asSSSiSicivS :: . . T.I BRA HY (Theological JScminarjj, PRINCETON* N. J, BT 75 .M45 1844 The Christian treasury THE CHRISTIAN TREASURY; A SELECTION OF STANDARD TREATISES ON SUBJECTS OF DOCTRINAL AND PRACTICAL CHRISTIANITY CONTAINING MAGEE'S DISCOURSES AND DISSERTATIONS ON THE SCRIP- TURAL DOCTRINES OF ATONEMENT AND SACRIFICE. WITIIERSPOON'S PRACTICAL TREATISE ON REGENERATION. "^BOSTON'S CROOK IN THE LOT. STUART'S LETTERS ON THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST. , GUILD'S MOSES UNVEILED. i. GUILD'S HARMONY OF ALL THE PROPHETS. . LESS'S AUTHENTICITY, UNCORRUPTED PRESERVATION, AND CREDIBILITY OF THE NEW TESTAMENT. EDITED BY THE REV. T. S. MEMES, LL.D. LONDON : HENRY G. BOHN, YORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN. MDCCCXLIV. DISCOURSES AND DISSERTATIONS ON THE SCRIPTURAL DOCTRINES OP ATONEMENT AND SACRIFICE; AND ON THE PRINCIPAL ARGUMENTS ADVANCED, AND THE MODE OF REASONING EMPLOYED, BY THE OPPONENTS OF THOSE DOCTRINES AS HELD BY THE ESTABLISHED CHURCH : WITH AN APPENDIX, CONTAINING SOME STRICTURES ON MR BELSHAM'S ACCOUNT OF THE UNITARIAN SCHEME, IN HIS REVIEW OF MR WILBERFORCE's TREATISE. BY THE LATE MOST REV. WILLIAM MAGEE, D.D. ARCHBISHOP OF DUBLIN. LONDON: HENRY G. BOHN, YORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN. 1845. J. BILLING, PRINT*! AND STkRIOTYPKk, WOKINO. llSRIiY. TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE WILLIAM CONYNGHAM PLUNKET. In placing at the head of these sheets a name, to which the respect and the admiration of the public have attached so much celebrity, and in avowing, at the same time, that I have selected the name of a friend, with whom I have been united, almost from childhood, in the closest habits of intimacy, I am aware that I subject myself to the imputation of acting as much from a motive of pride as from a sentiment of affection. I admit the imputation to be well founded. To enjoy the happiness of having such a friend, and not to exult in the possession, would be not to deserve it. It is a pride which, I trust, may be indulged in without blame ; and the distinction of having been associated with a character so transcendently eminent for private worth, for public virtue, and for intellectual endowments, I shall always regard as one of the most honourable circum- stances of my life. But, independently of these considerations, the very nature of my subject supplies a reason for the choice which I have made. For I know not, in truth, to whom I could, with greater propriety, inscribe a work whose chief end is to expose false reasoning and to maintain true religion, than to one in whom the powers of just reasoning are so conspicuously displayed, and by whom the great principles of religion are so sincerely reverenced. With these views, I trust that I shall stand excused by you, my dear sir, in having, without your knowledge, thus availed myself of the credit of your name. The following treatise, in which so many additions have been made to a former publication, as in some measure to entitle it to the appellation of a new work, I submit to your judgment ; well satisfied, that if it meet your appro- bation, it will not find an unfavourable reception from the public. I am, my dear Sir, With the truest attachment, Your affectionate friend and servant, The Author. Tr[wjtv Collegr, Dublin, S:pt, 21. 1809. CONTENTS. Discourse I. — On the scriptural doctrine of atonement, Page 7 Discourse II. — On the scriptural doctrine of sacrifice, . . 17 illustrations and explanatory dissertations. N. 1. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 1(5. 17- 18 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 2fi. 27- 28. 29. 30. 31. 32. 33. 34. 3:.. 36 37. I'iUB On the Pre-existence of Christ, and the species of arcni- nients by which this article of the Christian Doctrine has been opposed. ..... 23 Unitarian objections to the religious observance of stated days, ...... 28 On the importance of the Doctrine of Redemption, . lb. Pardon not necessarily consequent upon Repentance, 29 The sense entertained by mankind of the natural ineffi- cacy of Repentance, proved from the history of human sacrifices, ...... 30 On the multiplied operation of the Divine Acts, . 3ft Deistieal reasoning instanced in Chubb, . . ib. On the consistency of Prayer with the Divine Immuta- bility, . .... 39 On the granting of the Divine forgiveness through a Me- diator or Intercessor, .... 41 On Unitarians, or Rational Dissenters, . . 42 On the distinction between Unitarians and Socinians, 43 On the corruption of man's natural state, . . 44 On the misrepresentation of the Doctrine of Atonement by Unitarians, ..... 48 On the disrespect of Scripture manifested by Unitarian writers, ...... ib. On the Heathen notions of merit entertained by Uni- tarian writers, ..... 50 On I>r Juhu Taylor's scheme of Atonement, . . ib. The Doctrine of Atonement falsely charged with the pre- sumption of pronouncing on the necessity of Christ's death, ...... 52 On the mode of reasoning whereby the sufficiency of good works without mediation is attempted to be defended from Scripture, . . . . .54 The want of a discoverable connection between the means and the end, equally applies to every scheme of atone- ment, ...... 55 On the Scripture phrase of our being Reconciled to God, 56 On the true distinction between the laying aside our enmity to God, and being reconciled to God, . 57 On the proofs from Scripture, that the sinner is the object of the Divine displeasure, . . . ib. Instance, from the book of Job, of Sacrifice being pre- scribed to avert (Jod's anger, . . . .58 On the Attribute of the Divine Justice, . . ib. On the text in John, describing our Lord as " the Lamb of Cod, which taketh away the sins of the world," 59 On the meaning of the word " propitiation " in the New Testament, .... 60 On the texts describing Christ's death as a Sacrifice for Bin 61 On the word KATAAAAITI, translated " Atonement," in Rom. v. II, . . . . . 66 On the denial that Christ's death is described in Scripture as a Sin-offering, . . . . . ib. On the sense in which Christ is said in Scripture to have died for us, ...... 67 On the pretence of figurative allusion in the sacrificial terms of the New Testament, . . .68 Arguments to prove the sacrificial language of the New Testament figurative, urged by H. Taylor and Dr Priestley, . . . . . .69 On the sense entertained generally by all, and more espe- cially instanced amongst the Jews, of the necessity of propitiatory expiation, . . . . ib. On II. Taylor's objection of the want of a literal corres- pondence between the Mosaic sacrifice and the death of Christ, . . . . . .78 On the arguments by which it is attempted to prove the Passover not to be a sacrifice, . . .79 On the meaning of the word translated " Atonement" in the Old Testament, . . . .85 On the efficacy of the Mosaic atonement as applied to cases of moral transgression, ... 88 No, 38. 40. 41. 42. 43. 44. 45. 46. 47- 48. 4!l. 50. 51. 52. 53. 54. 55. 56. 57- 58. 59. 60. 61. 62. 63. 64. 65. 66. 67- 68. 69. 70. 71. 72. 73. 74. Pah a 93 96 On the vicarious import of the Mosaic sacrifices, On tin' imposition of hands upon the head of the victim, On the sufficiency of the proof of the propitiatory nature of the Mosaic sacrifices, independent of the argument which establishes their vicarious import, On the Divine institution of sacrifice ; and the trace9 there- of discoverable in the heathen corruptions of the rite. On the death of Christ as a true propitiatory sacrifice for the sins of mankind, .... On the inconsistency of the reasoning whereby the death of Christ is maintained to have been but figuratively a sacrifice, ...... On the nature of the sacrifice for sin. On 1 1 1 -= effect of the Doctrine of Atonement in producing sentiments favourable to virtue and religion, On the supposition that sacrifice originated in priestcraft, 120 On the supposition that the Mosaic sacrifice originated in human invention, .... Sacrifices explained as gifts by various writers, Sacrifices considered as federal rites, Bishop Warburton's theory of the origin of sacrifice, The supposition that sacrifices originated in the idea of gifts, erroneous, ..... On the date of the permission of animal food to man, On the Divine origin of language, ( )n the natural unreasonableness of the sacrificial rite, On the universality of sacrifice, On the universality of the notion of the expiatory virtue of sacrifice, ..... On the objections against the supposition of the Divine institution of sacrifice, .... On the sacrifice of Abel, as evincing the Divine institu- tion of sacrifice, ..... On the history and the book of Job, On Grotius's strange misconception of the nature of Abel's sacrifice, ..... On the difference in the Divine reception of the sacrifices of Cain and Abel, .... On the true meaning of the phrase, n AEIONA 0721 AN, attributed to the sacrifice of Abel, On the nature and grounds of the faith evidenced by the sacrifice of Abel, ..... On the probable time and occasion of the institution of sacrifice, ...... On the true interpretation of the passage, Gen. iv. 7, containing God's expostulation with Cain. On the comparison between the sacrifice of Abel and that of Christ, ...... On the nature of sacrifice before the Law : tending to shew its confinement to animal sacrifice, except in the case of Cain, ...... On the disproportion between the effects of the Mosaic and the Christian sacrifices, On the correspondence between the sacrificial language of the old Testament and that employed in the New to describe redemption by the death of Christ : and the original adaptation of the former to the subject of the latter, ...... Postscript to No. 69 — On Bolingbroke and Hume, On the correspondence between the annual expiation under the Law, and the one great expiation under the Gospel, ....... On the nature and import of the ceremony of the scape- goat, ...... Socinian objections urged by a divine of the Established Church against the doctrine of the vicarious import of the Mosaic sacrifices, and against other doctrines of the Church of England 210 The atonement by the sacrifice of Christ more strictly vicarious than "that by the Mosaic sacrifices, whereby it was typified, ..... 217 Concluding Number, . . . . 5:18 99 ib. 103 124 1.'.-. ib. 127 130 131 133 lb. 1.14 1.37 113 ib 144 ib. 147 148 17:. 176 177 180 181 183 186 187 ib. ik:> 198 208 209 APPENDIX, CONTAINING AN ACCOUNT OP TUB UNITARIAN SCHEME, AS DESCRinKD BY Mn BeI.SHAM, IN HIS REVIEW OR Mr AViLRRKFORCE's treatise; with occasional strictures on the leading arguments advanced in that publication, Page 219 PREFATORY ADDRESS. TO THE STUDENTS IN DIVINITY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF DUBLIN. The following Discourses, originally composed with a view to your instruction, are now with the same design submitted to your more deliberate examination. In these latter days Christianity seems destined to undergo a fiercer trial than it has for many centuries experienced. Its defenders are called upon, not merely to resist the avowed invader, who assails the citadel from without, but the concealed and treacherous foe, who undermines the works, or tampers with the garrison within. The temporising Christian, who, under the mask of liberality, surrenders the fundamental doctrines of his creed ; and the imposing Rationalist, who, by the illusions of a factitious resemblance, endeavours to substitute Philosophy for the Gospel ; are enemies even more to be dreaded than the declared and systematic Deist. The open attacks of the one, directed against the Evidences of Chris- tianity, have but served to strengthen the great outworks of our faith, by calling to its aid the united powers of its adherents ; whilst the machinations of the others, secretly employed against the Doctrines of our religion, threaten, by eluding the vigilance, and lulling the suspicions, of its friends, to subvert through fraud what had been found impregnable by force. To aid these machinations, a modern and depraved philosophy hath sent abroad its pernicious sophistries, infecting the sources of morality, and enervating the powers of manly thought ; and, the better to effect these purposes, clad in those engaging colours which are | peculiarly adapted to captivate the imaginations of young and ardent minds. Against arts and enemies such as these, the most strenuous exertions of all who value the religion of Christ are at this moment imperiously demanded. In what manner to prepare for this conflict we are informed on high authority. We are to " take unto us the whole armour of God — having on the breast-plate of righteousness ; and our feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of peace : above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith we shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked : and taking the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God." These are the arms which are to ensure us victory in the contest ; and without these arms we neither can nor ought to stand. A conspiracy the most deep and deadly has been formed against Christianity. The " powers of darkness" have combined their mightiest efforts. If, then, the Bentinels of the Gospel sleep upon their posts, if they do not instantly rouse to its defence, they are guilty of the blackest treason to their heavenly Master. There is no room for trace or accommodation. The " Captain of our salvation" has declared, that " he that is not with him is against him." The force of this declaration is at this day peculiarly manifest. It is now become necessary, that a broad and distinct line should be drawn between those who truly acknowledge the authority of revelation, and those who, whilst they wear the semblance of Christians, but lend the more effectual support to the enemies of Christianity. These reflections, though befitting all who profess the religion of Christ, press peculiarly on those who are destined to teach and to enforce his word. To you, my young friends, who look forward to the clerical office, they are important beyond description ; and, if allowed their due weight upon your minds, they cannot fail to stimulate to the most zealous and effectual exertions in your pursuit of sacred knowledge. Alreadj , indeed, has a more enlivened spirit of religious inquiry been manifested amongst you. To promote that spirit, and to supply some additional security against the prevailing delusions of the day, these Discourses on the Doctrines of Atonement and Sacrifice, — doctrinea against which, above all others, the Deist and the rationalizing Christian direct their attacks, — were originally delivered, and are now published. The desire expressed for their publication by the existing divinity classes would have been long since complied with, but for the addition of certain arduous academic duties to the ordinary engagements of the author's collegiate situation. To those who are so well acquainted with the laborious employment which those duties and engagements necessarily impose, no apology can be requisite on the ground of delay. More than twelve months have elapsed since the greater part of these sheets were committed to the press ; and the prosecution of the subject has been unavoidably suspended during a considerable portion of the intervening period. The form in which the work is now presented seems more to require explanation. The first design extended only to the publication of the two Discourses, with a few occasional and supplementary remarks : 6 PREFATORY ADDRESS. and on this plan the sermons were sent to press. But on farther consideration, it appeared advisable to enter into a more accurate and extensive examination of the subject, even though a short text should thereby be contrasted with a disproportionate body of notes. The great vice of the present day is a presumptuous precipitancy of judgment ; and there is nothing from which the cause of Christianity, as well as of general knowledge, has suffered more severely than from that impatience of investigation, and that confidence of decision upon hasty and partial views, which mark the literary character of an age undeservedly extolled for its improvements in reasoning and philosophy. A false taste in morals is naturally connected with a false taste in literature ; and the period of vicious dissipation is not likely to prove the era of dispassionate and careful inquiry. There is, however, no short way to truth. The nature of things will not accommodate itself to the laziness, the interests, or the vices of men. The paths which lead to knowledge are unalterably fixed, and can be traced only by slow and cautious steps. From these considerations, it was judged expedient to submit the subject of these discourses, and the crude and superficial reasonings which have of late been exercised upon it, to a stricter and more minute test of inquiry. For this purpose, the present plan has been adopted as best suited to that exactness of critical investigation which is due to the importance of the subject, and as the most fitly calculated to direct the thoughts of the student to the most useful topics of inquiry, and the most profitable sources of informa- tion. Such a plan, I have little doubt, will be favourably received by those whose minds, trained in the habits of close deduction, and exercised in the researches of accurate science, cannot but be readily disposed to accept, in the place of general assertion and plausible declamation, a careful review of facts, and a cautious examination of Scripture. One circumstance, which is of no mean value in the method here pursued, is, that it enables us, without interrupting the thread of inquiry, to canvass and appreciate the pretensions of certain modern writers, whose high tone of self-admiration, and loud vauntings of superior knowledge, have been but too successful in obtaining for them a partial and temporary ascendency in public opinion ; and who have employed the influence derived from that ascendency to weaken the truths of Christianity, and to subvert the dearest interests of man. I trust that you, my young readers, will see enough in the Illustrations and Explanatory Dissertations accompanying these Discourses, to convince you of the emptiness of their claims to that supe- riority, which, did they possess it, would be applied to purposes so injurious. You will probably see sufficient reason to pronounce, that their pretensions to philosophic distinction, and their claims to critical pre-eminence, stand on no better grounds than their assumption of the exclusive profession of a pure Christianity. The confident and overbearing language of such men you will then regard as you ought : and, from the review of their reasonings, and the detail of their religious opinions, you will naturally be led to feel the full value of the duly regulated discipline of the youthful understanding, in those severer exercises of scientific study, which give vigour to the intellect, and steadiness to the judgment ; and the still greater value of that early reverence for the mysterious sublimities of religion, which teaches the humility becoming man's highest powers when directed to the yet higher things of God. The half learning of modern times has been the fruitful parent of multiplied evils : and it is not without good cause, that the innovating theorist of the present day makes it his first object to abridge the work of education, and, under the pretence of introducing a system of more immediate practical utility, to exclude that wholesome discipline, and regular institution, which are essential to conduct the faculties of the young mind to sound and manly strength. I cannot conclude this prefatory address without indulging in the gratifying reflection, that, whilst the deceptions of wit and the fascinations of eloquence, combined with a wily sophistry and an imposing confi- dence, have but too frequently produced their pernicious effects, to the detriment of a true Christian faith, on the minds of the inexperienced and unreflecting ; these audacious attempts have seldom found, in this place, any other reception than that of contempt and aversion. And with true pleasure I feel myself justified in pronouncing with confidence, that, so long as the students of this seminary, intended for the office of the ministry, continue to evince the same serious attention to religious subjects which has of late years so honourably distinguished numbers of your body, and so profitably rewarded the zealous labours of your instructors in sacred literature, Christianity will have little to fear in this land from such attempts. That you may gloriously persevere in these laudable efforts to attain the most useful of all learning, and in the conscientious endeavour to qualify yourselves for the due discharge of the most momentous of all duties ; that so the work of God may not suffer in your hands ; and that, being judged fit dispensers of that " wisdom which is from above," you may hereafter be enabled to " turn many to righteousness," and finally to obtain the recompense of the " good and faithful servants" of Christ, is the ardent wish and prayer of your very sincere friend, The Author. AjirilM, 1801. TWO DISCOURSES ON THE SCRIPTURAL DOCTRINES OF ATONEMENT AND SACRIFICE; DELIVERED IN THE CHAPEL OF TRINITY COLLEGE, DUBLIN, ON GOOD FRIDAY, IN THE YEARS 1798 and 1799. DISCOURSE I. " But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumbling- block, and unto the Greeks foolishness; but unto them which are called — Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God." 1 Cor. i. 23, 24. That the sublime mystery of the Redemp- tion should have escaped the comprehension both of the Jew and of the Greek ; that a crucified Saviour should have given offence to the worldly expectant of a triumphant Mes- siah, whilst the proud philosopher of the schools turned with disdain from the humi- liating doctrine which proclaimed the insuffi- ciency of human reason, and threatened to bend its aspiring head before the foot of the Cross, — were events which the matured growth of national prejudice, on the one hand, and the habits of contentious discussion, aided by a depraved moral system, on the other, might, in the natural course of things, have been expected to produce. That the Son of God had descended from heaven ; that he had disrobed himself (No. I.) of the glory which he had with the Father before the world be- gan ; that he had assumed the form of the humblest and most degraded of men ; that, submitting to a life of reproach, and want, and sorrow, he had closed the scene with a death of ignominy and torture ; and that, through this voluntary degradation and suf- fering, a way of reconciliation with the Su- preme Being had been opened to the whole human race, and an atonement made for those transgressions, from the punishment of which unassisted reason could have devised no means of escape, — these are truths which prejudice and pride could not fail, at all times, to have I rejected ; and these are truths to which the irreligion and self-sufficiency of the present day oppose obstacles not less insurmountable than those which the prejudice of the Jew, and the philosophy of the Greek, presented in the age of the apostle. For at this day, when we boast a wider diffusion of learning, and more extensive acquirements of moral know- ledge, do we not find these fundamental truths of revelation questioned 1 Do we not see the haughtiness of lettered scepticism presuming to reject the proffered terms of salvation, because it cannot trace, with the finger of hu- man science, the connection between the cross of Christ and the redemption of man % But to these vain and presumptuous aspirings after knowledge placed beyond human reach, we are commanded to preach Christ crucified : which, however it may, to the self-fancied wise ones of this world, appear as foolishness, is yet, to those who will humble their under- standing to the dispensations of the Almighty, the grandest display of the divine perfections — " Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God." To us also, my brethren, who profess a con- viction of this truth, and who are called on by the return of this day, (No. II.) more particu- larly to recollect the great work of salvation, wrought out for us by the memorable event which it records, it may not be unprofitable to take a short view of the objections that have been urged against this fundamental doctrine (No. III.) of our religion; that so we may the better discern those snares which beset the Christian path, and that, being guarded against the obstructions which are insidiously raised against that true and gospel faith, whereby alone we can hope for aecep- s MAC E E ON T II E A T O N E M E N T. tancc and happiness, we may be able to place the great pillar of our hopes upon a basis which no force can shake, and no art can un- dermine. In the consideration of this subject, which every Christian must deem most highly de- serving the closest examination, our atten- tion should be directed to two different classes of objectors, — those who deny the necessity of any mediation whatever, and those who question the particular nature of that media- tion which has been appointed. Whilst the Deist, on the one hand, ridicules the very no- tion of a Mediator ; and the philosophising Christian, on the other, fashions it to his own hypothesis ; we are called on to vindicate the word of truth from the injurious attacks of both, and carefully to secure it, not only against the open assaults of its avowed enemies, but against the more dangerous mis- representations of its false or mistaken friends. The objections which are peculiar to the former are, upon this subject, of the same description with those which they advance against every other part of revelation ; bear- ing with equal force against the system of Natural Religion, which they support, as against the doctrines of Revealed Religion, which they oppose. And, indeed, this single circumstance, if weighed with candour and reflection — that is, if the Deist were truly the philosopher he pretends to be — might suffice to convince him of his error. For the closeness of the analogy between the works of Nature and the word of the Gospel being found to be such, that every blow which is aimed at the one rebounds with undiminished force against the other, the conviction of their common origin must be the inference of un- biassed understanding. Thus, when, in the outset of his argument, the Deist tells us, that, as obedience must be the object of God's approbation, and disobe- dience the ground of his displeasure, it must follow, by natural consequence, that, when men have transgressed the divine commands, repentance and amendment of life will place them in the same situation as if they had never offended ; he does not recollect, that actual experience of the course of nature directly contradicts the assertion, and that, in the common occurrences of life, the man who, by intemperance and voluptuousness, has in- jured his character, his fortune, and his health, does not rind himself instantly restored to the full enjoyment of these blessings on repenting of his past misconduct, and deter- mining on future amendment. Now, if the attributes of the Deity demand that the punishment should not outlive the crime, on what ground shall we justify this temporal dispensation? The difference in degree can- not affect the question in the least. It matters not whether the punishment be of long or of short duration ; whether in this world or in the next. If the justice or the goodness of God require that punishment should not be inflicted when repentance has taken place, it must be a violation of those attributes to per- mit any punishment whatever, the most slight, or the most transient. Nor will it avail to say, that the evils of this life attendant upon vice are the effects of an established constitu- tion, and follow in the way of natural conse- quence. Is not that established constitution itself the effect of the divine decree ? and are not its several operations as much the ap- pointment of its Almighty Framer, as if they had individually flowed from his immediate direction ? But, besides, what reason have we to suppose that God's treatment of us in a future state will not be of the same nature as we rind it in this — according to established rules, and in the way of natural consequence ? Many circumstances might be urged, on the contrary, to evince the likelihood that it will. But this is not necessary to our present pur- pose. It is sufficient that the Deist cannot prove that it will not. Our experience of the present state of things evinces, that indemnity is not the consequence of repentance here : can he adduce a counter-experience to shew that it will hereafter ? The justice and good- ness of God are not, then, necessarily con- cerned, in virtue of the sinner's repentance, to remove all evil consequent upon sin in the next life ; or else the arrangement of events in this has not been regulated by the dictates of justice and goodness. If the Deist admits the latter, what becomes of his Natural Reli- gion ? Now let us inquire whethei the conclusions of abstract reasoning will coincide with the deductions of experience. If obedience be at all times our duty, in what way can present repentance release us from the punishment of former trangressions ? (No. IV.) Can repen- tance annihilate what is past? Or, can we do more, by present obedience, than acquit our- selves of present obligation'? Or, does the contrition we experience, added to the positive duties we discharge, constitute a surplusage of merit, which may be transferred to the reduc- tion of our former demerit? And is the jus- tification of the philosopher, who is too en- lightened to be a Christian, to be built, after ail. upon the absurdities of supererogation ? " We may as well affirm," says a learned divine, "that our former obedience atones for our present sins, as that our present obe- dience makes amends for antecedent trans- gressions." And it is surely with a peculiar ill grace, that this sufficiency of repentance is urged by those who deny the possible efficacy of Christ's mediation ; since the ground on which they deny the latter, equally serves for the rejection of the former : the necessary con- nection between the merits of one being, and Discourse I.— ON THE SCRIPTUtAL DOCTRINE OF ATONEMENT. 0 the acquittal of another, not being less con- ceivable than thai which is believed to subsist between obedience at one time, and the for- giveness of disobedience at another. Since, then, upon the whole, experience (as far aa it extends) goes to prove the natural inefficacy of repentance to remove the effects of past transgressions ; and the abstract reason of the thing can furnish no link, wherehyto connect present obedience with forgiveness of former sins ; it follows, that, however the contemplation of God's infinite goodness and love might excite some faint hope that mercy would be extended to the sincerely penitent, the animating certainty of this momentous truth, without which the religious sense can have no place, can be derived from the express communication of the Deity alone, (No. V.) But it is yet urged by those who would measure the proceedings of divine wisdom by the standard of their own reason, that, admit- ting the necessity of a revelation on this sub- ject, it had been sufficient for the Deity to have made known to man his benevolent in- tention ; and that the circuitous apparatus of the scheme of redemption must have been su- perfluous for the purpose of rescuing the world from the terrors and dominion of sin ; when this might have been effected, in a way infi- nitely more simple and intelligible, and better calculated to excite our gratitude and love, merely by proclaiming to mankind a free par- don, and perfect indemnity, on condition of repentance and amendment. To the disputer, who would thus prescribe to God the mode by which he may best con- duct his creatures to happiness, we might, as before, reply, by the application of his own argument to the course of ordinary events ; and we might demand of him to inform us, wherefore the Deity should have left the sus- tenance of life depending on the tedious pro- cess of human labour and contrivance, in rearing from a small seed, and conducting to the perfection fitting it for the use of man, the necessary article of nourishment, when the end might have been at once accomplished by its instantaneous production. And will he contend, that bread has not been ordained for the support of man, because, instead of the piv-ejit circuitous mode of its production, it might have been rained down from heaven, like the manna in the wilderness? On grounds such as these, the Philosopher (as he wishes to he called) may be safely allowed to object to the notion of forgiveness by a Mediator. With respect to every such objection as this, it may be well, once for all, to make this general observation. We find, from the whole course of nature, that God governs the world, not by independent acts, but by connected system. The instruments which he employs, in the ordinary works of his providence, are not physically necessary to his operations. He might have acted without them if ho pleased, lie might, for instance, have created all men, without the intervention of parents : but where then had been the beneficial con- nection between parents and children ; and the numerous advantages resulting to human society, from such connection ? The difficulty lies here : the uses, arising from the connec- tions of God's acts may he various ; and such are the pregnancies of his works, that a single .•ict may answer a prodigious variety of pur- poses. Of these several purposes we are, for the most part, ignorant : and from this igno- rance are derived most of our weak objections against the ways of his providence ; whilst we foolishly presume, that, like human audits, he has hut one end in view, (No. VI.) This observation we shall find of material use, in our examination of the remaining ar- guments adduced by the Deist, on the present subject. And there is none to which it more forcihly applies than to that, by which he en- deavours to prove the notion of a Mediator to be inconsistent with the divine immutability. It is either, he affirms, (No. VII.) agreeable to the will of God, to grant salvation on re- pentance, and then he will grant it without a Mediator; or it is not agreeable to his will, and then a Mediator can I f no avail, unless we admit the mutability of the divine decrees. But the objector is not, perhaps, aware how far this reasoning will extend. Let us try it in the case of prayer. All such things a- are agreeable to the will of God mu-t be accom- plished, whether we pray or not ; and, there- fore, our prayers are useless, unless they be supposed to have a power of altering hi? will. And, indeed, with equal conclusiveness it might be proved, that repentance itself must be unnecessary. For, if it be fit that our sins should be forgiven, God will forgive us without repentance; and if it be unfit, repentance can be of no avail, (No. VIII.) The error in all these conclusions is tho same. It consists in mistaking a conditional for an absolute decree, and in supposing God to ordain an end unalterably, without any concern as to the intermediate steps whereby that end is to be accomplished. Whereas the manner is sometimes as necessary as the act proposed ; SO that if not done in that particu- lar way, it would not have been done at all. Of this observation abundant illustration may be derived, as well from natural, as from re- vealed religion. "Thus, we know, from natural religion, that it is agreeable to the will of God, that the distresses of mankind should be relieved ; and yel we see the desti- tute, from a wise constitution of Providence, left to the precarious benevolence of their fel- low-men ; and if not relieved by them, they are not relieved at all. In like manner, in Revelation, in the case of Naaman the Syrian, we find that God was willing he should 10 M A G E E ON THE A TON E M K N T. be healed of his leprosy ; but yet he was not willing that it should be done, except in one particular manner. Abana and Pharparwere as famous as any of the rivers of Israel. Could he not wash in them, and be clean ? Certainly lie might, if the design of God had been no more than to heal him. Or it might have been done without any washing at all. But the healing was not the only design of God, nor the most important. The manner of the cure was of more consequence in the moral design of God, than the cure itself: the effect being produced, for the sake of manifesting, to the whole kingdom of Syria, the great power of the God of Israel, by which the cure was performed." And, in 'like manner, though God willed that the penitent sinner should receive forgiveness, we may see good reason, why, agreeably to his usual proceeding, he might will it to be granted in one particular maimer only, — through the intervention of a Mediator, (No. IX.) Although, in the present stage of the sub- ject, in which we are concerned with the objections of the Deist, the argument should be confined to the deductions of natural reason ; yet I have added this instance from Revelation, because, strange to say, some who assume the name of Christians, and profess not altogether to discard the written word of Revelation, adopt the very principle which we have just examined. For what are the doctrines of that description of Christians, (No. X.) in the sister kingdom, who glory in having brought down the high things of God to the level of man's understanding? — That Christ was a person sent into the world to promul- gate the will of God ; to communicate new fights on the subject of religious duties; by hi - life, to set an example of perfect obedience ; by his death, to manifest his sincerity; and by his resurrection, to convince us of the great truth which he had been commissioned to teach, — our rising again to future life. This, say they, is the sum and substance of Christi- anity. It furnishes a purer morality, and a more operative enforcement ; its morality more pure, as built on juster notions of the divine nature ; and its enforcement more ope- rative, as founded on a certainty of a state of retribution, (No XI.) — And is, then, Christi- anity nothing but a new and more formal promulgation of the religion of nature? Is the death of Christ but an attestation of his truth ? And arc we, after all, left to our own merit for acceptance ; and obliged to trust, for our salvation, to the perfection of our obedience 1 Then, indeed, has the great Au- thor of our religion in vain submitted to the agonies of the cross ; if, after having given to mankind a law which leaves them less excus- able in their transgressions, he lias left them to be judged by the rigour of that law, and to stand or fall by their own personal deserts. It is said, indeed, that as by this new dis- pensation the certainty of pardon, on repen- tance, has been made known, mankind has been informed of all that is essential in the doctrine of mediation. But, granting that no more was intended to be conveyed than the sufficiency of repentance, yet it remains to be considered in what way that repentance was likely to be brought about. Was the bare declaration, that God would forgive the re- pentant sinner, sufficient to ensure his amend- ment ? Or was it not rather calculated to render him easy under guilt, from the facility of reconciliation ? What was there to alarm, to rouse, the sinner from the apathy of habi- tual transgression ? What was there to make that impression which the nature of God's moral government demands ? Shall we say, that the grateful sense of divine mercy would be sufficient ; and that the generous feelings of our nature, awakened by the supreme goodness, would have secured our obedience? that is, shall we say, that the love of virtue, and of right, Avould have maintained man in his allegiance? And have we not, then, had abundant experience of what man can do, when left to his own exertions, to be cured of such vain and idle fancies ? What is the his- tory of man, from the creation to the time of Christ, but a continual trial of his natural strength? And what has been the moral of that history, but that man is strong only as he feels himself weak? — strong, only as he feels that his nature is corrupt, and, from a consciousness of that corruption, is led to place his whole reliance upon God? What is the description, which the Apostle of the Gentiles has left us, of the state of the world at the coming of our Saviour ? — " Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wicked- ness, covetousness, maliciousness ; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, without understanding, covenant breakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful — who, knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them," (Rom. i. 29—32. Here were the fruits of that natural goodness of the human heart, which is the favourite theme and fundamental principle with that class of Christians with whom we are at present concerned. And have we not, then. had full experiment of our natural powers? (No. XII.) And shall we yet have the madness to fly back to our own sufficiency, and our mu q merits, and to turn away from that gra- cious support, which is offered to us through the mediation of Christ? No: lost as men were, at the time Christ appeared, to all sense of true religion ; lost as they must be to it, Discourse I.— ON THE SCRIPT! HAL DOCTRINE OF ATONEMENT. 11 at all times, when left to a proud confidence in their own sufficiency ; nothing short of a Btrong anil salutary terror could awaken them to virtue. Without some striking expression of God's abhorrence of sin, which might work powerfully on the imagination ami on the heart, what could prove a sufficient counter- action to the violent impulse of natural pas- sions ? what, to the entailed depravation, which the history of man, no less than the voice of Revelation, pronounces to have in- fected the whole human race? Besides, with- out a full and adequate sense of guilt, the very notion of forgiveness, as it relates to us, is unintelligible. We can have no idea of for- giveness, unless conscious of something to be forgiven. Ignorant of our forgiveness, we remain ignorant of that goodness which confers it. And thus, without some proof of God's hatred for sin, we remain unacquainted with the greatness of his love. The simple promulgation, then, of forgive- ness on repentance, could not answer the pur- pose. Merely to know the condition, could avail nothing. An inducement, of sufficient force to ensure its fulfilment, was essential. The system of sufficiency had been fully tried, to satisfy mankind of its folly. It was now time to introduce a new system, the system of humility. And for this purpose, what expe- dient could have been devised more suitable, than that which has been adopted ? — the sac- rifice of the Son of God, for the sins of men : proclaiming to the world, by the greatness of the ransom, the immensity of the guilt, (No. XIII ;) and thence, at the same time, evincing, in the most fearful manner, God's litter abhor- rence of sin, in requiring such expiation ; and the infinity of his love, in appointing it. To this expedient for man's salvation, though it be the clear and express language of Scrip- ture, I have as yet sought no support from the authority of Scripture itself. Having hitherto had to contend with the Deist, who denies all Revelation, and the pretended Christian, who, rationalising away its substance, finds it a mere moral system, and can discover in it no trace of a Redeemer, to urge the declara- tions of Scripture, as to the particular nature of redemption, would be to no purpose. Its authority, disclaimed by the one and evaded by the other, each becomes unassailable on any ground, but that which he has chosen for himself — the ground of general reason. But we come now to consider the objections of a class of Christians, who, as they profess to derive their arguments from the language and meaning of Scripture, (No. XIV.) will enable us to try the subject of our discussion by the only true standard, the word of Revelation. And, indeed, it were most sincerely to be wished, that the doctrines of Scripture were at all times collected purely from the Scrip- ture itself; and that preconceived notions, and arbitrary theories, were not first to 1 1 formed, and then the Scripture pressed into the service of each fanciful dogma. If God has vouchsafed a Revelation, has lie not there- by imposed a duty of submitting our under- standings to its perfect wisdom? Shall weak. short-sighted man presume to say — "If I find the discoveries of Revelation correspond to my notions of what is right and lit, I will admit them : but if they do not, I am sure the_\ cannot be the genuine Bense of Scripture : and I am sure of it on this principle, that the wisdom of God cannot disagree with itself?" That is, to express it truly, that the wisdom of God cannot but agree with what this judge of the actions of the Almighty deems it wise for him to do. The language of Scripture must, then, by every possible refinement, be made to surrender its (air and natural mean- ing, to this ]. redetermination of its uecessary import. But the word of Revelation being thus pared down to the puny dimensions of human reason, how differs the Christian from the Deist? The only difference is this : that whilst the one denies that God hath given us a Revelation, the other, compelled by evi- dence to receive it, endeavours to render it of no effect. But in both, there is the same self- sufficiency, the same pride of understanding, that would erect itself on the ground of human reason, and that disdains to accept the divine favour on any conditions but its own. In both, in short, the very characteristic of a Christian spirit is wanting — Humility. For in what consists the entire of Christianity but in this — that, feeling an utter incapacity to work out our own salvation, we submit our whole selves, our hearts and our understand- ings, to the divine disposal ; and, relying on God's gracious assistance, ensured to our honest endeavours to obtain it, through the mediation of Christ .Jesii-. we look up to him, and to him alone, for safety? Nay, what is the very notion of religion, but this humble reliance upon God? fake this away, and we become a race of independent beings, claim- ing, as a debt, the reward of our good works, (No. XV;) a sort of contracting party with the Almighty, contributing nought to his glory, but anxious to maintain our own inde- pendence, and our own rights. And is it not to subdue this rebellious spirit, which is ne- cessarily at war with Virtue and with God, that Christianity has been introduced? Does not every page of Revelation peremptorily pronounce this ? And yet, -hall we exercise this spirit, even upon" Christianity itself? Assuredly, if our pride of understanding, and self-sufficiency of reason, are not made to prostrate themselves before the awfully mys- terious truths of Revelation ; if we do not bring down the rebellious spirit of our nature, to confess that the wisdom of man is but fool- ishness with God, we may bear the name of 12 M A GEE ON THE A T O N E M E N T. Christian?, but we want the essence of Chris- tianity. These observations, though they apply, in their full extent, only to those who reduce Christianity to a system purely rational, yet are, in a certain degree, applicable to the description of Christians, whose notion of redemption we now come to consider. For what but a preconceived theory, to which Scripture had been compelled to yield its obvious and genuine signification, could ever have led to the opinion, that, in the death of Christ, there was no expiation for sin ; that the word sacrifice has been used by the writers (if the .New Testament merely in a figurative Bense ; and that the whole doctrine of the Redemption amounts but to this — " that God, willing to pardon repentant sinners, and at the same time willing to do it only in that way which would best promote the cause of virtue, appointed that Jesus Christ should come into the world ; and that He, having taught the pure doctrines of the Gospel, having passed a life of exemplary virtue, having en- dured many sufferings, and finally death itself, to prove his truth, and perfect his obedience ; an. I having risen again, to manifest the cer- tainly of a future state ; has, not only by his example, proposed to mankind a pattern for imitation ; but has, by the merits of his obe- dience, obtained, through his intercession, as a reward, a kingdom or government over the world, whereby lie is enabled to bestow par- don, and final happiness upon all who will accept them, on the terms of sincere repen- tance ?" (No. XVI.) That is, in other words, we receive salvation through a Mediator : the mediation conducted through intercession : and that intercession successful, in recom- pense of the meritorious obedience of our Redeemer. Here, indeed, we find the notion of redemp- tion admitted : but in setting up, for this purpose, the doctrine of pure intercession in opposition to that of atonement, we shall pcr- haps discover, v\hen properly examined, some small tincture of that modeof reasoning, which, a- we have seen, has led the modern Socinian to contend against the idea of Redemption at large ; and the Deist, against that of Revela- tion it-elf. For the present, let us confine our attention CO the objections which the patrons of this !!t\\ system bring against the principle of atonement, as sel forth in the doctrines of that Church to which we more immediately belong. As fur those which are founded in views of general reason, a little reflection will convince as, thai there is not any, which can he alleged against the latter, that may not be urged, with equal force, against the former: not a single difficulty, with which it is at- tempted to encumber the one, that does not equally embarrass the other. This having been evinced, we shall then see how little reason there was for relinquishing the plain and natural meaning of Scripture ; and for open- ing the door to a latitude of interpretation, in which it is but too much the fashion to indulge at the present day, and which, if persevered in, must render the word of God a nullity. The first and most important of the objec- tions we have now to consider, is that which reprcsentsthedoctrine of atonement asfounded on the divine implacability — in as much as it supposes, that, to appease the rigid justice of God, it was requisite that punishment should be inflicted ; and that, consequently, the sinner could not by any means have been released had not Christ suffered in his stead, (No. XVII.) Were this a faithful statement of the doctrine of atonement, there had, indeed, been just ground for the objection. But that this is not the fair representation of candid truth, let the objector feel, by the application of the same mode of reasoning to the system which he upholds. If it was necessary to the forgiveness of man, that Christ should suffer ; and through the merits of his obedience, and as the fruit of his intercession, obtain the power of granting that forgiveness ; does it not follow, that, had not Christ thus suffered, and interceded, we could not have been for- given ? And has he not then, as it were, taken us out of the hands of a severe and strict Judge ; and is it not to him alone that we owe our pardon ? Here the argument is ex- actly parallel, and the objection of implaca- bility equally applies. Now what is the answer 1 "That although it is through the merits and intercession of Christ, that we are forgiven ; yet these were not the procuring cause, but the means by which God, origin- ally disposed to forgive, thought it right to bestow his pardon." Let then the word inter- cession be changed for sacrifice, and see whe- ther the answer be not equally conclusive. The sacrifice of Christ was never deemed by any, who did not wish to calumniate the doctrine of atonement, to have made Cod placable ; but merely viewed as the means, appointed by divine wisdom, through which to bestow forgiveness. And agreeably to this, do we not find this sacrifice every where spoken of, as ordained by God himself? — "God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life," (John, iii. 16;) and, "Herein islove,not that we loved Cod, hut that he loved us, and sent his Sonto be the propitiation for our sins," (I John, iv. 10. ;) and again we are told, that " we are redeemed with the precious blood of Christ, as of a Lamb without blemish, and without spot — wdio verily was foreordained before the foundation of the world," (1 Pet. 1. la— 20;) and again, that Christ is "the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world," Discourse I.-ON THE SCRIPTURAL DOCTRINE OF ATONEMENT. 18 (Rev. xiii. 8.) Since, then, the notion of the efficiency of the sacrifice of Christ, con- tained in the doctrine of atonement, stands precisely on the same foundation with that of pure intercession — merely as the means whereby God lias thoughtfit to grant hisfavour and gracious aid to repentant sinners, and to fulfil that merciful intention which he had at all times entertained towards hia fallen crea- tures ; and since, by the same sort of repre- sentation, the charge of implacability in the Divine Being is as applicable to the one scheme as to the other ; that is, since it is a calumny most foully cast upon both ; we may estimate with what candour this has been made, by those who hold the one doctrine, the fundamental ground of their objections against the other. For it is on the ground of the expression of God's unbounded love to his creatures every where through Scripture, and of his several declarations that he forgave them freely, that they principally contend, that the notion of expiation by the sacrifice of Christ, cannot be the genuine doctrine of the New Testament, (No. XVIII.) But still it is demanded, " In what way can the death of Christ, considered as a sacrifice of expiation, be conceived to operate to the re- mission of sins, unless by the appeasing a Being, who otherwise would not have forgiven us?"— To this the answer of the Christian is,— " I know not, nor does it concern me to know, in what manner the sacrifice of Christ is con- nected with the forgiveness of sins : it is enough that this is declared by God to be the medium through which my salvation is effected. I pretend not to dive into the councils of the Almighty. I submit to his wisdom : and I will not reject his grace, because his mode of vouchsafing it is not within my comprehen- sion." But now let us try the doctrine of pure intercession by this same objection. It has been asked, how can the sufferings of one being be conceived to have any connection with the forgiveness of another? Let us likewise inquire, how the meritorious obedience of one being can be conceived to have any connec- tion with the pardon of the transgressions of another, (No. XIX.) : or whether the prayer of a righteous being in behalf of a wicked person can be imagined to have more weight in obtaining forgiveness for the transgressor, than the same supplication, seconded by the offering up of life itself, to procure that for- giveness ? The fact is, the want of discover- able connection has nothing to do with either. Neither the sacrifice, nor the intercession, has so far as we can comprehend, any efficacy whatever. All that we know, or can know of the one, or of the other, is, that it has been appointed as the means by which God has determined to act with respect to man. So that to object to the one, because the mode of operation is unknown, is not only giving up the other, but the very notion of a Mediator ; and, if followed on, cannot fail to lead to pure Deism, and, perhaps, may not stop even there. Thus we have seen to what the general objections against the doctrine of atonement amount. The charges of divine implacability, and of inefficacious means, we have found to bear with as little force against this, as against the doctrine which is attempted to be substi tuted in its room. We come now to the objections winch are drawn from the immediate language of Scrip- sure, in those passages in which the nature of our redemption is described. And first, it is asserted, that it is nowhere said in Scripture, that God is reconciled to us by Christ's death, but that we are every where said to be recon- ciled to God, (No. XX.) Now, in this objec- tion, which clearly lays the whole stress upon our obedience, we discover the secret spring of this entire system, winch is set up in oppo- sition to the scheme of atonement ; we see that reluctance to part with the proud feeling of merit, with which the principle of Redemp- tion by the sacrifice of Christ is openly at war ; and, consequently, we see the essential differ- ence there is between the two doctrines at present under consideration, and the necessity there exists for separating them by the clearest marks of distinction. But, to return to the objection that has been made : it very fortu- nately happens, that we have the meaning of the words in their Scripture use, defined by no less an authoritv than that of our Saviour himself:—" If thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath aught against thee, leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way — first be reconciled to thv brother, and then come and offer thy gift," (Matt. v. 23, 24.) Now, from this plain instance, in which the person offending is expressly described as the party to be recon- ciled to him who had been offended, by agree- ing to his terms of accommodation, and thereby making his peace with him, it manifestly ap- pears in what sense this expression is to be understood, in the language of the New Testa- ment. The very words, then, produced for the purpose of shewing that there was no dis- pleasure on the part of God, which it was necessary by some means to avert, prove the direct contrary : and our being reconciled to God, evidently does not mean, our giving up our sins, and thereby laying aside our enmity to God, (No. XXI.)— in which sense the ob- jection supposes it to be taken— but the turn- ing away Ins displeasure, whereby we are enabled to regain his favour. And, indeed, it were strange had it not meant this. What ! are we to suppose the God of the Christian, like the Deity of the Epicurean, to look on with indifference upon the actions of this life, and not to be offended at the sinner ? The displeasure of God, it is to be remembered, is 14 M A G E E O N THE A T ONE M E N T. not, like mini's displeasure, a resentment or passion, but ;i judicial disapprobation ; which if we abstract from our notion of God, we must cease to view him as the moral governor of the world. And it is from the want of this distinction, which is so highly necessary, and the consequent fear of degrading the Deity, by attributing to him what might appear to be the weakness of passion, that they, who trust to reason more than to Scripture, have been withheld from admitting any principle that implied displeasure on the part of God. Had they attended but a little to the plain language of Scripture, they might have rectified their mistake. They would there have found the wrath of God against the disobedient spoken of in almost every page, (No. XXII.) They would have found also a case, which is exactly in point to the main argument before us ; in which there is described, not only the wrath of God, but, the turning away of his displea- sure by the mode of sacrifice. The case is that of the three friends of Job, — in which God expressly says that his "wrath is kindled against the friends of Job, because they had not spoken of him the thing that was right," (Job, xlii. 7 ;) and at the same time directs them to offer up a sacrifice, as the way of averting his anger, (No. XXIII.) But then it is urged, that God is every where spoken of as a Being of infinite love. True ; and the whole difficulty arises from building on partial texts. When men perpetually talk of God's justice as being necessarily modified by his goodness, (No. XXIV,) they seem to forget that it is no less the language of Scrip- ture, and of reason, that his goodness should lie modified by his justice. Our error on this subject proceeds from our own narrow views, which compel us to consider the attributes of the Supreme Being a- so many distinct quali- ties ; when we should conceive of them as inseparably blended together, and his whole nature as one great impulse to what is best. As to God's displeasure against sinners, there can be then, upon the whole, no reasonable ground of doubt. And against the doctrine of atonement, no difficulty can arise from the Scripture phrase, of men being reconciled to God ; since, as we have seen, that directly implies the turning away the displeasure of God, so as to be again restored to his favour and protection. But, though all this must be admitted by those who will not shut their eyes against reason and Scripture, yet still it is contended, that the death of Christ cannot be considered as a propitiatory sacrifice. Now, when we find him described as " the Lamb (No. XXV.) of God, which taketh away the sins of the world," (John, i. 211 ;) when we are told, that " Christ hath given himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God," (Ephes. v. 2 ;) and that he "needed not, like the High Priests under the law, to offer up sacrifice daily, first for his own sins, and then for the people's; for that this he did once, when lie offered up himself," (Hebrews, vii. 27 ;) when he is ex- pressly asserted to be the " propitiation for our sins," (1 John, ii. 2 ;) and God is said to have "loved us, and to have sent his Son to be the propitiation (No. XXVI.) for our sins," (1 John, iv. 10 ;) when Isaiah, (liii. 10) describes "his soul as made an offering for sin," (No. XXVII.) ; when it is said that " God spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all," (Rom. viii. 32 ;) and that "by him we have received the (No. XXVIII.) atonement," (Rom. v. 11 ;) when these and many other such passages, are to be found ; when every expression, referring to the death of Christ, evidently indicates the notion of a sacrifice of atonement and propitiation ; when this sacri- fice is particularly represented as of the nature of a sin offering, which was a species of (No. XXIX.) sacrifice " prescribed to be offered upon the commission of an offence, after which the offending person was considered as if he had never sinned :" — it may well appear sur- prising on wdiat ground it can be questioned that the death of Christ is pronounced in Scripture to have been a sacrifice of atonement and expiation for the sins of men. It is asserted that the several passages which seem to speak this language contain nothing more than figurative allusions ; that all that is intended is, that Christ laid down his life for, that is, on account of, mankind, (No. XXX.) ; and that there being circumstances of resemblance between this event and the sacri- fices of the law, terms were borrowed from the latter, to express the former in a manner more lively anil impressive. And as a proof that the application of these terms is but figurative, (No. XXXI.) it is contended, (No. XXXII.) 1st, That the death of Christ did not corres- pond literally, and exactly, to the ceremonies of the Mosaic sacrifice : 2dly, That being, in different places, compared to different kinds of sacrifices, to all of which it could not possibly correspond, it cannot be considered as exactly of the nature of any : and lastly, That there was no such thing as a sacrifice of propitiation or expiation of sin, under the Mosaic dispen- sation at all, this notion having been entirely of heathen origin, (No. XXXllI.) As to the two first arguments, they deserve but little consideration. The want of an exact similitude to the precise form of the Mosaic sacrifice is but a slender objection. It might as well be said, that because Christ was not of the species of animal which had usually 1 n offered up ; or because he was not slain in the same manner ; or because he was not offered by the Bigh Priest, there could have been no sacrifice, (No. XXXIV.) But this is manifest trilling. If the formal notion of a sacrifice for sin, that is, a life offered up in Discourse I.— ON THE SCRIPTURAL DOCTRINE OF ATONEMENT. 15 expiation, be adhered to, nothing more can be required to constitute it a sacrifice, except by those who mean to cavil, not to discover truth. Again, as to the second argument, which, from the comparison of Christ's death to the different kinds of sacrifices, would infer that it was not of the nature of any, it may be re- plied, that it will more reasonably follow that it was of the nature of all. Resembling that of the Passover, (No. XXXV.) inasmuch as by it we were delivered from an evil yet greater than that of Egyptian bondage ; par- taking the nature of the Sin offering, as being accepted in expiation of transgression ; and similar to the institution of the Scape-goat, as hearing the accumulated sins of all ; may we not reasonably suppose that this one great sacrifice contained the full import and comple- tion of the whole sacrificial system ; and that so far from being spoken of in figure, as bear- ing some resemblance to the sacrifices of the Law, they were, on the contrary, as the apostle expressly tells us, (Hebrews, x. 1,) but figures, or faint and partial representations, of this stupendous sacrifice, which had been ordained from the beginning ? And, besides, it is to be remarked in general, with respect to the figurative application of the sacrificial terms to the death of Christ, that the striking resem- blance between that and the sacrifices of the law, which is assigned as the reason of such application, would have produced just the con- trary effect upon the sacred writers ; since they must have been aware that the constant use of such expressions, aided by the strength of the resemblance, must have laid a founda- tion for error in that which constitutes the main doctrine of the Christian faith. Being addressed to a people whose religion was en- tirely sacrificial, in what, but the obvious and literal sense, could the sacrificial representations of the death of Christ have been understood? We come now to the third and principal ob- jection, which is built upon the assertion, that no sacrifices of atonement (in the sense in which we apply this term to the death of Christ) had existence under the Mosaic Law ; such as were called by that name having had an entirely different import, (No. XXXVI.) Now, that certain offerings under this denomination re- lated to things, and were employed for the purpose of purification, so as to render them fit instruments of the ceremonial worship, must undoubtedly be admitted. That others were again appointed to relieve persons from ceremonial incapacities, so as to restore them to the privilege of joining in the services of the temple, is equally true. But that there were others of a nature strictly propitiatory, and ordained to avert the displeasure of God from the transgressor not only of the ceremo- nial, but, in some cases, even of the moral law, (No. XXXVII.) will appear manifest upon a very slight examination. Thus, we find it decreed, that " if a soul sin, and com- mit a trespass against the Lord, and lie unto his neighbour in that which was delivered him to keep — or have found that which was lost, and lieth concerning it, and Bweareth falsely, then, because he hath sinned in this, he shall not only make restitution to his neighbour — but he shall bring his trespass-offering unto the Lord, a ram without blemish out of the flock ; and the priest shall make an atonement for him before the Lord, and it shall be for- given him," (Levit. vi. 2 — 7.) And again, in a case of criminal connection with a bond-maid who was betrothed, the offender is ordered to "bring his trespass-offering, and the priest is to make atonement for him with the trespass- offering, for the sin which he hath done ; and the sin which he hath done shall be forgiven him," (Levit. xix. 20 — 22.) And in the case of all offences which fell not under the description of presumptuous, it is manifest, from the slightest inspection of the book of Leviticus, that the atonement prescribed was appointed as the means whereby God might be propitiated, or reconciled to the offender. Again, as to the vicarious (No. XXXVIII.) import of the Mosaic sacrifice, or, in other words, its expressing an acknowledgment of what the sinner had deserved ; this not only seems directly set forth in the account of the first offering in Leviticus, where it is said of the person who brought a free-will offering, " he shall put his hand upon the head of the burnt offering, (No. XXXIX.) and it shall be accepted for him, to make atonement for him," (Levit. i. 4 ;) but the ceremony of the scape- goat on the day of expiation appears to place this matter beyond doubt. On this head, how- ever, as not being necessary to my argument, (No. XL.) I shall not at present enlarge. That expiatory sacrifice (in the strict and proper sense of the wTord) was a part of the Mosaic institution, there remains then, I trust, no sufficient reason to deny. That it existed in like manner amongst the Arabians, (No. LIX.) in the time of Job, we have already seen. And that its universal prevalence in the Heathen world, though corrupted and dis- figured by idolatrous practices, was the result of an original divine appointment, every can- did inquirer will find little reason to doubt, (No. XLI.) But, be this as it may, it must be admitted, that propitiatory sacrifices notonly existed throughout the whole Gentile world, but had place under the law of Moses. The argument, then, which, from the non-exist- ence of such sacrifices amongst the Jews, would deny the term when applied to the death of Christ to indicate such sacrifice, necessarily falls to the ground, (No. XLII.) But, in fact, they who deny the sacrifice of Christ to be a real and proper sacrifice for sin, must, if they are consistent, deny that any such sacrifice ever did exist, by divine appointment. If) MAGEE U N T H E A T O N E M E N T. For on what principle do they deny the former, but this? — that the sufferings and death of Christ, for the sins and salvation of men, can make no change in God; cannot render him more ready to forgive, more bene- volent, than he is in his own nature; and, consequently, can have no power to avert from the offender the punishment of his trans- gression. Now, on the same principle, every sacrifice for the expiation of sin must be im- possible. And this explains the true cause why these persons will not admit the language of the New Testament, clear and express as it is, to signify a real and proper sacrifice for sin ; and why they feel it necessary to explain away the equally clear and express description of thai species of sacrifice in the Old, (No. XLIII.) Setting out with a preconceived, erroneous notion of its nature, and one which involves a manifest contradiction, they hold themselves justified in rejecting every accepta- tion of Scripture which supports it. But, had they more accurately examined the true im- port of the term in Scripture use, they would have perceived no such contradiction, nor would they have found themselves compelled to refine away, by strained and unnatural in- terpretations, the clear and obvious meaning of the sacred text. They would have seen that a sacrifice for sin, in Scripture language, implies solely this, — "a sacrifice wisely and graciously appointed by God, the moral gover- nor of the world, to expiate the guilt of sin in such a manner as to avert the punishment of it from the offender," (No. XL1V.) To ask why God should have appointed this particular mode, or in what way it can avert the punish- ment of sin ; is to take us back to the general point at issue with the Deist, which has been already discussed. With the Christian, who admits redemption under any modification, such matters cannot be subject of inquiry. But, even to our Imperfect apprehension, some circumstances of natural connection and fitness may be pointed out. The whole may be considered as a sensible and striking repre- sentation of a punishment, which the sinner « as conscious he deserved from God's justice : and then, on the part of God, it becomes a public declaration of his holy displeasure against sin, and of his merciful compassion for the sin- ner ; and on the part of the offender, when ottered by or for him, it implies a sincere con- fession of guilt, and a hearty desire of obtain- ing pardon : and upon the due performance of this service, the sinner is pardoned, and escapes the penalty of his trangi'essioii. This we shall find agreeable to the nature of a sacrifice for sin, as laid down in the Old Testament. Now, is there any thing in this degrading to the honour of God, or in the smallest degree inconsistent with the dictates of natural reason? And, in this view, what is there in the death of Christ, as a sacrifice for the sins of mankind, that may not, in a certain degree, be embraced by our natural notions? For, according to the explanation just given, is it not a declaration to the whole world, of the greatness of their sins ; and of the proportionate mercy and compassion of God, who had ordained this method, whereby, in a manner consistent with his attributes, his fallen creatures might be again taken into his favour, on their making themselves parties in this great sacrifice ; that is, on their complying with those conditions, which, on the received notion of sacrifice, would render them parties in this ; namely, an adequate conviction of guilt, a proportionate sense of God's love, and a firm determination, with an humble faith in the sufficiency of this sacrifice, to endeavour after a life of amendment and obedience? Thus much falls within the reach of our comprehension on this mysterious subject. Whether, in the expanded range of God's moral government, some other end may not be held in view, in the death of his only begot- ten Son, it is not for us to inquire ; nor does it in any degree concern us. What God has been pleased to reveal, it is alone our duty to believe. One remarkable circumstance, indeed, there is, in which the sacrifice of Christ differs from all those sacrifices which were offered under the law. Our blessed Lord was not only the subject of the offering, but the priest who offered it. Therefore he has become not only a sacrifice, but an intercessor ; his intercession being founded upon this voluntary act of benevolence, by which "he offered himself without spot to God." We are not only, then, in virtue of the sacrifice, forgiven ; but, in virtue of the intercession, admitted to favour and grace. And thus the Scripture notion of the sacrifice of Christ includes every advantage, which the advocates for the pure intercession seek from their scheme of redemption. But it also contains others, which they necessarily lose by the rejection of that notion. It contains the great advantage (No. XLV.) of impressing mankind with a due sense of their guilt, by compelling a comparison with the immensity of the sacrifice made to redeem them from its effects. It contains that, in short, which is the soul and substance of all Christian virtue — Humility. And the fact is plainly this, that, in every attempt to get rid of the Scrip- ture doctrine of atonement, we find feelings of a description opposite to this evangelic quality, more or less, to prevail : we find a fondness for the opinion of man's own sufficiency, and an unwillingness to submit, with devout and implicit reverence, to the sacred word of Re- velation. If, now, upon the whole, it lias appeared, that natural reason is unable to evince the efficacy of repentance; if it has appeared, that, for the purpose of forgiveness, the idea of a Discourse II.— ON THE SCRIPTURAL DOCTRINE OF SACRIFICE. 17 mediatorial scheme is perfectly consistent w itli our ordinary notions ; it' it lias appeared, that Revelation has most unequivocally pronounced, that, through the mediation of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, our redemption has been effect- ed ; if it has appeared, that Christ is declared to have effected that redemption by the sacri- fice of himself for the sins of mankind ; if it has appeared, that in the Scripture meaning of sacrifice for sin, is included atonement for transgression ; and if it has appeared, that the expression has been applied to Christ, in the plain and literal sense of the word, as the pro- pitiation of an offended Cod, — I trust we are sufficiently fortified against the Deist, who denies thedi vine mission ; against the Socinian, who denies the redeeming mediation ; and against the modern rationalising Arian, who denies the expiatory sacrifice of Christ: in short, against all, who would deprive us of any part of the precious benefits, which, as on this day, our Saviour died to procure for us ; against all, who would rob us of that humble feeling of our own insufficiency, which alone can give us an ardent and animating faith in the death and merits of our blessed Redeemer. DISCOURSE II. " And without 9hedding of blood is no remission." — IIeb. ix. 22. On the last commemoration of the awful sub- ject of this day's observance, it was attempted, in this place, to clear the important doctrine of redemption from those difficulties in which it had been artfully entangled by the subtle speculations of the disputatious Deist, and of the philosophising Christian. The impotence of reason to erect the degraded sinner to an assured hope of the sufficiency of repentance, pointed out to us the necessity of an express revelation on this head : that revelation, in announcing the expedient of a Mediator, was seen to fall in with the analogies of the provi- dential economy ; the Mediatorial scheme was shewn to have been accomplished, through the sacrifice of the only begotten Son of God ; and this sacrifice to have been effective to the ex- piation of the sins of the whole human race. What the peculiar nature and true import of this sacrifice are, and in what sense the expia- tion effected by it is strictly to be understood, it is my purpose on this day to inquire. And as, on the one hand, there is no article of Chris- tian knowledge of deeper concern, and, on the other, none that has been more studiously in- volved in obscurity, I trust that you, my young brethren, will not refuse your patient atten- tion, whilst I endeavour to unfold to your apprehension the genuine, because the scrip- tural, interpretation of that great sacrifice, whereby we are redeemed from the power of sin, ami have received the promise of an eter- nal inheritance. L. In the mode of inquiry which has been usually adopted on this subject, one prevailing error deserves to he noticed. The nature of sacrifice, as generally practised and understood, antecedent to the time of Christ, has been first examined ; and from that, as a ground of ex- planation, the notion of Christ's sacrifice has been derived ; whereas, in fact, by this all former sacrifices are to bo interpreted ; ami in reference to it only, can they lie understood. From an error so fundamental, it is not won- derful that the greatest perplexities should have arisen concerning the nature of sacrifice in general, and that they should ultimately fall, with cumulative confusion, on the nature of that particular sacrifice, to the investigation of which fanciful and mistaken theories had been assumed as guides. Thus, while some have presumptuously attributed the early and universal practice of sacrifice to an irrational and superstitious fear of an imagined sangui- nary divinity, and have been led, in defiance of the express language of revelation, to reject, and ridicule the notion of sacrifice, as originat- ing only in the grossness of superstition, (No. XLVI.) ; others, not equally destitute of re- verence for the sacred word, and consequently not treating this solemn rite with equal dis- respect, have yet ascribed its origin to human invention, (No. XLVII.) ; and have thereby been compelled to account for the divine insti- tution of the Jewish sacrifices, as a mere ac- commodation to prevailing practice ; and, con- sequently, to admit even the sacrifice of Christ itself to have grown out of, and been adapted to, this creature of human excogitation. Of this latter class, the theories, as might be expected, are various. In one, sacrifices are represented in the light of gifts, (No. XLVI 1 1.) intended to sooth and appease the Supreme Being, in like manner as they are found to conciliate the favour of men ; in another, they are considered as federal rites, (No. XLIX.) a kind of eating and drinking with God, as it were, at his table, and thereby implying the being restored to a state of friendship with him, by repentance and confession of sins ; in a third they are described as but symbo- lical actions, or a more expressive language, denoting the gratitude of the offerer, in such as are eucharistical ; and in those that are expiatory, the acknowledgment of, and contrition for sin, strongly expressed by the death of the animal, representing that death, which the offerer confessed to be his own desert, (No. L.) To these different hypotheses, which, in the order of their enumeration, claim respectively the names of Spencer, Sykes, and Warburton, it may generally be replied, that the fact of Abel's sacrifice seems inconsistent with them all : with the first, inasmuch as it must have been antecedent to those distinctions of pro- perty, on which alone experience of the effects H 18 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. (No. LI.) of gifts upon men could have been founded ; with the second, inasmuch as it took place several ages prior to that period, at which Doth the words of Scripture and the opinions of the wisest commentators, have fixed the permission (No. LII.) of animal food toman ; with the third, inasmuch as the language, which Scripture expressly states to have been derived to our first parents from divine (No. LI 1 1.) instruction, cannot be supposed so de- fective in those terms that related to the wor- ship of God, as to have rendered it necessary for Abel to call in the aid of actions, to express the sentiment of gratitude or sorrow ; and still less likely is it, that he would have resorted to that species of action, which, in the eye of reason, must have appeared displeasing to God, — the slaughter of an unoffending animal, (No. LIV.) To urge these topics of objection in their full force against the several theories I have mentioned, would lead to a discussion far exceeding the due limits of a discourse from this place. I therefore dismiss them for the present. Nor shall I, in refutation of the general idea of the human invention of sacri- fice, enlarge upon the universality (No. LV.) of the practice ; the sameness (No. LVI.) of the notion of its efficacy, pervading nations and ages the most remote; and the unreasonable- ness of supposing any natural connection be- tween the slaying of an animal and the receiv- ing pardon for the violation of God's laws ; — all of which appear decisive against that idea. But, as both the general idea, and the particu- lar theories which have endeavoured to recon- cile to it the nature and origin of sacrifice, have been caused by a departure from the true and only source of knowledge, let us return to that sacred fountain ; and, whilst we endeavour to establish the genuine Scripture notion of sacri- fice, at the same time provide the best refuta- tion of every other. It requires but little acquaintance with Scripture to know, that the lesson which it every where inculcates, is, that man by dis- obedience had fallen under the displeasure of his .Maker ; that to be reconciled to his favour, and restored to the means of acceptable obe- dience, a Redeemer was appointed ; and that this Redeemer laid down his life, to procure for repentant sinners forgiveness and accep- tance. This surrender of life has been called by the sacred writers, a sacrifice ; and the end attained by it, expiation or atonement. With such as have been desirous to reduce Chris- tianity to a mere moral system it has been a favuurite object to represent this sacrifice as entirely figurative, (Nos. XXXI. and XLIII.) founded only in allusion and similitude to the sacrifices of the law ; whereas, that this is spoken of by the sacred writers as a real and Eruper sacrifice, to which those under the law ore respect but as types or shadows, is evident from various passages of Holy Writ, but more particularly from the epistle to the Hebrews ; in which it is expressly said, that " the law, having a shadow of good things to come, can never with those sacrifices, which theyr offered year by year continually, make the comers thereunto perfect: — but this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins, for ever sat down on the right hand of God," (Heb.x.l, 12.) And again, when the writer of this epistle speaks of the high priest entering into the holy of holies witli the blood of the sacrifice. he asserts, that " this was a figure for the time then present, in which were offered both gifts and sacrifices, that could not make him that did the service perfect ; but Christ being come, an High Priest of good things to come ; not by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood, he entered once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us ; for," he adds, " if the blood of bulls and of goats sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ, who, through the eternal Spirit, offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God 1 " (Heb. ix. 9 — 14.) It must be unnecessary to detail more of the numerous passages, which go to prove that the sacrifice of Christ was a true and effective sacrifice, whilst those of the Law were but faint representations, and in- adequate copies, intended for its introduction. Now, if the sacrifices of the Law appear to have been but preparations for this one great Sacrifice, we are naturally led to consider, whether the same may not be asserted of sa- crifice from the beginning ; and whether we arc not warranted by Scripture in pronounc- ing the entire rite to have been ordained by God, as a type of that one sacrifice, in which all others were to have their consummation. That the institution was of divine (No. LVII.) ordinance may, in the first instance, be reasonably inferred from the strong and sensible attestation of the divine acceptance of sacrifice in the case of Abel, (No. LVIII ;) again, in that of Noah ; afterwards, in that of Abraham ; and also from the systematic establishment of it, by the same divine autho- rity, in the dispensation of Moses. And, whether we consider the book of Job as the production of Moses (No. LIX.) ; or of that pious worshipper of the true God, among the descendants of Abraham, whose name it bears ; or of some other person who lived a short time after, and composed it from the materials left by Job himself ; the representation there made of God as prescribing sacrifice to the friends of Job, in every supposition exhibits a strong authority, and of high antiquity, upon this question. These few facts, which I have stated, un- aided by any comment, and abstracting alto- gether from the arguments which embarrass Discourse II.— ON THE SCRIPTURAL DOCTRINE OF SACRIFICE. 19 the contrary hypothesis, to which I have already alluded, might, perhaps, be sufficient to satisfy an inquiring and candid mind, that sacrifice must have had its origin in divine in- stitution. But if, in addition, this rite, as practised in the earliest ages, shall he found connected with the sacrifice of Christ, confess- edly of divine appointment, little doubt can reasonably remain on this head. Let us then examine, more particularly, the circumstances of the first sacrifice offered up by Abel. It is clear from the words of Scripture, that both Cain and Abel made oblations to the Lord. It is clear also, notwithstanding the well known fanciful interpretation of an eminent commentator, (No. LX.) that Abel's was an animal sacrifice. It is no less clear that Abel's was accepted, whilst that of Cain was rejected. Now, what could have occasioned the distinc- tion X — The acknowledgment of the Supreme Being, and of his universal dominion, was no less strong in the offering of the fruits of the earth by Cain, than in that of the firstlings of the flock by Abel ; the intrinsic efficacy of the gift must have been the same in each, each giving of the best that he possessed : the ex- pression of gratitude equally significant and forcible in both. How then is the difference (No. LXI.) to be explained? If we look to the writer to the Hebrews, he informs us, that the ground on which Abel's oblation was preferred to that of Cain, was, that Abel offered his in faith ; and the criterion of this faith also appears to have been, in the opinion of this writer, the animal sacrifice. The words are remarkable — " By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righ- teous, God testifying of his gifts," (Heb. xi. 4). The words here translated, "a more excellent sacrifice," are in an early version rendered " a much more sacrifice," (No. LXII.) which phrase, though uncouth in form, adequately conveys the original. The meaning then is, that by faith Abel offered that, which was much more of the true nature of sacrifice than what had been offered by Cain. Abel, conse- quently, was directed by faith ; and this faith was manifested in the nature of his offering. What, then, are we to infer ? — Without some revelation granted, (No. LXIII.) some assur- ance held out as the object of faith, Abel could not have exercised this virtue ; and without some peculiar mode of sacrifice enjoined, he could not have exemplified his faith by an appropriate offering. The offering made, we have already seen, was that of an animal. Let us consider, whether this could have a connection with any divine assurance, com- municated at that early day. It is obvious that the promise made to our first parents conveyed an intimation of some future deliverer, who should overcome the tempter that had drawn man from his inno- cence, and remove those evils which had been occasioned by the Fall. This assurance, with- out which, or some other ground of hope, it seems difficult to conceive how the principle of religion could have had place among men, became to our first parents the grand object of faith. To perpetuate this fundamental article of religious belief among the descendants of Adam, some striking memorial of the fall of man, and of the promised deliverance, would naturally be appointed, (No. LXIV.) And if we admit, that the scheme of redemption by the death of the only begotten Son of God, was determined from the beginning ; that is, if we admit that when God had ordained the deli- verance of man, he had ordained the means ; if we admit, that Christ was " the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world ;" what me- morial could be devised more apposite than that of animal sacrifice? — exemplifying, by the slaying of the victim, the death which had been denounced against man's disobedience : thus exhibiting the awful lesson of that death which was the wages of sin, and at the same time representing that death which was actual- ly to be undergone by the Redeemer of man- kind : — and hereby connecting in one view the two great cardinal events in the history of man, — the fall and the recovery ; the death denounced against sin ; and the death appoint- ed for that Holy One, who was to lay down his life to deliver man from the consequences of sin. The institution of animal sacrifice seems, then, to have been peculiarly signifi- cant, as containing all the elements of religious knowledge ; and the adoption of this rite, with sincere and pious feelings, would at the same time imply an humble sense of the unworthi- ness of the offerer : a confession that death, which was inflicted on the victim, was the desert of those sins which had arisen from man's transgression ; and a full reliance upon the promises of deliverance, joined to an ac- quiescence in the means appointed for its accomplishment. If this view of the matter be just, there is nothing improbable even in the supposition, that that part of the signification of the rite, which related to the sacrifice of Christ, might have been in some degree made known from the beginning. But, not to contend for this, (Scripture having furnished no express foun- dation for the assumption,) room for the ex- ercise of faith is equally preserved, on the idea, that animal sacrifice was enjoined in the gene- ral as the religious sign of faith in the promise of redemption, without any intimation of the way in which it became a sign. Agreeably to these principles, we shall find but little diffi- culty in determining on what ground it was that Abel's offering was accepted, whilst that of Cain was rejected. Abel, in firm relianco on the promise of God, and in obedience to bis command, offered that sacrifice, which had 20 MA GEE ON THE ATONEMENT. been enjoined as tin- religious expression of his faith: whilst Cain, disregarding the gracious assurances that had been vouchsafed, or, at [east, disdaining to adopt the prescribed mode of manifesting his belief, possibly as not ap- pearing to his reason to possess any efficacy or natural fitness, thought he had sufficiently ac- quitted himself of his duty, in acknowledging the general superintendence of God, and ex- pressing his gratitude to the Supreme Bene- factor, by presenting some of those good things which he thereby confessed to have been de- rived from his bounty. In short, Cain, the first-born of the fall, exhibits the first-fruits of his parent's disobedience, in the arrogance and self-sufficiency of reason rejecting the aids of revelation, because they fell not within his apprehension of right. He takes the first place in the annals of Deism, and displays, in his proud rejection of the ordinance of sacrifice, the same spirit which, in later days, has ac- tuated his enlightened followers, in rejecting the sacrifice of Christ. This view of the subject receives strength from the terms of expostulation in which God addresses Cain, on his expressing resentment at the rejection of his offering, and the accept- ance of Abel's. The words in the present ver- sion arc, " If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted ? — and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door," (Gen. iv. 7,) — which words, as they stand connected in the context, supply no very satisfactory meaning, and have long served to exercise the ingenuity of commenta- tors to but little purpose. But if the word, which is here translated " sin," be rendered, as we find it in a great variety of passages in the Old Testament, a "sin-offering," the reading of the passage then becomes, " If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted ? and if thou doest not well, a sin-offering lieth even at the door," (No. LXV.) The connection is thus rendered evident. God rebukes Cain for not conform- ing to that species of sacrifice, which had been offered by Abel, lie refers to it, as a matter of known injunction; and hereby points out the ground of distinction, in his treatment of him and his brother : and thus, in direct terms, enforces the observance of animal sacrifice. As that part of my general position, which pronounces sacrifice to have been of divine in- stitution, receives support from the passage just recited ; so, to that part of it, which main- tain- that this rite bore an aspect to the sacri- fice of Christ, additional evidence may be de- rived from the language of the writer to the Hebrews, inasmuch as he places the blood of Abel's sacrifice in direct comparison with the blood of Christ, which he styles pre-eminently "the blooil of sprinkling," (Heb. xii.24 ;) and represents both, as " speaking good things," in different degrees, (No. LXVI.) What then is the result of the foregoing reflections? — The sacrifice of Abel was an animal sacrifice. This sacrifice was accepted. The ground of this ac- ceptance was the faith in which it was offered. Scripture assigns no other object of this faith, but the promise of a Redeemer : and of this faith, the offering of an animal in sacrifice ap- pears to have been the legitimate, and, conse- quently, the instituted expression. The insti- tution of animal sacrifice, then, was coeval with the Fall, and had a reference to the sacri- fice of our redemption. But, as it had also an immediate, and most apposite, application to that important event in the condition of man, which, as being the occasion of, was essentially connected with, the work of redemption ; that likewise, we have reason to think, was includ- ed in its signification. And thus, upon the whole, sacrifice appears to have been ordained, as a standing memorial of the death intro- duced by sin, and of that death which was to be suffered by the Redeemer. We, accordingly, find this institution of animal sacrifice continue until the giving of the Law : no other offering than that of an animal being recorded in Scripture down to this period, (No. LXVII.,) except in the case of Cain ; and that, we have seen, was rejected. The sacrifices of Noah and of Abraham are stated to have been burnt-offerings. Of the same kind also were the sin-offerings presented by Job ; he being said to have offered burnt- offerings according to the number of his sons, lest some of them " might have sinned in their hearts," (Job, i. 5.) But, when we come to the promulgation of the law, we find the con- nection between animal sacrifice and atone- ment, or reconciliation with God, clearly and distinctly announced. It is here declared, that sacrifices for sin should, on conforming to certain prescribed modes of oblation, be ac- cepted as the means of deliverance from the penal consequences of transgression. And, with respect to the peculiar efficacy of animal sacrifice, we find this remarkable declaration — " The life of the flesh is in the blood, and 1 have given it to you upon the altar, to make atonement for the soul," (Lev. xvii. 11 :) in reference to which words, the sacred writer, from whom I have taken the subject of this day's discourse, formally pronounces, that "without shedding of blood there is no remis- sion." Now, in what conceivable light can wo view this institution, but in relation to thatgreai Sacrifice, which was to make atonement for sins ; to that "blood of sprinkling," which was to "speakbetter things than that of Abel," (Heb. xii. 24,) or that of the law ? The law itself is said to have had respect solely unto him. To what else can the principal institution of the law refer? — an institution, too, which, unless so referred, appears utterly unmeaning. The offering up an animal cannot be imagined to have had any intrinsic efficacy in procuring pardon for the transgression of the offerer. The blood of bulls and of goats could have Discourse II.-ON THE SCRIPTURAL DOCTRINE OF SACRIFICE. 21 possessed no virtue whereby to cleanse him from his oflences. Still less intelligible is the application of the blood of the victim to the purifying of the parts of the tabernacle, and the apparatus of the ceremonial worship. All this can clearly have had no other than an instituted meaning; and can he understood only as in reference to some blood-shedding, which, in an eminent degree, possessed the power of purifying from pollution. In short, admit the sacrifice of Christ to be held in view in the institutions of the Law, and every part is plain and intelligible ; reject that notion, and every theory devised by the ingenuity of man, to explain the nature of the ceremonial worship, becomes trifling and inconsistent. Granting, then, the case of the Mosaic sacri- fice and that of Abel to be the same; neither of them in itself efficacious ; both instituted by God ; and both instituted in reference to that true and efficient Sacrifice, which was one day to be offered ; the rite, as practised before the time of Christ, may justly be considered as a sacramental memorial, " shewing forth the Lord's death until he came," (1 Cor. xi. 26 ;) and when accompanied with a due faith in the promises made to the early believers, may reasonably be judged to have been equally acceptable with that sacramental me- morial, which has been enjoined by our Lord himself to his followers, for the " shewing forth his death until his coming again." And it deserves to be noticed, that this very ana- logy seems to be intimated by our Lord, in the language used by him at the institution of that solemn Christian rite. For, in speaking of his own blood, he calls it, in direct reference to the blood wherewith Moses established and sanctified the first covenant, " the blood of the new covenant, which was shed for the remis- sion of sins," (Matt. xxvi. 28;) thus plainly marking out the similitude in the nature and objects of the two covenants, at the moment that he was prescribing the great sacramental commemoration of his own sacrifice. From this view of the subject, the history of Scripture sacrifice becomes consistent throughout. The sacrifice of Abel, and the Patriarchal sacrifices down to the giving of the Law, record and exemplify those momen- tous events in the history of man — the death incurred by sin, and that inflicted on our Redeemer. When length of time, and mis- taken notions of religion leading to idolatry and every perversion of the religious principle, had so far clouded and obscured this expressive act of primeval worship, that it had ceased to be considered by the nations of the world in that reference, in which its true value con- sisted ; when the mere rite remained, without any remembrance of the promises, and con- sequently unaccompanied by that faith in their fulfilment which was to render it an accep- table service ; when the nations, deifying every passion of the human heart, and erecting altars to every vice, poured forth the blood of the victim, but to deprecate the wrath, or satiate the vengeance of each offended deity; when, with the recollection of the true God, all knowledge of the true worship was effaced from the minds of men ; and when, joined to the absurdity of the sacrificial rites, their cruelty, devoting to the malignity of innumer- able sanguinary gods endless multitudes of human victims, demanded the divine inter- ference ; then we see a people peculiarly selected, to whom, by express revelation, tho knowledge of the one God is restored, and the species of worship, ordained by him from the beginning, particularly enjoined. The prin- cipal part of the Jewish service we accordingly find to consist of sacrifice ; to which the virtue of expiation and atonement is expressly annexed : and, in the manner of it, the par- ticulars appear so minutely set forth, that, when the object of the whole law should be brought to light, no doubt could remain as to its intended application. The Jewish sacrifices, therefore, seem to have been designed, as those from the beginning had been, to prefigure that one, which was to make atonement for all mankind. And as, in this, all were to receive their consummation, so with this, they all conclude ; and the institution closes with the completion of its object. But, as the gross perversions, which had pervaded the Gentile world, had reached likewise to the chosen people ; and as the temptations to idolatry, which surrounded them on all sides, were so powerful as perpetually to endanger their adherence to the God of their fathers, we find the ceremonial service adapted to their carnal habits. And, since the Law itself, with its accompanying sanctions, seems to have been principally temporal ; so, the worship it enjoins is found to have been, for the most part, rather a public and solemn declaration of allegiance to the true God in opposition to the Gentile idolatries, than a pure and spiritual obedience in moral and religious matters, which was reserved for that more perfect system, appointed to succeed in due time, when the state of mankind would permit. That the sacrifices of the Law should, there- fore, have chiefly operated to the cleansing from external impurities, and to the rendering persons or things fit to approach God in the exercises of the ceremonial worship ; whilst, at the same time, they were designed to pre- figure the sacrifice of Christ, which was purely spiritual, and possessed the transcendent virtue of atoning for all moral pollution — involves no inconsistency whatever, since in this the true proportion of the entire dispen- sations is preserved. And to this point it is particularly necessary that our attentionshould be directed in the examination of the present subject ; as upon the apparent disproportion in 22 MA GEE ON THE ATONEMENT. the objects and effects of sacrifice in the Mosaic and Christain schemes, the principal objections against their intended correspondence have been founded, (No. LXVIII.) The sacrifices of the Law, then, being pre- paratory to that of Christ ; "the Law itself bring but a schoolmaster to bring us to Christ ;" the sacred writers in the New Tes- tament naturally adopt the sacrificial terms of the ceremonial service ; and, by their refer- ence to the use of them as employed under the Law, clearly point out the sense in which they are to be understood, in their application under the Gospel. In examining, therefore, the meaning of such terms, when they occur in the New Testament, we are clearly directed to the explanation that is circumstantially given of them in the Old. Thus, when we find the virtue of atonement attributed to the sacrifice of Christ, in like manner as it had been to those under the law ; by attending to the representation so minutely given of it in the latter, we are enabled to comprehend its true import in the former, (No. LXIX.) Of the several sacrifices under the Law, that one which seems most exactly to illustrate the sacrifice of Christ, and which is expressly compared with it by the writer to the He- brews, is that which was offered for the whole assembly on the solemn anniversary of expi- ation, (No. LXX.) The circumstances of this ceremony, whereby atonement was to be made fur the Bins of the whole Jewish people, seem so strikingly significant, that they de- servea particular detail. On the day appointed for this general expiation, the priest is com- manded to offer a bullock and a goat, as sin- offerings, the one for himself, and the other for the people : and, having sprinkled the blood of these in due form before the mercy- scat, to lead forth a second goat, denominated the scape-goat, and after laying both his hands upon the head of the scape-goat, and confessing over him all the iniquities of the people, to put them upon the head of the goat, and to send the animal, thus bearing the sins of the people, away into the wilderness : in this manner expressing, by an action which cannot be misunderstood, that the atonement, which it is directly affirmed was to be effected by the sacrifice of the sin-offering, consisted in removing from the people their iniquities by a symbolical translation to the animal. For it is to be remarked, that the ceremony of the scape-goat is not a distinct one; it is a continuation of the process, and is evidently the concluding part, and symbolical consummation, of the sin-offering,'(No. LXXI.) So that the trans- fer of the iniquities of the people npon the head of the BCape-goat, and the bearing them away to the wilderness, manifestly imply, that the atonement effected by the sacrifice of the sin-offering consisted in the transfer and consequent removal of those iniquities. What, then, are we taught to infer from this cere- mony?— That, as the atonement under the Law, or expiation of the legal transgres- sions, was represented as a translation of those transgressions in the act of sacrifice in which the animal was slain, and the people thereby cleansed from their legal impurities, and released from the penalties which had been incurred ; so. the great atonement for the sins of mankind was to be effected by the sacrifice of Christ, under- going, for the restoration of men to the favour of God, that death, which had been denounced against sin ; and which he suffered in like manner as if the sins of men had been actually transferred to him, as those of the congregation had been symbolically transferred to the sin- offering of the people. That this is the true meaning of the atone- ment effected by Christ's sacrifice, receives the fullest confirmation from every part of both the Old and the New Testament ; and that, thus far, the death of Christ is vicarious, cannot be denied without a total disregard of the sacred writings. It has, indeed, been asserted, by those who oppose the doctrine of atonement as thus explained, that nothing vicarious appears in the Mosaic sacrifices, (No. LXXI1.) With what justice this assertion has been made, may be judged from the instance of the sin- offering that has been adduced. The transfer to the animal of the iniquities of the people, (which must necessarily mean the transfer of their penal effects, or the subjecting the animal to suffer on account of those iniquities,) — this accompanied with the death of the victim ; and the consequence of the whole being the removal of the punishment of those iniquities from the offerers, and the ablution of all legal oftensiveness in the sight of God, — thus much of the nature of vicarious, the language of the Old Testament justifies us in attaching to the notion of atonement. Less than this we are clearly not at liberty to attach to it. And what the Law thus sets forth as its ex- press meaning directly determines that which we must attribute to the great atonement, of which the Mosaic ceremony was but a type : always remembering carefully to distinguish between the figure and the substance ; duly adjusting their relative value and extent ; estimating the efficacy of the one, as real, intrinsic, and universal ; whilst that of the other is to be viewed as limited, derived, and emblematic, (No. LXXI 1 1.) It must be confessed, that, to the principles on which the doctrine of the Christian atone- ment has been explained in this, and a former discourse, several objections, in addition to those already noticed, have been advanced, (No. LXXIV.) These, however, cannot now be examined in this place. The most impor- Discourse II.— ON THE SCRIPTURAL DOCTRINE OF SACRIFICE. 23 tant have been discussed ; and as for such as remain, I trust that, to a candid mind, the general view of the subject which has been given will prove sufficient for their refutation. One word more, my young brethren, and 1 have done. On this day we have assembled to commemorate the stupendous sacrifice of himself, ottered up by our blessed Lord for our redemption from the bondage and wages of sin : and, on next Sunday, we are invited to participate of that solemn rite, which he hath ordained for the purpose of making us par- takers in tin' benefit of that sacrifice. Allow mo to remind you, that this is an awful call, and upon an awful occasion. Let him who either refuses to obey this call, or presumes to attend upon it irreverently, beware what his condition is. The man who can be guilty of either deliberately i> not safe. Consider seriously what has been said, and " may the God of peace, that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that greal Shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, make you perfect in every good work to do his will, working in you "that which is well-pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ ; to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen." ILLUSTRATIONS AND EXPLANATORY DISSERTATIONS. No. I.— Page 7. Col. 1. ON THE PRE-EXISTENCE OF CHRIST, AND THE SPECIES OF ARGUMENTS BY WHICH THIS ARTICLE OF THE CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE HAS BEEN OPPOSED. 'E*J;/jsv, GrothlS translates, "for whom he made the worlds ;" and thus gives to the word lux. a signification which not only has no parallel in the entire of the New Testament, but is in direct opposi- tion to the established rule of all gramma- rians; oix, with a genitive case, commonly signifying, the means by which ; but never implying the final cause, unless when joined with the accusative. See Phavorinus,1 Sca- pula, Stephanus, Hoogeveen in Viper. Glas- sius, &c. See also, on the application of the word in the New Testament, Sykes on Re- demption, pp. 190, 221, 241, — but particularly Schleusner's enumeration of its various senses,2 which seems to be quite decisive on the point. The solitary instance which Grotius has been able to discover in defence of his translation of the word oix, is to be found in Rom. vi. 4 ; in which it is manifest that his criticism can- not be maintained. Schleusner so pronounces upon it in the most peremptory terms. Whilst Grotius thus violates the rules and ' Ai«, TqiBitrit. iVi fj.iv iruvTxtririTxi >■(«*?, o*r,}.oi fj.i) is allowed to mean the mate- rial world, and which is always used plurally by the Jews, as implying the inferior and superior worlds, and, in its connection here, exactly corresponds with the things in heaven, and the things in earth (Col. i. 16.) ; and, up- on the whole, clearly means the physical world, or the heavens and the earth,4 — is yet strained by the Socinians to imply the evan- gelical dispensation: so that the entire passage is made to signify merely, that, by Christ's ministry, there should be, as it were, a new creation ; that is, a new Church begun upon earth. Now, it deserves to be considered, on wdiat principle of just interpretation such a translation can be adopted. It is true, that Christ, in some of the Greek versions of Isai. ix. 0, has been styled, e«t»!£ t&i/ fii^hovro; ctiowog. But, admitting the word here to im- ply a dispensation that was to come, docs it follow that this one dispensation is to be ex- pressed by the plural word a.iuvcc;'1. To force upon it this meaning, is again to do violence to grammar and usage. And yet this is done, because the plural interpretation, "by whom he constituted the ages ordispensations," lets in the obnoxious idea of pre-existence, as completely as the sense of a material creation can do. It may be worth while to inquire, in what way Mr" Lindsey has treated this .subject, in an essay written by him, in the second volume of the "Theological' Repository, entitled "Brief Remarks concerning the Two Creations ;" the express object of which is to shew, that none but a moral or spiritual creation was to be ascribed to Christ. He never once notices this passage of Hebrews; but directs his attention, almost entirely, to the text in Colossians, and to that in Ephes. iii. 0. And this is the more remarkable, because he refers to a passage to the same purport, in the very same chapter of Hebrews. The reason of this, however, it may 3 I do not mean by this expression to intimate, that Grotius is, strictly speaking, to be ranked among the followers of Soeinus. I am aware, that this charge advanced against him hy the author of L' Esprit tie M. JrnaitUl has been refuted, (see Hayle's Diet. VoI.V. pp.501, 583) ; and his single treatise, De Sutisfactione Otrifli contra Faust um Sacinum, might be judged sufficient to redeem him from the appellation. But his exposition of most of the passages of Scripture relating to the divinity of Christ is so clearly favourable to the main principle of the Socinian scheme, that, with some latitude, the term Socinian is not unfairly appli- cable. DrLardncr, in his Utter on the LoflOS, (vol. xi. p. 11l>— Kippis's edition of his Works.) written expressly for the purpose of establishing the proper humanity of Christ, affirms, that " Grotius explains texts better than the professed Socinians."— Whether Lardner, then, viewed him as far removed from the pale of the Fratres Poloni, is surely not difficult to decide. 4 See Whitby and Hosenmuller, in loc. and Col. i. 16. ; like- wise Pcirce and llallet : —also, Krebs. OOserv. on Col. i. 17- No. I.— PRE-EXISTENCE OF CHRIST, AND NATURE OF OBJECTIONS. 23 not be difficult to discover, when it is consi- dered, that, in the passages which he has exa- mined, though manifestly repugnant to his conclusion, there was not to he found so brief and stubborn an expression, :is rove ctlavxg i7ro!w£t>. As to the arguments derived by him from the passages which lie has thought pro- per to notice, they do not seem entitled to very minute attention. They amount merely to a note of Mr Locke on the one, and an assertion, on the other, that the natural crea- tion cannot have been intended, " because this is uniformly spoken of, throughout the Bible, as effected by the immediate power of God, without the interposition of any other being whatever." Thus, Mr Belsham's assertion, that Mr Lindsey would overturn the notion of the pre-existence of Christ, is maintained by Mr Lindsey's own assertion, that lie has done so. He admits, indeed, that his argument is not likely to " have any effect upon those who are Tritheists, or Orthodox in the vulgar and strict sense ; who can, with the same breath, and in the same sentence, without being astonished at themselves, assert, that there are three Creators and yet but one Creator. There is no arguing," he adds, " with men that can swallow, without feeling, downright contra- dictions." Mr Belsham, in his engagement that the champions of his tenets would be able fully to establish them, by proving that all such passages of Scripture as contradicted them were " either interpolated, corrupted, or misunderstood," forgot to make the exception, which is here very properly introduced by Mr Lindsey : — for sound argument must surely be lost upon such men as the above. But let us examine, farther, in what way the parallel passages in Col. i. 16, and Ephes. iii. 9, which, by attributing the work of crea- tion to Christ, seem to intimate his pre-exis- tence, are explained by other writers, who are tVllow-labourers with Mr Belsham in the laudable work of reducing the exalted dignity of our blessed Saviour to the common stan- dard of human nature. " It is true," says Mr Tvrwhitt, (Commentaries and Essays, vol. ii.) "that it is said, (Eph. iii. 9,) that God 'crea- ted all things by Jesus Christ.' But these words are thus to be interpreted: — things must be taken for persons ; because there are passages where the word is so understood : — by 'tilings that are,' must be intended persons peculiarly chosen by God, as the Jews were, in opposition to the Gentiles, who are descri lied as 'things that are not.' But, as we now speak of the Christian dispensation, 'by all things' must be understood, 'all persons, whether Jews or Gentiles, who believe in the Gospel ;' and by the word created is meant to be conveyed, not the giving being, or bringing into exis- tence, but the conferring benefits and privi- leges, or the placing in a new and more advantageous state of being." And thus, these few slight and obvious transitions being admit- ted, Mr Tyrwhitt easily explains the creation of all things by Jesus Christ, to be, the be- stowing upon all persons who would accept them, the privileges of the Gospel, by the ministry of Christ. Again, on Col. i. 16, we are informed by the German divines, Ernestus and Teller, in a similar felicity of interpretation, that, when it is said, "by Christ were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible," &c. it is meant to ex- press, by an easy figure, a new moral creation wrought in the world by the Gospel of Christ: " the things that are in heaven, and that are in earth," meaning the Jews and Pagans, — and the things "visible and invisible," the pre- sent and future generations of men ! See Rosenniiiller's Scholia, on Col. i. 1G.5 To remind these writers that Saint John has placed this matter beyond dispute, in his first chapter, by declaring, that the world which was made by Christ, was a world which " yet knew him not," and therefore could not have been the work of a spiritual creation, the very nature of which was to bestow the true know- ledge of Christ and his Gospel ; to remind them, I say, of this, and of the other express declarations in that chapter on the subject of Christ's pre-existence, in general, as well as on that of the creation by him, in particular, is but to little purpose. It is replied, that, in that chapter, the Logos, to whose operations the effects there spoken of are ascribed, does not imply a person, but an attribute ; and that the work of creation is consequently not attri- buted to Christ, but to the Wisdom of God the Father. This is not the place to discuss this point. Whoever wishes to see it fully exa- mined, may consult Whitby, Doddridge, and Rosenmiiller. To the inquiring reader I would more particularly recommend, upon this head, Pearson on the Creed, p. 116—120 : Le Clerc, Nov. Test. torn. i. p. 392—400 : Wits. Misc. Sacr. torn. ii. p. 88 — 118 : Whitaker's Origin of Arianism, p. 39 — 114: Howe's Critical Observations, vol. iv. p. 38 — 198: Bishop Tom- line's Elements, Art. ii., and Dr Laurence's Dissertation upon the Logos. But I am content to rest the whole issue of the question upon the state of the case fur- nished by the Socinian or Unitarian writers themselves. Let the reader but look into the translation of this chapter by Mr Wakefield, and let him form his judgment of the merits 5 What says the learned dissenter, Mr Peircc, upon such treatment of this passage of Colossians ? — " The interpretation which refers what is here said of our Saviour to the new creation, or the renovation of all things, is so forced and violent, that it can hardly he thought that men would ever have espoused it, but for the sake of an hypothesis. The reader may meet with a con- futation of it in most commentators." — Paraphrase, Uc. p. 12. note w. 2G MA GEE ON THE ATONEMENT. of the Socinian hypothesis, from the mode of expounding Scripture, which he will there find employed for its support. Let him try if be c.,ni even comprehend the distinct pro- positiona contained in the first fourteen verses. Let him try if he can annex any definite no- tions to the assertion, that wisdom (meaning thereby an attribute of God) was God ; or to the assurance, so strongly enforced by repeti- tion, that the wisdom of God was with God ; in other words, that the Deity had not existed before his own essential attributes: — or, again, if he can conceive how the Evangelist (supposing him in his senses) could have thought it necessary, after pronouncing the true light to be God, formally to declare that John was not that light : or, how he could affirm, that the wisdom, of which lie had spoken but as an attribute, was made flesh, and became a person, visible, and tangible : — in short, let him try if he does not find, both in the translation and the explanatory notes, as much unintelligible jargon as was ever crowded into the same compass ; nay, as is even, according to Mr Wakefield's notion, to be found in the Athanasian creed itself. This, however, is called a candid and critical inves- tigation of Scripture ; and this, it is to be re- membered, is the latest,6 and therefore, to be supposed the best digested, production of the Socinian school : it comes also from the hands of a writer certainly possessed of classi- cal erudition, — a quality of which few of his Unitarian fellow-labourers in the sister coun- try are entitled to boast. But, to add one instance more of the inge- nious mode of reasoning employed by these writers on the subject of Christ's p re-exis- tence : — in the 8th chap, of John we find our Saviour arguing with the Jews, who, on his asserting that Abraham had seen his day, im- mediately reply, " Thou art not yet fifty years old. and hast thou seen Abraham? Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, be- fore Abraham was, I am." The inference from this, that our Saviour here declared himself to have existed before the time of Abraham, appears not to be a very violent one ; his answer being immediately and necessarily applied to the remark made by the Jews upon his age, which rendered it impossible that he 0 Nota on nil the Books of Scripture, by Dr Priestley, have issued from the press since the first edition of this work : and to the exposition there attempted of the introduction of tSaint John's Gospel, the remarks, which I have made on Mr Wake- field's translation, apply as aptly, as if for that they had hecn Originally designed. Whoever has a curiosity to discover whether Mr Wakefield or J>r Priestley be the more unintelli- gible, may c ■ii-ult Knit's, kc. vol. iii. pp. 10, li), compared with .Mr Wak. field's comment already referred to. In addition to this work, there has yet more lately been given to the public from the Socinian press, what the authors an- pleased to call, An improved Version qfVu New Tettament. What new lights this improved Version has thrown upon this part of Scripture, will he seen when we come more particularly to notice this per- formance in another part of this work. could have seen Abraham : so that this pas- sage will be admitted to lie one of those, that " seem directly to assert the pre-existence of Christ." Now, in what way have Socinus and his followers got rid of this seeming con- tradiction to their opinions? " Uoiv ' At^ux/* yiviaOxt, \yu flfu, must be thus translated : Before Abram can be Arraiiam, that is, the father of many nations, I must be — the Mes- siah, or Saviour of the world." This famous discovery, which belongs to Socinus, was in- deed esteemed of a nature so far above mere human apprehension, that his nephew, Faus- tus Socinus, informs us, he had received it from divine inspiration. — *' Non sine multis preci- bus ipsius, Jesii nomine invocato, impetravit ipse." (Socinus contr. Eutrop. torn. ii. p. 67tt.) This sublime interpretation has, it must be confessed, been relinquished by later Socinians, who, in imitation of Grotius, consider Christ as asserting only, that he was before Abra- ham in the decree of God. But how this could serve as a reply to the objection of the Jews, respecting priority of actual existence ; or how, in this, Christ said any thing of him- self, that was not true of every human being, and therefore nugatory ; or why the Jews, upon a declaration so innocent and so un- meaning, should have been fired with rage against him as a blasphemer ; or (if the sense be, that Christ existed in the divine mind an- tecedent, not to Abraham's birth, but to his existence in the divine mind likewise) what the meaning can be of a priority in the divine foreknowledge, I leave to Mr Belsham and his assistant commentators to unfold. Indeed, this last interpretation seems not to have given entire satisfaction to Socinians themselves, as we find from a paper signed " Discipulus," in the fourth volume of the Thcol. Rcpos. in which it is asserted, "that the modern Unitarians have needlessly departed from the interpretation given by Slichtingius, Enjidinus, and other old Socinians, and have adopted another in its stead, which is not to be supported by any just grammatical construction." This gentle- man then goes on to furbish up the old Soci- nian armour, and exults in having rendered it completely proof against all the weapons of Orthodoxy. Mr Wakefield, however, seems to think it safer to revert to the principles of Grotius'-. interpretation ; and, accordingly, having for- tified it against the charge of grammatical inaccuracy, he presents it in somewhat of a new shape, by translating the passage, " Before Abraham was born, I am he" — viz. the Mes- siah. By which, he says, Christ means to im- ply, that " his mission was settled and certain before the birth of Abraham." That Mr Wakefield has, by this construction, not only avoided the mystical conceits of Socinus's interpretation, but also some of the errors chargeable on that of Grotius, cannot be No. I.— PRE-EXISTENCE OF CHRIST, AND NATURE OF OBJECTIONS. 27 denied ; but, besides that he has built his entire translation of the passage upon the arbitrary assumption of an ellipsis, to which the texts quoted as parallel furnish no support what- ever, it remains, as before, to he shewn, what intelligible connection subsists between our Lord's answer and the question put to him by the Jews. If he meant merely to say, that his mission, as the Messiah, had been ordained before the birth of Abraham, (which is in it- self a tolerable strain upon the words even of this new translation,) it will require all Mr Wakefield's ingenuity to explain in what way this could have satisfied the Jews as to the possibility of Christ's having actually seen Abraham, which is the precise difficulty our Lord proposes to solve by his reply. Doctor Priestley, in his later view of this subject, has not added much in point of clearness or con- sistency to the Sociman exposition. He con- fesses, "however, that the " literal meaning of our Lord's expressions" in the 56th verse, was, that "he had lived before Abraham," and that it was so considered by the Jews : but at the same time he contends, that our Lord did not intend his words to be so understood ; and that, when he afterwards speaks of his prio- rity to Abraham, his meaning is to be thus explained : " that, in a very proper sense of the words, he may be said to have been even before Abraham ; the Messiah having been held forth as the great object of hope and joy for the human race, not only to Abraham, but even to his ancestors," (Notes, &c. vol. iii. pp. 329, 330. 333, 334.) Such is what Dr Priestley calls the proper sense of the words, " Before Abraham was, I am." I have here given a very few instances, but such as furnish a fair specimen of the mode of reasoning by which those enlightened com- mentators, to wdiom Mr Belsham refers, have been enabled to explain away the direct and evident meaning of Scripture. I have ad- duced these instances from the arguments which they have used relating to the pre-ex- istence of Christ, as going to the very essence of their scheme of Christianity, (if such it can be called,) and as being some of those on which they principally rely. I have not scrupled to dwell thus long upon a matter not necessarily connected with the subject of these discourses, as some benefit may be derived to the young student in divinity, (for whom this publication has been principally in- tended,) from exposing the hollowness of the ground on which these high-sounding gentle- men take their stand, whilst they trumpet forth their own extensive knowledge, and the ignorance of those who differ from them. These few instances may serve to give him some idea of the fairness of their pretensions, and the soundness of their criticism. He may be still better able to form a judgment of their powers in scriptural exposition, when he finds, upon trial, that the form ulas of interpretation, which have been applied to explain away the notion of Christ's pre-existence from the pas- sages that have been cited, may be employed, with the best success, in arguing away such a meaning from any form of expression that can be devised. Thus, for example, had it been directly asserted that our Lord had existed for ages before his appearance in this world ; it is replied, all this is true, in the decree of God, but it by no means relates to an actual exist- ence. Had Christ, as a proof of his having existed prior to Ins incarnation, expressly declared, that all things had been created by him ; the answer is obvious — he must have been ordained by the divine mind, long before he came into being, as by him it had been decreed, that the great moral creation, where- by a new people should be raised up to God, was to be Avrought. Should he go yet farther, and affirm that he had resigned the God-like station which he filled, and degraded himself to the mean condition of man ; a ready solu- tion is had for this also — he made no ostenta- tious display of his miraculous powers, but offered himself to the world like an ordinary man. If any stronger forms of expression should be used, (and stronger can scarcely be had, without recurring to the language of Scripture,) they may all be disposed of in like manner. But should even all the varieties of critical, logical, and metaphysical refinement be found in any case insufficient, yet still we are not to suppose the point completely given up. The modern Unitarian commentator is not dis- comfited. He retires with unshaken fortitude within the citadel of his philosophic convic- tion, and under its impenetrable cover bids defiance to the utmost force of his adversary's argument. Of this let Dr Priestley furnish an instance in his own words. Endeavouring to prove, in opposition to Dr Price, that the expres- sions in John, vi. 62, " What and if ye shall see theSonof Man ascendupwhere he was before?" furnish no argument in favour of Christ's pre- existence, he uses the following remarkable language: — that " though not satisfied with any interpretation of this extraordinary pas- sage, yet, rather than believe our Saviour to have existed in any other state before the creation of the world, "or to have left some state of great dignity and happiness when he came hither, he would have recourse to the old and exploded Socinian idea of Christ's actual ascent into heaven, or of his imagining that he had been carried up thither in a vision ; which, like that of St Paul, he had not been able to distin- guish from a reality : nay, he would not build an article of faith of such magnitude, on the correctness of John's recollection and represen- tation of our Lord's language : and so strange and incredible does the hypothesis of a pre- 28 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. existent state appear, that, sooner than admit it, he would suppose the whole verse to be an interpolation, <>r that the old Apostle dictated one thine, and hisamanuensis wrote another." ( /.. Iters to Dr Price, pp. 67, 58, &c) — Thus i< completed the triumph of Unitarian ]diilo- Bophy over revelation : and thus i- the charge of incredulity against the pretended philoso- pher of the present day refuted ! Fur what is there too monstrous for his belief, if you except only the truths of the Gospel ? No. II.— rage 7. Col. 2. I N1TAIUAN OBJECTIONS TO THE RELIGIOUS OBSER- VANCE OF STATED DAYS. That the day on which the Saviour of men laid down his life for their transgressions, should have attached to it any feelings of reverence, or should be in any respect distin- guished from the number of ordinary days, has long been denied by different classes of dissenters from the established form ; forget- ting that its celebration was designed to awaken livelier feelings of devotion, by asso- ciating circumstance- : and not reflecting, that the argument which went to prove that no one day could possess a sanctity above another, should' have carried them much farther, and have ended in the abolition of the Sabbath itself. The writer, however, already alluded to in the last number, has, in his answer to .Mr Wilberforce's most excellent and truly pious work on the present state of religion, completely removed the charge of inconsis- tency, by directly asserting, that "Christianity expressly abolishes all distinction of days." — ••To a true Christian," he observes, "every day is a sabbath, every place is a temple, ami every action of life an act of devotion" — "whatever is lawful or expedient upon any one day of the week, is, under the Christian dispensation, equally lawful and expedient on any other." (Relsham's Review, See. p. 20.) Lest we should, however, imagine that this writer means to impose upon Christians so severe a duty, as to require them to substitute, for occasional acts of devotion, that unceasing homage, which the unbroken continuity of the Christian's Sabbath, and the ubiquity of his temple, might Seem to demand, he informs us (p. 133,) that "a virtuous man is perform- ing his duty to the Supreme Being, as really, and as acceptably, when he i- pursuing the proper business of life, or even when enjoying it- innocent and decent amusements, a- when lie is offering direct addresses to him, in the closet, or in the temple." And thus we see the matter is rendered perfectly easy. A Christian maybe employed, through the en- tire of his life, in worshipping his God, by never once thinking of him, but merely pur- suing his proper business, or his innocent amusements. This, it is true, is a natural consequence from his first position ; and gives to the original argument a consistency, which before it wanted. But is consistency of argu- ment a substitute for Christianity! Or could the teacher of divinity at Hackney have expected, that, from such instructions, his pupils should not so far profit, as to reject not only Christianity, but, many of them, the public worship, and with it the recollection, of a God? — It may be worth while to inquire, what has been the fact, respecting the students of the late academy at Hackney; and, indeed, what is the state of all dissenting academies throughout Great Britain, into which the sub- verting principles of Onitarianism have made their way. Do any of this description now exist?— "And wherefore do they not? — But, on this subject, more in the Appendix. No. III.— Page 7. Col. 2. OX THE IMPORTANCE OF THE DOCTRINE OF REDEMPTIOX. There is no one article of the Christian faith which, considered in itself, is more deserving of our closest attention, than that of our redemption by Jesus Christ. This is, in truth, the very corner-stone of the fabric. Against this, accordingly, every framer of a new hypothesis directs his entire force. This once shaken, the whole structure falls in ruins. We therefore rind the collective powers of heterodox ingenuity summoned to combat this momentous doctrine, in a work published some years back, entitled the Theo- logical Repository. Of what consequence, in the frame and essence of Christianity, it was deemed by the principal mar-dialler of this controversial host, may be inferred, not only from the great labour he ha- bestowed on this one subject, (having written rive different i --ays in that work, in opposition to the received doctrine of atonement.) but also from his express declarations. In Tkeol. Rep. vol. i. p. 429, he pronounces this doctrine to be " one of the radical, a- well as the nio-t gene- rally prevailing, corruptions of the Christian scheme;" and' in p. 124, he calls it "a dis- grace to Christianity, and a load upon it, which it must either throw off, or sink under." And le-t the combined exertions of the author- of this work might not prove sufficient to over- turn this unchristian tenet, he renews his attack upon it with undiminished zeal in his History of the Corruptions of Christianity ; among whicfa he ranks thbas one of the nio.-t important, stating, (vol. i. p. 152,) that "as the doctrine of the Divine Unity was infringed by the introduction of that of the Divinity of Christ, and of the Holy Ghost (as a person No. 4.— PARDON NOT NECESSARILY CONSEQUENT UPON REPENTANCE. 29 distinct from the Father ;) so the doctrine of the Datura! placahility of the Divine Being, and our ideas of the equity of his government, have been greatly debased by the gradual introduction of the modern doctrine of atone- ment." And, on this account, he declares Ids intention of shewing, in a fuller manner than with respect to any other of the corruptions of Christianity, that it is totally unfounded both in reason and Scripture, and' an entire depar- ture from the genuine doctrine of the Gospel. Indeed, the avowed defender of theSocinian heresy must have felt it indispensable to the support of his scheme, to set aside this doc- trine. Thus {Hist, of Cor. vol. i. p. 272) he says, "it immediately follows from Ins" (Socinus's) '* principles, that Christ beingonly a man, though ever so innocent, Ids death could not, in any proper sense of the word, atone for the sins of other men." Accordingly, both in his History of the Corruptions, and in the Theological Repository, he bends his prin- cipal force' against this doctrine of our Church. Shall not then so determined a vehemence of attack upon this doctrine, in particular, con- vince us still more of its importance in the Christian scheme; and point out to the friends of Gospel truth, on what ground they are chiefly to stand in its defence? No. IV.— Page 0. Col. 2. PARDON NOT NECESSARILY CONSEQUENT UPON REPENTANCE. Balguy, in his Essay on Redemption, (and after him Dr Holmes,1) has argued this 1 The late Dr Holmes, for some years Canon of Christ Church in Oxford, anil afterwards Dean of Winchester. 1 can- not mention this gentleman's name, without paying to it that tribute of respect which it so justly claims. To his Indefatigable and learned research the public is indebted for one of the most valuable additions to biblical literature, which, at this day, it is capable of receiving. Treading in the steps of that great benefactor to the biblical student, Dr Kennicott, he devoted a life to the Collection of materials for the emendation of the text of the Septuagint Scriptures, as his distinguished predecessor had done for that of the Hebrew. After the most assiduous, and, to a person not acquainted with the vigour of Dr Holmes's mind, almost incredible Labour, in the collation of MSS. and versions, he was enabled to give to the public the valuable result nf his inquiries, in one complete volume of the Pentateuch, and the Hook of D.iniil. That it was not allotted to him to finish the great work in. which he had engaged, is most deeply to be regretted. It is, however, to be hoped, that the learned Uni- versity, on whose reputation his labours have reflected additional lustre, will not permit an undertaking of such incalculable utility to the Christian world to remain unaccomplished, especially as the materials for its prosecution, which the Industry of Dr Holmes has so amply supplied, and which remain deposited in the Bodleian Library, must have comparatively but little to be done for its final execution. The preface to the volume which has been published concludes with these words : — " Hoc unum superest monendum, quod Collationes ista; ex omni genere, quae ad hoc opus per hosquindecim annos jam fuerunt elabo- rata;, in Bibliotheca Bodleiana reponantur, atquc vel a me, si vivaai et valeam, vel, si aliter accident, ab alio quodara Kditore, point with uncommon strength and clear- ness. The case of penitence, he remarks, is clearly different from that of innocence : it implies a mixture of guilt pre-contracted, and punishment proportionally deserved. It is consequently inconsistent with rectitude, that both should" be treated alike by God. The present conduct of the penitent will receive God's approbation : hut the reformation of the sinner cannot have a retrospective effect. The agent may he changed, hut his former sins cannot he "thereby cancelled : the convert and the sinner are the same individual person : and the agent must be answerable for his whole conduct. The conscience of the penitent furnishes a fair view of the case. His senti- ment^ of himself can be only a mixture of approbation and disapprobation, satisfaction and displeasure. His past sins must still, however sincerely he may have reformed, occasion self-dissatisfaction : and this will even be the stronger, the more he improves in virtue. Now, as this is agreeable to truth, there is reason to conclude that God beholds him in the same light. See Balguy's Essay, 1785, p. 31 — 55; and Mr Holmes's Four Tracts, p. 138, 139. — The author of the Scripture Ac- count of Sacrifices, part i. sect. 0, and part iv. sect. 4, has likewise examined this subject in a judicious manner. — It may be worth re- marking also, as Dr Shuckford has done, that Cicero goes no farther on this head than to assert, "Qjiem poenitet pecciisse, pene est in- nocens." Lamentable it is to confess, that the name of Warburton is to be coupled with the defence of the deistical objection, against which the above reasoning is directed. Put no less true is it than strange, that in the account of natural religion, which that eminent writer has given, in the ninth book of the Divine Legation, he has expressed himself in terms the most unqualified upon the intrinsic and necessary efficacy of repentance ; asserting that it is plainly obvious to human reason, from a view of the connection that must subsist be- tween the creature and his Maker, that, when- ever man forfeits the favour of God by a vio- lation of the moral law, his sincere repentance entitles hhn to the pardon of his transgressions. — I have been led, with the less reluctance, to notice this pernicious paradox of the learned bishop, because it affords me the opportunity of directing the reader's attention to the judi- cious and satisfactory refutation which it has lately received, in a prize essay in one of the sub auspicio Colendissimorum Typographel Clarendoniani Ox- oniensis Curatorum, In publicum emittentur." — The langnago also of the valuable and much to be lamented author, (with whom I was personally acquainted, and had for some years the satisfaction of corresponding,) was always such as to encourage the expectation here held out. That this expectation ihould be gratified, and with all practicable despatch, cannot but be tho anxious wish of every person interested in the pure and unadul- terated exposition of Scripture truth. 30 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. Bister universities. See Mr Pearson's Critical Essay on the Ninth Book of the Divine Legation, n, 26 — 34. The reasons that induced War- burton to adopt so heterodox a position are assigned by himself in one of his private letters to his friend Dr JIurd, and are, to the full, as insufficient as the position is untenable. These, together with the alarm given to Dr Ilurd by the new doctrine taken up by his friend, will be found noticed in the Letters (,-< us, that the Ethiopians were requi red by their laws to sacrifice boys to the sun, and girls to the moon. Sanchoniathon, as quoted by Philo, (Euseb. Praep. Evamg. lib. i. cap. 10,) asserts, that among the Phoenicians it was customary, in great and public calamities, for princes and magistrates to offer up, in sacrifice to the avenging demons, the dearest of their offspring, ii;^vr^jvrot; rt^u^dig octiiioai. This practice is also attributed to them by Porphyry (Euseb. P. Ei\ lib. iv.) Herodotus | (lib. iv. cap. 02) describes it as a custom with j the Scythians to sacrifice every hundredth man | of their prisoners to their God Mars. And Keyslcr, who has carefully investigated the antiquities of that race, represents the spread- ing oaks, under which they were used to per- form their sanguinary rites, as being always profusely sprinkled with the blood of the expiring victims, (Antiq. Septentr. Dissert, iii.) Of the Egyptians, Diodorus relates it (lib. i. p. 99, cd. Wessel.) to have been an established practice, to sacrifice red-haired men at the tomb of Osiris ; from which, he says, misunderstood by the Greeks, arose the fable of the bloody rites of Busiris. This charge brought by Diodorus against the Egyptians is supported by Plutarch, on the authority of Manetho, {hid. et Osir. p. 330.) At Ilelio- polis, also, three men were daily offered up to Lucina ; which practice, Porphyry informs us, was put a stop to by Amasis, (see Wessel. Diod. p. 99, n. 80.) And we are told by an Arabian writer, Murtadi, that it had been customary with the Egyptians to sacrifice, to the river Nile, a young and beautiful virgin, by flinging her, decked in the richest attire, into the stream : and, as Mr Maurice remarks, a vestige of this barbarous custom remains to this day ; for we learn from Mr Savary's Let- ters on" Egypt, (vol. i. p. 113,) that the Egyp- tians annually make a clay statue in the form of a woman, and throw" it into the river, previous to the opening of the dam — see Maurice's Indian Antiquities, p. 433. That this cruel practice existed also among the Chinese, appears from their histories, which record the oblation of their monarch Chingtang, in pacification of their offended deity, and to avert from the nation the dread- ful calamities with which it was at that time visited. This sacrifice, it is added, was pro- nounced by the priests to be demanded by the will of Heaven : and the aged monarch is represented as supplicating at the altar, that lus life may be accepted, as an atonement for the sins of the people, (.Martin. Hist. Sin. lib. iii. p. 75, ed. L659.J — Even the Persians, whose mild and beneficent religion appears at this day so repugnant to this horrid usage, were not exempt from its contagion. Not only No.5.— PREVALENCE OF HUMAN SACRIFICES. 31 were their sacred rites, like those of other nations, stained with the blood of immolated victims, as maybe seen in Herodotus (lib. i. cap. 132, and lib. vii. cap. 113,) Xenophon (Gyrop. lib. viii.) Arrian (Dc Exped, Ales. lib. vi. ad hncm,) Ovid (Fast. lib. i.) Strabo (lib. xv. p. 1065, ed. 1707,) Suidas (in Mi6pu ■,) and, as is fully proved by Blissonius (Dc Beg. Pers. Princ. lib. ii. a cap. v. ad cap. xliii.): but Herodotus (lib. vii. cap. 114,) expre>dy pronounces it to have been the Persian cus- tom to offer human victims by inhumation ; HiPGtxQ'j ii to CaouTX; KXTOQvauitv : and, in support of his position, adduces two striking instances of the fact ; in one of which his testimony is corroborated by that of Plutarch. The mysteries also of the Persian GrOd M it lira, and the discovery of the Mithriac sepulchral cavern, as described by Mr Maurice, have led that writer, in the most decisive manner, to affix to the Persian votary the charge of human sacrifice, (Indian Antioitities,i>p.(M5, 984,&c.) — The ancient Indians, likewise, however their descendants at this day may be described by Mr Orme (Hist, of Indost. vol. i. p. 5,) as of" a nature utterly repugnant to this sangui- nary rite, are represented both by Sir W. Jones (Asiat. Res. vol. i. p. 265,) and Mr Wilkins (in his Explanatory Notes on the Heetopades, note 292,) as having been polluted by the blood of human victims. This savage practice appears also to have been enjoined by the very code of Brahma ; as may be seen in the Asiatic Researches, as already referred to. The self-devotions, so common among this people, tend likewise to confirm the accusation. On these, and the several species of meritorious suicide extracted from the Aj/een Akbery, by Mr Maurice, see bid. Antiq. pp. 1G4, 166. The same writer asserts (p. 434,) that the Maho- metans have exerted themselves for the aboli- tionof this unnatural usage, both in India and Egypt. This author, indeed, abounds with proofs, establishing the fact of human sacrifice in Ancient India. Of the same horrid nature were the rites of the early Druids, as may be seen in Diod. Sic. (vol. i. pp. 354, 355, ed. Wess.) The Massi- lian Grove of the Gallic Druids is described by Lucan, in his Pharsalia, (lib. iii. 400, &c.) in terms that make the reader shudder : — " that every branch was reeking with human gore," is almost the least chilling of the poetic horrors with which he has surrounded this dreadful sanctuary of Druidical superstition. We are informed, that it was the custom of the Gallic Druids to set up an immense gigan- tic figure of a wicker man, in the texture of which they entwined above an hundred human victims, and then consumed the whole as an offering to their gods. For a delineation of this monstrous spectacle, see Clarke's Ca?sar, p. 131, fol. ed. 1712. Nor were the Druids of Mona less cruel in their religious ceremonies than their brethren of Gaul : Tacitus (vol. ii. p. 172, ed. Brot.) represents it as their constant usage, to sacrifice to their gods the prisoners taken in war: " cruorc captivo adolerc aras, fas habebant." In the Northern nations these tremendous mysteries were usually buried in the gloom of" the thickest woods. In the extended wilds of Arduenna, and the great Bercynian forest particularly, places set apart for this dreadful purpose abounded. Phylarchus, as quoted by Porphyry, affirms, that, of old, it was a rule with every Grecian state, before they marched against an enemy, to supplicate their gods by human victims; and, accordingly, we find" human sacrifices attributed to the Thebans, Corinthians, Mes- senians, and Temessenscs, by Pausanias : to the Lacedemonians by Fulgentius, Theodoret, and Apollodorus; and to the Athenians by Plutarch, (Themist. p. 262, et Arist. p. 300, ed. Bryan ;) and it is notorious, that the Athe- nians, as well as the Massilians, had a custom of sacrificing a man every year, after loading him with dreadful curses, that the wrath of the gods might fall upon his head, and be turned away from the rest of the citizens. — See Suidas on the words ■zegty/j/xoc, x.a.