of God, that taketh away the sin of the world," John i. 29. The iniquities of us all were laid upon him; and it was for no other cause that he took upon him the form of a servant, and the likeness of sinful flesh; and though he was rich, yet for our sakes became poor; and in fine, was exposed from his very infancy to griefs, sorrows, and persecutions. All these calamities proceeded from this, that, as both priest and sacrifice, he took our sins upon himself, in order to their being at last fully abolished by his death. The contrary the types. XXXVII. 3dly, The proof of this paradoxical assernot proved by tion, taken from the types of the Old Testament, is, in many respects defective. For, 1. There is no solid foundation for that hypothesis, that all the circumstances of the types ought, in the same manner, to be found in the antitype. For then it would follow, that Christ must have been slain at a year old, according to the type of the paschal lamb. 2. It is also a rash assertion, that none could act as a priest before his thirtieth year. There is no such command in the sacred writings. The Levites, indeed, were, by the annal law*, not admitted before their twenty-fifth year, Numb. viii. 24, nor before their thirtieth year, to the full exercise of their function, Numb. iv. 3. "But, indeed, I find no where among the rabbins," says Selden, de Succession. ad Pontificat. Ebræor. lib. ii. c. 4, "that the years of the Levites, as Levites, indicated the legal age of the priests. And I very much wonder that great men should admit of this, even while they sharply criticise upon others." It is the constant tradition of the Hebrews, that a priest is fit for his office at his thirteenth year, after his years of puberty, though he is not bound to take his turn with the rest before his twentieth year. See Outram de Sacrific. lib. i. c. 5. §. 3. Josephus relates of Aristobulus, "that when a young man, and out of his seventeenth year, he by the law ascended the altar to officiate." It is astonishing the very learned person did not attend to these things, which, from his skill in the Hebrew ritual, he could not be ignorant of. 3. If this argument is to be urged, it would thence follow, that Christ could have been a sacrifice after the seventh day from his birth, and immediately upon his thirtieth year be a priest; which is contrary to what is supposed in the sentiment we here oppose. In what sense dured the XXXVIII. To the third, we reply, 1st, That the question is not, whether Christ did, all his life long, wrath of God So endure the wrath of God as in the meantime to be favoured with no consolation or joy of the comforting Spirit: none will affirm this. But the question is, all his life. The author seems to refer to the law which debarred candidates from an office till such an age.-Cic. de Leg. iii. 3. and be the whether all those sufferings which Christ at any time endured, and all that form of a servant which he assumed, belong to the perfection of his satisfaction? A thing that cannot be overthrown by some shining intervals of joy, now and then. 2dly, To be the beloved Son of God, and at the same which he time to suffer the wrath of God, are not such contrary could bear, things, as that they cannot stand together. For, as beloved Son Son, as the Holy One, while obeying the Father in all of God. things, he was always the beloved; and indeed, most of all, when obedient even to the death of the cross; for that was so pleasing to the Father, that on "account of it he raised him to the highest pitch of exaltation, Phil. ii. 9; though, as charged with our sins, he felt the wrath of God, burning not against himself, but against our sins, which he took upon himself. Who can doubt that Christ, even hanging on the cross, was in the highest love and favour of God, so far as he was Son, though at the same time he was made a curse for our sins? 3dly, It has never been proved, that it was a thing improper and inconsistent for Christ to have some mitigation granted him, while he satisfied for our sins, by means of some rays of consolation, at intervals, shining in upon him, by which he might be animated resolutely to acquit himself in the conflict. Nor is it credible that he had always the sensation of divine wrath, or that it was always equally intense, even on the very cross itself; or that he was as much pressed down by his agonies, when he made a promise of Paradise to the thief, and spoke so affectionately with his mother and John, as when he complained that he was forsaken of God. See that kind address of God the Father to Christ, when "despised by every one," and "abhorred by the nation," and " "a servant of rulers," Is. xlix. 7. The Creed denies not all the sufferings tory. XXXIX. What is argued from the Creed, scarce deserves any answer. For when Christ is said to have