For the life of all flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your lives, for it is the blood that maketh atone ment for life.

In reference to this sentence, probably, the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews says, that (in the Mosaic law) without shedding of blood there was no remission of sins. See Magee's Dissertations, No. 38, and Outram De Sacr. lib. i. cap. xxi. § 10.

The meaning then given with much plausibility to this passage is as follows: No one shall eat any manner of blood, for I have given the blood upon the altar, so as to imply that the life of the animal is given in lieu of the life of the offerer, which would otherwise be forfeited, and that by that means he is saved from the evils which might be the consequence of -the sins he has committed.

Now we may freely admit that the shedding of blood upon the altar was a very solemn act, and had some such religious meaning as made it highly expedient that no common use should be made of blood, without in the least obliging ourselves to adopt the particular theory which is here insisted on. No doubt, when man appears before his Maker, especially as one intending to confess himself guilty of certain forbidden actions, he is filled with that fear and awe, which an apprehension of the results that would arise from the displeasure of this Being naturally occasions. He naturally measures his ideas of the punishment which may follow his crime, not so much from estimating the place which it takes in the scale of offences, as from contemplating the overwhelming power of him who bears the sword of justice; and religious worship is to him a very solemn and awful act.

This is a feeling which, though by no means pleasing, is salutary, especially to minds that are too gross and sensual to be moved by other considerations, and hence it was a part of wisdom to defend the principal constituents of Jewish worship from being made common by profane uses.

eminent degree offered to God: hence, also, the restrictions laid upon the eating of the flesh of sacrifices; and to this intent we must attribute the ceremonies by which the altar, the priests' dresses, and all the furniture of the holy place were separated and made holy, as well as those annual ceremonies by which all these things were sanctified afresh, or, (as the Scriptures term it,) reconciled and atoned. (Lev. xvi. 16.)

And whereas it is said that the life of the animal is in the blood, this appears to be rather a physical than a theological doctrine, and as far as it has any moral effect or purport, seems well explained by Dr. Sykes, (on Sacrifices, p. 130,) when he says that the law prohibiting the eating of blood was with design to keep men from all cruelty and immanity, by commanding them to take away the lives of animals in the gentlest and mildest manner possible.

We require, therefore, a plainer proof than the mere juxta-position (in the verse quoted from Leviticus) of the life of the victim and the life of the offerer, to be assured that the one has a vicarious relation to the other; especially as there are Hebrew phrases which would have placed the matter beyond dispute; a most desirable object in a doctrine considered as so material to orthodoxy. Would it not have been said, as the latter Rabbins have said, "Let his blood be for my blood; his soul of life for my life, or in lieu of mine," and 'n 127 17' wal nnn wai, "Life for life, eye for eye"? &c.

Nor will the later interpretations given by the Jewish Doctors to an ancient form of confessions, stated in Outram, lib. i. cap. xxii. § 9, be of any great service in support of the doctrine of vicarious punishment, though much relied on by Outram in loc., by Dr. Magee, in No. 33, and by Dr. Pye Smith, in pp. 12 and 14 of his Discourses on the Sacrifice of Christ, Lond. 1813.

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Hence the prohibition of imitating the composition of the holy oil and perfume; and this was partly the reason of the prohibition of eating blood and fat-both of which were in

VOL. XVIII.

an

last words," let this (victim) be my expiation," as the Jews tell us, signify, "Let this victim be substituted in my place, that the evil which I have deserved may fall upon the head of this victim."

The Jews may tell us this; but the "Let this be my expiation," words, express no more than this, Let this victim remove all displeasure of God from me, let this be my cleansing; leaving the real purport of Jewish sacrifices for sin, still a subject to be ascertained from other circumstances. We shall use but one further argument against the notion of the vicarious import of Jewish sacrifices; the one which Dr. Magee cites, as the fifth and last of these objections of which he volunteers a complete refutation, though it would, it seems, make no difference to his main argument, whether such objections were proved just or not.

We have already argued that the sacrifice of a victim is no emblem of vicarious punishment, because it is appointed for a variety of religious occasions where confessions of sin formed no part of the ceremony. Our present argument is the converse of this, namely, that atonement for sin being made in some cases without any animal sacrifices merely by an offering of flour, by piacular sacrifices could never be implied the vicarious substitution of a life.

"To this," says Dr. Magee," the answer is obvious, that although no vicarious substitution of a life could be conceived, where life was not given at all, yet from this it cannot follow, that where a life was given, it might not admit of a vicarious import." The question is not whether it might, but whether it did actually, and it is nothing else but giving up the question in dispute to concede, as Dr. Magee evidently does, that where a life was given in sacrifices, it might not have any vicarious import.

We must be excused from entering now into that particular description of the four principal classes of Jewish sacrifices, which we proposed to give with reference to what can be collected respecting their distinct objects and purposes. What is material to our purpose has already come under notice, though not, perhaps, in so sys

AM happy in being able to trans

Grant by the Bristol Fellowship Fund to The Christian Tract Society. "To the Secretary of The Christian Tract Society.

