f their own misconduct. But have we any reason
to complain of this appointment of God? Certainly not: for if we obey the
indications of his will, as seen in this part of the constitution of our
nature, by doing all in our power to relieve the distresses of our
fellow-men, we shall be infinitely more than repaid for all that we may
undergo and suffer. However painful may be the feeling of compassion, we
only have to obey its dictates by relieving the distressed to the utmost
of our ability, and we shall be more than repaid by the satisfaction and
delight which never fail to result from such a course of life; to say
nothing of those infinite rewards which God has prepared for those who
sincerely love and serve him.

Just so it is in relation to the sufferings of Christ. He was led by his
boundless compassion to avert from us the awful consequences of sin, by
the agony, and the sufferings, and the death, which he endured upon the
cross. And, according to the doctrine of atonement, he is infinitely more
than repaid for all this. Though he suffered in the flesh, and was made a
spectacle to men and angels, yet he despised the shame, seeing the joy
that was set before him. We do confess that we can see no insufferable
hardship in all this, nor the least shadow of injustice. One thing is
certain, if injustice is exhibited here, it is exhibited everywhere in the
providence of God; and if the doctrine of the atonement were stricken from
the scheme of Christianity, the injustice which is supposed to attend it
would still continue to overhang and cloud the moral government of God.
And hence, if the deist or the Socinian would escape from this frightful
spectre of his own imagination, he must bury himself in the most profound
depths and most cheerless gloom of atheism.

The doctrine in question is frequently misrepresented, and made to appear
inconsistent with the justice of God, by means of false analogies. The
Socinian frequently speaks of it, as if it were parallel with the
proceeding of a human government that should doom the innocent to suffer
in place of the guilty. Thus the feeling of indignation that is aroused in
the human bosom at the idea of a virtuous man's being sentenced to suffer
the punishment due to the criminal is sought to be directed against the
doctrine of the atonement. But in vain will such rhetoric be employed to
excite indignation and horror against the doctrine of the cross, in the
mind of any person by who