duct unto eternal glory is committed unto Christ, stands in need of the ministry of angels. And therefore hath God granted rule and power over them unto him, that nothing might be wanting to enable him to save unto the uttermost them that come unto God by him. So God hath given him to be head over all things to the church, Ephes. i. 22. that he should with an absolute sovereignty, use and dispose of all things to the benefit and advantage of the church.

This is the first branch of the lordship and dominion of Christ, according to the distribution of the severals of it before laid down. He is Lord of angels, and they are all of them his servants, the fellow-servants of them that have the testimony of Jesus. And as some men do wilfully cast themselves by their religious adoration of angels, under the curse of Canaan, to be servants unto servants, Gen. ix. 25. so it is the great honour and privilege of true believers, that in their worship of Christ, they are admitted into the "society of an innumerable company of angels," Heb. xii. 22. Rev. xv. 1-3. for they are not ashamed to esteem them their fellow-servants, whom their Lord and king is not ashamed to call his brethren. And herein consists our communion with them, that we have one common head and Lord; and any intercourse with them, but only on this account, or any worship performed towards them, breaks the bond of that communion, and causeth us not to hold the head, Col. ii. 19. The privilege, the safety and advantage of the church, from this subjection of angels to its head and Saviour, are by many spoken unto.

II. There is another sort of angels, those who "by sin left their primitive station," and fell off from God, of whom, and of their sin, fall, malice, wrath, business, craft in evil, and final judgment, the Scripture treateth at large. These belong not indeed to the possession of Christ, as he is the heir, but they belong unto his dominion as he is Lord. Though he be not a king and head unto them, yet he is a Judge and ruler over them. All things being given into his hand, they also are subjected unto his power. Now, as under the former head, I shall consider, 1. The right or equity, and 2. The end of this authority of Christ over this second sort, of the first race of intellectual creatures, the angels that have sinned.

1. As before, this right is founded in his divine nature, by virtue whereof, he is ixavos, fit for this dominion. He made these angels also, and therefore, as God, hath an absolute dominion over them. The creatures cannot cast off the dominion of the Creator by rebellion; though they may lose their moral relation unto God as obedient creatures, yet their natural, as creatures, cannot be dissolved. God will be God still, be his creatures never so wicked; and if they obey not his will

they shall bear his justice. And this dominion of Christ over fallen angels, as God, makes the grant of rule over them to him, as Mediator, just and equal.

2. The immediate and peculiar foundation of his right unto rule over fallen angels rendering the special grant of it equal and righteous, is lawful conquest. This gives a special right, Gen. xlviii. 22. Now that Christ should conquer fallen angels was promised from the foundation of the world, Gen. iii. 15. The seed of the woman, the Messiah, was to break the serpent's head, despoil him of his power, and bring him into subjection; which he performed accordingly, Col. ii. 15. He spoiled principalities and powers, divested fallen angels of all that title they had got to the world, by the sin of man; triumphing over them as captives, to be disposed of at his pleasure. He stilled, or made to cease as to his power, this enemy, pan, and self-avenger, Psal. viii. 2. leading captivity captive, Psal. lxviii. 18. breaking in pieces the head over the large earth, Psal. cx. 6. binding the strong man armed, and spoiling his goods. And the Scripture of the New Testament is full of instances as to his executing his power and authority over evil angels; they take up a good part of the historical books of it.

Man having sinned by the instigation of Satan, he was, by the just judgment of God, delivered up to Satan's power, Heb. ii. 14. The Lord Christ undertaking to recover lost man from under his power by destroying his works, 1 John iii. S. and to bring them again into favour with God; Satan with all his might sets himself to oppose him in his work, and failing in his enterprise, being utterly conquered, he became absolutely subjected to him, trodden under his feet, and the prey he had taken was delivered from him.

