"Every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof at the day of judgment. For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned'." And upon this account may every one, weeping and trembling, say with Job, "Quid faciam, cum resurrexerit ad judicandum Deus? What shall I do, when the Lord shall come to judgment"?"-Of every idle word---O blessed God! what shall become of them who love to prate continually, to tell tales, to detract, to slander, to backbite, to praise themselves, to undervalue others, to compare, to raise divisions, to boast? Τίς δὲ φρουρήσει πέζαν ὀρθοστάδην, ἄϋπνος, οὐ κάμπτων γόνυ ; "Who shall be able to stand upright, not bowing the knee, with the intolerable load of the sins of his tongue?" If of every idle word we must give account, what shall we do for those malicious words, that dishonour God or do despite to our brother? Remember how often we have tempted our brother or a silly woman to sin and death? How often we have pleaded for unjust interests, or by our wit have cozened an easy and a believing person, or given ill sentences, or disputed others into false persuasions? Did we never call good evil, or evil good? Did we never say to others, Thy cause is right, when nothing made it right but favour and money, a false advocate, or a covetous judge? Пāv óñμa ȧpyòv, so said Christ, "every idle word," that is, тāv óñμa kεvòv, so St. Paul uses it, "every false word"," every lie shall be called to judgment; or, as some copies read it, πāv рñμμа Tоvпρòv, "every wicked word," shall be πᾶν ῥῆμα πονηρὸν, called to judgment. For by apyòv, "idle words," are not meant words that are unprofitable or unwise, for fools and silly persons speak most of those, and have the least accounts to make; but by vain, the Jews usually understood false; and to give their mind to vanity, or to speak vanity, is all' one as to mind or speak falsehoods with malicious and evil purposes. But if every idle word, that is, every vain and lying word, shall be called to judgment, what shall become of men that blaspheme God, or their rulers, or princes of the people, or their parents? that dishonour the religion, and disgrace the ministers? that corrupt justice and pervert judgment? that preach evil doctrines, or declare perverse 1 Matt. xii. 36. m Job xxxi. 14. " Eph. v. 6. sentences? that take God's holy name in vain, or dishonour the name of God by trifling and frequent swearings; that holy name, by which we hope to be saved, and which all the angels of God fall down to and worship? These things are to be considered, for by our own words we shall stand or fall, that is, as in human judgments the confession of the party, and the contradiction of himself, or the failing in the circumstances of his story, are the confidences or presumptions of law, by which judges give sentence; so shall our words be, not only the means of declaring a secret sentence, but a certain instrument of being absolved or condemned. But upon these premises we see what reason we have to fear the sentence of that day, who have sinned with our tongues so often, so continually, that if there were no other actions to be accounted for, we have enough in this account to make us die; and yet have committed so many evil actions, that, if our words were wholly forgotten, we have infinite reason to fear concerning the event of that horrible sentence. The effect of which consideration is this, that we set a guard before our lips, and watch over our actions with a care, equal to that fear which shall be at doomsday, when we are to pass our sad accounts. But I have some considerations to interpose. 1. But (that the sadness of this may a little be relieved, and our endeavours be encouraged to a timely care and repentance) consider that this great sentence, although it shali pass concerning little things, yet it shall not pass by little portions, but by general measures; not by the little errors of one day, but by the great proportions of our life; for God takes not notice of the infirmities of honest persons that always endeavour to avoid every sin, but in little intervening instances are surprised; but he judges us by single actions, if they are great, and of evil effects; and by little small instances, if they be habitual. No man can take care concerning every minute; and therefore concerning it Christ will not pass sentence but by the discernible portions of our time, by human actions, by things of choice and deliberation, and by general precepts of care and watchfulness, this sentence shall be exacted. 2. The sentence of that day shall be passed, not by the proportions of an angel, but by the measures of a man; the first follies are not unpardon able, but may be recovered; and the second are dangerous, and the third are more fatal: but nothing is unpardonable but perseverance in evil courses. 3. The last judgment shall be transacted by the same principles by which we are guided here: not by strange and secret propositions, or by the fancies of men, or by the subtilties of useless distinctions, or evil persuasions; not by the scruples of the credulous, or the interest of sects, nor the proverbs of prejudice, nor the uncertain definitions of them that give laws to subjects by expounding the decrees of princes; but by the plain rules of justice, by the ten commandments, by the first apprehensions of conscience, by the plain rules of Scripture, and the rules of an honest mind, and a certain justice. So that by this restraint and limit of the final sentence, we are secured we shall not fall by scruple or by ignorance, by interest or by faction, by false persuasions of others, or invincible prejudice of our own, but we shall stand or fall by plain and easy propositions, by chastity or uncleanness, by justice or injustice, by robbery or restitution: and of this we have a great testimony by our judge and Lord himself; "Whatsoever ye shall bind in earth, shall be bound in heaven, and whatsoever ye loose shall be loosed there;" that is, you shall stand or fall according to the sermons of the gospel; as the ministers of the word are commanded to preach, so ye must live here, and so ye must be judged hereafter; ye must not look for that sentence by secret decrees or obscure doctrines, but by plain precepts and certain rules. But there are yet some more degrees of mercy. 