Secondly \ Man is a reasonable being, and every reasonable being, is an accountable being. He is a subject capable of moral govern- ment. His actions have a relation to a law. He is swayed by re- wards and punishments. He acts by counsel, and therefore of his actions, he must expect to give an account, as it is Rom. xiv. 12. " So then every one of us, shall give an account of himself to " God." Especially if we add, that all the gifts of body, mind, estate, time, &c. are so many talents, concredited and betrusted to him by God, and every one of us hath one talent at least ; therefore a time to render an account for all these talents will come, Matth. xxv. 14, 15. We are but stewards, and stewards must give an account, in order whereto, there must be a great audit day.
Thirdly \ And what need we seek evidence of this truth, further than our own conscience ? Lo, it is a truth engraven legibly upon every man's own breast. Every one hath a kind of little tribunal, or privy sessions in his own conscience, which both accuses and excuses for good and evil, which it could never do, were there not a future judgment, of which it is now conscious to itself. In this court, records are now kept of all we do, even of our secret ac- tions and thoughts, which never yet took air ; but of no judg-
* In considering so groat injustice, I have betaken myself to the judgment of God, who will declare who are guilty. Drusius. I have applied this remedy to this evil. Merc. I have comforted myself against this injustice, with the thought that God judgeth all. Gcirus.
f Si nullum peccatum manifesto, plecteretur poena ; nullam esse dirinam providential crederetur. liursum, si omne peccatum aperte puniretur. mdlum. fore judicium crederetur. — Au2.
528 THE FOUNT AIX OF LIFE. SERM. XLIL
ment, what need of records ? Nor let any imagine, that this may be but the fruit of education and discourse. We have heard of such things, and so are scared by them. For if so, how comes it to obtain so universally ? Who could be the author of such a com- mon deception ?
Reader, bethink thyself a little ; if thou hast a mind (as * one saitli) to impose a he upon all the world, what course wouldst thou take ? How wouldst thou lay the design ? Or why dost thou in this case imagine what thou knowest not how to imagine ? It is evident that the very consciences of the Heathens, have these offices of accusing and excusing, Rom. ii. 15. And it is hard to imagine, (as an ingenious author -f- speaks) that a general cheat should bow down the backs of all mankind, and induce so many doubts and fears, and troubles, amongst them ; and give an inter- ruption to the whole course of their corrupt living, and that there should be no account of it ? And therefore it is undoubted that such a day will come. But I shall rather chuse, in the
Second Place, to open the nature and manner of this judgment,
rpj ,. n than to spend more time in proving a truth,
1 he quality qf ^^ cannot be denied without violence offered
the judgment. tQ a man,g Qym Hght If then the question h^
What manner of judgment will this be ? I answer,
First, It will be a great and awful day. It is called the " judg- u ment of the great day," Jude 6. Three things will make it so, the manner of Christ's coming ; the work he comes about ; and the issues, or events of that work. The manner of Christ's coming, will be awfully solemn, " For the Lord himself shall rt descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the arch- " angel, with the trump of God ; and the dead in Christ shall u 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," &c. 1 Thess. iv. 16, 17. Here Christ breaks out of hea- ven, with the shouts of angels, zv ■/.O.rjciiuli, it signifies such a shout ( J saith one, as is to be heard among seamen, when after a long and dangerous voyage, they first descry land, crying aloud, with united voices, a shore, a shore. As the poet describes the Italians, when they saw their native country, " lifting up their " voices, and making the heavens ring again with § Italy, Italy : or " as armies shout when the signal of battle is given.'" Above all which (as some expound it) shall the voice of the Archangel be dis-
* Mr. Howe's Blessedness of the Righteous, p. 343.
f Sir Charles WoolseJy's Unreasonableness of Atheism, p. 76.
5 Ituliam^ Ita/iam, Icelo clamore sahttant. Virgil. JEneid.
SERM. XUI. THE FOUNTAIN OF LIFE. 529
tinctly heard. And after this shout, the trump of God shall sound. By this tremendous blast, sinners will be affrighted out of their graves ; but to the saints, it will carry no more terror, than the roaring of cannons, when armies of friends approach a besieged city, for the relief of them that are within it. The dead being raised, they shall be gathered before the great throne on which Christ shail sit in his glory ; and there be divided exactly to the right and left hand of Christ, by the angels. Here will be the greatest assembly that ever met. Where Adam may see his nume- rous offspring, even as the sand upon the sea-shore, which no man can number. And never was there such a perfect division made, (how many divisions soever have been in the world) none was ever like it. The saints in this great Oecumenical assize (as the author stiles it) shall meet the Lord in the air, and there the Judge shall sit upon the throne, and all the saints shall be placed upon bright clouds, as on seats or scaffolds round about him ; the wicked re- maining below upon the earth, there to receive thier final doom and sentence.
These preparatives will make it awful ; and much more will the work itself, that Christ comes about, make it so. For it is " to " judge the secrets of men," Rom. ii. 16. To sever the tares from the wheat ; to make every man's whites and blacks appear ; and according as they are found in that trial, to be sentenced to their everlasting and immutable states. O what a solemn thing is this !
And no less will the execution of the sentence on both parts make it a great and solemn day. The heart of man cannot con- ceive what impressions the voice of Christ, from the throne, will make, both upon believers, and unbelievers.
Imagine Christ upon his glorious throne, surrounded with my- riads and legions of angels, his royal guard ; a poor unbeliever trembling at the bar ; an exact scrutiny made into his heart and life ; the dreadful sentence given ; and then a cry ; and then his delivering him over to the executioners of eternal vengeance, never, never, to see a glimpse of hope or mercy any more.