sentence-if after all this exhibition of wisdom, and love, and power, the inhabitants of the heavenly world, may, at some remote period in eternity, leave their abodes of glory, and sink to the realms of woe?

There are but three ways in which we can conceive the character and condition of the righteous in the heavenly world will be ever altered. Either there must be something there to change the character and diminish the joys of the inhabitants; or they themselves must change their character and destiny; or God himself must change his purposes, and their dispositions, and by his own Almighty and irresistible energy, make them sinful. But is there any thing in the heavenly world that will tend to change the character or diminish the joys of its holy inhabitants? God is there: but he is without variableness or shadow of a turning. If the pure spirits around his throne ever have reason to love and adore him, they will always have reason to do so. And since God does not alter, their affections and joys will not alter. Throughout ceaseless ages, still he unfolds the lustre of his character; and those who have once beheld his beauty, can never be offended with his excellency, or weary with his glory. Nor will there be any thing in the character of the angels, in the employments and enjoyments of the heavenly world, that will have the least tendency to satiate or disgust the redeemed, but every thing to cherish and enkindle within them the flame of hallowed joy.

And as there is nothing in heaven to alter the disposition of its inhabitants, so the inhabitants will never voluntarily turn their backs upon it. They have no motive to do so, either from their judgment, their conscience, their prevailing disposition, or their best interests. And if the saints would be satisfied with their inheritance, and never choose the portion of the reprobate; so have we the assurance of the God of truth and love, that he will never influence them so to do. Nay, his faithfulness, and mercy, and inviolability, are pledged to keep them; his eternal covenant is pledged to keep them: nothing shall pluck them out of his hand; nothing shall separate them from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus their Lord.

O, dear hearers, whose heart does not fasten itself on this inestimable truth? What child of grace does not look down upon the mighty chasm between him and the lost, and rejoice that they who would pass from thence cannot? On this interesting point, therefore, every fear may be hushed. We have the assurance of the God of truth, that the heavenly inheritance" fadeth not away," by two immutable things in which it is impossible for God to lie; that they might have strong consolation who have fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before them; which hope they have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, that which is within the veil." Nor could there possibly be more certainty; nor could there be any doubt, or one moment's hesitation here. Tell me, when you open the everlasting doors to welcome my departing spirit, that the time may come when this inheritance may fail, and you take away the anchor of my hope. Publish the tidings in heaven, that their blessedness is not eternal, and the songs of seraphs are converted to notes of woe. Thanks be to God no such mournful tidings shall ever fall upon their ears. "There is a great gulf fixed, so that they which would pass from hence to you, cannot; neither can they pass to us that would come from thence."

But the inquiry is not the less interesting, and it is not the less instructing, Will the wicked after having been once shut up in hell, ever be admitted to

heaven? My dear brethren, who shall answer it but God? What has the God of heaven said on this momentous subject? How readest thou? I find in the Bible such declarations as these: "These shall go away into everlasting punishment:" they shall awake to "shame and everlasting contempt:" they shall be "punished with everlasting destruction:" they shall be consigned to "the bottomless pit:""the smoke of their torment shall ascend for ever and ever:" "The worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched." Now if language can express the never-ending misery of the wicked, is it not here expressed? If God can reveal this truth, it is here revealed. These and such like declarations determine with certainty, that the miseries of the wicked will run parallel and be coeval with the happiness of the good. An impartial examination of the Scriptures will convince every reflecting mind, that they furnish the same evidence of the unalterable allotments of the wicked, as they do of the unalterable allotments of the righteous. Our text presents us with nothing but a gulf equally impassable to both.

But this is not all. According to our selfish views, we very naturally suppose that, while the inhabitants of heaven will never wish to go to hell, the inhabitants of hell may wish to go to heaven. No doubt the wicked will earnestly desire to be delivered from their pains, but will they desire the holy happiness of heaven? What is there in heaven to make it desirable to an unholy mind? Nothing: rather every thing which to a wicked man would render it the object of revulsion and disgust. Nor is there any reason to expect as has often been said amongst them as well as amongst us—that the punishment of the damned will ever change their disposition, or soften and purify their hearts, so as to prepare them for the bliss of heaven. Suffering never leads men to God and holiness; punishment will not lead a bad man to love the punisher.

Besides where do you find the least intimation in the Bible, that God punishes the wicked in a future world for their benefit? No where it is the delusion of the depraved heart. On the contrary, he declares that he punishes them, not in kindness to reclaim them, but in anger to curse them—not in mercy to save them, but in wrath to destroy them. Satan and Beelzebub are no more meet for the enjoyment of heaven, than when they entered the world of woe. In defiance of all their sufferings, the wicked in hell will remain the avowed enemies of God; and being thus eternally unqualified for heaven, wil. never find access across the gulf to those immortal regions of bliss.

