tinually thank God that he is not required to travel a way his Savior never trod? And how cheerfully we sing,

Objection 3.

The graves of all the saints He bless'd,
And sweeten'd every bed;

Where should the dying members rest,
But with their dying Head.'

There was no necessity for the Divine nature to suffer. The human nature derived infinite dignity and value from its union with the Divine, and its sufferings were therefore sufficient for the redemption of mankind, without the sufferings of the Divine

nature.

Answer 1. This method of deriving merit is no where taught in the Bible, nor is it consonant to reason, as being that, on account of which we are redeemed, justified, and saved.

2. Worthiness or merit is not derived in this way. The condescension of a superior to an inferior, adds nothing to the real dignity and worthiness of the latter. The merit is his who condescends; and the greater the difference in the dignity and character of the two persons, the greater the condescension and merit. Merit, in the present case, is so far from belonging to the human nature, by derivation, that it is every where in Scripture, and by the whole Church, attributed to the Divine nature, and never would have been ascribed to the human had the sentiment been properly investigated. Was there ever a person, since the Savior was announced from heaven, who in his devotions and prayers admitted this view of merit-human merit thus derived? Are we not taught to look to Christ, and not merely to His human nature, for salvation, and to offer all our prayers and thanksgivings in His name, on His account, for His sake? Surely a sentiment which we cannot practise upon in our devotions should have no place in our creed. The truth is, that merit is wholly from the dignity of the Divine nature, and from His humiliation and obedience unto death.

Objection 4. The grand objection to the doctrine of this Essay is this: It is said that Jesus Christ could not suffer in his Divine nature e; that happiness is an essential attribute of the Divine nature, and of course the possibility of His suffering is excluded.'

Answer. It is not clear to my understanding that happiness is an essential attribute to the Divine nature, or that it is an attribute in the sense that integrity or holiness is. It appears that the happiness of the Deity is rather a result, so to speak, of the perfection of His nature and the rectitude of His conduct. God cannot be otherwise than holy : He cannot do wrong. But if He is pleased voluntarily to dispense with His happiness for a time, in view of accomplishing the greatest possible good to the universe, I can see no objection to His doing so. In thus suspending for a time His happiness, He violates no principle of moral holiness, nor departs in the least from infinite rectitude.

And is it not too much for us short-sighted creatures to say, that He cannot suffer pain, when He tells us in so many words, that He has power to lay down his life?' and that He took flesh and blood for the purpose of suffering death?'

Those who say the Divine nature did not suffer, seem not to be VOL. VI.-July, 1835.

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aware of what their words imply. Did He not suffer an eclipse of His glory when He became incarnate, and appeared in the form of a servant? But perhaps it is meant that He could not suffer pain. By what reasoning or argument this distinction can be made to appear, I know Cannot an infinite being suffer pain as well as suffer an eclipse or obscuration of his glory? But waiving this, let us consider the assertion that the Deity cannot suffer.'

not.

Was not the life of our blessed Savior upon earth made up chiefly of suffering and pain? Was there no suffering implied in His taking our nature and infirmities, and in bearing our sicknesses? Was there no suffering implied, when He who was rich became poor, (emptied Himself,) that we through His poverty might become rich? Was there no suffering, when He who was in the bosom of the Father left that felicity for a stable and a manger? Did the Son of God suffer no pain when extreme poverty placed His condition below the foxes which have holes, and the birds of the air which have nests? Was He a stranger to weariness and thirst? Did He not conflict with the powers of darkness, and endure the most painful temptations from His adversary the devil? Was He not reviled, and slandered, and persecuted by the very beings He came into the world to save? Did He not resist unto blood, striving against sin? Was the Divine nature present with the human, and did it suffer nothing during His bloody agony in the garden? If present, how did He support the human nature in the sense of the objector, when He was appalled, dismayed, and overwhelmed, with the weight of what He felt, and what He anticipated? And what support did the Divine nature administer to Him, when upon the cross He cried with a loud voice to the Father, My God! My God! why hast thou forsaken me-and gave up the ghost? Did the Son of God feel no pain when He was betrayed by one of His disciples, denied by another, and forsaken by all? Did He feel no pain when, as the King of the Jews, He was insultingly confronted with false witnesses, scourged, crowned with thorns, and crucified? Or did He suffer all these things as man only? Let the convulsions of nature speak, and let their voice be heard. Suffering made up and terminated the life of Christ upon earth; and shall we still be told that all these pains were suffered by His mere human nature? Yes, this is the objection. But where was the Divinity all this time? If it forsook the humanity in its suffering, we have a human Savior indeed: if the two natures remained united in one person, they were one in suffering.

