130 THE WORLD TO COME. compasses thee round about in all thy paths. Darkness itself cannot cover thee : The night shines as the day before him, and scatters light round about the criminal, that would hide himself from the wrath of God. Ask Jeremy the prophet, and he shalt tell thee, that none can hide himself' in secret places, where God shall not see him, the God who tills heaven and earth ; Jer. xxiii. et He shall hunt obstinate sinners from every. mountain, and out of the holes of the rocks, for his eyes are upon all their ways; neither their persons, nor their iniquities, can be hid from him. And as you can never conceal yourselves from the sight and notice of the judge, so neither can you turn your eyes away from him t You must behold his face in vengeance, and endure the distressing sight. The rays of his Majesty in the day of his wrath, shall strike through 'ail the crannies of the darkest den, and pierce the deepest shade. Lord, when thy hand is lifted up, they will not see; but they shall we, and be ashamed ; Isa. xxvi. H. And the face of the Lamb must be seen in all its unknown terrors. Rev. i. 7. Behold he comes in the clouds, and every eye shall see him ; The guilty creature, andthe divine avenger, shall meet eye to eye, though the creature has hid himself under rocks and mountains. 3. These rocks and mountains are designed to represent not only concealment and darkness, by their holes and caverns, but they are known bulwarks of defence, and places of security aüd shelter, by reason of their strength and thickness. When the prophet would express the safety of the man, who practises righteousness in a vicious age ; Isa. xxxiii. 16. he says, He shall dwell on high, his place of defence shall be the munitions If rocks. These shall be a bulttark round hire for Iris guard and - safety. When sinners therefore flee to the mountains and to the rocks, they may be supposed to see a thick covering, or a shield of defence, to secure them, where, the strokes of divine anger shall not break through and reach them : They trust to the solid protection of the rocks, and the strength of the mountains to guard them ; but these, alas, can yield no shelter from the stroke of the arm of God. Should the rocks, Ob sinner ! attempt to befriend thee, and surround thee with their thickest fortification; Iris wrath would cleave them asunder, and pierce thee to the soul with greater ease, than thou canst break through a paper- wall with the battering engines of war. Ask the prophet Nahum, 'who was acquainted with-the majesty of God, and he shall tell thee, how it throws down the mountain, and tears the rook in pieces: When his ,fury is poured out like fire, the 'mountains quake at him, the hills melt, the earth is burned at his presence¡ with all that dwell therein. He that has his way in the whirl- wind and in the storm, and the clouds are the dust of his feet;
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