the birthright, who supplant Esau, who purchase that which the Gentile apostasy reject, and shall inherit it when they seek it carefully with tears. Of that birthright, the first resurrection, or the translation, is the beginning; for they are the first-fruits unto God and to the Lamb, and escape the things that come upon the world. The residue of the birthright is just what Laodicea is counselled to purchase, and what she may obtain along with Philadelphia; not the execution of the Lord's vengeance from the air, but the fine gold and the white raiment. These she is called to purchase, as they who "buy wine and milk without money and without price" (Isai. Iv. 1), as they do who "buy the truth and sell it not" (Prov. xxiii. 23), as they do who sell all and buy the field (Matt. xiii. 44), as they do who buy oil from them that sell (Matt. xxv. 9): she is called to buy that concerning which she will not say, like other buyers, "It is naught, it is naught" (Prov. xx. 14): she is called to buy, at the command of God, in that awful hour of temptation wherein no man may buy or sell save he that hath the mark of the beast (Rev. xiii. 17); and to buy, foreseeing the time when no man shall any more buy the merchandize of Babylon, the well-favoured harlot, the mistress of witchcrafts, that selleth nations through her whoredoms, and families through her witchcrafts (Nah. iii. 4; Rev. xviii. 11).-Lastly, She is called, through her angel, to buy from Christ. She hath been buying from others, because she hath been buying things which Christ hath not to sell. She hath been buying a name which all men may know-not that name which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it." She hath bought sorceries and enchantments with the blood of the Lamb, that she hath bartered for gold. She hath disesteemed the reproach of Christ; esteeming the treasures of Egypt-the wealth of a republican because a Christless world. She hath wrought fine linen; not the fine linen of the Lamb's bride (Prov. xxxi. 24), but fine linen of Egypt, which is science (Prov. vii. 16). She hath forgotten to stand without fault in the blood before the Throne. She hath so coveted the conversion of wise men, or sorcerers, that she hath herself been well nigh converted into a mass of sorcery. She hath ceased to overcome by the Blood. She hath listened to "the accuser of the brethren, who accuseth them before our God day and night;" and hath persuaded men that they do right in giving ear to his accusation. She hath believed the liar, who saith that we are not without fault; and that the curse of the Law, and not the blood of the Lamb, doth stand between men and God; and so she hath ceased to defeat the liar. She knoweth not the victory of having faith through the Blood, despite of that accusation from a liar. She dishonoureth the Blood. She exceeds the

Papacy, in selling the remission of sins to gain the good will of them that love not God. Rome sells to men a participation in that remission which she herself professes to enjoy; but this our Laodicea doth, for the like end, barter away altogether. even from herself, the perfect and complete purgation of the conscience by the blood of Jesus: for she hath wilfully rejected this exhortation : 66 Let them return unto thee, but return not thou unto them" (Jer. xv. 19). She hath brought till she hath no more to bring; and if she bring nothing better, she shall find all vanity. Therefore Christ giveth her a twofold exhortation: counselling her to buy things which are not vanity, which she can find only with him; counselling her to buy from him what she buyeth, and from him she shall get no vanity. Now, what is she called to buy? First, she is to buy "gold fired out of the fire, that she may be rich." We all know the beauty and excellence of gold. It is employed by the Spirit of God to designate every thing that looks fair and splendid and enduring, whether in the eye of man or in the eye of God. The new Jerusalem is of pure gold; so are the streets thereof; so is the crown of the King of kings; so are the girdles of his risen saints: so also are the deckings of the mother of harlots, and the cup full of abominations which she holdeth. But while both the things which seem pure and the things which are so are expressed by gold," those only which are so are called "gold tried in the fire." For those only are so which God, who alone is Truth, findeth to be so. "Our God is a consuming fire;" and his judgment shall be seen in the day that shall be revealed by fire. Laodicea buildeth, and that on The Foundation too-else she were no church at all-but what doth she build? gold, silver, precious stones? Verily, no: wood, hay, stubble-very stubble, stubble fully dry,-works of pride, to be consumed; works which she herself, when she repenteth, will blush for and abhor. Every man must produce his work. There will be no selection, colouring, cloak, in that day of light. "Whatsoever doth make manifest is light" (Eph. v. 13). "Every man's work shall be made manifest; for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire: and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is. If any man's work abide, which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward: if any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss; but he himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire" (1 Cor. iii. 13). Now, Laodicea shall be saved by fire: she shall suffer loss: her work shall not be fireproof, just because it is hers, and not the Lord's. Christ con-. fesseth that only which is of his Father. The end of his Gospel is this, that in the Day of Judgment men may be found working the works of God. And "he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest that