$x.np*, and $xnts,ccy.6;. The practice prevailed also among the Ro- mans ; as appears not only from the devotions so frequent in the early periods of their his- tory, but from the express testimonies of Livy, Plutarch, and Pliny. In the year of Romo 657, we find a law enacted in the Consulship of Lentulus and Crassus, by which it was pro- hibited : but it appears, notwithstanding, to have been in existence so late even as in the reign of Trajan ; for, at this time, three Vestal virgins having been punished for incontinence, the Pontiffs, on consulting the books of the Sibyls to know whether a sufficient atonement had been made, and finding that the offended Deity continued incensed, ordered two men and two women, Greeks and Gauls, to be buried alive, ( Univ. Hist. vol. xiv. p. 588, ed. Dub.) Porphyry also assures us, that, even in his time, a" man was every year sacrificed at the shrine of Jupiter Latialis. The same cruel mode of appeasing their offended gods we find ascribed to all the other Heathen nations : to the Getie, by Herodotus (lib. iv. c. 94;) to the Leucadians, by Strabo (lib. x. p. 694;) to the Goths, by Jordandes (Dc Rcb. Getic. cap. xix. ;) to the Gauls, by Cicero (pro Fontcio, p. 487, ed. 1684,) and by Caasar (Bell. Gall. lib. vi. sec. 15;) to the Heruli, by Procop. (Bell. Goth. lib. ii. c. 15 ;) to the Britons, by Tacitus (Annal. xiv. 30,) and by Plinv (lib. xxx. cap. 1 ;) to the Ger- mans," by Tacitus (Dc Mor. Germ. cap. ix. ;) to the " Carthaginians, by Sanchoniathon (Euscb. P. Ev. lib. i. cap. 10,) by Plato (in Rtinoe, Opera, p. 565, ed. 1G02,) by Plmy (lib. xxxvi. cap. 12,) by Silius Itahcus (lib. 82 M A G E E ON T HE ATONE M E N T. iv. Lin. 767, &c.) and by Justin (lil>. xviii. cap. 6, and lib. xix. cap. 1.) Enmus says of them, (oil. Hess. 1707, p. 28,) " Poenei sont soliti sos Bacruficarepuellos." They are report- ed,by Diodorus, to have offered two hundred human victims at once: and to so unnatural ,-in extreme was this horrid superstition car- ried by this people, that it was usual for the parent himself to slaughter the dearest and most beautiful of his offspring at the altars of their bloody deities. Scripture proves the practice to "have existed in Canaan before the Israelites came thither, (Levit. xx. 23.) Of the Arabians, the Cretans, the Cyprians, the Rhodians, the Phocseans, those of Chios, Les- bos, andTenedos, the same may be established; see Porphyr. apud Euseb. P. Ev. lib. iv. cap. 16. Monimus, as quoted by Clem. Alexand. (Euseb. ibid,) affirms the same of the inhabi- tants of Pella. And Euripides has given to the bloody altars of the Tauric Diana a cele- brity that rejects additional confirmation. — So that the universality of the practice in the ancient Heathen world cannot reasonably be questioned. In what light, then, the Heathens of anti- quity considered their deities, and bow far they were under the impression of the exist- ence of a Supreme Benevolence requiring nothing but repentance and reformation of life, may be readily inferred from this review of tacts". Agreeably to the inference which these furnish, we find the reflecting Tacitus pronounce (Hist. lib. i. cap. 3,) "that the gods interfere in human concerns, but to punish — Nou esse cura) deis sccuritatcni nos- trum, esse ultionem." And in this he seems but to repeat the sentiments of Lucan, who, in his Pharsalia, (iv. 107, &c.) thus expresses himself: — " Felix Roma, quidcirt, civcsqne habitura bcatos, Si libtrtatis Sliperis tain cura placeret, Quam vindicta placet " On this subject the Romans appear to bavc inherited the opinions of the Creeks. Meiners (J/istoria Doctrinal de vero Deo, p. 208) asserts that the more ancient Creeks imagined their gods to be envious of human felicity ; so that, whenever any great success attended them, they were filled with terror, lest the gods should be offended at it, and bring on them some dreadful calamity. In this the learned professor but affirms what, we have seen, (p. 30,) is the formal declaration attri- buted to Solon by Herodotus : a declaration repeated and confirmed by the historian, in the instances of Poly crates and Xerxes: in the former of which, the prudent Amasis grounds his alarm for the safety of the too prosperous prince of Samos on the notoriety of the envious nature of the divine being, to Stlov i-zKjTXuiua a; 'iuTt (pdoui^ou (lib. ill. cap. 40) — and in the latter, the sage Artabanus warns Xerxes, that even the blessings which the gnib bestow in this life are derived from an envious motive, 6 3e $to;, yhvx.v'j yewntf toi/ ctluvet (tfiouiQo; tv oivtu iiipio,ut"'n» Ssovg fcq QtZuadxi ■. and Pliny, (lib. ii. cap. 7,) speaking of the deification of death, diseases, and plagues, says, that "these are ranked among the gods, whilst with a trembling fear we desire to have them pacified, — dum esse plaeatas, trepido metu cupimus." Cudwortb also (Intell. Syst. p. 6G4,) shews, in the instances of Democritus and Epicurus, that terror was attached to the notion of a divine existence : and that it was with a view to get free from this terror, that Epicurus laboured to remove the idea of a providential adminis- tration of human affairs. The testimony of Plato is likewise strong to the same purpose : speaking of the punishment of wicked men, he says, all these things "bath Nemesis decreed to be executed in the second period, by the ministry of vindictive terrestrial de- mons, who are overseers of human affairs ; to which demons the Supreme God hath com- mitted the government of this world." — De Anima Mundi. Opera, p. 109(5, ed. Franc. 1G02. Thus the Gentile religion, in early ages, evidently appears to have been a religion of fear. The same it has been found likewise in later times ; and such it continues to this day. Of the length of time during which this prac- tice of human sacrifice continued among the Northern nations, Mr Thorkelin, who was perfectly conversant with Northern literature, furnishes several instances, in bis Essay on the Slave Trade. Ditmarus charges the Danes with having put to death, in their great sacri- fices, no fewer than ninety-nine slaves at once. (Loccen. Antiq. Sue. Goth. lib. i. cap. 3.) In Sweden, on urgent occasions, and particularly in times of scarcity and famine, they sacrificed kings and princes. Loccenius (Histor. Rer. Sitecic. lib. i. p. 5) gives the following ac- count : " Tanta fame Suecia afflicta est, ut ei vix gravior unquam incubuerit ; cives inter sedissidentes,cum pcenam delictorum divinam agnoscerent, primoanno boves,altero homines, tertio, regem ipsum, velut irse coelestis piacu- luni, ut sibi persuasum habebant, Odino ini- molabant :" and we are told that the Swedes, at one time, boasted of having sacrificed five kings in a single day. Adam of Bremen, (Hist. Eccles. cap. 234,') speaking of the awful move of Upsal, a place distinguished for the celebration of those horrid rites, says, " There was not a single tree in it, that was not reve- renced, as gifted with a portion of the divinity, because stained with gore, and foul with hu- man putrefaction." In all the other Northern nations, without exception, the practice is found to have prevailed : and to so late a No. 5.— PREVALENCE OF HUMAN SACRIFICES. 33 period did it continue, thai we learn from St Boniface, that Gregory II. was obliged to make the sale of slaves fur saeriliee bj the German converts, a capital offence ; and Car- loman, in the year 7-t;?, found it necessary to pass a law for its prevention. Mallet, whose account of this horrid custom among the Northern nations deserves particularly to bo attended to, affirms that it was not abolished in those regions until the ninth century, {Northern Antiquities, vol. i. pp. 132 — 142.) And Jortin {Remarks on Eccces. I list. vol. v. p. 233) reports, from Fleury, an adhe- rence to this custom, in the island of Bngia, even so late as at the close of the twelfth cen- tury. The same dreadful usage is found to exist, to this day, in Africa ; where, in the inland parts, they sacrifice the captives, taken in war, to their fetiches : as appears from Snelgrave, who, in the king of Dahoome's camp, was witness to his sacrificing multitudes to the deity of his nation. Among the islanders of the South Seas we likewise learn from Captain Cook, that human sacrifices were very fre- quent : he speaks of them as customary in Otaheite, and the Sandwich Islands ; and in the island of Tongataboo he mentions ten men offered at one festival. All these, however, are far exceeded by the pious massacre of human beings in the nations of America. The accounts given by Acosta, Gomara, and other Spanish writers, of the monstrous carnage of this kind, in these parts of the world, are almost incredible. The annual sacrifices of the Mexicans required many thousands of victims ; and in Peru two hundred children were devoted for the health of the Ynca. (Acost. Hist, of Ind. pp. 379—388, ed. 1604. — Anton, de Solis. and Clavig. Hist, of Alex. lib. vi. sect. 18, 19, 20.)— Mr Maurice also in- forms us, that, at this day, among certain tribes of the Mahrattas, human victims, dis- tinguished by their beauty and youthful bloom, are fattened like oxen for the altar (Ind. Antiq. p. 843.) ; and the same writer (pp. 1077, 1078) instances other facts from Mr Crauford's Sketches of Indian Mythology, from which he concludes, that the notion of the efficacy of human sacrifice; is by no means extinct in India at the present time. This position is certainly contradictory to the tes- timonies of Dow, Holwel, and Grose. But, as the laborious research of Mr Maurice lias drawn together numerous and authentic docu- ments in corroboration of his opinion, it may fairly be questioned whether the authority of these writers is to be considered as of much weight in the opposite scale. The learned professor Meiners (Historia Doct. de reroDeo. sect, iv.) does not hesitate to pronounce the two former unentitled to credit : the first, as being of a disposition too credulous ; and the second, as deserving to be reckoned, for fiction and folly, another Megasthenes.1 Mr Dow's incompetency, on the subjeel of the Indian theology, has also been proved by .Mr Ealhed, who ha- shewn, in the preface to hi- transla- tion of the Gentoo Code, (p. 32, ed. I77<;,)that writer's total deficiency in the knowledge of the sacred writings of the Hindoos ; and a- to Mr Grose, I refer the reader to the Indian Antiquities (pp. 249, 255) for instances of his superficial acquaintance with the affairs of llindostan. It is of the greater importance to appreciate truly the value of the testimony given by these writers ; as on their reports has been founded a conclusion directly sub- versive of the fact here attempted to be esta- blished.8 1 In addition to the authorities already referred to upon this head, I would suggest to the reader a perusal of Air Mickle'a Enquiry into the Brahmin 'Philosophy, suffixed to the seventh Book of his Translation of Camoens' Lusiad. He will find in that interesting summary abundant proofs not only of the exist- ence of the practice of human sacrifice in modern India, but also of the total incredibility of the romance! of Dow and Holwel ; and lie will at the same time discover the reas in why these authors are viewed with so much partiality by a certain description of writers. The philosophic tincture of their observa- tions upon religion, and the liberties taken, by Mr Holwel especially, with both the Mosaic and Christian revelations, were too nearly allied to the spirit of Unitarianism not to have had charms fur the advocates of that system. — The superiority oi the revelation of IJrahma over that of Muses, Mr Holwel instances in the creation of man. In the former, he says, " the creation of the human form is clogged witli no difficulties, no ludicrous unintelligible circumstances, or inconsistencies. God previously constructs mortal bodies of both sexes for the recep- tion of the angelic spirits," (Mickle'a Lusiar Priestley considered this writer sufficiently enlightened, to be admitted as undoubted evidence in the establishment of what- ever facts he might be pleased to vouch ? Yet it is whimsical enough, that this writer, who is so eminently philosophical, and, as such, is so favourite a witness with Dr Priestley, should have disclosed an opinion with respect to philosophers, s i disreputable as the following : — " The devil and his chiefs have often, as well as the good angels, taken the human form, and appeared in the character of tyrants, and corrupters of morals, or of phi- losophers, who are the devil's faithful deputies," (Mickle'a I. mini, vol. ii. p. 250.) 2 To the curious reader, who may wish to see the latest and most interesting account of the sanguinary superstitions of the Hindoos, and of the general state of that people in p tnt of Civilisation at the present day. I would Strongly recommend I)r Buchanan's Memoir on the Expediency of an Ecclesiastical Etta blishnuntfor British India; in which he will not only find ample confirmation of Mr Maurice's statements, as to the dreadful extent of human sacrifice among the natives of llindostan (see pp. 33, :«, 47 — 60, !»1 — 104.) but also the most affecting exposi- tion of the decaying state of religion amongst their conquer rs. In this latter point of view, it is a work that cannot be too generally known, nor too attentively perused. The contrast which it exhibits between the indifference of Protestantism and the zeal of Popery, in those distant regions, is strikingly illustra- tive of the prevailing character of each. An establishment of 34 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. The subject of tins Number may derive ad- ditional light from the nature of the represen- tations of the Divinity, throughout the Heathen nations. Thus, in the images of the Deity among the Indians, we find an awful and terrific power the ruling feature. Thou- sands of outstretched anus and hands, gene- rally filled with swords and daggers, bows and arrows, and every instrument of destruction, express to the terrified worshipper the cruel nature of the god. The collars of human skulls, the forked tongues shooting from ser- pents' jaws, the appendages of mutilated corpses, and all the other circumstances of ter- rific cruelty which distinguish the Black God- dess Seeva, Haree, and other of the idols of Hindostan (Maurice's Ind. Antiq. pp. 182, 253, 327, 38], 882, 856, 857, 882,) sufficiently manifest the genius of that religion which presented these as objects of adoration. To the hideous idols of Mexico, one of which was eighteen military chaplains, of whom not more than twelve are at any one time in actual appointment, — with three churches, one at Calcutta, one at Madras, and one at Bombay, — consti- tutes the entire means of religions instruction for the vast extent of the British empire in the East ; whilst, at the various settle- ments and factories, at Bencoolen, Canton, and the numerous islands in that quarter in the possession of Britain, not a single clergyman of the English Church is to be found, to perform the rite of baptism, or any other Christian rite whatever. British armies, also, have been known to be not unfrequently in the field without a chaplain ; and it is said, that Marquis Cornwallis was indebted to the services of a British officer, for the last solemn offices of interment. The consequence (as Dr Buchanan states) has been, that " all respect for Christian institutions has worn away ; and that the Christian Sabbath is now no other- wise distinguished, than by the display of the British flag !" So that, " we seem at present,"' he says, " to be trying the question, Whether religion be necessary for a state ; whether a remote, commercial empire, having no sign of the Deity, no type of any thing heavenly, may not yet maintain its Christian purity and its political strength, amidst Pagan superstitions, and a volup- tuous and unprincipled people." The effect also of this want of religious instruction I)r Buchanan describes to be such as might naturally be expected, — a general spread of profligacy amongst our own people, and a firm belief amongst the natives, that " the English have no religion." Now, in what way does Dr Bucluinan describe the exertions of the Romish Church to propagate its peculiar tenets? An establishment of three archbishops and seventeen bishops, with a proportional number of churches and inferior clergy, is inde- fatigably employed in sending through the East, and particularly through the dominions of Protestant Britain, that form of reli- gious faith , which Protestants condemn as perniciously erroneous. In Bengal alone, he states, there are eight Romish churches, besides four Armenian and two Greek : and it affords matter of melancholy reflection, that we are compelled to derive a Con- solation under the consequences of our own religious apathy, from the contemplation of those beneficial effects, which l)r Buchanan ascribes to the influence of this Romish establish- ment, in its civilizing operation on the minds of the Asiatics. The sentiments, which an acquaintance with these facts must naturally excite in the minds of such as retain any sense of the value of true religion, make it particularly desirable that this work should be known to all ; especially to those who have tho power to promote the means of rectifying the dreadful evils which it authenticates. To a religious mind, the perusal of the work must undoubtedly be distressing. But, from the gloom, which the darkness of Pagan superstition, joined to the profli- gacy of European irreligion, spreads over the recitals it contains, the pious heart will And relief in that truly evangelical produc- of most gigantic size, seated upon huge snakes, and expressly denominated Terror, (Clavig. lib. vi. sect. 6,) it was usual to present the heart, torn from the breast of the human vic- tim, and to insert it, whilst yet warm, in the jaws of the blood-thirsty divinity, (Ibid. lib. vi. sect. 18.) The supreme god of the ancient Scy- thians was worshipped by them under the simi- litude of a naked sword, (Herod, lib. iv. cap. 02 ;) and in Valhalla, or the Hall of Slaughter, the Paradise of the terrible god of the Northern European regions, the cruei revelries of Woden were celebrated by deep potations from the skulls of enemies slain in battle. In conformity with this character of their gods, we find the worship of many of the heatlien nations to consist in suffering and mortification, in cutting their flesh with knives, and scorching their limbs with fire. Of these unnatural and inhuman exercises of devotion, ancient history supplies numberless instances. tion of pastoral love, presented in Archbishop Wake's primary charge to the Protestant missionaries in India ; and yet more in that delightful picture which is given of the church at Mala- bar: — a church, which, as it is reported to have been ot Apostolic origin, carries with it to this day the marks of Apos- tolic simplicity ; and which presents the astonishing phenomenon of a numerous body of Hindoo Christians, equalling, both in their practice and their doctrines, the purity of any Christian church since the age of the Apostles. " Such are the heresies of this church," said their Portuguese accusers, "that their clergy married wives ; that they owned but two sacraments, baptism and the Lord's supper ; that they denied transubstan- tiation ; that they neither invoked saints nor believed in purga- tory ; and that they had no other orders or names of dignity in the church than bishop or deacon." Such was found to be the state of the church of Malabar in the year l">i)i) ; and such, there is good reason to believe, had been its state, from its foundation in the earliest times of Christianity. (See Dr Buchanan's Memoir, pp. 1— 8, 12, IB, 55—62, /5— 7!> ) To the question which Popery triumphantly proposes to the Protestant, " Where was your religion before Luther?" the answer, "In the Bible," derives now an auxiliary from this most important and interesting fact. I should deem it necessary to apologize to the reader for this digression resj ectingthe contents of Dr Buchanan's pul lieation. were I not convinced, that, in drawing attention to its subject, I am doing a real service to Christianity. As a most valuable Appendix to this publication, I must beg leave also to recommend to the reader the eighteenth article of the 1st volume of the Quarterly Review. The impious policy, that would impede the introduction of the Christian religion into India, is there treated as it deserves. The fashionable sophistry which had for a time prevailed upon this subject, is most happily exposed by the Reviewer. And, with no common talent and address, it is unanswerably proved to be no less the interest, than the duty, of the conqueror, to spread the light of the Gospel far and wide through the regions of Hindostan. Melan- choly it truly is, that such arguments should be wanted to convince a Christian people. Great is the power of the British empire most undoubtedly. Yet, surely, if its interests are found to be incompatible with the interest! of Christ's kingdom, it cannot be difficult to pronounce which of the two must fall. I hat the reader may feel the full force of the observations contained in this note, he is requested to peruse the extraordi- nary details, authenticated by Dr Buchanan, in his recent publication, entitled Christian Settarehet i» Asia ; particularly those relating to the worship of Juggernaut, and the present condition of Ceylon, which are to be found at pp. 1l'!I— 147, and pp. 1(12—190 of that work. These details must be alarming in- deed to every serious mind. No. 5.— PREVALENCE OF HUMAN SACRIFICES. 35 In tlic worship of Baal, :ts related in the Book of Kings, and in the consecration to Moloch, as practised by the Ammonites, and not infre- quently by the Hebrews themselves, the sacred volume affords an incontestable record of this diabolical superstition. Similar practices are attested by almost every page of the profane historian. The cruel austerities of the (!2 — G70, fol. L7.38,; but Leland, {Christ, licv. vol. i. pp. 259, 270, 473, 4to. 1704,) and vari- ous other writers have collected numerous authorities on this head, and that the whole mass of heathen superstitions speaks no other language; insomuch that Bolingbroke himself (vol. v. pp. J I 4, '1 15, 4to.) admits the point in its fullest extent, lie next proceeds to exa- mine the religion of the ancient Persians and modern Parsis. To prove this people to have been free front any idea of atonement or sacri- fice, he quotes a prayer from Dr Hyde, and a description of their notion of future punish- ments from Mr Grose: and though these can, at the utmost, apply only to the present state of the people, (and whoever will consult Dr Hyde's History, pp. f>70, 574, on the account given by Tavernier, of their notion of Absolu- tion, and on that given by himself, of their ceremony of the Scape-Dog, will see good reason to deny the justness even of this appli- cation,) yet Dr Priestley has not scrupled to extend the conclusion derived from them to the ancient Persians, in defiance of the nume- rous authorities referred to in this Number, and notwithstanding that, as Mr Richardson asserts, (Dissert, pp. 25, 26, 8vo. 177»,) the Parsis acknowledge the original works of their ancient lawgiver to have been long lost ; and that, consequently, the ceremonials of the modern Guebres preserve little or no resem- blance to the ancient worship of Persia. See also Hyde, Rel. Vet. Pers. p. o74, ed. Oxon. 1700. Our author, laV yiVOV, tJTOt GUTYi'HCC KOtl Ct'7rO~AVT(>6)0~i;. KtX.1 o'Jtuz \v'i%oOCho'j tyi 'aoCKa.oayj, omotvil t Iloo-iibZvi hvalotv uTTOTrjuvvri;. Nor is the idea of propitiatory atonement more clearly expressed by the Greek, than it is by the Latin writers of antiquity. The words placare, propitiarc, cxpiarc, litarc, pla- camen, piaculum, and such like, occur so frequently, and with such clearness of appli- cation, that their force cannot he easily mis- apprehended, or evaded. Thus Horace, (lib. ii. sat. 3,) " Prudens placavi sanguine Divos :" and (lib. i. ode 28,) " Teque piacula nulla resolvent :" and in his second ode, he proposes the question, " cui dahit partes scelus expiandi Jupiter?" ("to which," says Parkhurst, whimsically enough, " the answer in the Poet is, Apollo — the second person in the Heathen Trinity.") Cesar, likewise, speaking of the Cauls, says, as has been already noticed, " Pro vita hominis nisi vitahominis reddatnr, uoii posse deorum immortalium numeii placari arhitrantur." Cicero, (pro Fonteio. X.) speak- ing of the same people, says, "Si quandoaliquo metuadducti, deos placandos esse arhitrantur, huinanis hostiis eorum aras ac tcmpla fnnes- tant." The same writer (De Nat. Dcor. lib. iii. cap. (5) says, " Tu autem etiam Deciorum devo- tionihus placatos Deos esse censes." From Silius Italicus and Justin, we have the most explicit declarations, that the object of the unnatural sacrifices of the Carthaginians was to obtain pardon from the gods. Thus, the former (lib. iv. lin. 767, &c.) — " Mos fuit in populis, quoscondidit advena Dido Poscore cacde deos veniam, ac liagrantibus aria (Infandum dictu) parvus imponerc natos" — And, 111 like manner, the latter (lih. xviii. cap. 0) expresses himself: "Homines ut victimas immolabant : et impubercs aris ad- mo vebant ; pacem sanguine eorum expos- centes, pro quorum vita dii rogari maxime solent." Lucan also, referring to the same bloody rites, usual in the worship of the cruel gods of the Saxons, thus speaks of them (Diarsal. lib. i. lin. 443, &c.) — " Et qulbus immites placatur sanguine dim Tentates, liorrensque feris altaribus Ilesus, Et Tharamis Scythise non mitior ara Diana?." Virgil likewise, (Mi. ii. lin. 116) — " Sanguine placasti9 ventos, ct virginc e.Tsa, Sanguine qusrendi reditus, animflque litandum Argolica " — Suetonius relates of Otho, (cap.7) " Per omnia piaculorum genera, manes Callxo propitiaro tentasse." And Livy (lib. vii. cap. 2) says, "Cum vis morbi nee humanis consilils, nee ope divina levaretur, ludi quoque scenici, inter alia coelestis irsB placamina institui dicuntur :" and the same writer, in another place, directly explains the object of animal sacrifice ; " Per dies aliquot, hostise majores sine litatione csbssb, diuque non inipetrata pax Deiim." The word Ktare is applied in the same manner by Pliny, (De Viris Must. Tall. Host.) "Dun. Numani sacrificiis imitatnr, Jovi Elicio litare non potuit ; fulmine ictus cum regia conlla- gravit." This sense of the word might be confirmed by numerous instances. Servius (jEn. iv. lin. 50) and Macrobius (lib. iii. cap. 6) inform us, that it implies "facto sacrificio placare numeii :" and Stcphaniis Bays from Nonius, that it differs from sacrificarc in this, that the signification of the latter is, veniam .38 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. petere, but that of the former, veniam impe- trare. But to produce all the authorities on this head wore endless labour : and, indeed, to have produced so many, might seem to be an useless one, were it not of importance to enable us to appreciate, with exactness, the claims to literary pre-eminence, set up by a writer, who, on all occasions, pronounces ex cathedra; and on whose dicta, advanced with an authoritative and imposing confidence, and received by his followers with implicit reliance, has been erected a system embracing the most daring impieties that have ever dis- graced the name of Christianity. If the ob- servations in this number, of the length of which I am almost ashamed, have the effect of proving to any of his admirers the incom- petency of the guide whom they have hitherto followed with unsuspecting acquiescence, I shall so far have served the cause of truth and of Christianity, and shall have less reason to regret the trouble occasioned both to the reader and to myself, by this prolix detail. No. VI.— Page 9. Col. 2. ON THE MULTIPLIED OPERATION OF THE DIVINE ACTS. This thought we find happily conveyed by Mr Pope, in his Essay on Alan : — " In human works, though labour'd on with pain, A thousand movements scarce one purpose gain ; In God's, one single does its end produce ; Yet serves to second, too, some other use " In the illustration of this part of my subject, I have been much indebted to the excellent Sermons of the Bishop of London, On the Christian Doctrine of Redemption ; and also to the sixth Letter of II. Taylor's Ben Mot-decafs Apology — a work which, though it contains much of what must be pronounced to be erroneous doctrine, is, nevertheless, in such parts as do not take their complexion from the tinge of the author's peculiar opinions, executed with acutencss, learning, and re- search. No. VII.— Page <>. Col. 2. DEISTICAL REASONING INSTANCED IN CHUI1B. The objection stated in the page here referred to, is urged by Chubb, in his reasoning on Redemption. The species of argument here emploj ed is a favourite one with this deistical writer. He applies it, on another occasion, to establish a conclusion no less extraordinary, than that the conversion of the Jews or Heathens to Christianity was a matter of little consequence, either as to the favour of Cod, or their own future safety ; " for," adds he, "if they were virtuous and good men, they were secure without such conversion ; and if they were had vicious men, they were not secured by it!" {Posthumous Works, vol. ii. p. 33.) Thus, with the simple apparatus of an if and a dilemma, was this acute reasoner aide, on all occasions, to subvert any part of the system of revelation against which he chose to direct his attacks. The A02 IIOT 2TH was never wanting to this moral Archi- medes ; and the fulcrum and two-forked lever were always ready at hand to aid the designs of the logical mechanician. Yet this man was one of the enlightened in his day. And even at the present time, there is good reason to think that he is held in no small estimation by those who claim to be distinguished by that appellation, amongst the professors of Christianity : for, in the treatises of Unitarian and other philosophic Christians of these later times, we find the arguments and opinions of this writer plenti- fully scattered ; and at the same time all ostentatious display of the source from which they are derived, most carefully avoided : — circumstances, from which their serious reve- rence of the author, and the solid value they attach to his works, may reasonably be inferred. Now, as this writer is one of the oracles from which these illuminating teachers derive their lights, it may afford some satisfaction to the reader, who may not have misemployed time in attempting to wade through the swamp of muddy metaphysics which he has left behind him, to have a short summary of his notions concerning Christianity laid before him. Having altogether rejected the Jewish re- velation, and pronounced the New Testament to be a " fountain of confusion and contradic- tion," and having, consequently, affirmed every appeal to Scripture to be *' a certain way to perplexity and dissatisfaction, but not to j find out the truth ;" he recommends our return from all these absurdities to "that prior rule of action, that eternal and invariable rule of right and wrong, as to an infallible guide, and as the solid ground of our peace and safety." Accordingly, having himself returned to this infallible guide, he is enabled to make these wonderful discoveries — 1. That there is no particular Providence ; andthat, consequently, any dependence on Providence, any trust in God, or resignation to his will, can be no part of religion ; and, that the idea of application to God for his assistance, or prayer in any view, has no foundation in reason. 2. That we have no reason to pronounce the soul of man to be immaterial, or that it will not perish with the body. 3. That if ever we should Suppose a future state in which man shall be accountable, yet the judgment, which shall take place in 'that state, will extend No. 7— DEISTICAL REASONING INSTANCED IN CHUBB. 39 but to a small part of the human nice, and but to a very few of the actions which lie may perform — to such alone, for example, as affect the public weal. Sucb are the results of argument triumph- ing over Scripture; and such is the wisdom of man when it opposes itself to the wisdom of God! — Yet this strange and unnatural blasphemer of divine truth declares, that the work, which conveys to the world the mon- strous productions of insanity and impiety above cited (and these are but a small portion of the entire of that description,') he had com- pleted in the decline of life, with the design to leave to mankind "a valuable legacy," conducing to their general happiness. The reader will hardly be surprised, after what has been said, to learn, that the same infallible guide which led this maniac to revile the Jewish and Christan Scriptures, and to con- demn the apostles and first publishers of Christianity as blunderers and impostors, prompted him at the same time to speak with commendation of the religion of Mahomet. ! 1 It deserves to be noticed, that a complacency for tlie religion of Mahomet is a character by which the liberality of the Socinian or Unitarian is not less distinguished, than that of the Deist. The reason assigned for this by I)r Van Mildert is a just one. Mahometanism is admired by both, because it sets aside those distinguishing doctrines of the Gospel, the divinity of Christ, and the sacrifice upon the cross ; and prepares the way for what the latter are pleased to dignify with the title of Natural Religion, and the firmer with that of Rational Chris- tianity.—Van Mildert's Boyle LccL, vol. i. p. 208. The same writer also truly remarks, (p. 202,) that, besides exhibiting a strange compound of Heathen and Jewish errors, the code of Mahomet comprises almost every heterodox opinion that has ever been entertained respecting the Christain faith. Indeed, the decided part which the Unitarians have beret 'fore taken with the prophet of Mecca seems not to be sufficiently adverted to at the present day. The curious reader, if be will turn to Mr Leslie's Thcolog. Works, vol. i. p. 207-, will not be a little entertained to see conveyed, in a solemn address from the English Unitarians to the Mahometan ambassador of Mo- rocco, in the reign of Charles the Second, a cordial approbation of Mahomet and of the Koran. The one is said to have been raised up by God, to scourge the idolizing Christians, whilst the other is spoken of as a precious record of the true faith. Ma- homet they represent to be "a preacher of the Gospel of Christ ;" and they describe themselves to be " his fellow-cham- pions for the truth." The mode of warfare they admit, indeed, to be different ; hut the object contended for they assert to be the same. " We, with our Unitarian brethren, have been in all aces exercised, to defend with our pens the faith of one supreme God ; as he hath raised your Mahomet to do the same with the sword, as a scourge on those idolizing Christians," (p. 909.) Leslie, upon a full and deliberate view of the case, ad- mits the justice of the claim set up by the Unitarians to be admitted to rank with the followers of Mahomet ; pronouncing the one to have as good a title to the appellation of Christiana as the other, (p. 337-) On a disclosure, by Mr Leslie, of the attempt which had thus been made by the Socinians, to form a confederacy with the Mahometans, the authenticity of the address, and the plan of the projected coalition, at the time, were strenuously denied. The truth of Mr Leslie's statement, however, (of which from the character of the man no doubt could well have been at any time entertained,) has been since most fully and incontrovertibly confirmed. —See Whitaker's Origin of Arianism, p. 39!>. Mr Leslie also shews, that this Unitarian scheme, of extolling Mahometanism as the only true Christianity, continued, for a length of time, to be acted on with " Whether the .Mahometan revelation 1 f a divine original or not, there seems," says he, "to be a plausible pretence, arising from the circumstances of things, for stamping a divine character upon it !" However, at other times lie seems disposed not to elevate the religion of Mahomet decidedly above that of Christ; for be observes, that "the turning from .Ma- hometanism to Christianity, or from Chris- tianity to Mahometanism, is only laying aside one external form of religion and making use of another ; which is of no more real benefit than a man's changing the colour of his clothes." His decision upon this point, also, be thinks he can even defend by the authority of St Peter, who, he says, has clearly given it as bis opinion, in Acts, x. 34, 35, that all forms of religion are indifferent. I should not have so long detained my reader with such contemptible, or rather, pi- tiable, extravagancies, but that the specimen they afford of the wild wanderings of reason, when emancipated from Revelation, may pre- pare his mind for a juster view of what is called Rational Christianity. No. VIII. — Page 9. Col. 2. ON THE CONSISTENCY OF r/RAYKR WITH Till: DIVINE IMMUTABILITY. Sec Price's Dissertations — 2d edit. pp. 209, 210. There are some observations of this excellent and serious writer upon the nature of prayer, wdiich are not only valu- able in themselves, but, with some exten- sion, admit so direct a bearing upon the sub- ject before us, that I cannot resist the desire I feel of laying them before the reader. In answer to the objection derived from the unchangeableness of Cod, and the conclusion thence deduced, that prayer cannot make any alteration in the Deity, or cause him to be- stow any blessings which he would not have bestowed without it ; this reply is made : — If it be in itself proper, that we should humbly apply to Cod for the mercies we need from him, it must also be proper, that a regard activity and perseverance. He establishes this at large, by extracts from certain of their publications, in which it is endea- voured to prove, "that Mahomet bad no other design but to restore the belief of the unity of God, which at that time was extirpated among the Eastern Christians by the doctrines of the Trinity and Incarnation ; that Mahomet meant not, that his religion should be esteemed a new religion, but only the restitution of the true intent of the Christian religion ; that the Mahometan learned men call themselves the truo disciples of the Messias:" — and, to crown all, " that Mahometanism has pre- vailed so greatly, not by force and the sword ; but by that one truth in the Koran, the Unity of God." And, as a just conse- quence from all this, it is strongly contended, that " the Tartars had acted more rationally in embracing the sect of Mahomet, than the Christian faith of the Trinity, Incarnation," Ac Leslie, vol. i. pp. 21(5, 217- 4!) M A G E E ON THE ATONEMEN T. should be paid to such applications ; and that there should be a different treatment of those who make them, and those who do not. To argue this a- implying changeahleness in the Deity, would be extremely absurd : for the unchangeableness of God, when considered in relation to the exertion of his attributes in the government of the world, consists, not in always acting in the same manner, however cases and ci remittances may alter ; but in always doing what is right, and in adapting his treatment of his intelligent creatures to the variation of their actions, characters, and dispositions. If prayer, then, makes an alter- ation in the case of the supplicant, as being the discharge of an indispensable duty ; what would in truth infer changeahleness in God, would be, not his regarding and answering it, but his not doing this. Hence it is manifest, that the notice which he may be pleased to take of our prayers by granting us blessings in answer to them, is not to be considered as a yielding to importunity, but as an instance of rectitude in suiting his dealings with us to our conduct. Nor does it imply that he is backward to do us good, and therefore wants to be solicited to it; but merely that there are certain conditions, on the performance of which the effects of his goodness to us are suspended ; that there is something to be done l>y us before we can be proper objects of his favour ; or before it can be fit and consistent with the measures of the divine government to grant us particular benefits. Accordingly, to the species of objection alluded to in page 9, (namely, that our own worthiness or un- worthiness, and the determined will of God, must determine how we are to be treated, absolutely, and so as to render prayer alto- gether unnecessary,) the answer is obvious, — that before prayer we may be unworthy ; and that prayer may be the very thing that makes us worthy : the act of prayer being itself the very condition, the very circumstance in our characters, that contributes to render us the proper objects of divine regard, and the neglect of it being that which disqualifies us for re- ceiving blessings. Mr Wbllaston, in his Rcligionof 'Nature, (pp. 115, 116,) expresses the same ideas with his usual exact, ami (1 may here particularly say) mathematical, precision. "The respect, or re- lation," lie ohserves, " which lies between God, considered as an unchangeable being, and one that is humble, and Bupplicates, and endea- vours to qualify himself for mercy, cannot be 3ame with that which lies between the <■ unchangeable I rod, and one that isobsti- nate. and will not supplicate,8 or endeavour liiitxi 'ott*s lU'lig. Enth. pp. 15(1—167. It may be satisfactory to the reader to know exactly what are the Articles and Psalms that have been rejected by Mr Wesley. — The Articles rejected arc, the third, eighth, the greater part of the ninth, thirteenth, fifteenth, seventeenth, eighteenth, twentieth, twenty-first, twenty-third, twenty-sixth, much of the twenty-seventh, twenty-ninth, thirty -third, and three others of the less important ones at the end. Those marked in italics are mora particularly to be noticed. The Psalms rejected arc, the 14th, Zlst, SSd, 63d, 64th, 68th, 60th, 04th, 73d, 74th, 7mh — 83d, 07th, limb. 94th, 101st, 103th, 106th, 108th— 110th, 120th, ISSd, 199th, I32d, 1.14th. 136th, l.'17th, 140th, 149th, The general character of tin- rejected Articles and Psalms will pretty clearly establish what has been alleged as to the nature of the opinions which Mr Wesley and his followers maintain, or, at least, of the doctrines which they reject. rhapsodies, exhibited such a portrait of the true Christian, and of the nature of that per- fection which it is permitted him in this life to attain, as is strictly warranted by Scripture, and highly edifying to contemplate. I, there- fore, here subjoin it, both as being naturally connected with the present subject, and as being calculated to afford satisfaction and im- provement to the Christian reader. "The perfect Christian, according to the representation of Holy Writ, is he who, as far as the infirmity of his nature will allow, a>])ires to universal holiness of life ; uniformly and habitually endeavouring to 'stand per- fect and complete in all the will of God,' and to 'fulfil all righteousness,' in humble imita- tion of his Redeemer ; who daily and fer- vently prays for ' increase of faith,' like the Apostles themselves; and strenuously labours to 'add to his faith, virtue ; and to virtue, knowledge ; and to knowledge, temperance ; and to temperance, patience; and to patience, godliness ; and to godliness, brotherly kind- ness ; and to brotherly kindness, charity.' Such is the assemblage of virtues necessary to constitute the character of the perfect Chris- tian ; ever aiming at, though never attaining to, absolute or sinless perfection, in this pre- sent state of trial, probation, and preparation for a better; and meekly resting all his hopes of favour and acceptance with God, not on his own defective and imperfect righteous- ness, but on 'the free grace of God, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus ;' ' for by grace we are saved through faith, and this not of ourselves, it is the gift of God ; not of works, that no. one should boast.' " — Metho- dism Inspected, pp. 30, 31. — This is the lan- guage of reason and of Scripture,'' by which the Christian, though ever aspiring to a higher and a better nature, is still reminded of that nature which belongs to him, and against the infirmities of which he can never either relax in vigilance, or remit in exertion. How strongly contrasted with such lan- guage are the above dogmas alluded to and the authorities adduced in their support! That the nature of those dogmas, and the extent to which they are maintained, may bo the better understood, I must here detain the reader with a few passages from the writings of Mr Wesley. As possessing the advantages of education, talents, and knowledge of man- kind, in a degree which places him much above the level of those who have succeeded him in the Methodist ministry, he may well 6Dr Stack also uses a language of like sobriety and scriptural correctness, in those passages of his very useful Lectures on the Acts, and on the Unmans, in which he has occasion to speak of the influence of the Holy Spirit. See particularly pp. 35. 36. of the former work, and pp. 148 — 150. of the latter. Attend also to the excellent observations of I)r Tomline, on the degree, of purity attainable by the Christian, and the nature of the en- deavours which he is to make after perfection.— Elan, of Christ Thcol. vol. ii. p. 285. No. 12.— THE CORRUPTION OF MAN'S NATURAL STATE. 47 be supposed not to have propounded the opinions of the sect in a shape more extra- vagant than that in which they are embraced by his followers. And first, on the subject of miraculous manifestations and impulses in the forgiveness of sins and assurance of salvation, he tells us: "God docs now, as aforetime, give remissions of sin and the gift of the Holy Ghost to us ; and that always suddenly, as far as 1 have known, and often in dreams, and in the visions of God," (Hainp- soifs Life of Wesley, ii. 81.) — Again : " I am one of many witnesses of this matter of fact, that God does now make good this his promise daily, very frequently during a representation (how made I know not, but not to the outward eye) of Christ, either hanging on the cross, or standing on the right hand of God," (I lamps. ii. 55.) — Again : " I saw the fountain opened in his side — we have often seen Jesus Christ crucified, and evidently set forth before us," (B. Lavingt. vol. i. part i. p. 51.) — And Coke, in his Life of Wesley, says, that " being in the utmost agony of mind, there was clearly represented to him Jesus Christ pleading for him with God the Father, and gaining a free pardon for him." Secondly, as to the tenet of perfection, Mr Wesley affords us the follow- ing ample explanation : — " They (the puri- fied in heart) are freed from self-will : as de- siring nothing, no not for a moment, but the holy and perfect will of God : neither supplies in want, nor ease in pain, nor life, nor death, but eontinuallv cry in their inmost soul, ' Father, thy will be done.' " " They are freed from evil thoughts,' so that they cau- ' That he, who could use such language as this, would feel it necessary to reject the fifteenth Article of the Church, as the reader is already apprised Mr Wesley did, will not appear sur- prising on a perusal of that article. — " Christ, in the truth of our nature, was made like unto us in all things, sin only except, from which he was clearly void, both in his flesh and in his spirit. lie came to be a lamb without spot, who, by sacrifice of himself once made, should take away the sins of the world : and sin, as St John saith, was not in him. Hut all we the rest, although baptized and born again in Christ, yet offend in many things ; and if we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." Such is the doctrine of the Established Church ; and mell is the direct contrary of the doctrine which Mr Wesley and his followers hold upon the subject of this Article ; for which reason they have, with perfect consistency, rejected it from their code of Christian belief. And, for the same reason, the cry of the party is every where loudly raised against every work that intimates the corruption of man's nature, in the language of the Article. As to the rejection of the eighteenth Article, Mr Wesley's lan- guage has not been so explicit as to enable us to pronounce, with perfect certainty, upon the precise ground of that rejection. But when we consider, that in that Article there is contained a condemnation of the assertion " that every man shall be saved by the law or sect which he profes«eth ;" and that it is at the same time affirmed, that " Holy Scripture doth set out unto us only the name of Jesus Christ, whereby men must be saved ;" and when at the same time we recollect, that "the name of Jesus Christ " implies certain belief and doctrines respecting the nature of the Saviour and the religion which he has taught ; whilst Mr Wesley considers doctrines, or right opinions, to be of little value, and holds the religious feelings which distinguish the true Methodist to be the only sure pledge and passport of salva- not enter into them, no not for an instant Aforetime, (i. e. when only justified) when an evil though! came in, they looked up, and it vanished away : but now it does not come in ; there being no room for this in a soul, which is full of God. They are freed from wanderings in prayer : they have an unction from the Holy One, which abideth in them, and teacheth them every hour what they Shall do, and what they shall speak."— (Pref. to second volume of Weslev's Hymns, llamps. iii. 52 ; and Coke's Life of Wes. pp. 278, 844.) Thescextractsfromthe writings of the father of Methodism fairly open up to us the two great fundamental doctrines of the sect: viz. 1. That the assurances of forgiveness and of salvation arise from a sudden infusion of divine feeling, conveyed by some sensible and miraculous manifestation of the Spirit : and 2. That the true believer attains in this life such perfection, as to be altogether free from sin, and even from the possibility of sin. Holding such doctrines, it is not at all won- derful that the Wesleyan Methodist is indiffe- rent about every other. Mr Wesley fairly says upon the subject of doctrines, "1 will not quarrel with you about any opinions : believe them true or false !" {Third Appeal, p. 185.) In another place he confesses, "The points we chiefly insisted upon were, that Orthodoxy, or Right Opinions, is at best a very slender part of religion,8 if it can be allowed to be any part of it at all 1" This, it must be admitted, is an excellent expedient for adding to the numbers of the sect. A perfect indifference about doctrines, and a strong persuasion that the divine favour is secured, whilst the fancy of each individual is counted to him for faith, — are such re- commendations of any form of religion, as can scarcely be resisted. But what can be more mischievous than all this? What more destructive of true religion ? The sound prin- ciples of Christian doctrine disparaged as of no value to the believer ; and the serious feel- ings of Christian piety caricatured, and there- by brought into general disrepute ; whilst the sober and regulated teaching of the na- tional clergy is treated with contumely and contempt ; "and separation from the national Son : — when we compare these things together, we seem to run no great risk in c including, that this article was condemned by the founder of Methodism, as clearly marking, that religious opinions were by no means a matter of indifference ; that, on the contrary, just notions concerning Christ were requisite for salvation ; and that for the want of these, no association with any particular sect or religious description whatever could mako compensation. "On this favourite position of Mr Wesley, Bishop Warburton justly remarks, that here is a complete separation between reason and religion. For when reason is no longer employed to dis- tinguish right from wrong opinions, religion has no farther con- nection with it. But, reason once separated from religion, must not piety degenerate either into nonsense or madness ? And for the fruits of grace what can remain but the froth and dregs of enthusiasm and superstition ? In the first ages of Christianity, 48 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMK N T. church deemed a decisive criterion of godly sincerity ! — In the contemplation of such a state of things, it seems as if one were sur- veying the completion of the following pro- spective description given to us by Sir Walter Raleigh : — " When all order, discipline, and church government shall he left to newness of opinion, and men's fancies ; soon after, as many kinds of religion will spring up as there are parish churches within England : every contentious and ignorant person clothing his fancy with the Spirit of God, and his imagi- nation with the gift of revelation : insomuch as when the Truth, which is but one, shall appear to the simple multitude no less varia- ble than contrary to itself, the faith of men will soon after die away by degrees, and all religion be held in scorn and contempt." — Hist, of the World, b. ii. ch. v. sect. 1. No. XIII.— Page 11. Col. 1. ON THE MISREPRESENTATION OF THE DOCTRINE OF ATONEMENT BY UNITARIANS. On this subject Dr Priestley {Hint, of Cor. vol. i. p. 1,53) thus represents the ar- guments of the Orthodox. " Sin, being an offence against an infinite Being, requires an infinite satisfaction, which can only be made by an infinite person ; that is, one who is no less than God himself. Christ, therefore, in order to make this infinite satis- faction for the sins of men, must himself be God, equal to God the Father." With what candour this has been selected, as a specimen of the mode of reasoning by which the doc- trine of Atonement, as connected with that of the divinity of Christ, is maintained by the Established Church, it is needless to remark. the glory of the Gospel consisted in its being a reasonable service. By this it was distinguished from the several modes of Gentile religion, the essence of which consisted in fanatic raptures and superstitious ceremonies ; without any articles of belief or for- mula of faith ; " right opinion being," on the principles of the Pagan priesthood, " at best, but a very slender part of religion, if any part of it at all." Rut Christianity arose on different princi- ples. St Paul considers right opinion as one full third part of religion, where, speaking of the three great fundamental princi- ples on which the Christian Church is erected, he makes truth to be one of them : — " The fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness, righteousness, and truth." So different was St Paul's idea, from that entertained of Christianity by Mr Wesley, who comprises all in the new birth, and makes believing to consist entirely in feel- ing. On the whole, therefore, we may fairly conclude (with Warburton,) that that wisdom which divests Christianity of truth and reason, and resolves its essence rather into mental and spiritual sensations, than tries it by mural demonstration, can never be the wisdom which is from above, whose lirst charac- teristic attribute is purity. The same writer truly adds, that if Mr Wesley's position be well founded, the first Reformers of Religion from the errors of Popery have much to answer for: who, for the sake of " ri^ht opinion, at best a slender part of religion, if any part of it atall," occasioned so much turmoil, and so many revolutions in civil .as well as in religious systems— • See Warburton \s Principle! qf Nat. and Rev. Religion, vol. i. pp. i63— 267. That some few, indeed, have thus argued, is certainly to be admitted and lamented. But how poorly such nun have reasoned, it needed not the acuteness of Dr Priestley to discover. On their own principle, the reply is obvious, — that sin being committed by a finite crea- ture, requires only a finite satisfaction, for which purpose a finite person might be an adequate victim. But the insinuation, that our belief in the divinity of Christ has been the offspring of this strange conceit, is much more becoming the determined advocate of a favourite cause, than the sober inquirer after truth. Our mode of reasoning is directly the reverse. The Scriptures proclaim the divinity of Christ ; and so far are we from inferring this attribute of our Lord from the necessity of an infinite satisfaction, that we infer, from it, both the great love of our Almighty Father, who has " spared not his own Son, but deli- vered him up for us all ;" and the great heinousness of human guilt, for the expiation of which it was deemed fit that so great a Being should suffer. The decent manner in which Mr Belsham has thought proper to represent the orthodox notion of the Atone- ment, is, that man could "not have been saved, unless one God had died, to satisfy the justice, and appease the wrath of an- other" {Renew, ike. p. 221.) This is language with which I should not have disgraced my page, but that it may serve to shew how dan- gerous a thing it is to open a door to opinions, that can admit of treating subjects the most sacred with a levity which seems so nearly allied to impiety. No XIV.— Page 11. Col. 1. ON THE DISRESPECT OF SCRIPTURE MANIFESTED BY UNITARIAN WRITERS. Perhaps I may be charged with having made a distinction in this place, which gives an unfair representation of Unita- rians, inasmuch as they also profess to derive their arguments from Scripture. But whether that profession be not intended in mockery, one might be almost tempted to question, when it is found, that, in every j instance, the doctrine of Scripture is tried by their abstract notion of right, and rejected if not accordant; — when, by means of figure and allusion, it is every where made to speak a language the most repugnant to all fair critical interpretation; until, emptied of its true meaning, it is converted into a vehicle for every fantastic theory, which, under the name of rational, they may think proper to adopt; — when, in such parts as propound Gospel truths of a contexture too solid to admit of an escape in figure and allusion, the ■ sacred writers are charged as bunglers, pro- No. 14.— DISRESPECT OF SCRIPTURE BY UNITARIAN WRITERS. 49 during " lame accounts, improper quotations, and inconclusive reasonings," (Dr Priestley's 12th Letter to Mr Jiurn,) and philosophy is consequently called in to rectify their errors ; — when one writer of this class (Steinbart) tells us, that " the narrations" (in the New Testament) " true or false, are only suited for ignorant, uncultivated minds, who cannot enter into the evidence of natural religion ;" and again, that " Moses, according to the childish conceptions of the Jews in his days, paints God as agitated by violent affections, partial to one people, and hating all other nations ;" — when another (Sender,) remark- ing on St Peter's declaration, that " prophecy came not in old time by the will of man, but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Spirit," says, that " Peter speaks here according to the conception of the Jews," and that, " the prophets may have delivered the offspring of their own trains as divine revelations," (DrErskine's Sketches and Hints of Ch. Hist. No. 3, pp. GO, 71) ; — when a third (Engedin) speaks of Saint John's por- tion of the New Testament, as written with " concise and abrupt obscurity, inconsistent with itself, and made up of allegories ;" and Gagneius glories in having given " a little light to Saint Paul's darkness, a darkness, as some think, industriously affected ;" — when we find Mr Evan son, one of those able com- mentators referred to by Mr Belsham in his Review, &c. p. 206, assert, {Dissonance, &c. p. 1) that " the evangelical histories contain gross and irreconcileable contradictions," and consequently discard three out of the four, retaining the Gospel of St Luke only ; at the same time drawing his pen over as much of this, as, either from its infelicity of style, or other such causes, happens not to meet his approbation ; — when we find Dr Priestley, besides his charge against the writers of the New Testament before recited, represent, in his Letter to Dr Price, the narration of Moses concerning the creation and the fall of man, as a lame account ; and thereby meriting the praise of " magnanimity," bestowed on him by theologians equally enlightened ; — when, finally, not to accumulate instances where so many challenge attention, we find the Gospel openly described by Mr Belsham, {Review, &c. p. 217,) as containing nothing more than the Deism of the French Theo-Philanthrope, save only the fact of the resurrection of a human being (see Appendix ;) and when, for the purpose of establishing this, he engages, that the Unitarian writers shall prune down the Scriptures to this moral system and this single fact, by shewing that whatever supports anything else is either " interpolation, omis- sion, false reading, mistranslation, or erro- neous interpretation" {Review, pp. 206, 217, 272 ;) — when, I say, all these things are con- sidered, and when we find the Bible thus con- temned and rejected by the gentlemen of this new light, and a new and more convenient Gospel carved out for themselves, can the occasional profession of reverence9 for Scrip- ture, as the word of God, be treated in any other light, than as a convenient mask, or an insulting sneer? It might be a matter of more than curious speculation, to frame a Bible according to the modifications of the Unitarian commentators. The world would then see, after all the due amputations and amendments, to what their respect for the sacred text amounts. Indeed it is somewhat strange, tiiat men so zealous to enlighten and improve the world have not, long before this, blessed it with so vast a treasure. Can it be, that they think the execution of such a work would impair their claim to the name of Christians ? Or is it rather, that even the Bible, so formed, must soon yield to another more perfect, as the still increasing flood of light pours in new know- ledge? That the latter is the true cause, may perhaps be inferred, as well from the known magnanimity of those writers, which cannot be supposed to have stooped to the former consideration, as from Dr Priestley's own declarations. In his Letters to a Philosophical Unbeliever, (part ii. pp. 33 — 35.) he informs us, that he was once " a Calvinist, and that of the straitest sect." Afterwards, he adds he " became a high Arian ; next a low Arian, and then a Socinian ; and in a little time a Socinian of the lowest kind, in which Chri>t is considered as a mere man, the sou of Joseph and Mary, and naturally as fallible and pec- 9 The fathers of the Socinian School are as widely distinguished from their followers of the present day, by their modesty and moderation, as by their learning and their talents. Yet, that it may be the more plainly discerned how remote the spirit of So- cinianism has been, at all times, from the reverence due to the authority of Scripture, I here subjoin, in the words of two of their early writers, specimens of the treatment which the sacred volume commonly receives at their hand. Faustus Socinus, after pronouncing with sufficient decision against the received doctrine of the Atonement, proceeds to say, " Ego quidem, etiamsinon semel, scd sf .l/i finpi on t's obedience, as we find them explained by this writer, will help us to a just view of the true nature of that which he calls our atonement. " Truth required," says he, (Key, See. No. 149,) " that grace be dispensed, in a manner the most proper and probable to produce reformation and holiness. Now this is what our Lord has done. He has bought US by his blood, and procured the remission of sins, as what he did and suffered was a proper reason for granting it, and a fit way of conveying ami rendering effectual the grace of Cod," &c. " Now this could be done no otherwise, than by means of a moral kind, such as are apt to influence our minds, and engage us to forsake what is evil, and to work that which is good," &c. — " And what means of this sort could be more effectual, than the heavenly and most illustrious example of the Son of God, shew- ing us the most perfect obedience to God, and the most generous goodnessand love to men, recommended to our imitation, by all possible endearments and engaging consideration-';'' And again, he says, (Script. Doct. No. 170,) "By the Mood of Christ God discharges us from the guilt, because the blood of Christ is the most powerful mean of freeing us from the pollution and power of sin." And he adds, "it is the ground of redemption, as it is a mean of sanctification." What then means the blood of Christ ? " Not a mere corporeal substance; in which case,"ashesays, "it would be of no more value in the sight of God, than any other thing of the same kind : nor is it to be considered merely in relation to our Lord's death and sufferings, as if mere death or suffering could be of itself pleasing and acceptable to God :" no, the writer informs us, (Key, ike. No. 14(5,) that the " blood of Christ is his perfect obedience and goodness : and that it implies a character," which we are to transcribe into our lives and conduct. And, accordingly, he maintains, (Script. Doct. No. 185,) that "our Lord's sacrifice and death is so plainly represented, as a powerful mean of improving our virtue, that we have no sufficient ground to consider its virtue and efficacy in any other light." To what, then, according to this writer, does the entire scheme of the Atonement amount? — God, being desirous to re-cue man from the consequences and dominion of his sins, and yet desirous to effect this in such a way, as might best conduce to the advance- ment of virtue, thought fit to make forgive- ness of all sins that were past, a reward of the meritorious obedience of Christ ; and, by ex- hibiting that obedience as a model for uni- versal imitation, to engage mankind to follow his example, that, being thereby improved in their virtue, they might be rescued from the dominion of sin : and thus making the example of Christ a " mean of sanctification," redemption from sin might thereby be effected. This, as far as 1 have been able to collect it, is a faithful transcript of the author's doc- trine. And what there is in all this, of the nature of Sacrifice or Atonement, (at hast so far as it affects those who have lived si. 52 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. the time of Christ,) or in what material respect it differs from the Socinian notion, which represents Christ merely as our instructor and example, I profess myself unable to discover. I have been thus full in my account of this writer's scheme, because, by some strange oversight, and possibly from his artful accom- modation of scriptural phrases to his own notions, whereby he is enabled to express himself in the language of Scripture, his works have received considerable circulation, even among those whose opinions on this subject are of an opposite description. Nay, the erroneous tenets of this author have been conveyed in a collection of Theological Tracts, some time since published by an able and learned Prelate in the sister country : and the candidates for orders in this, are by authority enjoined to receive part of their theological instruction from his writings. Those, who wish to see the errors of this scheme more amply reviewed and refuted, I refer to the examination of the doctrine, in the Scripture Account of Sacrifices, by Mr Portal, and in the Criticisms on Modem Notions of Atone- ment, by Or Richie : in the latter of which, particularly, the fallacy of the author's prin- ciples, and the gross ambiguity of his terms, are exposed with no less truth than ingenuity. With respect to H. Taylor, who, in his B. Mord. partly coincides with this writer in his explication of atonement, it is but justice to say, that he gives a view of the subject, in the main, materially different ; inasmuch as he represents Christ's concern for mankind, and his earnest intercession recommended by his meritorious obedience, to be the appointed means of his obtaining from God that king- dom, which empowers him to dispense for- giveness, &c Whereas Or. J. Taylor makes the obedience of Christ (with regard to such as have lived since his time) the means of redemption, as being the means of man's improvement in virtue ; and, so far from attributing any efficacy to Christ's obedience, as operating through intercession, (to which we find, from Scripture, God has frequently bestowed his blessings, see Number IX. p. 41,) he considers the intercessions and prayers of good men for others, in no other light, than as acts of obedience, goodness, and virtue. So that, in fact, the whole of his scheme, when rightly considered, (excepting only with respect to those who lived before Christ, in which part he seems inconsistent with himself, and on his own principles not easy to be understood,) falls in with the notion of good works and moral obedience, as laid down by the Socinian. And here lies the secret of .Mr Belsham's remark, (Review, &c. p. ih,) that '• Dr Taylor has, in general well explained these Jewish phrases" (viz. propi- tiation, sacrifice, redemption through Christ's blood, &C.) " in his admirable Key." As Mr | Belsham rejects the notion of redemption by Christ, and of faith in Christ, in toto, (see Re- view, &c. pp. 18, 104, 145,) it is not difficult to assign the cause of this commendation. No. XVII. — Page 12. Col. 2. THE DOCTRINE OF ATONEMENT FALSELY CHARGED WITH THE PRESUMPTION OF PRONOUNCING ON THE NECESSITY OF CHRIST'S DEATH. That men could not have been forgiven, unless Christ had suffered to purchase their forgiveness, is no part of the doc- trine of Atonement, as held by the Church of England. What God could, or could not have done, it presumes not to pronounce. ■What God declares he has done, that merely it asserts ; and on his express word alone is it founded. But it is to be remembered, that on this, as on many other occasions, that a priori reasoning, which so frequently misleads those who object to the doctrines of our Church, is imputed by them to us. Not being themselves in the habit of bowing with humble reverence to the Sacred Word, they consider not that we speak merely its sug- gestions ; ] and that, if we do at any time 1 The language of Witsius upon this subject is worth attend- ing to. " Supposito extare Revelationem de mysteriis, at in- quiri in sensum verborum quibus ista Revelatio mihi cxponitur ; non est in ista inquisitione ita proeedendum, ut primo rationem meam consulam, quid ea, in idearum ac notionum suarum scriniis, rei de qua agitur simile aut adversum liabeat, ut secun- dum eas quas ibi invenio notiones verba revclationis exponam, id unice operani dans, ut sensum tandem aliquem quanta maxi- ma possum commoditate iis dem ; qui istis mcis pranotionibus optime conveniat. Sed attendendum est ad ipsa verba, quid in omnibus suis cireumstantiis signiticare apta nata sint, quidque s cundum Scriptura> Btilum signiticare soleant ; atque hac via reperto sensu quein verba sine torsione per se fundunt, secure in eo acquiescendum est, omniaque rationis scita BUbjicienda sunt isti sensui quern iis me verbis dncet Deus." To these observa- tions he subjoins an example of the opposite modes of investigat- ing the sense of Scripture by the philosophizing and the humble inquirer, applying the former epithet to Socinus, and taking for the particular subject of investigation the passage in Job. i. 14, o kiyo; (ra.%% tyiivn. — " Socinus ita procedit : nihil invenit in toto rationis sua penu, quod ipsi repraesentetj Deum ita humansa unitum natural, ut ea unam cum ipso constituat personam ; ideoque talem conceptum absurdum Deoque injuriosum esso sciscit. Id nipponit ad liorum verborum expHea&anem u accinyens : idcirco omnes ingenii sui nervos intendit, ut sensum aliquem iis applicet, qui ab isthac assertione rcmotissimus sit. SoUicitat verba singula, toUicital nexum eorvm,Jleciit, torquet, iimn i, i agit, tie id dicere vidtantur quod dicunt. Nos longe aliter proeedendum cxistimamus. Accedimusad banc pcrieopam BUnplici atque liumili mente umliiuri atgue accepturi quuttptid Deo nos placcat doccrc. Consideramus verba in nativo suo significatu, et prout passim in sacris Uteris usurpantur; cxpen- dimus quid Xo>-c,- notet secundum phrasln Johannis, quid yitirOai, quid y that of Christ in their room," they are by no means to be considered as contending, that it. was impossible for God to have established such a dispensation as might enable him to forgive the sinner without some satisfaction to his justice (which is the sense forcibly put upon their words :) but that, according to the method and dispensation which God's wisdom has chosen, there results a moral necessity of such vindication, founded in the wisdom and prudence of a Being, who has announced him- self to mankind, as an upright Governor, resolved to maintain the observance of his laws. That by the necessity spoken of, is meant but a moral necessity, or, in other words, a fitness and propriety, Dr Clarke himself informs us ; for he tells us, (Sermon 1.37, vol. ii. p. 142, fol. ed.) that, " when the honour of God's laws had been diminished by sin, it was reasonable and necessary, in respect of God's wisdom in governing the world, that there should be a vindication," &c. And again, (Sermon 1.38, vol ii. p. 150,) in answer to the question, " Could not God, if he had pleased, absolutely, and of his supreme autho- rity, without any sufferings at all, have par- doned the sins of those, whose repentance he thought fit to accept ?" he says, " It becomes not us to' presume to say he had not power so to do :" but that there seems to be a fitness, in his testifying his indignation against sin ; and that " the death of Christ was necessary, to make the pardon of sin reconcileable, not perhaps, absolutely, with strict justice, (for we cannot presume to say that God might not, consistently with mere justice, have remitted as much of his own right as he suas ex verbo Doi hauriunt, qnituis rationis su.-p penum locti- pletent, quod Deo gloriosum est." — Misc.Sacr. torn. ii. pp. 591, 592. If the spirit which governed Socinus in his critical inves- tigation of the sacred text has been fairly described by Wit-mis in the passage which has just been cited, it must be unnecessary to add, that his followers of the present day have in no respect departed from the example of their master. pleased ;) but it was necessary, at hast, in this respect, to make the pardon of sin con- sistent with the wisdom of God, in bis good government of the world ; and to be a proper attestation of hisirreconcileable hatred against all unrighteousness." That the word necessary is imprudently used by Dr Clarke and others, I readily admit ; as it is liable to be misunderstood, and fur- Dishes matter of cavil to those who would misrepresent the wholeof thedoctrine. But it is evident from the passages I have cited, that, so far from considering the sacrifice of CI i list as a debt paid to, because rigorously exacted by, the divine justice, it is represented by Dr Clarke, and generally understood, merely as a fit expedient, demanded by the wisdom of God, whereby mercy might be safely adminis- tered to sinful man. Now, it is curious to remark, that II. Taylor, who so warmly ob- jects to this notion of a necessity of vindicating God's honour, as maintained by Clarke, See., when he comes to reply to the Deist, in defence of the scheme of Christ's mediation, uses a mode of reasoning that seems exactly similar : " God (B. Mordec. Let. 5,) was not made placable by intercession ; but was ready and willing to forgive, before, as well as after : and only waited to do it in such a manner as might best shew his regard to righteousness." Is not this in other words saying, There was a fitness, and consequently a moral necessity, that God should forgive sins through th< intercession and meritorious obedience ol Christ, for the purpose of vindicating his glory as a righteous Governor ? The profound Bishop Butler makes the following observations upon the subject of this number : — "Certain questions have been brought into the subject of redemption, and determined with rashness, and, perhaps, with equal rashness contrary ways. For in- stance, whether God could have saved the world by other means than the death of Christ, consistently with the general laws of his government? And, had not Christ come into the world, what would have been the future condition of the better sort of men ; those just persons over the face of the earth, for whom, Manasses in his prayer asserts, repentance was not appointed? — The meaning of the first of these questions is greatly ambiguous : and neither of them can properly be answered, without going upon that infinitely absurd supposition, that we know the whole of the case. And, perhaps, the very inquiry, Whal would have followed if God had not done as he has? may have in it some very great im- propriety, and ought not to be carried on any farther than is necessary to help our partial and inadequate conceptions of things." (But- ler's Analogy, p. 240.) — Such were the reflec- tions of that great divine and genuine philo- sopher, who at the same time maintained the 54 MAGEE ON THE A T ONEMEX T. doctrine of Atonement in its legitimate strict- ness. Will it then still be said, that divines of the Church of England uphold, as a part of that doctrine, the position, thai men could not have been sav< d, bad not Christ (lied to pur- chase their forgiveness? No. XVIII.— Page 13. Col. 1. ON THE MODE OF REASONING WHEREBY THE SUFFI- ( Il'.NCY OF GOOD WORKS WITHOUT MEDIATION IS ATTEMPTED TO BE DEFENDED FROM SCRIPTURE. Dr Priestley enumerates a great variety of texts to this purpose, in his third paper of the signature of Clemens, ( Thcol. licpos. vol. i.) Dr Sykes in the second chapter of his Scripture Doctrine of Redemption, and II. Taylor, in his 5th and 6th Letters, (B. Mord.) have, done the same. Dr Priestley adds to these texts, the instances of Job, David, Heze- kiah, Nehemiah, and Daniel, to shew that on good works alone dependence was to be placed for acceptance : and that the pardon of sin is every where in Scripture represented as dis- pelled solely on account of man's personal virtue, without the least regard to the suffer- ings or merit of any being whatever. A great display is constantly made of texts of this nature, by all who oppose the received doctrine of atonement. But it is to be re- marked, that, as they all amount merely to this, that repentance and a good life are acceptable to God, the inference derived from them can only have weight against that doctrine, when its supporters shall disclaim repentance and a good life, as necessary con- comitants of that faith in Christ's merits, whereby tliey hope to be saved ; or, when it shall be made to appear from Scripture, that these are of themselves sufficient. But do those writers whodwell so muchon goodworks in opposition to the doctrine of Atonement, seriously mean to insinuate, that the advocates of this doctrine endeavour to stretch the bene- ficial influence of Christ's death to the impeni- tent and disobedient? — Or can it be neces- sary to remind them, that obedience and submission to the divine will are the main ingredients of that very spirit, which we hold to lie indispensable to the producing and per- fecting of a Christian faith? And again; do they wish to infer, that, because these quali- ties are acceptable to God, they are so in them- selves, and independent of all other considera- tions '. Is it forgotten, that, whilst some parts of Scripture speak of these as well pleasing to God, others, not less numerous, might be adduced to shew, thai 1" sides these something more is required % Dr Priestley, indeed, fairly assert-, that nothing more is required ; and that the language <'!' Scripture everywhere represents repentance, and good works, as sufficient, of themselves, to recommend us to the divine favour, {Hist, of Cor. vol. i. p. 1.55.) How then does he get over those declarations of Scripture? — He shall speak for himself. "It certainly must be admitted," (T/icoL Hep. vol. i. p. 252,) "that some texts do seem to represent the pardon of sin, as dispensed in consideration of somethingelse than our repen- tance, or personal virtue; — and according to their literal sense, the pardon of sin is in some way or other procured by Christ. But since the pardon of sin is sometimes represented, as dispensed in consideration of the sufferings, sometimes of the merit, sometimes of the resurrection, and even of the life and obedience of Christ ; when it is sometimes Christ, and sometimes the Spirit, that intercedes for us ; when the dispensing of pardon is sometimes said to be the proper act of God the Father ; and again, when it is Christ that forgives us ; we can hardly hesitate in concluding, that these must be, severally, partial representa- tions, in the nature of figures and allusions, which at proper distances are allowed to be inconsistent: — and from so vague a repre- sentation of a matter of fact, founded on texts which carry with them so much the air of figure, allusion, and accommodation, reason and common sense compel us to appeal to the plain general tenor of Scripture," which he pronounces to be in favour of the sufficiency of good works. — And thus a great part of Scripture is swept away at one stroke, under the name of figure, allusion, ecc. &c. And because Christ is pointed out to us, as the means of our salvation, in every light in which he is viewed, (for as to the Father and the Holy Spirit being spoken of, as also concerned in the work of our Redemption, this creates no difficulty,) reason and common sense com- pel us to pronounce him as not connected with our salvation in any. This furnishes an additional specimen of the way in which Scripture is treated, by our modern rational commentators. A number of texts, enforcing a spirit of humble submis- sion to God's will, which is by no means in- consistent with, but, on the contrary, includes in its nature, a spirit of Christian faith, are taken literally, as not implying this faith, because it is not expressly named. And then another set of passages, in which this faith is expressly named, and literally required, are set aside as figurative. And it is pronounced, upon the whole, that common sense is to decide the matter. — And thus, by rejecting one set of passages entirely as figurative ; and then by explaining another set literally and independently, with which the former were connected, and would have perfectly coalesced, so as to afford a satisfactory and consistent meaning ; the point is clearly made out. Relying upon this method, which Dr Priestley has discovered, of retaining whatever esta- No. 19.— A WANT OF CONNECTION APPLICABLE TO ALL SCHEMES. 55 blishea his opinion, and rejecting whatever makes against it, MrBelsham may, indeed, safely challenge the whole hoily of the ortho- dox to produce a single text, that sliall stand in opposition to his and Dr Priestley's dogmas. But, moreover, it has been well" remarked, that all such declarations in Scripture, as pro- mise pardon to repentance, and are thence inferred to pronounce repentance of itself suffi- cient, as they were subsequent to the promise of ;i Redeemer, must be altogether inconclu- sive, even viewed in a distinct and independent light, inasmuch as it may have been in virtue of the pre-ordained atonement that this re- pentance was accepted. And as to the force of the word freely, on which not only Dr Priestley relies very much, but also Dr Sykes in his Scripture Doctrine of Redemption and II. Taylor, in the beginning of his Sixth Letter, {B. Mord. Apol.) it is obvious, that nothing more is meant by passages that employ this expression in describing God's forgiveness of sinners, than that this forgiveness was free with respect to any merits on the part of man, or any claim which, from repentance, or any other cause, he might be supposed to possess : since, admitting such claim, it would not be free, but earned. And in this very sense it is, that Dr J. Taylor himself, in his Key, &c. (No. 67,) contends that the wovAfrce is to be understood ; " the blessing of redemption being, as he says, with regard to us, of free grace — that is, not owing to any obedience of ours." — Any other application of the term must make the word free synonymous with unconditional ; in which case, forgiveness could not be a free gift, if repentance were required to obtain it ; that is, unless it were extended indiscriminately to the impenitent as well as the penitent. So that, in fact, the very use of the word/m?, as applied to God's forgiveness of men, is so far from supporting the opinion of the sufficiency of repentance in itself, that it goes to establish the direct con- trary : clearly evincing, that repentance can give no claim to forgiveness. — See some excel- lent reasoning on tins subject, in the judicious discourses, delivered at the Bampton Lecture, by Mr Vcysie, Serm. 6 and 7. No. XIX.— Page 13. Col. 1. THE WANT OF A DISCOVERABLE CONNECTION BE- TWEEN THE MEAN'S AND THE END, EQUALLY APPLIES TO EVERY SCHEME OF ATONEMENT. Dr J. Taylor illustrates this matter by a familiar parallel, {Key, &c. No. 151.) — To the question " Wherein is Christ's love and obedience a just foundation of the divine grace?" he answers, that he knows not how to explain himself better than by the following instance : — There have been masters willing, now anil then, to grant a relaxation of study, or even to remit deserved punishment, in case any one boy, in behalf of the whole Bel 1, or of the offender, would compose a copy of Latin verses. This at once shewed the master'e love and lenity, was a proper expedient for promoting learning and henevolcncc to the society of little men, training up for future usefulness, &c. — and one may say, that the kind verse-maker purchased the favour in both cases, or that his learning, industry, goodness, and compliance with the governor's will and pleasure, was a just ground anil foundation of the pardon and refreshment, or a proper rea- son of granting them. This Dr T. declares to be the best explana- tion he can give, of his scheme of man's redemption by Christ. And that in this there is any natural connection between the exer- tions of the individual, and the indulgence granted to the rest of this little society, it is not even pretended. The whole contrivance is admitted as a good expedient, or means, w hereby the intended kindness of the master was to be shewn. If, in order to supply a link, whereby they may be drawn into connection, the indulgence granted be supposed as a reward to the exertions and obedience of the indivi- dual, as is done by H. Taylor, in his Ben. Mord. Apology ; then, unless this reward, in the case of Christ, be but ostensibly such, and intended solely as a public exhibition to man- kind of the favour with which obedience and good conduct will be viewed by the Deity, (in which case it is not a real reward, but merely a prudent expedient, as before,) it must, of necessity, be admitted, that the trial of Christ's obedience was a principal object in the scheme of his incarnation ; for without some trial of his obedience how could it merit a reward? Now in what just sense of the word, there could have been any trial of Christ's obedience, it is for those to consid< r, who do not mean to degrade the Son of God to the Socinian standard. The author of the Scripture Account of Sacrifices has devised a scheme, the chief object of which is to remedy the want of con- nection. In this, the sacrifice of Christ is not. considered as a wise expedient of an instituted nature merely, but as a natural inducement, whereby God's displeasure against mankind was literally averted by Christ's intercession and mediation, recommended by his great zeal, and interest, in the salvation of men, mani- fested in the offering up his life in the eause. The author of this scheme has, with great ingenuity, accommodated to his notion the nature of the Patriarchal and Jewish sacrifices ; making their efficacy to consist entirely in the force of supplication or intercession, and their nature to he that of a gift, strongly expressive of homage and devotion. This author, how- ever, although his work contains most excel- L o6 MAGEE ON THE A T ONEM E N T. lent ami instructive matter, is not perfectly consistent : since, to have appointed a scheme of intercession, whereby, agreeably to recti- tude, God might be induced to grant forgive- ness (and that God did appoint this scheme the author is obliged to confess,) is, in other words, to have planned the redemption of man through the medium of intercession, but not in consequence of it: — in which case, this theory falls in with the notion of insti- tuted means adopted by the rest. But surely, upon the whole, it is not won- derful, that the grand and mysterious scheme of our Redemption should present to the am- bitious curiosity of human intellect the same impediment, which restrains its inquisitive researches in every part of nature: — the modus operandi, the connecting link of cause and effect, being itself a mystery impenetrable to human sagacity, equally in tilings the most familiar and the most obscure. On this subject it were well that the old distinction, laid down by Mr Locke, were remembered by those, who would deem it an insult to have it supposed that they were not perfectly acquainted with the writings of that eminent philosopher. No. XX.— Page 13. Col. 2. ON THE SCRIPTURE PHRASE OF OUR BEING RECONCILED TO GOD. Sec Thcol. Repos. vol. i. pp. 177, 178, in winch several texts are adduced, to establish this proposition. It is likewise attempted to maintain it on the general ground of the divine immutability : in virtue of which, it is asserted, the sufferings of Christ can produce no change in God : and that in man, conse- quently, the change is to be brought about. God is, therefore, not to be reconciled to men, but men to God. H. Taylor also {Ben. Mord. Apol. pp. 692 — 694,) contends, that " God is never said to be reconciled to the world, be- cause he was neverat enmity with it. It was the world that was at enmity with God, and was to be reconciled by coming to the knowledge of his goodness to them." He adduces texts, similar to those above referred to, in confir- mation of his opinion ; and upon the whole peremptorily asserts, that "the New Testa- ment knows no such language, as that God was reconciled to the world." The same ground had been before taken by Sykes, in his Script. Boct. of Redemp. (pp. 56, 426,) and in his Comm. on Hcb. — " There could be no need," (he says, on Hcb. vii. 27,) " of re- conciling God to man, when lie had already shewn his love to man so far, as to send his Son to reconcile man to God." The argument adopted by these writers had been long before urged by CrelNus, in support of the system of Socinus. And it deserves to he remarked, that all these writers have built their arguments upon an erroneous acceptation of the original word, which implies reconcilia- tion. Hammond, and, after him, Le Clerc (on Matt. v. 24,) remark, that the words x.xroe.'K- ~hot.TTia§ot,i and ~6iatKh%TTta6cti have a peculiar sense in the New Testament: that, whereas in ordinary Greek authors they signify to be pacified, and so reconciled, here, on the other hand, in the force of the reciprocal llithpahel among the Hebrews, is implied to reconcile one's self to another, that is, to appease, or obtain the favour of, that other : and in sup- port of this interpretation they adduce in- stances from Rom. v. 10, 1 Cor. vii. 11, 2 Cor. v. 20, and especially Matt. v. 24, in which last ^toi'h'Ka.ynSi tu dosKQa t-amcrOcci is precisely the same as is made by the Seventy, in their translation of 1 Sam. x\ix. 4, where they speak of David's "appeasing the anger of Saul." 'Efrin AIAAAArH2ETAI tZ gvgim clreu ■," Where- with shall he reconcile himself to his master?" according to our common version. Not, surely, how shall he remove his own anger against his master ; but, how shall he remove his master's anger against him ; how shall he restore himself to his master's favour? If any additional instance had been wanted to esta- blish the use of the word in this sense among the Jewish writers, this ono must prove decisive. No. 22.— THE SINNER THE OBJECT OF THE DIVINE DISPLEASURE. 57 of reconciling the world to God is expressly described, viz. his not imputing their trespasses unto them, that is, his granting them forgive- ness. There are, upon the whole, but five places in the New Testament, in which the term is used with respect to God ; Rom. v. M>, and xi. 15 ; 2 Cor. v. 18 — 20 ; Ephes. ii. 16, and Col. i. 20, 21. Whoever will take the trouble of consulting Hammond and Whitby on these passages, will be satisfied, that the application is diametrically opposite to that for which the Socinian writers contend. There are but two places besides, in which the term occurs, Matt. v. 24, and 1 Cor. vii. 11, in both of which the application is clear. And it deserves to be particularly noticed, that Dr Sykes (Script. Doct. of Redemp. p. 57,) sinks the former passage altogether, and notices the latter alone, asserting that this is the only one, in which the word is used, not in relation to the reconciliation of the world to God : and this, after having inadvertently stated in the preceding page that there were two such pas- sages. This will appear the less unaccountable, when it is considered, that the expression, as applied in Matthew, could be got rid of by no refinement whatever : but that the application in 1 Corinthians (not, indeed, in our transla- tion, which is not sufficiently explicit, but examined in the original,) will appear as little friendly to his exposition, Hammond and Le Clerc have abundantly evinced by their inter- pretation of the passage. No. XXL— Page 13. Col. 2. OX THE TRUE DISTINCTION BETWEEN THE LAYING ASIDE OUR ENMITY TO GOD, AND BEING RECON- CILED TO GOD. It is well remarked in the Theological Repo- sitory, by a writer under the signature Vcrus,1 that the laying aside our enmity to God must be a necessary qualification for, though without constituting the formal nature of, our recon- ciliation to God. This judicious distinction places the matter in a fair light. That God will not receive us into favour so long as we are at enmity with him, is most certain ; but that thence it should be inferred, that, on laying aside our enmity, we are necessarily restored to his favour, is surely an odd in- stance of logical deduction. 1 This writer I find to have been the Rev. Mr Brekcll : a writer certainly deserving of praise, both for the ability with which he c unbated the sophistry of the heterodox, and for the boldness with which ho carried tho war into the very camp of the enemy. No. XXIL— Page 14. Col. ON THE PROOFS FROM SCRIFTURE, THAT THE SINNER IS THE OBJECT OF THE DIVINE DIS- PLEASURE. Heb. x. 20, 27, "For if we sin wilfully, after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaincth no more sacri- fice for sins, but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries :" and again, " For we know him that hath said, Ven- geance belongeth unto me, I will recompense, saith the Lord :" and again, "It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God':" and again, (Rom. v. 9, 10,) "Much more, then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him — for if, when we were enemies, we were recon- ciled to God through his Son," &c. In this last passage, it is not only clearly expressed, that we are from disobedience exposed to the divine displeasure, but also that the way where- by we are rescued from the effects of that displeasure, or, as is here held an equivalent form of expression, reconciled to God, is by the death of Christ. To quote all the passages that speak a simi- lar language, were a tedious task. Nor indeed was the voice of Revelation wanted to inform men, that the sinner is the object of God's displeasure. Reason has at all times loudly proclaimed this truth : and in that predomi- nating terror, that Antyilxi^oi/ta, which, as shewn in Nlimber V. has, in every age and clime, disfigured, or rather absorbed, the reli- gion of the Gentiles, the natural sentiment of the human mind may be easily discerned. What is the language of the celebrated Adam Smith on this subject ? — " But if it be meant, that vice does not appear to the Deity to be, for its own sake, the object of abhor- rence and aversion, and what, for its own sake, it is fit and right should be punished, the truth of this maxim can, by no means, be so easily admitted. If we consult our natural sentiments, we are apt to fear, lest, before the holiness of God, vice should appear to be more worthy of punishment, than the weakness and imperfection of human nature can ever seem to be of reward. Man, when about to appear before a Being of infinite perfection, can feel but little confidence in his own merit, or in the imperfect propriety of his own conduct. In the presence of his fel- low-creatures, he may often justly elevate himself, and may often have reason to think highly of his own character and conduct, compared to the still greater imperfection of theirs. But tho case is quite different when about to appear before his infinite Creator. To such a Being, he can scarce imagine, that 58 .MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. his littleness and weakness should ever seem to be the proper object, either of esteem or of reward. But he can easily conceive, how the numberless violations of duty, of which he lins been guilty, should render him the object of aversion and punishment ; neither can he see any reason why the divine indignation should not be let loose, without any restraint, upon so vile an insect, as he is sensible that he himself must appear to be. If he would still hope for happiness, he is conscious that he cannot de- mandit from justice, but thathemustentreat it from the mercy of God. Repentance, sorrow, humiliation, contrition at the thought of his past conduct, are, upon this account, the sen- timents which become him, and seem to be the only means which he has left for appeas- ing that wrath which, he knows, he has justly provoked. He even distrusts the efficacy of all these, and naturally fears, lest the wisdom of God should not, like the weakness of man, be prevailed upon to spare the crime, by the most importunate lamentations of the crimi- nal. Some other intercession, some other sacrifice, some other atonement, he imagines, must be made for him, beyond what he him- self is capable of making, before the purity of the divine justice can be reconciled to his manifest offences. "The doctrines of Revelation coincide, in every respect, with those original anticipa- tions of nature ; and, as they teach us how little we can depend upon the imperfection of our own virtue, so they shew us, at the same time, that the most powerful intercession has been made, and the most dreadful atonement has been paid for our manifold transgressions and iniquities." ( Theory of Moral Sentiments, pp. 204— 20G.) Such were the reflections of a man, whose powers of thinking ami reasoning will surely not be pronounced inferior to those of any even of the most distinguished champions of the Unitarian school, and whose theological opinions cannot be charged with any sup- in »sed tincture from professional habits or interests. A layman, (and he too the familiar friend of David Hume,) whose life was cm- ployed in scientific, political, and philosophical research, has given to the world those senti- ments as the natural suggestions of reason.1 1 When these observations were before committed to the press, 1 was not aware that the pious reflections, to which they particularly advert, are no longer to be found as constituting a part of that work from which they have been quoted. The fact is, that in the biter editions of the Theory of Moral Sentirm ntt, no one sentence appears of the extract which has been cited above, and which 1 had derived from the first edition, the only one that I possessed. This circumstance, however, does not in any decree affect the truth of what had been Bald by the author, nor the justness of the sentiments which lie had uttered in a pure and unsophisticated state of mind. It evinces, indeed, that he drd not altogether escape the infection of David Hume's society ; and it adds one proof more to the many that already existed, of the danger, even to the most enlightened, from a familiar contact with Infidelity. How far Adam Smith's par- Yet these are the sentiments which are the scoff* of sciolists and witlings. Compare these observations of Adam Smith with what has been said on the same subject in Numbers IV. IX. and XV. No. XXIII.— Page 14. Col. 1. INSTANCE, FROM THE BOOK OF JOB, OF SACRIFICE BEING PRESCRIBED TO AVERT GOD'S ANGER. It was not without much surprise, that, after having written the sentence here re- ferred to, I found, on reading a paper of Dr Priestley's in the Thcol. Rep. (vol. i. p. 404,) that the Book of Job was appealed to by him as furnishing a decisive proof, not only " that mankind in his time had not the least apprehension that repentance and refor- mation alone, without the sufferings or merit of any being whatever, would not sufficiently atone for past offences :" but that " the Al- mighty himself gives a sanction to these sentiments." Let the Book of Job speak for itself : — " The Lord said to Eliphaz the Te- manite, My wrath is kindled against thee and thy two friends : for ye have not spoken of me the thing that is right, as my servant Job hath. Therefore take unto you now 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 : for him will I accept : lest I deal with you after your folly," (Job, xlii. 7, 8.) If this be not a sufficient specimen, we arc supplied with another in chap. i. 4, 5, in which it is said, that, after the sons of Job had been employed in feasting, " Job sent and sanctified them, and rose up early in the morning, and offered burnt-offerings according to the number of them all : for Job said, It may be that my sons have sinned, and cursed God in their hearts. Thus did Job conti- nually." I leave these without comment, to confront the assertions of Dr Priestley, and to demonstrate the value of his representations of Scripture. I shall only add, that in the very page in which he makes the above asser- tions, lie has quoted from Job a passage that immediately follows the former of those here cited. No. XXIV.— Page 14. Col. ON THE ATTRIBUTE OF THE DIVINE JUSTICE. Dr Priestley {Thcol Rep. vol. i. p. 417) asserts, that "Justice, in the Deity, can tiality to Hume did ultimately carry him, may easily be collected from his emphatical observations on the character of his deceased friend, to which I shall liave occasion to direct the reader's attention in another part of this work. No. 21.— ON THE ATTRIBUTES OF THE DIVINE JUSTICE. [>» be no more than a modification of that goodness and benevolence, which is his sole governing principle :" from which he of course infers, that "under the administration of God, there can be no occasion to exercise any severity on penitent offenders ;" or, in other words, that repentance must of itself, from the nature of the Deity, cancel all for- mer offences ; and that the man who has spent a life of gross vice and audacious impiety, if he at any time reform, shall stand as clear of the divine displeasure, as he who has uni- formly, to the utmost of his power, walked before Ins God in a spirit of meek and pious obedience. This is certainly the necessary result of pure benevolence : nay, the same principle followed up must exclude punish- ment in all cases whatever ; the very notion of punishment being incompatible with pure benevolence. But surely it would be a strange property of justice, (call* it, with Dr Priestley, a modification of benevolence, or whatever else lie pleases,) to release all from punishment ; the hardened and unrelenting offender, no less than the sincerely contrite, and truly hum- bled penitent. But in his use of the term justice, as applied to the Deity, is not Dr Priestley guilty of most unworthy trifling ? Why speak of it as " a modification of the divine benevolence," if it be nothing different from that attribute? and if it be different from it, how can benevolence be the "sole governing principle" of the divine administration ? The word justice, then, is plainly but a sound made use of to save appearances, as an attribute called by that name has usually been ascribed to the Deity ; but in reality nothing is meant by it, in Dr Priestley's application of the term, different from pure and absolute benevolence. This is likewise evident, as we have seen, from the whole course of his argument. Now, could it be conceded to Dr Priestley, that the whole character of God is to be resolved into simple benevolence, then the scheme, which, by re- jecting the notion of divine displeasure against the sinner, involves impunity of guilt, might fairly be admitted. But, as it has been well remarked, "If rectitude be the measure and rule of that benevolence, it might rather be presumed, that the scheme of redemption would carry a relation to sinners, in one way as objects of mercy, in another as objects of punishment ; that God 'might be just, and yet the justifier of him that believeth' in the Redeemer." See the second of Holmes's Four Tracts, in which he confirms, by parallel in- stances, the use of the word xjtl, as applied in the above passage by Whitby iu his Para- phrase.— On the subject of this Number at large, see also Numbers IV. XXII. and Bal- guy's Essay on Redemption. No. XXV.— Pago 14. Col. 1. ON THE TEXT IN JOHN, DESCRIBING OUR LORD AS " THE LAMB OF GOD, WHICH TAKETH AWAY THE SINS OF THE WORLD." What efforts are made to get rid of those parts of Scripture, that lend support to the received doctrine of the sacrifice of Christ, is evident from the remark made on this passage by the ingenious author of Ben Mordccais Apology. " The allusion here," he says, " seems to be made to the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah ; but the lamb is not there consi- dered as a lamb to be sacrificed, but as a lamb to be sheared." — (Let. vii. p. 794, 2d ed. 8vo.) Now upon what principle this author is enabled to pronounce that the allu- sion in this place is made to the lamb spoken of in Isaiah, rather than to the paschal lamb, or to the land) which, under the Jewish law, was offered daily for the sins of the people, it is difficult to discover. His only reason seems to be, that, in admitting the reference to either of the two last, the notion of sacrifice is neces- sarily involved ; and the grand object in maintaining the resemblance to a lamb that was to be sheared, not slain, was to keep the death of Christ out of view as much as pos- sible. But of the manner in which Scripture is here used to support a particular hypothesis, we shall be better able to form a right judg- ment, when it shall have appeared that the reference in John is not made to Isaiah ; and also, that the lamb in Isaiah is considered as a lamb to be slain. The latter is evident, not only from the entire context, but from the very words of the prophet, which describe the person spoken of (liii. 7,) to be "brought as a lamb to the slaughter ;" so that one cannot but wonder at the pains taken to force the application to this passage of Isaiah, and still more at the peremptory assertion, that the lamb here spoken of was a lamb to be sheared only. It is true, indeed, there is subjoined, " and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb ;" but it Mr Wakefield's remark on Acts, viii. 32, in wdiich he contends that the word translated shearer should have been translated slayer, be a just one, the objection vanishes at once. Retaining, however, the clause as it stands in the present version, that which follows, — "so heopeneth not his mouth,"— clearly explains, that the character intended to be conveyed by the prophet, in the whole of this figurative representation, was that of a meek and un- complaining resignation to suffering and death. And this also shews us that the passage in Isaiah could not have been the one imme- diately referred toby John ; because in it tho (i() MAG E E ON THE ATONEM E N T. lamb is introduced but incidentally, and as furnishing the only adequate resemblance to that character, which was the primary object of the prophet's contemplation : whereas, in the Baptist's declaration, that Jesus was " the Land) of God that taketh away the sins of the world," the reference must naturally bo to a lamb before described, and understood, as possessed of some similar or corresponding virtue, such as Saint Peter alludes to when he says, (1 Peter, i. 18, It),) " Ye were redeemed with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish." In this an allusion is evidently made to a lamb whose blood, under the Jewish law, bore analogy to that of Christ : that is, either to the paschal land), by the sprinkling of whose blood the Israelites had been delivered from destruction, or to the lamb that was daily sacrificed for the sins of the people, and which was bought with that half shekel, which all the Jews yearly paid, elg avtqov TV); \pvx*i$ olvtuv, ix^Chuactij^oci tzoh tuv ■&v/,uv ctvTuv, "as the price of redemption of their lives, to make an atonement for them," (Exod. xxx. 12, 14, 16.) With a view to this last it is, that Saint Peter most probably uses the expressions, " Ye were not redeemed .with silver and gold, but with the precious hlood of Christ, as of a lamb," &c. i. e. it is not by a lamb purchased with silver and gold that you have been redeemed, but by Christ, that truly spotless Lamb, which the former was intended to prefigure ; who, by shedding his blood, has effectually redeemed you from the consequences of your sins ; or, as the Baptist had hefore descrihed him, "the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the world :" and as Saint John, who records these expres- sions of the Baptist, again speaks of him in the Apocalypse, (v. 9,) the Lamb which had been slain, "and by its blood redeemed men out of every kindled and tongue and people and nation," or, in other words, " that had taken away the sins of the world." The author indeed admits (what it was impossible for him to deny) that, in the Apo- calypse, Christ "is spoken of as a lamb that was slain:" but then he says, that "he is not spoken of as a vicarious sacrifice ; for the Jews hail no sacrifices of that nature," (vol. ii. p. 789.) Be it so for the present : it is clear, however, that the lamb to which the allusion is made in the figurative representations of Christ in flic New Testament, is a lamb that was slain and sacrificed ; and that nothing but the prejudices arising from a favourite hypo- thesis could have led this writer to contend against a truth so notorious, and upon grounds so frivolous. No. XXVI.— Page 14. Col. 2. IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. The word faetafidg, translated propitiation, occurs in the New Testament only in the twTo passages noticed in the page here referred to, viz. 1 John, ii. 2, and iv. 10. Its true force, however, is obvious ; since, as appears from the application of the words faetafcos, faoiirx.oft.eu, e&Jieurxofteti, by the Seventy in the < )hl Testa- ment, it corresponds to the Hebrew word "1DJ, and therefore implies the making atonement, and thereby effecting a reconciliation with, or propitiating the Deity. — TheGreek translation of Ezekiel (xliv. 29) has made it synonymous with nNIDFT, a 8m offering ; and thus, II. Taylor {B. Mord. p. 808) asserts, that the word should be here translated. But it is curious to remark, that this writer has been so far led away by a desire to main- tain the system which he has adopted, that, in two pages after, he goes on to shew, that no one circumstance belonging to the sin-offering is to be found in the sacrifice of Christ. As producing indeed " the effect of the sin-offer- ings, remission of sins," lie concludes it may be so called, though possessing no one ingre- dient that enters into the composition of a sin-offering. His radical error on the Scrip- ture use of the word reconciliation, (which has been already examined,) prevented him from admitting the term propitiation, or pro- pitiatory sacrifice : sin-offering he therefore substitutes, and then endeavours to fritter this away. — It deserves to be noticed, that even Sykes, whose attachment to the orthodox opinions will not be suspected to have much biassed his judgment on this subject, considers t^iAxax.sol)xi to be correspondent to *1D3, and explains both by the words expiate, atone, propitiate, "whatever the means were," he adds, "by which this was to be done." — Essay on Sacrifices, pp. 132, 135. In Bom. iii. 25, iAxarr^io'/ is translated in the same sense with 1'axuuo:, " a propitiation," or "propitiatory offering," Sv/ux, or iwhv, being understood as it's substantive : and although it be true, as Krebsius observes, that the Seventy always apply this term to the mercy-seat, or covering of the ark, yet strong arguments appear in favour of the present translation. 1 'D.ocTTt-fiov — suliiuirliendum videtur h'uov nut 3Zu.x, ex- piatorium tacr\ficium, quemadmodum eadem ellipsis frequen- tissiiii;i est a pud toIs i in voce crurr.eiev, ct in xxi"rr'^°""> apud Auctoros. Hesychius cxponit KaOaqiriov eadem ellipd; nisi substantive sumptum idem rigniflcarc malis quod licca-p'ov propiliationem, ut Vulgatus vertit, consentiente Beza. Ejus generis substantiva sunt bixxe-rrfior, Svtrixe-r/.^iov, fvXax- rr.fiot, ct Bimilia; adeoqne Cbristus eodem modo vocabitoi i'A«,{/(>v, quo tXitvftis, I Job. ii. -', et iv 10. Eisner. Obf, Sacr. torn. ii. pp. 20, SI. No. 27.— ON CHRIST'S DEATH AS A SACUIFK K R)U SIN. (U See Schlcusner on the word : also Josephus, as referred to bv Krebsius and Michaelis.* Veysie {Bampt. Lea. pp. 219, 220, 221) has well enumerated its various significations. No. XXVII.— rage 14. Col. 2. OX THE TEXTS DESCRIB1X0 ( IIRls'l's DEATH AS A SACRIFICE FOR SIX. Isa. liii. 5-8. Matt. xx. 28 ; xxvi. 28 Mark, x. 45. Acts, viii. 82, 83. Rom. iii. 24. 26 ; iv. 26 ; v. 6—10. 1 Cor. v. 7 ; xv. 3. 2 Cor. v. 21. Eph. i. 7. Col. i. 14. 1 Tim. ii. G. Hob. i. 3 ; ii. 17 ; ix. 12—28 ; x. 10, 14, 18. 1 Pot. i. 18, 19. 1 John, iv. 10. Rev. v. 9 — 12 ; xiii. 8. All which, and several other passages, speak of the death of Christ in the same sacrificial terms that had been applied to the sin-offerings of old. So that they who would reject the notion of Christ's death, as a true and real sacrifice for sin, must refine away the natural and direct meaning of all these passages : or, in other words, they must new- model the entire tenor of Scripture language, before they can accomplish their point. Dr Priestlev, indeed, although he professes {Theol Rep. vol. i. p. 125) to collect " all the texts in which Christ is represented as a sacri- fice, either expressly, dr by plain reference," has not been able to find so many to this pur- pose as have been here referred to. After the most careful research, he could discover but a very few ; and of these he remarks, that " the greater part are from one Epistle, which is allowed in other respects to abound with the strongest figures, metaphors, and allego- ries :" and these being rejected, " the rest," he says, " are too few to bear the very great stress that has been laid upon them:" — and thus they are all discarded with one sweeping remark, that they carry with them the air of figure, and that had Christ's death been considered as the intended antitype of the sacrifices under the law, this would have been asserted in the fullest manner, and would have been more frequently referred to. We are here furnished with an instance 2 Micliaelis says, {Translation by Marsh, vol. i. p. 1)17,) " Jo- sephus, having previously observed that the blood of the martyrs had made atonement for their countrymen, and that they were utrr\$ «vn\J/i/£oy (victima substituta) tt.c toZ iOvove i^a^r/af, continues as follows, xctt 5jx to'u ctiuctrec tuv iLtri^&v ixtivuv, xa.i roy 'IAA2THPIOT Toy 3-ct*ctT0v ctvruv v> Slice, isr^ovoiot to* 'Io-»ot>:X bncrutn !" On the use of the word /Aao-T>-{i«» amongst Jewish writers, and the strict propitiatory sense in which it was used by the Hellenistic Jews, I deem this passage from Josephus decisive ; and I have but little hesitation in defy- ing the utmost ingenuity of Sotinian exposition to do away tin- force of its application to the subject before us. — Michaelis, in p. 173, remarks, that " in Rom. iii. 25, i?.xo-Tr,fiv has been taken by some in the sense of mercy-scat, but that Kypkc has properly preferred the translation propitiatory sacrifice." — Michaelis was surely no superficial nor bigjted expositor of holy writ. of the most expeditious and effectual method of evading the authority of Scripture. — First, overlook a considerable majority, and parti- cularly of the strongest texts, that go to sup- port the doctrine you oppose ; in the next place assert, that, "of the remainder, a large proportion belongs to a particular writer, whom you think proper to charge with meta- phor, allegory, &C &C : then object to tho residue, as too few on which to rest any doc- trine of importance: but, lest even theso might give some trouble in the examination, explode them at once with the cry of figure, &c. &c. This is the treatment that Scripture too frequently receives from those who choose to call themselves rational and enlightened commentators. There are two texts, however, on which Dr Priestley has thought fit to bestow some criti- cal attention, for the purpose of shewing that they are not entitled to rank even with those few' that he has enumerated, as bearing a plausible resemblance to the doctrine in ques- tion. From his reasoning on these, we shall be able to judge what the candour and justice of his criticisms on the others would have been, had he taken the trouble to produce them. The two texts are, Isai. liii. 10, "When thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin ;" and 2 Cor. v. 21, " He made him sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him." "Against the first he argues from the dis- agreement in the versions, which, he observes, may lead us to suspect some corruption in our present copies of the Hebrew text. Our trans- lation, he says, makes a change of person in the sentence — " He hath put him to grief— when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed," &c, in which, he adds, it agrees with no ancient version what- ever. In the next place, he asserts, that the Syriac alone retains the sense of our transla- tion, and at the same time remarks that this version of the Old Testament is but of little authority. He then gives the reading of the clause by the LXX and the Arabic, " If ye offer a sacrifice for sin, your soul shall see a long-lived offspring." He concludes with the Chaldcc paraphrase of Jonathan, which is different from all. And from the whole he draws this result, that the uncertainty as to the true reading of the original must render the passage of no authority. ( Theol. Rep. vol. i. p. 127.) But the real state of the case is widely diffe- rent from this representation: for, 1. Our translation docs not absolutely pronounce up- on the change of person, so as to preclude an agreement with the ancient versions. 2. The Syriac is not the only version that retains the sense of ours, the Vulgate, which Dr Priestley bas thought proper to omit, exactly correspond- ing in sense. 3. The Syriac version of the Old f!2 MAGEE O N T HE A T O N E M E N T. Testament, bo far from being of little autho- rity, is of the very highest. 4. The concur- rence of the LXX and the Arabic is not a joint, but a single testimony, inasmuch as the Arabic is known to be Little more than a version of the LXX,1 and, consequently, can lend no farther support, than as verifying the reading of the LXX, at the time when this version was made : and that it does not even authenticate the reading of the LXX, at an early day, may be collected from the Prolegom. of Walton, and Kennieott's State of the Hebr. Text, as referred to in the note below. 5. The Chaldee paraphrase of Jonathan is remarkable (as Bishop Lowth states in his Prelim. Dissert.) "for a wordy, allegorical explanation," so that an exactness of translation is not here to be expected. And, lastly, the apparent differences of the versions may be explained by, and fairly reconciled to, the present reading of the Hebrew text. These several points will be best explained, by beginning with the last. The state of the Hebrew text, as it stands in all our present Bibles, (at least in such of them as I have consulted, viz. Walton's Polyglot, Michaelis, Houbigant, Kennicott, Doederlein, &c, and scarcely undergoing any variation, however minute, from the prodigious variety of copies examined by Kennicott and Dc Rossi,) is as follows, y-|T PINT V0M DDK D'ttffi DN LD^y *THNV Now these words, as they stand, manifestly admit of a two-fold translation, according as the word Q^J"! is considered to be of the second person masculine, or the third person feminine, — viz. when thou shalt make bis soul an offering for sin, or, when his soul shall make an offering for sin: and though, with Ludovicus de Dieu, our present translation of the Bible, lias followed the former in the text, yet has it, with Cocccius, Montanus, Junius and Tremellius, Castellio, and almost every other learned expositor of the Bible, retained the latter, inserting it in the margin, as may be seen in any of our common Bibles. Jt deserves also to be remarked, that, in the old editions of our English Bible, (See Matthewe's, Cranmer's, or the Great Bible, and Tavemer's, — see also the Bibles in the time of Elizabeth, viz. the Geneva and Bishops' Bibles, — sec all, in short, that preceded James's translation,) this latter reading is the only one that 18 given : and it should be ob- served, (see New, Mine's Historic. View, p. 105) that one of the rules prescribed to the trans- lators employed in the lasl named version, which is the one now in use, was,- — "that where a Hebrew or Greek word admitted of two proper senses, one should be expressed in the context, and the other in the margin." Thus it appears, that Dr Priestley musl have 1 See Bishop Lowth 's Preliminary Distort, to hit Translation qf Isaiah — ami Walton's Polyglot ProUgom. 15, — .also Ken- nieott's SUite of tin- llebr. Text, vol. ii. pp. i'>i, 454. glanced his eye most cursorily, indeed, upon our English translation, when" lie charges it so peremptorily with the abrupt change of person. Again, this very translation, which, beside the older expositors above referred to, has the support ofVitringa and Bishop Lowth, and is perfectly consistent with the most accurate and grammatical rendering of the passage in question, agrees sufficiently with the ancient versions. In sense there is no difference, and whatever variation there is in the expression may be satisfactorily accounted for from a farther examination of the original. Thus, in the Vulgate it is rendered, "when he shall make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see," &C. — and in the Syriac, "the penalty of sin is laid upon his soul," (?'. e. in other words, his soul is made an offering for sin,) " that he might see," &c. Now the first is a literal translation of the Hebrew, if, only, instead of □^n be read □1,t£P-, which we may readily suppose some copies of the Hebrew to have done, without introducing the smallest uncer- tainty into the text. The second will also be found a literal version, if for D^Tl be read □!£\Tb which may be taken passively, "shall be made." Now it appears from Kennieott's various readings, that one MS. supports this reading. But there is a remark on this head made by Houbigant, (which has been over- looked both by Bishop Lowth, and the com- mentator on Isaiah who has succeeded him,3) that seems to deserve considerable notice. " The word," he says, "should be DtWl, in the passive voice : for that, as Morinus ob- serves, the Jews, before the vowel points were introduced, were used to mark the passive by the letter 1 interposed ; and that here, this Chaldaism had been allowed to remain by the transcriber." — See Houbigant in loc. Again, with respect to the LXX version of this passage, (for as to the Arabic it need not be taken into account, for the reasons before stated,) the difference between it and the last mentioned translation is not so great, as on the first view might appear. It is true, the reading of the LXX as given in our Polyglot, 2Doederlein translates as if the word were D*W*i «?"' vitam room, ut piaculum, inlerpotuerit ; and adds, that the hook Sohar ( Parascha 3v;>i) particularly warns us that it is so to he read, not Q"HWT. 'Mr Dodson was here intended, as being the only person, who (at the date of the first publication of this work) had given to the public a version of Isaiah later than that of Bishop Lowth. But the observation equally applies to Bishop Stock, who has given the latest translation of the Prophet, and who has in like manner overlooked this remark : for whilst he renders the word in a passive sense, " If his life shall be made a trespass-offering," he assigns for it a wrong reason ; deriving the passhe siynirtVa- tion from a supposed reflective import of the verb — should bo made, or (he says) should render itself; forgetting, that if this latter sense belonged to the verb, it would have been given in the form Hitkpahel, which clearly is not that of the verb CiM. — Bathe's translation of the passage is decisive for the passive signilieati ill of the verb: " Quodsi vita ejus ut sacriticium pro peccatis oblata fuerit." No. 27.-ON CHRIST'S DEATH AS A SACRIFICE FOR SIN~ 63 is Ixu ootre, " if ye offer :" but it is remarked by Bishop Lowth, that some copies of the LXX read ooitch, " shall be offered :" which agrees exactly with the Syriac. Indeed, as Mr Dodson very properly observes, Zutxi may be considered the true reading of the LXX, not only on the authority of Clemens R. and Justin, who read it so; but also from the custom which prevails in Greek MSS. of writing t instead of at. This practice is noticed by Wotton, in his edition of Clem. R. (p. 142,) on the words zsQOTQtvire vipx; lie cevrii, and is well known to all who arc con- versant in Greek MSS. as obtaining not only at the termination of words, as in the instance taken from Clemens, but in all parts of the word indifferently. This reading is likewise approved by Capellus. 4 Thus far, then, (and this, it is to be noted, is the most important clause in the passage,) the disagreement be- tween the LXX and the other ancient versions is done away. That it differs both from them and the Hebrew text, in some other parts of the sentence, must be allowed ; but that from an extensive collation of the several MSS. (which has now happily been at length under- taken,) even these differences may yet be removed, there is much reason to expect. The confirmation of the present reading of the Septuagint by the Arabic version is by no means an argument against this ; as that version is not above 900 years old, and may, therefore, have been derived from copies of the Septuagint, not the most perfect. Be- sides, it deserves to be remarked, that Bishop Lowth [Prelim. Diss.) pronounces the Sep- tuagint version of Isaiah to be inferior to that of any other book in the Old Testament ; and, in addition to this, to have come down to us in a condition exceedingly incorrect. Upon the whole, then, since the present state of the Hebrew text has been shewn to agree with the Syriac, the Vulgate, (both of which, it should be noted, were taken from the Hebrew, — one in the first, the other in the fourth century,) with our English trans- lation, and, in a material part, even with the LXX, we may judge with what fairness Dr Priestley's rejection of the present text, on the ground of the disagreement of the transla- tions with it and with each other, has been conducted. His omission of the Vulgate, his overlooking the marginal translation of our present, and the text of our older English Bibles, and pronouncing peremptorily on their contents in opposition to both ; his stating the Arabic as a distinct testimony, concurring 4 " Aliquando diversitas citationis a LXX posita est in diversa lectione variantiura Codd. Gnccorum tmv LXX; ut Esa. liii. 10, cditio SLxtina ruv LXX habet, lav San -anei xfAccci-ia;, " si dederitis pro peccato," qua? corrupta est lectio. At Justinus cum quibusdam codicibus habet, ikv Sarai, "si datus fuerit," qua? genuina est lectio respondens Ilebrajo." — Critica Sacra, Ludov. Capel. pp. 521), 530. with the LXX ; and his assertion, that the Syriac version of the Old Testament is con- fessed to be of little authority, when the direct contrary is the fact, it being esteemed by all biblical scholars as of the very highest — and all this done to darken and discard a part of holy writ — cannot but excite some doubt as to the knowledge or the candour of the critic. With respect to the Syriac version, Bishop Lowth, in his Prelim. Dissert, thus expresses himself. After describing the Chaldee para- phrase of Jonathan, which he states to have been made about or before the time of our Saviour, he says, " The Syriac stands next in order of time, but is superior to the Chaldee in usefulness and authority, as well in ascer- taining as in explaining the Hebrew text : it is a close translation of the Hebrew, into a language of near affinity to it : it is supposed to have been made as early as the first cen- tury."— Dr Kennicott also '{State of the Hebr. Text, vol. ii. p. 355) speaks in the strongest terms of this version, " which," he says, "being very literal and very ancient, is of inestimable value :" — he concludes it to have been "made about the end of the first century, and that it might consequently have been made from Hebrew MSS. almost as old as those which were before translated into Greek :" and he, of course, relies on it for many of the most ancient and valuable read- ings. The language of Dc Rossi is, if possible, still stronger, " Versio hsec antiquissima or- dinem ipsum verborum sacri textus et literam presse sectatur ; et ex versionibus omnibus antiquis purior ac tenacior habetur." ( Far, Lect. Vet. Test. Prolog, p. xxxii.) Dathe, also, both in his preface to the Syriac Psalter, and in his Opuscula, pronounces in the most peremptory terms in favour of the fidelity and the high antiquity of the Syriac version. In the latter work, particularly, he refers to it as a decisive standard by which to judge of the state of the Hebrew text in the second cen- tury. Dath. Opusc. Coll. a Rosen in. p. 171. In this high estimate of the Syriac5 version these great critics but coincide with the suf- 5 Although I am here only concerned with the Syriac ver- sion of the Old Testament, yet 1 cannot omit the opportunity of noticing a judicious and satisfactory defence of the high an- tiquity of what is called the Old Syriac Version of the New Testament, lately given to the public by Dr Laurence. That this version (or the Pcshito, as it is usually named for distinction,) was the production of the apostolic age, or at least of that which immediately succeeded, had been the opinion of tho most eminent critics both in early and modem times. The very learned J. D. Michaelis has maintained the same opinion, in his Introduction to the New 'Testament, vol. ii. pp. 29 — 38. But in this lie has not received the support of his English annotator, Dr Marsh, who contends, that we have no suflicient proof of the existence of this version at a period earlier than the fourth century : ibid. pp. 551 — 554. Dr Lau- rence, has, however, clearly shewn, that Dr Marsh's objections are not formidable, and has treated the subject in such a manner as to evince that the alleged antiquity of the version stands upon the strongest grounds of probability. See Laurence's Dissert, upon the Loyos, pp. C7 — 74. (U M A (i K 1 : 0 N T 1 1 E A T « » N E M E X T. frages of Pocock, Walton, anil all the mosl learned and profound Hebrew scholars, who in general ascribe it to tin- apostolic aire — (Scf Pocock. I'rif. to Micah, and Walton's Prolegom. 13.) — i>r Priestley, however, has Baid, that " it is confessed to he of little autho- rity!" I have dwelt much too long upon this point, hut it is of importance that it should be well understood what reliance is to In- placed on the knowledge, and what credit is to l>e given to the assertions of a writer, whose theological opinions have obtained no small degree of circulation in the sister island, and whose confident assumption of critical superiority, and loud complaints against the alleged backwardness of divines of the Estab- lished Church in biblical investigation, might draw the unwary reader into an implicit admission of his gratuitous positions. I come now to examine his objections against the second text — " lie made him sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might he made the righteousness of God in him." In This pas-age, the word xpetnrix, which is translated sin, is considered by Hammond, Le Clerc, Whitby, and every respectable commen- tator, to mean a sin-offering, or sacrifice for sin : it is so translated expressly by Primate Newcome in his new version. That this is the true meaning of the word will readily be admitted, when it is considered that this is the application of it in the Hebrew idiom ; and that Jews, translating their own language into Greek, would give to the latter the force of the corresponding words in the former. And that they have done so, is evident from the use of the word through the entire of the Greek version of the Old Testament, to which the apostles, when speaking in Greek, would naturally have adhered. Dr Middleton, in his answer to Dr Bentley, remarks, that " the whole New Testament is written in a language peculiar to the Jews; and that the idiom is Hebrew or Syriac, though the words be Greek." Michaelis also says, " The language of the New Testament is so intermixed witli Hebraisms, that many native Greeks might have found it difficult to understand it." (In- trod. to N. T. vol. i. p. 100.) Ludovicus ( 'apellus (in speaking of the Greek translators of the < Hd Testament, whose stj le, he says, is followed by the writers of the New) asks the question, "(^uis nescit, verba quidem esse Gneca, at phrases el sermonis structuram esse Hebrseam?" {Grit. Sacr. p. ol'l'.) And Dr Campbell, in his Preliminary Dissertations, pronounces, almost in the words of Capellus, "The phraseology is Hebrew, and the words are Greek."6 The justice of these observa- 8 Ernest! affirms, " Stilua Novi Testament i rcctc dlcatur //.■ us." See p. 82, Inst. Intern. Nov. TetU Indeed the observations of this writer (pp. 73—88.) are particularly worthy oi attention, if the readi r should lie desirous t<> u b this curious ai.il interesting subject Of the Style if the New Testament fully tions, as applying particularly to the expres- sion in the present text, is evinced in nume- rous instances, adduced by Hammond and and satisfactorily handled, I refer him to the last named work; also to Michaelis's fourth chapter on the language of the New Testament [Introduction, fee. voLi pp. U7— 200,) and parti- cularly to Dr Campbell's first and seeond Preliminary Disserta tit, us In the Four CrOtpelt, ice. At the same time, 1 must differ widely from Dr Campbell, when lie refers (as he does in p. 20, vol. i.) to the Bishop of Gloueester's Doctrine of Grace, fur the best refutation of the objections against the inspiration of Scrip- ture derived from the want of classical purity in its language. 1 would, on the contrary, direct the reader's attention to the Dissertation on the Principles of Human Eloquence, in which the bold paradoxes of the Bishop are set aside, and the argument placed upon a sound ar.d legitimate basis, by the learned Dr Thomas Leland, formerly a Fellow of this University. The Bishop, it is well known, had held, that the want of purity in the writings of the New Testament supplies in itself a proof of their divine original ; and had defended this position upon rea- sons nearly subversive of every just notion of the nature of human eloquence. Dr Leland, on the contrary, with a due regard to the principles of eloquence, of taste, and of common sense, and in the direct maintenance of them all against the attacks of this formidable assailant, more discreetly and successfully contended for the truth of this proposition, that " whatever rudeness of stylo may he discoverable in the writings of the New Testament, it ean afford neither proof nor presumption that the authors were not divinely inspired. " See p. 97, or rather, indeed, the whole of the judicious discussion from p. 88 to p. 118 of the Dis- sertation. This drew forth a reply in defence of the Bishop, which was distinguished more for point and sarcasm than for in- genuity and strength. Suspicion early fixed upon DrIIurdas the author. The letters of Warburton and Hurd lately published, prove the suspicion to have been just. It appears, also, that Warburton himself took considerable pains to have the pamphlet printed and circulated in Ireland {Letters, &c, pp.352, 364,) in the confident expectation, that the Irish Professor would be completely put to silence. The effect, however, was otherwise. The Professor returned to the charge with renovated vigour ; anil by a reply, distinguished by such ability as proved to tho opposite party the inexpediency of continuing the contest, closed the controversy. How complete, in the public opinion, was Dr Leland's triumph over both his mitred opponents, may easily be collected from the fact, that, however anxious to give extended circulation to the castigatory Letter before it received an answer, they both observed a profound silence upon the subject ever after; and that the letter to Dr Leland, remaining unacknowledged by the author, was indebted for its farther publicity to the very per- son against whom it was directed, who deemed it not inexpedient, in a new edition of his Tracts, to give it a place between the Dis- sertation which caused it, and the defence which it occasioned. The critical decisions of the day were decidedly in favour of Dr Leland. A late Review pronounces, that Leland, " in the opinion of all the world, completely demolished his antagonist." (Edin. lice. vol. xiii. p. 358.) The Critical Review for July and November 1764, and April, 17<>5, contain some masterly pieces of criticism upon the Dissertation and the Letter. But in no work is there a more striking or more honourable testi- mony borne to Dr Leland's superiority in this controversy, than in that which is entitled Tracts hi/ Warlmrton and a M'arbur- tonian ,- particularly in the Dedication and Preface prefixed to the Two Tracts which the eloquent editor describes as " Child- ren, whom their parents were afraid or ashamed to acknowledge,*1 ami which he therefore (compassionately, it certainly cannot bo said) determines to present to the public notice. Of these Two Tracts, Dr Kurd's well known Letter to Dr Jortin. tin the Delicacy Of Friendship, is one, ami his Letter to Dr Leland, is the other: and on the subject of these trnets. by which, it is added, Warburton was most extravagantly flattered, Leland mosl petulantly insulted, and Jortin most inhumanly vilified, severe justice is inflicted upon the author, by the indignant vin- dicatorof the two respectable characters that had been so un- worthily attacked. General opinion has long appropriated this publication to a name of no mean note in the republic of letters. Undoubtedly the vigour of conception, the richness of imagery, No. 27.— ON CHRIST'S DEATH AS A SACRIFICE FOR SIN. 65 Whitby in loc. And to this very text the passage from Isaiah, which has just been discussed, bears an exact correspondence ; for, and the splendour of diction, displayed in those parts of the work which the Editor claims as his own, arc such as must reflect honour upon any name. At the same time, it is much to be lamented, that talents and attainments of so high an order, as manifestly belong to tho writer, should have been devoted to purposes so little congenial with the feelings of benevolence ; and that the same spirit, which pressed forward with such gene- rous ardour to cast the shield over one reputation, should direct the sword with such fierce hostility against another, and exult in inflicting the very 6pecies of wuund which it was its highest glory to repel. The eulogium pronounced upon Dr Leland I here seize the opportunity of extracting from this performance. It is sketched by the hand of a master, and is too creditable to the memory of the individual, to be passed over by any one who takes an interest in what relates either to the man, or to the university of which he was an ornament. " Of Leland, my opinion is not, like the Letter-writer's, founded upon hearsay evidence, nor is it determined solely by the great authority of Dr Johnson, who always mentioned Dr Leland with cordial regard and with marked respect. It might, perhaps, be invidious for me to hazard a favourable decision upon his History of Ireland ; be- cause the merits of that work have been disputed by critics; some of whom are, I think, warped in their judgments by liter- ary, others by national, and more, I have reason to believe, by personal prejudices. But I may with confidence appeal to writings which have long contributed to public amusement, and have often been honoured by public approbation : to the Life of Philip, and to the Translation of Demosthenes, which the Letter-writer professes to have not read, — to the judicious Dissertation upon Eloquence, which the Letter-writer did vouchsafe to read, before he answered it, — to the spirited Defence of that Dissertation, which the Letter-writer, probably, has read, but never attempted to answer. The Life of Philip contains many curious researches into the principles of govern- ment established among the leading states of Greece : many sagacious remarks on their intestine discords: many exact descriptions of their most celebrated characters, together with an extensive and correct view of those subtle intrigues, and those ambitious projects, by which Philip, at a favourable crisis, gradually obtained an Unexampled and fatal mastery over the Grecian Republics. In the Translation of Demosthenes Leland unites the man of taste with the man of learning, and shews himself to have possessed, not only a competent knowledge of the Greek language, but that clearness in his own con- ceptions, and that animation in his feelings, which enabled him to catch the real meaning, and to preserve the genuine Bpirit, of the most perfect orator that Athens ever pro- duced. Through the Dissertation upon Eloquence, and the Defence of it, we see great accuracy of erudition, great perspicuity and strength of style, and, above all, a stout- ness of judgment, which, in traversing the open and spacious walk6 of literature, disdained to be led captive either by the sorceries of a self-deluded visionary, or the decrees of a self- created despot." Tracts by U'arburton and a Warburtonian, pp. 193 — 94. In the very year, in which these observations on Dr Leland's literary character were given to the public, three volumes of his Sermons issued from the Dublin press ; and, though posthumous, and consequently not touched by the finishing hand of the author, they exhibit a specimen of pulpit eloquence, not unworthy of the Translator of Demosthenes and the Historian of Ireland. To these Sermons there is prefixed a brief, but interesting and well-written life of the author, from which it appears, that the amount of his literary productions exceeded what have been here enumerated. The extract which I have made from the Tracts, although I do not accede to its justice in every particular, being disposed to attribute somewhat less to the Translation of Demosthenes, and a vast deal more to the History of Ireland, yet I could not deny myself the grati- fication of noticing, in connection with the name of Leland ; not only as being highly creditable to the memory of a distinguished member of the University with which I am myself so closely connected, but as supplying one of the few instances, in which as in that " his soul," or life, was to " be made" Qt£M, xpxnrix, or as tho LXX ren- der it, s£gi xtuxpr!x;, " a sin offering,"7 so here Christ is said to have been made x/uxotix, "a sin offering;" and " for us," as it must have hem from what is immediately after added, that " he knew no sin." For the exact coin- cidence between these passages, Vitringa (Is-t. liii. 10) deserves particularly to be consulted. Among other valuable observations, he shews that aspi xlcxotix;, VTrin xpxoTlxg, and Xfixnrlx, are all used by the Greek writers among the Jews in the same sense. Several decisive instances of this, in the New Testament, are pointed out by Schleusner, on the word XfiXOTtX. Now from this plain and direct sense of the passage in 2 Cor. supported by the known use of the word x/uxqtIx in Scripture language, and maintained by the ablest commentators on Scripture, Dr Priestley thinks proper to turn away, and to seek in a passage of Romans (viii. 3) to which this by no means necessarily refers, a new explanation, which better suits his theory, and which, as usual with him, substitutes a figurative in place of the obvious and literal sense. Thus, because in Romans God is said to have " sent his Son in the like- ness of sinful flesh," lv oftotuftxri accoKog xy,xp- Ttxs, he would infer, that when in 2 Cor. God is said to have " made him sin," it is merely meant that God had " made him in the like- ness of sinful flesh." Nor is he content with this unwarrantable departure from the lan- guage of the text, but he would also insinuate (Th. Rep. vol. i. p. 128) that the words tsspi xpxoTtx;, which occur in the text in Romans, and which, we have already remarked, are commonly used in Scripture language for a " sin offering," and are so rendered in this place by Primate Newcome, merely imply " for us," availing himself of our present ver- sion, which translates the words, " for sin." Such vague and uncritical expositions of Scrip- ture may serve any purpose, but the cause of truth. I have already dwelt longer upon them than they deserve, and shall now dis- miss them without farther remark. a provincial writer of this part of the empire has obtained due honour in the sister country. In concluding this long note, which has been almost exclusively dedicated to Dr Leland, I cannot forbear asking the question, whether it is to be ascribed to ignorance or to fraud, that, in a recent London edition of his Translation of the Orations of Demosthenes (viz. 180(i) his designation in the title is that of Fellow of Trinity College, Oxford/ Was the translation of the Greek orator supposed too good to have come from Ireland ? or was it imagined, that the knowledge of its true origin would diminish the profit of its circulation ? 7 In reference probably to the very words in this passage it is, that our Saviour declares (Matt. xx. 28,) that he gave t*» •J/u^^y olItoZ >.Ct°o* u.vt4 uroXluv, or, as Saint Paul afterwards ex; resseslt, (1 Tim. ii b',) avr/Avrget irrsj wa>T»i. 66 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. No. XXVIII.— rage 14. Col. 2. ON TIIK WORD K ATA A AATH, TRANSLATED " ATONE- MI.NT," IN BOM. V. 11. The word y.«7au«yi which is here trans- lated " atonement," it is remarked hy Sykes, (On IM-inp. pp. 50, 201) and II. Taylor, (B. Mord. p. 807) and others who oppose the re- ceived doctrine of the atonement, shonld not liavriir,ii jo rendered, but should have been translated "reconciliation." The justice of this ninark 1 do not scruple to admit. The use of the verb and participle in the former seems to require this translation. And this beine the single passage in the New Tes- tament, in which it is so rendered, (being elsewhere uniformly translated " reconciling," or "reconciliation," (Rom. xi. 15. 2 Cor. v. 18, 19) and heing no where used by the LXX in speaking of the legal atonements, and, moreover, there being an actual impropriety in the expression, " Wc have receired1 the atonement" I feel no difficulty in adopting this correction. But whilst I agree with these writers, in the use of the word reconciliation in this pas- sage, I differ from them entirely in the infe- rence they would derive from it. Their no- tion of reconciliation altogether excludes the idea of propitiation and atonement, as may be seen in Number XX. p. 56; whereas by these, it is manifest, both from the reason of the thing and the express language of Scrip- ture, that reconciliation is alone to be effected; as is pmved in the same Number. It deserves also to be observed, that though the word atonement is not used in our version of the New Testament, except in the single instance already referred to, yet in the original, the same, or words derived from the same root, with that which the LXX commonly use when speaking of the legal atonement, are not unfrequently employed in treating of the death of Christ. Thus i'ha.irx.o^ot.i and ££a«c%o- pa.1, which signify " to appease, or make pro- pitious," are almost always used by the LXX for HSDi which by translators is sometimes rendered " to make atonement for/' ami some- times "to reconcile:" and in Hebrews ii. 17, we find it said of our Lord, that lie was " a mer- ciful and faithful high priest, to make recon- ciliation for (elf to tXcunteaOeti) the sins of the people ;" and, again, he is twice, in l John, entitled u.ui'.'.'':. "a propitiation," &c, see Number XXVI. p. 60. Now, in all these, 1 It will Ue worth the while of those commentators, who con- tend (as we have noticed In Number XX.) iliat the reconcilia- tion spoken of in the New Testament meana only our being reconciled to God, or laying aside our enmity against him, — to consider, in what sense wo are said, In this passage, to have d the reconciliation. What rules of language can tiny adopt, who talk of a man's receiving the laying .aside of his own enmities? the word atonement might with propriety have been used ; and, as the reconciliation which we have received through Christ was the effect of the atonement made for us by his death, words which denote the former simply, as (x.xt a.