4. That sentence shall pass upon us not after the measures of nature, and possibilities, and utmost extents, but by the mercies of the covenant; we shall be judged as Christians rather than as men, that is, as persons to whom much is pardoned, and much is pitied, and many things are (not accidentally, but consequently) indulged, and great helps are ministered, and many remedies supplied, and some mercies extraregularly conveyed, and their hopes enlarged upon the stock of an infinite mercy, that hath no bounds but our needs, our capacities, and our proportions to glory. 5. The sentence is to be given by him that once died for us, and does now pray for us, and perpetually intercedes ; and upon souls that he loves, and in the salvation of which himself hath a great interest and increase of joy. And now upon these premises we may dare to consider what the sentence itself shall be, that shall never be reversed, but shall last for ever and ever. "Whether it be good or bad." I cannot discourse now the greatness of the good or bad, so far (I mean) as is revealed to us; the considerations are too long to be crowded into the end of a sermon; only in general: 1. If it be good it is greater than all the good of this world, and every man's share then, in every instant of his blessed eternity, is greater than all the pleasures of mankind in one heap. “Α τοῖς θεοῖς ἄνθρωπος εὔχεται τυχεῖν, "A man can never wish for any thing greater than this immortality," said Posidippus. 2. To which I add this one consideration, that the portion of the good at the day of sentence shall be so great, that after all the labours of our life, and suffering persecutions, and enduring affronts, and the labour of love, and the continual fears and cares of the whole duration and abode, it rewards it all, and gives infinitely more; "Non sunt condigna passiones hujus sæculi;" all the torments and evils of this world are not to be estimated with the joys of the blessed: it is the gift of God; a donative beyond the oóvov, the military stipend, it is beyond our work and beyond our wages, and beyond the promise and beyond our thoughts, and above our understandings, and above the highest heavens, it is a participation of the joys of God, and of the inheritance of the Judge himself. Οὐκ ἔστιν πελάσασθ', οὐδ ̓ ὀφθαλμοῖσιν ἐφικτὸν It is a day of recompences, in which all our sorrows shall be turned into joys, our persecutions into a crown, the cross into a throne, poverty into the riches of God; loss, and affronts, and inconveniences, and death, into sceptres, and hymns, and rejoicings, and hallelujahs, and such great things which are fit for us to hope, but too great for us to discourse of, while we see as in a glass darkly and imper • Xenoph. fectly. And he that chooses to do an evil rather than suffer one, shall find it but an ill exchange that he deferred his little to change for a great one. I remember that a servant in the old comedy, did choose to venture the lash rather than to feel a present inconvenience, "Quia illud aderat malum, istud aberat longius : illud erat præsens, huic erat diecula:" but this will be but an ill account, when the rods shall for the delay be turned into scorpions, and from easy shall become intolerable. Better it is to suffer here, and to stay till the day of restitution for the good and the holy portion; for it will recompense both for the suffering and the stay. But how if the portion be bad? It shall be bad to the greatest part of mankind; that is a fearful consideration; the greatest part of men and women shall dwell in the portion of devils to eternal ages. So that these portions are like the prophet's figs in the vision; the good are the best that ever were; and the worst are so bad, that worse cannot be imagined. For though in hell the accursed souls shall have no worse than they have deserved, and there are not there overrunning measures as there are in heaven, and therefore that the joys of heaven are infinitely greater joys than the pains of hell are great pains, yet even these are a full measure to a full iniquity, pain above patience, sorrows without ease, amazement without consideration, despair without the intervals of a little hope, indignation without the possession of any good; there dwells envy and confusion, disorder and sad remembrances, perpetual woes and continual shriekings, uneasiness and all the evils of the soul. But if we will represent it in some orderly circumstances, we may consider, 1. That here, all the trouble of our spirits are little participations of a disorderly passion; a man desires earnestly but he hath not, or he envies because another hath something besides him, and he is troubled at the want of one when at the same time he hath a hundred good things; and yet ambition and envy, impatience and confusion, covetousness and lust, are all of them very great torments; but there these shall be in essence and abstracted beings; the spirit of envy, and the spirit of sorrow; devils, that shall inflict all the whole nature of the evil and pour it into the minds of accursed men, where it shall sit without abatement: for he |