This is the next foundation of the authority of Christ over the evil angels. He had a great contest and war with them, and that about the glory of God, his own kingdom, and the eternal salvation of the elect; prevailing absolutely against them, he made a conquest over them, and they are put in subjection to him for ever. They are subjected to him, as to their present actings, and future condition. He now rules them, and will hereafter finally judge them. And in so far as in his holiness and wisdom he suffers them to act in temptations, seductions, and persecutions, he bounds and limits their rage, malice and actings; he orders and disposes these events to his own holy and righteous ends, and keeps them under "chains for the judgment of the last day." Then, for the full manifestation of his dominion over them, he will cause the meanest of his servants to set their feet on the necks of these conquered kings, and to join with himself in sentencing them to eternal ruin, 1 Cor. vi. 3. into which they shall be cast by him, Rev. xix.

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2. The ends of this lordship of Christ are various, as, 1. His own glory, Psal. cx. 1. 2. The safety of the church, Mat. xvi. 18. Rev. xii. 7-9. And 3. Exercise for their good. By temptation, 1 Pet. v. 8-10.. And 2. Persecution, Rev. ii. 10. xii. 10. both which he directs, regulates, and bounds to their eternal advantage. 4. The exercising of his wrath and vengeance on his stubborn enemies, whom these slaves and vassals to his righteous power, seduce, blind, harden, provoke, ruin and destroy, Rev. xii. 15. xvi. 13, 14. Psal. cvi. how much of the peace, safety and consolation of believers lies wrapt up in this part of the dominion of Christ, it were easy to demonstrate, as also that faith's improvement of it, in every condition, is the greatest part of our wisdom in our pilgri mage.

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And

III. All mankind, (the second sort of intellectual creatures or rational subsistences) belong to the lordship and dominion of Christ. All mankind was in the power of God as one gaua, one mass,' or lump out of which all individuals are made and framed, Rom. ix. 21. Some to honour, some to dishonour; the auto Qugaua, not denoting the same substance, but one common condition,' and the making of the individuals, is not by temporal creation, but eternal designation. So that all mankind, made out of nothing, and out of the same condition destined to several ends for the glory of God, are branched into two sorts. Elect, or vessels from the common mass to honour; and reprobates, or vessels from the common mass to dishonour. As such, they were typified by Jacob and Esau, Rom. ix. 11, 12. and are expressed under that distribution, 1 Thess. v. 9. Some «r «exas, from the beginning being chosen to salvation,' 2 Thess. ii. 13. go xalaboλns xeoux, Eph. i. 4. before the foundation of the world,' Rom. viii. 29. xi. 5. Mat. xx. 16. 2 Tim. ii. 10. Rev. xxi. 27. Others are appointed to the day of evil, Prov. xvi. 4. madaι wgoyygauusvos, of old fore-ordained to condemnation,' Jude 4. us aλwoiv xai logar, for to be destroyed,' 2 Pet. ii. 12. See Rom. ix. 22. xi. 7. Rev. xx. 15.

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To both these sorts, or to all mankind, is the lordship of Christ extended, and to each of them respectively. 1. He is Lord over all flesh, John xvii. 2. both living and dead, Rom. xiv. 9. Phil. ii. 9, 10.

2. Particularly he is Lord over all the elect. And besides the general foundation of the equity of his authority and power in his divine nature, and in the creation of all things, the grant of the Father to him as Mediator to be their Lord, is founded in other especial acts both of Father and Son. For,

1. They were given to him from eternity in design and by compact, that they should be his peculiar portion, and he their Saviour, John xvii. 2. Of the warns cagnos, all flesh,' over

which he hath authority, there is a xavi didaxe, an universality of them, whom the Father gave him in a special manner, of whom he says, "thine they were, and thou gavest them unto me," ver. 6. Acts xviii. 10. They are a portion given him to save, John vi. 39. of which he takes the care, as Jacob did of the sheep of Laban when he served him for a wife, Gen. xxxi. 36.40. See Prov. viii. 30, 31. This was an act of the will of the Father in the eternal covenant of the Mediator, whereof elsewhere.