they are wrought in God" (John iii. 21). Wherefore the saints, who obtain faith in God unseen, by conquering the unseen powers of darkness; and who, by faith in God unseen, do overcome things seen, and walk by faith, and not by sight; do rejoice in their inheritance to come, "that the trial of their faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth though IT be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ (1 ̊ Pet. i. 7). As it is written," He knoweth the way that I take: when He hath tried me I shall come forth as gold" (Job xxiii. 10):“I will try them as gold is tried" (Zech. xiii. 9): and again, "The fining-pot is for silver, and the furnace for gold; but the Lord trieth the hearts" (Prov. xvii. 3). The trial of the reins, then, is the fire, the true fire, of which the flaming fire is the type. It trieth our faith it shall try the faith of Laodicea; and try it by her works; for God judgeth no man in a corner, but taketh evidence against the heart by the works. "Hath thy faith wrought?" and "Hast thou wrought in faith?" are the two aspects of God's just inquisition. When God trieth the gold of the rich angel, he taketh its rust as a witness against it that it is not of him. And so Christ saith, Buy of me, not gold-not gold which promiseth to stand the fire-but gold fined already, the fruit of that faith which is "the substance of things hoped for." In the same strain speaketh he of the garments. Nakedness is no shame to the righteous: Adam and Eve were naked, but not ashamed; and he who knoweth God, and is known of Him, is not ashamed before him in whose eyes all things are naked and open. It was by the Fall that man got shame of spirit and shame of body. Nakedness hath become a shame by the Fall: it is as fallen creatures that we require the shame of our nakedness not to appear; and that shame disappeareth in the blood of the Lamb, wherein if any man walk, wherewith if any man be sprinkled, he cannot be naked. If any man be in Christ, he is perfectly clean in God's sight: the blood of Christ cleanseth from all sin; He hath washed us from our sins in his blood. The continual accusation of him who accuseth us before our God day and night--the continual lie of his children-is, that we are unclean before God; for he knoweth that he can alway keep guile in our mouths, if he can persuade us that we are not without fault before the Throne. But when he accuseth us unto God, God answereth him with the words, " Behold my Son, in whom I am well pleased:" and we must answer, with equal certainty, "He hath washed us in his blood." This last is the righteousness, the "fine linen," which is by faith-faith in the name which Jesus hath in the sight of his Father and our Father: the victory which we have in the blood of the Lamb. On that blood God is alway looking: Christ hath filled the

