thing that was right, as Job had done, chap. xlii. 7, 8. But, feting afide a future ftate, the friends would have fpoke more worthily of God, by vindicating his Providence in the exact diftribution of good and evil in this life; and Job, who afferted the contrary, would have mifreprefented his dealings with mankind.

The Patriarchs before and after Job, and the Ifraelites before Chrift came, had a notion of a future ftate. By facrifices was plainly fhewn, that a way was open to the Divine Favor and Acceptance; and the favor of God imports happiness, which to Abel, who was for that very reafon, because he was accepted of God, unjustly flain, could be only in a future ftate. Heb. xi. 4. Kas di' aurns arobavwv and dying on account of that his faith be yet fpeaketh an invifible future state of reward.-The tranflation of Enoch and Elijah, in two diftant ages, were well known demonftrations of a future ftate of reward and glory.-They were certainly acquainted with God and Angels, and heaven where both refided. Gen. xxii. 11. And the connection between this world and heaven, by the ministry of Angels, was clearly reprefented to Jacob. Genefis xxviii. 12. They muft, therefore, have a notion of another and better world.

The promise to Abraham, Genefis xvii. 7. I will be a God unto thee, we shall find is the fame with the gospel promife, and therefore must include the gift of eternal life. And as that promife was fure to Abraham, Ifaac, and Jacob, when they were dead, (Exodus iii. 6.) our Lord rightly infers, that they would rife again. (Luke xx. 37, 38.) For God is not a God of the dead, who cannot, as fuch, be benefited by him, but of the living; for though they are dead, they all live unto him, or with refpect of him, as he will raise them all to life again.-And the Patriarchs thus understood this promife; for when they confidered and represented their life in this world as a pilgrimage, Genefis xlvii. 9. or a state of fojourning or traveling, they plainly intimated that they were feeking, margida, their Father's country i. e. the heavenly country or city. Heb. xi. 1316. Had the profpects of Mofes been confined to this world, doubtless he would have preferred the pleasures and honours of Pharaoh's court; but by refufing them, and chufing rather to fuffer with the people of God, he plainly indicated, that he had refpect to the future recompence of reward. Heb. xi. 24, 25, 26,

It is certain the Jews, even during their peculiarity, were under the Abrahamic, or Gospel covenant, promifing the pardon of fin, and eternal life, as well as under the law, or Sinai covenant. Deut. xxix. 12, 13. And furely, if they were admited to a covenant of life and immortality, they could not be ignorant of a future ftate. Nor can it be judged at all improbable, that Mofes propounds eternal life to them in fuch paffages as this, Deut. xxx. 6. The Lord thy God will circumcife thy heart, and the heart of thy feed, to love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy foul, that thou mayft live. This our Lord understood of eternal life. Luke x. 25, &c. When one asked him, What shall I do to inherit eternal life? he fent him to the law of Mofes; and when the enquirer readily quoted the rule of life given by Mofes, our Lord replied, Thou hast anfwered well; this do, and thou shalt live, meaning eternally, Which leads us to understand Mofes in the fame fenfe, when he proposes life as the reward of their fincere religion, virtue, and goodness. Deut. xxx. 15, 19, 20,

19, 20. Lev. xviii. 5. compared with Romans x. 5. Gal. iii. 10, 11, 12. Indeed life and prosperity in the land of Canaan, is intermixed with such promises. This is to be confidered as addreffed to them in a national capacity, and with refpect to the covenant of peculiarity. [NoteLife is put for eternal life, John vi. 47, 48, 52, 53, 58.] ♫ is the begining, or former part; properly denotes, what comes after, the after part, time, or ftate. Thus Job's time, after his afflictions were over, is called his ahharith, chap. xlii. 12. So is a man's pofterity, or those that come after him in being. Amos iv. 2.

Sometimes it fignifies the happy confequence, or fequel of a course of action, Proverbs xxiv. 14, 20; frequently after-days, or times in this world; but is never used more properly than to denote a future state after death. Num. xxiii. 10. Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my ahharith, my after, or future fate, be like bis. Pfalm lxxiii. 3-18. The wicked lived in profperity, and died an eafy death. There are no bands in their death, verfe 4. I envied them, faith David, verse 17, until I went into the fanctuary of God; then understood I their ahharith, future State after death. Surely thou haft fet them in flippery places; thou haft caft them down into eternal deftruction, &c. Verse 20. As a dream after one is awake; fo, O Lord, when thou awakeft [y in awaking them, or when they are awakened] thou wilt defpife, [debase, pour contempt upon, Da. niel xii. 2.] their image [ their vain, shadowy, unsubstantial con

