Glimpses of Christian History Presents Pastwords #134: The World to Come or Discources on the Joys or Sorrows of Departed Souls by Isaac Watts ©2007

WATTS, ISAAC (1674-1748), Nonconformist hymn-writer. A native of Southampton, he was educated at the local grammar-school, where his unusual abilities induced a local benefactor to offer him a university education. He preferred, however, to enter the Dissenting Academy at Stoke Newington (1690-4), the high educational standard of which left a permanent mark on his mind. After holding a post as a private tutor, he was appointed assistant (1699) and then full pastor (1702) to the Independent congregation at Mark Lane, London. But Watt's health deteriorated from 1703 onwards, and his pastoral duties devolved increasingly on his assistant. In 1712 he resigned and spent the rest of his life at Abney Park, Stoke Newington. Watts deservedly merits a very high place among English hymn-writers. His hymns reflect his strong and serene faith and did much to make hymn-singing a powerful devotional force, esp. in Nonconformity, where hitherto the use of music in worship, apart from the metrical Psalms, had been regarded with suspicion. They include many still in common use, among them, "Jesus shall reign where'er the sun', 'When I survey the wondrous Cross', and 'Our God, our help in ages past.'

erhaps it may be inquired, Are there not multitudes of men in this world, who are not sinners of the grosser kind, but have lived, in the main, in the practice of common social duties, and have maintained the usual forms of religion, according to the outward rules of the gospel, and the custom of their nation, but they have been negligent indeed of any sincere repentance towards God, and have been strangers to inward vital religion throughout their whole course? Shall these creatures, who seem to stand in a sort of indifferent character, who are outwardly blameless, with regard to common morality, and have exercised the common virtues of justice and benevolence towards their fellow-creatures, perhaps under the influences of education or custom, or perhaps by the effect that reason, or philosophy, or their inward fears have had towards the restraint of their passions and appetites; I say, shall such sort of creatures as these be filled with those furies of rage and resentment against God, envy and malice towards their fellow-sinners, and all the vile and unsociable passions in these regions of misery, which they have never found working in them here on earth, or but in a low degree? Shall all the torments and inward anguish of soul that you have been describing, fall upon this rank of sinners, whom the eye of the world could hardly distinguish from good men, and who were very far from the character of the wicked?

I answer, 1st. That however there may seem to be three sorts of persons in our esteem, namely, the good, the bad, and the indifferent, yet the word of God seems to acknowledge but two sorts, Those who fear God and serve him, and those who fear him not; Mal. iii. 18. Those who have acted from principles of inward religion, or the love of God, and those who had no such principle within them: and therefore the scripture reveals and declares but two sorts of states in the future world, namely, that of rewards and punishments, or that of happiness and misery: and as God the righteous Judge is intimately acquainted with all the secret principles and workings of every heart, he alone knows who have practiced virtue sincerely from pious principles, and who have had no such principles within them. He well distinguishes who they are that have complied with the rules of the dispensation under which they have lived, or who have complied with it: and such as may have the good esteem of men may be highly offensive to God, who knows all things, and may be worthy of his final punishment; The Judge of the whole earth will do right.

And since he has declared it to be his rule of judgment, that he will reward every one according to their works, and it shall be much more tolerable for some of those creatures than it shall be for others, by reason of their lesser crimes, or their nearer approaches to virtue and piety, so it is certain he will act in perfect justice and equity towards every criminal, and none shall be punished above their demerits, though no impenitent sinner shall go unpunished.

We do not therefore imagine that every condemned criminal shall have the same degree of inward raging passions, the same madness and fury against God and their fellow-creatures, nor the same anguish of conscience as those who have been more grossly and obstinately wicked and vicious, and have willfully refused and renounced the well known offers of grace and salvation: there are innumerable degrees of inward punishment and pain, according to the degrees of sin.

It should be added, too, that the world of punishment is also a world of increasing wickedness, and those that have had some natural virtues and some appearance of goodness here, may and will renounce it all in the world to come, where they find themselves punished for their impenitence and irreligion, and their criminal neglect of God and godliness: and the least and lightest of the punishments of damned souls will be terrible enough, and yet not surpass the desert of their offences. They have been all in greater or less degrees treasuring up food for this immortal worm, and fuel for this fire, which is unquenchable.

Besides, it may be added here, that in threatenings the holy scripture generally expresses them in their highest degrees and most formidable appearances, on purpose to secure men from coming near the peril and border of them.

The Fire Which Shall Not be Quenched.

I proceed now to consider the description of hell in the nature of it, as it is represented by our Savior, and that is, that the fire is never quenched.

