temporal judgment is to be all the judgment that is ever to pass upon these "nations?" If not, and these "quick" need to be "judged" over again as "dead," what has such a judgment to do with the solemn awards recorded in the 25th of Matthew?

So plainly unsatisfactory is this, that even those who adopt it are obliged to eke out its deficiencies by at least the semblance of a universal judgment.

Mr A. Bonar "conceives that it is very likely there shall be a meeting at the great white throne, which shall be truly universal. We lose nothing of the advantage supposed to be found in this idea. There shall be a general judgment after the millennium. There shall be a resurrection of the wicked; and how immense the multitude, small and great, that arise and come to judgment? But besides these endless millions of the ungodly, there are present the happy millions of the saved, in their white robes, and with their crowns. For now is the season when that word shall be fulfilled, 'Do ye not know that the saints shall judge the world?' 'Know ye not that we shall judge angels?' is every way likely, too, that on that day Satan and every lost soul of all these millions shall hear from the lips of the Judge the grounds on which he acquitted each one of his redeemed.” *

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Mr Bonar here takes the final resurrection and judgment, in Rev. xx. 11-15, to be of the wicked alone. The righteous are present as assessors" indeed, but Mr Bonar does not say, and evidently does not hold, that they are judged then. "Satan and the lost hear from the lips of the Judge the grounds on which he acquitted each one of his redeemed;" that is to say, the grounds on which he had done so a thousand years before. The fact of this long prior judgment, and the grounds of it, may be announced; but the judgment itself is not then. And if so, of what use is it to say, "There shall be a general judgment after the millennium”? It does homage to the principle of a general judgment, as

* Redemption, pp. 158, 159.-Mr Alford interprets this scene of a general judgment at the end of the millennium, but asks, “to what purpose would be a judgment if all were to be condemned ?"-(Gr. Test., 2d ed., in loc.)

that which every one feels to be a first principle in religion; but while conceding it in words, it is not meant to convey the belief of it in the only sense in which every one understands such a statement. *

Second.-The late distinguished German commentator, Olshausen, who held the premillennial theory, takes "all nations" (Távra rà 0vn) to denote here "all men, with the exception of believers," that is, all unbelievers.† These unbelievers are of two classes, "the righteous" (díxasos) on the right hand, and the opposite class on the left. And if it be asked how good works can be ascribed to unbelievers, and the kingdom said to be prepared for them from the foundation of the world, the answer is, that "it is by no means consistent with Scripture to view the non-Christian world as absolutely excluded from good works, or from that faith which alone can produce good works; on the contrary, in all nations there are noble minds who follow out their knowledge with great fidelity, and are to be regarded as righteous persons. Only the degree of knowledge and faith in these non-Christian devout men must be estimated as very subordinate, and hence the point of view which they occupy, as such, is in reality nothing but susceptibility for the operations of the grace of God in Christ."

I should not have thought it necessary to advert to this obnoxious view of the judgment in Matthew, were it not that

*Mr Elliott's admission sounds to me very much the same, though his way of reconciling these two things is different from Mr Bonar's. "At the same time I admit," he says, "though there may be a primary reference to the judgment on the living at Christ's coming; yet, secondarily, a more extensive judgment on the dead too-on all the dead-may be included in the parable. How so will be seen in my next chapter. A direct individual judgment on the parties interested is described in the two preceding parables."—(Horæ, ut supra.)

† Equivalent to, as opposed to the people of Israel. He says that Professor Keil had taken this sense of the passage before him. (Comm. in loc.) Believers, according to this exposition, stand by the side of the Judge, and come not into judgment, but in and with Christ judge the world. (1 Cor. vi. 2.)

250 THE JUDGMENT-MEDE, MR BICKERSTETH, AND MR BIRKS.

one nearly identical with it is advocated by Mr Dallas. * According to him, too, unbelievers are the only party brought into judgment in this scene; and these are of two classes. The righteous unbelievers are such as do kind deeds to Christians, yet not knowing them to be such. But instead of regarding these as actuated by faith, as Olshausen does, and so admitted to the glory of the risen saints, as I suppose Olshausen means, he takes the invitation, " Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world," to mean, 'Come, inherit the sovereignty described in the first chapter of Genesis-have dominion over the fish of the sea,' &c. These,” says Mr Dallas, are set apart as the new stock of the generation of Adam, whom he will educate for a thousand years, without the influence of the devil to counteract the efforts of a dispensation of sight." Comment on this would be alike difficult and superfluous.