holy place with its presence-with the presence of that holy blood the sight of which moved the Father to visit him in the grave and raise him from death. He representeth all flesh in the holiest of all. In that blood God remembereth no sin: as it is written," God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing unto them their trespasses:" "Their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more." And when it is said that God hath remembered the sins of Babylon, that signifieth that she hath counted as an unclean or common thing that precious Blood wherewith she was sanctified. For by one offering hath God perfected the sanctified: he hath sanctified (or dedicated to himself in his gracious desire) the whole world by that Blood. But if any man despise that Blood, and clothe himself, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins. So Edom is to make herself naked (Lam. iv. 21). "He that is courageous among the mighty shall flee away naked in that day" (Amos ii. 16). To the virgin daughter of Babylon God saith, "Thy nakedness shall be uncovered; yea, thy shame shall be seen (Isa. xlvii. 3): "I will shew the nations thy nakedness" (Neh. iii. 5). And to this very angel of Laodicea the Holy Ghost, in the midst of the seven vials which the risen saints pour out, most tenderly writeth," Behold, I come as a thief: blessed is he that watcheth and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame" (Rev. xvi. 15). Now, inasmuch as the clothings of Laodicea are neither the unashamed nakedness of unfallen flesh, nor the unashamed sprinkling of the blood of the Lamb, Jesus warneth her to buy garments of him ;-white garments; for they which shall believe in the midst of the judgments shall have washed their robes, and shall HAVE made their garments white in his blood (Rev. vii. 14). Which thing all are now doing in the true act of faith towards God through Jesus Christ, who hath " put away sin by the sacrifice of him

self."

66

"As many as I love I rebuke and chasten: be zealous therefore, and repent" (Rev. iii. 19).-The rebuke and chastening here spoken of are evidently the judgments of the Lord; his refutation of every lie which the liar's children have told concerning him since the world began. The word eλeyx truly means, to refute, or convict. The light reproveth the deeds of darkness (John iii. 20). The Holy Ghost shall convince the world of sin" (John xvi. 8). And while the minister of Christ comforts the church, he rebukes gainsayers (Tit. i. 9). But the chastening here mentioned (Taidevia) contains in it the idea of fatherly instruction from God to his children. And therefore, while rebuke alone expresses wrath, rebuke and chastening express love as it is written, "My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, neither faint when thou art rebuked of

:

him; for whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth" (Heb. xii. 5). This corresponds with the fact already set forth more than once in commenting on these epistles so full of God's manifold wisdom; that the great tribulation (Rev. vii. 14) into which the sealed ones shall never enter, shall fall upon two classes of men, represented before the Flood by Methuselah and Lamech; of whom the former shall blaspheme the more because of the delusions and plagues, while the latter shall be established before God: as it is written, "These are they which came out of the great tribulation, and have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb; therefore are they before the throne of God" (Rev. vii. 14). Whence appears the emphasis of the words, "Whom I love I rebuke and chasten," evidently intended of God to inform the angel that his rebuke has towards Laodicea a different intention and aspect from his rebuke of them to whom he sendeth in righteous judgment strong delusion to believe a lie. It is the character of chastening, and not that of infliction, which exhibits the love the love lies in the instruction: and, if so, how profitable ought this Scripture to be, in delivering us from the widespread delusion that mere suffering proceeds from God, and is at once a token of his love and an agent in bestowing his grace -a foul delusion indeed, by which Satan is just preparing Laodicea to be content under his oppression with the mockery of resignation to God, and to withhold repentance by mistaking rebuke for chastening, so as not to give heed to the chastening at all. The church hath for a long time so forgotten her own true estate, the true estate of the world wherein she witnesses, and the true use of sickness and suffering, that her poor, neglected, unhealthy children absolutely stare when you speak to them of sickness as the work of the devil. They believe in a deity who is little else than a graft of theological (call them not Christian) dogmas upon an omnipotent but impersonal fate-a being whose mind it is impious to investigate, and unprofitable to know. And so they know little indeed of the God and Father of Jesus Christ, who is even now destroying the works of the devil: therefore we must faithfully disabuse them, at whatever expenses, of all their fancies that suffering is a token of God's love and approbation. What! did not sin enter into the world by Satan, and death by sin? Hath he ceased now to work sin, because he introduced it at the first? And is death less his present work, because he began it? Is not the devil he that hath the power of death, whom Christ by his death shall destroy; taking the wicked in his own craftiness? Surely God hath not taken up and been carrying on the things which Satan began; when the mission of his Son was to take up things in that condition into which Satan had brought them, and rescue them out of it: as it