T E S 



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T E S 



Christianity, or the religion of both Testaments, is tha 

 habitual course of life which rests upon a conviction o 

 the necesbity of the redemption of the world, and of the 

 neeJ of a personal redeemer Jesus Christ. Hence th 

 inadequacy of various terms employed occasionally a 

 synonymous with Christianity (such as the religion o: 

 moral conduct ; a practical belief in immortality and re- 

 tribution ; or the worship of God according to the pattern 

 given by Jesus) to express its distinctive peculiarities 

 ie of the religions to be found in the world at the birth 

 of Christ can claim alliance with Christianity, save thai 

 one which alone has any pretensions to be regarded as 

 historical and positive, and which was directly alluded to 

 by our Lord in the words that ' Salvation cometh from the 

 Jews.' Nor are the reasons of this difficult to be traced. 

 The conviction of the need of redemption turns the mind 

 upon the conviction of sin ; sin leads it to the considera- 

 tion of the law broken and violated : and this last con- 

 ducts it up to the original destination and capability ol 

 man and his relation to God ; and nowhere are these steps 

 to be traced so clearly as in the Law and the Prophets the 

 writings which contain the fullest account of the existing 

 disease and promised remedy. 



It is true that heathenism served in some sort to prepare 

 the way for Christianity. This is clear from two facts : 

 the ease with which heathen converts adopted the tenets 

 hrintianitv; and the analogy instituted by the early 

 Christian apologists between the relics of revealed truth, 

 which formed the brightest gems of heathenism, and their 

 own purer faith. But this preparation was merely nega- 

 Heathenism did no more than point out contraries 

 which it could not reconcile, doubts which it could not 

 solve, and wishes which it could not gratify. All ptmitirr 

 preparation for Christianity and the subject-matter of reve- 

 lation belongs to the Old Testament exclusively. 



The knowledge of the subject-matter of the Christian 

 system is drawn from one source exclusively, apostolical 

 tradition, as preserved to us in the sacred writings of the 

 New Testament. From these alone authoritative instruc- 

 tion is deduced. An analytical outline of the system of 

 faith contained in these writings is most properly divided 

 into two portions, respectively comprising the periods of 

 time anterior and subsequent to the coming of Our Lord. 

 In considering the ante-Christian period, the attention 

 is divided between Judaism and heathenism, or in other 

 words, between man under the law of God, and man with- 

 out this law, the two great classes into which the human 

 race was divide '' lently to the publication of the 



Mosaic code. But although different in many particulars, 

 both classes are included under one general point of re- 

 semblance, their wretchedness and want of a redeemer. 



From this helpless condition of man the mind reverts to 

 the point whence this dominion of sin and death, inse- 

 parably united, dates its commencement. But here a 

 -lion arises, whence was derived the power of sin to 

 extend itself among those who, like the Jews, possessed a 

 knowledge of the will of God :' The considerations arising 

 from this, of the relation of sin and death to the law, lead 

 tii the conclusion that the commandment which was or- 

 dained unto life was unto death. The law, according to 

 St. Paul, so far from affording deliverance from sin, or pro- 

 ducing saiictification, was the means of aggravating both 

 condemnation and guilt. This is still further illustrated 

 by other facts laid down by St. Paul, that the law can 

 never make man holy or happy in the sight of God. Being 

 such, why was it given at all ? The answer is, that it be- 

 longed to the plan by which God designed to make man 

 capable of redemption through Christ. To establish the 

 necessity of such redemption, to impress upon men a con- 

 \iction of the need of it, and to kindle a longing for it in 

 their hearts, is the object of the period anterior to Christ. 



Accordingly a survey of the state of the human race 

 antecedently to the coming of Christ leads to a conviction 

 of the need of a redeemer. The heathens lived in vice, 

 without knowledge of God, serving idols. Their standard 

 of action was litlle higher than that afforded by earthly 

 moti-. remaining of a higher knowledge. 



The condition of the Jews was very different. They were 

 indeed in i of Hie divine law, but they sought in 



vain to establish their righteousness before God by ob- 

 servance of its precepts. 



Through redemption, the difficulties which characterized 

 the ante-Christian period (and more especially the Jewish 



portion of it) were removed, and God and man reconciled. 

