declarative and did no more depend on the sacrifices offered than on a condition required by God the neglect of which would be an act of disobedience in them and by this means it could represent say they no more than such an expiation to be by Christ viz. God's declaring that sins are expiated by him on the performance of such a condition required in order thereto as laying down his life was But we assert another kind of expiation of sin by vertue of the Sacrifice being slain and offered which was real and depended upon the Sacrifice And this was twofold a Civil and a Ritual expiation according to the double capacity in which the people of the Iews may be considered either as members of a Society subsisting by a body of Laws which according to the strictest Sanction of it makes death the penalty of disobedience Deut. 27.26 but by the will of the Legislator did admit of a relaxation in many cases allowed by himself in which he declares That the death of the beast designed for a Sacrifice should be accepted instead of the death of the offender and so the offence should be fully expiated as to the execution of the penal Law upon him And thus far I freely admit what Grotius asserts upon this subject and do yield that no other offence could be expiated in this manner but such which God himself did particularly declare should be so And therefore no sin which was to be punished by cutting off was to be expiated by Sacrifice as wilful Idolatry Murther c. Which it is impossible for those to give an account of who make the expiation wholly typical for why then should not the greatest sins much rather have had sacrifices of expiation appointed for them because the Consciences of men would be more solicitous for the pardon of greater than lesser sins and the blood of Christ represented by them was designed for the expiation of all From whence it is evident that it was not a meer typical expiation but it did relate to the civil constitution among them But besides this we are to consider the people with a respect to that mode of Divine Worship which was among them by reason of which the people were to be purified from the legal impurities which they contracted which hindred them from joyning with others in the publick Worship of God and many Sacrifices were appointed purposely for the expiating this legal guilt as particularly the ashes of the red heifer Numb 19.9 which is there called a purification for sin And the Apostle puts the blood of Bulls and of Goats and the ashes of a heifer sprinkling the unclean together and the effect of both of them he saith was to sanctifie to the purifying of the flesh which implies that there was some proper and immediate effect of these sacrifices upon the people at that time though infinitely short of the effect of the blood of Christ upon the Consciences of men By which it is plain the Apostle doth not speak of the same kind of expiation in those sacrifices which was in the Sacrifice of Christ and that the one was barely typical of the other but of a different kind of expiation as far as purifying the flesh is from purging the Conscience But we do not deny that the whole dispensation was typical and that the Law had a shadow of good things to come and not the very image of the things i. e. a dark and obscure representation and not the perfect resemblance of them There are two things which the Apostle asserts concerning the Sacrifices of the Law First that they had an effect upon the Bodies of men which he calls purifying the flesh the other is that they had no power to expiate for the sins of the soul considered with a respect to the punishment of another life which he calls purging the Conscience from dead works and therefore he saith that all the gifts and sacrifices under the Law could not make him that did the service perfect as pertaining to the Conscience and that it was impossible that the blood of Bulls and Goats should take away sin So that the proper expiation which was made by them was civil and ritual relating either to corporal punishment or to legal uncleanness from whence the Apostle well proves the necessity of a higher Sacrifice to make expiation for sins as pertaining to the Conscience But that expiation among the Iews did relate to that Polity which was established among them as they were a people under the Government of a body of Laws distinct from the rest of the world And they being considered as such it is vain to enquire whether they had only temporal or eternal promises for it was impossible they should have any other than temporal unless we imagine that God would own them for a distinct people in another World as he did in this For what Promises relate to a People as such must consider them as a People and in that capacity they must be the blessings of a Society viz. peace plenty number of People length of days c. But we are far from denying that the general Principles of Religion did remain among them viz. that there is a God and a rewarder of them that seek him and all the Promises God made to the Patriarchs did continue in force as to another Country and were continually improved by the Prophetical instructions among them But we are now speaking of what did respect the people in general by vertue of that Law which was given them by Moses and in that respect the punishment of faults being either death or exclusion from the publick Worship the expiation of them was taking away the obligation to either of these which was the guilt of them in that consideration But doth not this take away the typical nature of these sacrifices No but it much rather establisheth it For as Socinus argues If the expiation was only typical there must be something â—n the type correspondent to that which is typified by it As the Brazen Serpent typified Christ and the benefit which was to come by him because as many as looked up to it were healed And Noah's Ark is said to be a type of Baptism because as many as entred into that were saved from the deluge So Corinth 10. the Apostle saith that those things happened to them in types v. 11. because the events which happened to them did represent those which would fall upon disobedient Christians So that to make good the true notion of a Type we must assert an expiation that was real then and agreeable to that dispensation which doth represent an expiation of a far higher nature which was to be by the Sacrifice of the Blood of Christ. III. Which being premised I come to prove that there was a substitution designed of the Beast to be slain and sacrificed in stead of the offenders themselves Which will appear from Levit. 17.11 For