Further there is not the least intimation in the Word of God that he will devise (as has been sometimes thought) any mode by which his enemies will be hereafter restored to his favour. Who can be so infatuated as to indulge the thought that after a preparation of thousands of years for a day of final decision, and after the decisions of that day shall have been finally pronounced, that there shall be another day of grace, another Saviour, other offers of mercy-that God will pour out his Spirit upon the tenants of the pit, and revive his work in the regions of despair? Do we not know, have we not heard, that at the close of that day it shall be said with awful emphasis-" He that is filthy let him be filthy still?" Do we not know that "God spared not his only Son," and that "there remaineth no more sacrifice for sin ?"

Besides there will be no opportunity for the wicked inhabitants of hell to be saved by Jesus Christ, because they have been condemned for rejecting

him and moreover, he will have given up the kingdom to God, even the Father. When the Lord Jesus shall return from heaven to pronounce the sentence and fix the allotments of the assembled universe, the restitution of all things spoken of by the prophet since the world began will be accomplished, and the mediatorial kingdom will be closed; the day of heaven and of hope will be closed; there will be no possibility of reconciliation with God, for there will be no mediator; the great gulf will be fixed: heaven and hell shall remain for ever, and the impassable gulf eternally remain.

Are these, beloved hearers, mere words, and empty speculation? or are they truths in which you and I have no concern? As you reflect on what has been said, allow me to remind you, in the first place, that every man who hears me will find at last his unalterable allotment in heaven or hell. While here in this house of prayer each one possesses the character of the righteous or the wicked: one of these characters you will possess as long as you remain in the present world: one of them you will possess when you come to die, and when you rise up from the dead, and when you appear before God in judgment: and the character you then possess will determine your residence in heaven or in hell. This will prove true not merely of those who lived before the flood-not merely of those who lived during the prophetical and apostolical ages-but for their children, and their children's children; of no people more than this, and of no living men, dear hearers, more than you. You may not realize it, but it is not on that account the less true: nay, perhaps some of you may think it all an idle tale; but it will not for this reason prove the less true: you may be thoughtless and unconcerned about it, but it will not on this account prove the less true or the less interesting, the less important, the less amazing and stupendous. Men are very apt to feel-and it is one of the delusions of the adversary over the human mind-men are very apt to think there is no such thing as hell, simply because they do not believe it; just as though its existence depended on their belief. You will not believe there is a hell. Well, what

of that? Does this prove there is none? You do not believe there is a hell: what does this prove but that you are in the broad way that conducts to that dark abode?

There is a class of men, dear hearers, that will never believe there is a hell till they have plunged into it. Ah! if you could blot hell out of the universe as easily as you can disbelieve it, I would not thus alarm you; I would not thus stand here wasting my breath, entreating you to escape the coming wrath. Remember God can send you to hell without your believing it. He does not ask leave of your wishes, nor of your opinion. No, no: there is not an individual in this assembly that will not at last find his unalterable allotment in heaven or hell: O, how inexpressibly solemn the thought! Heaven or hell! Not one of this assembly that will not, in a very few years, find his residence in heaven or hell!

Secondly, we learn from our subject that all may know before they leave this world what will be their future and final condition.

This is a subject on which men may well exercise deep thought, painful solicitude: What will become of us? Dear hearers, the question is easily answered. Who went to Abraham's bosom? Who sunk to that tormenting flame? It matters not whether you are old or young, rich or poor, wise or unwise,

honourable or despised, in order to know whether you go to heaven or hell. It was no crime in Dives to be rich, and it was no virtue in Lazarus to be poor but the one was the friend, and the other was the enemy of Jesus Christ: the one forsook and the other persevered in his course of iniquity; the one accepted and the other rejected the great salvation: the one was born of God -justified, sanctified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Holy Spirit, and made meet to be a partaker of the inheritance of the saints in light; the other remained dead in sin, and thoughtless, and condemned, and unholy, and a vessel of wrath fitted to destruction. This is the time, the infallible time. You have only to determine whether you are the friend or the enemy of God, in order to tell whether you are prepared to enjoy his favour or suffer his wrath. If you love God (cold as your love has been), if you accept his salvation, if you love his cause, if you love his truth, and if you do justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with God through the rich grace in Jesus Christ-though your iniquities are like mountains, they shall be pardoned and blotted out, and you will at last be awarded to eternal life. But if you remain unconcerned, and thoughtless, and dead in sin, and contentious, and disobedient to the truth, and reject the Saviour, what else can await you but indignation and wrath? The question for eternity is a simple but an amazing one: the question for eternity is decided in time, and usually within the short compass of a very few years. It is in the present world, and in these days of mercy, that you are forming your character for an everlasting existence beyond the grave; and you are forming them with inconceivable rapidity. Life is the seed-time; eternity is the harvest. "Whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap. He that soweth to the flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption: but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting."

