he fhines in his glory. He will effectually order their getting away out of his prefence, by a terrible voice from his throne, Matth. xxv. 41. "Depart from me, ye curfed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels." And they fhall go away one way, and he another with his faints; and they fhall never meet again. However, he courted them in this world, and they still fled from him, and would have none of him, they will never have a good word for them or to them, from him any more.

(5.) They will be relatively feparated from God the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. They cannot be locally separated from him, who is every where prefent, in hell as well as in heaven, Pfal. cxxxix. 8. But there will be a relative feparation, in an eternal blocking up of all comfortable communication between God and them; as when two parties break up a treaty of peace, and part with hoftile mind, proclaiming war against one another. Now though God is not their God by covenant, yet he is their Benefactor, and they get much benefit by that relation, Luke vi. 35. But then it is broke off for ever.

Laftly, They will be for ever under a total eclipse of all light of comfort and ease spiritual and bodily, Mat. xxii. 13. "Bind him hand and foot, and take him away, and caft him away into outer darkness ; there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." Hof. ix. 12. "Wo alfo to them when I depart from them.” Whatever good thing in body or mind they now enjoy is from God, as the light is from the fun; and therefore God totally withdrawing from, it is impoffible that any thing good or comfortable can remain with them; but even as when there is but one chink in a house to let in the light, and that is stopt, there muft needs be a total darkness.

2. They will be miserable both in body and foul there; for they muft depart into everlasting fire, Mat. XXV.

Mat. xxv. 41. How can it be otherwife in the lake of fire and brimftone, as it is called? Rev. xx. 10.

As to the state of their bodies there, though they be new framed of their duft, yet it will be to no advantage, but to fit them for a state of eternal mifery. And we may take a view of it in these three things.

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(1.) Their bodies will be bafe, inglorious, and loathfome. Dan, xii. 2. "And many of them that fleep in the duft of the earth fhall awake-fome to shame and everlasting contempt." Ifa. lxvi. 24. " And they fhall go forth, and look upon the carcafes of the men that have tranfgreffed against me; for their warm fhall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched, and they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh." No beauty can poffibly be found in them there, but their countenance will be for ever ghastly and frightful, as in the pangs of the fecond death. They will be like fo many dead carcafes there for unfightlinefs, while death preys on them there buried out of the fight of all, in the pit of deftruction.

(2.) There will be no health nor foundness in them there. How can there be in bodies fuffering the vengeance of eternal fire? What hale fide can one have to turn him to, fwimming in a lake of fire? They will be in torments, Luke xvi. 23.

(3.) Yet will they be of fuch a constitution as to bear up, and not faint away under their torments there, Mat. xxv. ult. They will ever be in the pangs of death, but never die out. The power of God will keep them up in that cafe, that they fhall not have the favour of fainting nor dying out.

As to the state of their fouls in their bodies there. (1.) Their minds or understandings will be fitted to carry on their mifery there. They will be impreffed there with clear notions of things, that here they either know not, or would not know; but then they will only be so known as to aggravate their mifery, Luke xvi. 23. "And in hell he lift up his eyes

and

and feeth Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bofom." They will know then what God is, Christ, fin, heaven, hell, and this world then past. Their minds will then be fixed and active; fixed on their misery, and active in turning it about in all its shapes, without poffibility of diverfion from the thoughts of it. The impreffions of wrath will be deep there.

(2.) There will, as it will for ever continue enmity against God, fo it will be croffed for ever by him. What they would, they fhall never obtain; and what they would not, shall be eternally bound on them. In the state of trial they would needs have their will, and many times they got it; but they will get it no more, when once there; the will of God will refift it for ever. Hence there is no rest for them, Rev. xiv. 11.

