e cross. We shall then behold the necessity of
that sacrifice, and see the omnipotent yearnings of the divine love in its
efforts to overcome an obstacle, which could not be otherwise surmounted.

It is often said, we are well aware, that God might have saved us by a
mere word; but he chose not to do so, preferring to give up his Son to
death in order to show his love. But how can such a position be
maintained? If God could save us by a word, how can it display his love to
require such immense sufferings in order to save us? If he could
accomplish the salvation of all men by a mere word, how does it show his
love to make such wonderful preparations for their salvation; and, after
all, permit so large a portion of them to be eternally lost? If we could
save the life of a fellow-being by merely putting forth a hand, would it
display our love for him if we should choose to travel all around the
earth, and incur incredible hardships and sufferings in order to save him?
Would this display our love, we ask, or our folly? Is it not evident,
then, that the principle that virtue or holiness might be easily caused to
exist everywhere, is utterly repugnant to the glory of revelation? Is it
not evident that it causes the transcendent glory of the cross to
disappear, and reduces the whole complicated system of means and
appliances for the salvation of the world to a mere idle mockery of the
miseries of man's estate? Does it not show the whole plan of salvation, as
conceived and executed by the infinite wisdom of God, to be an awkward and
bungling attempt to accomplish an end, which might have been far more
easily and perfectly accomplished? And if so, does it not become all
Christian theologians to expunge this false principle from their systems,
and eradicate it from their thoughts?

Section II.

The sufferings of Christ a bright manifestation of the goodness of God.

The reason why the love of God does not appear to all men in the sacrifice
of his Son is, that it is often viewed, not as it is in itself, but
through the distorting medium of false analogies, or of a vague and
ill-defined phraseology. Hence it is that the melancholy spectacle is
everywhere presented of men, of rational and immortal beings, living and
dying in a determined opposition to a doctrine which they have not taken
the pains to understand, and of whose intrinsic grandeur and glory they
have not enjoyed the most remote g