We have not done with the objection, and on one condition will admit its validity: If it was the humanity which was rich, and for our sakes became poor; if it was the humanity which was in the form of God, and thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but made itself of no reputation, took the form of a servant, &c; if it was the mere humanity (called the Lord thy God') which was tempted in the wilderness; if the Messiah who, thirsty and weary, sat upon the well, and conversed with the woman of Samaria, was the mere humanity of Christ; if the Alpha and Omega,' who was 'dead,' and the Lamb who was slain,' were the mere humanity, then I will acknowledge the objection to be valid.

It seems not to be considered by the objector that the humiliation of the Divine Word consisted, not merely in His becoming incarnate,

but in His becoming incarnate for a special purpose, namely, that He might do and suffer all that was necessary for the redemption of the world; and that after the union of the two natures, whatever is done or suffered, is done or suffered by the person thus constituted, and not merely by a part of it. If we say that Jesus Christ did not suffer in his Divine nature, for what purpose did He take human nature? Was it that He might perform certain actions which imply no suffering? They imply this who say the Divine nature did not suffer. But where do we learn this? In what part of the word of God is it to be found? It surely is not where the Father saith, Awake, O sword, against my Shepherd, against the Man that is my fellow, saith the Lord!' Who is the Shepherd here but He who had life in Himself, and had power to lay it down, and who did actually lay it down for the sheep? The Man here spoken of was the Fellow' of the Almighty. But who is the fellow or companion of the almighty Father but the Divine Son?

I would ask the objector, whether the Son of God, by becoming incarnate, was not made under the law,' the moral as well as the ceremonial, and that for the double purpose of obeying its precepts and suffering its penalty? If he says yes, there is an end of the controversy; if no, I would ask him to inform us in what sense, and for what purpose He was made under the law? Was it the human nature alone that redeemed us from the curse of the law, by being made a curse for us? Or was the Divine nature, in union with the human, made under the law without being made a curse for us? To be under the law is the birth-right of every human being; but the phrase, to be made under the law, is no where used to express the natural condition of man, as a subject of law; but implies the special act of the Deity, in subjecting the Son of God to the condition of mankind, with reference to the law which requires obedience, or suffering the penalty for disobedience, and which in the case of our Redeemer required both obedience, and suffering the penalty of our disobedience. If then the Divine nature in union with the human was made under the law, that He might redeem us from its curse, on what ground of truth or propriety can we say the Divine nature did not suffer?

If Jesus Christ suffered only in His human nature, notwithstanding the language of the Scriptures is so full and explicit on the point, I cannot see that we have any definite rule to guide our inquiries, but every one is left to his own fancy in deciding what was appropriate to the human nature, and what to the Divine. One may say, this thing was proper to be said and done by the human nature, that, by the Divine; and except we allow that the two natures acted and suffered together in the whole work of redeeming sinners, how can we tell what was done by the humanity, and what by the Divinity of Christ?

Is the objection to be understood as lying against all suffering on the part of the Divinity, or only against the principal sufferings, as the agony in the garden, and the passion on the cross? To all suffering undoubtedly. For by what rule can it be shown that He can suffer in one degree, and not in two? or in two degrees, and not in three? The objection is, that it is impossible for the Deity to suffer,' that is, in any degree. But in the way of this there are insuperable difficulties.

Of the Divinity of Christ it is said, that though He was rich, yet

for our sakes He became poor.' This is universally understood to be spoken of the Divinity alone. Man was never rich, but always poor. But the privation of heavenly happiness and glory, and subjugation to poverty, imply suffering in a high degree. This privation and subjugation were not for a particular time or occasion, but for the whole time of our Savior's life upon the earth. And why do we make such a distinction between the actions and sufferings of Christ? Does not action frequently imply suffering, especially such action as we find in the life of our blessed Lord? He took upon Him the form, and sustained the character of a servant: 'I am among you as one that serveth,' are His own words to His disciples. His was a life of laborious action and weariness; so that we may well say,—

'A suffering life my Master led.'

