Ex Libris C. K. OGDEN _ '*' ; X \ : ^ ii/) -. I ^ \. A REVIEW OP THE DOCTRINE OF THE EUCHARIST WATERLAND Pontoon MACMILLAN AND CO. PUBLISHERS TO THE UNIVERSITY OF xforfc A REVIEW OF THE DOCTRINE OF THE EUCHARIST WITH FOVE CHARGES TO THE CLERGY OF MIDDLESEX CONNECTED WITH THE SAME SUBJECT BY DANIEL WATERLAND, D. D. Forming parts of Vols. IV. and V. of his Collected "Works WITH A PREFACE BY THE LORD BISHOP OF LINCOLN AT THE CLARENDON PRESS M.DCCC.LXVIU PEEFACE. THIS volume has been issued at the request of the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, with the view of placing within the reach of those who may not be able to procure the collected Works of Dr. Waterland, and especially of candidates for Holy Orders, a treatise which was once considered almost as the text-book of the Church of England on the subject of the Eucharist, but which, in common with many of the works of the great Anglican Divines, has been somewhat cast into the shade by the lapse of time and the rapid issue of modern theological literature, and is, there is reason to fear, far less known at present than it deserves. Though suggested probably, on the one hand, by the publication of Mr. Johnson's 'Unbloody Sacrifice,' and by Dr. Brett's ' Discourse Concern- ing the Necessity of Discerning the Lord's Body,' and, on the other, by the Socinianising tracts of Bishop Hoadley on the Lord's Supper, and by an VI PREFACE. amicable controversy in which the Author had been engaged with Dr. Zachary Pearce, yet the 'Review of the Doctrine of the Eucharist/ as Bishop Van Mildert has observed, 'has little the aspect of a polemical work, although so large a portion of it may be applied as a corrective, or a preventive, of error. With scarcely any personal reference to the living authors of his time who entertained different views of the subject from that which he supported, Dr. Waterland has so conducted his train of reasoning and investiga- tion, as to meet all their diversities of opinion in their full force ; stating them with candour and fairness, and controverting them with no less moderation than ability and decision/ And the three Charges to the Clergy of Mid- dlesex which defend and supplement his former treatise, that ' On the Christian Sacrifice' (with its Appendix in reply to Johnson), that ' On the Sacramental Part of the Eucharist/ and that ' On the Distinctions of Sacrifice/ occasioned though they were by ' Some Remarks on the Review' by Dr. Brett, are equally devoid of controversial acrimony, nor are they of merely local or personal application. They form, together with the ' Review/ a body of teaching on the doctrine of the Eucharist, especially with reference to the various opinions on this vital subject which have been maintained within our own Church, PREFACE. Vll almost equally applicable to all times, and having a peculiar interest and importance in our own. The wide and intimate acquaintance which Waterland possessed, not only with the Christian Fathers but with the Romish Theologians and the writings of the foreign Reformers, the perfect fairness with which he, almost invariably, states and meets the views and reasoning which he controverts, and the singular simplicity, clearness, and vigour of his style, have placed him among the most trust- worthy and instructive of our own Divines : and while asserting and defending, as the true doctrine of the Eucharist, the via media between two ex- tremes, which, though not excluded by the tolerant moderation of our Articles and formularies, have each too facile a tendency to pass into serious error, he will be found, even by those whom he does not convince, to leave them in no doubt as to the meaning of his language and the bearing of his arguments ; and by others, and especially by students in divinity, a safe and perspicuous guide to those tenets on the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper which, as a matter of fact, have been held by the great majority of the ablest and most learned Theologians of the Reformed Church of England. J. L. CONTENTS. PAGE A Review of the Doctrine of the Eucharist, as laid down in Scripture and Antiquity ... ... ..... i An Introduction, first briefly shewing the Design of the Treatise, and next premising some Considerations : viz. I. That Scripture is our only Rule 3 II. That for the right understanding of Scripture, it is of great moment to know what the most eminent Writers before us have taught, and what they have agreed in ... 3 1. More particularly, Ancients first . . . 5 2. And then Moderns 6 III. That of the two Extremes, Profaneness and Superstition, the latter is the safest for any one to lean to .8 IV. That it is injuring and degrading the Sacraments to call them Positive Duties, rather than Religious Rites . . 1 1 1. The Eucharist not merely a Duty, but a sacred Rite, wherein God bears a Part . . . . . .11 2. That Part of it which is Duty, is not a single Duty, but more . . . . . . . . 1 3 CHAP. I. Explaining the most noted or most considerable Names of the Holy Communion . . . . . . . .16 1 . Breaking of Bread . . . . . . . .16 2. Communion . . . . . . . . .18 3. Lord's Supper . . . . . . . . .19 4. Oblation . . . . . . . . . .21 5. Sacrament .......... 26 6. Eucharist .......... 29 7. Sacrifice . . 30 8. Memorial . . ; .- . . ..." .-."-''. 32 9. Passover . . . . . . . .. -. . 34 10. Mass -. 37 CONTENTS. PAGE CHAP. II. Considering the Institution of the Holy Communion, as recorded by St. Matthew, St. Mark, St. Luke, and St. Paul 38 It came in the place of the Jewish Passover . . . .41 I. Resembling it in several Circumstances . . -42 2. Deriving its Forms and Phrases from it . . .43 CHAP. III. Concerning the Commemoration of Christ, in the Holy Communion 46 1. Remembering him as God-Man . . . . . . 48 2. Commemorating him as such . . . '.;--. 54 3. Celebrating his Memorial ... ... ; 58 CHAP. IV. Concerning the Commemoration of the Death of Christ . . . ... . . . .62 1. As an expiatory Sacrifice . . . . . . 63 2. Which is applied in the Eucharist . . . . 69 CHAP. V. Of the Consecration of the Elements . . " . 74 1. In what sense they are blessed or consecrated ... 74 2. By whom they are blessed . . . . . -77 3. What the Blessing amounts to . . . 79 CHAP. VI. Of Spiritual Feeding according to John vi. . .89 1. The Sense of the Ancients on that head . . . .99 2. The Sentiments of Moderns . . . . . .123 CHAP. VII. Of Sacramental, Symbolical Feeding in the Eucha- rist ' . . .' . . . 129 1. The Sentiments of the Ancients on that head . . .141 2. The Sentiments of Moderns . . . . . .163 CHAP. VIII. i Cor. x. 16 explained, and vindicated from misconstruction . . . . . . . . 175 Objections answered ........ 194 CHAP. IX. Remission of Sins conferred in the Eucharist . 210 Proved from Scripture 218 From Antiquity . 220 Judgment of the Reformers, and of the Church of England . 225 Objections removed . 228 CONTENTS. XI CHAP. X. Sanctifying Grace conferred in the Eucharist Proved from i Cor. x. 16 Proved from John vi. ....... Proved from Analogy ....... Proved from i Cor. xii. 13. The Judgment of the Ancients hereupon .... The Sentiments of Moderns on the same .... CHAP. XI. The Eucharist considered as a Federal Rite . Argued from the Nature of Communion .... From the Custom of drinking Blood in Covenants From the Words of Institution From the Analogy between that and Sacrifices, or Sacrificial Feasts . 289 Objections to Dr. Cudworth's Notion considered and con- futed .......... 291 CHAP. XII. The Eucharist considered in a Sacrificial View . 306 Some Account of Dr. Grabe's Sentiments .... 307 The Eucharist a spiritual Sacrifice, how . . . .310 The Judgment of the Ancients on that head . . -312 The Judgment of Moderns ....... 349 CHAP. XIII Of the Preparation proper for the Holy Com- munion . . . . . . . . . -351 1. Baptism . . . . . . . . . .352 2. Competent Knowledge . . . . . . '353 3. Sound Faith 353 4. True Repentance ........ 354 Consisting chiefly in Restitution ..... 358 Readiness to forgive . . . .362 Peaceableness ..... 366 Charity to the Poor .... 366 CHAP. XIV. Of the Obligation to frequent Communion . . 369 How stated in the several Ages of the Church : First Century , . 371 Second . . 372 Third 374 Fourth 374 Fifth .386 Sixth 389 Seventh 390 Eighth 390 Xll CONTENTS. PAGE The Doctrinal Use of the Christian Sacraments considered : in a Charge delivered to the Middlesex Clergy, May i2th, 1736 . . . 395 The Christian Sacrifice Explained, in a Charge delivered in part to the Middlesex Clergy at St. Clement-Danes, April the aoth, 1 738. To which is added an Appendix . . . . . . . 413 The Sacramental Part of the Eucharist Explained, in a Charge deli- vered in part to the Clergy of Middlesex, at the Easter Visita- tion, 1739 -4 8 5 Distinctions of Sacrifice ; set forth in a Charge delivered in part to the Clergy of Middlesex, at the Easter Visitation, 1740 . . 543 A REVIEW OF THE DOCTRINE OF THE EUCHAKIST, AS LAID DOWN IN SCRIPTURE AND ANTIQUITY. Ut autem literam sequi, et signa pro rebus quae iis significantur accipere, servilis infirmitatis est ; ita inutiliter signa interpretari, male vagantis erroris est. Augustini de Doct. Christ, lib. iii. cap. 9. p. 49. ADVERTISEMENT. IN the latter part of the sixth chapter, I have followed the common opinion of learned Protestants, (Mr. Bingham, Dr. Wall, &c.) in relation to Infant Communion, as prevailing in the fifth century, under a notion of its strict necessity, built upon John vi. 53. Though I had some scruple about it; as may appear by my manner of expressing myself, and by the reference to Thorndike in noteK Having since looked somewhat deeper into that question, I think it now just to my readers to advertise them, that I apprehend that common opinion to be a mistake ; and that though the practice of giving Communion to children at ten or at seven years of age (or somewhat sooner) was ancient, and perhaps general, yet the practice of communicating mere infants, under a notion of its necessity, and as built upon John vi, came not in before the eighth or ninth century, never was general ; or however lasted not long in the West, where it first began. My reasons for this persuasion are too long to give here : but I thought this short hint might be proper, to prevent misconceptions as to that Article. THE INTRODUCTION. MY design in this work is to treat of the Sacrament of the Holy Communion, according to the light which Scripture and right reason afford, making use of such helps and means for the in- terpreting Scripture, as God's good providence, in former or later ages, has furnished us with. The subject is of very great weight in itself, and of near concern to every Christian ; and 'therefore ought to be studied with a care proportioned to the importance of it : that so we may govern both ourselves and our people aright, in a matter of such consequence ; avoiding with great caution the extremes on both hands, both of excessive superstition