~h- hxy/i, and words derived from the same root,) may, when applied to the sacrifice of Christ, be not unfitly expressed by the latter, as con- taining in them its full import. No. XXIX. — Page 14. Col. 2. ON THE DENIAL THAT CHRIST'S DEATH IS DESCRIBED IN SCRIPTURE AS A SIN-OFFERING. I have, in the page here referred to, adopted the very words of Dr Priestley himself. ( Theol. Rep. vol. i. p. 12.3.) Dr Priestley, however, is far from admitting the death of Christ to be of the nature of a sin-offering. That it is but compared in figure to that species of sacrifice, is all that he thinks proper to concede. H.Taylor (Ben. Mord. pp. 811— 821) contends strenu- ously, and certainly with as much ingenuity as the case will admit, in support of tho same point. What has been urged, in Num- ber XXVII. upon this head, will, however, I trust, be found sufficient. At all events, it furnishes a direct reply to an argument used hy the former of these writers, (Theol. Rep. vol. i. pp. 128, 129) in which, for the purpose of proving that the " death of Christ was no proper sacrifice for sin, or the antitype of the Jewish sacrifices," he maintains, that, " though the death of Christ is frequently mentioned or alluded to by the Prophets, it is never spoken of as a sin-offering ;" and, to establish this position, he relies principally on his inter- pretation of Isai. liii. 10, which has been fully examined and refuted in the aforementioned Number. In addition to what has been advanced, in that Number, upon the other text discussed in it, namely, 2 Cor. v. 21, I wish here to no- tice the observations of Dr Macknight and Rosenmuller. The note of the former upon it is this : " ' Aju.»qt!oiv, a sin-offering. There are many passages in the Old Testament, where u/nxoTlx, sin, signifies a sin-offering, Hosea, iv. 8*. « They (the priests) eat up the sins (that is, the Bin-offerings) of my people.' In the New Testament, likewise, the word sin hath the same signification, Heb. ix. 26, 28 ; xiii. 11." To the same purport, hut more at large, Pilkington, in his Remarks, &c. pp. 168, 164. Rosenmuller observes as follow-: — "'A^«pt/«, victims pro peccato, ut Hebr. EDiPN Levit. vii. 2, nXIX? ct fitfUn, quod ssepe olliptice ponitur pro JlSlDn rQ}< ut Ps. xl. 7. Exod. xxix. 14, pro quo LXX usur- pant eepl d/xccpTicc:, SC^tw/*, Levit. V. 8, 9, 11, aliisque locis. Aliis abstracting est pro con- crete*, et subaudiendum est Z.0C XOLi CtybfOb hoxiu&v, CTt l\iffTl U.VTU fJUr, trT£CLTiClCT0Ut, tTOir,fflv Ot-VfiW TCCVTCt ffVVTOIJ.U; ■ST^XTTitrOcCI, UO-Tie OCV TiJ* TOV 'TUEP ATTOT 'AHOeANOTMENON vr^di^iut Wni*l. (|uuinque Agesilaus denunciasset fore, ut, quicunque darct equum et anna et pcritum liomincm, immunis esset a militia : effecit, ut haic non alitor magna celeritate faccrcnt, atque si quia alacriter aliquem suo loco moriturum quareret. — Be Venat. p. 7IJJI. • Atrlt.ox't ™Z sr*T{05 'TnEPAlIOHANfiN, rturxii- 7y,c iTjxi* i'Jx/.uoct, atirrl povoi ^iXotoltu^ Tuxoit rois" EAA^Civ x»xyo^uOr,txi. Antilochus pro patrc morti scse objiciens, tan- tuin gloria? consecutus est, ut solus apud Gra-cos amans patris appillotur Et quid opus est aliis exemplis ? cum lueulentis- miiiuiii sit, Joh. xi. SO, ubi mortuus dicitur Salvator vt\$ tou \xo~-j. Quod quale sit, mox exponitur, ita /x>, iAov to iOvos xrcXijTxi. Raphelii Annoi. torn. ii. pp. 2.13, 254. Ib.w forcibly the word Ctij is felt to imply substitution, is indirectly admitted in the strongest manner even by Unitarians themselves: the satisfaction manifested by commentators of that description, whenever they can escape from the eniphatlcftl bearing of this preposition , ie strikingly evinced in their late Ver- sion ojlhc Rao Testament. See their observations on Gal. i. 4. from the plain language of Scripture, it may be worth while to notice a distinction which has been judiciously suggested upon this subject, by Mr Veysie. (Bampt. Lecture, Sermon 5.) — Figurative language, he says, does not arise from the real nature of the thing to which it is transferred, but only from the imagination of him who transfers it. Thus, a man who possesses the quality of courage in an eminent degree, is figuratively called a lion ; not because the real nature of a lion belongs to him, but because the quality which characterizes this animal is possessed by him in an eminent degree : therefore the imagination conceives them as partakers of one common nature, and applies to them one common name. Now, to suppose that lan- guage, if it cannot be literally interpreted, must necessarily be of the figurative kind here described, that is, applied only by way of allusion, is erroneous ; since there is also a species of language, usually called analogical, which, though not strictly proper, is far from being merely figurative ; the terms being transferred from one thing to another, not because the things are similar ; but because they are in similar relations. And the term thus transferred, he contends, is as truly significant of the real nature of the thing in the relation in which it stands, as it could be were it the primitive and proper word. With this species of language, he observes, Scripture abounds. And, indeed, so it must ; for if the one dispensation was really intended to be prepa- ratory to the other, the parallelism of their parts, or their several analogies, must have been such as necessarily to introduce the terms of the one into the explanation of the other. — Of this Mr Veysie gives numerous instances. I shall only adduce that which immediately applies to the case before us ; namely, that of " the death of Christ being called," in the New Testament, a sacrifice and sin-offering:'' " This," says he, " is not, as the Socinian hypothesis asserts, figuratively, or merely in allusion to the Jewish sacrifices, but analogically, because the death of Christ is to the Christian Church, what the sacrifices for sin were to the worshippers of the taber- nacle :" (or, perhaps, it might be more correctly expressed, because the sacrifices for sin were so appointed, that they should be to the worshippers of the tabernacle, what it had been ordained the death of Christ was to be to the Christian Church :) " And, accordingly, the language of the New Testament does not contain mere figurative allusions to the Jewish sacrifices," but ascribes a real and immediate efficacy to Christ's death, an efficacy corresponding to that which was anciently produced by the legal sin-offerings." This view of the matter will, I apprehend, be found to convey a complete answer to all No. 33— OF THE NECESSITY OF PROPITIATORY EXPIATION. 69 that lias been said upon this subject, concern- ing figure, allusion, &c. Indeed, some distinction of this nature is absolutely necessary. For, under the pretence of figure, we find those writers, who would reject the doctrine of atonement, endeavour to evade the force of texts of Scripture, the plainest and most positive. — Thus, Dr Priest- ley {Hist, of Cor. vol. i. p. 214,) asserts, that the death of Christ may be called a sacrifice for sin, and a ransom ; and also, that Christ may in general be said to have died in our stead, and to have borne our sins ; and that figura- tive language even stronger than this may be used by persons who do not consider the death of Christ as having any immediate relation to the forgiveness of sins, but believe only, that it was a necessary circumstance in the scheme of the Gospel, and that this scheme was necessary to reform the world. That, however, there are parts of Scripture which have proved too powerful even for the figura- tive solutions of the historian of the Corrup- tions of Christianity, may be inferred from this remarkable concession. " In this, then, let us acquiesce, not doubting but that, though not perhaps at present, we shall in time be able, without any effort or straining, to explain all particular expressions in the apostolical epistles," &c. — {Hist, of Cor. vol. i. p. 279.) Here is a plain confession on the part of Dr Priestley, that those enlightened theories, in which he and his followers exult so highly, are wrought out of Scripture only by effort and straining ; and that all the powers of this polemic Procrustes have been exerted to adjust the apostolic stature to certain pre-ordained dimensions, and in some cases exerted in vain. The reader is requested to compare what has been here said, with what has been already noticed in Numbers I. and XIV., on the treatment given to the authority of Scripture by Dr Priestley and his Unitarian fellow-labourers. No. XXXII.— Page 14. Col. 2. ARGUMENTS TO PROVE THE SACRIFICIAL LANGUAGE OF THE NEW TESTAMENT FIGURATIVE, URGED BY II. TAYLOR AND DR PRIESTLEY. The several arguments enumerated in the page referred to are urged at large, and with the utmost force of which they are capable, in the 7th Letter of Ben. Mordecais Apology, by H. Taylor. Dr Priestley has also endeavoured to establish the same point, and by arguments not much dissimilar. Theol. Rep. vol. i. pp. 121 — 136. No. XXXIII. — Page 14. Col. 2. ON THE SENSE ENTERTAINED GENERALLY BY ALL, AND MORE ESPECIALLY INSTANCED AMONGST THE JEWS, OF THE NECESSITY OF PROPITIATORY EXPIATION. The last of the three arguments here referred to is urged by 11. Taylor {Ben. Mord. pp. 784, 785, 797,) as applied particularly to the notion of vicarious sacrifice ; but it is clear from the whole course of his reasoning, that he means it to apply to all sacrifice, of a nature properly expiatory; that is, to all sacrifice in which, by the suffering and death of the victim, the displeasure of God was averted from the person for whom it was offered, and the punishment due to his offence remitted, whether the suffering of the victim was supposed to be strictly of a vicarious nature or not. Such a notion of sacrifice applied to the death of Christ, this writer ascribes to the engrafting of heathenish notions on Jewish customs ; whereby the language of the Jews came to be interpreted by the customs and ceremonies of the heathen philosophers who had been converted to Christianity. Whether this notion be well founded, will appear from the examination of the origin of sacrifice, in the second of these Discourses, and from some of the explanatory dissertations connected with it. But it is curious to remark how Dr Priestley and this author, whilst they agree in the result, differ in their means of arriving at it. This author traces the notion of sacrifice, strictly expiatory, to heathen interpretation. Dr Priestley, on the contrary, asserts, that the heathens had no idea whatever of such sacrifice. He employs almost one entire essay in the Theological Repository (vol. i. p. 400, &c.) in the proof, that in no nation, ancient or modern, has such an idea ever existed ; and as we have already seen in Number V. ho pronounces it to be the un- questionable result of an historical examina- tion of this subject, that all, whether Jews or heathens, ancient or modern, learned or unlearned, have been " equally strangers to the notion of expiatory sacrifice ; equally destitute of any thing like a doctrine of proper atonement." To pass over, at present, this gross contradiction to all the records of antiquity, how shall we reconcile this gentle- man to the other? or, which is of greater importance, how shall we reconcile him to himself? For, whilst in this place he main- tains, that neither ancient nor modern Jews ever conceived an idea of expiatory sacrifice, he contends in another, (ibid. p. 426,) that this notion has arisen from the circumstance, of the simple religion of Christ having been " intrusted to such vessels as were the 70 MAGEE ON: THE ATONEMENT. apostles :" " for," adds ho, " the apostles wore Jews, and had to do with Jews, and conse- quently represented Christianity in a Jewish tin--," — and this inure particularly, " in the business of sacrifices." Now, if the Jews had no notion whatever of expiatory sacrifice, it remains to It accounted for, how the clothing the Christian doctrine of redemption in a Jewish dre all the people, at Sinai, no one was excus- able in his ignorance of this fundamental truth." 2 Thus the crimes of ignorance, of which this writer speaks in the passages referred to, are evidently not of the nature represented by Dr Priestley, namely, casual and accidental lapses, in which no proper guilt could be contracted: and consequently his argument, which from the application of the same form of sacrifice to these cases as to those in which guilt did exist, would infer, that in none was it the intention by the sacrifice to make expiation for trans- gression, must necessarily fall to the ground. Had Dr Priestley, however, taken the pains to make himself better acquainted with the works of the writer, whose authority he has cited in support of his opinion, he would never have risked the observations just now alluded to. He would have found, that, in the opinion of this, as well as of every other, Jewish writer of eminence, even those cases of defilement which were involuntary, such as leprosy, child-hearing, &c. uniformly implied an idea of guilt. Thus Abarbanel, speaking of the case of puerpery in the 12th chapter of Levi- ticus, says, that "without committing sin no one is ever exposed to suffering ; that it is a principle with the Jewish Doctors, ' that there is no pain without crime,' and that, therefore, the woman who had endured tho pains of childbirth was required to offer a piacular sacrifice." And again, on the case of the Leper in the 14th chapter of Leviticus, the same writer remarks, that the sin-offering was enjoined, "because that the whole of tho Mosaic religion being founded on this princi- ple, that whatever befalls any human creaturo is the result of providential appointment, tho leper must consider his malady as a judicial infliction for some transgression." And this principle is so far extended by Maimonides, (March Nevochim, p. 380) as to pronounce, that "even a pain so slight as that of a thorn wounding the hand, and instantly extracted, must lie ranked as a penal infliction by the Deity for some offence :" see also Claveriug Annot. in Maim. De Pcenitcntia, pp. 141, 142. Other Jewish writers carry this matter farther. Thus R. Bechai, on Levit. via. 7, says, that -'.Maimonides gives the same account of this matter. — See BIaim.dt Saerff. lh VtXL. p. 116; alsu, M< >i-.)< Nevochim, pp. 464, 405. " the woman after childbirth is bound to bring a sin-offering, in expiation of that original taint, derived from the common mother of mankind, by whose transgression it was caused that the procreation of the species was not like the production of tho fruits of the earth, spontaneous and unmixed with sensual feelings." Whether these opinions of the Jewish Rab- bis be absurd or otherwise, is a point with which I have no concern. The fact, that such were their opinions, is all I contend for. And this I think will satisfy us respecting the competency of Dr Priestley as an interpreter of their writings ; when we find him thus arguing from the actual impossibility that they could hold an opinion, which they themselves expressly assert they did hold ; and when we find him maintaining the rectitude of his theory by their testimony, whilst he explains their testimony by the unquestionable recti- tude of his theory. This is a species of logic, and a mode of supplying authorities from an- cient writers, in which Dr Priestley has been long exercised ; as may abundantly appear, not only from several parts of these illustration;;, but from the collection of very able and useful Tracts published by the late Bishop Horsley. A few words more concerning the Rabbis. — Dr Priestley endeavours to insinuate, as we have seen, p. 71, that "Abarbanel considers sin-offerings as fines or mulcts, by way of ad- monition not to offend again." Now, who- ever will take the trouble of consulting that writer himself, will find, that this subordinate end of sacrifice is mentioned by him, only in connection with offences of the slightest kind, and amounting, at the most, to the want of a sufficient caution in guarding against the pos- sibility of accidental defilement. When this want of caution has been on occasions and in stations so important, as to render it a high crime and capital offence, as in the case of the High Priest, the expression used is, that the offender deserves to be mulcted with death, but that the victim is accepted in his stead, &C. (De Veil. Abarb. Exord. pp. 31,3. 315.) Whether, then, the sin-offering was intended to be considered by this writer merely as a fine, the reader will judge, indeed Dr Priest- ley himself has already proved that it was not ; inasmuch as he has asserted that he has represented sacrifices for sin as emblematical actions. Now if they were solely emblemati- cal actions, they could not have been tines : and if they were solely hues, they could not have been emblematical actions. But if the author, whilst he represented them as fines, considered them likewise as emblematical actions, then the circumstance of his having viewed them in the light of fines, is no proof that he might not likewise have considered them as strictly propitiatory. The introduc No. 33.— OF THE NECESSITY OF PROPITIATORY EXPIATION. 73 tion, therefore, of this remark by Dr Priestley, is either superfluous or sophistical. The observations applied to Abarbanel ex- tent! with equal force to the opinions of Mai- monides : for the former expressly asserts more than once, (Exord. Comment, in Lent, pp. 231, 235) that he but repeats the sentiments of the latter, on the import of the sacrificial rite-;. Nor will the assertion of Maimonides, (which lias been much relied on by Sykcs,) viz. that " repentance expiates all transgres- sions," invalidate in any degree what has been here urged ; for it is evident, that, in the treatise on Repentance, in which this position is found, he is speaking in reference to the Jewish institutions, and endeavouring to prove, from the peculiar condition of the Jews since the destruction of their temple, that re- pentance is the only remaining expedient for restoration to the divine favour : " since we have no longer a temple or altar, there remains no expiation for sins, but repentance only — and this will expiate all transgressions." (Maim. De Poenit. Clavering, p. 45.) And with a view to the proving its sufficiency, (now that sacrifice was no longer possible, and to prevent the Jews, who had been used to attribute to the sacrifice the principal efficacy in their reconciliation with God, from thinking lightly of that only species of homage and obedience which now remained,) it seems to be that both here, and in his Moreh Ncvochim, (p. 435) he endeavours to represent prayer and confession of sins, as at all times constitu- ting a main part of the sacrificial service. But this by no means proves, that the sacrifice was not in his opinion expiatory; on the con- trary it clearly manifests his belief that it was ; since it is only because it was no longer possible for the Jews according to the Mosaic ordinances, that he considers it as laid aside : for if repentance and prayer were in themselves perfectly sufficient, then the reason assigned for the cessation of sacrifice, and the efficacy of repentance per se under the existing circumstances, would have been unmeaning. But this writer's notion of the efficacy of repentance, and of the ceremonial rites, may be still better understood from the following remarks. Speaking of the scape goat, he says, (Moreh Nevochim, p. 404,) that " it was be- lieved to pollute those that touched it, on account of the multitude of sins which it carried :" and of this goat he says again, (De Poenit. pp. 44, 45,) that " it expiated all the sins recounted in the law, of whatever kind, with regard to him who had repented of those sins ; but that with respect to him who had not repented, it expiated only those of a lighter sort :" and those sins of a lighter sort, he defines to be all those transgressions of the law against which excision is not denounced. So that, according to this writer, there were cases, and those not a few, in which repen- | tance was not necessary to expiation. And again, that it was not in itself sufficient for expiation, he clearly admits, not only from his general notion of sacrifices throughout his works, but from his express declarations on this subject. He says, that with respect to certain offences, " neither repentance, nor the day of expiation" (which he places on the same ground with repentance as to its expia- tory virtue,) " have their expiatory effect, unless chastisement be inflicted to perfect the expiation." And in one case, he adds, that "neither repentance followed by uniform obedience, nor the day of expiation, nor the chastisement inflicted, can effect the expia- tion, nor can the expiation be completed but by the death of the offender." (De Poenit. pp. 4G, 47.) The reader may now be able to form a judg- ment, whether the doctrines of the Jewish Rabbis really support Dr Priestley's position, — that amongst the modern Jews no notion of any scheme of sacrificial atonement, or of any requisite for forgiveness, save repentance and reformation, has been found to have had existence. And I must again remind him of the way in which the authorities of the Jewish writers have been managed by Dr Priestley, so as to draw from them a testimony appa- rently in his favour. The whole tribe of Rabbinical authors, who have, as we have seen, in the most explicit terms avowed the doctrine of atonement, in the strictest sense of the word, are passed over without mention, save only Nachmanides, who is but transiently named, whilst his declarations on this sub- ject, being directly adverse, are totally sup- pressed. Maimonides and Abarbanel, indeed, are adduced in evidence, but how little to Dr Priestley's purpose, and in how mutilated and partial a shape I have endeavoured to evince. These writers, standing in the fore- most rank of the Rabbinical teachers, as learned and liberal expositors of the Jewish law, could not but feel the futility of the sacrificial sys- tem, unexplained by that great sacrifice, which, as Jews, they must necessarily have rejected. Hence arises their theory of the human origin of sacrifice, and hence their occasional seeming departure from the princi- ples of the sacrificial worship, maintained by other Rabbis, and adopted also by themselves, in the general course of their writings. From these parts of their works, which seem to be no more than philosophical struggles to colour to the eye of reason the inconsistencies of an existing doctrine, has Dr Priestley sought support for an assertion which is in open con- tradiction, not only to the testimony of every other Rabbinical writer, but to the express language of these very writers themselves. But Dr Priestley is not contented with forcing upon these more remote authors a language which they never used, but he endea- 74 M A G E E ON THE ATONEMENT. vours also to extract from those of later date a testimony to the same purpose, in direct opposition to their own explicit assertions. Thus, in Buxtorf's account of the ceremony observed by the modern Jews of killing a cock on the preparation for the day of expia- tion, he thinks he finds additional support for his position, that, amongst the modern Jews, no idea of a strict propitiatory atonement has been known to exist. Now, as to Dr Priest- 1( y's representation of Buxtorf, I cannot op- pose a more satisfactory authority than that of Buxtorf himself, 1 shall quote the passage as given in that writer, and that no pretence of misrepresentation may remain, I give it untinged by the medium of a translation. " Quilibct postea paterfamilias, cum gallo pra manibus, in medium primus prodit, et ex Psalmis Davidis ait ; ' Sedentes in tenebris,' &c. — item, ' Si ei adsit Angelus interpres, unus de mille, qui 1111 resipiscentiam exponat, tunc miserebitur ejus, et dicet, redime eum, ne descendat in fossam : inveni enim expiationem' (gallum nempe gallinaceum, qui peccata mea expiabit.) Deinde expiationeni aggreditur, et capiti suo gallum ter allidit, singulosque ictus his vocibus prosequitur, YISvIT PIT ib' ^on/in m vnso nr \nrm nt bi ay D^ita crr6 ibx ^ni ruvvb ]ftN bmW- — ' Hie Gallus sit permutatio pro me, hie in locum meum succedat, hie sit expiatio pro me, huic gallo mors afi'eretur, mihi vero et toti Israeli vita fortunata. Amen.' Hoc ille ter ex online facit, pro se, sc. pro filiis suis, et pro percgrinis qui apud ilium sunt, uti Sum- mus Sacerdos in vet. test, expiationeni quoque fecit. Gallo deinde imponens manus, ut in sacrifices olim, cum statim mactat, cutemque ad collum ei primum contrahit et constringit, et secum reputat, se, qui prrefocetur aut stran- guletur, dignum esse : hunc autem gallum in suum locum substituere et offere ; cultello postea jugulum resolvit, itcrum animo secum per- pc ndcns, semetipsum, qui gladio plectatur, dignum esse ; et confestim ilium vi e manibus in terram projicit, ut denotet, se dignum esse, bus (pii hipidibus obruatur : postremo ilium assat, ut hoc facto designet, se dignum esse, qui igne vitam finiat: et ita quatuor luce mortis genera* pro Judajis gallus sustincro debet. Intestina vulgo supra domus tectum jaciunt. Alii dicunt id fieri, quia quuni pec- cata internum quid potius quam externum Bint, ideo galli intestinis peccata luerere : corvos itaquc advenire, et cum Judseorum peccatis in desertum avolare debere, ut hircus in vet. test, cum populi peccatis in deser- tum aufugiebat. Alii aliam reddunt cau- 8am. Causa autem, cur gallo potius quam alio animante utantur, hrec est, quia vir ebraice "QJ Gebher appellator. Jam si Geb- Aerpeccaverit, Gebher etiam peccati /m nam sus- tinere debet. — Quia vero gravior esset poena, quam ut illam subire possent Judsei, gallum gallinaceum qui Talmudica scu Babylonia dialecto"l^J (refi/ta* appellator, in locum suum Bubstituunt, et ita justitise Dei satisfit ; quia quum "13.1 Gebher peccaverit, ~q3 Gebher etiam, ?'. e. Gallus gallinaceus plectitur." — Spiagoga Jndaica, ed. 4, pp. 509 — 512. I leave this extract, without comment, to confront Dr Priestley's representation of it ; viz. that it indicates nothing of the strict notion of atonement. (T/ieol. Rep. vol. i. pp. 410, 411.) He adds, indeed, for the pur- pose of confirming his account of this passage, that this cock is afterwards eaten ; as if thence to infer, that the offerers could not consider the animal as a real substitute for them, in respect to their sins and their punishment : and yet Buxtorf expressly asserts, that when it had been the custom to distribute amongst the poor the animals slain in the manner above described, it created much murmuring ; the poor recoiling with horror from the gift, say- ing that they were required to eat the sins of the rich : and that the rich offerers were therefore obliged to bestow their charitable donations on the poor in money, to the amount of the value of their offering ; and " thus having redeemed the offering froni God, by its equivalent in money, they then feasted upon it," (Sj/n. Jud. pp. 515, 516.) Again, Dr Priestlev insinuates, that the Jews could not consider this offering as a strict expiation, because " that when they themselves die, they pray that their own deaths may be considered as an expiation or satisfaction for their sins." Dr Priestley does not recollect that the atone- ment made at the day of expiation extended only to the sins of the past year, and that those which were committed after that day, must remain unexpiated until the day of ex- piation in the succeeding year. The dying person had consequently to account for all the sins committed since the last preceding day of expiation. And as every natural ill was deemed by the Jews a penal infliction for sin, death was consequently viewed by them in the same light, and in the highest degree ; and therefore it was reasonable that they should hope from it a full atonement and satisfaction for their transgressions. Thus we see that even the authorities quoted by Dr Priestley as supporting his theories, are found to be in direct contradiction to them. And from this, and the numerous other in- stances of his misrepresentation of ancient writers, which may be found in the course of these remarks, we may learn a useful lesson respecting his reports of authors in those voluminous writings in which he has laboured to convert the religion of Christ into a system of heathen morality. I have, for this pur- ple, been thus copious on his representations of the opinions of the modern Jews ; and, without dwelling longer on this point, or ad- No. 33.— OF THE NECESSITY OF PROPITIATORY EXPIATION. 75 verting to Isaac Netto, who happened in a " very good sermon" to speak with confidence of the mercy of God, without hinting any thing of mediation as necessary to satisfy his justice, ( Theol. Rep. vol. i. p. 411,) I turn hack to what we are told three pages hefore con- cerning Philo and Josephus. These writers, who are nearly contemporary with our Saviour, Dr Priestley informs us, furnish no intimation whatever, in any part of their works, of " any ideas that have the least connection with those that are suggested by the modern doctrine of atonement," (pp. 408, 409 ;) and, according to his usual practice, he produces one or two insulated passages from the voluminous works of these authors to prove that their sentiments on the subjects of sacrifice, and of the divine placa- bility, correspond with his own. Now, were it true with respect to Josephus, as Dr Priest- ley asserts, that he suggests no idea in any degree similar to the received notion of atone- ment, yet could this furnish no proof that he entertained no such idea ; because he himself expressly informs us (Ant. Jud. lib. iii. cap. 9, sect. 3, p. 121, and cap. 11, sect. 2, p, 125 — vol. i. ed. Huds.) that he reserves the more minute examination of the nature of the ani- mal offerings for a distinct treatise on the subject of sacrifice, which has either not been written, or has not come down to us. But although the historian, in consequence of this intention, has made but slight and incidental mention of the nature of sacrifice, yet has he said enough to disprove Dr Priestley's asser- tion, having in all places in which he has occasion to speak of the sin-offering, described the victim as sacrificed in deprecation of God's wrath, and in supplication of pardon for trans- gression. UxoctiTYiat? ccfix^ryif^xruu, is the expression he constantly employs on this subject ;a and, in treating of the scape-goat, he calls it d7rorp07ricti7fi6; x.a.1 TZotncttT/iviz inri^ a.^u.orr^a.ruv. (See p. 92, as referred to in the note below.) And as to the distinction made by this writer between the sacrifices of Cain and Abel, on the strength of which Dr Priestley ranks him as an auxiliary on the subject of this sacrificial import, it deserves to be remarked, that this, so far as it can be understood, seems not to be in any degree inconsistent with the commonly received no- tions of sacrifice, inasmuch as it relates rather to the sentiments of the offerers, than to the intrinsic nature of the things offered.4 But besides, we find in the very section in which this distinction is pointed out, an obser- 3 Xtux^ov rl It) •srot^xirr.o'ti ccu.a.^rr,UMTaty — Again. t^lQov vt\% a.u.at.QTCt.duv — and, xocr'a. TS'x^ae.irr.trtv ocpcaqTiuv iqifov. — See Josephi Opera, Ant. Jud. lib. iii. pp. 9U, 92, edit. Genev. 163 i. 4 See the translation by L'Estrange, p. 5, who appears to have hit on the true meaning of the original, and compare the preceding sentences, in which the characters of the two brothers are described. ration respecting a sacrifice offered by Cain, which, had Dr Priestley permitted his eyes to wander but a few lines from the passage he has quoted, might have convinced him that Josephus admitted, equally with the suppor- ters of the present doctrine of atonement, the propitiatory virtue of sacrifice : for, having related the murder of Abel by his brother, and God's consequent resentment against Cain, he adds, that upon Cain's " offering up a sacrifice, and by virtue thereof (57 avrijc) sup- plicating him not to be extreme in his wrath, God was led to remit the punishment of the murder." Thus the wrath of God was averted by sacrifice, and that life which, according to strict justice, was to be paid for the life which had been taken away, was preserved through virtue of the offering made. With what rea- son, then, upon the whole, Dr Priestley has claimed the support of Josephus's testimony, it is not difficult to judge. Whether he has had better grounds for appealing to that of Philo, remains to be considered. This distinguished and philosophic Jew, whose resemblance to Plato, both in richness of diction and sublimity of sentiment, gave birth to the Greek proverb, % H'Kxtuu Qthu- »i£u, jj cJ)/AiJi/ a'hxravi'^si, has, indeed, exercised upon the Jewish doctrines an extraordinary degree of mystical refinement : he is also pro- nounced, by some of the highest authorities, to have been entirely ignorant both of the language and customs of the Jews, and con- sequently to have fallen into gross errors in his representation of the doctrines of their religion.5 And yet from two detached pas- sages in this author's writings, one of which is so completely irrelevant, that it were idle even to notice it, Dr Priestley does not hesi- tate to decide upon the notion entertained by the Jews of his day respecting the nature of sacrificial atonement. He also asserts, indeed, that in no part of his works does he suggest any idea in the slightest degree resembling the modern notion of atonement. To hazard this assertion, is to confess an entire ignorance of the writings of this author ; for, on the contrary, so congenial are his sentiments and language to those of the first Christian writers, on the subject of the corruption of man's nature, the natural insufficiency of our best works, the necessity of an intercessor, a re- deemer, and ransom for sin, together with the appointment of the divine AOT02 for these purposes, that the learned Bryant has been led to conclude, that he must actually have derived these doctrines from the sources of evangelical knowledge. That he had, indeed, the opportunity of doing so, from an intimate intercourse with Saint Peter, is attested by Hieronymus, (Catalog. Scriptor. Ecclcs.) Pho- tius, (Biblioth. cv.) and Suidas, (Historic.) by 5 See Photius Biblioth. cv. ed. 1G.15 ; Thcs. Temp. Jos. Scalig. Animad. p. 7, ed. 1658; andGrotius, in Matt, xxxvi. 18. 76 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. whom, as well as by Eusehius, {Hist. Ecchs. lil>. ii.) it is affirmed, that the beautiful eulo- gium contained in this writer's treatise, Uinl Riw Qsuq. was pronounced on the apostolic Christiana settled at Alexandria, who were the followers of Saint Mark, the disciple of Peter. The arguments of l)r Allix, however, in his Judgment of the Jewish Church, &c. (p.76 — 83,) thougb they may justly be deemed invalid as to the impossibility of Philo's in- tercourse with the first Christians, for which he contends in opposition to the above autho- rities, yet seem sufficient to warrant us in pronouncing, that however similar his notions and expressions may be to those of the early Christians, they yet were not derived from Christian sources ; and that, consequently, they exhibit the doctrines of the Jewish church : such, at least, as they were held by the Jews of Alexandria in his day. But to instance a few of the numerous passages in the works of this author of the import above alluded to: — He informs us, (n£?< vrov(>y. p. 217, ed. 1640,) that "man was made in the image of God" — that he was placed in a state of perfect happiness, (ibid, pp. 219, 220, and Ny>. p. 522,) and so degenerate, " that even his virtues are of no value, but through the goodness and favour of God," {IU%1 tou to Xno. p. 166) — mankind are consequently obliged " to trust to this alone for the purifi- cation of the soul, and must not imagine that they are themselves capable, without the divine favour and influence, to purge and wash away the stains which deform their nature." (Tley tuv 'Quuo. pp. 1111, 1112.) And so great does he represent this corruption of the human mind, as to exclaim, that " no man of sound judgment, observing the actions of men, can refrain from calling aloud on the only Saviour God, to remove this burden of iniquity, and, by appointing some 'ransom and redemption for the soul,' (kvtqx xul auuTQoe. KitTxPiis Tij; -J/vx'r,;,) to restore it to its original liberty." (\U,,\ 2vyx- A/«A. p. 333.) "For a race, by nature thus carried headlong to sin," he pronounces "some mode of propitia- tion to be necessary/YlIsgi (i>vy*o. p. 465,) and for this purpose, he says, "an advocate and intercessor for men" Churns tov §v*Tov) has been appointed, viz. " the Divine Logos, that Archangel, the first born Son of God, ordained by him to stand as a 'Mediator' (Mitlooio;) between the creature and the Crea- tor, acting as a surety to each party, (a^o- Ttooi; oftwivuii,') and proclaiming peace to all the world, that through his intercession men might have a firm faith in God," (0s/, Il^xy KA/jj. p. 509) — that same A6yo;, who is also called by him " an High Priest, free from all sin," (Ilggi i/y«5. p. 466, and Ilsgl tZ>v '(bu^. p. 597) ; of wdiose mediation he acknowledges the intercession of Aaron to have been but a type, (Il£?i yy«3. p. 446, and 0s/. lioxy. KAjjj. p. 508) ; and whom he describes to be that " substitute and representation" of the Deity (v-rrstoxoc: &eov) through whom he is related in the Old Testament to have conversed with man, (TLitf tZv 'Ovti%. p. 600.) And, when he speaks of that part of the law wherein it is said that the man of guilt should fly to an appointed city of refuge, and not be acquitted till the death of the high priest, he confesses (TU$ yy«S. pp. 465, 466) that by this the Lcvitical high priest cannot be literally meant, but that he must be in this case the type of one far greater ; for " that the high priest alluded to is not a man, but the sacred Logos, who is incapable of all sin, and who is said to have his head anointed with oil :" and that the death of this High Priest is that which is here intended : — thus admitting the death of the Logos, whom he describes as the anointed, and allows to be typified by the Jewish high priest, to be the means of recovery from a state of spiritual bondage, and of giving liberty to the soul. It is true, he allegorizes away this meaning again, according to Ins usual cus- tom. But, whilst he refines upon the doctrine, he at the same time testifies its existence in his day. The reader will now judge, whether this writer deemed " repentance and good works sufficient for divine acceptance," or whether he entertained "any ideas resembling those that are suggested by the modern doctrine of atonement." l)r Priestley however contends, that he considered sacrifices but as gifts ; ami this he infers from the account given by him, of the preference of Abel's sacrifice to that of Cain : viz. that, " instead of inanimate things, he offered animate; instead of young animals, those that were grown to their full size ; in- stead of the leanest, the fattest," &C Dr Priestley should at the same time have stated, that the whole of the account given by this writer of the history of Cain and Abel, is one continued allegory: that by the birth of the two brothers, he understands "the rise of two opposite principles in the soul ; one ascribing all to the natural powers of the individual, and thence represented by Cain, which signi- fies possession ; the other referring all to God, and thence denominated Abel" (HsfJ uv 'ls^ovQy. p. 130) : that this latter principle he also holds to be implied in the occupation of Abel, inasmuch " as by a tender of sheep, is meant a controller of the brute powers of the soul ; and that Abel, therefore, from his pious reference of all to God, is properly described as a shepherd ; and Cain, on the contrary, No. 33— OF THE NECESSITY OF PROPITIATORY EXPIATION. 77 from the deriving all from his own individual exertions, is called a tiller of the ground." (Ibid, pp. 136, 137.) The sacrifice of Abel consequently denotes the offering of the pious and devout affections of the heart ; this being " what is meant by the firstlings of the flock, and the fat thereof,'" [Ibid. pp. 137. 145. 154.) whilst that of Cain, on the other hand, repre- sents an offering, destitute of those affections, an offering of impiety, inasmuch "as the fruits of the earth import the selfish feelings : their being offered after certain days, indicates the backwardness of the offerer ; and the fruits, simply, and not the first-fruits, shew that the first honour was held back from the Creator, and given to the creature." {Ibid. pp. 137. 141, 142. 145.) And in this sense it is, that Abel is said by this writer, " neither to have offered the same things, nor in the same way : but instead of inanimate, things ani- mate ; instead of young and inferior animals, the matured and choicest :" in other words, that the most animated and vigorous senti- ments of homage are requisite to constitute an acceptable act of devotion. In this light the due value of Dr Priestley's quotation from this writer, as applied to the present question, may easily be estimated. But, had Dr Priestley looked to that part of this author's works, in which he treats ex- pressly of the animals offered in sacrifice, he would" have seen, that he describes the sacrifice for sin as being the appointed means of " ob- taining pardon, and escaping the evil conse- quences of sin," — kolkuv a.iru,~h~htt.yv\ — kukuv (fvyvi — ccuuidTtotv a.Oix,Yitu!' reader to form a just estimate of that writer's competency, and may, perhaps, suggest a useful caution in the admission of his assertions. No. XXXIV.— Page 14. Col. 2. ON H. TAYLOR S OBJECTION OF THE WANT OF A LITERAL CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN THE MOSAIC SACRIFICE AND THE DEATH OF CHRIST. H. Taylor goes so far as to use even this argument gravely, {Ben. Mord. p. 811 — 814.) Indeed, the bold liberties which this writer has been urged to take with the language of Scripture, and the trifling distinctions to which he has been driven for the purpose of divesting the death of Christ of the characters of the sin-offering prescribed by the law, render it desirable that his whole argument upon this particular point should be laid before the reader. When ingenuity, like that of this author, is forced into such straits, the inference is instructive. " It is true," (he says) "that the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews labours to shew a similarity between the Mosaic and the Chris- tian sacrifices ; which, no doubt, there was ; and, to make out the analogy, uses very hard figures : as when he compares sprinkling the blood of the victim, to the sprinkling our hearts from an evil conscience; and the tabernacle to the body of Christ ; and the flesh of Christ to the veil which opened the way into the Sanctum Sanctorum ; and calls it a new and a living way ; and considers Christ both as the High Priest and Victim. But were the analogy ever so exact, it would not make the expressions literal : and in many particulars there is no manner of likeness between them. Eor, in the sacrifice of Christ there was no salting with salt, no imposition of hands, no blood sprinkled by the Priest, in which con- sisted the atonement : for, the atonement was not made by the death of the victim, but by the sprinkling of the blood ; since the offender did not offer him to God, nor begged forgive- ness of his sins : all which things were custo- mary, and most if not all of them necessary, in a Mosaic expiatory sacrifice of a victim. Put this was not the case with Christ. He was crucified and slain, as a common male- factor." " If it be said, that Christ was the sacrificer, and he offered himself up to God; it should be considered, that the sacrifices of the Mosaic law were offered to gain forgiveness to the person who sacrificed : but this could not be I true of Christ, for he had no sin to be for- given." " If it be said, that he sacrificed as a Priest, to gain forgiveness for others ; it should be observed, that, according to the Mosaic law, he was incapable of such an office : for the No. 34.— WANT OF CONFORMITY TO THE MOSAIC SACRIFICE, &c. 79 law requires, that the Priests should be of the tribe of Levi, or the family of Aaron. But he (Christ) ' of whom these things are spoken, pertaineth to another tribe, of which no man gave attendance at the altar. For it is evident that our Lord sprang out of Judah, of which tribe Moses spake nothing concerning the priesthood,' (Heb. vii. 13, 14.) And, there- fore, Saint Paul, who was aware of this objec- tion, when he speaks of Christ as a Priest, tells us, that he was a priest of a superior order to the Aaronical priesthood, ' being a priest for ever after the order of Melchiscdek,' (ver. 17.) This is a plain concession, that, according to the Mosaic law, Christ was incapable as a priest to offer any sacrifice. But supposing he had been of the tribe of Levi, the case would have been just the same with regard to all mankind, except the Jews : for the Jewish sacrifices did not extend beyond the circum- cision. The sacrifice of Christ could not, therefore, be a propitiatory sacrifice, acccording to the Mosaic law ; and much less a propitia- tion for the sins of the whole world." " If it was therefore a literal offering or sacrifice made by Christ as a Priest, it was of a higher nature, and of a prior and superior dispensation to the Mosaic, such as was ottered in the days of Melchisedek, the priest of the most high God. But we have no reason to think that any offerings before the law were meant to be expiatory, but all of them eucha- ristical." Thus, after labouring to prove that Saint Paul was extravagant in his comparison of the Christian and Mosaic sacrifices, and that all his hard figures had not enabled him to make out a resemblance between them ; and labouring to prove this by shewing that Christ was neither literally a Mosaic victim nor a Mosaic priest, — (a point which no man was ever mad enough to contend for,) — thus, I say, after all this, our author, in his conclud- ing paragraph, admits the whole nature and force of the Christian sacrifice, and the true distinction which points out the reason why it should not conform in every minute cere- monial with the formalities of the Mosaic ; namely, that it was of a higher nature, and of a prior and superior dispensation. For, as to the accompanying observation intended to do away the effect of this admission, namely, that there is no reason to think that any offer- ings before the law were meant to be expia- tory ; this is a mere gratis dictum, the contra- diction of which, it is hoped, is satisfactorily made out in other parts of this work. And thus it appears, upon the whole, that on a single gratuitous assumption the author rests the entire weight of the preceding argument ; and on its strength he has presumed to set up his own doctrines in opposition to those of Saint Paul. Whether, then, in the present instance, this author, ingenious and learned as he undoubtedly is, deserves more to be condemned for his trifling as a reasoner, or for his presumption as a critic, it is not an easy matter to decide. No. XXXV.— Page 15. Col. ON THE ARGUMENTS BY WHICH IT IS ATTEMPTEO TO PROVE THE PASSOVER NOT TO BE A SACRIFICE. It is a curious fact, that the declaration of Saint Paul (1 Cor. v. 7) that " Christ our pass- over is sacrificed for us," is adduced by Dr Priestley (Tkeol. Rep. vol. i. p. 215) as a con- vincing proof that Christ was not sacrificed at all. It follows, he says, " from the allusion to the paschal lamb," contained in this pas- sage and others of the New Testament, " that the death of Christ is called a sacrifice only by way of figure ; because these two (namely, sacrifice, and the paschal lamb) are quite different and inconsistent ideas :" and the argument by which he endeavours to estab- lish this is not less extraordinary than the position itself, as it brings forward an instance in which one of these totally different and inconsistent ideas is expressly called in the Old Testament by the name of the other ; the passover being, in the passage wdiich he quotes from Exod. xii. 27, directly termed " the sacrifice of the Lord's passover." — This seems an odd species of logic. Dr Priestley, how- ever, hopes to mend the argument by assert- ing, that " this is the only place in the Old Testament, in which the paschal lamb is termed a sacrifice ;" and that here " it could be so called only in some secondary and par- tial, and not in the proper and primary sense of the word ;" and for these reasons — namely, that " there was no priest employed upon the occasion, no altar made use of, no burning, nor any part offered to the Lord : all which circumstances (he adds) were essential to every proper sacrifice." — Now, in answer to these several assertions, I am obliged to state the direct contradiction of each : for, 1. The passage in Exodus, xii. 27, is not the only one in which the paschal lamb is termed J12], " a sacrifice ;" it being expressly so called in no less than four passages in Deuteronomy, (xvi. 2, 4, 5, 6,) and also in Exodus, xxxiv. 25, and its parallel passage, xxiii. 18. — 2. A priest was employed. — 3. An altar was made use of. — 4. There was a burning, and a part offered to the Lord : the inwards being burnt upon the altar, and the blood poured out at the foot thereof. Dr Priestley adds, for the completion of his proof, that " the paschal lamb is very far from having been ever called a sin-offering, or said to be killed on the account of sin." But neither is the burnt- offering " ever called a sin-offering," nor is the animal slain in any of the various kinds of 80 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMEX T. peace-offering, whether in the votive, the fret -will, or the sacrifice of thanksgiving, ever "said to be killed on account of sin." In other words, one species of Bacrifice is not the same with, nor to be called by the name of another. I agree with Dr Priestley in this position, and shall not dispute with him any conclusion he may draw from so productive a premiss. But so evident is it that the passover was truly a sacrifice, that even Sykes himself (whose work on Redemption has been the great armoury whence Dr Priestley and the other combatants of that doctrine have de- rived their principal weapons of attack) found it impossible to deny the position. He ac- cordingly fully admits the point. (Essay on Sacrifices, p. 41.) And, indeed, whoever con- siders what are the essential characters of a sacrifice, can have little difficulty upon this head, as the passover will be found to possess them all. 1. It was a " Corban," or " offering brought to the tabernacle or temple," as we find it expressly enjoined in Deut. xvi. 2, 5, 6, and exemplified at the solemn passover in the reign of Josiah, 2 Chron. xxxv. 5, 6, 10, 11. That the tabernacle or temple, is intended by the expressions used in the passage of Deu- teronomy above referred to, and not Jerusalem at large, is evident from this, that the very same expressions are employed when speaking of all the sacrifices and offerings, in Deut. xii. ,5, 6, 11, 14, where it is manifest that the temple, the peculiar habitation of God, is necessarily meant. This still farther appears from 1 Kings, viii. 29, and 2 Chron. vii. 16. Moreover, we find the passover expressly called a Corban, (Numb. ix. 6, 7, 13,) and it is certain that nothing was so called hut what was brought and offered up to God at the tabernacle or temple, (see Cudw. Int. Sj/st. Discourse, &c. p. 13.) We may also add, that it is actually specified by Maimonides, as the reason why the Jews of later times cannot kill the paschal lamb, that they have no tem- ple to offer it in,1 (see Ainsw. on Exod. xii. 8.) — 2. The blood of the paschal lamb was poured out, sprinkled, and offered at the altar by the priests, in like manner as the blood of the victims usually slain in sacrifice, as appears from Exod. xxiii. 18, and xxxiv. 25; 2 Chron. xxx. 15, 16, and xxxv. 11. And in 1 Bishop Patrick in a note on Exod. xii. 21, makes the fol- lowing observation : — " I lore it may be tit to note, that the lamb being first killed in Egypt, it was killed in every man's house, for they had no altar there, nor any other place where they had liberty to kill it. Hut after they came to the land of Canaan, it was not lawful to sacrifice it any where, but in the place which God appointed for his worship, Deut. xvi. 2. From which Malmonidei concludes, that whatsoever they did with Other Sacrifices, yet this C mid not he offered in the high places, but only at the temple. And it is likely they did so in the wilderness, the tabernacle being newly erected at the keeping of the 6econd passover, Numb. ix. 5." this sprinkling of the blood consisted, as we are told by the Jewish doctors, the very essence of a sacrifice, (see Cudw. ut siq>ra, p. 10.) — 3. The fat and entrails were burnt upon the altar, as may be collected from the accounts given of the ceremony of the pass- over in the passages already referred to, as also from the declarations of the Jewish doc- tors, the description of the paschal sacrifice in the Misna of the Talmud, and the testimony of the Karraites, who are known to reject all the Talmudical traditions not founded on Scripture.- Thus, then, all the distinguishing characters of a sacrifice,1' we find to belong to the offering of the paschal lamb. It was brought to the temple as a Corban, or sacred offering to the Lord. It was slain in the courts of the temple, and the blood Mas re- ceived by the priests, and handed to the high priest, who, pouring it forth, and sprinkling it before the altar, offered it together with the fat and entrails, which were burnt upon the altar. One circumstance, indeed, has been urged, which wears the appearance of an objection, namely, that the paschal lamb was slain not by the priest, but by the person who brought it to the temple. Philo, in his Life of Moses, (p. 686,) has stated this, as distinguishing the passover from all other sacrifices, (which, by the way, clearly implies that he considers that to be a sacrifice as well as the rest ; and so, indeed, he expressly calls it, lldvOvpo; WT2IA — De Sept. ct Fest. p. 1190.) In this, how- ever, as in many other particulars of the Jewish rites, Philo is manifestly mistaken, this being by no means peculiar to the pass- over ; for that, in every kind of sacrifice, the individual that offered it might kill the sacri- fice, is evident from the instance of the burnt- offering in Levit. i. 4, 5 ; from that of the peace-offering, iii. 2 ; and from that of the sin-offering, iv. 24 ; the proper duty of the priests being only to sprinkle the blood, and to place upon the altar whatever was to be 2 See Cudw. Int. Syst. Disc. &c. pp. 12, 14, 15, 1G— See also Beatuobre'a intend, pp. 134, 135, ed. 1790; and Sykes's Essay on Sacrifices, p. 41. 3 " Pascfta nimirum erat Sacrificiton proprie dictum, Exod. xxiii. If), xxxiv. 25. Hinc Pascha &Ciassover had been to the Jcwrs. The question now arises, What was the nature of that sacrifice? The name of the in- stitution, and the circumstances of its appoint- ment, fully explain its import : the original word signifying to />ass over, not merely in the sense of change of place, but in the sense of sparing, passing without injury. Jehovah in his work of destruction having passed over, and left in safety, the houses of the Israelites, on the door-posts of which the blood of the sacrificed lamb was sprinkled, whilst he slew the first-born in all the houses of the Egyp- tians. Now, that the blood of the sacrificed lamb had any natural virtue, whereby the family, on whose door-posts it was sprinkled, might be preserved from the plague ; or that Jehovah,'' in 4 See Levit. i. 4—9 ; iii. 2—5 ; iv. 24—26. See also the Jewish doctors as quoted by Cudworth, Discourse, &c. pp. 11, 12, and Jenning's Jew. Antiq. vol. ii. p. 191. 5 Antiq. Jud. lib. iii. c. x. Josephi Opera, p. 93. A. l.xtA/.iw ovv o QiOi 'sr/.ecvcztrdoti it /ajj to cty^uqv tovto It) tm llv^oiv iyiyovu ; ov QtifCi iyot, «XA' 'on TS'^oixr^vo'd t.;v u.O.Xouo'otv 5.' oLiuacTo; tov Xsiotov yivr.trio'^oc.t ffoirr^toov ra> yivit tZv a.v9%uT&v. — Just. Mart. Thirlb. p. 374. Patrick on Exod. xti. 13, remarks that the blood was " a sign by which the Israelites were assured of safety and deliverance." And, indeed, the words of the original are, "the blood shall be to you for a token." Patrick adds frjm Epij hanius, that there passing, needed any such signal to distinguish between the Egyptians and t lie Israelites, (al- though the philosophy of Dr Priestley has not scrupled toadmit the supposition — see Tli. lt< j>. vol. i. j>. 21.5,) it cannot be necessary to contro- vert. For what purpose, then, can we conceive such a ceremony to have been instituted, hut as a sensible token of the fulfilment of the divine promise of protection and deliverance? And are we not, from the language of Scripture, fully authorized to pronounce that it was, through this, intended as a typical sign of protection from the divine justice by the blood of Christ, which, in reference to this, is called in Ileb. xii. 24, "the blood of sprinkling?" Indeed, the analogy is so forcible, that Cud- worth docs not hesitate to pronounce the slaying of the paschal lamb, in its first insti- tution, to be an expiatory sacrifice ; the blood of the lamb sprinkled upon the door-posts of the houses, being the appointed means of preservation by Jehovah's passing over. In confirmation also of the typical import of the ceremony, he notices a very extraordinary pas- sage quoted by Justin Martyr, in his dialogue with Trypho, from the ancient copies of the Bible, in which Ezra expounds, in a speech made before the celebration of the passover, the mystery of it as clearly relating to Christ, and which Justin concludes, was at a very early day expunged from the Hebrew copies by the Jews, as too manifestly favouring the cause of Christianity. The passage is too re- markable to omit. " This passover" saith Ezra to the people, " is our Saviour and refuge ;7 and it" you can feel a firm persuasion that we are about to humble and degrade him in this sign, and afterwards should place our sure trust and hope in him, then this place shall never be made desolate, saith the Lord of Hosts : but if you do not believe in him, nor listen to that which he shall announce, ye was a memorial of the transaction preserved even among the Egyp- tians themselves, though ignorant of the original of the rite. For at the Equinox, (which was the time of the passover,) they marked their cattle and their trees, and oneanuther, ix ftikruif, with red ochre, or some such thing, which they fancied would be a preservative to them. — See Patrick as above. ' K«i IrTtv E ^iya o Sio; tuv '''.i./v-'-r 'Eav hi fjt.y) Tfftff- Tivme reason to doubt its having existed in any genuine copy of the Old Testament. Grabe gives it as his opinion, that the sentence which Justin thus testifies to have stood in the ancient copies of Ezra, is rather to be con- sidered as having crept in from a marginal addition by some early Christian, than as having been expunged from the later copies by Jewish fraud. See also Wolf. BM.Hebr. vol. ii. p. 85. 82 M I GEE ON THR ATONEMENT. shall be a derision to all nation-." (Cudw. Int. Syrt. Disc p. 1G.) L'Enfant thinks the : words of St Paul, 1 Cor. v. 7, are a direct allusion to the first sentence of the passage here cited— see Doddridge on 1 Cor. v. 7. All ix in his Judgment of the Jew. dt- p. 333, says, thai when .Jnlm t lie Baptist speaks of " the Lamb, which takes away the sins of the world," the t\ peof the Paschal lamb is alluded to : and that this appears the more clearly from two things taught amongst the Jews : — 1. That the Shechinah delivered Israel out of Egypt : 2. That the Shechinah was typified by the Paschal Iamb. But, in proof that the \ Paschal lamb was a type of Christ, it is not necessary to resort to Jewish traditions. Scripture supplies the most decisive testimo- nies on the point. Saint John, and Saint Paul, both directly assert it, (Job. xix. 3G, 1 Cor. v. 7 ;) and our Lord himself seems to affirm it in his institution of the Eucharist at the last supper, (Matt. xxvi.2G.) But whoever wishes to sec this point fully examined, may consult Wits. (Econ. Feed, do Paschate ; or the selec- tion from that work in Jenning's Jew. Ant. vol. ii. pp. 201 — 208; or a yet more brief, and perhaps not less satisfactory review of the subject, in Beausob. & L'Enfant's Introd. pp. 138—138. I)r Priestley's mode of evading the force of the passage in 1 Cor. v. 7, as a proof that the death of Christ was a sacrifice, has Deen stated in the beginning of this Num- ber. I shall conclude it by noticing a different mode, adopted by a celebrated fellow-labourer of his in the work of refining away the fair and natural meaning of Scripture language, Dr Sykes. In the words "Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us," a plain unbiassed under- standing would find it difficult not to discover that the Passover is affirmed to be a sacrifice ; and that, in some corresponding sense, Christ is said to be sacrificed for us. Dr Priestley, as we have seen, avoids the latter position, by a direct denial of the former. Dr Sykes, on the other hand, admits the former, and yet peremptorily rejects the latter. Now though Dr Priestley's assertion, that the Passover is not here pronounced to be a sacrifice, may appear sufficiently bold ; yet the position, that it i- called a sacrifice, ami that Christ is not in the same sentence said to be sacrificed, seems a flight of criticism Still more worthy of our admiration. On what ground an exposition so extraordinary is founded, it is natural to inquire. Christ, we are told, is called our Passover, inasmuch as by his means our sins are passed over, just a- by means of the Paschal lamb the children of Israel were passed over in Egypt. So far is well. But how is he said to lie sacrificed for as? — why, by not being sacrificed at all ; but, by being compared to the Paschal lamb, which was a sacrifice ! Here is true logic, and rational criticism. If the reader should doubt this to be a Fair represen- tation ofDrSykes's argument, I refer him to the learned Doctor himself, Scripture Doctrine of Redemption, No. G-10, p. 220. In justification of what has been advanced in the preceding Number (p. 81) on the signification of the word HDH)) I subjoin the following observations. This Hebrew word, which we translate Passover, was rendered by almost all the early interpreters, in the sense which the English word implies; namely passing over. Josephus, who calls it Tztkaxoi, and sometimes pacta, ex- pressly affirms, that the Hebrew word signifies vTTsptccaix, or "passing over;" in commemo- ration of Cod's having " passed over" (vTVipZxg) the Hebrews, when he smote the Egyptians with his plague, (Antiq. p. G5.) Philo, in two distinct parts of his works, explains the word by the term oid^xai;. which he uses unequivo- cally in the sense of passing over, i. e. from place to place, {Opera, pp. 392, 439.) And, again, in p. 686, he employs the term to. dixQxTvoix, the " passings over," or from place to place. Aquila in his version renders the word by V7rip^ctatc, "a passing over," using nearly the same term with Josephus. And Jerome adopts the word transitus, as the just equivalent of the Hebrew. Thus far there appears a perfect agreement amongst the ancient versions ; affording at tin' same time a full justification of the phrase by which we render the Hebrew term in our common English Bibles. Some commentators, however, ami those of no mean note, for ex- ample, Vitringa, Lowth, Dathe, and Rosen- miiller, have raised doubts as to the propriety of the sense conveyed by the word passoccr, in explication of the original term hV2- The difficulties that weigh with the two latter are, however, of a nature, to which 1 cannot help thinking these critics have attached an im- portance beyond what is justly due. That the Arabic language does not ascribe the sense of transito to the word, seems by no means a proof that it cannot admit that meaning, as these authors contend, (Dath. and Roseiim. on Exod. xii. 11, and Dathe more fully, in Glass. Phil. San: pp. 968, 969.) Objections drawn from the kindred dialects ought to be admitted, only in the case of such words as are in themselves of a doubtful signification, receiving no illustration either from correspon- ding passages, or from early versions. Very different is the case of the term in question. Not only, as we have seen, do some of the earliest and most competent translators attri- bute to it the sense already stated, but several passages of Scripture justify that sense by a corresponding use of the verb from which the word is derived. This will appear by con- No. 35.— MEANING OF THE WORD TRANSLATED PASSOVER. 83 sideling the several verses of the twelfth chapter of Exodus, in which the institution of the Passover is proscribed, and the reason of its designation by that term expressly assigned. The communication is first made to Moses by Jehovah. — 11. " It is the Lord's Passover, (nOS) 12. For I will pass (TTOyO through the land of Egypt this night, and will smite all the first born in the laud of Egypt. 13. And the blood shall be to you for a token upon the houses where you are : and when I see the blood, I will/>ass over you, (TTIDQT D3"W) and the plague shall not be upon you for destruction, whilst I smite the land of Egypt." Again, in verse 23, this communi- cation of Jehovah is conveyed by Moses to the elders of the people in the following words : " For the Lord will pass ("Q^l) through, to smite the Egyptians, and when he seeth the blood, &e. the Lord will pass over the door (rmsn by tTfV nDSl) and will not suffer the destruction (or destroying plague) to come into your houses to smite you." And, lastly, in the 27th verse, when Moses instructs them as to the manner in which they are to explain the rite to their descendants, he tells them that they shall say, " It is the sacrifice of the Lord's passover (FTDD PQT) v>ho passed (HUB) over the houses of the children of Israel in Egypt, when he smote the Egyptians and delivered our houses." Now, it is evident, that if the verb HD3 has been rightly interpreted throughout these passages, the noun derived from it has been rightly explained. Let us, then, here consult the versions. The Septuagint, which uses the Hebrew term throughout for the noun, (viz. zsdaxec — and so through the Pentateuch, but in Chron. QxaiK,) employs different words in rendering the verb. In verse 23, it renders by tsctpe>.evf tin- trarb which he had fixed upon this part of Holy Writ. It is curious enough to trace the origin of the ridiculous epithet skip-offering, which has been adopted by this translator, in the writings of one of the most elegant and classical of our Hebrew critics, the celebrated Bishop Lowth ; who expressly describes "the common notion of God's passing over the houses of the Israe- lites to be, that seeing the blood, he passed over, or skipped those houses," &c. This last named critic, following the steps of Vitringa, has in a note upon Isaiah xxxi. 5, given an explanation of the term 17D3> with which the signification of the English word Pass-over is totally at variance. Both he and Vitringa admit the primary sense of the verb to be that of springing forward, or leaping for- ward, with rapidity, as it has been before explained ; and seem to have altogether adopted the exposition of the word which we have quoted from Fagius. But the notion entertained by these distinguished critics, that two agents were concerned in the preservation of the Israelites on the night of the passover, has led them to assign to the word, as applied in Exodus, the signification of covering, i. e. " protecting by covering," as Vitringa, or " springing forward to cover and protect," a- Lowth. " Here are manifestly," says the Bishop, "two distinct agents, with which the notion of passing over is not consistent ; for that supposes but one agent. The two agents are the destroying angel passing through to smite every house ; and Jehovah the pro- tector, keeping pace with him ; and who, seeing the door of the Israelite marked with the blood, the token prescribed, leaps forward, throws himself with a sudden motion in the way, opposes the destroying angel, and covers and protects that house against the destroying angel, nor suffers him to smite it." Here is, undoubtedly, an imposing picture of the transaction, presented to the imagina- tion of the reader ; but certainly without any foundation, save what exists in the fancy of the writer. An inaccurate translation, in- deed, of the 23d verse seems to afford some colour to this view of the transaction ; N7"), ^b D2?rD"?tt an? jrnwan tjt being rendered in our common version, "And will not suffer the destroyer to come into your houses to smite you." Rosenmuller attributes this wrong translation to the Septuagint. — " LXX verterunt 6 ohoOpwav, Becuti Judseorum opinionem, tribueutium angelo cuidam, fati ministro, fulgura, pestem, et similia homini- bus futalia : quod comnientuni etmulti Chris- tian! interpretes repetierunt. Sed nil tale in textu." Sehol. in Exod. xii. 23. Rosenmuller is undoubtedly right in asserting, that there is nothing whatever in the text to justify the idea of a second agent. Whoever reads over the entire chapter with any degree of care, will see, that the Jehovah, who prescribes the rite, is himself the agent throughout, without the least intimation of any other being concerned. For, as to the verse above referred to, its true translation, which I have given in a former part of this discussion, re- moves at once every semblance of support which it could be supposed to afford to the contrary opinion : the word JTlTiO, (the same which is used in the 13th verse as well as in the 23d,) signifying perditio, vas- tatio, corruptio, exterminatio, (as see Pol. Syn. also Vatabl. on Exod. xii. 13,) and the fynwd? *\X1 of the 13th verse, signifying exactly the same as the ep^ JTTNtfD of the 23d, i. e. in both places, tlie destroying plague. Besides, it must be remarked, that the ex- pression suffer in the 23d verse, which seems to imply a distinct agent who would enter the house of the Israelite if not prevented, has no authority from the original ; the strict translation being "he will not yire," or " cause," (|JT N7~) ; the word ]j""0 never being used in the sense of permitting, without the 7 marking the dative case of that to which the permission was granted : but the word JYIT^D not only wants the sign of the dative here, but has actually that of the accusative (/IK) in MS. (19. of Kennicott's. It appears, then, upon the whole, that the fancy of a twofold agent, indulged in by Vitringa, Lowth, and some other commen- tators, derives no support whatever from the text of Exodus : and, therefore, the objections, which that fancy alone suggested in opposition to the explanation which has been given of the word J"TD3, fall to the ground ; whilst the admissions of those writers, as to the primary acceptation of the word, must be allowed to stand in confirmation of those very conclusions which they were desirous to overturn. The passage in Isaiah, indeed, which they were engaged in elucidating, in some degree naturally led them to the view of the subject which we have just noticed. The prophet having there described Jehovah as protecting Jerusalem, in like manner as mother birds protect by hovering over their young ; and this being impossible to be conveyed by a term which merely implied passing orer, and which, so far from indicating an overshadow- ing protection, on the contrary necessarily induced an exposure of the defenceless young, and this only the more sudden the more rapid was the transition ; the commentators deemed it indispensable to extend the mean- ing of the word fTDD (here employed ) beyond the latter sense, and to give to it such a sig- No. 35.— MEANING OF THE WORD TRANSLATED PASSOVER. 85 uification as would admit the former ; and perceiving a strong similarity between the application of the term here, and to the deli- verance in Egypt, they endeavoured to explain it in such a sense as would embrace both transactions ; and were, accordingly, led to thai interpretation of the term, which required the twofold agency of which we have Bpoken. Hut, why recur upon every occasion to the primary sense of a word? Are there not in every language numerous words, in which the derivative becomes the prevalent and appropriate sense? And, if we suppose the deliverance from Egypt to have been alluded to by the prophet, (which, as well from the general similitude of subject, as particularly From the use of the terms J1D3 and TSPf which are conjointly used in speaking of the passover and its effe'et in Exod. xii. 27, seems scarcely to admit of doubt,) what could be more fit than to adopt that form of expression, which, from its familiar association with the deliverance from Egyptian bondage, had long been employed to designate that deliverance, without any reference whatever to its primary acceptation ? In other words, was it not most natural, that any providential preservation or deliverance of the Jewish people should be called by the word Pesach, the term used to denominate that recorded act whereby the first great preservation and deliverance of Israel was effected? Might not, then, the prophet have properly and beautifully em- ployed the word IIDD, in the passage referred to, in the sense of God's acting again as a protector and deliverer of his people, in like manner as he had done at the time of the nD3 ? This gives new beauty to the original passage, and relieves the comparison between its subject and the deliverance in Egypt from all embarrassment ; whilst it retains all that attractive imagery, with which the prophet embellishes the original idea. The passage would then stand thus : — As the mother-birds hovering over their young ; So shall Jehovah, God of hosts, protect Jerusalem, Protecting and delivering, preserving (as by a second Passover) and rescuing her. Bishop Stock, in his translation, has much disfigured the beauty of this passage ; neither displaying taste in the expression, nor judg- ment in the criticism : — Birds protecting the winged race, being neither elegant nor quite intelligible : and hopping round and over, which is rather an odd signification of the word rPD3. being a still odder reason for translating the word by flying round. Some have charged the Greeks with cor- rupting the original word I7DD Pesach, by writing it -zxax* ; and have seemed to intimate that the word was so used by them as if it were derived from ■za.vxu potior, intimating the sufferings of our Lord, of which the slaying of the passover was a type. That such an allusion may have sometimes been made, as might afford sonic apparent justification to the charge, there seems reason to admit. (See Glass. Phil. Sacr. i. 692, also Greg. Naz. Scrm. de Pasch. and Wolf. Cur. Phil. i. 3G5.) Yet, the fact is, that the 7703 of the Hebrew is written SFTD3 Pascha in the Chaldee, from which the sa^a of the Greek has immediately flowed. On the subject of the word Passover, I shall only add the following enumeration of its various applications : — 1. It signifies the passing over of Jehovah, who spared the Israelites when he smote the first-born of the Egyptians. 2. It signifies, by a metonymy, the lamb slain in memory of that deliverance. 3. It signifies the feast-day on which the paschal lamb was slain — viz. the 14th of the first month. 4. and lastly, It signifies the entire continuance and the whole employment of the festival, which commenced with the slaying of the lamb, and continued for seven days. No. XXXVI. — Page 15. Col. 1. on the meaning of the word translated " atonement" in the old testament. The meaning of the word 13D, the original of the term atonement in the Old Testament, has been modelled, like that of other Scripture phrases, so as to fall in with the theories of those, who are more anxious that Scripture should speak their language, than that they should speak the language of Scripture. The common artifice, by which the terms of Revelation have been discharged of all appro- priate meaning, has been here employed with considerable effect. By a comparison of the various passages in which the term occurs, its most general signification is first explored ; and in this generic sense it is afterwards ex- plained, in all the particular cases of its appli- cation. The manner in which Or Taylor has exercised this strange species of criticism on the word atonement, in his Scripture Doctrine, has been already noticed, pp. 50, 51. One or two additional remarks will more fully explain the contrivance, by which this writer has been enabled to shape this expression to his purpose. Having laid it down as a principle, "that those passages in the Levitical law, in which atonement is said to be made for persons by sacrifice, supply not so many different in- stances of a known sense of the word atone- ment, but are to be considered as exhibiting one single instance of a sense which is doubt- ful," (Scripture Doctrine, ch. iv. § 69,) he pro- nounces, (ch. v. § 70,) that " the texts which are to be examined, are those, where the word 80 MAGEE O N THE ATONEME N T. is used extra-levitically, or with no relation to sacrifices ; that we may be able tu judge what it imports when applied tu them." And agreeably to these notions he conducts his inquiry. Now, what is this, but to pro- nounce first upon the nature of the tiling unknown, and then to engage in its investi- gation ? The meaning of the term, in the several instances of its Levitical application, though as yet supposed unknown, is presumed to be the same in all : and this, notwithstand- ing that these cases of its application must be as different as its objects, — persons, and things; moral and ceremonial disqualifications. But, not content with thus deciding on the uniformity of an unknown signification, he proceeds to discover the meaning of the term in those passages which relate to sacrifice, by examining it in others in which it has no such relation. The result of this singularly critical examination is, that from thirty-seven texts, which treat of extra-levitical atonements, it may be inferred " that the means of making atonement for sin in different cases are widely different ; being sometimes by the sole good- ness of < rod, sometimes by the prayers of good men, sometimes by repentance, sometimes by disciplinary visitation, sometimes by signal acts of justice and virtue : and that any mean, whereby sinners are reformed, and the judgments of God averted, is atoning, or making atonement, for their sins." (Cap. 6, § 112.) What then follows respecting the Levitical atonement? Not, that the word, which, when used extra-levitically, is taken in various senses, according to the natural efficacy of the different means employed, is to be applied in its Levitical designation in a sense yet different from these, agreeably to the difference of means introduced by the Levitical institutions : quite the contrary. Winn specifically restricted to an appropriate purpose, it ceases to have any distinguishing character ; and the term, whose signification, when it had no relation to sacrifice, was diversified with the nature of the means and the circumstances of the occasion, is, upon assuming this new relation, pronounced in- capable of any new and characteristic meaning. This argument furnishes a striking instance of that species of sophism, which, from a partial, concludes a total agreement. Having discovered, by a review of those passages which treat of extra-levitical atonements, that these and the sacrifices which were offered for sin agreed in their effect ; namely, in pro- curing the pardon of sin, or the removal of those calamities which had been inflicted as the punishment of it ; the writer at once pronounces the extra-levilical and the sacri- ficial atonement; to have been of the same nature throughout ; without regarding the utter dissimilarity of the means employed, and without considering that the very ques- tion as to the nature of the atonement, is a question involving the means through which it was effected. But, whilst Dr Taylor has thus endeavoured to overturn the generally received notion of atonement, by an examination of such pas- sages as treat of those atonements which were not sacrificial, Dr Priestley professes to have carefully reviewed all those instances of atone- ment which were sacrificial ; and from this review to have deduced the inference, that the sacrificial atonement merely implies, "the making of any thing clean or holy, so as to be fit to be used in the service of God ; or, when applied to a person, fit to come into the presence of God : God being considered as, in a peculiar manner, the king and the sovereign of the Israelitish nation, and, as it were, keeping a court amongst them." (Hist, of Cor. vol. i. p. 193.) Dr Priestley, by this representation of the matter, endeavours to remove from view whatever might lead the mind to the idea of propitiating the Deity ; and, by taking care to place the condition of persons and things on the same ground, he utterly discards the notion of offence and reconciliation. But, in order to effect this, he has been obliged wholly to overlook the force of the original word, which is translated atonement, as well as of that which the LXX have used as its equivalent. The term ^D3, in its primary sense, signifies to smear, or cover with pitch, as appears from Gen. vi. 14.: and from this covering with pitch, it has been metaphorically transferred to things of a different nature ; insomuch that, in all the thirty-seven instances of extra-levi- tical atonement adduced by Dr Taylor, he asserts that the word ~)33 retains something of this original sense (Script. Doct. ch. vi. § 115 ;) and, agreeably to this, he pronounces " atone- ment for sin to be the covering of sin." This position seems fully confirmed by Nehem. iv. 45, Psal. xxxii. 1, lxxxv. 2, and other pas- sages in Scripture ; in which the pardon of sin is expressed by its being covered, and the punishment of it by its not being covered. And Schindler, in his Lexicon Pentaglotton, having in like manner fixed the general sig- nification of the word to be tcxit, opera it, modifies this generic signification according to the change of subject, thus: — de facie, scu ira, placarit, rcconciliavit ; de peccato, remisit, condonavit, expiavit ; de sordibus, expurgavit ; de aliis, abstulit, removit. Agreeably to this explanation of the word, in which Hebrew critics almost universally concur, the LXX render it by i^xocofixi, to appease, or make propitious, and the ancient Latin by exorare, and sometimes depreeari: (see Sabatier's Vet. Ltal.) the concealing, and removing from view, whatever is offensive and displeasing to a person, being necessary to reconcile him and render him propitious. No. 36.— MEANING OF ATONEMENT IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. s? And, indeed, in :i sense agreeable to this, that of bringing into a state of concord and recon- ciliation, the word atonement itself had been originally used by our old English writers; with whom, according to Junius, Skinner, and Johnson, it was written at-onc-ment, sig- nifying to be at one, or to come to an agreement : and in this very sense we find it used by our own translators, in Levit. xvi. 1(5, 20, where, speaking of the act whereby the High Priest was directed to make atonement for the holy place, they immediately after call it reconciling the holy place. But Dr Priestley has not only neglected the original and strict signification of the term implying sacrificial atonement, and imposed upon it a sense which at best is but secondary and remote ; he has also decided on a partial and hasty view of the subject, even as con- fined to the English translation : for, surely, although it be in every case of atonement evidently implied, that the thing or person atoned for was thereby cleansed, and so ren- dered fit for the service of God ; it must likewise be admitted, that by this they were rendered pleasing to God, having been before in a state impure and unfit for his service, and being now rendered objects of his appro- bation and acceptance as fit instruments of his worship. The fallacy of Dr Priestley's interpretation consists in this, that he assumes that to be the soleend of the atonement, which, although an undoubted consequence from it, was inseparably connected with, and subser- vient to, another and more important effect : the atonement indeed purifying, so as to qualify for the service and worship of God ; but this purification consisting in the removal of that, which unfitted and disqualified for such sacred purposes ; bringing what before was undeserving the divine regard into a state of agreement with the divine purity, and ren- dering it the object of the divine approbation. To make atonement, then, to God, was to remove what was offensive ; and thus, by conciliating the divine favour, to sanctify for the divine service. This general meaning of the expression, modified by the circumstance of its applica- tion, will lead us to its true value and force in each particular instance. Thus, in the atonements at the consecration of the taber- nacle, altars, vessels, and priests, the several instruments and persons destined for the offices of worship, being in their natural state un- worthy of this sacred use, were thereby puri- fied from all natural pollution, and rendered fit objects of the divine acceptance. The same may be applied to those atonements appointed for restoring persons to the privileges of public worship, who had been disqualified by cir- cumstances of external impurity; such as were occasioned by natural infirmities, diseases, and accidental events. But whilst in these cases, in which moral character could have no con- cern, the purifying rite of atonement was enjoined, to render both things and persons worthy and approved instruments of the divine worship ; so in those where moral character was concerned, the atonement made by the sacrifice for sin qualified the transgressor for the divine service, by removing what had been offensive from the sight of him " who is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity ;" the repentance of the offender, aided by the pious observance of the enjoined rite, averting the divine displeasure, and effecting a reconci- liation with his offended sovereign : whilst those who were guilty of a presumptuous and deliberate defiance of the divine authority were cut off from all connection with their God, and no atonement whatever allowed for their transgressions. Episcopius seems to state the case satisfactorily — " Sacrificia pro peccato, ea erant quae offerebantur ad impuri- tates expiandas, sive ess essent morales, sive physicfB aut potius cercmoniales. Morales impuritates voco, istas qua; animorum sunt : id est, quae culpam aliquam ex anima? sive ignorantia, sive errore, sive imbecillitate ortam in se habent : impuritates enim, qave per superbiam, &c. contrahebantur, sacrificiis ex- piari non poterant. Physicas sive ceremoniales impuritates voco, fajditates, sive maculas illas corporis, quae nulla culpa hominis coutrahi possunt ; quales sunt qua; ex leprosi, mortui contractu," ike. — Inst. Theol. lib. III. sect. II. cap. iii. vol. i. p. 71. This view of the matter seems to give to the whole of the Levitical atonement a consistent and satisfactory meaning. The atonement, in all cases, producing the effect of fitting for the divine service : — this, in such as involved no consideration of moral character, (as in the consecration of inanimate things, or the atone- ment for persons labouring under corporeal impurities,) could consist only in the removal of the external impurity, for in such cases this impediment alone existed : whilst in those in which moral character was concerned, as in cases of sin, whereby man, having nicurred the displeasure of his God, had disqualified himself for the offices of his worship, the un- fitness could have been removed only by such means as, at the same time, removed that displeasure, and restored the offender to the divine favour : — or, in other words, the atone- ment was in such cases an act of propitiation. And to such cases it is, that it may be applied in the strict sense of the word reconciliation ; so that the doctrine of .atonement, so far as relates to sin, is nothing more than the doctrine of reconciliation. As to the manner in which the sacrifice for sin may be supposed to have operated to tho effecting of this reconciliation, this is of no concern to the present inquiry. That a re- conciliation was thereby effected, insomuch So MAGEE 0 N T II E A T O N E M E X T. that the penalty of the transgression was remitted, ami the offender restored to the privileges which he had forfeited by his offence, is abundantly manifest. The instances in Scripture, in which the effect of the atone- men1 is expressly described as the removal of the divine displeasure, are too numerous to bo recited. Let a few suffice. — In Exod. xxxii. 30, 32, Moses, addressing the Israelites after the gnat crime which they had committed in worshipping the golden calf, says, " Ye have sinned a great sin ;" and " now I will go up unto the Lord ; peradventure I shall make an atonement for your sin :" and these words he immediately after explains, by his prayer to God, that he might forgive their sin. Again, we find a stop put to an infliction of punish- ment, by the atonement made by Aaron for the people in the rebellion of Korah. " And Mioses said, take a censer; and go quickly unto the congregation, and make an atone- ment for them ; for there is wrath gone out from the Lord ; the plague is begun : and Aaron took as Moses commanded him ; and made an atonement for the people — and the plague was stayed," Numb. xvi. 4G, 47, 48. The atonement made by Phinehas, and the effect of it, are not less remarkable : God says of him, he " hath turned my wrath away from the children of Israel, (while he was zealous for my sake among them,) that I consumed not the children of Israel in my jealousy — he was zealous for his God, and made an atonement for the children of Israel," Numb. xxv. II, 1,1, The instances of atonement here adduced, are not, indeed, of the sacrificial kind ; but they equally serve to evince the Scripture sense of the term, in cases of transgression, to be that of reconciling the offended Deity, by averting his displeasure : so that, when the atonement for sin is said to be made by sacri- fice, no doubt can remain, that the sacrifice was strictly a sacrifice of propitiation. Agree- ably to this conclusion, we find it expressly declared, in the several cases of piacular obla- tions for transgression of the divine commands, that the sin, for which atonement was made by those oblations, should be forgiven.1 Dr Priestley and II. Taylor have of late endeayoured to subvert this notion, by repre- senting sacrifices merely as gifts, and atone- ment as nothing but a ceremonial purifying and Betting apart from common use, for the divine service, without any idea whatever of propitiation : see Theol. licpos. vol. i. p. 199 205, andB. Mord. p. 788 — 805. How far this theory is invalidated by the observations contained in the present Number, it remains for the reader to judge. 1 shall only add, that Dr Sykes, whose authority both these writers 1 Sec Lcvit. iv. 20, 20, 31, :t-_. ; v. In, l.i, 16, 18 ; vi. 7 ; xix. 22. Numlj. xv. 25, 26, -'■'!. Consult also llallet's boles and Dis- courses, vol. ii. p. -7" — 274. are in general very willing to acknowledge, does not hesitate to pronounce the sacrificial meaning of the word J~T)33 atonement, to contain the notion of propitiation ; deriving it, as has been here done, from the original signification of the word "133, to cover,— that is, " to remove or take away anger or offence, by so covering it that it may Hot appear," (Essay on Sacrifices, pp. 152, 158, 159 ;) and " to make atonement for sins," he says, " is to do something by the means of which a man obtains pardon of them," (p. 800.) How strongly the propitiatory import of the sacrificial atonement, contended for in this note, was attributed to it by modern Jews, has been already amply detailed in Number XXXIII. In Dr Laurence's Sermon on the Metaphorical Character of the Apostolical Stj/le, (pp. 17, 82,) there are some good observations on the Targum of Jonathan, tending to con- firm the position, that the ideas of atonement, and of forgiveness, were held by the Jews in the time of our Saviour, as perfectly equivalent. No. XXXVII.— Page 15. Col. 1. OX THE EFFICACY OF IHE MOSAIC ATOXEMENT AS AITLIED TO CASES OF MORAL TRANSGRESSION. For the purpose of reducing the sacrificial atonement to the simple notion of external purification, it has been thought necessary to deny the appointment of any expiation for the transgressor of the moral law. It has been argued, that those sins and iniquities, for which it is in several instances expressly said that forgiveness was procured by the atone- ment, " do not, in the language of the Old Testament, necessarily imply a deviation from moral rectitude, or a transgression of the moral law ; but are frequently used, when nothing more can be underst 1, than a privation of that bodily purity, which the ceremonial law required; as we read of the iniquity of the sanctuary, (Numb, xviii. 1,) and of the ini- quity of the holy things, (Exod. xxviii. 88 ;) and as we find the ashes of the burnt heifer, though applied only for the purification of external uncleanness, expressly called ' tho ashes of the burnt heifer of purification for sin,' (Numb. xix. 7;) and, in like manner, the oblation required from him who had re- covered from a leprosy, a sin-oflering ; the unclean person, though free from Maine in a moral point of view, yet in the eye of the law being deemed a sinner." These observations, it is but fair to confess, are to be found in the pages of one of the ablest advocates of the doctrine of atonement. It is also urged that the sins for which atonements were appointed, were, at most, but, sins of ignorance, to which scarcely any moral character could attach, and No. 37.— ON THE EFFICACY OF THE MOSAIC ATONEMENT, &c. 89 which deserved to be ranked in the same class with mere natural or accidental infirmities. This latter point is largely insisted on by writers who oppose the received doctrine of atonement ; and it is particularly enforced by a writer in Theol. Rep. vol. iii. who signs himself Eusebius, and who professes to enter fully into an examination of the several cases of atonement recorded in the Old Testament. In reply to the first of these arguments, let it be remarked, 1. That the expressions so much relied on, "iniquity of the holy things, iniquity of the sanctuary," mean merely the profanation, or improper use of the holy things, &c. ; so that the iniquity here refers to the persons making this improper use of the holy things, not to the things themselves : and thus the entire objection, derived from the use of this expression, falls to the ground. This appears, as well from the force of the term in the original, which is translated, iniquity ; as from the context of the passages referred to. The Hebrew word y\y being derived from n^,the strict signification of which is, to turn, or to be turned, aside from the proper state or destination, applies with peculiar propriety to the improper, or profane use of the holy things of the sanctuary. And this sense is supported by the passages in which the ex- pression occurs ; the Priests " bearing the iniquity of the Sanctuary," (Numb, xviii. ],) and Aaron " bearing the iniquity of the holy things," (Ex. xxviii. 38,) manifestly relating, and being understood by every commentator to relate, to the care to be taken that no improper use or legal defilement should pro- fane the sacred things ; inasmuch as, in such case, it would rest with Aaron, and with the priests, to bear the punishment of, or make atonement for, such profanation. Thus Jarchi I on Numb, xviii. 1. " Upon you I will bring i the punishment of the strangers, that shall sin | concerning the sanctified things that are deli- vered unto you." Houbigant translates the words in Numb, sustinebit sanctuarii noxas ; i. e. as he explains it, reus erit delicti in sanc- tuarium admissi, — and in Exodus, suscipiet maculas donorum. — See also Ainsworth, Pat- rick, Calmet, Le Clerc, Dathius, and, in short, all the commentators, who concur in this interpretation ; and in like manner explain the passage in Exodus : see likewise Levit. xvi. 16 — 19. But as the word iniquity thus applied to the sacred things, will not prove, that by sin, in the Levitical law, nothing more was in- tended than external defilement ; so neither will, 2. The application of the terms sin and sin-offering to persons labouring under mere corporeal impurities. Respecting the case of the burnt heifer, in which, though intended solely for the purification of external unclean- ness, the ashes are expressly called " the ashes of the burnt heifer of purification for sin," it must be noted, that the argument here is chiefly derived from the words of the transla- tion, without attending sufficiently to the original ; the words in the Hebrew signifying literally, "the ashes of the burnt sin-offering."1 Purification for sin, then, is not the language of the original ; and from this, consequently, nothing can be inferred. But, even admitting that the corporeal impurities arising from leprosy, puerpery, contact of the dead, and other such causes, are spoken of as sins com- mitted by the persons labouring under them, in like manner as the direct and voluntary transgressions of the divine commands ; ad- mitting that it is pronounced of the former, equally as of the latter, that, in virtue of the atonement, the sin which had been committed was forgiven them ; admitting that the sin- offering, on these occasions, looked solely to the uncleanness, without having any respect to the general sinfulness and unworthiness of the person seeking to be restored to the privi- leges of the public worship of God ; and admitting that, in looking to the particular instance of uncleanness, it could not have been intended (as the later Jews explain it, see p. 72,2) through that, to have referred to that original guilt incurring the penalty of death, from which this and the other infir- mities of man's nature had taken their rise ; or to some specific crime, by which these bodily inflictions had been incurred:3 — admitting, I say, all these things, (which however it would be extremely difficult to prove,) and, consequently, admitting that the terms, sin, and sin-offering, as applied to these, could merely signify external uncleanness, and the appointed means of removing it ; yet can this furnish no inference Avhatever affecting those cases, in which the disqualification to be removed by the sin-offering is expressly stated to be, not that of external uncleanness, but resulting from a transgression of the divine commands. This, however it may be called a legal offence, cannot be thereby divested of its intrinsic nature, but must still inevitably remain a moral transgression. And when atonement is said to be made for sins com- mitted against any of the commandments of the Lord, it must surely be a strange species or interpretation that can confound such sins with mere external pollution, and the forgive- ness granted to such offences with the mere cleansing from an accidental impurity. It will appear yet more strange, when we come to notice, under the next head, some specific violations of the moral law, for which atone- ments were appointed. 1 See Ainsworth, Patrick, and Dathe, on Numb. xix. 1/ also Itichie's Pecul. Doctr. vol. i. p 212. 2 See also Ainsworth, on Numb. xix. 16; Lev. xii. ?•> ar.d xiv. 32. 34. 49. ; and Jennings' Jew. Antiq. vol. i. p. 322. 3 See Episcopius, de lepra, Inst. Theol. L. III. sect. ii. cap. 3. § 33. — also p. 72 of this volume. 90 MAGEE ON THE ATONE M E N T. But it is contended, that those transgres- sions of the divine commands, for which atonements were appointed, were merely sins of ignorance ; to which, as the writer in the Theol. Rep. pronounces, scarcely any moral character could attach ; and which, therefore, might justly be ranked in the same class with the former cases of accidental defilement. As this argument has been a good deal relied on, it becomes necessary to consider, more par- ticularly, the nature of those transgressions for which atonements were appointed, and the force of that expression in the original, which has been usually understood as implying sins of ignorance. And 1. it must certainly be admitted, that sins of ignorance, in the direct sense of the word, are intended by the expression, since we find it expressly stated in some places that they wist it not ; and, again, that the sins were done without their knowledge, and were hidden from them, and had come to their knowledge after they were committed. (Lev. iv. 13, 14. 23. 28 ; v. 2, 3. 17, 18 ; Numb. xv. 24.) Yet, even here, the ignorance intended cannot have been of a nature absolute and invincible, but such as the clear promulgation of their law, and their strict obligation to study it day and night, rendered them accoun- table for, and which was consequently in a certain degree culpable. Thus Houbigant, on Lev. iv. 2. Nos per imprndentiam, ut multi alii per crrorem ; melius quam Vulgatus, per ignorantiam. Nam leges per Mosen promul- gatas, et srcpe iteratas, ignorare Israel itse non poterant. This is also agreeable to the general language of Scripture ; in which, crimes said to be committed by persons, x.xtoc oiyvoiotv, in iijnorance, are nevertheless represented strictly as crimes, inasmuch as that ignorance might have been removed by a careful and candid search after their duty ; and thus, being volun- tary, their ignorance itself was criminal. See Acts, iii. 17, where the Jews who crucified Christ are said to have acted xoltol olyvoiotv. Saint Paul also ascribes the enormous wicked- ness of the Heathen world to "the ignorance that was in them," Eph. iv. 18. And their vicious desires, Saint Peter calls, iv tyj oLyvola. iiriOuftieus, "lusts in ignorance," 1 Pet. i. 14.4 Thus, then, even though the expression in the original were confined to sins of ignorance, yet would it not follow, that it meant such acts as were incapable of all moral character, and might be classed with mere corporeal infirmities, to which the notion of punishment could not possibly attach. But that the ex- pression, besides sins of ignorance, includes likewise all sucli as were the consequence of human frailty ami inconsideration, whether committed knowingly and wilfully, or other- wise, will appear from considering the true * See also Acts, xvii. .'X»; liom. x. 3 ; ] Tim. i. 1.1. and numerous other passages of tlic New Testament. force of the original term 173.3^, or rT2)!£'0, which, together with its root ^iy, n.1t£% or SOW, is found, in numerous passages of Scrip- ture, to signify the species of offence here described, in opposition to that which involves a deliberate and presumptuous contempt of God's authority. Coeceius thus explains it — "Si, putantes licitum, fecerint illicitum, igno- rantia verbi : aut, si prseoccupatus egerit, quod novit esse illicitum." The word, he says, as it occurs in Numb. xv. 22. 24 — 28, is directly opposed to ITD"! T3' i'1 verse 30, sinning " with a high hand," that is, deliberately and presumptuously. He also explains it, as im- plying a full and entire engrossment of mind and affection, producing a temporary oblivion of what is right : which is nothing more than the common effect of any passion which has taken strong hold of the mind. For this he instances Isa. xxviii. 7. In like manner Dr Taylor, in his Concordance, understands the word — " 33t£N t° err» f° do what is wrong, through ignorance, mistake, bad advice, or persuasion — or through the violence of some strung passion or affection." Dr Richie also, {Pecul. Doct. vol. i. pp. 226, 227,) adduces a great number of passages to prove, that the word in question " denotes any sin, which doth not proceed from a deliberate contempt of authority, but from human frailty or infir- mity only." See also Hammond, Le Clerc, and RosenmiUler, in Heb. ix. 7. — where they supply numerous instances to prove, that both dyvoih, and n.V#, are used in the sense here given, as extending to all sins that were not of the class of presumptuous, or such as by the law were necessarily to be punished with death. Rosenmiiller adds, that for every sin, except those to which death was annexed, atonement was made on the day of expiation. Now it is remarkable, that, for the sins atoned for on that day, the very word which is used by the Apostle in his Epistle to the Hebrews, (ix. 7,) is dyvor,pxTct.5 But, in fact, the 5 Schleusncr in his Spicikg. Lexic in Int. Grtrc. V. T. p. 3, thus explains the words ocyyoiaj and a.yvoy,y.x. '* 'Ayvoia* not&t Bimpliciter pecco, sine adjnnctfi notione ignorantia?. Erravit Hiclius, qui Z.yvt>ui tantum ex ignnrantia peccare notare dicit. Cf. Sirac. v. lit. iv fjayu.Xu xcti utic^ii fJ.r, ccyvou, firfci in : h. e. nullum plane peccatum committe, nee grave nee levc. Hire notio etiam ex Hehraieis verhis HV, Ett'N, et ,"W. quibus ayvoiiv in verss. Gnrc. respondet, apparet." — " 'Ayvoi,fx.a.Ta.. peccata Bimpliciter. 1 Mace. xiii. .'K», ubi cum voeabulo i.ua^rr.fj.ccTa permutatur. (Cf. Levit. xxvi. 39, ubi Hebrai- cum ny Aqu. ayveiav reddit.) Locum e I'hilone hue facientum dedit cl. Loesnerus ad Ilebr. ix. 7- Sic «ju«si!.i apud Xen. Ilist. Gnrc. I. 7- 10, simpliciter inique agere notat ; ubi bene pra'cipit S>. K. Morns, verba apud Cira>cos, vi originis scientiam aut inscientiam exprimentia, ut in omnibus Unguis, notare virtutes et vitia, qiwe illani BCientiam et inscientiam, vcl neces- sario, vol plerumque, sequi soleant." Loesner also remarks thus on the words, iiv\( icevrev n) rut rou Xa.nu ArNOHHATftN, in Hebr. ix. 7- — " Apud Alex- andriuos Interpp. loeis pluribus ayvoicc; vel a.ytor^u.ra. de J peccatis ct delicti* quibusvis ad exprinicndum Ilebraicum r.Nun dici, ignotum esse harum liter-arum amantibus non potest Adjungamus Pliiloncm lib. de Plant. Koe. p. 22!), c. scribentem No. 37.— ON THE EFFICACY OF THE MOSAIC ATONEMENT, &c. 91 opposition already alluded to in Numb. xv. 27, 30, seems at once to decide the point. For there we find the sins implied by the word mj£% directly opposed to sins of presump- tion ; that is, to such as proceeded, not from human frailty, but from a deliberate and audacious defiance of the divine authority ; which appears to be the true meaning of pre- sumptuous sins, as may be collected from Numb. xv. 30, 31 ; Exod. xxi. 14. — and v. 2. compared with xviii. 11 ; Deut. i. 42, 43 ; xvii. 12, 13 ; xviii. 22, and various other passages. See Pec. Doct. vol. i. pp. 229, 230, also Maim. 3 for. Nev. part. 3. cap. 1. And hence it appears, that, so far as the force of tho original term is considered, the efficacy of the atonement was extended to all sins which flowed from the infirmities and passions of human nature ; and was withheld only from those which sprang from a presumptuous defiance of the Creator. The word diy.ovaloig, used by the LXX in the translation of the term, though it seems to imply an involuntary act, is yet by no means inconsistent with this exposition. The force of this term, as applied by the LXX, is evidently not incompatible with a perfect consciousness of the crime committed, and is used only in opposition to ezovaiag, by which they every where describe such an act as is entirely spontaneous and deliberate, which, in the words of Episcopius, is performed, plena %-vffta.i vTop.itjLVYlffXGUcri tu.s lxa.trruv ATNOIA2 Tt xott hi/cuxsTixf, victimas in memoriam revocant singulorum pec- cata et delicta." The observations also of Danzius, on the word ayvof.u.a.rx, in the aforementioned passage of Hebr. deserve particularly to be attended to. " Peceata quae expianda sunt, voeantur hie i.yn>r,/jt,a.Tx. Qua? Sociniards haud alia sunt, quam qua? vel ignorantia sive oblivione juris alicujus divini, ex vel ignorantia facti et circumstantiarum, vel etiam ex humana quadam imbe- cillitate proficiscuntur. Equideui concedendum omnino est, i.yvor,u.a.ra. hinc inde in scriptis sacris ae profanis pro hujus generis extare peccatis. Quod autera et voluntaria ac graviora haud raro denotet, satis superque docent dicta Psalm xxv. 7, ubi yeg (quod quam magnum designet peccatum, mox dicturi sumus) LXX reddiderunt per a.yitti«.i. Hoseae, iv. 15, spiri- tualis Israelitarum scortatio per verbum ocyvoiu, pro Ebraieo till positum, exprimitur ; quae sane leve ac ex ignorantia com- missum peccatum non fuit : prout ex toto hoc capite satis clare apparet. Etiam Jud. v. 19, 20, pro quibusvis delictis idem vocabulum ponitur. Hinc et Syrus interpres pro ayvor,u.a.tn Apostoli in loco citato, (viz. Heb. ix. 7,) posuit f /o'va m : qua voce qua?vis designantur peceata, (vide Matth. xviii. 3"!,) etiam illud ab Adamo perpetratum, (vid. Rom. v. 16, sqq.) quod certe nee leve fuit, nee ex ignorantia commissum. Imo ex collatione loci Lev. xvi. sole lucidius patet, hie sub voce rat «,yvor,ij.a.TtMiv omnis generis contineri peceata. Biquidem ibi satis perspicue docetur, omnia peceata, in anniversario isto sacrificio expiari. Et quidem omnia ilia, quae supra vocibus fl9, "tt'S, ac riKtan erant expressa. Atque sub se continent quidquid omnino venit sub peccati nomine." The writer then proceeds, from a strict investigation of the exact sense of these Hebrew words, as well as from a copious enumeration of the opinions of the great Jewish doctors, to confirm his position, that in the word u.yv6r,fj.a.Tu., as used by the apostle, (Heb. ix. 7,) sins of every description are indiscriminately alluded to. See Danz. Fund. Pontif. Mux. in Ailyt. Anniv. in Mcutchen Nov. Test, ex Talm. p. 1007 — 1012. volnntate ; or, as he again explains it, which is done wilfully, and with a fixed and delibe- rate purpose of transgressing. (Inst. Thcol. lib. iii. sect. ii. cap. 3. § 9. 14.) ' Axovmagt then, is not to be considered as denoting an act, strictly speaking, involuntary ; but as opposed to what was deliberate and wilful : it is, therefore, applied with propriety to all sins of infirmity. The use of the word iKovaiu; in Heb. x. 26, throws abundant light on the force of this expression. See Ainsworth on Lev. iv. 2. See also tho authorities adduced by Eisner, Observat. Sacr. vol. i. p. 494. But, 2dly, the conclusion, which has been here derived from the signification of the ori- ginal word, is fully confirmed by the cases of atonement referred to in the text ; since the offences there described are clearly such as can by no means be brought within the description of sins of ignorance : it being impossible that a man could deny, or keep back, that which was intrusted to" him by another; or take from another his property by violence or deceit ; or deny upon oath, and withhold from the proper owner, what he had found, without a consciousness of the guilt. Besides, it is to be observed, that, neither in these, nor in the case of the bond-maid, it is said that the sin was committed in ignorance ; but, on the contrary, the very expressions used in the original, unequivocally mark a consciousness of crime in the several instances alluded to ; as may be seen particularly in Outram De Sacrif. lib. i. cap. xiii. § 4, where this point is fully established in opposition to Episcopius. These crimes, indeed, of fraud, perjury, violent injustice, and debauchery, the writer in the Thcol. Rep. seems disposed to treat as venial offences, being criminal, as he says, " but in a low degree," (vol. iii. p. 412.) "But, for the purpose of proving that no atonements were appointed for transgressions of the moral law, it would be necessary to shew that these acts were not in any degree criminal : this, how- ever, he has not attempted ; and he is, conse- quently, in the conclusion, compelled to admit (p. 414.) that the Levitical atonements ex- tended to violations of the moral law. Sykes also, it must be observed, is obliged to confess, that the cases here alluded to are cases of " known and open wickedness," Script. Doct. of Redemp. p. 331.) Hallet expressly says, " It is certain, that there were sacrifices under the law appointed to make atonement for moral evil and for moral guilt ; particularly for lying, theft, fraud, extortion, perjury, as it is written, Lev. vi. 1, 2, &c." — Notes and Disburses, vol. ii. pp. 277, 278. Now, that these atonements, in cases of moral transgression, involved a real and literal remission of the offence, that is, of the penalty annexed to it, will appear from considering not only the rigorous sanction of the Mosaic law in "general, by which he, " who did not <>9 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. continue in all the words of the law to do them," was pronounced "accursed," (Gal. iii. 10; Deut. xxvii. 2G,) and consequently sub- jected to the severest temporary inflictions ; hut also the particular cases, in which the piacular sacrifices are directly stated to have procured a release from the temporal punish- ments specifically annexed to the transgression : as in the cases of fraud, false swearing, &c. which, with the punishments annexed by the law, and the remission procured by the piacular oblation, may be seen enumerated by Grotius {De Satis/act. Chr. cap. x.) and still more fully by Richie, (Pecul. Doct.vo], i. pp. 232— 2.52.) Houbigant also speaks of it as a matter beyond question, that, in such offences as admitted of expiation under the Mosaic law, a release from the temporal penalty of the trans- gression, was the necessary result of the atone- ment. On Levit. v. 4. he describes the effect of the atonement to be, " ut post expiationem rcligione factam, non sit amplius legum civi- lium pcenis obnoxius." Hallet says, that the sacrifices " procured for the offender a delive- rance from that punishment of moral guilt, which was appointed by the law ;" and he instances the case of theft, in which, though the offender was liable to be cut off by the miraculous judgment of God, yet the sacrifice had the virtue of releasing from that imme- diate death, which the law had denounced against that particular sin. — Notes and Disc. pp. 270— 278. That the remission of sins obtained by the Levitical sacrifices was a remission only of temporal punishments, cannot weaken the genera] argument ; as the sanctions of the law, under which the sacrifices were offered, were themselves but temporary. The remission of the penalty due to the transgression was still real and substantial : the punishment was averted from the offender, who conformed to the appointed rite ; and the sacrificial atone- ment was, consequently, in such cases, an act of propitiation. The sacrifices of the law, indeed, considered merely as the performance of a ceremonial duty, could operate only to the reversal of a ceremonial forfeiture, or the remission of a temporal punishment : that is, they could propitiate God only in his temporal relation to his chosen people, as their Sove- reign: and for this plain reason, — because the ostensible performance of the rite being bul an act of external submission and homage, when uot accompanied with an internal sub- mission of mind and a sincere repentance, it could acquit the offender only in reference to that externa! law, which exacted obedience to God as a civil prince. In such casts, the Jewish sacrifices, merely as legal observances, operated only to the temporal benefits annexed by the Levitical institution to those expres- sions of allegiance : but, as genuine and sin- cere acts of worship and penitence, whenever the piety of the offerer rendered them such, they must likewise have operated to procure that spiritual remission and acceptance, which, antecedent to and independent of the Levitical ordinances, they are found in several parts of Scripture to have been effectual to obtain. The author of the Scripture Account of Sacrifices, (p. 168,) thus reasons upon this subject: — "This people (the Jews,) as to their inward state, were doubtless under the same control, both of the law of nature and of the divine Providence, as they were before the law ; this having introduced no change in this respect. They were consequently entitled to the pardon of all their sins, of what nature soever, upon the same terms as before." And then he goes on to shew, that, with the sacri- fices of the law, they continued to offer such also as had been customary in the Patriarchal times. And, in proof of this, he adduces instances from the law itself, in which such sacrifices are referred to and recognized. They appear manifestly alluded to in the two first chapters of Leviticus, in which the language marks the offering to be of a purely voluntary nature, and merely prescribes the manner in which such an offering was to be made : whereas, when specific legal and moral offences are to be expiated, the law commands the offering, and the specific nature of it. He adduces also the cases of David, and of Eli's house, to shew thatScripture supplies instances of " sacrifices offered out of the occasions pre- scribed by the law, for averting the divine displeasure upon the occasion of sin." — (P. 173.) What this writer justly remarks con- cerning sacrifices distinct from those prescribed by the law, I would apply to all ; and con- sider the penitent and devout sentiments of the offerer, as extending the efficacy of the Levitical sacrifice to the full range of those benefits, which, before the Levitical institution, were conferred on similar genuine acts of worship. Nor let it be objected to this, that the Apostle has pronounced of the Levitical offer- ings, that they "could not make perfect as pertaining to the conscience," (Heb. ix. !) ; x. 1.) The sacred writer here evidently speaks in comparison. lie marks the infe- riority of the figure to the substance, and the total insufficiency of the type, considered independently of that from which its entire virtue was derived, to obtain a perfect remis- sion. It might, indeed, he argues, by virtue of the positive institution, effect an external and ceremonial purification ; hut beyond this it could have no power. " The Mood of hulls and of goats could not, of itself, take away sins." It could not render the mere Mosaic worshipper " perfect as to conscience." It can have no such operation, hut as connected, in the eye of faith, with that more precious blood- shedding, which can " purge the conscience No. 38.— VICARIOUS IMPORT OF THE MOSAIC SACRIFICES. 93 from dead works to serve the living God." It could not, says Pcirce, on Heb. ix. 9, " with reference to the conscience, make perfect the worshipper, who only worshipped with meat and drink offerings and washings," &C. — In this view of the subject, the remarks con- tained in this Number seem no way inconsis- tent with the language of the apostle. One observation more, arising from the passage of the apostle here referred to, I would wish to offer. — In pointing out the inferiority of the Mosaic to the Christian institution, we hud the writer, in the tenth chapter, not only asserting the inefficacy of the Mosaic sacrifice for the full and perfect remission of sins, but taking considerable pains to prove it. Now from this it seems, that the Jews themselves, so far from confining their legal atonements to the mere effect of ceremonial purification, were too prone to attribute to them the virtue of a perfect remission of all moral guilt. Of this there can be no question as to the later Jews. Maimonides expressly says in his treatise, De Pcenit. cap. i. § 2, that " the scape-goat made atonement for all the trans- gressions of the law, both the lighter and the more heavy transgressions, whether done pre- sumptuously or ignorantly : all are expiated by the scape-goat, if, indeed, the party repent." I would remark here, that though Maimonides evidently stretches the virtue of the atonement beyond the limits of the law (presumptuous sins not admitting of expiation,) yet he seems to have reasoned on a right principle, in attri- buting to the sincere and pious sentiments of the offerer the power of extending the efficacy of the atonement to those moral offences, which the legal sin-offering, by itself, could never reach. No. XXXVIII.— Page 15. Col. 2. ON THE VICARIOUS IMPORT OF THE MOSAIC SACRIFICES. I have, in the page here referred to, used the expression vicarious import, rather than vicarious, to avoid furnishing any colour to the idle charge, made against the doctrine of atonement, of supposing a real substitution in the room of the offender, and a literal trans- lation of his guilt and punishment to the immolated victim ; a thing utterly incompre- hensible, as neither guilt nor punishment can be conceived, but with reference to conscious- ness, which cannot be transferred. But to be exposed to suffering, in consequence of an- other's guilt ; and thereby, at the same time, to represent to the offender, and to release him from, the punishment due to his transgres- sion, involves no contradiction whatever. In this sense, the suffering of the animal may be conceived a substitute for the punishment of the offender ; inasmuch as it is in virtue of that suffering that the sinner is released. If it be asked, what connection can subsist between the death of the animal and the acquittal of the sinner? I answer, without hesitation, I know not. To unfold divine truths by human philosophy, belongs to those who hold opinions widely different from mine on the subject of atonement. To the Chris- tian it should be sufficient, that Scripture has clearly pronounced this connection to subsist. That the death of the animal could possess no such intrinsic virtue is manifest; but that divine appointment could bestow upon it this expiatory power, will not surely be denied : and as to the fact of such appointment, as well as its reference to that great event from which this virtue was derived, the word of Revelation furnishes abundant evidence, as I trust appears from the second of the Discourses contained in this volume. Now, that the offering of the animal slain in sacrifice may be considered vicarious in the sense here assigned, that is, vicarious in symbol, (or as representing the penal effects of the offerer's demerits, and his release from the deserved punishment in consequence of the death of the victim,) — seems to require little proof, beyond the passages of Scripture referred to in the text. If farther evidence should, however, be required, we shall find it in a more particular examination of that most solemn service of the yearly atone- ment, described in p. 22 of this volume Meantime, it may be worth while to inquire, how far the arguments urged in opposition to the vicarious nature of the Mosaic sacrifices will operate against this acceptation. And, for this purpose, it will be sufficient to exa- mine the objections, as stated by Sykes, and H. Taylor ; inasmuch as the industry of the former, and the subtilty of the latter, have left none of the arguments of Socinus, Crellius, or the other learned antagonists of the doctrine of atonement, unnoticed or unimproved ; and the skirmishing writers of the present day have done nothing more than retail, with diminished force, the same objections. They are all reduced by Sykes and Taylor under the following heads: — 1. It is no where said in the Old Testament, that the life of the victim was given as a vicarious substi- tute for the life of him who offered it. 2. The atonement was not made by the death of the animal, but by the sprinkling of the blood at the altar. 3. No atonement could be made, where life was forfeited. 4. Atonements were made by the sacrifice of animals in some cases where no guilt was involved. And, 5. Atone- ments were sometimes made without the death of an animal, or any blood-shedding whatever.1 — This is the sum total of the 1 See Sykes's Essay on Sacr. pp. 121—141. Ben. Mord. pp. 797—799. and Crell. contra Grot. cap. x. 94 M A G E E O N T H E A T < ) N E M E N T. arguments, collected by the industry of these writers, against the notion of the vicarious nature of sacrifice : and it must be remem- bered, that Sykes applies these to the idea, that " the taking away the life of the animal was designed to put the offerer in mind of his demerits," no less than to the idea, that "the life of the animal was given in lieu of the life of the sinner ;" (pp. 120, 121.) so that they may fairly be replied to, on the principle of atonement here contended for. Now, to the first of these objections it may be answered, that it is again and again asserted in the Old Testament, that, in cases where punishment had been incurred, and even where (as we shall see hereafter) life itself was forfeited, the due oblation of an animal in sacrifice was effectual to procure the reversal of the forfeiture, and the pardon of the offender ; that is, the death of the animal was so far represented as standing in place of the offender's punishment, and in some cases even of his death, that through it, no matter how operating, the offerer was enabled to escape. This, however, is not deemed sufficient. Some precise and appropriate phrase, unequivocally marking a strict vica- rious substitution, is still required. But as a strict vicarious substitution, or literal equi- valent, is not contended for, no such notion belonging to the doctrine of atonement, it is not necessary that any such phrase should be produced. The words, "133, and K£0, in their sacrificial application, sufficiently admit the vicarious import ; and the description of the sacrificial ceremony and its consequences, especially in the instance of the scape-goat, positively prove it ; and beyond this nothing farther can be required. But it is curious to remark, that both Sykes and Taylor, in their eagerness to demonstrate that the sacrificial terms conveyed nothing whatever of a vicarious import, have urged an objection which rebounds with decisive force against their own opinion. "The life of the animal," say they, "is never called, in the Old Testament, a ransom ; nor is there any such expression as t^vt^ov, dvri^vT^ov, dvri- ■±vyj,'j, equivalent, exchange, substitute," &c. Essay on Sacr. p. 1H4. B. Mord. p. 197. — Now, not to speak of their criticisms on the expressions in the original, (particularly on the word 133,) which merely go to prove that these words do not necessarily convey such ideas, inasmuch as, being of a more extended signification, they are not in all cases applied exactly in this sense — an argu- ment which will easily strip most Hebrew terms of their true and definite meaning, being, as they arc denominated by Grotius, (/><• Satis. Ckr. cap. viii. § 2, 3,) Tzo^van/aoi — nut t<> speak, I say, of such criticisms, nor to urge the unfairness of concluding against flic meaning of the original, from the language used in the Greek translation ; have not these writers, by admitting that the words Avt^oj/, uvTi'hvr^ou, &c. if applied to the Mosaic sacri- fices, would have conveyed the idea of vica- rious substitution, thereby established the force of these expressions, when applied in the New Testament to the death of Christ, (Matt. xx. 28 ; Mark, x. 46 ; 1 Tim. ii. 6,) which, being expressly said to be a sacrifice for the sins of men, and being that true and substantial sacrifice, which those of the law but faintly and imperfectly represented, con- sequently reflects back upon them its attri- butes and qualities, though in an inferior degree ? Again, secondly, it is contended, that the atonement was not made by the death of the animal, but by the sprinkling of the blood. — True ; and by this very sprinkling of the blood before the altar it was, that, according to the prescribed rites of sacrifice, the life of the animal was offered ; as appears from the express letter of the law, which declares " the life to be in the blood," and subjoins, as a consequence from this, that " it is the blood," (the vehicle of life, or, as it is called a few verses after, the life itself,) " that maketh an atonement for the soul," or life, of the offerer. See Ainsworth and Patrick on Levit. xvii. 11 ; and for the concurrent opinions of all the Jewish doctors on this head, see Outram, dc Sacrif. lib. i. cap. xxii. § 11. — The rendering of the above verse of Leviticus in the old Italic version is remarkable; "Animaenim omnis carnis sanguis ejus est : et ego dedi eum vobis, exorare pro animabus vestris ; sanguis enim ejus pro anima exorabit." Sabatier. Vet. Ital. And even Dr Geddes's translation is decidedly in favour of the sense in which the passage has been applied in this number. "For the life of all flesh being in the blood, it is my will, that by it an atonement shall be made, at the altar, for your lives." But, thirdly, the sacrifice could not have implied any thing vicarious, as no atonement could be made where life was forfeited. — There is no argument advanced by the oppo- nents of the doctrine of atonement with greater confidence than this, and there is none which abounds with greater fallacies. It is untrue, in point of fact ; it is sophistical, in point of reasoning ; and it is impertinent, in point of application. 1. It is untrue ; for atonements were made in cases where, without atonement, life was forfeited. This appears, at once, from the passage of Leviticus last referred to ; which positively asserts the atonement to be mado for the life of the offerer : it also appears from the unbending rigour of the law in general, which seems to have denounced death against every violation of it, (sec Deut. xxvii. 26 ; Ezek. xviii. 19 — 23; Gal. iii. 10; James, ii. 10 ;) and, in particular, from the specific No. 38.— VICARIOUS IMPORT OF THE MOSAIC SACRIFICES. !'.-. cases of perjury, (Levit. vi. 3,) and of profane swearing, (yer. 4,) for which atonements were appointed, notwithstanding the strict scnteuce of the law was death, (Exod. xx. 7 ; and Levit. xxiv. 10,) — see on this Grot. Dc Satis/, cap. x. § 3 ; Hallet's Notes and Disc. pp. 27o — 278; and Richie's Death Doct. vol. i. pp. 245 — 249, 280. This last writer, it is to be observed, though opposing the doctrine of vicarious suffering, and wish- ing to avail himself of the objection here urged, yet finds himself not at liberty to advance farther than to state that it seldom happened that death was denounced against any offences for which atonement was appointed. 2. It is sophistical ; for, from the circum- stances of atonement not being appointed in those cases in which death was peremptorily denounced, it is inferred, that no atonement could be made where life was forfeited ; whereas the true statement of the proposition evidently is, that life was forfeited where no atonement was permitted to be made. It is true, indeed, that death is not expressly denounced in those cases in which atonements were allowed ; but this was because the atonement was permitted to arrest the sen- tence of the law ; as appears particularly from this, that, where the prescribed atonement was not made, the law, no longer suspended in its natural operation, pronounced the sen- tence of death. The real nature of the case seems to be this : the rigid tendency of the law being to secure obedience, on pain of forfeiture of life, all such offences as were of so aggravated a kind as to preclude forgiveness, were left under the original sentence of the law, whilst such as were attended with circumstances of mitigation were forgiven, on the condition of a public and humble acknowledgment of the offence, by complying with certain prescribed modes of atonement. It should be remembered, also, that the law was not given at different times, so as that its denunciations and atonements should be promulged at different periods ; both were announced at the same time, and therefore, in such cases as admitted of pardon, the penalty being superseded by the atonement, the punishment strictly due to the offence is consequently not denounced, and can only be collected now from the general tendency of the law, from some collateral bearings of the Mosaic code, or from the inflictions which actually followed on the neglect of the atonement. The whole strength of the present objection rests, then, upon this :— that we have not both the atonement prescribed, and the punishment denounced ; that is, the punishment both remitted and denounced, at the same time. _ But I have dwelt too long upon this ; espe- cially when, 3dfy, the whole argument is inapplicable. For even they who hold the | doctrine of a vicarious punishment, feel it not necessary to contend that the evil inflicted on the victim should be exactly the same in quality and degree with that denounced against the offender ; it depending, they say, upon the will of the legislator, what satisfac- tion he will accept in place of the punishment of the offender, see Outram De Sacr. lib. i. cap. xxi. § 1, 2, 9. But still less will this argument apply, where vicarious punishment is not contended for, but merely an emble- matic substitute, the result of institution, and which in no respect involves the notion of an equivalent. Fourthly, The atonement by animal sacri- fice, in cases not involving moral guilt, can only prove, that there were sacrifices which were not vicarious, inasmuch as there were some that were not for sin ; but it by no means follows, that where moral guilt was involved, the sacrifice was not vicarious. Now, it is only in this latter case that the notion of a vicarious sacrifice is contended for, or is, indeed, conceivable. And, accordingly, it is only in such cases that we find those ceremonies used, which mark the vicarious import of the sacrifice. The symbolical translation of sins, and the consequent pol- lution of the victim, are confined to those sacrifices which were offered confessedly in expiation of sins ; the most eminent of which were those offered on the day of expiation, and those for the High Priest, and for the entire congregation, (Lev. xvi. 15 — 28 ; iv. 3 — 12, and 13—22,) in all of which, the pollution caused by the symbolical transfer of sins is expressed by the burning of the victim without the camp : see Outr. De Sacr. lib. i. cap. xvii. § 1, 2. Thus it appears, that the very mode of sacrifice, as well as the occasion of its being offered, clearly ascertained the case of its vicarious import. But it deserves to be considered, whether even the cases of the puerpera, the leper, and the Nazarite, on which, as they seem to imply nothing of crime, Sykes and other writers of that class lay so much stress, do not bear such a relation to sin as to justify the oblation of the animal sacrifice in the view here contended for. It deserves to be considered, whether the pains of childbearing, and all diseases of the human body, (of which leprosy in the Eastern countries was deemed the most grievous,) being the signal consequences of that apostacy which had entailed these calamities on the children of Adam, it might not be proper, on occasion of a deliverance from these remarkable effects of sin, that there should be this sensible representation of that death which was the desert of it in general, and an humble acknowledgment of that personal demerit, which had actually exposed the offerer on so many occasions "to the severest punishment. That this was the notion enter- 96 MAGEE ON T il E A T O N E M E N T. tained by the Jewish doctors, with the additional circumstance of the imputation of actual crime, in these cases of human suffering, has been already shewn, p. 72. — See also Vitringa on Isai. liii. 4. There seems, like- wise, good ground to think, that the idea of distempers as penal inflictions for sins, was prevalent in the earliest ages even among the heathen, see Harris's Comment, on ch. liii. of Isaiah, p. 236, also Martini, as quoted by Rosenm. Schol. in Jesai. p. 909. The case of the Nazarite, it must be confessed, seems more difficult to be reconciled to the principle here laid down. And yet, if with Lightfoot (/A//-. Hebr. in Luc. i. 15,) it be admitted, that " the law of the Nazarites had a reference to Adam, while under the prohibition in his state of innocence," and that it was "designed in commemoration of the state of innocence before the Fall," (an idea for which he finds strong support in the traditions of the Jews,) it may seem not unreasonable to conclude, that the sacrifice ottered by the Nazarite polluted by the dead, was intended to com- memorate that death which was the conse- quence of Adam's fall from innocence, and which was now become the desert of sinful man. And thus the case of the Nazarite, as well as those of the puerpera and the leper, seems sufficiently reducible to the notion of sacrifice here laid down. But let this be as it may, it is clear, that to prove that a sacrifice may be vicarious, it is not necessary to shew that every sacrifice is so ; no more than, for the purpose of proving that there arc sacrifices for sins, it is necessary to shew that every sacrifice is of that nature. We come now to the fifth, and last, objec- tion ; in which it is urged, that atonements for sin being made in some cases without any animal sacrifice, but merely by an ottering of flour, by piacular sacrifice it could never be intended to imply the vicarious substitution of a life. To this the answer is obvious, that although no vicarious substitution of a life could be conceived, where life was not given at all, yet from this it cannot follow, that, where a life was given, it might not admit a vicarious import. It should be remembered, that the case here alluded to was a case of necessity ; and that this offering of flour was accepted, only where the offerer was so poor that lie could not by any possibility procure an animal for sacrifice. Can then any thing be inferred from a case, such as this, in which the offerer must have been altogether pre- cluded from engaging in any form of wor- ship, and - 1 1 1 1 1 out from all legal communion with his (bid, or indulged in this inferior sort of offering? Besides, i> it not natural to conceive, that this offering of flour being indulged to tin1 poor man, in the place of the animal sacrifice which, had he been able, he was bound to oiler, he should con- sider it but as a substitute for the animal sacrifice, and that, being burnt and destroyed upon the altar, he might naturally conceive of it as a symbol and representation of that destruction due to his own demerits? And to all this it may be added, that this individual might be taught to look to the animal sacrifices, ottered for all the sins of all the people on the day of atonement, for the full and complete consummation of those less perfect atonements, which alone he had been able to make. These constitute the sum total of the argu- ments, which have been urged against the vicarious nature of the legal piacular atone- ments. How far they are conclusive against the notion of their vicarious import here con- tended for, it is not difficult to judge. It deserves to be noted, that, in the examination of these arguments, 1 have allowed them the full benefit of the advantage which their authors have artfully sought for them ; namely, that of appreciating their value as applied to the sacrifices of the law, considered indepen- dently of that great sacrifice, which these were but intended to prefigure, and from which alone they derived whatever virtue they possessed. When we come hereafter to con- sider them as connected with that event in which their true significancy lay, we shal! find the observations which have been here made acquiring a tenfold strength. What the opinions of the Jewish writers are upon the subject of this Number, has been already explained in Number XXXIlf. Who- ever wishes for a more extensive review of the testimonies which they supply, on the three points, — of the translation of the offerer's sins, — the consequent pollution of the animal, — and the redemption of the sinner by the substitution of the victim, — may consult Outram, De Sacrif. lib. i. cap. xxii. § 4 — 12. No. XXXIX.— Page 15. Col. 2. ON THE IMPOSITION OF HANDS UTON TnE HEAD OF THE VICTIM. The ceremony of the imposition of hands upon the head of the victim has been usually considered, in the case of piacular sacrifices, as a symbolical translation of the sins of the offender upon the head of the sacrifice, and as a mode of deprecating the evil due to his transgressions. So we find it represented by Abarbaneljin ihe Introduction to his Com mentary on Leviticus, {De J'iet. p. 301 :) and so tho ceremony of the scape-goat, in Lev. xvi. 21, m ems directly to assert. And it is certain, that the practice of imprecating on the head of the victim the evils which the sacrificer wished to avert from himself, was usual amongst the heathen ; as appears, particularly, I No. 39.— IMPOSITION OF HANDS ON THE HEAD OF THE VICTIM. <;7 from Herodotus, (lib. ii. cap. xxxix.) who relates this of the Egyptians, and at the same time asserts that no Egyptian would so much as " taste the head of any animal," but, under the influence of this religious custom, flung it into the river. This interpretation of the ceremony of the imposition of hands, in the Mosaic sacrifice, is, however strongly contest- ed by certain writers, particularly by Sykes, (Essay on Sacrif. pp. 25 — 50.) and the author of the Scripture Account of Sacrifices, (Append. p. 10.) who contend that this ceremony was not confined to piacular sacrifices, but was also used in those which were cucharistical, " in which commemoration was made, not of sins, but of mercies :" it was not, therefore, say they, always accompanied with confession of sins, but with praise, or thanksgiving, or, in short, such concomitant as suited the nature and intention of the particular sacrifice. But, in order to prove that it was not attended with acknowledgment of sin, in sacrifices not piacular, it is necessary to shew that in none but piacular was there any reference whatever to sin. In these, indeed, the pardon of sin is the appropriate object ; but that in our ex- f>ressions of praise and thanksgiving, acknow- edgment should be made of our own unwor- thiness, and of the general desert of sin, seems not unreasonable. That even the eucharistic sacrifices, then, might bear some relation to sin, especially if animal sacrifice in its first institution was designed to represent that death which had been introduced by sin, will perhaps not be deemed improbable. And in confirmation of this, it is certain, that the Jewish doctors combine, in all cases, con- fession of sins, with imposition of hands. " Where there is no confession of sins," say they, " there is no imposition of hands." — See Outram, De Sacr. lib. i. cap. xv. § 8. But, be this as it may, it is at all events clear, that if the ceremony be admitted to have had, in each kind of sacrifice, the signi- fication suited to its peculiar nature and intention, it necessarily follows, that, when used in piacular sacrifices, it implied a refe- rence to, and acknowledgment of, sin : con- fession of sins being always undoubtedly connected with piacular sacrifices ; as appears from Levit. v. 5. xvi. 21. and Numb. v. 7. The particular forms of confession, used in the different kinds of piacular sacrifice, are also handed down to us by the Jewish writers ; and are given by Outram, {De Sacr. lib. i. cap. xv. § 10, 11.) The form prescribed for the individual, presenting his own sacrifice, seems particularly significant : " 0 God, I have sinned, I have done perversely, I have trespassed before thee, and have done so and so. Lo ! now I repent, and am truly sorry for my misdeeds. Let then this victim be my expiation." Which last words were accom- panied by the action of laying hands on the head of the victim, and were considered by the Jews, as we have seen from several autho- rities, in p. 70, to be equivalent to this: " Let the evils, which in justice should have fallen upon my head, light upon the head of the victim." See Outram, De Sacr. lib. i. cap. xxii. § 5, G. 9. Now, that this imposition of hands, joined to the confession of sins, was intended symbo- lically to transfer the sins of the offerer on the head of the victim, and consequently to point it out as the substitute for the offender, and as the accepted medium of expiation, will appear from the bare recital of the ceremony, as prescribed on the day of expiation. " Aaron shall lay both his hands upon the head of the live goat, and confess all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all their transgressions in all their sins, putting them upon the head of the goat — and the goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities," &c. (Lev. xvi. 21, 22.) The sins of the people being thus transferred to the animal, it is afterwards represented to to be so polluted, as to pollute the person that carried it away, (Lev. xvi. 26 ;) and, by the entire ceremony, expiation is made for the sins of the people. Now it is to be remarked, that this is the only passage in the entire Scripture, in which the meaning of the cere- mony of laying hands on the head of the victim is directly explained : and from this, one would naturally think, there could be no difficulty in understanding its true import in all other cases of piacular sacrifice. But the ingenuity of the writers above mentioned is not to be silenced so easily. The goat, says Dr Sykes, {Essay, p. 37,) was so polluted, that it was not sacrificed, but sent away : " it was not, then, to transfer sins upon the sacrifice, that hands were laid upon the head of the victim : as men would not offer unto God, what they knew to be polluted." In this notion, of the pollution of the scape-goat rendering it unfit to be offered in sacrifice, H. Taylor concurs with Sykes, {Ben. Mord. pp. 827, 828.) Now, to the objection here urged it may be answered, 1. That the scape-goat was actually a " part of the sin-offering" for the people, as is shewn more particularly in page 22, and Number LXXI ; and as is confessed by the author of the Scripture Account of Sacrifices, (Append, p. 12,) who agrees with Sykes in the main part of his objection ; and as may be directly collected from Levit. xvi. 5, 10, in which the two goats are called a " sin- offering," and the scape-goat described as " presented before the Lord, to make an atonement with him." See Patrick on these verses. Secondly, Even admitting the scape-goat to have been entirely distinct from the sin- offering ; since the same ceremony, which is allowed by Sykes and H. Taylor to be a proof -11 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. that the scape-goat was polluted by the trans- lation of the people's sins ; namely, the person who carried it away being obliged to wash, before he was again admitted into the camp ; since, I say, this same ceremony was pre- scribed with respect to the bullock and the goat which had been sacrificed as sin-offerings, it follows, that they likewise were polluted ; and that, therefore, there was a translation of sins to the animals, that were actually sacri- ficed in expiation of those sins. Now this translation being accompanied with, is also to be considered as expressed by, the imposition of hands ; a ceremony which it was the less necessary specially to prescribe here, as this was already enjoined for all cases of piacular sacrifice, in Levit. ch. iv. — and that this cere- mony did take place we can have 710 doubt, not only from this general direction in the 4th chapter, but also from the express testimonies of the Jewish writers on this head, (Ainsw, on Levit. xvi. 6. 11,) and from the description in 2 Chron. xxix. 23, of the sacrifice offered by Hezekiah, " to make an atonement for all Israel. — They brought forth the he-goats for the Bin-offering, before the king and the con- gregation, and they laid their hands upon them — and the priests killed them," &c. Thirdly, The entire of the notion, that what was polluted (as it is symbolically called) by sin, could not be offered to God, is founded in a mistake, arising from the not distinguishing between the natural 1 impurities and blem- ishes of the animal (which with good reason unfitted it for a sincere and respectful expres- sion of devotion,) and that emblematical defilement, which arose out of the very act of worship, and existed but in the imagination of the worshipper. It should lie remarked, also, that this notion of the defilement of the victim by the transfer of the offerer's sins, so far from being inconsistent with the Mosaic precepts, concerning the pure and unblemished state of the animal chosen for sacrifice, (Exod. xii. 5 ; Lev. xxii. 21 ; Numb. xix. 2. Mai. i. 14, &c.) as is urged by Sykes and H. Taylor, and by Dr Priestley, ( Thcol. Rep. vol. i. p. 213,) seems absolutely to require and presuppose this purity, the more clearly to convey the idea that the pollution was the sole result of the translated defilement of the sinner. In like manner we are told in the New Testa- ment, that Christ " was made a curse," and also " sin (or a sin-offering) for us ;" whilst, to make it more clear that all this was the 1 The word in the original used to denote the perfect state of the animals to be offered in sacrifice iso^n, which Rosenm. explains by " perfectum, i. e. sine vitio et defectu corporis, sine aigritudinc et membrorum debilitate ; id quod Gr.TC. 0Lu.jiu.e1, quod Alcxandrini hie habent." Josephus [Alttiq. lib. iii. cap. x.) calls these animals i)ox> r.^a. xxi xa.rk fjt,r,hi> >.iXa£r,/u.ivoc, " entire and without blemish." Herodotus also (lib. ii. cap. xl.) testifies, that the animals offered by the Kgyp- tians were of the like description! tov; KxOx%oh< ifcirxt rut (3oi>» xa) to'u< fiiiffxovi «i wxvnt AlyCfnoi h-vtva. effect of our sin, it is added that he "knew no sin" himself. And, indeed, they who consider the pollution of the victim as natu- rally irreconcileablo with the notion of a sacrifice, as Dr Priestley evidently does, would do well to attend to the x.ctdxofta.T& of the ancients, who, whilst they required for their gods the Ti~hiia. Svula. the most perfect animals for sacrifice, (see Potter on the Religion of Greece, ch. iv. and Outr. De Sacr. lib. i. cap. ix. § 3,) at the same time sought to appease them by offering Tip human victims, whom they had first loaded with imprecations, and whom they in consequence deemed so polluted with the sins of those for whom they were to be offered, that the word xxdan^x became synonymous to what was most execrable and impure, and with the Latins was rendered by the word scelus, as if to mark the very extreme and essence of what was sinful. See Ste- phanus on x.»8xn^a. and Suidas on the words x.d$a.^p.x and n^n^/j^a. It must be confessed, indeed, that the author of the Scrip. Account of Sacr. has gone upon grounds entirely different from the above named authors. He positively denies, that either the scape-goat, or the bullock, incurred any pollution whatever ; and maintains, that the washing of the persons who carried them away indicated no pollution of the victims, inasmuch as the same washing was prescribed in cases of holiness, not of pollution. (App. p. 11.) But, besides that this author is singular in his notion that the scape-goat was not polluted, he proceeds altogether upon a wrong acceptation of those passages, which relate to persons and things that came into | contact with the sin-offering ; it being commonly translated, in Levit. vi. 18, and elsewhere, " he that toucheth them (the sin- \ offerings) shall be holy," whereas it should be rendered, as Wall properly observes, in quite a different sense, " shall be sanctified," or cleansed, shall be under an obligation, or necessity, of cleansing himself, as the LXX understand it, ctyicta^aiTcci. See Wall's Critical Notes, Levit. vi. 18, where this point is most satisfactorily treated. Upon the whole, then, there appears no reasonable objection against the idea, that the imposition of hands, in piacular sacrifices, denoted an emblematical transfer of guilt f 2 Dr Gcddcs's authority, when it happens to be on the side of orthodoxy, is not without its weight ; because, having no very strong bias in that direction, there remains only the VU vert to account for his having taken it. I therefore willingly accept his assistance on this subject of the imposition of hands upon the head of the victim. He renders Levit. i. 4, " And he shall lay his hand upon the head of the victim, that it may be an acceptable atonement for him." And on the words, " lay his band," &c. he subjoins this remark: — " Thereby devoting it to God ; and transferring, as it were, his own guilt upon the victim." A mere typical rite, lie adds, derived, pro- bably, from the legal custom of the accusing witness laying his hand upon the bead of the criminal. As to Dr Geddes's mode of explaining the matter I am indifferent. Vakat quantum. ^o^39— IMPOSITION OF HANDS ON THE HEAD OF THE VICTIM. 99 and that the ceremony consequently implied the desire, that the evil due to the sinner might he averted, by what was to fall on the head of the victim. This receives farther confirmation from the consideration of other parts of Scripture, in which this ceremony of imposition of hands was used without any reference to sacrifice. In Levit. xxiv. 14, 15, we find this action prescribed in the case of the blasphemer, before he was put to death ; it being at the same time added, that "whosoever curseth his God shall bear his sin ;" thus, as it were, expressing, by this significant action, that the evil consequences of his sin should " fall upon his head :" and in these words, Maimonides expressly savs, the blasphemer was marked out for punish- ment by those who laid their hands upon his head, " thy blood be upon thine own head," (see Outram, De Sacr. lib. i. cap. xv. § 8,) " as if to say, the punishment of this sin fall upon thyself, and not on us and the rest of the people." The expressions also in Josh. ii. 19 ; 2 Sam. i. 16 ; Esth. ix. 25 ; Psalm vii. 16, and several other passages of the Old Testament, respecting evils " falling upon the head" of the person to suffer, may give still farther strength to these observations. It deserves to be remarked, that the sacrifice referred to in the passage cited in the text was that of a burnt-offering, or holocaust ; and as the language in which it is spoken of, as being accepted for the offerer, " to make atonement for him," obviously falls in with the interpretation here given of the ceremony of laying hands on the head of the victim, i't appears that it was not only in the case of the sin-offering enjoined by the law, that this action was connected with an acknowledgment of sin, but with respect also to that kind of sacrifice which existed before the law ; and which, as not arising out of the law, is accor- dingly not now prescribed ; but is spoken of in the very opening of the sacrificial code, as already in familiar use, and offered at the will of the individual : " If any man bring an offering— a burnt-sacrifice," &c — That the burnt-sacrifice was offered in expiation of sins, has, indeed, been doubted ; but so strongly is the reference to sin marked in the description of this sacrifice, that Dr Priestley, on the supposition of its being a voluntary offering, feels himself compelled even to admit it as a consequence, " that in every sacrifice the offerer was considered as a sinner, and that the sacrifice had respect to him in that character," ( Theol. Rep. vol. i. pp. 204, 205,) — a conclusion, so directly subversive of his notion of sacrifices as mere gifts, that, in order His admission of the " emblematical transfer of guilt upon the victim" I am perfectly contented wilh : and, indeed, his illus- tration, by the witness pointing out the object with whom the guilt lay, does not tend much to weaken the significancy of the action. to escape from it, he is obliged to deny, in opposition to every commentator, that the burnt-sacrifice here spoken of was a voluntary offering. Now, that the word, ^m"?, should not be translated, as it is in our common version, " of his own voluntary will," I admit with Dr Priestley : it should be rendered, as appears from the use of the word immediately after, and in other parts of Scripture, as well as from the Greek, the Chaldee, the Syriac, and the Arabic versions, "for his acceptance."3 See Houbig. Ainsw. and Purver. But the present version of this word is far from being the strength of the cause. The manner iii which the subject is introduced, and the entire of the context, place it beyond doubt, that the sacrifice spoken of was the voluntary burnt- offering of an individual. And thus Dr Priestley's argument holds good against him- self, and he admits that in every sacrifice there was a reference to sin. On the expiatory nature of the burnt-offering we shall sec more hereafter, in Number LXVII. No XL.