of Divine Justice, and to ignore the only way of reconciliation. This, I fear, too many of our philosophers and natural theologians do. They offer Cain's "fruit of the ground," without the blood of Abel's "firstling." But it is not and cannot be accepted; for there is no way into the Holiest but by the Blood of Jesus. Natural religion can tell us, ex cathedra, nothing about this. When an anxious conscience demands to know something more of God, something of his feelings towards offenders, of his way of dealing with rebels, whether there is forgiveness with Him, and mercy,—the creatures are mute. One says, It is not in me! and another says, It is not in me! All are ominously dumb on such questions as these.[1]
To enlighten us on these points is the grand object of the Word of God. It reveals to man the full hopelessness of his state, drawing aside the curtain from that hideous scene of eternal and utter ruin into which he had fallen by sin. It reveals also the remedy, God manifest in the flesh, bearing as a substitute human guilt, that through the blood-shedding of one spotless and infinitely perfect Victim, there might be full and free justification for every one that believeth.
When this grand inquiry, this quœstio quastionum,
- ↑ "Natural theology is quite overrated by those who would represent it as the foundation of the edifice: it is not that, but rather the taper by which we must grope our way to the edifice. . . . . It is not that natural religion is the premises and Christianity the conclusion; but it is that natural religion creates an appetite which it cannot quell: and he who is urged thereby, seeks for a rest and a satisfaction which he can only obtain in the fulness of the Gospel." Chalmers. Bridgew. Treat. ii. 290, 291.
