“That the death of Christ was the real and efficient sacrifice, of which the various offerings under the law were but the types or shadows, is evident from a crowd of passages in Holy Writ to which I have repeatedly drawn your attention. But as if to prevent the possibility of doubt on the subject, St. Paul emphatically tells the Hebrews that the High Priest entering into the Holy of Holies with the annual sin-offering was only ‘a figure for the time then present.’ And he distinctly adds, that Christ, not ‘by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood, obtained eternal redemption for us.’
“The promise made to our first parents intimated a future deliverer, who should remove those evils which had been entailed on mankind by their misconduct. This was the assurance that became to the Israelites the grand object of their faith; and it was to perpetuate this fundamental article of their hope and belief, that a standing memorial both of the fall and of the promised deliverance was appointed. Now, what memorial could be more apposite, than that of animal sacrifice?—It connected in one view the two great events in the moral history of man, the Fall, and the Recovery: the death denounced against sin, and the death appointed for that Holy Intercessor whose blood was to be accepted as a final atonement.
“How true it is, that the ways and thoughts of God are not like those of men!
“Wonderful in every part of it, but chiefly in the last acts of it, was the awful scene of this stupendous expiation. That the author of life should himself be made subject to death—that his sufferings and humiliation should be the manifestation of his glory—that by stooping to death he should conquer death;—and that the height of human malice should but accomplish the purposes of God’s mercy!
“If you compare the whole chain of prophecies with the history of our Lord’s sufferings, you will find that it was not until they were fulfilled to the minutest point, that the patient Son of God, as if then at liberty to depart, said ‘It is finished.’—Yes, all that the wicked were destined to contribute to the general deliverance was finished.
“We cannot understand the mysteries of God; but we may easily perceive his goodness. We cannot discover his motives, but we have no difficulty in discovering his will. We cannot comprehend the actions of Providence, or the moral government of the universe; but we can have no uncertainty about the laws which should govern our own actions—they are clearly and forcibly stated in the Gospel; all that it imports a sinful being to know, to believe, or to do, all that concerns our fall and our redemption, everything that involves the greatest interests of the human race, is there unfolded. We cannot penetrate that inscrutable decree which rendered it unfit to pardon sin without vicarious atonement; but we may form some faint conception of the immense sacrifice that Christ made for us, in order to satisfy Eternal Justice. From the horror with which he contemplated his approaching death, and from the agony with which he prayed that the cup of bitterness might pass from him, we may surely infer that his sufferings were of no ordinary nature—that the sacrifice was, indeed, great. Yet in the depth of his anguish, his prayer was one of perfect resignation and devout humility—‘Nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt.’
“Let us then learn, from his great example, how and where to seek for consolation when misfortune or misery overtakes us; let us pour forth our petitions with the same fervour as he did; and let us bow with the same submission in our hearts to the decrees of unerring wisdom.”
25th.—My excellent aunt came down stairs yesterday evening, and this bright cheering day she took a little walk with my uncle. Grace and I had the pleasure of accompanying them. Every thing seemed to sympathise with her recovery—all nature seemed to be reviving—buds opening, and young leaves bursting out; many branches of hawthorn in sheltered places quite green, and the young elms feathered with their pretty opening leaves. The glades in the forest were carpeted with primroses—the birds were building in every bush, and singing as they worked; the lambs were sporting about, and the pastures beginning to shew the little cheerful daisy—
The lambkin crops its crimson gem,
The wild bee murmurs on its breast,
The blue fly bends its pensile stem
Light o’er the skylark’s nest.
Grace repeated that pretty stanza of Montgomery’s; and when I asked her if she knew what was meant by “its crimson gem,” she replied, “Yes, Mamma told me that the buds of trees are called gems, from the Latin word gemma.” My uncle added that here the term is poetically applied to the flowers while yet unclosed—though it is only leaf-buds to which botanists give that name.