Fire signifies the medium or instrument of torture from without, which God has threatened to employ in the punishment of guilty creatures, even as the gnawing worm signifies their inward torment. Fire, applied to the sensible and tender parts of the flesh, gives the sharpest pain of any thing that comes within our common notice, and it is used in scripture to signify the punishments of damned sinners, and the wrath of God in the world to come; and perhaps that text is the foundation of it, Isa. Xxx. 33, Tophet is ordained of old, he has made it deep and large, the pile thereof is fire and much wood, and the breath of the Lord, like a stream of brimstone, doth kindle it. This Tophet was a place in the valley of Hinnom, where children were wont to be burnt in sacrifice to the idol Moloch; and from these Hebrew words hell in the New Testament is called Geenna, because of the burning torture and the terrible shrieks of dying children in this valley of Hinnom.

This description of hell by fire, is used by our Savior and his apostles, in their speeches and writings on this subject. Hell-fire is mentioned six times in six verses where my text lies; the last sentence of judgment passed upon sinners, as it is represented by our Savior, is expressed in the same language, Matt.xxv.41; Depart, ye cursed, into everlasting fire. The apostle Paul, speaking of the return of Christ, 2 Thess. I. 8, asserts, that he shall appear in flaming fire, to take vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel: and in Rev. xiv. 10, 11, as well as in other parts of this book, the final punishment of sinners is represented by fire and brimstone, as the instruments of their torment.

It is true indeed, spirits or beings which have no body cannot feel burning by material fire, unless they are united to some sort of material vehicles: but, that God will use material fire to punish obstinate and rebellious sinners hereafter, at the resurrection, it is not improbable, though it is very hard to say with full assurance: since the bodies of the wicked are to be raised again, it is not at all unlikely that their habitation shall be a place of fire, and their bodies may be made immortal to endure the smart and torture without consuming. Did not this God, by his almighty power and mercy, preserve the bodies of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, in the burning furnace of Nebuchadnezzar, so that the fire had no power to consume or destroy them? And cannot his power do the same thing under the influence of his justice as well as of his mercy? May they not be maintained for ever in their existence, to endure the appointed and deserved vengeance? If the blessed God has with much long suffering borne with these vessels of wrath, under their repeated oppositions to his law and gospel, and they still go on in their vice, obstinacy, and impenitence, and have fitted themselves for destruction, surely he will make his wrath and power known in their punishments, as St. Paul expresses it, Rom. Ix.22; and when the power and wrath of a God unite to punish a creature, how miserable must that creature be!

It is certain, that God has been pleased in his word frequently to make use of fire, brimstone, burning, smoke, darkness, and chains, and every thing that is painful and noisome to nature on earth, in order to represent the miseries that he has prepared for sinners in hell; and we must suppose that all these metaphors, if they are but mere metaphors, carry with them a sense of most intense pain and anguish with which god will afflict the bodies as well as the spirits of those guilty creatures, who have rebelled against his majesty, rejected his mercy, and exposed themselves to his indignation. But what particular instruments and methods of punishment, what other elements or means of torture the great God will make use of to execute his sentence in this tremendous work, is more than we can now declare, because God has not fully declared it: and I pray God none of us may be ever doomed to learn it by terrible experience. But if there be nothing but fire, the anguish will be intolerable, as one of our poets expresses it: In liquid burnings, or on dry to dwell, Is all the sad variety of hell.

Or what if the Almighty, who has all nature, with all its powers, at his command, should employ other material instruments for the execution of his desired wrath! What if he should choose the alternate extremes of fire and frost, as some have imagined, to torment those impenitent criminals! Or what if the creatures which they have abused to their impious and brutish purposes, should be made instruments and mediums of their punishment! Wine may be rendered a frequent means of sickness, agony, and pain to the drunkard, and meat and other dainties to the glutton, and gold to the covetous wretches who made gold their God, that they may all remember their crimes in their sufferings. The wisdom of God will execute the sentence of his justice in the most honorable manner.

And after all, if we call away our thoughts from fire, and every material instrument of pain, which the great God may employ in punishing obstinate rebels, and survey only those acute and dreadful impressions of horror and anguish, which a just and holy God may make on sinful spirits in an immediate manner in hell, this would overwhelm our souls with insupportable agonies: Who knows the power of thine anger? For according to thy fear so is thy wrath, says Moses, Psal. Xc. 11. Our fears do not rise above those evils which the wrath of God will inflict. Who knows what are those arrows of the Almighty, of which Job speaks, the poison whereof drank up his spirits, and those terrors of God which set themselves in array against him? Who knows what our Savior felt in the hour of his agony and atonement for our sins, which made him sweat drops of blood? And what sort of terrible impressions God himself may make of his own wrath and vengeance, on the heart of such criminals as willfully reject his salvation, is beyond our thoughts to conceive, or our language to express.

