscences, will affect one's powers of song. But in the
New Jerusalem the vocalization will be perfect. There shall be
perfect music, rendered by perfect voices. Every emotion shall
be ecstasy — every reminiscence shall be gratitude — every feeling
shall be joy — every prospect shall be bliss. There shall not be
one sorrowful feeling to unstring the strings of the harmonious
harp. There shall be no damp nor mist; there shall be no sharp
projecting angles ; there shall be nothing in that New Jerusalem
that will mar the perfect harmony of the perfect voice belonging
to the perfect hearts that sing that new and perfect song.
The song will be then a new song, such as was never sung
before. It may be called, too, a new song, because it will be
sung under new circumstances. Here our best songs are sung
by the waters of Babylon : our best harps have broken strings,
and are often hung upon the willows. But there, the song shall
be sung by the river that flows from the throne of G-od and of the
Lamb, and under the shadow of that tree whose name is the tree
of life, and by that company in whose hearts will be no sadness,
and in whose soul will be no curse, for they are without spot and
faultless before the throne.
It will also be a new song, not merely because it shall have
new themes, be sung under new circumstances and by new voices,
but because its music as well as its matter shall be divine. The
highest poetry, the purest and best compositions of man, are in-
adequate and imperfect ; and they who have made the highest
attainments are the first to admit that they see excellences be-
yond them, the very outskirts of which they have not yet reached.
In this world we have imperfect thoughts, imperfect feelings, im-
perfect affections ; and imperfect music is good enough. But in
THE NEW SONG. 517
heaven, when the heart shall be holy, and that heart shall be
full of holy ecstasy, and when the new voices that shall be heard
upon the other side shall break upon us in that glorious morn, it
will be found that the music of a Handel, or a Mozart, or a Men-
delssohn, will be utterly inadequate to be the vehicle of the sub-
lime emotions of the happy and holy hearts that are there. Then
there shall be music worthy of the minstrel; and music and
minstrels both shall be, like their common author, Christ, fault-
less and without spot before the throne.
And, in the next place, it may be called a new song, because
it shall begin a new year. We are now beginning one of those
little fragments into which we have divided time, called years.
We call this the first Sabbath of a new year. What is before us,
God only knows. It is well, perhaps, we do not know. What
scenes may be in homes that are now happy — what' hearts that
are now bounding, may, before it closes, be breaking — what spirits
that are now listening with ecstasy or apathy, may be amid the
lost or amid the saved — who is to live and mingle with the bless-
ed, and who is to plunge into the realms of the lost, Grod only
knows. We ought to have some idea whether this new year is
to convey us into a new year in a new heaven, and to join in a
new song ; or whether it is to precipitate us into that place where
all sights are sorrow, all sounds are discord, and all hearts bleed-
ing and none are bounding. What is before us this year, I know
not. I do not attempt to prophesy. My fears are, that it will be
for the world, and for the world's nations, a disastrous one ; but
I do not know; I can only guess from what I have said before.
This just reminds me, that I ought to have told you last Lord's-
day evening, when I spoke of the outpouring of the seventh vial,
and the downfall of Babylon, that it was added at the end, that
" there fell upon men great hailstones, each about the weight of a
talent." I omitted to state what seems to me to be meant
here. Hailstorms, in Apocalyptic language, denote northern in-
vasion. Storm or tempest is always invasion : you may recol-
lect instances of this in my former expositions. It is very re-
markable that the Emperor of Russia, whose dominion stretches
over so gigantic a territory, and who is the only autocrat perhaps
at this time in the world, has recently said of himself, ^*I am
SECOND SERIES. 44
618 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
raised up in the providence of God, for a great work that is be-
fore me." And it is stated in the great assembly at Frankfort,
that the Emperor of Russia has marched half a million of men to
the frontiers of his dominions, determined to right Europe, and
set up again the autocrats that are fallen. This is a symptom
of the great hailstone invasion ; and I only beg you to wait and
watch the progress of affairs, and see if this shall prove to be
another evidence that we are under the seventh vial, and that the
crisis of nations is the knell of approaching doom, and the call to
us to prepare to meet the Lord. I do not specify years or days,
because I dare not do so. What I say is this, That, if certain
epochs in our interpretation be correct, this dispensation will ter-
minate) about 1864, about which time, according to the purest
chronology, the seven-thousandth or Sabbatical year begins. I
said, those great epochs all converge, the nearest and the latest,
about that period. If it be so, then, if we are right in our chro-
nology — and I do not assume to be infallible in interpreting pro-
phecy — then the great epochs terminate about that time. This
Mr. Elliott and Mr. Birks think almost certain, and many others
who have given their attention to the subject have come to that
conclusion. Whether it be so or not, I believe that our lot is cast
in the last times. Are we prepared, when the discord of nations
shall cease, to sing the new song ? — to enter a new year, when all
things are made new ? At present, 1849 is a new year to the old
and wornout world ; but when these years shall have passed away,
we shall enter in heaven on a new year, in a world where all
things are made new.
I have spoken of the song, the singers of it, the music, the
circumstances, and the time when it is sung. Let me say one
word more about the singers of it. Who are they? what are
iheyl None but the hundred forty and four thousand — they
that have the Father's name written in their foreheads — they that
follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth — none but they that are
faultless before God, can sing it. In other words, it is the old
story yet ever new ; none but new men can sing the new song.
