N13259:257
Sermons, on the following subjects
Sermons, on the following subjects; The manner in which salvation is to be sought. The unreasonableness of indetermination in religion. Unbelievers contemn the glory of Christ. The folly of looking back in fleeing out of Sodom. The warnings of Scripture in the best manner adapted to the awakening and conversion of sinners. Hypocrites deficient in the duty of prayer. The future punishment of the wicked unavoidable and intolerable. The eternity of hell-torments. The peace which Christ gives his true followers. The perpetuity & change of the Sabbath. / By the late Reverend Mr. Jonathan Edwards, president of the College of New-Jersey.
Hartford: printed by Hudson and Goodwin, 1780
Sermon 6: The Warnings of Scripture are in the best manner adapted to the awakening and conversio…
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
BESIDES, it is his wrath that they endure: he measures out to them their several portions of punishment; he makes his wrath enter into them; he is a consuming fire to them; his anger is that fire, in which they are tormented. He therefore is doubtless able to give us as clear and distinct, and as true an account of hell, as the damned themselves, if they should rise from the dead. He needs not any to inform him.
HE knows far better what the eternity of those torments is, than any of them. He can better tell us how awful a thing eternity is. He knows better what the future judgment of sinners will be, when the LORD JESUS shall come in flaming fire to take vengeance on them that know not GOD, and obey not […] gospel. He knows far better than they, how […] the torment of the wicked will then be increased.
HE knows far better what the eternity of those torments is, than any of them. He can better tell us how awful a thing eternity is. He knows better what the future judgment of sinners will be, when the LORD JESUS shall come in flaming fire to take vengeance on them that know not GOD, and obey not 〈…〉 gospel. He knows far better than they, how 〈…〉 the torment of the wicked will then be increased.
2. WE have the truth upon surer grounds from ⟨p. 99⟩GOD'S testimony, than we could have it from the testimony of one rising from the dead. If there should one rise from the dead and should tell us of the dreadfulness of hell torments; how precarious a foundation would that be to build upon, in a matter of such importance, unless we consider it as confirmed by divine testimony. We should be uncertain, whether there were not some delusion in the case. We know that it is impossible for GOD to lie; and we may know that the matter is just as he declares it to us. But if one should come from the dead, we could not be so sure, that we were no way imposed upon. We could not be so sure that he who testified was not himself subject to some delusion. We could not be sure that the matter was not strained too high, and represented greater than it really is.