tween the natural* impurities and blemishes of the animal, (which with good reason unfitted it for a sincere and respectful expression 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 be 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, (Ex. xii. 5. Lev. xxii. 21. Num. xix. 2. Mal. i. 14, &c.) as is urged by Sykes and H. Taylor, and by Dr. Priestley, (Theol. 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 Testament, that Christ was made a curse, and also sin (or a sinoffering) for us; whilst to make it more

The word in the original used to denote 'the perfect state of the animals to be offered in sacrifice is 'on, which Rosenm. explains by "perfectum, i. e. sine vitio et defectu corporis, sine ægritudine et membrorum debilitate; id quod Græc. appor, quod Alexandrini hic habent." Josephus (Antiq. Lib. III. cap. x.) calls these animals oλoxλnga nai nara under deλwßnueva, entire and without blemish. Herodotus also (Lib. II. cap. xlii.) testifies that the animals offered by the Egyptians were of the like description: T8 nadages agσενας των βοων και τις μοσχες οι παντες Αιγυπτιοι θυεσι.

clear, that all this was the effect of our sin, it is added that he knew no sin himself. And indeed they who consider the pollution of the victim as naturally irreconcileable with the notion of a sacrifice, as Doctor Priestley evidently does, would do well to attend to the nabaguara of the antients, who, whilst they required for their gods the TEλ bucia, 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 up 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 nabagua 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 Stephanus on καθαρμα, and Suidas on the words καθαρμα and περίψημα.

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 scapegoat 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 Lev. 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 contrary sense, shall be SANCTIFIED, or CLEANSED, shall be under an obligation, or necessity, of cleansing himself, as the LXX understand it, ayiaσbyσetai. See Wall's Critical Notes, Lev. 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; and that the

* Dr. Geddes'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 vis veri to account for his having taken it. I therefore willingly accept his assistance on this subject of the imposi tion 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 hand, &c. he subjoins this remark"Thereby devoting it to God: and TRANSFERRING, as it were, HIS OWN GUILT UPON THE VICTIM." A mere typical

ceremony consequently implied the desire, that the evil due to the sinner might be 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 says, the blasphemer was marked out for punishment, 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 Joshua ii. 19. 2 Sam. i. 16. Esth. ix. 25. Ps. vii. 16. and several other pas

rite, (he adds,) derived, probably, from the legal custom of the accusing witness laying his hand upon the head of the criminal. As to Dr. Geddes's mode of explaining the matter I am indifferent. Valeat quantum. His admission of the emblematical transfer of guilt upon the victim I am perfectly contented with: and indeed his illustration, by the witness pointing out the object with whom the guilt lay, does not tend much to weaken the significancy of the action.

sages 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, it 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 accordingly not now prescribed; but 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 offeringa 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 con