SECTION VII.

PROOF THE SUFFERINGS OF CHRIST.

THE circumstance on which we are now to found is matter of fact. The sufferings of Jesus Christ are record. ed in indubitable history. The argument derivable from this source, is of a stronger nature than any of the preceding. History is so much more plain and distinct than prophecy, that the evidence it affords must be higher than that which is derived from the latter.

The facts regarding the sufferings of the Son of God are not affected by the sentiments that are entertained respecting the nature and design of these sufferings. The doctrinal opinions of men may differ, but historical truths must ever remain one and unalterable. There is no room for diversi. ty here; whoever admits the canonical authority of the writings of the evangelists, must give credit to the statements they contain; these are subjects of belief, not of opinion. And how stands the matter of fact with regard to the sufferings of Emmanuel? It will be admitted by all who believe the new testament history, that, in their nature, variety, intensity, and continuance, these sufferings were of no ordinary character.

His whole life was a scene of suffering. From his birth to his death, from the cradle to the cross, from the manger at Bethlehem to the tomb of Joseph, sorrow and suffering seem to have marked him as their own, While yet a babe in his mother's arms, he was driven into exile, to escape the fury of those who sought his life; when but a youth, he was doomed to follow a servile employment, that he might procure the means of bodily subsistence: and when he became a man, he was successively reproached, persecuted, accused, condemned, and crucified. At every period of his abode on earth we meet with the same general fea. tures of suffering; we see them in the weeping infant, the pensive youth, the man of sorrows, and the bleeding victim

of Calvary. He seems to have been marked out as the object of bitter hatred, the moment he entered our world; to have been followed throughout with deadly malice; and to have been at last hunted down with implacable revenge. The cup of woe, put to his lips at his birth, was never removed till he wrung out its bitter dregs on the cross. Called to dip his feet, so soon as he was born, in the trou bled waters of affliction, wave after wave continued ever after to lash with undiminished strength, deep calling unto deep, till the billows of death overwhelmed him, and cast his exanimate body on the desolate shore.

Every variety of suffering was compressed into his life of woe. He suffered poverty in all its rigour; being born in a stable and cradled in a manger, being ofttimes dependent on the charity of others for a precarious support, hav. ing no property that he could call his own, and being in many cases worse situated than the inferior orders of creation Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head.' He suffered reproach in all its bitterness; which to one, conscious of perfect innocence, as he was, and possessing the keenest moral sensibility, must have been inconceivably severe. The most malignant accusations, the vilest aspersions, the most cutting sarcasms, were directed against his person, character, and sufferings; and he who had done no violence, neither was guile found in his mouth, had to submit to be taunted as a glutton, a wine-bibber, a deceiv. er, a blasphemer, a Samaritan, a devil, nay the Prince of devils. He suffered temptation in all its malignity. The prince of darkness assailed him with all his ingenuity and power, and let loose upon him his legions, with their infernal suggestions, and wicked purposes, and cruel aims, surrounding him as strong bulls of Bashan, and gaping on him with their mouths like ravening and roaring lions. He suffered the indignity of an unjust trial; being rudely apprehended, dragged unceremoniously to the bar, falsely accused, subjected to the testimony of suborned witnesses, and finally condemned without a shadow of proof. He suffered crucifixion with all its ignominy and pain, being subjected to the previous scourging; bearing the cross on his lacerated body; having the bolts driven with ferocity into his hands and feet; having the whole joints of his body dissevered by the upright beam being let fall with

a sudden jerk into its place in the ground; being left to linger out a wretched existence amid the taunts, and jeers, and insults of an unfeeling mob; and having his heart pierced through with the spear of the infuriated soldier, whose demoniac wickedness impelled him to seek infamous distinction by an act of gratuitous barbarity. He suffered, above all, the wrath of God. It pleased the Father to bruise him. His agony in the garden and on the cross cannot otherwise be accounted for. When he came into the place called Gethsemane, he began to be sorrowful and very heavy’* he began to be sore amazed '+-he said My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death '+-' being in an agony, he prayed more earnestly, and his sweat was, as it were, great drops of blood falling down to the ground 'S --in the climax of his anguish, falling on the ground, thrice did he pray 'O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me he offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears.'|| And, when hanging on the cross, he gave utterance to the bitter, piercing, piteous cry of felt desertion, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?' In all this description, the translation falls as far short of the original language, as the energetic original falls short of the awful reality; no words being adequate to express that fearful amount of mingled terror, and amazement, and horror, which then seized, with all its intensity, on the holy soul of the devoted sufferer. Without any visible cause, his sufferings were awfully intense, as the bitter tears which he wept, and the deep sighs which he heaved, and the loud groans which he uttered, and the bloody drops which he sweat, and the heart-rending excla. mation to which he gave vent, do all most abundantly testify. I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint: my heart is like wax; it is melted in the midst of my bowels. My strength is dried up like a potsherd; and my tongue cleaveth to my jaws; and thou hast brought ine into the dust of death.'

