eath, or the grave;
hell, or the separate state, will never again be needed, as prisons to
keep their inmates for trial. "The lake of fire" is the place of
ceaseless and endless torment for all who are not "found written in the
book of life;" and this place seems to be distinct from the "bottomless
pit," Satan's "prison," out of which he had been loosed, (v. 7.)--Of the
beast it was said, he "ascendeth out of the bottomless pit," but not
that he was remanded thither again: he is said to "go into perdition,"
which must be "the lake of fire." (Compare ch. xvii. 8, with xix. 20;
and xx. 1-3 with v. 10.)--The plain and obvious meaning of these closing
verses of the 20th chapter, as delineated in its general import by
appropriate and familiar symbols and intelligible words, for ever
excludes, and emphatically condemns the conscience-stupifying heresies
and blasphemies of Unitarians and Universalists. The God-man Mediator,
seated upon the "throne of his glory," before whose face the "earth and
the heaven fled away," is thus evidenced to be the Son of God, Jehovah's
Fellow. And we may here adopt the assertion and caution of the "beloved
disciple,"--"This is the true God and eternal life.--Little children,
keep yourselves from idols." (1 John v. 20, 21.)--Moreover, these verses
reveal a place or state, more to be dreaded than the "killing of the
body,"--"the lake of fire, which is the second death," "where their worm
dieth not, and the fire is not quenched." (Matt. x. 28; 2 Thess. i.
8-10; Heb. x. 26-31.)

With the 20th chapter of the Apocalypse terminate the events of time, in
which the divine Author demonstrates, that "known unto him are all his
works, from the beginning of the world." (Acts xv. 18.) Many, indeed, of
the learned and pious have supposed the remaining chapters of the
Apocalypse, to be a description of the church on earth during the
millennial period. But besides the series, coherence and dependence of
the several parts of the book, precluding such _retrogression_, this
interpretation overthrows the scriptural distinction between the
militant and triumphant state of the church. And it is not to be thought
out of place, that the inspired prophet should describe, by suitable
emblems, the outline of the heavenly state; for this he has done briefly
already in a number of instances. (See chs. ii. and iii., also ch. vii.
15, 17.)--Those who consider the last two chapters as a delineation of
the church on earth, have f