And new men made so, when ? Not when they had to seize the
harp and open their lips to join in the music, but previously made
so upon earth — these alone shall be able to sing that new song
THE NEW SONG. 51^
which sliall be sung in heaven. " If any man be iiv Christ/* saya
the apostle, "all things are become new; old things are passed
away /' '^ Circumcision availeth nothing j uncircumcision availeth
nothing; but a new creature. '* None but new creatures can ap-
preciate that new music, or understand this new subject, or sing
the new song. Are you so ? Are you in 1849 what you have
been ever since you were born, burrowing in the earth — your
sympathies concentrated upon things that perish — your fears, your
hopes restricted to this world — ^your whole thoughts in your
counting-house or your cash-boxes ? or are you new creatures ?
Let me give you one or two short and simple tests. If you are
new creatures in 1849, this new year will have a new object of
pursuit. Hitherto it has been to eat and drink and to be merry,
to get rich, or great, or powerful ; but if you are new creatures,
it will now be to '* seek first the kingdom of God and his right-
eousness, that all these things may be added.'' The old creature
has but this feeling : I will take care of myself, and leave God to
take care of his honour as he may. The feeling of a new crea-
ture is : I will seek God's honour first, and do God's will above
all things, and leave God to take care of me and my soul and
mine.
If you are new creatures, you will have a new rule of life, and
faith, and walk. Your old rule was, " What will the world say
of this ? I wonder what such an one will think of it ? I will
not do this because it will bring me damage." These are not a
new creature's rules. He says. Is this consistent with my obliga-
tions and responsibilities before God ? If it be so, I will cheer-
fully enter upon it; but if it be not so, though it should give me
a thousand a year, I will turn my back upon it. Do not deceive
yourselves. The principle of the new creature is, that he can
fling a fortune away, rather than fling from him the favour and
approbation of God.
Begin the new year, then, determined that what God's word
plainly condemns you will renounce, however profitable; and
what God's word plainly enjoins, you will pursue, however pain-
ful it may be. If you are new creatures, you will have new views
of God. Hitherto you have thought of God as a tyrant. This
ifl the feeling of every carnal man. If I beg a natural man to
520 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
become a Christian, lie instantly forms to himself the most fright-
ful picture of suffering and sadness you can imagine. He says,
If I become a Christian I must give up the opera, I must leave
my box in Drury-lane; I must give up this most gratifying in-
dulgence, I must renounce that favourite amusement. If I can-
not do these things, how can I become a Christian ? Hear me :
You are looking at Christianity at a wrong angle ; you are not on
proper ground from which to judge. You forget that when you
get new duties to perform, and new sacrifices to make, you get a
new heart and new tastes corresponding thereto. The new wine
poured into the old bottles would be marred ; but when there is
new wine, there are also new bottles to receive it. The new work
is assigned to a new taste. I would not beg a man to abandon
the playhouse if I could not show him an attraction far brighter,
more glorious, more beautiful, more worthy of him. But what I
tell you is, that when you are made new creatures, your tastes
will be transformed from all that is evil. You will have new
tastes, affections, sympathies ; all things new. So you will have
new views of God. You will walk with him, not like a slave
with his master, but as a son with his father. Every thing con-
nected with God will appear to you beautiful. Whatever duty
he enjoins, whatever precepts he commands, will be musical to
your ear; because you have now a new taste, a new nature, and
all things are become new
521
LECTURE XXXVIL
CONCLUSION.
** The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen.** '
Revelation xxii. 20.
The word rendered "grace" in the Bible means simply free,
unmerited favour — love, loving-kindness, mercy. The idea that
specially distinguishes it is that of undeservedness — something
that is bestowed by gracious love, undeserved and unpurchased
by him that receives it. Grace begins in Genesis and closes the
Apocalypse. Grace gives us all our blessings; and it takes from
us for God, what it is gain to lose — only a revenue of glory.
The first sinner that was spared on earth, and the last saint that
was crowned in glory, are there by grace : our privileges here,
our blessings hereafter, are the gifts, the purchases, and the be-
stowals of grace. "We are saved by grace," is written upon all
we are, all we have, and all we hope for.
"Grace," which the evangelical seer wishes to be with us,
may be regarded, first, as comprehending all that Christ has done
for us. This explanation is not conjecture : it is an apostle's
statement. "Ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ," says
the apostle. Now, what is it? "That though he was rich, yet
for our sakes he became poor, that we through his poverty might
be made rich." I understand, therefore, that grace includes all
that Christ has done. All he suffered as an expiation for our
sins — all he did as a title to that glory we had lost — all his im-
puted righteousness, are the fruits of grace. No necessity was
laid upon him to interpose for us; if he had left us to perish in
our ruin, heaven would not have been without inhabitants, and
God had not been without glory.
Under this "grace" is included and meant, not only all that
Christ has done, but all that Christ now does. "All power la
44*
522 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
given unto me in heaven and in earth; go ye therefore and
teach all nations." " He ever liveth to make intercession for
us." ^^Wheresoever two or three are gathered together in my
name, there am I in the midst of them." And again: "My
grace is sufficient for thee." If Christ had remembered in hea-
ven his reception on earth, and when he left it had renounced
and abjured it for ever, he had only done what we merited. If,
therefore, his sympathies in heaven are so intimate with sinners
on earth, that wheresoever a Christian pines, there Christ feels,
and wheresoever Christians are persecuted, there Christ sympa-
thizes — all this is not the deserving of our merit, but the fruits
of the " grace of our Lord Jesus Christ."
If we take a retrospect of all recorded in the Apocalypse, we
shall see that all has been of grace. What preserved the solitary
seer in his exile of Patmos? what withdrew the mystic vail,
and disclosed to him scenes unspeakable and full of glory?
