[6.] Sixthly, I answer. It is no injustice in God to punish temporal offences with perpetual torments. God measureth the punishment by the greatness of the offence, and not by the time wherein the sin was acted. Murder, adultery, sacrilege, treason, and the like capital crimes, are doomed in the judicatories of men to death without mercy, and sometimes to perpetual imprisonment, or to perpetual banishment ; and yet these high offences were committed and done in a short time. Now tliis bears a proportion with eternal torments. 0 sirs, if the offences committed against God be infinitely heinous, why may not the punishment be infinitely lasting? Sinners' offences, as Austin well observes,^ are not to be measured temporis longitudine, by the length of time wherein they were done : but iniquitatis magnitudine, by the foulness of the crime : and if so, then God is just in binding the sinner in everlasting chains. We must remember that God is a great and a glorious God, and that he is an omniscient and an omnipotent God, and that he is a mighty, yea, an almighty God, and that he is a holy and a just God, and that he is out of Christ an incomprehensible, in- communicable, and very terrible God, and that he is an infinite, eternal, and independent God, Heb. xii. 29, 30. And we must remember that man is a shadow, a bubble, a vapour, a dream, a base, vile, sinful, worthless worm. Now these things being considered, must we not
^ As long as tlic guilt of sin remains, punishments and torments will remain. ^ Aug. cie Civit. Dei., lib. i. cap. 11.
216 London's lamentations on [Tsa. XLII. 24, 25.
confess that eternity itself is too short a space for God to revenge him- self on sinners in ? Bnt,
[7.] Seventhly and lastly, I answer, Siich sinners havebut lohat they chose. Whilst they lived under the means of grace, the God of grace set before them heaven and hell, glory and misery, eternal life and eternal death, so that if they eternally miscarry, they have none to blame but themselves, for' choosing hell rather than heaven, misery rather than glory, and eternal death rather than eternal life.^ Ah, how freely, how fully, how frequently, how graciously, how gloriously, hath Christ been otfered in the gospel to poor sinners, and yet they would not choose him, they Avould not close with him, they would not embrace him, nor accept of him, nor enter into a marriage covenant with him, nor resign themselves up to liim, nor part with their lusts to enjoy him : they would not come to Christ that they might have life ; they slighted infinite mercy, and despised the riches of grace, and trod under foot the blood of the everlasting covenant, and scorned the otters of eternal salvation ; and therefore it is but just that they should lie down in everlasting sorrows, John v. 40 ; Mat. xxii. 2-5 ; 2 Cor. iv. 3, 4. How can that sinner be saved that [still refuses sal- vation ? How can mercy save him that will not be saved by mercy ? yea, how can Christ save such a man, that will not be saved by him ? All the world cannot save that man from going to hell, who is peremp- torily resolved that he will not go to heaven. Sinners have boldly and daily refused eternal life, eternal mercy, eternal glory, and there- fore it is but just that they should endure eternal misery. And let thus much sufhce for answer to the objection.
Quest. But, sir, pray what are those duties that are incumbent upon those that have been burnt up, and whose habitations are now laid in its ashes ?
I answer, They are these that follow: —
1. First, See the hand of the Lord in this late dread fid fire, acknow- ledge the Lord to he the author of all judgments, and of this in ^x/r- ticular, Lev. xxvi. 41 , and Micah vii. il. It is a high point of Chris- tian prudence and piety to acknowledge the Lord to be the author of all personal or national sufterings that befall us : Jer ix. 12, ' Who is the wise man, that may understand this ? for what the land perisheth, and is burnt uj) like a wilderness, that none passeth through.' It is very great Avisdom to know from whom all our afHictions come, and for what all our nfllictions come upon us. God looks that we should observe his hand in all our sufterings. * Hear the rod, and who hath appointed it,' Micah vi. 9. God challenges all sorts of alilictions as his own special administration : Amos iii. 6, ' Is there any evil in the city, and the Lord hath not done it ? I form the light, and create darkness ; I make jieace, and create evil, I the Lord do all these things,2 Isa. xlv. 7. God takes it very heinously, and looks upon it as a very great indignity that is put upon his power, providence, and justice, when men will neither see nor acknowledge his hand in those
' Dcut. xi. 26, 27, and xxx. 15 ; HcK ii. 2, 3, and x. 28, 29 ; John iii. 14-17, SC, and i. 11.
* See this text fully opened in mv first Epistle to my Treatise on ' Closet Prayer.' [Vol. I.— G]
IsA. XLII. 24, 25.] THE LATE FIERY DISPENSATION. 217