beasts as unholy souls are to live there. i Surely God, and Christ, and the Spirit, and angels, and ' the spirits of just men made perfect,' are not so in love with dogs and swine, &c., as to put them into their bosoms, or make them their companions. Heaven is a place of too great state to admit such vermin to inhabit there. When Cyneas,2 the ambassador of Pyrrhus, after his return from Kome, was asked by his master what he thought of the city and state, he answered and said, that it seemed to him to be republica regum, a state of none but great statesmen, and a commonwealth of kings. Such is heaven ; it is no other state than a parhament of emperors, a commonwealth of kings. There is not a soul in heaven under the degree of a king, Kev. i. 6, and every king there hath a robe of honour upon his back, a golden sceptre in his hand, and a glorious crown upon his head. And do you think that it will stand with the state of heaven, or with the state of this commonwealth of kings, to admit such vermin as un- holy persons are, to be of that noble society ? Surely no. God hath long since resolved upon it, that no unclean beasts shall enter into heaven, that no dirty dogs shall ever trample upon that golden pave- ment. All in heaven are holy : the angels holy, the saints holy, the patriarchs holy, the prophets holy, the apostles holy, the martyrs holy, but the Lord himself above all is most glorious in holiness, and there- fore all those holy ones do, as it were in a divine anthem, sing and say, ' Holy, holy, holy. Lord God Almighty, heaven and earth are full of the majesty of thy glory,' Rev. iv. 8 ; Isa. vi. 3. Now certainly it would be a hell to these holy ones to have unholy wretches to be their companions.^ When the holy angels fell from their holiness, heaven w^as so holy that it spewed them out, as once Canaan did its unholy inhabitants, Lev. xviii. 28 ; and therefore certainly there wUl be no room in heaven for such filthy beasts as unholy persons are. Well, remember this, that all those stinging expressions and appellations which disgrace and vilify unholy persons, they were inspired by a holy Spirit, and penned by holy secretaries, and enrolled in his holy word, and pubHshed by his holy messengers, and all by his holy appoint- ment, who, as he is greater than the greatest, and wiser than the wisest, and better than the best, so he is too pure and too holy to eat the words that are gone out of his mouth, or to deny or unsay what he hath spoken, or not to maintain the truth thereof against all gain- sayers. It is prophesied that when the church shall be restored to her purity and glory, such beasts shall not be there, Isa. xxxv. 9 ; Ezek. xxviii. 24. The majesty of church discipline shall be such as shall keep out all such beasts. ' Jerusalem above ' is too glorious a habitation for beasts, or for men of beastly spirits, or beastly principles, or beastly practices. The city of the great God was never built for beasts. A wilderness and not a paradise is fittest for beasts.
9. The ninth argument to prove the truth of the proposition is this, God would not have his holy ones in this world to be yoked in
^ It was wont to be a trial whether land belonged to England or Ireland, by putting in toads or snakes, &c., into it ; if they lived there, it was concluded that the land be- longed to England ; if they died, to Ireland.
* Rather Cineas (Ki^'^aj) : the embassage to Rome took place after the battle of Hep. aclea, b.c. 280. Plutarch, Pyrrh. xviii. ; Diod. Exc. Vatic, xxii. ; Livy, xxxiv. 4. Q.
" There are no owla in Crete, nor no wild beasts in Lebanon.
HeB. XII. 14.] AND BEAUTY OF HOLINESS. 73
marriage with unholy ones ; and therefore certainly he will never suffer such to be yoked to himself to all eternity, i That God would not have his righteous people to be yoked in marriage with the unrighteous, is most evident by these scriptures : Deut. vii. 3, 6, ' Neither shalt thou make marriages with them ; thy daughter thou shalt not give to his son, nor his daughter shalt thou take unto thy son : for thou art a holy people unto the Lord thy God : the Lord thy God hath chosen thee to be a special people unto himself, above all people that are upon the face of the earth:' Ezra ix. 12, ' Now therefore give not your daughters unto their sons, neither take their daughters unto your sons.' But did they keep this commandment of the Lord ? No, as you may see in the second verse of that chapter, ' For they have taken of their daughters for themselves and for their sons : so that the holy seed have mingled themselves with the people of those lands : yea, the hand of the princes and rulers have been chief in this trespass.' But how did this operate upon good Ezra? That you may see in the third verse, ^ And when I heard this thing, I rent my garment and my mantle, and plucked off the hair of my head, and of my beard, and sat down astonied.' Oh the sorrow, the grief, the per- plexity, the holy passion, the indignation, the amazement, the astonish- ment that this abomination begot in the heart of good Ezra ! The like effect this sin had upon the heart of good Nehemiah, as you may see in that remarkable text, Neh. xiii. 23-25, compared with chap. X. 29, 30. So in 2 Cor. vi. 14, 15, ' Be ye not unequally yoked to- gether with unbelievers : for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness ? and what communion hath light with darkness ? and what concord hath Christ with Belial ? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel ?' It is an evil thing, a dangerous thing, to be yoked to any who have neither skill nor will to bear the yoke of Christ. Under the law an ox and an ass might not be yoked or coupled together, Deut. xxii. 10 — and to this the apostle alludes as some judge — God would not have righteous souls to be yoked in mar- riage with those that are unrighteous ; a gracious soul were better be married to a quartan ague than to an ungracious wife. ' A virtuous wife is a crown to her husband,' Pro v. xii. 4; she is the life of life. If thou art a man of holiness, thou must look more for a portion of grace in a wife, than for a portion of gold with a wife ; thou must look more after righteousness than riches ; more after piety, than money ; more after what inheritance she hath in heaven, than what possessions she hath on earth ; more at what interest she hath in Christ, than at what interest she hath in creatm'es ; more at her being new-born, than at her being high-born ; more at her being good, than at all her worldly goods, 1 Cor. vii. 39. If money makes the match, and she be good enough that hath but goods enough, thou shalt be sure to have hell enough with such a wife. In thy choice to err but once is to be un- done for ever, at least as to the comforts and contentments of thy life ; once blest or curst must be for ever so : men have not leave to choose