giving and the voice of melody.... Lift up your eyes to the heavens, and look upon the earth beneath; for the heavens shall vanish away like smoke, and the earth shall wax old like a garment, and they that dwell therein shall die in like manner; but my salvation shall be for ever and my righteousness shall not be abolished." Is. li. 3—6. God's protection to Israel at this appalling time seems promised in the sixteenth verse: "And I have put my words in thy mouth, and have covered thee in the shadow of mine hand, that I may plant the heavens, and lay the foundations of the earth, and say unto Zion, Thou art my people."

But, great and important as these changes will be, the identity of the earth will remain the same, and its localities be still distinguishable. Jerusalem, it is repeatedly promised, shall occupy her former site, being builded " upon her own heap;" and, in the following prediction of new heavens and a new earth, Israel is called to rejoice in that city during the Millennium: "Behold I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former shall not be remembered nor brought into mind. But be ye glad and rejoice for ever in that which I create; for, behold, 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." Is. lxv. 17-19. To these Isaiah again refers in the conclusion of his prophecy in connection with the restoration and honour of Israel: "And I will also take of them for priests and for Levites, saith the Lord. For as the new heavens and the new earth which I will make shall remain before me, saith the Lord, so shall your seed and your name remain." To this great change the apostle Peter directs the attention of Christians in his second general epistle. He stirs up the pure minds of believers that they should "be mindful of the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets" and apostles, and warns them of a heresy which should arise: "Knowing this first," says he, "that there shall come in the last days 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, whereby the world that THEN was being overflowed with water perished. But the heavens and the earth which are now by the same word, are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men." 2 Pet. iii. 3-8. As at the flood, the heavens and the earth are said to have perished, so are they destined to undergo another change, not by water but by fire at the coming of the Lord. However scoffers may delude them

• In a former page, (185,) we have shown that "day" is, in Scripture, often applied to an indefinite period of time, and that it is thus used to designate the Millennial age. It may be proper also to notice, that "judgment" and "to judge" are not confined to the award of happiness or misery, but are frequently used in the sense of government and to govern during that dispensation. "Behold the days come, saith the Lord, that I will raise unto David a righteous Branch, and a King shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgment and justice in the earth." Jer. xxiii. 5. "And many nations shall come and say, Come and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and to the House of the God of Jacob; and He will teach us of His ways and we will walk in his paths; for the law shall go forth of Zion and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. And He shall judge among many people, and rebuke strong nations afar off; and they shall beat their swords into plough-shares, and their spears into pruning-hooks." Micah iv. 2, 3. "And He shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of his ears; but with righteousness shall He judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth." Is. xi. 3, 4. "Then judgment shall dwell in the wilderness....and my people shall dwell in a peaceable habitation." Is. xxxii. 16-18.

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ken unto me, my people; and give ear unto me, O my nation; for a law shall proceed from me, and I will make my judgment to rest for a light of the people."Is. li. 4. So also when the Psalmist celebrates the "marvellous things" to be performed by the Lord when" He hath remembered his mercy and his truth toward the house of Israel," he calls on all the earth to "be joyful together before the Lord; for He cometh to judge the earth." Ps. xcviii. 1-9. This "judgment" or government, is also given to the saints during the Millennium, which may therefore with perfect propriety be called "the day of judg ment:" "And I saw thrones," says the apostle John, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given unto them." Rev. xx. 4. In this sense it is frequently used in the Scriptures, as when we are informed of those who "judged Israel." When this people demanded a king, their request was, " Make us a King to judge us." 1 Sam. viii. 5.-In all of these instances it is obvious that the word judgment is used in the sense of rule or government. Peter's use of the expression "day of judgment," may therefore be regarded as another instance of allusion to the Millennial Day. Ꭱ

selves with respect to the Saviour's Return, and although they may perceive no symptons of its near approach, yet as surely as the threatenings upon the antediluvian world were executed in their destruction, as certainly will an ungodly and unbelieving world be overtaken by the storm of divine indignation, "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." While men are de ceiving themselves with appearances, and, in defiance of previous example, suppose that the promises and threatenings of God will not be fulfilled, they shall suddenly be overtaken by the storm of divine wrath. And as at the flood the heavens and the earth perished by undergoing an important change, so are they now reserved for ANOTHER CHANGE, in preparation for the residence of the Redeemer and the comfort of men. But while the apostle reminds believers of these glorious predictions of the holy prophets, he also foretells that little attention or credit will be given to them. The mercy and the long-suffering of God, that sinners may come to repentance, being imputed to His unwillingness or inability to accomplish these glorious promises, the world will be taken by surprise when the period of their fulfilment shall arrive. "The day of the Lord,"* says the apostle, "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 burnt up. Seeing, then, that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness, looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat? Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness.' 2 Pet. iii. 10-13. It has been supposed that the apostle