Permit me to add once more, in view of this subject, how solemn and affecting the responsibility of the present hour! Human life is but a moment; and yet within this short term are crowded all the momentous concerns of an interminable existence. With ineffably tender interest, therefore, does our subject say to every individual in this assembly, "Behold now is the accepted time!' behold now is the day of salvation!" I stand in this sacred place, dear brethren, with no expectation of seeing your faces again till I see you at the bar of God: and I am concerned to ask myself which of this large assembly will be numbered with the righteous, and who will be gathered with the wicked? Awful question -enough to make an angel tremble! And yet it is rushing on our minds with inconceivable force in view of such a subject as this. O what child of Gospel mercy is there here who must at last find an allotment less tolerable than that of Sodom and Gomorrah? What man in advanced age, or in middle life, will then be seen to have gained the world at the expense of his soul? What youth whose way to the pit has been hedged up by counsels, and prayers, and tears, will at last be doomed to misery? Who, of all that hear me, will become more and more obdurate in their impiety-will still rush on the thick bosses of Jehovah's buckler, and in defiance of all the protestations of judgment and of conscience, and with all the sturdiness of devils, force their way to the furnace of God's wrath?

It will be a glorious life that the righteous shall attain-a dreadful death that the wicked die. When the angels shall come to bind the tares in bundles, and to burn them, and to gather the wheat into the garner of the great

scattered kings in her behalf, "broke the ships of Tarshish with an east wind." This God is he whose loving-kindness made him delightfully thought of in his temple; whose "praise is unto the ends of the earth;" whose "right hand is full of righteousness." This God is our God whose "judgments make Zion to rejoice, and the daughters of Judah to be glad." "Walk about Zion," cries the Psalmist," go round about her: tell the towers thereof. Mark ye well her bulwarks, consider her palaces; that ye may tell it to the generation following. For this God is our God for ever and ever."

Hence it is evident, that "this God, our God," is God in covenant with his people. The whole Psalm throughout, relates to a God in covenant. This expression admits of only a two-fold interpretation: one literal-the God in covenant with the Jewish church; the second prophetical, or figurative, applying to God in covenant with the Church of Christ. Both these interpretations may be comprehended in one, by explaining our text as speaking of God in covenant with his people. "This God"-the believing Jew of old, and the believing Christian now, may alike say-" This God is our God for ever and ever."

God in covenant with his people (for we have already arrived at that, as the meaning of our text)—God in covenant with his people is, we believe, from Scripture, the triune God-Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. The unity of the Godhead is beyond dispute. “Hear O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord," is the language of the Old Testament: "There is none other God but one," is the language of the New Testament. They who assume to themselves the name of Unitarians, more than insinuate that we deny or disbelieve the unity of God. But what is the first sentence of the first article of our religion? "There is but one living and true God." What is the second, the next sentence, which acknowledges the Trinity, as if to prevent that very insinuation? "And in unity of this Godhead there are three persons." For what is our creed? "I believe in one God." "The Catholic faith is this, that we worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in unity." Hence we maintain, that the Socinians have no exclusive right whatever to the name of Unitarians; and it ought not to be conceded to them; as it seems to admit their unfair assumption, that they alone assert the unity of God. Let them know that this is no exclusive praise-nay, that it is no praise at all, unless they have right views of the one true God. The Jew admits the unity of God, while he denies Jesus to be the Messiah. Is he therefore right? The Mahomedan continually asserts, "There is one God," while he as often adds, "and Mahomet is his prophet." Is his faith correct? The Deist professes to believe in a God-usually I believe in one God-while he denies the truth of revelation. A man may, therefore, believe in the unity of God, and yet not believe aright.

God in covenant is, we believe, a triune God; "three persons in one God." We more than fear whether the Deist, the Mahomedan, the Jew, or the Socinian know God in covenant, the covenant-making and covenant-keeping God. The Father is the Author of this covenant. He foresaw that man would fall; he foreknew all the misery that would ensue: and, therefore, he himself, out of the abundance of his own loving-kindness and grace, made a provision of mercy, a covenant of grace, for the fallen and miserable. He gave his Son he "so loved the world," says the Scripture, "that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever," of the guilty sons of men "believeth on him,