animal? Would it have occurred to them naturally that the Creator would be pleased with their burning to Him, in part or in whole, one of the creatures that He had made? Must they not have learnt it by tradition from our common ancestor, Noah? It should be remembered that in the Babylonian account of the Flood, as in the account in the Bible, stress was laid on the offering up of sacrifice as soon as the Flood was over. Probably Noah had received the tradition from Adam who had been taught of God in this matter.

Rev. E. SEELEY said: I do not rise to criticise as I agree with nearly all that Mr. Marston has now set before us whether by printed or spoken word.

"Christ died for our sins"; a "Propitiation for our sins for the whole world."

"God

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gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." "The Blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin." These scripture truths I fully accept. But, "the Christian Doctrine of Atonement includes more, and the fuller revelation makes the Gospel more intelligible :—more evidently "the wisdom of God." I Cor. i, 23, 24.

Let Scripture be our sole basis, and let us start with the first revelation of God's Gospel. Gen. iii, 15, "It shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel." This implies victory through suffering, a victory of conquest of the Evil one, and of deliverance of the enslaved. The New Testament tells us in clearer language of the Saviour "becoming obedient even unto death, yea, the death of the Cross." "Wherefore also God highly exalted Him, etc." (Phil. ii, 8, 9). Christ came as the God-given Lamb of Sacrifice. But the typical sacrifices were NOT CRUCIFIED. Why was Christ crucified ? With the last quoted text compare Rom. v, 18, 19 "As through one trespass the judgment came unto all men to condemnation; even so through one act of righteousness the free gift came unto all men to justification of life. For as through the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One shall the many be made righteous."

That " one act of righteousness" was the "obedience even unto death, yea, the death of the Cross." The perfect victory over extremest temptation was "well-pleasing" to God and effected

Atonement, and the Reconciliation included Redemption; as stated in Heb. ix, 12" by His own blood He entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption."

The absolute perfection of Christ's sacrifice of Himself in entire devotion to God through life and death was the " one act of righteousness" that "much more" than atoned for the former "one trespass" and also for our abounding sins, and therefore "where sin abounded, grace did abound more exceedingly; that as sin reigned in death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” (see Rom. v, 17-21).

So we see that Christ's tremendous victory was also the Atoning Act that pleased God, and it procured for the Reconciler the throne of grace and glory, and also the New Covenant of grace for mankind; and by that Covenant He assures grace and glory to all who accept His salvation, and trust in Him.

The Rev. JOHN TUCKWELL said that we could not add to that which God had Himself told us about the Atonement. He did not see that there was any force in the objection that had sometimes been made to the use of what had been spoken of as the "commercial terms in which the Doctrine of Atonement had been expressed. The Scriptures themselves spoke of "buying the truth," and similar terms were in ordinary usage amongst ourselves; thus we would say of a man who had ruined his health by overstudy that "he paid a heavy price for his knowledge," but here there was no question of anyone receiving that price. There was one view of the question which should not be overlooked. God was not only our Heavenly Father, full of mercy and love; He was also the Moral Governor of the universe, who could not look upon sin with the least degree of allowance. Light thoughts of Atonement generally went with a light estimation of sin. We can form no ideas of our own as to how it was possible for a just God to receive sinners back into favour; He Himself must tell us ; the plan must be His entirely; and His plan was seen in the sacrifice of the Incarnate Son of God.

Mr. J. SCHWARTZ, Junr., read quotations from the writings of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Mr. W. H. Mallock, Dr. E. B. Tylor, the Rev. George Henslow, and Sir Oliver Lodge to show that these writers were not in accord with Mr. Marston on the

question of Atonement, and he held that the doctrine of the "Blood" did not appeal to the majority of the educated laity of the XXth century.

The Rev. A. COCHRANE said: If it be true as the last speaker said in his quotation from Sir A. Conan Doyle, that the rising generation has largely outgrown the Doctrine of the Atonement, he could only say that he was very sorry for the rising generation. As for Sir Oliver Lodge, and others like him, the language they used only revealed their great ignorance of the real teaching of the Bible. The questions that lie behind the statement, "the Incarnate Son incurred the entire liability of the race that He came to redeem" (p. 48), are "Why did the Son take upon Himself the liability of the race," and "How could He do it"? The Apostle St. Paul in Col. i, speaks of Him not only as "the First-born from the dead," but also as "the First-born of all creation." In verse 16, we read in the Authorized Version "by Him all things were created," but in the Greek and in the Revised Version, it is "in Him." This passage in the Epistle deals with a wider subject than the reconciliation of the human race alone. It speaks of the reconciliation of all creation. The Son was the original Head of all things, and before the fall of man, He formed a real link between God and the human race. After the fall, He followed that race, to which He was so closely linked, into its fallen condition, so that He might redeem it, and bring it back to God. It was as the original Head of man that Christ incurred and took upon Himself the burden of man's sin. The great questions were not so much that of Atonement, as "Who made the Atonement?" and "What is His relationship to the human race?"

