But how distinguished must not that honour be which is conferred by God himself, who no longer calls them servants, but friends, [1] brethren, [2] and sons of God! [3] Hence the Redeemer will address his elect in these words, which at once breathe infinite love, and bespeak the highest honour: " Come, ye blessed of my Father, possess you the kingdom prepared for you." [4] Justly, then, may we exclaim with the psalmist: " Thy friends, O God! are made exceedingly honourable." [5] They shall also receive the highest praise from Christ the Lord, in presence of his Heavenly Father, and before the assembled hosts of heaven. And, if nature has interwoven in the human heart, the desire of honour, particularly when conferred by men eminent for wisdom, who are, therefore, the most authoritative vouchers of merit; what an accession of glory to the blessed, to evince to wards each other the highest veneration?
To enumerate all the delights with which the souls of the blessed shall be inebriated, would be an endless task: we can not even conceive them in idea: with this truth, however, the minds of the faithful should be deeply impressed, that the happiness of the saints is full to overflowing, of all those pleasures which can be enjoyed or even desired in this life, whether they regard the powers of the mind or the perfection of the body: a consummation more exalted in the manner of its accomplishment, than, to use the words of the Apostle, " eye hath seen, ear heard, or the heart of man conceived." [6] The body, which was before gross and material, having put off mortality, and now refined and spiritualized, shall no longer stand in need of corporal nutriment: whilst the soul shall be satiated with that eternal food of glory, which the master of that great feast will minister, in person, to all. [7] Who will desire rich apparel or royal robes, when; these appendages of human grandeur shall be superseded; and all shall be clothed with immortality and splendour, and adorned with a crown of imperishable glory! And, if the possession of a spacious and magnificent mansion forms an ingradient in human happiness, what more spacious, what more magnificent, can imagination picture, than the mansion of heaven, illumined, as it is throughout, with the blaze of glory which encircles the Godhead! Hence, the prophet, contemplating the beauty of this dwelling-place, and burning with the desire of reaching those mansions of bliss, exclaims: " How lovely are thy tabernacles, O Lord of hosts! my soul longeth and fainteth for the courts of the Lord: my heart and my flesh have rejoiced in the living God." [8] That the faithful may be all tilled with the same sentiments, and utter the same language, should be the object of the pastor's most earnest desires; as it should be of his zealous labours. " In my Father's house," says our Lord, " there are many mansions," [9] in which shall be distributed rewards of greater and of less value, according to
