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by the Judge, in their sentence, will fix such impressions of the eternity of their miserable state upon their minds, as they will never be able to lay aside, but will continue with them evermore to complete their misery. This will fill them with everlasting despair; a most tormenting passion, which will continually rend their hearts, as it were, in a thousand pieces. To see floods of wrath ever coming and never to cease; to be ever in torment, and withal to know there shall never, never be a release, will be the top-stone put on the misery of the damned. If "hope deferred maketh the heart sick," how killing will be hope rooted up, slain outright, and buried for ever out of the creature's sight!

Lastly, I might here show the reasonableness of the eternity of the punishment of the damned; but having already spoken of it, in vindicating the justice of God in his subjecting men in their natural state to eternal wrath, I only remind you of three things: (1.) The infinite dignity of the party offended by sin, requires an infinite punishment to be inflicted for the vindication of his honour; since the demerit of sin riseth according to the dignity and excellency of the person against whom it is committed. The party offended is the great God, the chief good; the offender a vile worm, in respect of perfection infinitely distant from God, to whom he is indebted for all that ever he had implying any good or perfection whatso

ever.

This then requires an infinite punishment to be inflicted on the sinner; the which, since it cannot in him be infinite in value, must needs be infinite in duration, that is to say, eternal. Sin is a kind of infinite evil, as it wrongs an infinite God; and the guilt

and defilement thereof is never taken away, but endures for ever, unless the Lord himself in mercy doth remove it. God, who is offended, is eternal, his being never comes to an end: the sinful soul is immortal, and the man shall live for ever: the sinner being without strength to expiate his guilt, can never put away the offence; therefore it ever remains, unless the Lord do put it away himself, as in the elect, by his Son's blood. Wherefore, the party offended, the offender, and the offence, ever remaining, the punishment cannot but be eternal. (2.) The sinner would have continued the course of his provocations against God for ever without end, if God had not put an end to it by death. As long as they were capable to act against him in this world, they did it; and thereføre justly will he act against them while he is, that is, for ever. God, who judgeth of the will, intents, and inclinations of the heart, may justly do against sinners in punishing, as they would have done against him in sinning. Lastly, That the wicked be punished for their wickedness is just; and it is no wise inconsistent with justice. The misery under which they sin, can neither free them from the debt of obedience, nor excuse their sinning and make it blameless. The creature, as a creature, is bound unto obedience to his Creator; and no punishment inflicted on him can free from it, more than the malefactor's prison, irons, whipping, do set him at liberty to commit anew the crimes for which he is imprisoned or whipped. Neither can the torments of the damned excuse or make blameless their horrible sinning under them; more than exquisite pains, inflicted upon men on earth, can excuse their mur

muring, fretting, and blaspheming against God under them for it is not the wrath of God, but their own wicked nature, that is the true cause of their sinning under it; and so the holy Jesus bore the wrath of God, without so much as one unbecoming thought of God, and far less any unbecoming word.

USE I.-Here is a measuring reed: O that men would apply it! 1. Apply it to your time in this world, and you will find your time to be very short. A prospect of much time to come, proves the ruin of Men will be reckoning their time by many souls. years, (like that rich man, Luke xii. 19, 20.) when, it may be, there are not many hours of it to run. reckon as you will, laying your time to the measuringreed of eternity, you will see your age is nothing. What a small and inconsiderate point is sixty, eighty, or a hundred years, in respect of eternity!

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pared with eternity, there is a greater disproportion than between a hair's breadth and the circumference of the whole earth. Why do we sleep then in such a short day, while we are in hazard of losing rest through the long night of eternity? 2. Apply it to your endeavours for salvation, and they will be found very scanty. When men are pressed to diligence in their salvation-work, they are ready to say, Alas! if it were To what purpose is this waste?' to be judged by our diligence, what it is that we have in view; as to the most part of us, no man could thereby conjecture that we have eternity in view. If we duly considered eternity, we could not but conclude, that, to leave no means appointed of God unessayed till we get our salvation secured; to refuse rest or comfort in any thing till we are sheltered

under the wings of the Mediator; to pursue our great interest with the utmost vigour; to cut off lusts dear as right hands and right eyes; to set our faces resolutely against all difficulties, and fight our way through all the opposition made by the devil, the world, and the flesh; are, all of them together, little enough for eternity.

USE II.-Here is a balance of the sanctuary, by which one may understand the lightness of what is falsely thought weighty; and the weight of some things, by many reckoned to be very light.

First, Some things seem very weighty, which, weighed in this balance, will be found very light. (1.) Weigh the world, and all that is in it, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, and the whole will be found light in the balance of eternity. Weigh herein all worldly profits, gains, and advantages; and you will quickly will quickly see that a thousand worlds will not quit the cost of the eternity of woe:

For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?" Weigh the pleasures of sin, which are but for a season, with the fire that is everlasting, and you must account yourselves fools and madmen to run the hazard of the one for the other. (2.) Weigh your afflictions in this balance, and you will find the heaviest of them very light, in respect of the weight of eternal anguish. Impatience under affliction, especially when worldly troubles so embitter men's spirits that they cannot relish the glad tidings of the gospel, speaks great regardlessness of eternity. Such a one will stoop, and take up his cross, whatever it be, thinking it enough to escape eternal wrath. (3.) Weigh the most dif

Mortification of the thing, in comparison Lastly, Weigh your O how heavy do these

ficult and uneasy duties of religion here, and you will no more reckon the yoke of Christ insupportable. Repentance and bitter mourning for sin on earth, are very light in comparison of eternal weeping, wailing, and gnashing of teeth in hell. To wrestle with God in prayer, weeping, and making supplication for the blessing in time, is far easier than to lie under the curse through all eternity. most beloved lust is a light with the second death in hell. convictions in this balance. lie upon many, till they get them shaken off! They are not disposed to fall in with them, but strive to get clear of them, as of a mighty burden. But the worm of an ill conscience will neither die nor sleep in hell, though one may now lull it asleep for a time. And certainly it is easier to entertain the sharpest convictions in this life, so as they may lead one to Christ, than to have them fixed for ever in the conscience, while in hell one is totally and finally separated from him.

Secondly, But, on the other hand, (1.) Weigh sin in this balance; and, though now it seems but a light thing to you, ye will find it a weight sufficient to turn up an eternal weight of wrath upon you. Even idle words, vain thoughts, and unprofitable actions, weighed in this balance, and considered as following the sinner into eternity, will each of them be heavier than the sand of the sea: time idly spent will make a weary eternity. Now is your seed-time: thoughts, words, and actions, are the seed sown; eternity is the harvest. Though the seed now lies under the clod, unregarded by most men, every the least grain shall

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