Farewell to the First Congregational Church in Norwalk, Conn. (bound with other addresses)

[Pp. 1G6-7.] "The manner had been to speak of one thing in the life of Christ as referrible to the action or choice of his human, and of another to that of his Divine nature ; till finally, all guards and correctives being omitted, the churches had begun, really and praotioally, to hold a bi-personal Savior, Im- pressions thus taken up, directly against the orthodox formula, were crossed by the strong assertion I made of Christ's personal unity, in exact coincidence with it ; and so I fell into an accusation of heresy, for no other reason than because I was more orthodox than I should be. Meantime what has befallen my accu- sers ? Something far more deplorable, I answer, than a defect of orthodoxy. Having lost out of mind the distinction between a twofold nature and two dis- tinct personal activities, their Savior is two, and not one any longer." 3 34 and man, but a iertium quid, a compound or identification of the two, styled sometimes the "divine-human." Thus our Savior is no longer very God, and God is no longer immut- able. 6. It is a natural consequence, that the doctrine of vicarous atonement should be denounced as a " residuum of scholastic subtleties," p. 105, and that there should be scepticism as to the perpetuity of such an incarnation. 6. All this seems to show that the Scriptural and Orthodox doctrine of the Incarnation should be, as it ever has been, re- garded and treated as fundamental, viz : " Christ, the Son of God, became man by taking to Himself a true body and a EEAsoiTABLE soTTL, and SO was and continues to be God and man, two distinct natures and one peeson foe evee." ATONEMENT. ^ t^hlt Section I. Showing that the doctrine of the vicarious sufferings of Christ, as a sacrifice or propitiatAon for our sins, is an absurdity / that such a sacrifice or propitiation was not needed y and that if God could accept the sufferings of the just for the unjust, and so remit the penalty due to transgressors, it would indicate in him the confusion or loss of all moral distinctions ; a readiness to let justice perish hy a double sacrifice. Also, that the Priesthood of Clvrist has no pecu- liar relation to our wants as sinners, hut has its foundation in the natnire of God ; that Christ did not come to die for our sins, nor to suffer for our release ; the only expression of his death that a/uails for our justification, lies in the virtue of the fact that his death was incidental; and that the whole scheme of suffering in Christ svbsinMted di/rectlyfor penal suffering in us, is a hare assumption, justified hy no Scripture authority whatever. There is absurdity in the thought of Christ's bearing our penalty, [228-9]. If God be willing to accept the sufferings of the just for the unjust, it indicates in him the loss or confu- sion of all moral distinctions ; a readiness to be satisfied with the stipulated quantum of woe, and to let justice perish by a double sacrifice ; first, by releasing the pains of guilt, and again by receiving the pains of holiness, [271]. To say that [Pp. 228-9.] " If Christ bears the penalty, then Christ in bearing it, were there any thing but absurdity in the thought," — [P. 271.] "The former doctrine I reject, because of the necessary insignifi- cance of any scheme, which represents God as executing penalties on himself and realising public retribution for sin, by transactions mthin the circle of his oan 36 God, by the sacrifice of Christ, satisfies his own justice, and works out the terms or even the awards of government, is the simplest form of absurdity, [229]. There was no need of such a propitiation, [243, 30Y; God in Christ^'' 198-9 ; aZso, for more ample proof, see If&te at the end of this Section']. To say, with the common evangelical doctrine, that the one Divine person suffers, because he suffers in the human nature, and so to offer to the world, as the very essence of the Gospel, a salvation purchased by the vicarious penal sufferings divinity ; also because, if it eould be significant, if we could either undeify Christ, or throw the penal burdens of justice upon his humanity, taken separately from his Divinity, the willingneas of God to accept the woes of iniwcence, instegd of the woes of guilt, wondd only indicate the confusion or loss of all moral distinctions ; a readiness to be satisfied with the stipulated quantum of woe, and let justice perish by a double sacrifice ; first by releasing the pains of guilt, and again by receiving the pains of holiness. [P. 229.] "It will also be made clear, by a much shorter method, that the immediate or first effect of Christ's work, can not -be on God ; for the pimple reason that Christ, in the highest .import of his person, is God. For, take what view we may of the three persons, he is not other than God. Then, it we hold this point firmly, and do not intermit our faith ; to ssty that God, by acting on himself, by acting right and left in himself, sictisfss his own justice and worjes out the terms or even the, awards of government, wholly within the circle of Deity f with- out passing out of that circle, will dppiar to evity one to be the simplest form of [P. 243 1 " But we go back now, once more, to the Hebrew at his sacrifice, and finding him engaged, as we jUst saw, to propitiate God, we venture to ask him whether, after all, it is God that wants propitiating, or himself that wants recon- ciling to God ? If he be a man of the earlier ages under the ritual, he is likely not to understand the question. But if he be a worshipper of the later times, the time, for example, of David and the prophets, when the reflective habit is a little more unfolded, and piety is gfowing more