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my heart is glad, and my glory rejoiceth; my flesh also shall rest in hope. For thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption," Psalm xvi. 10. This account of sufferings, and of hope in them, is by Peter applied to Christ, Acts ii. 26. And this is all that the scriptures assert about hope exercised by him. But that he now reigns in hope in heaven, is not making him a king who is entered into his glory, Luke xxiv. 26, but who is entered into a state of grace, into the privilege of exercising faith and hope. When he exercised hope, he had death and the pains of it, devils, and the grave, to hope against; but, when he had suffered death, he was crowned with glory and honour, Heb. ii. 9. And I would ask what he hopes for?

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Does he hope for glory? The answer is ready, God has glorified his Son Jesus.

Does he hope for his glorious kingdom? Dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, are given him, Dan. vii. 14. He had received the kingdom, and was a king, when he sent forth his armies, destroyed his murderers, and burnt up their city. Compare Luke, 19th chapter: "A certain nobleman went into a far country to receive for himself a kingdom, and to return. But his citizens hated him, and sent a message after him, saying, We will not have this man to reign over us. But when he was returned, having received the king

dom, then he commanded-But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me.'

Does he hope for joy? He is in the fulness of joy, and at the right hand of God, where there are pleasures for evermore.

Does he hope for power to exercise his mediatorial dominion? The answer is, that all power in heaven and on earth was given unto him, Matt. xxviii. 18, at his resurrection. And he is long since gone forth as the most mighty, in glory and majesty; the rod of his strength is gone forth out of Zion, and he now rules in the midst of his enemies. But, as for his now reigning in hope, the Bible knows nothing about it; and it had been better for this child of ignorance if he had been no wiser. And I ask what our Lord hopes for, when he is already the heir of all things, and in possession of all things, and is ascended far above all heavens, that he might fill all things? Eph. iv. 10. And no doubt but our Lord knows all this, and sees all this; and, if he does, there is no room for hope; for the Holy Ghost declares that that which is seen is not hope. Here Onesimus is under the painful necessity of proving the Saviour blind. This he must do before this reign of hope can be established; for, "Hope that is seen is not hope," Rom. viii. 24. But Onesimus goes on,

and says,

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'Also the heavenly host, who appeared to the

shepherds at the birth of Christ, undoubtedly

' relied on what they said and foretold, and ex'pected the accomplishment of all they predicted; 'or did they speak in unbelief and despondency? 'One or other must be the case.'

Answer: Divine revelation says nothing about the faith or hope of angels. Faith and hope are given to God's elect among the fallen race of mankind. The first of these is to counteract infidelity, the second to counterpoise despair. And these are parts of what is called the new man, which is a wonderful creature, made or created, according to the apostle Paul, who says, "Put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness," Eph. iv. 24. But that these graces are given to holy angels, or why they should be given to angels, I know not. The Spirit and his grace is poured upon the chil dren of men; but the Bible is utterly silent about its being poured out upon angels. But Onesimus declares that

If they have not faith and hope, they must speak in unbelief and despondency, and that this must be the case.

Answer: Unbelief is a giving God the lie, and is a damning sin; but then this is only found in evil angels, who are devils by sin, and in presumptuous hypocrites, who are devils in action, and devils by office, as Judas was; and, as for good angels, they have none of those ingredients in them which work despondency or despair. The creature that despairs must have sin and

slavish fear, guilt and shame, a sense of wrath, and a dread of damnation, working in him. These are the things which work despondency and despair; but these, in the worst sense, are peculiar to devils and hypocrites, for all the elect are ransomed from the pit.

Hence I observe that, if Onesimus treats of the Saviour, who is the Lord of hosts; or if he speaks of his glorious reign in heaven; if he speaks of holy angels or of glorified souls in glory; he is so blind, that, like the Jews of old, he thinks them all just such ones as himself; for even the Lord of hosts, he only reigns in hope, "Who is the blessed and only potentate, the King of kings, and Lord of lords; who only hath immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto; whom no man hath seen, nor can see," 1 Tim. vi. 15, 16. Even this most glorious sovereign of the universe, and his glorious and eternal reign, are all brought down to the faith and hope of Onesimus; for he cannot stretch one thought, nor form one idea, beyond his own faith and hope. This comparison would ill become a saint of God; but the comparison is ten times. worse when made by an hypocrite, whose daring, presumptuous, and delusive hopes are nothing else but the produce of the devil himself. But Onesimus goes on, and says,

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How men can impudently deny the existence ' of faith and hope in glory, is strange; for Moses and Elias were in glory when they spake. If

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they were destitute of faith and hope when speaking, they spake in unbelief and despair.'

If it be impudence to deny the existence of faith and hope in heaven, then the inspired apostles, and the Holy Ghost in them, have plainly done it. But he is the impudent man who has presumed to assert the contrary, without one single proof to support it. Moses and Elias when upon earth, hoped for the glory of God, Rom. v. 2, as all other saints do, and have done; and when on the mount they both appeared in glory, in the enjoyment of what they had hoped for: but, 'Hope that is seen is not hope; for 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." The brightest conceptions, views, or notions, that this poor blind bat can form or conceive of the realities and glories of another world, whether he considers the glorious kingdom of the Lord of it; or the glories of the bride, the Lamb's wife, in it; or the glories of the holy angels, the native inhabitants of it; all, all his clearest views, his brightest conceptions, and his most refined and exalted ideas, amount to no more than this, walking by faith and not by sight, and wading on in hope; and, if these fail, whether in angels or in glorified saints, unbelief and despair must immediately ensue. This he declares must be the case. If it be true, reader, what our Lord asserts, namely, that, "Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh;" and that, "An

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