3. So far we have been considering the Atonement as our Lord's work on behalf of men: we have now to consider it as meeting the inevitable demand of the human conscience that this vicarious sacrifice shall in some way satisfy man's sense of personal responsibility; that by means of the Atonement man shall, so far as he can, make amends for his own sin. The charge of injustice, as it is generally urged against the doctrine of the Atonement, rests, as will be shewn, upon a fundamental misconception as to the nature of Christ's work for us; but it is also commonly assumed that by the death of Christ all was done for man, and nothing in man, so that we are thereby relieved of all responsibility for our own wilful acts. It is this notion that we have now to investigate. First, however, we must acknowledge the truth contained in it. The Atonement is, after all, God's forgiveness of us in Christ, and no forgiveness is conceivable which does not in some degree relieve the offender of the consequences of his offence. Human forgiveness, though it may in some cases, perhaps, remit no part of the external penalty due to wrong-doing, must, in the very act of forgiving, put away and abolish the anger of the offended person, the alienation which the offence has caused, and which is certainly part, sometimes the greatest part, of the penal consequences of an offence. Human forgiveness, therefore, necessarily transgresses the strict law of retribution: yet no one can seriously contend that forgiveness is either impossible or immoral. And more than this, there is even in our imperfect forgiveness a power to blot out guilt, and to restore the offender to new life. Inexplicable though the fact may be, experience tells us that forgiveness avails to lift the load of guilt that presses upon an offender. A change passes over him that can only be described as regenerative, life-giving; and thus the assurance of pardon, however conveyed, may be said to obliterate in some degree the consequences of the past[234]. It is true that this result of forgiveness cannot be explained logically so as to satisfy the reason, but the possibility and the power of pardon are nevertheless facts of human experience. The Atonement is undoubtedly a mystery, but all forgiveness is a mystery. The Atonement undoubtedly transgresses the strict law of exact retribution, but all forgiveness transgresses it. And we may believe that human forgiveness is, in spite of all its imperfection, like that of God, for this is surely the lesson of the Lord's Prayer, 'Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive them that trespass against us.' Experience and conscience, therefore, lead us to expect that the Divine method of forgiveness will both disprove the exaggerated idea of personal responsibility, which is based on a false estimate of man's power, and will also transcend reason by rising into a region of mystery and of miracle[235]. We have to deal in this