on one hand, and of profane neglect on the other. We are now visibly under the extreme of neglect ; and therefore we ought to study by all means possible to inspire our people with a just respect for this holy institution, and to animate them to desire earnestly to partake often of it ; and in order to that, to prepare themselves seriously, to set about it with reverence and devotion, and with those holy purposes, and solemn vows, that ought to accompany it a .' But before I enter upon the main subject, it may not be improper here to throw in some previous considerations, in order to prepare my readers for what they will find in this treatise, that they may the more easily form a true and sound judgment of the subject-matter of it. I. The first consideration is, that Scripture alone is our com- plete rule of faith and manners, 'containing all things necessary to salvation, so that whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man, that it should be believed as an article of faith, or be thought requisite or necessary to salvationV Whatever Scripture contains, either in express words rightly understood, or by consequence justly deduced, is Scripture doctrine, and ought to be religiously believed and obeyed ; allowing only for the different degrees of importance belonging to different Scripture truths, or Scripture precepts. II. For the right understanding of Scripture, it is of great Bp. Burnet on Article XXX f. p. 484. b Article VI. B 2 4 The Introduction. moment to know what the most eminent writers or teachers, ancient and modern, have thought before us on the same subject ; and more especially to observe what they unanimously agreed in. For, as they had the same Scriptures before them, and the same common reason to direct them, and used as much care and diligence, and were blessed with as great integrity as any of us now can justly pretend to, their judgment is not to be slighted, nor their instructions to be despised. The 'responsa prudentum,' the reports, precedents, and adjudged cases are allowed to be of considerable weight for determining points of law : and why should they not be of like weight, ordinarily, for the determining points of theology? Human law there, and Divine law here, is properly the authentic rule of action : but the common reason of mankind is properly the rule of interpre- tation in both cases : and that common reason shines out the brightest, and appears in greatest perfection, in the united ver- dict of the wisest and most excellent men. It is much easier for one, or for some few fallible interpreters to be deceived, than for many, other circumstances supposed equal. Nothing less than very clear Scripture, or as clear reason, ought to weigh any- thing against the concurring sentiments of the Christian world : and even in such a case, some fair account ought to be given, how it came to pass, that such, clear Scripture or clear reason had hitherto escaped the notice, or missed of the acceptance of the wisest and best of men. A very judicious writer of our own has observed, that 'variety of judgments and opinions argueth obscurity in those things whereabout they differ ; but that which all parts receive for truth, that which, every one having sifted, is by no one denied or doubted of, must needs be matter of infallible certainty .' This he applies to the general doctrine of the Holy Communion, as being ' instrumentally a cause of the real participation of Christ, and of life in his body and blood d .' And it is of this that he says, ' that all sides at length, for aught he could see, were come to a general agreement : all approve and acknowledge to be most true, as having nothing in it but that which the words of Christ are on all sides confessed to enforce ; nothing but that which the Church of God hath always thought necessary ; nothing but that which alone is sufficient for every Christian man to believe concerning the use and force of this Sacrament : finally, nothing but that wherewith the writings of all antiquity are consonant, and all Christian confessions agreeable 6 .' Thus wrote that excellent person in c Hooker, b. v. p 310. d Compare p. 306. e Page 306. The Introduction, 5 the year 1597. The Zuinglians by that time had corrected, or more clearly explained their principles : and Socinus was scarce yet known on this side the water, or had made no figure with respect to this subject, or none worth the mentioning, in opposition to a prescription of fifteen hundred years before him, and to the united voice of all the churches in his time. It is a maxim of prudence, as in all other matters, so also in the interpreting Scripture, to consult with the wise, and to take to our assistance the most eminent lights we can anywhere find, either among ancients or moderns. To be a little more par- ticular, I may here observe something distinctly of each. i. As to ancients, some lived in the very infancy of the Church, had personally known our blessed Lord in the flesh, or conversed with the Apostles, and afterwards governed their respective churches, as venerable bishops, many years, often administering the Holy Communion, and at length dying martyrs. Is it at all likely, that such men as they were should not understand the true Scripture doctrine concerning the Sacraments, or that they should affect to delude the people committed to their charge, with superstitious conceits, or fond expectations 1 A man must be of a very odd turn of mind, who can deliberately entertain so unworthy a thought of the apo- stolical Fathers, or can presume to imagine that he sees deeper into the use or force of those sacred institutions than those holy men did. It is reasonable to conceive, that the New Testament was penned with a very particular view to the capacities of the first readers or hearers ; not only because it was natural to adapt the style to the then current language and customs, but also because much depended upon making the Gospel plain and intelligible to the first converts, above all that should come after. If the earliest Christians, after the Apostles, could not readily understand the religion then taught, how should it be handed down with advantage to others of later times ] But if the Scripture doctrine should be supposed comparatively obscure to those that come after, yet so long as the earlier Christians found it perfectly clear, and left behind them useful memoirs whereby we may learn how they understood it, there will be sufficient security against any dangerous mistakes in succeeding ages, by looking back to the sense of the most early interpreters. Great regard therefore ought to be paid to the known sense and judgment of the apostolical Fathers f . The later Fathers, of the second, third, and fourth centuries, have their weight also, in proportion to their known integrity, and abilities, and fame in f Of this see more in Abp. Wake's Apostolical Fathers, Introd. chap. x. 6 The Introduction. all the churches ; and more especially in proportion to their early standing, their nearness to the fountain-head S. 2. As to moderns of best note, they agree with the ancients in the main things, and may be usefully consulted on the present subject. Some of them have been eminently skilled in Jewish antiquities, and others in ecclesiastical. Some have excelled in criticism and the learned languages : others in clearness of conception and accuracy of judgment : all are useful in their several ways, and may suggest many things which upon due inquiry will be found to be right, and which no single writer, left to himself, and without consulting them, would ever have thought on. A man that affects to think by himself will often fancy he sees that in Scripture which is not there, and will overlook what there really is : he will run wide in his con- jectures, criticize in a wrong place, and fall short in most things, for want of compass, and larger views, or for want of a due consideration of consequences here or there. Truth is of wide extent, and is all over uniform and consistent : and it may- require many eyes to look out, and search round, that every position advanced may agree with all truths, natural and revealed, and that no heterogeneous mixture be admitted to deform and deface the whole system. How often does it happen, that a man pleases himself with a thought, which strikes him at first view, and which perhaps he looks upon as demonstration : and yet further inquiries into other men's labours may at length convince him that it is mere delusion, justly exploded by the more knowing and judicious. There are numberless instances of that kind to be met with among men of letters : which should make every writer cautious how he presumes too far upon his own unassisted abilities, and how he opposes his single judg- ment to the united verdict of wise, great, and good men. It requires commonly much pains and care to trace a notion quite through ; to run it up to its first principles, and again to traverse it to its remotest consequences, and to clear it of all just objections, in order to be at length rationally satisfied, that it is sound and good, and consistent throughout. Different churches, or parties, have their different interpretations of the same texts, and their different superstructures built upon the same prin- ciples. They have respectively their several, pleas, pretences, arguments, solutions, for the maintaining a debate either in the offensive or defensive way. A subject thus comes to be narrowly scanned, and minutely viewed on every side ; and so at length a This argument is considered at large in my Importance of the Doc- trine of the Trinity Asserted, vol. iii. ch. vii. pp. 601 666. The Introduction. 7 consistent chain of truth may be wrought out, by a careful hand, from what the finest wits or ablest heads among the several contending parties have happily supplied. But perhaps it may here be asked ; Is then every man obliged to look deep into religious controversies'? Are not the Scriptures alone sufficient for any plain and sincere Christian to conduct himself by, whether as to faith or manners 1 I answer : i. Com- mon Christians must be content to understand Scripture as they may, under the help of such guides as Providence has placed over them, and in the conscientious use of such means as are proper to their circumstances: which is all that ordinarily can be required of them. 2. Those who undertake to direct and guide them are more particularly obliged to search, into religious controversies, and to ' prove all things' (as far as lies in their power) in order to lead others in the right way. 3. Those guides ought, in their inquiries or instructions, to pay a proper regard and deference to other guides of eminent note, ancient and modern, and not lightly to contradict them, or vary from them ; remembering always, that themselves are fallible, and that new notions (in religion especially) are not comparable, generally speaking, to the old, proved, and tried. 