CONSUMMATION, Consummatio. This word does not signify only the Finishing, the End, the Perfection of any thing, but it likewise denotes frequently the utmost Misery. Numquid iratus es nobis usque ad consummationem? Art thou angry with us so far as to destroy us without hopes of recovery? And Psalm lviii. 14. Annuntiabuntur in consummatione, in ira consummationis, & non erunt: It will be every where published, that thou exercisest thy Vengeance in the day of Wrath, and they shall not subsist any longer. And Isaiah x. 22. Consummatio abbreviata inundabit justitiam; consummationem & abbreviationem faciet Dominus: The Justice of God shall be poured out upon Sinners, like a Deluge of Water; their ruin is resolved on, he will in a little time exterminate and destroy them: Consummatio abbreviata, or rather according to the Hebrew Consummatio or desolatio decisa, resolved, fixed, determined Destruction. The Prophet Nahum speaking of the ruin of Nineveh, In diluvio prætereunte consummationem faciet---- consummationem faciet, & non consurget duplex tribulatio: God will overflow this City with the Flood of his Wrath, he will destroy it, and will do it at once.
Jeremiah iv. 27. Deserta erit omnis terra, sed tamen consummationem non faciet: The Lord will reduce the Land to a meer solitude, but will not intirely destroy it. And Ezekiel xi. 13. Heu, heu, heu, Domine Deus, consummationem tu facis reliquiarum Israel: Alas! Lord, thou art going to annihilate the remains of Israel. We may observe expressions much alike in Isaiah xxxviii. 22. Jeremiah v. 10,18. xxx. 11. xlvi. 28. Ezekiel xx. 17. Daniel ix. 27, &c. In Psalm cxviii. 96. there is a more difficult passage, which however comes to the same. Omnis consummationis vidi finem, latum mandatum tuum nimis: I have seen, I have gone through the greatest dangers and misfor tunes, I have been exposed to utter Destruction; but thy Commandments have set me free, have protected me. The Hebrew, Latitudo mandatorum tuorum, is opposite to finis consummationis, or extremæ consummationis.