The singular ceremonial of the scapegoat

You remember, no doubt, the singular ceremonial connected with the scapegoat…The sins of the nation were symbolically laid upon its head, and it was carried out to the edge of the wilderness and driven forth to wander alone, bearing away upon itself into the darkness and solitude -- far from man and far from God -- the whole burden of the nation's sins. Jesus Christ takes away the sin which He bears, and there is, as I believe, only one way by which individuals, or society, or the world at large, can thoroughly get rid of the guilt and penal consequences and of the dominion of sin, and that is, by beholding the Lamb of God that takes upon Himself, that He may carry away out of sight, the sin of the world. So much, then, for the first thought that I wish to suggest to you.

--Alexander Maclaren (11 February 1826 – 5 May 1910, English non-conformist minister of Scottish origin).