VIII. Christ was perfectly innocent, and free from Sin. 1. John viii. 46. "Which of you convinceth me of sin? And if I say the truth, why do you not believe

me?"

Rather, as Dr. Campbell translates, and as the connexion requires, "Which of you convicteth me of falsehood?"

2. Acts iii. 14. "But ye denied the Holy One and the Just.”

3. Acts vii. 52. " And they have slain them who shewed before of the coming of the Just One, of whom ye have been now the betrayers and murderers."

4. James v. 6. "Ye have condemned and killed the Just One; and he did not resist you7."

Mr. Dodson supposes that in these texts there is an allusion to Isa. iii. 10, which he thinks to have been wilfully corrupted by the Jews in the original Hebrew, and which, in conformity to the LXX. and to Justin Martyr, he translates thus: "Wo to them, because they have devised evil against themselves, saying, Let us destroy the Just One, for he is of no use to us." This the learned translator understands to be a prophecy of the rejection and sufferings of the Messiah, here and in other places described as the Just or Righteous One.

5. 2 Cor. v. 21. "He hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin.'

6. Heb. vii. 26. "For such a high priest became us, who was holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners."

7. 1 Pet. ii. 21, 22. "Christ suffered, leaving us an example:--who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth."

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Tov Aixalov, the Righteous One,' and he did not resist you." Newcome.-See Dodson on Isa. iii, 10.

8. 1 Pet.

8. 1 Pet. iii. 18. "Christ has once suffered for sins, the Just for the unjust."

9. 1 John iii. 5. "And ye know that he was manifested to take away our sin; and in him was no sin." 10. Rev. iii. 10. "These things saith he that is holy, he that is true."

Remarks.

1. The moral character of Christ, through the whole course of his public ministry, as recorded by the evangelists, is pure and unimpeachable in every particular.

2. Whether this perfection of character in public life, combined with the general declarations of his freedom from sin, establish, or were intended to establish, the fact, that Jesus through the whole course of his private life was completely exempt from all the errors and failings of human nature, is a question of no great intrinsic moment, and concerning which we have no sufficient data to lead to a satisfactory conclusion.

3. The uniform and consummate wisdom, propriety, and rectitude of our Lord's conduct in the various singular and critical situations in which he was placed, as related by the concurrent testimony of four independent historians, is a fact so extraordinary, as to preclude the possibility of fiction.

The great original, from which these artless historians have drawn so finished a portrait, must have had a real existence, and consequently the evangelical narrative must be true.

SECTION

SECTION VI.

CONCERNING THE ALLEGED SUPERIORITY OF CHRIST TO ANGELS.

For the better understanding of this question, it is necessary to introduce some preliminary remarks.

I. The primary sense of the word angel (ayyeλos) is' messenger:' and in this sense it frequently occurs in the Scriptures both of the Old and New Testament. 1 Sam. xix. 14, "Saul sent messengers (Gr. ayyɛλous, angels) to take David." Luke ix. 52, "He sent messengers (angels) before his face." Chap. vii. 24, "When the messengers (angels) of John were departed."

II. The word angel, frequently in the Old Testament, and sometimes in the New, expresses any symbol of the divine presence, or any instrument by which God makes known his will, or executes his purposes. Thus the pillar of cloud and fire is called the angel of God,' Exod. xiv. 19.-The plagues of Egypt are called 'evil angels,' Psalm lxxviii. 49.-And Herod's disease is called 'the angel of the Lord,' Acts xii. 23.

III. The word is sometimes used to express a prophet or messenger of God. Matt. xi. 10, "This is he of whom it is written, Behold, I send my messenger (angel) before thy face."

IV. The word angel sometimes expresses an order of beings, real or imaginary, superior to mankind: such as the Jews, at the commencement of the Christian æra, believed to be the instruments of Divine Providence in the

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administration of the world. Mark xiii. 32, “ But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels that are in heaven."

Concerning these supposed celestial intelligences it may be observed,

1. That it is very doubtful whether the word angel ever signifies a permanently-existing spiritual being in any book of the Old Testament, which was written previously to the Babylonian captivity.

It cannot be proved that the appearances in human shape to Abraham, Gen. xviii.; to Lot, chap. xix.; to Joshua, chap. v. 13, and others, were any thing more than temporary phantoms, visible symbols of the divine presence, and mediums of divine communications. The supposition that they were such is the more probable, as one of the three who appeared to Abraham is expressly called Jehovah: Gen. xviii. 13. 22, 23. So likewise is the angel who appeared to Joshua: Josh. vi. 2.1

2. It is certain that no names nor orders of angels, nor any distinction of them into good and evil, is even hinted at in any book which can be proved to have been written. before the captivity.

3. In those books of the Old Testament which are certainly known to have been written during or after the cap. tivity, and likewise in the Apocrypha, angels are mentioned as a distinct and superior order of beings; they are represented as of different ranks and orders; as presiding over different countries; as separated into good and bad; and, what is most extraordinary, as even distinguished by appropriate names, viz. Gabriel, Michael, and the like.

"It is doubtful whether in some cases, what are called angels, and had the form of men, who even walked and spake, &c., like men, were any thing more than temporary appearances, and no permanent beings; the mere organs of the Deity, used for the purpose of making himself known and understood by his creatures." Dr. Priestley's Hist. of Early Opinions, vol. i. p. 5.

4. The whole mythology concerning angels is destitute of all foundation in the Jewish and Christian revelations. Antecedently to the captivity it was unknown. By Jesus and his apostles it is alluded to as the popular and established belief of the age; but by them it was never taught as an article of faith. Revelation therefore is no more responsible for the existence of angels, good or evil, than it is for the existence of witches, and necromancers, of apparitions, or of demons, that is, human ghosts entering into and tormenting living men,—all which are alluded to by the sacred writers, and even assumed as facts. The Jews probably borrowed their theory of angels from the Oriental philosophy. Our Lord and his apostles assumed it, and argued upon it as a popular hypothesis, as they did in the other cases: and they left the credit of this system, as they did the rest, to stand or fall by its own evidence, which, in fact, is none at all.

5. When the superiority of Christ to angels is affirmed in the sacred writings, it is to be understood in one or other of the following acceptations:

1.) That Jesus of Nazareth is superior to all former prophets and messengers of God.

2.) That when Jesus is represented under the character of a judge appearing in state, or seated upon a tribunal, officers under the name of angels, or messengers, are with great propriety introduced as attending in his train to support his dignity, and to execute his orders. How far this scenery will ever be realized, or whether the representation is to be understood in a literal or a figurative sense, the event only can ascertain. But consistency, and, if one may so express it, the costume of the picture, required that, where there was a judge, a tribunal, a hall of justice, books of law and judgement, arraignment and trial, and an immense multitude of spectators and of culprits, there should

also