4. If any man interpreting Scripture in a new sense, pretends that his doctrine at least is old, being Scripture doctrine ; he should be told, that his interpretation however is new, and very suspicious, because new, and so not likely to be Scripture doctrine. The novelty of it is itself a strong presumption against it, and such as nothing can overbalance but very clear and plain reasons on that side. The judgment of ten thousand interpreters will always be of considerable weight against the judgment of some few, who are but interpreters at best, and as fallible as any other : and it must argue great conceitedness and self-suffi- ciency, for a man to expect to be heard, or attended to, as a scripturist, or a textuary, in opposition to the Christian world ; unless he first fairly considers and confutes what the ablest writers have pleaded for the received construction, and next as fairly proves and enforces his own. That there is very great weight and force in the united voice of the Christian world, is a point not to be denied by any : and indeed those that affect to set up new notions are themselves aware of it, and tacitly, at least, confess the same thing. For they value such authorities as they are any way able to procure, or even to torture so far as to make them speak on their side : and they pride themselves highly in the number of their disciples, (as often as they chance to succeed,) thinking it a great advantage to their cause, if but 8 The Introduction. the multitude only, or the vulgar herd, approve and espouse the same thing with them. Socinus, for instance, while he slighted, or pretended to slight, the concurring judgment of all churches, ancient and modern, yet felt a very sensible pleasure in the applauses of some few individuals, whom he had been able to deceive : and he looked upon their approbation as a confirming circumstance that his sentiments were true and right. This kind of natural logic appears to be common to our whole species : and there are few, I believe, so sanguine, (unless disordered,) as to confide entirely in their own judgment, or not to suspect their own best reasonings, however plausible they may at first appear, if they have nobody else to concur with them and sup- port them. Therefore again I conclude as before, that it is of great moment to know and consider what others have thought before us, and what the common reason of mankind approves : and the more numerous or the more considerable the persons were or are who stand against us in any article, the less reason, generally, have we to be confident of our own private persuasions. I shall only add, that in subjects which have already passed through many hands, and which have been thoroughly sifted and considered by the ablest and best heads, in a course of seventeen hundred years, there appears to be a great deal more room for judgment than for invention; since little new can now be thought on that is worth notice: and it is much wiser and safer to take the most valuable observations of men most eminent in their several ways, than to advance poor things of our own, which perhaps are scarce worth the mentioning in comparison. III. I must further premise, in relation to our present subject, that as there may be two extremes, viz. of superstition on one hand, and of profaneness on the other, it appears to be much safer and better to lean towards the former extreme, than to incline to the latter. Where there is room for doubt, it is prudent to err rather on that side which ascribes too much to the Sacrament, than on that which ascribes too little. i. Because it is erring on the side of the precepts : for Scripture gives us express cautions 1 " against paying too little regard to this holy Sacrament, but never cautions us at all, or however not expressly, against the contrary extreme. 2. Besides, since we attempt not, and desire not to carry the respect due to the Sacrament at all higher than the ancient churches, and the primitive saints and martyrs have carried the same before, it will be en-ing on the humble, modest, pious side, if we should happen to run into an extreme, h i Cor. xi. 27, 29. The Introduction, 9 after such bright examples. And this again is much safer (for who would not wish that his lot may be amongst the saints ?) than it can be to deviate into the contrary extreme of irreverence, and to come so much the nearer to the faithless and unbelieving, who have their portion in this life. It may be pleaded perhaps, that a person does no harm, or risks no danger, by erring on the lessening side, because God will certainly perform what he has really promised of the Sacraments to every worthy receiver, whether believed or no. But then the question is, how a man can be thought a worthy receiver, who, without sufficient grounds, disbelieves the promises, much more if he confidently rejects them, and teaches others also to do so. Schlictingius pleads in this case, that the effect of the Sacrament will be the same to every one that receives, though he disbelieves the doctrine of its being a mean of grace i, or the like : as if he thought that the outward act of receiving were all, and that the inward qualification of faith were of no moment. But that was his great mistake. They Avho disbelieve and openly deny the inward graces of the Sacrament are unworthy receivers for that very reason, and ordinarily forfeit all right and title to the promised graces. It may be further pleaded, on the same side, that the notion of the Sacraments, as means of grace, (supposing it erroneous,) is apt to lead men to rely upon the Sacraments more than upon their own serious endeavours for the leading a good life, or to rest in the Sacraments as sufficient without keeping God's commandments. But this is a suggestion built upon no certain grounds. For suppose AVC were deceived (as we certainly are not) in our high conceptions of the use and efficacy of this Sacrament ; all that follows is, that we may be thereby led to frequent the Sacrament so much the oftener ; to come to it with the greater reverence, and to repeat our solemn vows for the leading a good life, by the assistance of Divine grace, with the more serious and devout affections. No divines amongst us, 1 'Articulus de coena Domini et necesse est.' Schlicting. adv. Balthas. baptismo (si vera est vestra sen- Meisn. p. 6. Conf. Socin. de Coena, tentia, qua coenam Domini et bap- torn. i. p. 767. tismum media esse statuitis per quae To which Abr. Calovius well an- Deus spirituales efFectus in animis swers : ' Negare nos, sacramenta hominum operetur) exprimit quidem talia media esse quae illico efFectus causam salutis instrumentalem : sed aequatur, etiamsi fides non accedat : tamen ignoratus aut repudiatus salu- fides autem locum habere nequit tern non adirnit, dummodo quispiam in iis qui negant et impugnant coena Domini et baptismo utatur ; directe media salutis divinitus iii- adhibitis enim istis divinitus ordi- stituta. ' Abr. Calov. contr. Socin. natis instrumentis effectum sequi torn. i. part 2. p. 251. io The Introduction. that I know of, ever teach that the use of the outward Sacrament is of any avail without inward faith and repentance, or entire obedience. Our Church at least, and, I think, all Protestant churches have abundantly guarded against any one's resting in the bare outward work. The danger therefore on this side is very slight in comparison. For what if a man should erroneously suppose that upon his worthy receiving he obtains pardon for past sins, and grace to prevent future, will not this be an encouragement to true repentance, without which he can be no worthy receiver, and to watchfulness also for the time to come, without which the Divine grace can never have its perfect work] Not that I would plead for any pious mistake, (were it really a mistake,) but I am answering an objection ; and shewing, that there is no comparative force in" it. Were the persuasion I am pleading for really an error, reason good that it should be discarded : religion wants not the assistance of pious frauds, neither can it be served by them. But as we are now supposing it doubtful on which side the error lies, and are arguing only upon that supposition, it appears to be a very clear case, that religion would suffer abundantly more by an error on the left hand, than by an error on the right ; and that of the two extremes, profaneness, rather than superstition, is the dangerous extreme. Add to this, that corrupt nature generally leans to the diminishing side, and is more apt to detract from the burden of religion than to increase the weight ; and therefore the stronger guard ought to be placed there. Men are but too inclinable of themselves to take up with low and grovelling sentiments of Divine things: and so there is the less need of bending Scripture that way, when the words are fairly capable of an higher meaning, yea, and require it also, as shall be shewn in the sequel. If it should be asked, what temptation any serious Christian can have to lessen the promises or privileges belonging to the Sacraments 1 I answer, that pure good-nature and mistaken humanity may often tempt men to be as easy and indulgent as possible, in their casuistry, for the relieving of tender consciences, and for the quieting the scruples of their brethren. The guides of souls are sometimes apt to be over-officious that way, and much more than is proper ; like as indulgent parents often ruin their children by an excessive fondness, considering their present uneasiness more than their future well-being. When Epicurus set himself to take off the restraints of religion, no doubt but he thought he was doing the most humane and the best-natured The Introduction. n office imaginable. It had the appearance of it, in some respects, (though upon the whole it was altogether the reverse,) and that was his chief temptation to it. It is not improbable that the same kind of good-nature, ill directed, has tempted many other- wise learned and valuable guides to be too indulgent casuists, and to comply too far with the humour of the world. Strict notions of the Sacraments require as strict observance of the same Sacraments, which demands the more intense care, and greater abstraction of thought ; all which is irksome and pain- ful to flesh and blood : there lies the temptation to low and diminishing conceptions of the Sacraments, both in clergy and people. But are there not temptations likewise to an over-scrupulous severity 1 Undoubtedly there are. Sometimes education, temper, prejudice ; sometimes indiscreet zeal, or a spice of enthusiasm : but in the general, and for the most part, the making religion bend to the humours and fashions of the world is the sin which most easily besets us ; and therefore there it is that we ought to appoint the double guard. To conclude this article, all extremes are wrong, and it may require some care and good discernment to observe in every instance the golden mean : but still there may be greater sin and danger on one side than on the other ; and I have thought it of some moment to determine thus briefly, to which of the extremes we may, in our circumstances, most securely and wisely lean. IV. There is another consideration very proper to be hinted here in the entrance, relating to the prejudice often done to our venerable Sacraments, by representing them under the detracting or diminishing name of positive duties : as if they were to be considered as duties only, rather than religious rites in which God bears a part ; or as if that part which belongs to us, and is really duty, were a single duty, and not rather a band and cement of all duties, or a kind of sponsion and security for the present and future performance of the whole duty of man. How this matter stands will be seen distinctly in the sequel. But it is proper to hint something of it here beforehand, lest the reader, by attending to a false light, should set out under a mistake of the main question. Let it be previously understood, what it is that we assert and maintain, for the removing of prejudices, and for the preventing any wrong suspicion, either of our exalting a bare external duty above faith, hope, and charity, or of our recom- mending any single duty in derogation to the rest. i. In the first place therefore, let it be carefully noted, that it is not merely a duty of ours, but a sacred rite, (in which God 12 The Introduction. himself bears a part,) that we are labouring to exalt, or rather to do justice to. The doctrine of our Church, and of all Chris- tian churches, early and late, is much the same with what our Homilies teach us : namely, that ' in the Sacraments God em- braces us, and offereth himself to be embraced by us ; ' and that they ' set out to the eyes, and other outward senses, the in- ward workings of God's free mercy, and seal in our hearts the promises of God k .' A learned writer observes and proves, that a sacrament relates to that which ' flows from God to us ; ' and he adds, that ' it is a thing neither denied nor forgotten by any, but is evident from what the Scriptures teach concerning Baptism and the Lord's Supper 1.' Indeed, the Socinian way is to exclude God, as it were, out of the Sacraments, and to allow him no part in them, but to reduce all to a bare human performance, or positive duty : but we have not so learned Christ. We are so far from thinking the sacramental transaction to be a bare duty of ours, that we conceive there is great use and efficacy in a sacrament, even where the recipient performs no duty at all, nor is capable of any, as in the case of infants receiving Baptism. It is further observable, that Baptism is frequently mentioned together with repentance, in the New Testament, as distinct from it ; though repentance alone, as it signifies or implies entire obedience, fully expresses all that is properly and merely duty on our part. A plain sign that Baptism, as a sacrament, carries more in the idea of it than the consideration of bare duty, and that it comes not, in its whole notion, under the head of duties, but of rites, or contracts, or covenants, solemn transactions between God and man. God bears his part in it, as well as we ours : and therefore it is looked upon as distinct from bare duties, and spoken of accordingly. I suppose it might be on these and the like considerations, that some Divines have conceived, that a sacrament, properly, is rather an application of God to men, than of men to God. Mr. Scandret, distinguishing a sacrament, according to its pre- cise formality, from a sacrifice, observes, that it is ' an outward visible sign of an invisible grace or favour from God to man m .' k Hoinily on the Common Prayer esse quasi manus Dei quibus is nobis and Sacraments. offert et confert quod a fide nobis 1 Towerson on the Sacraments, p. petitur et accipitur.' Voss. de Sa- 12. Vossius, to the same purpose, cram. Vi et Effic. p. 252. vol. vi. says : ' Quemadmodum fides est quasi Opp. manus nostra, qua nos quaerimus et m Scandret, Sacrifice of the Divine accipimus : sic verbum et sacramenta Service, p. 54. The Introduction. 13 And Dr. Eymer takes notice, that, according to our Church Catechism, ' a sacrament is not supposed, in its most essential part, an application made by men to God, but one made by God to man. . . A gracious condescension of God's, by which he converses with men, and exhibits to them spiritual blessings, &c. . . God's part is indeed the whole that is strictly and pro- perly sacramental : the outward and visible signs exhibited are in effect the voice of God, repeating his promise of that inward and spiritual favour 11 .' Dr. Towerson long before had observed, that there is a difficulty as to ' shewing that a sacra- ment relates equally to that which passeth from us to God, and that it imports our duty and service .' He conceived no difficulty at all, as to God's part in a sacrament ; that was a clear point : but he thought it not so easy to prove, that the strict and proper sense of the word sacrament includes man's part at all. However, it is very certain that the whole transaction, in the case of adults, is between two parties, and that the application is mutual between God and man. And this must be acknowledged particularly in the Eucharist, by as many as do allow of a Consecration-prayer, and do admit that service to be part of our religious worship, as also to be a federal rite. But from hence may appear how widely they mistake who consider a sacrament as a bare human performance, a discharge of a positive duty on man's part, and nothing more, throwing out what belongs to God, and what is most strictly sacramental. It is sinking or dropping the noblest and most essential part of the idea, and presenting us with a very lame and insufficient account of the thing. But a more minute explication of this matter, together with the proofs of what we maintain, will come in hereafter : all I intended here was only to give the reader some previous conception of the state of the main question, that he may understand the more clearly what we are about. 2. Next, I must observe, that that part in a sacrament which is really ours, and which, so far as concerns adults, is properly duty, is yet such a duty as is supposed to comprehend, one way or other, all duty : for receiving worthily (as shall be shewn in its place) implies present repentance, a heart turned to God and to universal obedience, and a serious resolution so to abide to our life's end. It has been thought somewhat strange, by those who have imbibed wrong notions of the case, that all Christian privileges should be supposed to follow a single duty, 11 Eymer, General Representation of Revealed Religion, pp. 286, 287. Towerson on the Sacraments, p. 12. 14 The Introduction. when they really belong to the whole system of duties. But when it is considered, that these privileges are never conceived to be annexed to this single duty, in any other view, or upon any other supposition, but as it virtually carries in it (or in the idea of worthy reception) all duty, the main difficulty will vanish ; for it may still be true, that those Christian privileges go along with the whole system of duties, and with nothing short of it. We never do annex all Christian privileges to this single duty, but as this duty is conceived, for the time being, to contain all the rest ; for that we take to be implied in receiving worthily. Whether we are right in interpreting worthy reception in so comprehensive a sense, is not now the question, but may be considered in its place : all I am con- cerned with here is to ward off a charge of inconsistency, with respect to our doctrine on this head. But to shew the weakness of the charge yet more plainly, let the same objection be urged in a very common case of oaths to a government, or of subscription to articles, to which many State-privileges and Church-privileges are ordinarily annexed. What, may some say, shall all those privileges be given, merely for the labour of repeating an oath, or of writing a name 1 No, certainly : the outward work is the least and the lowest part of what the privileges are intended for, if it be any part at all, in a strict sense. The privileges are intended for persons so swearing, or so subscribing, upon a presumption that such oath carries in it all dutiful allegiance to the sovereign, and that such subscription carries in it all conformity in faith and doctrine to the Church established. Of the like nature and use are our sacramental ties and covenants. They are supposed, when worthily performed, to carry in them all dutiful allegiance to God, and a firm attachment to Christ ; a stipulation of a good conscience, and, in a word, universal righteousness, both as to faith and manners P : all which is solemnly entered into for the present, and stipulated for the future, by every sincere and devout communicant. To be short, repentance, rightly understood, and a due attendance on the Sacraments, taken P What Tertullian observes of the audientis intinctio est, metus integer, sacrament of Baptism is justly ap- deinde quoad Dominum senseris, plicable to both Sacraments : ' La- fides sana, conscientia semel poeni- vacrum illud obsignatio est fidei, tentiam amplexata. Ceterum, si ab quae fides a poenitentiae fide in- aquis peccare desistimus, necessitate, cipitur et commendatur. Non ideo non sponte innocentiam induimus.' abluimur ut delinquere desinamus, Tertull. de Poenit. cap. vi. p. 125. sed quia desiimus, quoniam jam Kigali, corde loti sumus. Haec enim prima The Introduction. 15 together, do in our account make up the whole system of Christian practice for the time being : therefore in annexing all Gospel-privileges to worthy receiving, we do not annex them to one duty only, but to all, contained, as it were, or summed up (by the supposition) in that one. All the mistake and misconception which some run into on this head, appears to be owing to their abstracting the outward work from the inward worthiness supposed to go along with it, and then calling that a single duty, which at best is but the shell of duty in itself, and which, in some circumstances, (as when separate from a good heart,) is no duty at all, but a grievous sin, a contempt offered to the body and blood of Christ, and highly provoking to Almighty God. Thus far I have taken the liberty of premising a few things in the entrance ; not for the anticipating what I am hereafter to prove, but for the removing those prejudices which appeared to lie in the way. And now I proceed, with God's assistance, to what I intend upon the subject of the Eucharist, otherwise styled the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, or the Holy Communion. 