Grace. What saved and kept alive the church of Christ during
the sanguinary reign of a Nero — amid the hot and scorching
persecution of a Domitian? What made crypts and catacombs
more glorious than cathedrals, and martyrdom more desirable
than the laurel crown or the wreath of Caesar? What made the
people of Grod count it all joy when they suffered for their
Saviour's sake ? What preserved that church until it holds now
the hopes of millennial glory ? It was " the grace of our Lord
Jesus Christ." What brought it to pass that when Constantine
made the bishops kings, and the presbyters nobles, and the pro-
fession of Christianity a passport to political office; when the
baptismal font came to be the most popular rallying point, and
the religion of the fishermen of Galilee the religion of a mighty
and a powerful empire; and when doctrine began to be corrupt,
and purity and piety continued to decline, and faithfulness had
all but evaporated; — what brought it to pass that the church was
not utterly extinguished in the sunshine after she had survived
the storm, and was preserved as a woman fleeing to the wilder
ness, to hide herself for a time, times, and half a time, till the
corruption should be removed and the storm should cease, and
pUg should again look forth " bright as the sun, and fair as tha
CONCLUSION. 523
moon, and terrible as an army with banners ?" The answer is,
It was ^' the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.'^
What preserved that church when the poisonous floods of
Arianism roared and rushed after her to destroy her, and when
the dragon stood ready to devour the man-child that she should
bring forth? what spared the church from his fury, preserved
her in her purity, and prevented the gates of hell from prevail-
ing against her? "The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ/' What
was it when its terrible and medieval eclipse spread over Eu-
rope — when cathedrals were built by the spoils of widows, and
finished amid the protesting cries of orphans — when the priests
assumed the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and only opened
its gates, or pretended to do so, to those who paid them most
liberally — when the New Testament was a forbidden book — when
the truths of the gospel were unheard in pulpits raised to pro-
claim them? what was it that amid all this preserved the ^^Lux
lucens in tenebrisj' the beautiful motto of the Waldenses, " the
light shining in darkness," still burning amid the Cottian Alps,
and in sequestered vales, amid desert and untrodden moors?
what kept those lights still twinkling, till they met and mingled
and blazed in the splendour of the blessed Reformation? "The
grace of our Lord Jesus Christ." What was it that raised up a
Luther in Germany, a Knox in Scotland, and a Cranmer in
England ? It was " the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ." And
what was it that, when the churches of the empire as established
by law were dead, caused a Wesley to appear in England, an
Erskine in Scotland, and innumerable others, who followed and
rekindled the extinguished lamps, and began, by the blessing
of God, that second Reformation, the effects of which, with those
of the first, shall not cease till they mingle with the glories of the
millennial day ? What was it in the last century — when Vol-
taire, Marat, Hume, Gibbon, Paine, and all the other master in-
fidel spirits of previous and succeeding years, seemed to have it
all their own way, and anticipated the utter extinction of Chris-
tianity — that interposed, and made the Baptist Missionary Society,
the Church Missionary Society, the Wesleyan Missionary So-
ciety, the Tract Society, the Bible Society, all suddenly spring
up, and standing on their lofty heights, look down and laugh to
524 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
scorn the efforts of infidelity and skepticism? The answer is, lb
is "the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ/'
What was it that preserved this land amid the shocks and con-
vulsions of 1848? what has supported it in its sublime safety
amid the rocking countries of the continent of Europe ? what
has made it feel peace when all around has been disturbed ? what
has made it, like the harpers on the glassy sea, while all Europe
echoed with thunders and cries and voices, give its praise and glory
and thanksgiving to God and to the Lamb? "The grace of our Lord
Jesus Christ." Grace has been with the church in the past; grace
is with her in the present; grace has made her every sigh find an
echo in glory, her every joy a reflection on the throne, her safety ab-
sorb the sympathies of heaven, and Christ still show how true is the
promise that he made in Palestine, "The gates of hell shall not
prevail against thee.'' I ask. Why has all this been? It is no ac-
cession of happiness to God, it is no addition to the splendour of
that glory that exceeds the sun at noon. The only answer is,
His own free and sovereign grace. "He has not chosen us," in
the language he addressed to Israel, " because we were the great-
est or most excellent among all nations, but because the Lord
loved us." Grace, then, is in all that Christ has done; grace is
in all that Christ has suffered; grace is in all the blessings which
we have reaped ; grace is in all that he has promised to do. It
is of grace that he has said, " I will never leave thee nor forsake
thee ;" it is of grace that he has promised, " The gates of hell
shall not prevail against us ;" it is of grace that he has said,
that he will come again and receive us to himself — that where
he is, there we may be also.
But let me look at this grace as it shines in various particulars.
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ is exhibited in the pardon
of sin : " In whom we have redemption through his blood,
even the forgiveness of sins." Why? He adds, "According to
the riches of his grace." And again says the apostle, " Justi-
fied freely by his grace." If I address a believer in this assem-
bly, whose heart gives a responsive echo to that absolution which
God alone can pronounce and make real, " Thy sins be forgiven
thee" — if there be any one in this assembly who can say, " Wo
are justified freely by his grace, and therefore we have peace
CONCLUSION. 626
with God" — need I ask thee, my brother, why it is so? Thou
didst not inherit it, thou hast done nothing that can purchase it ;
the glad answer you will give in songs of gratitude and joy is,
*'By grace I am justified, by grace I must be saved."
