ll, sin lieth
at the door.' And hence too the statement of John, that Cain slew his
brother because his own works were evil and his brother's righteous. And
the faith attributed to Abel, as well as to Enoch, Moses and others, in
the Epistle to the Hebrews, is not faith in the sacrifice of Christ, but
simply a belief in God; a belief that 'He _is_, and that He is a
rewarder of them that diligently seek Him, or lovingly serve Him.'

There were many definitions and descriptions of saving faith common in
religious books for which I could find no authority in Scripture.

I also met with a multitude of cold hard things about the Trinity and
the Atonement in works on Theology which I never was unhappy enough to
find in the Bible. All seemed pleasant and natural and of heavenly
tendency there. I read books which seemed to require me to believe in
three Gods; but I met with nothing of the kind in Scripture. I heard
prayers and forms of benediction worded in a way altogether different
from the prayers and benedictions found in the Bible. The Scriptures
allowed me to think of God, in the first place, as one, as I myself was
one. They did not tell me He was three in the same way as I was three;
but they left the doctrine of the Trinity in such a state or shape that
I found no more difficulty in receiving it, than I found in receiving
the fact of a Trinity in myself. I left accordingly the hard repulsive
representations of the theologians to their fate, and accepted and
contented myself with the living, rational and practical representations
of Scripture in their stead.

The work of Christ was generally represented by theologians as exerting
its influence directly on God. His death was generally spoken of as a
satisfaction to divine justice, or as an expedient for harmonizing the
divine attributes, or maintaining the principles of the divine
government. God was represented as being placed in a difficulty,--as
being unable to gratify His love in forgiving men on their repenting and
turning to Him, without violating His justice and His truth, and putting
in peril the principles of His government. There were several other
theological theories of the design or object of the death of Christ. All
these theories may be true in a certain sense. They may, perhaps, be so
explained as to make them harmonize with the teachings of Scripture. But
I found none of them in the Bible. I found multitudes of passages which
represented the death and s