depth; is there not, also, a difficulty in
speaking to them of that great thing which the Church celebrates to-day?
Is there no difficulty in awakening their interest, or rather how can we
escape even from wearying or repelling them, when their own affections
and deep thoughts must find all words of man, whether of themselves or
others, infinitely unworthy to express either the one or the other? To
such, then, the words of the preacher may be no more than music without
any words at all; which does but serve to lead and accompany our own
thoughts, without distinctly suggesting any thoughts of another to
interrupt the workings of our own minds. We would speak of Christ's
death; most good it is for us and for you to think upon it; so far as
our words suit the current of your own thoughts, use them and listen to
them; so far as they are a too unworthy expression of what we ought to
think and feel, follow your own reflections, and let the words neither
offend you nor distract you.

I would endeavour just to touch, upon some of the purposes for which the
Scripture tells us that Christ died, and for which his death was
declared to be the great object of our faith. This done in the simplest
and fewest words will best show the infinite greatness of the subject;
and how truly it is, so to speak, the central point of Christianity.

First of all, Christ died as a proper sacrifice for sin; as a sacrifice,
the virtue of which, is altogether distinct from our knowledge of it, or
from any effect which it has a tendency to produce on our own minds. We
are forgiven for his sake; we are acquitted through his death, and
through faith in his blood. What a view does this open, partially,
indeed,--for what mortal eye can reach to the end of it?--of the evil of
sin, and of God's love! of what God's justice required, and of what
God's love fulfilled! This great sacrifice was made once, but it will
not be made again; for those who despise this there remains no more
offering for sin, but their sin abideth with them for ever.

Secondly, Christ's death is revealed to us as a motive capable of
overcoming all temptations to evil. "How much more shall the blood of
Christ purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?"
"He suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us
to God;" that is, that a consideration of what Christ's death declares
to us should have power to melt the hardest heart, and to sober the
lightest: