by Fire, of which we shall speak imy. However, this is manifeft, that yle of the facred Writers, in representing judicial Proceeding, is accommodated to man Customs and Inftitutions; and that either Books nor Registers will be found in the Air, nor the Hiftory of his past Life be recited to every Individual. That every one I will deferve the Fate which he meets with, I will fufficiently appear by the Testimony of t his own Confcience, and that State of Mind, in which he will be actually found.

BUT we have faid that thefe Things are in a great Measure accommodated to human Customs and Inftitutions, and particularly to the Doctrines and the religious Belief of the Heathens, who conftituted Judges in the infernal World, Obfervers of Justice and Equity, and the Rewarders and Revengers of 1 human Actions. Their Names and their Bufinefs, and the various Punishments which they inflicted upon flagitious Men, are fufficiently known from the Grecian Authors. Plato, above all of them, has copiously. treated of this Matter in feveral Places, as in his Phado, and towards the End of his Gorgias, and in his Tenth Book of a Commonwealth, under the Perfon of Herus Arminius, who was come back from Hell to make the Relation. But these and several other Things, which relate to the infernal World, and to the State of the Dead, were borrowed

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that will not happen literally upon the Day of Judgment. In this Part of the Subject, I believe, we shall have no Adverfary: In the other Part, likewife, 'tis manifeft, that several Things will be literally accomplished, according as they are related. Chrift will defcend from Heaven perfonally, and visibly, attended with his Angelick Guards, upon whose Coming the Dead will be raised, in order to undergo fome Examination or Probation, upon which every one's Destiny will depend. But that thefe Things will be actually done under the Command and Conduct of Chrift, the facred Scripture abundantly teftifies, Matt. xvi. 27. John v. 22, 27. Acts xvii. 31. Rom. xiv. 9. 2 Tim. vi. 8. and in numerous other Places.

You fee now that in this Representation of the laft Judgment, there is a Mixture of the vulgar and the fecret Hypothefis. 'Tis the Part of a wife Man to distinguish what, and how much belongs to each of them. The Tryal of Souls, in order to punish or reward them, according as each of them is undefiled or wicked, is the main of the Affair, the Design, and the End of it. Nor is it of much Significancy, whether this Tryal proceeds, after the Manner of external Judicatures, or a human Procefs, or by any other Way; provided 'tis effectual, and obtains the End defign'd by it. Some of the Antients were of Opinion, that this Tryal, at the Burning of the World, was to be performed

formed by Fire, of which we shall speak immediately. However, this is manifeft, that the Style of the facred Writers, in representing this judicial Proceeding, is accommodated to human Customs and Inftitutions; and that neither Books nor Registers will be found in the Air, nor the History of his past Life be recited to every Individual. That every one will deferve the Fate which he meets with, will fufficiently appear by the Testimony of his own Conscience, and that State of Mind, in which he will be actually found.

BUT we have faid that thefe Things are in a great Measure accommodated to human Customs and Inftitutions, and particularly to the Doctrines and the religious Belief of the Heathens, who conftituted Judges in the infernal World, Obfervers of Justice and Equity, and the Rewarders and Revengers of human Actions. Their Names and their Business, and the various Punishments which they inflicted upon flagitious Men, are fufficiently known from the Grecian Authors. Plato, above all of them, has copiously, treated of this Matter in feveral Places, as in his Phado, and towards the End of his Gorgias, and in his Tenth Book of a Commonwealth, under the Perfon of Herus Arminius, who was come back from Hell to make the Relation. But these and several other Things, which relate to the infernal World, and to the State of the Dead, were L3 borrowed

borrowed by the Grecians from the Egyptians, according to Diodorus Siculus, which, he fays, were begun by Orpheus, whom afterwards feveral Grecian Poets and Theologues followed.

BUT thefe Things by-the-by. What is more worthy of Remark, is, that fome among the Antients were of Opinion, that there was no perfonal Ministry, no artful Pomp or Ornament, in the Distribution of Justice to human Souls; but that the Nature of Things was by divine Providence fo prepared and ordered, that it would fpontaneous diftribute Juftice to every Soul that should be freed from its mortal Body. And, therefore, they gave the Name of Nemefis, and fometimes of Adraftia, to this Force of God or Nature: Αναπόδρασον ἀτίαν ἦσαν κατὰ φύσιν becaufe they believed ma Body able to fly from this Caufe thus appointLib. xiv. ed by Nature: As the Author of the Treatife fub finem. de Mundo fays. In the fame Manner Adraftia, or Nemefis, is faid by Ammianus Marcellinus, to be the Avenger of wicked Actions, and the Rewarder of the Good: Whom, fays he, antient Theologues imagining to be the Daugb

ter

But of the Punishment of the Wicked in Hades, and of the Fields of the Good, and of the Introduction of the making of Fdols, and the imitating of what relates to the Sepulchres of the Egyptians, &c. Thefe and Sentences of the fame Nature, concerning Orpheus and the Egyptians, you may fee in Disdorus, 1. i. m. fol. 86.

ter of Justice, teach us, that she overfees all earthly Things from hidden and remote Eternity; that he the Sovereign Queen of Causes, the imperial Arbitress of Things; that he the deciding and determining Judge, mingles the Lots in the fatal Urn, and abfolutely governs and difpofes of the Viciffitudes of human Affairs.

BUT this Force implanted in the Nature of Things, this Force, that is able thus to distinguish and to distribute Juftice to every one in a future State, has not been fo well explained by antient Philofophers or Theologifts, as to make it evident by what Methods and what Causes this can be effected without a judicial Process. Some of the Christian Fathers, as we observed above, were of Opinion, that this Probation would be effected, and this Judgment executed by Fire, at the general Conflagration of the World; in which they believed that the Souls of all thofe would be involved, who were formerly Inhabitants of this Earth; and that, according to the Degree of their Purity or Impurity, they would receive more or lefs, or no Damage at all from it. And this Opinion is founded up on St. Paul's Difcourfe to the Corinthians, 1 Epift. iii. 13. in thefe Words: Every Man's Work fhall be made manifeft, for that Day fhall declare it, because it shall be revealed by Fire; and the Fire fhall try every Man's Work, of what Sort it is. Origin again Celfus fays, That L. v. m.

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p. 240,

this 241.