canst reject these terrors. They are now declared with the kindest intention to thy soul, to press thee to "fly from the wrath to come." And fly thou must or perish in the flames. O that thou mightest feel, before it is too late to flee! and that all would hasten their pace to the mountain of refuge, lest the storm overtake them.

"God will visit for these things." He hath solemnly warned us that sin shall not go unpunished. And a punishment he hath assigned adequate to its high demerit; becoming the Majesty offended by it.

God himself will punish. "And who can stand when he is angry? If his wrath be kin-dled, yea, but for a moment, who may abide it? (Heb. x. 31. Psal. lxxvi. 7.—ii. 12. Nahum i. 6.) He is a consuming fire" able to punish as well as to bless to the uttermost. And what a fearful state must that be, when he arises to vindicate the honour of his broken Law, and to pour out the vials of "indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish, on every soul that doth evil?" (Rom. ii. 9.)

The scripture hath briefly informed us concerning the nature, place and endurance of the curse of sin. Not the fulness; for who but they that feel can tell the fierceness of the fire, or the intolerableness of the pains; And yet the very sound is enough to make the heart of every one that heareth it to tremble.

Tophet is ordained of old." (Isai, xxx. 33.) The place originally designed for the devil and his angels, is now become the habitation of sinful men; even thine, O sinner. "God hath prepared it." (Matt. xxv. 41.) It is "a place of torment." (Luke xvi. 28.) They that dwell there "have no rest day nor night." (Rev. xiv. 11.)The chains of darkness surround them. They

dwell in the shadow of death. "A furnace of of unquenchable fire; a lake which burneth with sulphur; a stream of living flames fed by the breath of the Almighty." (Isai. xxx. 33.) These are the dreadful images under which God's word reveals to us the prison of hell.

The nature of the torments inflicted therein is, according to our nature, twofold. He that taketh vengeance, punisheth "soul and body in hell." (Matt. x. 28.)

The soul in every faculty will feel the tormenting plague. The curse of God will fasten upon it, and it will be "a worm that never dies. Every reflection on the past will be like a scorpion's sting that striketh to the heart. Every thought sent out to take a survey of the future, will return filled with black despair, overwhelming with anguish. The consciousness of the immediate displeasure of the eternal God, will be "a poisoned arrow that drinketh up the spirit;" and the storms of wrath continually apprehended will fill the soul with terrors unspeakable: whilst all the furious passions let loose upon the poor distracted sinner; anger, malice, impatience, rage, like so many boisterous winds upon the sea, contend and toss the soul from one abyss of woe unto another.

The body, a principal in sin, will also share in the curse. It will lie weltering in flames consuming, : yet unconsumed: tormented, without "one drop of water to cool the raging fire." (Luke xvi.24.) For that the fire shall be real and eternal, the scripture seems abundantly to affirm. Nor do I see why it should be incredible, that he who raises the body, should be able to preserve it unconsumed in such a kind of suffering: or that it would at all suit the frequent assertion of the body's being "cast into hell," if the soul alone

was the sufferer. That our bodies will be spiritual is certain; but he that inflicts the punishment can prepare a fire, whose subtilty shall affect not our natures only, but also the angelical. And I doubt not but "the fire prepared for the devil and his angels," to which the accursed sinner will be condemned, will torment them as well as him.

Moreover, that the anguish will be intolerable, very fully appears from those dismal expressions of it, which fill the horrid caverns of Tophet.-There ceaseless weeping, remediless sorrows, revengeful but impotent blasphemies, "gnashing of teeth, and gnawing their tongues for pain,' are heard on every side. "Filled with the fury of the Lord, as a wild bull in the net," (Isai. li. 20.) they roar out in their pangs; and shriek echoes to shriek around. Then shall the most dreaded of all present evils be courted as a friend; "men shall seek death, and shall not find it.They shall desire to die, and death shall flee from them." (Rev. ix. 6.) O fearful state of wretchedness, where the very arms of death are pleasant! With what horror then should we regard each sin, that bringeth down both body and soul to such intolerable woe?

No mitigation or relief is there known or may be hoped for. Every object that could soothe the pains is removed. The voice of mirth, the songs. of vanity, the business, the companions, the amusements, that often here lulled to sleep the awakened conscience, are no more found. Sinners are left naked to their sorrows; and these roll on like billow upon billow without ceasing: "They have no rest day nor night :" (Rev. xiv. 11.) nay, they do not hope for any. No gleam of that sweet comforter ever breaks through the outer darkness. The hell of hells is this; that what

66

Until God

the sinner is, he must for ever be. ceases to be, he cannot cease to hate sin, nor hating to punish it.

Eternity is the only measure of suffering the wages of sin. Could any message reach the damned, that after millions of ages, more than are drops in the ocean, sands on the shore, stars in the firmament, atoms in the universe, or numbers in calculation, that then their torment should cease; surely they would in their chains leap for joy, and endure because there was hope in the end. But alas! when all these ages shall be at an end, their torments are as new as ever; it is still "but the beginning of sorrows." What an

alarming thought! when one spark from the furnace, one pang of remorse is now so painful, so grievous; what must eternity be in never-ending torment!

No marvel the sinner's heart rises against so fearful an expectation, and fain would soften down and explain away the duration of eternal misery but it stands on the firm basis of eternal truth. We must believe this or believe nothing: All God's word sinks with it.

:

It is allowed indeed, the word for ever implies sometimes in scripture only a limited duration, which is always determined by the nature of the subject, or something connected immediately with it; but here it is so determined by its very connexion as to be incapable of such a sense.The punishment of the sinner is expressive as of the same duration as the "life of the righteous." (Matt. xxv. 46.) The torments of wicked men are declared to be as enduring as those of the devils themselves; and I conceive it could never be said of any sinner, "it was good for him never to have been born;" (Mark xiv. 21.) if after any continuance of suffering, there should finally

remain for him an eternity of bliss; seeing all the possible computations of time vanish into nothing when placed against eternity, and are lost as a drop in the ocean. Nor is there the least intimation given throughout the whole book of God, that the wages of sin shall ever be paid but by the infliction and continuance of the punish

ment.

Such is the curse of God revealed against sin. Would God it might so deeply affect our hearts, as really to beget in us the most awakened concern about our sins. For which end,

III. I shall endeavour to enforce the matter still farther upon every man's conscience for conviction and humiliation.

First, Tell me, daring sinner, can thy heart endure, and thy hands be strong, when God shall thus deal with thee? What rock or mountain shall cover thee from this curse of sin, when the great day of God's wrath is come? Perhaps thou hast often despised these terrors of the Lord, and hast been of those "fools who make a mock at sin;" (Prov. xiv. 9.) but know assuredly thy shadow, when the sun shines on thee, doth not follow thee so close as the curse of God perpetually doth. It is It is upon thee rising up and lying down, going out and coming in; and thou art living, thou art dying under it: and dying, it may be, utterly unconcerned about it. Hadst thou been by when Shadrach and his brethren were cast into the midst of the burning fiery furnace, would not the sight have dismayed thee? Hadst thou had the power to rescue them, what would not humanity have caused thee to attempt? Yet they were safe in the protection of theirGod. If the fire had not been restrained, their bodies only for a moment could endure the pain, and then an eternity of bliss had received them. But