parts of your works. And it seems to me very strange, that any, who have read and considered but a part of what you have said upon this subject, should yet be insensible of the obvious fitness of the obedience of Christ. (considered in connexion with its important consequences, both as to himself and others) to promote the virtue, perfection, and happiness of the rational creation. For what, that we can think of, could have a greater aptitude to promote this best and most valuable of all ends, than the proper and attentive consideration of that high and distinguished honour, which the sovereign and everlasting Father and Lord of all has put upon the obedience and righteousness of his Son; in making them the foundation, not only of his exalting him to his own right hand, and crowning him with inconceivable glory and dignity, but also of his gracious purpose and promise to bestow upon the good and obedient, in every age, and under every dispensation of religion, the great and invaluable blessing of an happy and endless life, i.e, in other words, a glory and happiness, which will in some measure resemble that, which our Lord himself is possessed

of: for if we have died (to sin) with him; we shall also live with him: if we suffer with him; imitating in like circumstances that example of patience and fortitude, which he has set us; we shall also reign and be glorified together with him: for if we overcome, we shall sit with him in his throne, even as he also overcame and is set down with his Father in his throne, Rom. viii. 17. 2 Tim. ii. 11, 12. Rev. iii. 21.

But then, sir; at the same time that I allow, that the obedience of Christ was highly pleasing to God, greatly redounds to our advantage, and, when viewed in the light in which the scriptures have placed it, presents us with the most encouraging and animating motives to an imitation of him; I must beg leave to say, that his death, even when considered as a vicarious suffering for sin, seems to me to be equally fitted (to say no more now) to give us just notions, and to excite in us a proper abhorrence of sin ; as what is highly displeasing to God, evidently deserving of death, and what, if irreclaimably persisted in, will certainly bring death and perdition upon the sinner. Nor can I guess, why we may not consider the death of Christ,

supposing it vicarious, as a

mean of ! sanctification,' as well as his obedience or goodness shewed in dying for us. The considering the death of Christ, as (by the appointment of God) the immediate cause or ground of our pardon, no more obliges us to disregard those useful intimations, which, when viewed as such in all its circumstances, it is suited to convey to us, than the considering the obedience of Christ, as (by the same appointment) the foundation of our hope of immortality, &c. obliges us to disregard those equally useful intimations, which, when properly viewed as such, it is also fitted to convey to us. Nor. does our viewing the former in the one light, at all interfere with our viewing the latter in the other on the contrary, they seem to me to conspire together, and to unite, as it were, their tendencies to promote one great end, viz. the perfection and happi ness of men only with this difference ; that the one seems to be more directly cal culated to give us just sentiments of the malignity, demerit, and ill consequences of sin; the other, of the excellency, worth, and importance of righteousness and good. ness the one shews us, how much sin is

the object of God's abhorrence; the other, how much true goodness is the object of his complacency: the one lets us see, what the hardened sinner may justly fear; the other what the really pious and good man may reasonably look for. Nor is it easy for us to think of any other method, that the divine Being could have taken (at least consistently with that mercy, which he was disposed to shew to sinners) which would have given us a more striking idea of the evil of sin, than his thus appointing his own Son to die as a sacrifice for sin. For what could have shewed it to be more odious in his sight; or how could he have given us a more conspicuous mark of his displeasure against it, and of his resolution finally to punish impenitent sinners, than by giving his own Son, a person of such dignity, and so dear to himself, to suffer and die as he did, for the expiation of sin, or as that, without which he did not think itexpedient to pardon even returning offenders ?* Whereas upon your scheme, the

* See Hallet's notes and discourses, vol. 2, p. 307, 308. To what is said above I would just add here, that the death of Christ, as an appointment of the Father, and as what was willingly and cheerfully submitted to by the

death of Christ, though, when taken in connexion with its consequences, it points out to us the value and importance of obedience, yet does not (I will venture to say) shew us the malignity and desert of sin; at least in such a manner as it is done by the scheme you oppose: and, indeed, sir, herein your scheme seems to me to be defective; that though it represents righteousness, virtue, or goodness, as highly pleasing to God, and as, under his government, the only road to true honour and

Son, for our redemption from death, has an obvious and powerful tendency to promote our sanctification in this view; as it gives us the most convincing proofs of the Father's kindness and readiness to be reconciled to us,' Rom. viii. 32, and of the Son's love, John xv. 13, and, of consequence, presents us with some of the most encouraging, as well as ingenuous motives to repentance and obedience. See again Hallet's Notes, &c. p. 308, 309. Though, I must confess, there is one sentence in this last page, which seems not so just. It is this; 'If Christ had died only as a martyr, we could have

" seen no more of God's love in his death than in the death of St. Paul.' This, I say, seems not so just : because, supposing our Lord had died only as a martyr, yet God's appointing a person of so much greater dignity and so much dearer to himself to die for us (though in such a way) would surely have been an evidence of greater love, than his appointing the apostle Paul, or, indeed, any other person, to die in the same way would have been.