Revel.

Ver. 4,

12.

XX.

&

and nominally, either of a fecond Resurrec tion, or a fecond Judgment. But each of them is hinted at and implied in that Vision 4,5, &c. of St. John, which gives us a View of the Millennium; that one will be at the Beginning, and the other at the End of it. And as for the Refurrection, in other Places of the facred Writings, fometimes Regard is had to the first, and sometimes to the second, without distinguishing accurately. St. Paul in his Epiftle to the Corinthians treats chiefly, if not folely, of the laft Refurrection, as was before obferved: But Chrift in St. Luke feems to Luke xiv. point at the firft, which he calls, The Refurrection of the fuft, not of all, but of the Juft feparately: Such as is the first Resurrection, in which the Wicked are to have no Part, (Revel. xx. 4, 5. which compare with Pfal. i. 5.) which will be the Time of the firft Retribution. And this Refurrection of the Juft, answers to T Tanıyyeveria, The Regeneration, in which likewife Chrift promifes the Reward to his Saints, Matt. xix. 28, 29. Lastly, in the second, and last Refurrection, the Glory of the Juft will find its Accomplishment, when Mortality being fwallow'd up of Life, and their Terreftrial being converted into Celeftial and glorious Bodies, they shall be really equal, and like to the Angels.

14, 15.

THIS is the End of human Affairs, and this their Confummation. But now fome may enquire concerning the Earth, What will become

become of that, when its Inhabitants all have left it? Concerning this Matter, and others that have Relation to it, we have, in the Theory of the Earth, given our Conjectures. But fince these are doubtful and problematical Points, and, as it were, out of the Compafs of the Chriftian Doctrine, we did not think it proper to infert any Thing of them here. And fo much for thefe Matters.

CHAP. X.

Of Heaven and Hell. What fort of Heaven that of the Chriftians is, and how far it may be faid to be local. What Hell is; whether there is, or will be any Subterranean, or any other local, corporeal, and external Hell, before the Day of Judgment, and Conflagration of the World. Of the Punishments of Hell; whether they are to be looked upon as finite, or infinite, or indefinite.

A

ND now we have feen an End of all human Things upon Earth; and Heaven and Hell come next to be confider'd. By the Word Heaven, the Chriftians understand a State and Place of future Felicity, or Seats of beatified Souls: And these Seats they place in a fublime Station, remote from,

Earth,

Earth, and high in the Starry Regions, and call them Heaven. To this Point there is an Agreement between the Chriftian Doctrine, and the Opinions of the wifeft among the Heathens, and the Sentiments of their Philofophers, who fent back thofe Souls that had behaved themselves well on Earth, to that Heaven, from which they at first defcended. But as for the Poets, a Generation audacious and lawless, and who represent and mifreprefent the Doctrines of the Ancients according to their Pleasure, and fhew the Truth in Disguise and Masquerade, they place their Elyfian Fields, their Seats of the Bleffed, in I know not what Lands, and fortunate Iflands; or, which is yet more incongruous, under Ground, and in fubterranean Regions. Thus grofly does Virgil philofophize, to the Capacity and Tafte of the People; and that, perhaps, from an obfcure or corrupt fort of Knowledge, either of the ancient, or the future Paradise. 'Tis true, indeed, the Saints will enjoy a happy Life in that new Earth, and that fecond Paradife: But the Queftion is not here concerning that intermediate Happinefs, but the fupreme Beatitude and Seat of the Saints, after the laft Refurrection, at the End of the Millennium, when putting on their celestial Bodies, and changing their Seats, they shall enjoy a confummate Glory, and an inconceivable Felicity.

THAT

THAT these Seats are celeftial, or fuperceleftial, all Chriftians agree; I fay, or Superceleftial; for the Scholaftick Doctors affert, that a certain Empyrean, or fiery Heaven, fuperior to all the reft, will be the Habitation of the Saints, and all that will be eternally happy. But befides, that no fuch fiery Heaven appears to us, by the Help either of Sense or Reason, except the Bodies of the Sun, and the fixed Stars; there is no fuch Order of the Heavens, and no fuch System of the World as these Doctors imagine: For they imagine that all the Heavens are concentrical, or that they belong to one and the fame Centre, and are involved and wrapt up in each other, like the Coats of an Onion; which is in fome Measure true of the Planetary Orbs, but by no Means of the fixed Stars: For neither are they all of them fixed in one Superficies, as it were in the fame Ceiling, at an equal Distance every where from the Earth; but fome of them are immers'd deeper than others in the celeftial Regions, and are unequally diftant from us by immenfe immenfurable Spaces, and every one moves in its own peculiar Orb. And when thefe Authors place the Firmament, or the Orb of the fixed Stars above the Planets, then, other Orbs, Orb above Orb, till they come to the first Mover, as they are pleafed to express themselves, and then on the Summit of all, or in the fupream Circle of the Universe,

the

the Empyrean Heaven, they build up a Frame of the Heavens that is intirely fictitious, and an Order of Stars, that is not incommodious for the Vulgar, but is utterly unworthy of Aftronomers or Philofophers. And they

seem to have contriv'd this Empyrean Heaven on the Summit of all the Orbs, after the Example of their elemental Fire: For, as they have difpofed of this Fire in the superior Part of the elemental World, because it is more light and fubtle than the reft, fo in the Heavens they place this fiery or this flaming Orb, as being more pure and excellent than them all, in the fupream Region of the Univerfe. But they talk in either Case abfurdly For neither is there any fuch fiery Sphere in the outward Part of the fublunary World; and in the Spheres of the fixed Stars, the fiery Matter dwells not in the Ends or the Extremity of the Orb, but has its Place in the Middle, and conftitutes there a bright and a flaming Star. So that unless you will place the Habitation of the Souls of the Juft amidst these Flames, that is, in the Sun, or fome other Stars, you will find nothing befides of Empyrean through all the Extent of Heaven.

BUT though the Empyrean Heaven in the Senfe and Situation in which 'tis fet forth above appears to me to be a mere Fiction, yet I fee nothing that can hinder our Belief, that among the celeftial Orbs, as among the Stars, fome are more bright, more flaming, and,