Grace is also exhibited in our sanctification. Justification is
an act of grace ; sanctification is a work of grace ; and this work
is not a process that we can begin, or carry on, or that we can
consummate ; but as it begins in grace, it is carried on by grace,
and is consummated in glory. There is nothing we do, nothing
we say, nothing we can promise, that can merit one blessing from
God. From the least crumb that rests upon thy table to the
diadem of glory that shall be placed about thy brow — all is the
grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Then grace shines not only in justification and sanctification,
but also in adoption. What are we, if Christians ? The sons
of God. What a contrast to what we were by nature — the chil-
dren of wrath ! What has made us so ? No authority of man's.
The queen can make a nobleman : God alone can make a Chris-
tian. A nobleman is a mere adventitious and airy dignity — a
Christian is a real, an ever-rising, an eternal rank; and yet,
strange as it is, I may address some in this asssembly who would
rather have some such title as our beloved monarch can bestow,
than have that heart which the Lord of glory is ready and willing
to give. What a miscalculation if it be so ! When we lie upon
that bed, on which recently I have seen not a few — that bed from
which we take a calm retrospect of the past — prejudice, and pas-
sion, and anger, and ill-will, rolled away for ever, and from which
we take a solemn gaze into that terrible and untried futurity,
about which none of us have thought as we ought — you can have
now very little idea how truly worthless, at such an hour, and at
such a retrospect, and before such a prospect, crowns and coronets
and wealth appear.
My dear friends, realize at times a death-bed, and ambition
will fold its wings, and the proud heart will lie low in the dust,
and say, '^0 my Saviour, let thy grace make me but a child
of God, and I care not how soon may perish all the pomp, tho
honours, the vanities, and the ambition of a world that passeth
away." Yet, " to as many as received him, to them gave lio
526 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
power to become the sons of God." Grace shows itself in our
adoption ; grace will show itself in assurance. Many Christians
have spoken to me, and said, We grieve that we have not assu-
rance; we hope that we are Christians — we desire to be so — ^but
we dare not say we are absolutely certain that we shall be saved.
God does not give assurance to every one ; perhaps it is in mercy
that we have not assurance. Yet it is not because there is not
enough in the Bible to lead us to realize and to enjoy assurance.
But it is one thing to say, I know that I am saved by Christ —
that is assurance; but it is just as sufficient a thing to say, I be-
lieve in Christ in order to be saved. Make sure of grasping the
Saviour, and never trouble yourself about assurance. Faith in
Christ is the root; assurance is the beautiful blossom. God may
give you the root; he may withhold the blossom. Assurance is
a visible impress, stamped upon the soul of the believer, con-
vincing him from God that he is a child of God. A wife, for in-
stance, wears upon her finger a ring as the outward symbol that
she is married ; but if that ring were to drop from her finger and
be lost, the marriage covenant would not therefore be dissolved.
The ring is the mere outward symbol that she is married, it is
not that which makes her so. Assurance is the outward, visible,
audible symbol to the believer that he is a child of God; but he
does not cease to be a child of God because that outward sign or
symbol perishes. God binds him to himself by ties indissoluble
as his attributes can make them ; and whether he give them the
earnest and the foretaste of it, or withhold it, let us be satisfied
to cleave to Christ for salvation; and if we put our trust in him,
we shall never be put to confusion.
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ is with us also in all our
coiiSicts and trials. Our Lord has told us, "In this world ye
^ball have tribulation." Many persons fret and complain because
tnoy have not all the peace, and joy, and assurance, which they
think they ought to have. But we must discriminate; we are
not to expect to have the peace and happiness of heaven below ;
we are here as members of the church militant, not of the church
triumphant. It is as unreasonable to expect the dispensation
that now is, to be without conflict, as it would be to expect the
dispensation that shall be, without rest. Conflict is the charac-
CONCLUSION. 527
teristic of the present; rest, satisfaction, and repose are the bless-
ed characteristics of the next. Grrace does not make us cease to
be soldiers; but makes us, as soldiers, to be more than conquerors
through him that loved us. In this world we must have trials :
thanks be to God that we have them ! The family in this con-
gregation that has the fewest trials, is the family that is most to
be pitied, and that has the greatest reason to suspect its state in
the sight of Grod. The law of this dispensation is, " Through
much tribulation ye must enter into the kingdom of God." The
prophecy of our blessed Lord is, " In this world ye shall have
tribulation ; but in the end ye shall have peace." I believe that
if we had no trials, we should forget that there is a God; we
should cease to anticipate heaven; we should fail to make prepa-
ration for it. God loosens the roots of a tree previous to its fall.
God lops off the branches that exhaust its nutriment, that it may
be stronger, healthier, and better. And it seems to me that those
trials which we feel most bitterly — when God takes away from
us the relatives, the fathers, the mothers, the babes that we love
— are but loosening those ties that knit us to the world that now
is, and multiplying and strengthening those which draw us to
the world that shall be. ^' It is well," as the mother said when
her babe was snatched from her bosom, " It is well !" There is
a needs-be in it. Christ will not extract the thorn, but he will
give us grace to bear it. He will not take us from the midst
of the furnace, but he will be with us when we are in it. He
will not spare us the afflictions that we need, but he will strength-
en us under the afflictions that he sends. We shall not have too
few, or too light, or too short, as our carnal nature would de-
mand; we shall not have too great, or too many, or too long, as
Satan would suggest. Bat we shall have what Infinite Wisdom
has devised, and Infinite Love has tempered — ^just what we need,
and are truly expedient for us.
His grace shall be with us also, not only in our afflictions, but
the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ shall be with us, and has
been with us, in all our blessings and enjoyments. I solemnly
believe there is more danger to us in our prosperity than in our
trials. It needs more grace to hold a full cup steady than it ever
does to drink a bitter one. It needs more grace to keep us in
628 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
the sunshine than ever it did to keep us in the storm. Without
grace, our best blessings may be curses ; with grace, our greatest
calamities shall be blessings.
