such humility as that of God manifest in the flesh; and this was seen of angels, 1 Tim. iii. 16. And never was there such pride in any creature as in Satan refusing worship to his Maker in a nature made a little lower than his own. But God loveth the Son; and this opposition to him was highly resented, and ever will be. God summoned Satan and all his adherents, and arraigned them, and brought home his charge against them, and left it upon their mind and conscience, and the divine displeasure of God against it; but Satan's full trial of condemnation did not take place as yet; this was reserved to a future time; all that is said upon this head is, that God put no trust in these angelic servants; and his angels he charged with folly, Job iv. 18. Some good men understand that passage to be meant of good angels; and they talk of the charge being comparative folly. We know there can be no comparison between the creature and the Creator; but, as the angels of God are called elect angels, holy angels, and we read of the glory of the holy angels, mentioned by Christ himself, I think it is impossible that they could always behold the face of God if they could be charged with folly. And these angels do the will of God in their obedience so perfectly, that our Lord teaches us to pray, "Thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven." God pronounced all his works to be very good; but folly is always expressive of evil, in some branch of it or other. And, as the angels remain in their origi

hal and creative innocency, purity, and holiness, and are made known in the scriptures of truth to be elect angels, and are confirmed in their standing now in Christ, who is the head of all principality and power, if there is any folly in these holy creatures, it must reflect dishonour upon their creation and upon their Creator, for they are what God made them; nor have they any thing in them but what God put into them. And who will ascribe folly to God, or to the work of his hands? No one text in all the book of God ever pointed out or allowed sin or folly to be the workmanship of God; nor are they to be found in or among any one of the creatures that he made, when they came out of his hands. But it may be objected that they are called his angels; he charged his angels with folly; which shows that he claimed them as his. I answer, they were his before they fell; and even now he lays the same claim to them as he does to all wicked men; the deceived and the deceiver are his. The reason these good men urge in favour of good angels being intended, is, that the words charged with folly are not strong enough to express the just indignation of God against such consummate wickedness as that of open rebellion against the Almighty himself. To all which I answer, that for his disobedience, apostacy, and rebellion, Satan was charged with folly, and cast out of heaven; but as yet he had not taken his full trial, he was not as yet fully judged, because, like the

Amorites, he had not filled up his measure; his iniquity was not yet full. But, when he had ruined our first parents, and all the human race in them, then we hear of his full trial, and of his eternal sentence. But this was to take place in paradise in this world, which is the devil's stage of action, on which this unpardonable transgressor is to finish his work of deceiving, until all his adherents have filled up their measure as well as he, and then shall the end come.

After this Satan was cast out of heaven; for John seems to speak in allusion to this when he is predicting the dethroning of the pagan Roman emperors, in which Satan had long reigned and ruled, and by whose instrumentality he had long persecuted and murdered the saints; when, by the coming of Constantine, a Christian emperor, "The great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him. And I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, Now is come salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ; for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accused them before our God day and night. And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb." All these things seem to be borrowed from the fall of Satan, and by which pagan emperors and their ministers are compared to the devil and his angels.

Peter says, that Satan was not only cast out

of heaven, but was cast into hell. "For, if God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment," &c. Now, if the word, hell, signifies the dreadful state into which the angels are fallen, even as our Lord's sufferings are called hell and the pains of hell, it is easy to be understood; but if by hell is meant the bottomless pit, the real receptacle of the damned, it is a wonder how he got out. This is no where revealed, that I know of; but, if it was so, it was permitted for the trial of mankind; for the devils are by no means in a place of confinement, or they are not confined in any prison; for Peter says that our adversary the devil is continually going about, as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. And this is obvious enough, not only by the wickedness of the openly profane, but by the swarms of heretics, hypocrites, and impostors, with which the professing church is al

most overrun.

The highest seat of the Satanic empire, where the devils reside, hold their counsel, and keep their court, is in the air; this the scriptures testify abundantly. "Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience." This appears also by also by our Lord's our Lord's parable of the sower, in which he calls the devils the fowls of the air: "And it came to pass, as he sowed, some

And, when the dis

fell by the way-side, and the fowls of the air came and devoured it up;" and the explanation of that part of the parable is, that Satan cometh immediately, and taketh away the word that was sown in their hearts, Mark iv. 14. ciples returned from their labour in the ministry, and told Christ of the devils being subject to them through his name, our Lord said unto them, "I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven." By all which it appears that the devils hold their council, and keep their court, in the air; their pride still mounting them as high as they can possibly get.

And where they keep their court there they will find the beginning of their torment, for so it is written: "And it shall come to pass in that day, that the Lord shall punish the host of the high ones that are on high, and the kings of the earth upon the earth. And they shall be gathered together, as prisoners are gathered in the pit, and shall be shut up in the prison, and after many days shall they be visited. Then the moon shall be confounded, and the sun ashamed, when the Lord of hosts shall reign in mount Zion, and in Jerusalem, and before his ancients gloriously," Isaiah xxiv. 21-22. The host of the high ones that are on high are the devils, and are distinguished from the kings of the earth, which will be punished upon the earth in the battle of Armageddon, after the destruction of the beast; and this punishment will commence upon the first resurrection, in which