V. Piscator and Richard Watson object that the Calvinistic view represents Christ as rendering two distinct satisfactions to the law in behalf of his people. They maintain that obedience and penalty are alter- natives, the presence of one excluding the demand for the other. If Adam had rendered perfect obedience, he would not have been required also to satisfy, by suffering, the penalty. Therefore, they argue, if Christ. has satisfied the law by suffering the penalty due the sins of his people, he cannot be also required to render it in their stead the additional satisfaction of obedience.
We hold this to evince a very confused view of the case. God surely did not give Adam the choice be- tween obedience and death, as between. two equally legi- timate alternatives. The simple facts are, (a.) That God placed Adam at his creation (and federally the whole race in him) in a middle position, with a character holy, yet liable to fall. Such a position is a fair one. It has its advantages and also its terrible risks. (6.) God pro- mised Adam an advancement far above the position into which he was created, on condition of perfect obedience rendered for a definite period. (c.) He threatened him with that penalty which is inseparable from all moral law, of death in case of disobedience. The endurance of the penalty, therefore, is required of Christ’s people
ACTIVE AND PASSIVE OBEDIENCE. 245
in order that their sin may be expiated. And perfect cuarrze obedience is required for a definite period, in order that lis they may be righteously advanced to the grace which
had, from the beginning, been offered only on that con- dition. The active and passive obedience of Christ—the suffering of the penalty for the remission of sin, and the obeying of the law for life—do not therefore constitute
two satisfactions, but are one complete and perfect satis- faction of the whole law in all its relations,
CHAPTER XIX.
THE REFORMED DOCTRINE AS TO THE NATURE OF THE ATONEMENT PROVED TO HAVE BEEN THE FAITH OF THE ENTIRE CHRISTIAN CHURCH THROUGH ALL AGES.
CHAPTER ya ® ote
XTX.
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doctrine which has been in the preceding chapters set forth, in connection with its Scriptural evidence, has in its essential prin- ciples been the faith of the great body of God’s people from the beginning ; and especially that this has been ~ the case in every particular age and section of the Church precisely in proportion to its general orthodoxy and spiritual vitality. If truth be an essential prerequi- site in order to holiness, the general fact that a given system of belief has been found in association with all the vital godliness that has ever existed, is strong pre- sumptive evidence of the truth of that system. And this presumption is very much strengthened if it can be shown to be historically true that, as a general fact, the evidences of spiritual life are obscured in proportion as the central and characteristic principles of the system are ignored or misconceived, and that they have never con- tinued to exist at all where these principles have been intelligently denied. In order to apply this method of argument to the subject we have in hand, I will attend to the following points in their order :—1. To state precisely the several positions which I believe the his- torical evidence accessible to us will fully prove. 2. To
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present, in as condensed a form as possible, quotations cmarrmn from representative theologians and Church creeds which a establish the points proposed to be proved. And, 3. To apply the historical facts as to the general faith of the Church, thus established, to our main argument, indicat- ing what inferences from the universal consent of the Church of Christ to the truth of the doctrine appear to be legitimate.
I. I have, then, in the jirst place, to state the points Points which I believe can be established with reference to the heiiior
faith of God’s people, as a general and characteristic fact, eene
in all ages, with reference to the nature of Christ’s re- duced is claimed deeming work. to prove.