 The statement of the conditions and accomplishment of 

 this reconciliation leads to the consideration of the new 

 and holy life arising from it. 



The primary source and commencing point of the whole 

 scheme of redemption is God. According to his eternal 

 council, God decided on reconciling to himself a world 

 which had become alienated from him, and on rescuing 

 the race of Adam from the ruin to which they were has- 

 tening. This decree God had made known through his 

 prophets. An evidence of his truth and faithfulness was 

 supplied by its accomplishment. The instrument of this 

 was the mission of his Son, according to the eternal pur- 

 pose of his Father, 'that in the dispensation of the fulness 

 of time he might gather together in one all things in 

 Christ, both which are in Heaven and which are in earth.' 

 This mission of the Son, from which the newer period, 

 that, of Christianity, dates, coincides with the time when 

 heathenism and Judaism may be said to have filled their 

 appropriate spheres of moral action. Although no dog- 

 matic system, technically speaking, is to be found in the 

 writings of the New Testament, two points immediately 

 relating to the person of Christ are brought prominently 

 forward throughout. The first of these is his claim to 

 divine honours as the Son of God ; the second, his meri- 

 torious course of action, of which the crowning point was 

 his death, to which his resurrection was the glorious 

 sequel, and the proof of the completeness with which his 

 office had been discharged. 



The object of our Lord's earthly life was rather a course 

 of blameless and exemplary action than the delivery of a 

 moral code for human guidance. Hence, although in the 

 hortatory portions of St. Paul's Epistles allusion is made to 

 the excellencies exhibited by Christ, the mode 'of becoming 

 like him ' was conceived in a spirit, far deeper than that of 

 mere moral imitation. It is described as a putting off the 

 old man, and being clothed with Christ ; as being buried 

 with Christ, and as rising again with him. Such expres- 

 sions arise necessarily from the inseparable connection, 

 laid down in the New Testament scheme, between the 

 death and resurrection of Christ, as the foundation of the 

 ustification of man in the sight of God. 



The doctrines of repentance and a holy life implied in 

 :hese characteristics of the new covenant are essential 

 conditions on the side of the human party to the contract. 

 This is the sum and substance of the Sermon on the Mount, 

 which stands at the entrance of our Lord's earthly ministry, 

 a fit entrance and portal to the temple which lies beyond, 

 and an unfolding of the spirit and pure meaning of the 

 aw under which Christ came to live and suffer. A better 

 observance of this would have obviated the Antinomian 

 Jerversions which have risen up from the earliest times. 

 )ne garment, and one only, will make man meet for 

 rleaven :the wedding garment of Christ's parable), which 

 s the imputed righteousness of Christ, the accepted sacri- 

 ice for the children of Adam. But while the human race 

 exists, the essential rules of that law which Christ came to 

 satisfy will be binding, and men will find their truest 

 >leasure and profit in obedience to its spirit. Christ came 

 o found a new kingdom. Accordingly he opens his first 

 liscourse by describing the members of it, their condition 

 and prospects in the world. And yet his kingdom was not 

 o much a new one, as a fulfilling and spiritualizing of the 

 brmer dispensation ; for which reason the second part of 

 lis sermon is taken up in expounding the law of Moses, 

 and its real obligations, and, in the words of Robert Hall, 

 in animating its spirit, and in filling up or directing its 

 >ractice.' But essential to a due performance of the con-' 

 litions of this law ' must be reckoned the assistance or 

 guidance of God's holy spirit, as the chief of all aids, and 

 vhich contains all others. And because this cannot be 

 indei stood without admitting that the Holy Spirit is omni- 

 >resent, all-sufficient, and, in a word, strictly divine ; there- 

 ore the divinity of the Holy Ghost is a fundamental article 

 >f the Christian covenant.' (Latham, Harmonia Paulina.') 

 Christian Society forms the second part of the theologi- 

 cal system which may be extracted from the New Testa- 

 nent! as comprehending the origin of the Christian com- 

 nunity, its gradual progress and necessary conditions, the 

 relation of its members to each other, and their unity in 

 he spirit. We cannot fai-l to observe, according to Ham- 

 nond, ' from the interchangeable mixture of the graces 

 ICM-, ibed by Christ in the opening of the Sermon on the 