— Page 15. Col. 2. OX THE SUFFICIENCY OF THE PROOF OF THE PRO- PITIATORY NATURE OF THE MOSAIC SACRIFICES, INDEPENDENT OF THE ARGUMENT WHICH ESTA- BLISHES THEIR VICARIOUS IMPORT. That the Jewish sacrifices were propitiatory, or, in other words, that in consequence of the sacrifice of the animal, and in virtue of it either immediately or remote])', the pardon of the offender was procured, is all that my argument requires, in the place referred to by the present Number. The vicarious import of the sacrifice seems indeed sufficiently esta- blished by shewing, as has been done, that the sins of the offender were transferred in symbol to the victim, and immediately after expiated by the death of the animal, to which they had been so transferred. But this has been an argument ex abundanti ; and has been introduced, rather for the purpose of evincing the futility of the objections so confidently relied on, than as essential to the present inquiry. The effect of propitiation is all that the argument absolutely demands. For farther discussion of this important subject, I refer the reader to Number XLII. No. XLI. -Page 15. Col. 2. ON THE DIVINE INSTITUTION OF SACRIFICE ! AND THE TRACES THEREOF DISCOVERABLE IN THE HEATHEN CORRUPTIONS OF THE RITE. That the rite of sacrifice was not an inven- tion of man, but an ordinance of God ; that, however, in passing among the nations of the 3 The words, nrv »:aS WO, Rosenm. renders, *' Ut acceptus sit Deo, Dei favorem sibi conciliet." levit. i. 3. 100 M A ( i E E ON THE A T O N E M E N T. earth, it might have become deformed by idolatrous practices, it yet had not sprung from an idolatrous source, — it is the princi- pal object of the second of the Discourses pre- fixed to this volume, and of many of the Dissertations which are to follow, to establish.1 I shall not, therefore, here enter upon a dis- cussion of this question, hut confine myself merely to a few extracts from Eusebius, with some accompanying observations, upon this suhject. That learned writer, having deduced from the Scripture account of the sacrifices of Abel, Noah, and Abraham, and from the sacrificial institutions by Moses, the fact of a divine appointment, proceeds to explain the nature and true intent of the rite in the following manner : — " Whilst men had no victim that was more excellent, more precious, and more worthy of God, animals were made the price and ransom2 of their souls. And their sub- stituting these animals in their own room bore, indeed, some affinity to their suffering themselves; in which sense all the ancient worshippers and friends of God made use of them. The Holy Spirit had taught them, that there should one day come a victim, more venerable, more holy, and more worthy of God. He had likewise instructed them how to point him out to the world by types and shadows. And thus they became prophets, and were not ignorant of their having been chosen out to represent to mankind the things which God resolved to accomplish."3 — In other words, he pronounces, that the ancient sacrifices, those prescribed to the patriarchs, and those enjoined by the law, were types and figures, and known to lie such, of that one great sacrifice, which was, at a future day, to be offered upon the cross for the sins of the whole human race. Of the practices which grew out of this original institution, and of the abuses to 1 Dr Randolph, in liis interesting and valuable volume of Advent Sermons, has expressed himself with felicity upon this subject. " From those who presumptuously deride the dnctrine of Atonement, we wonld ask some reasonable solution of the origin of sacrifice. Will they make it consistent with any natural idea, will they discover in the blood of an innocent victim, any thing recommendatory in itself of the offerer's suit and devotions? Though they should clear away, what they term, a load of superstition from the Christian worship, they will rind it encumbering every altar of their favourite natural religion ; they will find these absurdities forming the significant and generally indispensable part of all religious ceremonies: and however disgraced, as we are ready to allow, with every abominable pollution, though retaining nothing to perfect the service, or to purify the offering, still in its expiatory form, in its propitiatory hopes, the sacrifice of heathen nations preserves the features of that sacred and solemn office, which was ordained to keep up the remembrance of guilt, till the full and perfect sacrifice, oblation, and satisfaction was made by an eternal Mediator, for the sins of the whole world." Sermons during Advent, pp. 46, 47. 2 AitT^a, tx; ietvT'jJr £a>r*f, xa.) ccvTi'^i/yct. •' Euseb. Demonst Evang. lib. i. cap. x. p. 36. The whole of tho tenth chapter is well worth attention. which it led amongst the heathen world, perhaps the most remarkable may be dis- covered in the mystical offering of the Pheni- cians recorded by the same writer from San- choniatho ; which, as well from the extraor- dinary circumstances of the transaction itself, as from the interesting and important bearing given to it by a late ingenious writer, I here submit to the reader in the words of the his- torian. 4 " It was an established custom amongst the ancients" (speaking of the Phenicians,) " on any calamitous or dangerous emergency, for the ruler of the state to offer up, in pre- vention of the general ruin, the most dearly beloved of his children, as a ransom to avert the divine vengeance. And they who were devoted for this purpose were offered mystically. For Kronus, truly, whom the Phenicians call 77, and who after bis death was translated with divine honours to the star which bears his name, having, whilst he ruled over that 4"E0«? r,v rot; ■7ffa.Xa.ioii £v rai; fj.iya.Xai; trvfJ,$oea7; rut xtvhvvojv, a.vr) ty]; TffavTuv qQooa; , to rtya.iTVtfJ.ivo* tut r-xwv rob; x^aroZvTa.; *j ■sroXius, r] idvou;, ll; ortfayw nthihovai XOtoov rot; TifAoj^ots "ha.lu.ovi. K.a.Tto'Qa.TTOvTO hi oi hihofcivoi MT2TIKJ22. — K°ovo; toivvv, S» oi ioivixa ltr^ar.X 7r$ov fj.ovoyivrt, ov hia. tovto liovh IxaXovv (tov fjovoyivov; ovtcu; It* xa) vZv xaXovfxivou ■nra^a. toi; ^oivt^t,) xtvhvvuv ix vxoi.ifj.ov fjiyttrruv xaTuXr^oraif ty.v x'Sioav, j3aowtXixu xotru.v.tra; trxYf^an tov vlov, fi&fj,ov rt xaTa.trxfja.tra.fj.ivo; xariSviri. Euseb. Priep. Evang. lib. i. cap. x. p. 40, and lib. iv. cap. xvi. pp. 156, 157. It will be remarked here, that the word 'ltr^ai,x, in this extract of Eusebius, I have written II in the translation. This I have done upon the authority of the ablest critics. Grotius, Vossius, and others, are of opinion, that the transcriber of Eusebius meeting with "IA (7/) supposed it to be a contrac- tion of the word 'ltr^a>,x {Israel) often abridged thus in the MSS. of the Greek Christian writers, and wrote it at full length as we now find it. This is confirmed by the circumstance of Kronus being elsewhere called //, as we leam from Eusebius himself (pp. '.'6, 37.) On this see Grotius in Deut xviii. 10. Vossius De Idol. lib. i. cap. xviii. p. 143. Marsham. Can. Clmm. p. 79; and Bryant's Observat. on Hitt. p. '288. The last named writer says, " Kronus, originally esteemed the supreme deity, as is manifest from his being called // and Hut. It was the same name as the El of the Hebrews ; and, accor- ding to St Jerome, was one of the ten names of God. * Phce- nicibus //, qui Ilebrseis El, quod est unum de decern nominibus Dei.' Damascius, in the life of Isidorus, as it occurs in Photius, mentions that Kronus was worshipped by the people of those parts, under the name of El. 4'oivixi; xa) 1Z$ot rot Kfivov 'llX, xa) lir.X, xa) RoXaOrtv irovouM^oviri." Observa- tions, &c. p. 289. It should be observed that the hit (El) of the Hebrews is written 3»J( (//) in Syriac ; and consequently is the 11 of the Phenicians : so that II and El are, without doubt, the same name. It should not, however, be dissembled, that Stillingflcet (after Scaliger and others) is of opinion, that the word might have been written Israel by Eusebius, as we now find it, and that by that Abraham might have been intended. (Orig. Sacr. p. 371) He has not, however, advanced any thing to place this matter beyond doubt. And the authority of Eusebius himself, as already given, with the other references that have been noticed, renders it highly probable that II was the word as originally written. Vossius also (p. 143) remarks, " Parum credibilo est, Phccnices pro Deo summo, hoc est Molocho, sive Saturno, habituros Israelem, parentem gentis vichur, maxi- uieque exosa; ; quod satis sacra testatur histuria." No. 41.— CORRUPTIONS OF THE DIVINE INSTITUTION OF SACRIFICE. 101 people, begotten by a nymph of the country, named Anobret, an only son, thence entitled Jeud (it being to this day usual with the Phenicians so to denominate an only son,) had, when the nation was endangered from a most perilous war, after dressing up his son in the emblems of royalty, offered him as a sacrifice on an altar specially prepared for the purpose." On the Phcnician rites, and particularly upon their mystical ottering here described, the late very learned Mr Bryant has offered some curious and striking observations, from which I have made the following selection, which, I trust, will not be unacceptable to the reader. After speaking of the sacrifices customary with various nations, especially their human sacrifices, he goes on to say, — " These nations had certainly a notion of a federal and an expiatory sacrifice. It was derived to them by tradition ; and though originally founded in truth, yet, being by degrees darkened and misapplied, it gave rise to the worst of profa- nations, and was the source of the basest and most unnatural cruelty. I have shewn at large that human victims were very common among the Phenicians : and Philo Byblius tells us from Sanchoniatho, that in some of their sacrifices there was a particular mystery : ' they who were devoted for this purpose, were offered mystically] that is, under a mystical representation ; and he proceeds to inform us, that ' it was in consequence of an example which had been set this people by the God Kronus, who in a time of distress of- fered up his only son to his father Ouranus.' "5 — He observes, that there is something in the account so very extraordinary as to deserve most particular attention ; and, after quoting the passage from Eusebius, which I have given at full length in page 100, he remarks, that " if nothing more be meant by it, than that a king of the country sacrificed his son, and that the people afterwards copied his example, it supplies a cruel precedent too blindly fol- lowed, but contains nothing in it of a mystery." — " When a fact" (he adds) " is supposed to have a mystical reference, there should be something more than a bare imitation. What- ever may have been alluded to under this typical representation, it was, I believe, but imperfectly understood by the Phenicians ; and is derived to us still more obscurely, by being transmitted through a secondary chan- nel." 6 5 It is to be noted, that Eusebius has given this ace >unt of the matter, in a passage different from that which I have already quoted from him. Amuov hi yivopivm, xtti tpBogx;, TOV 10LVT0V fjCOVOyiVq VtOV K^OVO? Ou°OC.V& TffOLT^t o?,oxa.^rrot. Prcpp. Evang. p. 38. 6 Bryant here alludes to the circumstance of our not being possessed of Sanchoniatho's history itself, but merely of a frag- ment of a Greek translation of it by Philo Byblius, handed down to us by Eusebius; who, as well as the translator, appear to have mixed with the original some observations of their own. Our author, having cleared the history from some obscurities and apparent contradictions, proceeds to his final result : — " This is the only instance of any sacrifice in the Gentile world, which is said to be mystical; and it was attended with circumstances which are very extraordinary. Kronus, we find, was the same with El, and Elioun : and he is termed "Yipiarog and 'T-^ovpxvto;. He is, more- over, said to have the Elohim for his coad- jutors : Hvf/^uxxoi l^ov, rot/ Kpovov, 'F.'haeifi ii:i)CK^nBoi; oett'ftoai, to atone for the sins of others, and avert the just vengeance of God ; ccvrl tjjj tzu.vtuv posterity to the people of the Jews? I am, upon the whole, therefore, rather disposed to think, that this sacrifice of the I'henicians grew out of the intended sacrifice of Isaac by have been originally Ain OU-r, " the fountain of light," the word nw being tendered variously, Aw, Avar, Aber, Ober." Now Ouranut, Bryant hud before derived in like manner, making it the transp nition of Ain Aur or Our, " the fountain of light ;" written Our ain, ami thence by the Greeks Ouranos. Bryant*! Obterv. See. pp. 285,291. Bochart, however, derives the word Anobret differently: time, maij-jn, An oberet, i. e. ex gratis o nci] ions: which, he Bays, is a just appellation for Sara, the wife of Abraham.— Boch. I'/iai. (Opera, torn, i p. ?12.) '•' The Hebrew word ttiv Jehid, signifies unicus, solitaries, and is frequently applied to an only bun. It is the very word used of Inaac in Gun. \.\ii. 2. Abraham, to which the circumstances of the history seem to correspond in many particu- lars. First, it is remarkable, that the very name by which God describes Isaac, when he issues Ins order to Abraham to offer him in sacrifice, is TIT) 10 Jehid, agreeing with the Phenician name Jeud given to the son of Kronus. Again, if Anobret has been justly explained by Bo- chart, as signifying " ex gratia concipien's," no epithet could be with greater propriety applied to Sara, the wife of Abraham ; of whom the apostle says, " Through faith Sara received strength to conceive, — when she was past age." Again, that Abraham should be spoken of by the Phenicians, as a king who reigned in those parts, is not unlikely, considering his great possessions and rank u amongst the sur- rounding people : and if the name assigned by the history be actually Israel, or "Ia, as the abbreviation of Israel, little doubt can then remain as to its application, there being nothing unreasonable (notwithstanding Vos- sius's remark noticed in p. 100.) in supposing him called by the title of the famous Patriarch whose progenitor he was, and from whom a whole people took its name. If even we should suppose the true reading to be II, as equivalent to the El of the Hebrews, and so consider him as ranked amongst the divinities of the Phenicians, as the other parts of the history undoubtedly describe Kronus to have been, there is nothing in this so very surpris- ing ; especially when it is remembered, that Kronus is related to have been advanced from a mortal to the heavens. There is also an expression used of Arbaham in Gen. xxiii. 6, which, by a slight variation of the rendering, would actually represent him as a supreme God, in perfect correspondence with all that we have seen applied to Kronus. The expres- sion I allude to is □,nL>N &WM, which is strictly rendered a "prince of God," a known Hebraism for a mighty prince, as it is accord- ingly given in the common Bible, the literal English being placed in the margin. Now this might with equal accuracy (DVT7N being a plural word) be rendered "a prince of Gods," and would accordingly, by those who held a plurality of Gods, as the Canaanites did, be so rendered : and thence he would come to be considered as supreme or chief among the gods. And accordingly we find the Elohiin described as the associates of Kronus: "^.vy.g.a.-^ai 'lAov rov Kpovov 'R'Ausi/lc i-iK*7]$wcti>. (Euseb. Pra^p. Prang, p. 37.) But yet farther, another circumstance remains to l>e noticed, which seems to give confirma- tion to the iiha, that Abraham was the Kronus of Sanchoniatho. We are told of Kronus by 10 '* Take now thy son, pTn\) thine only son." Gen. xxii. 2. " Sjee Gen. xxiii. G, where Abraham is addressed as a king. " Th.. u art a mighty prince among lie," No. 41.-C0HR1.1PTI0NS OF THE DIVINE INSTITUTION OF SACRIFICE. 103 this writer (Pr ovfifAxxov; x.XTXvxyx.xax; ; Etiam puden- da sibi ipse circumcidit, sociosque omnes ad simile factum per vim adigit. This exactly corresponds to what is said of Abraham, in Gen. xvii. 27. — See Stilling. Orig, Soar. pp. 371, 372 ; Shuckford's Connection, i. pp. 326, 327 ; and particularly Bochart Phalcg. torn. i. pp. 711, 712. Thus, upon the whole, it appears to me, that the reference of the mystical sacrifice of the Phenicians to the intended sacritice of Isaac by Abraham is natural 12 and striking. Nor, perhaps, after all, do I, in holding this opinion, differ very substantially from the 12 This application of the history of Sanchoniatho (as reported by Eusebius) to the circumstances of the birth and intended sacritice of Isaac recorded by Moses, will appear yet more satisfactory to him who will take the trouble of consulting either Stil'.ingfleet or Bochart, on the whole of the Phenician Theogony, as derived from Sanchoniatho. Those writers abun- dantly prove, that the particulars of that Theogony are borrowed from the facts referred to in the Mosaic history, and its various fables founded upon the mistake or perversion of the language of the Hebrew records. — Stilling. Orig. Sacr. pp. 3o'8 — 3/2. Boch. Phal. Opera, torn. i. pp. 704 — 712. See also Banier's Myth. vol. i. pp. 83 — 101 ; and Goguet's Origin of Laws, &c. vol. i. pp. 370 — 384. President Kirwan likewise, in a learned paper On the Origin of Polytheism, &c. (in the eleventh volume of the Trans, of the Royal Irish Acad.) has treated of this subject. Some of these writers, indeed, particularly Goguet, have doubted whether Sanchoniatho was acquainted with the sacred books. But to the main point with which we are con- cerned, it seems to be of little consequence whether the facts, as they are reported by Moses, or the general tradition of those facts, formed the groundwork of the Phenician mythology. It should be noted, that Bishop Cumberland, in his San- choniatho, pp. 134 — 150, maintains an opinion, directly repug- nant to that which has been advanced in this Number, on the subject of the Phenician sacrifice. But it must be observed, that the learned Bishop's arguments are founded on the want of a perfect agreement between the particulars of Abraham's history, and those of Kronus as detailed by Sanchoniatho : whereas nothing more ought to be expected in such a case, than that vague and general resemblance, which commonly obtains between truth and the fabulous representation of it. Of such resemblance the features will be found, in the instance before us, to be marked with peculiar strength. But the fear of tracing the idolatrous practices of the Phenicians, especially that most horrid practice of human sacrifice, to the origin of a divine command, rendered this excellent prelate the less quick- sighted in discovering such similitude. Indeed, the professed object for which he entered upon his Review of Sanchoniatho's history, must in a great degree detract from the value of his researches upon that subject. The account given by his bio- grapher and panegyrist Mr Payne, states of him, that " he detested nothing so much as Popery, was affected with the apprehensions of it to the last degree, and was jealous almost to an excess of every thing that he suspected to favour it : that this depravation of Christianity ran much in his thoughts, and the inquiry how religion came at first to degenerate into idolatry, put him upon the searches that produced the work in question ; inasmuch as the oldest account of idolatry he believed was to be found in Sanchoniatho's fragment ; and as leading to the discovery of the original of idolatry, he accordingly made it the subject of his study. Preface to Cumb. Sanch. pp. x. xxviii. With a preconceived system, and a predominant terror, even the mind of Cumberland was not likely to pursue a steady and unbiassed course. The melancholy prospect of affairs in the reign of James the Second, his biographer remarks, had inspired him with extraordinary horrors. learned Mr Bryant ; inasmuch as that intended sacrifice is acknowledged to have been typical of a great sacrifice to come ; and it may reasonably be supposed, that a tradition VJ of its mystical nature would pass down through the branches of the Abrahamic family, and so by the line of Esau descend to the inhabitants of the land of Canaan. And thus, eventually, the Phenician sacrifice, founded upon the typical sacrifice of Isaac, would derive from that, a relation to the great offering of which it was the model ; and from its correspondence with the type, acquire that correspondence with the thing typified, for which Mr Bryant contends, but in a form more direct. Thus, then, in this mystical sacrifice of the Phenicians, which, taken in all its parts, is certainly the most remarkable that history records amongst the heathen nations, we find, notwithstanding the numerous fictions and corruptions that disturb the resemblance, marked and obvious traces of a rite originat- ing in the divine command (as the intended sacrifice of Isaac indisputably was,) and terminating in that one grand and compre- hensive offering, which was the primary object and the final consummation of the sacrificial institution. No. XLII. — Page 15. Col. ON THE DEATH OF CHRIST AS A TRUE PROPITIATORY SACRIFICE FOR THE SINS OF MANKIND. Not only are the sacrificial terms of the law applied to the death of Christ, as has been shewn in Numbers XXV, XXVI, XXVII, XXVIII, XXIX ; but others, which open up more fully the true nature of atonement, are superadded in the description of that great sacrifice, as possessing, in truth and reality, that expia- tory virtue, which the sacrifices of the law but relatively enjoyed, and but imperfectly reflected. Reasonable as this seems, and arising out of the very nature of the case, yet has it not failed to furnish matter of cavil to disputatious criticism : the very want of those expressions, which in strictness could belong only to the true propitiatory sacrifice of 13 Were we to accept of Bishop Warburton's idea of the scenical nature of the intended sacrifice of Isaac, representing by action, instead of words, the future sacrifice of Christ, (whose day, as that writer urges, Abraham was by this enabled to see,) we might here positively pronounce, that a precise notion of that future sacrifice did actually exist in the time of Abraham : and that a foundation for the tradition was thus laid in an anticipated view of that great event. But without going so far as this ingenious writer would lead us, may it not fairly be presumed, that in some manner or other, that patri- arch, who enjoyed frequent communication with the Deity, was favoured with the knowledge of the general import of this mysterious transaction, and that from him there passed to his immediate descendants the notion of a mysterious reference at least, if not of the exact nature of its object ? On this subject, see Warb. Div. leg. ii. pp. 589 — G14 ; and Stebhing's Examina- tion of Warburton, pp. 137—143; and his History of Abraham. |f>4 M A ( ! R EON T H E A T () N E M E N T. Christ, being made a ground of objection against the propitiatory nature of the Mosaic atonement. Of this we have already seen an instance in page 94, with respect to the words ' ~kvto>)v, and drrth.vT%oi>. The expres- sion, bearing sin, furnishes another: the author of the Scripture Account of Sacrifices (p. 146.), urging the omission of this phrase in the case <>t* the legal sacrifices, as an argu- ment against the vicarious nature of the Levi- tical atonement. Such arguments, however, only recoil upon the objectors, inasmuch as they supply a reluctant testimony in favour of the received sense of these expressions, when applied to that sacrifice to which they properly apper- tained. But from this these critics seem to entertain no apprehension : and their mode of reasoning is certainly a bold exercise of logic. From the want of such expressions, as being of vicarious import, they conclude against the vicarious nature of the Mosaic sacrifices ; and, this point gained, they return, and triumphantly conclude against the vica- rious import of these expressions in that sacrifice to which they are applied. Not to disturb these acute reasoners in the enjoy- ment of their triumph, letus consider whether the terms employed in describing the death of ( Ihrist, as a propitiatory sacrifice, be sufficient- ly precise and significant to remove all doubt with respect to its true nature and operation. To enumerate the various passages of Scrip- ture, in which the death ot Christ is repre- sented to have been a sacrifice, and the effect of this sacrifice to have been strictly propitia- tory, must lead to a prolix detail, and is the less necessary in this place, as most of them are to be found occasionally noticed in the course of this inquiry ; especially in p. 61. and Numbers XXV, XXVI, XXVII, XXVI II. There are some, however, which, as throwing a stronger light upon the nature and import of the Christian sacrifice, demand our most particular attention ; and the more so, be- cause, from their decisive testimony in favour of the received doctrine of atonement, the utmost stntch of ingenuity has been exerted to weaken their force, and divert their appli- cation. Of these, the most distinguished is the description of the sufferings and death of Christ, in the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah. We there find this great personage represented as one, on whom " the Lord hath laid the ini- quity of us all ;" as one, who " was numbered with transgressors, and bare the sins of many ;" as one, who consequently " was wounded for our transgressions, and bruised for our ini- 1 In addition to what lias been already offered upon tlie meaning of these words, I beg to refer the reader to the judi- cious observations in I>r Narcs's Remark* on the Version of tin- Jfew Testament by the Unitarians, pp. 12S — 130; and to those "f DfttlziDS, in his treatise De ATTI'lli. Meusch. A'ov. Test, CX Tulm. pp. OC'I, 870. quities ;" and who, in " making his soul an (□ItfN) offering for sin," suffered " the chas- tisement of our peace, and healed us by his stripes." Thus we have, here, a clear and full explanation of the nature and efficacy of the sacrifice ottered for us by our blessed Re- deemer. And as this part of Scripture not only seemsdesigned to disclose the whole scheme and essence of the Christian atonement, but, from the frequent and familiar references made to it by the writers in the New Testament, ap- pears to be recogn/.icd by them as furnishing the true basis of its exposition, it becomes necessary to examine, with scrupulous atten- tion, the exact force of the expressions, and the precise meaning of the prophet. For this purpose, I shall begin with laying before the reader the last nine verses of the chapter, as they arc rendered by Bishop Lowth in his admirable translation, with the readings of the ancient versions, and some occasional explanations by Vitringa, Dathe, and other expositors. 4. Surely our infirmities he hath borne : 2 And our sorrows he hath A carried3 them : Yet we thought him judicially stricken ; Smitten of God and afHicted. 5. But he was wounded for our transgressions ; Was smitten for our iniquities: The chastisement, B by which our peace is effected, was laid upon him ; And by his bruises we are healed. 6. We all of us like sheep have strayed : We have turned aside, every one to his own way ; And Jehovah hath made to light c upon luin the iniquity of us all. 7. It was exacted, u and he was made answerable; and he opened not his mouth : As a lamb that is led to the slaughter ; And as a sheep before her shearers Is dumb : so lie opened not his mouth. 8. By an oppressive judgment he was taken off ; And his manner of life who would declare 1 For he was cut off from the land of the living ; For B the transgression of my people he was smitten to death. 9. And his grave, &c. Although he had done no wrong, Neither was there any guile in his mouth. 10. Yet it pleased Jehovah to crush him with affliction. If his soul shall make a propitiatory sacrifice, v He shall see a seed, \e. 11. Of G the travail of his soul he shall sec (the fruit,) and be satisfied. By the knowledge of him shall my servant justify " many ; For the punishment of their iniquities he shall ' bear.'* 1 2. Therefore will I distribute to him the many for his portion. And the mighty people shall he share for his spoil : Because he poured out his soul unto death ; And was numbered with the transgressors: And he K bare B the sin of many : And made intercession for the transgressors. ■-' KM 8 Vat . \vo- l> Kt'J No. 4-2.— THE DEATH OF CHRIST A PROPITIATORY SACRIFICE. 105 a (Carried.) Bajulavit. Vitr. — Sustinet. Dath. and Doederl. — rcbs «r»»wr ixi/Mm. Symm. — also Aq. and Theod.— See Crit. Sac. torn. iv. p. 5306. B (Cha$tisemetlt.) Poena exemplaris ad impetran- dam nobis reconciliationem cum Deo. Vitr. — Ejus castigatio nostrte cum Deo reconciliationis causa facta est. Dath. — Mulcta correetionis nostrse ei imposita fuit. Tig. — "»di» poena publica ad deter- rendos spectantes a peccando, exemplo poenarum, ut Ezek. v. 15. Gusset. Lex. p. 332. Poena exemplaris, qua alius moneatur et cohibeatur a peccando. Ux^ayux. Cocc. Lex. — Michaelis (; sra?E'W.ev ttlriv rxl; xfixerixi; i/*St, is the present reading of the LXX : and the Old Italic as given by Augustin, as well as the several readings collected by Sabatier, follow this very nearly: rendering it, " Dominuseum tradidit propter iniquitates nostras : " but Symm. corresponds with the received reading, KC^to; »*™»- rxtrxi irrolviirii/ iU xvrov Try xvouixv t&xvtwv y1u.ujv. The SyriaC reads, Dominus fecit ut occurrerent in eum peccata nostra. The Vulgate, Dominus fecit oecurrere in eum iniquitatem omnium nostrum: and Castellio, Jova in eum omnium nostrum crimen conjecit. Crellius, indeed, to avoid the force of this clause, translates it, Deum, per Christum, iniquitati omnium nostrum occurrisse : and is refuted by Outram, lib. ii. cap. v. § 3. Rosenmuller renders the words, incursare in eum jussit crimina nostrum omnium, h. e. poenas impietati nostra? debitas ilium unice perferre jussit Jehova. And upon the whole of the 4th, 5th, and 6th verses, he gives this general exposition : Quem nos ob sua crimina atrocissimis malis a Deo affectum existimavimus, ilium eos dolores sustinuisse nunc intelligimus, qui nobis pro peccatis subcundi fuemnt. d (It was exacted.) Exigebatur debitum. Vitr. — Exactionem sustinuit, vol solutio exacta fuit Michaelis. — Exigitur debitum, et ille ad diem res- pondit. Dath. — Mr Dodson seems, upon very slender grounds, to object to Bishop Lowth's trans- lation of this clause. Dr Taylor having, in his Concordance, pronounced the word vtu, to be a for- ensic term, signifying, he was " brought forth," and Symmachus having rendered it by the word zr$ounishment of their iniquities he shall hear.) Siquidcm eorum peccata bajulavit. Vitr. — Nam pro peccatis eorum satisfecit. Dath. — Nam poenas eorum sustinuit. Doederl. — Et iniquitates eorum ipse portabit. Vulg. — Peccata illorum ipse sustinebit. Old Italic as given by August. Sabat. in loc. — Mr Dodson contends against the propriety of the bishop's translation, and maintains, that the words will bear no other meaning than, " their iniquities he shall bear aira>/." In this he considers himself supported by the 'authority of the LXX, who render, K«i t«( afX.a^Tia.( avru* ecuTOt ANOI2EI. He does not, however, state, that Sym. translates the clause, rca itrtStias ttinui xvris TIIENETKEI : (Crit. Sac. torn. iv. p. 5300.) — and besides, as we shall see hereafter, the word a-vec^i^u yields him nc support. Bishop Stock renders, " Of their iniquities he shall bear the weight:" in which he agrees with Rosen- miiller, who says, " De formula hac bene monuit Martini, peccata propter mala, quae sibi adjuncta habent, ab Orientalibus ut grave onus reprcesentari, quo premantur, qui iis se inquinaverint, in cujus rei testimonium adducit locum Thren. v. 7. et ex Corano plura loca. Hinc apud Arabes, inquit, verbum, quod proprie est, grave onus sustinuit, dicitur pro, crimine gravatus fuit : itemque sarcina vocabuluin solenne est de criminibus eorumque poenis." k (He bare, &c.) Peccatum multorum tulit. Vitr. — Pro multorum peccatis satisfecit. Dath. — Multorum poenas sustinuit. Doederl. — Peccata multorum tulit. Vulg. — Peccata multorum sustinuit. August. — pertulit. Cypr. — and both add, after the LXX, et propter iniquitates eorum traditus est : Sabat. in loc. — Mr Dodson objects, as in verse 11, and renders it, he took aicay the sins, &.c. I have thought it necessary to take this accurate survey of this celebrated prophecy, and to state thus fully the various renderings of the most respectable versions and commen- tators, lest any pretence might remain, that, in deriving my arguments from this part of Scripture, I had, either unguardedly, or un- candidly, built on any inaccuracy in our common English translation. The plain re- sult of the whole is obviously this : That tho righteous servant of Jehovah, having no sin himself, was to submit to be treated as the vilest of sinners ; and, having the burden of our transgressions laid upon him, to suffer on account of them ; and, by offering up his life a propitiatory sacrifice, like to those under the law, to procure for us a release from the punishment which was due to our offences. And thus from that prophet, justly called Evangelical, who was the first commissioned to lift up the veil that covered the mystery of our redemption, and to draw it forth to open view from beneath the sdiade of Jewish cere- monies and types, through which it had been hitherto but faintly discerned, — we have a description of that great propitiatory Sacrifice, whereby our salvation lias been effected, as plain as it is possible for language to convey it. That Christ is the person described by the prophet throughout this chapter, cannot with any Christian be a matter of question. Saint Matthew, (viii. 17,) and Saint Peter, (1 Ep. ii. 24,) directly recognize the prophecy as No. 42.— THE DEATH OF CHRIST A PROPITIATORY SACRIFICE. 107 applied to Christ: and yet more decisive is the passage in Acts, (viii. 3r>) in which, the eunuch reading this very chapter, and de- manding of Philip, "of whom speaketh the prophet this?" it is said, that "Philip began at the same Scripture, and preached unto him Jesus." Indeed, so evident and undeniable is the application to Christ, that Dr Priestley him- self, whilst he is laboriously employed in withdrawing from the support of Christianity most of the prophecies of the Old Testament (which, he says, Christians, by " following too closely the writers of the New Testament," have been erroneously led to attribute to Christ, Theol. Rep. vol. v. p. 213,) yet pro- nounces it impossible to explain this of any other but Jesus Christ, (p. 226 ;) and considers the application of it to Jeremiah by Grotius as not deserving a refutation. White also, who, in his Commentary on Isaiah, professes to follow Grotius as his oracle, is yet obliged to abandon him in his explication of this pro- phecy, which he says cannot possibly belong to any other than Christ : and this he thinks so evident, that he concurs with A. Lapide, in pronouncing that " this chapter may justly challenge for its title, ' The Passion of Jesus Christ according to Isaiah.' " See also Kenni- cott's Dissert, vol. ii. p. 373. But, whilst Christ is of necessity allowed to bethesubject of this prophecy, the propitiatory sacrifice, which he is here represented as offering for the sins of men, is utterly rejected. And for the purpose of doing away the force of the expressions, which so clearly convey this idea, the adversaries of the doctrine of atonement have directed against this part of Scripture their principal attacks. What has been already advanced in Number XXVII. may shew how impotent have been their attempts to prove that Christ is not here de- scribed, as an nt^N, or "sacrifice for sin." And their endeavours to evince that this sacrifice is not likewise described as one truly propitiatory, we shall find to be equally unsupported by just argument, or fair and rational criticism. The usual method of proceeding has been, to single out one expression from this entire passage, and, by undermining its signification, to shake the whole context into ruins. The person, who is made an pttfN, or " sin-offer- ing," is said to " bear the sins of many." Now, it is contended, that to bear sins, signifies merely to bear them away, or remove them ; and that, consequently, nothing more is meant here, than " the removing away from us our sins and iniquities by forgiveness."6 In support of this position, the application of the prophet's words by Saint Matthew, (viii. 17,) and the force of the expressions which in this 6 B. Mord. p. 825. See also Taylor's Key, No. 1G2. ; Mr Dodson's Notes on this chapter of Isaiah ; and farticularly Crell. Resp. ad Grot. p. 24, iSec. prophecy are rendered by the words, bearing sins, are urged as unanswerable arguments. 1. It is said, that "the words in the 4th verse, ' our infirmities he hath borne, and our sorrows, he hath carried them,' are ex- pressly interpreted by Saint Matthew, of the miraculous cures performed by our Saviour on the sick : and as the taking our infirmities, and bearing our sicknesses, cannot mean the suffering those infirmities and sicknesses, but only the bearing them away, or removing them, so the bearing our iniquities is likewise to be understood, as removing them away from us by forgiveness." It must be owned, that this passage of Saint Matthew has given great difficulty to commentators. His applying, what the pro- phet seems to say of sins, to bodily infirmities ; and the bearing of the former, to the curing of the latter ; has created no small degree of perplexity. Some have, accordingly, con- tended,7 that Saint Matthew has applied the prophecy merelyin accommodation ; in which case, he supplies no authority as to the precise meaning of the words of the prophet : others8 again, that the expressions admit that full and comprehensive signification, that will include both bodily and spiritual diseases, and which consequently received a twofold fulfil- ment : others 9 again, that Christ might be said to have suffered the diseases, which he removed ; from the anxious care, and bodily harassing, with which he laboured to remedy them, bearing them, as it were, through sympathy and toil : and Bishop Pearce is so far dissatisfied with all of these expositions, that he is led to concede the probability, that the passage in Matthew is an interpolation. Now, if these several commentators, acqui- escing in the received, have proceeded on an erroneous, acceptation of the passages in Isaiah and Matthew, we shall have little reason to wonder at the difficulties which they have had to encounter in reconciling the prophet and the evangelist. It must surely, then, be worth our while to try whether a closer exa- mination of the original passages will not enable us to effect this point. For this purpose, it must first be observed, that all the commentators have gone upon the supposition, that the prophet, in the 4th verse, which is that quoted by Saint Matthew, speaks only of the sufferings of Christ on account of our sins : into which they have been led, partly by the Greek version, d^xorict;; and partly by the supposition, that Saint Peter refers to this same passage, when he speaks of Christ's "bearing our sins upon the cross." But the reference of Saint Peter is not to this 4th verse, but to the 11th and 12th : the words 7 See Calixt. Ernest. Schol. Propk. p. 230. Sykes's Essay on Christ, licl p. 231. Beausob. Rosenni. and Wakefield, in loc. 8 See Ilamm. Whitby, Le Cierc, and Lightfoot, in ioc. 9 See Vitr. on Iaa. liii. 4, & Raphe). Grot. & Doddridge, in loc 1(8 M A (1 E E ON THE ATONEMEX T. of Saint Peter, ret; dfcotoTtx; uvto; cLvyueyx.1, corresponding to the original in both these verses, and being the very same used by the LXX : rot; utu»oTix; ecvro; dvoloei, and cui/Tog u/xu^Tix;, d»i)»tyxt being their translation of them respectively. Again, with regard to the word, etfiotoTict;, which is now found in the Greek version of the 4th verse, there seems little reason to doubt, from what Dr Rennicott has advanced, in his Diss. Gen. § 70, that this is a corruption, which has crept into the later copies of the Greek ; the old Italic, as (collected from Augustin, Tertullian, and Athanasius,) as well as Saint Matthew, reading the word, dafovuot;, and thereby proving the early state of that version. Besides, Dr Owen {Modes of Quot. p. .31.) mentions two MSS. that read at th is day dadivilct; ; and one /xx'ActKict; : and from the collection in which the late Dr Holmes was engaged, if happily it should be prosecuted, it is not unlikely that more may appear to justify this reading. I rind, also, that in ninety-three instances, in which the word here translated uuxotix, or its kindred verb, is found in the Old Testament in any sense that is not entirely foreign from the passage before us, there occurs but this one in which the word is so rendered ; it being, in all other cases, expressed by da^ivux, I^xKxkIx, or some word denoting bodily dis- ease. See Calas. Cowc. on n^n, No. 1. That the Jews themselves considered this passage of Isaiah as referring to bodily diseases, ap- pears from Whitby, and Light'foot, Hor. Heb. on Matt. viii. 17. and also Poole's Syn. on Isaiah liii. 4. Pes. and Alsch. And that the word 13 vFT is to be taken in this sense, ap- pears not only from the authority of the Jews, but from that of most of the ancient transla- tions ; being rendered by Munster and the Tigurine, infirmitates ; and mot-bos, by Tre- mellius, Piscator, and Castalio. — Iren. and August, who give us the early Latin version from the Greek, read infirmitates ; and Tertul- lian, imbecillitates. Cocceius, and all the lexi- cons, explain it in the same sense ; and the several passages in which it occurs in the Old Testament, as collected both by Taylor and Calasio, place the matter beyond dispute. So that the word infirmities, by which Lowth, and Vitringa, in agreement with the old English versions, have rendered it in this place, can- not possibly be rejected. Mr Dodsorj entirely concurs in this interpretation ; and Kennicott asserts positively, that the word always de- notes bodily diseases. (Diss. Gen. § 70.) Dathe, and Doederlein, indeed, explain it by the general expressions, mala, and miseriams but Doederlein nt the same time admits that morbus is its literal signification. Having thus ascertained the true sense of the word WlTl, we next proceed to Nt£^ ; which, I agree with Mr Dodson, is not here to be rendered in any other sense, than that of tollo, aufero. This, when not connected with sins, iniquities, See. is not infrequently its signification. Dr Kennicott (Diss. Gen. § 70.) takes it in this place in the sense of ab- stulit ; and thus Tertullian expressly reads the word from the early Latin. So that the first clause, NEfl NVI lT^n, will then run," surely our infirmities he hath taken, i. e. taken away," exactly corresponding to Saint Mat- thew's translation and application of the words : and thus Cocc. (on Nt£0, N°. I.) ex- pressly renders it, " Morbos nostros ipse tulit, i. e. ferens abstulit." But the second, or antithetical clause, Q^D "O'QNDEN relates, as we shall see, not to bodily pains and distempers, but to the diseases and torments of the mind. That the word HSDD is to be taken in this sense, Kennicott affirms. (Diss Gen. § 70.) It is evidently so interpreted, Psal. xxxii. 10, " Many sorrows shall be to the wicked :" and again, Psal. xxxviii. 17. where the Psalmist, grieving for his sins, says, "My sorrow is conti- nually before me :" and again, Psal. lxix. 20. " But I am poor and sorrowful :" and again in Prov. xiv. 13. "The heart is sorrowful :" and Eccles. i. 18. " He that increaseth knowledge, increaseth sorrow:" and ii. 18. "What hath man of all his labour, of the vexation of his heart? For all his days are sorrows:" and Isa. lxv. 14. " My servants shall sing for joy, but ye shall cry for sorrow of heart :" and Jer. xxx. 15. " Thy sorrow is incurable, for the multitude of thine iniquity." Agreeably to this, the word is translated by Bishop Lowth, and by our common and most of the early English versions, sorrows. The Vulg. Vitr. and Dath. render it by dolores ; and the LXX by oowxTcti. — Tlovo;, which is the word used by Sym. Ul Aquil. and Theod. (see Pro- cop. Crit. Sac. torn. iv. pp. ,5200, 5300,) agrees with this, signifying, according to llesychius, ci.'hyo; ivipyrhux ohvvr,g, and being used com- monly in this sense in the Greek of the Old Testament. Yet, in opposition to all this Mr Dodson contends, that the Hebrew word is here to be rendered sicknesses: and this, upon no better ground, than that the word may signify bodily disorders, as well as dis- eases of the mind : and in support of this assertion, he refers to Taylor's Concordance. But, on consulting both Taylor and Calasio, "' Symmachus renders, rout uriicv; iiTiputt ; as see p. 105 of this volume. It is observable, that the rendering of the word 3M3Di in this place, by IION02, in the versions of Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion, has been omitted In Trommius'a Concordance, in the Lexicon Grtrcum ad Hexapla, in Biel's Lexicon in LXX. &c. and in SeMcmner's Spicileyium , intended as an addition to the Lexicon of Biel. Trommius, indeed, notices this rendering of the word 310 by Symmachus in Job, xvi. 6, and xxxiii. 1!) ; and of the word ~t; by Aquila in Job, xvi. 2, and by both Aquila and Symmachus in Psalm xiv. But none of these instances have been cited by Biel. A complete Concordance for the fragments of Aquila, Symmachus, and Theud.'ti 'ii, seems still a desideratum. No. 42.— THE DEATH OF CHIUST A PROPITIATORY SACRIFICE. 100 I find, that of about thirty passages of Scrip- ture, in which, exclusive of the one at present before us, the word 3tfD2 or its kindred verb is found, there is scarcely one that bears any relation whatever to bodily disease : ll and there is but one, (Job, xxxiii. 19,) in which the LXX have rendered it by any word imply- ing corporeal ailment. In this one place they have used the word ^asAa*/*, which, however, they do not always apply to bodily disease ; and which they have employed in the 3d verse of this very chapter, eflias Qipuv ^oCha.y.iot.v, where Mr Dodson renders the words, " acquainted with grief" But it is particularly worthy of remark, that this word □,3ND*.^ winch' Mr Dodson in this 4th verse would translate sick' nesses, he has himself rendered in the preceding verse, in the description to which this imme- diately refers, by the word sorrows, and yet pronounces this expression utterly inappli- cable here : thus allowing the person spoken of, to be " a man of sorrows," in one verse ; and denying that the same expression, which was there used, referred to those sorrows, in the next, where it came to be explained what and wdience these sorrows were. The secret, however, of this inconsistency of criticism lies in the Hebrew verb, annexed to this word. — The verb "?2Q, " to bear," in the sense of bearing a burden, could not be applied to sicknesses, as it might to sorrows : and as the object with those who deny that Christ suffered on our account, is to deprive the verb of this signification, the reason of contending for the adjunct sickness, in opposi- tion to such a wreight of evidence, is sufficiently obvious. The word, ^D, however, Mr Dod- son cannot prove to be taken here in the sense of removing. He says, " it has been already proved by many learned men," and refers to Crellius, Whiston, and Taylor. But in what manner these learned men have proved it, we shall presently see. In his answer to Dr Sturges, p. 21, he advances, indeed, his own reasons in defence of his exposition of the word 7^Q : but except the citation from Isa. xlvi. 4, which shall be noticed hereafter, his whole argument turns upon the supposition, that the Hebrew word, with which it is connected, as well as its cor- responding expression in Saint Matthew, is to be understood as signifying bodily disorders : in which case he says, " 7jjQ must be con- sidered as synonymous to N^J." All this, then, together with the accompanying remark concerning the use of the word iliaTetmu by Hippocrates, must fall with the hypothesis on which it is built ; and the strength of this hypo- thesis has been now sufficiently ascertained. 11 And what is singular, the very authority to which Mr Dodson refers, pronounces decisively against him in the passage before us, rendering the word by sorrows in this fourth verse as well as in the verse which precedes it. See Taylor's Concord. on 3(0, Nos. 23. 25. But, to proceed with the verb ^3Q. The word, or its derivative noun, occurs in twenty-six pas- sages of the Old Testament, one of which is the verse now under examination : two others relate to sins : one, the 11th verse of this chap- ter ; the other, Lam. v. 7, both of which we shall hereafter discuss more particularly : and the remaining twenty-three belong literally to bearing burdens on the shoulder ; and so strictly and exclusively is this signification appro- priated to the word, that we find the bearers of burdens employed in the work of the Temple, called (2 Chron. ii. 2, 18 ; xxxiv. 13,) □vZlD, *?2D t^N; by the LXX, voriQopoi; and in one passage, it is even used to express a yoke (Isa. x. 27,) LXX, Cvy6g: see Calas. and Kircher: see also Buxt. Cocc. and Schindl. they seem decisive on the point. Buxtorf supplies several instances of the application of the word, from the Jerusalem Targum ; all of which coincide with the sense here contended for. Schindler quotes a remarkable use of the word, in the Syriac translation of Saint Mark, v. 2G, it being there applied to the woman who is said to have "suffered many things (■sxQouau. uioAAot) of the physicians." For other instances of a similar use of the word in the Syriac, see Schaaf's Test. Syriac, 1 Cor. xiii. 7 ; 2 Tim. ii. 9 ; 1 Pet. iii. 17 ; also Schaaf's Lexicon Syriac. on the word Wo£>. Now, when, in addition to all these authorities, we find the Greek versions uniformly giving to the word, in this place, the sense of sustaining or suffering, (virifAsive* being, as we have already seen, the reading of Aq. Sym. and Theodot. ; and the LXX expressing both the noun and verb by the one word, oIwAtxi :) the Latin versions also rendering it in like manner ; (the old Italic as given by August, strictly following the LXX, pro nobis in dolo- ribus est ; the Vulg. Pagn. and Piscat. ex- pressing the word by portavit ; Montan. and Tremell. by bajulavit ; Munst. by sustinuit ; and Castal. by toleravit :) and our own English translation supported in the same sense by the most eminent biblical scholars, Vitr. Lowth, Dath. Doederl. and Rosenmuller ; it is natural to inquire what arguments have been used by those learned men to whom Mr Dodson refers us for his proof. But the reader will be surprised to find, that, confidently as Mr Dodson has appealed to them, they furnish no proof at all. Mr Whiston merely translates the passage as Mr Dodson has done, without advancing a single reason in support of it : (see Boyle's Lectures, fol. ed. vol. ii. pp. 2"0. 281.) Dr'Taylor (Key, eve. $ 162.) only says, that ^Q will admit the sense of carrying off', or away; and, in support of this, he instances one solitary pas- sage from Isa. xlvi. 4. which a single glance will prove not to convey this sense.12 And as 12 It is particularly remarkable also, that Dr Taylor, in his Concordance, has not only not adduced a single passage in 110 M A G E E ON THE A T O N K M E X T. to Crellius, he even confesses that he cannot find in the Old Testament a single instance of the use of the word, 73D, in the sense of bearing away ; and is obliged to confine him- self to the repetition of the argument of Socinus, derived from the application of this passage by Saint Matthew to bodily diseases, which Christ could be said to bear, only in the sense of bearing away.13 But, to suppose this clause applied by Saint Matthew to bodily diseases, is a pctitio principii ; the sense, in which it was understood by the Evangelist, being part of the question in dispute. And that it w.-is differently understood and applied by him, will, I trust, presently appear. Thus \\ e find these learned men, to whom Mr Dod- son has referred for a complete proof of the point he wishes to establish, fulfilling his ei ijra ^ement in a manner not very satisfactory. Mr Whiston offers no proof; Dr Taylor gives a single, and inapplicable instance ; and Crel- lius begs the question, admitting at the same time the general language of Scripture to be against him. This may furnish a useful hint to unsuspecting readers. — But to proceed. That this second clause in the 4th verse relates not to Christ's removing the sicknesses, but to his actually bearing the sorrows of men, has, I trust, been sufficiently established. Let us now consider the corresponding clause in Saint Matthew's quotation, Tfliff vooov; iZtx.oToc.oiv. This has commonly been referred, it must be confessed, to bodily diseases ; but, whether the occasion on which it is introduced, joined to the certainty that the preceding clause is applied in this sense, may not have led to this interpretation of the words, is worth}' of inquiry. That the word uooo; is primarily applied to bodily diseases, there can be no question. Dr Kennicott contends (Diss. Gen. $ 79.) that it is used here to express diseases of the mind. In this he adopts the notion of Grot, on Matt. viii. 17 : and certain passages both in the Old and New Testament undoubt- edly apply the word in this sense. Thus Psal. ciii. r5. " Who forgiveth all thine iniquities ; who healeth all thy diseases." Wisd. xvii. 8. " They that promised to drive away terrors and troubles from a sick soul." Also, 1 Tim. vi. 4. " He is proud, doting (or rather distrac- ted, vooZv) about questions and strifes of words." Schleusncr also explains the word vooioi, as metaphorically applied to the mind ; and quotes in confirmation of this, yElian, and Julius Pollux. To the same purpose Eisner (Obscrv. Sac. torn. ii. p. 307.) appeals which the sense of bearing otherwise than as a burden is con- veyed ; but he actually explains the word in this sense: "to bear, or carry a burden, as a porter." In the passage at pre- sent in dispute, indeed, he Introduce! the sense of bearing away : but then he does this avowedly on the supposition, that this passage is to be explained by the disetises spoken of by Suint Matthew. 13 See Crell. l{'.tp. ad Gr. p. 24 ; also, Socin. de Jet. Chr. pars 9. cap. 4. Opera, torn. ii. p. 149. 14 to Plutarch, Lucian, &c. And, if vitro?, as all Lexicons agree, corresponds to the morbus of the Latins, there can be no question of its occa- sional application to the disorders of the mind. Xow, if the word be taken in this sense in this passage of Matthew, it will exactly agree with the sorrows, or sufferings, of Isaiah. Or if, supposing it to denote bodily disease, it be used by metonymy (as Vitringa, on Isa. liii. 4, explains it) for pains and afflictions, the cause being put for the effect : or if, again, with Glassius, (Phil. Sacr. Dath. p. 972.) Doederlein, (on Isa. liii. 4.) and other distin- guished Biblical critics, it be supposed merely to express the punishment of sins, bodily dis- eases being viewed by the Jews familiarly in that light ; or if, waving these interpretations, which some may consider as too strongly figurative, the word be taken in its largest sense, as comprehending ills and afflictions in general, without regarding what their cause might be, — it will equally correspond with the expression of the prophet. And, that it is to be taken in this large sense, and by no means to be confined to mere bodily disease, is yet farther confirmed by the emphatical verb (ZctorxQip, which is connected with it, and which so adequately conveys the force of the Hebrew, *V}D. " Hi this word,'' Grotius (on Matt. viii. 17.) remarks, " as in the Hebrew 7QD and its corresponding ^N V ' which is here used by the Syriac version, is contained the force of burden and suffering." Thus Matt, again, xx. 12, " have borne the burden and heat of the day." And Luke, xiv. 27. " Whosoever doth not bear his cross." John, xvi. 12. " But he cannot bear them now." Acts, xv. 10. "A yoke on the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear." And in the same sense we find it used by Saint Paul, Gal. vi. 2. "Bear ye one another's burdens ; also v. 10. " He that" troubleth you shall bear his judg- ment:" And again, Rom. xv. 1. "We that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak." It must be unnecessary to cite more passages. There are, in all, twenty-six in the New Testament, in which the word jixa-olCu occurs, exclusive of this of Matt. viii. 17 : and in no one is the sense any other, than that of bearing, or lifting as a burden. (See Steph. Concord.) The four passages which are adduced by Taylor, (Key, 162.) viz. Mark, xiv. 13; Luke, vii. 14 ; John, xii. 6, and xx. 15, all of them imply this very idea : for even though the thing spoken of were eventually to be carried away, yet this necessarily requires that it should be carried or borne, as a burden. But what makes this objection the more ex- 14 On the force of the Syriac word \f consult Schaaf. Lexic. Syriac. So emphatical is this word, that the noun 1 1 V 1 derived from it, is used to signify onus, pondut, lareina, &c No. 42.— THR DEATH OF CHRIST A PROPITIATORY SACRIFICE. Ill traordinary is, that the carrying away is not necessarily implied in any one of them : the carrying (bajulare, Vulg. and Tertull. and Cod. BrixJ) the pitcher of water, which is spoken of in one ; and the bearing the dead man's bier, that is referred to in another ; conveying simply the idea of bearing. The two passages in John also, one relating to Judas bearing the bag, and the other to the taking away the body of Jesus, are by no means conclusive : the interpretation of carry- ing away, or stealing, what was put into the bag, though supported by B. Pearce and others, being but conjectural, and standing without any support from the Scripture use of the word : and lifting being all that is necessarily meant writh respect to the body of Christ, although the consequence of that lifting was the carrying it away, and that our version, attending to the general sense more than to the strict letter, has rendered it, borne him It c nee. I will only remark, in addition, that Dr Taylor has contrived to exhibit a much more numerous array of texts in support of his sense of the word (Zeumi^a, than those here examined. He has cited no fewer than ten. But this is a sort of deceptio visas; there being but the four above referred to in which the term occurs. The word iZxaTuai he had joined with two others, shaZt and dv^viyKs, and pursued the investigation of them jointly: thus the text in which any of these words was contained became necessary to be cited, and appeared to be applied to all. Whether this be an accurate mode of examining the signi- fication of words, which may differ in meaning or force ; or whether it may not tend to make a false impression on the hasty reader, by presenting to his view a greater number of authorities, than really exist, in support of a particular acceptation, it would not be amiss for those who are used to talk largely about candour to consider. This digression, though it somewhat retards the course of the argument, I thought it right to make, as, per- haps, there is nothing more useful than to put young readers on their guard against the arts of controversy. To proceed. The use of the word (Skotu^u in the Old Testament, by the LXX, Sym. and Aq. con- firms the acceptation here contended for (see Trom. Concord, and Biel.15) Amongst profane writers, also, we find additional authorities. 15 It is to be observed, that it is not only the Concordance itself that is to be consulted, but more particularly, Mont- faucon's Lexic. Grac. ad Ilexapla, which Trommius has placed at the end of his Concordance, and which is to be esteemed as a most valuable collection from the fragments of Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion. Of this Lexicon, as well as of the labours of Trommius, Biel has freely availed himself, in the compilation of his valuable Lexicon in LXX et alios Inlcrp. &c. From these works it will be seen, that Aquila has em- ployed the words p.) and refers to them in proof that he was the Messiah, (Matt. xi. 4, and Beausobre in loc.) it is not, I say, sur- prising, that this character of Christ should be described by the prophet. And that it should be introduced in this place, where the prophet's main object seems to be to unfold the plan of our redemption, and to represent the Messiah as suffering for the sins of men, will not appear in any degree unnatural, when it is considered, that the dews familiarly connected the ideas of sin and disease; the latter being considered by them the temporal1' punishment of the former. So that he, who 17 For abundant proof of this, see Whitby on Matth. viii 17, and particularly on is. 2. See also Grot. Beaosob. and Elosenm. on Matt. tx. i?. Dnuiua on the same, Crit. Sac. torn. vi. p. 288; and Doederl. on haiah, lui. 4. Martini also on the same passage observe*, " ipsa vcro dicendi formula interpretanda est ex opinione constants turn populorum antiquiorum omnium, tnm maxima OrientaUum,quagravioreflcalamitatesquascunque, sive ilia; morblsel corporis cruciatibus, give aliis adversitatibus cuntiiicrentur, Immediate ail Deurn, peccatorum vindicem re- ferre, casque tanquam pu-uas ah into nomine inllictas, con- eiderare solebant. See Kuscmn. on Isaiah, lui. 4. was described as averting, by what he was to sitffer, the penal consequences of sin, would naturally be looked to as removing, by what he was to perform, its temporal effects : and thus the mention of the one would reasonably connect with that of the other ; the whole of the prophetic representa- tion becoming, as Kennicott happily expresses it, " Dcscriptio Messioe benevolentissime et agentis et patientis." (Diss. Gen. § 70.) That the Evangelist, on the other hand, though speaking more immediately of the removal of bodily diseases, should at the same time quote that member of the prophecy which related to the more important part of Christ's office, that of saving men from their sins, will appear equally reasonable, if it be recollected, that the sole object, in referring to the prophet concerning Jesus, was to prove him to be the Messiah ; and that the dis- tinguishing character of the Messiah was, " to give knowledge of salvation unto his people by the remission of their sins," (Luke, i. 77.) So that the Evangelist may be con- sidered as holding this leading character primarily in view ; and, at the same time that he marks to the Jews the fulfilment of one part of the prophecy, by the healing of their bodily distempers, or, as Dr Taylor well expresses it, represents our Lord as acting one part of his saving work described by the prophet, he directs their attention to that other greater object of our Saviour's mission, on which the prophet had principally enlarged, — namely, the procuring forgiveness of their sins by his suffering. And thus, the present fulfilment of the prophecy was, at the same time, a designation of the person, and a pledge of the future more ample completion of the prediction. Grotins, notwithstanding he has fallen into the common error respecting the word wbn in Isaiah, and the supposition that Saint Peter and Saint Matthew refer to the same part of the prophecy, deserves parti- cularly to be consulted on this passage of Matthew. Cocceius also, in his Lexicon (on the word b2U->) gives this excellent explana- tion ; " he hath taken on himself (suscepit) our sorrows or sufferings eventually to bear them away, as he has now testified by the carrying away our bodily distempers." If it should bo asked, why, if it were a principal object with the Evangelist to point out the great character of the Messiah as suffering for sins, he did not proceed to cite those other parts of the prophecy, which arc still more explicit on that head ; I answer, that, having to address himself to those who were perfectly conversant in the prophecies, he here, as elsewhere, contents himself with referring to a prediction, with the particulars of which he supposes his readers to be fami- liarly acquainted ; merely directing them to the person of whom it treats, and then leav- No. 42.— THE DEATH OF CHRIST A PROPITIATORY SACRIFICE. 113 ing it to themselves to carry on the parallel between the prophecy and the farther verifi- cation of it in Jesus. On Saint .Matthew's peculiar mode of citing the prophecies, sec some excellent observations of I)r Townson. Disc. iv. Sect. ii. § 5. and Sect. iv. § 3. If, after all that has been said, any doubt should yet remain as to the propriety of thus connecting together, either in the prophet or the evangelist, the healing of diseases and the forgiveness of sins, I would beg of the reader to attend particularly to the circumstance of their being connected together frequently by our Lord himself. Thus, he says to the' sick of the palsy, when he healed him, " thy sins be forgiven thee," (Matt. ix. 2.) And, that bodily diseases were not only deemed by the Jews, but were in reality, under the first dis- pensation, in many instances, the punishment of sin, we may fairly infer from John v. 14, where Jesus said to him whom he had made whole, " Sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee." It should be observed, also, that what in Mark, iv. 12, is expressed, " and their sins should be forgiven them," is given in Matt. xiii. 15, " and I should heal them." See also James, v. 15, and Isaiah, xxxiii. 24, and observe the maledictions against the transgressors of the law in Deut. xxviii. 21. See also, in addition to the authors named in p. 115, Grot, on John, v. 14, Glass. Phil. Sac. a Dath. p. 972, and Le Clerc, and particularly Poole's Syn. on Matt. ix. 2. I have dwelt thus long upon this head, because there is no point on which the adver- saries, not only of the doctrine of atonement, but of that of the divine inspiration of the evangelists, rely more triumphantly, than on the supposed disagreement between Saint Matthew and the prophet from whom he quotes in the passage before us. ^ We come now to the second head of objec- tion ; namely, that the words in the original, which are rendered by bearing sins, do not admit the signification of suffering for them, but are, both in this prophecy, and elsewhere throughout the Old Testament, understood in the sense of taking them away. The two words, which are used by the prophet to express bearing sin, are, as we* have seen, p. 104, J2D in the 11th verse, and tfl#J in the 12th. Let us then inquire, in what sense these words are used in other parts of the Old Testament. The word N'£0, it is true, as we have already seen with respect to the 4th verse, is often applied in the signification of bearing away ; but being (like the word bear in English, which has no less than thirty-eight different acceptations in Johnson's Diet.) capable of various meanings, according to the nature of the subject with which it is con- nected ; so we find it, when joined with the word sin, constantly used throughout Scrip- ture, either in the sense of forgiving it, on the one hand ; or of sustaining, either directly or in figure, the penal consequences of it, on the other. Of this latter sense, I find not less than thirty-seven instances,exclusiveof thischapter of Isaiah ; in all of which, "bearing the burden of sins, so as to be rendered liable to suffer on account of them," seems clearly and unequi- vocally expressed. In most cases, it implies punishment endured, or incurred : whilst, in some few, it imports no more than a repre- sentation of that punishment ; as in the case of the scape-goat, and in that of Ezekiel lying upon Ins side, and thereby "bearing the iniquity," i. e. representing the punish- ment 18 due to the iniquity, " of the house of Israel." But in no one of all this number can it be said to admit the signification of carrying away, unless perhaps in the case of the scape- goat, Lev. xvi. 22, and in that of the priests, Ex. xxviii. 38, and Lev. x. 17, and of these no more can be alleged, than that they may be so interpreted. See on these at large, p. 117-119. ° ' To these instances of the word tW^, con- nected with NBn, fly, " sins, iniquities," cvc. may fairly be added those in which it stands combined with the words nSIPT, HE^D, " dis- grace, reproach, shame," ecc. of which there are eighteen to be found : and in all of them, as before, the word is used in the sense of enduring, suffering. The idea, therefore, of a burden to be sustained, is evidently contained in all these passages. Of the former sense of the word, when connected with sins, iniquities, offences, either expressed or understood, namely, that of forgiving, there are twenty-two ; in all which cases, the nominative to the verb iW^ is the person who was to grant forgive- ness. To forgive, then, on the part of him who had the power so to do ; and to sustain, on the part of him who was deemed either actually or figuratively the offender, seem to exhaust the significations of the word K'ZO- when connected with sins, transgressions, and words of that import. In conformity with this induction, Schindler {Lex. Pentaq. in NtM, No. III.) affirms, that this verb, when joined with the word sin, always signifies either to forgive it ; or to bear it, i. e. to suffer for it: remittere, condonare ; vel luere, dare poenas. Now, it has been commonly taken for granted, and Socinus even assumes it as the foundation of his argument, {De Jes. Chr. pars 2, cap. 4,) that this signification of for- giveness, which evidently is not the radical meaning of the word, has been derived from the more general one of bearing away, removing. But this seems to have had no just founda- tion : bearing away, necessarily implying something of a burden to be carried, it seems difficult to reconcile such a phrase with the 18 See Newcome, Munst. Vatabl. and Clarius, on Ezek. iv 4,5. H 114 M A G E E ON THE ATONEMEN T. notion of that Being, to whom this act of forgiven ( •-> i> attributed, throughout the old Testament. May not the word have passed to this acceptation, through its primary sense of bearing ; namely, Buffering, through pa- tieiuv, enduring, or bearing wtth? And it is remarkable that Cocceius, at the same time that he complies with the general idea, of referring the signification of the word in the sense oi forgiving sin to its acceptation of tol- lere, auferre, admits, that " in this phrase is contained the notion of bearing; ferendi, nempe per patientiam." (Lexic. on N£0 Number IX.) It is certain that the mercy of God is represented throughout Scripture, as being that of long suffering, and of great pa- tience. See Psalm lxxxvi. 15, and particu- larly Exod. xxxiv. 6, 7, and Numb. xiv. 18, where this very character is joined with the word NJ£0, as that under which the Deity is represented as forgiving iniquity. And it is deserving of remark, that, in the verse follow- ing the passage in Numbers, the forgiveness expressed by the word N!£0, is described to be of that nature which implies patient endu- rance ; for it is said, " as thou hast forgiven rmNl£0> this people, from Egypt even until now.'" Agreeably to this reasoning, Houbigant translates the word NI£0, in both the last passages, parcere. Thus, then, upon the whole, the generic signification of the word NtW> when applied to sins, seems to be that of bearing, suffering, enduring : and then, on the part of the sinner, it implies, bearing the burden, or penal consequences of transgression ; and on the part of him against whom the offence has been committed, bearing with, and patiently enduring it. We are now enabled to form a judgment of the fairness of Dr Taylor's criticism, [Key, No. 162,) on which Mr Dodson, (Isaiah, liii. 4,) and all the writers who oppose the doctrine of Christ's vicarious suffering, so confidently rely. We here see, that the language of Scripture furnishes no authority for translat- ing the word Nt£0, when connected with iniquities, in the sense of bearing away. Dr Taylor, indeed, adduces instances of this use of the term ; but they are almost all inappli- cable to the present case ; none of them relat- ing to iniquities, except the three which have beeil already alluded to in p. L13, namely Ex. xxviii. i?« ; Lev. x. 17 ; and xvi. 22. If, then, these three be found not to justify his explication, he is left without a single passage, of that great number in which this word is used in reference to iniquities, to support his interpretation. Now, as to the first of these, in which Aaron is Said to " hear the iniquity of the holy things ;" besides that the iniquity here spoken of, being a profanation of the holy tilings, scarcely supplies an instance of "py, in the direct sense of iniquity, combined with the verh ; there seems no reason whatever to doubt, that N^J is hoc to be taken in its usual signification of bearing the blame of, being made answerable for ; as in the passage in Numb, xviii, 1, which exactly corresponds to this, and as Houbigant here translates it, suscipient maculas donorum. See Number XXXVII. p. 89; and in addition to the authorities there named, Munst. Vatabl. Clar. Fag. and Grot, on Numb, xviii. 1. It must be remarked, also, that the word £|a/(0,19 used in this passage by the LXX as equivalent to NtW» furnishes no support to the objec- tion ; the term applied by the LXX to express the same thing in the parallel passage in Numb, xviii. 1, being ~hxp.Zot.vu, which is the term commonly made use of by them to render J^^J in those cases, where bearing the burden of sins by suffering for them, is under- stood. See on this p. 121. The word NttfJ, in the 2d passage, (Levit. x. 17,) has been pronounced, upon the autho- rity of the LXX, which renders JHNU^ here hot, xQzhyrt, to relate to the priests, and conse- quently to signify, not bearing, but, bearing away. But, even admitting the word in this 2>lace to be connected with the priests, and not with the victim, yet would it not thence necessarily follow, that the word could be used only in the sense of bearing away ; it having appeared, from what has been just said, that in its strict sense it might be applied with pro- priety even to the priests ; and in this way we find it explained by Jun. and Trem. who thus expound it in this place : " uta ceetu iniquita- tem in vos transferatis et recipiatis expian- dam ;" and, at the same time, to denote the manner in which this bearing the sins of the congregation was understood, refer to Levit. xvi. 21, 22, in which the priest is described as personating the people, laying his hands on the head of the victim, and whilst he placed the sins of the people thereon, making con- fession in their name, and as their represen- tative, so that he might be considered as bearing their sins, until he placed them upon the head of the goat. In like manner Patrick, — " the priest here, by eating of the sin- offering, receiving the guilt upon himself, may well be thought to prefigure One, who should be both priest and sacrifice for sin." 19 If the use of the word \%«.'t$u by the Seventy, for the lie- brew Ntt-:, supplied a proof that they understood the original word in the sense of bearing tncay, then must they have under- stood Levit. ix. S3, in the sense of Aaron's hearing moay his band, and Numb. xxiv. 2, in the sense of Italnnm's bearing away his eyes ; for in both of these places have they rendered NV1 by i|aj§a. Hut this, it is clear, would make actual non- sense of those passages: the sense being manifestly that of lifting up in both. In this sense, indeed, it will be found, upon examination, that the word i£- t'iolv following the verb in the sense of ini- quity, y\y, seems inconsistent with this application of the word d^xiQiu here. It serves, however, to shew, that the use of the word u.$thviTi by the LXX, is not decisive of their rendering the original in the sense of bearing away. And, indeed, when the word ' ATLO-Qipu has been used by them as a tran- slation of N£0, in a sense manifestly different from that of bearing away, (see p. 121,) the mere derivation of the word dtyxinsu should 20 It should be observed also, that in Psal. xxxii. 6, where K'Ci is undoubtedly used in the sense of forgiveness, and is accordingly rendered by the LXX afi'r,u,i, the word used by Symmachus is ifmifitt. not be deemed demonstrative of their applying it in that sense. But, besides, there seems no sufficient reason for rendering the sentence so as to apply the expression to the priests, and not to the sin- offering. Commentators, indeed, seem gene- rally to have assumed this point ; and Chei- litis (torn. i. p. 20.) in his answer to Grotius, builds on it with perfect confidence. The system, likewise, of the author of the Scrip. Ace. of Sac. is in a great measure founded upon it. (pp. 123. 145.) But excepting only the authority of the LXX, there appears no ground whatever for this interpretation ; and, accordingly, not only does Grotius (De Satis- fact. Chr. cap. i. § 10.) positively affirm that this passage affords an instance of " the victim being said to bear the iniquity of the offerer," but even Sykes himself, at the same time that he notices the version of the LXX, seems to admit the same. (Ess. on Sac. p. 144.) And I will venture to say, that whoever attends carefully to the original will see good reason to concur in this interpretation. The passage exactly corresponds in structure with that in Lev. xvii. 11 : and the comparison may throw light upon the subject. Here, the priests are rebuked for not having eaten the sin-offering, and the reason is assigned ; " for it is most holy, and God hath given it to you, to bear ( ]~\iW7, for the bearing,) the iniquity of the congregation," &c. There the Jews are ordered not to eat blood, and the reason is assigned ; " for the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you upon the altar, to make atonement (1*337, for the making atonement) for your souls," &c. Now, because the word you happens to lie nearest to the verb "1337 in this sentence, are we to infer, that the persons spoken to, were to make the atonement, and not the blood, which, though it happens to be placed farthest from the verb, is yet the subject evidently carried through the whole sentence, and is imme- diately after pronounced to be that which made the atonement ? Yet this is the reasoning applied to the former passage, which is pre- cisely parallel. Indeed, I cannot help thinking that the whole of this passage in Lev. x. 17. has been hitherto misunderstood ; and although, inde- pendent of the explanation which I am going to offer, the sense of the word bear which I contend for seems already sufficiently esta- blished, yet, since this is an interpretation which appears generally to have been over- looked, I must beg to propose it here. Moses rebukes the sons of Aaron, because they had noteaten the sin-offering, as he had before com- manded should be done, in the 6th chapter. Now, in that chapter he had directed that the offering for the priests should not be eaten, but should be entirely consumed with fire ; (ver. 23.) but that the sin-offering for the 116 M A U E E ON THE ATO N E M E N T. people should be eaten by the priests (ver. 20.) In the 9th chapter we find Aaron, under the direction of Moses, presenting a sin-offering for himself, and another for the people ; but, instead of obeying Moses's commands respect- ing the sin-ottering /u/- the people by eating it, he had burned it, as well as the sin-ottering for himself. This is the occasion of Moses's dis- pleasure, (x. 16.) and he reminds the sons of \.inni (ver. 17.) that the goat being the sin- offering for the people, being appointed to "bear the iniquity of the congregation" (not that of the priests,) it should therefore have been eaten. The force of the passage then is not, " God hath given it you to (cat, that by so doing ye might) bear (away) the iniquity of the congregation, &c. but, God hath given j mi it (to eat, it being the offering appointed to bear, or, as is the strict translation,) for the bearing (in whatever sense the sacrifice was usually conceived to bear) the iniquity of the congregation." This seems the most obvious and intelligible construction of this passage ; and, if this be admitted, it is evident that this text furnishes no support to the opinions of those who object to the sense of the word bear con- tended for in this Number. As little support will the remaining text supply, which relates to the scape-goat, (Lev. xvi. 22. That the scape-goat was represented as going into the wilderness, whilst he symbo- lically bore the sins of the people, which had been laid upon him, is certain ; and that he consequently bore them away, is equally certain ; but, that it thence follows, that the word used to express his bearing those sins must of itself signify to bear away, seems an unwarrantable conclusion. Their being borne away, was a necessary consequence of the goat's going away, whilst the symbolical burden lay upon his head ; and therefore proves nothing as to the meaning of the word here rendered to bear. Any word, which implied the sustaining a burden in any way, might have here been equally applied, unless it at the same time conveyed the notion of standing still under the burden, of which language (so far as I know) does not supply an instance. So that, in fact, the argument here seems to amount to this : that the word bear, leads the mind to hearing away, when the word away is connected with it: — a position not neces- sary to combat. It deserves also to be remarked, that the LXX have not here used any of those terms, which might be supposed to countenance the Beiise of hearing away. ' AvxQiQa, x.7ro(pi(>u,- utpxipu, i^oci'nu, (which Dr Taylor, and those who adopt his notions, are so desirous of bringing forward on other occasions, as prov- ing the Septuagint interpretation of N'£>.j in that sense,) are all rejected by the LXX in this ea-e ; in which, if bearing away was intended, these, or some word which might mark that meaning, would most naturally have been adopted ; and ~h»u.%u.vu, by which N'tiO is con- stantly rendered by the LXX in those cases where the actual sustaining of sins and their consequences is concerned, is the term em- ployed. We have now seen what is the full amount of Dr Taylor's objections against our account of the Scripture acceptation of the word ^'Zf^, when applied to sins : the three instances, whose value we have just considered, being all that he is able to oppose to a collection of thirty-four passages, which unequivocally ap- ply the word N!£0 to the sustaining of sin, or its consequences ; together with eighteen more, which, without exception, combine the word in the same sense with the terms shame, reproach, &c. And it is curious to observe, that it is from a signification of the word established upon such grounds and in opposi- tion to such evidence, that he has deduced the force of the expression when applied to the forgiveness of iniquities ; contending that it derives this signification from its more general meaning of bearing aivay, previously ascertained in the way we have described. Crellius, who is appealed to by Mr Dod- son on the signification of tins word Ni>'J, as he was before on that of 73D, (see P- 109,) adds but little strength to the cause. He mentions, indeed, an admission by Grotius, and an interpretation by Vatablus ; but he refers us for the complete proof to Socinus, as Mr Dodson had referred us to him. Socinus is to prove the point by examples, "prolatis exemplis." (Crell. Rcsp. ad Grot. p. 24.) Now, the examples adduced by Socinus, to prove that the word Nl£0> applied to sins, may pro- perly be translated in the sense of bearing away, arc the two which have been already noticed in p. 114, viz. Exod. xxxiv. 7, and Numb. xiv. 18. And these, he says, clearly prove it, because here the word is applied in the sense of forgiving, and that was done by bearing away or removing sins, or their punish- ment. See Socin. Opera De Jes. Chr. pars 2. cap. 4. pp. 148, 149. But, surely, since the dictum of this father of Socinianism was at last to decide the point, it had been sufficient had he at once affirmed it, without the circui- tous form of an example. Sykes, indeed, has discovered, as he thinks, one instance, which clearly establishes the acceptation of the word in tin1 sense of hearing away iniquity : it is that of Exod. x. 17. And I confess, were I confined to a single passage for the proof of the opposite, I think it is the one I should select, as marking, most deci- dedly, that this word has not acquired the sense of forgiving, through the signification of bearing away. Pharaoh says unto Moses, " forgive (Nltf) I l)r:i.v thee my sin only this once, and entreat the Lord that he may take away ("lD^) from me this death." Now, if No. 42.— THE DEATH OF CHRIST A PROPITIATORY SACRIFICE. 117 the word ^'^ wore rendered, with Dr Sykes, take away, it must then be, tale away the punishment of my sin ; taking away the sin itself being unintelligible, and this being the very sense in which the word is said to ac- quire the force of forgiveness. See Socin. Opera, torn. 2. p. 149. But, surely, to desire Moses to take away his punishment, and, after that, to entreat the Lord that he would take away the same punishment, seem not perfectly consistent. Whereas, if we suppose the word forgiveness to convey the force of enduring, bearing with, all is perfectly natural : and Moses, having thus forgiven the sin of Pharaoh, might reasonably be called on to entreat, that the Lord would remit the ptm- ishment. Besides, it is observable, that, where the punishment is spoken of, there the word used is not N!£0, mit TDn which unequivo- cally signifies, to take away. What then is the result of this unavoidably prolix inquiry? That the word N'ZO, when connected with the word sins, or iniquities, is throughout the entire of the Bible to be un- derstood in one of these two significations : bearing, i. e. sustaining, on the one hand ; and forgiving, on the other : and, that in neither of these applications does there seem any rea- son for interpreting it in the sense of bearing away : nor has any one unequivocal instance of its use, in that sense, ever been adduced. So far as to the word Nt£0- The mean- ing of 73D is> if possible, yet more evident. Being used, as we have already seen, p. 109. in every passage, where it is not connected with the word sins, or sorrows, in the literal sense of bearing a burden, we can have but little difficulty to discover its signification where it is so connected. In its reference to sorrows, it has also been specially examined, and the result, as we have seen, has confirmed its general application. Its relation to sins is exemplified but in two passages, one of which occurs in the 11th verse of the chapter of Isaiah under consideration, and the other is to be found in Lament, v. 7. Now, it hap- pens that this last passage is such, that the meaning of the word cannot be misunderstood. " Our fathers have sinned, and are not ; and we have borne 0J73D) their iniquities ;" or, as Dr Blayney renders it, we have " under- gone the punishment of" their iniquities. The force of the word 73D, then, will not admit of question : and if any additional strength were wanting to the argument concerning the verb N20, this word 72D standing connected with iniquity in the 11th verse, exactly as Nl£0 is with sin in the 12th, would abundantly supply it. That Nt£0, indeed, in all cases where the sense of forgiveness is not admis- sible, has the force of 73D when used in relation to sifts, will readily appear on exa- mination. Their correspondence is parti- cularly remarkable in the parallel application of the two words in the passage of Lamenta- tions just cited, and in those of Numb. xiv. 33. and Ezek. xviii. 19, 20. ; in which MV2 is used to express the sons' bearing the wicked- ness of their fathers, in precisely the Bame sense in which 7I1D is applied in flic former. These two words then, MliTJ and 7^D, being clearly used in the common sense of bearing sins, in tlie llthandl2th verses of this chapter of Isaiah, it remains yet to ascertain what is the Scripture notion conveyed by that phrase. Now, this is evidently, in all cases, the suffer- ing, or being liable to suffer, some infliction on account of sin, which, in the case of the offender himself, would properly be called punishment. This I take to be the universal meaning of the phrase. The familiar use of the words \ty, i7X'&n iniquity, sin, for the punishment'21 of iniquity, or, as I would prefer to call it, the suffering due to iniquity, fully justifies this explication of the phrase : and 80 obtrusive is its force, that we find this mean- ing conceded to the expression, even by Sykes, {Essay on Sac. p. 146.) Crellius, (Resp. ad Grot. p. 20.) and Socinus himself, (Z>e Jes. Chr. pars ii. cap. 4.) But, although the phrase of bearing sin is admitted by all to mean, bearing the punish- ment or consequences of sin, in the case where a man's own sin is spoken of, yet it is denied that it admits that signification where the sin of another is concerned : see Scrip. Ace. of Sacr. p. 142. Now, in answer to this it is sufficient to refer to the use of the expression in Lament, v. 7. compared with Jer. xxxi. 29, 30,) and to the application of it also in Ezek. xviii. 19, 20. and in Numb. xiv. 33. In all of these, the sons are spoken of, as bearing the sins of their fathers ; and in none can it be pretended that they were to bear them in the sense of bearing them away, or in any other sense than in that of suffering for them : and the original term employed to express this is, h~2D, in the passage in Lamentations, and IW1 in all the rest. Dr Blayney translates the passage in Lamentations, — " Our fathers have sinned, but they are no more, and we have undergone the punishment of their iniqui- ties." Dathe renders the expression, both here, and in Ezekiel, by lucre peccata ; and at the same time affirms, (on Jer. xxxi. 29.) that the meaning of the proverb adduced both in Jeremiah and Ezekiel is, "that God pun- ishes the >'ms of the fathers in the children." The proverb, to which he alludes, is that of " the fathers having eaten a sour grape, and the children's teeth being set on edge." The time is approaching, Jeremiah says, in which 21 See 2 Kings, vii. 9, and Zech. xiv. 19, and besides all the ancient commentators, consult Bishop Lowth on Isaiah, xl. 2, Dr Blayney on Jer. Ii. 6, and Primate Newcome on Ilos. x. 13 — the last of whom subjoins the remark, that " this particular metonymy, of the cause fur the effect, was natural among the Jews, whose law abounded with temporal sanction, which *'• jd often inflicted." lis MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. this shall not be any longer, " but everj man shall die for his own iniquity*' And this time, he subjoins, is to be under the new covenant, which was to be made with the Jew -i.-li people, and which was to differ from that which preceded, in that God was not, as hitherto, to visit the Bins of the fathers upon the children, but to visit each individual for his own transgresMons. The same subject is more largely and expli- citly treated by Ezekiel. The proverb used by Jeremiah is repeated by this prophet ; and, as Primate Newcome observes, is well rendered by the Chaldee, — " The fathers have sinned, and the sons are smitten." This, he says, nfcis to the second commandment ; and, on the peculiar principles of the Jewish dis- pensation, he admits the reasonableness of it as a judicial infliction. Dr Blayney, in- deed, thinks otherwise ; although he has expressly translated the passage in Lamenta- tions, " We have undergone the punishment of their iniquities." This seems not consistent. Yet he peremptorily rejects the notion of this as a judicial infliction. Had Dr Blayney, however, considered, that the penalties thus inflicted were such as belonged to the old covenant, namely, temporal, he would have seen no difficulty in this dispensation, as affecting the equity of God's proceedings : nor would he have been reduced to the inconsistency of calling that a punishment in one place, which he contends cannot be a judicial infliction in another. Let us follow the prophet a little farther : — he declares, as Jeremiah had done, that this shall no longer be. The judicial dispen- sation of the new covenant shall be of a diffe- rent nature. In future, "the soul that sin- neth, it shall die — if a man he just he shall live ; but if he hath done abominations, he shall surely die ; his blood shall be upon him (upon his own head) — and yet ye say, why ? doth not the so?i bear the iniquity of the father?" The prophet replies ; True, but this shall no longer be : " when the son hath done judgment and justice he shall surely live. The soul that sinneth it shall die ; the son shall not bear (N103) the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear (N£>3) the ini- quity of the son." The passage from Num- bers, in which the sons arc said to "bear" (NT}) the abominations of their fathers, exactly accord-.--' with those which we have now considered : and it appears incontestably from the whole, that to bear the sins of others,-* i- an cxpres>ion familiarly used, to denote the suffering evils, inflicted on account of those sins. I will not contend that this should be called 23 Hammond on 1 Pet ii. 24, supported by the Chaldee and Fagius, renders the passage here, bear the punishment of your sins. S.c also Ainsworth nn N'ninli. xiv. 33. 23 The observations of Martini on this subject deserve to bo quoted. " QuiciinqiK' niniinmi nialis atquc incommndis tole- randis aliorura iniseriani avcrtit, eorumque aalDtem promoveti suffering the punishment of those sins, because the idea of punishment cannot be abstracted from that of guilt : and in this respect I differ from many respectable authorities, and even from Dr Blayney, who, as we have seen, uses the word punishment in his translation. But it is evident that it is, notwithstanding, a judicial infliction ; and it may perhaps be figuratively denominated punishment, if there- by be implied a reference to the actual trans- gression, and if that suffering which was due to the offender himself be understood ; and which, ?/ inflicted on him, would then take the name of punishment. In no other sense can the suffering inflicted on one, on account of the transgressions of another, be called a punish- ment; and, in thislight, the bearing the punish- ment of another's sins, is to be understood as bearing that which, in relation to the sins, and to the sinner, admits the name of punishment, but with respect to the individual on whom it is actually inflicted, abstractedly considered, can be viewed but in the light of suffering. Thus the expression may fairly be explained. It is, however, upon the whole, to be wished, that the word punishment had not been used : the meaning is substantially the same without it ; and the adoption of it has furnished the principal ground of cavil to the adversaries of the doctrine of atonement, who affect to con- sider the word as applied in its strict signifi- cation, and, consequently, as implying the transfer of actual guilt. I could therefore wish that such distinguished scholars, as Bishop Lowth, Primate Newcome, and Dr Blayney, had not sanctioned the expression. That the term punishment, indeed, has fre- quently been used, where infliction only, without any reference to guilt in the indivi- dual sufferer, was intended, must be allowed. Cicero affords us a memorable instance of this ; " Silent leges inter anna ; nee se expectari jubent, cum ei qui expectare velit, ante injiista poena luenda sit, quani justa repetenda." The application of the word is yet more justifiable, where the sufferings endured have a relation to the guilt of another, on whom had they been inflicted they would have received the name of punishment in its strictest sense. They are, to use an expression of Crellius, the mate- ria poena; with respect to the offender ; and quarunque demum ratione id fiat, is pcenas peccatorum eorum lucre, tanquain piaciilmn pro iis apud Deimi intercedere dicitur, ut hominibus priscis fere omnibus, ita imprimis llcbrseis. Eadem fere ratio est formula: Arabibus frequentissima\ re- demptio tua sit anima mea, sciL apud Deutn, h. e. acerba qosevis, quin ipsius adeo mortis discrimen subirc non recusarem, modo to juvare, liberationcm a periculis, salutem atque incolu- mitatem tilii prn?starepossem. Ad explorationom TOO ejusmodi furmularum si pervenire velis, redeundem omnino est ad opini- onem^ut veteran) populorum omnium, ita hnprimisHebreoruin, ex qua calamitatrs quascunque, pra sertim atrnciores, tanquam pcrnas peccatorum ab ipsis diis praesentibus inflictas o>nsidcrare BOlebant, casque non alia rationi averti posse putabant, quam si vktima [nnocena loco hominis ejusmodi pawns subcundo, nuininis infest! iram sednrct."— See Rosenin. on Isaiah, liii. 6. No. 42.— THE DEATH OF CIIH1ST A PHOP1T1ATOHY SAC1MFICK. 119 when borne by anotlicr in bis stead, that otber may in a qualified sense be said to bear the punishment of the offender, as bearing that burden of suffering, which was due to him as the punishment of his offence. And thus in all cases, except where forgiveness is intended, the expression ]iy NIW, or ]ty b2D, is to be understood : namely, as sus- taining, or bearing the burden of that materia. ptenre, which was due to the offences, either of the individual who suffered, or of him on whose account, and in whose place, he suffered. In this sense we may justify the use of the expression bearing punishment, in cases of a vicarious nature ; but, to avoid all cavil, and misrepresentation of the phrase, it were better, perhaps, to adopt the phrase of suffering for sins. This view of the subject completely removes all those objections derived from a rigorous acceptation of the nature of punishment, which have been urged by Socinus, and Crel- lius, and repeated by every dissenter from the received doctrine of atonement since their day. And it is curious to observe, that Dr Benson, though contending for the notion of Christ's bearing our sins in the sense of bearing them away, and supporting ' this on the eround of Dr Taylor's interpretation of NtM, 72D, and the corresponding Greek words, in that sense, is yet obliged to admit the justness of the explication here proposed. " Sin," he says, " is frequently, in Scripture, put for sufferings, or afflictions. Bearing iniquity, or sin, is like- wise bearing punishment, or enduring affliction : aud when that punishment, or affliction, was death ; then bearing iniquity, or sin, and being put to death, were phrases of like import." And he admits, in consequence of this reason- ing, that Christ's bearing our sins, or, as he thinks right to call it, " bearing them away, was by his suffering death ; which, to us, is the penalty of sin." (Benson on 1 Pet. ii. 24.) So that we seem to have the authority of Dr Benson for saying, that Christ bore our sins, by suffering the penalty elite to them. " It "has now, I trust, sufficiently appeared, that the expressions used in this chapter of Isaiah to denote bearing sins, are elsewhere in Scripture employed to signify, not bearing them away, in the indefinite sense of removing them, but sustaining them as a burden, by suf- fering their penal consequences ; and this, not only where the individual was punished for his own sins, but where he suffered for the sins of others. We may now, therefore, pro- ceed to inquire into the true meaning of the phrase, in the prophecy before us : and, in- deed, so manifest is its application in this place, that, were it even ambiguous in other parts of Scripture, this alone might suffice to determine its import : so that, but for the extraordinary efforts that have been employed to perplex and pervert the obvious meaning B ' ====== of the words, it could not have been necessary to look beyond the passage itself, to ascertain their genuine signification to be that which has just been stated. In the description here given by the prophet we are furnished with a clear and accurate definition of words, and a full explanation of the nature of the thing. We are told, that God "made the iniquities of us all to fall upon him," who is said to have " borne the iniquities of many ;" thus is the bearing of our iniquities explained to be, the bearing them laid on as a burden ; and though a reference is undoubtedly intended to the laying the iniquities of the Jewish people on the head of the scape-goat, which was done (as is urged by Socinus, Crellius, Taylor, and other writers who adopt their notions,) that they might be borne, or carried, away ; yet this does not prevent them from being borne as a burden. The great object in bear- ing our sins, was certainly to bear them away ; but the manner in which they were borne, so as to be ultimately borne away by Him who died for us, was by his enduring the afflictions and sufferings which were ilue to them ; by his being numbered with the transgressors ; treated as if he had been the actual trans- gressor ; and made answerable for us ; and, consequently, wounded for our transgressions, and smitten" for our iniquities, in such manner, that our peace was effected by his chastise- ment, and we healed by his bruises ; he having borne our iniquities, having suffered that which was the penalty due to them on our part, and having offered himself a sacrifice for sin on our account. Now, it deserves particularly to be remarked, that these strong and decided expressions, which are clearly explanatory of the manner in which our sins are to be borne, and borne away, are but little attended to by the Soci- nian expositors, whilst they endeavour, I >y a detached examination of the words denoting the bearing of sins, and by directing our atten- tion to the ceremony of the scape-goat, to exclude from the view those accompanying circumstances, which so plainly mark a vica- rious suffering, and a strict propitiatory atone- ment. In contending, however, for the re- ference to the scape-goat in the expression bearing si?is,2i as it is here used, these writers furnish us with an additional argument in proof of the scape-goat having been a sin-offer- ing (see pp. 97, 104.) ; he, who was to bear our sins, and to procure our pardon, being here described expressly as a " sacrifice for sin," DttfN- Some arguments, indeed, are ottered by Socinus, {Opera, torn. ii. pp. 150, 151. 153.) and Crellius, {Resp. ad Gr. pp. 23— 30.) to weaken the force of the expressive pas-ages of the prophet's description, above referred to. But, after what has been said, it is 24 See Socin. Opera, torn. ii. p. 149. Crcll. Rcsp. ad Gr. p. 21, and Taylor's K(y, § 162. 123 MAGEE O N T H E A T O N E M E N T. unnecessary to add to the length of this dis- cussion, by a refutation, which must instantly present itself, on the principles already laid down. To bring, then, this tedious investigation to a conclusion, it appears, 1. That neither the expressions used by Isaiah in the 4th verse, nor the application made of them by Saint Matthew, art' in any degree inconsistent with the acceptation of the phrase, bearing sins, here employed by the prophet, in the sense of sustaining or undergoing the burden of them, by suffering for them : 2. That the use of the expression in other parts of the Old Testa- ment, so far from opposing, justifies and con- firms this acceptation : and, 3. That the minute description of the sufferings of Christ, their cause, and their effects, which here ac- companies this phrase, not only establishes this interpretation, but fully unfolds the whole nature of the Christian atonement, by shewing that Christ has suffered, in our place, what was due to our transgressions ; and that by, and in virtue of, his sufferings, our recon- ciliation with God has been effected. 1 have gone thus extensively into the exa- mination of this point, both because it has of late been the practice of those writers who oppose the doctrine of atonement to assume familiarly, and pro concesso, that the expression bearing sins, signified in all cases, where per- 1 sonal punishment was not involved, nothing more than bearing them away, or removing them; and because this chapter of Isaiah contains the whole scheme and substance of the Christian atonement. Indeed, so ample and comprehensive is the description here given, that the writers of the New Testament seem to have had it perpetually in view, in- somuch that there is scarcely a passage cither in the Gospels, or Epistles, relating to the sacrificial nature, and atoning virtue of the death of Christ, that may not obviously be traced to this exemplar: so that in fortifying this part of Scripture, we establish the founda- tion of the entire system. It will, conse- quently, be the less necessary to inquire minutely into those texts in the New Tes- tament which relate to the same subject. We cannot but recognize the features of the prophetic detail, and, consequently, apply the evidence of the prophet's explanation, when we are told, in the words of our Lord, that "the Son of man came to give his fife a ran- som for many," ( Matt. xx. 28 ;) that," as Saint Paul expresses it, he " qave himself a ransom for all," (1 Tim. ii. G ;) that he " was offered to bear the sins of many," (Ileb. ix. 28 ;) that God " made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin," (2 Cor. v. 21 ;) that " Christ redeemed vs from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us," (Gal. iii. 13 ;) thai be suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, (1 Pet. iii. IK ;) that he " died for the ungodly," (Rom. v. (>;) that he " gave himself for us," (Tit. ii. 14;) that he died for our sins" (1 Cor. xv. 3;) and "was delivered forour offences" (Rom. iv. 25 ;) that he "gave himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God," (Eph. v. 2 ;) that " we are reconciled to God by the death of his Son," (Rom. v. 10 ;) that his " blood was shed for many, for the remission of sins" (Matt. xxvi. 28.) — These, and many others, directly refer us to the pro- phet ; and seem but partial reflections of what he had already so fully placed before our view. One passage, however, there is, which de- serves a more particular attention ; because, being an acknowledged translation of the most important part of the prophetic description, it has, jointly with the prophecy, experienced the severity of Sociniau criticism. It is that passage in 1 Pet. ii. 24, where it is said of Christ, that he "his own self bare our sins, in his own body, on the tree." This has been referred to the 4th verse of the liiid chap, of Isaiah ; but, as we have already seen, (p. 107.) on grounds totally erroneous. With the same view, namely, that of weakening the force of the prophecy, the use of the word ccuqusyxi by the apostle, to express the bearing sins, of the prophet, has been largely insisted on. The word eLvcttps^a, it is contended, is to be under- stood in the sense of bearing-"' away: and Dr Benson, (on 1 Pet. ii. 24,) positively as- serts, that the word 6iv»(f^u is never used by the LXX, in any of those places in the Old Testament, where bearing iniquity is taken in the sense of bearing punishment, or enduring affliction. Now, as Saint Peter's words may fairly be considered as a translation of the words of the prophet, or, rather, as an adop- tion of the language of the LXX, (see p. 10".) it becomes necessary to examine the force of the expressions here used, as being a strong authority respecting the true meaning of the original passage in the prophet. And in this examination we shall find abundant confir- mation of the conclusion we have already arrived at. The word dvetQfya, which strictly signifies to bear, or carry, up ; and is, therefore, com- monly applied in the sense of offering up a victim, as carrying it up to the altar ; and may with equal propriety be applied to Christ hearing up with him "in his own body, t«; a/axorlx; iiftav evl ^v'Aov, our sins to the cross," (-ee Schleusn. Lex. and Hamm. in locum) — admits, of course, the signification of bearing as a burden ; and, joined with the word sins, as it is here, it corresponds to the Hebrew NtIO, or ^QD, in the sense of bearing their punishment, or sustaining the burden of suffering which they impose. In this very sense the seventy have used it, in direct opposition to Dr Benson's assertion : for, in Numb. xiv. 33, where the sons are said to bear the whoredoms, -"' Sec Dodson on Isaiah, liii. 11, also Socin. Dc Jcs. Chr. pan 2, cap. vi. and Crell. Bap. ml Or. p. 21. No. 42.— THE DEATH OF CHRIST A PROPITIATORY SACRIFICE. 121 or idolatrous sins, of their fathers, the word used by the LXX to express the Hebrew N'iO, is d»ct$i(>6> : now the Chaldee, in this place, employs the word 73p> which is universally allowed to signify suscipere, to undergo, or sustain, (see Buxt. Lex.) and translates the whole passage thus, " They .shall hear your sins, and I will visit the iniquities of the fathers in the children." Minister, Vatablus, Fagius, and Clarius, pronounce the expression to be a Hebraism, for suffering the punish- ment of the fathers' sins. Houbigant ex- pressly translates, pcenas luent. That this passage, also, is precisely of the same import with those in Lament, v. 7, and Ezek. xviii. 19, 20,) where suffering for sins is expressly marked out, has been already noticed (pp. 117, 1 18.) Now, in these passages manifestly denoting the very same thing, bearing sins, in the same way and on the same account, the version of the LXX is v-xia^ in the former ; and ~hxtA.Zot.vu in the latter. The force of inrkaxi requires no confirmation : if it did, its application in Psalm lxxxix. ,50, the only remaining place where it is used by the LXX, would supply it. And Wa-yZdvu is the ex- pression commonly applied by the LXX, throughout Leviticus, to express the bearing of sin, in those cases in which the offender was to suffer the actual punishment of his trans- gressions. And in the very next verse, wc rind the word dvotQi^a applied to denote the bearing these very sins in the persons of the offenders themselves, which, they had been told in the preceding verse, their sons should likewise bear, dvoiaovui. So that these expres- sions, dvxQioco, and Woty.Za.va, being employed by the LXX in passages precisely parallel, furnish a complete contradiction to Dr Ben- son's assertion. Indeed the LXX seem to have used the compounds of co, without much attention to the force of the adjoined preposition. This is evident in their use of the word dvotpiga, for the Hebrew fc$l£0, in Lev. xx. 19, where the sin was not to be borne away, as the word would strictly imply, but to be borne by suffering the punishment of death : and likewise, in Ezek xxxii. 30, where bear- ing shame, is applied by the prophet in the same sense. And in this passage, whilst the Vatic, reads d^otpkou, the Alex, reads "Kotytdvu : thus using the two words indifferently ; al- though ~KoLy.Zdvu is employed by the LXX, almost universally, in cases implying the ac- tual sustaining of guilt and suffering. Now, even if the word &TlO. what ground is it to be argued, that'ANApeja cannot be used by them in the same sense, and particularly, when it is employed by them in the translation of the same Hebrew word, and similarly connected with the same sub- ject, sins? But, to decide the acceptation of the word by the LXX, it will be sufficient to observe, that, of one hundred and thirty- three passages of the Old Testament, in which, exclusive of those of Isaiah at present under consideration, it is used as a translation of the Hebrew, it never once occurs in the sense of bearing away, (see Trom. Concord.) and that in those places in which it occurs in the relation of bearing sins, it is given as equivalent to the words Nt#J, and 73D ; being employed to render the former in Num. xiv. 33, and Isai. liii. 12 ; and the latter, Isai. liii. 11. And these three are the only passages in which the word is found so related. Now, in addition to what has been already said, on the words translated bearing sins, in these passages, and especially on the word /HD> let it be remarked, that the word tnreveyxs, is used by Symm. for the dvolau of the LXX, in the last-mentioned text : and that the very word, 7^D, which in the 11th verse is translated, dvoKpi^, by the LXX, is, by the same, rendered in the 4th verse, in the sense of sustaining ; the term employed by them being oivvdrcti, enduring grief, or afflic- tion; as if they had said oovvx;, or noi/ov; 'TI1EMEINEN, which is the expression used by Aq. Symm. and Theod. in this place. Now, as Saint Peter, in his description of Christ's bearing our sins, not only refers to Isaiah, but evidently quotes his very words, and quotes them in the language of the LXX, we can have no question of his stating them in the same sense in which they manifestly used them ; and that when he says, that Christ "bore27 our sins, in his own body, on (or to) the cross," he means to mark, that Christ actually bore the burden of our sins, and suf- fered for them all that he endured in his last agonies. That there may also have been implied a reference, in the word dvaQiou, to its sacrificial import so familiar both with the LXX and the New Testament, I see no reason to deny. This by no means interferes with what has been now urged, but rather confirms it, and explains more fully the manner in which our sins were borne by our Lord, namely, as by a sacrifice. So that the entire force of the passage may be, as Whitby lias stated it ; " he bare our sins in his own "body, 27 The Syriac rendering of the passage is remarkable. . j^ . , \ ^ " Et portavit peccata nostra omnia, et sustulit ilia in corpore suo ad crucem." Here the word W.T.A portabat quart pondtts, is unequivocal and decisive. — N'.B. Schaaf has rendered the Syriac cum corpore suo ; whilst it more naturally admits the rendering, in corpore suo, agreeably to the common translation. 122 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. offered (as) upon an altar for us ;" and by this interpretation wefind aperfecf correspondence with the only remaining passage in the New Testament, in which the phrase apttPTixs elvxZin-tv is found ; namely, Heb. IX. 28, where it is said, that " Christ was once offered, to bear the sins of many." The observations contained in this number will enable us to form a just estimate of Dr Priestley's position, — that neither in the Old Testament, nor in those parts of the New where it might most naturally be expected, namely, in the discourses of our Lord and his apostles, as recorded in the Gospels and Acts, do we find any trace of the doctrine of atone- ment. On this Dr Priestley observes, with no little confidence, in the Theol. Rep. vol. i. pp. 327 — 353 ; and again in his Hist, of Cor. vol. i. pp. 158 — 164. Surely, in answer to such an assertion, nothing more can be neces- sary than to recite the prophecy of Isaiah which has just been examined, and in which it is manifest that the whole scheme of the doctrine of atonement is minutely set forth ; so manifest, indeed, that, notwithstanding his assertion, Dr Priestley is compelled to confess, ( Theol. Hep. vol. i. p. 530,) that " this pro- phecy seems to represent the death of Christ, in the light of a satisfaction for sin." But the emptiness of the position is not more clearly evinced by this passage, and other parts of the Old Testament which might be adduced, than by the language of our Saviour and his apostles, in those very parts of the New Testament to which this writer chooses to confine his search, the Gos- pels and Acts. For, when the angel declares to Joseph, that " his name shall be called •lei'»« is used by the LXX for the Hebrew pip ; in every one of which passages nearly the oblation under the prescription of the Lcvitieal ritual is intended to be conveyed ; and indeed the word V^^ is the most general name for the sacrifices under the Mosaic law. See what is said on this word in No. LXII. The true and obvious reason why the writer to the Hebrews uses the term bw%a., is, because it is the very term employed by the Seventy in describing the offerings of both Cain and Abel in Gen. iv. 4, 5. The author of the Epistle, treating of the same subject, naturally uses the same language. 2 Mite. Sac. lib. ii. diss. ii. § 2 — ~. See also Heideg. Hist. Patriarch. Exercit. iii. § 52, torn. i. 128 M A U E E ON T II B ATONEM E N T. is, to me, highly incredible ; but that super- stition, the child of ignorance and fear, should think of offering Buch sacrifices, it is not at all wonderful : nor need we think it strange, that Bloses, although a wise legislator, in this indulged the humour of so gross and carnal a people as were the Israelites. All the nations around them offered similar victims, from the banks of the Euphrates to the banks of the Nile. The Egyptians, in particular, among whom they had so long sojourned, not only sacrificed animals to their gods, but selected the best of their kind. Indeed, I have ever been convinced, since I was capable of reflection, thai the whole sacrificial and ceremonial laws of Moses were chiefly borrowed from the prie>ts of Egypt, but prudently accommodated by the Hebrew legislator to the relative situ- ation of his own people, divested of profane licentiousness and barefaced idolatry, and restrained to the worship of one supreme God, who created the heavens and the earth, and whom he was pleased to call Ieue, Iao, or Jehovah !"a 8 Geddes's Critical Remarks on the Hebrew Scriptures, p. 300. The observations which this extraordinary writer, who wishes to be distinguished by the title of a Catlwlic Christian, subjoins ti the passage above referred to, will servo still farther to shew the true nature of bis claims to that denomination : — " This name, (he says, alluding to the name Jehovah,) I think, he (Moses) must have learnt in Midian : that he could not learn it in Egypt is clear from this, that the name was not known there before he announced it as the name of the God of the Hebrews ; and Jehovah himself is made to say, on Mount Sinai, that he bad never till then manifested himself by that name : but that the name before that was known in Midian, nay, that it was the name of the Deity, whom Jethro principally, or perhaps exclu- sively, worshipped, to me appears very probable from several circumstances." Having enumerated these circumstances, which enable him to pronounce that Moses bad put a gross falsehood into tli" month of Jeh ivau upon this subject, he concludes thus: — " From all this I think it probable, that the name Jehovah was known in Midian, Moab, and Syria, before the mission of Mums; and that Moses may have borrowed it thence. Those who literally believe what is related in the third chapter of Exodus will sneer at this remark ; and they are welcome so to do : I will never be angry with any one for believing either too much or too little:' Now, if we follow this writer to his Remarks upon the third chapter of Exodus, we shall learn what it is that he considers as ' lieving hut enough, Moses, in that chapter, informs us of " the angel of the Lord appearing to him in a flame of tiro out Of the midst of a bush;" — and of the divine mission then i xpre~sly eoiivi'jvd to him by (iod himself speaking out of the burning bush, and describing himself as " the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob." Now, what says Dr Geddes on this? "That in his apprehension, there might, in this particular apparition, be no other angel or messenger, than an uncommon luminous appearance in a bush of briars; which attracted the attention of Moses, and might bo considered by him as ■ divine call to return to Egypt for the purpose of delivering his brethren from their iron bondage." Then having proved the propriety of calling this "luminous appearance in the bush of briars," the angel of the Lord, and even God himself, from the passage in the Psalmist, " The Lord maketh the winds his messengers, and flames of lire his ministers ;" and recollecting the necessity of explaining how this luminous appearance, or Homing angel, was enabled to hold In the name of the Most High a long and distinct conversation with Moses, he boldly faces about and meets the difficulty at once. — "Hut can it !»• believed, that the wh lie dialogue, contained in this and the And again, this same enlightened expositor of Holy Writ unfolds, much to the credit of the Jewish legislator, the great advantages attending his imposition of Egyption cere- monies as matter of divine ordinance upon his following chapters, is founded upon the single phenomenon of a fiery meteor or luminous appearance in a bush of briars ? What may appear credible or incredible to others, I know not ; but I know, that 1 can believe this, sooner than believe that God and Moses verbally conversed together in the manner here related, on the bare authority of a Jewish historian, who lived no one can well tell when or where ; and who seems to have been as fond of the marvellous as any Jew of any age. But let every one judge for himself, as be has an undoubted right to do ; and believe as much, or as little, as pleaseth him My belief is my own." Such is Dr Geddes's enlightened view of this part of Scripture, on which the claim of the Jewish legislator to a divine mission is founded. lie states, indeed, with a modesty truly becoming, that his belief upon the subject is purely bis own. So, I will venture to add for him, it will ever remain. For although some may be found, whose reach of philosophical reflection may just serve to enable them, with I)r Geddes, to reject the narrative of Moses as a fabrication, and his pretensions to a divine mission as an imposture ; yet that nice discriminating taste in miracles, that could catch the flavour of a nearer approach to credibility in the case of a burning bush of briars carrying on a long conver- sation in the name of the Almighty, than in the case of that great Being directly communicating his will and issuing his commands to one of his intelligent creatures respecting a great religious dispensation to be introduced into the world by bumar agency, — is likely to secure to Dr Geddes an eminence in singularity from which he is in no great danger of experiencing the slightest disturbance. I cannot, however, yet dismiss this subject, and still less can I dismiss one so serious with an air of levity. However ludicrous and however contemptible the wild fancies and the impotent scoffs of this traducer of Scripture truths may be, yet the awful importance of that sacred book with which he has connected himself in the capacity °f translator, bestows upon his labours, by association, a consequence, which (barely) rescues them from present neglect, though it cannot operate to secure them from future oblivion. In the declaration of his creed, {Pre/, to Crit. Rem. p. vi.) and in the vindication of himself from the charge of infidelity, be affirms, " the Gospel of Jesus to be his religious code ; and his doctrines to be his dearest delight ;" he professes himself to be " a sincere though unworthy disciple of Christ." " Christian (he says) is my name, and Catlwlic my surname. Rather than renounce these glorious titles, I would shed my blood," &c. Now, in what does this Catholic Christianity consist? Not merely, as we have seen, in denying the divine mission of Moses, and in charging the messenger of that dispen- sation which was the forerunner of Christianity, with the fabrication of the most gross and infamous falsehoods, but in attributing to our Lord himself a participation in those false- hoods by their adoption and application to his own purposes in his conferences with the Jews. For the establishment of this, it will be sufficient to appeal to our Lord's solemn attestation to the truth of Moses's narrative of the transaction alluded to. " And as touching the dead, that they rise : have ye not read in the book of Moses, how in the bush God spake unto him, saying, 1 am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob ?" (Mark, xii. 26.) What the Catlwlic Cliristianitt/ of Dr Geddes amounts to. may be sufficiently inferred from the comparison of this single passage with the positions which he main tains in direct opposition to the authority of our Lord himself. Hut it will appear still more satisfactory from a short sum- mary of his services in the cause of Holy Writ, presented to us by the lien of an accurate and judicious writer, in the pages of a well-known periodical publication: — "The method taken by this Catholic Chriltian, of strengthening the foundation of the faith of Christians, seems very extraordinary. For it consists in tearing up all the foundations which the learning and the piety of the divines of former ages had been employed to lay. It would perhaps be doing more justice to his great enterprise to No. 47— MOSAIC SACRIFICES NOT DERIVED FROM HUMAN INVENTION. 129 people. "This concession must have been extremely agreeable to a sensual, grovelling people. The transition from the habits which they had contracted in Egypt was an easy one. The object of their worship was changed, but little of its mode : for it is not now a question say, that it is an attempt ta tear up the foundations which the Spirit of God has laid. He attacks the credit of Moses in every part of his character, as an historian, a legislator, and a moralist. Whether Moses was himself the writer of the Penta- teuch, is, with Dr Geddes, a matter of doubt. Hut the writer, whoever he might be, is one, he tells us, who upon all occasions gives in to the marvellous, adonis his narrative with fictions of the interference of the Deity, when every thing happened in a natural way ; and at other times dresses up fable in the garb of true history. The history of the creation is, according to him, a fabulous cosmogony. The story of the Fall, a mere Mythos, in which nothing but the imagination of commentators, possess- ing more piety than judgment, could have discovered either a seducing devil, or the promise of a Saviour. It is a fable, he asserts, intended for the purpose of persuading the vulgar, that knowledge is the root of all evil, and the desire of it a crime. Moses was, it seems, a man of great talents, as Numa and Lycurgus were. But, like them, he was a false pretender to personal intercourse with the Deity, with whom he had no immediate communication. He had the art to take advantage of rare but natural occurrences, to persuade the Israelites that the immediate power of God was exerted to ace implish his projects. When a violent wind happened to lay dry the head of the gulf of Suez, he persuaded them that God had made a passage for them through the sea ; and the narrative of their march is embellished with circumstances of mere fiction. In the delivery of the Decalogue he took advantage of a thunder- storm, to persuade the people that Jehovah had descended upon Mount Sinai; and he counterfeited the voice of God by a person, in the height of the storm, speaking through a trumpet. He presumes even that God had no immediate hand in deliver- ing the Israelites from the Egyptian bondage. The story of Balaam and his ass has had a parallel in certain incidents of Dr Geddes's own life. The laws of Moses are full of pious frauds. His animal sacrifices were institutions of ignorance and super- stition. The conquest of Canaan was a project of unjust ambi- tion, executed with cruelty ; and the morality of the Decalogue itself is not without its imperfections. In the end he comes to this very plain confession, — ' The God of Moses, Jehovah, if he really be such as he is described in the Pentateuch, is not the God whom I adore, nor the God whom I could love.' " &c. (Brit. Critic, vol. xix. pp. 3, 4.) Such are the views of the Hebrew Scriptures entertained by the man who undertook to be their translator ; and who, to these qualifications for the task, superadded those of a low and ludicrous cast of mind, a vulgar taste, and an almost total unacquaintance with the idiom of the English language. Whe- ther, then, upon the whole, I have dealt unjustly by this writer, in exemplifying his profane ravings by the brutal intoxication of the Spartan slave, and in conceiving the bare exhibition of the one to be sufficient like that of the other to inspire horror and disgust, I leave to the candid reader to determine. If, however, any taste can be so far vitiated, or any judgment so weak, as to admit to serious and respectful consideration that perversion of the sacred volume which he would dignify with the title of a translation, I would recommend at the same time a perusal of the learned and judicious strictures upon that work contained in the 14th and 19th volumes of the journal from which the above extract has been made ; a journal, to which every friend of good order and true religion in the community must feel himself deeply indebted. As a powerful antidote against the pois m of the work, Dr Graves's Lectures on the Four Last Books of Ike Pentateuch, whilst embracing much larger and more important objects, may be most usefully applied. In this valuable performance the authenticity and truth of the Mosaic history are established; the theological, moral, and political principles of the Jewish law are elucidated ; and all are, with ability and success, vindicated against the objections of infidels and gainsayers. among the learned, whether a great part of their ritual were not derived from that nation." (Geddes's Preface to Genesis, p. xiii.) Thus easily is the whole matter settled by this modest, cautious, and pious commentator. Now what says Dr Priestley upon this question, which has been so completely set at rest by the learned? '"They who sup- pose that Moses himself was the author of the institutions, civil or religious, that bear his name, and that in framing them he borrowed much from the Egyptians, or other ancient nations, must never have compared ^hem together ; otherwise they could not but have perceived many circumstances in which they differ most essentially from them all." He then proceeds, through a dissertation of some length, to point out the most striking of those differences : and among theso he notices the sacrificial discrepancies as not the least important, " Sacrificing (he says) was a mode of wor- ship more ancient than idolatry or the insti- tutions of Moses ; but among the heathens various superstitious customs were introduced respecting it, which were all excluded from the religion of the Hebrews." Having evinced this by a great variety of instances, he observes, — " As Moses did not adopt any of the heathen customs, it is equally evident that they borrowed nothing from him with respect to sacrifices. With them we find no such distinction of sacrifices as is made in the books of Moses, such as burnt-offerings, sin- offerings, trespass-offerings, and peace-offer- ings, or of the heaving or waving of the sacrifices. Those particulars, therefore, he could not have had from them, whether we can discover any reason for them or not. They either had their origin in the time of Moses, or, which is most probable, were prior to his time, and to the existence of idolatry." — " Lastly (he remarks,) among all the heathens, and especially in the time of Moses, human sacrifices were considered as the most accep- table to the gods : but in the laws of Moses, nothing is mentioned with greater abhorrence ; and it is expressly declared to have been a principal cause of the expulsion of the idola- trous inhabitants of Canaan. The right of the Divine Being to claim such sacrifices is intimated by the command to sacrifice Isaac, but it was declined, and a ram substituted in his place. Also, when the Divine Being claimed the first-born of all the Israelites, in the place of those of the Egyptians which were destroyed, none of them were sacrificed ; but the service of the Levites was accepted instead of them : and whereas there were not ! Levites enow for that purpose, the rest were redeemed by the sacrifice of brute animals, which evinced the determination of the Divine Being in no case to accept of that of men." 130 MAG !•: K O N T II E AT O N E M E X T. He finishes the entire disquisition by saying, " It may now, surely, be concluded, from this general view of the subject, t lint tlie two sys- tems, namely, that of Mioses, and that of the heathens, were oot derived from each other: and the superiority of that of Moses is so great, that, considering his circumstances and those of his nation :it the time, we cannot err in pronouncing, that they could not have had any human, but must have had a divine origin. Nor can any thing be said of Mr Langles, and others, who assert that the books of Moses wore copied, or in any other way derived, from the works of other Eastern nations, more favourable than that they had never nad them." 4 Such is Dr Priestley's opinion upon the subject, on which Dr Geddes comforts himself with having the unanimous suffrage of the learned in his favour. In truth, the absur- dity of Dr Geddes's notions on this subject, exposed as they have so frequently been when advanced by other infidel writers, (for with such I must beg leave to class this Catholic translator of the " books held sacred") I should not have deemed entitled to any specific refu- tation : but I could not resist the opportunity of confronting him with a brother critic, equally removed from the trammels of received opinions, and equally intrepid in exercising the right of free inquiry in the face of what- ever consequences might result. — When Greek meets Greek There is another writer also, for the purpose of confronting whose opinions with those of Dr Priestley I have been the more desirous of making the foregoing extracts from this author's Dissertation ; — and that is no other than Dr Priestley himself. Whoever will be at the trouble of perusing hi- positions relative to sacrifices contained in Number V. of this work, and also his observations on their origin alluded to in the Number which follows this, will have no small reason to be surprised at the orthodox complexion of the arguments \> hich have just been cited. For the striking inconsistency which will present itself upon such a comparison, it may not perhaps be difficult to account. I am willing, (and with much satisfaction in the reflection) to believe, that, as Dr Priestley approached the close of life, and was enabled, by being withdrawn from the fermentation of controversy and party, to view these awful subjects with the calmness, deliberation, and seriousness, which *A Dissertation, in which arc demonstrated the Orii/inaliti/ andtupcrior i n tenceqfVu Moiaie institutions, contained in l)r Priestlej 'j Notet on all the Books of Scripture, vol. i. pp. :s7:j — 400. See :iis> . the preface, p. xii. in which Or 1'riestloy uses these words : — '* The divine mission of Muses and that of .I.siH are in.-. ; ar .il.ly i innected ; and the religion of tho Hebrews and that Of the Christians arc part of the same Bcbeme ; M thai the separation of them is impossible. That Dr Geddes, and socle nthere, should have been of a different opinion, appears tj me most extraordinary." they demand, his religious opinions might have undergone some change, and made some approach to that soberer interpretation of Scripture which at an earlier period he had with almost unaccountable pertinacity resisted. I think I can discover strong signs of this in the comparative moderation of his last work, Notes on all the Books of Scripture ; but espe- cially in the Dissertation on the Originality and superior Excellence of the Mosaic Institutions, from which I have made the foregoing quota- tions, and which (although I cannot concur in the entire of its contents) I would strongly recommend, as containing a judicious summary of the internal evidence of the divine origin of the Mosaic institutions. No. XLVIII. Page 17. Col. 2. SACRIFICES EXPLAINED AS GIFTS BY VARIOUS WRITERS. Spencer maintains this theory of sacrifice : De Leg. Hebr. lib. iii. diss. ii. cap. 3. sect. 1, 2. pp. 762, 763. Mr Coventry, in the fifth discourse of his Philem. and Ifydasp. pp. 91, !>i\ 108, 109, adopts the same idea, clothing it, in his manner, with circumstances tending to disparage and vilify the entire rite. The author of the Scripture Account of Sacrifices proposes what he deems a different theory ; but which is distinguished from this, by a line so faint, as scarcely to be discerned. " Religious gifts" he says, " should be kept carefully distinct from gifts weakly presented to God, as men would offer gifts to one another :" and he explains sacrifices to be " sacred gifts, of things received first from God, and presented back to him for an exter- nal expression of gratitude, acknowledgment, faith, and every pious sentiment," (pp. 78 — 82, and Postsc. p. 21.) This notion, however, seems to have no just connection with any species of sacrifice, but the eucharistic. And however the sentiment of gratitude might have led to an offering of things inanimate, it could not have suggested the idea of the slaying of an animal, as was done by Abel at the beginning. Besides, this notion of sacrifico includes the idea of property, and is conse- quently not conceivable, without admitting an actual experience of the gratifying effect produced by gifts upon men : and thus it falls under the objection urged in Number LI. against the idea of gifts in general. Dr Priestley has adopted a similar theory, asserting that sacrifices arose from anthropo- morphitical notions of God, and are to be considered originally as gifts of gratitude. Like the last named author, he endeavours to support his notion from the practice of gifts of homage to great persons in early times ; No. 49.— SACRIFICES CONSIDERED AS FEDERAL RITES. ].'il and, like him, he considers, of course, an offering for sin as differing in no respect from any other sort of oblation. The progress of the rite of sacrifice, as growing out of the notion of gifts, he has traced in a circumstan- tial and elaborate detail, ( Th. Rep. vol. i. pp. 195 — 201,) which, whoever wishes to be con- vinced of the utter improbability of the theory in its .most plausible colouring, may take the trouble to consult. H. Taylor, (B. Mord. pp. 799 — 804,) in like manner, deduces sacrifices from the notion of gifts ; pronouncing them to have been nothing but free-will offerings of the first fruits of the earth, or fold ; and he expressly defines sacrifice to be "a sacred gift, set apart to God, whereby the sacrificer shewed his readiness to part with his property to religious uses, and thereby openly and publicly manifested his worship of God." He thus totally excludes the received notion of atonement ; and, agreeably to this, he subjoins, that " atonement and propitiation had no other meaning or design, than to purify, or sanctify, or set apart, any person or thing to the service of God, by separating them from common use." It is evident, that every explication here given of the theory of gifts carries with it the idea of a bribe to God to procure his favour. In some, it is disguised under the appearance of an expression of gratitude or homage, but this is evidently the essential ingredient, especially in all such sacrifices as were of a deprecatory nature. But, that such a notion was neither likely to obtain in the days of the first recorded sacrifice, nor has any connection with the ideas known to be universally attached in later days to animal piacular sacrifice, it will not require much thought to discover. No. XLIX. — Page 17. Col. 2. SACRIFICES CONSIDERED AS FEDERAL RITES. Sykes, in his Essay on Sac. p. 59, explains sacrifices as "federal rites," and represents them as " implying, the entering into friend- ship with God ; or the renewal of that friend- ship, when broken by the violation of former stipulations ;" and in p. 73, he says, that the origin of sacrifices may be accounted for on the supposition, " that eating and drinking together were the known ordinary symbols of friendship, and were the usual rites of engaging in covenants and leagues ;" this mode of entering into friendship and forming leagues with each other, being transferred by the ancients to their gods ; and in confirmation of this, he adduces instances from Homer, Virgil, Max. Tyr. and others, to shew, that they imagined that their gods did actually eat with them, as they ate with their gods. Thus, according to Sykes, Cain and Abel must both have eaten of the offerings which they brought ; and this, indeed, he positively asserts, p. 179. Hut not only have we no authority from Scripture to presume this, but, as we shall see in No. LI I. there is good reason to suppose directly the contrary. It should follow, also, from this theory, that all those who offered sacrifices, antece- dent to the Mosaic institution, must in completion of the ceremony have feasted upon the offering. Of this, however, no intimation whatever is given in Scripture. Jacob, indeed, is said to have called his brethren to eat bread ; but it by no means follows, that this was part of the sacrificial ceremony. That he should invite his friends to partake in the solemnity of the sacrifice, and afterwards entertain them, is perfectly natural, and conveys no notion whatever of feasting with God at his table. But besides, the holocaust, or burnt-offering, was such as rendered it impossible that the sacrificer could feast upon it, the whole of the animal being consumed upon the altar ; and that animal sacrifices, both before and a long time after the Flood, were of this kind, is generally acknowledged, {Scrip. Ace. of Sac. postsc. p. 32.) This difficulty, indeed, Sykes endeavours to evade, by saying, that the holocaust being deprecatory and offered on account of sins, it was to be entirely consumed by the offerer, and no part reserved for his own use, in confession that he did not think himself worthy to be admitted to eat of what Mas offered to God, (Essay, p. 232.) But now, if holocausts were the first sacrifices, it will scarcely be admitted, that an institution, which, for many ages after its commencement, absolutely precluded the possibility of feasting upon what was offered, should yet have taken its rise from that very idea. And besides, if the renewal of friendship, to be expressed by the symbol of eating with God, were the true signification of the sacrifice, to what species of sacrifice could it more properly apply, than to that whose precise object was reconciliation ? It deserves also to be remarked, that almost all the instances by which Sykes supports his theory are drawn from early heathen practices. Now, it is notorious, that animals unfit for food were sacrificed in several parts of the heathen world. Thus, horses were sacrificed to the sun ; wolves to Mars ; asses to Priapus ; and dogs to Hecate. Besides, it is not easy to conceive, had eating and drinking with God been at any time the prevalent idea of sacrifice, how a custom so abhorrent from this notion as that of human sacrifice could ever have had birth. Nor will it suffice to say, that this was a gross abuse of later days, when the original idea of sacrifice had been obscured and per- verted, (Essay, p. 347.) The sacrifice of Isaac, ; 132 M A GEE O N THE A T O N E M E N T. commanded by God himself, was surely not of this description ; and it will not be asserted that this was a sacrifice intended to be eaten : nor does it appear that Abraham had prepared any meat or drink-offering to accompany it. —B. Mord. p. 814. Upon the whole of Dr Sykes'.s reasoning in support of this theory it may be said, that he has transposed cause and effect, and inverted the order and series of the events. For whilst, from the custom of contracting leagues and friendships by eating; and drinking at the same table, he deduces the practice of feasting upon the sacrifice, and thence concludes this to be the very essence and origin of the rite, he seems to have taken a course directly oppo- site to the true one ; inasmuch as, in the first sacrifices, no part being reserved, it was not until long after the establishment of the rite, when many were invited to partake in the sacrifice, that feasting became connected with the ceremony ; and having thus acquired a sacred import by association, it was probably transferred to compacts and covenants amongst men, to bestow solemnity upon the act. See Scrip. Ace. of Sacr. postsc. p. 33. Whoever wishes to see a full and perfect refutation of this theory of Dr Sykes, may consult the second appendix of Dr Richie's Criticism upon Modern Notions of Sacrifice. It must, indeed, be confessed, that names of still higher authority are to be found on the side of the opinion which Sykes has adopted. Medc and Cud worth, in the course of their respective arguments to establish the Eucharist as a federal rite, had, long before the age of this writer, maintained the doctrine which he contends for ; and in this they were followed, and their reasonings repeated, by Dr Water- land, in his Nature, Obligation, and Efficacy of the Christian Sacrament considered. The main strength of the argument is marshalled by Mede in the four following reasons, which the reader, from the great celebrity of that writer, will naturally be desirous to sec. " First, ' Every sacrifice,' saith our Saviour, (Mark, ix. 49,) Ms salted with salt.' This salt is called, (Lev. ii. 13,) 'the salt of the covenant of God ;' that is, a symbol of the perpetuity thereof. Now, if the salt which seasoned the sacri lice, were 'sal foederis Dei, — the salt of the covenant of God,' what was the Bacramenl itself but ' epulum foederis, — the feast of the covenant?' Secondly, Mom- calls the blood of the burnt-offerings and peace-offerings, wherewith he sprinkled the children of [srael when they received the Law, the blood of the covenant which the Lord had made with them : ' This i^,' saith he, 'the blood of the Covenant which the Lord hath made with you,' (Exod. xxiv. 8.) — Thirdly, But, above all, this may most evi- dently be evinced out of the 50th Psalm, the whole argument whereof is concerning sacri- fices : there God saith, verse 5, ' Gather my saints together unto me, which make covenant with me by sacrifice:' and verse 1(>, of the sacrifices of the wicked, ' Unto the wicked God saith, wdiat hast thou to do to declare my statutes, and take my covenant in thy mouth, seeing thou hatest instruction?' &c. — Fourthly, 1 add in this last place, for a farther confirma- tion, that when God was to make a covenant with Abram, (Gen. xv.) he commanded him to offer a sacrifice, verse 9, ' Offer unto me (so it should be turned) a heifer, a she-goat, and a ram, each of three years old, a turtle dove, and a young pigeon.' All which he offered accordingly, and divided them in the midst, laying each piece or moiety one against the other ; and when the sun went down, God, in the likeness of a smoking furnace and burning lamp, passed between the pieces, and so (as the text says) ' made a covenant with Abram, saying, Unto thy seed will I give this land,' &c. By which rite of passing between the parts, God condescended to the manner of men." The author then proceeds to shew, that this custom of dividing the sacrifice and passing between the parts wras usual with the Gentiles, and not unknown among the Jews : and, upon the whole, he concludes as a matter decisively established, that sacrifices were in their nature and essence "federal feasts, wherein God deigneth to entertain man to eat and drink with or before him, in token of favour and reconcilement." ( Works of Joseph Mede, p. 170—172.) The opinions and arguments of a divine so learned, and a reasoner so profound, as Joseph Mede, should not be approached but with reverence : yet upon close examination it must be evident that this great man has here arrived at a conclusion not warranted by his premises. For, as to his first argument, it manifestly proves no more than this, that the Jewish sacrifices, which were all offered under and in reference to the covenant which God had originally made with the Jews, (Lev. ii. 13, and Exod. xxiv.) were always accompanied with that which was considered to be a sym- bol of the perpetuity of that covenant. In this there was evidently nothing federal, nothing which marked the entering into a present covenant, or even the renewing of an old one ; but simply a significant and forcible n>-urance of the faithfulness of that great Being with whom the national covenant of the Jews had been originally entered into. If this reasoning l>e just, and I apprehend it cannot be controverted, the whole strength of the cause is gone : for the remaining argu- ments, although they undoubtedly establish this, that some sacrifices were of the nature of federal rites, yet they establish no more: so that the general nature of sacrifice remains altogether unaffected. In those cases, also, where the sacrifice appears to have had afede- No. 50.- WARBURTON'S THEORY OF THE ORIGIN OF SACRIFICE. 