Then, said he, Lo, I come to do thy will, O God! He taketh away the first, the animal sacrifice, that he may establish the second, the spiritual, the doing of God's holy will; by the which will we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Christ once for all. Our Lord expressed the very essence of his sacrifice when he said, Not my will but thine be done. Such language could not be used by the Son, till he took on him the likeness of sinful flesh; or if before, prophetically: for till then he had no will distinct from the divine; and this never could be sacrificed to itself, because it could never be contrary to, or inconsistent with itself. 2dly, It is impossible those sufferings he needed to endure that he might make his soul an offering for sin, should have been inflicted on our Priest, had he appeared to the world in the form of God. For, not to mention that death was only one, though the last step in that ladder of humiliation by which Christ descended the unimaginable distance from the bosom of God to the darkness of that sepulchre in which his visible humiliation ended; we may ask, Who would have presumed, who would have dared to malign, to reproach, to persecute, much less to seize, condemn, torture, and crucify one, who appeared with the visible attributes and glory of the Most High? Fear would have made every tongue falter; fear would have paralized every hand; every heart would have quaked, and every countenance have gathered blackness; and all the world, when it saw his face as the sun shineth in his strength, and heard his voice as of many waters, would have fallen at his feet as dead. There had been none to cry, Not this man,

but Barabbas: Away with him: Let him be crucified. Every mouth would have been shut, and all the world guilty before him; or if any voice was heard, it would be the voice of despair, deprecating punishment.

But that he might suffer from man whatever was necessary for man's redemption, he hid himself under their own form, so that nothing of God might be visible but this moral glory, his holiness, his power, his rectitude, his unspeakable love, his unfathomable mercy: and men dared to inflict upon the Son of God so disguised, whatever the divine government and their eternal salvation required.

Our Priest, then, must be man. That he must be God, is too plain to need proof. A divine sufferer alone could be a worthy sacrifice for the sins of the world. His sufferings alone can have that dignity and worth in the eye of God, and that impressiveness in the eyes of men, which can qualify them to answer the ends of atonement, whether as regards the government of the Almighty, or the moral impression to be produced on our minds. Besides, we never can learn God's love from the sufferings for us of any one that is not God. We reason that God hath loved us, from the fact that he hath given himself for us.

And now, O sinners, this wonderful person is your Priest. The God-man made atonement, the God-man maketh intercession for you. Cling to his sacrifice; accept his mediation; plead his obedience with the Father. For he is able to save you to the uttermost, and all that come unto God by him; for he

ever liveth to make intercession for you. And, sprinkled with the blood of his sacrifice, you shall not come into condemnation; but rather may boldly ask, Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth; it is Christ that died, and rose, and reigns at the right hand of the Majesty on high.

But, Secondly, because we are weak and wayward, and exposed to many foes, and powerful, therefore, we need a King. And none can be such a king as we need, but one who is both God and man. When our race became apostate, the Father held no more intercourse with us directly: The Word assumed the office of Ruler of men; for the human eye could no longer look on God; the human ear could no longer hear his voice, but trembling it fled and sought to hide itself. The voice of man's guilt cried, like the Israelites, Give us a king that he may rule over us, and let him speak, but do not thou speak to us, lest we die. And so, the Son of God, who was to become man in due time, and has at length become our brother actually, and was always our brother by anticipation, he has ever from the first been the King of men. Almighty is his power, infinite his knowledge and wisdom, immeasurable his love, unfailing his rectitude; and he is bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh. He has always made the law for men, who himself is man, and has himself fulfilled the law he made. He legislates for his brethren, and rules his brethren, and he executes in regard to his brethren that law which he made for

them.

The Father hath given him to execute judgment also, because he is the Son of man. Therefore the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment to the Son. Foreigners and aliens are commonly regarded by nations as questionable rulers: and we, so suspicious are we rendered by sin, might regard a superior nature (even though that nature were divine) with distrust, as if less sensibly alive to them, and less prepared to sympathize with those infirmities in which itself did not participate. But now all judgment is committed to him who is the Son of man, that every suspicion on our part may be removed; and, because as he was, so are we in this world, we might have confidence before him in the day of judgment.

And now, ye followers of Jesus, what defence, what support, what guidance can ye need, which this your king, who is God Almighty, cannot afford you-which this your ruler, who is love, will not supply? In all your frailties and ignorances and temptations manifold, remember that He your Divine Sovereign is man, and has suffered being tempted, and is qualified to succour you when ye are tempted. Be not startled by dangers, nor scared by enemies; neither faint ye at the thought of your own weakness, and the power of the devil, and his cunning, and the cruel malice of his servants. Let the almightiness and infinite love of your most gracious King, God's son, your brother, assure your hearts, that following him, ye shall be conquerors, yea more than conquerors.

It was necessary that our Prophet, he who should effectually teach us, should be not simply God, or mere

man, but both: and none could so teach us who was not both God and man.

It is a gross mistake to suppose that what mankind needed most was knowledge of good and evil; or that the possession of this knowledge, in even the highest perfection, is sufficient of itself to subdue the heart to the obedience and love of God. The Jews possessed this knowledge as much as we do. The two great commandments are written as distinctly in the law as in the Gospel. The outlines of duty were traced for them as clearly as they are for us. But to how little purpose, their history teaches too plainly. Even regarding the heathens themselves, I will make bold to affirm, there is scarcely a duty or rule of morality, laid down in the New Testament, but may be found expressed, with more or less clearness, in the writings of some one or more of their poets or philosophers. What, then, did they need? They needed this, to be shown and convinced that goodness was not impossible. An actual instance of its practicability they had never witnessed; for teachers of virtue they had enough, but almost none who even pretended to exhibit what they taught. They saw righteousness as in the height of heaven, and they acknowledged its lovliness. They mined for it, as in the depths, and they confessed it was precious; but, in despair, they cried, Who shall ascend to the heavens to bring it down? who shall descend to the depth to bring it up, that we may do it? It was not necessary, therefore, that another temple of God should be reared of stones, or that, from that dead temple, the same dead law, the mere letter of outward