1 6 The Ancient Names of CH. I. CHAP. I. Of tJie most noted or most considerable Names under which the Holy Communion hath been anciently spoken of. BEFORE I come directly to treat of the thing, it may be proper to observe something of the names it has anciently gone under : which I shall endeavour to range in chronological order, according to the time when each name may be supposed to have come up, or first to have grown into vogue. A. D. 33. Breaking of Bread. The oldest name given to this holy ceremony, or religious ser- vice, seems to have been that of ' breaking bread,' taken from what the disciples saw done by our Lord in the solemnity of the insti- tution. I choose to set the date according to the time of the first clear instance a we have of it, rather than according to the time when St. Luke related it in his history ; because very probably he followed the style of those who then celebrated it. St. Luke in his history of the Acts, speaking of the disciples, says : ' They continued steadfastly in the Apostles' doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of bread, and in prayersV The circumstances of the text plead strongly for interpreting, it of the Holy Commu- nion : and the Syriac version (which is of great antiquity) renders it ' breaking of the Eucharist c ;' which is some confirmation of the same construction. A little lower, in the same chapter, a I said, first clear instance ; be- yet since it is a disputed construc- cause though Luke xxiv. 30, 35 tion, and such as cannot be ascer- has been understood of the Eucha- tained, I call that instance not clear, rist by some ancients, and more but pass it off as none, because it is moderns, (Romanists especially,) and doubtful. I see no absurdity in the interpre- b Acts ii. 42. tation, nor anything highly im- c The same phrase occurs in the probable, or that could give just Recognitions, lib. vi. n. 15 : ' Euclia- advantage to the Romish cause with ristiam frangens cum eis.' respect to communion in one kind ; CH. i. the Holy Communion. 17 mention is again made of the disciples, as ' continuing daily in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house d ;' or rather ' in a house,' set apart for holy uses 6 . St. Luke a third time takes notice of the ' breaking of bread :' where also the Syriac version renders as before, ' breaking of the Eucharist.' The circumstances confirm it : it was on the ' first day of the week/ and St. Paul is observed to have 'preached unto them.' St. Paul also himself seems to allude to this name, when speaking of this Sacrament he says, ' The bread which we break, is it not the Communion f V &c. They who would see more concerning this name may consult, besides com- mentators, the authors referred to at the bottom of the page?. I may just observe, by the way, that scruples have been raised against the construction here given ; and some have thought that the texts might possibly be interpreted either of a love- feast, or else of a common meal. I think, very hardly, and not without some violence. However, even Whitby and Wolfius, who appear to hesitate upon Acts ii. 42, 46, yet are positive enough with respect to Acts xx. 7, as relating to the Eucharist : and since there is no ground for scruple, excepting only that the Romanists make an ill use of this construction, and that may easily be obviated a better way n , I look upon the construction here given as sufficiently supported. And it is some confirmation of it, that Ignatius, of the apostolical times, makes use of the same phrase of ' breaking bread,' where he is plainly speaking of this holy Sacrament 1 . d Acts ii. 46. Our translation in f I Cor. x. 16. the phrase ' from house to house' f Casauboii. ad Annal. Eccles. (KOT' olKov) follows Beza, who renders Exerc. xvi. p. 378, alias p. 528. ' domatim, ' and has been found fault Buxtorf de Coena Domini, pp. 312, with by Scaliger, Mede, Beveridge, 313. Suicer. Thesaur. in voc. KKaais, and Cave, referred to in Wolfius Cur. p. 105. Julian. Vorstii Philolog. Crit. pag. 1048. Compare Johnson's Sacr. part. ii. p. 200. Towerson on Unbloody Sacrifice, vol. ii. p. 98. the Sacraments, p. 166. e ' Erant autem privata ilia virfpfa u Vid. Casaubon. ad Annal. loca a Judaeis semper sacris usibus Eccl. Exercit. xvi. n. 48. p. destinata ; saltern ex quo Daniel 379. propheta ascendisse in coenaculum ' "Ei/a apron K\uvTes. Ignat. ad ad orandum diceretur.' Pearson, Ephes. cap. xx. p. 19. Lect. in Act. Apost. p. 31. 1 8 The Ancient Names of CH. I. A. D. 57. Communion. * The name of Communion has been long famous, and was undoubtedly taken from St. Paul's account of this Sacrament, where he teaches that the effect of this service is the Communion of the body and blood of Christ k . He does not indeed directly call the Sacrament by that name, as others have done since he was signifying what the thing is, or what it does, rather than how it was then called 1 . But as his account gave the first occasion for the name of Communion, I thought it not amiss to date it from thence. I find not that this name became frequent in the earlier centuries : the Canons called apostolical are of doubtful age. The Roman clergy, in a letter to the clergy of Carthage, make use of the name Communion in the time of St. Cyprian m , that is, about the middle of the third century. But in the age next following, it became very common, both in the Greek and Latin Fathers. The Spanish Fathers, in the Council of Elvira, (A.D. 305), make use of it more than forty times : the Councils of Aries and of Ancyra (in 314 and 315) made use of the same. The Council of Nice, in the year 325, speaks of the same Sacra- ment under the name of Communion 11 , in their thirteenth Canon. Hilary, about the middle of the same century, styles it sometimes the Communion of the Holy Body, sometimes the Sacrament of the Holy Communion, sometimes the Communion of the everlast- ing Sacraments . A little later in the same century, Basil some- times has the single word Communion P to denote the Eucharist : at other times he calls it the Communion of the good Thing, or of k i Cor. x. 16. Cyprian. Epist. ii. p. 8. Bened. 1 'Non appellat Paulus Coenam ed. Domini Communionem tanquam pro- n Koivuvtas ird\iv T\>xv. Concil. prio ejus nomine ; sed vim et effica- Nicaen. can. xiii. p. 330. Harduin. ciam Sacramenti hujus exprimens, Hilarius Pictavens. pp. 169, 223, ait earn esse communionem, sive 740. edit. Bened. participationem corporis Christi.' P Koivtaviav oticoi KaTtx ovrfs > fy>' Casaubon. Exercit. xvi. n. 47. p. eavruiv f*f.Ta.\a.n$d.vov AA|oj'- 361. Spia 8e Kal tv Alyvirrcf eicaffTos teal m ' Si qui in hanc tentationem in- rwv iv \aa> reAoiWcop, &>s M -rb ciderunt, coeperint apprehendi infir- irXfiarov, ex.fi Koivwv'iav ev T< olicta mitate, et agant poeiiitentiam facti avrov, /cat ore ftov\tTai fisraAa^Saj'et sui, et desiderent communionem, 81' tavrov. Basil. Epist. xciii. p. utique subveniri eis debet ' &c. Apud 187. edit. Bened.; alias Epist. 289. CH. I. the Holy Communion. 19 the 'Sovereign GoocK I need not descend to lower Fathers, amongst whom the name became very frequent : Suicer r has col- lected their testimonies, observing withal the several accounts which they gave of the name, all reducible to three, i. The Sacra- ment is so called because of the communion we therein hold with Christ and with each other. 2. Because we are therein made part- ners of Christ's kingdom. 3. Because it is a religious banquet, which we partake of in common with our fellow Christians. A. D. 57. Lord's Supper. I am willing to set down the name of Lord's Supper as a Scripture name, occurring in St. Paul's Epistles 8 ; which appears to be the most prevailing opinion of learned Protestants. Not that I take it to be a clear point at all, or so much as capable of being proved : but I incline rather to those, both ancients and moderns, who interpret that place of the love-feast, kept in imi- tation of our Lord's Last Supper, which was previous to the original Eucharist. Thus much however is certain, that in the apostolical times the love-feast and the Eucharist, though distinct, went together, and were nearly allied to each other, and were both of them celebrated at one meeting. Without some such supposition as that, it was next to impossible to account for St. Paul's quick transition, in that chapter, from one to the other. Whether, therefore, Lord's Supper in that chapter sig- nifies the love-feast only, or the Eucharist only, or both together, one thing is clear and unquestionable, that they were both but different parts of the same solemnity, or different acts of the same meeting : and there is no occasion to be scrupulously nice and critical in distinguishing to which of the parts the name strictly belongs *. i Kotveevia rov ayadov. Epist. tius inquirere non est opus : sive Canon, prima ad Amphiloch. p. enim Christianomm Agapae, sive 272. Epist. secuncla, p. 293. ipsa Eucharistia significetur, nil in- r Suicer. Thesaur. in Koivdivia. terest, dummodo concedatur (quod Conf. Casaubon. Exercit. xvi. n. iiulla prorsus ratione iiegari potest) 47. p. 361, &c., alias 504, &c. EucharistiaecelebrationemcumAga- 8 i Cor. xi. 20. pis esse conjunctam.' Sam. Basnag. 1 ' Quid rei sit coena haec, accura- Annal. torn. ii. p. 296. C 2 2O The Ancient Names of CH. i. Maldonate, the Jesuit, in his Contents upon Matt. xxvi. 26, took upon him to reproach the Protestants in an unhandsome manner, for speaking of the Eucharist under the name of a Supper ; Avhich he thought irreverent, and not wan-anted by Scripture, antiquity, or sound reason u . The learned Casaubon some time after appeared in behalf of the Protestants x , and easily defended them, as to the main thing, against the injurious charge. Albertinus, long after, searched with all diligence into ancient precedents and authorities for the name, and produced them in great abundance y, more than sufficient to confute the charge of novelty, rashness, or profaneness on that head. The truth of the matter seems to be. that though there is no clear proof that the name of Supper is a Scripture name, yet some Fathers (as high as the fourth century) thought that it was, so understanding i Cor. xi. 20. And many interpreters of good note have followed them in it. Indeed it does not appear that the text was so construed before the latter end of the fourth century, or that the name of Lord's Supper was much in use as a name for the Eucharist. Irenaeus once has the name of God's Supper, but means quite another thing by it z . Tertullian has the same a for Lord's Table, referring to i Cor. x. 22, not to i Cor. xi. 20. He has also the phrase of Lord's Banquet b , [or Lord's Day Banquet,] and Banquet of God c , meaning the love- feasts then in use, which he elsewhere styles the Supper of Christians d . But St. Basil very plainly interprets Lord's Supper in that text of the Eucharist 6 : which even Fronto Ducaeus, in u ' Calvinistae sine Scripturae auc- c ' Convivium Dei.' Tertull. de toritate, sine veterum auctorum ex- Virgin. Vel. cap. viii. p. 172. emplo, sine ratione, nullo judicio, d ' Coena nostra de nomine ratio- coenam vocant.' Maldouat. p. 556. nem sui ostendit : id vocatur quod x Casaubon. Exercit. xvi. n. 32. dilectio apud Graecos. ' Tertull. p. 368, alias 513. Apoll. cap. 39. y Albertinus de Eucharistia, lib. i. e "na-irep oi>Sev Koivbv cr/ceCos eVwpe- cap. I. trot 6 \6yos eiffcpepeffOat fls TCI ayia, 1 ' Coena Dei.' Iren. lib. iv. cap. ovrias oi'/Se ra ayta els Kotvbv olitov 36. p. 279. ed. Bened. en-ire A.tVr#o. . . . /U^JTS rbv Koivbv Se'tir- a 'NonpossumuscoenamDeiedere, vov fv Kn\T]aia eafltetv /cat Trivetv, et coenam daemoniorum.' Tertullian. /J-^re rb KvpiaKbv Sflirvov fv olnia de Spect. cap. xiii. p. 79. Ka6v&pttiit. Basil. Regul. Brev. p. b 'Convivium Dominicum.' Ter- 310, p. 525. ed. Bened., alias 657. tull. ad Uxor. cap. iv. p. 168. Conf. Theodorit. in i Cor. xi. 20. CH. i. the Holy Communion. 