on this great subject it is to be expected, that Revelation should be consistent with itself. Consequently, the language of the Old and New Testament on this subject must be so understood, as to convey to the mind of the Christian reader one uniform and correspondent meaning.

Such has been the foundation, on which we have built; which by all who acknowledge the general inspiration of the Scriptures, must be admitted to be a foundation not to be shaken.

On this solid foundation our superstruc ture has been raised; composed of those scattered materials furnished by different parts of Scripture, so brought together and fitted to each other, as to render the building of Christianity, in our judgement, both firm, uniform, and compact,

To drop our figure; with the view of leading the Christian to the intended conclusion, we considered the Bible, as a book that must be compared with itself by all who would draw from it its proper meaning. But that such comparison may be made with effect, it is necessary that the language, in which the Bible has for the

most

most part been written should be understood. The Jews are a standing proof, to what a degree the matter of the Old Testament may be grossly misapprehended and falsely interpreted. To prevent the continuance of such gross misapprehension and false interpretation, which would have rendered the Christian Dispensation equally ineffectual with the Jewish, our blessed Saviour, immediately before his departure from the world, opened the understandings of his disciples, that they might understand the Scriptures." And the opening of their understandings, we find, consisted in pointing out and explaining to them "the things which were written in the Law, and in the Prophets, and in the Psalms, concerning himself." Luke xxiv. 44.

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The language of the Scriptures being intended to bring man acquainted with Scriptural things, of which he can have no idea but what is received from Revelation; it must teach him in a manner, in which alone, in his present state, he is capable of being taught; namely, through

the medium of such things as he already

comprehends.

Hence it is that the language of the Old Testament is, in a great degree, a language of type and figure; to be understood only in proportion as the correspondence between the sign and the thing signified can be justly ascertained. Upon the same principle, the Law was the adumbration of the Gospel; its instituted ordinances having their substance in the doctrines and mysteries of Christianity; in the words of the Apostle, "whose body is Christ."

This groundwork of our plan, having, it is presumed, been sufficiently established, we proceeded to place upon it the important doctrine of vicarious atonement for sin by sacrifice; considered as that essential doctrine, or grand hinge on which the great scheme of Redemption turns; and to which every part of divine Revelation, from that delivered to Adam in Paradise to the winding up of the awful scene of mysterious love, in the communications of the spirit to St. John, bears its appropriate meaning.

The

The general idea annexed to sacrifice from its original institution, has been, that it was the appointed atonement for sin. All the Heathen superstitions, which were but so many different corruptions of this original institution, proceeded on this established idea. Their sacrifices being called their avτluxe, or ransom for their souls; and to the shedding of their blood they imputed pardon, and reconciliation with their offended deities.

When the Levitical Law was instituted, this idea, uniformly annexed to sacrifice, received the most formal and decided confirmation of the true God. "The life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it unto you upon the altar, to make an atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul. Therefore I said unto the children of Israel, no soul of you shall eat blood." Levit. xvii. 11, 12.

On this acknowledged principle, that blood made atonement for the soul, the whole Levitical service proceeded. The design of that service being to remind the parties concerned, that the life of the

beast

beast slain on the altar, was accepted in exchange for the life of the offender; which, according to the original covenant between God and man, had been forfeited by sin.

On sacrifice, then, considered as the appointed atonement for sin, by the substitution of one life for another, there seems to have been but one opinion since the world began. The difference of opinion now subsisting on this subject, between the unbelieving Jew and the Christian, respects the quality of the blood appointed to be shed for this purpose. The Jew, looking for a Messiah yet to come, considers, that in his days there shall be no further occasion for bloody and propitiatory sacrifices; and consequently that then all sacrifice shall cease, except that of praise and thanksgiving*. The Christian, knowing the Messiah to be already come, considers that the bloody and propitiatory sacrifices of the law have ceased, because the blood of the Messiah, which that poured out on the altar was designed to pre-figure, has been actually shed.

*See Raym. Mart. Pug. fid. part iii. dist. iii. c. 12.

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