nce the former must lead to the
latter; for, as the foremost apostle said, "It was not possible
that he should be holden in death."

The apostolical writers do not speak of salvation by the blood of
Christ any more plainly than they do of salvation by the name of
Christ, salvation by grace, and salvation by faith. If at one time
they identify him with the sacrificial "lamb," at another time
they as distinctively identify him with the "high priest offering
himself," and again with "the great Shepherd of the sheep," and
again with "the mediator of the new covenant," and again with "the
second Adam." These are all figures of speech, and, taken
superficially, they determine nothing as to doctrine. The
propriety and the genuine character and force of the metaphor are
in each case to be carefully sought with the lights of learning
and under the guidance of a docile candor. The thoughts that, in
consequence of transmitted sin, all departed souls of men were
confined in the under world that Christ, to carry out and
revealingly exemplify the free grace of the Father, came into the
world, died a cruel death, descended to the prison world of the
dead, declared there the glad tidings, rose thence and ascended
into heaven, the forerunner of the ransomed hosts to follow, these
thoughts enable us to explain, in a natural, forcible, and
satisfactory manner, the peculiar phraseology of the New Testament
in regard to the death of Christ, without having recourse to the
arbitrary conceptions and mystical horror usually associated with
it now.

For instance, consider the passage in the second chapter of the
Epistle to the Ephesians, from the eleventh verse to the
nineteenth. The writer here says that "the Gentiles, who formerly
were far off, strangers from the covenants of promise, are now
made nigh by the blood of Christ." This language he clearly
explains as meaning that through the death and resurrection of
Christ "the middle wall of partition between Jews and Gentiles was
broken down" and a universal religion inaugurated, free from all
invidious distinctions and carnal ordinances. In his bodily death
and spiritual ascension the Jewish ritual law was abolished and
the world wide moral law alone installed. From his spirit, rising
into heaven, all national peculiarities fell away, and through him
Jews and Gentiles both had access, by communion with his ascended
and cosmopolitan soul, unto the Father. A careful study of all the
passage