She told me, No: This, on which we stand, is eternal election or absolute predestination; called by Moses an ancient mountain, because it was cast up and established from everlasting; and that high hill, with its shining top, is glorification, which he calls a lasting hill, because it endures for ever. And the feast which thou hast here been entertained with he calls the chief things of the ancient mountains, and is an earnest of the precious things of the lasting hills, Deut. xxxiii. 15.

Alas! said I, how can people fight so desperately against this blessed hill? 'Because,' said she, 'they never tasted the sweet things of it; they may have gifts, and receive joy, but are servants still; and such are said to receive joy by the way side, not on the mount. He that is established here will praise the mount; but those that want to climb up another way find this mountain an impediment, therefore they fight against it, and so do the devils as well as they; and there are some ministers of Christ, who have almost forgotten the feast they once had on this mount. Natural affections, and the fear of man, have brought a snare on many; and they preach so as to obscure the mount, and aim to please the carnal and great, which fills the house of God with chaff, and occasions all the bloody persecutions that come to purge the floor from that chaff which they have contracted together. God uses the fan to purge away the chaff; their work is not perfect before God, nor do they declare his whole counsel; such

shall suffer loss in their ministerial labours, and be saved by fire themselves, 1 Cor. iii. 15. These men begin in the Spirit, but dwindle too much into the flesh again, Gal. iii. 3; then, at their last hours, they are delivered up to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that their spirits may be purified in the fiery trial, 1 Cor. iii. 13, and saved in the day of the Lord Jesus, 1 Cor. v. 5; as Job was for the destruction of self-righteousness, and Peter for the destruction of self-confidence.'

Then she pointed to the sea which I had lately escaped, Psalm 1xix. 14, and told me that troubled sea was the inhabitants of the world, Isaiah lvii. 20, and those foaming billows ungodliness and wrong, Psalm lxv. 7; and the highest waves that dash so violently against this mountain, the desperate pride of men, rebelling against God, called by David proud waves, Psalm cxxiv. 3, 4, 5. Then she pointed with her finger towards the ocean, and asked if I did not see a light. I said, 'Yes, but more smoke than light, I think.' Yes, said she, that is Sinai's mount; or, in a figure, the fiery law of God, thrown from his right hand, Deut. xxxiii. 2: God cast it into the sea when the second trumpet sounded. The first was a jubilee, but the second sounded for war against the people, who are heirs of that curse which the law reveals, Isaiah xxxiv; and all the wrath of the eternal God will be found in it; Fury is not in him, it is in that mount, Isaiah xxvii. 4.

In that mount are treasured up all the treasures of hail, which God has reserved against the day of trouble, against the day of battle and war, Job Xxxviii. 22, 23. Whenever that mount discharges itself the whole seven thunders will utter their voices, which John the apostle could not describe with a pen; and, when once it breaks forth, those who now contend for it will flee before it; for it will throw its combustibles into every unrenewed heart; yea, it will make the wicked run like a fiery wheel, and persecute them with all its storms, Psalm lxxxiii. 13, 14, 15. But, said I, is it not strange that so many insensible sinners should be dancing round it? And she said, Israel in the wilderness did the same; it has set many on fire, so that they cannot rest, yet they know it not; yea, some are so burnt with it that they have an earnest of its whole contents within them, yet never lay the sin of unbelief to heart. This fulfils what Isaiah saith, It set them on fire, but they knew it not; it burned them, but they laid it not to heart, Isaiah xlii. 25.

That mount is both the magazine and armory of God. You have a full account of all its stores in the thirty-second chapter of Deuteronomy; and, when this world is ripe for ruin, that fire which you see will melt the elements; and all the inhabitants of the world, who cleave to it for life and salvation, shall feel the effects of its dreadful artillery; for it will descend into hell with the

my

wicked, as you read, "For a fire is kindled in anger, and shall burn unto the lowest hell, and shall consume the earth with her increase, and set on fire the foundations of the mountains. I will heap mischiefs upon them; I will spend mine arrows upon them." That fire burns in every soul that is in black despair in this world; and, if you go down into hell, it burns there also.

Then she pointed towards the smoke of it, and asked if I did not see a large body of people gaily dressed. I said, Yes. She told me that body was some of the great men of the world, called Atheists and Deists. Sin, said she, has seared their consciences, and the smoke of the bottomless pit has blinded their eyes; they are gone, you see, to blackness and darkness, and that is an earnest of outer darkness. These shall, ere long, pray for the rocks to fall on them, and to the hills to cover them; these have their hour under the powers of darkness; they deny the Lord that bought us. And, "if they do these things in the green tree, what shall be done in the dry?"

Then, pointing again, she said, Do not you see a large rock near that vapour of smoke? I said, Yes, and many on it. She said, That rock is the error of Arianism; and, when they go from that, they go into the smoke; they are those who trample on the atoning blood of Christ; and, by exclaiming against the Lord's divinity, they render it ineffectual to heal them; for the efficacy of the human blood arises from its union with the God

head, Heb. ix. 14; so, making him a creature only, they exclude themselves from redemption; for none can redeem his brother, nor give to God a ransom for him, Psalm xlix. 7. However, "their rock is not as our rock; even our enemies themselves being judges," Deut. xxxii. 31. On the right hand you see several little rocks, and some dry earth by them; those are the rocks of Silly; where many, trusting in a form of godliness, others in a reformation, some in a bigotted and party spirit, some in blind zeal, others in gifts, some in church-membership, and others in dry order only; stay, and have built those little huts which you see; but, when the winds blow, and the floods come, they are generally washed away, building and all. Job calls these silly ones, Job v. 2, and the rocks take their names from those that inhabit them. Those that you see so near the mount are such as stick in natural affections only, and suppose it to be the Spirit of God; and Universal Charity hammers out God's counsel so as to please them all; but he that preaches to please men can never be the servant of Christ, Gal. i. 10.

But come, turn thine eyes towards the East; don't you see a cross? Yes, said I, and a man on it. Then said she, Christ hath been evidently crucified, and set forth before you, Gal. iii. 1. I looked at him till my sins against him came afresh to my mind; and I mourned over him as one in bitterness for his first-born, Zech. xii. 10.

She led me through one gate, called Imputed