SERM. plea heard and scanned; the merits of every cause weighed XXXIII. in an even balance, according to truth and equity; men's neglects and omiffions of duty fhall also come under confideration; an account will be exacted of all the talents entrusted to any man, (of the abilities, opportunities, and advantages he ever had of doing God fervice,) and of what improvements answerable he hath made; what men have done themselves, and what they have done by others, from the influence of their advice, their perfuafion, or 1 Cor. iv. 5. their example, shall be searched out and poised; God, faith St. Paul, will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, Rom. ii. 29. and will make manifeft the counfels of hearts; and, of Matt. xii. every idle word that men fhall Speak, they shall render an 36. account at the day of judgment, faith our Lord; and, Matt. xxv. After a long time, faith he again, the Lord of thofe ferEcclef. xii. vants cometh, and reckoneth with them, &c. and, Every work, faith the Preacher, God fhall bring into judgment, with every fecret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil. 1 Pet. 4, 5. 18. 4. 6. That upon each man, according to the true quality of his doings, thus detected, examined, and stated, a definitive sentence fhall pass, whereby he shall be acquitted and approved, or condemned and reprobated; tóre ó šπaivos 1 Cor. iv. 5. Yevýσetaι ixásw, Then, faith St. Paul, praise fhall be to each one; praise, that is, generally, (by an evenμioμòs, or favourable manner of speech,) a due taxation and esteem, accordMatt. xxv. ing to merit: then, Well done, good and faithful fervant, and, O thou bad and flothful fervant, fhall be pronounced to one or the other fort of men, respectively, according to their demeanour here. 21, 26. Μισθαποδο σία. Heb. xi. 26. 7. That according to the purport of this sentence a difcrimination shall be made; and to one party a gracious reward, correfpondent to the quality and measure of their good works, in a blissful place; to the other, a sore punishinent, in proportion to their demerits, in a place of misery : to the one, everlasting joy and glory above in heaven; to the other, endless forrow and fshame beneath in hell, shall Matt. xvi. be affigned and dispensed effectually. The Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then 27. he fhall reward every man according to his works; he will SERM. Jeparate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his XXXIII. Sheep from the goats; and he shall fet his fheep on his right Matt. xxv. hand, but the goats on the left: then the King fhall fay unto 32, &c. them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world :—and, Then he shall fay alfo unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye curfed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels: and, the good and faithful fervant fhall enter into his Mafter's joy; the bad and flothful shall be caft into utter darkness, where is weep- Matt. xxv. ing and gnashing of teeth: fo our Lord himself expreffeth it: and St. Paul thus; We muft, faith he, all appear before 2 Cor. v. 10. the tribunal of God, Iva xoμlontaι exa505, that each one may bear away the things done in the body, according to what 21, 30. 6-9. he hath done, whether it be good or bad: and, God will Rom. ii. render unto every man according to his works: to them who by patient continuance in well-doing feek for glory and honour and immortality, eternal life: but unto them that are contentious, and obey not the truth, but obey unrighteoufnefs, indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish, upon every foul of man that doeth evil: and even of old the Prophet Daniel thus briefly did express this different doom; Many of them that fleep in the duft of the Dan. xii. 2. earth shall awake; fome to everlasting life, and fome to Shame and everlasting contempt. Hence in regard to one party is the time of judgment styled the feafon of refresh- Acts iii. 19. Eph. iv. 30. ment, the day of redemption, the time of recompenfe; in Luke xiv. reference to the other, the day of wrath, the day of de- 12. struction, the time of vengeance; when our Lord will, as Rom. ii. 5. St. Paul faith, take vengeance on them that know not God, 2 Pet. iii. 7. and obey not the Gospel of our Lord Jefus Chrift; who Shall be punished with everlasting deftruction from the prefence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power. Col. iii. 24. 2 Thef. i. 8. 8. We are also farther taught, that all this fhall be tranfacted in a regular, public, and most folemn manner, in open court, in the face and audience of all the world, before angels and men. For our Lord is defcribed com- 2 Thef. i. 7. ing to judgment with attendance of all the holy angels ; Matt. xxv. Luke ix. 26. 1 31. xvi. 27. SERM. and the faints, being themselves firft approved, shall beXXXIII. come affeffors there; and all men are reprefented as preJude xiv. fent at the trial, or as fpectators and auditors thereof: 1 Cor. vi. 2. Whosoever, faith our Lord, shall confefs me before men, him Matt. xix. Shall the Son of man also confefs before the angels of God; Luke xii. but he that denieth me before men, fhall be denied before Matt. x. 32. the angels of God: and, There is nothing covered that Luke xii. 2. Shall not be revealed; neither hid, that shall not be known: 28. 8, 9. 11. 