cannot deserve it For no meer Man can deserve to be made God But it is more agreeable to the Divine Nature and Will not to give his Honour to a Creature 3. But after all the Invectives of these Enemies to Mysteries we do not make that which we say is Incomprehensible to be a Necessary Article of Faith as it is Incomprehensible but we do assert that what is Incomprehensible as to the Manner may be a Necessary Article as far as it is plainly Revealed As in the Instances I have already mentioned of the Creation and Resurrection of the Dead would they in earnest have Men turn Infidels as to these things till they are able to comprehnd all the difficulties which relate to them If not why should this suggestion be allow'd as to the Mysteries which relate to our Redemption by Iesus Christ If it be said the Case is not alike for those are clearly Revealed and these are not this brings it to the true and proper Issue of this matter and if we do not prove a clear Revelation we do not assert their being Necessary Articles of Faith but my present business was only to take off this Objection That the Mysteries were Incomprehensible and therefore not to be received by us II. And so I come to the second Way by which we are to Examine the several Senses of Christ Iesus coming to save Sinners Which of them tends more to the Benefit and Advantage of Mankind or which is more worthy of all Acceptation And that will appear by considering these things 1. Which tends most to the raising our Esteem and Love of Christ Iesus 2. Which tends most to the begetting in us a greater Hatred of Sin 3. Which tends most to the strengthening our Hope of Salvation by Iesus Christ. 1. As to the raising in us a greater Esteem and Love of Christ. We are certain that the Infinite Love and Condescension of Christ Iesus in undertaking such a Work as the saving of Sinners makes it most worthy of all Acceptation Some Men may please themselves in thinking that by taking away all Mysteries they have made their Faith more easie but I am certain they have extremely lessen'd the Argument for our Love viz. the Apprehensions of the wonderfull Love and Condescension of Christ in coming into the World to save Sinners And yet this is the great Argument of the New Testament to perswade Mankind to the Love of God and of his Son God so loved the World that he gave his only begotten Son c. This is indeed a mighty Argument of Love if by the only begotten Son be meant the Eternal Son of God who came down from Heaven as S. Iohn speaks just before but if no more be meant but only that God made a meer Man to be his Son and after he had preached a while here on Earth and was ill used and crucified by his own People he Exalted him to be God and gave him Divine Attributes and Honours this were an Argument of great Love to the Person of Christ but not to the rest of Mankind But God's Love in Scripture is magnified with Respect to the World in the sending of his Son In this was manifested saith the Apostle the Love of God towards us because that God sent his only begotten Son into the World that we should live through him Herein is love not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be a Propitiation for our Sins The great Love we still see is towards us i. e. towards Mankind but according to the other Sense it must have been Herein was the Love of God manifested to his Son that for his Sufferings he exalted him above all Creatures He that spared not his own Son saith S. Paul but delivered him up for us all If he were the Eternal Son of God who came to suffer for us there is a mighty force and Emphasis in this Expression and very apt to raise our Admiration and our Love But what not sparing his own Son is there if nothing were meant but that he designed by Sufferings to Exalt him For not Sparing him supposes an Antecedent Relation of the highest Kindness but the other is only designing extraordinary Kindness for the sake of his Sufferings Therefore the Argument for the Love of God is taken from what his Son was when he deliver'd him up for us all he was his own Son not by Adoption as others are S. Iohn calls him his only begotten Son and God himself his beloved Son in the Voice from Heaven and this before his Sufferings immediately after his Baptism when as yet there was nothing extraordinary done by him as to the great Design of his coming Which shews that there was an Antecedent Relation between him and the Father and that therein the Love of God and of Christ was manifested that being the only begotten Son of the Father he should take our Nature upon him and for our sakes do and 〈◊〉 what he did This is indeed an Argument great enough to raise our Adâ—â—ration to excite our Devotion to inâ—â—â—me our Aâ—â—ections but how flat and low doth it appear when it comes to no more 〈◊〉 this that there was a Man wâ—om after his Sufferings God raised from the Dead and made him a God by Office Doth this carry any such Argument in it for our Esteem and Love and Devotion to him as the other doth upon the moâ—â— serious Consideration of it 2. Which tends most to beget in 〈◊〉 a greater Hatred of Sin For that is so contrary to the Way of our Salvation by Iesus Christ that what tends most to ouâ— Hatred of it must conduce most to our happiness and therefore be most worthy of all Acceptation It is agreed on all handâ— that Christ did suffer very much both in his Mind and in his Body In his Mind when it is said that he was troubled in Spirit that he began to be sorrowfull and very heavy and soon after My Soul is exceeding sorrowfull even unto death S. Luke saith that he was in an Agony wherein he not only prayed more earnestly but his sweat was as it were great Drops of Blood falling to the Ground What made this Amazement and dreadfull Agony in the mind of the most innocent Person in the World Was it meerly the Fear of the Pains of Death which he was to undergo That is impossible considering the Assurance which he had of so glorious a Reward so soon following after when so many Martyrs endured such exquisite Torments for his sake without any such Disturbance or Consternation But the Apostles give us another Account of it S. Peter saith he was to bear our Sins in his own body on the tree that Christ suffered for Sins the just for the unjust S. Paul that God made him to be Sin for us who knew no Sin that he might be made the righteousness
