other part of the universe of God to be punished, or receive their reward, but more especially are they recompensed to the full in this earth. The saints will inherit or be recompensed in the earth, after sin and sinners are destroyed and the curse removed and it is re-created. All the judgments that God ever has or will pour out upon the wicked, are upon this earth. Here they have lived and sinned, and here Christ will meet them and reward them according to their deeds. Isa. 24:

The earth mourneth and fadeth away, the world languisheth and fadeth away, the haughty people of the earth do languish.

The earth also is defiled under the inhabitants thereof, because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant.

Therefore hath the curse devoured the earth, and they that dwell therein are desolate; therefore the inhabitants of the earth are burned, and few men left.

Fear, and the pit, and the snare, are upon thee, O inhabitant of the earth.

And it shall come to pass, that he who fleeth from the noise of the fear, shall fall into the pit, and he that cometh up out of the midst of the pit shall be taken in the snare; for the windows from on high are open, and the foundations of the earth do shake.

The earth is utterly broken down, the earth is clean dissolved, the earth is moved exceedingly.

The earth shall reel to and fro like a drunkard, and shall be removed like a cottage; and the transgression thereof shall be heavy upon it, and it shall fall and not rise again.

And it shall come to pass in that day that the Lord shall punish the host of the high ones that are on high, and the kings of the earth upon the earth.

And they shall be gathered together as prisoners are gathered in the pit, and shall be shut up in the prison, and after many days shall they be visited.

Then the moon shall be confounded, and the sun ashamed, when the Lord of hosts shall reign in Mount Zion, and in Jerusalem, and before his ancients, gloriously.

I have made this long quotation because these passages

express clearly the doctrine of the destruction of the wicked, and the change this earth will undergo preparatory to its being possessed by the righteous. The kings of the earth that are now gathered as prisoners in the pit, or grave, are to be visited again; they are to be brought forth in the day of judgment when the heavens and the earth shall shake, and shall be punished upon the earth with an utter extermination. Then will the glory of God fill the whole earth, and the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Heb. 12: 26:

Whose voice then shook the earth: but now he hath promised, saying, Yet once more I shake not the earth only, but also heaven.

And this word, Yet once more, signifieth the removing of those things that are shaken, as of things that are made, that those things which cannot be shaken, may remain.

Wherefore, we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably, with reverence and godly fear:

For our God is a consuming fire.

There is something that remains, then, after the shaking. Yes. The kingdom that the saints possess, and the eter nal reign of Christ as the Head of the new creation, will then be established and remain forever. The Apostle is in harmony with Isaiah, and as the subject is continued in the next chapter, we make another quotation. Isa. 25: 6:

And in this mountain shall the Lord of hosts make unto all people a feast of fat things, a feast of wines on the lees, of fat things, full of marrow, of wines on the lees well refined.

And he will destroy in this mountain the face of the covering cast over all people, and the veil that is spread over all nations.

He will swallow up death in victory, and the Lord will wipe away tears from off all faces, and the rebuke of his people shall be taken away from off all the earth, for the Lord hath spoken it.

And it shall be said in that day, Lo, this is our God, we have waited for him, and he will save us; this is the Lord, we have waited for him, we will be glad and rejoice in his salvation.

For in this mountain shall the hand of the Lord rest, and Moab shall be trodden down under him, even as straw is trodden down for the dunghill.

:

Mountain in prophesy, denotes a government or kingdom, and this mountain or kingdom, is Christ's everlasting kingdom that is to succeed all other kingdoms in this earth. Therefore this earth is the territory of Christ's kingdom, and will be the inheritance of the saints; consequently here will be prepared the Lord's feast of fat things for his people. The veil of mortality and death cast over all the inhabitants of the earth will then be destroyed, and death shall be swallow. ed up in victory. Moab, that stands in this prediction as a representative of the wicked, shall be trodden down under the Lord's feet, as straw is trodden down for the dunghill. 26: 1, 2: In that day shall this song be sung in the land of Judah-which is now the whole earth-We have a strong city salvation will God appoint for walls and bulwarks. Open ye the gates, that the righteous nation which keepeth the truth may enter in. O, what a joyful day to the righteous when the gates of salvation shall be opened wide and free, and they shall be invited to enter in and possess again their long-lost inheritance! Their foes will oppress them no more-the wicked trodden down and crushed beneath the Conqueror's rod, will rise to sin, blaspheme, and oppose no more. Then the wilderness and solitary place shall be glad for them, and the desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose. The parched ground shall become a pool, and the thirsty land springs of water in the habitation of dragons, where each lay shall be grass with reeds and rushes, and there shall be nothing to hurt or destroy in all God's holy mountain. Isa. 3: 5.

The quotations I have made are a key to understand many parts of Isaiah's and Jeremiah's predictions concerning the kingdom of Christ, the inheritance of the saints, and their glorious reign on earth. All these prophesies

will have their fulfillment on the new earth, wherein dwell. eth righteousness. Daniel 7: 13:

I saw in the night visions, and behold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of days, and they brought him near before him.

And there was given unto him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, and nations, and languages, should serve him; his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed.

27th v. And the kingdom, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him.

The locality of Christ's kingdom, and the inheritance of the saints, cannot be misunderstood if we consult the oracles of God. It is on this earth, after the judgment and destruction of the wicked, and no where else. Hence our Saviour said, Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is done in heaven. When this kingdom comes, there will be in it all that purity, holiness, and harmony, that there is in heaven above. Rev. 5: 10: And hath made us unto our God kings and priests, and we shall reign on the earth.

Enough has been here quoted, and said, to establish the doctrine that this earth is to be restored to the saints, and to become their final resting place. And it must be regarded as another essential doctrine of the Christian faith, and object to be secured in the plan of redemption. The Bible begins with a paradise-with a new heavens. and earth-and ends with the same. Between the two ends we have the fall of man, and its consequences, and the plan fully developed of his redemption, or restoration, and that of the earth.

DESTRUCTION OF THE WICKED.

From what the Scriptures teach of the plan of redemption, and the inheritance of the saints, as we have now examined these subjects-it must be plain to the reader that the wicked will be destroyed, eternally. But as this doctrine is disputed, I propose to examine it more particularly under a distinct head.

The penalty of the law is the first thing to be settled, in coming to an understanding of this doctrine. Wherever there is a law, there is a penalty to that law. If God gave to man a law, he gave a penalty to that law, and made man subject to that penalty, whenever he violated that law. Let us notice the law and its penalty. Gen. 2: 16. And the Lord God commanded [here is law] the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: But of the tree of knowledge of good and evil thou shalt not eat of it: [penalty] for in the day thou eatest thereof thou SHALT SURELY DIE. There need be no misunderstanding as to the nature of this penalty, or death. It is literal death, nothing more, nothing less.

Some would have it a spiritual death only, i. e., dead in sin-dead to holiness and righteousness. If this was the penalty, then man would never have died literally. But we are not left to conjecture, or to form our own opinions ; God has settled the question and declared what death the penalty is. We have noticed this once, but we will go over it again in this place.

In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground, for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art and unto dust shalt thou return. All speculation, and spiritualism is at an end; God is his own interpreter. It is nothing short of the literal dissolution of the man, and his return to his original elements. This is