but light in comparison with the torments of the damned. For as in hell, there is an absence of all that is good and desirable; so there is the confluence of all evils there, since all the effects of sin and of the curse take their place in it, after the last judgment. Rev. xx. 14, " And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire." There they will find a prison they can never escape out of; a lake of fire, wherein they will be ever swimming and burning; a pit, where they will never find a bottom. The worm that dieth not shall feed on them, as on bodies which are interred: the fire that is not quenched, shall devour them, as dead bodies, which are burned. Their eyes shall be kept in blackness of darkness, without the least comfortable gleam of light: their ears filled with the frightful yellings of the infernal crew. They shall taste nothing but the vinegar of God's wrath, the dregs of the cup of his fury. The stench of the burning lake of brimstone will be the smell there; and they shall feel extreme pains for evermore.

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3. They will be most exquisite and vehement torments, causing "weeping, wailing, and gnashing of teeth, Matt. xiii. 42, and xxii. 13. They are represented to us under the notion of pangs in travail, which are very sharp and exquisite. So says the rich man in hell, Luke xvi. 24, "I am tormented, (to wit, as one in the pangs of child-bearing) in this flame." Ah! dreadful pangs! horrible travail! in which both soul and body are in pangs together! helpless travail, hopeless and endless! The word used for hell, Matt. v. 22. and in divers other places of the New Testament, properly denotes "the valley of Hinnom;" the name being taken from the valley of the children of Hinnom, in which was Tophet, (2 Kings xxiii. 10.) where idolaters offered their children to Moloch. This is said to have been a great brazen idol, with arms like a man's; the which being heated by fire within it, the child was set in the burning arms of the idol: and that the parents might not hear the shrieks of the child burning to death, they beat drums in the time of the horrible sacrifice: whence the place had the name Tophet. Thus the exquisiteness of the torments in hell are appointed to us. Some have endured grievous tortures on earth, with a surprising obstinacy and undaunted courage; but men's courage will fail them there, when they find themselves fallen into the hands of the living God, and no out gate to be expected for ever. It is true, there will be degrees of torment in hell: "It shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon, than for Chorazin and Bethsaida," Matt. xi. 21, 22. But the least load of wrath there will be insupportable; for how can the heart of the creature endure, or his hands be strong, when God

himself is a consuming fire to him? When the tares are bound in bundles for the fire, there will be bundles of covetous persons, of drunkards, of profane swearers, unclean persons, formal hypocrites, unbelievers, and despisers of the gospel, and the like: the several bundles being cast into hell-fire, some will burn more keenly than others, according as their sins have been more heinous than these of others; a fiercer flame will seize the bundle of the profane, than the bundle of the unsanctified moralist; the furnace will be the hotter to those who sinned against light than to those who lived in darkness, Luke vii. 47, 48, "That servant which knew his Lord's will, and prepared not himself, neither did according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes. But he that knew not, and did commit things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes." But the sentence common to them all, (Matth. xiii. 30,) Bind them in bundles to burn them,' speaks the great vehemency and exquisiteness of the lowest degree of torment in hell.

4. They will be uninterrupted: there is no intermission there, no ease, no, not for a moment. "They shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever," Rev. xx. 10. Few are so tossed in this world, but sometimes they get rest; but the damned shall get none, they took their rest in the time appointed of God for labour. Now storms are readily seen, but there is some space between showers, but no intermission in the storm that falls on the wicked in hell. There deep will be calling unto deep, and the waves of wrath continually rolling over them. There the heaven will be always black to them, and they shall have a perpetual night, but no rest, Rev. xiv. 11, "They have no rest day nor night."

5. They will be unpitied. The punishments inflicted on the greatest malefactors on earth, to draw forth some compassion from those who behold them in their torments: but the damned shall have none to pity them: God will not pity them, but laugh at their calamity,' Prov. i. 26. The blessed company in heaven shall rejoice in the execution of God's righteous judgment, and sing while the smoke riseth up forever, Rev. xix. 3. "and again they said, Allelujah; and her smoke rose up for ever and ever. No compassion can be expected from the devil and his angels, who delight in the ruin of the children of men, and are, and will be for ever void of pity. Neither will one pity another there, where every one is weeping and gnashing his teeth, under his own insupportable anguish and pain. There natural affections will be extinguished; the parents will not love their children, nor children their parents: the mother will not pity the daughter in these flames; nor will the daugh

ter pity the mother: the son will show no regard to his father there; nor the servant to his master, where every one will be roaring under his own torment.

LASTLY, To complete their misery, their torments shall be eternal, Rev. xv. 14, 'And the smoke of their torments ascended up for ever and ever. Ah! what a frightful case is this, to be tormented in the whole body and soul, and that not with one kind of torment, but many; all of these most exquisite, and all this without intermission, and without pity from any. What heart can conceive those things without horror! Nevertheless, if this most miserable case were at length to have an end, that would afford some comfort; but the torments of the damned will have no end, of the which more afterwards.

