Never was fair weather after foul, nor warm weather after cold, nor a sweet and beautiful spring after a heavy and nipping and terrible winter, so comfortable, sweet, and desirable and welcome to the poor birds and beasts of the field, as this day will be to the church of God. Darkness! it was the plague of Egypt; it is an empty, forlorn, desolate, solitary, and discomforting state. Wherefore light, even the illuminating grace of God, especially in the measure that it shall be communicated unto us at that day, it must needs be precious. In light there is warmth and pleasure. It is by the light of the sun that the whole universe appears unto us distinctly, and it is by the heat thereof that every thing groweth and flourisheth; all which will now be gloriously and spiritually answered in this holy and new Jerusalem. O how clearly will all the spiders and dragons and owls and foul spirits of antichrist, at that day, be discovered by the light hereof. Now also will all the pretty and little birds in the Lord's field, most sweetly send forth their pleasant notes, and all the flowers and herbs in his garden spring. Then will it be said to the church by her husband and Saviour, "Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away; for lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone, the flowers appear on the earth, the time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land; the fig-tree putteth forth her green figs, and the vine with her tender grapes give a good smell." You know how pleasant this is, even to be fulfilled in the letter of it, not only to birds and beasts, but to men; especially it is pleasant to such men as have for several years been held in the chains of affliction. It must needs therefore be most pleasant and desirable to the afflicted church of Christ, who hath lain now in the dungeon of antichrist for. above a thousand years. But, Lord, how will this lady, when she gets her liberty and when she is returned to her own city, how will she then take pleasure in the warmth and spangling beams of thy shining grace, and solace herself with thee in the garden, among the nuts and pomegranates, among the lilies and flowers, and all the chief spices! "And in the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month; and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations." This tree of life is the Lord Jesus Christ; and that he is here called a tree, is to show how fruitful and exceeding advantageous he in all his benefits will be to the inhabitants of this city. This is the tree under whose branches the fowls of heaven shall now most safely lodge, and find relief from the hot and fainting beams of the persecuting sun of this world.