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SEC
I.
PROOF
OF
A
SEPARATE STATE.
321
the
judge
standeth
at
the door."
Rev. xxii.
10.
"
Seal
not
up the prophecy
of
this book, for the time
is
at
hand."
Verse
N.
"
And, behold,
I
come quickly,
and
my
re-
ward
is
with me,
to give every man
as his
work shall
be
:"
And
the sacred volume
is
closed with this
assurance,
verse
20.
"
Surely,
I
come quickly
;
and the echo,
and
expectation
of
the apostle,
or
the church, Amen,
even.
so
come,
Lord Jesus."
It
is
granted,
that, in
prophetical
expressions,
such
as
all these are,
some
obscurity
is
allowed
:
And
it
may
be
doubtful, perhaps, whether
some
of
them may
refer
to Christ's
coming,
by
the
destruction
of
Jerusalem,
or
his coming to
call
particular
persons
'away
by his
mes
senger
of
death,
or
his
appearance
to
the last
judgment.
It
is
granted,
also,
it
belongs' to
prophetical language to
set
things
far distant,
as
it
were,
before
our
eyes,
and
make
them seem present,
or
very
near
at
hand.
But
still these expressions liad
plainly
such
an
influence,
on
primitive christians,
as
that
they imagined the day
of
re-
surrection
and judgment
was
very
near
:
and
since
the
prophetical
words
of
Christ, and
his
apostles, seemed to
carry
this
appearance
in
them,
and to keep
the church
under
some
uncertainty,
it
is
no wonder,
that
the
apos-
tles
chiefly
referred
the
disciples;
of that
age,
to
the
day
of
the
resurrection,
for
comfort
under their
sufferings
and
sorrows':
And though they
never asserted,
that Christ
would
cone
to
raise the dead, and
judge
the world, in
that
age,
yet
when
they knew themselves,
that
he would
not
come so soon,
they might
not think
it
necessary
to
give
every
christian,
or every
church, an immediate
ac-
count of the
more
distant
time
of
this
great
event,
that
the uncertainty
of it
might keep them
ever
watchful
:
And, even when
St.
Paul
informs the Thessalonians,
that
the day
of
the
Lord
was
not
so
very
near,
as
they
imagined
it, 2
'Mess.
ii. 2.
yet
he
does
not
put
it
off
be-
yond
that century
by
any express language,
Thus
we
see
there
is
very good reason,
why
the
New
Testament
should derive its motives
of terror
and
com-
fort
chiefly
from the
resurrection, and
the day
of
judg-
ment
;`
though it
is
not altogether silent of
the
separate
state
of
souls,
and
their
happiness or
misery, :commenc-
ing,
in
some
measure, immediately
after death,
which
bas
vol..
11.
Y