that the obedience of Christ is imputed to us, and the merit of his good works transferred to us, (which we might surely have expected to find there mentioned, had it been designed to teach such a doctrine); but, on the contrary, it seems rather to be implied that his obedience was imputed to Himself, as necessary to qualify him for the great sacrifice of atonement.

And the language of Scripture on this point coincides with the most sound moral judgment; which indicates that nothing short of a life of unsinning virtue could have made Him, Himself, acceptable and fit for his great office; that, in short, it behoved Him "to fulfil all righteousness," in order that He might be a spotless Victim, and an undefiled Priest: that in suffering indeed an accursed death, He did more than could be required of an innocent person on his own account; and that, therefore, He died, "the just for the unjust ;" but that his being just,--the perfect obedience of his life could not be more than requisite to constitute Him perfect as a man. I speak, of course, of his obedient life in reference to his human nature alone; in respect of which He always declared, "My Father is greater than I;" to

speak of his obedience considered as a Divine Person, would beat least approaching very near to the Arian doctrine; since all obedience necessarily implies a superior.

b There is, I fear, in many Christians a strong habitual leaning of the mind to this view of the Scripture doctrines; though they are unconscious of it from their having formally condemned Arianism, and distinctly asserted the equality of the Son and the Holy Spirit with the Father: forgetting that this is no security against a tinge being given to their ordinary course of thought on the subject,—a tendency practically to contemplate three distinct Divine Beings, the second inferior to the first, and the third to both. That it is possible for men to become something very near indeed to Arianism without knowing it, we have a curious instance in ecclesiastical history. In the early stages of Arianism, a confession of faith was agreed upon which was satisfactory to all parties, till some time after, the Arians began to boast of their triumph, and to point out the sanction which the formula adopted gave to their doctrine; and then "the Church," says Jerome, "marvelled to find itself unexpectedly become Arian." Something of the same kind, on a smaller scale, took place very recently among ourselves. The discovery of Milton's system of theology, startled many persons by its avowed Arianism, who had been accustomed to commend his poems for their sound theology; though they convey the very same views, stated almost as plainly as, in a poem, they could be.

*At Rimini, A. D. 360.

These

Surely, then, when we read that

by the obedience of (the) one, many (the many) shall be made (or constituted, ---KATAOTAOŃσOVTAI) κατασταθήσονται)

66

righteous," the presumption is strongly in favour of such an interpretation as shall accord with the declaration that we are "justified by his blood." Now such an interpretation is not only allowable, but is even, I may say, suggested by the Apostle himself in another passage, in which, speaking of Christ's death, he uses the very corresponding word to (TAкOŃ) "obedience" in this place: Christ, he says, " became

These instances are amply sufficient to prove, at the very least, such a possibility as I have alluded to.

Probably, indeed, the whole doctrine of justification through the righteousness of Christ imputed to believers, may be traced in a great degree to these semi-arian views. Men are apt to conclude that the "righteousness of Christ” must denote something distinct from the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, bringing forth fruit unto holiness; because they fear to confound together what they habitually, though unconsciously, consider two different agents. Whereas Scripture, if they would submit to be implicitly led by it, promises that Christ will come unto his servants and "make his abode with them;"-that "hereby know we that He (Christ) dwelleth in us, by his Spirit which He hath given us;" and that "the Lord is the (not "that" as our translation has it) Spirit."

obedient (vπýкoos) to death, even the death of the cross. His death, indeed, is more than once referred to in this point of view; namely, as a part, and as the great and consummating act of that submissive and entire obedience which he rendered throughout to his Father's will: for instance, in our Lord's own words just before he suffered, "not my will, but thine be done:" "Lo, I come to do thy will, O God;" " when He suffered He threatened not, but submitted Himself to Him that judgeth righteously."

Then, with respect to the imputation of Adam's sin to his descendants, it might, as I have said, be expected that if true, it would be frequently and fully set forth. But, at any rate, it could hardly fail to be mentioned on those occasions where the Apostle is occupied in proving and insisting on the universal necessity of a Redeemer, and the inevitable ruin of mankind without an atoning sacrifice. Now this plainly is his object in the opening of this very Epistle, (to the Romans) which is generally regarded as the most systematic of all that he wrote. What then is St. Paul's procedure? He dwells at large on the actual sins of men; he gives a copious and shocking

detail of the enormities of the Gentile world, into which they had plunged in defiance of their own natural conscience; and then expatiates on the sins of which the Jews had been guilty in violation of the law in which they trusted. How needless would all this have been for one who maintained the doctrine of imputed sin! No one, indeed, denies that men do commit actual sin; but the hypothesis I have been speaking of would have cut the argument short: on that supposition it would have been sufficient to say at once, that Adam's transgression being imputed to all his posterity, so that they are all regarded as guilty of his act, they must be in consequence, whether sinful or innocent,-whether more or less sinful, in their own persons, doomed to eternal perdition, unless redeemed from this imputed guilt. Nor does the passage I have appealed to, stand alone in this respect. Numerous às are the denunciations of divine judgment against sin, all concur in making the reference not to the imputed sin of our first parents, but to the actual sins of men: none of them warrants the conclusion that any one is liable to punishment (I mean in the next world) for any one's sins but his own.