Such are the facts of the case. plainly on the page of inspired history.

They are recorded

It is no exaggerated description, no overcharged picture we have given of

* 1 Matt. χχνι. 37. ἤρξατο λυπείσθαι καὶ αδημονεῖν.

† Mark xiv. 33. ἤρξατο ἐκθαμβεῖσθαι.

f Matt. xxvi. 33. Mark xiv. 34. περίλυπός ἐστιν ἡ ψυχή μου εως θανάτον.

◊ Luke xxii. 44. ἐν ἀγωνια.

|| Heb. v. 7.

The recital may fall

the sufferings of the Man of sorrows. below, but it certainly does not go beyond, the matter of fact. And now comes the question, Can these facts, respecting the Saviour's sufferings, be accounted for without an atonement? Let us see.

The sufferings of Jesus of Nazareth cannot be explained on the simple principle of retributive justice. He was perfectly pure and innocent in himself. Not only was his life unmarked by any atrocious wickedness demanding a peculiar severity of punishment, but he was so free from the slightest stain of sin as not to have had one recollection tinged with remorse.' If it be denied that he suffered as the substitute of guilty men, it concerns such as hold this opinion to show, how, in consistency with the equity of God, he could have been subjected to a single pang of that accumulated woe which came upon him to the uttermost, much less to the whole amount of this fearful suffering. The ordinary course of equitable retribution fails to account for a single drop of that full and bitter cup of wrath, which he drank to the very dregs.

The same reason, namely, the innocence of the sufferer, precludes the supposition that the sufferings were simply corrective, chastisements, severe in themselves, kindly meant for the good of him who was their subject. In the case of one who was holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners, one who had no sin, of what could his sufferings be corrective? for what could they be chastisements? God corrects man for iniquity; but Jesus had no iniquity. If his children forsake his law and walk not in his judg. ments, God visits their trangression with the rod and their iniquity with stripes; but he of whom we now speak' did always those things that pleased the Father.' 'Even the daring theory which represents the Redeemer as a peccable mortal will not avail here; as it is not the liability to transgress, but actual transgression, which calls for cor. rection; not the possibility of going astray, but actual deviation from the right path, which calls for chastisement.

Nor will it do to assert that the sufferings and death of Christ were necessary to confirm the truth of his doctrines in general, as if this were the only purpose served by them. This is all that many will admit. He suffered and died, say they, as a martyr. That his sufferings and death prove his sincerity, is readily granted, and thus far they

may be said to involve the idea of martyrdom. But it merits consideration here, that to prove the sincerity of belief in a doctrine is one thing, and to prove the truth of the doctrine believed in, is quite another thing. Sufferings and death on its behalf may do the former; but they cannot do the latter. The sufferings of Christ could never have proved his doctrine true, had it been false. They cannot then be said, properly speaking, to confirm its truth, so much as to confirm the sincerity of his belief. But the death of Christ is what makes his doctrine true. The doc. trines of the gospel derive their truth itself, rather than the confirmation of their truth, from the death of Christ; and had Jesus not suffered and died, there could never have been such a system of doctrinal truth as the gospel exhibits. Incarnation-atonement-resurrection-the Spirit's influ. ence, would all have been nonentities. The tendency,

then, of the theory which explains the fact of Christ's suffering on the principle of its being confirmatory merely of his doctrine, is virtually to annihilate the priesthood of Christ, and all the peculiarities of the gospel. According to this, he is to be looked upon only as a Teacher, a Prophet, an Instructor :-a teacher, too, of nothing more than the simple principles of deism. The divine Being is thus robbed of all legal satisfaction in the salvation of sinful men; the language of scripture in general on the subject of salvation is converted into unmeaning, unintelligible jargon; while the epistle to the Hebrews in particular becomes a forced and unnatural allegory. Where, in this case, is the propriety of so much being said about the sacrifice, and blood, and cross of Christ? Why is he so often and so emphatically called a Saviour, if all that his death effected was merely to seal the truth of what he taught? Nay. where, this being the whole, was the necessity at all for his becoming man? Could not the truths of revelation have been established without so formidable an expedient as this? Was there so great a lack of external and internal evidence, as to render such a step indispensable? Were the doctrines, in which it was thought necessary that the world should be instructed, possessed of so little intrinsic reasonableness? Were prophecy and miracles so destitute of all power to convince, that nothing would suffice, but that the Son of God must leave the heavenly glory, assume the likeness of sinful flesh, tabernacle with men upon the earth, submit