Christ's certain and sudden appearance to judgment. By Thomas Vincent, sometime Minister of Maudlins…

CHAP. XIII. The Application.

The Lord Jesus Christ will certainly and quickly appear. The day is appointed by the eternal and unalterable decree of God, and he hath revealed the thing, though not the time, in his word of truth; the day approacheth, it cannot be far off; time is flying away upon swift wings; the day of the World is almost spent, the shadows of its evening are stretched forth to a great length; yet a little while, and Christ will be here; he will appear in his glory; never did eye of Man behold such glory and majesty in the greatest earthly Potentate, as will be seen in the Lord Jesus Christ on this day; all the state & pomp, & splendour, & glittering glory, which some Princes have been decked withal in their Triumphant shows, is no more to be compared with the pomp and […] of the Lord Jesus Christ in this appearance; than the shining of a Candle, or Glow-worm, or rotten stick in the night, is to be compared with the shining of the Sun in its noon-day glory: Ere long the great Gates of Heaven will life up their heads, and those everlasting Doors (within which Christ doth, for the present, remain) will be opened; and then this King of Glory will come forth, and come down with marvellous splendour and brightness of Majesty; It is said, Psal 47. 5. God is gone up with a shout, the Lord with the sound of the Trumpet▪ then God will come down with a shout, the Lord with the sound of a Trumpet, […] Thess. 4. 16. The Chariots of the Lord are twenty thousand, ⟨p. 178⟩even thousands of Angels: Psal. 68. 17. All the holy Angels shall attend upon him, and blow the Trumpet before him, at this last Assize, to awaken and summon the World to judgment: then the Sun in the Firmament will be darkened, when this more glorious Sun doth appear; then the whole frame of Heaven will shake▪ and the foundations of the Earth will be moved, the everlasting Mountains will bow, and the perpetual Hills will shrink; yea the Heavens will pass away with a great noise, and like a sroll be rolled together, and the Elements will melt with fervent heat, and the Earth will be on Fire, and every Mountain and Island will flee away from before his face; then the Sea will roar, & all living Creatures, likely, will be in a strange consternation; the the wicked Tribes of the Earth will mourn, and the Saints will rejoice at this glorious appearance of the great God, and their Saviour.