dition.] Verse 23. Nevertheless I am continually with thee, [the object of thy fpecial care.] Verse 24-27. Thou shalt guide me by thy counsel, and afterward receive me to glory, &c. Proverbs xxiii. 17, 18. Surely there is an end, ahharith, an after-ftate. Jer. xvii. 11. As the bird Kore hatcheth eggs, which he did not lay, fo he that getteth riches, and not by right, shall leave them in the midst of his days, and at his end [1") in his after-or future-ftate,] fhall be fool, vile, contemptible. Verfe 13. They that depart from me fhall be written in the earth, not registered in heaven, in the book of life. Deut. xxxii. 29- their latter end, their after or future-ftate. Pfalm xxxvii. 37, 38.-the end, ahharith, of that man is peace, happiness. But the tranfgreffors fhall be utterly deftroyed [where but in the future world?] the end, ahharith, of the wicked fhall be cut off. Deut. xiv. 1, 2. Ye are the children of the Lord your God; (of an immortal Father) ye shall not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness between your eyes for the dead. They must not mourn as those that had no hope, I Thef. iv. 13. Adoption includes the redemption of the body. Romans viii. 23.Ifaiah xxvi, 19, Thy dead men hall live, with my dead body fhall they arife: awake, and fing ye that dwell in the duft; for thy dew is as the dew of herbs, which makes herbs to fpring and grow up. But the earth fhall caft out the wicked dead, the rephaim, as abortives.

See Pfalms xv. xvi. 9, &c. xvii. 15.when I awake out of death, Daniel xii. 2. Pfalms xxiii. 6. xxiv. 3, 4, 5. Eccl. iii. 16, 17. xii. 13. Ifaiah xxv. 8. li. 6.

These instances may fatisfy, that, although life and immortality are brought into the fulleft light by the Gospel, a future state was not un

G 4

known

CH. XXV. known from the begining to the coming of Christ. We may therefore take it for a good rule, that the words, life and falvation, in the Old Teftament, may be understood of a future life and falvation, when the context will admit of fuch an interpretation.

We have found, that in the Patriarchal Age, among the nations, before the Jewish peculiarity, there were perfons eminent for religion and yirtue, who worshiped the living God, and enjoyed extraordinary communications from him; but that many were of a different character, wicked and ungodly men; and that idolatry, captivating the minds of the ignorant, weak, and vicious, fpread fo faft, that it threatened the total extinction of good morals, and of the knowledge and pure worship of God. How the Father of mankind counteracted this new inftance of degeneracy we fhall fee, when we have fetled the Scripture-Chronology, and confidered the judgment of God upon Sodom and Gomorrha.

CHA P. XXV.

The SCRIPTURE-CHRONOLOGY from the DELUGE to the EXODUS. The Wickedness and Ruin of SODOM, &c. 857 Years.

***EN. xi. 26. it is faid, Terah lived 70 years, and begat Abram,

G Nahor, and Haran. But Terah was 205 years old when he ** died in Haran, Gen. xi. 32. After Terah's death, Abram left Haran; and then was he 75 years old, Gen. xii. 4. which being fubtracted from 205, Terah's age, gives 130, the year of Terah, when Abram was born.

+ Add Isaac's age (60) when Jacob was born, to the years from the Deluge, and you will have 512, the year after the Deluge when Jacob was born. Shem was 98 years old at the Deluge, and lived 600 years, Gen. xi. 10, II. Take 98 from 600 and there remains 502, the years Shem lived after the Deluge; which, deducted from 512, the year after the Deluge, in which Jacob was born, leaves ten years, the time between Shem's death and Jacob's birth. Hence it follows, that Ifaac lived with Shem 50, and that Abram lived with Shem 150 years. Ifaac alfo, who lived 180 years, (Gen. xxxv. 28.) lived 120 with Jacob, i. e. till within ten years of Jacob's going down into Egypt. And as Shem lived with Methuselah 98, and Methusela with Adam 240, three persons, Methuselah, Shem, and Ifaac, might bring down the account of things from Adam till within ten years of the going down of the Ifraelites into Egypt. From the Deluge to the Promife was 427 years.

From the Promise to the time when Jacob and his family went down into Egypt was 215 years. And from the Promise to the time when the children of Ifrael came out of Egypt was 430 years. Compare Exod. xii. 41. with Gal. iii. 17. Therefore the time of their continuance in Egypt must be 215 years.