The grace of Christ has been with' us, and will be with us, in
all the ordinances of his appointment. Many of us drew near the
table of the Lord this day. It was grace that instituted that
communion on the eve on which its author was betrayed. It was
grace that has spared us through another year to commemorate
his dying love ; it was grace that enabled us to surround that -
table, and solemnly to subscribe ourselves by his name; and it
was grace that has made that communion to be any thing more
than a form — to be to us a channel of virtue, a means of grace,
a pledge of glory. And it is grace alone that will enable us, as
becomes those who have been the subjects of countless mercies
and unbounded love, to shine as lights in the world, that men
may see our good works, and glorify our Father which is in
heaven.
And the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ has been with us, and
will be with us, in all our duties. It is by grace that the hea-
viest cross becomes light, and the hardest yoke becomes easy;
and the man who feels that what he undergoes is the appoint-
ment of him that died for him on the cross will bear it with the
greatest patience and submission. " I can do all things," says
the apostle, ^'through Christ, who strengtheneth me." It is
grace whereby we serve God acceptably; amd of his grace have
we received all, and grace for grace.
But the closing prayer of the seer in this passage is not only
that grace may be with us in all these various particulars — grace
in the pardon of our sins — grace in our sanctification — grace in
our adoption — grace in our assurance — grace in our conflicts —
grace in our trials — grace in our blessings — grace in our ordi-
nances — and grace in our duties; but he prays that this grace
^' may be with us all."
With ministers of the gospel, for they specially need grace.
The apostle tells us that it was grace that he specially asked; for
he says, " the grace of God given unto me, that I should be a
preacher of the gospel." Again he says, " grace given unto me
as a wise master builder;" and again, ^^Unto me, who am less
CONCLUSION. 629
than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should
preach amoug the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ/'
Grace in a minister's heart will be the eloquence of his sermon,
the influence of his life, and his most persuasive language.
You must pray, not that your minister may have the greatest
gifts which the natural man can have, but that he may have the
greatest?H^ce which the Christian man alone has.
If it needs grace to be with our ministers, it needs grace to be
with our people also. You need grace to hear, as well as does
the minister to speak. It is practically the feeling of multitudes,
that they must look to the pulpit for gifts and graces and every
thing, and they must look to the pew for nothing at all. My
dear friends, the reason why there are so many dead pulpits, is
just because there are so many dead pews. The reason why
there is not so great power in the pulpit, is that there is not such
fervent prayer in the pew. I believe that all the presentations
and patrons, all the parish and popular elections, will never sup-
ply the place of fervent prayer in the closet, and persevering
prayer in the pew. And if your souls do not grow in grace,
blame indeed the minister, for he may deserve it, but blame not
him only; blame yourselves. In order to produce good fruit, it
needs not only good seed sown and scattered, but it needs also a
good soil in which to plant it. And if the soil be bad, or if
Satan come and catch it away the moment it is sown, or if thorns
and the cares of this world choke it, then, remember, you are
not to blame the sower, who has sown good seed and has sown it
carefully, but you are to blame yourselves. There is a great deal
of Popery in us all. "We look to our minister to pray for us, to
preach for us, and, if he only could, to be responsible for us at
the judgment-seat of God. No man in the universe of God can
be responsible for another. Not the greatest angel of those
around the throne of Deity can denude me of my obligations,
responsibilities, and duties. You and I must stand before the
judgment-seat of Christ, and amid that glory which shall make
thoughts to be legible and character to be transparent, just as
clearly and vividly as the printed book is legible and transparent
now. And we must all stand at that judgment-seat, each feel-
ing the intense and unutterable solitude of being alone. Dear
SECOND SERIES. 45
630 APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES.
brethren, try often to be alone; try to realize solitude except
with Grod. You must die alone. Have you ever seen a death-
bed ? Nothing can help it. The physicians retire, relatives hide
their countenances and weep, and the man dies alone. Nobody
can help him; they must leave him when the soul is about to
separate from the body and begin its long journey; every rela-
tive remains behind. We must die alone ; we must stand at the
judgment-seat alone ; we must be answerable alone; and may God
grant that we may now realize what it is to be alone with God
as our Father, lest we be alone with him once for all as our Judge.
Grace, then, we pray may not only be with all ministers, but
with all the congregation. But more than this is in " Grace be
with you all." Grace be with all true Christians, of every name,
denomination, and class. I have learned what true catholicity is
since I began to study the Apocalypse. I have learned how poor
and evanescent are all the distinctions of sect, how real and sub-
stantial is the grace of God. I have learned how unimportant it
is before God to be churchman or dissenter, how unspeakably
precious it is to be a Christian. I have seen upon the stage of
that mysterious drama, that all distinctions, except those of Christ
9,nd Antichrist drop away : these alone appear upon the scene, and
these alone are cast up before the great white throne. Grace,
therefore, be with all the ministers of all the sections of the
Christian church. Grace be with those whom neither bishops
nor presbyters can make, but only the Lord of Glory. Grace be
with all those who are called by the Holy Ghost, whether conse-
crated by man or not. Grace be with all that love the Lord Jesus
Christ in sincerity and truth, whether they can pronounce our
shibboleth or not. It is this grace being with them, not mecha-
nical laws and rules and distinctions alone, shall bind them into
brotherhood, and make them feel how lasting is the communion
of saints, how transitory is the discipline and the distinction of
sect. Grace be with them at all times. May it be with them in
prosperity and in adversity — when they arc few and when they
are many — when they are persecuted and when they are prosper-
ed — grace be with them. In all places — when peasants are their
auditory, and lowly rooms their cathedrals — grace be with them
etill.
