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- For JUDGMENT I am come into this world." John ix. 39.

Let it be distinctly remembered, that all. God's judgments, when rightly understood, are a cause of joy. They are gloomy, they are dreadful, we acknowledge, when separated from the end which God has in view in ordaining them; but when connected with his purpose, and with the final consummation that he will accomplishby them, they are bright, they are beautiful, they are glorious. There is a. passage or two in the Psalms, which occur with great force to the mind, in this connexion.; we mean those passages in which David calls upon all creation to REJOICE, because God, and none else, will JUDGE THE EARTH. We must quote one or two of them. "He shall JUDGE the people righteous. ly. Let the heavens REJOICE and let the earth be glad; let the sea roar, and the fulness thereof; let the field be joyful, and all that is therein; then shall all the trees of the wood rejoice before the Lord; [Why?' why all this joy ?] for he cometh, for he cometh.to JUDGE THE EARTH; he shall judge the world with righteousness, and the people with his truth:" Psalms xcvi. 10-13. This is the way God's judgments should be regarded. Take one more passage. Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, all the earth; make a loud noise, and rejoice, and sing praise. Sing unto the Lord with the harp; with the harp, and the voice of a psalm. With trumpets, and sound of cornet, make à joyful noise before the Lord, the King. Let the sea 'roar, and the fulness thereof; the world and they that dwell therein.. Let the floods clap their hands; let the hills be joyful together, before the Lord, FOR HE COM ETH TO JUDGE THE EARTH; with righteousness shall he judge the world, and the people with equity." Psalms xcviii. 4-9.

Thus we see, God will judge, that is, rule and govern the earth by Jesus Christ, in his Gospel. The kingdom of the Messiah is. set up among men.. He shall judge the people righteously. He came to judge

the earth. He came, and established his moral kingdom on the earth, and now he rules the world by the. power of that kingdom. Mankind are not to go into some other world to be judged; the judgment is established on the earth. God hath given assurance of this in raising up Jesus from the dead.

On the subject of "judgment," see "Universalist Expositor," Vol. III. p. 312. Skinner's "Universalism Illustrated and Defended," pp. 229–243, and Balfour's "Essays," pp. 221-305.

LXVI.

"And as he reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come, Felix trembled." Acts xxiv. 25.

Does the passage say this judgment was to come in the future state? No. The passage forbids such an interpretation, for the best critics tell us, that it should be rendered, the judgment about to come. Dr. Haweis translates the passage. as follows. And as he discoursed of righteousness, and temperance and the judgment which is ready to be revealed," &c. See Balfour's "Essays,” pp. 279–286.

LXVII. "And thinkest thou this, O man, that judgest them which do such things, and doest the same, that thou shalt escape the judgment of God? Or despisest thou the riches of his goodness, and forbearance, and long-suffering; not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth thee to repentance? But, after thy hardness and impenitent heart, treasurest up unto thyself wrath against the day of wrath, and revelation of the righteous judgment of God; who will render to every man according to his deeds." Rom. ii. 3-6.

We most fully believe, that all sin will be justly and adequately punished, — that "God will render to every man according to his deeds." This is the doctrine which the passage before us was intended to teach.

What is meant by the wrath of God, in the sacred Scriptures? We are not to understand this language, as though Gad could be exercised by wrath or anger, in the same manner with feeble, sinful man. It is the explicit testimony of the apostle, that "God is love;

and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in him ;" and surely we must not interpret any passage of Scripture in such a way as will conflict with the principle therein laid down. By a careful examination of the passages in which the wrath of God is mentioned, we are persuaded, that the sacred writers put it as a metonymy for the divine judgments. When God is said to pour out his wrath upon men, the expression is highly figurative, referring to the judgments which God, always merciful, inflicts upon rebellious nations, or individuals, for their sins. The phrase, "day of wrath," like the phrase, "day of judgment," does not in every instance in which we find it in the Scriptures, refer to the same particular time. These phrases refer to different times, or periods of judgment, when God, in an eminent and remarkable manner, punishes wicked nations for their offences. The day of wrath, or judg ment, to Sodom and Gomorrah, was the time when God destroyed those cities by fire from heaven. Then they were judged, or punished for their sins; it was a time, or a day of judgment or wrath to them; they had long been preparing themselves, by their increasing wickedness, for that judgment; or, to use the language of the passage before us, they had been "treasuring up unto themselves wrath against the day of wrath;" and when the time had fully arrived, the wrath of God was poured out upon them to the uttermost. So when Babylon was destroyed, it was her day of judgment, or day of wrath. The time of the destruction of any people, or nation, was a day of judgment, or wrath, to them. This was preeminently true of the Jewish nation; for nothing is more common with the sacred writers, than to represent the time of the destruction of the Jews, by the phrase, "day of judgment," "day of wrath," or the time of the "pouring out of the wrath of God." Such we believe to be the true application of the passage at

