earth with its judicial waters, and left eight persons only to go down from Ararat to look forth upon a world dismantled and depopulated, and to begin the long and the weary march of life in an economy greatly deteriorated. Thirdly, we have the Noachian, if I may use the expression, dispensation, starting from the ark and the mountains of Ararat, under the beautiful symbol and shadow of the rainbow, light and darkness; the age too strongly branded by unbelief and impiety and idolatry, till at last this age also ended in the burning of Sodom and Gomorrah, the cities of the plain, and the institution of another and a new covenant, which took place as the fourth dispensation. This we may call the Abrahamic dispensation, when God appeared to the father of the faithful, teaching, covenanting, and making bright promises; an age intensely interesting in its story, like life's April day, full of sunshine and of showers, of lights and of shadows. But it also ended in judgments upon Egypt, and the overthrow of Pharaoh in the Red Sea, and the exodus of the Israelites toward the promised and the better land. Fifthly, we have the Mosaic economy, beginning at the Red Sea, constituted and consecrated again by the appearance of Deity; characterised by the weary march through the desert, by the possession of the promised land, pledged to them as long as they were faithful to their covenant ; ending at last in the overthrow of that beautiful city Jerusalem, the beauty and the joy of the whole earth; in which God dwelt between the cherubim; in which now the Mosque of Omar raises its crescent to the sky, while on the Holy Land the Druse, and the Moslem, and the monk leave their desolating footprints; from its shores the people that have a right to it are exiles, until God lifts the standard in the sky, and bids Israel come forth, and return, and again dwell in Palestine. After this dispensation comes the sixth, in which we now live; a dispensation beginning with God manifest in the flesh, seen of angels, justified in the Spirit, believed on in the world, received up into glory; a dispensation whose characteristic feature is not the conversion of the whole

world, which will not be accomplished in it, but the election and conversion of a people out of the world, to be presented unto him a glorious church, without spot, or blemish, or any such thing. Whilst it is our most sacred and our most instant duty to carry the Gospel to every creature upon earth, and the shorter the time that remains the more instant and urgent ought our efforts to be; yet it is evident that the Gospel of the kingdom preached in this economy will not issue in the conversion of all the inhabitants of the earth. We are expressly told: "This Gospel of the kingdom shall be preached among all nations for a witness, and then shall the end come ;" and we read that when our Lord comes, instead of all being righteous, there shall be great sin and great wickedness in the world. See St. Paul's characteristics of the last times. One of the marked and expressive signs of the approach of that age is the fulfilment of the second chapter of Joel. That chapter is probably now being partially fulfilled. The day of Pentecost, that passed away 1800 years ago, was the first sprinkling drops of the shower. But God is now pouring out his Spirit upon all flesh in greater abundance. And as if to show that we occupy the evening hours of this last sixth dispensation, let us notice at this moment the instancy, and the urgency, and the frequency and the force with which the Gospel is being preached; in theatres, in halls, at prayer-meetings held in barns, and in drawing-rooms, by men who have great talent, with great roughness, but real piety, calling men with a voice of thunder to prepare to meet God, and provoking echoes in the most obdurate hearts. These things must strike the most thoughtless and the most unreflecting, indicating as they do the era in the age, the sixth age or dispensation, in which it is our lot now to live. The seventh age or dispensation comes, called the millennial rest. In this millennial day all shall be righteous; every tear shall be wiped from every eye; God alone shall be exalted; Jerusalem shall be lifted up to the top of the mountains, and all nations shall come to it; Satan shall be bound for a thousand years; the wolf shall lie down

with the lamb, and the little child shall lead them. But this dispensation, so marvellous, like the preceding six is to end in judgment; for we read that at the close of the millennial economy, after the thousand years have been finished, Satan is to be let loose for a little; and then occurs the perplexing statement, beset with great difficulties, to the effect that some nations in the four quarters of the globe are to come up and compass the camp of the saints of the Most High, headed by Satan ; as if it were Satan's last desperate muster, on which he stakes his eternal condition of ruin or victory; but we read that he is taken, and cast into the lake that burneth with fire, and death and hell are cast into it too; and the millennial age melts into the heavenly, as the sweet dawn melts into the noonday sunshine, never to be clouded nor to be interrupted for ever.

I have thus. given the history of the past in these six economies, of which we have either experience or history. Of the seventh, the experience or the history remains still to be realised.

