nd it hath no
affinity with the opinion of an earthly or temporal kingdom of Christ, or
of the Jews' building again of Jerusalem and the material temple, and
their obtaining a dominion above all other nations, or the like.

I shall now bring home the point. There are very good grounds of hope to
make us think that this new temple is not far off; and (for your part)
that Christ is to make a new face of a church in this kingdom,--a fair and
beautiful temple for his glory to dwell in: and he is even now about the
work.

For, first, "The set time" to build Zion is come, when the people of God
"take pleasure in her stones, and favour the dust thereof," Psal. cii. 13,
14, 16. The stones which the builders of Babel refused are now chosen for
corner stones, and the stones which they chose do the builders of Zion now
refuse: "They shall not take of thee a stone for a corner, nor a stone for
foundations," Jer. li. 26. Those that have anything of Christ and of the
image of God in them begin to creep out of the dust of contempt, and to
appear like stars of the morning. Nay, to go farther than that, the old
stones, the Jews, who have been for so many ages lying forgotten in the
dust, those poor "outcasts of Israel" (Psal. cxlvii. 2), have of late come
more into remembrance, and have been more thought of, and more prayed for,
than they were in former generations.

Secondly, Are there not great preparations and instruments fitted for the
work? Hath not God called together, for such a time as this, the present
Parliament, and the Assembly of Divines, his Zorobabels, and Jehoshuas,
and Haggais, and Zechariahs? Are there not also hewers of stones, and
bearers of burdens? much wholesome preaching, much praying and fasting,
many petitions put up both to God and man? the covenant also going through
the kingdom as the chief preparation of materials for the work? Is not the
old rubbish of ceremonies daily more and more shovelled away, that there
may be a clean ground? and is not the Lord by all this affliction humbling
you, that there may be a deep and a sure foundation laid?

Thirdly, The work is begun, and shall it not be finished? God hath laid
the foundation, and shall he not "bring forth the head-stone?" Zech. iv.
7, 9. Christ hath put Antichrist from his outerworks in Scotland, and he
is now come to put him from his innerworks in England: "His work is
perfect" (Deut. xxxii. 4), saith Moses; "I am Alpha and Omega (saith
Christ), the b