UNKNOWN before the promulgation of the Law, inasmuch as it was FIRST set forth in the Law as a NEW doctrine but that, Before the promulgation of the Law, the doctrine of an atonement had no DIVINELY APPROVED existence; or, in other words, that, Although the doctrine of an atonement might have SIMPLY and SUPERSTITIOUSLY existed before the promulgation of the Law, it did not exist, before the promulgation of the Law, WITH THE DIVINE SANC

TION AND APPROBATION.

IV. Mr. Davison's much too large assertion being now set aside, as corresponding neither with matter of fact nor even with his own abatements and allowances, I have henceforth to meet him upon ground considerably lower than that which he had originally taken.

At present, therefore, omitting the assertion, that, At the promulgation of the Law, the doctrine of an atonement was an ENTIRELY NEW doctrine, a doctrine hitherto UNKNOWN and UNTHOUGHT OF; I consider Mr. Davison as speaking in the following more moderated terms.

We have no evidence whatsoever of the DIVINELY APPROVED existence of the doctrine of an atonement PREVIOUS to the delivery of the Law by the hand of Moses. Whence it will result, that, if God did NOT reveal to the patriarchal religionists the

doctrine of an atonement, they could not, WITH THE DIVINE SANCTION AND APPROBATION, have had the rite of piacular sacrifice.

In this manner I understand Mr. Davison's present argument. The true question is not, Whether the doctrine of an atonement EXISTED anterior to the delivery of the law; for, with respect to its bare previous EXISTENCE, there cannot be a shadow of doubt: but the true question is, Whether the doctrine of an atonement existed anterior to the delivery of the Law WITH THE DIVINE SANC

TION AND APPROBATION.

Of the present question, I understand Mr. Davison to maintain the negative: I myself rather incline to maintain the affirmative.

CHAPTER II.

Evidence of the divinely approved existence of the Doctrine of Atonement during the Patriarchal Ages, from its universal prevalence throughout the Gentile World.

THE UNIVERSAL prevalence of expiatory sacrifice throughout the heathen world has been so amply shewn by the excellent Archbishop Magee, and is (unless I wholly misapprehend him) so fully

allowed by Mr. Davison, that, without further investigation, I assume it as an established fact: and this fact I am willing to make the basis of an argument in favour of the divinely approved existence of the doctrine of an atonement during the patriarchal ages*.

Throughout the ENTIRE World, the religion of Paganism taught and maintained the expiatory power of animal sacrifice.

Now whence did the Pagans receive this notion of an atonement? From the light of nature and from the principles of reason, as Mr. Davison most justly remarks, they could not have received it from revelation, as Mr. Davison further contends, they did not receive it. What then, on the principles of Mr. Davison, was the medium, through which it was conveyed to them?

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I. "The reply," says Mr. Davison," is obvious. Superstition, by an easy corruption of mind, might soon come to think, that the animal vic"tim was not merely the representative of a de"served punishment, in which use it was rational; "but the real equivalent for it, in which sense it

was most unreasonable and might thus resort "to sacrifice for pardon, as well as confession".

* Magee's Disc. on Atonem. and Sacrif. No. V, XXXIII, LVI. Davison's Inquiry, pp. 143, 144,

† Inquiry, p. 144,

II. Certainly, the solution of the difficulty is given with Mr. Davison's characteristic acuteness and, though it doubtless rests upon a mere unproved conjecture, yet I am free to say, that this hypothetical solution would have accounted very handsomely for the existence of the pagan notion of an atonement, if that notion had been confined to a SINGLE people. But such is not the case. The pagan notion of an atonement was UNIVERSAL: and, upon the precise fact of its UNIVERSALITY, I claim to join issue with Mr. Davison.

Of superstition the vagaries are so endless and so extraordinary, that we cannot easily determine what it might or might not strike out: but the obvious tendency of this inventive humour is the production of variety, not of uniformity. Peradventure the priesthood of any SINGLE people, acting agreeably to Mr. Davison's very plausible conjecture, might strike out the notion of an atonement, and might practically exemplify that notion in the rite of bloody piacular sacrifice but, according to what is called the doctrine of chances, it were a marvel, that the priesthood of EVERY people, however widely separated, and however socially unconnected, should, with a rare concurrence of sentiment, harmoniously

E

and uniformly agree to adopt the self-same modification of superstitious belief and practice. I have always thought, and I still think, that an UNIVERSAL accordance in matters purely arbitrary evinces, of necessity, that those matters had a common origin. Now, if this principle be just, (and I have not, as yet, seen any reason to doubt its justice,) the UNIVERSAL accordance of the pagan world, in the purely arbitrary doctrine of an atonement and in the purely arbitrary practice of piacular sacrifice, invincibly demonstrates, that that doctrine and that practice could not, in point of fact, have been INDEPENDENTLY struck out by all the nations of the world in their insulated state, but that the doctrine and practice in question must have been derived to all nations from some one common origin to which the ancestors of all nations must have had an equally easy access.

III. And, now, what shall we pronounce to be the common origin, from which the UNIVERSAL doctrine and practice alike emanated?

1. Shall we adopt the wild speculation of Huetius and other writers of the same school,

* This, accordingly, I have made the professed basis of my work on the Origin of Pagan Idolatry: and I do not perceive any ground for deeming such a foundation in

secure.