133 ral aspect, the true state of the matter is pro- bably this, that where there was a covenant, there was a sacrifice also to givo solemnity and obligation to the covenant ; sacrifice being the most solemn act of devotion, and therefore naturally to be called in for the enforcement of the religious observance of any compact engaged in. Thus, the sacrifice, being but the accompaniment of the covenant, does not necessarily partake of its nature. In other words, although it be admitted, that where there was a covenant there was also a sacrifice, it by no means follows, that wherever there was" a sacrifice there was also a covenant. That some sacrifices, therefore, had a federal relation, proves nothing as to the nature of sacrifice in general : and the conclusion, which we had before arrived at, remains, conse- quently, unshaken by the reasons which have been adduced by Mode. — Bishop Pearce's Two Letters to Dr Waterland may be read with advantage upon this subject ; although they contain many particulars in which the reflecting reader will probably not concur. No. L. — Page 17. Col. 2. BISHOP WARBURTON'S THEORY OF THE ORIGIN OF SACRIFICE. Bishop Warburton (Div. Leg. B. ix. ch. 2.) represents the whole of sacrifice as symbolical. The offerings of first-fruits he holds to be an action expressive of gratitude and homage : and in this way he accounts for the origin of such sacrifices as were eucharistic. But, aware of the insufficiency of the theory, which places the entire system of sacrifice on the ground of gifts, he proceeds to explain the nature of expiatory sacrifice in the manner described in the page" to which this Number refers. It is to be lamented, that an ingenious writer of whom I have had occasion in another place to speak in terms of commendation, should in his view of the Bishop's opinions upon this subject, have permitted himself to give sup- port to that, which is certainly not among the most tenable of his Lordship's notions ; — namely, the idea of the human origin of sacri- fice. This, too, (though probably not so intended by the author,) has been done in a way which has a powerful tendency to mis- lead the unwary reader : the professed object being to exhibit an impartial enumeration of the arguments on both sides of the question, whilst, in truth, a preponderating weight has been studiously cast in favour of one. I allude to Mr Pearson's Critical Essay; in the 4th section of which the reasonings of Spencer and Warburton, in defence of the heathenish origin and subsequent divine adoption of the rite of sacrifice, are treated with a complacency which they but ill deserve. The reasonings themselves, as they are elsewhere in this work largely discussed, I shall not here stop to consider. No. LI. Page 18. Col. 1. THE SUPPOSITION THAT SACRIFICES ORIGINATED IN THE IDEA OF GIFTS, ERRONEOUS. Dr Ruthcrforth, in a communication to Dr Kennicott, collects from Gen. iv. 20, that the introduction of property, or exclusive right, amongst mankind, is not to be fixed higher than the time of Jabal, the eighth from Adam. He is there said to have been the father, or first inventor, of H^pE : that is, says Ruther- forth, not as we translate it, " the father of such as have cattle," (for he was clearly not the first of such, Abel having been a keeper of sheep long before,) but of private property ; the word HJDQ signifying strictly possession of any sort, and being so rendered in the Syriac version. (Kennic. Two Dissert. App. p! 252 — 254.) In addition to this it may be remarked, that the word H2pl2 seems to have been applied to cattle, merely because cattle were, in the earliest ages, the only kind of possession; and that, when there is nothing in the context to determine the word to that application, it can be considered only in its original and proper sense, namely, possession. But whether this idea be right or not, it is obvious that a community of goods must have for some time prevailed in the world ; and that, consequently, the very notion of a gift, and all experience of its effect upon men, must have been for a length of time unknown. And if the opinion be right, that sacrifice existed before Abel, and was coeval with the Fall ; it becomes yet more manifest, that ob- servation of the efficacy of gifts could not have given birth to the practice, there being no subjects in the world upon which Adam could make such observation. Besides, as Kennicott remarks, (Two Diss. p. 207,) "no being has a right to the lives of other beings, but the Creator, or those on whom he confers that right :" if then God had not given Abel such a right, (and that he did not confer it even for the purposes of necessary food, will ap- pear from the succeeding Number,) even the existence of the notion of property, and the familiar use and experience of gifts, could not have led him to take away the life of the animal as a gift to the Almighty ; nor, if they could have done so, can we conceive that such an offering would have been gra- ciously accepted. 134 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. No. LIT. — Page 18. Col. 1. ON THE DATE OF THE PERMISSION OF ANIMAL FOOD TO MAN. The permission of animal food evidently appears from Scripture to take its date from the age of Noah : the express grant of animal food then made, clearly evincing that it was not in use before. This opinion is not only founded in the obvious sense of the passage Gen. ix. 8, but lias the support of commenta- tors, the most distinguished for their learning and candid investigation of the sacred text.1 But, a- ingenious refinements have been em- ployed to torture away the plain and direct sen-e ut' Scripture upon this head, it becomes necessary to take a brief review of the argu- ments upon the question. Two grants were made ; one to Adam, and one to Noah. To Adam it was said, (Gen. i. 29, 80,) " Behold, I have given you every herb 1 'caring seed, which is upon the face of all the earth ; and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree, bearing seed, to you it shall be for meat ; and to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat." Again, to Noah it is said, (Gen. ix. 8,) " Every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you ; even as the green herb have I given you all things." Now, whilst the obvious inference from the former of these passages is, that God's original grant of the use of his creatures for food, was confined to the vegetable crea- tion ; the conclusion to be drawn from the latter is found to be precisely similar, inas- much as, had animal food been before permit- ted for the use of man, there had been no occasion for the specific grant to that purpose now made to Noah. And, in perfect agree- ment with this reasoning, we find the Scrip- ture history of the period antecedent to the I 1 1 entirely silent concerning the use of animal food. Dr Sykes, however, can see nothing in the first grant to Adam, " but a general declara- tion of a sufficient provision for all creatures ;" nor in the second to Noah, " but a command to >lay before they ate flesh :" flesh having from the first been used for food. (Essay, &c. Pp. 177, 17!!.) In support of these extraor- dinary positions he employs arguments not less ext raordinary, I. He contends, that the former grant is necessarily to in- underst 1 with certain limitations; for thai, as sonic creatures were not formed for living on herbs, and some herbs were of a poisonous quality, the grant 1 See Mtinst. Vatab. f'lar. Grot, and Le ('lore on Gen. ix. .3; also Slmckf. Connect. toL i. i>. m ; and Kennic. Txo Diss. !'• 7". cannot be supposed to extend to every green herb ; and hence lie infers, that the grant cannot be interpreted as enjoining or pro- hibiting any particular species of food ; and that, consequently, animal food may be in- cluded, (p. 169 — 171.) But it seems rather a strange inference, even admitting the exis- tence of noxious vegetables at the time of the grant, that, because it must in propriety be limited to a certain description of the things generally permitted, it might therefore be extended to a class of things never once named ; or that, because a full power was given to man over all herbs, to take of them as he pleased for food, whilst some would not answer for that purpose, the dominion given was not, therefore, to relate to herbs, but generally to all things that might serve for human sustenance. But, 2. he maintains, that, at all events, this grant of herb and tree for the food of man, does not exclude any other sort of food which might be proper for him. And, to establish this, he endeavours to shew (p. 171 — 177,) that the declaration to Noah did not contain a grant to eat animal food in general, but only some particular sorts of it, such as are included in the word t£0~l, by which he understands creeping things, or such animals as are not comprehended under the denominations of beast and fowl ; so that, admitting this to be a grant of something new, it was yet by no means inconsistent with the supposition, that sheep, oxen, goats, and such like animals, had been eaten from the first. Now, this directly contradicts his former argument. For if, as that maintains, the grant to Adam was but a general declaration of abundant provi- sion, and consequently leaving man at full liberty to use all creatures for food, why introduce a permission at this time respecting a particular species of creatures? But besides, W£") does not imply a parti- cular species of animals, but denotes all, of whatever kind, that move. That this is the true acceptation of the word may be collected from Cocceius, and Schindler, as well as Nachmanides, (who is quoted by Fagius, Grit. Sue. on Gen. i. 29,) and the several authorities in Poole's Syn. on Gen. ix. 8: and so manifest does it appear from the original in various instances, that it requires no small degree of charity not to believe that Dr Sykes has wil- fully closed his eyes against its true meaning. His words are particularly deserving of remark. "Throughout the law of Moses, it is certain, that it (t^'Jl) never takes in, or includes, beasts of the earth, or birds of the air, but a third species of animals different from the other two :" and this third species he conjec- tures to be, "all such, either fish or reptiles, that not having feet glide along," (p. 178.) Now the direct contrary of all this is certain : and had Dr Sykes, in his accurate survey of No. 52.— DATE OF THE PERMISSION OF ANIMAL FOOD. 135 the entire law of Moses, but allowed his eye to glance on the words contained in Gen. vii. 21, lie probably would not have been quite so peremptory. "All flesh died, that moveth (tf'.JT"0 upon the earth ; both of fowl, and of cattle, and of beast, and of every creeping thing (lp£r) that creepeth (y~U£/n") upon the earth." Here the creeping things are specially named, and included, together with all other creatures, under the general word l#D"V And it is particularly deserving of notice, that in the 11th chapter of Levit., in which the diffe- rent species of animals are accurately pointed out, those that are properly called creeping things are mentioned no less than eleven times, and in every instance expressed by the word \1iy : and yet from this very chapter, over- looking these numerous and decisive instances, Dr Sykes quotes, in support of his opinion, the use of the word I£T2"1 in the two following verses : " Neither shall you defile yourselves with any manner of creeping thing (y~lt£>) that moveth (l^Din) upon the earth," verse 44. — And again, " this is the law of the beasts, and of the fowls, and of every living creature that moveth (t^'Jin) in the waters," verse 46. Here, because the word t^ftl, which is a description of all moving things, (as has been shewn above, and may be proved from various other instances, — see Jenn. Jew. Antiq. vol. i. p. 306,) is found connected with reptiles and fishes, it is at once pronounced to be appropriate to them ; notwithstanding that through the entire chapter, whose object it is carefully to distinguish the different kinds of animals, it is never once used in the numerous passages referring specially to the reptile and fishy tribes as their proper appellation, and is translated in these two verses by the LXX in its true generic sense, xivovfisvo;, "that moveth." So that Dr Sykes might with as good reason have inferred, that, because creeping things are occasionally called living creatures, living creatures must, consequently, mean creeping things. To say the truth,' "if Dr Sykes had been desirous to discover a part of Scripture, completely subversive of his interpretation of the word t£*ftH, he could not have made a happier selection than the very chapter of Leviticus to which he has referred. But, to leave no doubt that the grant made to Noah wras a permission for the first time of animal food, we find an express description of the manner in which this sort of food was to be used immediately subjoined : " But flesh with the life thereof, shall ye not eat." Now, if animal food had been before in use, this injunction seems unaccountable, unless on the supposition, that it had been the practice, before the Flood, to feed on the flesh of animals that had not been duly killed for the purpose; and Dr Sykes's argument, which maintains, that this prohibition merely tended to prevent the eating such animals as died of themselves, or the eating the animal without having duly killed it, must rest entirely on the presump- tion that such had been the practice before. But on what ground he has assumed this, he has not thought proper to inform us : and the certainty, that, before the Flood, animals were killed for sacrifice, seems not consistent with the supposition. It is curious to observe, that this argument adduced by Sykes falls in with one of the strange conceits of the Jewish Rabbins ; it being a tradition of theirs, that there were seven precepts handed down by the sons of Noah to their posterity, six of which had been given to Adam, and the seventh was this to Noah, " about not eating flesh, which was cut from any animal alive." See Patrick's Preface to Job — also Jennings's Jew. Antiq., vol. i. p. 147. It must be confessed, however, that argu- ments of a nature widely different from these of Sykes, have been urged in opposition to the interpretation of the several grants to Adam, and to Noah, contended for in this note. Heidegger, in his Historia Patriarch. Exercit. xv. § 9, vol. i. maintains, that the passage (Gen. i. 29, 30) is to be thus trans- lated : " Behold, I have given you every hert bearing seed, &c. (to you it shall be for meat;) nay, also, every beast of the earth, and every fowl of the earth, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth wherein there is life, with every green herb for meat." This trans- lation he defends, on the ground of the occa- sional use of the preposition 7, in the inclu- sive, or copulative, sense ; whence he holds himself justified in explaining it here, as the mark of the accusative, not of the dative case. In support of this acceptation, he also pro- duces some names highly distinguished in the annals of sacred criticism, namely, Capellus, Cocceius, and Bochart. And to reconcile this interpretation with the grant to Noah, which seems inconsistent with the idea that the right to animal food hail been conveyed before the time of that patriarch, he considers this second grant but as a repetition of the first to Adam, and that the words, " even as the green herb have I given you all things," are not to be understood as conveying now, for the first time, a right to the use of all crea- tures, similar to that which had been before granted with respect to the herbs and fruits, but merely as confirming the grant formerly made, of the green herb and of all living creatures, without distinction. Now, although the particle 7 is used in some few parts of Scripture, in the sense here ascribed to it by Heidegger, yet if we examine the instances in which it is so applied, (all of which may be seen at one view in Noldius Concord. Pariicul. Ebr. pp. 398, 401,) we shall find, that it stands in those cases com- bined and related in such manner as to give a new modification to its general and ordinary 136 M A G E E O N T HE ATONEMEN T. meaning. But, surely, in the present case, no such modifying relation exists. On the contrary, the very frame and analogy of the sentence seem to determine the word to its usual dative signification. Having occurred twice in the 2!)tli verse, and in both places manifestly in this sense, (JD37, "to y°u>") it then immediately follows in direct connection, and this connection marked most unequivo- cally by the copulative particle "), (737"),) so as to determine unavoidably the continuance of its application in the same sense. The word JHN, likewise, succeeds to the clauses enumerating the animal tribes in the 30th verse, precisely in the same manner in which it followed that relating to the human kind, in the preceding verse ; and as, there, it is admitted to be the mark of the accusative, specifying the things allotted to the sustenance of the human species ; so, here, it is evidently to be used in the same sense, specifying those things that are appointed for the support of the brute creation. This analogy, however, Heidegger is compelled by his interpretation to overturn ; and whilst he allows to the word this signification through the whole of the preceding verse, he here abruptly and arbitrarily changes its application, and attri- butes to it the force of with, which is neces- sary to make sense of the passage, according to his mode of translating it. How, then, does the matter stand ? In two passages exactly corresponding, and imme- diately connected, the preposition 7,. and the particle J~"lN, are arbitrarily applied in diffe- rent senses, to make out the translation of Heidegger ; whilst on the commonly received interpretation, the anology is preserved throughout, and the same uniform meaning is attributed to each particle in the corres- ponding clauses. Indeed, the version con- tended for by Heidegger is, upon the whole, so violent and unnatural, that it requires but to read the passage in the original, to be con- vinced that it is inadmissible ; and perhaps nothing but the respectability of the names that appear in its support, could justify its serious investigation. One advantage, how- ever, manifestly attends the notice of it in the present discussion. It proves, that the learned writers, who defend this interpreta- tion, consider the commonly received version as utterly irreconcileable with the notion, that the first grant to Adam conveyed the permission of animal food. For if any of the arguments used by Dr Sykes, and others, to shew that it could be so understood, were deemed by these writers to have any value, they surely would not have resorted to this new and unwarrantable translation in sup- port of that position. In addition to what has been said, it may be proper to remark, that this new version of Gen. i. 29, 30, is so far from receiving any countenance from the Jewish writers, that they are nearly unanimous in the opinion, that the right of eating flesh was not granted until the time of Noah. See particularly Abenezra, and Sol. Jarchi, in their annota- tions on this part of Scripture. Heidegger also confesses, that the Christian Fathers, nearly without exception, concur in the same opinion. Hist. Patriarch. Excrcit. xv. § 3. Objections, however, are drawn from the history of Abel's sacrifice ; and from the dis- tinction of animals into clean and unclean, antecedent to the Flood. It is said, that Abel's sacrifice having been of the firstlings of his flock, and it never having been customary to offer any thing to God, but what was useful to man, it may fairly be concluded, that animals were used for food even in the time of Abel. Heideg. Hist. Patr. Exer. xv. § 25. To this the reply is obvious ; that the principle here laid down is accommodated to particular theories of sacrifice, — to such as place their origin and virtue in the notion of a gift to the Deity, or of a self-denial on the part of the offerer ; and therefore the argu- ment presupposes the very thing in question, namely, the origin and nature of sacrifice. But, besides, the conclusion will not follow, even admitting the principle ; since Abel's flock might be kept for the advantages of the milk and wool, and thus what he offered was useful to himself. Nor to this can it reason- ably be objected, that, by the practice of the law, the male firstlings were offered, and that therefore Abel's offering could have deprived him only of the wool, the use of which might not yet have been learned ; for it cannot with propriety be contended, that the first and more simple form of sacrifice should be ex- plained by the usages of succeeding and far distant times, and by the complicated system of the law of Moses. But, again, it is urged, that the distinction of creatures into clean and unclean, (Gen. vii. 2,) proves animal food to have been in use before the Deluge, inasmuch as such dis- tinction can be conceived only in reference to food. To this it has been answered by Grotius,2 that the distinction was made pro- leptically, as being addressed by Moses to those who were familiar with this distinction afterwards made by the law : and again, by Jennings, {Jew. Antiq. vol. i. p. 151,) that such a distinction would naturally be made, from the difference observed to exist between the animals, without any reference to food ; or that, though the use of them for food were held in view, the distinction might have been first made at the time of entering the ark, when we find it first mentioned, and a greater number of those that were most fit for food then preserved, merely because God intended 1 Dc. Ver. Chr. lib. v. § 9. — Sec also Srencc !>?■ LcQ- Bebr. lib. i. cap. v. § 1. No. 52.— DATE OF THE PERMISSION OF ANIMAL FOOD. 137 to permit the use of them in a very short time. But reasonable as these answers may appear, may it not he thought more satisfac- tory, to consider this distinction as relating originally, not to food, but to sacrifice : those creatures, which were sanctified to the service and worship of God, being considered pure ; whilst those that were rejected from the sac- rificial service, were deemed unfit for sacred uses, or unclean ? And agreeably to this idea, the word denoting " unclean," throughout the law, 11*212, is put in opposition not only to -in!2, " clean," but to Wp, " holy."2 The distinction, then, of clean and unclean ani- mals before the Flood, is admissible upon the principle of the divine institution, or even of the existing practice of sacrifice, without sup- posing the permission of animal food before the time of Noah. In conformity with the above reasoning, we find the first use to which this distinction is applied in Scripture, is that of sacrifice ; Noah having " taken of every clean beast, and of every clean fowl, and offered burnt- offerings,"3 (Gen. viii. 20.) Besides, it is to be remembered, that the distinction into clean and unclean with respect to food, was entirely a different institution from the distinction into clean and unclean with respect to sacri- fice. (See Patrick and Ainsw. on Gen. vii. 2.) Dr Kennicott's remark on this subject is deserving of notice. " Although the distinc- tion of beasts into clean and unclean was not registered until we come down to Deutero- nomy, (xiv. 3,) yet," he says, " this is no reason why we should not suppose it intro- duced by God at the same time that he instituted sacrifice ; for whoever considers carefully will find, that the law is in part a republication of antecedent revelations and commands, long before given to mankind." {Two Dissert, pp. 217, 218, — comp. Ainsw. on Gen. vii. 2.) Witsius considers the dis- tinction of beasts into clean and unclean so manifestly to relate to sacrifice in the time of Noah, and to have originated from divine institution, that he even employs it as an argument in support of the divine appoint- ment of sacrifice before the Flood. (Miscell. Sacr. lib. ii. diss. ii. § 14.) Heidegger also, though he contends for the use of animal food in the antediluvian world, yet admits the distinction of animals into clean and unclean, to have been instituted by divine authority, in reference to sacrifices before the Flood. Hist. Patr. Exercit. iii. § 52, torn. i. * See Coeceius and Parkliurst on the word tcja. 3 See Pol. Synop. on Gen. vii. 2 ; compare also Gen. xv. 9, with Jameson's note thereon. No. LIIL — Page 18. Col. 1. ON THE DIVINE ORIGIN OF LANGUAGE. " The first use of words appears from Scripture to have been to communicate the thoughts of God. But how could this be done, hut in the words of God ? and how could man understand the words of God, before he was taught them % " The apostle has told us, that " faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God ;" thus clearly pronouncing all knowledge of divine things, and consequently all language relat- ing to them, to have had its origin in revela- tion. But it is not only with respect to things divine, that revelation appears to have j supplied the first intimations of language. In terms relating to mere human concerns, it seems to have been no less the instructress of man. For in what sense can we under- stand the " naming of every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air, brought before Adam for this purpose by God," but in that of his instructing Adam in the manner whereby they were in future to be distin- guished ? To suppose it otherwise, and to imagine that Adam at the first was able to impose names on the several tribes of animals, is to suppose, either that he must from the first have been able to distinguish them by their characteristic marks and leading proper- ties, and to have distinct notions 1 of them 1 In speaking of the necessity of a distinct notion being asso- ciated to each term indicating a class or species, it is not meant to imply, that to render generic terms significant, appropriate abstract notions must be annexed. That such notions cannot be entertained by the mind, or, rather, that they involve a con- tradiction subversive of their existence, the very arguments and illustrations employed by Mr Locke in their support and explana- tion are sufficient to demonstrate. See particularly Locke's Essay, B. iv. ch. vii. § 9. It has been fully and conclusively established by that most accurate of metaphysical reasoners, Berkeley, that what is called a general idea, is nothing but the idea of an indi- vidual object, annexed to a certain term, which attaches to it a more extensive signification, by recalling to the mind the ideas of other individuals, which are similar to this one in certain characters or properties. This explanation of the nature of Universals, which has been commonly ascribed to Bishop Berkeley, who has, undoubtedly, unfolded and enforced it in the most intelligible and convincing manner, is, however, of much earlier origin. The distinction of Nominalist and Realist is known to have been clearly marked in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, under the teaching of Roscelin, and his pupil Abelard. The Cynics and Stoics, also, of early times, maintained opinions which entitle them to be ranked of the former class: and, contrary to the assertion of Mr Dugald Stewart, who follows the authority of Brucker in placing Aristotle among the Realists, there certainly are to be found in the writings of that philosopher the elements of those just notions concerning Universals, which have been adopted by the Nominalists. Of Hoscelin, we are told by Brucker, (Hist. Phil. vol. iii. p. 90/,) that he maintained the position, " Universalia, ncc ante rem. nee in re existere, nee ullam habere realem cxistentiam, sed esse nuda nomina et voces, quibus rerum singulariiim genera denotentur." This opinion of Roscelin, that Universals 138 M A G E E ON THE A T ONEMEN T. annexed to their several appellations ; or, that he applied sounds at random, as names of the animals, without the intervention of such notions. But the latter is to suppose a jargon, not a language : and the former im- plies a miraculous operation on the mind of Adam, which differs nothing in substance from the divine instruction here contended for. Indeed, even abstracting from the informa- tion thus given in Scripture, those who have well examined this subject have been utterly at a loss to conceive any other origin of lan- were merely words or names, was strenuously supported, with some small alteration not very distinctly Intelligible, by liis follower Abelard : and was no less strenuously opposed by the Realists, who contended, that Universals have an actual exis- tence in return naturd, and that their boundaries are accu- rately determined hy appropriate essences, according to which Nature lias classed the individuals of the respective species. That the authority of Aristotle was erroneously claimed bv the latter ; and that, on the contrary, the views of the Stagyrite were favourable to the Nominalists, l)r Gillies has taken laud- able pains to demonstrate. In his valuable Analysis of a part of the writings of that philosopher, he has satisfactorily proved, that, by general terms, Aristotle meant only to express the result of the comparison of different individuals agreeing in the same tiSoj or appearance, without the supposition of any cor- respondent general ideas existing in the mind ; or, in other words, that a general term was conceived by him, to stand as a sign for a number of individuals, considered under the same aspect, and, from certain resemblances, assigned to the same class. See Dr Gillies's Aristotle, vol. i. p. 66 — 72. How perfectly this corresponds with the clearest views of modern metaphysics, is manifest at a glance : and it cannot but afford peculiar satisfaction to all who feel a reverence for exalted genius to find, that, after the unworthy disparagement which for a length of time has been so laboriously cast upon the great name of Aristotle, the honourable homage of a rational coinci- dence in his opinions, not merely on this, but on an almost endless variety of important subjects, has been the result of the most enlightened inquiries of later days. It has been singularly the fate of the Greek philosopher, to be at one time supersti- tiously venerated, and at another contemptuously ridiculed ; without sufficient pains taken, either by his adversaries, or his admirers, to understand his meaning. It has been too fre- quently his misfortune to be judged from the opinions of his followers, rather than from his own. Kven the celebrated Locke is not to be acquitted of this unfair treatment of his illustrious predecessor in the paths of Metaphysics; although, perhaps, it is not too much to say of his well known Essay, that there is scarcely to be found in it one valuable and important truth concerning the operations of the understanding, which may not bo traced in those writings against which he has directed so much misapplied raillery ; whilst, at the same time, they exhibit many rich results of deep thinking, which have entirely escaped his perspicacity. Indeed, it may be generally pronounced of those who have, within the last two centuries, been occupied in the investigation of the intellectual powers of man, that, had they studied Aristotle more, and (what would have followed as a necessary consequence) reviled him less, they would have been more successful in their endeavours to extend the inhere of human knowledge. To return to the subject of this note, — it must be observed, that to the two different and opposite opinions on the nature of Universals already alluded to, namely, that of the Nominalists and that of the Realists, there is to be added a third and inter- mediate one, that of the Conceptualists, so called from their distinguishing tenet, that the mind has the power of forming general conceptions by abstraction. This sect is represented by Uruckcr, as a modification of thai of the Nominalists. «' Nomi- nates, deserta paolo Abelardi hypothesi, universalia notionibus, atqucconccptibus mentis, ex rebus singularibus abstractione for- guage, than divine institution. Whitby con- siders this so completely evident, that he thinks it forms in itself a clear demonstration, that the original of mankind was as Moses delivered it, from the impossibility of giving any other tolerable account of tile oiigin of language. (Sermons on the Attrib. vol', ii. p. 29.) Bishop Williams, in his 2d Sermon, (Boyle Lcct. vol. i. p. 167,) affirms, that though Adam had a capacity and organs admirably contrived for speech, yet in his case there was a necessity of his being immediately instructed by God, because it was impossible matis.consisterestatuebant: undeCV>Hu£t; Sn!-i$xiTCC' '■ anQl in the philosophy of the Greeks, reason and words are denominated by one and the same term, Xoyo;. Now, if this be just ; if language be, in truth, the indispensable instrument of reasoning; is it too much to affirm, that language could not have been discovered by reasoning ; or, in other words, that the operations of reason- ing could not have effected that, by which alone its operations are conducted ? According to the Conceptualist, indeed, who holds that the mind can contemplate its own ideas independently of words, the invention of language by the exertion of thought is by no means inconceivable ; since, on this hypothesis, reasoning may precede language, and therefore may minister to its discovery. And yet, when considered somewhat closely, it may not perhaps appear a very easy matter to imagine the practicability of such a process. Reasoning, it is manifest, can be conducted only by proposi- tions or affirmations, either verbal or mental. A proposition, affirming of any individual thing, that it is itself, or that it is not another, (could we even suppose the mind in its first stage of thinking capable of forming such a proposition,) is not to be ranked amongst the class of affirmations which belong to reason- ing. The power of distinguishing individual objects pertains to the faculty of perception, and is necessary to reasoning, but can form no part of it. Nothing individual, then, being an attribute, every affirmation, which can make a part of reasoning, demands the existence of a general sign. The formation of general signs must, therefore, precede all affirmation, and con- se uently every exercise of the reasoning faculty. The Concep- tualist, who asserts, that general signs are supplied by the general ideas with which abstraction furnishes the mind, must Of course contend, that the exercise of the power of abstraction must be antecedent to every act of reasoning. Now, in the first place, it cannot but be deemed extraordinary, that the very faculty, which is pronounced to be the distinguishing characteristic of the rational species, 6hould be called into action previous to the exercise of reason. If such a faculty can be exerted before the use of reason, why not exerted without it ? And, in that case, why should not the tribes of irrational animals, whose perceptions of individual objects may be as distinct as those in the minds of men, pass from those individual perceptions to universal ideas, if such transition can bo made without the exercise of reason ? But again, not to dwell upon this consideration, (since it may be pretended that it is abstrac- tion itself which in its consequence produces rationality,) if we inquire, what it is that can put an unreasoning mind upon this process of abstraction ; a process allowed by all to be difficult, and represented by some in such a light as makes it appear to embrace contradictions ; it will not be very easy to give an answer. In contemplating things by classes, it is true, we both who has laboured to prove language not to have been of divine appointment, admits, that without it reason cannot be used by man. Now, if language be necessary to the exer- cise of reason, it clearly cannot have been the result of human excogitation ; or, as it is put by Dr Ellis in his Enquiry, &c. language can- not be contrived without thought and know- ledge ; but the mind cannot have thought and knowledge, till it has language ; therefore language must be previously taught, before man could become a rational creature ; and none could teach him but God. (Scholar Armed, vol. i. p. 140.) Locke's principles expedite the acquisition of knowledge, and facilitate its com- munication. Iiut can these ends act upon a mind which has not yet begun to reason ? Can the anticipations of knowledge become a motive, where it has not yet been learned what knowledge is; or, can the desire of communication constitute an incitement, where the very notion of the subject matter to be communicated has never yet been conceived 1 For it must be remembered, that, as we are now speaking of language as subsequent to reasoning, and of reasoning as subsequent to abstraction, we must conceive abstraction to be exerted, without any notion actually acquired either of reasoning or language, or any direction or forecast suggested by a reference to either. Abstraction, in short, in this view of the case, is a random and unintelligible movement, which is excited by no design, pro- poses no object, and admits no regulation. So irrational a foundation for a rational superstructure, cannot be deliberately maintained. Dr Price, whose system imposed on him the necessity of upholding the existence of abstract ideas, as " essential to all the operations of the understanding, and as being implied in every act of our judgment," felt himself, at the same time, obliged, from the foregoing considerations, to deny that such ideas can be acquired by any mental process, such as that of abstraction. " Were abstract ideas," he observes, " formed by the mind in any such manner, it seems unavoidable to conceive that it has them, at the very time that it is supposed to be employed in forming them. Thus, from any particular idea of a triangle, it is said we can form the general one : but does not the very reflection said to be necessary to this, on a greater or lesser triangle, imply, that the general idea is already in the mind '!" (Review of the principal Difficulties in Morals, p. 37.) The learned Cudworth, in like manner, speaking of the under- standing, as an artificer that is to fabricate abstract notions out of sensible ideas, demands, whether, " when this artificer goes about his work, he knows what he is to make of them before- hand, and unto what shape to bring them. If he do not, he must needs be a bungling workman : but if he do, he is pre- vented in his designs, his work being already done to his hand : for he must needs have the intelligible idea of that which he knows or understands, already within himself." (Treatise con- cerning Eternal and Immutable Morality, pp. 220, 221.) Mr Harris, also, is led, as he says, by the common account of the mode in which our ideas are generated in the mind, " to view the human soul in the light of a crucible, where truths are produced by a kind of logical chemistry." Hermes, pp. 404, 405. These writers are accordingly forced into the gratuitous supposition of a distinct faculty, for the origin of abstract ideas in the human mind. This Dr Price pronounces to be "the faculty, whose natural object is truth." (Rev. p. 37.) And Cudworth, from whom he has largely drawn, and whose mysterious solution of this difficulty he does not altogether reject, ascribes the origin of our abstract ideas to a certain " perceptive power of the Noetical part of the soul, which, acting by itself, exerts from within the intelligible ideas of things virtually contained in its own cognoscitive power, that are universal and abstract notions, from which, as it were, looking downwards, it comprehends individual things." Treatise, pp. 217, 218. Mr Harris, again, accounts for the existence of abstract ideas, by a " connective act of the soul, by means of 140 MACJEE ON THE A T ONE M E N T. concerning the nature of language, although ho did not see liis way with sufficient clear- ness to lead him to the right conclusion, the last named writer proves to be per- fectly correspondent to the above reason- ing." (Ibid. pp. 133, 139.) And in an able work published at Berlin by Siismilchius in 17C>fi, the same principles are successfully applied to establish the same conclusion ; namely, that the origin of language must have been divine. Even Hobbes admits, that " the first author of speech was God himself, that instructed Adam how to name such crea- tures as he presented to his sight." (Leviath. eh. iv. p. 12.) From the impossibility of conceiving how language could have been invented, some have been led, in opposition to all just reason- ing, to pronounce it innate.3 Many even of the ancients, totally unaided by revelation, were obliged to confess that the discovery of this art exceeded all human powers. Thus Socrates, in the Cratylus of Plato, is repre- sented as saying, " the first names were framed by the gods ;" and in the same work we are told, that " the imposition of names on things belonged to a nature superior to that of man," and that it could " pertain only to him who hath a full discernment of their several natures." — Pol. Syn. on Gen. ii. 19 ; Stilling. Orig. Sac. B. i. ch. i. § 3 ; and Euseb. Proep. Evang. lib. xi. cap. 6. It must be remarked, that they who hold the opinion that language is of mere human invention are, for the most part, obliged to which, by an energy as spontaneous and familiar to its nature as the seeing of colours is to the eye, it discerns at onci', what in many is one ; what, in tilings dissimilar and different, is similar, and the same:" and this "connecting or unifying power " of the mind, he makes to be the same with that which discerns truth : and by moans of this alone it is, that he consi- ders, that individuals themselves can become the objects of knowledge ; in which he seems to coincide with the mystical notions of Cudworth. See Hermes, p. 3ti0 — 372. Into such extraordinary straits, and unjustifiable assumptions, have these learned and able writers been drawn, whilst they maintained the existence of universal ideas, and at the same time found it impossible to accede to the notion of their produc- tion by the process of abstraction. They would have reasoned more justly, if, from the impossibility of acquiring universal ideas by such a process, they had inferred that no such ideas do actually exist in the mind ; and that the general abstract notion, whieh is at the same time to include all and none of the circum- stances of individual existence, is a fiction which never can be realized. They would have arrived at a conclusion still more comprehensive and important, if they had drawn this farther consequence, that there is not in nature any Universal really existing ; and that since no idea can be other than the idea of an individual, to terms alone can a universal or general nature be ascribed. From all which it must follow as a necessary result, — that without language neither can knowledge bo acquired, nor reasoning exerted, by the human intellect ; and that, since language must precede these, it cannot have been discovered by them, and therefore cannot be deemed the offspring Of human invention. 3 Seo Shuckf. Connect, vol. i. p. 109, and also an essay of Count de Fraula, (Mi'm. de I' Acad. Imptr. el Hoy. Jirusscls, vol. xiv.) in which language is represented as an instinctive quality of man, constituting a part of his very creation. proceed on suppositions of the original stato of man, totally inconsistent with the Mosaic history. Thus, amongst the ancients, Diodorus SicahlB,(Biblioth.]ih. i.)Vitruvius, (De Archit. lib. ii. cap. 1, 2,) Lucretius, &e. ground their reasonings upon an idea, (derived from the atomic cosmogony of Moschus, Demooritus, and Epicurus, which represented human beings as springing from the earth, like vege- i tables,) that men first lived in woods and caves like brute beasts, littering only cries and indistinct noises, until gradual association for mutual defence brought with it at length conventional signs for communication. And the respectable and learned, though strangely fanciful, author of the Origin and Progress of Language, wdio is among the latest that have written in defence of this opinion, is compelled to admit, that the invention of language is too difficult for the savage state of man; and accordingly he holds, that men, having been placed originally in a solitary and savage state, must have been associated for ages, and have carried on some common work, ami even framed some civil polity, and must have con- tinued for a considerable length of time in that state, so as ultimately to acquire such powers of abstraction as to be able to form general ideas, before language could possibly be formed. Now, whether such theories, in supposing a mute emergence from savage bar- barism to reflecting civilization, and a conti- nued association4 without an associating tie, prove any thing else than their own extrava- gance; and whether, by the prodigious diffi- culty and delay which even they attach to the invention of speech, they do not give strong confirmation to the Mosaic account, which describes man as destined for the immediate enjoyment of society, and consequently in- structed in the art of speech, it is for the reader to judge. Other writers again, for example, Condillac (in his Essay on the Origin of Human Know- ledge,) Batteaux (in his Principles of Litera- ture,) and Gebelin (in his Monde Primitif) maintain, that man is not by nature the mutum pecus he is represented by the Scotch * Dr niair in his Lectures on Rhetoric, (vol. i. p. 71.) makes the following just and apposite observations: — "One would think, that, in order to any language fixing and extending itself, men must have been previously gathered together in con- siderable numbers ; society must have been already far advanced : and yet, on the other hand, there seems to have been an absolute necessity for speech, previous to the formation of society. For, by what bond could any multitude of men be kept together, or be made to join in the prosecution of any common interest, until once, by the intervention of speech, , they could communicate their wants and intentions to each 1 other ? So that, either how society could form itself, previously to language, or how words could rise into a language, previously to society formed, seem to be points attended with equal difficulty. And when we consider, &c. difficulties increase so much upon us on all hands, that there seems to be no small reason for referring the first origin of all language to divine teaching or inspiration." . No. 53.-ON THE DIVINE ORIGIN OF LANGUAGE. I 11 philosopher: but that sounds, either excited by passions, or produced by imitation, would necessarily be formed so as to constitute an inarticulate language ; which would ultimately suggest the idea, and supply the elements, of more perfect speech. The transition, how- ever, from the simple sound to the diversified articulation is still a wide chasm in each of these solutions. And whilst the range of the f>assions seems, on the one hand, to present a imit which the powers of communication, derived from that source, cannot be conceived to transcend; the various sounds and motions in nature must, on the other, be admitted to exhaust the models, which alone could draw forth the imitative powers of the human voice. So that, according to these theories, single tones, or cries, either excited by some passion, or formed in imitation of some natural sound, must in all just reasoning fill up the measure of human language. It is not easy, then, to discover any advantage possessed by these theories over that of Lord Monboddo, and the ancient Epicurean philosophers. The latter but represent the human kind originally placed in the condition of brutes; the former seem careful to provide that it should never rise above that condition. As it may be matter of curiosity to know tn what manner these writers endeavour to explain the transition from mere vocal sounds to articulate speech, it may be proper to sub- join here a specimen taken from one of them, by no means the least distinguished in the literary world, the Abbe Do Condillac. He admits the operation to be extremely tedious ; for that " the organ of speech (in grown per- sons,) for want of early use, would be so inflexible that it could not articulate any other than a few simple sounds: and the obstacles which prevented them from pro- nouncing others, would prevent them from suspecting that the voice was susceptible of any farther variation." Now it may be fairly asked, would not these obstacles for ever prevent any articulations, or even sounds, beyond those which the passions might excite, or other sounds suggest ? How is this diffi- culty, which has been fairly admitted by the j author, to be removed ? He shall answer for ! himself. The child, from the pliancy of its vocal organs, being freed from the obstruc- I tions which incapacitated the parent, will S accidentally fall upon new articulations in the endeavour to communicate its desire for a par- ' ticular object ; the parent will endeavour to j imitate this sound, and affix it as a name to the object, for the purpose of communicating with the child : and thus, by repeated enlarge- ments of articulation in successive generations, language would at length be produced.3 5 It should be remarked, that, were even all that is here con- tended for admitted to be practicable, language in the true sense of the word is not yet attained. The power of desig- Such is the solution of the origin of lan- guage which human philosophy presents; sending us to the accidental babble of infancy for the origination of that, which, it confesses, must exceed the power of the imagination to invent, and of the organs of the man to accomplish : inverting the order of nature, by supposing the adult to learn the art of speech by imitation of the nursling; and, in addition to all, building upon the gratuitous assump- tion, that the child could utter articulations undirected by any pre-existing model. On such reasoning it cannot be necessary to enlarge. Besides, to all those theories which main- tain the human invention of language, the test of experience may fairly be applied. We nating an individual object by an appropriate articulation, is a necessary step in the formation of language, but very far rem ived, indeed, from its consummation. Without the use of general signs, the speech of man would differ little from that of brutes ; and the transition to the general term from the name of the individual is a difficulty which remains still to bo surmounted. Condillac, indeed, proposes to shew how this transition may be made, in the natural course of things, " Un enfant appelle du nom d' Arbre le premier arbre que nous lui montrons. Un second arbre qu'il voit eusuite lui rappelle la meme idee; il lui donne le meme nom; de meme a un troisieme, a un quatrieine, et voila la mot d' Arbre donne1 d'abord a un individu, qui devient pour lui un nom de classe ou de genre, une idee abstraite qui comprend tous les arbres en general." In like manner Adam .Smith, in his Dissertation on the Origin of Languages, and Mr Dugald Stewart, in his Elements of the Philosophy of the Human Mind, endeavour to explain this process ; representing those words which were originally used as the proper names of individuals, to be successively transferred to other individuals, until, at length, each of them became insensibly the common name of a multitude. This, however, is more ingenious than solid. The name given to an individual being intended exclusively to designate that individual, it is a direct subversion of its very nature and design to apply it to any other individual, known to be different from the former. The child, it is true, may give the name of father to an individual like to the person it has been taught to call by that name : but this is from mistake, not from design ; from a confusion of the two as the same person, and not from a perception of resemblance between them whilst known to be different. In truth, they whose thoughts are occupied solely about individual objects, must be the more careful to distinguish them from each other ; and, accordingly, the child will most peremptorily retract the appellation of father, so soon as the distinctness is observed. The object with those, whose terms or signs refer only to individuals, must naturally ho to take care that every such term or sign shall be applied to its appropriate individual, and to none else. Resemblance can produce no other effect than to enforce a greater caution in the application of the individual names, and therefore has no natural tendency to lead the mind to the use of general terms. It may be thought, indeed, that the idea of number, attaching to individuals of a similar appearance, might natu- rally lead to some general designation, whereby the aggregate of those individuals might be marked out. But it should be recollected, that the very notion of number, which seems one of the commonest and most familiar to the mind, does itself presuppose a class ; since objects cannot be enumerated, unless previously referred to some one genus or class, or, which is the same thing, unless they are previously expressed by some common sign. Since, then, mere resemblance will not lead to the use of general terms ; and since the notion of number actually presupposes the existence of general terms ; it follows, that the transition from proper names to general terms cannot be accounted for in the way in which these writers have endeavoured to explain it. 142 M A G E E ON THE ATONEMEN T. may safely challenge their authors to produce in their support ;i SIDgle tact, a single instance, in the whole range of history, of any human creature ever using articulate sounds as the signs of ideas, unless taught, either imme- diately and at once by God, or gradually by those who had been themselves instructed. That there have hcen instances of persons, who, possessing all the natural powers of mind and hoily, yet remained destitute of speech from the want of an instructor, there can be no question. Diodorus Siculus (lib. iii. § 19, p. 187, torn. 1. Wessel.) informs us of an entire nation wanting the use of speech, and communicating only by signs and gestures. But, not to urge so extraordinary a fact, Lord Monboddo himself, in his first volume, fur- nishes several well attested instances; and relates particularly the case of a savage, who \\ as caught in the woods of Hanover, and who, though by no means deficient either in his mental powers or bodily organs, was yet utterly incapable of speech. Had man then been left solely to the operation of his own natural powers, it is incumbent upon these writers to shew, that his condition would have differed as to speech from that of the Hanoverian savage. As for those writers who admit the Mosaic account, and yet attribute to Adam the for- mation of language unassisted by divine in- struction, they seem to entertain a notion more incomprehensible than the former ; in- asmuch as the first exercise of language by the father of mankind is stated to have preceded the production of Eve,and cannot, consistently with the Scripture account, he supposed to have been long subsequent to his own crea- tion. So that, according to these theorists, he must have devised a medium of communica- tion, before any human being existed with whom to communicate: he must have been able to apply an organ unexercised, and inflexible, to the arduous and delicate work of articulation; and he must at once have attained the use of words, without those multiplied preparatory experiments and con- curring aids, which seem on all hands admitted to he indispensable to the discovery and pro- duction of speech. To remedy some of these difficulties, it has been said, that the faculty of speech was made as natural to man as his reason, and that the use of language was the necessary result of his constitution. If by this were meant, that man spoke as necessarily as he breathed, the notion of an innate language must be allowed ; and then the experiment of the Egyptian king to discover the primitive language of man, must be confessed to have had its foun- dation in nature: but if it be merely meant, that man was by nature invested with the powers of speech, and by his condition, his relations, and his wants, impelled to the exercise of these powers, the difficulty returns, anil all the obstacles already enumerated oppose themselves to the discovery of those powers, and to the means by which he was enabled to bring them into actual exertion. It may perhaps add strength to the observa- tions already made upon this subject, to remark, that the author who has maintained this last mentioned theory, and whose work, as containing the ablest and most laborious examination of the question, has been crowned with a prize by the Academy of Berlin, and has been honoured with the general applause of the continental literati, has utterly failed, and is admitted to have failed, in that which is the grand difficulty of the question. For, whilst he enlarges on the intelligent and social qualities of man, all fitting him for the use of language, the transition from that state which thus prepares man for language, to the actual exercise of the organs of speech, he is obliged to leave totally unexplained. (See the account given of the Essay of Herder on the origin of language, in Nouvcaux Memoircs de V Acad. Roy. 6;c. de Berlin, 1771 — and again an Analysis of that work by M. Merian, in the vol. of the same Mi-moires for the year 1781.) Enough, perhaps more than enough, has been said in answer to those theories and objections, which have been raised in opposi- tion to that which Scripture'' so obviously and unequivocally asserts, — namely, the divine institution of language. 6 In addition to the proof which has been already derived from this source, it should be remembered, that the laws given by God to the first pair respecting food for their preservation (Gen. i. 29; ii. 9,) and marriage for the propagation of their species (Gen. ii. 22, 23.) together with the other discoveries of his will recorded in the beginning of Genesis, (i. 2!l ; ii. 16 — 19; iii. 8—12, 14 — 22,) were communicated through the medium of language ; and that the man and the woman are there expressly stated to have conversed with God, and with each other. Besides, in what sense could it be said that a meet companion for the man was formed, if there were not given to both the power of communicating their thoughts by appropriate speech ? If God pronounced it " not good for man to be alone ; " if, with multitudes of creatures surrounding him, he was still deemed to be alone, because there was none of these with which he could commune in rational correspon- dence ; if a companion was assigned to him whose society was to rescue him from this solitude; what can be inferred, but that the indispensable requisite for such society, the powen and exercise of speech, must have been at the same time vouchsafed ? It should be recollected, too, that this is not the only instance recorded in Scripture of the instantaneous communi- cation of language. The diversity of tongues occasioning the confusion of Babel, and the miraculous gift of speech to the apostles on the day of Pentecost, may render a similar exer- cise of divine power in the ease of our first parents moro readily admissible : for it surely will not be contended, that such supernatural interference was less called for from the nature of the occasion, in the last named instance, than in either of the two former. The writer of Ecclesiasticus pronounces decisively on tho subject of this Number. When the Lord created man, he alhrms that, having bestowed upon him " the five operations of the Lord, in the sixth place he imparted to him understanding : and in the seventh, speech, an interpretation of the cogitations thereof." — Eccles. xvii. 5. No. 54.— NATURAL UNREASONABLENESS OF THE SACRIFICIAL RITE. 143 It is not necessary to the purpose of this Number, nor does Scripture require us, to suppose with Stillingfleet (Orig.Sac. B. i.eap. i. £• 3.) and with Bochart {Hicroz. P. i. L. i. cap. 9.) that Adam was endued with a full and perfect knowledge of the several creatures, so as to impose names truly expressive of their natures. It is sufficient, if we suppose the use of language taught him with respect to such things as were necessary, and that he was then left to the exercise of his own faculties for farther improvement upon this founda- tion. But that the terms of worship and adoration were among those which were first communicated, we can entertain little doubt. On the subject discussed in this Number, the reader may consult Morinus, Exercit. de Ling. cap. vi. ; Buxtorfii Dissertat. p. 1 — 20 ; Walton. Prot. 1 § 4 ; Warburt. Div. Leg. B. iv. S. iv. vol. ii. pp. 81, 82 ; Delan. Rev. Exam. Diss. 4 ; Winder's Hist, of Knowledge, chap. i. § 2 ; Barrington's Misc. Sacr. vol. iii. pp. 8. 45 ; Dr Beattie and Wollaston, as referred to ; and, above all, Dr Ellis's Enquiry whence cometh Wisdom, &c. which, together with his work, entitled Knowledge of Divine Things from Revelation, is too little known, and cannot be too strongly recommended. The former of these tracts of Dr Ellis I have never met with, but as bound up in the collection of Tracts, entitled The Scholar armed. No. LIV.- -Page 18. Col. 1. ON THE NATURAL UNREASONABLENESS OF THE SACRIFICIAL RITE. Outram states {De Sac. lib. ii. cap. i. § 3.) that the force of this consideration was in itself so great, as to compel Grotius, who defended the notion of the human institution of sacrifices, to maintain, in defiance of all just criticism, that Abel did not slay the firstlings of his fiock ; and that no more is meant, than that he brought the choicest produce of his flock, milk and wool, and offered them, as Cain offered the choicest of his fruits. Indeed the natural unfitness of the sacri- ficial rite to obtain the divine favour, the total incongruity between the killing of God's creatures, and the receiving a pardon for the violation of God's law, are topics which have afforded the opponents of the divine institu- tion of sacrifice too much occasion for triumph, to be controverted on their side of the question. See Philemon to Hydaspes, part 5. p. 10 — 15. The words of Spencer on this subject are too remarkable to be omitted: " Sacrificioruin materia (pecudum caro, sanguis effusus, &c.) tarn vilis est, et a summa Dei majestate tarn longe dissita, quod nemo (nisi plane simplex et rerum rudis) quin sacrificia plane superflua, Deoque prorsus indigna facile judicaret. Sano tantum aberat, ut ethnici paulo humaniorea sacrificia deorum suorum naturae consentanea crederent, quod iis nun rare mirari subiit, unde vitus tarn tristis, et a natura deorum alienus, in hominum corda veniret, se tarn longe propa- garet,et eorum moribus tain tenaciter adh&reret." De Leg. llcb. lib. iii. diss. ii. cap. 4. sect. 2. p. 772. — Revelation would have removed tho wonder. No. LV.— Page 18. Col. 1. ON THE UNIVERSALITY OF SACRIFICE. What Dr Kennicott has remarked upon another subject, may well be applied to this. " Whatever custom has prevailed over the world, among nations the most opposite in polity and customs in general: nations not united by commerce or communication, (when that custom has nothing in nature, or the reason of things, to give it birth, and to esta- blish to itself such a currency,) must be derived from some revelation: which revela- tion may in certain places have been forgotten, though the custom introduced by and found- ed on such revelation still continued. And farther, this revelation must have been made antecedent to the dispersion of Babel, when all mankind, being but one nation, and living together in the form of one large family, were of one language, and governed by the same laws and customs." {Two Dissert, p. 161.) For, as Sir Isaac Newton observes, all man- kind lived together in Chaldsea under the government of Noah and his sons, until the days of Peleg. So long they were of one language, one society, and one religion. And then they divided the earth, being forced to leave off building the tower of Babel. And from thence they spread themselves into the several countries which fell to their shares, carrying along with them the laws, customs, and religion, under which they had till those days been educated and governed. {Chronol. p. 186.) And again, as Kennicott observes from De- Ianey, whatever practice has obtained univer- sally in the world, must have obtained from some dictate of reason, or some demand of nature, or some principle of interest, or else from some powerful influence or injunction of some Being of universal authority. Now, the practice of animal sacrifice did not obtain from reason ; for no reasonable notions of God could teach men, that he could delight in blood, or in the fat of slain beasts. Nor will any man say, that we have any natural instinct to gratify, in spilling the blood of an innocent creature. Nor could there be any temptation from appetite to do this in those ages, when the whole sacrifice was consumed by fire ; or ] It MAUEE ON T PI E ATONEMENT. when, if it was not, yet men wholly abstained from flesh : and, consequently, this practice did not owe its origin to any principle of interest. Nay, so far from any thing of this, that the destruction of innocent and useful creatures i- evidently against nature, against reason, and against interest; and therefore iiiu-t l>e founded in an authority, whose influ- ence was as powerful, as the practice was universal : and that could be none but the authority of God, the Sovereign of the world ; or of Adam, the founder of the human race. If it be said of Adam, the question still remains, what motive determined him to the practice? It could not be nature, reason, or interest, as has been already shewn ; it must, therefore, have been the authority of his Sove- reign : and had Adam enjoined it to his pos- terity, it is not to be imagined, that they would have obeyed him in so extraordinary and expensive a rite, from any other motive than the command of God. If it be urged, that superstitions prevail unaccountably in the world ; it may be answered, that all supersti- tion has its origin in true religion : all super- stition is an abuse : and all abuse supposes a right and proper use. And if this be the case in superstitious practices that are of lesser moment and extent, what shall be said of a practice existing through all ages, and per- vading every nation ? See Kennic. Two Diss. pp. 210, 211, and Rev. Exam. Diss. viii. p. 85 — 89. It is to no purpose that theorists endeavour to explain the practice as of gradual growth ; the first offerings being merely of fruits, and a transition afterwards made from this to animal sacrifice. Not to urge the sacrifice of Abel, and all the early sacrifices recorded in Scripture, the transition is itself inconceivable. The two things are toto coclo different : the one being an act of innocence ; the other a cruel and unnatural rite. Dr Richie's remarks on the subject of this Number are particularly worthy of attention. Essay on the Rectitude of Divine Moral Government under the Patri- archal Dispensation, § 53, 64. No. LVI. — Page 18. Col. 1. ON THE UNIVERSALITY OF THE NOTION OF TIIE EXPIATORY VIRTUE OF SACRIFICE. It is notorious, as we have already seen in Nos. V. and XXXIII, that all nations, Jews ami Heathens, before the time of Christ, en- tertained the notion, that the displeasure of the offended Deity was to be averted by the sacrifice of an animal ; and that, to the shed- ding of its blood, they imputed their pardon1 and reconciliation. In the explication of so 1 See on this also Stanhope, Serm. xiii. Boyle Led. vol. I. pp. 790. 794. strange a notion, and of the universality of its extent, unassisted reason must confess itself totally confounded. And, accordingly, we find Pythagoras, Plato, Porphyry, and "other reflecting heathens, express their wonder, how2 an institution so dismal, and big with absurdity, could lave spread through the world. So powerful is the inference, which this fact consequently supplies, against the human invention of sacrifice, that Dr Priestley, labouring to support that doctrine, and, at the same time, pressed by the force of the argument, has been obliged boldly to face about, and resolutely deny the fact ; contend- ing, in defiance, as we have already shewn, of all historical evidence, that the notion of expiating guilt by the death of the victim, was not the design of sacrifice, either among the nations of antiquity, or among such as have practised sacrifice in later times. This idea Dr Priestley considers too absurd for heathens. Christians alone, excepting that description who have proved themselves on this head as enlightened as heathens, could have swallowed such monstrous absurdities. If, however, the fact appears to be against Dr Priestley, what follows from his reasoning? A cruel, expensive, and unnatural practice has been adopted, and uniformly pursued, by the unaided reason of mankind for above four thousand years. It remains then for him, and the other advocates for the strength and sufficiency of human reason, to consider whether it be that sort of guide, on which implicit reliance is to be placed ; and whether it be wise to intrust to its sole direction our everlasting; concerns. No. LVII. Page 18. Col. 2. ON THE OBJECTIONS AGAINST THE SUPPOSITION OF THE DIVINE INSTITUTION OF SACRIFICE. The principal objections to this opinion are derived from the two following considerations : 1. The silence of the sacred historian on this head ; which, in a matter of so great impor- tance, it is said, is irreconcileablc with the supposition of a divine command : 2. Those passages in the Old Testament, in which God seems openly to disown the institution of sacrifice. I. The former is thus urged by Bishop Warburtoli. " The two capital observances, in the Jewish ritual, were the Sabbath, and Sacrifices. To impress the highest reverence and veneration on the sabbath, the sacred historian is careful to record its divine original : and can we suppose that, had sacrifices had the same original, he would have neglected to 2 See Kennic. Two Distert. p. 202, and No. L1V. of this work. No. 57— OBJECTIONS AGAINST THE DIVINE INSTITUTION OF SACRIFICE. 145 establish this truth, at tho time that he recorded the other, since it is of equal use, and of equal importance ; I should have said, indeed of much greater?" (Div. Leg. B. ix. ch. ii. vol. 4. pp. 661, 662. ed. Hurd.) To this it may be answered, that though the distinction of weeks was well known over all the eastern world, it is highly probable, that the Hebrews, during their residence in Egypt, were negligent in their observance of the sabbath ; and that, to enforce a religious observance of it, it had become necessary to give them particular information of the time and occasion of its first institution ; but that, in a country like Egypt, the people being in little danger of losing their veneration for sacrifices, the same necessity for directing their attention explicitly to their institution did not exist. The observation of Dr Delaney also deserves to be noticed ; namely, that as the rite of sacrifice was loaded with many additional ceremonies, at its second institution, under Moses ; in order to guard the Jews from the infections of the heathen, it might have been wisely designed by their lawgiver not to recall their attention to its original simplicity, lest they should be tempted to murmur and rebel against their own multifarious ritual. Rev. Exam. Diss. viii. vol. i. p. 94. But, perhaps, an answer yet more satisfac- tory may be derived from considering the manner in which the history of the first ages of the world has been sketched by the sacred penman. The rapid view he takes of the antediluvian world, (having devoted but a few chapters to the important and interesting concerns of the Creation, the Fall, and the transactions of all those years that preceded the Flood,) necessarily precluded a circum- stantial detail. Accordingly, we find several matters of no small moment connected with that early period, and also with the ages im- mediately succeeding, entirely omitted, which are related by other sacred writers. Thus Peter and Jude inform us of the angels that fell from their first estate, and are reserved in everlasting chains ; also of a prophecy deli vered by Enoch to those of his days ; of the preach- ing of righteousness by Noah ; and of the vexation which the righteous soul of Lot daily experienced, from the unlawful deeds of those with whom he lived, (2 Pet. ii. 4, 5, 7, 8, and Jude, 6, 14, 15.) None of these things are mentioned by Moses : and even such matters as he has deemed of sufficient consequence to notice, he introduces only as they may be connected with the direct historic line which he holds in view ; and, whilst hastening on to those nearer events on which it was neces- sary for him to enlarge, he touches on other affairs, however important, but as they inci- dentally arise. In this way, the first mention of sacrifice is evidently introduced ; not for the purpose of giving a formal history of the rite, of explaining how or when it was insti tuted, in which case a formal account of its origin might have been expected ; but merely as an occasional relation, in the history of the transfer of the seniority, or right of primoge- niture, and so the parentage of the Messiah, from Cain into a younger line, which, accord- ing to Kennicott, was a thing absolutely necessary to be known ; and also, probahly, of the ruinous effects of the Fall, in the effer- vescence of that wicked and malicious spirit, which made its first baleful display in the murder of Abel. The silence, then, of the historian, as to the divine institution of sacri- fice, furnishes no argument against it. See Kenn. Two Diss. p. 211 ; Wits. Misc. Sac. Lib. ii. Diss. ii. § 2 ; also Richie's Pccul. Doct. vol. i. p. 136. But then, according to the Bishop's reason- ing, the relation given by Moses of the insti- tution of the sabbath justifies the expectation, that, had sacrifice arisen from the divine com- mand, its origin would likewise have been recorded. But in what way is the divine appointment of the sabbath recorded? Is it any where asserted by Moses, that God had ordered Adam and his posterity to dedicate every seventh day to holy uses, and to the worship of his name ; or that they ever did so, in observance of any such command ? No such thing. It is merely said, that, having rested from the work of creation, " God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it." Now, so far is this passage from being universally admitted to imply a command for the sacred observance of the sabbath, that some have altogether denied the sabbath to have been instituted by divine appointment : and the fathers in general, and especially Justin Mar- tyr, have been considered as totally rejecting the notion of a patriarchal sabbath. But although, especially after the very able and learned investigation of this subject by Dr Kennicott in the second of his Two Disserta- tions, no doubt can reasonably be entertained of the import of this passage, as relating the divine institution of the sabbath, yet still the rapidity of the historian has left this rather as matter of inference : and it is certain, that he has nowhere made express mention of the observance of a sabbath until the time of Moses. Indeed, it may be a question, whether, con- sidering accurately the passage which describes the sacrifices of Cain and Abel, and the cir- cumstances attending them, it does not in itself furnish sufficiently strong ground to infer the divine appointment of sacrifice. The familiar manner in which the mention of this sacrifice is introduced, joined to the peculiar force of the words □,D> \p!2, (which, as Kennicott. supported by Fagius, shews, ought not to be translated, generally, in process of time, but at the close of the appointed season,) 140 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. seems to indicate a prior and stated observance of this rite ; and the manifest acceptance of Abel's sacrifice by God evinces an approbation of that pre-osistinff practice, which can leave little doubt respecting the source of its insti- tution. And this advantage the case of sacri- fice clearly possesses over that of the sabbath; namely, that in the patriarchal history we have repeated and explicit accounts of the continuance of the former, whilst the notices of the sabbatical observance, antecedent to the Mosaic dispensation, are obscure and infrequent. Now, were we to argue rigidly against the continued observance of the sab- bath, from its not having been expressly recorded, we might contend, as has been already hinted, for the necessity of a more explicit statement of its divine origin in the time of Moses ; whilst the unbroken tradition and uninterrupted practice of sacrifice, (a thing controverted by none that I know of, except Lord Barrington in his Miscellanea Sacra, vol. iii. Diss. ii. cor. 3. and by him upon grounds rather fanciful and refined,) might render it less necessary for Moses to be particular on this head. But, in truth, the silence of the historian respecting either the sabbatical or sacrificial observance is but of little weight, when there are circumstances in the history, from which the practice may be collected. The very notoriety of a custom maybe a reason, why the historian may omit the mention of its continuance. Of this Dr Kennicott states a striking exemplification in the case of circum- cision, which though constantly observed by the Israelites, is yet never once mentioned in the sacred history as having been practised in a single instance, from the settling of the Israelites in Canaan, down to the circumcision of our blessed Saviour ; that is, for a space of one thousand four hundred and fifty years. And even of the observance of the sabbath itself, we find not one instance recorded, in any of the six books that follow the Mosaic rude. What is thus applied to the continu- ance, will equally hold for the origin of a custom. II. The second objection, derived from pas- sages in the Old Testament in which God Beems to disown the institution of sacrifice, is to be replied to by an examination of those passages. In the fiftieth Psalm God is described as saying, "I will not reprove thee for thy sacrifices, or tli\ burnt-offerings — I will take ao bullock," &c — "Will I eat the flesh of bulK or drink the blood of goats?" And again in Psal. Ii. "Thou desirest not sacrifice — thuii delightest not in burnt-offerings." And again in lVal. xl. " Burnt-otl'erings and sin-offerings hast thou not required." Sacri- fices here, it is said, are Bpoken of as not pleasing to God. But it is manifest, on an inspection of the context, that this is only intended in a comparative sense, and as abstracting from those concomitants without which sacrifice never could have been accept- able to a holy and righteous God. This is farther confirmed by the manner in which similar declarations are introduced, in La. i. 11, 12 ; lxvi. 3 ; Prov. xv. 8 ; and Amos, v. 21, 22. If the argument be carried farther, it will prove too much ; it will prove, in direct contradiction to the testimony of Moses, that the Jewish sacrifices had not been ordained by God. These passages, then, from the Psalms must go for nothing in the present argument. But, then, it is said that the prophet Jere- miah (vii. 22,) furnishes a decisive proof in these words, — " For I spake not unto your fathers, nor commanded them, in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt-offerings or sacrifices." This, it is urged, as referring expressly to a time prior to the giving of the law at Mount Sinai, clearly proves that God did not institute sacrifices before the promulgation of the law by Moses. But this, like the former passages, is manifestly to be understood in a compara- tive sense only ; as may easily be collected from what immediately follows : " But this thing I commanded them, saying, Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and ye shall be my people ;" that is, " The mere sacrifice was not that which I commanded, so much as that which was to give to the sacrifice its true virtue and ctficacy, a sincere and pious sub- mission to my will ;" " to obey being better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams," (1 Sam. xv. 22.) In like manner, — " I will have mercy, and not sacrifice," (llos. vi. 6.) " Rend your hearts, and not your garments," (Joel, ii. 13.) " Your niurmur- ings are not against us, but against the Lord," (Ex. xvi. 8.) " Labour not for the meat that perisheth, but for the meat which endureth to everlasting life," (John, vi. 27.) The Scrip- ture abounds with similar instances, in which the negative form supplies the want of the comparative degree in the Hebrew idiom : not excluding the thing denied, but only implying a preference of the thing set in opposition to it. ' Dr Blayney, indeed, thinks it not neces- sary to consider the words of Jeremiah in a comparative sense. The word jy, he says, admitting the sense of propter, the passage should be read, " I spake not with your fathers, nor commanded them, for the sake of burnt- ofl'erings," &c. ; that is, God did not command these purely on their own account, but as a means to some other valuable end. The sense is substantially the same. Now, if the passage be not taken in this sense, but be supposed to 1 See Walt. Polyglot I'roleg. Miotism. 6. Lowth on H09. vi. 6. Mede. p. 352. Kenn. Two Diss. pp. 2U8, SOS ; and Jena. Jew. Ant. vol. i. p. 313. No. 57— OBJECTIONS AGAINST THE DIVINE INSTITUTION OF SACRIFICE. 147 imply, that God had not instituted sacrifices at the time of the departure of the llehrews from Egypt, then a direct contradiction is given to the Mosaic history, which expressly declares, that God himself had ordained the slaying of tlie paschal lamb, not only before the giving of the law at Sinai, but before the migration of the Israelites from Egypt. And that this was really a sacrifice, and is repeatedly called by Moses by the very same term HJ2T, which is here applied to denote sacrifice by the prophet, has been already fully shewn in No. XXXV. of this work. Or, again, if we concur in the interpretation of this passage, as given by the Jewish doctors, Jarchi and Maimonides, and adopted by Dr Kennicott, we may consider it as a declaration on the part of God, that he had not first com- manded the Israelites concerning the sacrificial rites, after he had led them out of Egypt. The passage in Jeremiah, say they, refers to the transaction at Marah, (see particularly Kenn. Two Diss. pp. 153, 209.) The Jews, when they had arrived here, three days after they had left the Red Sea, murmured at the bitter- ness of the waters : a miracle was wrought to sweeten them ; and then God made a statute and ordinance for them, and proposed to them, in exact agreement with what is here said in Jeremiah, to obey him, to give ear to his commandments, and keep his statutes, and that he would in turn be their protector, (Exod. xv. 25, 26.) Now, this having been some time before the formal institution of the sacrificial rite at Mount Sinai, and the Jews having always dated the beginning of the law from this declaration at Marah, the Jewish doctors maintain it to be true in fact, that God did not first enjoin their code of sacrificial observances, but commanded them concerning moral obedience : and thus they understand the form of expression in Jeremiah, as we do that of Saint Paul, " Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression," (1 Tim. ii. 14 ;)that is, Adam was not first deceived, and was not first in the transgression, but Eve. The meaning of the passage in Jeremiah would then be, that as God had not, in the first instance, enjoined to the Jews their sacrificial ritual, after he had led them out of Egypt ; so they were not to attach to the observance of all its minntice a superiority over moral obedience, but the con- trary, the latter having been first commanded.2 This explanation agrees in substance with the former : and from both it manifestly appears, that this passage has no relation to the original institution of animal sacrifice. The whole of this subject is fully and ably treated by Mede, who sums up his entire argument in these words. " According to one 2 See Maim. Moreh. Ncv. part. iii. cap. 32, ap. fin.— Ken- nicntt's Two Diss. pp. 153, 209.— and Jenn. Jew. Ant. vol. i. p. 312. of these three senses, are all passages in tlie Old Testament disparaging and rejecting sacrifices literally to be understood : namely, when men preferred them before the greater things of the Law ; valued them out of their degree, as an antecedent duty ; or placed their efficacy in the naked right, as if aught accrued to God thereby ; God would no longer own them for any ordinance of his ; nor, indeed, in that disguise put upon them, were they." Mede's Works, pp. 352, 353. No. LVIII. Page 18. Col. 2. ON THE SACRIFICE OF ABEL, AS EVINCING THE DIVINE INSTITUTION OF SACRIFICE. Hallet considers this single fact as supplying so strong an argument on the present ques- tion, that he does not hesitate to pronounce it, a demonstration of a divine institution. " For," he says, " Abel's sacrifice could not have been acceptable, if it had not been of divine appointment, according to that obvious maxim of all true religion, ' In vain do they worship God, teaching for doctrines the com- mandments of men,' (Mark, vii. 7.) Thus, Abel must have worshipped God in vain, had his sacrificing been merely a commandment of his father Adam, or an invention of his own. And, to make this matter more evident, why do we not now offer up a bullock, a sheep, or a pigeon, as a thank-offering after any remark- able deliverance, or as an evidence of our apprehensions of the demerit of sin ? The true reason is, because we cannot know that God will accept such will-worship, and so conclude that we should herein worship God in vain. As Abel, then, did not sacrifice in vain, it was not will-worship, but a divine appointment. To this, the want of a right to slay animals before the Flood, unless conferred by God for this very purpose of sacrifice, gives yet farther confirmation." Hallet on Hebr. xi. 4. Dr Richie remarks, that the divine accep- tance is not confined to the sacrifice of Abel, but that we find it extended also to others offered under the patriarchal dispensation. Thus, God is said to have " smelled a sweet savour" (a strong expression of his accep- tance) when Noah offered his burnt-offering. Job's care, likewise, to offer burnt-offerings for his children, is mentioned as an eminent effect of piety, and with particular marks of approbation, (Job, i.) And the honourable mention, which is made of the sacrifices offered by other pious men in this period of the world, leaves no room to doubt of their having been likewise graciously accepted by God. It is, moreover, to be observed, that the oblation of some of those early sacrifices was expressly ordered by God himself; as 148 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. the burnt-offoring of Abraham (Gen. xxii.) and those which were offered by the three friends of Job, (xlii.) Now, that it is more natural to think, that God would order and accept of the performance of a mode of wor- ship which had been instituted by himself, than that ho would thus countenance one which had been the product of mere human invention, is a thing which will not bear much dispute. See Dr Richie's Pec. Doct. vol. i. pp. 149, 150. Indeed, whoever wishes to see the subject of the divine institution of sacri- fices satisfactorily treated, may consult the last named work, p. 136 — 151, to great advan- tage. See also Harrington's Misc. Sac. vol. iii. pp. 67 — 71 ; and Heidcg. Hist. Patr. Exercit. iii. § 52, 53, torn. i. This last mentioned writer considers the ifvm/Pifffcos, or the burning of the sacrifice by fire from heaven, a decisive proof of a divine institution : and that the patriarchs were favoured with this infallible sign of the divine ' acceptance of their sacrifices, the language of Scripture leaves us no room to doubt. That , it was by this sign that it was known that the sacrifice of Abel was accepted, is the almost unanimous opinion of the fathers. And in this the Jewish doctors concur : as see Aben Ezra and Jarchi on Gen. iv. 4. Theodotion translates the verb in this verse, ivvxv^iaiv : a translation with which even Julian was satisfied. It is certain that this manifestation of the divine power was vouchsafed in later times. The sacrifice of Abraham, (Gen. xv. 17,) sup- plies a striking instance of it. And if Shuck- ford's reading of 1^3 (to kindle) instead of "Oy (to pass) be admitted, this passage becomes in itself decisive of the point, (Con- nection, &c. vol. i. p. 298.) But if we look to the period under the law, we shall find this the usual method l of signifying the divine acceptance of the sacrifice. Hence, to accept a burnt sacrifice, is called in the Hebrew, (Ps. xx. 3,) to " turn it into ashes." The relics of tli is are to be found even in the heathen tra- ditions. Thus Servius on JEn. xii. 200, says, " AmoTigst the ancients fire was not lighted upon the altar, but by prayer they called down fire from heaven, which consumed the offering." From these, and other arguments not less forcible, ever) commentator of note had been led to pronounce in favour of the idea, that the acceptance of the sacrifice was testified, from the beginning, in the miraculous manner here described.9 That the fire which consumed the sacrifice was a flame which issued from the Shechinah, or glorious visible presence of God, is tl pinion of Lord Har- rington : see Misccll. Sacr. vol. iii. dissert. 2, 1 Seo Lev. ix. 24 ; .Tin!:*, vi. 21 ; 1 Kings, xviii. 3fl ; 1 Chr. xxi. 26; 2 Clir. vii. 1, Inc. 2 See Fafjius, Frotius, Le Clerc, Ainsw. Fatrick, Jameson, o.itlie, RoscnmUIIer, &c. on Gen. iv. 4. " On God's visible presence." But be this as it may, the fact of this divine fire consuming the sacrifice seems to be established ; and the inference from this fact in favour of the divine institution of sacrifice cannot easily be overturned. No. LIX. — Page 18. Col. 2. ON THE HISTORY AND THE BOOK OF JOB. There is no one part of the sacred volumo which has more exercised the ingenuity of the learned, than the Book of Job. Whether it contain a true history or a fabulous relation ? If true, at what time and place Job lived ? And what the date and author to be assigned to the work ? — These are questions, which have given birth to opinions so various, and to controversies so involved, that to enumerate all, and to weigh their several merits, would far exceed the compass of the present work. But to take a brief review of tha opinions of the most distinguished critics, and to elicit from contending arguments the probable re- sult, whilst necessary to the subject of our present inquiry, cannot fail to furnish matter of interesting investigation. I. On the first of the questions above stated, there have been three opinions : one, pro- nouncing the poem to be a real narrative : a second, holding it to be a mere fictitious rela- tion, intended to instruct through the medium of parable : and the third, adopting an inter- mediate idea, and maintaining the work itself to be dramatic and allegorical, but founded upon the history of real characters and events. Among the many distinguished names which support the first opinion, are to be reckoned, in later times, those of Spanheim, Sherlock, Schultens, Bishop Lowth, Peters, and Kenni- cott : to these, perhaps, may be added that of Grotius, who, though he contends that the work is a poetic representation, yet admits the subject to be matter of true history. In defence of this opinion, the work is considered as supplying strong intrinsic evidence ; the general style and manner of the writer be- traying nothing allegorical, but every where bespeaking a literal relation of actual events ; entering into circumstantial details of habita- tion, kindred, and names ; and adhering with undeviating exactness to those manners and usages, which belong to the age and country of which it seems to treat. The reality of the person of Job is also attested by the prophet Ezckiel, who ranks him with two other real and illustrious characters ; and by the apostle .lames, who proposes him as a character parti- cularly deserving of imitation. Concurrent traces of profane history, too, supply additional confirmation, as may be seen in Dr Gray's account of the Book of Job ; so that, as this No. 59.— ON THE HISTORY AND THE BOOK OF JOB. 149 judicious writer properly observes, " it has every external sanction of authority, and is stamped with every intrinsic mark that can characterize a genuine relation." In direct opposition to this is the system of Maimonides : which, representing the whole as a parabolical and fictitious relation, has been adopted, successively, by Le Clerc and Michaelis. The arguments of the first of these writers have been fully replied to by Codur- cus ; those of the second, by Peters ; and those of the last have received some judicious ani- madversions from the pens of Dr Gray and Dr Gregory. The arguments commonly urged in support of this hypothesis are derived from certain circumstances of intrinsic improbabi- lity : such as, the miraculous rapidity with which the calamities of Job succeeded ; the escape of precisely one servant to bear the news of each disaster ; the destruction of seven thou- sand sheep, at once struck dead by lightning ; the seven days' silence of the friends of Job ; the highly figurative and poetic style of dialogue, which never could have taken place in actual conversation. These are what Peters calls the little exceptions of Le Clerc to the truth of the history ; and might, some of them, deserve attention, were we neither to admit a supernatural agency in the transac- tions, nor a poetic rapidity in the narrative rejecting the consideration of unimportant particulars. An objection, however, of greater moment is derived from the conversation of Satan with the Almighty : and to this Michaelis adds others which he claims as his peculiar inven- tion, deduced from the name of Job ; from the artificial regularity of the numbers ; and from internal inconsistencies and contradic- tions. Of these last named, perhaps, the two former might well be ranked among the little exceptions : the derivation of the name of Job, from a word which signifies repentance, being at best but conjectural ; and, even were it certain, making nothing against the reality of the persons ; names having been frequently given in ancient times, from circumstances, which occurred at an advanced period of life ; of which numerous instances appear in holy writ : and, as to the regularity of the numbers, j — the years of Job's life, his children, his j sheep, his camels, his oxen, and his asses, | being all told in round numbers, and all exactly doubled in the years of his prosperity i — it is obvious to remark, that it would ill suit the fulness and elegance of poetic l narra- tion to descend to the minutiae of exact numeration ; and that, as to the precise dupli- cation, it is but a periphrasis growing out of the former enumeration, intended merely to 1 The poem, perhaps, strictly speaking, may he said not to begin until the third chapter ; that which precedes being narra- tion. But the narration, agreeably to the lofty style of the East, is itself of poetical elevation. express, that the Lord gave to Job twice as much as he had before. The two remaining objections require more particular consideration. And first, as to tho incredibility of the conversation, which is re- lated to have taken place between the Almighty and Satan, it may be observed, that this, and the assemblage of the celestial intelligences before the throne of God, should be considered as poetical, or, as Peters with more propriety expresses it, prophetical personifications, in accommodation to our limited faculties, which are abundantly authorized by God himself in holy Scripture, and arc perfectly agreeable to the style wherein his prophets have been frequently commanded to deliver the most solemn and important truths. Thus, the prophetic visions of Isaiah, (chap, vi,) of Ezek. (chap, i.) of Saint Paul (2 Cor. xii. 2, 4,) and of Saint John, (Rev. iv. 1, 2,) repre- sent the proceedings of Providence, in like reference to our powers and modes of concep- tion : and the vision of Micaiah (1 Kings, xxii. 19 — 23,) and that of Zechariah (ii. 13. iii. 1,) supply cases precisely parallel in every respect. Farmer justly remarks on this sub- ject, that such " visions, or parabolical repre- sentations, convey instruction as truly and properly, as if they were exact copies of out- ward objects." 2 And, indeed, if the intro- duction of Satan be admitted as an argument against the truth of the history, it should lead us equally to reject the narrative of our Lord's temptation, as an unfounded fiction. If, however, the opinion of Dathe (which has also the support of Herder, Eichhorn, and Doederlein,) be well founded, all difficulty arising even from this circumstance is removed ; inasmuch as the evil spirit is not, according to his interpretation, intended ; but one of the angelic ministers, whose peculiar office it was to explore and try the real characters of men, and to distinguish the hypocrite from the sincerely pious. The objection, derived from the internal inconsistencies and contradictious of the work, is thus stated by Michaelis. — Job, who could not have been advanced in years himself, up- braids his friends with their youth (xxx. i.) yet these very men exact reverence from Job as their junior, speaking of themselves as aged men, much older than his father (xv. 10; and are expressly described by Elihu (xxxii. 6, 7,) as men to be respected for their hoary age. {Notce et Epimetra, pp. 178, 179.) This argument Michaelis admits to be the grand strength of his cause, and to this Dr Gregory's reply is satisfactory, so far as the meaning of tin* passage (xxx. 1) is concerned ; in which there certainly appears no relation to the 2 Enquiry into the Temptation, p. 164. — attend to this writer's observations, — also to Chappel. Comment, prof- p. xiv. and particularly to Peters's Grit. Diss. p. 113 — 122, and Taylor's Scheme o/Scr. Div. ch. xxi. 150 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMEN T. friends of Job, but merely a general complaint bewailing the degraded state to which himself had fallen : ami contrasting with that high respect which he hail in former days expe- rienced, — when even the aged arose ami stood up, when princes refrained talking, and the nobles held their peaee, — his present abject condition, when even those that were younger than him, and who were of such mean descent, that he would have disdained to have set their fathers with the dogs of his flock (by which he could not possibly have intended his three friends,) now held him in derision. But, I apprehend, Dr Gregory's criticism on ch. xv. 10. — namely, that by the words, with us, 0}30 's meant, with zts in opinion — is not at all supported by the genius of the Hebrew, Tior by parallel usage. I think it is evident, both from this and the passage, xxxii. 6, 7, that the friends of Job, or some of them, were aged. But in the true mean ingof the word WW1, which seems to have been hit off by Chappe- low alone of all the commentators, we shall find a complete solution of the difficulty. This word, as Chappelow remarks, on Job, xii. 12, and xxxii. 6, does not merely imply age, but the wisdom which should accompany age. It may, perhaps, not improperly be expressed, in our language, by the single term sage. Taking the word in this sense, no inconsis- tency whatever appears : for then the thing denied by Job to his friends, in xii. 12, claimed by themselves in xv. 10, and ascribed to them by Elihu, in xxxii. 6, 7, will be, not length of years, but those fruits of wisdom, which years should have produced. It should also be noted, that in xv. 10, the words are in the singular number ; so that, in strictness, no more than one amongst them is here spoken of, as advanced in age beyond the years of Job. Indeed, an inconsistency so gross and obvious, as this which is charged against the Book of Job by the German professor, cannot be other than seeming, and founded in some misapprehension of the meaning of the origi- nal. Even admitting the poem to be fabulous, he must have been a clumsy contriver, who could in one place describe his characters as young, and in another as extremely aged, when urged to it by no necessity whatever, and at full liberty to frame his narrative as he pleased. Anil this want of comprehension Bhould least of all have been objected by those critics, who, in supposing the work to have been composed in an age and country diffe- rent from those whose manners it professes to describe, arc compelled, upon their own hypothesis, to ascribe to the writer an uncom- mon portion of address and refinement. But, supposing the narrative to have a foundation in truth, the third hypothesis, which represents this as WTOUghl up into an allegorical drama, remains to be considered. This Strange conceit was the invention of War- burton. He considers Job, his wife, and his three friends, as designed to personate the Jewish people on their return from the capti- vity, their idolatrous wives, and the three great enemies of the Jews at that period, Sanballat, Tobiah, and Geshem. This allego- rical scheme has been followed by Garnet, with some variations, whereby the history of Job is ingeniously strained to a description of the Jewish sufferings during the captivity. The whole of Warburton's system, the " im- probabilities of which," as Peters observes, " are by no means glossed over by the elabo- rate reasoning and extravagant assertions of the learned writer," is fully examined and refuted by that ingenious author, in the first eight sections of his Critical Dissertation. The arguments by which this extraordinary hypothesis has been supported, are drawn from the highly poetic and figurative style of the work, whence it is inferred to be dramatic ; and from the unsuitableness of particular actions and expressions to the real characters, which at the same time correspond to the persons whom these characters are supposed to represent, whence it is inferred to be alle- gorical. But, from the first nothing more can fairly be deduced, than that the writer has not given the precise words of the speakers, but has dressed out the dialogue with the orna- ments of poetry, in a manner which, as Dathe truly tells us, is agreeable to the customs of the country in which the scene is laid ; it being usual to represent the conferences of their wise men on philosophic questions, in the most elevated strain of poetic diction. (See Dathe on Job, ch. iii.) And as to the second, it cannot appear to a sober reader in any other light than that of a wild and arbi- trary fancy. Bishop Lowth declares, that he has not been able to discover a single vestige of an allegorical meaning, throughout the entire poem. It requires but a sound under- standing to be satisfied, that it has no such aspect. And, at all events, this strange hypo- thesis rests altogether upon another ; namely, that the book was written in the age of those, to whom it is supposed to bear this allegorical application. If, then, as we shall hereaftei see, there be no just ground for assigning to the work so late a date, the whole of this airy fabric vanishes at once. II. The history of Job appearing now, on the whole, to be a true relation, the second question conies to be considered, — In -what age, and country, did he live? As to the place of Job's residence there seems to be little difficulty. Commentators are mostly agreed in fixing on Iduunea, a part of Arabia Petraea. Kennicott {Remarks onSelect Passages, p. 1.52,) considers Bishop Lowth as having completely proved this point. Codurcus had long before maintained the same opinion. (Praf.ad Job ;) and Dathe and the modern German commen- No. 59.— ON THE HISTORY AND THE BOOK OF JOB. 151 tators give it their support. The position of the land of Uz (see Lam. iv. 21) the residence of Job, and of the several plans named as the habitations of his friends, seems to ascertain the point with sufficient precision. Children of the East, also, appears to be a denomination applicable to the inhabitants of that region (see Lowth, Pra'/cct. xxxii.) and is even pro- nounced by Dathe to have been appropriate. The only objection deserving notice, that can be raised against this supposition, is drawn from the great distance of Idumsea from the country of the Chaldeans, who, living on the borders of the Euphrates, could not easily have made depredations on the camels of Job. And this has been thought by some a sufficient cause for assigning to Job a situation in Arabia Deserta, and not far from the Euphrates. But, as Lowth replies, what should prevent the Chaldeans, as well as the Sabeans, a people addicted to rapine, and roving about at im- mense distances for the sake of plunder, from wandering through those defenceless regions, and pervading from Euphrates even to Egypt ? And, on the other hand, what probability is there, that all the friends of Job, residing in and near Idumaea, should be instantly in- formed of all that had happened to Job in the desert of Arabia, and on the confines of Chal- dea, and repair thither immediately after the transaction ? Shuckford's arguments concur with these of Lowth, and are fully satisfactory on this head. See Connect. B. vii. vol. ii. p. 138. See also Gray on the book of Job, note r. ' The LXX likewise describe the land of Uz as situated in Idumcea : and Job himself they consider an Idumaean, and a descendant of Esau, (see Append, of the LXX.) The Moham- medan writers likewise inform us that he was of the race of Esau. See Sale's Koran, chap. 21, vol. ii. p. 162. With respect to the age of Job, one thing seems generally admitted ; namely, its remote antiquity. Even they who contend for the late production of the Book of Job are compelled to acquiesce in this. Grotius thinks the events of the history are such, as cannot be placed later than the sojourning of the Israelites in the wilderness. Pro?/ ad Job. Warburton, in like manner, admits them to bear the marks of high antiquity : and Mich- aelis confesses the manners represented to be perfectly Abrahamic, such as were common to all the seed of Abraham, Israelites, Ishmae- lites, and Idumaeans. (Not. et Epim. p. 181.) Some of the principal circumstances from which the age of Job may be collected are these which follow: — 1. The general air of antiquity which is spread over the manners recorded in the poem, of which Michaelis, as above referred to, has given striking instances. 2. The length of Job's life, which seems to place him in the patriarchal times. 3. The allusions made by Job to that species of idolatry alone, which by general confession was the most ancient, and which, as Lowth observes (Lectures on Sacred Poetry, Greg. ed. vol. ii. p. 355,) is a decisive mark of the patriarchal age. 4. The nature of the sacrifice offered by him in conformity to the divine command ; namely, seven oxen and seven rams, similar to that of Balaam, and suitable to the respect entertained for the number seven in the earliest ages.3 This, though, as Mr Henley observes, the ancient practice might have been continued in Idumaea after the promulgation of the Mosaic4 law, is far from being, as he asserts, destitute of weight ; inasmuch as the sacrifice was offered by the command of God, who, although he might be supposed graciously to accommodate himself to the prevailing customs before the promulga- tion of the Law, yet cannot be imagined, after he had prescribed a certain mode of sacrifice to the Israelites, to sanction by his express authority, in a country immediately adjoin- ing, a mode entirely different, and one which the Mosaic code was intended to supersede. 5. The language of Job and his friends, who, being all Idumaeans, or at least Arabians of the adjacent country, yet converse in Hebrew. This carries us up to an age so early as that in which all the posterity of Abraham, Israelites, Idumaeans, and Arabians, yet continued to speak one common language, and had not branched into different dialects.5 6. Certain customs of the most remote antiquity are alluded to by Job. He speaks of the most ancient kind of writing, by sculpture. His riches also are reckoned by his cattle. And as to the word |—liD>I£'p> which is translated a piece of money, there seems good reason to understand it as signifying a lamb. This word occurs but in two other parts of Scripture, Gen. xxxiii. 19, and Josh. xxiv. 32, and in both of these it is applied to the pur- chase of a piece of ground by Jacob, who is on that particular occasion represented as rich in flocks, and as driving with him large quan- tities of cattle : and, accordingly, the Targum of Onkelos, the LXX, Jerome, Pagninus, and the learned Jew Aben Ezra, have all of them rendered the word lamb, or sheep. In order to force the wrord to the signification of a piece of money, it has been pretended, that the coin bore the impress of a lamb. Upon this con- jecture, and a passage in Acts vii. 15, 16, which can give it no support, is the entire interpretation built.6 Now the notion of a 3 See Jablonski Panth. JEgr/pt. Vroleg. pp. 53—59. Univ. Hist. 15. iii. ch. xxxvii. sect. 3 ; also Ains. on Lev. iv. 6 ; and Numb, xxxiii. 1. 4 See Mr Henley's note in Dr Gregory's Translation of Lmcth's Lectures, vol. ii. p. 356. 5 See Lowth, de Sacr. Poes. Prcel. xxxii. p. 311 ; also Crayon Job, note a3. 6 See Cocc. Lex. — Calas. Concord. — Drusius, and Grotius, and Hodge's Elihu on Job, xlii. 11 ; also Iiamia. and Whitby on Acts, vii. 15, 16. 152 MA GEE ON THE ATONEMENT. stamped coin, as Bathe remarks, (on Job, xlii. 11,) is inadmissible in an age so early as that of Jacob. The way of payment in silver in the time of Abraham we know to have been by weight, or shekels uncoined : and what authority have we to pronounce, that stamped money was in use in the time of Jacob ? The money which was put into the sacks of Joseph's brethren seems to have been the same as in the time of Abraham, being called SDD .T~fi~n^, strictly bmidles of silver (Gen. xlii. 35 ;) an expression not likely to be ap- plied to coined pieces of money. And, indeed, no expression, indicating such pieces of money, seems to occur in any of the early books of the Bible. Junius and Tremcllius on Gen. xxxiii. 19,7 speak of sheep as the ancient medium of traffic; and pronounce the word ntyiV'p to be peculiar to the Arabians and ancient Canaanitcs. This, and the remark of Codurcus, "that as pccunia was first called from peats, so Keschita, which first signified pecus, was afterwards transferred to signify pccunia," tend to confirm our reasoning. For if a sheep was the most ancient medium of traffic, and was in the earliest times expressed by the word Keschita, whilst its subsequent transfer to denote pccunia is but conjectural, there can be but little difficulty as to the conclusion. See also an elaborate dissertation on the word by Costard : in which he shews, that the first stamping of money with any effigies was of a date several centuries later than the time of Jacob, not having been known before the time of Cyrus. (Enquiry into the Meaning of the Word Kesitali, p. 12, &c.) If this opinion be right, the point is decided. At all events it should be remembered, that, if Keschita must signify a piece of money, the only age, beside that of Job, in which we find the word applied in Scripture, is the age of Jacob. That no such coin was known of under the Mosaic dispensation, is shewn by Hodges, in his Elihn, p. 242. 1 have dwelt thus long upon the investigation of the true meaning of tins word, as well because the interpretation of it, as a stamped piece of money, seems to have been too easily acquiesced in by com- mentators in general ; as because I would not presume to differ from the received translation without the most careful examination. From the above considerations, the great antiquity of Job seems to be an unavoidable consequence. To specify the exact time at \\ hich he lived, is ;i matter of greater difficulty, hut of inferior importance. Euscbius places him before Moses two whole ages : and in this he concurs with the opinion of many of the 7 Gcddes, in li is CritUai Bi Wfc irks, truly observes, on tho word TTVmiS In tins DUHge, that " must interpreters, after the Sept. Iiavo understood it of lambs, more particularly ewe- lambs. So equivalently (lie adds) all tbo ancient versions. Some have Imagined (lie says) that it was a piece of money with the figure of a lamb on it : which is highly improbable, as coined money is of a much later date." Hebrew writers, who (as Selden observes) describe him as living in the days of Isaac and Jacob. That the judgment of the eastern nations does not differ much from this, may be seen in Hottinger's Smegma Orientate, p. 381. (See Patrick's Pref. to Job.) Shuckford is of opinion that he was contemporary with Isaac. (Connect. B. vii. vol. ii. p. 127.) Spanheini (Hist. Job, cap. ix. p. 28.5.) places him between the death of Joseph and the departure from Egypt. But whoever wishes to see the most probable and satisfactory account, may consult the table of descent given by Kennicott, (Remarks, &c. p. 152,) in which Job is represented as contemporary with Amram, the father of Moses ; Eliphaz the Tcmanite, who was the fifth from Abraham, being contemporary with both. Mr Heath agrees with this account, in placing the death of Job about fourteen years before the Exodus. III. The third and last question now comes to be considered ; namely, what date, and author, are to be assigned to the Book of Job. That the poem is as ancient as its subject, and that Job was not only the hero but tho author of the work, is the opinion of many distinguished commentators. The objections brought against this opinion are derived from marks of later times, which it is said are to be discerned in the work, and which are copiously summed up and largely insisted on by Mr Heath. 1. It is urged, that there is frequent allusion to the laws of Moses. On the directly opposite presumption it had been pronounced, that the book could not have been written at a late period, for the benefit of the Jews ; in- asmuch as there is not to be found in it, " one single word of the law of Moses, nor so much as one distant allusion to any rite or ceremony of the law."8 The instances adduced by Heath, in support of his position, are taken from Job, iii. 10, and xli. 14, and xxxi. 28 ; the two first of which, in speaking of manumis- sion, and eternal servitude, allude, as he says, to the law in Exod. xxi. 2 — 6, concerning the release of the Hebrew servant in the seventh year, and the ceremony of piercing the ear where an eternal servitude was con- sented to : and the third, in describing idolatry as " a crime to be punished by the judge," must, as he thinks, relate to the Mosaic dis- pensation ; the laws of the Mosaic polity being the only ones in the world which punished idolatry. (Essay towards a New Version, p. 129.) As to the two first instances, the re- semblance is so imaginary, or, rather, so truly chimerical an idea, as not to deserve an answer: if the reader, however, wish to see one, he will find it in Mich. Not. et Epim. p. 189. To the third, which has also the autho- rity of Warburton and Mr Locke, it may be 8 See Sherlock's Use of Proplt. Diss. ii. p. 207 ; see also Lowth, Prated, xxxii. p. 312. No. 59.— ON THE HISTORY AND THE BOOK OF JOB. 163 replied, that Scripture decides the point ; as it informs us, that Abraham was called from Chaldea on account of the increase of idolatry, to raise a people for the preservation of the worship of the true God : so that the allusion to the exertion of judicial authority against idolatry, was most naturally to be expected from a descendant of this patriarch, and, it may be added, from one not far removed. See Lowth's Lectures, &c. Greg. ed. vol. ii. pp. 354, 355 ; also Michael. Not. et Epim. p. 190; and especially Peters, Crit. Diss. pref. p. iii. — xii. where this point receives the most ample examination. 2. It is contended that there are allusions, not only to the laws, but to the history, of the Jewish people. But these allusions, as stated by Heath, are so extremely fanciful, as in the opinion of Michaelis to require no farther refutation than the bare reading of the passages referred to (Not. et Epim. pp. 191, 192.) Some of the same kind had been urged by Warburton, (Div. Leg. B. vi. § ii. vol. iii. pp. 494 — 499,) and proved to be futile and visionary by Peters, (Grit. Diss. p. 28 — 36.) Indeed, these points have been so completely canvassed, that we may now with confidence pronounce, as Sherlock had done before, ( Use ofProph. p. 297,) that there is no one allusion, direct or indirect, either to the law, or to the history, of the Jews, that can be fairly pointed out in the Book of Job. But, 3. It is maintained, both by Heath and Warburton, that the use of the word Jehovah determines the date of the book to be later than the age of Moses : God not having been known by that name, until he appeared to Moses, as he himself declares, in Exod. vi. 3. This, however, is evidently a misapprehension of the meaning of the passage in Exodus : it being certain, that God was known to the patriarchs, Abraham and Jacob, by the name of Jehovah ; that he calls himself by that name in speaking to them ; and is so called by them again expressly.9 The sense of the passage then must be, not that the name was unknown to all before Moses, but its true signification ; that is, the nature and properties of the self-existent Being, expressed by that comprehensive name Jehovah, which in the original signifies, according to Le Clerc, and almost all the commentators, " faithful and steadfast, making things to be," that is, fulfil- ling all his promises, which he began to accomplish in the time of Moses. By this name, then, in its true sense, God certainly was not known, or, as Peters renders it, was not distinguished, before the time of Moses.10 9 See Gen. xiv. 22 ; xv. 2, 8, 7 ; xiiv. 3 ; xxviii. 13, 16 ; and xxx ii. 9. 10 See Vatablu3, Dath. and Rosenm. in locum — also I'eters's Pre/, to Crit. Diss. p. xii. — xvi., and Bishop Kidder's Convm. on the Five Books of Moses, vol. i. p. 297- The last named learned expositor, agreeably to the idea suggested above, explains the This objection may, consequently, be set aside. Nor will the 4th objection, derived from the mention of Satan, be found to have greater weight. The Evil Being, it is contended both by Heath and Warburton, was not known to the Jews in early days ; and the word Satan never occurs until a late period of their his- tory, as a proper name ; in which light it is said to be here necessarily used, as being preceded by the emphatic article J7, ItDt^n, i. e. the adversary. But, that the doctrine of an evil spirit was not unknown to the Jews at an early day, is evident from the history of Ahab, in which mention is made of it as a thing familiar, and in a manner precisely similar to the present case. Indeed the history of the Fall could scarcely be made intelligible to them without that doctrine ; and Warburton himself admits (B. vi. § 2, vol. ii. p. 533,) that the notion of an evil prin- ciple had probably arisen " from the history of Satan misunderstood, or imperfectly told, in the first ages of mankind." In the next place the word Satan,11 was clearly not unknown to the early Jews, as appears from the use of it in Numb. xxii. 22, in the story of Balaam. We find it also in 2 Sam. xix. 22 ; 1 Kings v. 4 ; xi. 14, 23y 25 ; Psalm lxxi. 13 ; cix. 20, 29. But if it be asserted, that it is used in those several places but as a common appellative, yet still neither will it follow, that the name might not have been used, as the being was certainly known amongst the early Jews ; nor does it even appear, that the word is here used as a proper name ; as the article may be employed only to mark out that adversary, or accusing spirit amongst the angelic tribe, who had undertaken the otfice of putting the virtue of Job to trial ; so that no part of the objection is valid. See Mich. Not. et Epim. pp. 193, 199, and Dathe as referred to p. 324 : and on this entire objection consult Warb. Div. Leg. vol. ii. pp. 530 — 535, and Peters's Crit. Diss. pp. 88—92 But, 5. It is argued, and upon this point passage in Exodus thus: — "Jehovah denotes not only God's eternal being, but his giving of befng to other things, and especially the performing his promise. Now Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, had received promises, but enjoyed not the thing promised. The time was now come in which God would bring to pass what he had promised ; and now they should know that he is the Lord. Isaiah, xlix. 23; liii. C; lx. 1G. The knowing him by his name Jehovah, implies the receiving from him what he had promised before," &c. This view of the matter ought to have saved Dr Geddes from the very laborious discussion of the point into which he has entered in his Critical Kcmarks, and finally from the necessity of pronouncing, that " we must either suppose the writer of Exodus in contradiction with the writer of Genesis, or allow that the name Jehovah has been put in the mouths of the patriarchs prior to Moses, and in the mouth of God himself, by some posterior copier, corrupting the original passages by substituting for QinStf, the word .T)!T<, which had in later times become the peculiar name of God among the Hebrews " 11 See on this word Taylor's Scheme of Scripture Divinity, cli. xi. 154 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. Heath and most other objectors principally rely, that the Book of Job abounds with Chaldaisms, Syriasms, and Arabisms, which clearly prove the lateness of its production. Nun , in opposition to thi<, we have the autho- rity of the most distinguished scholars and critics, Schultens and Mich:ielis,in pronouncing that the charge of Chaldaisms is totally erron- eous. Those Chaldaisms, on which Le Clerc so confidently relies, by which the plural termination in is put for im, Schultens asserts to be " Hebraic* et Arabicffi dictionis, atque vetustissimse monets" (Ur Grey's Job, pref. p. xii :) and .Michaelis affirms, that of such Chal- daisms as by their present use might evince the lateness of a Hebrew work, not one is to be discovered in this book. (Not. et Epim. p. 1 93.) The prefix of ttf, in ch. xv. 30, supposed to be a Chaldaism from ~Wi$, he proves is not so. And, even were it so used, this is shewn by Kennicott (Remarks, ike. p. 153,) to supply no argument against the antiquity of the book, that will not equally affect the book of Genesis. That expressions of Syriac and Arabic affinity frequently occur, there can indeed be no question. This stands upon the authority of the most distinguished scholars, Bochart, Pocock, Hottinger, and Walton. (See Wits. Misc. Sac, Lib. i. cap. xvi. § 28.) Nor is this denied by Schultens, Kennicott, and Michaelis. But from this they infer the remote antiquity of the work ; since, says Michaelis, the Hebrew, Syriac, and Arabic, are not to be considered so much different languages, as dialects of one radical language, originally common to the descendants of Abraham ; and the higher we ascend, the more resemblance we shall consequently find. But besides, Michaelis adds, that one principal reason for our attributing to the Book of Job, Chaldaic, Syriac, and Arabic expressions, may be its very great antiquity, and uncommon sublimity of elevation, occasioning a greater number of «x«| teyopsvu, and expressions difficult to be understood : which commen- tators are consequently led to explain from those several languages ; not because the words strictly belong to them, but because there are more books, and better understood in those languages, than in the Hebrew ; and hence it is supposed, that the expressions actually belong to those languages.12 On this topic, perhaps, so much need not have been said, bad not the high authority of Bishop haw given to the objection more con- sequence than truly belongs to it, by the hint conveyed in his ingenious work on the Theory of Religion, (p. 74,) that the subject of it had been " too slightly passed over." Since the time of the Bishop it lias received more ample 12 Mich. Not. H Sptm. pp. 194, 1*)5. See Peters's Crit. Diss. pp. I'M — 1.17, and 141 — 1-13 ; Bee also t'odurc. Prtrf. ad Job, »lnre the necessity of consulting Talcums, &c. 13 urged iu a way which fully justifies this solution of Michaelis. discussion : and from that discussion there seems to arise the strongest argument in favour of the antiquity of the Book of Job. So that we may see the justness of Bishop Lowth's remark, that " from the language, and even from the obscurity, of the work," no less than from its subject, it may fairly be inferred, "to be the most ancient of all the sacred books." Prwl. Hebr. xxxii. — But not only do these criticisms bear upon the age of the poem, but on the country of its author. For does not the mixture of foreign expressions rather prove that the author was not a Jew ; and does not that of the Arabic particularly, with which it is considered most to abound, indicate its Arabic extraction, which perfectly agrees with the supposition of Job having been its author ? And it deserves to be noticed, that even Codurcus, wdio supposes it to be the work of one of the later prophets, yet conjectures from the style, that the prophet might have been originally from Idumsea, — the very country of Job. (Prof, ad Job.) 6. It is objected by Codurcus, Grotius, and Le Clerc, that there are passages in the Book of Job which so strongly resemble some in the Psalms and Proverbs, that we may fairly suppose them to have been taken from those writings. But to this Warburton has well replied, that " if the sacred writers must needs have borrowed trite moral sentences from one another, it may be as fairly said, that the authors of the Psalms borrowed from the Book of Job, as that the author of Job borrowed from the Book of Psalms :" Div. Leg. vol. ii. p. 499. See also Peters's Crit. Diss. pp. 139 — 141. And had the learned Bishop been disposed to exercise as unbiassed a criti- cism upon himself, as he has done upon Grotius and Le Clerc, he would have felt the same argument bearing with equal force against the objection which he has attempted to deduce from the supposed adoption of certain phrases, which arc found in other books of the Old Testament. That, how- ever, which the Bishop has not done for himself, Peters has done for him ; by shewing that those few phrases, which he has instanced, have no peculiar stamp of age or country, and bear no marks whatever of being borrowed from other parts of Scripture. (Crit. Diss. pp. 26 — 29.) it should also be observed, that, in opposition to the above-mentioned objection of Grotius, Le Clerc, &c. Bishop Hare has endeavoured to shew, that there is internal evidence that the Psalmist has borrowed from Job, not Job from the Psalmist. And Chap- pelow (Comment, on Job, v. 16, viii. 10, and pref. p. 10,) represents the passages which are common to Job with the writers of the Psalms, Proverbs, ike. as proverbial forms of speech, sentences of instruction, or QvQi millim, as they are peculiarly called in Job, transmitted from one age to another. It therefore is not No. 59.— ON THE HISTORY AND THE BOOK OF JOB. 155 necessary to suppose that either borrowed from the other. I have now enumerated all the arguments deserving any notice, which have been urged against the antiquity of the Book of Job. How conjectural, unfounded, and futile most of them are, and how inconclusive others, it is not difficult to discover. This indeed thev tend to shew, that the more the objections against the antiquity of this book are exa- mined, the stronger will the arguments be found in favour of it. In addition, however, to what has appeared, there are some positive proofs which have been advanced, and which are not a little worthy of consideration. Bishop Patrick has observed, in his preface to Job, that though there is plain mention of the Deluge, and the burning of Sodom, there is no allusion to the drowning of Pharaoh, and the other miraculous works attending the deliverance of the Israelites from Egypt : and that Elihu, when expressly reckoning up the different modes of revelation, takes no notice of the revelation made to Moses. These omis- sions, however, as well as the want of refe- rence to any of the Mosaic rites, though they furnish a decisive proof against the late age of the book, on the supposition of the author being a Jew, yet do so, it must be confessed, only upon that supposition. But it will not be easy to account for the circumstance of the book's containing no allusion to "any one piece of history later than Moses," (Sherl. Use of Proph. p. 207,) upon any hypothesis, that places its date lower than the age of the Jewish lawgiver. Now, if to these considerations be added the characters of antiquity attached to the subject, the conduct, and the language of the work ; some of which have already appeared in the discussion of the foregoing objections, and which are in general so strikingly obvious, as to constrain even those who contend for the late production of the work to represent it as written in imitation of early manners ; — if we admit with Peters {Grit. Diss. p. 143.) that there are expressions in this book, of a stamp so ancient, that they are not to be met with in the Chaldee, Syriac, or any other language at present known ; and that many, which rarely occur elsewhere, and are difficult to be explained, are here to be found in their primi- tive and most simple forms; — if, in short, there be, on the whole, that genuine air of the antique, which those distinguished scholars, Schultens, Lowth, and Michaelis, 13 affirm in every respect to pervade the work, we can scarcely hesitate to pronounce with Lowth and Sherlock, that the Book of Job is the oldest in the world now extant. (Prcel. Hebr. and Use of Proph. Diss. ii. p. 206.) Taylor draws the same conclusion from a very satisfactory 13 See Grey's Schult. Job. praef. p. xiii.— Prcel. Hebr. p. 310. and Mich. Aot. ct Epim. p. 135. though brief view of the merits of the entire argument, in the 22d chap, of his Scheme of Scrip. Div. which I would particularly recom-. mend to the perusal of the reader. It deserves also to be noticed, that a writer 14 in the Theol. Rep. vol. i. p. 73, who is by no means a friend to the idea of the antiquity of the Book of Job, is compelled by the decided marks of the remote and primitive state of the Hebrew, every where discoverable in the work, to pro- nounce the author to have been a person of great " ability and address ; who was master of the old language, and had given a venerable antique air to his poem, by making the per- sons of his dialogue, supposed to have lived in very early times, speak the language which was spoken in their days." Whether there was any person of such ability and address, it is for this writer to decide. With his admis- sion I am content. After what has been said, we can have but little difficulty with the systems of Grotius, Warburton, Heath, and others, who suppose the work written at a late period of the Jewish history, for the consolation either of the Edo- mites when carried away by the Babylonians, (which was the notion of Grotius,) or of the Jews in circumstances of similar distress, after or under the captivity : the former of which was Warburton's, and the latter Garnet's idea. What has been said of the style, and other peculiarities of the Book of Job, neces- sarily subverts all such theories. And to bring down this sublime poem to the age of the Babylonish captivity, especially to the period succeeding it, would be, as Lowth ob- serves, little different from the error of Har- douin, who ascribed the golden verses of Virgil, Horace, &c, to the iron age of monkish pedantry and ignorance. {Led. &c. ed. Greg, vol. ii. p. 355.) Besides, all these theories are utterly inconsistent with the existence of the Book of Job before the time of Ezekiel ; a fact which Grotius inferred, and which, notwith- standing Warburton's denial of the conse- quence, Peters has shewn must be inferred from the mention of Job by that prophet. 15 The supposition, then, that Ezra, Ezekiel, or, indeed, any person subsequent to the age of Moses, was the writer of this book, must, for the reasons that have been assigned, be en- tirely rejected. It remains, of course, only to inquire, whether it is to be ascribed to Moses, or was written before his time. In either supposition, the antiquity, both of the history and of the book, is sufficiently established, for the purpose of my argument concerning sacri- fice ; but, on a subject so interesting, we are naturally impelled to look on to the end. '4 This writer appears to be Mr Seott, the author of the translation of Job into English verse : the paper iii the Theol. Rep. being printed as his in an appendix to that translation. 13 See Div. Leg. B. vi. § 2. vol. ii. p. 490, and Crit. Diss. pp. 145—150. 156 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. That Moses was the author of the book lias been the opinion of many, both Jews and Christians. But the arguments which have been used to prove that the writer could not l>e later than the giving of the law, or the departure of the Israelites from Egypt, will equally prove, that, if the book was the production of Rfoaes, he must have written it before the Exodus. Accordingly, Huet, Michaelis, and Kennicott, who attribute the work to him, have placed it at that early period, and thereby in a good measure escape the force of Bishop Lowth's objection, derived from the want of that allusion to the customs, ceremonies, or history of the Israelites, which he thinks must have appeared, had Moses written the book with a view to the consola- tion of his people at any time after the pro- mulgation of the law. Michaelis says, that it was probably written by him, to console the Israelites under their Egyptian slavery. (Not. et Epim. pp. 181, 182.) And Kennicott thinks, that Moses, having lived a long time in Midian, and on the borders of Idumaaa, may well be supposed the author, having there learned the story of Job's fortunes, which was probably then recent ; and that thus also may the Arabic forms of expression, which occur in the work, be easily accounted for. Remarks. &c. p. 152. These writers have followed the notion of Huet, and of several of the most ancient Jewish and Christian authors, whom he enu- merates. (See Bern. Evang. p. 226.) To this opinion, however, it has been objected by Dupin, that " the style of Job is figuratively poetical, and obscure, entirely different from (hat of the Pentateuch :" and Bishop Lowth, whose judgment with respect to style will scarcely be questioned, does not hesitate to pronounce the style of Job to be materially different from that of Moses, even in his poetic productions ; and describes it to be of that compact and sententious kind, which is to be observed in the prophecies of Balaam the Mesopotamian. (Prcel. llebr. xxxii.) Mi- chaelis also admits the force of this criticism, by seeking to account for the dissimilitude, from the supposition that the Book of Job was written by Moses at a very early period of life. {Not. et Epim. p. 186.) But although a youthful imagination might sufficiently account for a higher degree of poetic imagery and embellishment, yet it seems a strange reason to assign for a more "compact, con- densed style, and a greater accuracy in the poetical conformation of the sentences," which is the character attributed to it by Lowth, as distinguishing it from the Pentateuch. Kennicott, however, it must be confessed, differs from the bishop so far as to affirm, that there isa Btriking resemblance in the construc- tion of the poetry of Job to the song of Moses in Deut. xxxi. (Remarks, &c. p. 153.) But even admitting his discernment of the graces and characters of style to be equal to that of the elegant composer of the Lectures on the Hebrew poetry, and the sublime translator of Isaiah, yet still it remains to be inquired, whence were derived those expressions of Syriac and Arabic origin, which are not to be discovered in the Pentateuch ? If it be said, as Father Simon has expressly alleged, (Grit, des Prolcg. dc Dup. lib. v. p. 514,) and as is hinted also by Kennicott, that Moses might have learned these dialects whilst in the land of Midian, it then remains to be explained, how he came to unlearn them again, before he wrote the Pentateuch. As to one particular sameness of expression, which Kennicott. thinks he discovers in the Pentateuch and Job, namely, the frequent use of the future for the preterite ; if this were indeed a peculiarity confined to these lb two parts of the sacred volume, might it not be accounted for, by supposing it to have been the usage of tho language in its earliest period, and which, though it did not descend later than the writ- ings of Moses, yet might have been common to that and the preceding ages ? But, admitting even a similarity of style, one great difficulty still hangs upon the hypo- thesis, that Moses was the author of the book ; namely, that as he must have intended it for the Israelites, it is scarcely possible to conceive, that, although relating an Iduma?an history, he should not have introduced something re- 16 The learned critic has been obliged to confess, on sub- sequent consideration, that the conversion of the future into the preterite by the ' prefixed, is not strictly confined to the Pentateuch and the Book of Job; and he himself adduces instances of a similar usage from Judges and Isaiah ; and thus, in truth, does away the force of his own observation. He adds, however, in support of his first position, that "this idiom, being seldom found elsewhere, and being found so often, and within so few verses, both in the Pentateuch and Job, must certainly add some weight to the opinion that these books came from the same writer." (Remarks, &c. pp. 15.-), 154.) In the criticism here advanced, this distinguished scholar has not exercised his usual caution and research. The fact differs most widely from his assertion. For it is certain, as we have been most truly told in a late ingenious publication, that, throughout the whole Hebrew Scriptures, the pcrfeet tense is most generally expressed by the converted future ; so that it is clearly the proper idiom of the language. And it is with justice added, that this is a peculiarity of a nature so extraordinary as to bo highly deserving of attention ; because tho regularity of its changes will bear the strictest examination, whereby may be demonstrated the great gram- \ matical accuracy and propriety of expression that has been observed by all the writer! of the Hebrew Scriptures for so many years, from Moses to Malachi. This position is sub- stantiated by a wide range of examples in the Letter on certain particularities of the Hebrew Syntax, written by Mr Granville Sharp, whose acute and valuable philological inquiries as well in that and his other Letters on the same subject, as in his investigations of the Greek text, cannot be too highly com- mended. The labours of this learned layman reflect honour upon himself, and, what ho appears to have much more at heart, light and intelligence upon the sacred text. Lowth in his Lectures, vol. i. p. 335 846, has treated of tho above peculiarity of the Hebrew tenses. No. 59.— ON THE HISTORY AND THE BOOK OF JOB. 157 ferring to the peculiar state and circumstances of the people, for whose use it was destined ; of which no trace whatever appears in the work. The common subjects touched upon in both, too, we should expect to find similarly handled : and yet, if Peters's remark be just, the manner in which the Creation, the Fall, the Deluge, and other points of ancient history, are treated in the Book of Job, is widely diffe- rent from that in which they are spoken of in the books of Moses. See Grit. Diss. p. 126. There seems, thou, upon the whole, sufficient ground for the conclusion, that this book was not the production of Moses, but of some earlier age : and there appears no good reason to suppose, that it was not written by Job himself. Lowth favours this idea, and Peters urges some arguments, of no inconsiderable weight, in its support. {Grit. Diss. pp. 123 — 125.) The objections against it, from Arabia being called the East, (which, according to Grotius and Le Clerc, marks the writer to be a Hebrew,) and from the account given of the death of Job in the conclusion, create no diffi- culty. Peters has shewn, that not only did other nations, beside the Hebrews, call Arabia, the East ; but that it was customary even with the Arabians themselves : and that the writer was an Arabian, he infers, with much inge- nuity, from the manner in which he speaks of the North wind. As for the addition of a few lines at the conclusion, made by some other hand, for the purpose of completing the history ; this should no more invalidate Job's title to the work, than a similar addition at the conclusion of Deuteronomy, should invali- date that of Moses to the Pentateuch. See Grit. Diss. pp. 127, 128. and pref. p. xvi. But, whether we suppose Job the author of the book or not, its great antiquity, and even its priority to the age of Moses, seems to stand on strong grounds. And, upon the whole, perhaps we may not unreasonably conjecture the history of the book to be this : — The poem, being originally written either by Job, or some contemporary of his, and existing in the time of Moses, might fall into his hands, whilst residing in the land of Midian, or after- wards when in the neighbourhood of Idu- masa ; and might naturally be made use of by him, to represent to the Hebrews, either whilst repining under their Egyptian bondage, or murmuring at their long wanderings in the wilderness, the great duty of submission to the will of God. The encouragement which this book holds out, that every good man suffering patiently will finally be rewarded, rendered it a work peculiarly calculated to minister mingled comfort and rebuke to the distressed and discontented Israelites, and might there- fore well have been employed by Moses for this purpose. We may also suppose, that Moses, in transcribing, might have made some small and unimportant alterations, which will sufficiently account for occasional and partial resemblances of expression between it and the Pentateuch, if any such there be. This hypothesis both furnishes a reasonable compromise between the opinions of the great critics who are divided upon the point of Moses being the author, and supplies an answer to a question of no small difficulty, which hangs upon almost every other solution ; namely, when, and wherefore, a book treating mani- festly of the concerns of a stranger, and in no way connected with their affairs, was received by the Jews into their sacred canon? For Moses having thus applied the book to their use, and sanctioned it by his authority, it would naturally have been enrolled among their sacred writings : and, from the antiquity of that enrolment, no record would, conse- quently, appear of its introduction. This hypothesis satisfies the third query in the TheoL Repos. vol. i. p. 72. I have the satis- faction also to find, that this notion is not without support from many respectable autho- rities. The ancient commentator on Job, under the title of Origen, has handed down a piece of traditional history, which perfectly accords with it. See Patrick's Preface to Job. Many of the most respectable early writers seem to have adopted the same idea, as may be seen in Huet, (Dcm. Evang. p. 226,) and, with some slight variation, it has been fol- lowed by that learned author. Patrick also and Peters speak of it as a reasonable hypo- thesis. ( Grit. Diss. pref. pp. xxxiv. xxxv.) And certainly it possesses this decided advan- tage, that it solves all the phenomena. One observation more remains to be offered ; and that is, that there is good reason to pro- nounce the Book of Job an inspired work. Its reception into the Jewish canon ; the recogni- tion of the history, and, as Peters has abun- dantly proved, {Grit. Diss. pp. 21, 145 — 148,) consequently of the book itself, by the prophet Ezekiel ; a similar admission of it by another inspired writer, Saint James ; and the express reference made to It by Saint Paul, (1 Cor. iii. 19,) who prefaces his quotation from it by the w7ords, it is written, agreeably to the common form of quoting from other parts of inspired Scripture ; — all these fully justify the primi- tive fathers, and early councils, in their recep- tion of it as a canonical and inspired book. (See Gregor. pref. in Job.) The intrinsic matter of the work also strengthens this idea. Job appears, from xxxviii. 1, and xlii. 5, to have enjoyed the divine vision. In what manner, whether, as the Seventy seem to think, by some appear- ance of a glorious cloud, or otherwise, it avails not. That, in some way, he was honoured with one of those extraordinary manifestations of the Deity, by which the prophets and inspired persons were distinguished, and that he was admitted to immediate communication 158 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMEN T. with the Almighty, is positively asserted. Now, if this did really happen, — and the whole hook hecomesa lying fable, and a lying fable recognized by inspired writers as a truth, if it did not, — it necessarily follows, that Job was a prophet : and as a natural consequence it must be admitted, that Job himself was the author of the work : since it cannot be supposed, that God would convey supernatural communications to one person, .-ind appoint another to relate them. That Job was not an Israelite, cannot be urged as an argument against such an hypothesis, since we rind that Balaam is expressly said to have been similarly favoured. Other instances also are given by Bishop Law in his Considerations, ike. pp. 72 — 76. See also Patrick's Append, to the Paraph, on Job, and Peters's Grit. Diss. pp. 123 — 125. Now, from admitting the prophetic charac- ter of Job, we derive two considerable advan- tages. First, it removes the difficulty, which otherwise must hang upon the supposition, that the words of that much celebrated passage in his writings refer to the doctrines of a Re- deemer and a future state : 17 and, 2. it supplies an additional confirmation of the divine origin of those great truths concerning the Creation, the Fall, and the Deluge, as they stand re- corded in the books of Moses. If I have dwelt rather long upon this point, I trust that the interesting nature of the sub- ject, as well as the importance of the reality and antiquity of Job, in an examination of the history of sacrifice, will supply a sufficient excuse. I have little fear that the discussion will appear unnecessarily prolix to those who are acquainted with the vast variety of opin- ions, and multiplicity of arguments, to which this question has given birth. My principal object in this, as in most other of the disserta- tions in this work, has been to combine with Mich illustrations as the general argument may require, useful directions to the young student in divinity, as to those leading topics and references, that may serve to assist his course of reading. This I have done on the present occasion with all possible brevity. A greater degree of compression must have led to dryness and obscurity. It will be well, if, even in its present form, this review of the question be not found chargeable with these defects. Aftkr the full detail which has just been given of the various opinions respecting the " In addition to the numerous writers, who are commonly known to have maintained the application of the 13th chapter of Job to the doctrine of a future state, I think it right to mention the name of Velthusen, who, in his KxtreHationtt Criticw in Jobi, cap. xix. 23 — X), has with much ability and critical acumen defended this idea. See also l'feiffer, Dubia Vtxata, so5 — iu. age and country of Job, as well as respecting the date of the poem which bears that name, I might, perhaps, deem myself excused from making any additional remarks upon this sub- ject, even in the face of a translation of that poem, which has lately conic before the public, accompanied with observations repugnant to the resulting probabilities as they have been here deduced, but not less repugnant (as I con- ceive) to the truth of Scripture history and the principles of fair interpretation. These obser- vations, however, coming from a prelate of the Established Church, acquire from that circumstance a weight, which will not permit them to be overlooked ; and compel a discus- sion, in which I feel myself bound (however reluctantly) to engage, in defence of what 1 have already submitted, and of what appears to me to be equally sustained by argument, and sanctioned by Scripture. That I may not do the right reverend author injustice, I quote the very words, in which he has so summarily beaten down the notions hitherto so generally entertained, concerning the anti- quity both of the book and of the age of Job. " The sacred writers, in general, have been apt to ascribe to the Book of Job, an origin, that loses itself in the shades of the remotest antiquity. The opinion, I believe, rested at first on the very sandy foundation of what is stated in the two concluding verses of the work, which ascribe to its hero a longevity that belonged only to the generations not far distant from the Flood. Of the authenticity of those verses, I think I have shewn, in my note on them, that we have every reason to be suspicious. But, if it were ever so difficult to ascertain the portion of time when the Patriarch lived, it may not be impossible, from the internal marks in the poem itself, to conjecture with tolerable certainty the era of its author. This is what I have attempted to execute. The subject is curious, and, on a close inspection of the work before us, certain notes of time have presented themselves to my observation, which appear to have escaped the diligence of all preceding critics. The reader will allow me to offer them to him here in a summary manner ; referring him for farther satisfaction on the point to what I have said in the notes. — Allusions toevents recorded in the five books of Moses are to befound in this poem, ch. xx. 20, compared with Num. xi. 33, 34 ; ch. xxvi. 5, compared with Gen. vi. 4, 7, 11 ; ch. xxxiv. 20, compared with Fxod. xii. 19 ; ch. xxxi. 33, compared with Gen. iii. 3, 12 : and I shall hardly be expected to prove, that the author of the poem derived his know ledge of those events from a history of so much notoriety as that of Moses, rather than from oral or any other tradition. Facts are not usually referred to, before the history recording them lias had time to obtain currency. The inference is clear ; the writer of Job waa No. £9.— ON THE HISTORY Ai\D THE HOOK OF JOB. 159 junior to the Jewish legislator, and junior, it is likely, by some time. — A similar mode of reasoning, upon comparison of ch. xxxiii. 23, with 2 Sam. xxiv. 16, 1 Chron. xxi. 15, will, if I mistake not greatly, bring down the date of our poem below the time of King David. — Lastly, ch. xii. 17, to the end, seems to point to the circumstances preceding and attending the Babylonish captivity ; and chap, xxxvi. 8 — 12, has an appearance of alluding to the various fortunes of Jehoiachin, king of Judah, 2 Kings, xxiv. 12; xxv. 27. — Notes of time these, which, though not so manifest as the forementioned, may deserve attention ; since they add strength to the sentiment of those learned men who have been inclined to give the honour of this celebrated composition to Ezra." — The Book of Job newly translated by the Riyht Reverend Joseph Stock, Bishop of Killalla, pref. pp. v. vi. Such is the rapid decision of the Right Rev. translator, upon a question which has occupied the attention, and divided the judgments, of the most learned and able theologians ; and such are the new lights, whereby this new expositor of the Book of Job is enabled to discern the erroneousness of the opinion in favour of its high antiquity, which has at all times most generally prevailed. It must be remarked, indeed, that his Lordship, in the history of his work, has stated, that the whole was executed in a period of six weeks, and that too a period of great agitation and dis- traction of mind ; and also, that he declined the aid of the many learned commentators, who had gone before him in the translation of this most difficult book, confining his attention to three English writers, Heath, Scott, and Parkhurst ; writers, who, however respectably they may rank as compilers, cannot be named with those great and distinguished Hebrew scholars, liJ whose labours his Lordship found it 18 It was particularly unfortunate, that his Lordship felt indis- posed to the trouble of consulting the commentary of Schultens ; a work, which, although its author is rather slightingly described by his Lordship as the " Dutch expositor," has been considered by all the later interpreters of Job, his Lordship excepted, as a mine of the most valuable learning, and particu- larly indispensable to such as were not acquainted with the Arabic, and what may be called the dialects of the Hebrew, in which it is acknowledged by every commentator that the Book of Job abounds, and from which, indeed, the peculiar difficulty of that book is admitted to arise. Dr Grey, in his preface, speaking of this work, terms it " egrcgium opus." And of the benefit he derived from it in his translation of Job, he thus expresses himself: — " Quantum mihigaudium attuierit, quan- taque cura et molestia liberarit elaboratissimura hocce summi viri eruditionis atque diligentiae monumentum, facile dijudicare est. Parata, ut ait Plinius, inquisitio, nee onerosa collatio. Nempe omni isto apparatu illico jam instructus eram, quem alioquin mihi multo cum sudore undecunque conquirendum esse praevideram : unoque sub conspectu habui non tantum quicquid uspiam a doctissimis viris in hoc argumento concinna- tum, sed et ordine ita accurato dispositum, eo judieio atque diligentia perpensum, ut nil alind mihi negotii jam relictum videretur, quam exscriptoris munere perfungi." — Liber Jobi — Rieard. Grey, prsef. p. iii. Heath also, in his pref. p. xiii. speaks of the work of Schultens convenient to reject. These circumstances will abundantly account for the cursory manner in which his Lordship has treated the subject of the antiquity of the Book of Job ; for the errors into which he has fallen upon that important point ; and also for the general air and character of the translation itself. And, in the first instance, it is painful to remark, that in the very first paragraph of the work, his Lordship has confounded two ques- tions which are altogether distinct ; and, from this confusion, has been led (with a licence which might better befit such expositors as Dr Geddes, or the Unitarian Society, than a Bishop of the Established Church,) to reject the two last verses of Job, as a spurious addition to the work. The two questions relate, one to the time at which Job actually lived, and the other to the time at which the Book of Job was written. These, it is obvious, have no necessary con- nection, as the history of a person who lived in the patriarchal age might be composed even at the present day ; and, therefore, these respective dates have, at all times, been made the subjects of separate inquiry. Yet the Bishop begins by telling us, that the reason which first induced the sacred critics to assign the Book of Job to an era of remote antiquity, is to be found in the two last verses, which ascribe to Job himself a patriarchal longevity ; that is, that the critics have pronounced the Book of Job to be extremely ancient, because that book describes its subject as having lived at a very early period. Now, no critics have reasoned in this manner ; nor, in truth, could any have so reasoned, who deserved the name. Some, indeed, have pronounced the book to be as ancient as its subject, inasmuch as they conceived it to have been the production of Job himself. But they who do not contend for this, and even those (such as Warburton in language equally strong. "The use of the dialects in the investigation of the true meaning of the several roots in this" (the Hebrew) " language, was never carried to the height it is at present, till the late very learned Albert Schultens, in the beginning of this" (the last) " century, bent his studies this ! way ; and with so great success, that I think it may be truly said in his praise, that his endeavours have contributed more towards the true knowledge of the Hebrew language, than the united labours of all that went before him." Was this the commentator, from whose " two ponderous volumes," (which, after all, are but two thin quartos,) a trans- lator of the Book of Job, who does not profess either to have any acquaintance with the Arabic, should turn away with weariness and disgust ? Heath pursues a different course in his version : — "I have drawn (says he) from the dialects all the light my knowledge in them would supply me with ; and in this part I acknowledge myself much indebted to the valuable works of the late very learned Albert Schultens." — Pref. page xv. Bishop Stock, on the other hand, tells us, that he had " received from Scott, as much information with respect to the discoveries of Schultens, the Dutch expositor, as he wished to possess." — Pref. p. vii. This surely is in every way an odd declaration. If one were only to ask, how the quantum suJRcit could be ascertained, without the knowledge of what Schultens' book actually contains, it would be rather difficult to frame an answer. 