21 his notes upon the place, confesses ; endeavouring at the same time to bring off Maldonate as fairly as the matter would bear, while, in reality, he yields the main thing, with respect to the Fathers, at least. However, it must be owned that Basil is the first who directly so interprets the text, and that the Fathers were not all of a mind about it, and that the appellation of Supper was not very common till after the fourth century ; and that even in the later centuries the name of Lord's Supper was a name for that supper which our Lord made previous to the Eucharist. The third Council of Carthage (A. D. 418) speaks of 'one day in the year in which the Lord's Supper was celebrated f :' where it is plain that Lord's Supper does not mean the Eucharist, but the supper proper to Maundy-Thursday, kept in imitation of our Lord's Paschal Supper, previous to the Eucharist. And the like is mentioned in the Trullan Council (A. D. 683), in their 2Qth Canon?. So that Lord's Supper was not then become a familiar name, as now, for the Eucharist, but rather eminently denoted the supper previous to it ; either our Lord's own, or that which was afterwards observed by Christians as a memorial of it, being a kind of love-feast. I shall only add further, that Hilary the Deacon (A. r>. 380, or nearly) in his comment upon i Cor. xi. seems to dislike the name of supper 1 ', as applied to the Eucharist, and therefore could not interpret the text as Basil of that time did. A. D. 96. Oblation. The name of oblation may, I think, be fairly carried up as high as to Clemens of Rome, who upon the lowest computation wrote his famous Epistle as early as the year 96. The more common date is 70, or thereabout : but a learned and considerate writer', who very lately has re-examined the chronology of that Epistle, has with great appearance of probability brought it down to A. D. 96 : and there I am willing to rest it. f Miaj T7jeria$ % (if pas ev fj TO Kvpia- rium Eucharistiae inter coenandum Kbv Sflirvov firirf^t'irai. Concil. Car- celebratum, non coenam esse : medi- thag. Can. xliv. p. 567. Bevereg. edit, cina enim spiritalis est, quae cum s Mias eTTjffiou ^iifpas, tv 77 -rb reverentia degustata, purificat sibi iivpiaK^v SeiTrvoc fimt\f7rai. Concil. devotmn.' Pseud. Ambros. in loc. Trull. Can. xxix. p. 188. * Lardner, Credibility of Gospel k 'Ostendit [Christus] illis myste- Hist, part ii. vol. i. pp. 5062. 22 " The Ancient Names of CH. i. Clemens speaks of the oblations and sacred functions of the Church, referring, very probably, to the Eucharistical service k : neither can he without some violence be interpreted to mean any- thing else. In another place, he still more plainly refers to the same, where he says ; ' It would be no small sin in us, should we cast off those from the episcopal function, who holily and without blame offer the gifts 1 .' Here he expressly speaks of gifts offered, (that is, of oblation,) and by sacerdotal hands. The gifts were brought to the altar, or communion table, by the people, and were recommended to God's acceptance by the offici- ating bishop, or presbyter. So there was first a kind of lay oblation, and next a sacerdotal oblation of the same gifts to God. Those gifts consisted partly of alms to the poor, and partly of oblations, properly so called, to the Church ; and out of these last was usually taken the matter of the Eucharist, the bread and wine m . The oblation, as I before hinted, was twofold ; hence the whole service of the Eucharist came to be called the oblation : and to communicate, or to administer, in Church language, was to offer. There was a third kind of oblation which came up afterwards, in the third century : or, to speak more accurately, the commemoration, which was always a part of the Eucharistical service, came by degrees to be called an oblation, (but not within the two first centuries, so far as I can find,) and then commenced a kind of third oblation : not a new thing, but an old service under a new name. k Hdvra rc|ej iroietv 6ti\ofj.fv , . . KOVTO.S ra ScSpo, rijx ftrta-KOTrrjs airo/Bd- rds re irpoo-Qopas Kal \firovpyeias ^TTI- \tanev. c. xliv. p. 178. Compare re\f7ffdai . . . ol o$v -rots trpoffrtray- Johnson's Unbl. Sacrifice, part i. fJ.l"US KCUpOlS TTOlOWTfS TOS TTpOepo/J.evtav avrqi Qvaitav, rov- offert Deo, ei qui alimenta nobis rt THLGIV ratv tdvaiv irpoatyfpofjifwv avrw 8. ad Philadelph. c. 4. Ovffiuv, Tovretm TOV Itprov TTJS eiixa- z Justin. M. Apol. 96. Dialog, pp. piffrias, KOI TOV iroTrjpiov o^o'nas TTJS 2 2O, 386. Thirlby. ev^apitrrias, irpo\(yei r&re. Just. a Irenaeus, pp. 251, 294, 341, 360, Dialog, p. 220, edit. Lond. ed. Bened. dvvias &s TrapeScaKfv 'iTjaoOs 6 b Clem. Alex. Paedag. lib. ii. cap. Xpurrbs ytvevdai, TOVTCO-TIV tvl TTJ 1. p. 178. ed. Oxon. fvxaptffriq TOV Uprou /col TOV irorr)- c Origen. contr. Gels. lib. viii. sect. piov. Ibid. p. 386. 57. p. 784. ed. Bened. ori fity ovv teal filial ical evx6/j.fi/a.i, re- 22O, 562, 570. Kigalt. Aticu p.6va.L (coi tlzpfaroi tlffi rf ei)fJ.i' ravra yap Ep. pp. 34, 37, 38, 39, 117, Il8, 125, n.6va KOI XpiffTiavo'l irapeAajSoi' irotfty, 190, 191, 223. Ox. edit. nal CTT' a.va.jj.vi}(rti St rrjs Tpofpfii/. dicit Dominus, hoc facite in meam Ibid. p. 38. Cp. Apost. Const, lib. vi. commemorationem, invenias quod cap. 23. ista est commemoratio sola, quae r Tovrov Srjra rov dv/j.a,ros r D 34 The Ancient Names of CH. i. the grand sacrifice s . I need not descend lower, to fetch in more authorities for the use of this name : only, I may just give a hint that all those Fathers who interpreted the name sacrifice, as applied in such a particular view to the Eucharist, by a memorial of a sacrifice, may as reasonably be understood to call the Eucha- rist a memorial, as to call it a sacrifice. Those Fathers were many, and Chrysostom may be esteemed their chief : who while he follows the ordinary language in denominating the Eucharist a sacrifice, (considered in its representative view,) yet intimates withal, that its more proper appellation, in that view, is a memo- rial of a sacrifice *. I may further take notice, that St. Austin comes very near to what I have been speaking of, where he calls the Eucharist by the name of the sacrament of commemoration, or sacramental memorial . To conclude this article, let the reader observe and bear in mind, that the names of oblation and sacrifice, as applied to the Eucharist in one particular point of view, do both of them resolve into the name memorial : and so far they are all three to be looked upon as equivalent names, bearing the same sense, pointing to the same thing. This obser- vation will be of use, when we come to consider the Eucharist in its sacrificial view under a distinct chapter below. A. D. 249. Passover. The name of Passover has been anciently given to the Eu- charist, upon a presumption that as Christ himself succeeded to the paschal lamb, so the feast of the Eucharist succeeded in the room of the paschal feast. Christ is our Passover, as the name stands for the lamb x : the Eucharist is our MV e'jrl Tpairefyi fKTf\f~iv, Sia ,uaTos avrov, teal TOV Levit. p. 31. Eulogius. apud Phot. (Turnpiov OUHO.TOS. Ibid. p. 30. cod. 280. p. 1609. Fulgentius. de s T)II> n.vfifi.i)v TOV (JifyaAov OV/JLUTOS. Fide ad Petr. cap. Ix. p. 525. Ibid. p. 40. Fragm. 618. Oecumenius, in Hebr. 1 Ilpoo-tpfponev /j.ei>, oXA* a.vd^.vT}ffiv x. p. 846. Theophylact. in Hebr. Trotov/j-eda TOV OOVO.TOV avTov. . . . T^V x. I. p. 971. aurV Ovcrtav del iroiov/jitv, fM\\6v Te u ' Sacramentum memoriae." Au- a.vap.vriciiv epyadfjif6a. Qu effdlovra rfjs ffapitbs -rov ritu, sed et cum sermones ejus reci- A.6yov OVK fffriv foe ov iroieT rb irdar- pimus, in quibus vita consistit. Sicut Xa, oirtp epfj-yvevfrat Sia&ar-fipta., 810- et ipse dicit, Verba quae locutus fiaivtav a.fl ry \o-ytfffj.y Kal iravrl \6yq sum, spiritus et vita est.' Orig. in KOI -navy irpd^fi airb rSiv rov j8iou Num. Horn. xvi. p. 334. ed. Bened. TTp3.yiJia.riav (ir\ -rbv tbv Kal firl TT]V a 'Judas proditor indicatur, sine ir6\iv avjov ffitffovtv. Orig. contr. quo pascha, accepto calice et fracto Gels. lib. viii. p. 759. ed. Bened., pane, conficitur. ' Hilar. in Matt, alias p. 392. cap. xxx. p. 740. ed. Bened. D 2 36 The Ancient Names of CH. i. is but a type, though much more plain than the old one : for I am bold to say, that the legal Passover was an obscurer type of another typeV St. Jerome, who was once Nazianzen's scholar, follows him in the same sentiment, styling the Eucharist the true sacrament of the Passover, in opposition to the old one . But no one dwells more upon that thought, or more finely illustrates it, than the great St. Chrysostom in divers places. He asks why our Lord celebrated the Passover ] And his answer is, because the old Passover was the figure of the future one, and it was proper, after exhibiting the shadow, to bring in the truth also upon the table d : a little after he says, 'it is our Passover to declare the Loi-d's death 6 ,' quoting i Cor. xi. 26. And he adds, that who- ever comes with a pure conscience, celebrates the Passover, as often as he receives the communion, be it to-day, or to-morrow, or at any time whatever f . And he has more in the same place, to the same purpose. In another work he speaks thus : ' When the sun of righteousness appeared, the shadow disappeared : . . . . therefore upon the self -same table both the Passovers were celebrated, the typical and the reals.' A little lower, he calls the Eucharist the spiritual Passover 11 . Isidorus Pelusiota afterwards styles it the Divine and true Passover 1 . And St. Austin observes, that the Jews celebrate their Passover in a lamb, and we receive ours in the body and blood of the b Mtra\rfif/6fi.0a Sf TOW Tacrxa vvv d Chrysost. torn. i. Orat. contr. fj.fv rvvtKus erj, ical t ToD 7raAacoD Jud. 3. P- 610. ed. Bened. yvfj.v&r(pov rb yap vofJUKov ird e Tldcrxa 8e fan, TO r'bv 6d.va.Tov ToA.jUa> Kal Ae'-yw, T'tnrov rinros ?iv xarayy f \\eiv. Ibid. p. 6ll. a/j.v5p6r(pos. Nazianz. Orat. Hi. p. f Tldirxa iriT\e?, K'UV aijfj.fpov, K&C 692. afipiov, /c&v dirortpovv fjLfrdffXfl TTJS c ' Postquam typicum pascha fue- Kotvtavias. Ibid. p. 612. rat impletum, et agni cames cum 8 'Ei/ avrfj rrj rpairf^ri fKarepov apostolis comederat, assumit panem, ylverat traffxa, Kal rb TOV rvwov, nal qui confortat cor hominis, et ad rb TTJ? a\ri9flas. Chrysost. de Pro- verum paschae transgreditur sacra- dit. Jud. Horn. i. torn. i. p. 383. mentum : ut quomodo in praefigura- 'En-' aurf/s rrjs rpatrefos, KOI rb rvTrit(bi> tione ejus Melchisedec, summi Dei irdcrxa. vrrtpfypa\l/f, Kal rb a\T]6ii'bv sacerdos, panem et vinum offerens trpo(r(9j]Ke. Ibid, fecit, ipse quoque veritatem sui cor- h Tb -rrvfVfj.ariKbv ird fdcr^a 6 T^p finuv, al ft Kara- fers to such authors as have es- uy^i rmiav. Justin Mart. Dial. p. poused the first of the instances, 292. edit. Thirlby. Cp. Wolfius, after Baronius and Scaliger. i Cor. v. 7. 