Thus much shall suffice concerning the metaphor of fire, and the hand of God himself in kindling this fire for the execution of his sentence against impenitents. But since I have entered so far into this subject, I cannot think it proper entirely to finish it, without giving notice of some different and dreadful additions to their torment which will arise from evil angels, and from their companions in sin and misery among the children of men: for in the agonies of our Savior, men and devils joined together to afflict him, when it pleased the Father to bruise him, and to make his soul an offering for our sins.

Evil angels, wicked and unclean spirits, with all their furious dispositions and active powers, will increase the misery of the damned. They paved the way to hell for man by the first temptation of our parents in paradise, and they have been ever since busy in tempting the children of men to sin, and they will be hereafter as busy in giving them torment. When these wicked spirits, O sinner, who have taken thee as a willing captive by their baits and devices in this world, when they have led thee down through the paths of vice to the regions of sorrow, they will begin then to insult thee with hateful reproaches, and to triumph over thee with insolence and scorn. When they have deceived thee on earth, to thy own perdition, they will make thee the object of their bitter ridicule and mockery in hell.

Oh, could we turn aside the veil of the invisible world, and hold the bottomless pit open before you, what bitter groans of ghosts would you hear, not only oppressed and agonizing under the wrath of a righteous God, but also under the insults of cruel devils? As there is joy among the angels of heaven when a sinner repents, or when a soul arrives safely at those blessed mansions; so when a rebellious and obstinate criminal is sent down to hell, you would hear the triumphs of those malicious spirits over him, with the voice of insulting pride and hellish joy; and while they domineer over you, and tear you as roaring lions who seek and tear their prey, you will curse yourselves a thousand times for hearkening to their deceitful allurements. You will vent your rage against yourselves, at the same time that they scoff at you, as eternal fools who have lost a God, and a heaven, and immortal happiness, by your own madness and folly in hearkening to their temptations.

The mutual upbraidings of fellow sinners and fellow sufferers among the children of men, will aggravate your wretchedness day and night without end. Those who drew each other into foul iniquities, shall fill the ears of each other with loud and sharp reproaches for their mutual influence on both their ruin, and shall charge their damnation, and all their heavy sorrows, as a heavy load on each other's souls. Some of those who have been joined in the nearest ties of kindred and friendship, while they dwelt in flesh and blood, shall be the terrible instruments of their keenest remorse and vexation, and tease their spirits with endless upbraidings.

Here the sons of pride, that most hateful iniquity, shall be overwhelmed with huge mortification and disdain: the mighty sinner shall be insulted by the meanest of the crowd, and princes shall be bearded and affronted by those gay slaves of the court, whom they once employed in flattering and adorning them. They were once vain enough to believe they were something more than mortal; but now they are spurned by those very flatterers with a foot of contempt, and their eternal pride still swelling, gives their own hearts new stings and twinges at every resentment. None but a proud and haughty creature in this world, who has sometimes met with scorn and insult from his inferiors, can speak feelingly of the exquisite sensibility of these torments of soul in hell.

But, besides this, there are many sinners, who lived in malice, and who died with their hearts full of revenge against their fellow sinners; and when they shall meet them in those deplorable regions, how natural is it to suppose they will endeavor to execute this revenge upon them, without end and without mercy! For it may be easily supposed that malice, revenge, and cruelty, which are the proper character of devils, shall not be abated among the children of men, when they are grown so near akin in their tempers to those evil spirits, and are now for ever mingled amongst them.

And yet further, who knows what the damned in hell shall endure from the endless brawls and bitter quarrels among themselves? What new contentions will arise perpetually in such a country, where it is perhaps the practice and custom of the place, and nature of the inhabitants, for the most part, to make every one of their fellows as uneasy and as miserable as they can! Oh, what mad and furious pride, and malice, and every hellish passion, will be raging almost in every bosom against all those who are near them, and this in a dark prison where all are intensely tormented, and where there is no such thing as compassion or sincere love, nothing to soothe each other's sorrows, but every thing that may add to the smart and anguish!

