82 TUE WORLD TO COME. inactive. " The wise virgins, as well as the foolish, were slum- bering and sleeping ;" Mat. xxv. 5. The mischiefs and sorrows which attend each of these when Christ shall summon them to judgment, or shall call them away from earth by natural death, are great and formidable, though they are not equally dan; gerous: Let us consider each of them in succession, in order to rouse dead sinners from their lethargy, and to keep drowsy christians awake. First, let us survey the sad consequences, which attend those that are asleep in sin; and spiritually dead, when the hour of natural death approaches : They are shell as these : L " If they happen to be awakened on the borders of the grave, into what a horrible confusion and distress of soul are they plunged ?" What keen anguish of conscience, for their past iniquities seizes upon them ? What bitter remorse and self. reproaches, for the seasons of grace which they have wasted, for the proposals of mercy which they have abused and rejected, and for the divine salvation, which seems now to be lost for ever, and put almost beyond the reach of possibility and hope: They feel the messenger of death laying his cold hands upon them, and they shudder and tremble with the expectation of ap- proachingmisery. They look up to heaven, and they see a God of holiness there, as a consuming fire, ready to devour them as stubble fit for the flame : They look to the Son of God, who has the keys of death in his hand, and who calls them away from the land of the living, even to Jesus, the compassionate Media- tor, but they can scarce persuade themselves to expect any thing from him, because they have turned a deaf ear so long to the invitations of his gospel, and so long affronted his divine com- passion. They look behind them, and with painful agonies, are frighted at the mountains of their former guilt ready to overwhelm them : They look forward and see the pit of hell opening upon them with all its torments ; long darkness with - out-a glimpse of light, and eternal despair with no glimmerings of hope. Or if now and then amidst their horrors, they would try to form some faint hope of mercy, how are their'spirits perplexed with prevailing and distracting fears, with keen and cutting re- flections ? " Oh that 1 had improved my former seasons for reading, for praying, for meditating on divine things ! But I cannot read, I can hardly meditate, and scarce know how to pray.' Will the ear of God ever hearken to the cries and groans of a rebel, that has so long resisted his grace? Are there any pardons to be had for a criminal, who never left his sins till ven- geance was in view ? Will the blood of Christ be ever applied to wash a soul, that has wallowed in his defilements, till death roused him out of them ? Will the meanest favour of liessen be indulged to a wretch who has grown bold in sin, in opposi-
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