Luke 16:26-29

And besides all this, &c.— "Ah poor creature! the time of mercy and hope is now over: God has fixed such a vast and unpassable distance between the happy and the miserable by an irreversible decree and sentence, that if any of us were ever so desirous to go and relieve you, it would be absolutely impossible to do it; and it is as impossible for any of your distressed company to come to us, and share in our joys, though they were ever so earnest in attempting it." So the state of every soul at death is unalterably fixed. Then the rich man, despairing of any comfort for himself, said to Abraham, "I entreat thee, by all the tenderness of a father, to shew me, at least, so much favour, as to dispatch Lazarus to my father's house, where I have five brethren still living, who are your offspring too, that he may acquaint them with the true state of things in the eternal world: let him tell them what a dreadful condition my sins have brought me into; and let him warn them of the danger of treading in my steps, lest they share with me in my plagues, and increase my guilt and torment for having drawn them into ruin by my example."So, though there is no compassion or charityamong the damned, yet they are in fearful expectation of growing miseries from the reproaches of their companions in iniquity who are still upon earth; and as their punishment is already more than they know how to bear, they would fain have every thing prevented, that might add still further to their distress. To this Abraham replied, "No request can be granted to you, who are under an irrevocable sentence of damnation: and as to what you ask for your brethren, it is unreasonable: God will not go out of his appointed and settled way, to humour you or them: they have sufficient notices and warnings in the writings of Moses and the prophets, which they may read as often as they please, and which are read and preached in the synagogues every sabbath-day: if therefore they would escape the torments of the damned, and obtain the blessedness of the righteous, let them attend to those instructions which God has already afforded them." So sinners in a state of eternal damnation will find no expedient to prevent their increasing calamities; and sinnersunder the means of grace upon earth must stand or fall according to their use or abuse of those means, having no room to expect that Godwill convert them by visions from or into the other world, or go out of his ordinary and instituted way to save them.