Oh, that the present survey of these horrors of soul, these complicated distresses and miseries from within us and without us, from every quarter of heaven and hell, from the gnawing worm within us, and from the fire of the wrath of God, and the mutual insults, railings, and injuries of men and devils, might all lie with its due weight upon our spirits now, while we are in the land of hope; that every one of us may be awakened to a timely concern about our highest interest, and hasten to make our escape as Lot did from Sodom, lest the sentence of death be pronounced upon us while we delay, and the fiery deluge overtake us.

But here I would tarry a little, to answer a repeated objection, namely, the terror of this outward punishment from the hand of God, which is described by avenging fire, is so severe and intolerable, that it awakens some lesser criminals to raise the same cavil against this unquenchable fire, or God's punishing hand, as was raised before against the never dying worm, or the inward anguish of soul arising from its own conscience.

It is possible some lesser sinner, who has had more appearances of piety or religion here on earth, may rise and say, "You have set the punishments of sin in a most horrible and tremendous light, from this worm: but surely this cannot be the case, nor these the sufferings which God will inflict on every wretched creature in hell. Are not the punishments there proportioned to the offences? What if these sharpest and deepest tortures and horrors should be the portion of the vilest criminals, the most impious rebels against God, the profane and obstinate abusers of grace, the scoffers at Christ and his gospel, and the cruel persecutors of all the saints; yet will every soul who had not quite religion and holiness enough to reach heaven, be thus terribly tormented in hell? Does not Christ himself tell us, and did you not allow before, that it shall be more tolerable for some sinners than for others? And will there be no easier abodes, no milder regions, no kinder and more favorable appointments, for such as have had many good wishes and hopes, many friendly exercises of virtue towards men, and some workings of imperfect piety towards God?

To this I answer, as before, It is certain that every one shall be judged, according to their works, by an unerring rule of equity, and shall be punished according to the aggravation of their iniquities. But dost thou know, O sinner, how great is that punishment which the least transgression against the law of God deserves? One single sin, which thou wilt not part with, will create insufferable misery. And though there may be other criminals there of much more heinous and aggravated guilt, profaneness, and rebellion than thine is, yet if thy soul be filled with all that torment which one sin may create and deserve, there will be hell enough around thee to make thy distress too terrible for thee to bear.

Besides, let it be remembered, that whatsoever tendencies toward piety, or appearances of goodness might be found with thee in this world, all these will vanish and be lost, when once thy day of grace is finished, and all the means of grace and salvation are ended for ever. If thou hast refused the proposals of mercy, and continued in thy sins without repentance, and hast never accepted the salvation are ended for ever. If thou hast refused the proposals of mercy, and continued in thy sins without repentance, and hast never accepted the salvation of Christ while it was offered, all the good that thou seemest to have shall be taken from thee, or rather thy heart itself will grow more hard, thy will more obstinate against God, and every evil passion will rise and prevail, and make thee perhaps as very a devil as thy companions in guilt and misery. It is for those who would not part with their beloved sins, which were as dear as right hands, or as right eyes, that the never dying worm and the unquenchable fire are prepared, as the context itself informs us in this place.

And as the worm of conscience, even for lesser sins, will gnaw thy heart with intense anguish, so the vengeance of divine fire will torment thee with exquisite pain, though thy pain and thy anguish shall not be equal to what greater criminals endure. But it is wise and kind in the blessed God to denounce the terrors and sanctions of his law in their utmost severity, to guard his law the better against every transgression, and to frighten and secure his creatures from sin and punishment.

Trifle not therefore, O sinner! With the means of mercy, and venture not upon little sins, in hope of little misery, nor dare to continue in an impenitent state, without God, without Christ and his salvation, upon a foolish presumption that thy sins are but small, and thy punishment shall be less than others; for the least of those sorrows shall be found greater than any mortal creature can bear, and therefore thou shalt be made immortal to suffer them.

It is granted, there are many mansions in hell, as well as in heaven, but as the lowest mansion in heaven is happiness, so the easiest place in hell is misery.

There is another objection rises here, which it is necessary to give some answer to, namely, If the punishments of hell are so intense and terrible, between the worm of conscience, the fire of God's anger, and the malice of evil spirits, surely, it will work up human nature into ecstasy and madness; it will take away all the regular exercise of our natural powers; it will render us, perhaps, mere passive miserable beings, of keen sensations without reasoning. This is certain, that such and so various tortures would have that influence upon our natures at present, and why should it not hereafter? And will the blessed God continue to punish creatures when their reason is lost? What can such punishments avail?

