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    sponding degree may one be benefited by the merit of another . But as in the former case the individual could not be charged with another ' s crime , so in the latter case he cannot appropriate another ' s merit . As suffering in the one case cannot be denominated punishment , so enjoyment in the other cannot be termed reward , but bad or good fortune according to the natural course of events .

    A * By this , then , I am to conclude that virtue and vice are not transferable any more than reward and punishment ; and that when one is benefited by the good , or suffers by the evil conduct of another , he can take neither merit nor demerit to himself , but ascribe his good or bad fortune to the natural course of events ?

    O . Most certainly . A . But how am I to reconcile your doctrine with the usages of all nations ? For all nations have coincided in the sentiment , that both crime and punishment may be transferred . O . Produce an example .

    A , Take that of sacrifices . Have not sacrifices in all ages and countries been offered for the expiation of guilt , even according to the natural dictates of reason and religion ? On these occasions the sins of the individual were supposed to be transferred to the victim , and to be expiated by the sacrifice of his life . Nay , according to the law of Moses , which you will grant to have been of divine institution , the sins not of one individual but of the whole people might be transferred to the head of a single animal , to be

    carried away . 1 allude to the scape-goat ; the law concerning which is as follows : " And Aaron shall lay both his hands upon the head of the live goat , and confess over him all the iniquities of the children of Israel , and all their transgressions in all their sins , putting them upon the head of the goat , and shall send him away by the hand of a fit man into the wilderness . And the goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities into a land not inhabited , ' * fcc .

    O . And do you really understand this as literally expressed ? A * How can it be understood otherwise ? O . Ridiculous ! Truly a most easy and convenient mode of getting quit of crimes and their consequences , putting them on the head of a goat to run away with them ! Even your own language , which you naturally , though perhaps inadvertently expressed , indicates the impossibility of such transferrence . Did you not just now say , that " the sins of the individual were

    supposed to be transferred to the victim , and to be expiated by the sacrifice of its life" ? It was with propriety that you used the term * ' supposed , " for it could be nothing else than supposition . Hear the express declaration of the great Apostle of the Gentiles : " For it is not possible that the blood of bulls or of goats should take away sins . " Because crime , I say , crime is a

    personal act that is already past , and therefore irrevocable ; what the guilty person hath done never can be made the doing of another , and never can be undone . So long as he exists , the guilt adheres to him ; and when he dies , though his memory were to last through eternity , it must be stained with it . What is past , I speak it with reverence , is not in the power even of Omnipotence to recall .

    A . Truly , I do not comprehend your statement . Fauntleroy has been ordered for execution . That order is past But is it not possible to recall the order ? Might not his Majesty exercise his royal prerogative , and grant a full and free pardon ? 0 . Very true , he might . But would it the less on that account cease to

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    492 Vicarious Punishment .

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), July 2, 1827, page 492, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1798/page/20/