and not for others? The Bible contains no hint of such a distinction among those whom the Judge will place on his left hand. They all will be sentenced to "depart, accursed, into everlasting fire," and all "shall go away into everlasting punishment." The decisions of that day are equally final to them all. When Christ shall have delivered the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall no longer sit upon his mediatorial throne as a Prince and a Savior, to give repentance and remission of sins; when the dead shall have been raised and the living changed, and all men shall have been judged according to their deeds; when the world shall have been burned up, the righteous received to heaven, and the wicked cast into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched; then probation will have ended, the affairs of the world will be finally settled, and each one of the human race will be permanently fixed in the condition of bliss or woe, for which his life on earth shall have prepared him.

CHAPTER VI.

THE INTERMEDIATE STATE.

Will any, with these declarations of the word of God before them, dare to neglect preparation for the Judgment while they live, hoping to attend to it in the grave? It would seem impossible for such rashness to find a place in any heart; and yet, as men are sometimes content with strange apologies for what they wish to do, it may be well to consider, more particularly than has yet been done, whether preparation for heaven may be safely deferred till after death.

Let us keep distinctly in mind, the question we are to examine. We have seen that at some future time, there is to be a General Resurrection, and a General Judgment, fol

lowed by Final Retribution. Those whom the Day of Judgment finds unprepared, must then " go away into everlasting punishment.' In this life, God gives us the means of grace, offers us pardon through the blood of his Son and the saving influences of his Spirit, and urges us to accept his offered mercy. May we safely put off the acceptance of that mercy till we are dead, trusting that these offers will be continued and that we shall accept them between death and the Judgment?

Let us remember that our all is at stake. If we neglect to prepare for heaven before we die, and if there should be no opportunity for preparation in the grave, our souls must be lost -lost forever. It would be better, infinitely better for us never to have been born, than to live and die unprepared for heaven, trusting to a future probation which we shall never see. A concern of such tremendous importance ought not to be deferred, unless we have the most conclusive proof that there will be another season in which we can attend to it. What, then, can we prove concerning it?

It is certain that, if there be such a second probation, some will neglect that opportunity to prepare for the Judgment, as well as this; for that day will find them still unprepared, and they will therefore be sentenced to "depart, accursed, into everlasting fire." That second probation, then, if there be a second, will not be a certain remedy for sin, sure to save all who waste the present. It will, like the present, be an opportunity that may be wasted, and that some will actually waste, as they do that now granted them. Either there will then, as now, be temptations to neglect the soul and persevere in sin; or the state of men's souls will be such that some will sin without temptation. There appears no reason to expect that those who waste their first probation, will make any better use of the second, if a second be granted them. It is dangerous, then, to die unprepared for the Judgment.

It is also certain, that to a part of the human race, no second probation will be granted. Some, as we have seen, I Thess. 4: 15, will be" alive and remain unto the coming of the

Lord." So Paul says, I Cor. 15: 51, 52, "We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump." And Peter, preaching to Cornelius and those that were in his house, said of Christ, "It is he, which was ordained of God to be the Judge of quick [of the living] and dead." And Paul, again, II Tim. 4: 1, "I charge thee therefore before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom, preach the word." And in I Pet. 4: 5, we

are told that the licentious and idolatrous heathen "shall give account to him that is ready to judge the quick and the dead." Those, then, who are alive and remain" at the day of Judgment, will not die, as men now do. They will be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump." They will then be judged, with all others, "according to their works ;" and that judgment, we have seen, is final. It settles their condition forever. There is no time in which they can enjoy a second probation, between death and