I answer, surely god will not continue to punish madmen; therefore none of these torments shall extinguish our reason, or destroy our intellectual powers; for it is as creatures of reason and free will that sinners are thus punished, and therefore these powers must remain in their proper exercise; besides, the very operation of these powers in self condemnation, and self-upbraiding, are part of their punishment. But whether God will so fortify the natures of the damned, which probably shall not be made of flesh and blood, and enable them to bear such intense pain without distraction, or whether the highest extremes of their torment shall only be inflicted at some certain periods or intervals, so that they shall soon return to their reasoning powers again, with bitter remembrance of what passed, this matter is hard to determine; and because it is unwritten and unrevealed, I am silent. But it still remains that punishment shall be so intense and severe, as becomes a God of holiness and justice to inflict on rebellious and obstinate creatures.

Reflections on the Nature of these Punishments.

It is time now that we should proceed to form some special reflections on the nature of the punishments of hell, such as they have been described in the foregoing discourse.

Reflection 1. What dreadful and unknown evil is contained in the nature of sin which grows up into such misery, which breeds this stinging worm in the conscience, which prepares the creature for such fiery torments, and which provokes a God to inflict them! The vessels of wrath have prepared themselves for it, as the apostle intimates, by their own sins, Rom. Ix. 22; they are fitted for destruction: nor does all the intense and infinite anguish of this punishment exceed the desert of our sins. The great God, in a way of bounty, may often bestow upon us vastly beyond what our little services can ever pretend to have deserved, but he never punishes beyond our deserts.

What a dangerous and pernicious mistake is it in the children of men to sport with sin, as with a harmless thing! It is much safer sporting with a poisonous serpent, or with burning firebrands. The serpent has many gay and pleasing colors on its skin, and appears a very charming creature, which tempts children and fools to play with it: and the same ignorance inclines them sometimes to sport with fire, because of its shining brightness: and till they are burnt with the fire, or bit by the serpent, they will not forsake their foolish choice, nor be convinced of their danger: such is the case and temper of sinful mortals; their senses indulge the pleasing flatteries of sin, and are fond of its tempting amusements, till they feel the smart of the fire raging in their bosoms, and the adder stings them to death. Thus the wise man describes the flatteries of wine in the view of the drunkard, Prov. xxiii.31,32. But the same wise man pronounces every one a fool that makes a mock at sin, or trifles with so formidable a mischief, Prov. xiv. 9.

How vain are the gay fancies of sinful men in the hour of temptation, and how shocking and dreadful will be their disappointment! They think the descriptions of sin, which are blown up and kindled into such terror by the lips of the preacher, are but as mock fire which never burns; but the great day of vengeance, which makes haste towards them, will terribly and eternally convince them of the fatal mischief of it by the various plagues that shall seize upon them. The living worm shall gnaw their consciences, and the fire of God will torment their spirits, and spread a raging anguish through their whole natures; and every twigging accent of their pain shall teach them, but with a terrible and hopeless conviction, what unspeakable evil is contained in sin. They will then find what a fearful thing it is to fall into the hands of the living God, who has a right, and power, and will to punish; Hev. X.31.

Oh, that each of us might arrive at this holy wisdom, to learn the dreadful evil of sin from this Bible, this book of the divine law and grace, and not provoke the blessed God to teach us so necessary a lesson by the rod of his vengeance! Oh, that we could look upon every unlawful action, and particularly every sin against conscience, as the seed of that worm which will gnaw our souls in hell with intense pain; as part of that fuel which is kindling into a flame to torment our consciences for ever; and, that under the powerful influences of these representations of sin, we might fly to the utmost distance from it with horror, and make our safe escape!

Reflection 2. If the punishments of hell, appointed by the blessed God, carry so much terror in them, how much mistaken are the sinful children of men in the ideas which they form of the great and blessed God! This representation of the vengeance of the Lord in hell may be of use to refute such mistaken opinions.

Some have framed a god for themselves: not such as dwells in the heavens, not such as he has described himself in his word; but their vain imagination has raised up an idol made of mere goodness and mercy, without holiness and justice; it is their own self-love which forms this idle and foolish image of the God that made them, because they do not like to think of falling under the terror of his power. They venture to affront him to his face, they dare him to vengeance; and as the writer of the book of Job expresses it, They stretch out their hands against God, they strengthen themselves against the Almighty, they run upon him with insolence, and venture upon the thick bosses of his buckler; Job xv. 25,26. There are multitudes in our day that are arrived at such a dreadful height of impiety, as to call upon him for the damnation of themselves, as well as of their friends, in sport and merriment: they will not believe that the blessed God will ever be found so severe and formidable as preachers describe him: and because judgment is not speedily executed against the men of iniquity, therefore the sons of men have their hearts set in them to do mischief. Madness in is their hearts; Eccl. Viiii.11. and ix. 3. Because God delays his indignation they will not believe he has any belonging to him, notwithstanding all the terrible words by which he is represented by the prophets, the apostles, and the son of God himself: and while they rush boldly on those crimes which God has severely forbidden, they are ready to think God is just such an one as themselves, regardless of virtue and government. And because they make nothing of sin, they imagine God will make nothing of it.

