r behalf, but that
being who valiantly labors and denies himself. It is the kindness and
mercy exhibited in the self-denial that move the affections; and the
affections can move to no being but the one that makes the
self-denial, because it is the self-denial that draws out the love of
the heart.

"It is said, that Christ was sent by God to do His will and not His
own; and therefore we ought to love God, as the being to whom
gratitude and love are due for what Christ said and suffered.

"Then it is answered: If God willed that Christ, as a creature of His,
should come, and by His suffering and death redeem sinners, we ought
not to love Christ for it, because He did it as a creature in
obedience to the commands of God, and was not self-moved nor
meritorious in the work; and we cannot love God for it, for the labor
and self-denial were not borne by Him. And further: If one being, by
an act of his authority, should cause another innocent being to
suffer, in order that he might be loved who had imposed the suffering,
but not borne it, it would render him unworthy of love. If God had
caused Jesus Christ, being His creature, to suffer, that He might be
loved Himself for Christ's sufferings, while He had no connection with
them, instead of such an exhibition, on the part of God, producing
love to Him, it would procure pity for Christ and aversion towards
God. So that, neither God, nor Christ, nor any other being, can be
loved for mercy extended by self-denials to the needy, unless those
self-denials were produced by a voluntary act of mercy upon the part
of the being who suffers them; and no being, but the one who made the
sacrifice, could be meritorious in the case. It follows, therefore,
incontrovertibly, that if Christ was a creature--no matter of how
exalted worth--and not God; and if God approved of His work in saving
sinners, _He approved of treason against His own government_; because,
in that case, the work of Christ was adapted to draw, and did
necessarily draw, the affections of the human soul to Himself, as its
Spiritual Saviour and thus alienated them from God, their rightful
object. And Jesus Christ Himself had the design of drawing men's
affections to Himself in view, by His crucifixion; says He, 'And I, if
I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me.' This He
said signifying what death He should die: thus distinctly stating that
it was the self-denials and mercy exhibited in the crucifixion that