CONCLUSION. 531
And then the Seer concludes this precious book with this word
— ^' Amen/^ A word it is short in utterance, sublime in signifi-
cation. Let me give you some specimens of it. The word is
applied to Christ in several passages in the Gospel of John; for
instance, "Verily, verily, I say unto you:" literally, "I, the
Amen, the Amen, say unto you." I only wish our translators had
kept the word wherever it occurs : they have kept it in the Apo-
calypse, but they ought to have also retained it in many other
places. For instance, in 1 Sam. ii. C5 : "I will raise me up a faith-
ful priest, and I will build him up a sure house :" literally, " I
will raise me up an Amen priest, and I will build him up an
A.men house." Again, Isaiali xxxiii. 6: "Bread shall be given
him : his waters shall be sure," as it stands in our translation :
but literally translated it is, " Bread shall be given him, and his
shall be Amen waters." His shall be living water, that proceed-
eth from the throne of God and of the Lamb. Again, in Isaiah
xxviii. 16 : "I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone,
a precious stone, a sure foundation : he that believeth shall not
make haste." In the original it is, " Behold, I lay in Zion a
foundation stone he that says to it. Amen, shall not
make haste." And in Genesis xv. 6: "Abraham believed God:
and he counted it to him for righteousness :" literally, " Abra-
ham said to God, Amen; and God counted it to him for righteous-
ness :" Amen thus connecting Christ and faith in Christ, as the
sum and substance of Christianity.
In concluding these lectures on the last two chapters of the
Apocalypse, let me state, that if you cannot say Amen to all my
views of prophecy — if you cannot acquiesce in all my expositions
of the past, or in all or any of my auguries and anticipations
of the future — if you cannot agree with me that the six first
seals refer to the Roman Empire — nor in my explanation of the
sounding and application of the trumpets — if you cannot concur
with me as to the scenes of the seven vials; that the last has
been poured into the air, that the first throbs of the last earth-
quake have begun, that voices and cries are sounding from the
nations of the earth, that great Babylon is coming into remem-
brance before God, that the first scorching contents of that vial
are being poured upon its head, the Antichrist, Pius IX., the
582
APOCALYPTIC SICETCHES.
chief pontiff, who is now a refugee under its influence' — if you
do not believe with me that the next sound that shall reverberate
from the skies and be re-echoed in glad songs from the earth will
be, *' Behold, I come quickly" — if you cannot believe with me
that in the course of a very few years " every eye shall see Him,
and they also that pierced Him, and all the kindreds of the earth
shall wail because of Him" — if you cannot believe with me, what
chronology has proved, that in the course of less than twenty
years more the seventh millennium of the world begins, or the
seventh thousand year, or that it is the rest that remains for the
people of God — if you cannot say Amen to all these things, yet
there are some things to which you c*an say. Amen. " Unto Him
that loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood,
and made us kings and priests to God and our Father for ever, to
Him be glory and honour for ever and ever:" to this you can
say. Amen. " Salvation, and glory, and blessing, and thanksgiv-
ing, be unto our God, and to the Lamb for ever and ever; and
they said. Amen." To these words also you can say. Amen.
^'- Worthy is the Lamb to receive power, and riches, and wisdom,
and strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing. And they
said, Amen." And many — I pray that many that hear, and
more that shall read, may have grace to say Amen too.
THE END.
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scholastic exercises. In doing so, she endeavours to *each them something of the formation of cha-
racter, and offers them various useful hints for their improvement, mentally and physically : explains
to them the station they are to occupy in society, and sets before them in its tr'oe light the responsi-
bility they incur by a neglect of their proper duties, in their too eager pursuit of the follies of the day,
Such a book cannot fail to be useful, and we hope it may be read extensively.— £aWJffJore American.
THE BROKEN BRACELET,
AND OTHER POEMS.
By MRS. ESLING, (Late Miss Waterman.)
Price in Cloth, Gilt Backs, $1 00.
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Ccntaining many Gems of Thought, from writers of the highest celebrity, on themes of permanent
interest. — Observer.
"Good taste and good judgment make the selections of these excerpts, which convey lessons in
morals and wisdom in brief sentences, the best for seizing hold of the understanding, and remaming
fixed upon the memory.
FOREST FlTwIFs^oFtHE WEST.
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WITH PORTRAIT, ETC.
In Cloth, Gilt Backs, 75 cents. Full Gilt, $1 00.
She possesses a warm, lively fnncy, and true poetic feeling : her verse flowing pure and musical a*
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This volume is destined to take its place among the numerous American poetesses whoso charmis;
•rscfl expressive of womanljr feeling enrich our literature.— Pref2)^<n-Min.
LINDSAY AND BLAKISTON
PUBLISH
A MANUAL OF SACRED HISTORY;
OR,
A GUIDE TO THE UNDERSTANDING
(Bi tilt gibiiu |Ian 0f Salbnti^n
ACCORDING TO ITS HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT.
BY
JOHN HENRY KURTZ, D.D.,
PROFESSOR OP CHUnCH HISTORY IN THE UNIVERSITY OP DORPAT, ETO.
TRANSLATED FROM THE SIXTH GERMAN EDITION,
BY
CHARLES R SCHAEFFER, D.D.,
OPINIONS OF THE PRESS.