Oh, that the sons of men would once learn to know God better! For there are many who have not the true knowledge of God, I speak it to their shame, when they fancy he is all made up of gentleness and forbearance, without holiness and justice. Alas! Sirs, these attributes are as necessary in a God as grace and compassion; he is and he must be a wise, a righteous governor of the world: and his wisdom requires that impenitent sinners should be punished to secure the honor of his law, and to guard his gospel from contempt. These awful perfection's of the blessed God are as necessary to vindicate his authority and his government from insult and rebellion, as his goodness is needful to encourage sinful creatures to repent and return to their duty. The word of God expressly tells us, he is a God of holiness and a consuming fire: Heb. Xii.29; but there is many a sinner that will never learn this lesson till the torments of hell teach it him by dismal experience. They have trifled with his majesty, and mocked at his threatenings all their life, till at the moment of death he awakes like a lion, and tears their spirits with everlasting anguish.

I might take notice also in this place, that there is another mistaken notion of God, into which some persons have unhappily fallen, as though God were the cause and author of sin, and have spoken unadvisedly with their lips, in such language as borders too near upon blasphemy. But it is evident that a God, who will punish the sins of men with such intense pain and torment, can never be so inconsistent with himself as to be the author or cause of those sins. It is granted, that his universal providence has a concern in everything that is transacted among men: but since he has informed us in what a dreadful manner he will execute his vengeance against sinners in the world to come, it is insolence and indignity against the blessed God to represent him as introducing sin into our world. Let God be true, though every man be a liar; let God be pure and righteous, and holy, though every man be found guilty and criminal; otherwise, how shall God judge the world! How can he inflict such torments on rebellious creatures, if he constrain or influence them to practice this rebellion! All opinions therefore that allow of such an inference, as though God were the author of sin, must be pronounced false and pernicious to men, as well as injurious to the justice of God; for these notions throw a vile imputation on the blessed God, and charge him with heinous insincerity, to forbid the commission of sin by all these terrors, and yet suppose him to influence men to the practice of it.

Reflection 3. How reasonable is it for us to believe that such a hell as I have described is prepared for impenitent sinners, since there are so many appearances of the beginnings of it here on earth, so many indications, and signs, and forerunners of such misery and torment inflicted on sinful men. Survey the remarkable executions of God's judgments on the world in several ages and nations; look back to our first parents, who were thrust out of paradise, the garden of pleasure, and banished from the gates of it for ever, upon the account of the first sin, and the entrance of it was guarded by a flaming sword to forbid their return. Behold the flood of watery vengeance in the days of Noah breaking up from the vast caverns of the earth, and pouring down from the windows of heaven to punish sin: deep calls unto deep, in the tremendous noise of these water-spouts, which spread death and desolation over the face of the whole earth, because all flesh had sinned against God their Creator. Turn your eyes to Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities of the plain, suffering the vengeance of heaven, with lightning and devouring fire bursting from the clouds to punish the unnatural crimes of that country. See the fiery flying serpents, as the messengers of divine anger, to punish the rebellion of the Israelites in the wilderness: mark what multitudes in the camp of Israel received their mortal sting, and were given up to destruction and death. Cast your eyes abroad over the nations, and what records have we of all former ages, which do not manifest the vengeance of God pursuing the iniquities of men, by wars, and famines, and pestilence's, and every thing that is bitter and dreadful to human nature. See Jerusalem, the city of God, all in flames, and the whole land of Judea laid desolate, with deepest distress diffused and reigning among all the inhabitants of it: above a million of them were actually slaughtered and consumed by famine and sword, as a sacrifice to the anger of God, for their long provocations, and the cruel barbarous murder of his Son Jesus.

When you have taken all these surveys, then tell me if such terrors of the Lord do not give us sufficient warning what unknown agonies and destruction's may be expected by obstinate and impenitent sinners from the hand of God, when the utmost limits of his patience restrain his wrath no longer, but his wisdom gives a loose to all his fiery indignation.

