"to the devil as a tormentor. And with refpect "to God, justice required that man should be re"deemed, but not with refpect to the devil; fo "that Chrift paid his blood to God, and not to "the devil. It was not naturally impoffible for God," he fays, " to be reconciled to man "without the death of Chrift, but this was more "convenient, as by this means he obtained more " and better gifts than by the mere will of God." He fays that "God might have remitted the fins " of men by his mere will, but that it is more ❝ convenient to do it by the death of Christ, on "account of the various ufes which it answered at "the fame time, especially moral ones; and among "others he mentions our being thereby the more "excited to love God, and that Christ thereby gave an example of obedience, humility and "fortitude." He fays†, that "the guilt of fin is "taken away by the renovating power of grace, " and the punishment of Christ, as a man making fatisfaction to God." He illuftrates the merits of Chrift with respect to chriftians, by the idea of his being the head, and they the body, as if, fays he, a man by means of his hands fhould redeem himself from a punishment due for a fin committed by his feet. Laftly, he maintained that baptifm, penance, and the other facraments, derived their virtue from the death of Christ. * Ibid. Qu. xlvi. Art. iii. p. 111. + Ib. Q. xxii. p. 57. ‡ Qu. xlviii, Art. vi. p. 120. It appears from thefe extracts, that the Latin church was far from having any confiftent doctrine of atonement, though a great deal was ascribed to the death of Christ. We fhall find, in another part of this work, that though the writers of this age admitted the doctrine of Austin concerning grace, they were not without expedients to make room for the doctrine of the merit of good works, and even to provide a fund of merit, transferable to those who had it not, of which the court of Rome made a most intemperate use. This doctrine of merit, would naturally check the tendency which the divines of that`church might otherwise have had, to perfect the doctrine of fatisfaction for fin by the death of Chrift; and it was in oppofition to this doctrine of human merit, that Luther, and fome others of the reformers, laid the great stress which we find they did upon the doctrine of the merit of Christ, and the fatisfaction made for our fins by his death. With them, therefore, and with them only, shall we find the doctrine of atonement completed in all its parts. How this business stood in the Greek church, I have had no opportunity of tracing; but from the few fpecimens I have given of it, it fhould feem, that their opinions were nearer to thofe of our reformers than those of the church of Rome. It is very remarkable, that we find nothing like a controverfy on the fubject of this doctrine in all all the western church, quite down to the reformation; nor do we find any thing of this kind in the Greek church, except, that in the twelfth century, the emperor Emanuel, Commenus, exercised himself and his divines with this question, "in what fenfe it might be affirmed than an in"carnate God was at the fame time the offerer " and the oblation?" But nothing of any consequence refulted from it. SECTION VIII. Of the Doctrine of the Reformers on the Subject of Atonement. THE first who feparated from the church of Rome were the Waldenfes, of Piedmont in the Alps. They feem to have had their origin from the time of Claudius bishop of Turin, who distinguished himself by his oppofition to the worship of images, and other innovations of the church of Rome, in the tenth century. With them we find a general outline of the doctrine of atonement in the confeffion of faith, which they prefented to the king of France in 1544; in which * Mosheim, vol. ii. p. 435. they they fay, that," the Fathers, to whom Chrift was "promifed, notwithstanding their fin, and their "impotence by the Law, defired the coming of "Chrift to fatisfy for their fins, and to fulfil the "Law by itself." But we find nothing of this fubject in their older confeffions. In general, however, it cannot but appear probable, that as the advocates of the church of Rome were inclined to explain away the doctrine of grace, and to introduce that of merit, those who wished for a reformation of the abuses of penance, purgatory, and indulgences, which were founded on the doctrine of merit, would lean to the other extreme, and lay great stress on the fatisfaction made for fin by the death of Christ alone. t Wickliffe feems to have been a firm believer of the doctrine of predeftination, and alfo of the abfolute neceffity of the death of Chrift, in order to the forgiveness of fin, if his fentiments be faithfully represented by Dupin, who cenfures him for maintaining that God could not pardon fin without the fatisfaction of Jefus Chrift; that he can fave none but those who are actually faved; and that he wills fin in order to bring good out of it. And Mr. Gilpin represents him ‡, as maintaining that "all men, as far as the merit of "another can avail, are partakers of the merits * Leger, Histoire. p. 94. Hiftory, vol. viii. p. 117. " of "of Chrift." This, however, is not very confiftent with the doctrine of predeftination. But after the reformation by Luther, we find the doctrine of fatisfaction, or atonement for fin by the death of Chrift, reduced to a regular system, grounded on certain principles, and pursued to its proper extent. It cannot be faid of the divines' fince that period, as it may perhaps be faid of fome before it, that what we meet with in them on this fubject were only cafual expreffions, or hafty and unfettled thoughts, and that if they had written more fully and profeffedly upon the subject, they might, perhaps, have advanced what would have been inconfiftent with it. There can be no doubt but that the principles of this doctrine were the real persuasion of many of the first reformers, that they confidered it as an article of the utmost consequence, and that even the doctrine of the divinity of Chrift was only a fecondary confideration with refpect to it. Since the reason of the incarnation of Chrift, they fay, was the giving merit to his fufferings and death, and to enable him to make an infinite fatisfaction for fin, which was of infinite magnitude, and required nothing lefs to expiate it at the hands of a righteous and just God. That the firft reformers fhould fo eagerly catch at this doctrine, and lay the ftrefs they did upon it, may be accounted for upon two confiderations. The firft is, that the controverfy began |