DISCOURSE VII. 143 paid to the Father and to the Son ; . ye that mingle in all the joyful conversation of that divine and holy assembly, say, is there found any useless hour there ? do your devotions, your duties and your joys, ever suffer such an entire interruption of rest and silence, as the season of darkness on earth necessarily creates amongst the inhabitants of our world ?" Tite living creatures * which are represented by John the apostle in Rev. iv. 6 -8. whether they signify saints or angels, yet they were full of eyes that never slumber; they rest not day nor night, this is spoken-in the, language of mortals, to signify that they are never interrupted by any change of seasons or intervening darkness, in the honours they pay to God : They are described as ever saying, viol /, holy, holy, Lord God almighty, who was, and is, and is to come. And the same sort of expres- sion is used concerning the saints in heaven. Rev. vii. 14, 15. They who came cut of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb, they are before the throne of God, and serve him day and night in his temple; that is, they constantly serve or worship him in his holy temple in heaven. Perhaps the different orders and ranks of them in a continual succession, are ever doing some honours to God. As there is no night there, so there is no cessation of their services, their worship, and their holy exercies, in one form or another, throughout the duration of their being.. Our pleasures here on earth are short -lived : If they are intense, nature cannot bear them long, any more than constant business and labour : And if our labours and our pleasures should happily join, and mingle here on earth, which is not always the case, yet night compels us to break off the pleasing labour, and we must rest from the most delightful business. Happy is that region on high, where business and pleasure are for ever the same among all tite inhabitants of it, asid there is no pause, or entire cessation of the one or the other. C0 'fell tne, ye warm and lively christians, when your hearts are sweetly and joyfully en- gaged in the worship of God in holy conversation, or in any pious services here on earth, how often you have been forced to break off these celestial entertainments by the returning night. But in the heavenly state there is everlasting active service with everlasting delight and satisfaction." In that blessed world there can be no idleness, no inactivity, no trifling intervals to pass away time, no vacant or empty spaces in eternal life. Who can be idle under the immediate eye of God? Who can trifle in the presence of Christ ? Who can neglect the plea- surable work of heaven under the sweet influences of the * The word which is translated "beast," signifies only "animals," or "living creatures," and does not carry with it to mean and as disagreeable as idea as the word " beasts" in Eaglisb.
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