To enforce this yet upon your hearts, think again of all the pains and torments of flesh and spirit, which arise from the distempers of body, and from the anguish of soul, even in this present state of trial, this land of hope, this season of divine long-suffering. Go to the hospitals, where the gout, and stone, and rheumatism, and a thousand maladies torture the nerves and the joints of men with intolerable smart; and infer thence what God will inflict both on the flesh and spirit, or the soul and body of sinners, in the day of his complete vengeance, when his offers of mercy and the years of his grace are come to their last period. Go and survey the fields of battle and slaughter, where thousands of the dead and the dying are mingled in confused heaps, and groan out their souls in long anguish and extreme torture, with bruises and wounds, and all the smarting effects of the instruments of war. Now if all these things come under the conduct of divine providence in a sinful world, which is yet in a way of hope, what may those resolved and obstinate rebels expect, when all the doors of hope are shut up for ever, and providence has nothing to do on earth or in hell, but to execute the vengeance of a God.

Shall we take one step yet further, and think of the inward pangs of conscience, which some awakened criminals have felt in this life on the account of sin, when the arrows of God have been shot into their souls, and the poison thereof lies drinking up the spirits? Think what dreadful ferments of passion and rage, and hatred of God have been found in the hearts of some sinful creatures, when they have grown mad with revenge against God and against themselves, and envy against all their fellow mortals, who are not in the same circumstances; think yet again how terribly their misery must be aggravated, when the torture of everlasting despair attends all the rest of the pains and sorrows they suffer; and then say if the description of a future hell in the word of God may not be true and real. What anguish beyond all the power of present thought and language, may seize all the powers of willful and impious rebels against the authority and the mercy of God, when all the stores of his vengeance that have been treasuring up for many years, shall be poured out upon them without any mitigation or mixture of mercy.

Reflection 4. It is matter of surprise, and great astonishment, that thousands and ten thousands of the sinful children of men, from day to day, and from year to year, are walking on the borders of all this misery, and yet are so thoughtless and unconcerned about it. They carry peaceful and easy minds in the midst of this dreadful danger, and while they have all the symptoms of the children of wrath upon them, they live without fear, and make no effort toward their escape. Wretched creatures indeed! Who have a mortal disease upon them that will breed this gnawing worm of conscience, that will grow up into all this anguish and distress, and yet are senseless of their own peril, unacquainted with their own state of soul, and are daily treading their earthly rounds of business and of pleasure with a merry heart. All the heavy artillery of divine vengeance is ready to be discharged upon them, as soon as the door of death opens and lets them into the invisible world; and yet they walk on fearless and joyful, and have no guard or defense from all this misery, besides their own vain presumption. Stupid creatures, to lie down at night, and awake in the morning within an inch of hell, and yet secure and fearless! They live without God in the world, and that even in this land of light and hope, where he offers to visit them with all his graces; and yet they are hasting hourly to the eternal world, where they must meet and behold him in all his terrors.

Will nothing awaken you, O ye obstinate transgressors against God, ye obstinate rejecters of his grace and gospel? Will nothing warn you to flee from the wrath to come? But just thus it was in the days of Noah; the sinners of that generation would not hearken to that preacher of righteousness; and even when they saw the clouds of heaven grow big and black over their heads, and the rain began to be poured down from the skies, little did they imagine that it would have drowned the earth, till they were overwhelmed with the rising destruction. And so shall it be in the days of the Son of man, when all the warnings of the preachers have been despised, and the threatened vengeance of the book of God derided, when they have set up for bold and witty scoffers, and impudently demanded, Where is the promise of his coming? Then shall the great and terrible day of the Lord come, and pour out upon them the full measure of wrath and indignation.

Is it not time, my friends, to bethink yourselves, whether this be your case? Is it not time for every one of us to examine our souls? Am I exposed to this danger? Am I every moment on the brink of this misery, and yet content to continue so one night or one day longer? Can I ever hope to escape the fury of a God, while I thus abuse his patience? Or can I have any expectations of living with him as my God hereafter, if I never seek after him here? The face of God, as a stranger in the world to come, carries infinite terrors in it, and yet we are content to be strangers to him, and to live without his acquaintance. The wrath of God abides upon every man who is unregenerate in this life, and who has not trusted in the name of the son of God; John iii.36. yet they are thoughtless of it, for they feel it not; but the moment when they shall awake into the world of spirits, that wrath will be felt with sudden and dreadful anguish, as a most insupportable burden, and will crush all the powers of the soul into torment.

Reflection 5. It deserves, and it demands our highest gratitude to the great God, our humblest acknowledgements and our most exalted praises to his majesty and his mercy, that we, who have long ago deserved this misery, are not yet plunged into the midst of it; that we have not been entirely cut off from the land of hope, and sent down to this destruction. Blessed be the name and the grace of our God for ever and ever.

