[2.] In reference to their extent in respect of subjects, with their visible glorious appearance, which is under innu- merable promises to be very great in the latter days. 'For it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established in the top of the moun- tains, and shall be exalted above the hills, and all nations shall flow unto it ;' Isa. ii. 4.'*
These then are the things which cannot be shaken, which we may reduce to three heads.
1st. The growth of righteousness, peace, and joy in the saints, being filled with light and love from the special presence of Christ, with a wonderful increase of the number of them, multitudes of the elect being to be born in those days, the residue of the Jews and fulness of the Gentiles meeting in one fold, and there ' dwelleth righteousness ;* 2 Pet. iii. 13.'
» Psal. ii. 6. ex. 2. Acts ii. 36. Rev. i. 18. 1 Cor. xv. 24—27.
*> Luke vi. 20. Mark xii. 34, &c. = Psal. xlv. 6. ex) v. 13. Isa. ix. 7. Obad. 21.
d Isa. xi.5— 10, xviii. 18, 19. xxx. 18, 19. Micah iv. 1.
e Isa. xlix. 18—22. liv. 1—3, &c. Iv. 1 1, 12. Ix. 16, 17. Ezek. xlviii. 35. Amos ix. 11.
Rom. ix. 15, &c. Isa. xlix. 22, 23. Ixvi. 21. Mai. iii. 3. Ezek. xliii. 10, 11. Rev,
xjti. 3. liv. 11—13, 6cc. Zech. xiv, 9—11.
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2dly. The administration of gospel ordinances, in power and purity, according to the appointment, and unto the ac ceptation of the Lord Jesus. * The temple of God and the altar being measured anew, the outward court defiled with Gentile-worship is left out;' Rev. xi. 1, 2.
3dly. The glorious and visible manifestation of those ad- ministrations, in the eyes of all the world, in peace and quietness, 'none making afraid, or hurting in the whole mountain of the Lord;' Isa. Ixv. 25.
For the personal reign of the Lord Jesus on earth, I leave it to them, with whose discoveries I am not, and curiosities I would not be acquainted.^
But as for such, who from hence do, or for sinister ends pretend to fancy to themselves a terrene kingly state unto each private particular saint, so making it a bottom * vi- vendi ut velis,' for every one to do that which is good in his own eyes, to the disturbance of all order and authority, civil and spiritual, as they expressly clash against innu- merable promises, so they directly introduce such confusion and disorder, as the soul of the Lord Jesus doth exceedingly abhor.
It is only the three things named, with their necessary dependencies, that I do assert.
2. And lastly, of these it is said they must remain : that is, continue, and be firmly established, as the word is often used ; Rom. ix. 11.
The words of the text, being unfolded, and the mind of the Holy Ghost in them discovered, I shall from them commend to your Christian consideration this following position.
Observation. The Lord Jesus Christ by his mighty power, in these latter days, as antichristian tyranny draws to its period, will so far shake and translate the political heights, governments, and strength of the nations, as shall serve for the full bringing in of his own peaceable kingdom ; the nations so shaken, becoming thereby a quiet habitation for the people of the Most High.
Though the doctrine be clear from the text, yet it shall receive farther scriptural confirmation, being of great weight and concernment. Dan. ii. 44. * And in the days of these
' Acts iii. 21.
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356 THE SHAKING A N' D TRANSLATING
kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed : and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces, and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever.' That this is affirmed of the kingdom of Christ under the gospel, none ever doubted.
Three things are here remarkably intimated of it.
1. The time wherein it shall most eminently be esta- blished ; and that is, ' in the days of these kings,' of which Daniel was speaking,
2. The efficacy of its being set up : * It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms.'
3. Its own stability : ' It shall never be destroyed.'
1. For the first, there is great debate about the principal season of the accomplishing of this prediction : much hesi- tation who those kings are, in whose days the kingdom of Christ is eminently to be established. In the days when the two legs of the Roman empire shall be divided into ten kingdoms, and those kingdoms have opposed themselves to the power of Christ, that is, in the days wherein we live, say some. Yea, most of the ancients took this for the Roman empire, and to these the bringing in of the kingdom of Christ is the establishment of it in these days : others understand the Syrian and Egyptian branches of the Grecian monarchy, and the bringing in of Christ's kingdom to be in his birth, death, and preaching of the gospel, wherein certainly the foundations of it were laid. I will not contend with any mortal hereabouts. Only I shall oppose one or two things to this latter interpretation. As,