(3.) Their affections will all be tormenting, Mat. xxii. 13. "There shall be weeping and gnashing of . teeth." All pleasant paffions, whether of one kind or another, will then be rooted out: no joy nor delight in any object whatsoever will fpring up with them any more. But they will be brim-full of forrow, racked with anxiety, filled with horror, galled with fretfulness, and darted through with defpair, Rev. xvi. 21. Their fouls ftocked with ftrong lufts, and finful habits contracted in their life, will be left to pine on in them for ever; eagerly defiring to have them gratified, but no gratification of them poffible. So they will be under an eternal gnawing hunger after fomething to fatisfy the large cravings of their finful wretched fouls; but there will be nothing to be had for ever for that end, Luke xvi. 25.

(4.) Their confciences will ever be awake there, and witness to their face that they are juftly ruined, and have ruined themfelves, Mat. xxii. 12. It will prefent to them their fins thro' the whole course of their life, and cut them with remorfe for them. It will upbraid them with their unbelief, witness against them

that

that they were warned, but would not hearken. And so it will be in them a gnawing worm that dieth not.

(5.) Their memories will be fresh there, Luke xvi. 25. Sins fometimes buried and out of mind with them, will be called to mind with all their aggravating circumftances. They will have a galling and cutting re-. membrance of the pleasures of fin, which they fometime thought themselves happy in; of the profits of fin, that they sometimes hugged themselves in. Times, places, means, inftruments, when, where, and by which they.v were ruined, or might have been brought into a state of falvation, will all be remembered there.

Laftly, The wrath of God will fink into their fouls there, Pfal. cix. 18. Vindictive justice will make inconceivable impreffions on them, that will melt their fouls like wax in the midst of their bowels. Some of God's own people have felt some drops of wrath here, that if they had continued but a little longer, they would have fainted away under them. What will the full shower of it be in hell, where every stone of that hail is the weight of a talent? Rev. xvi. 21.

3. They will be shut up in outer darkness there, Mat. xxii. 13. Hell is the place of outer darkness. It is fo called in oppofition to the glorious light that the faints within heaven do enjoy. The Jews had their marriage-fuppers by night, and fo while the guestchamber was filled with lights, there was nothing but darkness without. So while the faints are in heaven, in eternal light at the marriage fupper of the Lamb, the damned are without in darkness. It must be so; for light is fweet to the eyes, and nothing fweet can be there. When Christ fuffered on the cross, there was an eclipse for the fame reason. But it went off, for Chrift overcame death; but the eclipse in hell can never go off. And the darkness there is a deep darknefs, it is the mist of darkness that never clears, 2 Pet. ii. 17. the blackness of darkness, Jude 13. Hence, (1.) Difmal and melancholy must the state of the

damned

damned be, in that region of horror, where is not the least comfortable gleam of light to their eyes. As there is no night in heaven, but eternal day, so there is no day in hell, but an eternal night, an everlasting gloom. If there were no more in it, it would be terrible never to fee the light.

(2.) They will not range up and down as vain men now do in the world, diverting themselves with this and the other object. There is nothing to be seen there to please the eye. The Egyptian darkness was an emblem of it, which gives the reason of the phrase, chains of darkness, as was before obferved. And accordingly the damned are faid to be bound hand, and foot, Matth. xxii. 13. in which posture one cannot range from place to place, but at moft tofs and roll himself like a fick man on his bed.

4. They will have the fociety of devils there, being fhut up with them in the same pit of destruction, Mat. xxv. 41. Rev. xx. 10. As the faints in heaven fhall be happy in the fociety of God himself, Chrift, and his holy angels; fo will the damned be miferable in the fociety of the devil and his angels. How dreadful would it be to dwell in the pleasanteft fpot of the earth haunted by the apparitions of devils? how much more than all that to be fhut up in the pit of hell, in the Lake of fire with them, when they shall be filled with wrath to the brim!

5. There will be degrees of torment and misery in hell, the torments of fome more grievous than others. All there will be unfpeakably miferable, and unpitied in their mifery; but the mifery of fome will be screwed to a greater height than that of others. As finners claffed themselves on earth, in higher or lower forms, in dishonouring of God; fo will they be claffed in their punishment, Matth. xiii, 30. "Gather ye together firft the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them." As there are many manfions in heaven, fo will there be many bundles in hell; bundles of ignorants, worldlings,