1 Buxtorf. Dissert, vi. de Coena, p. * ' 'Av djtvTjcm ritus Hebraeorum 301. Dissert. vii.Vindic. pp. 347, 348. redolet : habebant namque Judaei, r Bucherus, Antiq. Evangel, p. in celebratione agni paschalis, plures 375. Compare Deylingius (Miscel- ejusmodi a.i>afj.vi)ffets et recordati- lan. Sacr. p. 228, &c.), who abso- ones,' &c. Bucherus, p. 379. CH. ii. the Holy Communion. 45 5. In the ancient paschal feast, the master of the house was wont to take cup after cup (to the number of four) into his hands, consecrating them one after another by a short thanks- giving ; after which each consecrated cup was called a cup of blessing. It is judged by the learned in Jewish antiquities", that the third or fourth cup (Buxtorf is positive for the fourth) was what our Lord was pleased to sanctify, by taking it into his hand, and giving thanks over it. It is doubted what the words 'after supper' mean ; whether in the close of the paschal supper, as some think x , or after they had eaten bread, as others construe y : but the difference is not of moment, and so I pass on. 6. At the institution of the Passover it was said, ' The blood shall be to you for a token upon the houses where you are ; and when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and the plague shall not be upon you 2 ,' &c. The blood was the token of the covenant in that behalf, between God and his people; as circum- cision before had been a token a also of a like covenant, and called covenant b as well as token. In the institution of the Communion, our Lord says, ' This cup is the new covenant in my blood which is shed for you, for many, for the remission of sins.' The cup is here by a figure put for wine ; and covenant, accord- ing to ancient Scripture phrase, is put for token of a covenant ; and wine, representative of Christ's blood, answers to the blood of the Passover, typical of the same blood of Christ c : and the u Pfaffius de Oblat. Euch. p. 173. consecratum, quam versionem se- Buxtorf. iu Lex. Talmud, pp. 614, quuntur Arabs et Persa. Sic Grae- 616. Dissert, vi. p. 300. Lightfoot cis Sttwvov quideni ISitas coenam, on Matt. xxvi. 27, p. 259. Buche- sed TraxfAcUs et Karaxpj)' 'Tb juera SfiTrvfiffat [i Cor. xi. z Exod. xii. 13. 25.] noil vertenduin est, post coenam a Gen. xvii. 1 1. communem, qualis nunquam fuit, b Gen. xvii. 10. 'This is my cove- sed remote post coenam paschalem : nant,' &c. ; and v. 13, 'my covenant vel, quod vero similius est, proxime shall be in your flesh, ' &c. et immediate pos esum panis conse- c 'Deus speciali mandate sacrificia crati ; cui expos iioni respondet re- et primitias offerendas ordinavit, censio historica Luc. xxii. 10. wtrav- maxime effusionem sanguinis, ut ab TCOS KO.} r>> TtoTtipio" /j.tra rb Strnvriffai, initio homines haberent unde effusi- postquam coinederant, scil. paiiem onis per Christum tacite recordari 46 The Commemoration of Christ CH. in. remission of sins here, answers to the passing over there, and pre- serving from plague. These short hints may suffice at present, just to intimate the analogy between the Jewish Passover and the Christian Eucharist in the several particulars of moment here mentioned. 7. At the paschal feast there was an annunciation or declara- tion d of the great things which God had done for that people : in like manner, one design of the Eucharist is to make a de- claration of the mercies of God in Christ, to ' sheAv the Lord's death till he come.' 8. Lastly, at the close of the paschal supper, they were wont to sing an hymn 6 of praise : and the like was observed in the close of the institution of the Christian Eucharist ; as is recorded in the Gospels. The many resembling circumstances, real and verbal, which I have here briefly enumerated, do abundantly shew that this holy Euchai'ist was in a great measure copied from the paschal feast, and was intended to supply its place, only heightening the design, and improving the application. The use of the observation may appear afterwards, when we come to consider more minutely either the general intent or the particular parts of this Christian service. CHAP. III. Of the Commemoration or Remembrance of Christ in the Holy Communion. SINCE the end or design of anything is always considered as first in view, antecedent in natural order to the performance, so the rules of just method require that in treating of this Sacra - possent. Dan. ix. 24. Heb. ix. et Observant praeterea viri docti vimim x. Horn. iii. Praeter caeteras obla- rufum, quale in illis regionibus cres- tiones Deo factas, com memorabilia cebat, ac in primis in coena paschali sunt sacrificia in festo expiationum. bibebatur, egregiam nobis sanguinis .... Turn quoque sacrificium agni memoriam relinquere.' Bucher. An- paschalis, et quotidiani, seu jugis tiq. Evan. p. 389. sacrificii, attendi debet. Hos igitur d See Lightfoot, vol. ii. p. 778. adritus et oblationes alludit Christus Pfaffius, p. 181. cum ait, TOVTO ydp tan rb alpa /.LOV e See Lightfoot, vol. ii. pp. 258, , . , rb Tys Katvfjs SioO^KTjs, rb irepl iro\- 260. Pfaffius, p. 181. Kiev fKX^"6/jifvov fls &(pecriv a/j.apTtuv. CH. in. in The Holy Communion. 47 ment we should begin with some account of the proximate end and design of it ; namely, the commemoration or remembrance of Christ, ' This do in remembrance of me f ;' and particularly of his death and passion, 'shew the Lord's death till he come?.' I call it the proximate or immediate end, because the ultimate end of all is the happiness of man, or, what is coincident there- with, the glory of God. Our blessed Lord seeks not his own glory, but the good of his creatures, in all that he appoints them to do. He is not capable of receiving advantage, or any real addition to his own glory, by any of our commemorations or ser- vices : but all these things are graciously appointed for our present and future benefit ; and we may be confident that Christ, the Captain of our salvation, would prescribe nothing in a par- ticular manner, which does not as particularly contribute to that end. Some Divines, of a refined and elevated way of thinking, will not allow that God can have any end but himself, in anything that he does, because he can have no higher : but then they do not mean that God proposes to himself any increase of happiness or of essential glory, to which nothing can be added ; but that, as he is naturally benevolent, and as he takes delight in his own being and attributes, (the most worthy of his love,) so he delights in the exercise of his goodness, and chooses it as worthy of himself, and, in this sense, acts only for himself. In such a sense as this, our blessed Lord may be said to have acted for himself, or for his own glory, in what he did for mankind : but it can in no sense be allowed, that he receives any advantage by what we say or do ; and therefore the ultimate end (so con- sidered) of our commemorations or services is the benefit accruing from thence to ourselves : what they are we shall see in due time and place. This being premised for clearer conception, or to prevent mistakes, I now proceed. The commemoration of our Lord's dying for us includes two things ; the consideration of him as Lord, and as dying ; one expressing his personal dignity, the other expressing his f Luke xxii. 19. 1 Cor. xi. 24, & i Cor. xi. 26. Tbi> 6a.va.-rov rov 25. TOVTO itoieire its -rty ^rjv avd/j.- Kvpiov KaTayj(\\ere &xpis ov tut 48 The Commemoration of Christ CH. in. meritorious sufferings relative to us. The first of the two may suffice for the present : the second may be reserved for a distinct chapter. I here take for my ground the words of our Lord, ' This do in remembrance of me.' The Greek words els T^V e^v dvd- fjLvrja-iv may bear three several renderings (or four) : i. In re- membrance of me. 2. In commemoration of me. 3. For a memorial of me, or, for my memorial. They differ not much in sense, but yet as they do differ, they may deserve a distinct consideration. The second includes the first ; and the third includes both the former, not vice versd : so they rise, as it were, in sense, and are so many distinct gradations, as shall be shewn presently. I. I begin with the first and lowest, this do 'in remembrance of me.' The Socinians, (some of them at least,) not content with supposing this remembrance or commemoration to be one considerable end or part of this Sacrament, make it to be the only end or use of it h ; yea and sometimes go so far as to say that it constitutes the very nature or essence of this holy rite : for they interpret the words, ' This is my body,' so as to mean, this action, this eating and drinking, is the memorial of Christ's body broken \ &c. Which is overdoing, and neglecting to dis- tinguish between the thing itself, and the end or design of it ; between what is done, and for what purpose it is done. We eat bread and we drink wine in the Sacrament, the symbols of Christ's body and blood ; and we do so for this reason, among others, that Christ may be remembered, and the merits of his passion celebrated. But this I hint by the way only, and pass h 'Et haecquidem quam explicui- Christ! pro memoriali signo cor- inus, mortis Christi annuntiatio pro- poris Christ! fracti, et sanguinis prius est, atque unicus Coenae Domi- fusi sumimus : cornmemorationem nicae finis,' &c. Volkel.de Coen. Dom. autem, istius sacri ritus finem usum- p. 687. que esse dicimiis.' Schlichting. contr. 1 'Haec actio frangendi et come- Meisn. p. 761. 'Ritus istius natu- dendi panem, est corpus, hoc est ram in panis fractione et esu, et e commemoratio Christi corporis pro poculo potu, perque haec in mortis nobis fracti.' Smalc. cont. Frantz. Christi representatione qnadam, si- p. 315. tarn esse dicimus.' Ibid. pp. 785, 'Corpus Christi et sanguinem 786. CH. in. in the Holy Communion. 