USE. Learn from this, (1.) The evil of sin. It is a stream that will carry down the sinner, till he be swallowed up in an ocean of wrath. The pleasures of sin are bought too dear, at the rate of everlasting burnings. What availed the rich man's purple clothing and sumptuous fare, when in hell he was wrapt up in purple flames, and could not have a drop of water to cool his tongue? Alas! that men should indulge themselves in sin, which will be such bitterness in the end, that they should drink so greedily of the poisonous cup, and hug that serpent in their bosom, that will sting them to the heart, and gnaw out their bowels at length! 2. What a God he is, with whom we have to do: what a hatred he bears to sin, and how severely he punisheth it! Know the Lord to be most just, as well as most merciful; and think not that he is such an one as you are, away with that fatal mistake ere it be too late, Psal. I. 21, 22. "Thou thoughtest that I was altogether such an one as thyself; but I will reprove thee, and set them in order before thine eyes. Now consider this, ye that forget God, lest I tear you in pieces, and there be none to deliver," The fire prepared for the devil and his angels, as dark as it is, will serve to discover God to be a severe revenger of sin. Lastly the absolute necessity of fleeing to the Lord Jesus Christ by faith; the same necessity of repentance, and holiness of heart and life. avenger of blood is pursuing the, O sinner! haste and escape to the city of refuge. Wash now in the fountain of the Mediator's blood, that thou mayest not perish in the lake of fire. Open thy heart to him, lest the pit close its mouth on thee. Leave thy sins, else they will ruin thee: kill them, else they will be thy death for ever.

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Let not the terror of hell-fire put the upon hardening thy heart more, as it may do, if thou entertain that wicked thought, viz. "There is no hope," (Jer. ii. 25,) which perhaps is more

rife among the hearers of the gospel, than many are aware of. But there is hope for the worst of sinners, who will come unto Jesus Christ. If there are no good qualifications in thee, (as certainly there can be none in a natural man, none in any man, but what are received from Christ in him) know that he has not suspended thy welcome on any good qualifications: do thou take himself and his salvation, freely offered unto all, to whom the gospel comes. "Whosoever will, let him take of the water of life freely," Rev. xxii. 17, "Him that cometh to me, I will in no wise cast out," John vi. 37. It is true, thou art a sinful creature, and canst not repent; thou art unholy, and canst not make thyself holy: nay, thou hath essayed to repent, to forsake sin, and to be holy, but still missed,of repentance, reformation, and holiness: and therefore, Thou saidst, There is no hope. No, for I have loved strangers, and after them will I go." Truly no marvel that the success has not answered thy expectation, since thou hast always begun thy work amiss. But do thou first of all honour God by believing the testimony he has given of his Son, namely, that eternal life is in him and honour the Son of God by believing on him, that is, embracing and falling in with the free offer of Christ, and of his salvation from sin and from wrath made to thee in the gospel, trusting in him confidently for righteousness to thy justification, and also for sanctification, seeing "of God he is made unto us both righteousness and sanctification," 1 Cor. i. 30. Then if thou hadst as much credit to give to the word of God, as thou wouldst allow to the word of an honest man offering thee a gift, and saying, take it, and it is thine; thou mayst believe that God is thy God, Christ is thine, his salvation is thine, thy sins are pardoned, thou hast strength in him for repentance and holiness: for all these are made over to thee in the free offer of the gospel. Believing on the Son of God, thou art justified; the curse is removed. And while it lies upon thee, how is it possible thou shouldst bring forth the fruits of holiness? But the curse is removed; that death which seized on thee with the first Adam, (according to the threatening, Gen. ii. 17,) is taken away. In consequence of which, thou shalt find the bands of wickedness (now holding thee fast in impenitency) broken asunder, as the bands of that death; so as thou wilt be able to repent indeed from the heart; thou shalt find the spirit of life, on whose departure that death ensued, returned to thy soul, so as thenceforth thou shalt be enabled to live unto righteousness. No man's case is so bad, but it may be mended this way, in time, to be perfectly right

in eternity: and no man's case is so good but another way being taken, it will be marred for time and eternity too.

III. The damned shall have the society of devils in their miserable state in hell; for they must depart into fire prepared "for the devil and his angels." O horrible company! O frightful association! who would choose to dwell in a palace haunted by devils? To be confined in the most pleasant spot of earth with the devil and his infernal furies, would be a most terrible confinement. How would men's hearts fail them, and their hair stand up, finding themselves environed with the hellish crew in that case! But ah! how much more terrible must it be, to be cast with the devils into one fire! locked up with them in one dungeon! shut up with them in one pit! To be closed up in a den of roaring lions, girded about with serpents, surrounded with venomous asps, and to have thy bowels eaten out by vipers, altogether and at once, is a comparison too low to show the misery of the damned, shut up in hell with the devil and his angels. They go about now as roaring lions, seeking whom they may devour: but then shall they be confined in their den with their prey. They shall be filled to the brim with the wrath of God, and receive the full torment (Matth. viii. 29,) which they tremble in expectation of, (James ii. 19,) being cast into the fire prepared for them. How will these lions roar and tear! How will these serpents hiss! these dragons vomit out fire! What horrible anguish will seize the damned, finding themselves in the lake of fire with the devil who deceived them; drawn thither with the silken cords of temptation by these wicked spirits, and bound with them in everlasting chains under darkness! Rev. xx. 10, "And the devil that deceived them, was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever."

Oh! that men would consider this in time, renounce the devil and his lusts, and join themselves to the Lord in faith and holiness. Why should men choose that company in this world, and delight in that society they would not desire to associate with in the other world? Those who like not the company of the saints on earth, will get none of it in eternity; but as godless company is their delight now, they will afterwards get enough of it, when they have an eternity to pass in the roaring and blasphemous society of devils and reprobates in hell. Let those who use to invoke the devil to take them, soberly consider, that the company so often invited, will be terrible at last when come.