While there are thousands who have been sent down to the place of punishment, whence there is no redemption, before they had continued so long in sin as many of us have done, what a peculiar instance is it of divine long-suffering and goodness, that we are not actually put under the sting of this living worm, under this fiery vengeance from the hand of God! What was there in us that should secure us from this destruction, while we continued in our state of guilt, rebellion, and impenitence? Have we not seen many sinners on our right hand, and on our left, cut off in their sins, and to all appearance they seem to be sent down to the place of sorrows? What is it but the special mercy and distinguishing favor of God that has dealt thus kindly with us, and spared and saved us, week after week, and month after month, while we continued in our iniquities, and has given us space for repentance and hope? What shall we render to the Lord for all his patience and long suffering, even to this day? How often have we incurred the penalty of the law of God, and the fiery sentence of condemnation by our repeated iniquities, both against the authority and the grace of God! And yet we are alive in his presence, and are hearing the words of hope and salvation. Oh, let us look back and shudder at the thoughts of that dreadful precipice, on the edge of which we have so long wandered. Let us fly for escape to the refuge that is set before us, and give a thousand glories to the divine mercy that we are not plunged into this perdition.

Reflection 6. Let us learn from this description of hell, and our imminent danger of it, the infinite value and worth of the gospel of Christ; this gospel which calls us aloud to fly from the wrath to come, and points out to us the only effectual way to escape it. What can all the riches of the Indies do to relieve us under the guilt and distress into which sin had brought us? What can the favor of princes, and the flattering honors of the world do to rescue us from this danger? What can the highest gust of sensuality, and the most exquisite delights of flesh and blood do to secure us against this overwhelming misery? It is only the gospel of the blessed Jesus who is our refuge, and our safety from the tremendous destruction.

What are the heights, and depths, and lengths, of human science, with all the boasted acquisitions of the brightest genius of mankind? Learning and science can measure the globe, can sound the depths of the sea, can compass the heavens, can mete out the distances of the sun and moon, and mark out the path of every twinkling star for many ages past, or ages to come; but they cannot acquaint us with the way of salvation from this long, this endless distress. What are all the sublime reasonings of philosophers upon the abstruse and most difficult subjects? What is the whole circle of sciences, which human wit and thought can trace out and comprehend? Can they deliver us from the guilt of one sin? Can they free us from one of the terrors of the Almighty? Can they assuage the torment of a wounded spirit, or guard us from the impressions of divine indignation? Alas! They are all but trifles, in comparison of this blessed gospel, which saves us from eternal anguish and death.

It is the gospel that teaches us the holy skill to prevent this worm of conscience from gnawing the soul, and instructs us how to kill it in the seed and first springs of it, to mortify the corruption's of the heart, to resist the temptations of Satan, and where to wash away the guilt of sin. It is this blessed gospel that clearly discovers to us how we may guard against the fire of wrath, or rather how to secure our souls from becoming the fuel of it. It is this book that teaches us to sprinkle the blood of Christ on a guilty conscience by faith, that is, by receiving him as sincere penitents, and thereby defends us from the angel of death and destruction. This is that experimental philosophy of the saints in heaven, whereby they have been released from the bonds of their sins, have been rescued from the curse of the law, and been secured from the gnawing worm and the devouring fire.

A serious meditation of hell in its exquisite pain and sorrow, will enhance our value of the salvation of Christ, and will exalt our esteem and honor of the love of God, who has delivered us from eternal death. If we will but appoint our thoughts to dwell a little on the terrors and vengeance from which the blessed Jesus has rescued us by his glorious undertaking, if we will stretch the powers of our souls, and survey the lengths, and the breadths, and the depths of this distress and misery which we have deserved, this will discover to us the heights, and the depths, and the lengths of his love, who submitted himself to the curses of the law of God, and was made a curse for us, that he might redeem us to the possession of an eternal blessing; Gal. Iii.23. This will show us what exceeding riches of the grace of God have been laid out upon us for our salvation. This will spread before us the unmeasurable love of Jesus, which has brought him down from the bosom of his Father into such agonies as he sustained in the garden, and on the cross, that he might rescue us from the wrath to come. Oh, what immense and endless debts of gratitude and love are due from every ransomed sinner, who has been released from the bonds of his guilt, and from all this wretchedness, by the love of God the Father, and the grace of his Son Jesus Christ; to whom be glory, and honor, and most exalted praise, for ever and ever. Amen.