"DEAR SIR,

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Bristol, June 13, 1823. "I feel it a pleasure to hand you a resolution that was passed at our Fellowship Fund Meeting on Wednesday evening, viz. That three guineas be voted in aid of the Christian Tract Society, and the tracts be presented to the ladies and gentlemen conducting our Charity and Sunday Schools, for distribution, as they may deem proper, among the children. And also, that this resolution be recommended to the attention of each succeeding committee, as a means of usefulness, both to the Christian Tract Society and our Schools.'

"The objects of the above resolution are very perceivable. Besides the assistance afforded to the Christian Tract Society, the conductors of our schools will have extra rewards to bestow, for attention, good conduct and fair

promises. And these tracts taken home by the children, will, perhaps, in most instances, be read by their parents or some others of the family, and thereby their interest and value being discovered, they will, it is hoped, by degrees, lead to the cultivation of real religious principles among the connexions of the children; an object as closely connected with our Fellowship Funds and Unitarianism, as it is with the Christian Tract Society.

"But these excellent tracts must be well CIRCULATED to be read, estimated and bring forth fruit.

"I trust that the appeals in behalf of the Christian Tract Society will not be lost sight of by our Fellowship Funds and congregations having Sunday and Charity Schools, or opportunities of doing good, by the distribution of these truly valuable tracts.

"Yours, very respectfully, "A FELLOWSHIP FUND MEMBER."

nence, which may serve to verify the charge I have here advanced.

In the first volume of Dr. Priestley's Institutes of Natural and Revealed Religion, (pp. 7, 8,) we meet with the following remarkable passage: after arguing that the Deity must have exerted his creative power from all eternity, he observes, "So little are our minds equal to these speculations, that though we all agree that an infinite duration must have preceded the present moment, and that another infinite duration must necessarily follow it; and though the former of these is continually receiving additions, which is, in our idea, the same thing as its growing continually larger; and the latter is suffering as great diminution, which, in our idea, is the same thing as its growing continually less; yet we are forced to acknowledge that they both ever have been, and always must be, exactly equal; neither of them being at any time conceivably greater or less than the other. Nay,

we cannot conceive how both these

eternities added together, can be greater than either of them taken separately."" Is it possible," the Trini

66

ther exempt from inconsistency, and I have always considered the Unitarians as affording a striking exemplification of this remark, in laying so much stress on their objection to the Trinitarian doctrine, from its mystery. When they attempt to prove that it is unfounded in the language of Scripture, they do no more than exercise that right which unquestionably be longs to every Christian; and this, in truth, is the only mode of reasoning on the subject which can be called legitimate. But when they contend, as they are too apt to do, that the doctrine ought to be rejected on account of its mysterious nature, and its obvious impossibility, they evince the same degree of prejudice which they impute to their adversaries, and act in direct contradiction to their own practice on other points of speculative theology. Without recurring to the inexplicable difficulties which meet us in every quarter, when we direct our thoughts to the operations of the natural world, I shall content myself with selecting two instances from Unitarian writers of acknowledged emi

contradiction more palpable than those which are involved in the belief, that the creation is coeval with its Maker; that there is an eternity past which is always increasing, and an eternity to come which is always diminishing, and yet that both of them ever have been, and ever must be, precisely equal: and lastly, that these two eternities. added together, will not amount to more than one of them taken separately?" Stronger language than this has never, I believe, been used by the most zealous advocate of the Trinity; but in the present day, it is satisfactory to observe, that the majority of the more liberal divines belonging to the Established Church, rest contented with the simple scriptural statement of this doctrine, without attempting a metaphysical explanation of what is confessedly beyond the comprehension of finite understandings. It is not the essence of the Deity which ought, in my opinion, to excite our researches, so much as his attributes and character; and he who by the united aid of reason and revelation can, satisfactorily ascertain the latter, need

entertain little anxiety to know in what manner controversialists may terminate their disputations respecting the former.

It may possibly be said, that the example I have here adduced is so entirely speculative, and so little connected with human conduct, that it ought not to be placed in comparison with a subject of such universal interest as the nature of the Supreme Being. This objection, whether well or ill founded, certainly will not be alleged against the second example which remains to be noticed. I have read the last edition of Dr. Southwood Smith's Illustrations of the Divine Government with attention, and I may add, with much interest, though I do not profess to concur in all his reasonings. He is one of the very few writers even on that side of the question, who ascribes the existence of evil, as well moral as physical, to the will of the Almighty, as its truly efficient cause; and when this admission is traced to its consequences, it involves one of the greatest conceivable mysteries. It is somewhat singular that Jonathan Edwards, the most successful vindicator of the doctrine of philosophical necessity, and whose leading arguments are irrefragable, should yet hesitate in making the same admission, and should adopt the Arminian distinction, as far as it regards moral evil, that its prevalence is permitted, but not ordained, by the allwise Ruler of the universe. He endeavours to support this distinction by a very inapt illustration taken from the sun, considered as the cause of light and heat, and as the cause of darkness and cold; but, in truth, however unwilling many persons may feel to acknowledge it, that Being who consents to the existence of any effect which he had the power to prevent, and which he has evidently taken no measures to prevent, is to all intents and purposes the cause of that effect. With more consistency, therefore, Dr. S. Smith maintains that the Deity is the cause of moral evil in as real and strict a sense as he is of natural evil, and that "he has appointed both for the same wise and benevolent purpose, namely, because he saw that they would produce the greatest sum of good."

