glorious will the one appear! how ugly and loathsome the other! both are alike, by nature: both may live under the same means of grace: and yet, he, truly fearing God; thou, a despiser of God: he, a sincere professor of holiness; thou, a bitter hater of it: he, conscientious in all duties, which concern both God and man; thou, a swearer, a drunkard, a lewd profane wretch, that neither fearest God nor regardest men : and, therefore, he shall be thy judge. Nay, not only the examples of saints, but the examples of those too, who have been less vicious among wicked men themselves, shall rise up in judgment against them and condemn them: the moral virtues of Heathens shall serve for the lessening of their own, and the greatening of the condemnation of others, who have not arrived to their pitch: thou art called a Christian, and thinkest that name enough to pass thee at the day of trial; but, what wilt thou say, when God shall produce many Heathens better than such Christians? their temperance and sobriety shall judge thy excess and riot; their uprightness and justice, thy fraud and deceit and all the privilege, which thou shalt get by being a Christian, is only to lie the lower and hotter in hell: our Saviour tells us, Luke xi. 31, 32. The queen of the south, and the men of Nineveh, who, for ought we know, were never otherwise than idolatrous Heathens, yet they shall rise up in the judgment with the men of this generation, and shall condemn them.

3. The saints shall judge the world, by giving their Consent and Approbation to that most righteous Sentence of Condemnation, which Christ shall pronounce against them.

When Christ shall say to the goats on his left-hand, Go, ye cursed, into everlasting fire; the saints also shall shake their hands at them, and echo it after him, Go, ye cursed: and subscribe, that he is just and righteous, in damning all the unbelievers in the world, though many of them may be their own parents, or children, or friends, or nearest and dearest relations.

iii. And, if the saints must thus judge the world; then, 1. See here the mistaken judgment, which the world passeth upon them.

It counts them a company of poor silly souls, who have more honesty and less wit, by half, than needs. They are jeered and abused, persecuted and wronged, on all hands; and, if any forbear them, it is more out of scorn than love. Well, be it so: shortly, this jolly and frolic world will find itself much

mistaken, when it shall see these despised ones advanced on the bench as assessors with Christ, and princes and potentates stand trembling at the bar as guilty malefactors.

2. Must the saints judge the world? how much, then, doth it behove them to be careful, that they do not commit the same crimes themselves, for which they must hereafter judge others !

This consideration should be exceedingly effectual with all those, who pretend to be saints and hope to judge the world, to exercise a singular holiness, and live quite otherwise than the world doth. And yet, who, almost, is there, that doth not hope to be among the judges, at the Last Day? Ask the drunkard or swearer, ask the profanest wretch that comes to church, "Do you hope to be saved?"" To be saved! God forbid, else. It were pity I should live, if I had not hopes to be saved." And canst thou, who tearest the holy name of God with fearful oaths and curses, think thyself a fit man to judge swearers to hell? Canst thou, who sittest swilling till wine and strong drink inflame thee, be fit to judge drunkards to hell? Canst thou, who wallowest in thy uncleanness, be fit to sit with God as a judge upon whoremongers and adulterers? Certainly, if such as these be the judges, who shall be the guilty? The Apostle thought it a most absurd thing, that men should pretend to teach the Law, and yet transgress it: Rom. ii. 21. Thou, which teachest another, teachest thou not thyself? Thou, that preachest a man should not steal, dost thou steal? so may I say, Thou, that hopest to judge others, judgest thou not thyself? Thou, that hopest to judge stealers, and liars, and adulterers, and blasphemers, and the whole rabble-rout of sinners; wilt thou steal, and lie, and commit adultery, and blaspheme, and be as bad as the worst of men? Certainly, such hopes are utterly in vain; and, instead of being judges of others, such men shall find themselves condemned and executed as malefactors, at that day.

And, thus much, concerning the Third General propounded, who shall be the Assistants in the Judgment.

IV. The next general propounded, was, to give a brief description of the APPARATUS; the Manner and Method of the whole transaction.

And this, indeed, shall be unspeakably glorious and majestic. Every thing in it shall be so ordered, as may make most for the terror of the wicked, and the joy and glory of the godly.

i. CHRIST'S COMING TO JUDGMENT SHALL BE SUDDEN AND UN

EXPECTED.

The world shall be secure; and think of no such thing, as a Day of Judgment. Every one shall be minding other matters: some, their trades; and some, their pleasures: and some, too, shall be sinning, when the last trumpet shall sound to judgment. Oh! how fearfully will men then be surprized! Some will be howling, and some praying; and, before they have spoken another word, be changed in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye; and then away through the air, to meet Christ in the clouds.

ii. For, THERE SHALL HIS THRone be set, anD THERE SHALL ALL EYES BEHOLD HIM, IN THAT VERY BODY WHICH HE ASSUMED FOR US.