160 ilAUEE ON THE ATONEMENT. and Heath19) who have been desirous to reduce the date of the book to a very late period of the Jewish state, in consequence of allusions to certain parts of the Jewish history which it appeared to them to contain, have, notwithstanding, found no difficulty in placing I the existence of Job in that remote ago to which the history assigns it. They have, in short, argued thus: — Job lived at an early period ; but we have reason to conclude, that the history which treats of him was composed at a period considerably later. Whereas the present translator argues as if Job could not have lived early, because the history was written late. Or rather, to repeat the charge already made, two ideas totally distinct, the time of Joh, and the date of the history, arc manifestly confounded. And this confusion, which so inauspiciously prefaces his Lordship's work, unhappily conducts it to its close : for in the concluding note we find the following observations: — "These two last verses have every appearance21' of being a spurious addition 0 Heath, indeed, specially remarks upon the gross error of not making a due distinction between the times of Job, and those of the author of the poem : and on the whole he pronounces it as his own opinion, that the author in many parts of his work alludes to facts, which, though undoubtedly posterior to the age of Job, on account of its great remoteness, were yet anterior to his own ; and consequently he holds, that no argument can be drawn from such circumstances against the antiquity of the times of Job on the one hand, nor against interpretations suited to the manners and history of the probable age of the author on the Other. And therefore, although he reduces the date of the author of the poem as low as the Bishop of Killalla can desire, he yet conjectures the time of Job to have been earlier than the Exodus, and considers the length of life ascribed to him by the two verses with which the Bishop has quarrelled, as one of the proofs of the fact. See Heath's English Version of Job, pp. xix. xx. xxiv. - What the circumstances arc, that give to these two verses " every appearance of being a spurious addition to the work," his Lordship has not thought proper to mention. What do these verses contain? Simply the following words: — "After this lived Job an hundred and forty years, and saw his sons and his sons' sons, even four generations. So Job died, being old and full of days." Now, if all that is meant be this, that the verses could Dot have been written by Job himself, this undoubtedly no person will be found disposed to dispute, as it is not pretended that he rose from the grave to finish the book. Hut this surely cannot be the proof of their want of authenticity, which, in the beginning of his preface, his Lordship boasts of having discovered, and promises to produce in his note upon the Verses: and, in point of fact, he does not here adduce it as a proof; but simply asserts, as we have seen, that the "verses have every appearance of being a spurious addition to the work." He goes on, indeed, to state of this addition, that it has been " fabricated by such another dealer in the marvellous, M lie that has fastened his long string of fables to the close of the translation bj the I..W interpreters." Now, with great deference to his Lordship, there is not only no appearance of thi H Verses bfting SUCfa B fabrication as that which winds up the conclusion of the S iptuaguit translation, (and his Lordship might have added, Of the Syriac and Arabic also,) but there is as direct and proper evidence of the contrary as the nature of the ■ will admit. The difference between the two is precisely this, that the one is f iund in every MS. of the original Hebrew, and the Other has nothing corresponding to it in any ; that the one has, in all ages, been received withi nt question as part of the canon of Scripture, and the Other never: that the one, in short, is found in the record, and the other is not. Such is the to the work, fabricated by such another dealer in the marvellous, as he that has fastened his lorn: string of tables to the close of the trans- lation by the LXX interpreters. The fallacy must be obvious, when we call to mind the allusions, in the poem, to facts that happened in and after the time of Moses, who lived but one hundred and twenty years, and even of David, when the age of man was reduced to its present standard of seventy years." Thus, then, it appears, that because the translator thinks proper to bring the date of the Book of Job lower than the time of David, the length of the life of Job could not exceed what was usual in that age of the world, and therefore the two verses which ascribe to him a longer period cannot be genuine, and must be discarded from the sacred text. That is, in other words, no history can ever be written of any individual who lived at a preceding period. This is certainly an unhappy speci- men of antiquarian research ; and a still more unhappy specimen of biblical criticism. On similarity of appearance between the two, from which his Lord- ship infers them on the view, to be equally fabrications ! Surely never was there a more arbitrary and barefaced attach upon the integrity of the sacred text. The verses have never been questioned ; they appear in every MS. of the Hebrew ; and they stand precisely on the same ground, as to every circumstance of genuineness, with any other verses in the entire Hook of Job. It must be observed, that what is said here is perfectly admis- sible, even on the supposition that Job himself was the author of the poem : the argument not requiring that the two concluding verses should have been written by the same hand that com- posed the remainder of the work ; but that they were, equally with any other verses, genuine parts of the book as it was originally received into the Hebrew canon, and not the unautho- rized and spurious addition of an unknown fabricator. That the verses in question were written by Moses, at the time when the entire work was adapted by lum, and accommodated to the uses of his followers, may appear not improbable from what has been said at page 157 of this volume. Hut, perhaps, after all, no other proof of tho spuriousness of these two verses has been intended by the right reverend author, than what arises from those allusions to facts later than the time of Moses, and even of David, to which his Lordship immediately after adverts. If this be the case, then, in addition to the con- founding together the times of Job and of the author of tho book, which has been remarked upon above, his Lordship has conducted the entire of his reasoning in a circle : having pro- mised, in his preface, to overturn the notion of the high antiquity of the Hook of Job, by establishing the spuriousness of these two verses, on which he states that notion to have been founded; and having here established the spuriousness of the verses, by denying the antiquity of the book. Whatever may be the errors in the argument, his Lordship, however, seems to think that all will be set to rights, by rejecting from the sacred text what- ever does not correspond with the theory which he has adopted. As the discussion of this subject has led to the mention of the addition made by the LXX, at the conclusion of their version of the Hook of Job, it may gratify the curiosity of the reader Who is not conversant in these matters, to kjiow what that addition is. Having, agreeably to the Hebrew original, stated that Job died full of days, the Greek proceeds, "Hut it is written that he will rise again with those whom the Lord raises up. This is interpreted from a Syriac book. ' He dwelt in the land of Ausitis' ( of Aus or Uz, ) ' in the borders of Idumxa and Arabia; but his name was lirst called Jobab : and, marrying an Arabian wife, ho begot a son, whose name was Ennon ; and he was himself the son of Zare, a grandson of Esau, of a mother Bosorra, so that he was tho fifth from Abraham. And these are No. 51).— ON THK IIISTOKY AND THE HOOK OF JOB. 161 the same ground on which he has rejected the two concluding verses, the right reverend critic might reject a very lar^e portion of the Book of Job, as a spurious addition to the genuine work ; since every where throughout are plentifully scattered those indications21 of patriarchal antiquity, for the direct exposition of which these two last verses are pronounced to be surreptitious. But, not to dwell any longer on this unfor- tunate mistake, and the rash attempt at mutilating the sacred text which it has occa- sioned, let us proceed to consider those notes of time, attaching to the poem itself, which "have escaped the diligence of all preceding critics ;" and by the discovery of which, his Lordship thinks himself enabled to pronounce upon the lateness of its production. The first of these is said to be found in chap. xx. 20, in which we are told that the true rendering is, " Because he acknowledged not the quail in his stomach :" and the following remark is subjoined: — "Here, I apprehend, is a fresh example of the known usage of the Hebrew poets, in adorning their compositions by allusions to facts in the history of their own people. It has escaped all the inter- preters ; and it is the more important, because it fixes the date of this poem so far as to prove its having been composed subsequently to the transgression of Israel at Kibroth-hataavah, the kings which reigned in Edom, over which country he ruled ; first, Balak son of Beor, and the name of his city was Denhaba ; but after Balak Jobab, called Job ; but after him Asom, prince of the land of Theman ; and after him Adad, son of Barad, who smote Midian in the plain of Moab, and the name of his city was Gethiam. And the friends who came to him, were Eliphaz of the sons of Esau, king of the Themamtes ; Baldad, sovereign (rijavvo?) of the Sauchajans ; and Zophar, king of the Mina?ans.' " With this the Syriac and Arabic, as given in the Polyglot, nearly correspond. And a fragment of Aristaas, as taken from Eusebius (Prcep. Evang. lib. ix. cap. xxv. torn. i. p. 430,) contains most of these particulars, referring to Polyhistor as his authority. On the passage in the Greek it is to be remarked, that it contains internal evidence, that the Book of Job has not had the same Greek interpreters that have rendered the other books of the Old Testament ; since it expressly states, that the version was derived from a Syriac book. And, indeed, it is clear upon inspection, that the Greek inter- preters of Job have taken uncommon liberties in their transla- tion ; having, besides variations from the obvious sense of the Hebrew as it now stands, made large additions, not only here, but in several other places, particularly at chap. ii. 9, to the speech made by Job's wife. See also chap. xix. 4 ; xxxvi. 28 ; xxxix. 34. It is to be noted also, that the concluding addition to Job in the Greek is given differently by the Vatican and the Alexandrian MSS. ; that it is found in Tlieodotion, but not in Aquila or Symmachus ; and that in the Complutensian edition of the LXX it is wanting. It is said also to have been in the Old Italic. At what time it was introduced cannot be conjectured ; but the Greek version of Job appears to have been earlier than Philo Judarns, from his quoting it in his book, De Nominum Mulalionc. See W'esley, Dissert. LIII. p. 409 413. and p. 599; Hod. de Vers. Groec. p. 196; also Drusiusand Codurcus on the last verse of Job, and Carpzov's Defence, p. 36, &c. For the sources whence this piece of adscititious history was probably derived, the reader may turn to Gen. xxxvi. and 1 Chron. i. 21 See pp. 151, 155. of this volume for the proof and general admission of this point. recorded in Numb. xi. 33, 34. Because the wicked acknowledged not the quail, that is, the meat with which God had filled his stomach, but, like the ungrateful Israelites, 'crammed and blasphemed his feeder,' (as Milton finely expresseth it,) he shall experience the same punishment with them, and be cut off YTll2rT3, in the midst of his enjoyment, as Moses tells us the people were □v)NS3") liephaim ; there arises from this very circumstance a proof, that the inference which the Bishop would hence deduce, respecting the priority of Moses to the author of this poem, is a false one. For those giants of the old world are instead of *Jt332, read in their MS. MTP33 : for it is remarkable, that the word N23, which they here render ra, irr*ex°,vtt< they have in the 15th verse rendered ttxiai now, ric IxiexovTot and c3, as see Gen. xlv. 18; Esth. viii. 1, 7; and in Esth. vii. 8, they translate iff! by oTxa : therefore it seems not unreasonable to suppose, that they have read the word tttO here; that is, tit for t, and a i inserted. It is to be remarked, however, that, amongst the various meanings ascribed to the passage by commentators, there is not one that gives the smallest countenance to the ren-dering of the word l~v proposed by the Hishop, and on which the whole force of his argument concerning the date of the book depends, (even the pointing of the Masora opposes him : ) nor is there one that gives to that word any other sense than that of quietness, tajety, abundance, enjoyment, all of which spring from the same primary idea ; the Syriac only (with its copy the Arabic) excepted ; which renders the word by mi .) signifying hit Judgment, his condemnation, or his punishment : sec Schaaf's lex. Siir. And how to reconcile any of these senses to the original YTIt, 1 confess myself totally at a loss. 21 .May it be permitted, in transitu, to ask, what possible meaning can be assigned to these two lines ? Is it, that the waters are pierced through, as well as the might)/ deadt And d> their inhabitant* mean the fishes 7 And is it meant, that they are als> pierced through f And what is intended by the waters from beneath t from beneath trinity It should be remarked, that, although in the reference to Scott, which is mentioned above, it seems as if the Hishop had adopted these strange phrases in common with that writer, yet the case is not so ; they have nothing in common but the meaning of the word C3*NB*v The Hishop is original, almost throughout the whole verse, especially in the expression of " the waters from beneath ,-" the Hebrew necessarily requiring (as will appear immediately upon inspection) that the word beneath, whether it be construed in connection with the u\itcrs or not, must precede: that is, if the two words are to be combined, it must be "beneath the waters," just the opposite of his Lordship's collocation. No. 59.— ON THE HISTORY AND THE BOOK OF JOB. 10:5 called by Moses 0^33, Naphilim; and in no one instance by the name of Rephaim, which is here applied. So that if we really have, in this place, an allusion to those giants who lived before the Flood, we must suppose the knowledge of the writer to have been derived from some source different from the writings of Moses : a conclusion, directly the opposite of that which it has been the Bishop's object to establish. His Lordship, indeed, tells us, that he expects not to be called upon " to prove, that the author of the poem derived his knowledge of events from a history of so much notoriety as that of Moses, rather than from oral or any other tradition." But, surely, in facts so notorious as those of the Deluge, and of the existence of those giants and wicked men who preceded it, it cannot be thought too much to demand, that some marked similitude between the accounts given of them by Moses and by any other early writer should be adduced, in proof that either borrowed from the other. At all events, it is clearly too much on the other hand to expect, that this should be conceded, in defiance of a marked dissimilitude, such as has been shewn in the present case to exist. And, after all, even were a resemblance discoverable, the question, Which was the earliest writer? would still remain exactly as before. The Bishop, in truth, on the word Rephaim, is altogether at variance with himself. The phrase " mighty dead," which he here uses for Rephaim, is the same which (after Bishop Lowth) he has employed in Isaiah, xiv. 9, for the same Hebrew word. But the explana- tion of the term which he has there given, he states to have originated with Rosenmiiller, (or rather he should have said with Vitringa, for from him Rosenmiiller has taken it,) and is altogether different from that which he has here borrowed from Scott. His words there are : — " Rephaim, the gigantic spectres. Ghosts are commonly magnified by vulgar terror to a stature superior to the human. Rosenm." — Stock's Isaiah, p. 40. Thus, then, we find, that Ghosts, as such, are magnified by vulgar terror, and may be called Rephaim. And so, the appellation, " mighty dead," or Rephaim, becomes applicable to all the inhabitants of the invisible world. But how then can that, which is represented as a quality of the shades of all dead men, namely, gigantic size, or Rephaism, be considered in this place as designating the spirits only of a particular class of human beings, who, being of actually gigantic stature, had lived before the Flood ? The two expositions meet, with such adverse fronts, that I despair of being able to recon- cile them. " Non nostrum tantas componere lites." It should not be suffered to pass unnoticed, that in the passage of Job, with which we are at present concerned, there occurs, besides the word O^Hn Rephaim, another term of con- siderable moment ; to the true nature and meaning of which the Right Rev. translator has by no means paid that attention, which the office assumed by him demanded. The term I allude to is ^MW Sheol:3* a term in whose signification is involved a question no less important than that of the early belief entertained by the people of the East, con- cerning the existence of the soul after death. With respect to these two important terms, it fortunately happens, that they stand so combined in one part of Scripture as to throw light upon each other, and to leave little 25 It had been well, if tlio Bishop had attended somewhat more to those learned investigations of the import of this and other difficult terms, which are to be found in Mercer, Schultens, Peters, and the other laborious Commentators, I whose cautious researches have only excited his disgust. V>"e should then not find that uncertainty of meaning, which at present attaches to his Lordship's translations of the passages in which such terms occur. The word, in particular, which is here referred to has been rendered by him, in different places, with such variety and such vagueness as to leave the reader altogether ignorant of the sense which the trans- lator conceives most properly to belong to it. Of eight places in which it occurs in the Book of Job, and of ten places in the Prophecy of Isaiah, there is not one, in which the Bish p has taken occasion to give a precise idea of its true signification. S imetimes he calls it "the lower region," (Job, vii. 9 ; xiv. 13 ; xxiv. 19)— at others, " hell," (Job, xi. 8 ; Isai. xiv. 9)— again, " the grave," (Job, xvii. 13, 16; xxi. 13; Isai. v. 14; xiv. 11, 15; xxviii. 15, 18; xxxviii. 10, 18)— again, in the present passage, "the lower world;" and again, (Isai. lvii. 9,) "the lowest pit." Amidst all this variety of appli- cation, not a single glance, that I can discover, has been taken at the radical meaning of the word, except in one pass- ing remark, in a criticism, which is of so extraordinary a nature, that I cannot avoid quoting the whole of it, as it stands. It is a note on Job, xx. 9.—" Wliich beamed on him. 1f]fif». The reader, who shall take the pains to examine the several Hebrew roots commencing with the letter V, will be apt to think with me, that the original sense of by far the greatest part of them, may best be discovered, by divesting them of this same initial letter, which stood in the place of an article or preposition merely. Thus re, the sun, I conceive to be the feeler, who feeleth after and investigateth all things: O^ltf, the heavens, the place of waters, t3">0-W, from which rain, or waters, come; 5MW, the place of the in* nsible, Sheol or Hades. And thus may the verb before us ClVi', be traced to NBl, of which we want an example, but it probably signified to shine, as from it" (that is, from a non existing word, observe.) " is derived |-isi, pitch.'" Surely, such another perfect specimen of adventurous criticism the entire regions of conjecture can scarcely supply. In truth, this is such an exercise of the critical faculty, as, were it in- dulged in, must render the Hebrew Scriptures a perfect nullity, by fastening on them any sense that any guesser might think proper to affix. That the prefix v, as an abbreviation for the relative lew, is not unprecedented, is well known to Hebrew scholars : but, at the same time, this is acknowledged to be a Chaldaism, which, although it is found in the later books of the Old Testament composed about and after the time of the captivity, is denied to have any place in those of earlier production. (See above, p. 154.) What then is to become of all those words beginning with the letter e\ in the several books preceding the captivity, which constitute by much the greater part of the Hebrew Scripture ? Are all those words to be inter- preted by divesting them of the initial », in opposition to the hitherto received opinion, that not more than two or three such words at the most are to be found through the entire range of those early writings ? Then, indeed, it is time to set about a new translation of the whole body of the Old Ten- 1R4 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. doubt remaining upon this most interesting article of Oriental theology. If we look to [saiah, xiv. !), we shall there find, what were the Jewish opinions upon this subject in the days of that prophet. I here subjoin the whole passage, as it is rendered by Bishop Lowth. '• Hades (Sheul) from beneath is moved because of thee to meet thee at thy coming : He rouseth tor thee the mighty dead, (Rephaim) all the great chiefs of the Earth : He maketb to rise up from their thrones all the kings of the nations. All of them shall accost thee, and shall say unto thee : Art thou, even thou too, become weak as we? Art thou made like unto us 1 Is then thy pride brought down to the grave ; the sound of thy sprightly instruments ? Is the vermin become thy couch, and the earth-worm thy covering ? How art thou fallen from heaven, 0 Lucifer, son of the morning I Art cut down to the earth, thou that didst subdue the nations ?" taincnt, since so numerews a class of words have hitherto been altogether misunderstood by every interpreter of Scrip- ture. What, in truth, is to become of the Hebrew language ? The lexicons at present exhibit, as primitives, not fewer than two hundred words commencing with the letter p. Now to pronounce, that " by far the greatest part " of these are com- pounded, and must be divested of that letter in order to discover their true meaning ; leaving it also to the conjecture of the individual to determine which words have the prefix, and which not, is surely neither more nor less than to con- vert the language into mere babble. One would think it scarcely possible to add to the extravagance of this proceed- ing; and yet has this not been done in the criticism referred to, when, in one of the compounds thus fancifully made up, it is admitted that one of its components has no place in the language ? as in the case of i"lB», to shine, of which the Bishop says, " we want an example ; " and truly says so, there being no such word, in that sense, or in any sense approach- ing to it, cither in the Hebrew of the Oil Testament, or in any of the kindred languages, Chaldce, Syriac, or Arabic. But his Lordship adds, that though there it not, yet there " i 1 1 :; insensible. Now it is notorious, that the ward 3IJJ bears, throughout the entire Scripture, no other ■ than that of foolish ; which indeed in the Scripture uso b] l implies wicked; a meaning, surely, sufficiently removed tram that of insensible ; and the more markedly so, as in the primary sense of the word, it signifies not simply folly, but .in activity In folly. There is, indeed, it should he noticed, a source for certain Hebrew words commencing with tp, very different from that wild and arbitrary one devised by the Bishop. The Syriac lias a special conjugation, to which Schultens and Michaelis have given the name of Schaphel, from, the prefixed f being its characteristic, as the ,-| add jffi are the characteristics of the conjugations Hiphil and Htthpahel In the Hebrew. This is seldom used bj the Hebrew in its verbs, but not unfre- qucntly in nouns derived from that conjugation. Here is a legitimate source, and one which in its nature supplies a rule a limitation. See on this Syriac form, Michaelis, Wot Thus then, in like manner as Homer, in his Odj/ssey, sends the souls of the slaughtered wooers to Hades, where they meet with the manes of Achilles, Agamemnon, and other heroes ; so the Hebrew poet, in this pa-saire of inimitable grandeur, describes the king of Babylon, when slain and brought to the grave, as entering Sheol, and there meeting the Bephaim, or manes of the dead, who had descended thither before him, and who are poetically represented as rising from their seats at his approach. And as, on the ono hand, the passage in the Grecian bard has been always held, without any question, to be demonstrative of the existence of a popular belief amongst the Greeks, that there was a place called Hades, which was the receptacle for departed souls ; so this poetic image of Isaiah must be allowed, upon the other, to indicate in like manner, amongst the Jews, the existence of a popular belief that there was a region for departed souls called Sheol, in which the Rephaim or Manes took up their abode.-0 et Epim. p. 195. — also Mich. Gramm. Syr. p. 91. It should he noted that the Schaphel of the Germans should be called Shaphcl with us ; the word being derived from the letter v, which they write seh, and we sh. There is another instance of the application of the new discovery made by the Bishop, respecting words beginning with f, of a nature so extraordinary, and of which his Lord- ship has made so extraordinary a use, that I cannot forbear annexing it to this note. On the verb ~BD in ch. xxxiv. 26, he remarks in the note: " pSD or psc, from infrequent occurrence, is not well understood ; but if, according to my rule, we cast off V, we shall come to a better known verb, pS, to stamper, or to tumble." Now, in the first place (to make no remark on the exercise of fancy with respect to the it', as that is his Lordship's rule,) the word which is described as being from unfrequent occurrence not well understood, is found above a dozen times in the Hebrew Bible, and in such connection as to have caused to the commentatore no doubt about its meaning ; for which it also derives addi- tional confirmation from the kindred languages. And on the other hand, tho word ~S, (or as he should have written it, pIS,) which bis Lordship pronounces to be so much better known, occurs only in three places, with tho possibility of that sense of ttogger, in which we are told it is so familiarly understood ; and even in those places, the Greek and Latin translators do not concur in giving it that sense: so that, in truth, this word, in the application of it, may be considered as involved in some uncertainty, whilst the one which it is conjured up to supplant is involved in none. But we have not done with this discovery yet. The true sense of p£D or pat' is made out, by his Lordship's rule, to signify ttogger or tumble ; and, accordingly it is so rendered by him, in the passage to which this note has been attached. But then tho same word occurs in four other places in the Book of Job, xx. 22 ; xvii. 23 ; xxxiv. ;I7 ; xxxvi. If) ; and in the three first of these, the idea of clapping the hand*, which is the true one, and which the Bishop has rejected in the above criticism, is adopted by him ; and in the fourth, the vague sense of exposure is introduced : whilst the idea of ttogger, which his Lordship has laboured so much and so unjustifiably to esta- blish as the true and proper sense, is completely forgotten. Surely this is too rambling. 88 As the above is a point of considerable moment, and vitally connected with a subject which has excited much controversy and great interest, I must add a few more observations upon the meaning of the two remarkable words with which we aro here concerned. And, in the first instance, the reader may not bo No. 59.— ON THE HISTORY AND THE BOOK OF JOB. 105 The no*t passage to which the Bishop has referred us, (see p. 133,) is found in chap. xxxiv. 20, which in our common version displeased with a compressed statement of what the very learned Vitringa lias given at length upon this head. After admitting, in his remarks on the passage of Isaiah just cited, that tlio word Shed! may lie (though it very rarely is) applied in the sense of grave or sepulchre, he proceeds to argue, that in this sense it cannot have been employed in the passage under discussion ; for that it would be a monstrous abuse of language, to say that the grave stirred up those who were actually dead : and therefore he contends, that the whole passage must be explained, as a poetic fiction, accommodated to the existing opinions of the day, which he holds to have been these : — That the souls of men, when released from the body by death, pass into a vast subter- raneous region, as a common receptacle, but with different mansions, adapted to the different qualities of its inhabitants ; and that here, preserving the shades and resemblances of the living, they rill the same characters they did in life. That this entire region was called by tho Jews Shedl, by the Greeks Hades, and by the Latins Inferi, That these were the notions that commonly prevailed amongst the Jews, he conceives to be fully established by various parts of Scripture ; and to this, he thinks, the history of tho witch of Endor yields confirmation, inasmuch as, let the illusion in that transaction be what it might, it goes to establish, the fact of the opinion which was then vulgarly received. Agreeably to this hypothesis, he contends that various expressions of the patriarchs and prophets are to be explained ; and to this purpose he instances Gen. xxxvii. 35 ; Psalm xvi. 10 ; xxx. 4 ; xciv. 17 ; in all of which, a place where souls, when freed from the body, were assembled, still preserving all their faculties, is, as he thinks, plainly supposed. From the Hebrews he conceives that this opinion passed to other people, and became disfigured by various fictions of their respective invention. Thus tho doctrine of the Egyptians respecting Hades is given in the second book of Herodotus ; where we have the history of Rhampsinitus, who, according to the traditions of the Egyptians, had visited the infernal regions, and returned safe to life. The notion, he says, was variously embellished by the Greek poets ; and afterwards, being stripped by Plato of much of its poetic ornaments, was embodied by him in his philosophical system. Hence, again, the Latins, and the nations at large, derived their phraseology in speaking of the state of the dead ; for instances of which phraseology he refers to Velleius, Livy, Florus, and others. The learned writer then proceeds to the Rephaim, who are here described by Isaiah, as raised from their seats by Sliedl, on the approach of the King of Babylon ; and who must conse- quently be the shades or manes by which Shedl is inhabited. But wherefore denominated Rephaim ? By this word, he says, it appears indisputably from Isaiah, xxiv. 14, compared with this passage, must be meant the souls of the deceased. But at the same time, he observes, it appears no less indisputably from Gen. xiv. 5, and Deut. iii. 11, that the same word is employed to designate a people of gigantic stature among the Canaanites ; and it is accordingly almost every where rendered " giants" by the LXX and Vulgate. How to reconcile these two senses, which appear so very different, has been a difficulty with com- mentators. But this difficulty, he says, will be removed, if wo attend to the notion which has vulgarly prevailed concerning ghosts or manes ; that they appear of a stature greater than human : and hence our author thinks, that the word which originally denoted the shades of the departed, came to be trans- ferred to denote men of a gigantic bulk ; and so became finally an appellation for both. See Vitringa in Isa. torn. i. pp. 432, 433. I find that Cocceius explains the application of the term Rephaim to the giants in Canaan, on the same principle, though not so explicitly, as Vitringa. His words are, " possit videri, eos" (gigantes, scil.) " ita appellatos, quod tanquam manes et spectra inter homines versarentur." The word itself he derives originally from nB">, resolvere ; or as the LXX ■srx^aXvarQxi, ixXCia-Bai ; and its primary meaning he considers to be " resoluti mortui in pulverem redacti" — hence manes. Michaelis has, in a way that appears not equally satisfactory, endeavoured to account for the application of tho 6aruo term Rephaim to giants stands thus : "In a moment shall they die, and the people shall he troubled at midnight, and pass away ; and the mighty shall be taken and ghosts, on the idea of the dark caverns inhabited by the former. — See Kot. et Epim. pp. 28, 29. The very learned and ingenious examination of tho terms Shedl and Rephaim, by Peters, (from p. 318, to 31)2,) merits particular attention. Shedl he distinguishes into two partB, tho upper and the lower, in the latter of which ho places the resi- dence of the wicked spirits ; and to this class he applies the term Rephaim, as being giants in impiety. In this point, how- ever, I apprehend he has carried the matter too far ; for the giants in impiety to whom he primarily alludes, are those monstrous defiers of God's authority who lived before the Flood, and were overwhelmed by the Almighty for their enormous wickedness : and from these it is that he transfers tho term Rephaim, to the shades of all such as had been mighty in violence and crimes. But in doing this, he has fallen into the same error which I have noticed in Bishop Stock and others; namely, that of supposing Rephaim to have been the name of those heaven-defying giants that lived before the Flood ; whereas, as was shewn in p. 102, they had no such name ; being known only by that of Nephilim. Peters, indeed, appears to me also to have followed the clue of interpretation, with respect to the term Rephaim, in a wrong direction altogether, by transferring the word from the primary signification of giants to the secon- dary one of shades ,• whereas 1 have little doubt that it was first the proper appellation of the latter, and thence extended to tho former, in the manner suggested by Vitringa. At the same time I agree with Peters and with Scliultens, that the word is sometimes taken in an unfavourable sense, so as to particularize the souls of the wicked. This, I think, is manifest from Prov. ix. 18 ; xxi. 16. And I would in tho following manner explain the various acceptations of the word, which I have not been able to find has yet been satisfactorily done by any author. From the verb nsi, signifying resolvere, I derive, with Cocceius, the word q,,n,S"i, resolutis which, applied to human beings, denotes that they are reduced to their first elements by dissolution. Rephaim, therefore, implies the deceased, in that separated condition of the component parts of their nature which is produced by death : and as the bodily part moulders into dust and becomes insensible, it is consequently applied to that active principle, which retains the consciousness, and con- tinues, as it were, the existence of the man. Rephaim, then, imports men in that state to which they are brought, when reduced by dissolution to the simple and essential element, the soul ; and thence has been used to signify the ghosts of the deceased. These, again, being clothed by the imaginations of the living in certain airy shapes, and magnified through terror to gigantic stature, in process of time lent their name to men of great and terrific bulk ; and hence the appellation passed to giants, and became the denomination of certain classes of that description in Canaan. Again, these Rephaim of the Canaanites, being distinguished amongst a people who were all odious for their crimes, and as such pronounced to be an abomination to the Lord, the idea of great wickedness, so strongly associated with the name, was by degrees reflected back upon the primitive term; so that Rephaim, as applied to the souls of the dead, came at length to imply also specially the souls of the guilty dead. Thus Rephaim becomes properly capable of these three senses. Ghosts, Giants, and Ghosts of the wicked. Again, as to the origin of the word trntv Shedl, signifying, as we have seen, the region allotted to the residence of the RepJiaim, or shades of the departed, it has been best derived from the verb ?tW, qua-sivit, postulavit, indicating its insatiable craving ; a character which we find particularly attached to it in several parts of Scripture — see Isai. v. 14; Habak. ii. 5; Prov. xxvii. 20 ; xxx. 16. At the same time I confess, I cannot but think, that there has been overlooked by the Critics a particular acceptation of the word ~nv, which would more adequately convey the true character and nature of Sliedl. The verb is known not only to signify, to demand, or crave, but to demand, or crave as a loan ,■ and therefore implies that what is sought for is to be rendered back. In this view of the case, Shedl is to be understood, not simply as the region of departed 166 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. away without hand." On this passage his Lordship makes the following observations, — " The Midden death here described, its hap- pening at midnight, the trepidation of the people, the removal of the strong ones to the other world by an invisible hand; what are all these hut the circumstances recorded by .Moses in Exodus, xii. 29, of the destruction of the first-horn of the Egyptians? Pharaoh likewise is the king, to whom God is said just before to have given the title of Belial. We have here of course another proof, that the spirits, but as the region which is to form their temporary residence, and from which they are at some future time to be rendered up ; thus indicating an intermediate state of the soul, between its departure from this world, and some future stage of its existence. This particular acceptation of the word re- ceives countenance in this passage of Job, especially from the rendering of the LXX and the C'haldee, with which our com- mon version corresponds. The word iS^irlV the former renders by uxia8y,ffoiTai, (from /ik/x, obstetrix,) shall be brought forth ; and the latter by a word signifying regencrabuntur — shall be born again : both evidently explaining the Hebrew word SVn or Sin, in reference to the ]/ains of bringing forth ,- and signify- ing, that the Rephaim were to be rendered up from the place of their residence, and, as it were, born again into some new state of existence. Codurcus also, I find, in his explanation of Shedl, describes the notion entertained of it by the Jews thus : " 'jfliflPi purgatorii locum existimant, ex quo redduntur superis anima\ exantlatis quibus erant obnoxiac pcenis." (Crit. Sacr. torn. iii. p. 331)1.) Windet also mentions, that to the Sheol of the Hebrews, corresponds the Amenthes of the Egyptians, which Plutarch, comparing it with the Hades of the Greeks, expounds by t'ov ?.a,u.Sav»vT« %?.$ hlSovrix., in his book of Isis and Osiris. {De vita functorum statu, p. 24; also Peters, p. 320.) Windet likewise informs us, that the Jews hold Gehenna, or the place of perdition, to be the lowest part of Sheol, the general receptacle of departed souls : and that in order to express the great depth, to which they conceive it to be sunk, they are used to describe it as beneath the waters: their idea being, that the waters are placed below the earth, and that the earth floats upon them like a ship. {De vita func- torum statu, pp. 242, 243.) Tartarus, in like manner, he says, i.p. 245,) the Greeks made the lowest part of Hades. On the Jewish notions of Sheol, compared with the Greek notions of Hades, I would refer the reader to the entire of the last-named work; to Peters's Crit. Diss, as before noticed ; to Bishop Lowth's Lectures, vol. i. pp. 156—106. (Greg, edit) and Mr Henley's note in ditto, p. 213; to Mich. Kot. el Epim. pp. 27, 28 ; and to Hishop Ilorsley's Ilosea, pp. 46, 157—160, £00, 2(11. He may consult also with advantage the Sermon of this last writer, upon Christ's descent into Sheol: and upon tin- same subject he will find a good discourse by Johnson of Cranbrook, in the second volume of his Sermons. Were 1 now. upon the whole, to offer my own rendering of the passage in Job out of which this long discussion has arisen, 1 would venturo the following: — The souls of the dead tremble ; I 'laces] below the waters, and their inhabitants. The seat of spirits is naked before him ; And the region of destruction hath no covering. Here I take the " souh of the dead," and the " inhabitants of the places below the (abyss of) witters," to bear to each other the same proportion, that is found, in the next verse, to subsist between the " seat of spirits," and the " region of destruction :" of the dead who were sunk in the lowest parts of Sheol being placed In the " region Of destruction," or the Gehenna of the later Jews. So that the passage, on the whole, conveys this, — that nothing is. or can be concealed from the all-seeing eye of God ; that the souls of the dead tremble under his view, and the shades of the wicked, sunk to the bottom of the abyse, '*, in such a manner, as to imply the passing on of the destroying angel, as described by Moses. In doing so, he has undoubtedly improved the resemblance to the account of the transaction in Exodus. But to make this point out, he is compelled either to violate grammar, or to pluralize the angel. These things, however, avail nothing, as the hypothesis must be supported. Warbnrton, with the same resolute determina- tion to modernize Job, discovers, in the passage before us, not only the transaction in Egypt, but also another of a nature entirely different. The words, he says, " plainly refer to the destruction of the first-born in Egypt, and Sennacherib's army ravaging Judea." — Div. Leg. vol. ii. p. 498. What now becomes of that appropriate term, " midnight," which, with the Bishop, singled out the transaction in Egypt from every other ; and of that other significant word, insy. "pass through," which has so completely satisfied Heath, that no other than that transac- tion could have been intended, — neither of these words being found in the history of the destruction of Sennacherib's army ? Codurcus has, with true propriety and good sense, suggested the use which is to be made of the two events alluded to by Warbnrton ; namely, that they are facts, to which the mind U naturally led, as tending to exemplify and confirm the observa- tion on the ways of Providence, which is laid down in this part of Job ; and that had these events taken place before the composition of the poem, it would not be unnatural to suppose that the writer had them, with others of the same kind, in his view. These are the reflections of a sober judgment, which, it were much to be wished, was more frequently to be met with in our commentators and translators. I should mention, indeed, that Holden and Scott have taken the same judicious view of the subject. To prove how wide in its application this passage in Job has been found, I shall add only one instance more of its appropriation. The Chaldee has discovered in it an allusion to " the destruction of Sodom." 28 His Lordship has here created a difficulty against himself. For, as was stated above, were Pharaoh supposed to be in this place intended under the title of llelial, this would disprove tho Bishop's position, that the writer alludes to the history in No. 59.— ON THE HISTORY AND THE BOOK OF JOB. 107 Again, as his Lordship reminds us, and with the additional emphasis of italics, the passage in Job describes those who were taken away, as " the strong ones.'" Now what does Moses tell us? That, " the Lord smote all the first- born in the land of Egypt, from the first-born of Pharaoh that sat on his throne, unto the first-born of the captive that was in the dungeon ; and all the first-born of the cattle." In other words, he informs us, that the first- born, of both man ami beast, was indiscrimi- nately destroyed ; and this, the Bishop thinks, is significantly conveyed by the phrase strong ones, or rather (as our common version more properly reads) the mighty. But, again, his Lordship sees plainly in "the invisible hand," (or, as he himself renders it, and as it ought to be rendered, without hand,) a marked proof of the allusion in this part of Job to Moses. To this it may safely be replied, that the proof is as invisible as the hand ; for nothing corresponding to this phrase is to be found in the language of Moses. In short, if one were seeking arguments to prove that the writer of the Book of Job had not, in this place, his eye fixed upon the record of the transaction in Egypt which has been left by Moses, he would naturally select most of those very circumstances on which the Bishop seems so firmly to rely. For it must be remembered, that his Lordship is not con- tent to say, that the writer of the Book of Job refers to facts, which are related also by Moses ; but he contends, particularly, that he must have derived his knowledge of those facts from the very accounts which Moses had given of them in his writings: — facts, he observes, not being usually referred to before the history recording them has had time to obtain currency ; and the author of Job being, consequently, indebted to the history of Moses Exodus. But that Pharaoh is intended here, there is not the slightest ground to imagine. In this I will be judged even by the Bishop's own translation : " Shall even the hater of justice give laws ? And wilt thou condemn the eminently just One ? Who saith unto a king, Thou art Belial ! Ye are wicked ! unto princes : Who accepteth not the persons of nobles, Neither is the rich man," &c. Now where is Pharaoh ? Is it in the word Belial ? That name was never given to him. But he deserved such a name. Why? Is it because Belial implies wickedness? and was Pharaoh the only wicked king ? AVe might also demand to be informed who were those " Princes of Pharaoh's court," who are at the same time denominated wicked. In truth, the Bishop's argument might, on the whole, be put thus : Pharaoh, it is true, is not by Moses called Belial, but he ought to have been so called by him, and therefore we may consider him as actually having been so called. Again ; Pharaoh is not named here, but as the word Belial is used, which denotes wickedness, Pharaoh ought to have been named, and therefore we may consider him as having been actually named. Really this is too extravagant. — N.B. The word Sj^Vs Bdial,m simply signi- fies worthless, wicked, &%{Uof, nequam ■ from 72 non, and T}i profuit. for his knowledge of such facts as have been adverted to by both. See p. 154. But, in truth, not only is it manifest, that the writer of Job has not, in the passage before us, referred to the Mosaic account of the destruction of the first-born in Egypt, but there appears no reasonable ground for sup- posing that he meant to allude to that transac- tion at all. This will be best seen by a perusal of the entire passage in Job, as it is given in the common version, and here subjoined.29 29 " Shall even he that hateth right govern 1 And wilt thou condemn him that is in^st just ? /*• it fit to say to a King, Thou art wicked ? And to Princes, Ye are ungodly ? How much less to him that accepteth not the persons of princes, Nor regardeth the rich more than the poor ? For they are all the work of his hands. In a moment shall they die ; And the people shall be troubled at midnight, and pass away, And the mighty shall be taken away without hand. For his eyes are upon the ways of man, And he seeth all his goings. There is no darkness nor shadow of death, Where the workers of iniquity may hide themselves. For he will not lay upon man more than right ; That he should enter into judgment with God. He shall break in pieces mighty men without number. And set others in their stead. Therefore he knoweth their works, And he overturneth them in the night, So that they are destroyed. lie striketh them as wicked men, In the open sight of others : Because they turned back from him, And would not consider any of his ways. So that they cause the cry of the poor to come unto him ; And he heareth the cry of the afflicted." I cannot deny myself the pleasure of introducing, in this place, to the reader's acquaintance, a translator of the Bo k of Job, in the person of a young lady ; who, adorned with all the accomplishments which distinguish her own sex, devoted herself, at the age of fifteen, to studies the most serious and intense, that are accustomed to occupy the attention of the other: and this, with such surprising success, that although self-taught, and nearly deprived of the benefit of books, she left behind her, at the expiration of her twenty-ninth year, a numerous collection of writings, so various and so valuable, as may well make many a literary man look back with a blush upon the labours of a lengthened life. See Fragments in Prose and Verse, by a young Lady. Miss Smith's translation of the Book of Job, for which she had qualified herself by a close study of the Arabic and Hebrew, was completed before her twenty-sixth year, two years earlier than the date of the translation by the Bishop of Killala. It is at this time well known to the public, by a neat edition of the work, which has, since the date of the above observations, been given by Dr Randolph, who has enhanced its value by a variety of judicious critical observations. I annex this lady's version of the passage above referred to, as it may be to many a matter of curiosity to compare with our received translation any part of so extraordinary a production. Shall he who hateth right govern ? And wilt thou condemn him, who aboundeth in justice ? Who saith to the King, Thou art unprofitable ; Wicked, to the Nobles : Who lifteth not up the faces of Princes, Nor turneth away from the cry of the Poor, For they are all the work of his hands. In a moment they shall die; At midnight the people shall tremble, and pass away. And the mighty shall be removed without hand. 168 M A G E E o X T H E ATONE M E N T. Now what is there lure, to lead us to the destruction of the first-born in Iyiryj>t ? Surely, if this were intended, BOme of the man; extra- ordinary circumstances of so extraordinary a transaction would have been glanced at — the slaying of the lamb — the blood sprinkled upon tlic door-posts — the destroying angel — the preservation of the Hebrews, &c. < >n the eon t ran , the great power and impartial justice of God, in visiting, with sudden destruction, all, whether people or princes, whose crimes demand vengeance, seems to be the main thing insisted upon, without any discrimi- nating characters to bind down this judicial e\crci>e of his power to any one particular event. As to the circumstance of the destruc- tion being wrought " at midnight," or, as it is again more generally stated, "in the night," it seems to connect with the idea, that " the workers of iniquity" could, as they imagined, "hide themselves," in the "darkness" and privacy of the night. Grey and Schultens, accordingly, explain the phrase of night or midnight, " in securitate profundissima." The paraphrase of Calvin upon this passage seems to give the justest notion of it. " Non opus erit, ut Deus multos milites armet, &c. ad potentissimos et robustissimos evertendos : si modo insufflet, parvi et magni, puncto tempo- ris, rapientur, et media nocte quum omnes quiescunt atque nihil minus expectant, exter- For his eyes are on the ways of man, And he seetli all his steps. There is no darkness, and no shade of death, To conceal the workers of iniquity. For on no man hath it yet hcen put, To walk with Gud in judgment. He hreaketh the mighty — they cannot be found; And setteth up others in their stead. Because he knoweth their works, Tiny are overturned in the night — they arc crushed. He striketh them like culprits, In the place of beholders. Because they turned from behind him, And would nut follow all his ways. Bringing before him the cry of the poor ; And he heard the cry of tho oppressed. On a comparison with the original, this will be found more faithful in many parts than the received version. Particularly, in that very difficult passage in the lHth and 19th verses, in which the latter demands so large an ellipsis as is found in italics in the common Bible, our fair translator has, by a close adhe- rence to the original, given excellent sense to the whole. She wag DOt aware that she coincided with high authorities in giving this turn to the original. (See Schnurrer, DitserL PAS. p. 879.) •■ Ilium, ipii regem adeo compellat bominem ncquam ; viros primarloi, improbos? Non respicit prindpes," &c. &c. The I. XX and Vulg. render it in like manner " qui elicit ;" and one MS. of !>'• RomPs reads IBINfl, filing it in this sense The 23d . too, — the difficulty of which is so great, that Schultens has reckoned up nineteen different meanings assigned to it. whilst Bohnurrer baa added several others, (p. 280,)— in which also our common version makes out the sense bj an ellipsis, and Itishop Stock, by introducing a change in the original text, (supposing T1S to be put for Sl» — we have, here, rendered naturally as to the context, and simply and accurately as to the original, without supposing any change in the text, or putting minabuntur ; sine maim hominis auxiliove ; quin sine conatu ant molimine ullo." Span- heim, in his History of Ji>6, gives the same explanation. Minister, Vatablus, Clarius, Drusius, Patrick, Holden, Scott, and Dathe, likewise concur in this view of the case. Upon the whole it must be clear to every unpreju- diced reader, that nothing but the creative eye of an hypothesis could have discovered, in this passage of Job, the appropriate mark of time which the Bishop and Heath have descried in it. We pass on, then, to the next and only remaining allusion to the books of Moses ; which, his lordship informs us, is to be found in chap. xxxi. 33, compared with Gen. iii. 8, 12. The words in Job are, " If I covered my transgressions, as Adam, by hiding mine ini- quity in my bosom." Now, independently of the probability, that the general outline of the story of Adam's transgression had been handed down so as to be generally known to those who lived near the patriarchal age, — it must be observed, that this translation is by no means generally acquiesced in, either by the ancient or by the modern interpreters of Job. The Arabic and Syriac render the phrase DltfD, generally, "as men." The LXX render, or rather paraphrase it, xxovaico;, " in- voluntarily," or through the infirmity which belongs to man :x — the Vulgate, "quasi homo," any forco upon the words. The sense of the entire passage may, agreeably to this translation, be now thus unfolded: — The wicked are at once and suddenly punished ; inasmuch as no darkness can conceal them from the all-seeing eye ; and as it has not been allotted to man to enter into judgment, and discuss the right of the case with his God, so, without the delay of any judicial process, he breaketh the mighty at once, because with- out any such form of judicial discussion " he knoweth their works," &c. A marginal reading on the 24th verse in the com- mon Bible goes to strengthen this interpretation, " without searching out," exactly expressing the absence of that formal and inquisitorial examination which the omniscience of the Deity renders unnecessary. Perhaps Miss Smith meant this by the words " no search," which she has added as another ren- dering for that which she has paraphrased by the expression, " they cannot be found." There is another line in the above extract from this lady's version which deserves to be noticed. " Nor turneth away from the cry of the poor," (verse 19.) Here the word Wnt, which in the common translation is rendered " the rich," has been taken in its ordinary and familiar acceptation, " cry ;" and 1 rind that Pagninus, in his version of the passage, has used it in the same sense. To render the original exactly, then, according to this meaning of the term, it would be, " Nor turneth away from the cry at the face of the poor." " The cry a( Qiefiux 0/the poor," for " the cry of the poor," certainly appears a harsh construc- tion, but yet is not irreconeilcalile with the Hebrew idiom. The parallelism in the 19th verse is undoubtedly better preserved by this translation than by the common one: the poor in the second line being contrasted with the princes in tho first ; whereas, in the usual way of rendering, (pe being taken to signify the rich,) the same description of persons that are spoken of in the first line are again introduced into the second, so as to disturb the simplicity of the contrast, by naming twice over one of the sub- .ii-eis of the opposition. 30 Sec p. ill for this senso of axeucriuc, as used by the LXX. l-o, In addition to what is there said, the remarks of Fischer in his Cinris Reliquiarum Veriionwn Oreecarum, itc. pp. 219 — 222; Velthuaen, Comment. Theol, torn. iv. No. 59.— ON THE HISTORY AND THE HOOK OF JOB. 109 — Pagninus, in like manner, " ut homo," — J. Tr. and Pise. " more hominmn," — Mercer, "sicut homines," — Tindal, "before men," — Dathe, " more humano," and subjoins to his translation the following remark : " Many interpreters think that Q1N is here the pro- per name of the first man. But since, in the whole Book of Job, there is no one evident allusion to the sacred history, I rather agree with those, who render the word DIND, 'as men,' ' after the manner of men.' " a I have enumerated these opinions, not because I think that the common version "As Adam," ought to be rejected, but for the pur- pose of shewing how little reason there is for pronouncing with confidence, — so as to build upon it any argument as to the time of the writer, — that such must be the sense. It is remarkable that all the early interpreters render the word otherwise. At the same time I cannot but confess that it appears to me to be a natural and just translation. And I will add, that there is introduced in the same verse, another expression, on which the bishop, had he noticed it, might have laid some stress in furtherance of the argument he has advanced. *QniL 32 has for its root 82TI, the 31 Mis3 Smith's translation of the word has rus into a freedom which seems not justified by the original — " as a mean man." For this no authority is adduced. The word OIK is undoubt- edly to be rendered in this sense in Isa. ii. 9. But Vitringa well remarks upon that place, that when the words v)>tt and aw occur contrasted in the same sentence, the former signifies a man of dignity and note, the other a person of meaner condition. There is no passage, I believe, in the Old Testament, in which, without such a contrast implied in the sentence, the word is confined to the import which has here been given to it by Miss Smith. 32 This is commonly rendered " in my bosom." I am con- vinced that it should be rendered " in my lurking-place," and that the whole verse should be thus translated : — " Did I cover, like Adam, my transgression, By hiding, in my lurking-place, mine iniquity." I agree also with Peters, (pref. p. viii.) that this contains a reference to the history of the first man, and his endeavours to hide himself after his transgression. But when he joins with these words, and as part of the same sentence, " because I feared a great multitude, or the contempt of families terrified me," I think he joins together incongruous ideas ; for Job would in no degree have resembled Adam in hiding his transgression, had it been done through the fear of men, and to avoid the contempt of families, there being none such for Adam to fear. So that I cannot but wonder that so perspicacious a writer could have been led into such confusion. The Bishop of Killalla, in his translation, has fallen into the same mistake. Miss Smith has marked the true spirit of the oonnection, — " Then let me be terrified," &c. The translation of the following verse, as it has been given by the bishop, I cannot avoid annexing, on account of a singularity in the version which I believe is scarcely to be paralleled. " Because I dreaded the great multitude, And the buz of families scared me," &c. I need not say that the word buz is peculiar to this version. The original expression signifies simply and plainly contempt, and is so rendered by all. Why then buz ? The reader will be sur- prised to learn that this is the very word in Hebrew put into the English character; 113, buz. This translation is certainly literal in the most literal sense of the word. But is it not too same that is used in Gen. iii. 8, 10, to describe the hiding of our first parents from the pre- sence of God. But yet, even tins must be admitted to form a very slight ground of inference, in supposing the passage in Genesis to have been referred to by the writer of Job ; especially when it is considered, that the idea much to pursue such exactness, so as to allow the meaning alto- gether to escape ? This is not the only instance afforded us by the bishop, of this new species of literal translation, which is effected merely by an alteration of the character in which the original word is written, and so giving a Hebrew word in an English type. Another striking one is supplied in ch. iv. 10, and repeated in ch. x. 16 ; xxviii. 8, in all which places wo find the word 5TW, Shachal, which has been by other interpreters rendered a lion, con- veyed to us by the bishop under the term jackal — a change of the sense for which no conceivable reason can be assigned but the sameness of sound, the word jackal, or schakal, (the name being thus indifferently written by English zoologists, from the French chacaZ,) coinciding exactly with the Hebrew. It is not, indeed, without reason that the word ~y\z: thoghal, has been considered as denoting that species of fox which is called the jackal, as may be seen in Parkhurst, who has some good observations on the word ; and as it is used by Geddes in his transla/ion of Judges, xv. 4, concerning the foxes said to be caught by Samson. But 'Sic, the word with which we are con- cerned, has, I am confident, never been so rendered by any writer but Bishop Stock ; and in using the word jackal, in the several passages above mentioned, the English reader will be immediately aware, on the bare perusal, how miserably the sense is degraded. But still more so will he find it in those other parts of Scripture where this word is to be met with, viz. Psal. xci. 13 ; Prov. xxvi. 13 ; Hos. v. 14 ; xiii. 7 ; — in all of which a fierce and powerful animal is manifestly intended. When the slothful man through pretended terror is made to exclaim, " There is a lion in the way;" what will be thought of the change that makes him cry out, " There is a jackal in the way ?" Bishop Pocock and Primate Newcome have both justly re- marked on the word ~rw in Hos. v. 14, that it undoubtedly signifies a species of lion; and the latter has well explained the word in agreement with Bochart, " brw, Leo niger, for nrro; the 5 and 1 being often exchanged in the Eastern languages." [N.B. On the first of the three texts in Job above cited, there is a judicious criticism made by Pilkington (in his Remarks, p. 183) with respect to the true pointing of the place, which I have not seen noticed by any translator of Job, and which ought not to be overlooked.] Having noticed Bishop Stock's treatment of that noble animal the lion, in reducing him (under the term 5rw) to the low estate of the jackal, I cannot avoid adverting to another attack made by him upon the same animal, (under the term nyrri',) in the third of the texts already referred to. In the common version of Job, xxviii. 8, we have, " the lion's whelps have not trodden it, nor the fierce lion passed by it." In the bishop's rendering, " The sons of the splitter tread it not, neither passeth over it the jackal." Will not the reader exclaim, " Hyperion to a Satyr !" But now, to discover what is meant by " sons of the splitter,'' or how such an expression could come to be substituted for " the lion's whelps," must surely be left to (Edipus himself, did not his lordship step in to relieve us from our difficulty, by a trans- lation of his translation, in the following note: " The splitter.' The lion, who splilteth his prey in sunder." His lordship then proceeds to explain how the word comes to signify the splitter. The word mttW, he writes .-ti'n~ii', who iplitteth ; and so, he observes, we have another instance of the mode of tracing the meaning of words that commence with v> ; — a mode to which I have already directed the reader's attention in the note p. 163. To the instances there enumerated of the application of this strange and fanciful rule, he will be pleased to annex this new specimen of its use, which has changed " the whelps of the lion" into " the sons of the splitter !" N.B. " The daughters of screeching" (Stock's Job, xxx. 2!)) seem fit companions for these " sons of the splitter." 170 M A GEE ON THE A T O N E M E N T. of hiding or concealing, is conveyed, in tho same verso, in two other words, HDD and T31D ; bo that when the same idea was again to be expressed, Mime third term would natu- rally be employed. Besides, independently of tins consideration, the mere use of so common a word, and one which lias heon so frequently employed throughout the poem, could of itself prove nothing. We have now seen the full amount of the proofs by which the Bishop of Killalla per- suades himself that he has established the priority of the writings of Moses to the Book of Job. And whether those " notes of time," which (he adds) " have escaped the diligence of all preceding33 critics," be sufficient to justify the inference so confidently drawn, "that the writer of Job was junior to the Jewish legislator," must be left to the reader to decide. Indeed, were the utmost that the bishop desires conceded to his arguments ; even allowing his lordship's flight of quails, and the destruction of the first-born in Egypt, to hold good ; the poem would not thereby, of necessity, be brought lower than the time of Moses ; but might still, consistently with this admission, have been composed during the sojourning of the Israelites in the wilder- ness ; which (it should be observed) is one branch of the hypothesis which supports the antiquity of the poem. See above, page 157. And yet his lordship is not content with inferring from the fore-mentioned supposed allusions, that the writer of Job was junior to Muses, but would also deduce from them the likelihood of his having been "junior by some time." But since the quail cannot be maintained ; since the mere word night, or midnight, is insufficient to designate the destruction of the first-born in Egypt; since the facts of the existence of giants before the Flood (even supposing such to have been inten- ded by the Rephaim of Job,) and of Adam's transgression and his endeavour to conceal it (supposing these also to have been alluded to,) 33 Of the four " notc9 of time" that have heen discussed, there is but une (that which is founded on the bishop's novel transla- tion, quails) that ha9 not been again and again adverted to, by different writers, as supplying some ground for questioning the antiquity of the Book of Job, and as often either abandoned or confuted. The same is to be said of the other notes of time Which Ins lordship has advanced, with the exception of that one which relates to the history of David, on which more hereafter. The assertion, however, which his lordship has made as to these notes of time having escaped the diligence of preceding critics, is easily explained by the statement which accompanies it, namely, that his lordship declined the trouble of acquainting bJnuelf with "hat preceding critics had written. This offers, at the same time, no very satisfactory justification of the fact of old wares being put forward for new. The general reader would naturally, from his lordship's language, have inferred, that new proofs were now adduced of the lateness of Job, and, from faith in his lordship's authority, might imagine that these proofs were more potent than any that had gone before ; but he would little expect to find in them nothing but the shreds and refuse of former hackneyed criticisms and exploded conjectures. must have been known even to the latest date of the patriarchal age by tradition ::M it seems plainly to follow, that the "sandy foun- dation," on which the bishop conceives the opinion of the antiquity of this poem to be built, belongs rather to another structure, which his lordship has, by his own confession, a little too hastily thrown up. On the three remaining marks of time it cannot be necessary to dwell. The reader will be easily satisfied upon the bare perusal of the passages referred to, even in the bishop's own translation of them, that they contain no indications whatever of that reduced date which he ascribes to this book. The inference from ch. xxxiii. 23, x which would bring it 34 The great distance of time from Adam creates no difficulty respecting Job's knowledge of the transaction of the Fall. It should be remembered that the patriarchal longevity diminishes the effect of that distance. In fact, we can connect Adam and Abraham by two intervening links, Methuselah and Shem : Methuselah connecting Adam and Shem, as having lived con- currently with part of the lives of both ; and Shem again, in like manner, connecting Methuselah and Abraham. The his- tory need then have passed but through three steps to reach Abraham from Adam, and so would naturally spread through the several branches of the Abrahamic family ; from which, and not remotely, the three friends of Job, and Job himself, are supposed to have been descended. Blair gives the lives of the four patriarchs above named, so as to make it appear that Methuselah was 253 years old at the death of Adam ; Shem, !>7 years old at the death of Methuselah ; and Abraham, 150 years old at the death of Shem. 35 It is whimsical enough, that the writers who are desirous to reduce the antiquity of the Book of Job discover, in the same passages, resemblances to events entirely different. Bishop Stock sees clearly, in the above passage, an allusion to the de- stroying and interceding angels in the time of David, described in 2 Sam. xxiv. 1G, and 1 Chron. xxi .15. WarbortOO discerns in it *' a most circumstantial account of God's dealing with Ilezekiah, as it is told in the Books of Chronicles and Kings," (Dii: Leg. vol. ii. p. 497.) And Heath, again, pronounces of it, that it " so plainly describes the case of Ilezekiah, when he fell sick, and the prophet Isaiah came to him with messages from God, that it is hardly possible to apply it (Aha wise." That the application so strenuously contended for by the two last writers is altogether inadmissible, has been decisively shewn by Peters, in his Crit. Diss. pp. 35, 36. Were objects of allusion to bo curiously sought after among the events recorded in sacred his- tory, the intended sacrifice of Isaac might perhaps be thought an object of reference not less likely than any that has been assigned. But, in truth, of all that have been suggested by any supposed resemblance, none has been more unhappily selected than that which the bishop has imagined, and in which I verily believe he has not been anticipated by any preceding critic. The perusal of the passage in Job, and of the history to which his lord- ship refers, will be at once sufficient to prove, not only that they do not correspond, but that they are actually repugnant. Vet his lordship speaks with full confidence of the conclusion derived from this reference : " Here," he says, " is a remarkable pas- sage, well worthy of the attention of critics, who wish to ascertain the much disputed point, the date of the poem before us;" and he proceeds to point out the precise fact, to which the allusion here is made, " that of the destroying angel seen by David in the act of inflicting a plague upon Jerusalem, and commanded to stay his hand in consequence of the atonement which the interceding amid ordered King David, by the prophet Gad, to offer unto God ;" and the correspondence, of course, is made to consist in there being an interceding and a destroying angel found both in the history and in the poem. Now, it unfortunately hap- pens that it is not quite clear that there is an angel spoken of in the poem at all ; but, admitting that there bo, it appears that we have then in this place an interceding angel only, and no No. 59.— ON THE HISTORY AND THE BOOK OF JOB. 171 down to the time of David, is, as maybe seen in the note below, too shadowy to bear the touch : and the supposed allusions to events belonging to the age of the captivity, in chap- ters xxi. and xxxvi.thc bishop himself admits to be so faint as not to bo very confidently relied on. And yet, strange to say, after making this admission, and consequently relinquishing the only pretence that existed for reducing the poem lower than the age of David, he yet speaks of these very passages, as " adding strength to the sentiment of those learned men, who have been inclined to give the honour of this celebrated composition to Ezra." That is, he abandons the premises, and at the same time holds to the conclusion : — and this, too, a conclusion, which the most ingenious critics, who have ever undertaken its support, have failed in their endeavours to maintain. It certainly seems strange, that an hypo- thesis, which reduces the date of this book to the times of the Babylonish captivity, and which ascribes the production of so sublime a poem to such a writer as Ezra, should, after having been so completely exploded, be at this day revived ; revived, too, in the face of the triumphant arguments of Grey, Peters, Lowth, and Michaelis : and without any one reason advanced for its support, or any one argument against any of the numerous and powerful objections which those writers have brought against it. All the various ingenuity and erudition of aWarburton had beenpressed into the service of this hypothesis ; all had been employed to deck out a system for its support. A machinery was contrived ; an allegory was dressed up ; an assemblage of imposing circumstances imagined ; an end devised ; means suited to that end dexterously adapted ; and the reader's curiosity was at least excited and amused, if his judgment was not convinced. But now, after all this machinery has been broken up ; after this engaging allegory, with all its plausible ac- companiments, has been proved to be but a splendid vision, a baseless fabric, the mere dream of a luxuriant and uncontrolled ima- gination,— one of those that issue from the ivory gate, — is it not too much to be called upon by a cold, dull, and cheerless ipse dixit, to replace the fragments of the shattered struc- ture, to embrace the visionary theory as an established truth, and to surrender to the unsupported assertions of Bishop Stock, what had been refused to the learned and subtle destroying one ; and that in the history we have a destroying angel, and no interceding one, — that is, the poem and the his- tory are directly opposite in their characteristic features. There are other circumstances of obvious unsuitableness, on which it is unnecessary to enlarge. The answer of Peters, even to the application made to Hezekiah, supplies at once a refutation of this. To Sehultens, Grey, Scott, and Dathe, in their annota- tions on the place. I refer the reader ; also to Schnurrer's judi- cious view of it, Dissert. Phil. Crit. pp. 275—277. argumentations of Bishop Warburton? When I speak of the mere assertion of his lordship, I desire that it may be remembered, that I allude exclusively to his reduction of the date of the poem to the time of Ezra. Some colour of argument I admit to have been held forth for his lowering it to the age of David ; but none whatever has been offered for the transi- tion from David to Ezra. This interval of above five hundred years, including the times of all the early prophets, the first of whom (Jonah) was near two hundred years later than the death of David, is flung away with- out ceremony; and the reader, who may have been sufficiently complaisant to travel with the bishop so far down as to the second of the Jewish kings, finds himself unexpectedly transported, at once and without notice, to "a period nearly one hundred years later than the return from the captivity. As a translator of the Book of Job, his lord- ship was more particularly called upon to discuss the probability of this last supposed era of its production than of any other, inas- much as many arguments advanced particu- larly against this era are derived from the nature of the style and language of the poem ; a subject on which it is remarkable that his lordship, whose immediate business was with the language of the book, has given no opinion whatever, unless what may be conceived to be implied in the supposition, that the period of the captivity was the era of the work, and Ezra its author. Perhaps Bishop Lowth was too severe upon his rival critic Warburton, when he pronounced, upon his advancing the same supposition, that the man who could seriously entertain it must not have " read either Job or Ezra in their original, and with a competent knowledge of the language," (Letter to Warb. p. 74.) This admirable critic proceeds, however, at length, (from p. 73 to p. 95,) to detail those distinctive characters of style, which (he thinks) establish the truth of his positions, touching the antiquity of the composition in question, — and which it might not be disadvantageous to some modern critics to peruse. He concludes his valuable remarks on this head with the following words : — " But what is the difference between these," (namely, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel,) "in comparison of the difference between the author of the Book of Job and Ezra ? Let any one properly qualified to judge in this matter read the plain historical narrative in the two first chapters of Job ; it is neat, concise, clear in its order and method, pure and elegant in its expression : let him then turn to Ezra, and find, if he can, a single Hebrew chapter, on which he can with a safe conscience bestow any part of this commendation. Let him, moreover, take into the account this last au- thor's barbarous terms ; and then let him tell me fairly, whether he does not find as much 17 -J MAOEE ON Til K A TO N E M E N T difference between these two writers as be- □ Sallust and William of Malmsbury. Lei him oext look into the poetical parts of Job, and let him compare them with any part of Ezra's undoubted writings, and I would then a.-k him, whether he would not as soon pitch upon Geoffrey of Monmouth for the author of the Eneid, if that were a doubtful point, as Ezra for the author of the poem of Job ; and I should not much doubt of his answering in the affirmative," (Letter to Warb. pp. 96,97.) Bishop Louth dors not stand single in these opinions. For the evidence supplied to the antiquity of the Book of Job from the nature of its language, I refer the reader to pp. 154 — 166; and in the subjoined note,-* the opinions of some of the most 3,5 On the idea that Ezra could have written in that pure and poetic Style, which is to be found in the Mosaic writings, the Psalms, and the Book of Job, Michaelis makes the following remarks : — " Nihil Ezra inornatius ; ut mirer, quo erroris por- tento iMosaica i II i scripta tribui potuerint : quanquam non est, quod mirer, cum facinus similliinum ausus sit llardoinus." [Prof, in Xot. et Epim. p. ix.) Again, '• Comparet cui lubet, qua? ante et post exilium Babylonia Ilebraice scripta supersunt ; nee minorem inveniet lahem ac ruinam quam in lingua Latina. Quapropter est mihi veri dissimillimum, grande ac poetieum spirantes psalmos post reditum ex Babyloue BCriptOS fuisse — Ezra certe, raj"* Hebraitmo nihil tit humiliut et ingratius, psalmos nobilissimos trilmere, peecat > vicinum est Ilarduini, odas Iloratianas infimae lingus I.atina? a'tati tribuentis," (p. 196.) Again, speaking particularly of the Book of Job, he says, " Totius poematis ea est puritas. elegantia, sublimitas, qua nihil majos perfectiusque in toto Ilebraico codice superest. — Hocne I ma, Hiream ubique lingua' llebraiea? et Mosaicam setatera spirans, ad ferrea ilia tempora detrudamus, qua; cxtincto uno b do i ' ■ .i. Jeremia, nihil perfect i ac ne quidem mediocriter pulcri. fuderunt?" (pp. I87i 188.) Schultens is not less strong in his remarks upon the language and antiquity of Job : — " Nullus inter sacros codices tarn genuinum remotissimce anti- quitatis prsfert characterem. Multo facilius Enniana? lingua? veneraiidiini decus et pondus, expressisset Bcriptor aliquis ferrese rctatis, quam Ilebra-us ab exilio Babylonico redux grandissiinuni illud, magDificum, intcmeratum, ultima; vetustatis nota emi- nentissima imprcssum, quod e sublimi hacce, tarn materia, quam stylo, compusitione relucet. Hoc qui discernere non /■«.', t, na ille vel ditt 7tperite,judicarecensendut." (l'raef. * * * 3 ) Warburton, who was not suspected of very deep knowledge "f the Hebrew language, was little qualified to feel, and less disposed to admit, the force of such reasoning as the above. lie therefore made no reply to the arguments so power- fully pressed upon him from these sources by Bishop Lowth in bis Letter; although, as appears from a private communication to his friend Burd, he found himaell mod sorely galled bybia more critical adversary. See p. 3G9 of Letters from a late ■ ■/ Prelate. Having adverted to these Letters. I cannot avoid transcribing an extraordinary passage relating to the Book of Job, as an instance of the whimsical originality, for which that extraordi- nary man conceived his superior talents to have afforded him a licence: — " Po r -i ' ' it was bis eternal fate to !"■ persecuted by bis friends. His three comforters passed sentence of con- demnation upon him, and he has ln'cn executing in tfflgie ever since, lie was first b and to the -take by a long catena of Creek Fathers; then tortured by I'ineda; then strangled by Caryl; and afterwards cui up by Wesley, and anatomized by Gamet Pray don't rerkon me amongst his hangmen. I only acted the tender part of his wife, and was for making short work with him. But be was ordained, I think, by a fate like that of I'rometheu9, to lie still upon his dunghill, and have his brains sucked out by owls." Pp. 29, 30k distinguished Bebrew critics will be found in a more detailed state to yield continuation to the above position-. In speaking of Le Clerc, who has led the way to the reduction of the date of this poem to the age of Ezra, Schultens has made the following observations : — " Do- lenda est conditio hnguarum orientalium, prout ea3 a multis tractantur. Unus, alter, tertius ad summum annus iis percipiendis datur. Analysis satis prompta, Explicatio ad receptam versionem non omnino impedita. Placent profectus ; et jam metam Be tenere credunt, qui earceribus vix egressi. — Quid causae? Turn alia, de quibus alias, turn hoc vel maxiine, quod qui in Grsecis, Latinisve, non satis subactus, sibi aliquid arroget, mux in ordinem cogatur, atque ad subsellia relegetnr: qui in Orientalibus, etiam in re pauperi ditis- simus, non sibi tantum, sed et reliquis, videa- tur, si modo ope Lexici aliquid in medium proferre, mereesque suas venditare queat." Are our commentators of the present day more conversant in Hebrew literature, and more cautious in giving to the public their inter- pretations of the Hebrew Scriptures, than Le Clerc? We have now seen how indefensible, in the opinion of the most distinguished Hebrew critics, that hypothesis appears, which, redu- cing the Book of Job to the period of the captivity, ascribes its production to such an author as Ezra. In embracing this hypothesis, however, the Bishop of Killalla has but trod- den in the steps of others. But what shall we say to that, which reduces Job himself to so late a date? This, I apprehend, is a discovery that has been entirely reserved for his lord- ship : at least I know of no commentator who is entitled to dispute with him the honour, whatever it may be, that belongs to the inven- tion. It cannot, indeed, be affirmed, that he has laboured directly and specially to establish this point, lint has he not SO conducted his reasoning, as that it must follow by necessary implication? In the observations which have been offered at the outset of these remarks, pp. 159 — 161, we have seen that the time of Job, and the date of the book, are treated by him as in all respects the same.''7 If, there- fore, his lordship has succeeded in bringing down the latter below the Babylonish capti- vity, he must he considered, on his own prin- ciples, as having done the same by the former. 3" It is possible that his lordship may, to the justness of the assertion which I have here repeated from the [dace referred to, object the following words, which will he found quoted from his preface in p. l.lii : — " But. if it were ever so difficult to ascertain the portion of time when the patriarch Ural, it may not be in! -sihle. from the internal marks in the poem itself, to con- jecture with tolerable certainty the era of its author." I do not deny, that the bishop has here spoken of the times of Job him- self and of the author of the book as not necessarily connected ; nor do I assert that he deliberately intended to consider them as the same; I only affirm, that in his reasoning (whether inten- tionally or not) they are completely confounded. No. 59.— ON THE HISTORY AND THE BOOK OF JOB. 173 The last note of the translation explicitly affirms, that Joh must have lived after the time of David. The entire scheme of the reasoning pronounces, that he must have lived in the time of Ezra. On this result I think it not necessary to offer any comment.38 And, indeed, it is not without some pain that I have heen led to comment upon his lordship's work at all. There are many reasons why I could have wished to forbear ; and among these is not the least forcible, the circumstance of its having issued from a member of that distinguished order in the Church, to which I feel at all times disposed, from inclination not less than duty, to pay the utmost deference and respect. This last consideration, however, upon reflec- tion, seemed to render it the more necessary that I should undertake the unpleasing task, in which I have been engaged throughout the latter part of this Number. I had already given to the public, in a former edition of this work, those remarks on the history and Book of Job which are contained in the for- mer part of the Number. I had, upon grounds which appeared to me satisfactory, maintained the antiquity both of the book and of its sub- ject ; and from this had derived an argument in favour of the antiquity and wide extent of the sacrificial rite. I had also, proceeding in a way directly opposite to that which the bishop has, in his preface, described himself to have pursued, spared neither pains nor time to acquire the best information, and from the best interpreters, before I presumed to offer my ideas to the public. Soon after I had done so, the bishop's work appeared, carrying with it the authority of his station, and, by a single dictum, levelling the whole of my laborious structure in the dust. That my observations were not thought worthy of notice by his lordship, could not cause, even to the feelings of an author, much uneasiness, as the works of the most learned and celebrated commenta- tors on Job were left not only unnoticed, but confessedly unperused. What remained, under these circumstances, to be done 1 Silence might be construed into an admission, that what I had before advanced had been unadvisedly offered, and could not be maintained ; and, on the other hand, in treating of the bishop's performance, justice required that I should speak of it in terms remote from those of commendation. Executed with a haste that nothing can excuse ; abounding with errors both of reasoning and interpretation ; presu- ming, upon slight and fancied theories, to new-mould the original text f'J and withal 38 If any were requisite on a point so perfectly untenable, the observations in the first part of this Number would abun- dantly supply it. ** Bishop Stock prides himself on a list of conjectural altera- tions of the Hebrew text, contained in an Appendix to hi3 translation,— by which it appears, as he pronounces, that there setting the seal of Episcopal authority to the entire congeries of precipitancies, mistakes, and mutilations — a due regard to my own are more than sixty places in Job, in which the text has been corrupted. By much the greater number of these alterations is proposed upon the reading of a single MS., or of a couple at the most ; and what deserves yet more to be remarked is, that, for not fewer than twenty-three, no authority of any MS. or version whatever is pretended, but the name of Stock alone is annexed, as a sufficient justification ! To this, it must be remembered, that we are to add, the rejection of the two last verses of the book upon the same unsupported dictum. These, one would think, are tolerable exercises of the conjectural faculty ; and yet, strange to say, they are far exceeded by one which yet remains to be noticed ; and which will be found contained in the notes on chap. xli. 11, 12. " I am strongly of opinion, that, in the original of this fine poem, the speech attributed to God ended here," (viz. end of verse 12:) " not only because it forms a fuller and more digui- fied conclusion than that which now closes the chapter; but because it assigns a satisfactory answer to the question, With what view was this laboured description introduced, of the two formidable works of the Creator, tin; river horse and the croco- dile ? Answer that question yourselves, saith the Almighty : if ye shrink with terror before my works, how will ye dare tc set yourselves in array against their Maker ? But to whom then shall we ascribe the Appendix contained in the last two-and- twenty verses of the forty-first chapter ? Either to the author himself of the poem, who, in his second but nut better thoughts, conceived he might add something valuable to his picture of the crocodile ; or, which is more likely, to some succeeding genius, impatient to lengthen out by his inventive powers what had justly obtained possession of the public esteem. After enclosing therefore in brackets a superfetation that might well have been spared, we will go on, however-, to give light to it. — Observe bow the Appendix is ushered in : [12. ' I will not be silent,' &c] Is this language for the Omnipotent ? Is it at all suitable to the grandeur of conception manifested in the rest of the poem ? the thread is too visible, by which the purple patch, of more show than utility, is fastened on." Here, indeed, is critical amputation with a vengeance. And here we have a large portion of the original at one stroke scored off, and rejected as a superfetation, (so his Lordship is pleased to call it,) exactly in the same manner as we find the history of the birth of Christ, in the beginning of Matthew and Luke, scored off, as a superfetation, by the Editors of the Unitarian New Testament. Heath had, indeed, transposed the first four- teen verses of the fortieth chapter, and inserted them between the sixth and seventh verses of the forty-second. For this, too, he had assigned a reason not deficient in plausibility. But to reject altogether an entire portion of the book, and this upon the merely fanciful and figurative ground of a "thread too visible " and a " purple patch," has been reserved for a bishop of the Established Church. Having adverted to the subject of conjectural emendation of the Sacred Text, I cannot but enter my protest most decidedly against the spirit, which has, of late years, so mis- chievously infected the translators of the books of Scripture in that particular respect. The Bishop of Killalla. unfortunately, has had no small degree of countenance in such practices. By others, and those, too, critics of no small repute, this spirit has been too much indulged. The late Bishop of St Asaph has well observed, that considering the matter only as a problem in the doctrine of chances, the odds are always infinitely against conjecture. (Ilorsley's liosea, pref. p. xxxiv.) — The conse- quences growing out of the habit of altering the original Hebrew according to conjecture, must be, that we shall cease altogether to possess a standard text, and that for the word of God, we shall ultimately have only the word of man. Bishop Pocock justly observes upon this practice, that, " every one, for intro- ducing any where such a meaning as pleased him best, might alter the words as he pleased, of which there would be no end ; and it would be a matter of very ill consequence indeed. We must," he adds, "fit our meaning to the words, and not the words to our meaning." (Pocock's Works, vol. ii. p. 493.) — That the MSS. and ancient versions are not to be called in, to assist 174 MAGE E O N T II E A T ONE M E N T. credit, but, infinitely more, a due regard to the cause of truth, demanded thai Bucb a work should not be allowed to pass upon the world as a faithful exposition of a part of sacred writ. In my observations upon the individual defects of this work, I have not thought it necessary to travel beyond the course which the bishop's remarks upon the date of Job unavoidably prescribed. But 1 cannot dismiss the subject filially without saying, that, in my opinion, the necessity for a new English ver- sion of the Book of Job (if any be supposed previously to have existed) has in no particular been diminished by that which has been given to the world by the Bishop of Killalla.*' As a matter of curiosity, and as supplying some relief from the tcedium controversies, I annex a short account of the history of Job, a- it has been handed down amongst the Arabians. Job, or Aiub, (as he is called in Arabic, agreeably to the Hebrew name 3VN,) is re- ported by some of their historians to have been descended from Ishmael ; it being held, that from Isaac, through Jacob, all the prophets hail sprung, excepting three, Job, Jethro, (the father-in-law of Moses, called by the Arabians Schoaib,) and Mahomet ; which three had come of the line of Ishmael, and were Ara- bians. Byr others, his descent is traced from Isaac, through Esau, from whom he was the third, or at most the fourth, in succession. And in the history given by Khendemir, who distinguishes liim by the title of the Patient, it is stated that by his mother's side he was descended from Lot : that he had been com- missioned by God to preach the faith to a people of Syria : that, although no more than three had been converted by his preaching, he was, notwithstanding, rewarded for his zeal by immense possessions : that his wealth and prosperity excited the envy of the devil, who, presenting himself before God, charged Job witli motives of self-interest in his religious obedience, and asserted, that if the Almighty would deprive him of his substance, his boasted allegiance would not hold out for a single day : that the devil obtained permission to strip him of his wealth, but that Job's fidelity remained unshaken : that having received still farther permission to afflict him in his person, the in rectifying the Hebrew text, where confusion has manifestly arisen. I am very far indeed from contending: but that what is properly called conjecture should he permitted to interfere, and now especially, after the immense labours of Kennicott and De Rossi in their collation of the various copies of the Hebrew, is, I think, wholly inadmissible. This is not the place to enlarge upon such a subject. I would strongly recommend to the peru- -.ii .'fth'' reader the judidotu observation! of Bishop Ilorsley, in his preface, at be! ire referred to, and at p. xxxix. See also Ihilhn li/nitnil.i, p. 136 - 137- ■"' His lordship has. since the publication of the second edition of this work, been advanced to the See of Waterford. To avoid confusion, however, I have continued to designate him by the title under which he is known to the public as the translator of Job. devil infused by a pestilential breath such infection as to render Job's entire body one putrid ulcer, and of a nature so offensive, as to repel from him every attendant, and to force the inhabitants to drive him out of the city into a remote and solitary place, w hither his wife carried every day what was necessary for his subsistence : that "the devil constantly stole from her whatever she had provided for this purpose ; and having reduced her to such a condition, that she had nothing remaining for her husband's relief, he appeared to her in the form of a bald old woman, and offered, upon condition of her giving two tresses of hair that hung upon her neck, to furnish her every day with what she might require for her husband's subsistence : that Job's wife having agreed to the proposal, and parted with the tresses, the devil produced the hair to Job, affirming that it had been cut from his wife's head when caught in the act of matrimonial unfaithful- ness : that Job, enraged against his wife, was led to swear, that if he recovered his health he would most severely punish her for her offence : that the devil, having thus got the better of Job's patience, transformed himself to an angel of light, and published to the people of the surrounding country that Job had forfeited the favour of God, and that they should no longer permit him to abide among them : that Job, being informed of what had passed, had recourse to God by prayer, who in a moment put an end to all his sufferings ; for that the angel Gabriel descended to the place where he was, and, striking the earth with his foot, caused a fountain of the purest water to spring up, wherein Job having washed his body and drank of it, was suddenly and perfectly restored to health : and that, after this, God multiplied his riches in such a man- ner, that, to express the abundance of it, the Arabian authors say that a shower of gold fell upon him. See D' llerbelot, Bibl. Orient. torn. i. pp, 75, 70, 4.">2, A'>\\ ; also Sale's Koran, vol. ii. p. 162, in which latter place the story- is given with some minute variations. The reader will of course consider these fables as introduced here principally- for his amusement. One fact, however, they une- quivocally speak — the belief of the Arabians that there was in reality such a person as Job, who lived in the patriarchal age, and was dis- tinguished above all men by his sufferings and his patience. The reverence for the name of Job has been in truth from the earliest times, and to this day continues to be, through all Arabia, extremely great ; so that many of the noblest families among the Arabians have gloried in being descended from that patriarch. The famous dynasty of the great Saladin have been known by the name of Aioubites, or Jobites, their illustrious founder being called by the name of Job. (D'Herb. Bib. Orient. torn. i. p. 76.) The reverence for this name No. 00.— NATUKE OF ABEL'S SACRIFICE MISTAKEN BY GUOTIUS. 175 has, I am sorry to say, been carried still far- ther amongst Christians : the worship of Job being (as Broughton tells ns) of great anti- quity, both amongst the Greek and Latin churches ; the Greeks having chosen the 6th of May for celebrating the festival of Saint Job, and the Latins keeping it on the 10th. Diction, of all Relig. vol. i. p. 538. No. LX. — Page 19. Col. 1. ON GROTIUS'S STRANGE MISCONCEPTION OF THE NATURE OF ABEL'S SACRIFICE. Grotius, followed by Le Clerc, interprets the words in Gen. iv. 4, which we translate the firstlings, as signifying the best and finest ; and will have this to relate only to the wool, which is known to have been offered to the gods in later times. That also which we ren- der the fat thereof, he considers to mean no more than the mill; and appeals to the Seventy, who in numerous instances have certainly translated the word ^\>T1, here used, by yx.'Koe.. But first, as to □>11D25 it cannot be denied, that, in relation to man or beast, it is never found in any part of the Bible in any other sense than that of first-born. So appropriate is this meaning, that "1132 is used absolutely, to express primogeniture, and the right result- ing from it, as in Gen. xxv. 31 — 34, and xliii. 33. It is, indeed, applied to first fruits, or fruits first ripe ; but this evidently refers to its radical signification of first-born ; nor can any instance be adduced of the application of the term in the figurative sense of finest and best, contended for by Grotius, unless such a signification be tacitly supposed to attach in all cases to the idea of the first, or earliest, in its kind. He has, indeed, referred us to the expression /"VIS T03 in Job, xviii. 13; to the use of the word D^"TQ2> applied to the fruit of the fig-tree ; and to the force of the term ""I1035 employed to denominate the species of camel distinguished for its swiftness. But none of these instances can bear him out. The first, which he would arbitrarily render " morbus maxime lethalis," is no more than " the first-born of death," a strong poetical expression ; for the more particular meaning of which see Parkhurst on the word, and Chappelow on Job, xviii. 13. The second, which he says implies " ficus maxime fructi- ferse," is an expression peculiarly unfortunate, as the word in this application is used to de- note that species of fig which is early ripe ; insomuch that at this day the word 1 boccore ("1132) signifies, in the Levant, the early fig, as Shaw states in his Travels, p. 370, fol. As to the third instance, the reason of applying this term to the fleetest species of camel, is not the general idea of distinction and superiority, 1 See Lowth's Isai. xxviii. 4 ; Blayney's Jer. xziv. 2 ; and Newcomc's IIos. ix. 10. but the peculiar quality of swiftness ; the idea of celerity and prevention being most appo- sitely conveyed by a term, whose radical sig- nification implied the first, or earliest. In this sense the word is explained in the kindred dialects of the Syriac and (particularly) the Arabic ; for which see Schindler and Castell. Indeed, no lexicon whatever, so far as I can discover, supports Grotius in the general sig- nification which he attributes to the word. But all concur in giving to it the meaning of the earliest or first produced, or some other flowing from and connected with these. Again, with respect to the word ^bn, al- though it is undoubtedly used in several places to signify milk, as well as fat, yet, as Heidegger remarks, (Hist, Patr. Exercit. v. § 20, torn, i.) there is not a single passage in Scripture, in which it is applied in that sense, when sacri- fice is spoken of, and the offering is said to be But, moreover, as to Grotius's notion, that the wool and milk were the parts of the ani- mal which alone were offered by Abel on this occasion, it is notorious that neither one nor the other is ever mentioned in Scripture as an offering to the Deity, unless this single passage be supposed to supply an instance. Kenni- cott also contends, in opposition to Grotius, that the strict analogy of translation will not admit the possibility of his construction of this passage of Genesis. " For if," says he, " it be allowed by all, that ' Cain's bringing of the fruit of the ground,' means his bringing ' the fruit of the ground,' then Abel's ' bring- ing of the firstlings of his flock,' must likewise mean his bringing ' the firstlings of his flock,' " the exact sameness in the original phrase requiring an exact similarity in the transla- tion. ( Two Dissert, pp. 192, 193.) The pas- sage, indeed, needs but to be read to prove the whimsical conceit of this comment of Grotius. Not one word is said of wool, or that can lead the mind to it by any conceivable reference ; but yet, because he is determined not to allow the sacrifice of Abel to have been an oblation of the animal itself, and there being no part of it that could be offered, without slaying the animal, except the wool and the milk, he is therefore led to pronounce that in the offering of these the sacrifice consisted. Nothing, in truth, can be more strangely chimerical than the whole of Grotius's obser- vations on this part of Scripture. His criti- cisms on the words HEl^H "H30, furnishes another extraordinary specimen. " By these words," he says, " nothing more is meant than what the heathens in later times under- stood by their Sagmen, which was a sort of turf, cut out of sacred ground, and carried sometimes in the hand of a Roman ambassa- dor." On this Heidegger is compelled to exclaim, " Ssepe vir, caetera magnus, ex pa- ganis ritibus talia, obtorto collo, ad explica- ii 17<; M A U E E ON THE A T O NEME N T. tionem rerum saerarum rapit ; qua?, si propius intueare, ncc ca-lum nee terrain attingunt." (Ercrcit. v. § 10.) But to return. With respect to the word ^rO^n, it may be right to remark, that, instead of " the fat thereof" (which is ambiguous,) it may with more propriety he rendered, " the fat of them" meaning thereby, the fattest or best among the firstlings. It is well known that the word ^717 is often used for the best of its hind. Thus |~07 H/fl, is the finest of the wheat, (Ps. lxxxi. 10' ; cxlvii. 14.) And the fat of the oil, the fat of the wine, stand for the best of the oil and wine, and have been so trans- lated,-' (Numb, xviii. 12.) It is the more necessary to make this distinction, lest the particular mention of the fat might lead to the supposition that the sacrifice was a peace- offering, the fat of which was consumed upon the altar, and the flesh eaten by the priests and the person at whose charge the offering was made. This was clearly an offering of a later date. The use of animal food was not as yet permitted. And the sacrifice seems to have been a holocaust, the whole of which was consumed upon the altar. That the sacrifice was of this kind many arguments concur to render probable. (See p. 131 ; also Shuck. Connect, vol. i. p. 81.) But it is placed beyond the possibility of doubt, if it be admitted, with the authorities and reasons adduced in pp. 147, 148, that the sign of the Divine accep- tance of Abel's sacrifice was the consumption of it by fire from heaven. Porphyry, in his second book, De Abstin. Anim. considers this a sufficient reason to pronounce the ottering of Abel to have been a holocaust, and compares it with that of Solomon, described in 2 Chr. vii. 1, where it is said, that " when Solomon had made an end of praying, the fire came down from heaven, and consumed the burnt- ottering (or holocaust) and the sacrifices." No. LXL — Page 19. Col. 1. ON THE DIFFERENCE IN THE DIVINE RECEPTION OF THE SACRIFICES OF CAIN AND ABEL. To those who reject the divine institution of sacrifice, this has always proved a stum- bling-block ; and to remove the difficulty, various solutions have been elaborately, but unsuccessfully, devised. The difference in the treatment of the two brothers had been accounted for l>\ ancient commentators, from the different mode of division of their several oblations, as it' Cain's fault had consisted in not giving to God the best parts, or the proper parts of the sacrifice. This unintelligible notion, which an early enemy of revelation, Julian, failed not to urge against Christians, took its rise from the Septuagint translation 2 See Chryao9t. Jun. Vatab. ; also Jen. Jew. Antiq. vol. 1. p. 14!); and Kcnn. Two Ditt. pp. 193, 194. Ovk, ixv o(>8u; v^oaiviyKyjc, 6(>8az of Gen. iv. 7. um, ix» opuu; 0z /nvj OiiXr,;, %/ueif>Ti;, — "If you should rightly offer, but yet not rightly divide, would you not sinl" Others have held, that the difference arose from this, that, whilst Abel brought of the firstlings of his flock, Cain did not, in like manner, bring of the first or best of his fruits. This idea, for which there appears no farther foundation in the original, than that it is simply stated that Cain brought of the fruits, originated with Philo, (as may be seen in p. 77 of this work,) and has had the support of several Christian commentators. See Cyril, cont. Julian, lib. x. p. 349, ed. Spanh. Lips, and Pol. Synop. in Gen. iv. 3. Hallet also, in his note (s) on Heb. xi. 4, concurs in this idea, and at the same time adds, that Abel's faith caused him to select the choicest for sacrifice. Primate Newcome, in his new version, seems to adopt the same notion, explaining the " more excellent sacri- fice" in Heb. xi. 4, as "consisting of more choice and valuable offerings." Again, the reason of the difference assigned by Josephus, (Antiq. Jud. lib. i. c. 3,) is, that " God was more pleased with the spontaneous productions of nature, than with an ottering extorted from the earth by the ingenuity and force of man." This strange conceit has been confined to Josephus, and the Rabbins, from whom Havercamp affirms, and Cunaeus and Heidegger fully prove, it was derived by this author. — See Krehs. Obserr.in Nor. Test. p. 383. Another reason assigned is the difference of moral character. But the history clearly connects the fact of the acceptance of the one and the rejection of the other, with tin1 nature and circumstances of the respective oblations. Again, it is said that Cain's entertaining a design against his brother's life laid the foun- dation for the difference of treatment. But this intention against his brother's life is expressly affirmed to have been the conse- quence of the preference given to his brother's ottering. Dr Priestley has observed1 (Theol. Rep. vol. i. p. 195,) that "the actions of both the brothers " (in the offerings made by them of 1 This essay of Dr Priestley, in which (as has been stated in ! p. 130 of this work) he has laboured to disprove the divine insti- tution of sacrifices, and to establish their mere human invention as springing from anthropomorpliitical notions of the Deity, it may be curious to compare with his latest observations on this subject in his NotM, &c. on Gen. iv. 3. There, in treating of the offerings of Cain and Abel, he expressly inserts his belief in the divine origin of sacrifices. " On the whole," lie says, " it seems most probable, that men were instructed by the Divine Being himself in this mode of worship," (sacrifice,) " as well as taught man; other things that were necessary to their subsis- tence and comfort." This observation, together with those which have been already referred to, (pp. 129, 130,) cannot be read without wonder, when it is considered, that the author of them had spent a life in the continued endeavour to refute the assertions which they contain. This, however, after all, but shews tho vast difference there is No. CI. -RECEPTION OF THE SACRIFICES ON CAIN AND ABEL. 177 the flock and of the fruits) " seem to have heen of the same nature, and to have had exactly the same meaning." In this I entirely agree with him. Viewed in the light of reason merely, the distinction made between them by the Deity is utterly unaccountable. Sacrifices being considered as gifts, or as federal rites, or as symbolical actions, expressing the dis- positions and sentiments of the offerer, or in any way that human invention can be con- ceived to have devised them ; the actions of the two brothers appear to stand precisely on the same ground, each bringing an offering of that which he respectively possessed, and each thus manifesting his acknowledgment and worship of the great Author of his possessions. But what do I infer from this ? That reason cannot untie the knot ; and that to revelation consequently we must look for the solution. Here the difficulty vanishes, and all appears connected and satisfactory, as I trust is shewn in the account given of this matter in the second of these Discourses. — See pp. 19, 20. The words of Cloppenburg on this sub- ject deserve to be noticed : — " Etsi diversse oblationi videatur occasionem prrebuisse diver- sum vitse institutum, ipsi tamen diversitati oblationis hoc videtur subesse, quod Abel pecudum oblatione cruenta ante omnia cura- vit, to i'hccs-/iPtov 6id tyi; 1zi(JTiU<; iU TV Ot'l^OtTl, propitiationem per fidem in sanguine, quo necessario purificanda erant dona Deo oblata, Heb. ix. 22, 23. — Cainus autem, oblatione sola Eucharistica de fructu terrse defungens, supine neglexerit sacrificium i^xrixou, ut eo nomine Deo displicuerit, neque potuerit obti- nere Justitice Dei, quce ex fide est, testimonium, quod non perhibebat Deus, neglecto istoc externo symbolo supplicationis ex fide pro remissione peccatorum obtinenda. Quemad- modum ergo, in cultu spirituali, publicanus supplicans cum peccatorum i^o^o'KoyYiati de- scendit in donium suam justificatus pras pha- risaao, cum gratiarum actione, Deo vovente decimas omnium qua) possidebat, Luc. xviii. 12, — sic censemus hac parte potiorem fuisse Abelis oblationem prse oblatione Caini, quod ipse supplicationem suam pro impetranda peccatorum remissione testatus sit per sacri- ficii propitiatorii cruentam oblationem, cum alter dona sua eucharistico ritu offerret, %o>o\s ciiuxro^vaici;" Swrif. Patriarch. Schola. p. 15. On the subject of this Number see Kennic. Two. Dissert, p. 225 — 238, and Barrington's Misc. Sacr. p. 69 — 71. between the disputant and the inquirer. The wonder is easily removed by the view already taken of this matter in p. 130. And, upon the whole, there seems good reason to think, that, had Dr Priestley been permitted, for a longer period, to enjoy that freedom from angry polemics, which was indulged to the few concluding years of his life, he would have grown into a juster acquaintance with many of the vital truths of Scripture, and would have retracted many of those noxious opinions which he had so long and so assiduously toiled to disseminate. No. LXII.— Page 19. Col. 1. ON THE TRUE MEANING OF THE PHRASE, IIAEIONA 6T2IAN, ATTRIBUTED TO THE SACRIFICE OF ABEL. Dr Kennicott's criticism on this passage, combined with Gen. iv. 4, is too remarkable to be passed over in silence. The words, xXs/oi/a ^vaietv, he contends, should be rendered a sacrifice greater, or more, in reference to number, rather than to value; for that, although -aoKiig in the positive sense does sometimes signify cxcellens, prcestans, yet in the other degrees of comparison it is never so used ; but that rshtiav has constantly the signification of plus, amplior, copiosior, or numcrosior ; and for this he refers to the several lexicons of Budseus, Constantine, Ges- ner, Hederic, Leigh, Scapula, and Stephens : and from Stephens's Concordance he says it appears, that zshziav has not the sense of pratstantior, through the whole of the New Testament. The idea of number, he says, necessarily strikes us; and therefore Wick- liffe's, which reads a much more sacrifice, he affirms to be a just translation ; and that Queen Elizabeth's version was right, in pre- serving the force of this, by rendering the words, a greater sacrifice. In conformity with these observations ho suggests an interpretation of Gen. iv. 4, which, I apprehend, is peculiar to himself ; namely, that Cain brought a single offering, of the fruits of the ground ; and Abel a double obla- tion, consisting likewise of the fruits, and of an animal sacrifice besides. His principal argument in support of this novel idea is derived from the use of the word Mincha in this place ; the meaning of which, he says, is fixed precisely in Levit. ii. 1, and confined to an unbloody oblation, viz. a meat-offering ; or, as we generally appropriate the word meat to flesh, more properly a bread-offering. This term, he argues, being here applied to Abel's oblation, and being totally inapplicable to the animal sacrifice which he is expressly said to have offered, it follows, that he must likewise have made an offering of the fruit of the ground such as Cain had brought. And this, he contends, the very turn of expression in the original strongly indicates ; for that, in strict- ness, the passage should be rendered, " Cain brought of the fruit of the ground, a Mincha to Jehovah — and Abel brought (the same,) he also (brought) of the firstlings," &c. ; for that in the words, wn DD N^H blTR, the particle QJ cannot be joined to the verb immediately preceding, from the nature of the position, and its connection with a second nominative case — and that, agreeably to this, the Seventy have rendered the clause, K«< "AetX vji/syy.e Kui ccvto; d~o tuv gputotozuv. 178 M A GEE U N T II E A T ONE M E N T. This criticism of Dr Kennieott scorns, how- ever, unworthy of so great a name ; fur even admitting, that the particle DJ is to be connected, not with the preceding verb, but with the second nominative case, the inference drawn by Dr Kennieott will by no means follow ; there being no form of expression more familiar to the Hebrew, than the emphatic repetition of the persons spoken of, with this particle QJ adjoined. To adduce instances of this were idle, as it is one of the most common idioms of the language. Who- ever wishes for examples, however, may find them in sufficient plenty, in Nold. Concord. Partic. Ebr. pp. 201, 202. Now, in this applieatioTi of the particle, it is manifest, that the whole of Dr Kennicott's construction falls to the ground. Again, admitting the particle to be used in the additive sense, also, as Dr Kennicott's view of the passage requires, yet will not this justify his translation ; since, being necessarily connected with the second nominative case by this writer's own admis- sion, it can only mean, that Abel also, as well as Cain, brought an offering ; whereas, accor- ding to Dr Kennieott, it must signify, that he brought also of the firstlings, &c. that is, he brought not only what Cain had brought, but besides, or in addition to that, of the firstlings of his flock ; to make out which translation, the word also must be connected, not with the second nominative case NIH, or ocvto;, but with the following words, p*H23!2, or «xo rls'j xputot6x.uv, from which it is entirely dis- joined by the intervening pronoun. Thus Dr Kennieott becomes inconsistent with him- self, having first contended for the immediate conjunction of the particle with the second nominative case, and having then applied it in such a sense as to require its conjunction, not with this nominative case, but with another part of the sentence. But he relies on the force of the word Mincha, which is applied only to Abel's offering : the Lord being said to have had " respect to Abel and to his Mincha." It is, then, of importance, to ascertain the true meaning of this word ; and the more so because if this writer's sense of the term be admitted, and at the same time his theory of the double oblation be rejected, the necessary inference is, that no animal was slain by Abel, but thai the offering must have been of the unbloody kind, and consequently that it was, a- Grotius has contended, merely an offering of the milk and wool of his flock. Now, it is in the titv-t place to he remarked, that he explains the word Mincha, as applied to the offerings of Cain and Abel, by the exact definition of it, ;js we find it specifically used under the law, w hire it appears to he confined to offerings of the unbloody kind, (See Two Dissert, p. 188 — 192.) I'.ut if Dr Kennieott be right in explaining the Mincha in all cases by the strictness of the Levitical definition, then it necessarily follows, that Cain did not merely bring an offering of the fruits of the ground, but that he brought the very kind of meat-offering, or Mincha, appointed in the second chapter of Leviticus, where, as Kenni- eott emphatically observes, the description of the meat-offering concludes with these words, Kin rims, "this is a Mincha." Cain's offering, then, must have consisted of " fine flour with oil poured upon it, and frankin- cense placed thereon." The exact quantities also of the flour and oil, as proscribed in the law, must have been employed. This the force of Kennicott's argument indispensably requires. For he contends, that the very definition of the Mincha, as given iti Leviticus, " determines the sense of the word absolutely in the five books of Moses ; for that wherever the inspired author mentions the won] Mincha, as a sacrificial term, he must certainly use it in the same sense ; the same which had been settled upon it by God himself, before Genesis was composed." Now, it is certain, that wdierever the Mincha, properly so called, is spoken of under the law, it must be understood in the sense expressly given to it by the law : and in this reference it is, that Buxtorf, Reland, Outram, and Jos. Mede, (whom Kennieott quotes in justification of his opinion,) seem to have spoken of the Mincha. But, surely, when applied to oblations antecedent to the law, the term is not necessarily to be taken in that restrained sense, to which its general signification was limited, in later times, by those appropriate circumstances attached to it by the legal institution. It is undoubtedly true, as Gussetius, who is referred to by Kennieott, remarks, that a Mincha presented to God signifies an unbloody oblation. But when he says, that it always does so, and that " there is not one instance of its being used for an animal oblation throughout the Bible;" {Comment. Ling. Ebr. p. 47^,) ho, in the first place, begs the question respecting the sacrifice of Abel, which is expressly called a Mincha: secondly, he forgets, that every other instance of its sacrificial application is an instance of the use of the term under the law, by which its original meaning had been narrowed : and, lastly, both he and Kennieott materially err in point of fact ; the word Mincha being fre- quently employed oven under the law, to denote animal sacrifices, as well as the bread or flour-offerings. Thus in l Kings, xviii. 29, 36 ; 2 Kind's, iii. 20; and Ezra, ix. 4, 5, we find the morning and evening sacrifices, which, beside a bread-offering and drink-offering, in- cluded also the offering of a lamb, described by the general appellation of Mincha. In Judges, vi. 11!. the same term is applied to the offering of a kid with unleavened cakes. And in 1 Sam. ii. 17, and Mai. i. 13, 14, it is used No. 62— ON THE TRUE MFANING OF THE II akiona 0Y21 IN OF ABEL. 179 lti relation to animal sacrifice, in a manner the most explicit and unqualified. So that, al- though, as Rosemniiller on Levit. ii. 1, affirms, tliis word be applied per einincntiam to the oblation of corn, yet even under the law we find its more general signification forco its way. This proves decisively the weakness of Dr Kennicott's argument derived from the sup- position that the words jfln nTOD, (Lev. ii. 6,) are to be understood in the sense, This is a Mincha, that is, as marking the precise meaning of the term, wherever it occurred in a sacrificial relation. Indeed, the circum- stances of the various kinds of bread-offerings, comprehended under the term Mincha, which Kennicott himself admits to have existed, (pp. 190 — 192,) and of which there were not fewer than five, prove that this passage could not have been intended here as confining the term to the specific oblation to which it refers : and that it could only mean, that this oblation was one of those which might be included under the term Mincha. Vatablus renders the words, " Munus est : i. e. tale est munus quod ofierri debet Deo." See also Fagius, Vatablus, Castalio, on Exod. xxx. 9. It is certain that the true and original sig- nification of the word, is that of an offering presented to a superior. Thus we find it in Gen. xxxii. 20, and xliii. 11, 15, in wdiich places it is used for the purpose of appeasing ; again, in 2 Chr. xxxii. 23, and Ps. lxxii. 10, where it is applied to offerings brought by strangers to the temple at Jerusalem ; and also in 1 Kings, x. 25 ; 2 Chr. ix. 24 ; 2 Kings, viii. 8, 9, where it is used to denote the gifts sent to earthly princes. The word appears to be derived from an Arabic verb, signifying donavit ; see Rosenm. and Le Clerc on Lev. ii. 1, and Schindl. Lcxic. Pentag. Parkhurst derives it from the Hebrew verb nj, quievit, posnit ; and Calasio from 7\T\1, duxit, without, however, making any change in the significa- tion. From this it follows, that all sacrificial offerings, whether bloody or unbloody, must fall under the general denomination, Mincha. That it is taken in this large sense by all lexicographers, Le Clerc (on Lev. ii. 1,) posi- tively asserts. See also Castell, and especially Parkhurst, on the word. Drusius (on Heb. xi. 4.) affirms, that it is of greater extent than is commonly admitted. Ainsworth observes, (on Lev. ii. 1,) that it " was generally any solemn gift, or present, to God, or man : in special, a present or sac- rifice unto God : more specially, an offering of the fruits of the earth." Sykes also {Essay, &c. p. 17,) uses the word in the same general sense, wmilst he admits, that " later use has pretty much confined it to oblations of Hour or meal." How little reason, then, Dr Kennicott had for introducing so novel and dangerous a cri- ticism, is, I trust, upon the whole sufficiently evident. How inconsistent also it is with the ideas of sacrifice, which he holds in common with the doctrine maintained in these dis- courses, will appear, when it is considered, that if, in the case of Abel's oblation, the word Mincha be supposed to relate, not to the sacrifice of the animal, but solely to an offering of the fruits with which it was ac- companied, it must follow, since God is said to have had respect to his Mincha, that it was not the animal sacrifice, but the offering of the fruits, which conciliated the divine re- gard. And thus the theory which pronounces the animal sacrifice to have been originally enjoined as a type of the great sacrifice of Christ, and which ascribes to this, as the in- stituted expression of the true faith, the supe- riority of Abel's offering over that of Cain, is at once overturned. And yet to this very theory it is, that Dr Kennicott, in his Disser- tation on the oblations of Cain and Abel, has given his warmest support. Perhaps it may not be amiss here, to endeavour to ux the true meaning and value of the sacrificial terms "PHp? HrOE, and 1~QT, Corban, Mincha, and Zebach : and the more particularly, as their relative force seems not to have been stated with exactness by any late writer. The first of these terms, being derived from 2T)p, signifies whatever was brought to God before the altar ; whether dis- missed, as the scape-goat ; dedicated to the service of the sanctuary, as the sacred vessels, and the conductors of the sacred rites, the Levites ; or offered up, as the sacrifices pro- perly so called, which were consumed at the altar. Again, the Mincha was an oblation, which was of the nature of a sacrifice, being consumed at the altar, whether it consisted of things animate or inanimate, although, as we have seen, the Mosaic institution in a good degree narrowed its application ; confining it, for the most part, to what is called the meat- offering, or, as it should in strictness be deno- minated, the bread or flour-offering. And lastly, the Zebach was the oblation of an ani- mal slain in sacrifice. Thus, Corban is the most general term, including all sorts of offer- ings, or dedications, to God in his temple ; Mincha is the next in order, applying to those offerings which were consumed at the altar ; and Zebach is the species infima in the scale, relating only to the animal sacrifice. But to return to Dr Kennicott, and the immediate subject of this note. His remark on the word ^'Kilov, that it necessarily involves the idea of number, becomes now totally inap- plicable. The idea of a double oblation in the case of Abel, which it was intended to support, has been shewn to be entirely groundless : and, indeed, his observations on the force of the word irXetav itself seem not less so. That " the notion of number is included in every 1MJ M A G E E ON T H E A TONE M E N T. application of the word throughout the New Testament," is so far from being true, that numerous j)ri->aj_rcs may be cited, in which DO such idea can possibly attach to the word. Thus, in .Matt. vi. 25, u Is not the soul more {■z>,iioiv) than meat?" — and again, xii. 41. " Behold, a greater (rritiay) than Jonas is here." .Many other such instances may be seen in Stephanus's Greek Concordance, to which Dr Kennicott has referred in support of bis opinion. But the true force of the word, both in the positive and the comparative, may be best seen in Schleusner's Lexicon. It will thence appear, that the just value of the ex- pression in the passage in Hebrews, has been given in the text : a more ample, or fuller sacrifice, expressing in eniphatical terms, that which partook more largely and essentially of the true nature and virtue of sacrifice. Vatablus renders the word uberiorem. No. LXIIL — Page 19. Col. 1. ON THE NATURE AND GROUNDS OF THE FAITH EVIDENCED BY THE SACRIFICE OF ABEL. " Faith," we are informed by the apostle, Rom. x. 17, "cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God." Tins account of faith, combined with the numerous examples ex- hibited in the eleventh chapter of Hebrews, in illustration of its nature, can leave us at no loss to pronounce, that Abel's offering was in obedience to a divine revelation. For it must be remarked, that in the several instances, adduced in this chapter, of persons actuated by this exalted principle, the belief of some- thing declared, and a mode of action confor- mable to that belief, are uniformly exhibited. In like manner, then, as Noah, Abraham, and the rest, are represented as acting in conse- quence of a divine command, placing an entire reliance in the promise of him who coni- manded; so Abel, in the sacrifice which he offered, must be supposed to have acted under the sune impression, — believing what God had promised, and therefore sacrificing as God had ordered. Indeed, as Heidegger remarks, the divine revelation was in his case even more necessary, than in any other of those mentioned. The sacred writer again informs US, at the 13th verse of the same chapter, that Abel and all flu' other- whom he had named, "died in faith" (/'. e. a- Ballet paraphrases it, " retained their faith, until their death, or the time of their leaving the world,") '-not having received the promises," (not having received the com- pletion of them ; that being reserved for later times, as is intimated in the concluding part of the chapter, and is dearly expressed in Acts, xiii. .".L', 33, " We declare unto you glad tidings, how that the promise which was made unto the fathers, God hath fulfilled the same unto us their children") — " but having seen them afar off; and were persuaded of them, and embraced them." Now, that these promises included the pro- mise of the Messiah, Kennicott says, is plain : "first, because this is the promise, peculiarly and emphatically so called throughout Scrip- ture: and secondly, because that the temporal promises, respecting the land of Canaan, can- not alone, if at all, be meant here, as the apostle speaks of all the patriarchs, whom he had mentioned in the beginning of the chap- ter : and Abraham, who is one of those men- tioned, is expressly said to have ' sojourned in the land of promise ;' whilst, on the other hand, Abel, Enoch, and Noah (three of the patriarchs included in the word all,) had not received the promise of ' entering the land of Canaan.' So that some other promise, made in the first ages, and frequently repeated, must be that to which the apostle here alludes. And what promise can that be, but the pro- mise of a future Redeemer made to Adam V — the promise, that " the seed of the woman should bruise the serpent's head :" a promise, which was to be commemorated in the patri- archal and all succeeding sacrifices, " until the seed should come." Agreeably to this, the Homily on Faith applies this eleventh chapter of Hebrews, stating, that holy men of old, although they were not named Christian, yet exercised a Christian faith ; seeking, as we do, all the benefits of God the Father, through the merits of his Son Jesus Christ ; and differ- ing from us only in this, that whereas "they looked when Christ should come, we be in the time when he is come." To the fulfilment of this promise, then, was the faith of Abel directed; and the enjoined manifestation of this faith the apostle justifies us in pronouncing to have been the kind of sacrifice which he offered ; and which, as being of the true nature of the sacrifice required of the faithful, procured from God that accep- tance, and witnessing of his offerings, which was refused to Cain. See Heideg. Hist. Pair. Excrc. iii. § 52, torn. i. — Shuckf. Connect, vol. i. pp. }!(!, '87— Kennic. Two Dissert, p. 212 — '215. and Edwards's Surra/ of the various Methods, pp. 99, 100. See also Witsius, (Misc. Sac. lib. ii. diss. ii. § 7 — 10,) who removes the objections brought by Spencer against the application of this chapter of Hebrews, here contended for ; and den. Jew. Ant. vol. i. pp. 57 — 59, where some excellent remarks are to 1.,' found on the difficulty which the men- tion of Jephthah, in the catalogue of distin- guished believers, might appear to create. It must he confessed, that certain commen- tators, among whom are to be reckoned Grotius, Hammond, Le Clerc, Rosemnidler, and Primate New come also, if I rightly under- stand him, interpret the promises alluded to No. 68.— OFTHE FAITH EVIDENCED BY THE SACRIFICE OF ABEL. 1K1 in this chapter as temporal ; and are conse- quently reduced to the necessity of confining the expression, outoi ttxvts;, all these, in the 13th verse, to some of those that had been named, or of referring it to all the descendants of Abraham, of whom mention had been made in the sentence immediately preceding. Now, it is obvious, as Whitby remarks, that all the descendants of Abraham did not die in faith : and how, on the other hand, any particular individuals of those before named can lie selec- ted by an expression, which comprehends all, it is not easy to discover. And \i all who had been before named are referred to, (as is unavoidable,) then, as we have already seen, the promises cannot have been temporal, there being some to whom no temporal promises were made, as Abel and Enoch. As to the difficulty arising from the declaration, that the persons "enumerated had died in faith, when it is known that Enoch did not die, but was translated ; this is easily removed by consider- ing, that the stress in this clause is not laid upon the death of those believers, but upon their having retained their faith through life, as is well marked inHallet's paraphrase, quoted in the preceding page, and in the common use of language would naturally be conveyed in the words here used by the apostle. See Drusius, in loc. who supplies several instances of a similar latitude of expression in Scripture. Hallet, Doddridge, and Whitby, deserve to be consulted upon this entire chapter. They fur- nish a complete answer to the arguments of those who contend for a temporal promise. I shall only add here an observation of Eisner, on the extravagant eagerness shewn by two of these commentators, Grotius and Le Clerc, in defence of the temporal solution. Having remarked, that Le Clerc condemns Hammond, for his mystical interpretation of the " city which has foundations," as implying an everlasting mansion in the heavens ; and that he approves of the idea of Grotius, that Jerusalem was the city here intended : he exlcaims, " Mira est viri illius rtt vnodeaet oovKsuovtos imprudentia : quomodo quseso ex- spectasse illam urbem Abrahamus dicetur, quam post multa demum sa?cula posteris suis o-surum noverat a Deo edoctus? — quomodo deinde Deus conditor vocabitur Hierosolymae terrestrisl — denique infra, v. 16, coelum esse illam urbem apparet, nam patria ccelestis voca- tur. Simplicius quoque ad Epictetum, cap. xii. p. 77, in morte reperiri rw &'Xrl6iuviv vocroiO* dixit, de beatis sedibus." Observat. Soar. torn, ii. p. 367. No. LXIV. — Pago 19. Col. 2. ON THE PROBABLE TIME AND OCCASION OF THE INSTITUTION OF SACRIFICE. The event which, according to the principle of sacrifice maintained in the page here referred to, gave birth to the establishment of the rite, seems obviously to determine the time of its institution. The commission of sin, and the promise of a Redeemer, being the grand objects of its reference, no period seems more fit for its appointment than that at which sin first entered, and the promise was first delivered ; that is, the period immediately succeeding the Fall. And, indeed, the manner in which the first sacrifice recorded in Scrip- ture is introduced in the narrative, strongly indicates the pre-existence of the rite; tin- words D"1^ YpE' intimating (as Kennicott has shewn in the second of his Two Diss. p. 177 — 183.) a stated time for the perfor- mance of this duty : and the whole turn of phrase marking a previous and familiar obser- vance. See Richie's Peculiar Doctrines, Part ii. § 42, vol. i. p. 138. If, then, sacrifice be admitted to have been coeval with the Fall, every argument which has been adduced to prove that Abel offered sacrifices in obedience to the divine injunction, will apply with increased force to shew, that Adam must have done the same. Scripture also supplies additional confirmation, by the fact which it relates, of the first pair having been, by the express command of God, clothed with the skins of beasts. Much as some have endeavoured to depreciate the value of this fact, it will be found, when more closely examined, to supply a strong evidence on this head. That the beasts, whose skins were allotted for covering to our first parents, had been slain, it is natural to suppose ; as it is not reasonable to think that any animals had died of them- selves, so soon after their creation, and without having yet experienced any severities of cli- mate or situation. Now, there were no pur- poses for which they could have been slain, unless those of food, sacrifice, or covering. That they were not slain for food, has beeu, it is hoped, sufficiently established in No. LII. Neither can it be admitted, that they were slain merely for covering ; since it cannot be supposed, that Adam would, immediately after the sentence of the divine displeasure, have dared to kill God's creatures without his permission ; nor is it likely, that God should order them to be slain solely for their skins, when man could have been supplied with sufficient covering from the hair and wool ; and when, the flesh of the animal not 182 M A G E E OX T H E A T < ) N E M E N T. being permitted for food, there must have been an unnecessary waste <>f the creatures. It follows, then, thai they had been slain with a view to sacrifice. This alone supplies an adequate reason. The whole of the animal (if the offering be supposed a holocaust, as there is good reason to conclude all to have been,1 until the Mosaic institution) would here be devoted to the uses of religion, except the skin, which would be employed for the purpose of clothing. And even this might not be without its moral and religious end, as it might serve to our first parents for a con- stant memorial of their transgression, of the death which it merited, and of the divine mercy by which that death was withheld. It seems also not unlikely, that from this institution was derived the appointment in Lev. vii. 8, that the priest should have the skin of the burnt-offering. See particularly, on the subject of this number, Kennic. Two Diss. pp. 67 — 70, 2-17, 228, and Wits. Misc. Sacr. lib. ii. diss. ii. § 12. — also Ileideg. Histor. Patr. Exercit. v. § 1(5 ; Delan. Iter. Exam. vol. i. diss. viii. p. 9!) — 103 ; Barringt. Miscell. Sacr. vol. iii. pp. 17. 67 ; Shuckf. Connect, vol. i. b. 2, pp. 80, 81 ; and Patr. and Ainsw. on Gen. iii. 21. A translation, indeed, lias been given of the passage in Gen. iii. 9, which subverts the entire of the argument derived from the skins gis-en to the first pair for clothing, by referring the word "y\y to the skin of Adam and his wife, and reading it in this sense, "that God made for them coats, or coverings of their skin." Cloppenburg remarks, (Sacrif. Patri- arch. Sch. p. 13,) that the word ""1TJ? is never to be found in Scripture in any other signifi- cation, than that of the hide of an animal. Kennicott also concurs in this criticism, with one slight and conjectural exception. But the truth is, there are many exceptions, which these distinguished scholars must have, hastily overlooked. Exod. xxxiv. 30; Job, x. 11 ; xix. 20, 26, with others which may be seen in Cocceius, Schindler, and Calasio, and need not be enumerated, supply examples as strong as that which has been noticed by Kennicott, from Exod. xxii. 26. But although the word is in thoe several instances applied to the human skin, yet the form and construction of the passage before us will not admit it here. It is here introduced absolutely, and without anj of those connecting parts of speech which might mark its relation to the persons spoken of, whilst, in the passages above referred to, the relation is always so pointed out. On the supposition that "the human skin is here meant, the last named passage, viz. Exod. xxii. 26, exactly corresponds to this, the raiment for his skiii, in the one, agreeing precisely with the covering for their skin, in the 1 Seep. 17, and the pronoun suffixed to it, TYI}/? '. in like manner, both of these, or at least the suffixed pronoun, (□my,) would undoubtedly have been used here, had the skin of the per- sons covered been intended ; whereas the word "ITj; is introduced absolute and uncon- nected. See Kennic. Two Dissert, pp. 68, 69. Accordingly the LXX, and all the ancient versions, except the Chaldee, have uniformly rendered the sentence in its present received acceptation. So little deserving of serious attention did the translation which has been here discussed appear to Dr Lardner, that, in his Essay on the Mosaic Account, ike. (Kippis's edit. vol. xi. pp. 239, 249,) when engaged in a direct examina- tion of the subject, he does not condescend to notice it, at the same time that he observes upon Le Clerc's interpretation, which is scarcely less extraordinary : viz. that the word, jmiTO» does not signify coats, but tents: so that the covering provided for Adam and his wife were not coats, but tents, of skins. In this, however, Le Clerc has nothing to support him but his own ingenuity of inven- tion. The word N3YTO» which is exactly the Greek x'r^"> being never used to signify any thing but a garment. And even ii* it were, it seems rather extraordinary, as Kennicott re- marks, that God should take care to make a tent or habitation for the first pair in Paradise, when, in the very next words, we read of God's turning them out of Paradise. This, however, is not the only instance in which Le Clerc lias indulged an arbitrary fancy- in his Comments on Scripture. 2 Whoever wishes to be satisfied of the levity of Le Gere's occasional strictures on Scripture, may consult the dissertation of Witsius, on the Author 0os oreAjjf. JHSIOn also may be rendered by vitux»Ts;, and \2D by '/]<7v%xarjv. All this, how- ever, it must be remembered, is to be con- sidered rather possible than natural. For although the infinitive certainly admits such a connection with the verb ^LDYIi as to imply the doing well1 that which is expressed by the infinitive, yet the use of the verb j"7Nl£f for offering sacrifice, and of 17/13 for dividing, can scarcely be said to be authorized by any passages in Scripture. Indeed that 17/13 should admit the sense of dividing, it ought to be written JH/13, unless we suppose the word to he taken in the sense of freely sharing, or imparting (which 17/13 is n°t incapable of expressing) and that thence the Greek trans- lator^ fell themselves justified in extending it to the above signification. As for V^n, also, it i> onlj by a considerable latitude of figura- tive application that it can be interpreted as in the Greek; its literal meaning being that 01 hi mg down as an animal. So that, upon the whole, the version by the LXX is rather to be defended than approved : whilst the translation by Jerome, and still more that by 1 Of this construction, Prov. xxx. 2!) ; Psalm xxxiii. .3 ; Isaiah, .wiii. Hi ; Bsek. xxxiii. 32, and many other parts of Scriptnre, supply instances. Theodotion, presents a view of the passage much more natural as well as grammatical. Jerome's translation runs thus : "Nonne si hene ejxeris, demittetur tiM '. Kt si DOU bene egeris, ante fores peccatum tuum sedebit ? Ft ad te societas ejus : sed tu magis dominare ejus," (Quatst. Hebr. in Genes.) And this, again, is thus modified in the Roman Vulgate : — " Nonne si bene egeris, recipies ? Sin autem male, statim in foribus peccatum aderitl Sed sub te erit appetitus ejus, et tu dominaberis illius." In both of these the sense is nearly the same as that in our common English Bibles ; except that the last clause is applied by the followers of the Vulgate, not to Abel, but to the sin just before spoken of, and is interpreted as pronouncing on the full domi- nion of man over his sinful desires, and assert- ing the uncontrolled freedom- of his will. The Romish writers adduce Jerome's para- phrase3 on the text, as clearly proving this to have been his view ; and also refer to the authority of Augustine, who specifically argues the point thus, " Tu dominaberis illius ; nun- quid fratris? absit. Cujus igitur nisi peccati?" On these authorities, together with that of the Jerusalem Targum, the Doway4 translators 2 Erasmus (II>/peraspist. Diatrib. ii. § 9G) cites the passage thus: "Sub te erit appetitus tuus, et tu dominaberis illius;" and from this unauthorized reading deduces an argument in opposition to Luther, on the free will of man. 8 In his Questions on Genesis he thus explains the text : " Quod si male egeris, illico peccatum ante vestibulum sedebit, et tali janitore comitaberis ; verum, quia liberi arbitrii cs, moneo ut Don tibi peccatum, sed tu peccatodomineris." 4 Ernesti, in his Jnstitutio Interprets Novi Testament), p. 79, exclaims, " Quam multi errores orti sunt in Ecclesia, ex lingua; Hebraiea.- ignorantia ! Doctrina do purgatorio, pceni- tentia, fide, bonis operibus, et alia;, ex Augustino quidem et vcrsione Vulgata proferri quidem, sed adseri et defendi non possunt contra interprctem lingua; Ilebraica; gnarum." Other reasons, however, very different from mere ignorance of the Hebrew language, have been ascribed for the errors in Scripture Interpretation, imputable to the advocates of the Church of K i >me. Father Paul informs us, in one of his Letters, (Letter 25,) that the Pope, complaining of Era. Fulgentio, said, " that preaching of the Scriptures is a suspicious thing; and that he who keeps close to the Scriptures, will ruin the Catholic faith." And again, (Letter 26,) the Pope is made to say of him, " that, indeed, he made some good sermons, but bad ones withal ; and that he insisted too much upon Scripture ; which is a book, to which if any keep close, he will quite ruin the Catholic faith." And indeed, that the Pope had reason to complain of Era. Eul- gentio's sermons, must be admitted, when we tind from Burnet's Life of Bishop Iledell, (p. 1 l!l.) that that father, in preaching on the words, " Have ye not read?" took occasion to tell the auditory, that if Christ were now to ask this question, all the answer they could make tu it would be, " No, fur they were nut Buffered to do it ;" and thence proceeded to remonstrate, with the most animated zeal, against the restraint put on the use of the Scripture by the See of Rome. In a work, which, within a few years, has obtained the most distinguished mark of approbation from the highest and most learned society of a nation holding communion with the Church of Home, we meet with a detailed statement of those causes which have disqualified the votaries of that church for the task of Scriptnre interpretation. After an enumeration of the advan- tages derived to the literature and civilisation of Christendom from religious houses, as depositaries of the remains of ancient learning, the author thus proceeds : — "If the churchmen pre- No. 65 -ON THE TRUE INTERPRETATION OF THE PASSAGE, Gen. iv. 7. 185 ground a triumph over the heretical (Protes- tant) versions, whose object in referring the clause to Abel and not to sin, they conceive to be that of escaping from the doctrine of free will ; for the hostility to which doctrine, entertained by the first Reformers, they arc branded by these translators with the title of Manichees. (See the Doway Bible on Gen.iv.7.) To these Romish doctors I leave a Romish doctor to reply. Dr Geddes, in his Critical Remarks, pp. 54, 65, has endeavoured to shew, that Jerome's version, or that of the Vulgate, served in tins manner tlie faint tradition of knowledge, it must, at the same time, be acknowledged, that in their hands it more than once became dangerous, and was converted by its guardians to pernicious purposes. The domination of Rome, built upon a scaffolding of false historical proofs, had need of the assistance of those faithful auxiliaries, to employ on the one side their half knowledge to fascinate men's eyes, and on the other to prevent those eyes from perceiving the truth, and from becoming enlightened by the torch of criticism. The local usurpations of the clergy, in several places, were founded on similar claims, and had need of similar means for their preservation. It fol- lowed, therefore, both that the little knowledge permitted should be mixed with error, and that the nations should be carefully maintained in profound ignorance, favourable to superstition. Learning, as far as possible, was rendered inac- cessible to the laity. The study of the ancient languages was represented as idolatrous and abominable. Above all, the reading of the Holy Scriptures, that sacred inheritance of all Christians, was severely interdicted. To read the Bible, without the permission of one's superiors, was a crime ; to translate it into the vulgar tongue would have been a temerity worthy of the severest punishment. The Popes had, indeed, their reasons for preventing the word of Jesus Christ from reaching the people, and a direct communication from being established between the Gospel and the Christian. When it becomes necessary to keep in the shade objects as conspicuous as faith and public worship, it behoved the darkness to be universal and impenetrable." Villers's Essay on the Reformation of Luther, p. 88—90. The same writer, in another place, thus contrasts the characters of the Protestant and Romish Churches, as to their grounds of assent to sacred truths : — " The Church of Rome said, ' Submit, without examination, to authority.' The Pro- testant Church said, ' Examine, and submit only to thy own conviction.' The one commanded men to believe blindly ; the other taught them, with the apostle, to reject the bad, and choose only that which is good." Ibid. p. 294. And when the Church of Rome was at length obliged, by the necessities of self-defence, to grant to her faithful sons the privilege of theo- logical investigation, in what way docs the same writer represent the system of studies permitted for this purpose ? The theology of the Romanist, and that of the Protestant, he describes as " two worlds in opposite hemispheres, which have nothing common except the name." — " The Catholic theology rests," says he, " on the inflexible authority of the decisions of the Church, and therefore debars the man who studies it from all free exercise of his reason. It has preserved the jargon and all the barbarous appendages of the scholastic philosophy. We perceive in it the work of darkness of the monks of the tenth century. In short, the happiest thing which can befall him who has unfortunately learned it, is speedily to forget it. The Protestant theology, on the contrary, rests on a system of examination, on the unlimited use of reason. The most liberal exegesis opens for it the knowledge of sacred antiquity ; criticism, that of the history of the Church ; it regards the doctrinal i art, reduced to purity and simplicity, as only the body of religion, the positive form which it requires ; and it is supported by philosophy in the examination of the laws of nature, of morality, and of the relations of men to the Divine Being. Whoever wishes to be instructed in history, in classical literature, and philosophy, can choose nothing better than a course of Protestant theology." Ibid. pp. 307, 308. Such are the observations contained in a work which has been dis- cannot be maintained. He has not, however, adduced the arguments which bear most strongly against their interpretation ; namely, those which apply to the mistranslation of the concluding clause of the seventh verse, and to the violence offered even to that mistranslation in pronouncing that Cain having sinned should acquire dominion over his sinful desires, which is as much as to say, that by yielding to sin a man acquires the power of controlling it. But too much has been said upon Romish exposition. s tinguished by a prize, conferred by the National Institute of France. Perhaps one of the most decisive proofs of the justice of this writer's remarks on the state of sacred literature in the Romish Church has been supplied by the late republication, in this country, of that wretched specimen of Scripture criticism, Ward's Errata. This powerless offspring of a feeble parent, which was supposed to have perished when it first saw the light above a century ago, has lately, upon signs of reanimation, been hailed in Ireland with shouts of joy. And the meagre abstract of Gregory Martin's Discovery of the Manifold Corruptions of the Holy Scriptures, a work which has itself lain for two hun- dred years overwhelmed by confutation, has been received by the Romanists, of this part of the empire, with a gratulation that might well become the darkest ages of the Church. A work, con- demning the Protestant translation of the Bible for using the term messenger instead of angel, (in Mai. ii. 7; iii. 1 ; Matth. xi. 10; Luke, vii. 27, &c.) by which the character of angel is withdrawn from the priesthood, and of a sacrament from orders: for not rendering the words (in Heb. xi. 21) t^oo-ex^uktev 'Em to kx^ov rr,; pxSiov oci/tS, as the Rhemish does, adored the top of his rod, and thereby surreptitiously removing one of the principal Scripture arguments for image worship: for, ascribing to the word 5CB, in the second commandment, the meaning graven image, whilst the Rhemish renders it graven thing, which, with those who admit an image not to be a thing, will exempt images from the prohibition of the commandment : for not giving to the words fyciravoia and panitentia, the sense of penance, but merely assigning to them their true interpreta- tion repentance, and thus doing wilful despite to the sacrament ot penance : — a work, I say, condemning the Protestant trans- lations of the Bible for these, and some other such errors ; and in all cases demonstrating the error by one and the same irre- fragable proof, — that the Romish version is the true one, and that the Protestant version, which differs from it, must conse- quently be false, — is certainly not such a one, as might, in the nineteenth century, be expected to be raked up by the clergy of a widely extended communion, and exhibited triumphantly as a master-piece of critical erudition. In the opinion of many, this miserable performance did not deserve an answer ; especially as every argument which it contained, had been in former times repeatedly confuted. Perhaps, however, they judged more rightly, who thought, that even the weakest reasonings should be exposed, lest they might be imagined to be strong ; and that even the most hackneyed arguments should be replied to, lest they might be conceived to be new. Accordingly, this work received an answer from Dr Ryan, whose zealous exertions in the cause of religious truth are well known, and is about to receive another from the Rev. Richard Grier, of Middleton. These gentlemen, at all events, display courage in their enter- prise, since the author whom they attack, backed by the whole Council of Trent, has pronounced, that whoever shall not receive the books of Scripture, " as they are read in the Catholic (Romish) Church, and as they are in the Vulgate Latin edition, 6hall be accursed." Errata, p. 37. 5 How little entitled the orthodox member of the Romish Church is, at this day, to expect serious consideration in the walks of sacred criticism, may be inferred (in addition to what has been said in the last note) from the description given of him by a doctor of his own communion. " The vulgar Papist rests his faith on the supposed infallibility of his church, 186 M A G E E O N THE A T O N E M E N T. I come now to the translation by Thcodo- tion, which, as it appears to me, does perfecl justice to the original, and with which the version which I have proposed entirely coin- ciiles. Ovx, ocv ciyxt)u>; TOijISt oexrov ; net! d,v y.v) ctyxflZ; iroiflg, tTri Si/ox; x/uxbtix eyKxfl/irxr kxI -xno; oi o^utj cci/Tif, y.xl x\~u~ xv-i. Here is an agreement in all its parts with the rendering which has been submitted; the force of utuM^riu, like that of JHNtDn, extending to the sin-offering: iy*»6nrxt, as well as \^D, denoting the posture of an animal; and «£t» the masculine decidedly marking, that the reference in the last clause was, not to x/xxptix** but to Abel. See Theodot. apud Montefalc. Grotius has given the passage somewhat of a different turn, and yet departs but little although lie knows not where that infallibility is lodged, nor in what it properly consists: it is to him a general, vague, inde- finite idea, which he never thinks of analysing. He reads in his catechism, or is told by his catechist, that the Church cannot err in what she teaches ; and then he is told, that this unerring church is composed only of those who hold commu- nion with the Hishop of Home, and precisely believe as he and the bishops who are in communion with him believe. From that moment reason is set aside ; authority usurps its place, and implicit faith is the necessary consequence. He dares not even advance to the first step of Des Cartes's logic ; he dares not doubt : for in his table of sins, which he is obliged to con- fess, he finds doubting in matters of faith to be a grievous crime." Such i3 Dr Geddes's account of him whom he is pleased to call " the vulgar Papist ;" under which title he, in truth, means to include all who are sincere votaries of the Church of Rome, and whom that Church would acknowledge as such ; in other words, he means by this term to designate all who are actually within the pale of Popery. And let it not be supposed that this is the testimony of an enemy in the disguise of a friend ; and that the author, whilst he assumed the name of Catholic, was influenced by the feelings of a Protestant. On the contrary, it is manifest, from the fol- lowing passage, that his mind remained under the powerful influence of Homish impression, and that ho continued still a partisan of that faith whose errors he affected to decry. For, Bays he, " Is the faith of the vulgar Protestant better founded ? He rests it on a book called the Holy Bible, which he believes to be the infallible word of God." And thus he pronounces the faith of the Protestant and of the Papist to be alike implicit and alike unfounded. " If the instructor of the Protestant be asked how he knows that the book which he puts into the hand of his catechumen is the infallible word of God, he cannot, like the priest, appeal to an unerring church ; he acknowledges no such guide ; and yet it is hard to conceive what other better argument he can use." He goes on even to pronounce, that, " in the Popish controversy, the Romanists have, on this point, the better side of the question ; called by some of their controver- sialists, the question of questions.'" And in what way docs their Mipfri ■ i r i t v appear upon this question of questions? By " its never having been satisfactorily solved by the Romanists them- selves; the; having always reasoned in what is termed a vicious circle : proving the infallibility of the Church from the authority of Scripture, and the authority of Scripture from the Church's Infallibility." [Prtfiux to Critical Remarks, p. v.) This must undoubtedly have given the Romanists the better side of the question ; fir what Protestant logician could successfully reply to such an argument ? But the reader must be wearied of this fatuity. 6 That is, to iiio(ni, in the sense of tin ; in which senso alone it is that it has been by some made the subject of reference, in opposition to Abel. In the tense of sin-oft, riiitj. it would, as we have seen, admit the masculine pronoun aii-S : but to tho word, taken in that sense, the reference of the pronoun would have no meaning. from the meaningwhich has been here assigned. He considers the force of the si bene egeris, as carried down to the concluding clause, so as to make the sense this: a It' thou doest well, Abel, as the younger, shall be rendered subject to thy authority." And so makes the clause beginning with, " If thou doest not well," ike. parenthetical ; of which, he says, innu- merable instances are to be found in the Hebrew Scriptures. This mode of translating the passage has been adopted by 1'urver in his English version ; and it is certainly not un- worthy of commendation. At the same time, I cannot but think the view of the sentence, which I have ottered to the reader, more grammatical, more consistent, and more natural.7 No. LXVL— Page 20. Col. 1. ON THE COMPARISON BETWEEN TnE SACRIFICE OF ABEL AND THAT OF CHRIST. Dr Richie judiciously observes, on this passage of Hebrews, that " it makes the sacri- fice of Abel to have been of the piacular kind, by the comparison which it makes between the effect of it and that of the sacrifice of Christ, which without doubt was of the pia- cular kind. For, unless these two sacrifices had been of the same kind, and productive of similar effects, such a comparison could not have been made, nor the effect of the one pro- nounced to have been better, or much greater, than the effect of the other : causes of a diffe- rent nature producing effects of a dissimilar kind : and between effects of a dissimilar kind, no such comparison as that here made being admissible." Peculiar Doctrines of Reve- lation, Part II. § xlii. p. 138. 7 The note of Ludov. de Dieu on this passage deserves to be noticed. " An non, sivc bene offeras, sive non bene, ad ostium peccatum cubat ? Quum scilicet, indigne ferret Cain, fratris sacriricinm suo esse pralatum, quod non minus recte sacrifi- ciorum ritus observasset fratre, neque quicquam, sive quoad rem oblatam, sive quoad cxternam offerendi rationem ac ceremo- niam, dignius a fratre ac meliua profectum esset, monet Deus, non esse hie ipsam oblationem respieiendam, recte nc ea secun- dum legem scilicet cerimonialem facta sit, an secus ; sed perso- nam offcrentem, dedita ne ea sit peccato, an non. Tu peccatum perpetUO circumfers, illudque in proeinctu babes, Cubans quippo ante fores ; itaque nihil refcrt, bene ne an male secundum rites legales offeras. Vel optima ttia oblatio a peccato vitiatur. Non debebat appetitOJ tuns ferri ad peccatum, sed peccati appctitus ad to, sicut mulieris appctitus ad inaritum cui subest, tuque ei domlnarL Posset ctiam vcrti, An non sive pulchrum quid adferas, sive non pulchrum," die. Aninnnlv. in Y>t. Test. p. 13. These interpretations possess much ingenuity, but are liable to the grammatical objection already urged, of taking nNCTi, in the sense of sin, in the masculine gender. No. 67.— ON THE NATURE OF SACRIFICE BEFORE THE LAW, &c. 187 No. LXVIL- -Pago 20. Col. 2. OX THE NATURE OF SACRIFICE BEFORE THE LAW : TENDING TO SHEW ITS CONFINEMENT TO ANIMAL SACRIFICE, EXCEPT IN THE CASE OF CAIN. From the time of Abel's sacrifice to the giving of the law, we find the sacrificial offering described by no other appellation than that of 7Y?y or nil, the holocaust or burnt-offering, and the zebach or immolated victim. Thus we see the former expression used of the sacrifice of Noah in Gen. viii. 20, and again repeatedly applied to the sacrifice of Abraham in the twenty-second chapter. It is also employed by Moses in speaking of sacrifices to Pharaoh, in Exod. x. 25, and again in describ- ing the offerings of Jethro, (xviii. 12.) The oblations of Job likewise, (Job, i. 5,) and of his friends, (xlii.7, 8,) are so denominated : as are those of Balaam, in the twenty-third chapter of Numbers. In the numerous other instances of the mode of worship by sacrifice, which occur in this early period, the expression used is either f"QT, or, where the sort of sacrifice is not exactly specified, a word immediately derived from, and clearly implying it, fOTDj which, though translated generally by us an altar, and being sometimes applied to that on which incense was presented, cannot, as Sykes remarks, (Essay, p. 246,) whenusedabsolutely, and in its strict sense, be otherwise understood, than as signifying " that on which slat?i anitnals were offered." Doctor Richie, indeed, not only maintains that none but animal sacrifices were offered from the time of Cain to the promulgation of the law, but that all during that period were none other than holocausts, or burnt-offerings ; the zebach, or slain animal, having been uniformly offered up in that manner : and that, consequently, all the sacrifices of this early period were piacular. In this last posi- tion Sykes concurs, so far as to allow, that " all holocausts before the days of Moses were deprecations of wrath ;" and he admits also, that, from the time of Abel until that of Jacob, there is no instance of any other sacri- fice than the burnt-offering. But from his peculiar notions concerning the nature of sacrifice he is led to contend, that the sacrifice of Jacob, and those of Moses and Jethro, in- cluded a peace-offering, although he confesses, that in no one instance is there any mention expressly made of peace-offerings before the law. The circumstances on which Sykes grounds his opinion are, — 1. The introduction of the word !~GT : which is of no weight, because nothing prevents the zebach from having been an holocaust. — 2. The mention of the eating of bread at the time of the sacrifice : from which no inference can be drawn re- specting tho nature of the sacrifice, as we have already seen in Number XLIX. — And,3. The mention of both the zebach and the holocaust, in the cases of Moses and Jethro, in Exod. x. 25, and xviii. 12 : to which Richie has satisfactorily replied, by shewing that the particle \ is to be taken, not in the sni-c <.f and, but in that of even. Indeed Dr Richie deserves particularly to be consulted on the whole of this subject. See Pecul. Dovobuyp.x (23,) et di/TiTVTo», l exemplar (24,) quomodo % Quia ilia prsestabat carni munditiem (14,) id est, reatus ablationem, non autem spiritui sive conscience (9,) ha:c autem ipsi conscientia? (14.) Quia quod in Veteri Lege erat mors temporalis, hoc in Novo Foedere est mors aeterna, (Heb. x. 29 :) ac proinde illic libera- tio erat temporalis, hie vero ctiuviog XvT^uai;, ceterna redemptio, (Heb. ix. 12.) Qua re sicut eodem loco ab effectu legalis victima? ad effectum hujus per spiritum oblatse argumen- tmii producitur, Qvanto magis, ike. sic et nobis licet hunc in modum certissime argu- mentari, — Victima legalis rcatuni carnalem BUStulit, Deum movendo ad remissionem ; ergo multo magis reatum spiritualem, Deum itidem ad remissionem movendo, toll it oblata per spiritum victima." — Grotii Opera T/ieo- log. torn. iv. pp. 331 —333. The principles from which Grotius has de- rived liis conclusion are manifestly these, — 1. That the expiation wrought by the sacrifices under the law were typical of that effected by the death of Christ ; 2. That in every type there must be something of the same general nature with that which is contained in the thing typified ; and, 3. That, combined with this general correspondence between the type and the thing prefigured, there should exist that disproportion which might be expected between the Bhadow and the substance. These principles, indeed, are so dearly and 1 Grotius lias here used the word antttj/pt Improperly, nnd in a sense directly opposite to that in which he has just before properly applied the term. unequivocally laid down by the apostle in his Epistle to the Hebrews, that even the great fathers of the Socinian school, Faustus Soci- nus and Crellius, admit their evidence, and differ from Grotius only in the application. In establishing the correspondence and the disproportion of the Mosaic and the Christian expiation, they urge the reasoning of the apostle no less forcibly than Grotius has done, as may be seen in the treatise of Soci- nus De Jes. Christ. Serv. (Opera, torn. ii. pp. 157, 158,) and in Crellius's Respons. ad Grot. (Opera, torn. i. p. 204 — 211.) These exposi- tors, not having been initiated into the con- venient artifice so familiar to their followers, of rejecting the authority of an apostle when it made against them, found themselves com- pelled by the plain language of Scripture to acknowledge the validity of these principles. The nature of their system, however, being at variance with their admission, they were led to strain one principle to an extreme, subversive of the other ; and, by urging dis- proportion within the confines of dissimilitude, they were enabled to escape the bearings of that correspondence of the two dispensations which forms the foundation of the apostle's argument, and for which they had themselves in the first instance strenuously contended. For whilst, in professing to represent the expiation by the sacrifice of Christ as of a superior order to that effected by the sacri- fices of the law, they endeavour to establish this by such a description of its nature, as divests it of every character which the Mosaic sacrifice possessed, they in truth shew, that the death of Christ bore no relation whatever to those sacrifices by which they admit it to have been typified ; that is, in other words, they make the Mosaic sacrifices at the same time typical and not typical of the death of Christ. See this point well treated, though in a different manner, by Stillingrleet, in his Discourse conceminq the true Reasons, &C pp. 365 — 367. On another fallacy in the reasoning of the above writers it is also necessary to remark. Whilst they profess faithfully to follow the apostle's reasoning in his address to the He- brews, they represent the expiation of the legal sacrifice as wholly typical ; whereas it was not less real and effectual, under its own proper system, than the sacrifice of Christ was under that by which it was succeeded ; whilst, at the same time, it prefigured that more important expiation which was to be intro- duced under the new dispensation ; all the parts of which, the apostle distinctly informs us, had their corresponding circumstances in thai which went before. Upon the whole, then, briefly to sum up the present subject. — The people of the Jews being placed under a peculiar polity, whereby they stood at the same time in a civil and No. 68.— DISPROPORTION OF THE MOSAIC AND CHRISTIAN SACRIFICES. 189 a ritual relation to their divine Governor, their offences in these several relations exposed them to the inflictions appropriate to each. The mercy of the Legislator at the same time provided for them the means of expiation by sacrifice, whereby, in certain cases, the corporal punishment incurred by the violation of the civil law, and the legal impurities con- tracted by the neglect of the ritual institutions, might be done away. The en ti re system, how- ever, being but preparatory for another by which it was to be superseded, was constituted in all its essential parts in such a manner as to be emblematical of that which it was in- tended to introduce ; and the several parts of the one, consequently, adjusted by the same proportions which were to obtain in the other. Hence it follows, that the sacrifices under the temporal and ceremonial dispensation of the Law had a real efficacy in releasing those who were subjected to it from its temporal penalties and ceremonial disqualifications ; in like manner as the one great sacrifice under the Gospel possesses the power to release mankind at large from the everlasting penal- ties of that spiritual law under which all men are bound, and to cleanse the conscience from those moral impurities which forbid all access to that holy Being, who is to be worshipped only in spirit and in truth. The expiation, then, under the old law, was no less real than that which it prefigured under the new, whilst it bore to the dispensation of which it was a part, the same proportion which that more perfect expiation by the death of Christ bears to the more perfect dispensation to which it appertains ; the wisdom of the divine contri- vance, in this as in the other branches of pro- vidential arrangement, rendering that which was complete and effectual for its own imme- diate purpose, at the same time introductory and subservient to other and more important objects. Berriman, in treating of the typical inter- pretation of the law, although leaning a little too much to the notion of its being merely symbolical, places the parallelism and propor- tion of the two dispensations in a just and satisfactory light. " From what," "he asks, " was the offender delivered by the legal sacrifices? Was it not from the temporal death, and the danger of being cut off from the congregation? And to what privilege was he restored or entitled ? Was it not to the privilege of appearing before God, and joining in the public worship? What was the purifying or sanctification consequent upon such atonements? Was it not (as the apostle styles it) the purifying of the flesh ? an outward and a transient efficacy, which could not reach to purge their consciences from dead works ? And why was all this necessary to be often repeated, but because it had no solid or permanent effect, nor deserved to find ac- ceptance of itself? But if we take it in a symbolical or typical point of view, then it leads us to acknowledge the benefit of Christ's redemption, and those invaluable privileges lie has purchased for us. That temporal death, which was denounced by the law, will denote that everlasting punishment to which sinners are exposed as such. The legal impurity, which wanted to be cleansed, will denote the defilement and impurity of sin. The outward admission to the service of the temple, will denote our spiritual privilege of access unto God, as well in the present ordinances of his church, as in the future inheritance of his eternal kingdom. And all this being per- formed by the oblation of sacrifices, clean and perfect in their kind, will import our being; ' redeemed with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot ; who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, for a sweet- smelling savour, and entered not into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the true, but into heaven itself, that true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man, there to plead the merit of his sacrifice, and make for ever intercession for us.' " — Boyle Lecture Sermons, vol. iii. pp. 776, 777. On the subject of this Number in general, there are some excellent remarks of Bishop Stillingfleet, to be found in his Discourse con- cerning the true Reasons, &c. pp. 315 — 318. No. LXIX. — Page 22. Col. 1. ON THE CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN THE SACRIFI- CIAL LANGUAGE OF THE OLD TESTAMENT AND THAT EMPLOYED IN THE NEW TO DESCRIBE REDEMPTION BY THE DEATH OF CHRIST : AND THE ORIGINAL ADAPTATION OF THE FORMER TO THE SUBJECT OF THE LATTER. If, indeed, it be considered, that the sacrifice of Christ was the great object held in view in the appointment of all preceding sacrifices, and that these were primarily designed as sacramental representations of that, it will follow, that in reference to it must the sacri- ficial terms have been originally framed : and that, therefore, when applied by the apostles to the death of Christ, they were adopted, not merely as being familiar to the Jews from their applications to the sin-offerings under the law, but because of their original adaptation to this one great sacrifice, in consequence of which they had been applied to the legal sacrifices ordained to represent it. For some valuable observations on this subject, see Holmes's Four Tracts, pp. 102, 103. If this view of the matter be just, it then follows, that so far were the writers of the New Testament from employing the sacri- li)0 M A (J R E ON Til E A TO N E M E N T. ficial terms in mere accommodation to Jewish notions, (an argument much insisted on by Dr Priestley, II. Taylor, ami others, see p. 14, and pp. 68, 69,) that they must have used them as primarily belonging to the death of Christ, and as in strict accuracy more aptly characterizing the Christian sacrifice, than those sacrifices of typical import to which they had been applied under the law. From this also it might be expected, that a fuller light would now be thrown upon the nature of the Jewish sacrifice, and the true force and value of the sacrificial ceremonies and phrases be more perfectly understood. And this we find to be the case, the language of the New Testament on the subject of atone- ment being more precise and significant than that of the Old. Instances of this may be seen in pp. 09, 103, 104, and are not denied by the opponents of the doctrine of atonement, as has been already observed in the places referred to. Thus, then, we find the Old Testament and the New bestowing mutual elucidation on this head : the rites and terms of sacrifice in the Old exemplifying and de- scribing the leading principles and funda- mental notions of atonement ; and the more exact and perfect delineation of it in the New filling up the outline, and exhibiting the great work of our redemption in its genuine magnitude and beauty. The train of reflection pursued in this Number leads me naturally to notice the opi- nions of Archbishop Tillotson, as connected with its subject. Nor is it without much regret that 1 find myself compelled to notice, for the express purpose of marking with con- demnation, the opinions of a prelate, whose great talents and virtues have combined to shed so bright a lustre on the annals of the English Church. This distinguished writer,1 having been forcibly impressed with the many visible traces of the doctrines and truths of revelation discoverable in the mythology and worship of the heathen world, was led to conclude, with a rashness little to be expected from such a man, that the Christian religion, whilst it was in its substance a most perfect institution, was yet, in condescension to the weakness of mankind, accommodated to the exist ing prejudices of the world, SO far as was consistent with the honour of God, and its 1 So highly was Tillotson esteemed as a writer by the cele- brated Locke, that, in his treatise Concerning Reaiiinij and hi fur a (ifnlli-iihiit, he specifically recommends the constant perusal of the works of that prelate, as a most useful exercise for the student who is desirous to acquire the talent of perspi- cuity. So very highly, indeed, did that most excellent judge of whatever Is requisite to clearness of expression, rate the arch- bishop's endowments in this particular, that he has joined with him but one other writer in the English language, as exhibiting a just model f >r the acquisition of a perspicuous style. That writer is ('hilling worth, whom he 00 u nils also for attainments of yet higher value. " Hesldcs perspicuity," lie says, " there must be als > right reasoning ; without which, perspicuity serves but to expose the speaker. And for the attaining of this, I own great and valuable purposes. And ac- cordingly, he maintains, that the doctrine of our redemption by the sacrifice of Christ had its origin in the notion of sacrifices entertained amongst the Pagans. " This notion," he says, " of the expiation of sin, by sacrifices of one kind or other, seems to have obtained very early in the world ; and, among all other ways of divine worship, to have found the most universal reception in all times and places. And, indeed, a great part of the Jewish religion and worship was a plain condescension to the general appre- hensions of men, concerning this way of appeasing the Deity by sacrifice : and the greatest part of the Pagan religion and wor- ship was likewise founded upon the same notion and opinion, which, because it was so universal, seems to have had its original from the first parents of mankind, cither imme- diately after the Creation, or after the Fl I ; and from thence — I mean as to the substance of this notion — to have been derived and pro- pagated to all their posterity. And with this general notion of mankind, whatever the ground or foundation of it might be, God was pleased so far to comply, as once for all to have a general atonement made for the sins of all mankind, by the sacrifice of his only Son." Tillotson's Works, vol. i. p. 440. For similar observations, see lb. pp. 439, 44G, 447, 451. And again, in vol. ii. p. 112, he states the matter thus : — that " with these notions, which had generally possessed mankind, God was pleased to comply so far, as, in the frame of the Jewish religion, (which was designed for a type of the more perfect institution of the Christian religion, and a preparation for it,) to appoint sacrifices to be slain and offered up for the sinner," &c. and that after- wards, in the dispensation of the Gospel, the same condescension to the apprehensions of mankind was likewise observed, as has been already stated. Now, it is surely much to be lamented, that when this learned prelate had, upon a full examination of the case, been led to discover such a striking conformity between Paganism and Christianity, as must reduce the matter to this alternative, cither that the Christian dispensation was framed in compliance with heathen prejudices, or that Paganism was a should propose the constant reading of Ohillingworth, who, by his example, will teach both perspicuity and the way of right reasoning, better than any book that I know ; and therefore will deserve to be read upon that account over and over again ; not to say any thing of his argument." — Locke's Works, vol. iv. p. 001. Why I have so readily availed myself of the opportunity, afforded by this honourable testimony, of presenting Chilling- worth to the more immediate notice of the student, at this period, and in this country, will not be difficult, upon reflec- tion, to disc iver. Quncrc: Aro Tillotson and Chillingworth, and writers of that manly stamp, those with whom the youth of the present day are most solicitous to converse, for the im- provement of their reasoning and their style ? -J No. 09.— SACRIFICIAL LANGUAGE OF OLD AND iNLW 'lESTAMLiYls. 191 corruption of those oracles which conveyed anticipations of the Christian scheme ; it is much, I say, to be lamented, that he should have been drawn into a conclusion so directly at variance with history and Scripture, when one so powerfully sustained by both was im- mediately at hand. The stumbling-block to the archbishop, as an ingenious writer has justly remarked, was the supposition of a religion of nature,- prior to, and independent of, revelation. Hence arose the assumption, that the notion of ex- piation for sins by sacrifice, which he found so early and so universal, was the mere sug- 2 One of the most singular theories ever devised on the suhject of Natural Religion, is that of Bishop Warburton ; which I subjoin here the more readily, as it tends to shew to what strange conceits even the greatest men may be carried, when they attempt to be wise beyond what is written, and pre- sume to substitute their own conjectural reasonings for the solid truths of Revelation. Man, he contends, was created mortal, in the immaterial as well as the material part of his nature, immateriality simply being common to him with the whole animal creation. But by God's breathing into his nostrils the bre UK of life, and thereby making him a living sou!, the life in man was discriminated from the life in brutes; since by this act was communicated to his immaterial part a rational prin- Ciple, which, by making him responsible for his actions, must require, according to the existing constitution of things, a con- tinuance of life, and, consequently, a distinct existence of the s ml after its separation from the body. In the state in which, according to the bishop, the first couple were placed previous to their admission into Paradise, they were subject only to the law of Natural Religion, the constituent parts of which religion were discoverable by the efforts of the human understanding unassisted by divine instruction. On being advanced to the Paradisiacal state, man became the subject of Revealed Reli- gion ; and, as the reward of his obedience to the positive precept attached to his new condition, immortality, (meaning thereby the perpetual duration and uninterrupted union of the body and soul.) a quality which was altogether extraneous to his original nature, was placed within his reach by the free grace of God. The opportunity now afforded to him, of exalting his nature by the superinduced blessings of immortality, was lost by his non-compliance with the condition : and at the same time the corruption, which his disobedience caused to that rational nature in which he had been made to resemble the divine image, degraded him to his first condition of mortality, and made him again liable to that total death, that complete annihilation to which his frame was originally subject. But, by the intervention of Jesus Christ, man was not only restored to the advantages of his original state, namely, the continuance of the soul after the dissolution of the body, but he was also enabled to obtain that immortality, which Adam by his obedi- ence might have secured ; witli this difference, however, that, in the immortality procured by Christ, death is permitted to give a temporary interruption to that existence and union of the soul and body, which, in the other case, would have been unbroken. But not only had the transgression occasioned a relapse into that state of mortality in which man had been originally created, but it also threw him back into that subjec- tion to natural religion in which he was at first placed. In this dispensation of Natural Religion, which, according to Bishop Warburton, was thus permitted to precede the dispensation of Grace, the aids and succours of virtue were not, however, accor- ding to his hypothesis, wanting ; for, in his view of the subject, the light of revelation is by no means required to make known the efficacy of repentance, or the rewards of upright conduct. Ii >tli these points, he contends, are evidently manifest to the eye of reasm, tracing the connection that must subsist between the creature and his Maker. Such are the paradoxical, and, it must be added, unscriptural sentiments, conveyed by this learned writer in the ninth book of the Divine Legation. They gestion of human apprehensions ; not deduced from any express revelation concerning " the Lamb of God slain," in degree and type, 4ifrom the foundation of the world ;" not springing from any divine institution, ordained for the purpose of shewing forth Christ's death, until he should himself appear in the flesh, to fulfil all that was prefigured of him, and to take away sin, and put an end to sacrifice, by the one great sacrifice of himself. Had the archbishop, as the same writer observes, reflected, that a religion or law of nature,3 is a mere ens rationis ; that the first parents of mankind were not left to the un- will be found well, though briefly, treated by Mr Pearson, in the first three sections of his Critical Essay ,- a work, of which I have already had occasion to speak, pp. 30, 133. l)r Graves, also, in the fourth section, part iii. of his Lectures on the Pentateuch, has made many valuable remarks, affecting, though not directly, these positions of the too ingenious bishop. It ought not to pass unnoticed, that his lordship, in one of his Letters to his friend Dr nurd, speaks of this his favourite theory, as intended " to confute the triumphant reasoning of unbelievers, particularly Tindal, who say redemption is a fable : for the only means of regaining God's favour, which they eter- nally confound with immortality, is that simple one which natural religion teaches, viz. repentance. To confute this, it was necessary to shew, that restoration to a, free gift, and the recovery of a claim, were two very different things. The com- mon answer was, that natural religion does not teach recon- ciliation on repentance; which, if it does not, it teaches nothing, or worse than nothing." Of Natural Religion, then, after all that Bishop Warburton has written about it, we have his full confession, that " if it does not teach the sufficiency of repen- tance, it teaches even worse than nothing." The opponent of the notion of Natural Religion may safely allow the matter to rest upon the ground on which the bishop has placed it. That God will accept repentance in compensation for obedience, nothing short of the Word of God can ever establish satisfactorily to any reasonable mind. The consequence of this position is supplied by the author of the Divine Legation. 3 To him who would wish to see, how little the Religion of Nature, so far as it contains any thing truly valuable to man, is strictly entitled to that name, I would recommend the perusal of the preface to The Religion of Jesus delineated. The observations there contained, whilst they tend to shew, in animadverting upon The Religion of Nature delineated, how sadly deficient the scheme of natural religion is found, even at this day, although sketched by the hand of a master, and aided by the borrowed discoveries of revelation, at the same time clearly evince, that the promulger of the truths of what is called natural religion,*- in almost every case in which he advances any that are of importance to mankind, is, in reality, to be deemed, not AiroblSocxTo;, but &iodi$xzTt>;. Of this, however, the fullest and most complete proof is to be dorived from the invaluable work of Dr Ellis, in which he may be said to have demonstrated. The knouiedge of Divine Things to be from Revelation, not from Reason or Nature. Leland has also abundantly established the fact, of the total insufficiency of human reason in religious concerns, by the view, which he has given, of the state of religion in the heathen world, in his work on The Advantage and Necessity of the Christian Revelation. From Clarke's sixth and seventh prop, of his Evidence of Natu- ral and Revealed Religion, although this author is disposed to attribute to the powers of reason rather more than their due share, the same inference may be deduced — especially from what is said, pp. 6">9— 665, and 666 — 671, vol. ii. of his works. I should be guilty of injustice to an accomplished modern writer, if, on this subject, I permitted to pass unnoticed Dr Maltby's Thesis for his degree of B.D. contained in the volume of his Illustrations of the Truth of the Christian Religion. The following proposition, " Nequit per se humana ratio cognitione satis plena et certa assequi, quo potissimum modo Deus sit 192 M A C E E O X T II E A T (J N E 31 E N T. assisted light of reason or nature, but were, from the beginning, fully instructed by their Creator in all things necessary for them to know ; that, after their fall, the way and method of their salvation was, to a certain degree, made known to them ; that all reli- gious rite- flowed from the same divine source, viz. the original revelation of the redemption of the world by the sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ : that all the apprehensions and common prejudices of mankind, as they are called, were derived from the same fountain ; that all, until the apostacy at Babel, had the same tongue, the same faith, the same Lord ; that the heathen carried off from thence the -inie religious rites and ceremonies, and the same sentiments concerning God and his ways with man, which, by change of language, length of time, wantonness of imagination, perver>etie>s of human nature, and subtlety of the devil, were reduced to that corrupted state of faith and practice in which our Saviour at his advent found them ; and that, as already observed, from the first promise made to Adam, during the patriarchal and legal disp 'nsations, all was Christianity in type and figure ; so that Christianity was the first religion in the world, corrupted afterwards, indeed, by the Gentile, but preserved by the Jew in type, till Christ, the great Antitype, the reality and completion, came, — had he (this writer observes) pursued this train of thinking, he would have found the reverse of his conclusion to be the truth, namely, "that Christianity was not instituted in compliance with Pagan- ism ; but that Paganism was nothing else but the great truths of Christianity split and de- based into a legend of fables, such as we meet with in their mythology."4 — Spcerman's Let- ters to a Friend concerning the Septuagint Translation and the Heathen Mythology, pp. 160, 151. colendus ; qua? sint hominum officia ; vita denique futura sit, Decile, sterna," is there treated with a justness, a succinctness, i 1 taste, a correctness of style, and a strength of authority, which reflect honour upon its author as a divine, and as a scholar, and cannot fail to give satisfaction to the reader, who wishes to find the substance of what can he said upon this important question, compressed into the smallest compass, and in the best manner. The concluding observation, concerning such at at the present day repose on the sufficiency of reason fir a knowledge of their duties, contains a truth, in which mind must necessarily acquiesce. " Profecto oadeni, qua veteroa philosuphi, caliu'ine animi coruin sunt mcrsi : aut si quid melius sapiunt, id omne a Christiana reli- gione mal.i Bde mutuati sunt.'' (P. 355.) And, therefore, as the writer finally remarks, it is most devoutly to be desired. that the advocates for the all-sufficiency of reason would deeply imprint upon their minds this momentous maxim of the great ■n : — "Causa vero et radix fere omnium malorum in scientiis ea una est, quod ilimi mentis humane vires falso mira- mur et ext llimus, vera ejus auxilia non qua;ramus." (P. 359.) 4 If this view of the case be a just one, wo certainly might reasonably expect to find in the mythology of the ancients, in a much larger and more important sense, what Plutarch says of the Egyptian fables, a.fj.\io^an «►«? \ftqi.rut rr,t iXyBiixf, same f tint and obscure resemblance of the truth. The writer who has made the above obser- vations, and whose reasonings would not have been less valuable had they taken less tincture from the Hutchinsonian school, has endea- voured, and not without success, to establish the point last adverted to ; namely, the deri- vation of the Pagan mythology from the divine revelations. Tillotson's idea corresponds with that which was afterwards adopted by Spencer. For, since he admits the Jewish dispensation to have been typical of the Christian, the accom- modation of the Christian scheme to Pagan prejudices, for which he contends, could only have been effected through the previous ac- commodation of the Jewish scheme to those prejudices ; which, as we have seen in Num- ber XLVII, falls in with the theory main- tained by Spencer. And this theory, as we have seen in the same number, p. 127, is satisfactorily refuted by Shuckford, whose work on The Sacred and Prophane His- tory of the World connected, goes to esta- blish the direct contradictory of Spencer's position.5 The arguments of Spencer are also successfully combated by Witsius in his JEqyptiaca : see likewise the same author's Misc. Soar. Lib. I. Diss. i. pp. 429—437. War- burton confesses truly, that Spencer's work is but a paraphrase and comment on the third book of the Morch Neoochini of Rabbi Mai- monides; and, joining forces with Spencer0 5 The particular application of his arguments to Spencer's notion will be found briefly sketched in vol. i. pp. 313 — 317. 6 How little Spencer deserved to have the support of War- burton, is not only manifest, from the whole scheme of his argu- ment, in his great work Dc Leaibus Ihhnrorum, (which is itself unsupported by true history, and has always been resorted to by infidel writers in order to wing their shafts more effectively against the Mosaic Revelation,) but may also be made to api'car, more evidently and briefly, by the quotation of a single passage from this writer's Discourse concerning Prodigies. " It is," he says, "the nature of the Boul to be greatly impressive to a persuasion of parallels, equalities, similitudes, in the frame and government of the world. This general temper of the soul easily inclines it to believe great and mighty changes in states, ushered in witli the solemnity of some mighty and analogous changes in nature ; and that all terrible evils are prefaced or attended with some prodigious and amazing alterations in the creation : — Hence perhaps it is, that we generally rind great troubles and judgments on earth described, especially by per- sons eest.it ical, prophets and potts, (whose speeches usually rather follow the easy sense of the soul, than the rigid truth ofthingt . | by all the examples of horror and confusion in the frame of the creation. The Prophet David describes God's going forth to judgment thus : — ' The earth shook and trembled, the founda- tions also of the hills moved and wereshaken,' "&c.(pp. 7l'— "-•) Now, can it be any defence against this irreverent attack upon the prophets inspired by God, which charges them with indulg- ing in enthusiastic visiotis and expressions founded only in their own fancies, and not in the truth ofthingt; can it, I say. be deemed any defence to urge, as Warburton has done, that, " through his intention to the argument, he often expresses himself very rrude!;/ f" (Die. Leg. vol. ii. p. 341.) If he be so Crude in his expression, as to cast discredit upon Revelation, whilst his intention is to support it, he must surely be a very unsafe guide in theology. At the samo time, it can hardly be imagined, that an author, possessing considerable powers and facilities of Language, could, in any case, especially in one affecting the very foundation of Revealed Religion, ex- No. i.O.— SACU1F1C1AL LANGUAGE OF OLD AM) NEW TESTAMENTS. 193 in maintaining the orthodoxy of the philo- sophizing Jew,7 ho contends, with all his might, against the arguments of Witsius and Shuckford. — Div. Leg. Book IV. sect. 6. To this he was urged by the necessity, which his paradoxical system had imposed upon him, of making out for the Egyptian rites and institutions an extravagant antiquity : and in defence of his dogmas lie advances every thing that a powerful hut perverted ingenuity, acting on a wide range of learning, could supply.8 press himself so crudely, as to represent himself destitute of a belief, which he firmly, habitually, and reverently maintained. At all events, it is evident, that such a writer is to be consulted with much caution, and his authorities scanned with much suspicion. 7 For a very curious and interesting account of the circum- stances which gave rise to the production of the celebrated work, the March Scvochim, in which Maimonides first gave to the world the theory of the ceremonial institutions of the Jews here referred to, the reader may consult Warburton's Div. Ley. vol. ii. pp. 353, 354. He will probably, however, not be alto- gether satisfied, that the existing necessity of " shewing to the apostatizing Jews, that the Scriptures might be defended or even explained on the principles of Aristotle ; and of gratifying the inquisitive and disputatious tendencies of those, who in- quired after the reasons of the Jewish laws, by finding out a reasonableness and convenience in their ceremonial rites," sup- plies a proof, that those reasons, which the philosophic Jew had thus assigned, were the true reasons which influenced the divine Legislator in the several ordinances of his Law. The parallel, which Warburton here insinuates, between the nature of his own great work and that of Maimonides, will not escape the notice of the observing reader. " The character of this distinguished scholar and divine, as it is portrayed by the hand of a master, I here willingly subjoin. "He was a man of vigorous faculties, a mind fervid and vehement, supplied by incessant and unlimited inquiry, with wonderful extent and variety of knowledge, which yet had not oppressed his imagination, nor clouded his perspicacity. To every work he brought a memory full fraught, with a fancy fertile of original combinations, and at once exerted the powers of the scholar, the reasoner, and the wit. But his knowledge was too multifarious to be always exact, and his pursuits were too eager to be always cautious. His abilities gave him a haughty confidence, which he disdained to conceal or mollify ; and his impatience of opposition disposed him to treat his adver- saries with such contemptuous superiority, as made his readers commonly his enemies, and excited against him the wishes of some who favoured his cause. He seems to have adopted the Roman emperor's determination, oderint dum metuant ; he used no allurements of gentle language, but wished to compel rather than persuade. His style is copious without selection, and forcible without neatness : he took the words that presented themselves : his diction is coarse and impure, and his sentences are unmeasured." — Johnson's Life of Pope. For a view of the character more favourable, but not more just, I would refer to that which Bishop Hurd, the uniform admirer and panegyrist of Warburton, has given in the life he has written of that prelate. His encomiums, on The Divine Legation especially, are overcharged ; and the recollec- tion that the cause of truth and of religion, no less than the reputation of his friend, was involved in the estimation of that important work, should have rendered his panegyric more qualified. My friend Dr Graves, in his late excellent work on the Pentateuch, has sketched a portrait, which, for likeness of fea- ture and justness of colouring, seems to me to merit a place in the neighbourhood of that which has been drawn by Johnson. Speaking of the Divine Legation, and having observed, that, " While its author lived, his splendid talents and extensive learning raised in hi3 followers and defenders such enthusiastic admiration, that they could not perceive, or at least would not Lord Bolingbrokc has seldom been found instrumental in correcting theological mis- takes, and yet nothing can be more apposite in reply to these dangerous notions of Tillot- son, Spencer, and Warburton, than his ob- servations upon this very subject. For the weighty reasons assigned hy these writers, he says, (alluding to such a.s held the opinions of Spencer,) — "The God of truth chose to indulge error, and suited his institutions to the taste of the age : he contented himself also to take ordinary and natural means, in a case to which they were not adequate : and whilst miracles and divine interpositions were displayed in great abundance before the eyes of the Israelites, yet Moses, under the direc- tion of the Almighty, chose to make use of superstitions which he did not want, and which defeated instead of securing his intent ; insomuch that, if the apostacies of the Israel- ites, after such manifestations of the one true God, can be any way accounted for, it must be by the effect of the very expedient which had been employed to prevent those apos- tasies." In short, he says, the whole plan of Providence seems to have been, " to destroy idolatry by indulgence to the very supersti- tions out of which it grew." y — Bolingbroke's Phil. Works, vol. i. pp. 313— SI 9. What the noble Sophist had intended with no better will to Revealed Religion itself, than to those of its advocates whom he pro- fesses to rebuke, I have, in this extract, taken such liberties in modifying, as will permit the argument to bear only where truth would allow, that he had been in the smallest point erroneous : while the keenness of his controversial asperity, the loftiness of his literary pretensions, and the paradoxical form iti which lie too frequently chose to clothe his opinions, roused in his answers a zeal of opposition, which would sometimes yield him no credit for the discovery of any truth :" he then proceeds : " Time should now enable us to view him in his true light : in reason- ing, sagacious yet precipitate ; in criticism, ingenious but not unprejudiced; his comprehensive view sometimes embraced in the process of his inquiries too wide an extent ; while his quick imagination sometimes led him to combine his arguments with too slight a connection. But when he directed, to any one grand point, his undivided and unprejudiced attention, he frequently diffused over it the radiance of genius, and discovered the recesses of truth. Happy, had his humility been equal to his talents, and had his temper been as calm and tolerant, as his understanding was luminous and penetrating. 11 is researches would then have been conducted with more caution and impar- tiality, would have produced more unexceptionable conclusions, and had been attended with happier success." Dr Graves's Lec- tures on the Pentateuch, vol. ii. pp. 209 — 211. 9 On the same subject, this writer, in another place, thus pointedly (though, as his custom is, irreverently) expresses himself. " In order to preserve the purity of his worship, the Deity is represented as prescribing to the Israelites a multitude of rites and ceremonies, founded in the superstitions of Egypt from which they were to be weaned ; and he succeeded accord- ingly. They were never weaned entirely from all these super- stitions : and the great merit of the law of Moses was teaching the people to adore one God, much as the idolatrous nations adored several. This may be called sanctifying Pagan rites and ceremonies, in theological language : but it is profaning the pure worship of God, in the language of common sense." — Phil. Works, vol. v. p. 375. 194 M A ( . E E ON THE A T 0 N E M E N T. have directed it ; namely, upon those mis- taken interpreters of revelation, who depart from the written word of God, to follow the guidance of their own fancies in explaining the grounds and motives of the divine dispen- sations. Such it h impossible not to pro- nounce Tillotson, Spencer, and Warburton, to have been, on the particular subject now b< fore us. In how very different a manner we ought to pursue our inquiries, from that which these writers would propose, I have already endea- voured to enforce, pp. 18 — 21; also No. LXVII. and pp. 189 — 192. And how fully we are justified in so doing, will yet more satisfacto- rily appear, on consulting Dr Graves's Lectures ■It (especially the two sections of Lect. vi. part iii.) and the Eight Discourses on the Connection between the Old and New Testa- ment ; in which latter work, the unity of the scheme of Redemption pervading the entire series of the divine dispensations, has been treated with much ability by Archdeacon Daubeny, whose opinions, upon so many important points, 1 amhappytofind perfectly coincident with those which I have submitted to the public, throughout these pages, on the nature of the atonement. To such as may be desirous to investigate more deeply the opinions of the three dis- tinguished writers against whoml have found it necessary to contend in discussing the sub- ject of the present Number, I recommend an attentive perusal of the tenth book of Euse- bius's Prceparatio Evangelical — Book iii. chap v. of Stillingfieet's Origines Sacrce : — Bochart's Geoqraphia Sacra: — Witsius's Mgyptiaca : — Winder's History of Knowledge : — Kllis's Knowledge of Divine Things from Re- velation, (especially pp. 122 — 129:) — Nichols's Conference with a Theist, (particularly vol. i. pp." 290— 808, and pp. 319, 320 :) — Faber's llorai Mosaicce : and Dr Woodward's Dis- course on the Ancient Egyptians,™ (Archwolog. vol. iv.) Bishop Tomline, in his excellent 10 An extract from this discourse I here subj lin, as particu- larly worthy of attention, in reply to the favourite theory of cer : — " Whatever might he the bent and dispositions of the Israelites, it was Moses's proper business to rectify them. He was not to indulge them in tin ir fancies, but inform them of their duties, and direct them t<> what was fit, reasonable, and consistent with pood morals and piety, though that happened to be never their gusts and inclinations: which, accordingly, he every where did; and there are numerous Instances of it through all his government of them. 11 is lining Otherwise might, indeed, have shewn a great deal of policy, but not near so much probity and goodness, as are discoverable thr ugh his whole conduct of this great people. I can very v allow Dr Spencer, that this was the method that Maho- A| ollonius Tyanrcus, and some politicians have taken : nor will I enter into any contest with him, whether the devil makes use of the same in order to seduce mankind from the hip of God ; all which be gives, I think, surely with a little too much i r.iiiei Instances in confirmation "f his notion: bul this I am mighty sure, M lea «.is on all ions very far from it." Pp. 281, 282. — Spencer bad justi- fied I rvationsb] .ions. " In co enim Elements of Christian Tlicohqjj (Part i. chap. i. pp. 37 — 48,) has admirably summed up the argument from the concurrence of profane tradition with the Mosaic history ; deducing both from the common source of revelation, disguised, indeed, and disfigured in the one by allegories and fabulous conceits, but con- veyed to us by the other in its pristine and uncorrupted purity. The laborious and valu- able researches of Mr Bryant, .Mr .Maurice, and particularly Sir William Jones, have thrown new and powerful lights upon this important subject. As to the searching, with a curious minute- ness, into the resemblances which subsist between the Pagan mythologies and the great truths of the Jewish and Christian revelations, this may, undoubtedly, be carried too far. And I agree entirely with the learned and judicious Dr Nares, that we are not bound, in the proof N E M E N T. recent date of the tables, but has also pointed out two errors in the calculations from which M. Bailly deduced his results; and has clearly demonstrated the epoch in the tallies, not to have been real, but fictitious. And, last of all, Mr Bentley seems completely to have settled the point, in his two must ingenious and learned papers, in the sixth and eighth volumes of the Asiatic Researches, in which he not only contends, that, from the principles of the Hindu astronomy, the recent date of the tahles can be deduced ; but that also, from authentic testimony, independent of all cal- culations, the age of the Suryd Siddhantd can be proved to be such, as not to carry the date of its composition farther back than the year 10G8. In his endeavours to establish these points, he has not scrupled to pronounce M. Bailly and Professor Playfair to have been totally mistaken in their reasonings concern- ing the antiquity of the Indian astronomy ; and to have proceeded upon an entire igno- rance of the principles of the artificial system of the Hindus : the nature of which he states to consist in this, — that "certain points of time ba ch are fixed upon as epochs, at which the planets are assumed to fall into a line of mean conjunction with the sun in the begin- ning of Aries ; and that from the points of and reasonings of so distinguished a mathematician as M. La- place on a point of such vital moment, as that of the great antiquity which it has heen the fashion to ascribe to the astro- nomical tables of the Hindus; and on a point, also, in which the opiniuns of a mathematician can alone have weight. " Les tables Indicnncs indiquent une astronomic plus per- fectionnee ; mats tout ports Ddammi ol des erreursd ml i> determinations des Indicns on( itc susceptibles, on dolt observer qu'ils n'onJ oonsiderdlea Inegalite* dn BoleD el de la lune, que relativement aux eclipses dans lesqueliee liquation aniuielle do l.i hue s'ajoutc a 1' equation du centre du soleil, et raugmente d'environ 22"; co qui est a-peu-pres la diSerc nee dc nus determinations a cellc des indices. time so assumed as epochs, the Hindu astro- nomer carries on his calculations, as if they had been settled so by actual observation; and determines the mean annual motion-. which he must employ in his Bystem, from thence, as will give the positions of the planets in his own time, as near as he is able to determine the same by observation." (Vol. vi.p. 642.) — He then proceeds to shew by what means such fictitious epochs may be assumed, without incurring the danger of a perceptible variation from the real mean mo- tions : and, upon the whole, he has fortified his argument in a way that renders it not easy to be shaken. The high authority of the names which .Mr Bentley has to oppose on this subject, (Sir W. Jones himself having, as well as M. Bailly and Professor Playfair. maintained the antiquity of the Indian astro- nomy,) may occasion some delay to the reception of his opinions. But, from the proof's which have been advanced in their support, and from the additional lights to be expected upon this subject, there seems little reason to doubt that they will ere long be generally acquiesced in. At all events, the main foundation, on which the extraordinary antiquity of the In- dian records has been built, must be given up I'lusieurs elemens, tels que les equations du centre de Jupiter et de Mars, sont si difVcrens dans les tables Indiennesde ce qu'ils devoient etre a leur premiere epoque, que Ton ne peut rien conclure des autres elemens en faveur de leur antiquity. I.'en- semble de ces tables, et .sin-lout Vimpossibiliti' tie la conjonction queUei supposcnt a la inane epoque, proueent au contraire qu'ettesont iU consVruUes, ou dumoinsreetijiees, dansdes.temps modemes; ce que confirment les moyens mouvemens, qu'elles assignent a la lune, par rapport a son perigee, a ses nceuds, et au soleil ; et qui plus rapides que suivant Ptolemee, iiuliquent (videmment que la formation dc ces tables est posterieure au temps ile eet nslronome ; car on a vu que ces trois mouvemens s'accelerent de sieclc en siecle." — Exposition du Systcinc du Monde, pp. 293, 294. Thus has M. Laplace, from the evidence which the tables themselves supply, not only overturned the prevailing notion of their great antiquity, hut reduced their date even lower than the lirst century : since he places them lower than the age of Ptolemy, who lived until Nil a. d. Having heen led to make mention of this eminent mathe- matician, than whom a greater name has not arisen since the days of Newton, I cannot forbear noticing, as a matter of singular curiosity, the coincidence of a remarkable astrono- mical epoch, as fixed by his calculations, with the year in which Archbishop Usher has placed the creation of the world, according to the chronology of the Hebrew, The epoch is that of the coincidence of the greater axis of the earth's orbit with the line of the equinoxes, at which time the true and the mean equinox were the same. This M. Laplace computes to have taken place, about the year 41104 before the Christian era ; which is the very era of the creation, as Chronologists have derived it from the Hebrew Scriptures. — Traiii distinguished, are ovcrpower- n._'. . xerted for the purpose of laying bare to the public eye the miserable deficiencies of his lordship, as a phi] 9 iphical writer, under the several heads of Of tntth, Ot consistency, oi learning, ai d "f reasoning. churches," &c. But this is not all. We find this same writer again, in vol. ii. pp. 200—210, both deny the fact, that the divine unity had been taught to the Israelites and soon forgotten by them (which is the very example he builds upon in the above passage,) and also the application of that fact to the case of other nations (which application is the very use he has himself made of that fact,) — and then, after all this, and almost in the same breath in which he has made these assertions, he draws back again in part, and says, " I do not so much deny the truth of the facts, as I oppose their application," (p. 210.) That is, — (I cannot resist the re- capitulation,)— our author first denies a cer- tain fact as impossible: then establishes its strong probability upon general principles of human nature, supported by an example drawn from the case of the Israelites, and applied to that of mankind at large : then he both denies the truth of that very example, and the justness of its application, (both of which are his own undisputed property :) and then again he admits them both, in certain (but different) degrees ; since he does not so much deny the one, as he opposes the other. What does all this mean % Is it, or is it not, nonsense ? Have we not here, then, (to use the sort of pleasant and sportive phrase, that might not improbably have been used by such writers as his lordship,) in beating about for game, sprung a whole covey of con- tradictions, which, after winging their tor- tuous course in all directions, have at last sought shelter, by taking flight into the im- penetrable thickets of nonsense 1 Now what is to be done with such a writer as this? The author of the memoirs of his life, whilst he speaks in terms much too strong of his qualities as a statesman, remarks, in allud- ing to the excursions which, as an author, he had ventured to make beyond his propei sphere : " I should be sorry, that you took your politics from priests ; but I should be in more pain if I thought you in danger of receiving your religion from a politician." Memoirs of the Life of Lord Bolingbrohe, p. 232. In truth, to sum up all in a word, my Lord Bolingbroke was no more than a cox- comb in literature, and a pretender in science. Nor has religion, though the principal object of his hostility, so much to complain of his bungling attempts as philosophy : at the same time that both have experienced more of malevolence, than injury, at his hands. With him, the great sages of antiquity have been as much the objects of lordly contempt, as the prophets and apostles ; and the maxims of ancient wisdom have been held as cheap as the established doctrines of Re- velation. Whatever, in short, is not Lord Bolingbroke, is not sense. All, whether •J'i() M V ( . I : K ON T H E A T O N I". .M K N T ancient or modern, who have trod the same ground before him, historians, chronologists, moralists, philosphers, divines, all are either blockheads or impostors. And even Locke and Newton dwindle into drivellers, where they have presumed to meddle with those subjects, which the viscount condescends to illustrate. — {Phil. Works, vol. ii. Essay 3. ubique, especially p. 100.) The treatment which the truly wise and learned, both of ancient and modern times, constantly receive at his lordship's hands, naturally calls to mind the sarcasm of Crito in Berkeley's Alciphron. "I tell you, Eu- phranor, that Plato and Tully might perhaps make a figure in Athens or Rome : but were they to revive in our days, they would pass but for underbred pedants, there being at most coffee-houses in London several able men who could convince them they knew nothing, in what they are valued so much for, morals and politics." And Lysicles imme- diately subjoins, " How many long-headed men do I know, both in the court-end and the city, with five times Plato's sense, who care not one straw, what notions their sons have of God or virtue !" — Berkeley's IForis, vol. i. pp. 309, 370. The versatility, also, with which this noble writer can, at one time, affect grave and learned research, and at another, as it may suit his purpose, pro- fess to hold all such pedantic argumentation in contempt, is most happily illustrated, in the same admirable treatise, by the picture which is there drawn, of the Proteus shift- ing and modifications of the free-thinking tribe. " When one of these has got a ring of disciples around him, his method is, to exclaim against prejudice, and recommend thinking and reasoning ; giving to under- stand that himself is a man of deep re- searches ami close argument, one who examines impartially and concludes warily. The same man, in other company, if he chance to be pressed with reason, shall laugh at logic, and assume the lazy supine airs of a fine gentleman, a wit, a railleur, to avoid the dryness of a regular and exact inquiry. This double fare of the minute philosopher, is of )io small use to propagate and maintain his notion-. Though to me it seems a plain case, that if a fine gentleman will shake off all authority, and appeal from religion to reason, unto reason he mu-t go." (Pp. 4G0, 461.) But the truth is, as the same writer again re- marks, (p. 639,) "that in the presenl age thinking is more talked of but less practised than in ancienl times; and that, since the revival of learning, men have nad much and wrote much, bul thonght (comparatively) little : insomuch that, with us, to think closely and justly is the least part of a learned man, and none at all of a polite man. The free-thinkers, indeed, make great preten- sions to thinking, and yet they shew but little exactness in it. A lively man, and what the world calls a man of sense, are often desti- tute of this talent, which is not a mere gift of nature, but must be improved and perfected by much attention and exercise on very diffe- rent subjects ; a thing of more pains and time than the hasty men of parts in our age care to take." What time our man of parts employed for this purpose, may easily be inferred from the circumstance, of his having commenced his philosophical investigations at the age of forty, after a youth revelled in the most voluptuous and dissipating enjoyments, and a manhood distracted by the most tumultuous political agitations. But it is full time to have done with him : I shall therefore only add to what I have said upon so unworthy a subject, by referring the reader, who can have any curio- sity to know more of such a man, to the characters that have been given of him, by Chesterfield and by Blair. The latter con- cludes a very qualified commendation of his style, by observing, that in his matter there is "hardly any thing to commend; that in his reasonings, for the most part, he is flimsy and false: in his political writings, factious; in what he calls his philosophical ones, irre- ligious and sophistical in the highest degree." — Blair's Lectures on Rhetoric, vol. i. Lect. xix. p. 282. See also the observations in Lect. xv. p. 211, of the same volume. The former gives such an account of him, upon the whole, as must be edifying to the young reader parti- cularly; who will thereby be completely let into the secret of such men, by one of them- selves; and will have the benefit of observing how much oven a libertine, when in cold blood, can be shocked by libertinism. One or two passages 1 cannot avoid transcribing, as proving how greatly, even from the testi- mony of his warmest admirer, Lord Boling- broke is found deficient in every thing that is truly valuable, either in a philosopher or in a man. His noble panegyrist, in recommend- ing to his son to study the manner, that would best enable him "to seduce and to impose," proposes to him Lord Bolingbroke's style and mode of writing, for his imitation, in direct opposition to works of learning and sound reasoning, which he particularly decries: and, after pressing upon him, again and again, the repeated perusal of Lord Bolingbroke's writ- ings, he assigns as his reason for so doing, that he wishes him "to lay aside all thoughts of all that dull fellows call solid, and exert his utmost care to acquire what people of fashion call shining." — Chest. Letters, vol. iii. p. 151. And in another place, where he speaks of the whole of that unhappy lord's character, he is obliged, though with much softening, to describe him as "a most mor- tifying instance of the violence of human No. 69.— POSTSCRIPT, ON BOLINGBItOKE AND HUME. 201 passions, and of the weakness of" (what ho chooses to call) "the most exalted human reason.*1 — "His youth," he says, " was dis- tinguished by all the tumult and storm of pleasures, in which he most licentiously triumphed, disdaining all decorum. His fine imagination has often been heated and ex- hausted with his body, iii celebrating and deifying the prostitute of the night; and his convivial joys were pushed to all the extra- vagancy of frantic Bacchanals. Those pas- sions were interrupted but by a stronger, ambition. The former impaired both his constitution and his character, hut the latter destroyed both his fortune and his reputa- tion." Vol. ii. p. 828. Such was the Pythagorean institution of this great philosopher, who was to be quali- fied, by these intense lucubrations, to com- municate new lights to mankind, and to improve the world by a juster set of notions in morals and philosophy. The noble charac- terize^ after glossing over these hideous enor- mities, and contrasting with them what he is pleased to represent as splendid qualities, is compelled, after all, to conclude, in words no less applicable to the insincere and unprinci- pled writer, than to his subject : " Upon the whole, of this extraordinary man, what can we say, but, Alas, poor human nature!" — Poor, indeed, when it presumptuously rejects those aids which Heaven designed to minister to its weakness, and to rectify its corruption. In a course of observations, in which I have insensibly been drawn to enlarge at so much length, upon the subjects of free-thinking and scepticism, it is impossible to forget David Hume. The ideas suggested in the progress of it bring into view, by necessary association, this chief of modern sophists ; who, whether the precedence be determined by the boldness of impiety, the contempt of truth, the per- plexities of disputation, or the inconsisten- cies and contradictions in reasoning, — is un- doubtedly entitled to the first place in the list of British infidels. The leading subject also of the discussion, in which we are at pre- sent engaged, naturally summons him to our tribunal. For, as his philosophic forerun- ner, Bolingbroke, has bestowed much unpro- fitable labour on the questions of polytheism and the divine unity, the same questions solicit the minutest investigations of this author, especially in his treatise upon the Natural History of Religion y19 a title, which, 19 On this treatise Warburtnn makes the following observa- tions, in a letter to his friend llurd : — " The Essay is to esta- blish an atheistic naturalism, like Bolingbroke; and he goes upon one of Bolingbroke's capital arguments, that idolatry and polytheism were before the worship of the one God. It is full of absurdities. They say this man has several moral qualiti s. It may be so. But there are vices of the mind as trail as body ; and a wickeder heart, and more determined to do public mis- chief, I think, I never knew." — Letters of a late eminent Prelate, p. 239. as has been remarked, contains a form of ex- pression much as proper as if he had spoken of the Moral History of Meteors. And here, having positively pronounced, that "Poly- theism must have been the first and most ancient" (which certainly may be admitted, if it was the first) "religion of mankind," (Essays, vol. ii. p. 402 :) and having affirmed it to be an incontestable fact, that about seventeen hundred years back all mankind were Polythcists, (p. 403 ;) and that, as far as history reaches, mankind appear universally to have been Polytheists ; at the same time that he docs not pretend to be ignorant, that about seventeen hundred years back, there was in existence such a book as the Old Testament, and such a history as that of Jo-ephus; and that lie himself informs US, (p. 43:!,) that it appears from Herodotus, that " the Getso were genuine Theists and Unitarians :" — having, I Bay, thus dogma- tized as became a sceptic, and falsified as became an historian, he proceeds, in a man- ner perfectly7 his own, to shew what never had been dreamt of before, not even in the craziest reveries of a, Bolingbroke, that the notion of the Divine Unity had sprung up from the blundering conceptions of the vul- gar, and that it demanded the reasoning powers of the philosophers to restore again the old system of a plurality of Gods ! This will hardly be credited. Let the reader therefore turn to the precious original, (p. 435,) where he will find the manner fully described, in which this notion takes its rise amongst the vulgar ; for of these it is that he has been speaking throughout the preceding page. " Men's exaggerated praises and compliments still swell their idea upon them ; and elevating their deities to the utmost bounds of perfec- tion, at last beget the attributes of unity and infinity7, simplicity and spirituality." Thus, then, the one, infinite, uncompounded, and spiritual first Cause, springs, as we see, out of the tendencies of the vulgar to praise and panegyric. But, immediately after, we find, that this is a height too giddy7 for those who have thus risen to it, and that it is necessary that they should be quietly let down again to the firmer and more peaceful footing of Poly7- theism. For, "such refined ideas being some- what disproportioned to vulgar comprchen sion," (although having grown naturally out of vulgar conception,) " remain not long in their original purity7; but require to be sup ported by7 the notion of inferior mediators or subordinate agents, which interpose between mankind and their supreme Deity. These demi-gods, or middle beings, partaking more of human nature, and being more familiar to us, become the chief objects of devotion, and gradually7 recal that idolatry7 which had been formerly7 banished by7 the ardent prayers and panegyrics of timorous, indigent mortals." — 202 MAG E !•: 0 X T II E A TO N E M ENT. See also pp. 429, 430, or rather the whole of the extraordinary reasoning upon this subject in the sixth, Beventh, anil eighth sections. — Thus, then, we see, that the vulgar, in their high flights of praise and panegyric, rose to the discovery of a first Cause ; while a set of wiser men8" we musl suppose called in to restore the mob of middle deities to their pristine honours, since the purpose is to suit the objects of worship to vulgar comprehen- sion-. And so we find, that, under the direc- tion of the wonder-working #oo>jy&V. the philosophers and the people are made at once to change sides, and act each other's parts ; the people taking to themselves the discovery of the first Cause, and the philosophers, in return, the discovery of demi-gods and middle beings. Unless, indeed, as Bishop Hurd says, the people are supposed to have done both ; "discovered the unity in their blind, timo- rous, and indigent state ; and, when they were so well informed, struck out, in a lucky '-' In truth, Mr Hume himself seems entitled to rank amongst thoa wiser men, as he has been able to discover many advan- tages in the scheme of polytheism. " For," lie says, " if we examine, without prejudice, the ancient heathen mythology, as contained in the poets, we shall not discover in it any such monstrous absurdity as we may at first be apt to apprehend. Where is the difficulty in conceiving, that the same powers or principles, whatever they were, which formed this visible world, men and animals, produced also a species of intelligent creatures of more refined sulistance, and greater authority than the rest ? That these creatures may be capricious, revengeful, passionate, Voluptuous, is easily conceived ; nor is any circumstance more apt among ourselves to engender such vices than the licence of aba lute authority. And, in short, the whole mythological system is so natural, that, in the variety of planets and worlds contained in this universe, it seems more than probable, that somewhere or other it is really carried into execution." Essays, vol. ii. p. 2A2. Thus, the cautious investigator, whose scepticism will not yield to the proofs of the existence of one God, sees no difficulty in admitting it as more than probable that there are many. In this system of polytheism, also, our philosopher finds many advantages. For " where the Deity is represented as infinitely superior to mankind, this belief, though altogether just, when joined with superstitious terrors, is apt to sink the human mind in the lowest submission and abasement, aid to represent the monkish virtues of mortification, penance, humi- lity, and passive suffering, as the only qualities which are accep- table to him. But where the gods are conceived to be only a little superior to mankind, and to have been many of them advanced from that inferior rank, we are more at our ease in our addresses to them, and may even, without profaneness, aspire sometimes to a rivalship and emulation of them ; hence activity, spirit, courage, magnanimity, love of liberty, and all the virtues which aggrandize a people." Ibid. p. 440. Our author has for- gotten to a. 1,|, that in our aspirings to a rivalship with these nearer gods, that he proposes as the objects of our addresses, wo might ri.-e also to that capriciousness, reveiigefulness, passion- al, i.ess, voluptuousness, and other gucfa qualities with which ho ha- been pleased to invest them, and which qualities seem in the \ i a of himself and .Mr Qlbbon to be the principal ingredients in that •' elegant mythology," which they would so strongly recom- mend to our admiration. It has been well remarked, by an eloquent and int. resting urit> r, that antichristian writers, while they are giving us their opinions, may in truth be giving us more, may be discovering their morals while they mean to teach us only their creed ; and thus may carry, like Bellerophon, their own condemnation, while they Imagine the) are graciously con- veying intelligence and oen light to mankind, so that the old proverb, " Bellerophontis Liters, " maj be a proper motto for the learned labours of them all. — Voting's Centaur, p. -M. moment, their gross s\ ,tem of Polytheism."21 On this, and the whole monstrous assemblage of falsehoods, inconsistencies, and nonsense, with which this extraordinary Essay'2'1 is stuffed, I would refer the young reader to the Remarks on Mr David Hume's Essay on the Natural History of Religion, in which-'' Dr Hurd has so successfully employed the wea- pons, with which his friend Warburton had, just before, transfixed the brother-infidel, Bolingbroke. Yet such writers as these, such writers as Hume and Bolingbroke, (at least until their ignorance, falsehood, and absurdities, had become sufficiently notorious to expose their followers to the like imputations,) it had been the fashion to extol and admire. How such writers could ever have obtained followers, may at first sight, indeed, appear difficult to explain. The difficulty, however, admits a satisfactory solution ; and one which has been so justly given by a late respected writer, that I shall content myself with the mere repeti- tion of what he has said upon the subject. Having remarked, that, in his Treatise of Human Nature, Mr Hume's vain love of sin- gularity had led him to endeavour to involve even the fundamental principles of geometry in confusion ; but that, finding it impossible by his paradoxes on such a subject to rouse the attention of the public, he turned himself to moral paradoxes ; this writer goes on to shew, that Mr Hume in doing so had calcu- lated rightly, for that these, "when nun begin to look about for arguments in vindi- cation of impiety, debauchery, and injustice, become wonderfully interesting, and can hardly fail of a powerful and numerous patronage. The corrupt judge ; the prosti- tuted courtier; the statesman, who enriches himself by the plunder and blood of his coun- 21 Diderot, indeed, in his execrable Sl/sUmedela Nature, has completed the view of this subject, that had been so imperfectly sketched by Bolingbroke and Hume. He has manfully under- taken to prove, not only that polytheism must have been, in the early ages of the world, the necessary result of men's observation of nature; but that it must be much more so " now that the course and progress of philosophy has tended to remove men's prejudices!" This completely relieves Hume's argument from all its perplexities. — ' l)r Nares, in his admirable collection of sermons, preached at the Bamptotl Lecture, in 1H05, pronounces, of this extra- ordinary production, that, if he wished to satisfy any person of the indispensable necessity of a divine Revelation in the first ages of the world, upon the infidel's own view of thiiiL's. he would refer him at once to Mr Hume's Natural History of Re- ligion. (Nares's Bampton Lectures, p. 485.) And DrMaclaine says of the same work, in his Letters to Mr Soame Jetiyns, that perhaps no book is more adapted to shew tho unspeakable advantages of a divine Revelation. -•' This work has been here, agreeably to the hitherto com- monly received opinion, ascribed to Bishop Hurd. But, from the letters of Bishop Warburton lately published, it now appears, that it was the production of his own pen, and received only some additional colouring from his literary friend. See a curious account of this transaction in the Letters of a late eminent Prelate, pp. 239, 240. No. 69.— POSTSCRIPT, ON BOLINGBROKE AND HUME. 203 try ; tin' pettifogger, who fattens on the spoils of the fatherless and widow ; the oppressor, who, to pamper his beastly appetite, abandons the deserving peasant to beggarj and despair; the hypocrite ; the debauchee ; the gamester ; the blasphemer, — prick up their ears when they are told, that a celebrated author has written a book full of such comfortable doc- trine as the following: — That justice is not a natural but an artificial virtue, depending wholly on the arbitrary institutions of men, and previous to the establishment of civil society not at all incumbent : that moral, intellectual, and corporeal virtue, are all of the same kind ; in other words, that to want honesty, to want understanding, and to want a leg, are equally the objects of moral dis- approbation, and that it is no more a man's duty to be grateful or pious, than to have the genius of Homer, or the strength and beauty of Achilles : that every human action is neces- sary, and could not have been different from what it is : that when we speak of power as an attribute of any being, God himself not excepted, we use words without meaning : that we can form no idea of power, nor of any being endued with any power, much less of one endued with infinite power ; and that we can never have reason to believe that any object, or quality of an object, exists, of which ue cannot form an idea: that it is unreason- able to believe God to be infinitely wise and good, while there is any evil or disorder in the universe ; and that we have no good rea- son to think that the universe proceeds from a cause : that the external material world does not exist ; and that if the external world he once called in doubt as to its existence, we shall be at a loss to find arguments by which we may prove the being of God, or any of his attributes : that those who believe any thing certainly are fools : that adultery must be practised, i'f men would obtain all the ad- vantages of life ; that if generally practised, it would soon ceas° to be scandalous ; and that, if practised secretly and frequently, it would by degrees come to be thought no crime at all:-4 that the question concerning the sub- 24 " My inquiry concerning the Principles of Morals is, of all my writings, historical, philosophical, or literary, incom- parably the best.'' Hume's Life, p. vii. The passage, referred to above, affurds an excellent specimen of the writer's qualifi- cations as a moral instructor. And yet it is of such a man as this, that such a man as Adam Smith has delivered the follow- ing testimony : — " I have always considered Mr Hume, both in his lifetime and since his death, as approaching as nearly to the idea of a perfectly wise and virtuous man, as perhaps the nature of human frailty will permit."— Letter from Adam Smith, LL.D. to W. Strahan, Esq. annexed to Hume's Life, and pre- fixed to the late edition of Hume's History of England. Por the reception which such a declaration as this so amply merited, I refer the reader to Bishop Home's Letter to Dr Adam Smith .■ in which, as well as in the Letters on Infidelity at large, he will find the ablest and most incontestable confutation of Hume and his infidel associates. In truth, the extract from Hume on the subject of adultery stance of the soul is unintelligible : that mat- ter and motion may often be regarded a- the cause of thought : that the soul of man be- comes every different moment a different being ; so that the actions 1 performed last year, or yesterday, or this morning, whether virtuous or vicious, are no more imputable to me, than the virtues of Aristides are imput- able to Nero, or the crimes of Nero to the man of Ross." — Essay on the Nature and Immutability of Truth, by Dr Beattie, pp. Ill — 113. Sec also pp. 315, 316, where many other doctrines equally rational and valuable are to be found, together with the references to those parts of Air Hume's works in which they are contained. But this is not all. Mr Hume had not done enough, it seems, for the extinction of religion, and the subversion of morals ; but, with a zeal bespeaking his fidelity to the master whom he served, he left behind him blasphemies to be published after his death, which even he was afraid to publish whilst he lived. So, indeed, his great admirer tells us, in his Apology for the Life and Writings of David Hume: whose posthumous papers, he says, would probably " carry his philo- appeared to me so monstrous, that, with some doubts of Dr Beattie's accuracy, I turned to the original to ascertain its fairness, and there found the following justification of the reporter: — "It is needless to dissemble. The consequence of a very free commerce between the sexes, and of their living much together, will often terminate in intrigues and gallantry. We must sacrifice somewhat of the useful, if we he very anxious to obtain all the agreeable qualities; and cannot pretend to reap alike every advantage. Instances of licence daily multi- plying, will weaken the scandal with the one sex, and teach the other by degrees to adopt the famous maxim of I.a Fontaine, with regard to female infidelity ; ' that if one knows it, it is but a small matter ; if one knows it not, it is nothing.'" (Hume's Essays, vol. ii. p. 394.) Again (p. 255) he contends, that the necessary "combination of the parents for the subsistence of their young is that alone which requires the virtue of chastity or fidelity to the married bed. Without such a utility, it will readily be owned (he asserts) that such a virtue would never be thought of." And this being a favourite subject with this writer, whose Inquiry concerning the Principles of Morals, is boasted of by himself as his best work, lie proceeds to enlarge upon it in an additional note, (p. 490.) in which he calls in the aid of Greek to sustain him in his philosophic pro- fligacy, and. referring all notions of virtue and vice to public utility, asks, with an air of final triumph, — '• And, indeed, to what other purpose than that of utility do all the ideas of chastity and modesty serve?"— This is the perfectly wise and virtuous man of Adam Smith. Dr Aikin's remarks (in the General Biography) on this extraordinary language of Dr Smith, although not pressing upon the parts of Hume's writings here adverted to, deserve to be noticed. " We may," he says, " reasonably demur to Dr Smith's moral estimate, in attributing the perfection of virtue to a man, whose leading principle was, by his own confession, selfish, (the acquisition of literary fame.) and who never seems to have made any of th se sacrifices of interest and inclination to public good, in which virtuous action chiefly consi>ts. Far- ther, whatever degree of freedom of discussion may be justifiabl >, with the benefit of mankind in view, it may be d ubted whether a mere fondness for speculation, or a love of philosophic applause, will morally excuse a writer, for sporting with opinions which are commonly held of the highest importance to human welfare.'' •j,, 4 M \ < 1 R E ON Til E A T 0 M E M E N T. Bophy still Dearer to that point, which he might not think it discreet to push too vigo- rously in his lifetime." What that point was, is but too evideut on a single glance at the h orks which he thus bequeathed For the public benefit. The Dialogues on Natural Religion, and the Essay <>n Suicide, are standing monu- ments of a heart as wicked, and a head as weak, as ever belonged to any man who pre- tended to the character of a philosopher and a moralist. To leave deliberately, as a legacy to mankind, a recommendation of self-murder, and an assurance that there is no God, at the very moment when he was himself about to appear before the bar of that dread Being ; and, whilst thus occupied for the destruction of his fellow-creatures, to amuse himself with pleasant conceits about Charon and his ferry- boat, (as his biographer informs us he did, when he was almost dropping into his grave.) lias something in it so frightful, that one naturally recoils from the thought of it with horror. It seems to be equalled only by the hideous impiety of Diderot, who adduces it as a decisive proof of the non-existence of a God, that he was permitted to write a work filled with blasphemies against his nature, and arguments against his heing.25 Having, however, made mention of this valuable bequest of Mr Hume, I cannot deny the reader the satisfaction of knowing some- what of the precious materials of which it consists. And first, as to his Dialogues. He there exhibits various modes, in which the world may have been produced ; all of which he pronounces to be to the full as satisfactory, as that of a creation by the will of the Deity. Generation or vegetation, he says, will answer the purpose ; and the latter process, which he prefer-, he thus particularly explains: — "In like manner as a tree sheds its seed into the neighbouring Gelds, and produces other trees, so the great vegetable, the world, or this planetary system, produces within itself cer- tain seeds, which, being scattered into the surrounding chaos, vegetate into new worlds. A comet, for instance, is the seed of a world : and after it has been fully ripened, by passing from miii to sun, and star to star, it is at last tossed into the unformed elements which every where surround this universe, and immediately sprouts up into a new system." (Dialogues, p. 132.) But, as this process of vegetable production supposes a mother vege- table already in existence, or a worhUalready in being, s<> accurate a reasoner could not hut account for the formation of the first world, from which all others are to sprout. And •"' "Sice Dieu tout puissant est jaloux dc ses prerogatives, — comment permet-il, qu'UD mortel comme nioi ose attaqucr BC8 droits, ses litres, son existence nicmc '!" VOL ii. p. GVI. (if Systemc de la Nature/ a work which was published under the name of Mirahaud, but is supposed with good reason to have had the atrocious Diderot for its author. this he docs in two ways, that he may the better satisfy all descriptions of readers. Either such a process has Been going on from eternity; or a world might have been formed originally thus : — " A finite number of parti- cles i< only susceptible of finite transpositions; and it must happen in an eternal duration, that every possible position must be tried. The continual motion of matter, therefore, in less than infinite transpositions, must produce order ; and order, when once established, sup- ports itself." (Dialogues, pp. 1-IC>, 149.) — Now must not Ephraim Jenkinson, and his cosmogonies, hide their diminished heads, on a comparison with this philosopher and his sublime inventions? How far inferior also was the object of the former sage to that pro- posed by the latter ! The one but sought to cheat the honest Vicar of Wakefield of his horse, but the other looks to the more glorious attainment, of cheating mankind of their trust in a God, and their hopes of a futurity. How meagre and unphilosophical is the Hist chapter of Genesis, compared with such lofty speculations as these of Mr Hume ! If we turn, now, to that other valuable per- formance, the Essay on Suicide,-n there we find truths no less momentous, and reasonings no less acute, than those which the former had exhibited. He informs us, that the whole scope of man's creation is limited to the pre- sent life ; that the life of a man is of no greater importance than that of an oyster ; and as it is admitted that there is no crime in divert- ing the Nile or the Danube from their courses, so he contends there can be none, in turning a few ounces of blood from their natural channel; and so, upon the whole, he peremp- torily concludes in favour of self-murder ! He goes farther ; and, to satisfy the conscience of the Theist, he maintains, that, on the sup- position of a God, we are acting under the direction of Providence, when we put an end to our existence ; and, again, to satisfy the conscience of the Christian, lie endeavours to evince the lawfulness of suicide under the Christian dispensation. The last point, indeed, it has been remarked, it is not difficult to make out, provided the liberty of putting two texts together be permitted : — thus, "Judas departed, and went and hanged himself" — "Go and do thou likewise." Mr Hume's arguments are little better. So much for this paragon of modern meta physicians ; this dee]) thinker and acute rea- soner, whom it was at one time so much the fashion with witlings and libertines to extol. As to certain advantages of style, Mr Hume, no doubt, possessed them ; but as to his rea- 26 Some of -Mr Hume's admirers became so much ashamed of this monstrous and absurd performance, that they were led to deny that it ever came from his pen. Whoever wishes for a complete proof of his being the author, may consult the Monthly Review for 17!H, vol. bat p. 427- No. 69.— POSTSCRIPT, OIN BOLINGBROKE AND HUME. 205 soiling, nothing under that name can be more contemptible. This, indeed, seems now pretty generally admitted ; and few, who have an j regard for the opinion of men of sense, would, at this day, venture to support the paradoxes, and adduce the arguments, of David Eume. By the .species of reasoning adopted by that writer, Dr Beattie lias well remarked, it \\ ould be easy to prove any doctrine ; and to evince this, he supplies the following recipe, as con- veying the whole mystery of the manufacture of his metaphysical paradoxes. — "Take a word (an abstract term is the most conve- nient) which admits of more than one signi- fication ; and, by the help of a predicate or copula, form a proposition suitable to your system, or to your humour, or to any other thing you please, except truth. When laying down your premises, you are to use the name of the quality or subject, in one sense ; and, when inferring your conclusion, in another. You are then to urge a few equivocal facts very slightly examined (the more slightly the better) as a farther proof of the said conclu- sion ; and to shut up all with citing some ancient authorities, either real or fictitious, as may best suit your purpose. A few occasional strictures on religion as an unphilosophical thing, and a sneer at the Whole Duty of Man, or any other good book, will give your disser- tation what many are pleased to call a liberal turn; and will go near to convince the world, that you are a candid philosopher, a manly free-thinker, and a very fine writer." (Essav on Truth, p. 309.) This gives by no means an exaggerated idea of Mr Hume's mode of conducting his metaphysical disquisitions ; so that what has been said of his Dialogues, may be applied, with truth, to almost all his reasonings on moral or religious subjects, — namely, that they cannot possibly hurt any man of a philosophical turn, or" even any man of common sense ; that they may serve, indeed, to confirm the giddy, the profligate, and the unprincipled, in "their prejudices against religion and virtue, but must 'be de- spised by every man who has the smallest grain of seriousness or reflection. Gray's estimate of his character I cannot prevail upon myself to suppress, not only because it comes from a man of real genius, learning, and reflection, but because it must be admitted to be altogether untinctured with the supposed prejudices of a divine :— " I have always thought David Hume a pernicious writer, and believe he has done as much mis- chief here as in his own country." ' A turbid and shallow stream often appears to our ap- prehensions very deep.' A professed sceptic can be guided by nothing but his present pas- sions (if he has any) and his interests ; and to be masters of his philosophy we need not his book or advice, for every child is capable of the same thing, without any study at all. Is not that na'inir and good humour, which his admirers celebrate in him, owing to this that he has continued all his days an infant, but one that unhappily has 1 a taught to read and write? That childish nation, the French, have given him vogue and fashion, and we, as usual, have learned from them to admire him at second hand." (Mason's Gray,27 vol. ii. pp. 249, 250.) There are two striking features in the cha- racter of llunie. which have not been adverted to in the sketch here drawn of him by Gray — his disingenuousness, and his bigotry. To couple the term bigot-" with the name of David Hume, may, at first sight, appear to partake of his own paradox. But it should be considered, that bigotry is not necessarily' connected with religious belief; and that it is no less possible to display its invincible pre- judices, by an irrational and intolerant zeal against, than for, religion. Now, undoubt- edly, in this sense, no man has proved himself more of a bigot than Hume. Far from being the calm and philosophic inquirer which he pretends to be, he is evidently influenced by an insatiable zeal for the propagation of hi's atheistical tenets ; and his intolerant and per- secuting spirit against those who oppose the adoption of his infidel creed is every where manifested by his furious abuse of all who are tenacious of their Christian hopes, but more particularly of the clergy, and these, too,_ of every religious persuasion, without distinction. Of this, abundant proofs are to be met with in almost every part of his writ- 27 For some admirable and beautiful remarks by tbe same author, on the Materialists, and upon Lord Shaftesbury, and particularly on Lord Bolingbn.ke and his Philosophical Works, see the same volume, pp. 118 — 125. With respect to Hume, we are informed by .Mr Ritchie, that he was particularly stung by the severe animadversions of Gray. For. as the biographer adds, "notwithstanding the eulogium which he sometimes bestows on the equanimity of his own temper, it is known, that he felt the attacks on his literary reputation with exquisite sensibility: and although he persevered in the resolution of writing no answers to his antagonists, (except in the single case of his quarrel with Rousseau,) he did not always receive the criticisms of others with the apathy lie professes." Account of the Life and Writings of David Hume, p. 301. Indeed, if we give credit to the account of him in the London Review for 1777, we shall pronounce him one of the most choleric, instead of being one of the calmest, of philosophers. His Ti-eatise of Unman Nature having experienced considerable severity of criticism in a publication entitled, The Works of the Learn, ,1. the author (as the Review states) became so highly provoked, that "he flew into a violent rage to demand satisfaction of Jacob Robinson the publisher; whom he kept, during the paroxysm of his anger, at his sword's point, trembling lest a period should be put to the life of a sober critic by a raving philosopher." It is well known, also, that his resentment against Dr Beattie was so violent, that he could hardly put upon it any decent restraint. J8 I find indeed, from an anecdote in Ritchie's Life of Hume, that I have his own authority for this epithet. For, as his biographer informs us, his reply to a friend, who jocularly threatened him with writing an account of his life and character, was, that as to his character, he would himself give it in a single sentence ; " candid and liberal with respect to the pre judices of others, bigoted with respect to his own.'' 2u6 M A f ; 1 : E ( ) X THE A T O N E M E N T. ings ; but more especially in his Twenty-first Essay, on National Characters, {Essays, vol. i. E. 215,) where, and In the annexed note T, e pronounces " priests of all religions to be the same," and goes on laboriously to prove. that a priest, as such, " must be destitute of every virtue, and possessed by almost every vice." How rtrongly Horace Walpole — whom T particularly name, as not having any undue leaning towards Revelation, and as being, it must be supposed, tolerably free from that odium theologicum, which our author so plentifully charges against the clergy — how strongly, I say, lie condemns this intole- rant zeal in this man of pretended moderation and philosophic calmness, may be seen on looking into his works.29 Now, surely, this is a most unreasonable intrusion into what our author so willingly admits to be the ex- clusive province of the clergy. There is some excuse for warmth, in the man who perceives an attempt to rob him of what he holds most precious ; but there is none for the man, who makes that attempt, flying into a passion, because it is resisted. Again, as to the disingenuousness of Hume ; this is sufficiently manifest on the inspection of his works. The instances adduced by the various writers who have taken the trouble to expose his flimsy sophisms arc so multi- plied, as to render it unnecessary to dwell upon this subject. Of these writers, in addi- tion to the authors of the well-known answers to his Essay on Miracles, (an essay which, but for adventitious circumstances, could not have deserved an answer,) I would particu- larly recommend to the young reader, Dr Beattie, and Bishops Ilurd and Home, who have, in the works already alluded to in this Postscript, exhibited this imposing and de- ceitful infidel in his true colours. Nor is it only in matter of reasoning, but in matter of fact, that he stands convicted of dishonesty. No writer, perhaps, has established this more clearly than Dr Elrington, in his Donnellan Lecture Sermons, to which 1 refer particularly at pages 233, 234, and 296—302. It is but fair, however, to confess, that Mr Hume has not confined altogether to religious I rd Orf.nl, indeed, omits no opportunity of expressing his dislike and even contempt of the common run of what arc called Geniuses, and Philosophers, in modem times. " No (Jenins i bave known," says he, "has bad common sense enough to balai the impertinence of their pretensions. They hate priests, but love dearly to have an altar at their feet ; for which n awn it Is much pleasanter to read them than to know them." (Lord Orf.ird's Work.-:, vol. v. p. 421.) This ohservation. though Immediately directed against Rousseau, who was at this tune Introduced intn England by Hume, was manifestly not designed exclusively f ir. him. And although Hume is frequently sp iken of in terms apparently favourable, yet even in his lordship's Utters to Hume himself, (vol. lv. pp. 2i;o — 265,) the cutting sarcasms and c mtemptuous sneers against authors and philoso- phers of a certain class, sufficiently intimate In what light the noble author really viewed the Scottish as well as the French philosopher. subjects his talent of disingenuous representa- tion. His unfaithfulness and gross partiality as a historian, have been long pretty generally acknowledged : and it has been pronounced by judicious and candid writers upon the subject of English history, that the History which Mr Hume has given to the world is a most injurious work to put into the hands of the British youth, in order to give them just ideas of the history or constitution of England. Dr Towers, in his Observations on Mr Hume's History, says, that "fidelity, accuracy, and impartiality, are requisite in a historian ; and that in these Mr Hume is greatly deficient." Dr Gilbert Stuart also points out, in his View of Society in Europe, (see particularly pp. 320, 323, 326,) many gross and wilful errors in the historian : and at p, 327, lie fully demonstrates how unfit }Ir Hume was for the task which he undertook. " Mr Hume," he says, " struck with the talents of Dr Brady, deceived by his ability, disposed to pay adulation to government, or willing to profit by a system formed with art, and ready for adoption, has executed his His- tory upon the tenets of this writer. Yet, of Dr Brady it ought to be remembered, that he was the slave of a faction, and that he meanly prostituted an excellent understanding, to vindicate tyranny, and to destroy the rights of his nation. With no less pertinacity, but with an air of greater candour, Mr Hume lias employed himself to the same purposes ; and his History, from its beginning to its conclu- sion, is chiefly to be regarded as a plausible pretext of prerogative. No friend to huma- nity, and to the freedom of this kingdom, will consider his constitutional inquiries, with their effect upon his narrative, and compare them with the ancient and venerable monu- ments of our story, without feeling a lively surprise, and a patriot indignation." Mr Fox, also, in his late celebrated work, speaks of the continual display, in Hume's History, of his " partiality to kings and princes, as intolerable. Nay," he adds, " it is, in my opinion, quite ridiculous : and is more like the foolish admiration which women and children sometimes have for kings, than the opinion, right or wrong, of a philosopher." And a set of writers, whose national partiali- ties would not indispose them to Hume, agree fully in this sentiment. " Few things," they say, "seem more unaccountable, and, indeed, absurd, than that Hume should have taken part with high church and high monarchy men. The persecutions which he Buffered in his youth from the Presbyterians may, per- haps, have influenced his ecclesiastical partia- lities. But that he should have sided with the Tudors and the Stuarts against the people, seems quite inconsistent with all the great traits of his character." (Edinh. Review, vol. xii. p. 276.) What great traits of character? No. GD.-POSTSCRIPT, ON BOLINGBROKE AND III ME. 2 7 We have already scon what they amount to. No, no ; the man who is not influenced by a love of truth must be destitute of principle. Ami in such a character, inconsistencies must abound. Where there is no standard to refer to, no anchor to hold fast, what can be ex- pected but perpetual vacillation? The man who laboured to traduce Scripture would not fail to falsify history. lie who could be blind to the grandeur and glory of the Christian dispensation, could not easily discover the beauty and sublimity of the British constitu- tion. And we need not be surprised to find the same man a renegade in religion, and a slave in politics. The mischievous and dishonest uses, also, to which Hume perverts his History, should not pass without observation. Mere historic, falsehood had lost much of its interest in the bnast of this writer, had it not been made subservient to his favourite object, the sub- version of moral and religious truth. The picture, which has been already drawn of the historian in this light, is sketched with such justness and good taste by the masterly pencil of .Mrs H. More, that I cannot do better than present it to the reader's view as it has come from the hand of that admirable woman. " There is a sedateness in his manner, which imposes ; a sly gravity in his scepti- cism, which puts the reader more off his guard, than the vehemence of censure, or the levity of wit ; for we are always less disposed to suspect a man who is too wise to appear angry. That same wisdom makes him too correct to invent calumnies, but it does not preserve him from doing what is scarcely less disingenuous. He implicitly adopts the inju- rious relations of those annalists who were most hostile to the reformed faith i30 though 30 Vilters, in his Essay on the Reformation, (Mill's transla- tion, p. 107.) offers the following observations, which go to sup- port the above allegation, and deserve to be particularly attended to : — " It is well known with what fury the rage of party pours out calumny upon eminent men. Upon Luther, above all men, it has been discharged in torrents. Among other causes, it has been found out, that his zeal arose only from the discontent of the Augustines, who beheld, it is said, with envy the Dominicans invested by the Pope with the commission of preaching indul- gences. That Maimbourg should have picked up such a story is nothing wonderful ; but it is inconceivable, that Voltaire and Hume should have repeated it as a certain fact." This author then proceeds to expose the falsehood of the calumny, and refers to a note of Dr Maclaino on Mosheim's Ecclesiasticai History, in which, he says, is " proved, beyond dispute, the absurdity of the imputation." The translator, pursuing the same subject, goes on thus : — " The credit of Voltaire is now so low in this country, that no means, however base, of forwarding a favourite object will be thought beneath him. He is now detected, and his authority is of very little value. Hut Hume, who, through the whole course of his History, lies in wait for an opportunity of throwing discredit upon the cause both of religion and of liberty, who possessed a rooted enmity against all the best interests of mankind, and whose actions exhibit more of deliberate misan- thropy than those of any other man perhaps that ever lived, still enjoys a reputation and authority which he by no means deserves ; and his writings contribute strongly to corrupt the public sentiments. Dr Maclalne's note, referred to bv Villers, no must have known their accounts to be aggravated and discoloured, if not absolutely invented, lie thus makes others responsible is a full exposure, more full perhaps than was necessary, of one Of those instances of bad faith with which his History abounds. It any one were tO publish an edition of his History, with notes, pointing out the eagerness with which he has used nut onh law- ful, but puis ined arms against religi in and liberty, exposing tho unfounded assertions, the weak reflections, and the barbarous phraseology which he so often employs, he would abate that false admiration so long attached to his works, and confer a great obligation upon the public." These charges against Hume may possibly not be sufficiently temperate and measured, but they contain in them much of truth ; and the principal charge, that of historical bad faith, is undoubtedly made out by Dr Maclaine in the note alluded to; which note 1 here subjoin, not merely because it establishes the point at present under consideration, but because it so completely rescues the author of the Reforma- tion from the unfounded calumnies which Hume had contributed to circulate, and which of late days an interested zeal has pro- pagated in this country with more than usual industry. " Mr Hume, in his history of the reign of Henry the Eighth, has thought proper to repeat what the enemies of the Reforma- tion, and some of its dubious or ill-informed friends, have ad- vanced with respect to the motives that engaged Luther to oppose the doctrine of indulgences. This elegant and persuasive his- torian tells us, that the ' Austin friars bad usually been employed in Saxony to preach indulgences, and from this trust had derived both profit and consideration ; that Arcemboldi gave this occu- pation to the Dominicans ; that Martin Luther, an Austin friar, professor in the University of Wirtemberg, resenting the affront put upon his own order, began to preach against the abuses that were committed in the sale of indulgences, and, being provoked by opposition, proceeded even to decry indulgences themselves.' It were to be wished that Mr Hume's candour had engaged him to examine this accusation better before he had ventured to repeat it. For, in the first place, it is not true that the Austin friars had been usually employed in Saxony to preach indul- gences. It is well known that the commission had been offered alternately, and sometimes jointly, to all the mendicants, whe- ther Austin friars, Dominicans, Franciscans, or Carmelites. Nay, from the year 1229, that lucrative commission was princi- pally intrusted with the Dominicans ; and in the records which relate to indulgences, we rarely meet with the name of an Austin friar, and not one single act by which it appears that the Roman Pontiff ever named the friars of that order to the office under consideration. More particularly, it is remarkable, that, for half a century before Luther, (('. c. from 1450 to 1J17,) during which period indulgences were sold with the most scandalous marks of avaricious extortion and impudence, we scarcely meet with the name of an Austin friar employed in that service, if we except a monk, named Palzius, who was no more than an underling of the papal questor Raymond Peraldus ; so far is it from being true, that the Augustine Order were exclusively, or even usually, employed in that service. Mr Hume has built his assertion upon the sole authority of a single expression of Paul Sarpi, which has been abundantly refuted by De Priero, Palla- vicini, and Graveson, the mortal enemies of Luther. " Hut it may be alleged, that, even supposing it was not usual to employ the Augustine friars alone in the propagation of indul- gences, yet Luther might be offended at seeing such an impor- tant commission given to the Dominicans exclusively, and that, consequently, this was his motive in opposing the propagation of indulgences. To shew the injustice of this allegation, I observe, secondly, that, in the time of Luther, the preaching of indul- gences was become such an odious and unpopular matter, that it is far from being probable, that Luther would have been soli- citous about obtaining such a commission either for himself or for his order. The princes of Europe, with many bishops and multitudes of learned and pious men, had opened their eyes upon the turpitude of this infamous traffic ; and even the Franciscans and Dominicans, towards the conclusion of the fifteenth century, opposed it publicly, both in their discourses and in their writings. Nay, more, the very commission, which is supposed to have excited the envy of Luther, was offered by Leo to the General of the Franciscans, and was refused both by him and his order, 208 M AG 1 : E ON THE ATONE M E N T. for the worst things he a--crN, and spreads the mischief without avowing the malignity. When he speaks from himself, the sneer is so cool, the irony so sober, the contempt so dis- who gave it over entirely to Albert, Bishop of Mentz and Mag- deburg. Is it then to be Imagined that either Luther, or the other Austin friars, aspired after a commission of which the Franciscans were ashamed ? Besides, it is a mistake to affirm that this office was given to the Dominicans in general, since it was given to Tetzol alone, an individual member of that order, who had been notorious for his profligacy, barbarity, and extor- tion. "But that neither resentment nor envy were the motives that led Luther to oppose the doctrine and publication of indulgences, will appear with the utmost evidence, if we con- sider, in the third place, — That he was never accused of any such motives, either in the edicts of the pontiffs of his time, or amidst the other reproaches of the contemporary writers, who defended the cause of Koine, and who were far from being sparing of their invectives and calumnies. All the contem- porary adversaries of Luther are absolutely silent on this head. From the year 1517 to l.r>46, when the dispute about indulgences was carried on with the greatest warmth and animosity, not one writer ever ventured to reproach Luther with these ignoble motives of opposition now under consideration. I speak not of Erasmus, Sleiden, De Thou, Guicciardini, and others, whose testimony might perhaps be suspected of partiality in his favour: but I speak of Cajetan, Hogstrat, Do Prierio, Emser, and even the infamous John Tctzel, whom Luther opposed with such vehemence and bitterness. Even Cochlaeus was silent on this head during the life of Luther ; though after the death of that great reformer, he broached the calumny I am here refuting. But such was the scandalous character of this man, who was notorious for fraud, calumny, lying, and their sister vices, that Pallavieini, Bossuet.and other enemies of Luther, were ashamed to make use either of his name or testimony. Now, may it not be fairly presumed, that the contemporaries of Luther were better judges of his character and the principles from which he acted, than those who lived in after-times ? Can it be imagined, that motives to action, which escaped the prying eyes of Luther's contemporaries, should have discovered themselves to U9 who live at such a distance of time from the scene of action, to M. Bossuet, to Mr Hume, and to other abettors of this ill- contrived and foolish story '. Either there are no rules of moral evidence, or Mr Hume's assertion is entirely groundless." — M i-lic im's Bed. Hist. cent, xvi.sect. i. chap 2, vol. ii. pp. 17, 18. Dr Maclaine has very properly observed, that the cause of the Reformation (which must stand by its own intrinsic dignity. and is in no way affected by the views or characters of its instruments) can derive no strength from this inquiry, but as it may tend to vindicate the personal character of a man, who has dune eminent service to the cause of religion. In truth, so far from looking for selfish and ignoble motives to account for Luther's zealous opposition to the publication of indulgences by Tetzel, one has only to read the account given by Mosheira of this transaction, to have his astonishment excited, that Luthers did not start up in thousands to raise their voices against it. " This bold and enterprising monk," he says, speaking of Tetzel, " had been chosen, on account of his uncommon impudence, to preach and proclaim in Germany those famous Indulgences of Leo X., which administi red remission of all sins, past, present, and to come, however enormous their nature, to those who were rich enough to purchase them. The frontless monk executed this iniquitous commission, not only with matchless insolence, indecency, and fraud, but even car- ried his [mplet] o far as to derogate from the all-sufficient power and influence of the merits of Christ." The translator adds, in exemplification, that, "in describing the efficacy of tin w i dulgenoes, Tetzel said, among other enormities, 'thai even had any one ravished the "i tiier of God, he (Tetzel) had wherewithal to efface his guilt.' lie also boasted, that he 'had saved more souls from hell by these indulgences, than St Peter had converted to Christianity by his preaching."* Yet Hume oould discover no cause for Luther's resistance of such indul- I, but that be had lost the sale of them himself. creet, the moderation so insidious, the diffe- rence between Popish bigotry and Protestant firmness, between the fury of the persecutor and the resolution of the martyr, so little marked ; the distinctions between intolerant frenzy and heroic zeal so melted into each other, that though he contrives to make the reader feel some indignation at the tyrant, he never leads him to feel any reverence for the sufferer. He ascribes such a slender superio- rity to one religious system above another, that the young reader, who does not come to the perusal with his principles formed, will be in danger of thinking that the reformation was really not worth contending for. But in nothing is the skill of this accomplished sophist more apparent, than in the artful way in which he piques his readers into a conformity with his own views concerning religion. Human pride, he knew, naturally likes to range itself on the side of ability. He therefore skilfully works on this passion, by treating with a sort of contemptuous supe- riority, as wreak and credulous men, all whom he represents as being under the religious delusion. To the shameful practice of con- founding fanaticism with real religion, he adds the disingenuous habit of accounting for the best actions of the best men, by referring them to some low motive ; and affects to confound the designs of the religious and the corrupt, so artfully, as if no radical difference existed between them." (Mrs H. More's Hints for a Young Princess, vol i. pp. 156 — 158.) Thus does this elegant writer describe the pernicious tendencies of Hume's History, which, as possessing at the same time many of the beauties of style, she happily charac- terizes in a word, as " a serpent under a bed of roses," (p. 155.) And thus we see, that in no occupation of Mr Hume, whether exercis- ing himself as the light essayist, the dee]) philosopher, or the grave historian, does he ever lose sight of the one great warfare, in which he had enlisted himself against truth, virtue, and religion. In this Postscript to the foregoing Number, I have wandered far, indeed, from my sub- ject ; but by no means from my object : for, if 1 shall have the good fortune of impressing any one of my youthful readers with a just opinion and abhorrence of such writers as Bolingbroke and Hume, I conceive I shall have done no small service to the cause of truth, of virtue, and of religion. No. LXX.— Page 22. Col. 1. ON TIIF, COKRESPONOKXCE BETWEEN THE ANNUAL EXPIATION UNDER THE LAW, AND THE ONE GREAT EXPIATION UNDER THE GOSPEL. The sacrifice on the anniversary of expiation seems to be distinguished from all others by a No. 71.— NATURE AND IMPORT OF CEREMONY OF THE SCAPE-GOAT. 209 peculiar degree of solemnity, as if to mark its more immediate reference to the great sa- crifice of Christ. Thus, on this day, we find the high priest exclusively commanded to officiate : and on this day alone, in the Stated exercises of his office, was he permitted to enter into the Holy of Holies, and to carry the blood of the victim into the presence of God, to offer it before that glory, which, seated between the two cherubims, overshadowed the mercy- seat, and represented the Divinity, — a circum- stance which the apostle particularly marks, (Heb. ix.) as prefiguring the entrance of our great High Priest, with the blood offered by him for our redemption, into the true presence of the most High, the immediate habitation of God's holiness and glory. The high priest also seems to have been selected for the solemn services of this day, as more adequately repre- senting the whole assembly, in whose name he sacrificed and supplicated forgiveness ; and, therefore, more properly typifying him, who, representing the whole human race, was to procure redemption by his blood for the whole assembly of mankind. Whoever wishes for a more minute detail of the particulars of this solemn sacrifice, and of its peculiar fitness to represent the sacrifice of Christ, may consult Outram. De Sacr. lib. 1, cap. xviii. § 6, 7 ; lib. 11, cap. iii. § 2, 3, 4. He will also receive much satisfaction from an examination of Ainsworth's comment on the sixteenth chapter of Leviticus. For many valuable remarks connected with the subject of this Number, Daubeny's Discourses on the Connection between the Old and New Test, may be consulted. And in Rhenferdius's treatise De Comparatio?ie Expiationis Anniv. Pontificis Max. V. et N. Test. (Meuschen's Nov. Test. &c. pp. 1013 — 1039,) a most copious and circum- stantial enumeration is given of the particulars, in which the annual expiation by the Jewish high priest resembled the one great expiation of the New Testament. It may be proper to observe, that such is the force of the resem- blance, that Socinus himself admits this anni- versary sacrifice of atonement, — inasmuch as " it was of special divine ordinance, at a stated season, offered by the high priest, and ap- pointed to atone for all the sins of all the people," — to be fairly accounted typical of the sacrifice of Christ. — Socin. Oper. (Prcelect. Thcol. cap. xxii.) torn. i. p. 583. No. LXXL— Page 22. Col. 1. ON THE NATURE AND IMPORT OF THE CEREMONY OF THE SCAPE-GOAT. On this, see what has been said in pp. 97, 98, and attend particularly to the fifth, seventh, and tenth verses of the sixteenth chapter of Leviticus, from which it appears that the two goats arc, throughout the chapter, spoken of as one sin-offering ; being expressly so called in the first of these verses ; presented jointly as the offering of the people in the second ; and, though separated into two distinct parts by the lot cast, in the ninth verse, yet each described as contributing to the atonement for the people, as appears from the tenth verse compared with the seventeenth. Indeed, that the two goats made but one sin-offering on this occasion, the best commentators freely admit. See Jameson's observations on this chapter of Leviticus. The reason of this seems obvious. The death of the animal was requi- site to represent the means by which the expi- ation was effected : and the bearing away tho sins of the people on the head of the animal, was requisite to exhibit the effect ; namely, the removal of the guilt. But for these dis- tinct objects, two animals were necessary to complete the sin-offering. It must be allowed, that an account some- what different has been given of this matter by some very judicious commentators. The goat sent into the wilderness, and that which wTas offered up in expiation, jointly, they say, typify the great Redeemer of mankind : the former animal exhibiting that which could not be displayed by the latter, as having been slain, namely, that Christ was not only to be " delivered for our offences," but to be "raised again for our justification,"(Rom. iv. 25 ;) and that although he was to be " crucified through weakness," yet he was to " live by the power of God," (2 Cor. xiii. 4.) Thus Ainsworth, Bochart, Alting, and, before them, Augustine and Procopius, understand it. The opinion of these writers, respecting the truth to be illustrated by the dismissal of the second goat, may perhaps not improperly be com- bined with that which has been here proposed : so that Avhilst the goat which was slain exem- plifies the sacrifice offered for the sins of man- kind ; that which was sent away alive, may represent not only the removal of those sins in consequence of that sacrifice, but also the restoration to life of him by whom they were so removed. Whether, however, this point be admitted or not, the circumstance of the two goats jointly constituting one offering, by exhibiting the different adjuncts, cannot, I think, with any reason be controverted. Bhenferd contends that this point is com- pletely established by an evidence resulting from the nature of the ceremony itself. For, he says, the imposition of hands, and the con- fession and implied translation of sins upon the victim, being usual in the sacrifice of ani- mals in expiation ; and this ceremony being omitted in the case of the goat that was slain, whilst it was employed in the case of the goat that was sent away ; decidedly prove, that both animals were designed to be considered as one offering, and that the latter, consc- 210 M A G E E ON THE A T O N E M E X T. quently, represented him who was to bear the sins oi Israel, and by bis Bufferings to expiate and to remove them. SeeJac. Rhenferd. /.''/'. Annie. See. p. 1033 of Meuschen, Nov. Test, ex Talm. Whoever may have a curiosity to know whether any, and what ceremony, analogous to that of the scape-goat, is observed by the Jews of modern times, on the day of expia- tion, may turn to p. 74, where he will find, that a cod- is now substituted for the legal victims ; and that the entrails of the animal to which the sins of the offerers are conceived to have been transferred by impre- cation, arc exposed upon the top of the house, to be carried away by the birds into their solitary haunts, in like manner as, under the law, the scape-goat had been conceived to carry away the sins of the people into the wilderness. See also Buxtorf. Synag. Jitd. and Broughton's Dictionary of Religions, article Expiation. No. LXXII. — Page 22. Col. 2. SOCINIAN OBJECTIONS URGED BY A DIVINE OF THE IsTABLISHED CHURCH AGAINST THE DOCTRINE OF THE VICARIOUS IMPORT OF THE MOSAIC SACRI- FICES, AND AGAINST OTHER DOCTRINES OF THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND. The arguments in behalf of the vicarious import of the Mosaic sacrifices have been so fully examined in Nos. XXXVIII. and XXXIX., that nothing need here be added to what has been already offered upon this head. It is with great regret that, in reverting to this Bubject, I feel myself obliged to notice the following observations, which have been re- cently hazarded by a divine of the Established Church, with a rashness and a flippancy which cannot too strongly be condemned. " Those who seek a protection for their absurd and unscriptural ideas of a vicarious punishment, under the shelter of the Jewish ritual, do not consider that that ritual was solely intended to preserve the Jews from the idolatry and polytheism of the neighbouring nations, by keeping their imagination sensibly interested, their minds perpetually employed, and their time continually occupied with the performance of rites and ceremonies, sacrifices and oblations, which all tended to keep alive in their minds the unity of the Godhead ; and thus to preserve them a distinct people, till the time appointed came for the opening of the Christian dispensation, when the distinc- tion between .Jew and Gentile was to be done away.1 There are, I know, some people w hose 1 The same idea this author takes pains frequently to enforce. In his Religion utthout Cant, (p. 119,) he states it thus: " The ceremonial laws of the Mosaic dispensation were intended merely to preserve unbroken the barrier between Jew and Gen- fancy is stronger than their judgment, who suppose that the varied sacrifices and ordi- nances of the Mosaic ritual, and indeed all the fractional parts of the Mosaic dispensation, were intended only as types and figures of particular facts and doctrines in the history and institution of the Messiah. Those, whose minds are not fitted for larger and grander views of the ways of God, may well employ their time in these puerile conceits ; but they will be despised by wise and sober men, who do not like to assimilate the operations of the Deity to the trick and pantomime of a con- juror."— The Guide to Immortality, by Robert Fellowes, vol. iii. pp. 55, 5G. Such are the modest insinuations of a divine whose mind is, of course, " fitted for large and grand views of the ways of God ;" whose comprehensive ken enables him, although un- aided by any lights from Scripture, to discern what was the sole design of the Jewish ritual ; who is possessed of " a judgment," that at once detects the silly fancies of all such as " suppose" that that ritual could bear any tile, till the coming of him," &e. And yet, will it be believed, that in the very same page, this determined enemy of every thing typical in the Mosaic dispensation, affirms, that, in the Mosaical law, the great scheme of redemption was obscurely in- sinuated, rather than distinctly portrayed, in types and figures. in the sacrifices of the altar, and the atonements of the priest ? The Redeemer, he adds, "was seen through the rites of the Mosaic dispensation as through a veil or a glass, darkly." How- then does this " wise and sober " writer differ from those, " whose fancy prevailing over their judgment," has led them to view the Mosaic dispensation as containing in it something typical of the Christian ? He admits, that the sacrifices and atonements under the one, did obscurely typify the great scheme of redemption in the other. And who contends that the type was any other than a faint and obscure draught of the reality ? Thus, then, he saves his reader the trouble of confut- ing the assertion, that the Jewish ritual was solely intended to form a barrier between Jew and Gentile, and that none bat a visionary could ever have dreamt of its bearing a typical relation to the Christian scheme. This is not the only case in which the freedom and variety of this author's views have led him to mutually confronting posi- tions on the same subject. To select one instance more out of a rich abundance. In p. 17!> of the last named work, he tells the Christian, that "it is only by personal acts of sin, baldening into habits of sin, that lie becomes a transgressor, subject to the wrath of God ;" and, agreeably to this, he asserts again, in p. 210, that " it is not by some occasional misdoings that we are to pass sentence on any man;" — that, " in estimating the worth of the human character, we are not to form our calcula- tions on the conduct of one single day, but to take the average of many days and years, and see what proportion a man's viola- tion of his duty bears to its performance, his virtues to his vices, his sins to his righteousness." And yet this indulgent moralist, who had thus far endeavoured to relieve us from any inconvenient pressure of sin upon our consciences, by enabling us to reduce the balance against us in the debtor and creditor account of transgression and righteousness, shortly after turns upon us, all at once, with (his unpleasant sentence: "The moment we have violated any one duty of truth, justice, and humanity, or any one saying of the perfect law of Christ, that moment we are polluted with guilt, and. without repentance, obnoxious to punishment." See p. 220. — Really, it were by no means unadvisabie, that a writer (not excepting even a teacher of theology) should take some little pains to know what his own opinions were, before he proposed them for tho instruction of the public. No. 72.— VICARIOUS 1 U IN >HT OF MOSAIC SACRIFICES, &c. OBJECTED TO. 211 relation to the Messiah ; and who is also " wise and sober" enough to " despise" all those, who, by forming such a supposition, "' assimilate the operations of the Deity to the trick and pantomime of a conjuror." Now, who are the persons, who, by forming such strange suppositions, and by indulging in such " puerile conceits," have rendered themselves the objects of this gentleman's con- tempt? Not to speak of the person alluded to in the last note, (who probably stands too well with the author, to be exposed to any portion of that scorn which is to be shared among those who entertain such notions,) one of the first and most distinguished in this way is the Apostle Paul. He has gone the unreasonable length of endeavouring to prove, in a most minute and laboured detail, that the institutions of the Law were but shadows of things to come. But, then, of Saint Paul, and his various " puerile conceits," this writer makes no account. The apostle, he informs us, " labours with mysterious meanings, which he fails in developing with sufficient perspi- cuity."— " He was of the sect of the Pharisees, who were wont to allegorize on the literal sense of Scripture. His writings have a tincture of cabalistical refinement — and even occasionally glimmer with a ray of Grecian philosophy." — " The Epistle to the Romans is bewildered with the polemical Christianity of that day." His epistles, generally, are " filled with the abstruse discussions of Rab- binical learning ; or relate to questions which are at present of more curiosity than impor- tance." — "A modern believer has" (con- sequently) " very little concern with any of the epistles of this apostle ;" or, indeed, it must be added, with any of the epistles, all of which this writer finds to be " involved in a tenfold obscurity ;" and to which he pronounces it impossible that we could ever pay the smallest attention, but that " we prefer stumbling in darkness ; that we de- light more in error than in truth ; or that we imagine there is no piety where there is no mystery." — Picture of Christian Philoso- phy, pref. pp. iv. — vi. pp. 131 — 132. See also Guide to Immort. vol. iii. pp. 230, 231, where the same point is again earnestly enforced. In another work {Religion without Cant, pp. 13, 14) the same author takes care to acquaint his reader more particularly with those phari- saical dogmas and heathenish notions, which Saint Paul had so deeply imbibed ; and he illustrates the power of ancient prejudices over the mind of the apostle, by a happy and elegant allusion to the tang of the tainted cask; which, as he has presented it in a Latin phrase, likely to excite attention from its novelty, will, he thinks, give to " the saga- cious" a sufficient idea of his meaning. Of his meaning, in truth, no person can entertain a doubt. His language is plain and intelligible enough. It is neither more nor less than this, that Saint Paul, and, indeed, the authors of all the apostolical epistles, have shewn themselves to be mere drivellers : that wo should consequently reject all their fancies ; discard the hitherto received doc- trines of Christianity as idle dreams ; and regard the Gospel merely and exclusively as a moral system, or, as he chooses sometimes to term it, as a rule of life. This is the point which this writer mainly labours to establish throughout his various theological2 publica- tions. And, for the purpose of effecting this, he strenuously contends that the Christian religion contains in it no doctrine that is mysterious ;3 that it pronounces a good moral 2 The AnticcUvinUt, A Picture of Christian Philosophy, Religion without Cant, and The Guide to Immortality, are the works with which this author has favoured the puhlic on theolo- gical subjects. [Another theological work has, I understand, issued from the same pen, since the time at which this note was written : hut what tho nature of its contents may he, I confess I have not been anxious to discover.] Of these several vo- lumes, all largely descanting upon the morality, to the dispa- ragement, or rather to the exclusion, of the doctrines, of the Gospel, the Christian excellence which forms the favourite theme, is benevolence. It were well if he had treated those, from whose opinions he thinks proper to dissent, witli tiiat mild- ness, and brotherly forbearance, which might prove him to have written under the influence of the virtue which he so highly praises. His language, on the contrary, is every where that of the bitterest rancour, and the most arrogant contempt, against all who embrace the doctrines which he rejects, and which, in subscribing the articles of the church to which he belongs, ho bound himself by a solemn promise to maintain. Nay, he even dooms to the place of future torments, in common with the most profligate and abandoned of sinners, all who have taught the " false and pernicious doctrines of innate depravity, imputed righteousness, and such other dogmas as are contrary to good- ness."— Guide to Immort. vol. i. p. 316. Yet with all this gall perpetually discharging itself, charity and the kindly affections are flie never-ending topics of declamation ; a declamation even sometimes swelling into pindaric. Love, indeed, of one kind or other, is with this writer so favourite a theme, that a late work, in which he has indulged in the effusions of poetry, is exclusively devoted to the subject. It must be confessed, however, that the love there treated of is as far removed from Christian love, as any that a Christian minister could feel himself justified in recommending. — Poemt chicfty descriptive of the softer and more delicate sensations and emotions of the heart I Surely, surely, there is mischievous stuft enough of this kind abroad, without calling in the clergy to contribute their stock of silly love songs, to the increase of the nuisance. — And yet, perhaps, the love-songs of this clergyman are not more mischievous than his theology. They certainly are not more poetic. 3 " In the following work, it will perhaps be objected, that I have introduced no mysteries: but whatever is mysterious is unnecessary. The essentials of a religion consist in few, and those the plainest truths."— " False religions may extol the im- portance of mysteries : but there is no mystery in the true." — Guide to Immnrtality, vol. i. pref. p. xiv.— Similar language is scattered plentifully amongst the pages of this work. Being thu3 prepared to render all perfectly smooth throughout the Gospels, and the Epistles being altogether discarded, our author pro- ceeds with his pruning-knife in his hand, and freely and un- sparingly lops or bends every thing to his own wish, and, as he conceives, to the great edification of his reader. And yet, strange to say, notwithstanding his plain reason'mg, which "all men in the possession of reason may understand," he has left behind him mysteries not less than those which he boasts to have removed ; if that which cannot be comprehended be allowed to be mysterious. Amongst many such, his observe- 212 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMENT. life to be the only requisite condition4 of sal- vation ; that in the Gospels alone arc to be found comprised every useful truth, and every religious duty ; and that, consequently, in his own work, which professes to give a just view of whatever the ( lospels teach, the Chris- tian reader will meet "a faithful and a cheer- ing Guide to Immortality. " The author goes yet farther: he holds, that our Saviour's Sermon on the Mount " contains a summary of everything which it is necessary to believe or to practise." (Anticalvinist, pp. 13, 25.) tions upon the Incarnation and the Atonement supply notable specimens. The very opening of his work, indeed, cannot fail to satisfy all who examine it, of his qualifications as a commen- tator, who is to remove from the sacred writings all the obscu- rities of mystery. Confessing that he cannot discover what meaning should be assigned to the word Aoyoj, he "gives no translation to this mysterious term, but retains in the text the Original word Logos, to which he leaves every reader to annex whatever interpretation he may think best." (Vol. i. p. 3.) — This is certainly a new mode of removing a difficulty : and Mr Pell iwes is evidently not quite satisfied with it himself, lie, therefore, in the succeeding notes, calls in the aid of I)r Lardner, and labours, with the help of this Socinian ally, to explain the nature of that, the term to express which he does not ven- ture to translate. And now the matter comes out, that this Logos, let the word mean what it may, must actually be God himself. For if it be the reason, the wisdom, or the power of God, then what but God himself can it be ? Thus the first point gained in making the matter plain, is, that the attri- bute of any being is that being. Well, then, this Logos is actually God himself. How g'>es on the plain returning now ? " In the beginning was God ; and God was with God ; and God was God." So far there is no mystery undoubtedly; nor yet in the succeeding assurance, that " God was in the beginning with God." And for such communications, it must be conceded to Mr Fellowes and his Socinian auxiliaries, that the evangelists could have but little need of inspiration. But as we advance a little farther, we find that this Logos, (that is, God,) is called The Light ,■ and that this Light, which in one verse is God, becomes, in the next, the Messiah, "the visible image of the wisdom of God ;" and that immediately after it be- comes God again. — See the notes, pp. 3—7, vol. i. of Guide, &c.) So much for the freedom from mystery, and clearness of ex- position, in which this author exults ; and for the want of which he every where indulges in the most indignant inveo- igainst such as give support to the creeds and articles of the Established Church ; all of whom, Indiscriminately, he never fails to abuse as ignorant and intolerant, in a manner that evidently marks where these terms may justly be applied. A glance at the exposition of the introductory verses of St John's Gospel, as given in pp. 25, 26, of this work will satisfy the reader, with what associates this Church of England divine Is to be ranked in his comments upon Scripture. 4 Guide to Immor. vol. i. p. 327 This is also the familiar language of Mr Fellowes throughout. The clergy, he says, (vol. i. p. 323,) " ought solely and exclusively to be the moral teachers of the people." (He means to say, that the clergy " ought to be so|,|y and exclusively moral teachers of the people.") Indeed be carries this point so far, that he would have " the ministers of the Establishment compelled to teach nothing but that pure morality which Christ taught, without cant or mystery."