SERMON XII.

The Grand Conflagration.

REV. xx. 9.

And fire came down from God out of Heaven, and devoured them.

T has been obferved before, that when Satan fhall be

IT

loofed from his prifon, he will make his last grand onfet against the Church of God; firft, by deceiving the unwary nations, who were grown lukewarm ; and then he will infuse a perfecuting spirit into them, or allure them, through the hopes of grandeur and conquest, into a dreadful rebellion-which will prove the final overthrow, both of the deceiver and the deceived; fo that neither fhall be able to make the smallest effort, from henceforth, for ever.

2. MEAN-TIME there will be a drawing together of the faints, and Jerufalem, I have faid, will be the royal city of all the earth, called the beloved city: for it seems highly probable, that those places which exhibited the furprising scene of an abafed Creator, will be the grand theatres of his millennial glory. The beloved city will

be

be of vast extent, no doubt, and still greater will be its fuburbs and connected environs, called the camp of the faints. It is very likely the faints may be apprized of the ftorm gathering against them, and may-attempt fomething in the way of self-defence, which may occafion their drawing together. But here it may be faid, as on a former occafion,-The Lord fhall fight for you, and ye fhall hold your peace *. For whilft Satan and his combined army, like Pharaoh and his hoft, are buoyed up with vain expectations, either of wealth or revenge, and while they cry, Peace and fafety, fudden deftruction comes upon them; for fire falls from heaven, and confumes them, and, I apprehend, will confume the world; for I judge this will be the Grand Conflagration. What may be the formal caufe of this fudden and tremendous fcene, is a fecret, as yet, to mankind, and, perhaps, will be fo till the awful tranfaction is over. However, this, I take, to be the final diffolution of our folar fyftem: "the wreck "of matter and the crush of worlds," and to which our Lord refers where he says,—As the lightning which shineth from the east even unto the weft, so shall the coming of the Son of man be t.

3. Ir feems very clear that the General Conflagration will be before the Laft Judgment; for before the white throne appears, upon which the Son of God fhall fit, heaven and earth muft pafs away, and then the dead, small and great, muft ftand before God; and the bocks must be opened, and the dead judged. Upon the fire falling from heaven, Satan muft be immediately caft into the lake of fire

*Exod. xiv. 14% + Matth. xxiv. 27.

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and brimstone, where the beaft and the false prophet are, and muft be, tormented day and night for ever *.

4. BUT the fubject which claims our immediate confideration is,-The awful Conflagration. Awful, indeed! Had we feen the Temple and Jerufalem in flames, how fhocking would the appearance have been? or even our London, in 1666, how abashed we should have stood? What a confternation would feize our breafts? Or when Rome fhall be destroyed by a fiery earthquake, as it is terribly spoken of, when all shall ftand afar off for fear of her torment, weeping and wailing at the fight! +-Perhaps the most dreadful that hath ever been feen. But what are all these, in comparison of this general confumption? Mere fire-brands or tapers! O my God, let the fire of thy love elevate my foul now above the cares, anxieties, and concerns of life, fo that I may then lift up my head, and "shout above the fiery void"! It may now be proper to confider,

I. The Certainty of this awful Scene. II. The Uncertainty of it.

III. The dreadful Confternation thereof.

1. AND firft, with regard to the certainty of it. Let it be obferved, in all thefe Sermons, I am addreffing those who believe the Bible; and hence it is that my proofs and arguments are drawn from that divine quiver. As for all the fmall philofophical quibbles which are, or may be, brought against the truths contained in the divine oracles, it is not my province to answer them, as I apprehend they would lead to vain janglings; therefore

it

*Rev. xx. 10.

† Chap. xviii. 15.

it would be loft time. For, in mere natural things, we fee men are at a vaft diftance from each other, notwithftanding all the boafted certainty of demonftration. For inftance, in the cafe of the fun, what a vaft chafm is there in their calculations of the diftance and magnitude thereof; nay, even in the trite and trivial matter of the boiling of an egg-so small and glimmering is the feeble ray of boasted reason.

2. THEN let us attend to the law and the testimony. It seems the General Deluge was an emblem of this stupendous fcene, and will be, as little expected by the carelefs ones who are at ease in Zion. They were quite fecure, until the flood came and swept them all away: fo fhall it also be in the days of the Son of Man *. So that the first general blotting out of the human race is, or was, an emblem, or type, of this final blotting out of the prefent world. There never was a type but there was its antitype; never was there a fhadow but it had a fubftance; and fo, in this most awful period, an univerfal deftruction must take place. It may here just be obferved, that the Bible is a two-edged fword, and, therefore, generally, has a two-fold meaning-a literal or historical, and a figurative, which, for the most part, are already accomplished; but their full and fublime accomplishment is yet to take place.

3. ANOTHER Circumftance, and that is, the Prophets often speak of a thing as if it were already done; for inftance, the fifty-third Chapter of Isaiah, which delineates a fuffering Saviour, fpeaks of him as a person that had then

*Matth. xxiv. 39.

then endured all the pain, fhame, and ignominy therein fo feelingly defcribed,-whereas it was feveral hundred years after before he was wounded for our tranfgreffions and bruifed for our iniquities. In the fame stile, I apprehend, many of the prophecies of the final diffolution.

4. LET me point out a few of these which speak directly to the point :-Clouds and darkness are round about him: righteousness and judgment are the habitation of his brone. A fire goeth before him, and burneth up his enemies round about. His lightnings enlightened the world: the earth faw it, and trembled. The hills melted like wax at the presence of the Lord, at the prefence of the Lord of the whole earth *. Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth, while the evil days come not, nor the years draw nigh, in which thou shalt fay, I have no pleasure in them: While the fun, or the light, or the moon, or the ftars, be not darkened, nor the clouds return after rain +. Howl ye; for the day of the Lord is at hand; it fhall come as a deftruction from the Almighty. Therefore all hands fhall be faint, and every man's heart shall melt. Behold, the day of the Lord cometh, cruel both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land defolate; and he shall deftroy the finners thereof out of it. For the stars of heaven, and the conftellations thereof, fhall not give their light: the fun shall be darkened in his going forth, and the moon shall not cause her light to fhine . Therefore I will shake the heavens, and the earth fhall remove out of her place, in the wrath of the Lord of hofts, and in the day of his fierce anger. The earth is utterly broken down, the earth is clean diffolved, the carth is moved