suffered under Pontius Pilate, it was with no such in- of Christ to tention, as to distinguish the satisfactory sufferings of beatisfac Christ from those which are not-a fiction, I imagine, that none ever thought of-but simply to specify the time in which Christ completed his sufferings, and the person by whose authority he was condemned to the cross. Nor will the maintainer of this paradox affirm, that all the sufferings which Christ endured under Pilate, or by his authority, were satisfactory; for if the satisfaction must be restricted to the three hours of darkness, then both the scourging, and those indignities which Christ suffered in the pretorium, and his condemnation, nay, his very crucifixion and death, must be excluded. XL. It is certain a violence is done the Catechism, The Catewhich refers the impetration of our salvation to the one chism peroffering of Christ, with no other design than what Paul verted. does, whose meaning I have already explained. The words of Quest. xxxviii. appear to be perverted and misinterpreted. 1st,. Because it is an answer to this question: "What believest thou, when thou sayest, He suffered ?" But that expression, "he suffered," does not signify the bare susception of guilt, but the enduring of sorrows. 2dly, If to endure the wrath of God does not there signify to feel it, but only to take its guilt upon himself, or be exposed to it, it would follow that even at the close of his life he did not feel the wrath of God. For in the same sense the Catechism affirms, that very thing of the whole of Christ's life, and of the close thereof. 3dly, Ursinus is a more faithful interpreter of the Catechism, when he writes, "Under the appellation of suffering are understood all the infirmities, miseries, griefs, racking tortures of soul and body, to which, on our account, Christ was obnoxious, from his nativity to his last breath," &c. 4thly, It is in vain to seek for any pretence to this forced sense from Quest. lxxxiv., and John iii. 36. For it is not an obnoxiousness to the wrath of God that alone hangs over unbelievers and hypocrites, but they are really in a state of wrath and curse; and that curse which they are now under is the beginning and a part of those pains which they shall suffer for ever. More special XLI. The more special arguments or exceptions, arguments. either regard the death of Christ, or his agonies in the garden, or are taken from the beginning and end of the solar eclipse; which I shall set in such a light as at the same time to refute them. Christ, which is a ransom, signifies only the pains of eternal death, but That death of XLII. If any shall say, that the Scripture, when ascribing our redemption to the death of Christ, means, not by that death, those very intense pains of eternal death, which Christ endured both in soul and body together, also the death When he complained that he was forsaken of God; I of the body. answer, that indeed they are not, on any account, to be secluded from the compass or extent of the word death; but the death of Christ is not to be confined to them, so as to exclude the death of the body, or the separation of soul and body. For Peter speaks expressly of his being put to "death in the flesh," 1 Pet. iii. 18, and the whole Scripture ascribes our ransom to that death; from which Christ arose by his resurrection; and in fine, Paul makes the sacrifice which Christ offered, to consist in a death, which is like to that which is appointed for all men once to undergo, Heb. ix. 27, and which, verse 26, is a sacrifice, and was shadowed forth by the slaying of the legal sacrifices. And we have already mentioned several places which cannot, without manifest violence, be so explained as to exclude the death of the body from being included in his death. In what sense Christ said, "It is finish XLIII. If you object that Christ had before said, "It is finished," I answer, it ought to be understood of his finishing all those things which he was to suffer and do ed."" in life, so that nothing remained but to conclude the whole by a pious death. Just as Paul said, 2 Tim. iv. 7, "I have finished my course." And Christ himself, John xvii. 4, "I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do." Whence one would absurdly infer, that there remained for Christ, on saying this, nothing further to be done or suffered; when he was still to be made perfect by his last sufferings. The meaning is evident ; namely, that Christ, in discharging his office, had perfectly performed all he was thus far to perform. Christ's not without a curse. XLIV. If you insist upon it, that his death was calm and gentle, without the appearance of any pains of gentle death eternal death, having already undergone these; I answer, it was a gentle death indeed, in so far as the faith of Christ, now victorious over