"A very comprehensive, accurate, and methodical digest of the Sacred Hig-
tory — done vs-ith genuine thoroughness and scholarship. There is nothing
among our manuals of Biblical History that corresponds with this. It is sim-
ple in style, and orthodox in sentiment." — JV. Y. Evangelist.
"The Observations (introduced by the author) are replete with the results
of extensive research — meeting objections and cavils, solving difficulties, ex-
plaining obscure passages, reconciling apparent discrepancies, pointing out
connections, exposing and rectifying errors, unfolding the nature and design
of sacred institutions and ordinances, and showing the relation of events, per-
sons, institutions and prophecies, to the great central fact and theme of Scrip-
ture, man's redemption through the incarnate Son." — Evangelical Review,
April, 1855.
"This is the best book of the kind we have ever examined, and one of the
best translations from German into English we have ever seen. The author
makes no parade of learning in his book, but his exegetical statements are
evidently founded on the most careful, thorough, and extensive study, and can
generally be relied upon as among the best results, the most surely ascertained
conclusions of modern philological investigation. We by no means hold our-
selves responsible for every sentiment in the book, but we cordially recommend
it to every minister, to every Sunday school teacher, to every parent, and to
every intelligent layman, as a safe and exceedingly instructive guide, through
the entire Bible history, the Old Testament and the New. It is a book which
actually accomplishes more than its title promises," Ac. «fec. — {Andover) Bibli-
otheca Sa<Jra, April, 1855.
jMun hti i\)t ^xm nf Ittttj's $mtl listnti},
PUBLISHED BY LINDSAY AWD BULKISTON, PHILADELPHIA.
Dr. J. 11. Kurtz's Manual of Sacred History is the production of a very
able and pious divine of our church in Europe. The author is particularly
distinguished for his learning, his orthodoxy, his liberality, his piety, and his
originality. He writes with great clearness and condensation, and presents in
a brief compass a large amount of matter. His various works, and particularly
his Histories, have received the highest endorsement abroad in their popularity
and multiplied editions, and are commended in the strongest terras by the most
eminent divines. Guericke, Bruno Lindner, and Kudelbach, laud his Histo-
ries in the strongest terms, and the Evangelical Review,* in the United States,
has furnished evidence of his great merits from authentic sources. The admi-
rable Manual of Sacred History, translated by Dr. Schaeffer, (and, having ex-
amined some parts of the translation, we may say icell translated,) will consti-
tute a rich contribution to our theological literature. Having encouraged the
translator to undertake the work, we are the more free to express our high
opinion of it, and the fidelity with which it has been executed. We hope this
will bo the forerunner of other translations of works of the author.
C. P. KRAUTH,
Professor of Sac. Phil. Church Hist, and Past. Theol.. Gettysburg, Pa.
Sept. 16, 1854.
The Sacred History of Dr. J. H. Kurtz, does not belong to the ordinary class
of historic Manuals, with which the literature of Germany abounds. On the
contrary, after considerable acquaintance with it, we hesitate not to pronounce
it a production of very superior merit in its department, possessed of high lite-
rary and theological excellence. Its style is pure and perspicuous, its divisions
are natural and appropriate, and the grouping of events felicitous and impres-
sive. Without assenting to every sentiment of the author, we cordially recom-
mend his work to the patronage of the Christian public, and consider Dr.
Schaefi'er as entitled to the gratitude of the church, for presenting this Manual
to the English public in so accurate and excellent a translation.
S. S. SCHMUCKER,
Professor of Didactic, Polemic and Ilomiletic Theology, in Tlieol. Sem. of Gettysburg.
Sept. 17, 1S54..
I know of no work in the English or German language which gives, in so
flhort a compass, so full and clear an account of the gradual development of
the divine plan of salvation, from the fall of man to the resurrection of Christ
and the founding of the apostolic church, and which is, at the same time, so
sound in sentiment, so evangelical in tone, and, without being superficial, so
well adapted for popular use, as the "Manual of Sacred History," by Dr. J.
11. Kurtz. The translation of the Rev. Dr. Charles F. Schaefi'er seems to me,
as far as I have examined it, to do full justice to the German original, as well
us to the English idiom. PHILIP SCHAFP,
Prof. ofCh. nist., &C.
Mercershurg, Pa., Jan. 31, 1855.
* July, 1853, p. 138.
PUBLISHED BY LINDSAY AND BLAKISTON, PHILADELPHIA.
K * ■% * It would seem that the author of this work is one of that class of
individuals on -whom God has bestowed ten talents. * * * The author is a
methodical thinker; he narrates in the most beautiful language and in great
clearness, though in a condensed form. * * * The translator has placed in
the sacred historical library a work of rare merit." — Easton Whi(/, of Jan.
17, 1855.
" The author's remarkable genius and vast attainments have already given
him a place among the greatest lights in theology and history on the continent
of Europe. The present work * * * requires to be thoroughly examined in
order to a full appreciation of its highly evangelical type, of its lucid arrange-
ment, of its felicitous selection of historical events, of the harmony of the va-
rious parts, and the bearing of the whole upon one glorious consummation. * ♦
There are few minds, if any, that have thought so extensively or so profoundly
on the subjects of which it treats, that they may not be instructed by it. Dr.
Schaeffer has performed his work as translator in a manner that fully satisfies
those who are most competent to judge of the merits of the translation."—
Albany Argus, of Jan. 24, 1855. i
*'We cannot but regard this work as a valuable aid to our own students an*
instructors, from its clear and pregnant summary of facts, its lively and original
suggestions, and its constant exhibition of unity in all God's plans and dispen-
sations, of which even the most pious and attentive readers of the Bible are too
much accustomed to lose sight.
