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imply a vicarious death, Raphelius on Rom. v. 8. directly asserts; and produces several indisputable instances from Xenophon, in which υπερ and avT have the force of substitution. * In like

* Raphelius's observations upon this subject are so valuable, that I apprehend his entire note will be acceptable to the critical reader.—“Rom. v. 8. Yπeg nμwr aтelave—id est ar, loco, vice nostrâ mortuus est, ut nos mortis pœna liberaremur. Vicariam enim mortem hoc loquendi genere Græci declarant. Neque Socinianis, qui secus interpretan, tur, quenquam ex Græcis credo assensorem esse. Nostræ sententiæ Xenophon adstipulatur. Nam cum Seuthes puerum formosum bello captum occidere vellet, Episthenes autem, puerorum amator, se pro illius more deprecatorem præberet, rogat Seuthes Episthenem: H xα 0ε2015 av, w Επισθενες, ΥΠΕΡ ΤΟΥΤΟΥ ΑΠΟΘΑΝΕΙΝ ; Vellesne, mi Epis thenes, PRO HOC MORI? Cumque is nihil dubitaret pro pueri vita cervicem præbere, Seuthes vicissim puerum interrogat, εἰ παίσειεν αυτον ANTI εκεινε; num hunc feriri PRO SE vellet ? De Exped. Cyri, &c.Et Hist. Græc. &c. ПIGOELπTWY SE Q Αγεσίλαος, οςις παρέχοιτο ιππον και όπλα και ανδρα δοκιμον, οτι εξεσι αυτω μη τρατευεσθαι, εποίησεν ετω ταυτα συντομως πραττεσθαι, ώσπερ αν τις τον ΥΠΕΡ ΑΥΤΟΥ ΑΠΟΘΑΝΟΥΜΕΝΟΝ προθυμως Ton. Quumque Agesilaus denunciasset fore, ut, quicunque daret equum et arma et peritum hominem, immunis esset a militiú: effecit, ut hæc non aliter magna celeritate facerent, atque si quis alacriter aliquem svo Loco moriturum quæreret. De Venat. pag. 768. Αντίλοχος τε πατρος ΥΠΕΡ ΑΠΟΘΑΝΩΝ, τοσαυτης ετυχεν ευκλείας, ως μονος Φιλοπάτως παρα τοις Ελλησιν arayogɛvonval. Antilochus PRO PATRE morti sese objiciens, tantum gloriæ consecutus est, ut solus apud Græcos amans patris appelletur.-Et quid opus est aliis exemplis? cum Juculentissmum sit, Joh. xi, 50, ubi mortuus dicitur Salvator

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manner, (2 Sam. xviii. 33.) when David saith concerning Absalom, τις δωη τον θανατον σ8, there is clearly expressed David's wish, that his death had gone instead of Absalom's.

But indeed this force of the word neither can be, nor is, denied by the writers alluded to. The actual application of the term then, in the several passages, in which Christ is said to have died for us, to have suffered for us, &c. is to be decided by the general language of Scripture upon that subject. And if it appears from its uniform tenor, that Christ submitted himself to suffering and death, that thereby we might be saved from undergoing the punishment of our transgressions, will it not follow, that Christ's suffering stood in the place of ours, even though it might not be of the same nature, in any respect, with that which we were to have undergone.

υπερ το λας. Quod quale sit, mox exponitur, va μn oλov TO εθνος απόληται.” Raphelii Annot. tom. ii. pp. 253, 254. How forcibly the word weg 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 emphatical bearing of this preposition, is strikingly evinced in their late Version of the New Testament. Seo their observations on Gal. i. 4.

NO. XXXI.—ON THE PRETENCE OF FIGURATIVÈ

ALLUSION IN THE SACRIFICIAL TERMS OF THE
NEW TESTAMENT.

PAGE 30. (8)—On the whole of this pretence of figurative applications, whereby H. Taylor, (B. Mord.) Dr. Priestley, and others endeavour to escape 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 language, 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 pro

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per, is far from being merely figurative: the terms being transferred from one thing to another, not because the things are similar, but be cause 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 preparatory to the other, the parallelism of their parts, or their several analogies, must have been such, as neces sarily to introduce the terms of the one, into the explanation of the other.-Of this Mr. V. gives numerous instances. I shall only adduce that, which immediately applies to the case before us: viz. 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 Tabernacle:" (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 lan

guage 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 sinofferings." This view of the matter will, I appre hend, be found to convey a complete answer, to all that has been said upon this subject, concerning figure, allusion, &c.

i.

Indeed some distinction of this nature is abso

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lutely 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. Priestley (Hist. of Cor. vol. 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 figurative 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 figurative solutions of the Historian of the Corruptions of Christianity, may be inferred from this remarkable concession. "In this then let us

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