into his flesh and blood, and been most intimately united with his body. It would have even been a disadvantage as compared with the paradisaical state; for man has learned to sin, and may at every moment be deceived by the serpent, and so would ever need anew such a divine declaration of grace-a constant process of sin and forgiveness, without end or result. Christ, now, could be our Redeemer in his Incarnation and Death, only as he was wholly different from us. In Christ all die; in him they are renewed, that, freed from sin and the curse, they may have eternal life. By the Incarnation the bites of the serpent in the flesh are extirpated; fleshly lusts expelled; death, the wages of sin, overcome, (ii. 69, 70.) And with the Apostle, (1 John iii. 14,) Athanasius makes the sign of this sonship in us to be love to the brethren. As children of God in Christ, we are united to him, and with one another in love. Interpreting John xvii. 21, he puts into the mouth of Christ the words, (iii. 21,) "The perfection of my disciples proclaims to the world the advent of the Son, when others see that they are full of God: the work is completed, in that men are freed from sin, no longer dead, but looking to us, are divinely united to each other by the bond of love.

Thus is Christ the beginning and source of the "new creation," 2 Cor. v. 7; in his flesh he has opened a new and living way. If, as the Apostle says, old things are passed away, lo! all things are become new, (2 Cor. v. 17;) in this new creation, one must be the first. A mere man, mortal since the fall, could not be this; through a frail and earthly being, the first creation was wrecked: it must be restored by the Lord himself, through union with whom man may walk in this new life, and come to the Father. The resurrection of Christ is full of significancy for this "mystical union;" he is the "beginning, the first-born from the dead, that in all he might have the pre-eminence," (Col. i. 18.) God's hand created the world perfect, through man's guilt it became imperfect; thus it cannot remain; human nature must be glorified; this was achieved through Christ, when he assumed it, with all its weakness; this was the work laid upon him, (John iv. 34, ix. 4;) thus our whole redemption rests in Christ. And here Athanasius goes still farther back, not only to the eternal ground, but to the

eternal end of our salvation. In Christ we were chosen to salvation by God from eternity, (ii. 77.) But how could God have chosen us, ere we existed, if we were not preconceived in him? how receive us to sonship, if the Son himself, before the foundation of the world, "had not assumed the economy" for our sakes? So, too, since we are of the earth, we could not have reached the end of our calling, which is eternal life, had not the hope of life in Christ been prepared, ere time was, (ii. 77.) But Athanasius looks not only at the objective, but also to the subjective side of our redemption; not merely to the blessedness, but also to the duties of the new life. He says, (ii. 51, 52) Since man had become disobedient, and even angels had fallen, there was in the creature no longer moral constancy; an unchangeable nature was required, that man might have in the unchangeable rectitude of the Logos an image and pattern of virtue. The art and power of the serpent that conquered the first Adam, are broken on him. From his victory comes to us such living power, that we can say, (2 Cor. ii. 11,) "we are not ignorant of his devices." Thus is Christ to us "the chorus-leader of virtue;" as God and the eternal Logos, he is the just judge and friend of virtue.

What is thus true of redemption, holds good also of the means of redemption and of grace; these, too, were deceptive and ineffectual, if Christ were merely a creature, and not eternally begotten of the Father. This holds true above all of the Holy Spirit, the only sanctifying power. No one but Christ, (i. 49,) can unite man with the Holy Ghost; the Spirit is His. So, too, of the means of grace, in the narrower sense, especially of baptism, of which Athanasius speaks at length; here is moored the constitution of all our faith, (iv. 21.) If the Son is not equal with the Father, why is his name given in the baptismal formula? (Matt. xxviii. 19;) why add a creature, who cannot be for us any bond of union with God, and who does not himself stand in essential unity with the Creator? But may not the reason be, to unite us with the Son? No: this would be no sufficient ground, if he is a creature, for naming his name in baptism; for, if God could make him to be a Son, he might also make us so (ii. 41.) The reason why he is named in the baptismal formula is not that the Father is not sufficient of himself,

but because the Father is for us in the Son alone, through him gives us his grace in holy baptism. Whom the Father baptizes, him the Son also baptizes, and he whom the Son baptizes receives consecration in the Holy Ghost. (Rom. i. 17; 1 Cor. i. 24; John xiv. 23.) The Arians lose the "fullness of the mystery' in baptism; denying the eternal divinity of the Son, their baptism is maimed, and hence useless, (ii. 43.) Of the Word of God as a means of grace Athanasius has no need to speak against the Arians: nor yet of the Lord's Supper, which he calls (Ad Serap. ep. iv. cap. 19;) "bread from heaven and spiritual nourishment," defining the two elements, the sensible and the supersensible, the flesh and the Spirit, according to John vi., and showing the significancy of each on christological grounds. From the words, "this is my body," he derives (Orat. cont. Ar. iv. 36) an argument against Paul of Samosata, since the Lord does not say, "the Christ, i. e., the mere man, is other than the Logos," but "he is with me and I with him."