The Rev. F. B. JOHNSTON said that Mr. Schwartz had quoted from a number of writers, and claimed that the majority of educated men at the present time was on his side. Truth has always been held by the minority of men; the carnal mind kicks at the Doctrine of the Atonement.

The Rev. F. CECIL LOVELY, rose to protest against the attitude Mr. Schwartz habitually took in putting forth views that were diametrically opposed to the constitutions of the Victoria Institute. Mr. Schwartz did not appear to have any desire to investigate Philosophical and Scientific questions of truth; but only to assert opinions, which were often offensive to those whose belief was

"based upon faith in the existence of one Eternal God, who, in His wisdom created all things very good."

Prof. LANGHORNE ORCHARD thought there could be no question as to the truth that "a profound and inviolable association linked the forgiveness of their sins with the shedding of the blood of Jesus" (p. 49).

The value of the Paper-good as it is-would, however, have been enhanced had the author carefully explained the meaning of "sin" and the meaning of "The Blood of Christ." St. John tells us that "sin is lawlessness." It is insubjectivity of will to the law of God. The proper penalty of sin is forfeiture of life, as stated in the declarations-"The soul that sinneth it shall die," "The wages of sin is death," "Sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death." By his sin, man has forfeited his life. The penalty must be met, either by the sinner himself, or, if he is to be saved, by another on his behalf. Thus, salvation involves the vicarious principle, and is impossible otherwise. "The Blood of Christ" is His life poured out upon the Cross, that we might live (cf. Lev. xvii, 11, 14, and St. John x, 10).

The CHAIRMAN in closing the meeting said that he thought the Institute owed a debt of gratitude to Mr. Schwartz for he showed the "leanness of the land" possessed by merely negative teaching.

Mr. Marston had already left, but the meeting indicated very plainly its gratitude for the impressive address he had delivered on a subject of profound importance.

SUBSEQUENT COMMUNICATIONS.

Sir ROBERT ANDERSON: To gain clear thoughts on this subject we do well to define the word "Atonement." As Archbishop Trench tells us in his Synonyms, "When our translation (of the Bible) was made it signified, as innumerable examples prove, reconciliation, or the making up of a foregoing enmity; all its uses in our early literature justifying the etymology, now sometimes called in question, that atonement' is at-one-ment."

No one, indeed, who will study the passages in which the Hebrew word occurs which our translators usually render "to make atonement " can fail to see that under the divine law the at-one-ment was not the sacrifice itself, but a result of sacrifice, depending on the

work of priesthood. And in keeping with this, iλdokopai is used in Heb. ii, 17, with reference to the Lord's present and continuing work for His people, as High Priest.

Now, however, the word has come to be accepted as equivalent to "propitiatory sacrifice." And in this sense, not only is atonement, as Mr. Marston says, older than Christianity, it is older than Judaism. For Abel offered a propitiatory sacrifice. And the record gives proof that he did so in pursuance of a preceding revelation; for it was not by higher intelligence, but by faith that he offered a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain. The universality of sacrifice (and it is found among all the savage races of the world) can only be accounted for by a tradition based on a primeval revelation. For no rational being could evolve from his own brain the idea that by killing a fellow creature he would appease God. Its universality, moreover, gives proof that human nature instinctively responds to the Divine demand for a propitiatory sacrifice. And the infidel must account for this before we can give a hearing to his attacks on the Scriptural truth of the Atonement.

The Rev. Chancellor LIAS: The Christian Creed is a collection, not of dogmas, but of facts. It does not, in the first instance, that is, consist of propositions drawn up on paper and accepted by the mind (though these may result from it), but of fundamental facts believed by the heart, and realized by the conscience. The controversies which for centuries have desolated Christianity have not been on the facts of the Divine Order, presented in the Creed, but on the explanations of those facts which various schools of theology have given of such questions, as the Presence in the Eucharist; the fact of Inspiration; the necessity of an Episcopal government of local churches. So on the question of Atonement, explanations have found acceptance which had the merit of simplicity, rather than that of duly estimating all the various conditions of a very complex problem. The great Father Origen has been credited with the theory that the price of our redemption was paid to the Devil; it is a matter of fact that he did deliver himself of such an obiter dictum, as of many other like suggestions. But his reasoned conclusion was that the mode of Christ's Atonement involved a host of considerations, some lying on the very surface, but some of immense complexity and difficulty. There can be no harm whatever in endeavouring to find reasonable explanations of a