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Third.-Mede's way of solving the difficulty adopted by Mr Bickersteth and Mr Birks, is at least less repulsive than the two foregoing ways. According to this view, it is not one judgment at all, but two-one at the beginning and the other at the end. They take "the sentence of absolution to continue all the time of the first resurrection, that is, all the thousand years long. That once ended and finished, and not before, he shall proceed to pronounce the sentence of condemnation upon such as are to be condemned."†

"The true and full view," says Mr Bickersteth, "seems to be that which makes it include the resurrection of the just at the beginning, and the unjust at the close of the millennial day.. The work of acquittal and mercy, which is our Lord's delight, is first in order; afterwards follow the sentence of wrath, which is his strange work. We follow the current of God's Word, as well as the deep instincts of a heart and conscience renewed in love after

* Lent Lect. for 1843, ut supra.

+ Mede's Works, p. 841. Mr Birks has now modified his views, bringing them into nearer conformity with the received sense of the passage (p. 241), though not, as I think, in keeping with simplicity.

the image of Christ, in assigning the sentence of reward and mercy to the morning, and the sentence of condemnation to the evening of that great and terrible day." He thinks this view of the passage is confirmed by the omission of the word "brethren" in the case of the wicked. To the righteous, it is said, "Inasmuch as ye did it unto one of the least of my brethren, " without any mention of the wicked; whereas to the wicked it is merely said, "Inasmuch as ye did it not unto the least of these," by which he conceives is meant, not "these righteous," but "these wicked"—each company standing by itself, and without the presence of the others, before the Judge, and each "containing within itself the full test of its acceptance and its rejection; the righteous in their own mutual and brotherly love, the wicked in their own mutual hatefulness and hatred." 99*

Need I appeal to the reader whether this broken judgment does not utterly break down the solemn impression which the bare reading of this scene in Matthew irresistibly makes upon all minds? Mr Bickersteth himself, than whom no man was more able to feel the force of this remark, seemed conscious of danger in this direction. "For this purpose," he says, "of clearly enforcing the great issues of the judgment, our Lord brings into close contrast the acts of the morning and evening of that great judgment-day. FURTHER DETAILS

WOULD ONLY HAVE BROKEN THE SOLEMN IMPRESSION OF THE

TRUTH taught in this account of the last judgment." I think "the solemn impression of the truth taught" here, is "broken" sufficiently by the "details" which Mr Bickersteth himself introduces into it.

But this suggests an important question: Why should "details" tend to break up our solemn impression of the judgment? If details be in the thing, why should the mention of them have that effect? I will answer the question. The Word of God represents the judgment, and every enlightened conscience instinctively looks forward to it as one unbroken and simultaneous act-how brief, or how protracted, does not in the least affect this view of it; and every intro

* Guide, pp. 284-286, with note. Fifth Edition.

duction of those "details" which the premillennial theory brings into it, of morning acts and evening acts, besides the mid-day acts of "government and rule," is an intrusion which the mind will not tolerate, and can only listen to at the expense of having all its solemn impressions of it dissipated.

So much is this the case, that you cannot take up a volume of sermons in which the judgment is handled by a premillennialist, and pressed home upon the conscience, without finding that he proceeds upon the common view of it, laying aside, or, as much as possible, keeping away from "details," which just means every thing different from the ordinary view. I remember being struck with this many years ago, in Dr M'Neile's volume of "Seventeen Sermons;" and one of his "Sermons on the Second Advent," entitled, Righteous Retribution at the Second Advent," is much of the same nature. In all its general descriptions and appeals, it is solemn and stirring; but in proportion as premillennial "details" find their way into his statements, the subject is lowered, and the impression diluted.

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In reply to this Dr H. Bonar says, "I am unable to appreciate the force of Mr Brown's reasonings against the judgment being broken up into parts.

I confess I do not see how the breaking up of the judgment into acts and parts will dissipate its solemnity." (Pp. 105, 106.)* This is a point which I am very much disposed to leave to the reader. At the same time, I can furnish Dr Bonar with a statement to which he will probably attach some weight :"There are three decisive objections," says Mr Birks, "to the view [of this passage in Matthew] which refers it to the judgment of living nations before the millennium begins.

* Mr Birks thinks the very reverse. Such details, he affirms, would, in consequence of “the narrowness and limitation of the human faculties, be a jar and dissonance intolerable to the human mind" (p. 235). How Mr B. reconciles this with the multitudinous and distracting details which he himself introduces into his theory of the second advent, I am unable to comprehend.