The mark of this seventh economy, which is introduced at the 17th verse of this chapter, to which Peter refers in the 3rd chapter of his Second Epistle, is a new heaven and new earth, "wherein dwelleth righteousness." What a distinguishing feature is this, not wherein dwelleth law, which is not always righteousness, but "wherein dwelleth righteousness;' when every heart shall be love, every intellect shall be light, every conscience shall be peace, and all blessings break upon the shores of hearts that have been crushed, like summer waves upon the sands from a peaceful sea, chiming in songs of gratitude unbroken and undisturbed for ever and ever! In that blessed state wherein dwelleth righteousness there shall be no more misunderstanding and misinterpretation of each other. The worst wars that have convulsed the earth, and scourged the nations, have arisen from misunderstanding. There shall there be no uncharitableness to desire to misinterpret; there will be no shadow of ill-will upon a single brow; there shall be no ripple of ill-feeling rushing

through the channels of a single heart; they shall all be righteous, saith the Lord. There shall be no ignorance in that day to lead to misapprehensions. We now see through a glass darkly. I believe if two people that heartily hate each other and such phenomena do occur -were to see each other as they are, they would shake hands and embrace each other, and marvel at the misunderstanding that had led to their discords, their divisions, and disputes. It is by seeing bits of each other that we misinterpret each other; and it is by putting hasty constructions upon each other's words, and deeds, and features, and manner, that we come often to uncharitable and unrighteous inferences respecting each other. In that blessed state there shall be no crime to stain the calendars of the world or to vex the souls of the people of God. Each heart shall be the holy chancel in which God dwells; each spirit shall be the seat of the very shechinah, and be consecrated as the holy of holies itself. Whatever taint sin has left, whatever trail it has spread upon the earth, whatever seeds of evil it has sown, whatever bitter fruits it has given birth to, shall all be swept away from that divine economy in which dwelleth righteousness. In it there shall be no more tears, nor sorrow, nor crying; all former things shall have passed away. Every word shall be true, every feeling shall be just, every affection love, every act shall be righteous, as measured by the standard of heaven; every thought shall be pure, as weighed in the sanctuary of the Eternal; righteousness shall dwell in every heart, its illumination; in every affection, its warmth; in every imagination, its inspiration; in every word, its music; in every deed, its colouring, its fragrance, and its glory; the whole soul, body, and spirit shall be inlaid with the exquisite and imperishable mosaic of righteousness, and love, and peace, and joy ; and no tides of change or streams of trouble shall pass. one ripple or cast one shadow over that brilliant and beautiful economy in which dwelleth righteousness. And mark the force of the expression, "dwelleth righteousness." Here it has been an incidental and a

transient visitant, like angel visits, few and far between ; but then righteousness shall no longer be a visitor to our world, whom we entertain as a stranger unawares, but a permanent inhabitant; for it is said, "In which dwelleth righteousness." The earth will be purified ; righteousness will rest upon it like a glory cloud, and be reflected from its every rock, and stream, and tower, and fruit, and flower, like sweet and cloudless sunshine. Righteousness shall dwell in it. Such is the promise of God by Isaiah.

We have reason to believe that this righteousness will dwell in a material orb, with material glories, among men living in the flesh, raised from the dead; or of the living changed, recognising each other, and holding communion and fellowship with each other; and only out of this earth shall be ejected what Satan succeeded in introducing, but nothing that God made shall be destroyed; it shall be purified, consecrated, and hallowed. Sin, the blot that has defaced it, the interpolation that has disturbed it, shall pass away for ever and ever. Sin crept into heaven with the angels; it penetrated into Paradise with Satan; it is in this economy in the air, in the earth, in the ocean; a guest at our tables, a companion in our journeys, a tenant in our hearts, a blot upon our memories, an intruder and a disturber in our consciences. Sin at this moment is a shadow in the sanctuary, an interruption in our holiest prayers, a discord in our sweetest songs, a worm in the fairest and the most fragrant flower; it creeps into our charity, and turns it into vain-glory; it penetrates our worship, and makes it hypocrisy; it touches our faith, and it becomes presumption; it mingles with our repentance, and makes it despair; it vitiates our noblest deeds, like the fly, the dead fly, in the apothecary's ointment, and makes them sinful and polluted in the sight of a holy God. In this dispensation sin enters the eye of one, as in the case of David; it nestles in the hand of another, as a bribe in Gehazi; it settles on the tongue of a third, as in the case of Ananias; it was the life of the treachery of Judas; it was the core of the denial of Peter; it