  Friends and Brethren:—The Biblical record of the great Nazarene, whose character we to-day commemorate, is scanty; but what is given, puts to flight every doubt as to the immortality of his words and works. Though [30] written in a decaying language, his words can never pass [1] away: they are inscribed upon the hearts of men: they are engraved upon eternity's tablets. Undoubtedly our Master partook of the Jews' feast of the Passover, and drank from their festal wine-cup. [5] This, however, is not the cup to which I call your at- tention,—even the cup of martyrdom: wherein Spirit and matter, good and evil, seem to grapple, and the human struggles against the divine, up to a point of discovery; namely, the impotence of evil, and the om- [10] nipotence of good, as divinely attested. Anciently, the blood of martyrs was believed to be the seed of the Church. Stalled theocracy would make this fatal doctrine just and sovereign, even a divine decree, a law of Love! That the innocent shall suffer for the guilty, is inhuman. The [15] prophet declared, “Thou shalt put away the guilt of innocent blood from Israel.” This is plain: that what- ever belittles, befogs, or belies the nature and essence of Deity, is not divine. Who, then, shall father or favor this sentence passed upon innocence? thereby giving the [20] signet of God to the arrest, trial, and crucifixion of His beloved Son, the righteous Nazarene,—christened by John the Baptist, “the Lamb of God.” Oh! shameless insult to divine royalty, that drew from the great Master this answer to the questions of the [25] rabbinical rabble: “If I tell you, ye will not believe; and if I also ask you, ye will not answer me, nor let me go.” Infinitely greater than human pity, is divine Love,— that cannot be unmerciful. Human tribunals, if just, borrow their sense of justice from the divine Principle [30] thereof, which punishes the guilty, not the innocent. The Teacher of both law and gospel construed the substitution of a good man to suffer for evil-doers—a crime! When [1] foretelling his own crucifixion, he said, “Woe unto the world because of offenses! for it must needs be that offenses come; but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh!” [5] Would Jesus thus have spoken of what was indis- pensable for the salvation of a world of sinners, or of the individual instrument in this holy (?) alliance for accom- plishing such a monstrous work? or have said of him whom God foreordained and predestined to fulfil a divine [10] decree, “It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea”? The divine order is the acme of mercy: it is neither questionable nor assailable: it is not evil producing good, [15] nor good ultimating in evil. Such an inference were impious. Holy Writ denounces him that declares, “Let us do evil, that good may come! whose damnation is just.” Good is not educed from its opposite: and Love divine [20] spurned, lessens not the hater's hatred nor the criminal's crime; nor reconciles justice to injustice; nor substitutes the suffering of the Godlike for the suffering due to sin. Neither spiritual bankruptcy nor a religious chancery can win high heaven, or the “Well done, good and faithful [25] servant,... enter thou into the joy of thy Lord.” Divine Love knows no hate; for hate, or the hater, is nothing: God never made it, and He made all that was made. The hater's pleasures are unreal; his sufferings, |
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