*

real propitiatory offerings. But this we cannot do, for God expressly disclaims any gift presumptuously offered him for the mere purpose of deprecating his displeasure. There is no iniquity with the Lord our God, nor respect of persons, nor taking Of gifts.

IV. We have now seen that sacrificing existed from the most remote antiquity; that the practice was universally prevalent; and that these ancient and universal sacrifices were of a strictly piacular or vicarious nature. And the point next to be considered respects THE ORIGIN of these ancient and universal sacrifices.

They must have had some adequate origin, and that origin must be either human or divine. To account for the practice, on the principle of a human origination, many theories have been formed, and much discussion has been expended; but the only satisfactory explanation of the singular fact is to be found, we presume, in the principle that sacrifice was originally instituted by God with reference to the atonement of Christ; the heathen sacrifices being so many imitations of the primitive practice, a knowledge of which was obtained by tradition, though greatly corrupted by cruel and frivolous inventions of man. This view of the subject admits of being extensively argued.

1. The divine origin of primitive sacrifice may be argued from its being impossible otherwise to account for its existence.

It cannot be regarded as a dictate of reason ; for reason can discover nothing either acceptable to God or fitted to remove the guilt of sin, in the destruction of an innocent creature; but rather the contrary, as such an act of cruelty seems more calculated to increase than to take away guilt, and an injury done to one of God's works seems fitter to incur than to appease his displeasure. It cannot have originated in natural instinct; for there is no appetite in man which can be supposed to be gratified by shedding the blood and burning the flesh of an unoffending animal. As little can it be supposed to have originated in priestcraft. In primitive times no distinct order of priesthood ex. isted ; the sacred functions were performed by the head of the family, who could have no pecuniary inducement to introduce expensive religious rites; and even in later times, the sacrifices were provided at the expense of the offerers, and were no source of emolument whatever to any order of men. There is just one other supposition, and this is not less unsatisfactory than those to which we have already referred, namely, that the practice originated in superstition. But superstition is the corruption of true religion, and supposes something similar in the latter, on which it is based, and from which it takes its rise. Without true religion there could be no superstition, just as without sincerity there could be no hypocrisy; without a genuine currency there could be no counterfeit coin; without truth there could be no falsehood; without a proper use there could be no abuse. Superstition can never, thus, of itself, account for the existence of sacrifice. Besides, superstition is apt to be endlessly diversified in its forms, while the practice in question is uniform throughout the whole range of its existence, which we have seen to be universal. Admitting that superstition might have accounted for its existence among a single people, it could not without a miracle, be supposed to have given rise to the same uniform practice in every nation of the world.

It thus appears that no mere human principle can account for the origin of primitive sacrifice. But the practice existed from the greatest antiquity, and prevailed over the whole earth. There is no disputing this fact. And as no effect can exist without an adequate cause, the fact in question must have originated in something sufficient to give it existence: and if this is not reason, nor natural instinct, nor priestcraft, nor superstition, what, pray, can it be, but the sovereign authority of God ? How any practice,' says Dr. Patrick Delany, in his admirable dissertation on this subject, how any practice could obtain in the world, to which mankind were neither urged by the interest

e.

and subtilty of any set of men, nor by any dictate of reason, nor by any instinct or demand of nature, nor by any interest of any kind; but quite the contrary, in direct contradiction to every principle of reason, and nature, and interest; (for the destruction of innocent creatures is against reason, against nature, and against interest :) I say, how such a practice could prevail

, and prevail universally, is impossible to be accounted for, but from some powerful and irresistible influence of example, or injunction of authority. And what example could have such influence, except that of Adam, or what authority could have such power, except that of God, is to me, I own, utterly inconceivable.... Where any practice is universal, it must demonstrably have some universal cau And that can be no other in the case before us, but either God, the founder of the world, or Adam, the founder of the human race; from whom it was derived to all his posterity.....But sacrifice was such a practice, as, unless enjoined by the authority of God, must of necessity be detrimental ; without any prospect of pleasure, or profit, or advantage of any kind. And therefore, unless Adam was worse than an idiot, it was impossible he could enjoin on his posterity such a practice, from any other motive than divine authority; or, if he had, it is unimaginable why they should universally obey him, from any other motive; unless they also were idiots for two thousand years successively. Nay, this is not all; for it will follow that the Egyptians, and Greeks, and Romans, were likewise worse than idiots in their turn; that the whole heathen world were brutes and monsters for two thousand years more, in the practice of this very rite ; nay, they actually are so to this day. In a word, either this rite had some foundation in true religion, which swayed the whole world to the practice of it for four thousand years, and yet sways the heathen part of it to this day; or else this boasted principle of reason, which could suffer men to go on in a train of such absurdity and barbarity, for four thousand years, nay,

