But I come now to treat of hope; for the hope of Onesimus, as well as his faith, are to accompany him to heaven; that is, if they can get there.

7. Whatever hope is, it always respects and is conversant about something to come, but not any thing already obtained; hence it is called hope to come, Acts xxvi. 7. Now, in heaven, all things hoped for will be come, in all their meaning, in all their fulness, and in all their perfection: Christ then will fill all things, Eph. iv. 10. "I will fill their treasures," Prov. viii. 21. All grace shall be full; and, "When that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away." If all fulness and perfection be then come, what is there to be hoped for? And, if hope to come be employed in heaven, I ask how this future hope can comport with endless glory, when the past and the future tenses are both swallowed up in eternity? for time shall be no more, and of course no room for hope to come.

8. We have the promise, that in heaven Christ will shew us plainly of the Father: "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." Yea, and we shall see Christ too; "We shall see him as he is," says John, "for we shall be like him." And then the Holy Spirit asks, "What a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for? But, if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it," Rom. viii. 24, 25. According to this text Onesimus must not destroy one grace

by another; he must not destroy patience in order to save hope; for no doubt but there will be a daily cross to bear in heaven, as well as hope to come. In this passage the word of God declares that hope is employed about things which we see not, and that in hope and patience we wait for them; and then the grand question in my text is, Why Onesimus should go on hoping, if he sees himself in full possession of all promised good? "For what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for?" And, if he will go on in imagined hope, he himself destroys by sight all the hope he has; "For that which is seen is not hope."

9. Full possession is always opposed to hope; so that it is impossible that hope and possession should stand together. Hope implies something to come; possession is the full enjoyment of all things hoped for, as fully come; so that the Holy Ghost expressly asserts that, that is not hope which is seen; "For we are saved by hope: but hope that is seen is not hope." "Now we see through a glass darkly, but then face to face: now I know in part, but then shall I know even as also I am known," 1 Cor. xiii. 12. Here the apostle describes the glories of heaven to clear views, seeing face to face; and to a perfection of knowledge, knowing even as also I am known; and, "That which is seen," saith the Holy Ghost, "is not hope;" though Onesimus says it is. The husbandman ploughs his ground, sows his crop, and hopes for harvest; yea more, he may gather

his corn into his barn, and thresh it, and winnow it, in hope; for we read of plowing, and of plowing in hope; and we read of threshing, and of the thresher's being partaker of his hope, 1 Cor. ix. 10. But, when the corn is sold at the market, and all the money sacked, that farmer must be as complete a noodle as Onesimus, if he expects another crop from the dry stubble. If it be true that no person that loveth and maketh a lie can enter into the heavenly Jerusalem, I should like to know what gate this blind idiot thinks to enter by, who can so daringly pervert the word of God, contradict the Holy Spirit of truth, and fabricate such innumerable falsities, contrary to all the Spirit's teaching, contrary to the experience of every saint, and repugnant to the whole current of truth; and all this in order to deceive the simple and the blind, that he may exalt himself as a leader, when at the same time he is destitute of all good hope through grace, and of all experience which worketh hope.

10. Hope is conversant about things difficult, and yet possible. Abraham against hope believed in hope, Rom. iv. 18. Abraham wanted a son, in and through whom all the families of the earth. were to be blessed; but his own body, and the age and natural sterility of Sarah, lay hard against it; but against all probability, and impossibility in nature, Abraham believed in hope, founded on the power, the truth, and the faithfulness of God; and this hope brought forth the son and promised heir,

And just so the saint: "He putteth his mouth in the dust, if so be there may be hope," and when he has obtained it, and ground to hope on, even then he has the devil, the law and the bondage of it, the world and the wicked in it, his own misgiving heart, and a sea of in-bred corruptions, to hope against; and still against all this natural barrenness, and these formidable obstacles and enemies, he believes in hope, and becomes an heir of promise, and one of blessed Abraham's seed through faith. But then it is implanted in the heart of every saint that this formidable host of inveterate enemies will not be found in heaven; so that there will be nothing to oppose us, and of course nothing to hope against; all difficulties and obstacles being removed out of the way, the poor soul will be completely set down in the undisturbed possession of all that he believed in and hoped for.

11. Nor do I believe that this hypothesis of our flying Onesimus will stand the test of common sense; for we are exhorted to take the shield of faith, wherewith we are to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked. The saint's whole warfare is called the good fight of faith; and the victory that overcomes the world is even our faith. Now to hold fast and to manage the shield is the saint's highest skill and wisdom; and on this his victory depends; "Walk before me, Abraham, and be thou upright: I am thy shield, and thine exceeding great reward." But, when the good soldier of Christ has fought the fight and finished it; when

devils and persecutors, whimsical prophets and hypocrites, are all shut up in hell; when the law in the members is over, the body of sin and death banished, and the Canaanite is no more in the house of the Lord of hosts; when the eternal pension is enjoyed; then to tell an old soldier that he must still keep at drill, and be using his arms, and be wielding and managing his shield, and that for ever; this, this would afford but little encouragement to poor old weather-beaten soldiers, already worn out with service, and covered with wounds and scars. But, blessed be God, there is no small difference between the chimeras of a mussulman and the truths of the gospel: Christ will present his church to himself, "A glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle, or any such thing." All wounds and scars, the spots of sin, and the wrinkles of old age, will be done away.

12. Hope is called an helmet, which is a piece of armour for the head, to screen it in the day of battle; hence we are exhorted to put on the breastplate of faith and love, and for an helmet the hope of salvation, 1 Thess. v. 8. But then this is not wanted but in times of war; for when all our enemies are conquered, when the last enemy, death, is swallowed up in victory, and all the inhabitants of the heavenly country eternally at rest, then to enforce the necessity of wearing the iron cap, when there is nothing before us but eternal peace, can be nothing else but the capricious humour of such fantastical.commanders as our Onesimus. Besides,