righteous persons who are not antecedently supposed to be so by his own Argument Christ being dealt with as a sinner must suppose guilt antecedent to it and since the Apostle declares it was not his own in those words Who knew no sin it follows that it must be the consideration of ours which must make him be dealt with as a sinner by him who made him to be sin for us But to suppose that Christ should be said to be made sin without any respect to sin is as much as if the Latins should call any one Scelus and mean thereby a very honest man or a Piaculum without any supposition of his own or others guilt But we are to consider that the sufferings of Christ seeming at first so inconsistent with that relation to God as his only Son which the Apostles assert concerning him they were obliged to vindicate his innocency as to men and yet withal to shew that with a respect to God there was sufficient reason for his permission of his undergoing these sufferings That he knew no sin was enough to clear his innocency as to men but then the question will be asked If he were so innocent why did God suffer all those things to come upon him Did not Abraham plead of old with God That he would not slay the righteous with the wicked because it was repugnant to the righteousness of his nature to do so That be far from thee to do after this manner to slay the righteteous with the wicked and that the righteous should be as the wicked that be far from thee shall not the Iudge of all the Earth do right How then comes God to suffer the most perfect innocency to be dealt with so as the greatest sins could not have deserved worse from men Was not his righteousness the same still And Abraham did not think the distinction of calamities and punishments enough to vindicate God's proceedings if the righteous should have been dealt withal as the wicked And if that would hold for such a measure of righteousness as might be supposed in such who were not guilty of the great abominations of those places that it should be enough not only to deliver themselves but the wicked too how comes it that the most perfect obedience of the Son of God is not sufficient to excuse him from the greatest sufferings of Malefactors But if his sufferings had been meerly from men God had been accountable only for the bare permission but it is said that he fore-ordained and determined these things to be that Christ himself complained that God had forsaken him and here that he made him sin for us and can we imagine all this to be without any respect to the guilt of sin as the cause of it Why should such an expression be used of being made sin might not many others have served sufficiently to declare the indignities and sufferings he underwent without such a phrase as seems to reflect upon Christ's innocency If there had been no more in these expressions than our Adversaries imagine the Apostles were so careful of Christ's honour they would have avoided such ill-sounding expressions as these were and not have affected Hebraisms and uncouth forms of speech to the disparagement of their Religion But this is all which our Adversaries have to say where words are used by them out of their proper sense That the Prophets and Apostles affected tricks of wit playing with words using them sometimes in one sense and presently quite in another So Crellius saith of Isaiah That he affects little elegancies of words and verbal allusions which makes him use words sometimes out of their proper and natural sense thence he tells us The sufferings of Christ are called chastisements though they have nothing of the nature of chastisements in them And from this liberty of interpreting they make words without any other reason than that they serve for their purpose be taken in several senses in the same verse For Socinus in one verse of St. Iohn's Gospel makes the World to be taken in three several senses He was in the World there it is taken saith he for the men of the World in general The world was made by him there it must be understood only of the reformation of things by the Gospel and the world knew him not there it must be taken in neither of the former senses but for the wicked of the world What may not one make of the Scripture by such a way of interpreting it But by this we have the less reason to wonder that Socinus should put such an Interpretation upon Gal. 3.13 Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the Law being made a curse for us for it is written Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree In which he doth acknowledge by the curse in the first clause to be meant the punishment of sin but not in the second And the reason he gives for it is amavit enim Paulus in execrationis verbo argutus esse St. Paul affected playing with the word curse understanding it first in a proper and then a Metaphorical sense But it is plain that the design of S. Paul and Socinus are very different in these words Socinus thinks he speaks only Metaphorically when he saith that Christ was made a curse for us i. e. by a bare allusion of the name without a correspondency in the thing it self and so that the death of Christ might be called a curse but was not so But St. Paul speaks of this not by way of extenuation but to set forth the greatness and weight of the punishment he underwent for us He therefore tells us what it was which Christ did redeem us from The curse of the Law and how he did it by being not only made a curse but a curse for us i. e. not by being hateful to God or undergoing the very same curse which we should have done which are the two things objected by Crellius against our sense but that the death of Christ was to be considered not as a bare separation of soul and body but as properly poenal being such a kind of death which none but Malefactors by the Law were to suffer by the undergoing of which punishment in our stead he redeemed us from that curse which we were liable to by the violation of the Law of God And there can be no reason to appropriate this only to the Iews unless the death of Christ did extend only to the deliverance of them from the punishment of their sins or because the curse of the Law did make that death poenal therefore the intention of the punishment could reach no further than the Law did but the Apostle in the very next words speaks of the farther extension of the great blessing promised to Abraham That it should come upon the Gentiles also and withal those whom the Apostle speaks to were not Iews but such as thought they ought to joyn the