The two last points, the Word of God, and the Eucharist are more frequently mentioned in the Festal Epistles of Athanasius, from which we subjoin a few statements as to the doctrine of redemption. In the first epistle he speaks of the time at which the redemption appeared, citing Eccles. iii. 1, “to everything there is a season;" God ever sends salvation at the right time, which he knows as a skillful physician This redemption is purchased for us by his humiliation, (Ep. vi;) "he assumed for our sakes a corruptible body;" "he sacrificed himself to destroy death by his blood;" his sufferings are past, the redemption is eternal. The Ariomanites, the Christomachites and heretics, (Ep. x.) misinterpret all this: on account of his humiliation, which was for us, they deny his essential divinity; because they see him born of a Virgin, they doubt whether he is truly the Son of God; since he appeared in time as a man, they deny his eternity; while they consider him as suffering for our sakes, they do not believe that he is the incorruptible Son of the incorruptible Father. Ungrateful foes of Christ! Godless above all! who kill their Lord: blind in the eye of the soul, Jews in opinion, not understanding the Scriptures-not hearing the holy men, who say, "let thy

countenance shine, and we shall be saved." But this does not annul the blessings of his sufferings. He suffered, that we, who suffered in him might become insensible to suffering; he descended to raise us up; he was born that we might love him, the unborn; he became corruptible, that we might put on incorruption; he descended to death, to give us immortality, and to make the dead to live. We owe our salvation also to his exaltation, as well as to his humiliation; to his resurrection as well as to his death. The fruit of his resurrection (Ep. ii.) is, that he raised us with himself loosing the bands of death; instead of the curse he gave a blessing, joy instead of sorrow, the Easter-Festival instead of mourning. So, in Ep. v., “our salvation consists in this, that we receive life for death, freedom for bondage, the kingdom of heaven instead of hell. Death reigned ever before, but now the divine word is spoken, To-day shalt thou be with me in Paradise.' This is Christ's glory, this the miracle of his divinity, that he exchanges for our sufferings the benefits of his death." The sum of all his gracious gifts is in the Saviour's promise, "I am the bread of life," John vi. 35, (cf. Ep. vii., where this idea is unfolded at length with reference to the feast of Wisdom, Prov. ix. 1 sq.) Sin has the bread of its own death, (Prov. ix. 17, 18) but the bread of Wisdom gives living fruit. It nourishes each as he uses it, (Ep. x.); some, as lambs, he feeds with milk; others, as boys, with meat; for the more perfect, he has bread, and gives his flesh for food. We feed on the Logos of the Father, (Ep. iv.): we eat his sacrifice (Ep. v.) as our bread of life, and bathe our souls in his dear blood, as in a fountain. The Word of God is also magnified as the food of the soul, in the sense. of the apostles, (1 Cor. iii. 2; Eph. iv. 13, 14; 1 Pet. ii. 2; cf. Hebr. v. 14.) The vision of God, and the words he utters are the food of angels. All God's gifts here on earth are but pledges of the eternal blessedness of heaven, types of the joys of the perfected. The Lord is the food of the spirits above, the delight of the whole heavenly host. He is all unto all, and with his human love has pity upon all. In the worthy celebration of the earthly festival we have the pledge of the heavenly feast, (Ep. vi.) Faith is the means whereby we receive these gracious gifts, and eat the bread of life; "we

must mortify our earthly members, and be nourished by the living bread in faith and love to God, since we know that it is impossible, without faith, to share such bread." When our Saviour said, "If any man thirst let him come to me and drink," He added, "He that believeth on me, out of his body shall flow streams of living water." Athanasius ever insists upon the necessity of a correspondence between objective and subjective Christianity. "Our wills, (Ep. iii.) must ever strive, together with the grace of God, and not become weary, lest we lose the gifts of grace. The unclean spirit enters in, when virtue is away. We should repay grace by thankfulness, (Ep. v.) When we repay to the Lord his benefits, we give nothing of our own, but only what we have before received; it is a proof of his grace, that, as it were, he asks from us his gift; "My sacrifices," he says, "are my gifts," that is, what ye give to me belongs to you only as you have received it from me.

Since, now, all these blessings come only through belief in the eternal divinity of Christ, the Arians may not share in them. Their error makes them fail both in respect to true Christian knowledge, and true Christian practice. The Arian heresy in respect to Christology and the Trinity, is avenged by all the doctrines of the Christian faith. For how, asks Athanasius (Or. I. c. Ar. c. 7,) can he speak truly of the Father, who denies that the Son reveals the Father? How can he think aright of the Holy Spirit, who contemns the word which the Spirit offers us! In respect to the resurrection, who can believe one that denies that the Lord has become for us the first fruits of them that slept? He that ignores the true origin. of the Son from the Father, must he not be in error about his manifestation in the flesh? That the Arian heresy is avenged in the Christian life; that they have no true sacraments, no true festivals, and hence no real joy, since they have not Christ, the Son of God, the living centre, the true source of all joy; and that the orthodox church, in its seeming humiliation, is still inwardly the triumphant church; of this Athanasius discourses with eloquent words, in his eleventh Festal Epistle: "We will not act in a godless way with the Ariomanites, who say, that thou, O Logos, art from nothing; that which is eternal with the