by his one sacrifice of himself he might fully atone for all our offences: and our Lord also, as we learn from Holy Writ, ever liveth to make intercession for us*.

Intercessory prayer and piacular sacrifice are here, we see, avowedly united: and we are certain, that the prayer of the great intercessor, no less than the prayer of Job, will be heard and accepted of the Lord. Yet, notwithstanding this undoubted circumstance, it were most unsatisfactory reasoning thence to infer, that, BECAUSE the prayer was efficacious, THEREFORE the sacrifice possessed no expiatory power.

CHAPTER IV.

Evidence of the divinely-approved Existence of the Doctrine of an Atonement during the Patriarchal Ages, from the Character of the Sacrifice of Noah.

THE preceding remarks may perhaps throw some light upon the true character of the sacrifice of Noah: and, when the true character of that sacrifice shall have been ascertained, it may possibly tend yet additionally to establish the divinely-approved existence of the doctrine of

* Heb. vii. 25.

an atonement during the period of the Patriarchal Dispensation.

Mr. Davison, with some reason, censures Dr. Spencer for pronouncing the sacrifice of Noah to have been piacular*. In saying this, I wish not to be understood as intimating, that Dr. Spencer was mistaken as to his opinion of its piacularity; for I believe his opinion, in that particular, to be perfectly correct: but the fact is, that he tacitly assumes, what he ought explicitly to have proved. Thus far, therefore, Mr. Davison's censure is just. In Dr. Spencer's very brief discussion of the matter, his arguments may shew, that the sacrifice was deprecatory: but the establishment of this point, as he has left the question, does not therefore demonstrate, that the sacrifice was also expiatory.

This defect in Dr. Spencer I shall endeavour to supply: and, for the sake of clearness, I shall argue the whole matter from the beginning.

I. The history of Noah's sacrifice is detailed by the sacred writer in manner following :—

Noah builded an altar unto the Lord: and took of every clean beast and of every clean fowl; and offered burnt-offerings on the altar. And the

*Inquiry, p. 38-42.

Lord smelled a sweet savour; and the Lord said in his heart: I will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake; for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth: neither will I again smite any more every thing living, as I have done. While the earth remaineth, seed-time and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night, shall not cease*.

II. In this narrative, so far as the character of the sacrifice itself is concerned, we learn nothing definite.

The Hebrew word, employed by Moses to describe the oblation of Noah, is that identical generalising word, which is used to describe the respective oblations of Job and his three friends, and which our translators render by the English term burnt-offering.

Now this word may, or may not, describe an expiatory sacrifice: and, if our information had extended no further than the simple statement of Noah's oblation; we should not, on any solid grounds, have been able to determine, whether it were eucharistic or homologetic or simply deprecatory or complexly piacular. The object of the sacrifice, or the intention of the

* Gen. viii. 20-22.

sacrificer, would have been left in such a state of total uncertainty, that it would have been mere folly to hazard any explicit opinion.

III. But, from the narrative, we learn much more than the naked fact, that Noah, with whatever intention, offered up burnt-offerings: we additionally learn from it, both the mode in which God accepted the sacrifice, and the answer which he inwardly gave to it.

Now it is obvious, that, when this information is conveyed, much information is also inevitably conveyed as to the intention of the sacrificer: for we may always learn, from the purport of an answer, the nature of the address or the question which produced that answer; and, if the mode in which a sacrifice is received be specifically detailed, we may always learn, from such detail, the object of the sacrifice itself. The one plainly involves the other. Hence, from the sequel of the narrative, we may gather, I think, without much difficulty, the object of Noah's sacrifice.

1. The mode, in which God accepted the sacrifice, is described in our English translation, which here follows the Greek of the Seventy, by the expression, that The Lord smelled a sweet savour: but, as Dr. Spencer has justly

observed, the original Hebrew ought rather to have been rendered, The Lord smelled an odour of rest.

This phrase, the learned writer, with good reason, supposes to mean, that God, who was previously offended, became, by Noah's sacrifice, pacified and appeased*: and, in support of his interpretation, he adduces the Syriac version, which explains the Hebrew of Moses by the expression An odour of placability †.

The same view was evidently entertained by Josephus, as likewise cited by Dr. Spencer: for, arguing retrogressively from the mode in which the sacrifice was accepted, he very naturally supposes Noah to have prayed, that God would favourably accept his oblation and that the earth might never hereafter experience similar anger‡. I may add, that this identical exposition of the phrase now before us is adopted also by Aben-Ezra, as cited by Buxtorf. He rightly

* Odoratus est Dominus odorem quietis: hoc est, Qui antea commotus erat, quietus et placatus, Noachi sacrificio, reddebatur. Spencer. de Leg. Heb. lib. iii. dissert. ii. cap. 3. sect.2. p. 143.

† Odorem placabilitatis. Ibid.

† Ευμενῶς τε οὖν ἀυτὸν προσδέχεσθαι τὴν θυσίαν παρεκάλει, καὶ μηδεμίαν ὀργὴν ἔτι τήν γῆν ὁμοίαν λαβεῖν.

Jud. lib. i. c. 3. § 7. p. 13. Hudson.

Joseph. Ant.