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as for the good: there is a preparatory Hell as well as a preparatory Heaven. And as the souls of good men, who die, will not receive their full measure of perfect bliss and glory, until the general resurrection from the dead, so it will be with the wicked. Their measure of suffering and punishment will not be filled until the sentence of condemnation has been pronounced upon them. But they will be like accused criminals committed to take their trial at the next assizes. They will be in a state of constant pain and suffering. The place in which they are confined, the thick gloom and silence which surround them, the consciousness of their guilt, the remorse of conscience, the woe-stricken countenances of their fellow prisoners, the anticipation of their trial, and all its attendant circumstances, the stern looks of the Judge, the certainty of their conviction, and the prospect of suffering the eternal vengeance of Hell fire-these things will fill them with agony and anguish, so that they will not rest day nor night. And may God of His great mercy grant, for Christ's sake, that neither you nor I may ever experience these horrors in reality! May we all so live the life that now is, in Christ, by Christ, and for Christ, that when we die, angels may carry us into Abraham's bosom ; there to rest in sweet repose, until the archangel's trump shall bid us rise on the resurrection morn.

LECTURE XIII.

A. ... The third day He rose again from the dead;

......

It has been said by Bishop Horne, "the idea of pleasure is inseparable from that of a garden, where man still seeks after lost happiness, and where, perhaps, a good man finds the nearest resemblance of it which this world affords." Now doubtless this is true in its direct signification; of all employments the occupation and cultivation of a garden are capable of affording the most pure and innocent delight. This at least we may believe, independently of our own. experience, from the mere fact that man was originally placed in the garden of Eden by his benevolent Creator. But the above remark is equally true in another and higher sense. The idea and mention of a garden cannot but awaken in the mind of a good man feelings of pleasurable delight; his chiefest happiness, his dearest hopes, his brightest prospects are associated with it. True, he cannot look back upon the once happy scene in the garden of Paradise,

when all was simplicity and guilelessness, without feelings of pain and sorrow. True, he cannot behold the awful and appalling sufferings of His Redeemer in the garden of Gethsemane without remorse and self-abasement, for he knows that his very own sins were instrumental in causing them. Yet when he looks to the mighty and inexpressible blessings, which were purchased for him on that sacred spot, he cannot but rejoice, though it be with fear and trembling. But more especially, when he advances three days from that time, and joins company very early in the morning with Mary Magdalene, and with her enters the garden in the place where Jesus was crucified-oh! has not the good man reason to rejoice with unmingled rejoicing? As he looks into the sepulchre of his crucified Redeemer, and sees" the linen clothes lying, and the napkin that was about his head, not lying with the linen clothes, but wrapped together in a place by itself;" as he hears an unearthly voice address his weeping companion, and say, " Fear not; for I know that ye seek Jesus, which was crucified; He is not here for He is risen, as He said:"—yea, as he hears the voice of the Lord Himself speak and say, "Mary," --has not the good man, I ask, every reason to hail with delight and pleasure the very name of a garden, consecrated, as it thus is, to his memory by all that is most dear and precious to him, by events which have obtained for him in full his lost happiness, the

blessings of his first estate of bliss, and purity, and innocence? My little children, as oft as you see, or enter into a garden, recollect that the sepulchre, in which the body of Jesus was laid after its removal from the cross, was in a garden; and that there it was, where our Lord first shewed Himself alive after His death to the mourning Magdalene: and then try to encourage the good thoughts of love and gratitude to your Saviour, which should necessarily arise in your hearts. If you recal to mind the great blessings, which come to us, in consequence of our Lord's resurrection from the dead, surely you will feel grateful to Him, whenever anything puts you in remembrance of that great and glorious event. For it is the foundation of all our hopes; the keystone of the arch, as it were, upon which the building of the Christian religion is raised. Remove it, and all falls to atoms; nothing real, nor substantial remains. As St. Paul argued, "If Christ be not risen, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins-If in this life only we have hope

in Christ, we are of all men the most miserable"-we are absolutely in a worse condition than the heathen, who have never heard the name of Christ. Our religion requires us to make sacrifices for Christ's sake, to practise self-denial, to carry a daily cross, to endure tribulations and persecutions, and forego our own comfort and indulgence; and if there be no hope of a recompence of reward on the other side of the

grave, there is nothing to cheer and encourage us,
day by day, in our work of patience and self sacrifice.
The yoke of Christ is no longer easy, His burden is
no longer light. But thanks be to God, "now is
Christ risen from the dead, and become the first fruits
of them that slept." As we have believed that He
suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead and
buried, and that He descended into hell, so we now
believe that the third day He rose again from the
dead. It had of old been declared by the mouth of
David, His father after the flesh, that Christ's soul
should not be left in hell, and that His flesh should
not see corruption.
so it came to pass.

And as it had been thus foretold,
On the day of His crucifixion,

Christ's soul went down into Hell, the place of the departed spirits of good men, and His body was laid in the grave. But neither the one, nor the other, remained in their respective abodes beyond the third day. Though death seemed to triumph on the cross, yet its bands were soon loosed, for "it was not possible that Christ should long be holden of them." As St. Peter stated in his address on the day of Pentecost, "Him, whom ye have taken and by wicked hands have crucified and slain, God hath raised up." And Paul in his address at Antioch stated, "He, whom God raised again, saw no corruption." Thus literally was fulfilled the prophecy of David. In like manner also the type of Jonah in the whale's belly