for six thousand years together, is a very bad and insufficient guide. One of these positions is indisputably

of it are to be found; and the sacred history, which goes the farthest back of any records with which we are acquainted, contains abundant proof of the antiquity of sacrifices.

In the Book of Job, which is perhaps the oldest writing in existence, mention is made of sacrificing more than once. The patriarch himself followed the practice:-'And it was so, when the days of their feasting were gone about, that Job sent and sanctified them, and rose up early in the morning, and OFFERED BURNT-OFFERINGS according to the number of them all.'* The same thing was exemplified, under the sanction of a divine command, by Job's friends :'Therefore take unto you now,' said God, 'seven bullocks and seven rams, and go to my servant Job, and OFFER UP FOR YOURSELVES A BURNT-OFFERING, and my servant Job shall pray for you......... So Eliphaz the Temanite, and Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite, went and DID ACCORDING AS THE LORD COMMANDED THEM.'t Abraham, if not belonging to a previous age, was at least contemporary with the man of Uz, and he also followed the same practice :-'And Abraham lifted up his eyes, and looked, and behold, behind him a ram caught in a thicket by his horns; and Abraham went and took the ram, and OFFERED HIM UP for a burnt-offERING in the stead of his son.' Nearly five hundred years earlier than this, we find Noah, the second father of our race, acting a similar part on an occasion of great solemnity and importance :-'And Noah builded an altar unto the Lord, and took of every clean beast, and of every clean fowl, and ofFERED BURNT-OFFERINGS on the altar.'§ Pushing our inquiry into still more remote antiquity, we meet with the practice, in the case of Abel, at a distance of not less than fifteen hundred years from the case last adduced:-'And Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock, and of the fat thereof; and the Lord had respect unto Abel and to his OFFERING.'||

Nor is even this the highest antiquity to which the

* Job i. 5.

§ Gen. viii. 20.

+ Job xlii. 8, 9.

|| Gen. iv. 4.

+ Gen. xxii. 13.

evidence of the existence of sacrifices can be carried. We are now, indeed, within little more than a hundred years of the creation of man. But, unless greatly mistaken, there is good reason to believe that the practice of sacrificing was coeval with the fall of man. We know not what else to make of the circumstance of our first parents being provided with garments of the skins of animals: Unto Adam also, and to his wife, did the Lord God make COATS OF SKIN, and clothed them.'* The animals whose skins furnished this primitive clothing, must have been dead, and the question is, how came they by their death?-Were they slain on purpose, merely to furnish garments for our first parents? This, to say the least of it, is extremely improbable, when we consider that there were so many other ways by which the same end could have been accomplished, without inflicting pain on sentient and innocent creatures. Can they be supposed to have died of themselves? This is barely possible, but not at all probable. They had just lately been created in perfection, and that in so short a time they should have died a natural death is a most violent supposition. Could they have been slain for food? This, too, is an unreasonable presumption. It does not appear that animal food was in use till after the flood. The first grant of animals for meat, which we find on record, is that given to Noah after the deluge. To man, at first, we read only of the herb of the field and the fruit of the tree yielding seed being given for meat. How, then, we repeat the question, could those animals have died whose skins were the clothing of our first parents? And the only answer that accords with reason, or with the facts of the case, is, that they were slain for sacrifices. The impossibility of satisfactorily accounting otherwise for their death, taken in conjunction with the mention made of animal sacrifices immediately afterwards, gives to this supposition the weight of the very highest presumption, if not

* Gen. iii. 21.

† See Magee on Atonement, vol. ii. p. 31. Smith on Sac., p. 230.