-— Reli- gion without Cunt. p. 131 — It has been remarked of the work so entitled. — which deals, usque ad nauseam, in the cant or OOTnmon-place usual with a certain class of writers on the sub- jects of liberality, benevolenee, morality, kc. blended, at the same time, (in the indulgence, it is to be presumed, of benevolent and moral feeling*,) with DO small portion of the cant of invec- tive against all the supporters of the Established religion, that instead of being denominated Religion without Cant, it might, by a slight transposition, have BC .uiredamuch more appropriate description, Cant without Religion. So that even his own three volumes, expla- natory of the true meaning of the four evangelists, are in a great degree superfluous ; inasmuch as the substance of a few chapters which have been given by one of them, com- prehends all that is actually requisite. This is undoubtedly making brief work with the writings of the New Testament : and, in this view of the case, he might with as much pro- priety have entitled his book, a short cut, as a cheering guide, to immortality. But that we may appreciate the more justly the value of this writer's theological opinions, it is necessary to observe, that, whilst he every where5 insists on the propriety of con- fining the entire range of Christian instruction within the limits of our Lord's discourses, as recorded by the evangelists, he at the same time very candidly informs us, that some of the grandest and most important truths of Christianity were not made known to the apostles until after their Master's death. " The great mystery of a suffering Messiah," he says, (and with what consistency he talks of such a mystery, or of any mystery what- ever, let the reader judge,) " could not pru- dentially be explained, and was not openly and unreservedly taught, till after his resur- rection." (Guide, ike. vol. i. p. .344.) In the sentence preceding this, he takes care to state distinctly, that, during the life of our Lord, this knowledge was withheld even from his immediate followers. Neither could it have been communicated to them in the interval between the resurrection and ascension, con- sistently with the representation of the case which this author gives ; for lie particularly acquaints us (which he admits to be more than the evangelists themselves have done) with the subjects of our Lord's discourse during that interval. " It was principally occupied with instructions relative to their (the apostles') ministry," &c. But " all things necessary for the belief or the practice of men, and which are essential to salvation, our Lord had repeatedly inculcated on his disciples before his death." And, accordingly, "the apostles delivered nothing necessary to salvation, which Christ had not previously enjoined in his discourses to his disciples; and of which we have a copious summary in the writings of the evangelists." (Guide, ike. 6 Besides what has been already quoted upon this subject, in the preceding page, we find the following remarks in this writer's Guide la Imni. vol. iii. p. 231 : — " Those who prefer religious spe- culation to the practice of religion, or who wish to keep alive the memory and to rekindle the heat of controversies, whose lustre and whose interest have long since been lost in the night of ages, may dedicate the best portion of their days to the fruit- less study of that imperviously dark and inextricably bewildering polemical matter, which is still preserved in tho apostolical epistles."— " But the precepts of Christ, as they are contained in his various parables and discourses in the four evangelists, contain all the instructions which are necessary to our improve- ment in righteousness — include, in short, every essential principle of genuine Christianity." No. 72.— VICARIOUS IMPORT OF MOSAIC SACRIFICES, &c. OBJECTED TO. 213 vol. iii. pp. 229, 230.) —What now follows from all this? — That "the groat mystery of a suffering Messiah" is of no importance in the Christian scheme. For nothing is im- portant that is not contained in our Lord's discourses delivered before his death, and as they are gi%ren to us by the evangelists ; and in these discourses, we arc told, the subject of a suffering Messiah is carefully suppressed. But we have not yet done with the variety of the author's views upon this head. He has again and again assured us, that our Lord had, in several discourses before his death, communicated to his disciples every impor- tant truth ; and yet he freely confesses, in other places, that there were several impor- tant truths which were not so communicated, but which our Lord had promised to convey to his disciples by the Spirit of truth, whom he would send to them after his death. {Guide, vol. iii. p. 64.) — It is true, indeed, that as to this Holy Spirit, or Paraclete, Mr Fellowes questions,6 (p. 63,) whether it may not simply signify Christ's resurrection and ascension!" This, however, he proposes only to the " dis- passionate and deep-thinking." — But what again shall we say of the evangelical narra- tion, as Mr Fellowes describes the matter in another place ? (p. 68.) " After my resurrec- tion, I will declare to you the will and counsels of the Father without any indistinctness or obscurity." And yet to this he immediately subjoins : " The sacred historians have only very briefly recited the discourses of Jesus with his disciples after his resurrection." — Thus, then, " the will and counsels of the Father," the " expounding in all the Scriptures (begin- ning from Moses and all the prophets) the things concerning himself," — which were vouchsafed by Christ to his disciples after his resurrection, and which the evangelists have (not " briefly," but) not at all " recited," are to be sought for precisely where it is confessed that they are not : and the Gospels are alone to be referred to, for clear and distinct views of doctrines which the Gospels do not con- 8 "It is a question which may be proposed to calm, and dispassionate, and deep-thinking men, whether our Lord, under the idea of a paraclete or counsellor, spoke of his resurrec- tion and ascension ; events which so greatly contributed to dispel the prejudices, to enlighten the minds, and to elevate the hearts of his disciples ; and, in short, to lead them into all truth." So much for plain, unrefined, natural exposition. Now if, in speaking of the Comforter that was to be sent, our Lord meant his resurrection and ascension, it is evident that we may substitute these words for that which they imply, wherever it is spoken of. And then, our Lord's address to his disciples would run thus : — " If I go not away, my resurrection and ascension will not come to you ; but if I go, I will send him (that is, my resurrection and ascension) unto you. And when he is come," &c. " However, when he cometh, even the Spirit of truth, (or, in other word?, my resurrection and ascension,) he will guide you unto all truth : for he (that is my resurrection and ascension) will not speak of himself," Ate. I certainly must leave this to " the dispassionate and deep- thinking," for I find it quite beyond the reach of my com- prehension. tain : whilst that part of Scripture is to be rejected as unnecessary, and even injurious, which was specially allotted to the purpose of communicating to mankind that knowledge of the truth, which the Spirit of truth, as well as the words of our Lord, conveyed to the apostles, subsequent to his resurrection. Thus we find this writer, who is to clear away all mystery and difficulty from Scrip- ture truth, perpetually at variance with him- self, no less than with the real doctrines of Christianity. Surely, he should have endea- voured to form at least a consistent set of opinions, before he attempted to obtrude them on the public ; and, more particularly, before he ventured to fly in the face of the whole Christian world, by an open rejection of one of the most important portions of inspired Scripture. Humility, however, is not one of the weaknesses of this writer ; and certainly knowledge is not his forte. Any reply to the arguments advanced by Mr Fel- lowes, for the rejection of the Epistles in the investigation of the Christian doctrines, is rendered unnecessary by the arguments them- selves. Independent of their extravagance, (I had almost said, their folly,) they carry in them, as we have seen, their own refutation. In truth, the object of our Saviour's life was to supply the subject, not to promulgate the doctrines, of the Gospel. The evangelists, therefore, confine themselves to the simple duty of narration ; and the doctrines, which altogether depended upon what our Lord had done and suffered, particularly upon his death, resurrection, and ascension into heaven, were, after this groundwork was fairly laid, to be fully set forth by those, to whom our blessed Saviour had solemnly promised the unerring aid of the Holy Spirit, and who were espe- cially designated by him for that very pur- pose. See p. 122, for farther observations upon the attempt made by Dr Priestley and his Socinian phalanx, similar to this of Mr Fellowes, to beat down the authority of the Epistles. By rejecting the Epistles, or, which is the same thing, the doctrines which they con- tain, Mr Fellowes, indeed, thinks that he may? 7 Upon this prudential plan of clearing away mysteries from Christianity, in order to bring infidels of all descriptions within its pale, I cannot avoid noticing the observations of a writer, whose opinions deserve at least as much respect as those of Mr Fellowes. " As to the mysterious articles of our faith, which infidels would by no means have us forget; 'Who,' say they, ' can swallow them ?' In truth, none but those who think it no dishonour to their understandings to credit their Creator. Socinus, like our infidels, was one of a narrow throat ; and out of a generous compassion to the Scriptures, (which the world, it seems, had misunderstood for 1500 years,) was for weeding them of their mysteries ; and rendering them, in the plenitude of his infallible reason, undisgusting and palatable to all the rational part of mankind. ' Why should honest Jews and Turks be frighted from us by the Trinity ?' &c. He was for making re- ligion familiar and inoffensive. And so he did ; and unchristian too." The same admirable writer subjoins. " Those things which our hands can grasp, our understandings cannot compre- hend. Why then deny to the Deity himself, the privilege of 214 M AG E E ON T If E \ T O N R M R N T. reconcile "Jews, Turks and infidels of what- ever denomination," tu Christianity. (Ghtide, 6cc. vol. i. pref. p. xv.) — No; thai he will not effect: but he will accomplish this, — he will rentier Christianity very little different from what Jews, Turks, and infidels, have already embraced. Thus, then, upon the whole, it is manifest, that we have the very essence of Socinianism presented to us by a writer, in the garb of a minister of the Established Church : a writer, too, who expatiates in every page on the moral virtues, — on the virtues of truth, hon- esty, and fidelity, — whilst he openly boasts of the good policy of continuing in the bosom of that communion which he labours to sub- vert ; and exultingly avows his breach of those solemn engagements, by virtue of "which he obtained admission within its pale. Such plain and unenlightened Christians, as have not acquired a relish for the refinements, which enable an ingenious casuist to violate his promise and to betray his trust, will be apt to suspect that, in this author's hands, Christianity has not only been abridged of its mysteries, but also curtailed somewhat in its morality. For what do those Articles contain, to which every clergyman of the Established Church has declared his entire and unfeigned assent, but the very doctrines which this gen- tleman ridicules and rejects? Surely, the doctrines of the Trinity, the Incarnation, the Redemption, and the various other momentous Christian truths, which they pronounce to be indispensable to the formation of a genuine Christian faith, are not to be found comprised in the Sermon on the Mount, which this author maintains to be a " summary of every thing, which it is necessary to believe or to practise." It is, indeed, scarcely conceivable, how a person in the possession of a sane understand- ing can reconcile to himself subscription to the articles of any Church, and rejection of the doctrines which those articles define. To say, as this author does, that the sixth article, in pronouncing that nothing is to be received •i- an article of faith which is not founded in Holy Writ, supplies a dispensation from the obligation of the rest, is to make as short work with the articles of the Church, as he has already made with the canon of Scripture. Would it not, under these circumstances, have saved much unnecessary trouble, to reduce the articles (,f the < 'liurch to the single declaration of the sixth ? Or, indeed, were we to seek being one amidst that multitude of mysteries which lie has made ?" Such are the striking anil just reflections of the cele- brated Dr Young, on this Important subject, in his Centaur not FabuiOUi, (p. 14 ;)a work which, in this age Of frivolity, volup- tuousneas, ;,tni Irreligion, I would particularly recommend to the attention of my young reader, promising him in the perusal, not less entertainment from the liveliness of Its illustrations and the brilliancy of its wit, than Improvement from the soundness of its reasonings and the animation of its piety. the simplicity, which this author so strongly recommends, the sixth article itself must be yet farther reduced, to correspond to the just dimensions of Gospel truth ; and the whole that our Church should pronounce to be requisite for the true belief of a Christian teacher, should at once be confined to the range of Christ's Sermon on the Mount. But, to a person not desirous of escaping from the obligations of a solemn engagement, it would naturally occur, that the Church, in propounding certain articles of belief, could never have acted so absurdly, as to superadd to these one paramount article, which was to do away the obligation of all the rest. On the contrary, he would necessarily reason thus : that whilst certain doctrines are pro- posed as articles of faith, and it is at the same time declared that none are to be received as such, which are not founded on the authority of Scripture ; it is clearly intended to be con- veyed, that the articles proposed are founded upon that authority, and to be received as articles of faith by those only who conceive them to be so founded. The language which Mr Fellowes's reasoning would put into the mouths of the framers of the articles is rather whimsical. " For the purpose of avoiding diversities of opinion, and the establishing of consent touching true religion^ we require from the clergy of the Established Church of England an unfeigned assent to the several doctrines which we propose ; and for the better effecting the aforesaid purpose, we also require of them, each for himself, accor- ding to his private interpretation of Scripture, to modify or to reject these doctrines at plea- sure, and to introduce such diversities of opi- nion as they may respectively think fit." This is Mr Fellowes's view of the matter. I would suggest to him a view of it somewhat different, in the words of one of the most distinguished ornaments of the English Church at the pre- sent day. " ' I do willingly and ex animo subscribe to the Thirty-nine Articles of the Church of England,' is the indispensable form of subscription ; and therefore it behoves every one, before he offers himself a candidate for holy orders, to peruse carefully the Articles of our Church, and to compare them with the written word of God. If, upon mature exa- mination, he believes them to be authorized by Scripture, he may conscientiously subscribe them ; but if, on the contrary, he thinks that he sees reason to dissent from any of the doc- trines asserted in them, no hope of emolument or honour, no dread of inconvenience or dis- appointment, should induce him to express his solemn assent to propositions, which, in fact, he does not believe.'"' — Bishop Tomline's 8 The title of our Articles, in describing the object for which they are framed, uses the very words which are here printed in Italics. 9 Dr Balguy, in speaking of the duties of the clergy, touching No. 72.-VICARIOUS IMPORT OF MOSAIC SACRIFICES, &c. OBJECTED TO. 215 Elements, &c. vol. ii. p. 507.) According to Mr Fellowes's reasoning, on the other hand, a Christian minister may express his solemn assent to propositions, which, in fact, he docs not believe. And this is the writer who re- solves the whole of Christianity into morality. Jiirain lingua, mentem injuratam gcro, is a sentiment which has seldom been so openly avowed as by this gentleman. The dishonest subterfuge of mental reservation has been often charged upon that church, against whose corruptions it has been the glory of ours to protest. It might1" now with justice be re- torted upon our own, if, indeed, it could (as I confidently trust it cannot) reasonably be supposed, that opinions on the subject of subscription, similar to those entertained by Mr Fellowes, prevail in any degree amongst the clergy of the establishment. Hut, after all, we do not find this gentle- man completely satisfied with his own views of the subject. In the wish, which he ex- presses, H that Parliament should give relief from all subscriptions to doctrine, it is mani- fest, that he is not altogether contented with the dispensation, which he conceives the sixth article to supply. Whether Parliament, how- ever, grant such relief or not, his free spirit is not to be restrained. " When the Church of England got rid of one Pope, it never intended to raise up thirty-nine in its place," 12 (p. xxi.) And if the Church presume to do so, he is, at all events, released from such iniquitous exer- the Articles, affirms, that " every word that comes from our mouths in opposition to the established faith, is a violation of the most solemn engagements, and an act of disobedience to lawful authority." 10 It has, in truth, been retorted, in a late publication, by a Roman Catholic writer, and directed even against those of our clergy, who conceive themselves to be bound by their subscrip- tion to consider the Articles merely as articles of peace. Even of these this author pronounces, that they must be allowed to have acted under impressions " contrary to every principle of Christian sincerity, and favourable to perjury." What then would the same writer have said of a minister of the Established Church, who, so far from viewing those Articles, to which he had solemnly declared his unfeigned assent, as articles of peace, openly arraigns them as grossly antiscriptural, and professes it to be his determination to oppose and to overturn them by every means in his power ? The passage to which I have referred, is to be found at p. Ivi. of the introduction to a work, entitled The Protestant Apology for the Roman Catholic Church. The author of the introduction (who styles himself Irena?us) possesses ability and information worthy of a better cause than that which he has undertaken to support ; and many things have fallen from his pen, in that treatise, which well deserve the considera- tion of Protestant divines. I mention this the more willingly, because it has not been my lot to meet with publications by any late writer of the Romish Church, alike deserving of notice. 11 Guide to 1mm. vol. i. pp. xviii. xix. 12 It is curious to observe this advocate for Christian freedom, who spurns with such indignation these popes which are imposed by the authority of the Church, devising, at the same time, a pope of his own, to which he would have the whole body of the clergy compelled to bend the knee. For, as we have already seen, (note 4 p. 212.) his favourite plan is, that the ministers of the establishment should be compelled to teach nothing but pure morality. Thus, like most of the other mighty advocates for freedom, the liberty which lie wishes for, is merely the liberty to deprive others of theirs. cise of authority, by a duty of higher obliga- tion— the duty which he owes to the great spiritual King. (Pp. xxi. — xxiii.) But it may be asked, whether this duty authorizes him to betray his trust, by voluntarily con- tinuing a member of a particular communion, which he labours, in violation of the most solemn engagements, to overturn ; labours to overturn, by the very means which his con- nection with that communion supplies ; and the enjoyment of which means, he pretty plainly intimates to be the principal cause for which he maintains that connection. (Pp. xix. xx.) It is, however, but fair to state, that, in this deliberate endeavour to overturn the doctrines which the Articles enforce, this author considers himself by no means charge- able with a violation of his engagements. The argument, indeed, is somewhat new. It amounts to this : that he who attends to the direct, natural, and obvious meaning of the Articles, is least likely to arrive at their right construction : and that, as to the letter, they are in truth more honoured in the breach than in the observance. Whoever doubts this to be a fair representation, may turn to the pages last referred to ; and also to pp. 33 — 42, of Relig. without Cant, where we find the author more fully unfolding the entire mystery of his reasoning upon this subject ; for mystery and paradox this author does not dislike, where they are of his own creation. It is there laid down, authoritatively, that the true meaning of the Articles is not to be collected from the Articles themselves, but from the sense of the clergy at large ; who, it is affirmed, " may put any construction™ upon 13 Dr Paley, a writer certainly not of the same stamp with Mr Fellowes, gives a very different account of this matter. " Sub- scription to articles of religion, though no more than a declara- tion of the subscriber's assent, may properly enough be considered in connection with the subject of oaths, because it is governed by the same rule of interpretation ; which rule is the animus imponentis. The inquiry, therefore, concerning subscription, will be, (/ww imposuit, et quo animo?" — (Principles of Moral and Political Philosophy, p. 148. ) This is manifestly an inquiry of a nature very far removed from that which Mr Fellowes re- commends to us. And, although I cannot agree with Dr Paley, either as to his general notion of the intent of the Articles, or as to his idea, that the animus imponentis terminates with the legislature that enacted them, yet it cannot, I think, be reason- ably denied, that he proposes the true principle of their inter- pretation. A just corrective of the laxity with which Dr Paley applies that principle, may be found in Mr Gisborne's Principles of Moral Philosophy, pp. 190—192. To this work, as well as to Bishop Tomline's Elements, I would earnestly advise the divinity student to resort for accurate notions upon this subject. Very loose opinions have been scattered abroad, by various writers, upon this point ; a point which, of all others, demands a most conscientious precision. Rut of all these writers, none, perhaps, of any note, has advanced a more relaxed system, than the late Cambridge professor, Dr Hey, who, in his Lectures on Divinity, however much of learning and good sense they may otherwise contain, has certainly merited the charge made by Bishop Law, of leading the members of the Church " into all the labyrinths of a loose and a penidious casuistry." (Vol. ii. p. 13.) His description of the nature of the tacit repeal adopted by the 216 M A G E E ON THE A T O N E M E N T. them which they think best :" that, " accor- ding to that construction, the Articles may and ought to be subscribed j" and thai be, who thus subscribes them, inasmuch as he maintains a unity of doctrine with the majo- rity of his brethren, " i- a better friend to the Church of England, than he is who may sub- scribe the Articles in a sense more agreeable to tho litter," &c. Thus, we are informed by a writer, who boasts of not submitting his opi- nions to authority, that we are not to exercise our private judgment in discovering the true sense of the Articles, but to take it entirely on trust from others. This, however, turns out, in the conclusion, to be, after all, but a con- venient mode of rendering the whole depen- dent upon the judgment of the very individual who thus modestly disclaims its exercise. For, since all is now to be decided by the suffrage of the clergy, and since there is no practicable contrivance whereby this suffrage can be nu- merically collected, the sense of the majority must, of course, be precisely that which each individual may conceive it to be. But, again, as it is not merely " the majority of the living members," but " particularly the most learned, upright, and judicious members of the Church of England, that constitute that Church ;" it must be the sense of the majority of these, it is manifest, that is to determine the point. Now, who are the most learned, upright, and judicious members of that Church? These clearly can be no other than they who reject all mystery ; who make Christianity nothing but a moral rule ; who can discern in it no- thing more than Dr Priestley, or Mr Belsham, or any other free expositor, who would divest it of all its peculiarities ; who, in short, agree with Mr Fellowes, in pronouncing the entire sum and substance of the Christian religion to be comprised in Christ's Sermon on the Mount. Thus, then, it appears that our au- thor ends where he began, and that the true Church of Geneva, (vol ii. p. 56,) and his manifest recommen- dation of it as an example to be followed by other churches, will supply a sufficient proof of this assertion. — Dr Powell, again, another eminent member of the University of Cambridge, has given but too much colour, by certain expressions of his in his Discourse on Subscriptions, fur the wild opinions Of Mr Fellowes upon this subject ; although, when well considered, and in con- nection with the context, they will be found to give him no sup- port. The following observations of this writer deserve to be quoted. Speaking of the subscription of the clergy, he says ; •' Our Articles of religion arc not merely articles of peace. They are designed also as a test of our opinions. For, since it cannot be imagined, that men should explain with clearness, or enforce with earnestness, or defend with accuracy of Judgment, such doctrines as they do not believe, the Church requires of those who are appointed to teach religion, a solemn declaration of their faith. Noris it more unreasonable to exclude a man from this office, who, through error, unavoidable, suppose, and innocent error, is unfit to execute it ; than to deny him a civil employ- ment, for which he is accidentally disqualified. He, therefore, who assents to our Articles, must have examined them, and be convinced of their truth." !>r Powell's Ditcourm on vartoui Subjects, pp. 33, 34. The whole of this passage is well worthy of attention. meaning of the Articles, as well as the genuine sense of Scripture, is to be collected only from him who has supplied us with The Guide to Immortality. Now, what is all this less than insanity ? But it is the insanity of a vain mind, of which we see too many instances on religious sub- jects daily. Well might a periodical writer, whose attachment to religious truth entitles him to general praise, describe this writer as " presumptuous, idolizing his own conceptions, and fancying his own reason infallible, and cutting short the line of faith exactly where it happens to interfere with their suggestions. — Already," it is added,14 " he is a latitudinarian in the widest sense of the word : the natural progress is from that to a fanciful, self-willed, merely nominal Christian ; making even the Gospels bend to his own whim. From this point the descent to Deism, or even Atheism, is perfectly easy ; nor do we know, indeed, that a Deist differs much, except in name, from such a Christian." Mr Fellowes has, it is true, congratulated himself on his good fortune, in being the sub- ject of these animadversions of the British Cri- tic ; as they have furnished the occasion of his "receiving so much elegance of praise from one who is equally distinguished by the vigour of his intellect, and the fervour of his benevo- lence." (Rclig. without Cant, pref. p. xxxviii.) That Dr Parr has proved his benevolence by the high panegyric which he has bestowed upon Mr Fellowes, there can be no question ; but whether he has done equal credit to his intellect, or, what is of more consequence, whether he has served the cause of truth and of Christianity, by such indulgence of that ami- able feeling, is certainly much to be doubted. Had Dr Parr confined himself to the testi- mony which he has borne to the purity and benevolence I5 displayed in the private life of Mr Fellowes, as he is a competent, so he would 14 It should be observed, that these remarks were drawn forth by one of the earliest of this writer's performances. He has since travelled farther in the same direction ; and given additional proof of the justice of those animadversions, and the truth of those prognostics. 15 Dr Parr speaks in terms altogether unmeasured of the benevolent and charitable feelings which uniformly govern the life and guide the pen of Mr Fellowes. And yet it is an extra- ordinary effect of those benevolent and charitable feelings, that he should every where throughout his writings pour forth the language of virulence and contempt against all who support the creeds and articles of the Church, against all, in short, who deem any thing beyond his abridged form of Christianity neces- sary for a Christian. Perhaps even from the writings of the most illiberal bigot a stronger instance of the want of charity cannot be adduced than that which this author supplies, (as has been noticed, p. 811,) in speaking of those, who " teach the false and pernicious doctrines of innate deprurity, imputed righteousness," inc. In short, it is of a writer, who lias war con- tinually in his mouth, that Dr Parr pronounces peace to be for ever in his heart. It is almost ludicrous to see such a writer represented as using in his own person the language of Grotius, " Pacem amavi semper amoque," even in the qualified sense in which this pacific disposition is described. {Spital Sermon, No. 72 -VICARIOUS IMPORT OF MOSAIC SACRIFICES, &c. OBJECTED TO. 217 have been admitted to be an unexceptionable witness. But, in speaking of an author, whose works are before the public, Dr Parr, however highly his learning and talents may be (and highly they ought to be) rated, yet cannot possibly expect, that the opinion which he thinks fit to pronounce upon that author's productions, shall necessarily regulate the public decision. Perhaps, indeed, in the de- clarations which this classical and most elabo- rate writer has hazarded on the subject of Mr Fellowes's theological publications, although nothing can shake his reputation as a scholar, he may not have added much to his character as a divine. For when he tells us that he finds but " two or three points of controversial divinity in which he dissents from Mr Fel- lowes," (who, in almost every point of contro- versial divinity, dissents from the Articles of the Established Church,) and that he discovers scarcely any thing to be objected to, except " that Mr Fellowes does not assent to some positions of Mr Wilberforce 16 about original sin ; for the attempt to refute whom, some enlightened believers may applaud, and some orthodox churchmen would pardon him :" — when he tells us these things, he proves beyond a doubt, either that he has perused Mr Fel- lowes's writings with an eye of blameable partiality, where the cause of religious truth demanded an honest search, and even a piercing scrutiny ; or that his own opinions hang but loosely and uncertainly upon the point of orthodoxy. Dr Parr needs not to be informed that the truths of Christianity are not to be conceded even to the amiable sym- pathies of friendship ; nor their just measure and degree to be accommodated to the forma- tion of a polished and a pointed sentence. It were to be wished, that in his praises of Mr p. 82.) Dr Parr's universal acquaintance with the ancient classics will readily suggest to him whose language I use, when (without being deterred by the " tales pacis hostes insurrectu- ros," &c.) I beg to substitute for the foregoing the following description, as more aptly illustrative of the character of his friend: — ' firfi it Tit, cti/Tout |vveAo»v, Qotivi irtfuxtvoii ix) rat [Av.Ti cevrout txiiv r.trvxtu-v, f^r,Tt rout ocKXovt Ctv8%UTGUt £C6V, oeflut CCV i'lTOt. 16 Dr Parr, in speaking of the state of his mind respecting the bo.ik published by this excellent man, and sincere Christian, which gave rise to the strictures of Mr Fellowes, says, that the description of it lies in the following narrow compass: — ri fj.lv £» i«^^f , 6V pLtfX,*rlu.oil ; tx hi uitrec, ov ffwiriULt ; Tec hi t!Tl ■crio-tv, oi htm /j,i.'C,u. Now although there be some opinions in Mr Wilberforce's work, to which 1 am as unwilling to apply the Zoziu.k*u as Dr Parr can he ; yet I cannot help thinking, that it would neither have discredited his discernment to have under- stood the reasoning, nor his taste and piety to have stored his memory with many of the results which it contains. I confess, I think it but a bad symptom of the times, when even grave characters can be found to juin in the vulgar ridicule of distin- guished piety : when religious seriousness but serves as a ground for ludicrous denominations and sarcastic epithets ; and these too not confined to the light and the malevolent, but receiving a partial sanction from the philosopher and the divine, and even admitted with more than toleration in one of the great assem- blies, with whose morality and corruption those of the entire people cY these nations are vitally interwoven. Fellowes he had not selected, as a mark of his sense, his being "a Christian without bigotry." It certainly, on the other hand, is not to be wondered at, that Mr Fellowes has returned the compliment, by describing his eloquent encomiast, as " a priest without intolerance and without guile." The reciprocal panegyric might surely have been rendered sufficiently palatable, without the seasoning of illiberal aspersions upon Christianity and its priest- hood. Dr Parr, for whose general character and talents, 1 feel, in common with all who can appreciate integrity and genius, a sincere and unaffected reverence, may think that I have spoken too strongly upon this subject. But the impress of his praise is no slight matter ; and the danger of its giving a circulation to what ought not (and without it, perhaps, would not) obtain currency with the public, demands an open exposure of the baseness of the coin, to which it would attach a fictitious value. In truth, mischievous as are the publications of Mr Fellowes, I should not have thought it necessary to animadvert upon them in this place, but that the eloquent eulogies of Dr Parr, joined to the writer's presenting himself to the public as a clergyman of the establish- ment, might, by throwing young readers off their guard as to the true character and object of his works, expose them to be misled by the false lights of a treacherous guide. To such readers, the satis eloquentia?, sapiential parum, of the author, is imposing ; the specious gloss of liberality and benevolence which his writ- ings wear, is attractive ; the classic authority of his splendid panegyrist is commanding. And as it was for readers of this description, especially for students of divinity intended for holy orders, that the present work was origi- nally designed, it naturally falls within its province to endeavour to secure them against such snares, when calculated to entrap them into false notions of their duties as professors of a Christian faith, or of their engagements as members of a national clergy. No. LXXllI. — Page 22. Col. 2. THE ATONEMENT BY THE SACRIFICE OF CHRIST MORE STRICTLY VICARIOUS THAN THAT BV THE MOSAIC SACRIFICES, WHEREBY IT WAS TYPIFIED. The justness of the position here laid down will be readily perceived, not only from the observations in p. 22, but yet more fully from comparing what has been said in Num- bers XXXVIII. and XXXIX. on the vicari- ous import of the legal sacrifices, with the remarks in Number XLII. on the true and essentially vicarious sacrifice of Christ. The 218 M A G E E ON THE ATON E M E N I . reflections contained in pp. 94, 103, 104, should be particularly attended to, as pointing ont the due proportion of the Mosaic and Christian atonements. See also pp. 21, 22, and Num- ber LXVIII. and pp. 189, 190. I subjoin here a very extraordinary para- graph, w Inch 1 find in a treatise of Danzius De hinza Redemption** humance, on the subject of an admission by the Jews of the vicarious Buffering of tixeSon for the sins of men, pur- suant to an eternal compact with the Father to that end. " Consentiunt hie nobismet Judiei, scilicet Dcum Patrem cum Filio suo jam ah seterno de redimendo humano genere consilium iniise. llinc notabilem quondam hie de re inter Deum et Mcssiam dialogum, per fabulara, tingunt : quern ex Helvico hie apponere placet, qui eundem ex R. Mos. Haddarschan, super Gen. i. 3, excerpsit, et ita sonat ; ' Dixit Jehova sanctus Penedictus, Messia juste mi ! isti, qui sunt reconditi apud te, hujusmodi erunt, quud futurum, ut peccata eorum inducant te in jugum grave, &c. Re- spondit coram eo Messias, Domine mundi ! Ego quidem laitus suscipio super me tribula- tiones istas, sive tormenta : eo tameu pacto, ut tu in diebus meis vivifices mortuos, et eos, qui a primo Adamo usque ad illud tempus mortui fuerint, &c. Dixit ei Sanctus Bene- dictus, Concedo. Protinus igitur suscepit ex dilectione super se Messias tormenta omnia et trihulationes, sicut scriptum est, Ies. LIII. afflictus ipse, et angustiatus est.' " — Meuschen. Nov. Test, ex Talm. p. 850. This extract I give to the reader as matter of curiosity. No. LXXIV. — Page 22. Col. 2. CONCLUDING NUMBER. Those objections, the discussion of which would have been improper and impracticable from the pulpit, have been carefully canvassed in the preceding dissertations. It has been the wish of the author to notice all that seemed in any degree deserving of attention. They who are acquainted with the subject, will, it is hoped, do him the justice to allow that he has omitted none of moment. Whe- ther hehasbeenassuccessful in their refutation, as he has been industrious in their collection, it is for others to judge. This, at least, he can venture to affirm, that he has examined them with a conscientious regard to truth and Scripture. And he now concludes this inquiry with an humble, and not unanxious hope, that the word of God may not have suffered in his hands. APPENDIX, CONTAINING AN ACCOUNT OF THE UNITARIAN SCHEME, AS DESCRIBED BY MR BELSHAM; IN HIS REVIEW OF MR WILBERFORCE's TREATISE ; WITH OCCASIONAL STRICTURES ON THE LEADING ARGUIvkNTS ADVANCED IN THAT PUBLICATION. " OSra; iraAa/rrajof rt>7{ ■XoWdl; ri Z,i,-rn(n; rr,g a.Xv,0t!a<, xou irTiToc.troifAct.fiiciM.ov rftxetTM." — Thucyd. lib. i. c. 20. *' I like not that arrogant theology, which presumes to explore what angels desire to look into, and which, failing in its attempt, rejects as absurd what it is not able to understand." — Bishop Watson's Charge in 1795. " Aperte dicite non vos credere Christi Evangelio : nam qui in Evangelio quod vultis creditis, quod vultis non creditis, vobis potius quam Evangelio creditis. " — Aug. cont. Faust, torn. vi. p. :S36. ed. 1569. In supplement to certain remarks in the pre- ceding sheets, (particularly to those in pp. 10, 23—28, 42 — 45, 48—50,) it becomes necessary to exhibit a brief outline of the opinions of that sect, which, under the assumed title of Unitarian, has presumed to arrogate the exclusive profession of the Divine Unify; and which has of late years exerted itself, in the sister country, with uncom- mon zeal and activity, for the subversion of the doctrines and the establishment of the national religion. An abstract, presenting at one view the- leading principles and consequences of the system, divested of the imposing phraseology which writers of modern days know so well how to apply to all objects whether worthy or unworthy, may prove not less beneficial to some who have, than to others who have not, embraced its doctrines. The task, indeed, is not without its difficulty. To seize what is fugitive ; to fix that which is ever in the act of change ; to chain down the Proteus to one form, and to catch his likeness ere he has shifted to another ; this is certainly a work not easy to be accomplished. What Unitari- anism, however, was in the year 1 1798, a 1 This Appendix was originally drawn up in the year 1800. What have been the wanderings of the fugitive since that period, the author has had little leisure, and les9 inclination, to explore. He is also disposed to think, that full as much consequence has been already attached to the subject, as it is entitled to. writer, who professes himself its faithful in- terpreter and vindicator, has circumstantially detailed. Mr Belsham, the late theological teacher at Hackney, has, ex officio, announced the creed of the day : and, so far as the prin- ciple of dissent can admit concurrence, the doctrines which he has promulged may reason- ably be presumed to be those generally re- ceived by the Dissenters of the Unitarian denomination throughout the sister country. The scheme, as presented by this writer, in his Review of Mr Wilberforce's Enquiry, is briefly as follows. — Beginning with the exis- tence of "an infinitely powerful, wise, and good Being, as the first and fundamental principle of rational religion," he pronounces the essence of this Being to be love: and from this he infers, as a demonstrable consequence, that none of the creatures formed by such a being, "will ever be made eternally miser- able." To suppose the contrary, he main- tains, is not only inconsistent with the Divine benevolence, but directly contradictory to the plainest principles of justice. That all will rise again after death, he admits to have been taught by Christ : and he likewise admits, that " the wicked will be raised to suffering." But, since God would act mi justly in inflict- ing "eternal misery for temporary crimes, the sufferings of the wicked can be but reme- dial, and will terminate in a complete purifi- cation from moral disorder, and in their 2-20 M \ C, F. E ON Til E A T O N E M E N T. ultimate restoration to virtue and happiness ; ' or, as he elsewhere8 expresses it, " Mtoral evil must be expelled by the application of natural evil ;" ami, if not" fully effected in this life, " tin' process must bo carried <>n by the severer sufferings of a future retribution." Thus the doctrine of a puraatory4 stands immovably fixed on the basis of the Divine justice : and the antithesis between eternal misery and tempo- rary crimes is made to complete the demon- stration of the Unitarian ; by which he is not only enabled to communicate "confidence" and" "tranquillity" to " the enlightened and virtuous believer,"5 but, he might also have added, a hardened and fearless security to the impenitent offender : and without this, he contends, "the God of nature must be viewed as frowning over his works, and, like a merci- ]<•" tyrant, dooming his helpless creatures to eternal misery," cv'c.y Whoever desires to see this curious specimen of reasoning fully exa- mined and exposed, will find ample satisfac- tion in Mr Walker s Letter to Mr Belsham, pp. 40—42. Having thus softened down the article of judicial retribution, and lightened guilt of most of its terrors, as well as of much of its deformity, (there being, as he contends, "a preponderance of virtue, even in characters contaminated with the grossest vice;"") he naturally proceeds to depreciate the value of the atonement by Christ. The notion of his death, as a propitiatory sacrifice for the sins of men, Mr Belsham totally rejects : and the doctrine of redemption through his blood, he holds to be an entire mistake, founded in the misunderstanding of certain phrases peculiar to the Jews :8 and finally, for the full esta- blishment of his opinions, lie refers us to Dr J. Taylor ; the amount of whose reasoning on this head, " in his admirable1-* Key," as * Review, &c. pp. 12—16. ■ Pp. 41, 42. 4 See, besides the above references, p. 154. 8 P. 21. e P. 20. 7 Pp. 14, 38, 30, 40, 42. 8 Pp. 17, 18, 105, 106. 9 In a periodica! publication, distinguished for the upright- ness and talent with which it is conducted, there is to be found n scries of valuable letters, upon the subject of the work above alluded to: and in the conclusion, the writer observes as fd- lows, upon this " admirable Key."—" The key of this author is not, I am persuaded, the legitimate one. I should rather be tempted to resemble it to some of those false keys, vulgarly called picklocks. The web of the key, to speak technically, is, in those Ingenious Instruments, cut to as slender a form as is Istent with the strength necessary for turning the bolt, in order that the chance of the lm] edimenl from the wards may be as little at pos.ii,:,-. But the lock, with which this theological advi nturiT had to do, was of such a peculiar construction, as to resist every effort to open it. except with the true key. The Doctor gave some desperate wrenches, and doubtless imagined thai he bad his purpose when he found the key turn In his hand. But it has been disc rvered by others, that he did no more than break it in the lock, and tin bolt, for any tiling which he has done to remove it. remaii * where it was before.'" Christ. Observ. vol. vi. p. ,m>4. The figure undoubtedly c mveya no incorrect Idea of the work which it is so much the fashion with Soclnian writers, and with good real iii, to i stol. Mr Belsham finds convenient to call it, has been already examined at large, in the fore- going work, especially pp. 50 — 52, 54, 55, 85 — 88. The merits and the sufferings of Christ having, in the scheme of thi> writer, no con- nection with the acceptance of man ; the notion of his divine nature, and oven that of his pre-existence, are discarded as wild chimeras. Jesus Christ he considers "as a man in all respects like to his brethren :" and he seems particularly anxious that the opi- nions of the Unitarian should not be con- founded with those of Socinus ; who, he says, whilst he properly maintains, ''that Jesus had no existence before his birth, yet admits the unscriptural and most incredible notion, that, since his resurrection, he has been ad- vanced to the government of the universe."10 The father of Socinianism had but half accom- plished the work of degrading the Son of God, whilst he allowed him a superiority over the human kind after death. Mr Belsham, with strict consistency, completes the system ; and boldly contends, that as he differed in no re- spect from man in his mode of coming into the world, so can he have no dominion or superiority over him in the world of spirits. That he "is indeed now alive, and employed in offices the most honourable and benevo- lent," he does not attempt to deny : but since " we are totally ignorant of the place where he resides, and of the occupations in which he is engaged," he maintains, that " there can be no proper foundation for religious addresses to him, nor of gratitude for favours now re- ceived, nor yet of confidence in his future interposition in our behalf."11 Thus, because wo are ignorant of the place and occupations of the Son of God, is all intercourse between man and his Redeemer at an end ! Thus says Mr Belsham. And so far is he from con- sidering our blessed Lord as an object of reli- gious address, that he can look upon him only as the "most excellent of human characters, the most eminent of all the prophets of God ;" whose "memory ho reveres," whose "doc- trine he embraces," in whose "promises he confides," and to whose " authority ho l.i.w s." li To v hat then does Christianity amount, on Mr Belsham 's plan 1 To nothing more than good habits ; and those habits, the result of man's own unaided and independent exer- tions, or rather the result of external influ- ences and irresistible impressions.11 Those usually received, and (as Mr Wilbcrforce pro- perly stylos them,) peculiar doctrines of Chris- tianity, which declare the corrupted state oj human nature, the atonement of the Savi< and the sanctifying influence of 'the Holy Spirit, our author rejects as utterly inconsistent with 10 I'. 74. " I'. 85. '- Pp. 84, 85. Pp. 170-175. APPENDIX.— UNITARIAN SCHEME, AS DESCRIBED BY MR. BELSIIAM. 221 truth and Scripture.14 The preponderance of virtue over vice in the world at large, and with a very few, if any, exceptions, in every individual in particular, he maintains to be indisputable." The practice of virtue, he pronounces to be the only ground of accep- tance with God, without any regard to faith in Christ, to his merits, or his sufferings, all which he proscribes as notions unscriptural and absurd :lli and as to the influence of the Holy Spirit being that which prompts to vir- tue, he tinds little difficulty in expunging this likewise from his creed, being fully satisfied, " that the Scriptures do not teach the exis- tence of any such person as the Holy Spirit, and that there is no ground for the expecta- tion of any supernatural operation on the mind." 17 The sole incitements to virtuous conduct, spring, according to Mr Belsham, from "the circumstances in which men are placed, and the impressions to which they are exposed :" — " moral and religious habits not being acquired in any different way from other habits of mind :" 18 — that is, according to his reasoning, all being equally the result of a necessary operation : the religious ten- dency, as well as its opposite, naturally arising out of a certain " state of the brain ;" 19 and " habits growing by the influence of particular impressions, with the same regularity and certainty with which the fruits of the earth are produced and matured by the genial in- fluence of the sun, and of the fructifying showers." *° Thus does the advocate of human merit vindicate the independency of human virtue. Let us stop for a moment to examine this more fully. " Virtue 21 is a system of habits, 14 P. 170. 15 Pp. 13, 14, 38, 39. 18 Pp. 104. 105, 172, 173. 17 P. 97.— See also pp. 70, 71, 70 — 79. 18 Pp. 134, 148, 173, 180. P. 171. Pp. 174, 175 — also p. 41. Mr Belsham in his Elements, where it is his intention to convey his ideas in the most scientific form, defines virtue to he, "the tendency of an action, affection, habit, or character, to the ultimate happiness of the agent." (P. 371.) It is at the same time to be noted, that of this tendency the true and pro- per judge is the agent himself. What then follows? Why, plainly this, as Dr Price has properly objected, that, agreeably to this definition, " any the most pernicious and horrible effects will become just and fit to be produced by any being, if but the minutest degree of clear advantage or pleasure may result to him from them." {Review qf Morals, p. 183.) Now how does Mr Cooper, who coincides in Mr Belsham's sentiments, reply to this? "Granted. But let God look to that. A future state of retribution has been ascertained fur the very purpose of obvia- ting this objection." Mr Belsham indeed admits, that " the expression is harsh, and hardly consistent with the reverence due to the Supreme Being ;" but contends " that the meaning is just, and the reply satisfactory." What ! a retribution here- after ! Wherefore a retribution ? Must a being, whose only business was to calculate the balance of advantage, suffer for a mistake in that calculation, when he made it with a view to that which alone he was bound to look to, his own advantage ? And this, too, when he could not by any possibility have made a different calculation. For, as Mr Belsham informs us, {Elements, p. 391,) "the only difference between the most vir- tuous and the most vicious person is, that the former was conducing to the greatest ultimate happi- ness:"91 "and men being the creatures of circumstances, the habits they form, whether good or bad, are the result of the impressions to which they are exposed;"-'3 or, as we have just seen, are the result of a necessary and mechanical operation, and arise out of causes independent of the agent, if such he can be called. Now, it seems natural to demand of this writer, in what respect his scheme differs from that part of the high doctrines of Calvin, which he most strongly reprobates? Does he not, equally with the reformer of Geneva, contend that man has nothing which he can call his own? Does he not, equally with him, reduce every action under the necessary and irresistible control of motives, in which the agent has no choice, and over which he can have no power ? And does he not, whilst he thus concurs with the follower of Calvin, differ from himself, by abolishing the very idea of merit, whilst he makes merit the foun- dation of his system ? Mr Belsham, indeed, exerts all his ingenu- ity, as Dr Priestley had done before,2* to escape from this resemblance to the Calvinist. The attempt, however, is vain. The Unitarian may fancy that he has provided a complete salvo for the difficulties of his system, and a clear distinction from that of the Calvinist, by substituting his notion of a purgatory for that of eternal punishment. But here the con- sequences with which he presses the Calvinist return upon himself. For, if it be inconsistent with " infinite justice and goodness to doom a being to eternal misery, for no other cause but that of not extricating himself out of the state in which his Creator placed him, with- out any power to act or will ;"25 I would ask, by what principles of reasoning it can be reconciled to the same infinite justice and goodness, to doom to temporary misery a being placed in circumstances precisely similar ; that is, determined to one certain mode of action, by an indissoluble chain of motives, and an irresistible necessity. If the idea of punish- ment for that which was the result of inevi- table necessity, be repugnant to the essential nature of justice, it must be equally so, wdie- ther that punishment be of long or of short duration. The quantity of the evil endured, if no evil tvhatever ought to be inflicted, can make no change in the nature of the case. The power that prolongs or heightens the punishment, where no punishment was de- served, may be more malignant, but cannot placed in circumstances, and exposed to impressions, which generated virtuous habits and affections, and the latter in circumstances by which vicious principles and dispositions were produced :" the one so circumstanced as that he must un- avoidably calculate right, and the other so circumstanced as that be must unavoidably calculate wrong. So much for the true distinction between virtue and vice. - P. 38 » P. 41. 24 Philosoph. Keccssity, sect. xiii. "' Revieto,\>. 58. L'^_ M A G E E ON Til E A TO N E M E N T. be more unjust. Thus, then, allowing to the Unitarian the full benefit of his purga- torial™ scheme, (for which, however, Scrip- ture supplies Dot the smallest foundation,) he is exposed, equally with the Calvinist, to the charge which he himself brings against the latter, of "impeaching the character of his .Maker, and traducing his works."-7 Thus much for the consequences of the two systems. Again, as to the principle of necessity, it is precisely the same whether the Unitarian endeavour to (liquify it by the title of philo- sophical ; or degrade it by that of predesti- nation. Or, it" Mr Belshamwill still pretend t<> differ from the follower of Calvin, whom he describes as, equally with himself, pro- nouncing man a necessary instrument, destitute of self-agency, it can only be in this; that whilst the latter makes man a necessary instru- ment in the hand of God, Mr Belsham's system admits the possibility of rescuing him from this slavish subjection to his .Maker, by placing him under the irresistible control of chance, or destiny, or some other equally con- ceivable power. For, to suppose all the actions of man to spring necessarily from motives, and these motives the unavoidable result of external impressions and local circumstances ; the divine Spirit giving no direction in the particular case, and the man having no power cither to regulate their operation, or to resist their impulse ; is to suppose all that the Stoic and the Atheist could desire. 20 The formal notion of a purgatory T find laid down by our author, in the philosophical treatise before alluded to, in which it is liis professed object to give to students accurate and fundamental notions on all the leading subjects of morality and religion. That the precision of li is ideas may not sutler in the rep irting, I shall state them in bis own words. " If there be a future life, the immediate condition of the great loa^ of mankind when they enter npon it must be a state of very considerable pain and suffering. For the great majo- rity of human characters are alloyed with one or more vicious habits and affections. These must be put under a process of cure, more or less severe in proportion to the malignity of the moral disease." — Element! of the Philosophy of the Muni. p. -|o_>. Our author also affirms that he has the testimony of Scripture for this doctrine. I apprehend it st be the Second I cabet r, Where others have pretended to rind it also. Or, perhaps, as he has not joined in turning the doctrine to so good I i wlii profrss to have found it there, his autho- rity has been of that classical nature which might better suit a philosopher. •' Ergo exercentur pecnis, vetcrunif|ue malorum Suppllcla expendunt : alt e panduntur inanes Suspense ad ventoa ; aliis sub gurgite vasto Infectum eluitur scelus, aut exuritur Igni. Quisqui suos pattmur Manes." JEn, Lib. vi. " !''>r this are vai lout | enances enjoined ; And some arc hutlg to bleach upon the wind ; S ime plunged In waters, others plunged In Ores, 'I ill ail the dregs are drained, and all the rust expires. All have their Manes, and those Manes bear." Drvden. Pagans, Jews, Mahometans, and Papists, have heretofore held these notions: to these we must now add the Philosophical Unitarian. • *? BevUw, p. 37. Such is the exalted merit of man, fashioned by the deistical jargon of that which equally disgraces Christianity and philosophy, by assuming their names. Such are the lights afforded us by the rational Christian: who mends Calvinism by purgatory; secures to man a property in his actions, by rendering him the unresisting slave of motives ; and maintains the interests of religion, by subjec- ting human conduct solely to the mechanical operations of secondary causes. It is indeed extremely difficult to make out Mr Belsham's system. But it is one of the advantages of inconsistency, that the state- ment of the absurdities in one part of an argument is liable to be discredited by con- tradictory positions in another. Thus, whilst Mr Belsham repeatedly affirms that man is not to look to the influence and sustaining aid of the divine Spirit, but solely to his own exertions, or, as he most singularly explains these exertions, to circumstances and impres- sions which work upon his mind by a mechanical and necessary operation ; he pro- fesses, in other places, not altogether to banish the notion of the divine agency. " We are," he says, " thankfully to ascribe all our im- provements, our hopes, and our consolations, to God." " Mr Belsham has here struck a little out of the path to direct Atheism, in which he seemed before rapidly advancing : and this saving clause was indispensable to a writer who professes a belief in the existence of a God. But when we come to inquire on what ground our gratitude is due to a Being who has not contributed, by any beneficial influence, to the improvement of our virtue, we find our independence of a divine grace still carefully secured, inasmuch as the sole foundation 01 our thankfulness to the Supreme Being is, that "to his appointment, and con- tinued agency, all causes owe their efficacy." w It is, then, "for the original constitution and general arrangement of the works of nature alone, that we are to be grateful : and not for any special operation of a divine influence in any individual case. May we not, there- fore, fairly apply to our philosopher, what Cicero pronounced of the refiners of ancient times, " verbis roliquisse Deos, re sustulisse ?" But, that we may the more perfectly under- stand our author's meaning, he supplies us with a specimen of the mode in which a judi- cious instructor should endeavour to reclaim a vicious person, desirous of reformation. Having first carefully guarded him against all unscriptural doctrines, such as original sin, atonement, merits of Christ, and the like ; having warned him, not to expect any super- natural impressions upon his mind, nor to imagine that moral and religious habits are to be acquired in a way different from any other; w I'. 175. Pp. 17:.. 11:11. APPENDIX.— UNITARIAN SCHEME, AS DESCRIBED BY MR. BELSHAM. 223 having pointed his attention, particularly, to those parts of Scripture which direct liiin to do justice, to love mercy, &c. ; having urged him to fix in his mind just and honourable sentiments of God, as the greatest, wisest, and best of beings; 30 he proceeds, more circum- stantially, to the case of the offender ; and beginning, in due form, with a definition of virtue, " as a course of conduct leading to the greatest ultimate happiness," and of vice, as " that which leads to misery ;" he next lays before the sinner, (or, in the milder vocabu- lary of Mr Belsham, the " person oppressed by the tyranny of evil habits,"31) the exact state of his case. " You are deficient in vir- tuous habits, you wish to form them ; you have contracted vicious affections, you wish 3~' to exterminate them. Yrou know the circum- stances in which your vicious habits were originally contracted, and by which they have been confirmed. Avoid33 these circumstances, and give the mind a contrary bias. You know what impressions will produce justice, benevo- lence, &c. Expose your mind repeatedly and 30 P. 174. 31 p. 172. 32 N. B.— It is above all things necessary for the reformation of this person " oppressed by the tyranny of evil habits," (so alarming and fanatical a phrase as that of sinner I must not use,) that he feel no remorse, be the vicious acts that he has committed ever so enormous. For Mr Belsham informs us, in his Elements, (pp. 307 — 406,) that " the doctrine of philosophi- cal necessity supersedes remorse." And, indeed, it is happy that it does so ; because, whilst, on the one hand, he pronounces remorse not to be essential to repentance ; he proves, on the other, that it is a thing in itself highly pernicious ; inas- much as it is " founded upon the belief, that in the same pre- vious circumstances, it was possible to have acted otherwise." A perfect freedom from uneasiness of mind after the murder of a parent, or the seduction of the innocent ; an undisturbed composure, flowing from the conviction, that under all the cir- cumstances it was impossible to have acted otherwise, must surely contribute much to accelerate the repentance of the offender, and to complete his reformation ! 33 This is a whimsical sort of address from a writer who, upon his principle of necessity, maintains the impossibility of avoid- ing, upon the recurrence of similar circumstances, any act which has once been performed. For if this be, as he contends it is, (Elements, &c. p. 107,) a sufficient reason for asserting, that the person who has once yielded to any temptation, must, under the like circumstances, yield to it again, and that, consequently, the only chance for his escape is to be found in flight ; it must likewise be a sufficient reason for concluding, that he who has not at one time been able to fly from the circumstances which brought the temptation, will not bo able to fly from them at another ; the circumstances, at the time of the intended flight, being the same as before : and thus the impossibility recurs ad in- finitum. Our writer had condemned Mr Godwin, (Elements, &c. p. 405,) for the indiscreet avowal of the consequences of this system ; namely, that necessary agents are incapable of moral discipline. But has not Mr Belsham himself as completely dis- closed the secret by his reasoning'/ For, if a necessary agent can never acquire an increase of strength to resist the tempta- tions of vice, where is the improvement in moral discipline ? This Parthian moralist, who is to be for ever unequal to the rctiia. Cc-unr,, and can hope to conquer only by flying, will Bnd that he will not have much to boast of in the way of conquest, if his steed is to be as much fettered in the flight as he is himself manacled in the conflict. Alas ! that Mr Belsham will not per- mit his penitent to call to his aid that auxiliary, and that armour, which would enable him to " quench all the fiery darts of the wicked !" perseveringly to the influence of these impres- sions, and the affections themselves will gra- dually rise, and insensibly improve, &c. All that is required is judgment, resolution, time, and perseverance ! " M Really, Mr Belsham must excuse me, if I take the liberty of saying, that I know nothing in the English language to equal this, except the Energies of Miss Bridgetina Botherim.35 It is not my intention to introduce ludicrous ideas upon such a sub- ject ; but the resemblance is too striking and apposite to be overlooked. So far as Mr Bclsham's language is intelli- gible, his process of conversion amounts to this : — He tells the vicious person that he has contracted bad habits ; and he desires him by all means to get rid of them. How far this salutary advice and direction would operate to the reformation of the sinner, they, who may have been reclaimed from vicious courses by such means, can best say. But one thing deserves particularly to be remarked, that, whilst the mind of the sinner is directed to contemplate the excellence of virtue, to excite its own energies, to expose itself to impres- sions, and the like, not one word escapes of the propriety of prayer ; on the contrary, all supplication for divine assistance seems to be expressly excluded, and, indeed, evidently must be so, on Mr Belsham's principles. For, if goodness be the necessary result of impres- sions and circumstances, the mechanical effect of particular traces on the brain, derived from the general operation of established and unal- terable laws of our constitution, there is no 34 Pp. 174, 175. 35 Modem Philosophers : — a work which, if perused with feelings favourable to religion and order, must be allowed to furnish a decisive proof that Mrs Hannah More is not the only female of the present day, by whom zeal and talents have been eminently displayed, in defence of all that can be deemed valu- able in this life, and in that which is to come. "Were we, in truth, to search out among the authors of later times, for those who have most successfully promoted the cause of virtue and religion, by the combination of what is most inte- resting with what is most edifying in their writings, we should find them to have been principally of the other sex. With the name of Mrs Hannah More, who ranks eminent in that class, — and whose numerous and diversified publications, scattering their benefits through every gradation of society, from the prince down to the peasant, have come home to the breasts of all, with that irresistible force which springs from the united powers of piety and genius, — we have to connect, in grateful remem- brance, the names of Hamilton, of Bowdler, of West, of Cha- pone, and (notwithstanding something that one could wish to be otherwise) of Barbauld. To " the venerable Elizabeth Carter, and the blooming Elizabeth Smith," we have also to cast our eyes; if, in Mrs More's words, we would "contem- plate profound and various learning, chastised by true Christian humility ;" and if we would wish to dwell on the recollection of " acquirements which would havo been distinguished in a uni- versity, meekly softened, and beautifully shaded by the gentle exertion of every domestic virtue, the unaffected exercise of every feminine employment," (Calebs, pp. 250, 251.) Bid my present subject lead me merely to advert to the distinction which superior talents, exquisite taste, and the charms of fine com- position, confer upon the female writers of the present day, it would be impossible to overlook the commanding claims of Miss Edgeworth. - M A ( . I : ! . ON Til K A T ( ) N K M E X T. room, in the particular case, for divine inter- ference. We may, according to Mr Bel-ham's principles, i 1 1 < I > 1 1 ur • ■ in sentiments of compla- cency to that 6rs1 cause, the beneficial effects of whose original arrangement we feel in the individual instance; but prayer addressed to the Divine Being can have no rational object. Prayer, accordingly, forms no part of this writer's system. In no one line of his work does he recognize it as a Christian duty; in- deed, the mention of it has not once escaped him. It is not, then, surprising, that we should find Mr Belsham endeavouring to diminish the opportunities and inducements to prayer by contending, that the Christian religion has not prescribed the appointment of a day for the purposes of divine worship. But he goes farther. He affirms, that " Christianity ex- pressly abolishes every such distinction of days;":5(i that, "under the Christian dispen- sation, every day is alike ; no one more holy than another : that whatever employment or amusement is lawful or expedient upon any one day of the week, is equally lawful and expedient on any other day :" 3' that, conse- quently, " a virtuous man is performing his duty to the Supreme Being as really, and as acceptably, when he is pursuing the proper business of life, or even when enjoying its innocent and decent amusements, as when he is offering direct addresses to him in the closet or in the temple." ■* From these premises he peremptorily concludes, that all distinctions of days should be exploded : that our business, and our amusements, should be pursued on every day alike : and that the laws which enjoin the observance of the Sabbath are " un- reasonable and unjust."89 He likewise main- tains that the Sabbatical spirit naturally leads to uncharitable and censorious feelings ;w that "persons who are so very religious on a Sunday," (as to make regular attendance on the services of the church a matter of con- science,) "are too apt to lay aside religion for the rest of the week ;"41 and that, upon the whole, the Sabbatical observance is highly injurious to the cause of virtue. To this per- nicious institution our author does not scruple to attribute the decrease of national morality : a!;. I lie rejoices with a Christian joy, that the late "ill advised" proposition, "for enforc- ing a stricter observation of the Lord's day," was wisebj rejected by the legislature.4-' Now, it. may perhaps occur to a plain, un- philosophical reader to inquire, what sort of a teacher of Christianity is this, who thus levels Christ, through the whole of his existence, to the rank of human nature; leaves man, for acceptance, to his own merit ; and that merit the pure result of external impressions, and 36 Review, p. BO. 37 Pp. 20, 139. 38 P. 138. ■ Pp. 140, 141. *° P. 141. 41 P. 142. M P. S03. mechanical operation ; rejects the notion of prayer,43 making man as it were independent 43 How different are the reflections of true philosophy, guided by a pious reverence for the superior lights of Revelation ! The words of a distinguished and attractive writer, whose publica- tions have always tended to promote what his life has uniformly exemplified, the love and practice of virtue, are too interesting and important to be omitted on this subject. " If we admit the truth of Revelation, the evidence which it delivers of the special interposition of God, in the physical and moral government of the world, must be deemed decisive. Instead, therefore, of involving ourselves in the mazes of metaphysical subtlety, let us direct our attention to the foundation of that intercourse with the Deity, which is at once the most interesting duty, and the noblest privilege of our nature. We are taught, that ' he who cometh to God, must believe that he is, and that ho is a re- warder of them who diligently seek him :' that ' in him we live, and move, and have our being :' that ' as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him :' that ' if we, being evil, know how to give good gifts to our children, how much more shall our Father, which is in heaven, give good things to them that ask him.' ' For this thing,' saysSt Paul, ' I besought the Lord thrice, that it might depart from me.' And our Saviour is recorded to have prayed the ' third time, saying the same words, O .' my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me : Nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt.' Indeed, the form of devotion which Christ recommended to his disciples, affords the clearest proof that he regarded prayer as an acceptable and efficacious act. Nor is this supposition incon- sistent with that immutability of the divine attributes, which is essential to their nature and perfection. The wisdom, bene- volence, and justness of the Deity, are ' the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever.' But this uncbangeableness implies, that in their exercise they arc always accommodated to the purest rectitude, and to the greatest sum of felicity. And thus a pro- vidence is established, which discriminates between the virtuous and the vicious ; which adapts the properest mear.s to the ac- complishment of the best ends ; and regulates all things so as to work together for the highest good. To this superintending direction, a pious Christian will look up with humble confidence, ' for ease under suffering, for protection in danger, and conso- lation in sorrow.' If prayer were not enjoined as a duty, he would instinctively perform it as a refuge for human infirmity. And he may reasonably presume, that such filial dependence will be Indulgently accepted by his heavenly Father, who, in his divine administration, is characterized as being ever ready ' to bind up the broken in heart ; to heal the wounded in spirit ; and to give good gifts to them that worthily ask him.' " — Father's Instructions, part the third, by Thomas Percival, M.I), pp. 118 — 120. I the more willingly refer to this excellent perform- ance, because, independent of the value of the passage here extracted, and the vein of fervent piety which pervades the entire volume, the observations which it contains on the subject of the Divine permission of evil, the topics it suggests for the farther confirmati n of the evidences of Christianity, and the directions it conveys for the due regulation of the clerical con- duct and character, entitle it to the most serious perusal from every friend to religion and virtue. Since the date of the first edition of this work, the revered person spoken of in the above note, has paid the last debt of nature : and lias gone to receive, in another state, the reward of the piety and virtues which distinguished him in this. To offer any general remarks here upon the life and character of a man so estimable and so esteemed, would be little worthy of a subject whose magnitude and interest entitle it to the most ample consideration. To the memory of this venerated friend, I have already elsewhere offered an humble tribute. And, happily, as preserving to society a valuable light, a complete memoir of his life and writings has been given to the public by his son, Dr Edward Percival, now of Dublin. This memoir, prefixed to the entire collection of Dr Percival's works, must be too well known, and too justly appreciated, to render it neces- sary for me to enlarge upon the fidelity and ability with which it has been executed. The spirit which it breathes, and the talent which it exhibits, conspire to afford the happiest presage. APPENDIX.-UNITARIAN SCHEME, AS DESCRIBED BY MH. BELSHAM. 225 of his Maker ; and, finally, proscribes the Sab- hath, as destructive of Religion and Morality? Mr Belsham, being aware that such a question would naturally suggest itself, has been care- ful to supply the answer, lie tells us, that he desires to be considered, as a " Moral teacher of Christianity."" And, lest we might not perfectly understand the nature of this Moral or Unitarian Christianity which he teaches, he informs us, that it is substantially the same with the system of Lepaux, and the Theophi- lanthropes of France. This is a fair and can- did account of the matter. The same title, which they can produce to the denomination of Christians, Mr Belsham can undoubtedly advance. Indeed, his must be allowed to be yet stronger : for, though, as he observes, their " common principle is a belief in the existence, perfection, and providence of God, and in the doctrine of a future life ; and their rules of morals, love to God, and good will to men ;" and thus, as he remarks, their " pro- fessed principles comprehend the essence of the Christian religion ; yet, in not admitting the resurrection of Christ, the Theophilanthro- pists deprive themselves of the only solid ground on which to build the hope of a" future existence." ls Thus, we see, in one short view, the nature of Mr Belsham's Unitarian scheme, and its advantage over that of the French Theophilanthropes. He not only holds, in common with them, the above mentioned essential principles of Christianity ; but he also maintains, in addition, that a man has actually risen from the dead : the admission of which fact into the creed of the Theophilanthropes, he candidly confesses, would have left his scheme no superiority over theirs ; inasmuch as, by laying a solid ground for their doctrine of a future life, it would have rendered their system perfectly complete. But, seriously, are these the doctrines of that sect, who call themselves Unitarians, in the sister country ? or are they erroneously ascribed to them by Mr Belsham ? Indeed, if we are to judge from the applause bestowed on Mr Belsham's performance by writers of that denomination in England, we have reason to think that he has given a fair repre- sentation. Now, if he has, it surely seems unworthy of men, who exult in the open and fearless avowal of their opinions, to trifle with the name of Christian; and if he has not, it is full time, that they should throw- back Mr Belsham's doctrines on himself, and his Theophilanthrope associates. I am most willing to admit, that no person has a right to deny to Mr Belsham the appellation of a " Moral teacher." To this he is fully entitled, as having a firm belief in the existence and that the son will prove himself, through life, not unworthy of the father, whose endowments, whose attainments, and whose excellencies, he has recorded. 44 P. 227. « P. 217. general providence of God ; and as inculcat- ing principles, thai tend to beget love and gratitude to that Being, and to produce a corresponding benignity of affection to our fellow-creatures, impressing the duties of benevolence and social kindness to man, as, I make not the smallest question, he truly feels them. But, whilst thus much is freely admitted, surely Mr Belsham cannot reason- ably be offended if he should be denied the appellation of a " teacher of Christianity?" For what is Christianity ? Is it any thing differing from the natural religion of the Deist ? And if differing ; is it in doctrines, or in precepts ? Not in doctrines, according to Mr Belsham ; for he asserts, again and again, that it has none peculiar. Is it in pre- cepts ? No, says Mr Belsham ; for the pure and simple scheme of the Theophilanthrope, who rejects revelation, " comprehends the essence of Christianity." And has, then, Jesus Christ passed as a mute across the great stage of human affairs ? And shall we denominate ourselves from Him who has taught us no- thing different from what we knew before? No, says Mr Belsham, this is not so : by his rising from the dead, he has proved to us the certainty of a future life. Is this then Chris- tianity? Of this, Mr Belsham may be an excellent teacher : but in such Christianity, his instructions will, I trust, ever be confined to a very small number indeed. And is Mr Belsham displeased with Mr Wilberforce, for calling this " a sort of half- way-house between orthodoxy and infide- lity?" I cannot but think, that most people of plain sense and candid minds, wdio have not been visited by any rays of modern illu- mination, will rather be of opinion, that Mr Wilberforce, has erred, in not advancing this mansion a little beyond the middle point. Nor is this without countenance from Mr Belsham himself, since he confesses, that " of the two he would rather approach the confines of cold and cheerless scepticism, than the burning zone of merciless orthodoxy ;" u by which last, it must be observed, he understands the principles of Christianity, as held by the Established Church ; merciless being merely the ordinary adjunct to the character of every established priesthood. On this subject, Mr Belsham exhibits rather an unfortunate specimen of that calm and softened charity, which distinguishes and adorns the temperate region, where he rejoices to find himself placed, in a happy medium between the two above mentioned " ineli- gible extremes." A want of integrity, a dis- regard of truth, " indolence, pride, and bitter zeal against all who oppose the doctrines of the public creed," he represents as the never failing consequences of an established religion, 46 P. 263. 226 MAGEE ON THE ATONEMEN T. " whether true or false ;" the unvarying cha- racteristics of "an established priesthood." Such a body, he contends, u is, in its very nature, a persecuting order." "All hreathe the same fiery and intemperate spirit. Truth and honest inquiry they are paid to discoun- tenance and repress."*' "Interested priests anil crafty statesmen will continue to support a religious establishment, which answers their private and political purposes, at the same time that they hold its doctrines in con- tempt."1" The object, to which these obser- vations are intended more immediately to apply, Mr Belsham does not leave his reader at a loss to discover, when he plainly affirms, that the heads of our Establishment look to means very different from that of "a sincere faith in" their own "creeds and homilies, for the prosperity of the National Church :" 49 and with the same liberal reference it is, that he reminds us of the saying of Cicero, "that lie wondered how augur could meet augur without laughing :" and again of that memo- rable exclamation of Leo, in the days of papal Rome, " How lucrative is this fable of Jesus Christ !" M thus clearly intimating, what a warm supporter of his doctrines and his per- formance has since announced in terms a little more direct, " It is well known, that many of our public teachers laugh in their sleeves, and some of these sleeves, they say, are of lawn, at those doctrines, which they inculcate from the pulpit, with a pretended earnestness." 51 Nor does Mr Belsham confine his charges to those who are the immediate superinten- dents of the national religion. Though parti- cularly favoured with Mr Belsham's notice, they do not entirely engross it. By his obser- vations on the institution of a national fast,0 he takes care to hold up the civil, no less than the ecclesiastical heads of the state, as objects of public contempt and execration, for their gross insincerity, and unprincipled imposi- tion on the people. Now, if all this be of the nature of that charity, which belongs to the middle region, under whose temperate influence Mr Belsham professes to enjoy phi- losophic repose, I rather apprehend that the inhabitant of this " pleasant and commodious dwelling" is a- far removed from the charity, as he boasts to be from the peculiar doctrines, of Christianity. It must, indeed, be confessed, that great allowance is to be made for those \\ I h > have been, as it wire, rocked in the very cradle of discontenl ; and who have been used, from infancy, to view every act of the government, and every ordinance of the church, with the bitterness of a discomfited and vindictive enemy. But it is strange, that whilst lan- *" P. 19ft 48 Pp. 230. 233. *• P. 220. M P. 230. 61 Layman'* Letters to Mr Wtibetforce on the Doctrine of Hereditary Depravity, /*• 17-. M Review, pp. 204, 205. guage of the nature here cited every where deforms Mr Belsham's pages, and those of his Unitarian associates, they should make the icant of charity the principal charge against all who hold Christianity in any other than the vague and fleeting form in which they profess to embrace it. In the management of a controversy, it may not indeed be had policy to charge the adversary with whatever unfair arts you mean to resort to yourself. Thus, whilst the opposite party bears all the odium, you possess yourself of the profit. So, at least, it seems to be with the writers of Mr Bel- sham's way of thinking. A total want of can- dour and charity is perpetually objected to all who defend the rectitude of the national reli- gion ; whilst every principle of both is grossly violated by thoso who oppose it : and at the same time that the charge of self-interest is freely bestowed upon such as support the Establishment, it is hoped that it will not be remembered that interest is as much con- cerned to acquire, as to retain ; it is modestly expected that no mention will be made of the pride and fervour of party ; and that no note will be taken of the resentful jealousy of those temporal advantages, which, as they form the leading theme of animadversion, may not un- reasonably be presumed to be the principal ground of hostility. In a spirit congenial to these feelings, Mr Belsham seems not a little to have partici- pated, when he thus openly states, as in ano- ther place48 he indirectly insinuates, under the thin covering of the terms Paganism and Popery, that the religion of the Church of England is a mere engine of state ; and, as such, "cried up by interested statesmen and their hireling priests ;" who, he says again, naturally "support that religion which sup- ports them:"64 and that, at this moment, "pure Christianity" (by winch he describes the system taught by himself and Dr Priestley) " is so far from meeting with public encouragi ment in England, that it is in a state border- ing upon persecution."68 This last remark, indeed, seem-, according to Mr Belsham's view of things, to have been altogether un- necessary. 'I'he assertion, that " an esta- blished priesthood is in its very nature a persecuting order," renders this a tautologous position. But, in what way do these pro- fessors of pure Christianity appear to be "in a state bordering upon persecution?" Simply, because they are not permitted to rail against established authority with impunity; to preach up doctrines in politics, subversive ol subordination ; to bring the government, both in Church and State, into disrepute and con- tempt amongst the people, by every species of calumny; to establish the enlightened system of France, the Theophilanthropism of 88 P. 19fi. 54 P. 233. M P. 197- APPENDIX.— UNITARIAN SCHEME, AS DESCRIBED BY MR. BELSIIA.M. 227 Lepaux, and the miso-monarchism of Paine. The government, the clergy, and the people of England, are surely much t<> blame for throwing any obstacles in the way of such great reforms ! And what is the grand proof adduced by Mr Belsham, of the persecution carried on against pure Christianity in England at the present day? Plainly this, that the great champion of Unitarian'isni has been driven from his native country, and " compelled to seek for refuge," from "the rage of persecuting bigotry, "in the transatlantic wilderness ;" in which, however, it appears that he is subject to no deprivations ; since we are informed in the very next line, that, in this loilderness, he has the" good fortune to be surrounded by " en- lightened sages." m But, ludicrous as is this picture of the wilderness of sages, here pre- sented by our author, it were unfeeling, and unpardonable, to trifle on such a subject. What Dr Priestley's reasons may have been for exchanging England for America, I shall not presume to pronounce. That they are not to be resolved " sole!/' into his religious opinions, as Mr Belsham seems desirous to convey, is, I believe, pretty generally under- stood." That the purity of Dr Priestley's pri- vate character, the amiable simplicity of his manners, the variety and strength of his talents, the persevering industry with which he pursued what he deemed useful truth, and the independent spirit with which (had it not been frenzied by the intemperance of party) he might have so profitably maintained it, — are circumstances which must make every good man regret that misapplication of his powers, which rendered it necessary for him to abandon his native country in the decline of life, I will most readily admit ; and I freely subscribe to the strongest testimony which "his wannest admirers can bear to the many and great virtues57 which adorn his 68 Pp. 197, 198. 57 From a friend, of tlio highest literary distinction and moral worth, who was connected by habits of early and continued inti- macy with Dr Priestlev, I received, on the first publication of these remarks on that author's character, a letter containing the following observations. " The character you give of Dr Priestley has reminded me of that drawn by Dr Samuel Parr, in his letter from Irenopolis to the inhabitants of Eleutheropolis. As this pamphlet was a temporary publication during the riots of Birmingham, and you have probably never seen it, 1 will transcribe the passage to which 1 refer ' I confess, with sorrow, that, in too many in- stances, such modes of defence have been used against this for- midable Ileresiarch, as would hardly be justifiable in the support of revelation itself, against the arrogance of a Bolingbroke, the buffoonery of a Mandeville, and the levity of a Voltaire. But the cause of orthodoxy requires not such aids. The Church of England approves them not. The spirit of Christianity warrants them not. Let Dr Priestley be confuted where he is mistaken. Let him be exposed where he is superficial. Let him be rebuked where he is censorious. Let him be repressed where he is dogmatical. But let not his attainments be depre- ciated, because they are numerous almost without a parallel. Let not his talents be ridiculed, because they are superlatively private life. But, whilst I most cheerfully make these concessions to the talents and the virtues of Dr Priestley, and whilst I join in the most decided reprobation of those savage acts of violence, which, in his instance, have disgraced the annals of English polity, yet I cannot hesitate to believe, that if in any country in which the direction of affairs was In Id by those enlightened politicians, and professors of pure Christianity, who form the associates of Dr Priestley and Mr Belsham, any man had employed himself, for a series of years, in labouring to overturn the esta- blished order of things, and had even advanced so far as, in the intoxication of his fancied success, openly to boast that he had prepared a train whereby the whole must inevitably be destroyed,58 a very different lot from "that great. Let not his morals be vilified, because they are correct without austerity, and exemplary without ostentation ; because they present even to common observers the innocence of a her- mit and the simplicity of a patriarch ; and because a philoso- phic eye will at once discover in them, the deep-fixed root of virtuous principle, and the solid trunk of virtuous habit.' This beautiful portrait is, I think, accurate in its lineaments. But there are two features in the character of Dr Priestley, which it does not exhibit, and which to you I will not scruple to commu- nicate. He has a sort of moral apathy, which makes him abso- lutely insensible of the severity of the wounds he inflicts in his polemic discussions. Feeling no enmities in his constitution, he makes no discrimination between friends and foes. And having adopted the language and dipped his pen in the gall of contro- versy, he suspects not that he excites bitterness of heart, because he is unconscious of it in himself. I could exemplify this obser- vation, by his treatment of Dr Enfield, Dr Brocklesby, Judge Blackstone, and several others whom he really loved or respected. Another striking trait in his character, is an almost total defi- ciency in discretion, that intellectual faculty, which is, as Pope well expresses it, ' although no science, fairly worth the seven.' A report has prevailed here, that Dr Priestley proposes to re- turn to England. But I find that his latest letters signify his intention of passing the remainder of his life in America, where he is happy in every respect, except the enjoyment of literary society, and possesses a library and philosophical apparatus far superior to those which he had at Birmingham." This fragment, containing so much that is interesting concern- ing Dr Priestley, will, I conceive, not be unacceptable to the reader ; and although I consider the bright parts of the charac- ter to have been too highly emblazoned by Dr Parr, the darker spots to have been too sparingly touched by my much valued cor- respondent, and some important points to have been entirely overlooked by both, yet I cannot withhold from the memory of a man certainly possessed of many amiable qualities, and some extraordinary endowments, a tribute, to which two persons, eminent for their worth and their attainments, have conceived him to be justly entitled. 58 n We are, as it were, laying gunpowder, grain by grain, under the old building of error and superstition, which a single spark may hereafter inflame, so as to produce an instantaneous explosion."— Importance of Free Enquiry, p. 40. What Dr Priestley means by the old building of error and superstition, the context sufficiently explains. On the impossibility of sup- porting the ecclesiastical constitution, if once a great majority of the people can be made hostile to it ; and on " the power of small changes in the political state of things, to overturn the best-compacted establishments," he likewise enlarges with much earnestness and force : ibid, pp. 39, 41, 44. The fittest seasons, and best opportunities, for silently working out the great effects, which he here professes to hold in view, this writer had before communicated to his fellow-labourer, Mr Lindsey, in the dedi- cation of his History of Corruptions, pp. 6, 7- " While the attention of men in power is engrossed by the difficulties that 22S M A G E E ON T II E A T O N EMEN T, which lias fallen to Dr Priestley, would await him. The privilege of transferring his resi- dence to another land, unless, indeed, it were to that land from which no traveller returns, would hardly be conceded. Cur enlightened philosophers of the present day, adopt, on these occasions, much simpler modes of pro- ceeding; and a peep aero-- the liritish Chan- nel may readily satisfy as as to the nature of the process, where there is no " lucrative fable of Jesus Christ" to be maintained ; no "esta- blished 5y clergy to breathe the fiery spirit of persecution ;" and where the rights of civil and religious man are explained and exercised upon the broadest principles of a philosophy, untrammelled, even to Mr Belsham's most sanguine wishes. One distinction between the two cases, may, indeed, possibly exist. The professors of an all-perfect philosophy and a, rational Christianity, knowing theirs to be the cause of virtue, and acting only from a love of truth, are meritorious in removing, by whatever means, all impediments to the accomplish- ment of ends so glorious as those they hold in view : whereas, the advocates of received doctrines, and of existing establishments, not even believing what they profess, and being only concerned to defend a lucrative falsehood, are, by the original sin of their cause, crimi- nal in the performance of every act, however natural and necessary, which has a tendency to maintain it. This distinction may, pos- sibly, supply a satisfactory explanation : — but to proceed. As I cannot entirely agree with Mr Bel- sham respecting the persecution carried on by the established clergy, against those who, under the title of Unitarians, are, as Mr Bel- sham affirms, the only professors of a pure Christianity ; so neither do I agree with him respecting that which he deems a natural con- sequence of this persecution, — the great in- crease of this body in numbers and conse- quence. Possibly, indeed, without making any very valuable concession to Mr Belsham, it mi > >*,, mlii and ignorance, he afterwards, in the con- clusion of the same work, (vol. ii. p. 471,) narrows his attention to the elerieal part of that body, pronouncing their arguments, in defence of the system they support, to be " so palpably weak, that it i^ imri-lij ys.ulih- they should be in earnest :" by which it is not difficult to discover, to which of the two classes beforo named the established clergy were, in his opinion, to be con- signed.— That Dr Priestley should, Indeed, have imagined that many who rejected the doctrines of the Established Church, might yet be found among the ranks of its professed teachers, may well he supposed, when we rind that he deliberately advised .Mr Lindsey to retain his preferments in the Church, at the same time that he laboured to undermine its creed: an advice, however, which the rector of Catteriek was too honest to 'limply with, although it might not be unpalatable to ci ' mi clergymen of the present day ; Rich asMrFcllowesandMrstonc. faith, it is not surprising that this should appear, to minds so prepared, with all the circumstances of probability. And, certainly, no argument can be more convenient: from no combination of events can its force suffer any diminution, and from no ingenuity of reply can it ever meet refutation. Though the entire host of those professing the pure Christianity of the Unitarian were ostensibly reduced to Dr Priestley and himself, yet, by the application of this argument, aided by a portion of thai faith, which, not having been largely expended on other subjects, Mr Bel- sham might have to bestow in abundance on this and similar occasions, I should not be surprised to find him solacing himself, even then, with the satisfactory persuasion, that the "glorious period" was fast approaching, in which "the Unitarian church" was about to "comprehend, in its ample enclosure, the whole Christianized world :"w the prejudices and interests of mankind causing but a tem- porary and artificial suppression of those sen- timents which must necessarilyand universally prevail. This argument, then, I must admit to be wholly unanswerable. Dr Priestley has indeed advanced, that he " never knew a single instance of any person, who was once well grounded in Unitarian principles, becoming an unbeliever." w If the becoming an unbeliever be admitted as the proper proof of an antecedent deficiency of confirmation in Unitarian principles, the posi- tion is a safe one ; but if Dr Priestley means to say that the influence of Unitarian prin- ciples is unfavourable to infidelity, it need only be replied, that the fact speaks a language directly the reverse. For it is notorious, and it will require no small degree of hardihood to deny it, that from those who have professed Unitarianism in England the largest stock of unbelievers has arisen : nay, more, that their principal academy, the place in which Uni- tarian principles were inculcated in their greatest purity, and with every advantage of zealous ability in the teacher, and of unbiassed docility iti the learner, has borne witness to the efficacy of those principles, by its dissolu- tion, imperiously demanded by the prevalence of infidel opinions. Now, in what way shall we account for this event ? Was Unitarianism not properly taught at Hackney? Or, with all its vaunted simplicity, is it a scheme so difficult to conceive, that the learners, not being able to comprehend it rightly,7" became unbelievers from not having been Jirmli/ tw Review, p. 266. m Tficol. Repos. vol. iv. p. 24. 70 Indeed, Mr Helsham seems to represent Unitarianism as a matter complicated, and difficult to be understood. For the total rejection of Christianity by some of his Unitarian brethren he assigns the following reasons: — "They cither did not understand their principles ; or they were perplexed with diffi- culties, which, perhaps, patience and attention might ha\e solved ; or," &c.— Revicte, p. 265. APPENDIX— UNITARIAN SCHEME, AS DESCRIBED BY Mil. BELSHAM. 231 grounded? Howsoever it be explained, the fact is incontrovertible, and seems not a little to countenance the idea, that the road to Unitarian ism differs from that which leads to infidelity by so slight a distinction, that the traveller not unfrequently mistakes his way. And surely, if, with Mr wilberforce, we sup- pose the station of the former to be placed at no great distance from the confines of the latter, it is not surprising that they, who in the morning of life begin their journey from this advanced stage, should be able to finish the entire course with ease ; whilst those, who do not reach it till the evening of their days, may have some indisposition to proceed, espe- cially if, from early habits, they had been taught to feel a salutary horror of those regions that lie beyond. One difficulty, amounting to paradox, which attaches to this entire system, yet remains to be noticed. It might appear, to such as have been used to consider Christianity as some- thing more than natural religion, with a super- added proof of a future state of retribution, that they who hold this to be the sum of the Christian scheme must, at the same time, reject the writings of the New Testament, or at least all those parts that go beyond the mere facts of the life and resurrection of Christ. Mr Belsham, however, informs us in what manner the Unitarians, whilst they retain the title of Christians, by acknowledg- ing the authority of the New Testament, yet contrive to preserve their " simple creed," unaffected by those important truths which it contains. There are two ways in which the word of Revelation and a system of reli- gious belief may be made to square. One is, by conforming our belief to Revelation : the other, by adjusting Revelation to our belief. The latter is that chosen by Mr Belsham and his Unitarian associates ; and, accordingly, the New Testament, and the creed of the Unita- rian, are, at the same time, without difficulty retained. Of the mode of adjustment Mr Belsham exhibits a perfect specimen. "Christ," he says, " being described in the New Testament as a man, having appeared as a man, having called himself a man, having had all the accidents of a man ; having been born, having lived, eaten, drunk, slept, conversed, rejoiced, wept, suffered, and died, as other men," there is sufficient reason to pronounce him really such ; no farther proof can be required : and the onus proband! , he contends, lies with them, who " maintain that he was something more than man :" and whatever texts of Scripture can be adduced in support of that opinion, he adds, " the Unitarians pledge themselves to shew, that they are all either interpolated, corrupted, or misunderstood :"71 in short, they engage to get clearly rid of them in some 71 Review, pp. 270 — 272. way or other. Either the passage should have no place in Scripture; or, if it must be admitted, it should appear under some diffe- rent modification ; or, if the present reading must be allowed, it is wrongly interpreted by all but Unitarians ; and sometimes even the subject originally misunderstood by the in- spired writer himself: until, at length, the Sacred Volume is completely discharged of all that exceeds the convenient and portable creed of the Unitarian. This, it will be allowed, is, in Mr Belsham's own words, " making Scrip- ture with a witness;"72 and exhibits no mean specimen of my Lord Peter's ingenious device, in extracting the legitimate meaning of his father's will : the totidem sj/Uabis, or at all events the totidem Uteris, cannot fail to supply the deficiencies of the totidem verbis."3 Lest, however, these ingenious modes of eliciting the sense of Scripture should be deemed too bold, Mr Belsham supplies a decisive reason to prove, that the Unitarian alone is duly qualified to form a sound judg- ment in matters of sacred criticism. To com- prehend the true import of Scripture, he informs us, " requires time, labour, patience, and candour."74 How, then, could it be ex- pected, that any but the aforesaid moral teachers of Christianity should rightly ascer- tain its meaning? That this laborious, patient, and candid expurgation of Scripture, whereby every passage intimating the divine nature of Christ is completely expunged, or new- modelled so as to speak a different language, should be stigmatized by the harsh representa- tion, of " mangling and altering the transla- tion to the mind" of the Unitarian, as Mr Fuller and Mr Wilberforce have, it seems, very uncivilly described it, only serves to recal to Mr Belsham's " recollection the honest quaker's exclamation, 0 argument ! 0 argu- ment! the Lord rebuke thee :"75 the argument 72 Review, p. 1 16. 73 Tale of a Tub, sect. ii. 74 Review, p. 272. 75 This animated and delicate species of irony, is, with Mr Belsham, a favourite mode of treating his literary antagonists. Having, in his controversy with Mr Carpenter, established the inconsistency of man's freedom with the divine foreknow- ledge, on such principles, that, as he modestly affirms, " no proposition in Euclid admits of a more perfect demonstration ;" he suddenly recollects himself, — " Hut all this is metaphysical reasoning ; and why should we puzzle ourselves with meta- physical subtilties ?" And then in a spirit of humanity, sym- pathizing most tenderly with his galled and lacerated opponent, he exclaims, — " 0 naughty metaphysics .' thus cruelly to impale a worthy, well-meaning gentleman , upon the horns of a goring dilemma, and to leave him writhing and smarting there with- out relief. — I am sorry for my friend's unfortunate situation." (Lett, on Arian. p. 47.) And so he goes on grieving for the cruel discomfiture which he had himself caused to his friend ,• hut which, it seems, he could not well have avoided, from the uncommon keenness of his argumentative talent, and the piercing potency of his metaphysics It should, however, be observed, to the credit of Mr Belsham, that he has not been influenced by any unworthy fear, to withhold from the world the knowledge of the nature and use of those all-subduing weapons, which have never failed to secure to him such easy triumphs in his controversial campaigns. The logic and meta- physics, whereby he has laid many a sturdy combatant low, ■J •■•.-' HA6EE ON THE ATONKM K N T. being, without question, all on the side of the Unitarian, whose modifications of the Gospel, t'xhil >it i iilt it as a mere revival and confirmation of natural religion, cannot tail to approve themselves to all " men of enligh- tened minds;" whilst the old orthodox fancies, that " the corruption of human nature, the atonement of the Saviour, and the sanctifying he baa fairly given to the public ; and it is now the fault of those with whom ho lias henceforward to contend, if they do not con- ceive with the same clearness, and reason with the same pre- cision, as himself. On the work which exhibits these, and which, dignified with the title of Elements of the Philosophy of the Mi ml awl of Moral Philosophy, professes to give, within the compass of one octavo volume, a most complete view of logics, morals, and meta- physics, I have had occasion already to offer some remarks in the preceding notes of this Appendix. Those remarks, however, as they relate, for the most part, to detached topics, rather incidental to the main object of the work than essentially con- nected with it, scarcely supply an adequate idea of its true value, and of the benefits which must have accrued, in point of strict reasoning and just conceptions, to the students of Hackney, and which are now held out by this publication to the world at large. I shall here adduce a few specimens, which go more immediately to its general excellence, as a treatise of logical and metaphysical instruction. First, in the list of axioms, we find the following, which may prove the degree of caution with which our author proceeds. — " Axiom 4. The agreemenloi two ideas with a third, cannot prove their disagreement with each other," (p. lii.) — By this, such reasoners as are naturally led to con- clude, that when two ideas agree with a third, they must disagree with each other, are completely guarded against falling into this vulgar error. Again, in the next page, we are apprized of a term, so circumstanced, as that it may become a proposition ; namely, the major term in a syllogism, whose major premiss is a particular affirmative. Tor, of such a term, he says, " If it be the subject, it is particularly taken as being a particular proposition," and again, "If it be the predicate, it is parti- cularly taken as being an affirmative proposition." This will provide against the errors of those who might have conceived that the term would still remain a term, and could never have turned into a proposition of any sort. Again, in the matter of definition, we find much more of copiousness and versatility, than can be met with in ordinary treatises of logics and meta- physics. The definitions with which the work commences, are those of perception and sensation. These, and their concomi- tants, we find thus variously propounded : — 1. " Perception is the attention which the mind pays to a variety of impressions made upon it by external objects, or by internal feelings." 2. " Perception is the faculty by which we acquire sensa- tions and ideas." 3. " Sensation is the perception of an object by the organs of sense." 4. "Sensation is the faculty of acquiring certain internal feelings, by the impression of external objects upon the organs of sense." 5. "A sensation is the impression made upon the mind by an object actually present." 6. " Sensations ate internal feelings, excited by the im- pressions of external objects upon the organs of sense." — Sec pp. vii. 10, 11, 15, Hi. Now, not only have we here a rich variety of definitions, but juch as, by a due combination of their powers, is found capable of engendering more. Thus, if we combine the second and fifth, we obtain a new definition for perception .- namely, " the faculty by which we acquire impressions made upon the mind," &c. : so that perception finally turns out to be its own producer, inasmuch as it seeks after, and aoquirei those Impressions, from which, we arc told in the first definition, it derives its existence. Again, if we combine the first and sixth, we obtain a more extensive and detailed view of the nature of perception for since, iu the influence of the Holy Spirit," are the promi- nent doctrines of the Christian Revelation, — are left to the professors of the national faith; interested and unprincipled men, who, not believing the doctrines they uphold, " testify their regard to the Scriptures by empty pro- fessions ;" or ignorant and blundering higots, who are led by a slavish and " blind sub'inis- latter, sensations are described as a species of " internal feel- ings," it follows, that "perception is the attention which the mind pays to a variety of impressions made upon it, 1. by ex- ternal objects, 2. by sensations, 3. by all other internal feelings.' And, lastly, since by the fifth definition, " a sensation is an impression made upon the mind," if we join this iu friendly union with the two former, we have then contained in the defi- nition of perception, " an attention to impressions made upon the mind, by impressions which are made upon the mind." I will follow this no farther. I do not pretend to exhaust the combinations and their results : these few, perhaps, may satisfy the reader. Of our author's uncommon powers in definition, I shall only give one instance more : but that one cannot but be deemed sufficient, inasmuch as it will shew the possibility of deciding, in an instant, the most difficult questions in metaphysics. " Volition is that state of mind, which is immediately previous to actions which are called voluntary." " natural Liberty, or, as it is more properly called, Philosophical Liberty, is the power of doing an action, or its contrary, all the previous circumstances remaining the same." (P. 227-) Now here is the point of free- will at once decided : for volition itself being included among the previous circumstances, it is a manifest contradiction in terms, to suppose " the power of doing an action or its contrary, all the previous circumstances remaining the same;" since that supposes the power of acting voluntarily against a volition. After this, surely, Mr Belsham might have spared himself the trouble of the ninety-two pages which follow, as his opponents must have been at once suffocated by the above definitions. Hut the philosopher was determined to give the absurd advocate for free-will no quarter ; and therefore has dealt out argument after argument, blow after blow, until the adversary is no longer able to stand before him. lie was not even content, until he brought the evidence of mathematics to his aid, to prove, ex absurdo, that philosophical liberty totally confounds the distinc- tion between virtue and vice. Thus, "for example, benevo- lenee without liberty is no virtue ; malignity wiO eut liberty is no vice. Both are equally in a neutral state. Add a portion of liberty to both ,• benevolence instantly becomes an eminent vir- tue, and malignity an odious vice. That is, if to equals you add equals the wholes will be unequal ; than which nothing can be more absurd !" Does the reader doubt that those words are fairly quoted ? Let him turn to pp. 258, 2.">!», of the treatise, and satisfy himself that there is in the world such a mathemati- cian as the author of the above proof. But I have done with this work. It must by this time be clear, that in logics, meta- physics, morals, and mathematics, the students must have been well instructed at Hackney. Having boon led by the subject of this note to the mention of a combination of metaphysical and mathematical reasoning almost t o ludicrous for serious observation, I cannot make better amends to the reader for such a demand upon his pa- tience, than by directing his attention to a very small but valu- able tract, entitled. The Doctrine of Philosophical Necessity briefly invalidated! in which the author, Mr Dawson of Sed- bergh, has most happily effected that which has been here so unmeaningly caricatured ; having enlisted the accuracy and brevity of mathematics (a science with which he is so well acquainted) in the cause of metaphysics: and having thereby been enabled to plant the standard of Philosophical Liberty on a strength, from which the advocates of the opposite doctrine have not found it convenient to attempt to dislodge him. One faint effort indeed was made by a writer in the Monthly Review for July. 17111. Hut this was so easily repelled by the author in a second edition of his tract, that, as far as 1 can learn, the attempt has Dot been repeated. APPENDIX.— UNITARIAN SCHEME, AS DESCRIBED BY MR. BELSHAM. 233 sion to vulgar interpretations."78 It needs scarcely to be remarked, that among the vir- tues of the new system, modesty seems not to occupy, any more than charity, a very distin- guished place. For the fulfilment of the engagement, to overturn every interpretation of Scripture that wars with the simple creed of the Unita- rian, Mr Belsham refers us, — for he has not thought proper to undertake the task himself, — to a list of commentators, on whose critical exertions he is willing to rest his cause. Here we find, in addition to some respectable names, and to some from whom his peculiar opinions will not receive much support, the names of " Wakefield, Evanson, Lindsey, and Priest- ley."7'' These last being the only persons now 7i! living, of those whom he has enume- rated as the great oracles of Gospel interpre- tation, to these of course he must principally refer, when he affirms, as we have seen, that "the Unitarians pledge themselves" to get rid of every passage in Scripture that mili- tates against the principles of their system. Now, I do agree with Mr Belsham, that if he had traversed the entire range of all who 76 For these two descriptions of character, and for that of the Unitarians, placed in direct opposition to both, as the only " enlightened and consistent Christians," the reader may turn to what Mr Belsham has said, Review, pp. 26—30, 196, 199, 220, 230, 233. Indeed it should be stated in justice to Mr Belsham, that the charges of incompetency, insincerity, and slavish adhe- rence to popular systems, are not confined by him to the divines of the Established Church. Some not a little distinguished amongst the Dissenters, are examples of the impartiality of his strictures. Even the pious, candid, and learned Doddridge had adopted an " erroneous and unscriptural system." " His love of popularity," with other causes, had " strangely warped his judgment in the interpretation of the Scriptures ;" and his works are, consequently, " not calculated to instruct his readers in the true sense of the Christian Scriptures, nor to infuse into them a spirit of rational and manly piety." (Pp. 102, 103, 213, 214.) He had unfortunately retained some of those old-fashioned notions about atonement and grace, which have been vulgarly supposed to distinguish Christianity from natural religion. He was not, in short, a Rational Dissenter : for it is not from the members of the Establishment solely, but from the various other classes of dissenters, that the grand characteristic of Rationality divides the Unitarian. 77 Review, p. 206. 78 It is matter of melancholy reflection, that, of the above named writers, all actively engaged in the propagation of their respective opinions when the first edition of this work was pub- lished, not one is at this day living. So rapidly do we all pass off in this fleeting scene of things! Respecting those who no longer live to answer for themselves, I confess I feel somewhat of the force of the maxim, De mortuis nil nisi bonum. And yet, when it is considered, that though the man dies, the author lives ; that the interests of the living should not be sacrificed to a sentiment unprofitable to the dead ; that, on the contrary, were the deceased himself to rise from the grave, he would pro- bably feel it his first duty to oppose those very errors which lie had before been industrious to disseminate ; there seems no good reason, why any greater delicacy should now be used in treating of the pernicious mistakes and misconceptions of such writers, than had formerly been observed ; more particularly as the subject is infinitely too important for compromise. I have, therefore, neither retracted nor softened any observation apply- ing to the works of the above named authors, unless where I have had cause to doubt the truth and justice of the observa- tion itself. profess to have a single shred of Christianity hanging to them, he could not have found a phalanx more admirably fitted, by the apparatus of "interpolations, omissions, false readings, mistranslations, and erroneous inter- pretations," 7'J to empty Scripture of every idea that does not correspond with the pure Christianity of those who call themselves Unitarians. Paine could not well have been added to the list. He most imprudently strikes down all at once, and would brush away the flimsy cobwebs, of both Old and New Testament, at one stroke. But, cer- tainly, more"" resolute expungers, parers, and di versifiers of Sacred Writ, he could not have discovered in the whole tribe of polemics. Of their powers in this way some few speci- mens have been exhibited in the foregoing Dissertations ; and from the notable exertions of master-criticism, which have been there occasionally noticed, little doubt can be enter- tained of the sufficiency of these writers to fulfil the engagement entered into on their behalf by Mr Belsham. Our author himself, indeed, has favoured us with but few displays of his critical inge- nuity. Those few, however, prove him by no means unworthy of the cause which he supports. The two passages, which expressly ascribe the office of intercession to Christ, are, (Rom. viii. 3-1,) " He is now at the right hand of God, making intercession for us ;" and, (Ileb. vii. 25,) " He ever liveth to make 79 Review, p. 206. 80 Dr Geddes has travelled too slowly through the Old Testa- ment, to entitle him by his meritorious services in the New, to a place in the present list. But from the liberal views which the part of his translation already published, joined to his late volume of Critical Remarks, presents, concerning the false representations of the Deity in the Pentateuch, — the cruel and sanguinary character of the God of the Hebrews, — the juggle of the miracles said to be wrought by Moses, — the incredible num- ber of prodigies not literally to be believed, — the frequent interposition of the Deity and his agents, not to be admitted, — the absurdity of attributing inspiration to the writers of the early books of the Old Testament, — the error, inconsistence, and downright absurdity, to be found in the Hebrew writings, from which their inspiration cannot be credited, even on the authority of St Paul, or though an angel from heaven were to teach it, — the information of the Hebrew historians derived from public registers, popular traditions, and old songs, — from these, and other observations of a similar nature, there is offered a reason- able promise, that when this translator of the books accounted sacred shall have extended his researches to the New Testament, and thereby clearly made known his scheme of Christianity, he will prove himself fully entitled to have his name enrolled among the most enlightened of Mr Belsham 's Unitarian commentators. When we find him thus freely concurring with Lord B.iling- broke, in pronouncing the God of Moses to be " partial, unjust, and cruel, delighting in blood, commanding assassinations, mas- sacres, and even exterminations of people," can we doubt that he will agree with his hardship, and other philosophic inquirers, in viewing the God of Paul in a light equally unworthy of our religious adoration ? — Bolingbroke's Works , vol. v. p. 567. — 4to. 17-14. The earthly career of Dr Geddes has been closed since the above was written ; nor did he live long enough to carry his mischievous perversions of Scripture beyond the limit of the Pentateuch and the historical books. >s.u M A G E E ON THE ATON E M E NT T intercession for us." Now, as Mr Belsham cannot allow to Christ the office of intercessor, he begins with remarking, that "the exact import of the phrase is difficult to be ascer- tained" in these passages: and fur this he assigns a reason, which cannol be denied to be sufficient, that " probably the writers themselves annexed to it no very distinct idea."81 Saint Paul, it is clear, was do rational Christian, or he would nut have used words so inaccurately and unphilosophically ; for, besides the aforesaid vagueness of expression, it is certain, that " God has no right hand at which Jesus can stand, to intercede !"a2 By this philosophical discovery, the authority of Saint Paul is completely and at once set aside. His words, it is shewn, admit no precise meaning. That, however, which Saint Paul ought to have said, Mr Belsham informs us-. viz. " that Jesus, having been advanced to great dignity and felicity, is, by the appoint- ment of God, continually employing his renovated and improved powers, in some unknown way, for the benefit of his church." We are told, that " we may imagine what we please, but that more than fins is not revealed ;" of which it unfortunately happens, that tiot one word is revealed — except by .Mr Belsham ; Saint Paul having simply said, that Christ "is now at the right hand of God, making intercession for us." God, however, has no right hand; and interceding does not mean interceding^ 81 Review, pp. 69, 70. w Ibid, p. 70. ra Mr Belsham 's remark on the force of the original word, rendered by us, making intercession, deserves to be noticed. " The word," he says, " expresses any interference of one per- son for or against another." Now, from this it follows, that if Christ be not supposed to interfere for us, he must be employed in exercising his power against ns. Does Mr Belsham prefer this to the received sense ? It appears, however, that he has borrowed his view of this passage from Dr Taylor's note on Rom. viii. 27, as he refers us to that for full satisfaction. Such then is the joint light of I)r Taylor and Mr Belsham. Hut it seems necessary to remind Mr Belsham of the difference between fTv?%&viit xderk, and itTvyx<*vl" &*>{• I must therefore take the liberty of referring him to his Lexicon. Or, if he will look to commentators, perhaps were he to consult Locke and Pierce, two of those very commentators whom he himself has named, but seems to have named only as giving a grace and character to his list, whilst they certainly deserved to have been placed in better company, he would tind their interpretation decidedly in favour of that, which no scholar can question to be the sense of the original, interceding. As the authority of a German com- mentator is likely also to have considerable weight with Mr Bel- sham, I would recommend it to him to attend to Roscnmullcr's distinction, (Horn. xi. 2. ) — 'Ei/Tvyx1**11* k™J nvei, est nego- tiuui alicnjai c munendare, intercedere pro aliquo; ivTvyxavi" x.a.Ta. mot, est aliquem accusare :" so says Schleusner likewise (who deserves to be particularly consulted on the word inTvyx*'"') and so say all the Lexicons. Mr Belsham, how- ever, says otherwise. " lime, labour, patience, and candour," have, no doubt, convinced him that they are wrong. As Mr Belsham has referred to I)r Taylor, for the true and adequate sense of the original word in these passages, it is but fair to state that writer's observations on the force of the term as applied in Horn. viii. 27. " The Spirit of God nuikes intercettion tor the tatntt, not by making application to God on their behalf, but by directing and qualifying their supplications in a proper manner, by his agency and influences upon their hearts ; which, With a few other criticisms of the like nature Mr Belsham has enriched his work. He has, however, not adventured far into the field of controversy. He has trusted rather to abstract reasoning, upon what he calls phi- losophical principles, and whilst he has con- fined himself to the stringing together of a number of rapid conclusions from plausible premises, or to what is vulgarly styled"4 de- according to the gospel scheme, is the peculiar work and office of the Holy Spirit." What then ? Is Dr Taylor, he who hat SO " well explained the Jewish phrases in his admirable Key," is he, after all, but one of those " popular interpreters," who, in opposition to the "Rational Christian," contend for the idle notion of the existence and influenco of the Holy Spirit » And does he, to whom Mr Belsham refers, for a full explana- tion of the original phrase commonly rendered in the sense of " making intercession for us," expound the words ivrvyxxviit irr££, when applied to the Holy Spirit, as signifying that benevo- lent interference, whereby our supplications are rendered more acceptable and effectual with our Almighty Father ? The same words, it is clear, cannot be instantly purged of this meaning, when they are applied by the same writer, in a few lines after, to the case of our blessed Lord : so that I fear much, that, when Mr Belsham comes to reconsider this matter, he will be obliged to repudiate his boasted auxiliary, Dr Taylor, as little better than orthodox. What had been thus given, in the former editions of this work, as matter of speculation, has now become matter of fact : Mr Belsham, in his latter views of this subject, has carefully omitted the mention of Dr Taylor. He finds it much safer to place his reliance on Mr Lindsey ; an authority which is not likely to fail him in any Unitarian perversion of the sense of Scripture. And, with his assistance, having first explained the word ivTuyxavto. as expressing any kind of interference what- ever, he arrives at this conclusion, that what is called the " in- tercession of Christ " implies the "operation and effect of his mission and doctrine in the world."— {Calm Inquiry, &c. p. 327.) In like manner the Unitarian Version, to which be refers, and in which probably he but quotes himself. For an admirable exposure of the absurdity of the intepretation thus given by Mr Belsham and his Unitarian Version, I refer the reader to Dr Nares's Remarks, p. 140—144. I shall only add, for the pur- pose of shewing how miserably unfit the Editors of this Version are for the task which they have undertaken, that in their note on this word in Rom. viii. 34, whilst they profess to give the in- terpretation of it by Schleusner, (an authority to which I had formerly taken the liberty of referring Mr Belsham,) they garble and actually falsify his application of the term ; and again, that in their note on the same word in Ileb. vii. 26, they repeat the identical error of reference into which Schleusner had fallen, quoting Acts, xxvii. 24, instead of Acts, xxv. 24 : and this too, whilst they are engaged in enumerating the precise parts of the New Testament in which the word is to be found, and would have us believe that they have consulted those very passages for its meaning : thus evincing, at the same time, their servile adherence to any authority on which they may choose to rely, and their negligent rashness united with affected research In matters relating to the accuracy of the sacred text. "■' One of the finest possible specimens of the species of criti- cism that goes by this name, is to bo found in another publica- tion of Mr Belsham's, which I have already noticed, entitled letter! on Arianism. At p. 129 of that work, he attacks the absurdity of deducing from the language used throughout the New Testament, respecting the " creation of all things by Jesus Christ," the strange conclusion, that by him a creation was literally effected. He admits, indeed, that in Ephesi&IU, iii. !), it i- said, that "(id created all things by Jesus Christ :" — that in lleb. i. 2, it is slid, " by whom also he made the worlds;" — and, again, in Colossians, i. 15, 16, " Who is the Image "f the invisible God, the first-born of every creature : for by him were all things created that are in heaven, and that are in earth, \isible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him : and he is before all things, and by him APPENDIX.- UNITARIAN SCHEME AS DESCRIBED BY M It BELSHAM. 235 clamation, he has left it to the more critical advocates of Unitarianism to prove, that the words of Scripture bear that meaning which he every where assumes. Indeed, this work, the professed object of which is to try the doctrines of the Gospel by the standard of Scripture, no less than by that of reason, is so miserably deficient in the point of critical inquiry, that its avowed admirers, the Ana- lytical Reviewers, feel it necessary to admit, whilst they endeavour to vindicate, this defect. " We have said this is a popular work. The reader must not look into it for verbal criti- cism, or the citation of ancient authority." But they add, in excuse, " the work to which it is a reply was altogether declamation." ^ And if so, it has undoubtedly been answered in its own way. I have now done with Mr Belsham ; nor should I have directed the attention of the reader so much to this gentleman's perfor- mance, had I known any ♦* other work than all things consist." But after lanching against these, the usual Socinian refutations, — that creating does not mean creating, and that tcorlds are dispensations, &c. &c. — he pro- ceeds, by a still happier flight, to shew that the same language is as applicable to Bonaparte as to Jesus Christ. I give his words : — "Of a certain person, who now makes a very considerable figure in the world, it may be said with truth, so far as the civil state of the continent of Europe is concerned, that he is the creator of all these new distinctions, high and low, whether thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers, all these things are made by him, and for him, and he is before them all, takes precedence both in time and dignity, and by him do all these thing9 consist. Yet who would infer from such language as this, that the present ruler of France is a being of superior order to mankind, much less that he is the maker of the world ? The language which is true of Bonaparte, in a civil sense, is applicable to Jesus Christ in a moral view ; but it no more implies pre-existence, or proper creative power, in one case than in the other !" — This comment of Mr Belsbam's requires no comment from me. 85 Review for March, 1798. 86 That part of the Unitarian creed which relates to the per- son and character of our Lord, has received some additional touches from the hand of Mr Helsham, in a work recently pub- lished ; which he entitles, A Calm Inquiry into the Scripture Doctrine concerning the Person of Christ ; and in which he pro- fesses to give a formal digest of the recognized opinions of the Unitarians upon this subject in the year 1811. Of this digest I select the few passages which follow. — " The Unitarian doc- trine is, that Jesus of Nazareth was a man constituted in all respects like other men, subject to the same infirmities, the same ignorance, prejudices, and frailties," — "that he was born in low circumstances, having no peculiar advantages of educa- tion, or learning," &c "The Unitarians maintain, that Jesus and his apostles were supornaturally instructed, as far as was necessary for the execution of their commission, that is, for the revelation and proof of the doctrine of eternal life, and that the favour of God extended to the Gentiles equally with the Jews ; and that Jesus, and his apostles, and others of the pri- mitive believers, were occasionally inspired to foretell future events. But they believe that supernatural inspiration was limited to these cases alone : and that when Jesus or his apostles deliver opinions upon subjects unconnected with the object of their mission, such opinions, and their reasonings upon them, are to be received with the same attention and caution with those of other persons in similar circumstances, of similar education, and with similar habits of thinking," (pp. 447, 451.) Here then is an improved view of the case : a manifest progress in the Unitarian system. The supernatural instruction vouchsafed to our Lord was strictly Umited to the object of his uiission : this the Review of Mr TVilberforce's Treatise, in which the entire system and bearings of the doctrines called Unitarian are exhibited with equal brevity, distinctness, and candour. To object was exclusively to make known the doctrine of eternal life, and the admission of the Gentiles to divine favour equally with the Jews: in all matters not connected with this object, the opinions and reasonings of our Lord aro to be esteemed of no greater value than those of any person of similar circum- stances and education, he being subject to the same ignorance and prejudices to which the common nature of man is subject : and as he was of low circumstances, and had no peculiar advantages of education or learning, of course it follows, upon the whole, that the opinions and reasonings of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ are (except when they relate to the doc- trine of future life and universal retribution) to be treated with as little respect as those of any person of low origin and circum- stances, who had received as few advantages of learning or education. I have not carried on the argument as regarding the apostles, for Mr Belsham and his associates have long ago disposed of the Epistles. But how much of the Gospels must now follow them as waste paper? — Yet, farther, it is not merely the "ignorance and prejudices" to which our Lord was "as subject as other men," that we have to guard against, in his opinions and reasonings on all topics, save the one above excepted ; but we have also to secure ourselves against the con- sequences of those " infirmities and frailties" of all descriptions, which are incident to human nature, and to which our Lord was not less liable than other human beings. Thus, according to Mr Belsham, the moral as well as the intellectual imperfec- tions, which render the opinions and reasonings of men, and more particularly of men who have had no peculiar advantages of education or learning, liable to error and exception, alike affect the opinions and reasonings of our blessed Lord ; save only that one subject, to which, Mr Belsham informs us, his commission was rigidly restricted. As Mr Belsbam's language seems here to cast a reflection on the moral character of our Lord, it is but justice to Mr Belsham to state what he has expressly said upon that point. " The moral character of Christ, through the whole course of his public ministry, as recorded by the evangelists, is pure and unimpeachable in every particular. Whether this perfection of character in public lite, combined with the general declaration of his freedom from sin, establish, or were intended to establish, the fact, that Jesus, through the whole course of his private life, was completely exempt from all the errors and failings of human nature, is a question of no great intrinsic moment, and concerning which we have no sufficient data to lead to a satisfactory conclusion," (p. 190.) Here Mr Belsham admits, that we have no actual proof of any sinful acts committed by our Lord in his private life, so that we cannot positively and satisfactorily pronounce any thing upon that head. But it must be observed, that this admission has been made after the recital of certain declarations of Scripture, that "he knew no sin;" that he was "holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners ;" that he " did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth ;" and others of the same import : — although, as these declarations do not relate to the object of Christ's mission, as stated by Mr Belsham, it is difficult to discover to what credit they are entitled upon the principle which he has laid down. In a distant part of his work, however, in which he was sufficiently removed from the influence of the above testimonies, and when lie prepares himself to sum up resolutely the articles of the Unitarian creed, he rises above the weakness into which he had here allowed him- self to fall ; and (as we have seen above) affirms of that great Being, who came to redeem the world from sin, that he was subject to the common infirmities and frailties of human nature. It will not now appear surprising, that Mr Belsham and his Unitarian associates, are so extremely anxious to establish the apocryphal Gospel of the Nazarenes to be the true original Gospel of St Matthew : for that Gospel, as Jerem. Jones (a favourite with the Unitarians) has shewn, in his Method of settling the Canonical Authority of the New Testa- ment, vol. i. p. 376, has left us reason to believe, that " Christ was a sinner, or, at least, that it is doubtful whether he was so or not !" 236 M A r; I. i; ON T H E A T O N E M K N T, Mr Belsham is certainly due the praise of an honest and open avowal of Ins sentiments. And in hi- work, a^ I doubt not in his life, are exhibited strong traits of talent, combined with amiable and virtuous feeling. The same freedom with which he has treated others, and with which, wore he to offer any animadver- sions on this work,"7 his pen would be directed towards me, I have not scrupled to use with him. If I have misrepresented him, it cer- tainly has not been my intention. His lan- guage, I confess, has offended me by its arrogance ; and perhaps the feeling which that would naturally excite may have dictated a mode of reply not always sufficiently respect- ful. If any thing like asperity or sarcasm has escaped me, I wish it to be considered as applied to the cause, and to the manner of supporting it, rather than to the writer him- self. His opinions, as undermining the best interests of human kind ; and his style, like that of all the writers of the same side of the question, as tending to overbear by an im- posing confidence of tone, and a familiar and frontless assumption of superiority, can scarcely be received without indignation,88 or 87 Since the first publication of this work in 1801, neither Mr Belsham nor any of his learned Unitarian fellow-labourers, have,as far as I know, favoured the public with any observations upon the arguments which it contains. I)r Priestley, if I recollect rightly, about the year 1790, stated, in one of the public prints, that his History of Early Opinion* having remained a long time un- answered, if the same silence should be observed during a limited period, which lie specified, he would consider it as an acknowledgment, on the part of the whole Christian world, that it was unanswerable. In this 1 will not presume to follow Dr Pricstley"s example. It had better become l)r Priestley to sup- pose, that his work had not received an answer, because it was nut deemed of sufficient moment to demand one. It must surely become me to suppose the same of mine. At the same time, I cannot but rejoice that its reception and circulation have been such as to give good reason to believe, that there is no small portion of the community to whom it appears to contain useful matter: and I shall certainly feel most sincere satisfaction, if it be allowed to continue to work its silent way, without the noise and the exasperation of controversy. "" I cannot allow myself to employ the term which Mr Bel- sham does not scruple to combine with this, on much slighter provocation, — "contempt." {Reveiw, p. 64.) And yet, to pass from MrBelsham to the entire class of his fellow-labourers, and to speak, not of the individual, but of the cause at large, and of its champions, — what can be more fitly calculated to excite even the feeling which that term expresses, than the Impotent and arrogant attempts of a few loquacious sciolists, direct) x •^a.Xlrrr,, hoxovtra. uvect fjLiyi^-Yt Q'^ovvat, eminently belongs to the race of modern Socinians, or Unita- rians as they choose to call themselves, and requires of course only to be unmasked in order to be put down. To this, I con- fess, my efforts (throughout this Appendix especially) have been particularly directed : and so anxious have I been to effect this point, which in such a case I conceive to be vital, that I have not hesitated to expose myself to those imputations which are generally cast upon the liberality and the politeness of the writer, who scruples not to press home truths in a direct man- ner, without fear, and without compromise. If I have had the good fortune to accomplish this object, I am satisfied to submit to whatever consequences may follow. I am not, indeed, without the apprehension, that I may appear to assume somewhat too much in the application of the following passage from Bishop Warburton ; and yet it approaches so nearly to the state of my own feelings, in winding up this Appendix, that I cannot avoid transcribing it. In speaking of the particular manner in which he had thought it right to treat the pernicious sophistries which were opposed to the fundamen- tal truths of Christianity, that glowing and powerful writer thus expresses himself. — " lie knows what the gentle reader thinks of it. Hut he is not one of those opposers of Infidelity, who can reason without earnestness, and confute without warmth. He leaves it to others, to the soft Divine, and courtly Controver- sialist, to combat the most flagitious tenets with serenity ; or maintain the most awful of religious truths in a way, that mis- leads the unwary reader into an opinion of their making but little impression on the writer's own heart. For himself, he freely owns, he is apt to kindle as he writes ; and would even blush to repel an insult on sense and virtue with less vigour than every honest man is expected to shew in his own cause." — Remarks on Hume's Essay, &c. p. 12. Such observations as have been added to the Appendix, since the appearance of the first edition of this work, it has been thought right to introduce in the form of notes, so as to leave the text (as it originally stood) unaltered. J *ll|J> .. ril.Tll ANIi .fBHIOTTriR. WOB1HO, ivinr. CONTENTS. No. Pau* 47. On the supposition that the Mosaic sacrifice originated in human invention, .... 127 48. Sacrifices explained as gifts by various writers, . 130 49. Sacrifices considered as federal rites, . . 131 50. Bishop Warburton's theory of the origin of sacrifice, 133 51. The supposition that sacrifices originated in the idea of gilts, erroneous, . . . . ib. 52. On the date of the permission of animal food to man, 134 53. On the Divine origin of language, . . .137 54. On the natural unreasonableness of the sacrificial rite, 143 55. On the universality of sacrifice, . . . ib. 56. On the universality of the notion of the expiatory virtue of sacrifice, ..... 144 57. On the objections against the supposition of the Divine institution of sacrifice, . . . . ib. 58. On the sacrifice of Abel, as evincing the Divine institu- tion of sacrifice, ..... 147 53. On the history and the book of Job, . . 148 60. On Grotius's strange misconception of the nature of Abel's sacrifice, ..... 175 61. On the difference in the Divine reception of the sacrifices of Cain and Abel, .... 176 62. On the true meaning of the phrase, LTAEIONA 0T2IAN, attributed to the sacrifice of Abel, . . 177 63. On the nature and grounds of the faith evidenced by the sacrifice of Abel, ..... 180 64. On the probable time and occasion of the institution of sacrifice, . . . . . .181 65. On the true interpretation of the passage, Gen. iv. 7, containing God's expostulation with Cain, . 183 No. Paoh 66. On the comparison between the sacrifice of Abel and that of Christ, ..... 67. On the nature of sacrifice before the Law : tending to shew its confinement to animal sacrifice, except in the case of Cain, ...... 68. On the disproportion between the effects of the Mosaic and the Christian sacrifices, 69. On the correspondence between the sacrificial language of the Old Testament and that employed in the New to describe redemption by the death of Christ : and tie original adaptation of the former to the subject of the latter, ...... Postscript to No. 69 — On Bolingbroke and Hume, 70. On the correspondence between the annual expiation under the Law, and the one great expiation under the Gospel, ...... 71. On the nature and import of the ceremony of the scape- goat, ...... 72. Soeinian objections urged by a divine of the Established Church against the doctrine of the vicarious import of the Mosaic sacrifices, and against other doctrines of the Church of England, . . . .210 73. The atonement by the sacrifice of Christ more strictly vicarious than that by the Mosaic sacrifices, whereby it was typified, ..... 74. Concluding Number, .... Appendix, containing an account of the Unitarian Scheme, as described by Mr Belsham, in his review of Mr Wilberforce's treatise ; with occasional strictures on the leading arguments advanced in that publication, 186 187 ib. 189 198 208 209 217 218 219 PRACTICAL TREATISE ON REGENERATION. BY JOHN WITHERSPOON, D. D PRINCIPAL OK PRINCETON COLLEGE, NEW JERSEY. CONTENTS. Introduction, Pack 1 CHAPTER I. Some general observations on the metaphor used by the apostle John, " Except a man be born again ;" and the same or similar expressions to be found in other parts of the word of God, .... Bfct. I. — From this expression, " Except a man be born i in, he cannot seethe kingdom of God," we may learn tli ■ greatness of that change which must pass upon every child of Adam before he can become an heir of life, Sect. II. — This expression, "Except a man be horn again," and ether similar expressions, imply, that the change here intended is not merely partial, but universal. Sect. III.— From these words, " Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God," and other similar expressions in the Holy Scriptures, we may infer, that the change here intended is net merely external imperfect, but inward, essential, and compl Sect. IV.— From this metaphor, " Except a man be born the kingdom of God," and other parallel ex] ressi as in the Holy Scriptures, we may learn the change here intended is supernatural, CHAPTER II. In which is shewn wherein this change doth properly and directly consist, and what are its principal evidences and fruits, . 16 20 Sect. I.— Wherein the change in Regeneration doth pro- perly and directly consist, Sect. II.— The second part of this change. Sect. III.— The effects of Regeneration, with some of the principal evidences of its sincerity. Sect. IV. — A more particular inquiry into what properly constitutes the sincerity of the change, T*AOH 20 22 .TO CHAPTER III. Of the steps by which this change is accomplished, . 37 Sect. I. — There must be a discovery of the real nature of God, ...... 3» Stxr. II.— There must be a discovery of the infinite glory of Cod, . .... 45 Sect. III.— There must be a conviction of sin and danger, 44 Sect. IV.— Of the degrees of sorrow for sin in true peni- tents, ...... 48 Sect. V Acceptance of salvation through the cross of Christ. .... 52 Sect. VI now the believer recovers peace of conscience, 56 Sect. VII. — How the Christian is governed in his daily conversation, ..... M Conclusion, . . ... 60 PRACTICAL TREATISE ON REGENERATION. Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God John, iii. 3. INTRODUCTION. The condition on which ministers of the Gospel hold their office, is extremely awful. " They must render an account unto God" of their fidelity to the souls committed to their charge. Their duty and danger, as servants of God, arc jointly and strongly expressed in the commission given to the prophet Ezekiel : " Son of man, I have made thee a watchman unto the house of Israel, therefore hear the word at my mouth, and give them warning from me. "When I say unto the wicked, Thou shalt surely die ! and thou givest him not warning, nor speakest to warn the wicked from his wicked way, to save his life ; the same wicked man snail die in his iniquity, hut his blood will I require at thine hand. Yet, if thou warn the wicked, and he turn not from his wickedness, nor from his wicked way, he shall die in his iniquity : hut thou hast delivered thy soul," Ezek. iii. 17 — 19. It is natural for us, in such a situation, to be often revolving in our minds this great and weighty trust. It is at once our duty and interest, to consider with all possible care, in what way we may have the easiest and most effectual access to the hearts of sinners ; what views of divine truth will be most con- vincing, what forms of address will make the strongest and most lasting impression ; in one word, how we may acquit ourselves in our ministry, so as to be a " savour of life unto life" to many of those who hear us, and to " deliver our own souls" from the blood of those that perish. Such, indeed, is the undeniable moment and importance of the truths of the Gospel, that I am often ready to think, it will be easy to set them in so clear and convincing a light, as that no person of common under- standing shall be able to resist. I am often ready to say within myself, Surely, if they be warned, they will no more dare to rush on the thick bosses of the Almighty's buckler : surely, the boldest sinner must tremble at the thoughts of death, judgment, and eternity, fa«t approaching, and from which it is impos- sible to fly. But, when we see how many are able to sit unmoved under the most awful threatenings from the word of God, how many continue unchanged under the most alarming dispensations of Providence, our thoughts are immediately carried to the un- searchable depth of Divine counsels ; and we must say with our blessed Saviour, " Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in thy sight," Luke, x. 21.; or with the Apostle Paul, " But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost : in whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them that believe not, lest the light of the glorious Gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them," 2 Cor. iv. 3, 4. The secret counsel of the Most High, how- ever, though we must adore with reverence, it is impossible for us to comprehend. What influence this has upon the final state of par- ticular persons, no man in the present life is, and probably no created being will ever be, able fully to explain. This only we know, that it is not such as to take away the guilt of sin, or destroy the efficacy of means. A sense of duty therefore constrains us to resume the arduous and difficult task, entreating the assistance and blessing of God, under a firm persuasion that he will hear the prayer of faith, and make his own word " quick and powerful, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and the marrow, and a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart." The subject I have made choice of, and intend to handle in the ensuing treatise, immediately regards the substance of religion, and is happily as little entangled in contro- versy as any that could be named. We are told, that "except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." In this, all A PRACTICAL TREATISE ON RKGEN KRATIOX. parties, ev< ry profession :in