REMARKS: Below

DEDICATION: Below

INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER BY SAMUEL HANSON COX, D. D.

CHAPTER I: THE NECESSITY OF ATONEMENT.

CHAPTER II: THE FACT OF ATONEMENT.

CHAPTER III: THE NATURE OF THE ATONEMENT.

CHAPTER IV: THE NATURE OF THE ATONEMENT CONTINUED.

CHAPTER V: THE EXTENT OF THE ATONEMENT.

The author is said to have been "a man of marked ability, who, like Charles G. Finney, had turned away from flattering prospects in the practice of law to preach the Gospel." A long and influential pastor of the Presbyterian Church in Troy, N.Y., he preached in 1823 a series of four sermons on the Atonement, which were acclaimed worthy of publication and took place in 1825. "These sermons are designed to fill a humbler but perhaps not less useful place, than that occupied by more critical and finished productions." 

Extensive developments toward the general governmental view of the Atonement had taken place in New England in the process of revivals, from the pivotal sermons by Jonathan Edwards, Jr., in 1785 to refute the growing influence of Universalism, based upon the literal payment theory then most commonly held. Beman warmly espoused Finney's efforts and invited him to labor for revival in Troy in 1826. "Beman's published opinions on the Atonement coincided closely with those which Finney himself subsequently wrought out," wrote G. F. Wright of Oberlin. It is important to observe that while Finney worked out his main propositions in prayerful study of the Bible, as he humbly wrote he entered into a movement of truth that had long been going on and became, it appears, its leading dynamic influence in the power of the Holy Spirit.

The present revision of the sermons attest the interest in studying fundamental truth in the revivals which were being so warmly experienced in Northeastern America.

TO THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY, SYNODS, PRESBYTERS, SESSIONS and CHURCHES, OF CONSTITUTIONAL PRESBYTERIANS, this treatise is affectionately inscribed by the author. This work is founded on a discussion published in FOUR SERMONS, some twenty years since, and which is now out of print; but if is enlarged, and, it is hoped, much improved. The form of Sermons has been exchanged for that of Chapters; and the subject matter contained in the second chapter, is entirely new. Other parts have been amended, and some entirely re-written.

From the frequent calls which have been made for this work, and the spirit of religious investigation which exists, at the present time, in this country, it is hoped, that this effort may exert an humble agency, at least, in establishing the minds of sincere inquirers, upon the solid rock of Bible truth. It is commended also to the candid perusal of the christian public, and the kind benediction of approving heaven.

NATHAN S. S. BEMAN.

TROY, JULY 1844.