the curse under which he labored.

Whatever the offense was, it was in the flesh, the result of weakness
rather than malice. There was something in his nature that inclined to
evil and was responsible for sin. The better part tried to serve, but
the inferior man revolted. Flesh, therefore, was wicked and sinful; and
since all offense must be atoned for, the flesh should pay the penalty
of evil. The wrath of God could be appeased, and sacrifice was the
thing that could do it.

Another thing most remarkable among those who worshiped by sacrifice in
the early times, is that they believed firmly in the reversibility of
merit, that is, that the innocent could atone for the wicked. Somehow,
they acquired the notion that stainless victims were more agreeable to
God than others. God sanctioned this belief among the Jews, and most
strikingly on the hill of Calvary.

This being the case, man being guilty and not having the right to
inflict the supreme penalty upon himself, the natural thing to do was
to substitute a victim for himself, to put the flesh of another in the
place of his own and to visit upon it the punishment that was due to
himself. And he offered to God this vicarious atonement. His action
spoke in this wise: "My God, I am a sinner and deserve Thy wrath. But
look upon this victim as though it were myself. My sins and offenses I
lay upon its shoulders, this knife shall be the bolt of Thy vengeance,
and it shall make atonement in blood." This is the language of
sacrifice. As we have said, it supposes the necessity of atonement and
belief in the reversibility of merit.

Now, if we find in history, as we certainly do find,--that all peoples
offered sacrifice of this kind, we do not think we would be far from
the truth if we deduced therefrom a law of nature; and if it is a law
of nature, it is a law of God. If there is no religion of antiquity
that did not offer sacrifice, then it would seem that the Almighty had
traced a path along which man naturally trod and which his natural
instinct showed him.

We believe in the axiom of St. Augustine: "securus judicet orbis
terrarum, a universally accepted judgment can be safely followed."
Especially do we feel secure with the history of the chosen people of
God before us arid its sacrifice ordained by the law; with the sanction
of Christ's sacrifice in our mind, and the practice of the divinely
inspired Church which makes sacrifice the soul of her worship.

The victim w