Acts i. 11. This same Jesus, which is taken from you up...into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven. His First Coming, to save the world, was mean and contemptible; but his Second Coming, to judge the world, shall be with the greatest glory and splendor that heaven can make. He shall set out of heaven with a shout, given by all the hosts of heaven: 1 Thess. iv. 16. He shall come in flaming fire, attended with his mighty angels: 2 Thess. i. 7, 8. And all this, to strike terror into the hearts of wicked men, who shall have so great a Judge to condemn them; and to fill the hearts of his own with joy, who shall have so glorious a Redeemer to save them.

iii. HE SHALL SEND FORTH HIS ANGELS, to assemble all nations and persons before him.

These are such officers, as none can resist, none can fly from. They will come into the very graves to you; throw off your earthy covering; drag out, and drive all the wicked of the earth, though loth and struggling, by whole herds, unto the Judgment-Seat.

iv. And, there, Christ SHALL MAKE A SEPARATION between them.

The sheep, i. e. those who have heard his voice, and been obedient to him, the Chief Shepherd of their Souls, he will place, visibly, on his right-hand, in a select company, by themselves the goats, those who have followed the bent of their own lusts and wills, shall be pounded in together, on his left

hand. Both companies expect the passing of the last and definitive sentence upon them: the one, with infinite joy and exultation, the sentence of their admission into eternal happiness; the other, with inconceivable horror, the sentence of eternal wrath. According to this different sentence, so shall presently follow its different execution: the reprobates shall be driven away by angels, and dragged away by devils; and, whether they will or no, shall be forced to torments: the elect shall attend upon Christ back again, who shall enter into heaven at the head of them, and, with rejoicing, shew them all to his Father, as the children, which his eternal love had given him, and his own merits purchased.

I have not written these things to instruct any, in what they are ignorant of. I suppose, all know these first rudiments of truth. And it is a very fearful thing, to consider, that so many know the Day of Judgment, so certain, so dreadful, as it is held forth to be, and yet so few prepare for it. Let us be persuaded, therefore, to live as those, who must undoubtedly come to judgment, and give an account of all they have done in the flesh otherwise, believe it, our knowledge of the Day of Judgment and of the great transactions which shall then be, will but make that day the more dreadful to us, and our eternal condemnation the more intolerable.

V. Consider the UNIVERSALITY of this judgment.

We all, saith the text, must appear before the judgment-seat of Christ.

i. All, WITHOUT EXCEPTION; and all, WITHOUT DISTINCTION. 1. All must appear, without the Exception or Exemption of any from the trial of this Great Day.

Rom. ii. 6, 9, 10. God will render to every man according to his works: Tribulation and anguish, upon every soul of man that doeth evil.... But glory and honour...upon every man that worketh good. Nor greatness, nor goodness, can privilege any man from the sentence of the Judge; no more than here they cau from the arrest of death. Nay, though death seems to be as universal as life itself: What man is there that liveth, saith the Psalmist, and shall not see death? it mows down all before it, and lays them in the dust: yet judgment is far more certain and universal, than death is. The Apostle tells us, 1 Cor. xv. 51.

that we shall not all sleep; that is, our death-sleep: at Christ's last appearance, there shall be a world full of men, some trading and some sinning, as now they are: none of these shall taste of death; but yet they must all undergo judgment. And, therefore, we rehearse it as an Article of our Faith, that Christ shall come to judge both the quick, or living, and the dead. All shall hear, and all must obey, the peremptory summons of the last trump: not a soul shall then hide itself in the crowd: not a body shall skulk in the grave. But all must appear. And, though our loose dust be scattered to the four winds of heaven; yet, by the almighty power of God and the ministry of angels, every dust shall be picked up, and rallied again into the same body. The Sea shall give up the dead, which are in it; and Death and the Grave shall deliver up the dead, which are in them; and every man shall be judged according to his works: as we have it described, Rev. xx. 13. And,

2. As all, without exception, so all, without distinction, must abide the trial of this Great Day.

God will be no accepter of persons. Where the cause makes no difference, the Judge will not. He will as well hear what the consciences of the greatest can say against them, as what the consciences of the meanest; and give the Devil as free liberty, to accuse, to drag away, and damn princes, as peasants. Rev. xx. 12. I saw the dead, both small and great, stand before God: they all stand: there, no one calls, "Bring a seat here, for this emperor, and that king: Make room there, for this nobleman, and that gentleman:" no; great and small, noble and contemptible, must all stand huddled, in the same common crowd, together. Indeed, there shall be no such distinction as great and small, according to worldly pre-eminence: there will appear great sinners, and less; and great saints, and less: but, between great persons and their inferiors, that day will know no difference: all shall there stand upon the same level: high and low, young and old, all must alike come to judgment: no reverence shall there be shewn to the grey-hairs of an old sinner, nor any pity to the cries of a young.

Thus must all appear; without Exception, and without Distinction.

ii. And that, FOR THESE REASONS: