LORD, In Wrath Remember MERCY. AMEN.

The conflagration of the world!
(Samuel Davies, "The Universal Judgment!")

"The present heavens and earth are reserved 
for fire, being kept for the day of judgment 
and destruction of ungodly men. The day 
of the LORD will come like a thief. The heavens 
will disappear with a roar; the elements will be 
destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything 
in it will be laid bare!" 2 Peter 3:7, 10 

The present state is but the infancy 
of the world. All the events of time, even 
those which make such great noise to us, 
and determine the fate of kingdoms--
are but as the trivial games of little 
children. But if we look forward and trace 
events to maturity, we meet with vast, 
significant and majestic events! 

To one of those scenes I would direct your 
attention this day; I mean the solemn, 
tremendous, and glorious scene of 
the universal judgment!

You have sometimes seen a stately 
building in ruins; come now, and view 
the ruins of a demolished world! 

Come now, and view the whole universe 
severely laboring and agonizing in her 
last convulsions, and her well-ordered 
system dissolved! 

You have heard of earthquakes here and 
there which have laid huge cities in ruins. 
Come now, and feel the tremors and 
convulsions of the whole globe, which blend 
cities and countries, oceans and continents, 
mountains, plains and valleys--
in one giant heap!

You have a thousand times beheld the moon 
walking in brightness, and the sun shining 
in its strength. Come now, look and see the sun 
turned into darkness, and the moon into blood! 

It is our lot to live in an age of war, blood, 
and slaughter; an age in which our attention 
is engaged by the dubious fate of kingdoms. 
Draw off your thoughts from these trifling 
objects for an hour, and fix them on more 
solemn and vital objects. 

Come view this dread scene!


"The world alarmed, both earth and heaven o'erthrown, 
 And gasping nature's last tremendous groan;
 Death's ancient scepter broke, the teeming tomb,
 The Righteous Judge, and man's eternal doom!"

Let us now enter upon the majestic scene! 
But alas! what images shall I use to 
represent it? Nothing that we have ever 
seen, nothing that we have ever heard, 
nothing that has ever happened on 
the stage of time--
can furnish us with proper illustrations. 
All here is low and groveling--
when compared with the grand 
phenomena of that day!

We are so accustomed to trifling earthly 
objects, that it is impossible that we should 
ever raise our thoughts to a suitable pitch 
of elevation. But before long, we shall be 
amazed spectators of these majestic wonders--
and our eyes and our ears will be our instructors! 

But it is now necessary we should 
have such ideas of them--
as may affect our hearts, and prepare 
us for them. Let us therefore present 
to our view, those representations 
which divine revelation--
our only guide in this case, give us . . .
  of the person of the JUDGE, and the manner of HIS appearance; 
  of the resurrection of the dead, and the transformation of the living; 
  of the universal gathering of all men before the supreme tribunal; 
  of their separation to the right and left hand of the JUDGE, 
     according to their characters; 
  of the judicial process itself; 
  of the decisive sentence; 
  of its execution, and
  of the conflagration of the world!
   ~  ~  ~  ~

I trust that the above excerpt has whet your appetite to read the whole of Davies' sermon,
 "The Universal Judgment!"