The doctrine of the Christian Church--in the widest sense of that much-fought-over term--was then as follows, and I will state it in language which is studiously moderate, _as compared with the orthodox teaching_ of the great Christian divines. If any one doubts this assertion, let him study their writings for himself. I really dare not transfer some of their expressions to my own pages. God the Father having cursed mankind and condemned them to eternal damnation, because of Adam's disobedience in eating an apple--or some other fruit, for the species is only preserved by tradition, and is not definitely settled by the inspired writings--and having further cursed each man for his own individual transgressions, man lay under the fierce wrath of God, unable to escape, and unable to pacify it, for he could not even atone for his own private sins, much less for his share of the guilt incurred by his forefather in Paradise. Man's debt was hopelessly large, and he had "nothing to pay;" so all that remained to him was to suffer an eternity of torture, which sad fate he had merited by the crime of being born into an accursed world. The second person of the Trinity moved to pity by the helpless and miserable state of mankind, interposed between the first person of the Trinity and the wretched sinners; he received into his own breast the fire-tipped arrows of divine wrath, and by suffering inconceivable tortures, equal in amount to an eternity of the torments of hell, he wrung from God's hands the pardon of mankind, or of a portion thereof. God, pacified by witnessing this awful agony of one who had from all eternity been "lying in his bosom" co-equal sharer of his Majesty and glory, and the object of his tenderest love, relents from his fierce wrath, and consents to accept the pain of Jesus as a substitute for the pain of mankind. In plain terms, then, God is represented as a Being so awfully cruel, so implacably revengeful, that pain _as_ pain, and death _as_ death, are what he demands as a propitiatory sacrifice, and with nothing less than extremest agony can his fierce claims on mankind be bought off. The due weight of suffering he must have, but it is a matter of indifference whether it is undergone by Jesus or by mankind. Did not the old Fathers do well in making the awful ransom a matter between Jesus and the devil?