their time is," they are the more in earnest that, by a glorious reverse of their naturally ruined state, they may prove at last to have not been "made in vain." They "pass the time of their sojourning in fear;" they are "sober, and watch unto prayer." "As obedient children, they fashion not themselves after the lusts of their ignorance, but, as He who hath called them is holy, so they seek to be holy in all their conversation." In a word, they count all things as loss, for the excellency of the knowledge of their Lord and Saviour: for they "know whom they have believed;" they have the fullest assurance in their faith. On other objects, which are so eagerly pursued by the men of this world, they have closed their eyes for ever: forgetting the things behind, reaching forward to those before, they press forward to the mark and prize of their high calling; and, though racks, ropes, swords, or fires, were to obstruct their way, they would rush through them all to reach their eternal goal! Jesus Christ is to them the very food of the soul, the very bread of life; and they make it the substance of their continual supplication, "Whatever beside is denied, Lord, evermore give us this bread!” Such are the views and affections which inspire true believers; such the object which, stretching into eternity, puts out, casts a darkness over, the brightest sublunary splendours; an object, apart from which it may be justly said, that "men," that "all men, are made in vain!”

The necessity and certainty of that salvation, that immortality, which the gospel reveals, is one

and the first inference from what has been said: another, and the last inference I shall mention, is the extreme folly' and misery of those who persist in the neglect of this salvation, this immortality. It is to throw away the end of existence, to sever ourselves from the possibility and the infinitude of happiness, and, in the awful language of scripture, to "judge ourselves unworthy of eternal life!" If a vast sum of money were committed to us, and we suddenly discovered that, by our own neglect, the whole was lost, we should be affected, probably, with serious alarm and regret: but what must be our emotion,-what our consternation, remorse, and despair,—should we discover, at the last judgement, that we have lived in vain; that, so far as our own interest is concerned, we have been made in vain; that we have received the grace of God in vain; that, having neglected the one salvation, we are lost, lost in the scale of being; immortal creatures, lost to the great purpose for which our Maker gave us existence; lost to happiness; irrecoverably and for ever lost! What must it be to discover that the mistake we have committed is at once infinite and irreparable; that we have been guilty of an infatuation, which it will require eternity to deplore, and eternity to comprehend! Now is the accepted time: let us earnestly avoid such an unutterable calamity; let us choose the favour of God as the only adequate end of our being; and embrace the salvation of Jesus Christ as the only way to attain that end; in a word, let us act as those who are swayed by the conviction that the

christian is the only man of whom it can be said, in relation to eternal felicity, that he is not "made in vain."

IX.

DEATH, THE LAST ENEMY, SHALL BE
DESTROYED.*

[PREACHED AT BEDFORD, MAY, 1817.]

1 COR. XV. 26.—The last enemy that shall be destroyed, is death.

In this chapter the apostle directs the views of christians to the final consummation of all things; when the mediatorial kingdom of Christ, in our nature, having answered the ends for which it was established, shall be surrendered, " and God shall be all in all."

This kingdom is, in the mean time, progressive, and will be so till all enemies shall be subdued and placed under his feet. The apostle brings in the words of the text as an instance of this general proposition; but it may be proper here to remark somewhat of inaccuracy in our common version. That rendering does not seem to sustain the conclusion to which the apostle had arrived. It was his purpose to establish the perfection of our Saviour's conquest, the advancement of his

*From the Notes of the Rev. S. Hillyard.

triumphs, and the prostration of all enemies whatever beneath his power. Now to say that "the last enemy that shall be destroyed is death," by no means affords proof of this position. Though death might be destroyed, and be the last enemy that should be destroyed, it would not thence appear but that other enemies might remain, not destroyed. But the proper rendering is, "Death, the last enemy, shall be destroyed."

Having made this observation, I would now direct your attention to the import of the proposition; and I will consider

I. The nature of that enemy that shall be destroyed; and why he is called "the last enemy."

II. The manner and the successive stages in which our Lord Jesus has already conquered in part, and will completely conquer this last enemy.

I. The nature of that enemy that shall be destroyed, and why he is called "the last enemy."

It is not necessary to say much to shew that death is, in many respects, an enemy to the sons of Adam. It is so, first, if we consider it in its most obvious effects, the dissolution of the human frame. Every part of the body is part of a marvellous fabric, of a wonderful machine; which bears upon it the mark of divine wisdom and skill in its contrivance and execution. It is a work which man is not only unable to form or contrive, but the contrivance of which he is not able to comprehend. Every man possesses and carries in himself certain excellencies of composition, and enjoys the benefit of innumerable operations, while he is wholly

VOL. VI.

unacquainted with the internal machinery by which they are produced. If we look upon the Goths and Vandals as the enemies of the nations, and of all civilized society, because they destroyed palaces and temples, and the ancient monuments of art; what must we think of death, which demolishes, not only in one victim, but in innumerable victims, the noblest fabric that was ever raised on earth; and spoils the most skilful works that were ever constructed? All human beauty, and vigour, and strength, are at once laid prostrate by the power of death; are broken and shivered to pieces under the stroke of this great tyrant. Were we to see, at once, all the victims which, in different lands and climes, and in all ages, have fallen before him, we should behold a pile of ruins raised to the heavens: but these ruins are mostly crumbled to dust, and concealed in the darkness of the grave; or what an amazing view would be afforded of the power and conquests of this universal enemy!

Again, Death is an enemy, as he puts an end to all that is terrestrial with regard to man. All the schemes, and projects, and thoughts, that relate only to the concerns of time, are destroyed. "In that day," says the word of God, "his thoughts perish" all the thoughts of the sublimest genius of the most acute philosophers, of the subtlest statesmen, of the most ambitious projectors, perish! All find, at once, a termination to their intellectual labours, their sublunary joys and sorrows, hopes and fears: they go only as far as death leaves space for them; and stop where he