1263. J Christ's reign on earth. 559
thine onlye." An entire subjection of the soul to Christ is a very rare attainment. But in that day there shall be none to " say, Lord, Lord, without doing the things which he com- mands." Hypocrisy will then be banished from the world ; and all who are called Israel, will be " Israelites indeed f." " All will be righteous in that dayg." Every vessel in the Lord's house, from the greatest to the least, will be holiness to the Lord : nor shall there any more be the Canaanite in the house of the Lord of hosts'1."]
Is this the true import of the prophecy ? How great then must be,
II. The blessedness of the period to which it refers —
Surely it will be a season of great temporal -pro- sperity—
[There will then exist few, if any, of those calamities which now overrun the world. Do wars now rage, and deso- late the earth ? They shall then cease : " the swords shall be beat into plow-shares, and the spears into pruning-hooks : nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more1." Do unfruitful seasons reduce men to great distress? There shall then be such fertility in the earth, that " every man shall sit under his own vine and fig- treek," in the undisturbed possession both of peace and plenty. Do injustice and oppression prevail ? Universal righteousness will then obtain ; and neither fraud nor violence be suffered upon earth1. Do diseases bring men to an untimely end? To such a degree shall the constitutions of men be strength- ened, that a person at the age of a hundred years shall be accounted only a child ; and if he die at that early age, he shall be judged as cut off prematurely by a judicial act of God's displeasure. In truth, the whole system of things will appear like " a new creation ;" " a new heaven, and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness"1."]
Then, also, shall spiritual blessings most richly abound —
[Men's knowledge of the Gospel shall then far exceed any thing that is possessed at this day : " The light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun sevenfold, as the light of seven days, in the day that the Lord bindeth up the breach of his people, and healeth the stroke
e Isai. xxvi. 13. f John i. 47. s Isai. Ix. 21.
h ver. 20, 21. i Mic. iv. 3. k Mic. iv. 4.
1 Isai. xi. 6 — 9. and lx. 17, 18.
111 Isai. lxv. 17 — 20. and 2 Pet. iii. 13.