one hand, we regard the animal slain in the sacrifice as the passive, involuntary subject of a ceremony, which indicated nothing more than the devotion of the person who performed it, and if, on the other hand, we understand by the efficacy of the death of Christ to take away sins, the testimony which it bore to the reality of his mission from God as a teacher of religion,-what is that point of comparison between the sacrifice of the animal and the sacrifice of Christ, which constituted a ground for pronouncing the inferiority, the inefficacy of the former, and the perfection, the sufficiency of the latter? We perceive, it is true, a resemblance between the animal offered in sacrifice-the lamb without

blemish and without spot, and our Redeemer in his voluntary submission to the death of the cross: they were both unoffending and innocent sufferers. But the language of the Apostle directs our attention to an opposition, a contrast between them, and instructs us to look for the reason of that contrast-the reason why the blood of bulls and goats was necessarily inert and powerless, and the blood of Christ all-sufficient to take away sins. Can that reason be any other, than that the former could not expiate the guilt of the sinner, and the latter could?

E

It should be added that, if the argument which we have taken on this subject be wellfounded, it must expose the futility of those attempts which are made to explain away the doctrine of Christ's satisfaction to divine justice in behalf of mankind, by alleging a variety of possible constructions of the original phraseology of Scripture. To take an examplewhen Christ is said to have died for us, it is argued that the phrase may signify that he died on our account, or for our benefit, as well as in our stead: but if such alterations were as allowable as the opponents of that doctrine could possibly desire, the great fact, that in the death of Christ there was a property to take away sins, which was signified by divine appointment in the institution of sacrifice, but which was necessarily wanting in the blood of irrational creatures, restrains us to the conclusion, that, in dying for our benefit, he bore the imputation of our sins, and suffered in the place of the guilty: though, indeed, this conclusion could scarcely have been impressed upon us in language more direct and unequivocal than is used by the sacred writers; as in the following passages:-" Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on

*On this proposed emendation, in rendering the Greek prepositions, see Magee, vol. i. p. 227.

the tree;" "Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us;" "Who gave himself a ransom for all;" with numerous others, which may be presumed to be familiar to every reader of the Scriptures.

We have prosecuted an argument in support of a most essential doctrine of Christianity; and so long as attempts shall be made to expunge it from the public formulary of our faith, so long as our belief of it shall be in danger of being destroyed or unsettled, a minister of the Gospel can want no inducement to apply his attention to its defence and confirmation. Not

* It seems, however, that there is a prior objection to this doctrine, which it is not in the power of language to remove. At least, when the author of "the ScriptureDoctrine of Atonement examined," asserts (p. 95) that "the Scripture never speaks, nor, in any consistency can speak, of Christ satisfying the demand of law and justice," can we believe that, had the Scripture literally affirmed, that our Lord satisfied the demand of law and justice, that author would have allowed the imputation of sin to the Messiah to have been taught in the Scriptures? If there be such a prior objection to the doctrine of which, in truth, we are left in no doubt by the language of its opponents-the contrariety of opinion on the subject of the sacrifice of Christ affords, in itself, no proof of an ambiguity in the Scriptures, or of the precariousness of language, as a medium of transmitting from generation to generation the substance of divine communications. The dispute may be maintained on an entirely different ground:-such, for example, as that on which we were engaged in the former part of the preceding discourse.

only so-to examine or review the evidence of this or any other tenet of our religion-to repeat the act of belief in it-to renew our impressions of its truth and reality, is one means—not the least essential-of retaining a just sense of its importance and value, or of establishing its influence on the affections and conduct. This, we would remind you in conclusion, is the proper end of all inquiry into the sense of the Scriptures. We must be too well persuaded that in religion, as in every other kind of knowledge, it is one thing to perceive the reality of a fact, or the truth of a proposition, and another to appreciate the magnitude of that fact, or the import of that proposition. The difference may be almost as great as that which there is between a belief of the authenticity of a work, and an accurate acquaintance with its contents. We may, every hour of our lives, believe, or, rather, we may never for a moment doubt the existence of God; but we are rarely, it may be, arrested by the immensity of that conclusion,* or impressed with ideas of the wisdom, the power, the goodness-in a word, the perfection and infinity of those attributes which are proper to the Creator and Preserver of all things. In

*"It is an immense conclusion that there is a God."Paley's Nat. Theol. ch. xxiv.

like manner, we may, at all times, be far from disbelieving the reality of our Saviour's atonement for the sins of mankind; but we may be feebly, if at all, affected by those momentous conclusions which it must of necessity involve, and force upon the consideration of every reflective believer-the utter incongruity which all iniquity must bear to the character of the Divine Being, and the happiness of his creatures the inconsistency which there must be between wilful and unrepented sin, and a wellfounded hope of his forgiveness-the immense debt of gratitude which binds us to the Deity, and the infinite encouragement afforded us to serve and obey him - we may be but rarely affected by considerations of this nature, and, consequently, derive from that one sufficient sacrifice which was offered by Jesus Christ for the sins of the whole world, but little, if any impulse to our religious affections—but little, if any inducement to holiness of life.

It may be, happily, far otherwise. We may be employing our powers, discharging our duties, and expending, or, rather, "redeeming" our time, under a deep and abiding impression of that manifestation of the Deity which is made to us in the atonement of our Saviour of his abhorrence of evil, and his compassion for trans