DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS, to wit. BE IT REMEMBERED, that on the nineteenth day of August, A. D. "The Atoning Sacrifice, a Display of Love-not of Wrath. By 'But God commendeth his love towards us, in that, while we were 'Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.'-ST. JOHN." JNO. W. DAVIS, Clerk of the District of Massachusetts. CAMBRIDGE: E. W. METCALF AND COMPANY. CONTENTS. CHAP. I. An Appeal to the Benevolent Heart. CHAP. II. General Remarks and Explanations. CHAP. III. Various Purposes of the Messiah's Death. CHAP. VII. Opinions and Concessions of Theological Professors. 33 CHAP. VIII. The Circumstances of the Crucifixion incompatible CHAP. XII. The Propitiatory-and the Righteousness of God- or After Thoughts on Rom. iii. 24, 25, 26. CHAP. XIII. The Veracity of God in regard to his Threatenings. 71 CHAP. XIV. The different Senses in which One Person is said to CHAP. XV. In what Sense did the Messiah bear the Sins of Many? 82 M128820 CHAP. XXIV. Salvation by Jesus Christ a Redemption from Sin. 143 CHAP. XXV. Probable Causes of Error relating to the Atonement. 148 CHAP. XXVI. The Peculiar Things said of the Death of Christ. 158 CALIFORNIA INTRODUCTION. THE following passage from the Christian Spectator will show, under what perilous prospects the subsequent pages have been written :— "Even to discuss the subject of atonement is at the present, putting to hazard a man's good name, if not his standing in the church. If he departs from the beaten path, the cry of wanderer is raised. If he refuses to use old names and old forms of expression, he is in danger of being thought heretical. Scarcely can he venture even to discuss minor points relative to the subject, without finding some one to cry out against him. This is unfor tunate in regard to discovering what is true, and discouraging to those who incline to pursue investigations of this nature. Still there are minds deeply enough engaged in this great cause, to venture upon the pursuit of what is scriptural, and upon the rejection of what philosophy has added to the Scriptures." These remarks are found in a review of the Rev. S. E. Dwight's Sermons on the Death of Christ. Report says that the review was written by a respected professor in one of our theological seminaries-by a man whose opportunities to know the state of feeling which he describes, have probably been far better than mine. I shall, therefore, not call in question the correctness of his testimony. But if it be true, I may say, that a state of feeling exists which I am unable to reconcile with either humility, candor, or benevolence, a feeling too, which, so long as it shall prevail, must operate as an obstacle to impartial inquiry and to the progress of light. Admitting the truth of the state ment, the feader will perceive that in publishing the results of tabbrious inquiry, on one of the most interesting subjects, I must do it at the risk of what is dearer to a good man than life itself, his Christian character. But my situation is neither singular nor unprecedented. From the time of the Messiah's ministry to the present hour, Christian truth has had to make its advances against the tide of popular prejudice, and the wind of persecuting clamor. If the Savior and his apostles were not deterred from publishing their unpopular doctrines by the reproaches and menaces of self-sufficient men, why should I hesitate through fear that "the cry of wanderer" will be raised against me? or by the "danger of being thought heretical?" Under a clear conviction of the perils which await the man who by patient inquiry finds reason to depart from the beaten path," the following chapters have been written. They have also been written in a firm belief of the atoning sacrifice by Jesus Christ, and of its saving efficacy to all who are so influenced by it, as to learn of him who was meek and lowly of heart. 66 About two years ago my mind was called to this subject by reading a Family Sermon in the Christian Observer. The following was the passage which arrested my attention. "When the gates of Paradise closed upon our first parents, in consequence of the introduction of sin into the world, men no longer beheld in their Maker a friend; but felt, and justly, that his displeasure was excited against them; nor was there longer any way of access to the throne of a justly offended Majesty. But the word of God has pointed out to us a source of pardon and way of intercourse through a Mediator, by virtue of whose merits. and obedience, we may return to him and find favor at his hands, notwithstanding all our transgressions." Christ. Obs. for Nov. 1826. I had often read similar representations, but never before with a similar effect on my mind. The sentiment, that after sin entered the world "men no longer beheld in their Maker a friend," occasioned a feeling of horror |
