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32.) seems plainly to be, God forgives in or through Christ: viz. by him preaching and declaring and granting forgiveness upon man's repentance.'

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THE

ANTI-SATISFACTIONIST, &c.

PART THE THIRD.

CONTAINING

Chapter 1. The nature of the death of Christ.

Chap. 2. The design of his death.

Chap. 3. The connexion of the death of Christ with the dispensation of the gospel.

Chap. 4. The connexion of the death of Christ with the Salvation of men.

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THE

ANTI-SATISFACTIONIST, &c.

PART THE THIRD.

CHAPTER FIRST.

The nature of the death of Christ.

THE death of Christ is a fact too plainly stated in the New Testament for any serious christian to doubt its reality; but upon two points relative to it the professors of the gospel are much divided, i. e. in their opinions of his person, and of what occasi oned his death. These points we will examine.

One fact is certain, i. e. that whatever the person of Christ may be, his real and proper person died. It is not the death of a part of him, what was not essentia! to his existence, that the gospel declares, but the death of a whole Christ. He whom the Jews nailed to the cross was the very Christ. Let all the house of Israel know assuredly, that God hath made that same Jesus whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ. (Acts, ii. 36.) such was the language of the Apostles to the Jews. If a real and complete Christ did not

die, a real and complete Christ could not rise; but that which was raised from the dead, be it whatever it might, was declared to be the Son of God with power. Rom. i 4. There is no Christ preached in the gospel but he who was crucified. He who was raised from the dead, consequently who actually di ed, is the appointed judge of quick and dead, Acts, xvii. 31. Hence it is clear, that Christ, in his proper person, could, and did, actually die.

Many of the advocates for the modern doctrine of atonement have contended that none but an infinite and eternal being could make satisfaction for sins; yet that the satisfaction was made by the death of the person who made it. The late Mr. J. Hervey says, "Had our Savior's sufferings been the sufferings of a mere man, or of the most exalted Angel, I acknowledge they could have borne no proportion to our demerit. It were impossible for a finite being to sus tain the wrath, or discharge the debt.-Was an infinite Majesty offended? an infinite Mediator atoned. Weigh the dignity, the immense dignity of the Re deemer's person against the everlasting duration of our punishment and it will not only counter-balance but preponderate. Finite creatures can never make an infinite satisfaction, no not through the most unlimited revolution of ages. Whereas when our divine Lord undertook the work, being

infinite, He finished it at once.'

truly and properly

Thus, it seems, the

Thus, it

good man thought, that nothing but the death of a divine, infinite person, a person of immense dignity, could make satisfaction; but the death of such

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