Now if we subtract, not only the greater, but the lesser sufferings from His life, even those of privation and laborious action, what do we leave? Would not this make a blank in His life and character, which we should behold with horror and grief? Would it not be a subversion of His most important offices, as our Redeemer? If we say the Divine nature did not suffer, we leave the human nature to sustain all the suffering necessary for our redemption, and also to perform nearly the whole active service of the Redeemer upon earth. Might we not as well turn Socinians at once, and humanize His person and His actions as well as His pains? But then what shall we do with the Scriptures? Shall we torture and press them into a service they never contemplated? To say nothing of the numerous proofs of His Divinity and incarnation, how shall we understand innumerable passages, which expressly or by implication refer suffering and death to the Divine nature, in connection with the human? For example, How can we understand Acts xx, 28, without admitting the substance of Dr. A. Clarke's comment? When we grant,' says he, that the greater evidence appears to be in favor of, Feed the Church of the Lord which He has purchased with His own blood; we must maintain that, had not this Lord been God, His blood could have been no purchase for the souls of a lost world.'

Again. How could we comment Col. i, 18, without admitting the following: The beginning here mentioned, (who is the beginning?) is very different from that spoken of before; and yet this beginning, which is His resurrection, is plainly laid down as a foundation of the principality and headship which He holds over the Church. He was the beginning, with respect to the creation of all things, being the Lord, or first born of every creature; He is the beginning and head of the Church, being the first born from the dead: the first who ever rose to an endless life. In all things, means in all respects; not only as the Maker of all things, but as the Mediator raised from the dead.' (Coke in loc.)

The passages which cannot be fairly commented without admitting the suffering and death of the complex person of our Savior, are very numerous, and are thus commented on by all sound interpreters of the word of God. I would not however represent that they have all adopted the theory of this Essay; nor can I see how they are consistent with themselves, or with the word of God, when they limit the sufferings of Christ to His human nature.

Thus I have exhibited some of the principal proofs of the proposition with which we started, and have answered all the principal objections which I have either heard or could think of; and must now leave the subject with the candid reader, who would do well to look carefully into it before he decides. And let him reflect that it is one which must be decided by revelation, and not by the reason of man. If the Scriptures teach that the whole complex person of our Savior suffered, that is the truth, and must be received, notwithstanding any difficulties that human reason may not be able to solve. If this is not the doctrine of the Bible it is to be rejected.

The question discussed in the foregoing pages, as it involves the character of the actions and sufferings of Christ, must be allowed to be important. It involves to a high degree the character of God, and the character of man, and the relation and obligations subsisting between them; it stamps the value of the human soul, and exalts, or otherwise, as the question is decided, the whole system of revealed religion. The entire system of revelation rests on the sacrificial death of the Son of God, as a building on its foundation. It has always been the glory of the Christian that he has a Divine and infinite Savior, and he measures his obligations to Him by the dignity of His person, and the labors and sufferings He has sustained in his redemption. He confesses Him in his creed, prays to Him as his God, and praises Him in his songs. And he does right thus to worship his Redeemer. The more highly he exalts His character and sufferings the more acceptable will his worship be, and the greater its saving effect upon his own heart. But let it never be supposed that the writer, in what is here or elsewhere said, supposes that their worship must be defective and unsound who differ from him in their views of the main position of this Essay. He utterly disclaims every sentiment and feeling of the kind; and for any word or sentence that might be so construed, he casts himself on the charity of his Christian brethren, and would ask pardon of God and man.

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And may both the reader and writer be permitted to mingle their notes of thanksgiving and praise with that innumerable company who shall sing with a loud voice, Worthy is the Lamb that was slain, to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honor, and glory, and blessing. Amen.

T. MERRITT.

N. B. As truth, and not victory or novelty, is the object of the foregoing Essay, and as the Scriptures alone can decide whether our Savior suffered in His whole person, or only in a part of it, the writer takes this opportunity to say, that should any one reply to what he has written, he will not feel himself bound to answer, unless his meaning should be misapprehended. If any one will show, by Scripture and sound argument, that his theory and arguments are unsound, he shalk have the thanks of the author.

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