A history of the work of redemption. Containing the outlines of a body of…

(1) It will be a time of great light and knowledge. The present days are days of darkness, in comparison of those days. The light of that glorious time shall be so great, that it is represented as though there should then be no night, but only day; no evening nor darkness▪ So Zech. xiv.6.7. "And it shall come to pass in that day, that the light shall not be clear, nor dark. But it shall be one day, which shall be known to the Lord, not day, no• night: but it shall come to pass, that at evening time it shall be light." —It is further represented, as though God would then give such light to his church, that it should so much exceed the glory of the light of the sun and moon, that they should be ashamed: Is. xxiv.23. "Then the moon shall be confounded, and the sun ashamed, when the Lord of hosts shall reign in Mount Zion, and in Jerusalem, and before his ancients gloriously."

There is a kind of a veil now cast over the greater part of the world, which keeps them in darkness: but then this veil shall be destroyed: Is. xxv.7. "And he will destroy in this mountain the face of the covering cast over all people, and the veil that is spread •out all nations." Then all countries and nations, even those which are now most ignorant, shall be full of light and knowledge. Great knowledge shall prevail every where. It may be hoped, that then many of the Negroes and Indians will be divines▪ and that excellent books will be published in Africa, in Ethiopia, in Tartary, and other new and most barbarous countries and not only learned men, but others of more ordinary education, shall then be very knowing in religion: Is. xxxii.3.4. "The eyes of them that see, shall not be dim; and the ears of them that hear, shall hearken. The heart also of the rash shall understand knowledge. Knowledge then shall be very universal among all ⟨p. 263⟩