heaven alone. They say to God, " Draw me, and we will run after thee :" that is, Draw me, and I will bring all I can along with me. This will be the endeavour of every soul that truly turns to God ; and God will bless these labours of love, in whomsoever they may be found. If all are not called to speak in public, all have a sphere in which they may exert them- selves to advantage : and all who are upright before God will employ their talents, whether in visiting the sick, or in the education of children, or at all events in instructing their own households and their more immediate friends. Activity in the cause of God is inseparable from true piety.]
And inconceivable will be their bliss —
[Perhaps the idea of our Lord's transfiguration may assist us a little in forming some faint conception of the appearance of the righteous in that day. We know that " their bodies shall then be changed like unto Christ's glorious body ;" and in their souls also " they shall be like him :" and in all their powers, whether of soul or body, shall they be " filled with all the fulness of their God." The souls also, to whom in their day and generation they were useful, shall then be as jewels in their crown, and sources of augmented bliss and honour to all eternity.]
Address —
1. Those who are regardless of that day —
[Think, I pray you, what your feelings would now be, if all the evil that has ever passed in your hearts were made known to your fellow-creatures, I fear there would be very few of us that would not veil our faces with conscious shame, and be glad to hide ourselves in any distant retreat where we might escape the eyes of those who knew our guilt. What then will be your feelings in that day, when every abomina- tion, with all its attendant aggravations, shall be exposed before the whole assembled universe ? Now you may be able to glory in your shame ; or may possibly be hardened into utter insensibility: but it will not be so then. Your sensibilities will be as quick and vivid, after millions of years, as at the first moment of your exposure ; and your conscious desert of all
the shame and contempt be as pungent as ever Oh
that I could prevail on you now to humble yourselves*, that then you may be exalted ; and now to clothe yourselves in the robe of Christ's righteousness, that then " the shame of your nakedness may not appear f."]
2. Those who are living in a state of preparation for it —
e Jer. iii. 25. * Rev. iii. 18.