269. EBB to Hugh Stuart Boyd
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 2, 75–77.
Hope End
September. 1827.
Sir,
I am too much obliged to you for sending me your work on the Atonement [1] to neglect attending to the request you have thought it worth while to make. I shall therefore speak quite frankly upon any point on which I may venture to entertain doubts; & as such a point can merely relate to the manner of proving, & not to the truth proved, which I have the happiness of being able to join you in embracing, I must, in the first place, assure you that I have read your book with sincere respect both for your ability as a disputant & your elevated feelings as a Christian.
I quite agree with you in believing that “Christ died, because no inferior being could bring salvation:” and I am forced to believe that no inferior being could bring salvation .. because Christ died. The manner of the salvation proves the fearfulness of the danger: & this proof you have ably adduced in page 29 of your Treatise. We may stand upon the fulcrum of the death of the Divine Person, & thence argue its necessity,—but if we begin a priori to argue its necessity, we lose the που στω, [2] —& I confess it seems to me doubtful whether we should ever reach the revealed fact. Nevertheless you attempt this mode when you make use of the argument, reprobated by Magee, [3] & virtually reprobated by Bishop Butler in his profound “Analogy,” [4] —i.e. “Sin being an offence against an infinite Being requires an infinite satisfaction, which can only be made by an infinite person.” Magee’s reply is certainly very weak, & you have most convincingly shewn the weakness in pages 43 & 44. [5] I think, however, that there does exist a fallacy in the argument, notwithstanding the ingenuity of your defence. You observe that the divine law being a transcript of the divine perfections, & the divine perfections being correspondant to the divine nature, the demands of the law must be like the nature, immense eternal immutable,—and the punishment incurred by a disobedience to the demands, must be like the demands, immense eternal immutable. Now if I pursue this line of reasoning, it becomes clear to my mind that condemned Man does not only suffer eternally that he may, as a finite being, suffer immensely,—which you seem to express in page 11,—but he must suffer actually both eternally & immensely, in order to satisfy the eternal & immense demands of that law which is the transcript of God’s perfections. Immensity & eternity must be equal & separate & independant charcteristics of a punishment incurred by offenders against Him who hath among his attributes, immensity & eternity. And thus we are brought ad absurdum,—& find ourselves at a monstrous conclusion .. viz .. that the Redeemer’s sufferings for Man must be not only immense but eternal. If that atoning suffering be only immense,—tho’ its immensity be immeasurably great,—it has not fully vindicated the transcript of the divine perfections,—& thus there cannot be a perfect satisfaction.
You must be kind enough to remember that I have only done as you desired in speaking freely, since nothing but your desire could justify my speaking at all. You must also do me the justice of observing that the objection I dare offer your candour for consideration, is not directed against the acknowledged truth .. “no inferior being could bring salvation”,—tho’ I do venture to object to what always appears to me dangerous, a metaphysical mode of treating scriptural subjects. We reason “out of book” when we reason out of the Book,—for ‘only the spirit of God can search the deep things of God”. [6]
There is one Arminian doctrine from which I pray to be defended. [7] Arminian writers & Preachers are fond of hanging the rags of human righteousness over the fair vesture of Christ’s righteousness, instead of hiding them beneath it: and this is a melancholy, but too natural perversion. For the soul of Man yearneth unto her pride of virtue & her intellectual pride,—and seeing, that, to follow Christ, she must “leave all,” often “goes away sorrowful, having great possessions.” [8]
With regard to the Calvinistic doctrines of predestination & irresistable grace, if I were to embrace them at all, it should be, I believe, a Sublapsarian modification of them,—but at present I feel unwilling to do so, even on such terms. There are great difficulties on both sides of the question, & therefore I am the more happy to agree with you, that an opinion may be entertained on either side without endangering Christian essentials.
You desire to know my views & ideas of the Atonement,—but you, who have filled a book with your “Reflections,” can hardly expect me to comprise mine in a letter. I will however answer your question respecting my opinion of the doctrine “as a subject proposed to the head & heart”– I answer it briefly tho’ fully in the words of Paul—“Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners––of whom I am Chief!” [9] Let “the head” take the general fact, “the heart” the particular application,—& head & heart will have enough to do.
Can you forgive me if I venture to express a regret that you should have spoken so very contemptuously of the Bishop of Dublin? [10] His book, tho’ it is, as you say, a “huge book,” & moreover a heavy book, & moreover a book not altogether unobjectionable in matter, yet has learning, & can hardly pass uselessly thro’ the mind of an attentive reader. His arguments on the inefficacy of repentance seem to me particularly good.
And now I have only to repeat my thanks for the gratification & advantage recieved from your publication—requesting its author to
believe me
his obliged & sincere
E B Barrett.
Thank you for the interesting little tract– My Father is sorry not to have yet had it in his power to go to the chapel—but he fully intends doing so.
Address, on integral page: Hugh Stuart Boyd, Esqr / Ruby Cottage / Malvern Wells.
Publication: EBB-HSB, pp. 8–9 (in part).
Manuscript: Wellesley College.
1. Reflections on the Atoning Sacrifice of Jesus Christ (1817).
2. “Place to stand,” from comment attributed to Archimedes: “Give me a firm place to stand and I will move the earth.”
3. William Magee (1766–1831), Archbishop of Dublin, also wrote on this subject in his Discourses on the Scriptural Doctrines of Atonement and Sacrifice (1801).
4. Joseph Butler (1692–1752), Bishop of Durham, produced one of the most respected theological works of his time, The Analogy of Religion, Natural and Revealed, to the Constitution and Course of Nature (1736).
5. Referring to Magee’s proposition, Boyd said (p. 42): “Its sophistry may be exposed in more ways than one; but I shall content myself with a single argument.” In the following pages he goes on to offer a rebuttal of Magee’s thesis.
6. A paraphrase of I Corinthians, 2:10.
7. The doctrines propounded by Jacobus Arminius (1560–1609) were largely a reaction against the tenets of John Calvin (1509–64), who recognized only the Bible as a source of knowledge and authority in matters pertaining to religious belief. Arminius insisted that real free-will in man was compatible with Divine Sovereignty; that the theory of predestination was unbiblical; and that Christ died for all men and not for the elect alone.
8. Matthew, 19:22.
9. I Timothy, 1:15.
10. i.e., William Magee (see note 3 above).
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