Jofeph was 30 years of age when preferred by Pharoah, Gen. xli. 46. After that there were seven years of plenty, and two of famine (Gen. xlv. 11.) before Jacob came down into Egypt. Jofeph, therefore, was then 39 years of age, after that he lived 71 years, for he lived in all 110 years, Gen. 1. 22, 26. Take 71 out of 215, and there remains 144, the time the Ifraelites remained flaves in Egypt after Jofeph's death. Exod.

i. 8.

Before we come to the promise made to Abraham, which was the foundation stone of the grand fcheme to preferve religion and morals in the world, we must turn our thoughts a while to a particular difpenfation, which God inflicted upon four cities, Sodom and Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboim, (Gen. xiv. 2. Deut. xxix. 23.) that stood in a very extenfive, fruitful, and pleafant vale, along the fides of the river Jordan, Gen. xiii. 10. So far had idolatry, and the immorality which usually attends it, infected the world, that these four populous cities, and Zoar, which lay not far from them, (Gen. xiv. 2. xix. 20.) were become exceffively debauched and wicked, indulging to that vileft fort of lewdness, which is commonly called Sodomy, going after strange flesh, (Jude 7.) the men burning in their luft one towards another, men with men working that which is unfeemly. Rom. i. 27.

Therefore God purposed to punish them with an exemplary and total deftruction. Abraham, in the benevolence of his foul, interceded for their preservation. Gen. xviii. 23. And fuch is the mercy of God, fo great his regard to virtuous characters, and fo ready for their fakes to beftow bleffings, even upon the unworthy, that he would have spared them, if but ten truly fober and virtuous perfons could have been found in all thofe five cities; but they were univerfally and irreclaimably corrupt. Therefore, fparing Zoar for Lot's fake, (Gen. xix. 20, 21.) he deftroyed the other four cities, with all their inhabitants, by pouring upon them the most dreadful ftorm of fire and brimftone from heaven; and also, probably, by a terrible earthquake, that broke up the very foil of the

earth,

earth, and by an irruption of bituminous waters, which turned the whole vale into one heavy, fetid, and unwholfome lake, called the dead, or falt fea, about 30 miles long, and 10 miles broad, Gen. xix. 24, 25, which remains unto this day.

This dreadful inftance of Divine Vengeance, through the mercy of God, removed the bad examples of thofe daring finners, had a natural fitness to awaken and reform the furviving impious, and was very properly intended to remain a perpetual monument of the wrath of God upon the wickedness of mankind. 2 Pet. ii. 6. Jude ver. 7. Suffering the vengeance of eternal fire. Note the fire was eternal, as it totally and for ever destroyed those cities never to be built again. God thus revealed his future wrath from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteoufness of men. And though there be no prefent appearances of it, we fhould not therefore be fecure. For, as our Lord obferves, Luke xvii. 28. The Sodomites did eat, they drank, they bought, they fold, they planted, they builded, thoughtlefs and fecure; but the fame day that Lot went out of Sodom, it rained fire and brimftane from heaven, and deftroyed them all. Even thus fhall it be in the day that the Son of Man is revealed.

Gen. xix. 24. The LORD rained fire and brimstone from the LORD in heaven. This is an Hebraifm, where the noun itself is put inftead of the perfonal pronoun.

Gen. xix. 26. But his wife looked back from behind him, and he became a pillar of falt. Note The fulphureous ftorm did not begin to fall upon Sodom, till Lot was fafely arrived at Zoar, Gen. xix. 22. But his wife looked back before he reached Zoar; for the looked back from behind him, as he was going to Zoar. Therefore, when fhe looked back, Sodom, and the fine country about it, appeared in the fame pleasant and ferene state as ever. Confequently, fhe looked with a look of affection to the place, and of regret to leave it, and their goods that were in it, according to the import of the verb This implied unbelief and dif trust of what the angels had affirmed, that God would immediately deftroy the place. She did not believe, or fhe did not regard it; fhe stopt by the way, and left her husband to go by himfelf; fhe would go no further, and might be at a confiderable diftance from Zoar, and fo near to Sodom, as, probably, to be involved in the terrible shower, and thereby turned into a nitro-fulphureous pillar. This gives the proper fense and force of our Lord's admonition, Luke xvii. 32. Remember Lot's wife. Let the judgment of God upon her, warn you of the folly and danger of hankering after, and being lothe to part with small and temporal things, when your life and happiness, the greatest and most lafting concerns, are at stake,

CHAP. XXVI,