But does not this assertion present

to the reflecting mind a difficulty, I may even say a contradiction, beyond the limits of human comprehension? Is not the free inquirer astounded, when he first perceives, that though the great and benevolent Author of Nature has forbidden, under the severest penalties, the commission of every act which can occasion evil, however remote, either to the agent himself, or to the creatures placed within his sphere of action, yet that the very evil which the Creator has thus prohibited, should in all its revolting forms, he one of the principal instruments in his own hands of producing good? The very notion that pain and sorrow should be the only, or, if not the only, at least the best mode of promoting joy and tranquillity, contains a mystery of which we shall in vain attempt to frame any satisfactory solution. The fact may be true, but how, or why, are questions which it is impossible to answer.

He, however, who professes an ardent attachment to the cause of truth, must not shrink from its consequences; and that man well deserves the appellation of timid, who, when convinced that any doctrine is supported by indisputable argument, dares not follow the results to which it finally leads. There are undoubtedly many persons who, while they admit that evil is adopted by the Divine Being as the most effectual instrument of good, are yet unwilling to view the subject more in detail. But with all their reluctance, there is no escape, unless they voluntarily relinquish their claim to the character of sound reasoners. Be their timidity what it may, they cannot avoid conceding not only that the accumulation of sorrow, affliction and suffering, which we observe in the various gradations of society, is ordained for the purpose of increasing the amount of human happiness, but that all the crimes, the depravities, the atrocities of the worst part of the species, are selected as the best possible means of promoting the ultimate purity and felicity of the delinquents themselves. The most flagitious enormities that ever stained the moral character, must be regarded as the best instruments which could have been chosen for effectuating the designs of infinite benevolence. What

ever is most revolting in the catalogue of human crimes, adultery and incest and murder, with all their terrific effects, must be viewed as the best modes which unlimited wisdom could devise of leading the perpetrators of these offences to spotless purity and endless peace. All the deeds, cruelty and bloodshed which took place during the existence of the Jewish polity; all the excesses of impurity and profigacy prevalent among the most polished nations of antiquity;

sanguinary proceedings of the Inqui

sition in the darkest period of papal susperstition; and all the enormities and tortures of the African slave trade în more recent times, though in direct contradiction to the laws of God, and the general interest of society, though at variance with the plainest precepts of Christianity, and the best feelings of the human heart, must appear to those who adopt this theory of the origin of evil, to be nothing more than the wisest preparatory measures that could be ordained for the moral improvement of the race of man, and to constitute an essential part of that divine system of education by which the mind is to be trained to perfect virtue and interminable happiness. In short, the worst crimes of the very worst man that ever imbibed the breath of heaven, must, according to this view of things, not only contribute to the permanent prosperity of the world at large, but must be deemed absolutely requisite for the ultimate perfection of his own character, and for the final completion of his own

welfare.

In spite, however, of these consequences, it is strenuously maintained, that without this explanation of the existence and tendency of evil, it would be impossible to vindicate the Divine character; for if benevolent at all, it must be infinitely so; and nothing can be more truly preposterous than the attempt to reconcile the boundless benevolence of the Creator with a preponderance of misery among his intelligent creatures.

While the preceding doctrines, therefore, involved as they are in difficulty and contradiction, are advocated by Unitarian writers of eminence, they must, in my apprehension, be destructive of the argument, advanced by the

party to which they belong, against the mysterious nature of some of the orthodox opinions of the National Church.

CLERICUS CANTABRIGIENSIS.

The Nonconformist.
No. XXVII.

An Essay on the Causes of the Decline of Nonconformity.

few

Tappeal with a stronger interest

to man than those which stand connected with religion. Whether it be viewed in a moral or in a speculative light, or presented as a matter of history, it affords ample scope for interesting reflection. No sooner does the attention become awakened to its importance, than the mind seeks relief in an external profession, and it then obviously becomes a question of some interest, Under what form has the teaching of it been best administered?

From the period of the Reformation, and indeed long before, there have been various religious bodies in the nation, contending for supremacy, and all upon the reasonable presumption, that the scheme they proposed approached the nearest to scripture and to antiquity. If the means adopted for deciding their pretensions had been equally rational, truth would have stood some chance in the contest, and good sense would not have been offended. But the current of history goes to prove that nothing is so arbitrary and unnatural as the ascendancy of religious sects. From the reign of Henry the VIII. to that of Elizabeth, and within the short space of twenty years, the national religion underwent four or five several changes, to suit the temper of the sovereign; and, at each change, the foregoing profession was proscribed as false and impious. When James I. ascended the throne, the ecclesiastical fabric, reared by Elizabeth, was thought to be in jeopardy, the new king having been trained in the hot-bed of Presbyterianism. That it was not then overturned, was owing more to the humour of James, than to any want of pliability in the Parliament or the nation; for it is pretty evident that the bishops and courtiers were looking forward to such