and immortality. How little claim have you to this distinction, and how then can you hope to enjoy its exceeding great reward? Yet this most delightful issue of the labors and sorrows of life is still within your grasp. Deserving as you now are of the divine condemnation, and utterly disqualified as you are for the enjoyment of the divine presence, a change in your condition and prospects may yet be effected. The mercy of God is full and freeyour doom is not now fixed-and the gospel calls you to flee from the wrath to come, and enter upon the path leading to happiness. Obey this callseek the Lord while he may be found-work out your salvation with fear and trembling; and you shall die the death of the righteous, and your last end shall be like his.

12

90

SERMON VII.

THE HEAVENLY STATE.

1 JOHN iii. 2.

It doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.

A GREATER inquisitiveness concerning a future existence, than is actually observed among men, might be reasonably expected. The subject is surely one of sufficient interest to excite universal attention, and to excite it in a very remarkable degree. When we reflect that, since the world began, generation after generation has existed and in its turn disappeared from the face of the earth, is not the inquiry a natural one, Where has this multitude of human beings gone Have they utterly perished? Is the memory of them all that remains?

Again, when we call to our recollection many whom we have most ardently loved, for whose happiness, as much as our own, we have felt concerned, who have associated with us many days and years, and when in vain we now search for them among the living, how can we avoid indulging some conjectures concerning their present condition? And when the mind takes such a direction, how natural is it with the thought of their continued existence to associate some picture of its nature and circumstances?

And when we consider that in the way in which all flesh has gone we shall also go, that as others have died so must we, how strong should be our desire to pierce the thick darkness which gathers around the tomb, to obtain a distant view of another world, if such world exists, and to obtain a hope and confidence that when this earth shall know us no more, we shall yet live and live in happiness. Taking into view the considerations which I have suggested, it would seem that every man's thoughts would be much exercised in regard to futurity, and that the formation of some system of belief in respect to it would be the uniform result. On the other hand, however, there are reasons which induce an opposite course of conduct, which influence many to confine their views to the present life, and which produce an indisposition in all to think as much as they otherwise would of the state

which may be consequent upon the dissolution of the body.

In the first place, this is, in itself, a gloomy subject of contemplation. It is conversant with the sufferings most appalling to our nature. It calls to mind the loss of earthly happiness and the separation from endeared friends. In this view, then, it is natural that the mind should not more frequently recur to it than is unavoidable. But in the circumstances of multitudes, the subject to which we are referring is not merely gloomy, but terrible. The consciousness that they do not possess the approbation of God;—the knowledge that upon him depends the ordering of their future lot;the consequent anticipation that their final condition cannot be a happy one-all concur in producing a disposition rather to rest in their present enjoyment, than to speculate concerning their future prospects.

These considerations, however, do not affect the pious man; and contemplations which impress others with alarm, may to him be productive of pleasure. To such an one, the declaration of the Apostle will furnish a grateful subject of meditation. "It doth not yet appear what we shall be but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is."

I shall from these words take occasion to consider 1. What is mysterious in the future condition of the pious.

II. What is determined in Scripture concerning it.

I. "We know not yet what we shall be." There is therefore a present obscurity in our views. God has not removed the vail from before our eyes. There are indeed beams of light which allure and guide us home, but there is not enough to satisfy our curiosity. Now we see things as through a glass, darkly.

Our first inquiry is, What is there mysterious in the future condition of the pious?-There is much of this character. I shall however only adduce a few particulars.

1. We know not then the place of their abode. We indeed commonly designate it by the name of heaven, and suppose it to be at an undefined distance above us. The imagination passes from earth to the aerial regions surrounding it; thence to the expanse in which the stars are apparently fixed; and beyond this, rests in a world of light and happiness, which it portrays. There is something natural in this process, and there is countenance given to the conclusion at which it arrives, by holy writ. The process is a natural one; for, in endeavoring to form the conception of all that is bright, and glorious, and pure, we do not allow the mind to sink into the dust beneath our feet, but seek to be removed from it as far as possible, and to attain a natural elevation correspondent to that