himself, but whatsoever he should hear, that, only, he should speak.

No ill effects would, then, proceed from the privilege of being let into new truths, or, of being entrusted with the power of foretelling things to come. And, from the very consideration, that Jesus had engaged to confer such privileges upon his disciples, who, if not overruled in the use of them, that is, if not truly and immediately inspired, would, or rather must, have employed them to the discredit and subversion of his own design; from this single consideration, I say, it may fairly be concluded, especially when we can now compare the assurance with the event, That He himself was the person, he assumed to be, that is, A DIVINE PERSON; and his religion, what we believe it to be, THE WORD AND WILL OF

GOD.

SERMON XLIV.

PREACHED MAY 29, 1774. T. S.

ACTS i. 11.

Fe men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus, which is taken up from you, shall so come, in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.

As the entrance of Jesus into the world, so his departure out of it, was graced by the ministry of angels. Events, so important as these, deserved, and, it seems, required, to be so dignified. His birth was, indeed, obscure and mean; and therefore the attendance of those flaming ministers might be thought necessary to illustrate and adorn it. But his ascension into heaven was an event so full of

glory, that it needed not, we may think, any additional lustre to be thrown upon it by this celestial appearance. For what so likely to raise the ideas and excite the admiration of those, who were witnesses of this event, as the fact itself, so sublimely and yet so simply related in these words of the sacred historian while they beheld, he was taken up, and a cloud received him out of their sight?

We may presume, then, that the heavenly host were not sent merely to dignify this transaction, in its own nature so transcendantly awful; but for some further purpose of divine Providence. And we find that purpose expressed very plainly in the words of the text; which contain an admonition of great importance, and direct the attention of the disciples to the true end, for which this scene of wonder was displayed before them. For while they looked stedfastly toward heaven, as he went up, two men stood by them in white apparel; which, also, said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come, in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.

The Apostles, we may suppose, were only occupied with the splendor of the shew; or

they were wholly absorbed in the contemplation of its miraculous nature; or they were speculating, perhaps, on the circumstances of it. They were asking themselves, as they gazed (at least, if they had possessed the philosophic spirit of our days, they might be tempted to ask), how the natural gravity of a human body could permit its ascent in so light a mediumhow a cloud, which is but a sheet of air, impregnated with vapours, and made visible by reflected light, could be a fit vehicle of a gross and ponderous substance, and serve for the conveyance of it into the purer regions of æther, which we call heaven-or, what need indeed there was, that Jesus should be carried up thither; as if the God, to whom he ascended, were not in every place, alike; as if there were any such distinction, as high and low, with regard to him; as if all space were not equally inhabited by an infinite spirit; and as if his throne were not in the depths beneath, as well as the heights above, every where, in short, without respect to our descriptions of place, where himself existed.

From such a state of mind, or from such meditations as these, the Angels divert the Apostles, and call off their attention to a point, which deserved it better, and concerned them

more nearly. "Tis, as if they had said, "Suspend your admiration of this glorious spectacle; suppress all your fond and useless speculations about the causes of this event, and learn from us the proper uses of it. Ye have seen your Master thus visibly carried up from you into heaven; by what means, ye need not know, and may well forbear to inquire. But this intelligence receive from us (and it much imports you to be made acquainted with it); this same Jesus, who is thus gone up from you for a time into heaven, will come again with the same, or even additional glory, to judge the world in righteousness; to see what improvements ye have made of all he has done and suffered for you; and to fix your final doom according to your respective deserts, or miscarriages. Think well of this instruction, which so naturally results from all he said while he was with you on earth, and from what has now passed before your eyes; drop all your other inquiries, and resolve them into this, above all, deserving your best attention, how ye may prepare yourselves for that day, when he shall so come, in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.”

The weight of this angelic admonition was enough to put all curious imaginations to flight,