they professed is supported. Of this circumstance they were distinctly aware, and they recognized the fact with disinterested satisfaction. Yea and if I be offered,' says Paul, upon the sacrifice and service of your faith, I joy and rejoice with you all.'* 'Who now rejoice,' says he on another occasion, 'in my sufferings for you, and fill up that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh for his body's sake, which is the church,t -and whether we be afflicted, it is for your consolation and salvation.' But are we at liberty to infer, from this language, that the sufferings of Christ bear no other relation to the advantages of his people than do those of the apostles? Was Christ delivered for our offences in no higher sense than Paul the apostle may be said to have been? On the theory of interpretation we are combating, we must regard then as exactly parallel. But this is a conclusion from which, at least, Paul himself would have shrunk back with abhorrence. What else can we make of his appeal to the Corinthians - Was Paul crucified for you ?'§ Surely he could never have employed such language, had he believed that the crucifixion of Christ had no other relation to the salvation of Christians than that merely of being for their benefit.

Such is the proof of the atonement of Christ, derived from the writings of the new testament. The doctrine of the remission of sins through the atoning blood of Jesus, indeed, pervades these writings, and like the sun, invests their pages with

* Phil. ii. 17. † Col. i. 24. + 2 Cor. 1. 6. § 1 Cor. i. 13.

a sacred light. That the sufferings of the Redeemer,' says the eloquent Robert Hall, were vicarious and piacular, that he appeared in the character of a substitute for sinners, in distinction from a mere example, teacher, or martyr, is so unquestionably the doctrine of the inspired writers, that to deny it, is not so properly to mistake, as to contradict their testimony; it must be ascribed, not to any obscurity in revelation itself, but to a want of submission to its authority. The doctrine in question is so often asserted in the clearest terms, and tacitly assumed as a fundamental principle in so many more; it is intermingled so closely with all the statements of truth, and inculcations of duty throughout the holy scriptures, that to endeavour to exclude it from revelation is as hopeless an attempt as to separate colour from the rainbow, or extension from matter.** To the same purpose is the testimony of another eminent writer, with whose words we conclude our adduction of proof:- That Christ suffered and died as an atonement for the sins of mankind, is a doctrine so constantly and so strongly enforced through every part of the new testament, that whoever will seriously peruse those writings, and deny that it is there, may with as much reason and truth, after reading the works of Thucydides and Livy, assert, that in them no mention is made of any facts relative to the histories of Greece and Rome.'‡

We have, thus, given a view of the evidence by * Hall's Works, i. 489.

† Soame Jenyns' View of the Internal Evidence, &c., ninth ed., p. 22, note,

which the fact of Christ's atonement is supported. In the antiquity and universal prevalence of vicarious sacrifices, for whose existence we have found it impossible to account excepting on the principle of being instituted by God to prefigure the sacrifice of Christ, we have one argument. In the sacrifices of the Levitical economy, purposely designed, and eminently calculated, to lead to Christ, we have another argument. The prophecies of the old testament supply us with a third. The facts of Christ's sufferings, of which it is otherwise impossible to give a satisfactory explanation, furnish us with a fourth. While the passages in the new testament scriptures which speak of Christ making reconciliation; of his being a propitiation; of his giving a ransom and making redemption; of his being made sin, a curse, a sacrifice; and of his dying for us and our sins, add a fifth proof to this body of evidence. The whole. of these arguments are taken from the word of God. Some of them are deduced by way of inference from established premises; others are derived from a careful exegesis of scripture language; but each rests on a basis of infallible truth, and all together constitute a mass of evidence so clear, cogent, and convincing, as nothing but the most wilful enmity to the truth can resist. If the sacred scriptures, and not our own preconceived opinions and prejudices, are the standard to which we are to appeal, it seems impossible, but by the most obstinate moral perversity, to refuse the testimony they bear on this momentous subject. In short, unless the doctrine of substitution

is admitted, the sacred volume seems reduced to a mass of unintelligible, meaningless, contradictory assertions; the feelings of the writers seem to be out of all harmonious proportion with the nature of their subject; their elevation is fanaticism, their enthusiasm idolatry, and their transports of passion indicate only zeal without knowledge: we may safely join issue with those who represent them as 'babblers,' for, in this case, their reasonings are inconclusive, their inferences unsupported by their premises, and their premises themselves at variance with fact. Let us beware of adopting opinions, or acting a part which leads to such frightful consequences; and let us yield our minds up, with all becoming submission, to the divinely authoritative testimony by which it is affirmed that CHRIST HATH LOVED US AND HATH GIVEN HIMSELF FOR US, AN OFFERING AND A SACRIFICE TO GOD, for a sweet-SMELLING SAVOUR,

SECTION IX.

MATTER OR SUBSTANCE OF CHRIST'S ATONEMENT.

HERE we are to inquire what it was by which Christ made atonement for sin. That he did make an atonement, we consider as established in some preceding sections; it is natural next to ask how this was effected. Christ did many things while on earth; he taught, he obeyed, he suffered, he died. Now, the thing to be ascertained, is, by

which of these he gave that satisfaction to the law and justice of God in which we conceive the essence of atonement to consist. The truth, on this topic, we are inclined to think, lies in the following statement :-That Christ made atonement by his sufferings alone; that all his sufferings were comprehended in the matter of his atonement; and that a peculiar importance attaches, in this connexion, to the sufferings of his soul and of the concluding period of his life. Let us attend to the several branches of this position.

I. Christ made atonement by his sufferings alone. This statement has been questioned by some of the older writers on the subject, and the opinion it involves has been deemed heretical. To this conclusion they have been led, by taking a more extensive view of the nature of atonement than respect to strict accuracy of definition seems to warrant. Indeed the whole controversy, on this point, depends on the extent of meaning which is attached to the word atonement. If understood to embrace the whole of the Saviour's work for the redemption of man, then more than his sufferings ought to be included in its substance. On the other hand, if by the atonement of Christ is meant only a particular department of the work performed by him for our salvation, correct thinking will require us to restrict our view of its matter to his sufferings alone.

To obviate all difficulty on this subject, it seems necessary only to advert to our definition of atonement. It is this That satisfaction given to the law and justice of God, by the sufferings and