Allusion is frequently made in the New Testament to the day of the Lord. The Old Testament prophets have also many predic tions concerning the various periods of this eventful"day.' The following passages among others may be consulted. Is. ii. 12. xiii. 6, 9. xxxiv. 8. Jer. xlvi. 10. Ezek. xxx. 2, 3. Joel i. 15. ii. 1. iii. 14. Obad. verses 15, 17. Zeph. i. 7, 14. ii. 2, 3. Zech. xiv. 1.

here predicts the utter destruction of the material world at the coming of Christ. But, strong as the language is, it does not warrant this opinion. The atmospheric heavens shall be dissolved, and their elements shall melt with fervent heat, yet the perishing of the earth in this instance by fire is put in contrast with the destruction occasioned by the waters of the flood. This, while it overwhelmed the guilty inhabitants and destroyed their works, still left the substance of the earth the same, although marred by the disruptions it occasioned. However great the changes thus made upon its surface, to this the effects of the flood were principally confined.

Still there is much difficulty-equally experienced by millenarian and antimillenarian commentators,-in giving a view of this passage consistent with itself and other scriptures. The extent of the judgments and the nature of the dispensations predicted by the holy prophets, of which the apostle reminds them, deserve serious consideration; still the "promise" of new heavens and a new earth, recorded by Isaiah, to which the apostle refers, is, as we have seen, to have its fulfilment at the Millennium,* when the Lord

* Dr. Hamilton's confused ideas of the new heavens and new earth have been so ably exposed in the letter addressed to himself in "Defence of the Students of Prophecy," as to render unnecessary any lengthened remarks. Still, we may remind him, that the term new is applied in the above prediction of Isaiah to the earth in its Millennial state. When, therefore, he asserts, (p. 278,) that the sacred writers "have told us, as distinctly as language can express it, that the future habitation of the redeemed is to be a new, that is, another heaven and another earth, with which the present earth and heaven have no connection, and of which they shall form no part," he only affirms what he ought to prove. The Doctor believes in a coming Millennium, and even quotes part of the above passage from Isaiah to prove its nature. But has not the Lord, by the prophet, in it "told us, as distinctly as language can express it," that then He will 60 create new heavens and a new earth"? And as the apostle expected these new heavens and earth of which he speaks, according to God's "promise," and as the only promise contained in the Old Testament Scriptures, of new heavens and a new earth, is that by Isaiah, it must be to this that he alludes. Yet the Doctor himself will not maintain that this promise is to be fulfilled by the creation of "another heaven and another earth, with which the present earth and heaven have no connection, and of which they shall form no part.' Nor will he assert that "the heavens" which " were of old, and the earth standing out of the water, and in the water" before the flood, had no connection with, and formed no part of "the heavens and the earth which are now," with which the apostle contrasts them.

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shall "create Jerusalem a rejoicing and her people a joy.” But were the difficulty even greater in human estimation than it is, faith can confidently trust for the fulfilment of God's promise thus explicitly given. Jehovah sometimes manifests His glory by putting the faith of his chosen people to the test in their reception of his promises. To evidence his own power, and to try the faith of the children of Israel, on their leaving Egypt the Lord caused Moses lead them off the proper route, and to encamp by the sea. In this situation, while entangled by the wilderness, and seeming to have no choice left, but either to perish in the yawning deep or await a no less certain destruction by the hand of their infuriated pursuers, they cried to Heaven for help. But the Lord said unto Moses, "Wherefore criest thou unto me? Speak unto the children of Israel that they GO FORWARD.” This was indeed a trial of their faith. Speak unto them that they go forward, while the rolling billows seemed to threaten certain and immediate destruction! But, by faith, they passed through the Red Sea as by dry land, which the Egyptians essaying to do were drowned." To the primitive disciples the injunction of our Saviour relative to their escape from Jerusalem must have appeared no less mysterious : "And when ye shall see Jerusalem COMPASSED with armies, then know that the desolation thereof is nigh. Then let them which are in Judea flee to the mountains, and let them which are in the midst of it depart out; and let not them that are in the countries enter thereinto, for these be the days of vengeance that all things which are written may be fulfilled." Luke xxi. 21, 22. To the disciples it must have appeared a singular advice, that they should make their escape when they saw Jerusalem compassed with armies, rather than at an earlier period. Without faith in the veracity and faithfulness of Him the display of whose omniscience they had often witnessed, and in whose wisdom and goodness they could fully confide, they might have questioned the meaning of the injunction, and refused to avail themselves of the promised deliverance. But the event not only justified the trust they reposed, but afforded a glorious display of the Saviour's divinity. The full import of the distinct promise of new heavens and a new earth, as recorded by Isaiah, and referred to by Peter, we may not be able to perceive,