all temptations, was well apprised that he had surmounted the greatest pains, and was secure about his resurrection and the promised reward; but yet he died a cursed death, inflicted by the wrath of God against sin, and the curse of it was typically figured by his hanging on the tree, which still continued in and after death. For while he hung on the tree, so far he was doubtless under the curse, according to Gal. iii. 13. By which it signified, that his punishment ought to be taken as holding forth guilt, and the curse of God. The death of believers no against the death of argument satisfactory XLV. But, say you, believers are still to die; and therefore Christ did not satisfy for them by his death. I answer, the Catechumens have been taught to answer this objection from Quest. 42 of the Heidelberg Catechism. By the death of Christ, death hath ceased to Christ. be, what it was before, the punishment inflicted by an offended judge, and the entrance into the second death, and is become the extermination of sin, and the way to eternal life; and at the last day it shall be altogether abolished. And if you go on to argue in this manner, I shall easily make it appear from your own hypothesis, that even that very anguish of Christ, when he complained of his being forsaken of God, was not satisfactory for us; for believers themselves often complain of spiritual desertion. But Zion said, the Lord hath forsaken me," Is. xlix. 14. Where we have the very same word which the Lord Jesus uses, Ps. xxii. 2. And Zion says so truly, with respect to the sense of grace, and the influence of spiritual consolation. The difference between the desertion, whereby Christ עזבני יהוה * Q. But since Christ died for us, why must we also die? A. Our death is not a satisfaction for sin, but the abolishing of sin, and our passage into everlasting life. was forsaken of his Father, and that of believers, consists in this, that, in the former, there was the wrath and curse of God, and the formal nature of punishment, which are not in the latter; neither are these in their death. The being strengthened no objection to the suffer by an angel, ings in the satisfactory. XLVI. What is objected to our argument, taken from the agonies of Christ in Gethsemane, is very inconsistent. They say, that these sufferings were not satisfactory, because then an angel appeared to comfort garden being him; whereas a good angel could not have done this without a most grievous sin against God, if Christ was then actually making satisfaction; especially as he was to tread this wine-press alone, and it was foretold that, while making satisfaction, he should be deprived of all consolation. Ps. lxix. 20,"there is none to take pity, comforters I found none;" for, 1st, That angel did not tread the wine-press together with the Lord Jesus; nor bear any part of his sufferings; nor, by any natural influence, did he assist Christ in carrying that burden. He strengthened Christ only in a moral sense, by setting before him the glorious issue of the conflict he had undertaken, and by other arguments to the like purpose. 2dly, There is no reason why some small share of comfort should not be administered to Christ while in the act of making satisfaction; especially if with a view to preserve him for more, and not fewer sufferings. The words of Ps. lxix. are not to be taken in such a general sense, as to exclude all manner of consolation and pity; for " a great company of people and of women bewailed him," Luke xxiii. 27, as did also "all the people that came together to that sight, and smote upon their breasts," ver. 48, and the beloved disciple John, and above all his pious mother, "whose soul then a sword pierced," Luke ii. 35. Nor is there any thing in the words of the Psalm which obliges us to confine these things to the three hours of darkness. It treats of that time in which "they gave him gall for his meat, and in his thirst gave him vinegar to drink," ver. 21, which was not done during the darkness. 3dly, It cannot be inferred, that God the Father, in sending that angel, had not then either begun to act, or, at that time, ceased to act, as a strict and impartial judge; any more than it can be inferred, that the disposition of Christ's enemies was softened to pity, when they laid the cross on Simon of Cyrene in order to carry it after him. For both was done with a view lest Christ, sinking under his present pains, should escape those that were to ensue. 4thly, We shall by this be better able to form a judgment of the incredible load of anguish with which that mighty lion of the tribe of Judah was so pressed 'down, that he appeared almost ready to sink under it, unless he was, in some manner at least, encouraged. 5thly, Nor on any pretence can that angel be accused of any sin in strengthening Christ, while satisfying |