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the head of this section.

In Rom. i. 18, Paul lays down this general principle," the wrath of God is revealed from heaven, [to

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men on the earth;] against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness." Throughout the remainder of chapter i. Paul shows the truth of this statement in reference to the Gentile nations. In verses 2132, he describes their abominable wickedness, and informs us of the wrath of God, or the punishment, which came upon them in consequence of it. And as Mr. Balfour says, "It deserves every man's notice, that the apostle does not say that they who commit such things are worthy.of endless misery. No; he says, "who knowing the judgment of God, that they who commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do, thern." Though such.persons knew that the judgment of God had come on the old· world, on Sodom and Gomorrah, &c. for such crimes, yet they were not deterred from the commission of them. It is evident that death, which Paul here calls: the judgment of God, was the highest and most severe punishment inflicted upon them. He gives not the slightest intimation, that their punishment extended, beyond death. To say it did, and call it eternal death, is travelling beyond the record, and boldly asserting things without proof; for the phrase eternal death. does not occur in the Bible.""Essays," pp. 243, 244.

In chap. ii. Paul proceeds to speak of the Jews; and he tells them, ver. 24,." that the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles through you.". That Paul was addressing the Jews, in chap. ii. see Whitby. Now it is evident to every reader of the Scriptures, who understands what he reads, that the day on which God poured out his judgments upon the Jews was a day of wrath. See the manner in which Zephaniah describes the punishment of the Jews, by Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, who was an instrument in the hand of God for that purpose, chap. i. 8-18. That time is called "the day of the Lord's sacrifice," ver. 8, 9;, "that day,".ver. 10; that time," ver. 12; "the great day of the Lord, which was near and hasted

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greatly," ver. 14; "a DAY OF WRATH, (mark the expression,) a day of trouble and distress, a day of wasteness and desolation, a day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness," ver. 15. This is a very full proof of what is said Job xxi. 30, "The wicked is reserved to the day of destruction, they shall be brought forth to the day of wrath." We' read again, Job xxxvi. 13, "The hypocrites in heart heap up wrath," which answers to the language of the passage we are considering, "treasure up wrath against the day of wrath." See the destruction of Babylon foretold in the same terms, Isaiah xiii. 9.

The New Testament writers, in most cases, gather their figures and phraseology from the Old Testament. Hence they speak of the destruction of the Jews, and of the Mosaic economy, under the same figures and terms, which we have already considered. John the Baptist, inquired of the Pharisees and Sadducees, "Who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come?" Matt. iii. 7. This did not mean, nor does it say, wrath to come in the immortal state. It was, as Adam Clarke explains it, "the desolation which was about to fall on the Jewish nation for their wickedness." Com. on the place; and as Lightfoot says, "It came to pass with them, when, about forty-four years after this, they were destroyed by the Romans." Works, IV. 264. Paul, writing concerning the Jews, says, "The wrath is come upon them to the uttermost. 1 Thess. ii. 16. They had been treasuring up wrath against the day of wrath. Jesus, when discoursing upon their destruction, told them, "Ye have killed the prophets, and ye also persecute the church of God." He says, "Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers." Matt. xxiii. 32. They did fill up that measure; they treasured up wrath against the day of wrath; they set at defiance the laws of God; and when Paul wrote to the Thessalonians, the Jews were ripe for destruction. The "harvest" had come; the end of the world, or age, was near; God was about to thrust in the sickle, and

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