let us now carry our views forward, even to that awful time spoken of by our Saviour in the text, -"When the Son of Man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him." And remember, however wide may be the interval between these two events, it will make no difference as to the condition in which we shall appear before the throne of Christ. We are to be judged for the things done in the body, not in the spiritual state in which we shall exist between death and the resurrection. We know not what that state shall be, but we have every reason to believe that the "souls of the faithful" are in the enjoyment of rest and peace in the presence of God, immediately on their departure from the body. The thief on the cross, to whom Christ said "To-day shalt thou be with me in paradise," surely was not a singular exception. When St. Paul said "I have a desire to depart and to be with Christ, which is far better" than to remain in the flesh, he surely did not mistake in thinking that he also should be with Christ, as soon as he had left the world. Nor is it likely that he spoke of it as a peculiar favour reserved for himself, but as the general condition which all christians would enter at the hour of death. * And if it be

* St. Stephen dies with this prayer on his lips," Lord Jesus receive my spirit.

so, we can hardly entertain a doubt on the other hand, that the spirits of those who die in impenitence and unbelief, will, on quitting their wretched clay, be conveyed to some place of gloom and misery, some prison house of woe; where with the "angels that kept not their first estate," they will be "reserved" as it were "in everlasting chains, under darkness, unto the judgment of the great day," tormented bitterly by their own reflections and consciences, even "before the time of final punishment, and "trembling" at the prospect of the vengeance that awaits them.

Cause is there, indeed, for fear and trembling, if we consider the awful descriptions that are given of the coming of our Lord. I will read to you a few of these descriptions, and first that in my text: "When the Son of Man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory. And before him shall be gathered all nations. And he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats.

"And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left.

"Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.

"Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.

"And these shall go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into life eternal." That of St. Paul is no less awful.

"The Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels,

"In flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ;

"Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power."

Take another account from St. Peter.

"But the heavens and the earth which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men."

"The day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up."

St. John in the Book of Revelation, is more descriptive, and gives a lively, but most alarming picture of the proceedings of that great day.

"And I saw a great white throne, and him

that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them.

"And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God, and the books were opened. And another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.

"And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death."

Thus it has pleased the Holy Spirit to set before our eyes the terrors of the day of judgment; no doubt for our benefit, that we may be impressed with awe at the prospect, that we may be anxious to "flee from the wrath to come," that "seeing we look for such things," we may consider well "what manner of persons we ought to be, in all holy conversation and godliness," and that we may, through the mercy of God, be stirred up to watch and pray always," that we may be found worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of Man."

I think it may be useful, on the present occasion, to follow up an idea presented to us in two of the passages above quoted. The descriptions of our blessed Saviour and of St. John, bring before our minds a scene, such as (though on an

infinitely smaller scale) many of us have witnessed, and all have heard of,-the proceedings before an earthly tribunal. There is the judge seated on his throne of glory; all the world summoned before him upon their trial; some to be acquitted, and some to be condemned; and the books open out of which they are to be judged, the writings which contain either the charges against them, or the evidence of their innocence; the book, containing Christ's word, according to which every man shall be judged, answering to those books wherein the laws and statutes of the land are written, according to which sentence must be given in our earthly courts. And last of all the book of life, for which we have no parallel, since human laws are not like those of heaven,-they only punish, they do not reward.

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I will not presume to picture to you this awful scene. I should, at best, only diminish the interest and sublimity of it, by any attempt of description; and we know not how the ceedings will be conducted. But since the scripture has used a familiar and intelligible figure for the sake of representing the matter in some measure to our view; since our blessed Saviour, and his apostle St. John, inspired by him, have on this subject "spoken after the manner of men, because of the infirmity of the flesh," I see no