This truth will explain those features of the Apocalyptic prophecy, which might else embarrass us, when we compare them with the views of primitive times. How is it, we may be asked, if all the saints are to partake in that resurrection, that the martyrs alone meet the eye, plainly and clearly, in that blessed vision? The words of the Apostle will supply a full answer. When the Lord answered Job in the whirlwind, we know the appeal which He made to His Divine power, as the Maker and Upholder of the starry firmament. "Canst thou bind the sweet influences of the Pleiades, or loose the bands of Orion? Canst thou bring forth Mazzaroth in his season? or canst thou guide Arcturus with his sons?" Are then Orion, Arcturus, and the Pleiades, the sole witnesses for God among the innumerable stars of heaven? No, surely, the least of those bright worlds is not less truly sustained by the same power, and will be an everlasting witness to His glory. "He calleth them all by their names, not one faileth.” Yet some stand out, prominent above all the rest in their beauty and glory, among those ordinances of heaven, of which He has set the dominion over the earth. "So also is the resurrection of the dead." That we may catch the full glory of that blessed hope, we must fix our

eyes on the brightest stars among that innumerable company of heaven. of heaven. We must learn to imitate their zeal, to tread in their footsteps, to rejoice in their fuller recompense, and adore the wisdom and love which crowns with a double honour the most faithful and self-denying among the followers of the Lamb. The faith and zeal, which lived and reasoned as if martyrs only were to share in the blessing, may be far nearer to the mind of Christ, than the lukewarm religion, which contents itself with the thought of personal safety, and perverts the message of grace, till it fancies that the most indolent and worldly Christian shall shine hereafter in equal glory with the Apostles and martyrs of the Lamb.

But we may ask, further, what is the moral purpose of the delay, which the Holy Spirit in His parting message has clearly revealed, in the time of the second resurrection of the unjust? This would be a wide and almost boundless field, which we cannot now explore. Yet we may answer, in one word, that it reveals to us the divine forbearance, and brings out the hope of the Church, as its time draws near, in a form doubly suited to attract the earnest desire of all the children of God.

"The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, but is long suffering to us-ward, not willing

that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance." And will not this Divine attribute shine with a new lustre, when, in the very hour of judgment, when the trumpet shall sound, and all the saints rise to their full glory, even in this hour, there is a further delay, before the sentence finally goes forth against the unbelieving and the profane? Will it not reveal, more clearly than ever, that judgment is God's strange work, and that He delighteth in mercy; when this solemn pause, and a whole dispensation of new mercy to our fallen world, precedes the striking of that solemn hour of judgment and doom to all ungodly sinners?

But the same delay, which manifests the Divine forbearance, makes the hope of the resurrection more bright and joyful to the children of God. Even the most fervent Christian, in his present state, would shrink from the desire of his own immediate glory, if the same moment is to seal the ruin, and complete the heavy curse, of every lost and reprobate sinner. Whenever the great hope of the Church begins to pass from the field of mere abstractions into that of real truth, a great event near at hand, if the link be drawn so closely between the hour of glory to the saints and the eternal judgment of all who have lived

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and died in sin, even a strong and lively faith must shrink from desiring it, and submission and reverence, rather than longing desire, will be the highest possible attainment. We may, perhaps, go further still, though here we would speak with humility and reverence. Yet we may well believe that our Lord himself sympathizes, in part, with these instincts of His people. He is the son of David, and the history of David, in the time when wilful rebellion was overthrown, is only a type of the deep language of His heart. He, too, in the hour of deserved justice, grieves with deepest and most tender love over the rebel, once a child, that perishes in his sin. There will be no haste to complete the work of judgment; nay, every stroke of vengeance, that may be spared for a time, is willingly forborne, in that day of espousals, and of the gladness of His heart. "Shall there any man be put to death for me this day, for do I not know this day that I am King over Israel?" In due time, it is true, every son of Belial must be put away, and all that do wickedly shall be as stubble. But in that hour of gladness, when the King shall appear in his beauty, and His people shall rise in the beauty of holiness from the womb of the morning, He will wait for a time, and rest in His love towards His ransomed children, till another and

last outbreak of hellish wickedness shall call for the last sore judgment to be fulfilled. Thus 'mercy, first and last, shall brightest shine;' and at every step the Divine counsels, as they are slowly unveiled, shall clear away every reproach which ungodly men, in their blindness, have uttered against the forbearance and loving-kindness of the Son of God.

IV. Hitherto we have considered the resurrection as an universal fact of God's holy providence. Let us now, for a few moments, rise to a higher view, and meditate on the unutterable glory which it implies to all the children of God. In them alone the words of the Apostle, in their full meaning, will be accomplished. When our Lord appears, their corruptible bodies will put on incorruption, and their mortal bodies will put on immortality.

And here let us consider, the excellence and glory implied in the phrase itself, a spiritual body. It is foolish, indeed, to contradict the very words of the Apostle, and say that it denotes mere spirit, and not body. No, clearly, it is a true body, but filled with a spiritual and heavenly life, and free from every taint of earthly weakness and corruption. It is a body, over which the immortal spirit has complete and undivided control, so that no outward force of natural causes, but the will of