2. His grant is strengthened by redemption, purchase and acquisition. This was the condition of the former grant, Isa. liii. 10-12. and this condition was made good by him; so that his lordship is frequently asserted on this very account, 1 Cor. vi. 20. 1 Pet. i. 18, 19. 1 Tim. ii. 5, 6. John x. 15. xi. 52. Eph. v. 25-27. Rev. v. 9. And this purchase of Christ, is peculiar to them so given him of the Father in the covenant of the Mediator, as, 1. Proceeding from his especial and greatest love, John xv. 12, 13. Rom. v. 8. 1 John iii. 16. iv. 9, 10. Acts xx. 28. Rom. viii. 32. And, 2. Being accompanied with a purchase for them which they shall certainly enjoy, and that of grace and glory, Acts xx. 28. Eph. i. 14. Acts ii. 36. Phil. i. 29. Heb. ix. 12. 15. And indeed the controversy about the death of Christ, is not primarily about its extent, but its efficacy and fruits in respect of them for whom he died.

3. Those thus given him of the Father and redeemed by him, are of two sorts. 1. Such as are actually called to faith in him, and union with him. These are further become his, upon many other especial accounts. They are his, in all relations of subjection, his children, servants, brethren, disciples, subjects, his house, his spouse. He stands towards them in all relations of authority; he is their Father, Master, elder Brother, Teacher, King, Lord, Ruler, Judge, and Husband; he rules in them by his Spirit and grace, and over them by his laws in his word; he preserves them by his power, chastens them in his care and love; in his providence feeds them out of his stores; tries them and delivers them in his wisdom; bears with their miscarriages in his patience; and takes them for his portion, his lot and inheritance; he raises them at the last day, and takes them to himself in glory; every way avouching them to be his, and himself to be their Lord and Master.

2. Some of them are always uncalled, and shall be so, until the whole number of them be completed and filled. But even before they are called, they belong, on the former accounts, to his lot, care and rule, John x. 6. They are already his sheep by grant and purchase, though not yet really so by grace and holiness. They are not yet his, by present obedi

ential subjection, but they are his by eternal designation and real acquisition.

Now the power that the Lord Jesus hath over this part of mankind is universal, unlimited, absolute, and exclusive of all other power over them, as to the things peculiarly belonging to his kingdom. He is their King, Judge, Lawgiver, and in things of God, purely spiritual and evangelical, other they have none. It is true he takes them not out of the world, and therefore, as to a BINTIxa, the things of this life,' things of the world, they are subject to the laws and rulers of the world; but as to the things of God, he is the only Lawgiver who is able to kill and make alive. But the nature and ends of the lordship of Christ over the elect, are too large and comprehensive to be here spoken unto, in this brief delincation of his kingdom, which we undertook in this digression.

2. His lordship and dominion extends to the other sort of men also, namely, reprobates, and men finally impenitent. They are not exempted from that "all flesh" which he hath power over, John xvii. 2. nor from those "quick and dead" over whom he is Lord, Rom. xiv. 9. nor from that "world" which he shall judge, Acts xvii. 31. And there are two special grounds that are peculiar to them, of this grant, and power, and authority over them.

1st, His interposition upon the entrance of sin against the immediate execution of the curse due to it, as befel the angels. This fixed the world under a dispensation of,

1. Forbearance and patience, Rom. ii. 4, 5. Acts xvii. 30. Rom. ix. 22. Psal. lxxv. 3.

2. Goodness and mercy, Acts xiv. 16, 17.

That God who spared not the angels, when they sinned, but immediately cast them into chains of darkness, should place sinners of the race of Adam, under a dispensation of forbearance and goodness; that he should spare them with much longsuffering during their pilgrimage on the earth, and fill their hearts with food and gladness, with all whose fruits of kindness, which the womb of his providence is still bringing forth for their benefit and advantage; is thus far on the account of the Lord Christ, that though these things as relating to reprobates, are no part of his especial purchase, as Mediator of the everlasting covenant of grace, yet they are a necessary consequent of his interposition against the immediate execution of the whole curse upon the first entrance of sin, and of his undertaking for his elect.

2d, He makes a conquest over them. It was promised that he should do so, Gen. iii. 15. and though the work itself prove long and irksome, though the ways of accomplishing it be to us obscure, and oftentimes invisible, yet he hath undertaken it,