s own; that if
the endurance of suffering by substitution were possible, it could not
be righteous; or that if it were not unrighteous, it could be available
to any beneficent purpose. Finding none of these suppositions, but all
their opposites in the spirit and detail of the sacred records, we
absolutely reject the popular doctrine of the atonement by Christ, while
we regard his sacrifices for us with reverential gratitude, and our
obligations to him with awe and rejoicing.

The more attentively we ponder his instructions and the more amply we
estimate the benefits he brought us, the more conscious do we become of
the impiety of withholding from the Supreme Author of our salvation the
gratitude and praise which are due to his free, unpurchased grace. It is
given through Christ, but it originates in God. It comes through a
mediator; but that mediator was appointed, informed, guided by God. To
him Christ ascribed, not only the acceptance of his sacrifice and
mediation; but the design in which it originated, the means by which it
was wrought, and the end which it should ultimately accomplish; and the
more we contemplate the design, become acquainted with the means, and
joyfully anticipate the end, the more eagerly do we join with Christ in
ascribing to Jehovah the glory and the praise.

We will now explain our meaning in saying that the Catholics alone, of
all Christians who have admitted the doctrine of satisfaction for sin,
have not restricted its application to one very peculiar case. They have
been perfectly consistent in not so restricting it; and they would have
been more extensively consistent if they had gone as much beyond the
point they have reached, as they have beyond the Church of England and
the disciples of Calvin. If the principle be sound, it will bear a
boundless application; if it be unsound, it can be no part of
revelation, and should be instantly relinquished. If atonement for sin
by a transferrence of punishment be possible in any case, it cannot be
pronounced impossible in any similar case. If spiritual guilt can be
atoned for by ritual sacrifices, in any instance, no one knows that it
may not in any other instance. Therefore if the Church of England holds
that the Jewish sacrifices were in strict analogy with that of Christ,
they cannot reasonably condemn the offering of the mass, and pious gifts
offered by the innocent on behalf of the sinner. Neither can the
Calvinists, who regard the Mosaic off