"This book is, according to the Lutheran standard, thoroughly orthodox in
matters of doctrine, and is more thoroughly religious in spirit than any similar
German work with which we are acquainted.
"The English translation is, in our opinion, highly creditable to its author;
not only accurate, so far as we have yet had time to judge it, but less disfigured
by undue adherence to German idiom, by awkward stiffness, and by weak ver-
bosity, than any version we have recently examined." — Biblical Repertory and
Princeton Review, of Jan. 1855.
" It is a work of great value, not only on account of its literary excellence,
and the profound theological knowledge displayed in it, but especially as sup-
plying a great want in a clear, simple, and thorough explanation of all the
difiicult points and obscure questions both as to doctrine and ecclesiastical
polity in the Bible.
"AH who are desirous of a thorough understanding of Bible history should
possess themselves of this learned and interesting work." — Eastonian, of Jan,
27, 1855.
2
Mniim Iiq tin? 3[htss nf liirtj's mxti SiMnrti,
PUBLISHED BY LINDSAY AND BLAKISTON, PHILADELPHIA.
•* This volume deserves to be in every family ; all may read and study it
with profit. It is well adapted for schools and seminaries of learning and the-
ology. "* * We are pleased to learn that arrangements have been already made
for its immediate introduction into Esther Female Institute and Capital Uni-
versity. We know of no work in any language, in all the bounds of sacred
literature, calculated to exert a more wholesome and beneficial influence in
the cause of Christ, than this work." — Lutheran Standard, {Columbus, 0.) of
Jan. 26, 1855.
««- iff * The present volume treats of the subject of Sacred History on a
novel plan. It furnishes a suggestive comment on the incidents recorded in
the Bible, considered as illustrations of the divine purpose in the salvation of
man. The style is clear, compact, and forcible, presenting a mass of weighty
thoughts, in simple and appropriate language." — N. Y. Tribune, of Jan. 5, 1855.
« « -X- An important addition to the line of text-books. The plan of the
work is as novel as it is happy. * * * Like all other of the recent German
theological and metaphysical works, the analytical arrangement is exquisitely
delicate and minute, perhaps too much so; and the amount of valuable histo-
rical material as well as of doctrinal exposition it contains, bears a proportion
to the amount of space which those who are accustomed to our own looser
method of composition may well welcome." — Episcopal Recorder.
*'The arrangement is admirable, the explanatory remarks are instructive,
and the whole work one of marked ability." * * — Baltimore {Baptist) True
Union.
"All classes of readers may study it with advantage." — N. Y. Commercial.
" An admirable volume. Its literary and theological merits are of a high
order, and entitle it to a wide circulation among the lovers of a religious lite-
rature. The translator has faithfully executed his task." — Christian Chronicle.
" It is a work of great value as a text-book for Bible classes and schools, and
which may be made extensively useful in a family." — {Boston) Daily Evening
TraveUer.
"We have perused this volume with great satisfaction. It is a succinct yet
comprehensive sacred history, narrated in a style of great purity and attractive-
ness; and though its subject is ancient, and hundreds of volumes have been
Trritton up6n it, yet the book is as full of freshness and charm as if it were a
romance." — Nev) York Observer, of April 19, 1855,
3
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HISTORY OF THE CRUSADES,
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And yet a spirit still and bright,
With something of an ungGlhsht.— Wordsworth.
In Cloth, Gilt Backs, 75 cents. In Full Gilt Edges, Ac, $1 25.
Thp object which the intelligent author of this volume has in view, is to awaken the attention of
young ladies to the important duties of life which devolve upon them, after they have ceased their
scholastic exercises. In doing so, she endeavours to "leach them something of the formation of cha-
racter, and offers them various useful hints for their improvement, mentally and physically: explains
to them the station they are to occupy in society, and sets before them in its true light the responsi-
bility they incur by a neglect of their proper duties, in their too eager pursuit of the follies of the day,
Such a book cannot fail to be useful, and we hope it may be read extensively.— .BaWM/jore American.
THE BROKEN BRACELET,
AND OTHER POEMS.
By MRS. ESLING, (Late Miss Waterman.)
Price in Cloth, Gilt Backs, $1 00.
"They are the poems of the affections, swelling forth from a heart chastened by the discipline of
life, sympathizing with all human sorrow, and loving the beautiful in nature and the true in senti-
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TREASURED THOuilslioFF^ AUTHORS.
BY CAROLINE MAY,
AUTHOR OF THE "AMERICAN FEMALE POETS," ETC.
A neat 12nio. volume. Price $1 00.
In this book all is sound, rational, and improving, calculated to promote delicacy of feeling and
loftiness of sentiment, full of good sense and goo<l taste. It is the best treasury of thoughts in the
language.— CAm/tan Intelligencer.
Ccntaining many Gems of Thought, from writers of the highest celebrity, on themes of permanent
interest.— Oftserrcr.
" Good taste and good judgment make the selections of these excerpts, which convey lessons in
morals and wisdom in brief sentences, the best for seizing hold of the understanding, and remaining
fixed upon the memory.
FOREST FL?W?Ril7lHE WEST.
By MRS. ROBERTS, (Late Miss Rickey.)
WITH PORTRAIT, ETC.
In Cloth, Gilt Backs, 75 cents. Full Gilt, $1 00.
She possesses a warm, lively fnncy, and true poetic feeling : her verse flowing pure and musical a*,
the waters of her own West.— BuUelm.
This volume is destined to take its place among the numierous American poetesses wliose charming
•rscs expressire of womanly feeling enrich our literaturu.— Pre«6y(enan.
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