subjective, he will begin to revolve the question internaUy, and will finally reply that he finds the need of a sacrifice in himself, and the wants of his own character as a sinner, and not in God. He will also bring into view the fact that God is unchangeable, ' No, I do not suppose,' he will answer, ' that God wants propitiating so much as I want Changing in my spirit' " [P. 307.] " These words, I say, hang all their virtue on the assurance that God only waits to be merciful ; that he is not estranged from lis, but we averse from him ; and that Christ, in his death and sacrifice, came to assure us of this, and so to bring us to God." "God in Christ^', [P. 198-9] "First, it assumes that, as punishment expresses the abhorrence of God to sin, or what is the same, his justice, he can sustain his law, and lay a ground of forgiveness without punishment, only by some equiva- lent expression of abhorrence — an assumption that is groundless and tdthckit con- sideration, as I may cause to appear in another place, " Secondly, this latter seems to accord with the former view in supposing that Christ suffers evil as evil, or as a penal visitation of God's justice, only doing it in a less painful degree ; that is, suffering so much of evil as will suffice, considermg the dignity of his person, to express the same amount of abhorrence to ^iii that would be expressed ty the eternal punishment of aU mankind. I confess my inability to see how an innocent beiiig could ever be set, even for 37 of the San of God, is reducing the Gospel to a residuum of scholastic subtleties,' [101 — 3]. ' The Peiesthood of Oheist has no peculiar relation to the wants of sinners, but is on this wise ; Christ is the Word of the Pather [" or the power of self-representation so denomi- nated," Ood in Christ, ITY], before all worlds; and in that sense a medium of knowledge and approach to the Father ; and so the eternal Priest of the uniyerse, making eternal in- tercession (eternallj interrening or coming between) for us and all created minds ;" " for the sinless and pure, if such there be, as sinless, for sinners as sinners." His Priesthood has its ground, [not in the work of atonement or propitiation, {see the passages cited), but] "in the nature of God," [263-4.] one moment, in an attitude of displeasure under God. If he could lay his frown, for one moment, on the soul of innocence and virtue, he must be no such being as 1 have loved and worshipped. Much less can I imagine that he should lay it on the head of one, whose nature is itself co-equal Deity. Does any one say that he will do it for public governmental reasons? No governmentm rea- sons, I answer, can justify even the admission of innocence into a participation of frowns and penal distributions. If consenting innocen,ce says, ' let the blow fall on irte^ precisely there is it for government to prove its justice, even to the point of sublimity ; to reveal the essential, eternal immitigable distinction it holds between innocence and sin, by declaring that as under law and its distributions, it is even impossible to suffer any commutation, any the least confusion of places." See, also, tfie note at the end of this section. [P. 101-2.] "Or, if this be avoided, the -whole matter of the life and passion of Christ will be tortured out of its value and even its dignity, by duestions and arguments and dialectic quibbles, that are only continuances upon nis Gospel of the crucifixion perpetrated oil his body. Thus, to give an example, we find Mr. Symington asserting, first, in his work on the Atonement (p. 154), that 'Jesus had no personal existence as a man,' which is proper orthodoxy ; and then, shortly after, when the question rises, ' who suffers in the suffering death of Christ ! we have the following dismally wise sohition or answer : ' Although the hurdEin nature was alone capable of suffering, it was never- theless the person to whom this nature belonged, who suffered. It tnay be thought that, atihis rp,tp,.as the person was Divine, such an assertion involves the blas- phemy that Deity suffered. By no means. When a person suffers, it does not follow that he suffers in all that pertains to him. He may suffer in his property, and not suffer in his honor ; he may suffer in his happiness, and not in his cha- racter ; he may suffer in his body, and not in his soul; still it is the person who suffers. So m the case before us, while the Son of God suffers in his human na- ture, it is still the person that suffers.' — {Atonement, p. 164)" [P. 103.] "To solve a diffieijlty by throwing it into a shuffle where no one can catch it ; tb argUe that the one Divine person suffers without Divine suffer- ing 1 because he suffers in the human nature I which is impersonal and can not suifiFer I and then to offer to the world, as the very essence of the Gospel, a sal- vation purchased by the vicarious penal sufferings of the Son of God I is re- ducing the Gospel to a residuum of scholastic subtleties, which is likely enough, doubtless, to be hid in the world, but as unhkely as possible to be an active leaven of grace after it is hid." rp 9fiS-4..1 " Ab- in TOv diaoourae at Cambridge, I discarded the common 38 It waa not the object of Christ's mission to die for our sins,- or to suffer directly for our release. The only efficacious ex- pression of his death lies in the fact that it is incidental. [God in Christ, 201, 218.] He came into membership with us under the corporate law of evil in the race, for some benevo- lent end or reason apart from the ostentation of suffering ; and what he suffers is in no way penal in the experience, save as the currents of causes under which he suffers are themselves penal, as related organically to the sins of the race, [285-6].