10. whatsoever ye have spoken in darkness shall be heard in the light; and that which ye have spoken in closets shall be proclaimed upon the house-tops. 9. That alfo the judgment fhall pafs to the full conviction and entire fatisfaction of all that are prefent; so that each one concerned therein fhall be forced in confcience to acquiefce in his doom, as moft juft and equal; the condemned stooping with awe to his juftice; the abfolved adoring with humble reverence his mercy; the spectators applauding with admiration his holy wifdom: for that Rom. ii. 5. day will be, as St. Paul calleth it, a day of revelation of God's righteous judgment; and God in regard thereto is Rom. xiv. represented speaking thus; To me, as I live, faith the Lord, every knee shall bow, and every tongue shall give 2 Thef. i. glory to God: and, our Lord, in that day, faith St. Paul, will be glorified in his faints, and admired in all them that believe and, He will then, as it is in St. Jude, convince all that are ungodly of all their ungodly deeds, which they have ungodlily committed, and of all the hard Speeches which ungodly finners have spoken against him. So that thereupon those confeffions and acclamations of praise in Rev. xix. 2. the Revelation fhall be refounded through heaven; Alle10. xv. 3. luia; Salvation, and glory, and power, be to the Lord our God; for true and righteous are his judgments: Salvation be unto our Lord, that fitteth on the throne, and to the Lamb: Great and wonderful are thy works, O Lord God Almighty; juft and true are thy ways, O thou King of Saints. Jude xv. xvi. 7. vii. Thus do the holy Pandects of our religion set out that judgment, which all men hereafter muft undergo; wherein all the attributes of God fhall be confpicuously glorified; his wonderful clemency fhall be fweetly difplayed, his SERM. exact juftice fhall be terribly demonftrated, his perfect XXXIII. wifdom fhall be clearly unfolded; wherein the knotty intrigues of Providence fhall be loofed, and the myfterious depths of the divine counfels fhall be laid open; and God's honour, which now by the bold and rafh judgments of men is often attacked, fhall be thoroughly cleared and repaired, to the joyful fatisfaction of all pious men, and fad confufion of the impious; wherein the great wisdom of thofe, who before all things choose to be good and to ferve God, and the extreme folly of those who scorn or neglect piety, fhall be most evidently apparent; wherein, finally, all scores that now fo undiscernibly run on fhall be exactly quitted and even; impartial right shall be done; every man fhall have his due affigned and rendered to him. But let fo much fuffice concerning the judgment appointed: we proceed to the next particular, the Judge ordained; he; that is, Jefus, our Lord and Saviour. 25. II. The original right and abfolute power of judging doth infeparably pertain to God Almighty, whofe creatures, whose servants, whose subjects we are, and confequently to whofe judgment we stand obnoxious; as he is naturally the Sovereign Lord and King of the world, fo he is, as the Apostle calleth him, xprys wávrov, the Judge Heb. xii.13. of all perfons and things; and particularly Judge of all Gen. xviii. the earth, or of all men, as Abraham did style him; as upon the grounds fpecified we do owe obedience to the laws he prefcribeth us, performance of the service he allotteth us, and improvement of the talents he committeth to us; fo we do thence ftand obliged to render an account to him of our correfpondent behaviour, and due management in those respects, and are liable to the judgment he fhall make thereof: all judgment therefore must be exercised either immediately by God himself, or in fubordination to him; in his name and right, and by virtue of authority derived from him; otherwife that of St. Paul, Who art thou that judgest another's fervant, might be Rom.xiv.4. SERM. alleged against any, who, without licence or commiffion XXXIII. from him, fhould prefume to judge us. 16. Exod. xxxiii. 20. Ifa. vi. 2. Now that immediately God should administer any judgment, is incongruous to his nature and to ours; it is particularly unsuitable to the manner of this judgment, which God defigneth to be fuch as may pafs openly before all the world, to the confpicuous declaration of his glorious justice and mercy, to the clear fatisfaction and conviction of all perfons interested therein: which, that it might be, it was fit, as St. Austin faith, that they who were to be judged fhould fee their judge; it is fit, that the affistants, and fpectators, or witneffes thereof, fhould discern the process: but the glorious and dreadful presence of God cannot be difcernible by us, or would not be support1 Tim. vi. able; He, faith St. Paul, inhabiteth inaccessible light, so that no man hath feen, or can see him: and, Thou canst not fee my face, faith he to Moses; for there shall no man fee me, and live: that majefty, before which the purest seraphins, being dazzled with its infinite brightnefs, are conftrained to veil their faces; that prefence, of which the Prophet faith, The mountains quake at him, and the hills melt, and the earth is burnt in his prefence; yea, the world, and all that dwell therein; how should frail and impure flesh fuftain how fhould guilty finners appear before Pf. lxxvi. 7. him? Who may fand in his fight when he is angry? CXXX. 3. when he is angry, at whose wrath the earth shall tremble, Jer. x. 10. and the nations fhall not be able to abide his indignation: What ear of mortal man could endure that voice, at which the earth melteth; that reproof, at which the pillars of heaven are aftonished? It being therefore from the divine excellency impoffible or inconvenient, that God himself, immediately as fuch, fhould exercise judgment; it hath pleased him, in his stead, to constitute one most fit for that employment: as he for particular temporal judgments here hath appointed princes and governors visibly to ma Nah. i. 5. (Pf. civ. 32. xviii. 18.) cxliii. 2. Pf. xlvi. 6. Job xxvi. 11. a Etenim ea quæ judicantur, oportebat videre judicem et fcire hunc a quo judicantur, &c. Iren. iii. 9. Rectum erat, ut judicandi viderent judicem. Aug. |