49 on to what I design. Remembrance of Christ is undoubtedly a principal end of this Sacrament. It is not declared by the insti- tution itself, in what view, or under what capacity we are here to remember him ; but that must be learned from other places of Scripture, which declare who and what he is : for certainly we are to remember him in such a light as the Old and New Testa- ment have represented him in. This appears to be an allowed principle on all hands : for none think themselves obliged to stop in the bare words of the institution, without carrying their in- quiries further into the whole compass of Scripture, when they see proper. The Socinians themselves will not scruple to allow that Christ may or ought to be remembered in the Sacrament as Lord, in their sense, or as Master, or Saviour, or Head, or Judge, though there is not a word of Lord, or Master, or Saviour, or Head, or Judge, in the bare form of the institution as delivered by Christ : but those names or titles are to be fetched from other places of Scripture. Therefore, I say, it is allowed by all parties, that we ought to remember Christ, in the holy Communion, according to what he is, by the Scripture account of him. This foundation being laid, I go on to the superstructure : and for the more distinct conception of what this remembrance implies or contains, I shall take leave to proceed by several steps or degrees. i. It is not sufficient to remember Christ merely as a very great and good man, a wise instructor, and an admirable teacher, while he lived, received up into celestial bliss and glory when he died : for all this comes vastly short of what sacred Writ declares of him ; and is indeed no more (if so much) than what the Pagans themselves, the Platonists, particularly of the second and third centuries, were ready to admit. For, being struck with the fame of his undoubted miracles, and with the inimitable force of his admirable precepts, holy life, and ex- emplary death, they could not but revere and honour his memory ; neither could they refuse to assign him a place among their chief sages or deities k . And all the plea they had left for k See this particularly proved in a written by Laurence Mosheim, and very learned and curious dissertation, lately inserted, with improvements, E 50 Commemoration of Christ CH. in. not receiving Christianity was, that his disciples (as was pre- tended) had revolted, or degenerated, and had not duly observed the wholesome instructions of their high leader 1. Those Pagan philosophers therefore, as I said, remembered Christ, in as high a view as this article amounts to : a Christian remembrance must go a great deal higher. 2. It is not sufficient to remember Christ merely as an eminent prophet, or one of the chief prophets, an ambassador from heaven, and one that received his Gospel from above, wrought miracles, lived a good life, was deified after death, and will come again to judge mankind : for all this the Mahometans themselves (or some sects amongst them) can freely own, and they pay a suitable regard to his memory on that score m . It is all vastly below what the Scriptures plainly testify of him, and therefore does not amount to a Christian remembrance of him. 3. Neither yet is it sufficient to remember Christ as our Head, Lord, and Master, to whom we owe such regard as disciples do to their leader or founder : for all this is no more than what the Jews justly ascribed to Moses, who was but the servant of Christ n . And it is no more than what many nominal Christians, ancient and modern, many half-believers have owned, and what all but declared apostates or infidels must own. And it comes not up to what the Scriptures fully and frequently teach, and therefore does not amount to a due remembrance of him. into his Latin translation of Cud- praeceptoris sui scitis Christianos worth, vol. ii. Cp. Euseb. lib. vii. Platonici criminabantur .. ..atque cap. 1 8. 'Christum, Servatorem nos- castam et sanam ejus disciplinam trum, virum magnum, divinum, et variis erroribus inquinasse sapientissimum fuisse non inficia- i. Quod divinis Christum honoribus bantur, qui egregia et divina plane afficerent ; nee enim a suis id postu- docuisset, cumque a Judaeis injus- lasse Christum. 2. Quod Deos negli- tissimo supplicio necatus ftiisset, in gerent, et eorum cultum extinctum coelum ad Deos commeasset.' Mo- vellent ; Christum enim ipsum a shem. ibid. p. 23. Hence perhaps it Diis baud alienum fuisse.' Moshem. was, that the Emperor Alexander ibid. p. 24. Severus, (of the third century,) along m See Eeland. de Eeligione Mo- with the images of Apollonius and hammedica, pp. 25, 33, 34, 44, 45, Orpheus, had others of Abraham 212, 224. David Millius, Dissert. and Jesus Christ, receiving them as x. de Mohammedismo, pp. 344, 345, deities. Lamprid. \'it. Severi. 346. 1 'Descivisse scilicet a sanctissimi D Heb. iii. 2 6. CH. in. in the Holy Communion. 51 4. Neither, lastly, is it sufficient to remember Christ as higher than the angels, or older than the system of the world : for that is not more than many misbelievers, of former or of later times, have made no scruple to own, and it is still short of the Scripture accounts. For, according to the whole tenor both of Old and New Testament, Jesus Christ is not merely our Lord, Master, Judge, &c., but our Divine Lord and Master ; Lord in such a sense as to be Jehovah and God of Israel, God before the creation, and by whom all creatures were made ; who ' laid the foundation of the earth,' and even the 'heavens are the works of his hands P;' who has a rightful claim to be worshipped and adored, by men, by angels n, by the whole creation r . 'And no wonder, since he is described in sacred Writ as 'God with us 8 ,' as Lord God*, 'true God u ,' 'great God x ,' 'mighty Gody,' 'over all, God blessed for ever 2 .' Such is the Scripture account of our blessed Lord, and his personal dignity ; and therefore as such we ought to remember him as often as we think of him, and more particularly at the Communion table. For since the value of what our Lord has done or suffered rises in proportion to the dignity of the person so doing or suffering, it is manifest that we cannot duly or suitably remember him in the Sacrament, if we entertain not those high and honourable conceptions of him, which such his personal dignity demands. If the sending of the only-begotten Son into the world, to suffer, bleed, and die for us, was really the highest instance of Divine love which could possibly have been given : and if we are obliged, in return, to express our thankfulness in a way suitable thereto : and if such a suitable return is altogether impracticable without a just sense of the favour granted : and if no just sense can be had of it, while we take away the most endearing and enforcing consideration, which most of all enhances the value of it : if these premises be true, the conclusion is plain and necessary, that as often as we John i. i, 2, 3. P Heb. i. 10. The reader who desires to see 1 Heb. i. 6. r Rev. v. 13. these several texts explained, and s Matt. i. 23. 'Luke i. 16, 17. objections answered, may please to u i John v. 20. x Tit. ii. 13. compare my Eight Sermons, and y Isa. ix. 6. z Rom. ix. 5. particularly the sixth. E 2 52 Commemoration of Christ CH. in. remember Christ in the Eucharist, we ought to remember him not barely as a wise man, or a good man, or an eminent prophet, or chief martyr, or as our particular Master, or Founder, or Redeemer, but as an almighty Saviour and Deliverer, as the only -begotten of the Father, 'very God of very God,' of the same Divine nature, of glory equal, of majesty co-eternal. He that remembers him in any lower sense than this, in opposition to this, is not worthy of him ; neither can he be esteemed by sober and discerning Christians as a worthy partaker of the holy Communion. To confirm this reasoning drawn from Scripture texts, I shall subjoin some human, but very ancient authorities. They are what all writers, so far as I can perceive, in some degree value, and think it an honour to have, if they can but contrive any colourable pretensions to them a : and it is only when disappoint- ment makes them despair, that they affect to contemn what they cannot arrive to. Justin Martyr is a very early writer, born about the year 89, (as appears probable,) and writing with- in forty or fifty years of the latest Apostle. It is worth the while to know what so early and so considerable a person thought of a Christian Sacrament, which he had so often fre- quented ; especially when he gives us a formal, solemn account of it, in the name of his Christian brethren, and in an address to the Emperor. 'This food we call the Eucharist, of which none are allowed to be partakers but such only as are true believers, and have been baptized in the laver of regeneration for the remission of sins, and live according to Christ's precepts. For we do not take this as common bread and common wine : but as Jesus Christ our Saviour was made flesh by the Logos of God, and had real flesh and blood for our salvation, so are we taught that this food, which the very same Logos blessed by prayer and thanksgiving, is turned into the nourishment" and substance of our flesh and blood, and is in some sense the flesh and blood of the incarnate Jesus V I choose to follow ft See my Importance of the Doc- b Justin Mart. Apol. i. cap. 86. trine of the Trinity, vol. iii. pp. 655, p. 96. edit. Thirlby. Beeves, vol. i. 656. pp. 1 20, 121. CH. in. in the Holy Communion. 53 Mr. Reeves's translation of this passage, though somewhat paraphrastical, because he has very well hit off the sense. What I have to observe upon it, as suitable to my present purpose, is, that particular notice is twice taken of the incarnation of the Logos, (that is, of God incarnate, according to Justin's known doctrine of the Logos being God,) and the Sacrament is not only supposed to be a commemoration , but a kind of emblem of it by Justin's account 11 , as the intelligent reader will observe. The reason is, that the Sacrament of the Eucharist is the Sacrament of the passion 6 , and God the Son, by becoming incarnate, first became passible. All which will be made plainer, by another passage of the same Justin, in his Dialogue with the Jew f , which is as follows : ' That prayers and thanksgivings, made by those who are worthy, are the only sacrifices that are perfect and well pleasing to God, I also affirm : for these are the only ones which Christians have been taught to perform even in that, remembrance [or memorial] of their food both dry and liquid, wherein also is commemorated the passion which God of God suffered in his own person, [or for them].' i have no need to take notice here of more than is to my present purpose. The words 'God of God' are what I point to, as a proof that the Divinity of Christ was an important article of the Eucharistical remembrance. If any should incline to read 'Son of God,' (upon conjecture, for it is no more,) instead of ' God of God,' in that place, it will still amount to the same, because Justin always un- derstood the phrase of ' Son of God' in the highest and strongest c Eis a.vdu.vr}ffi.v rov re ffiafiaroTrot- Kal eV ava/uvfifffL 8e rrfs rpo(pris avriav t)o~a(r6ai avrbv 810, rovs Tfiffrevovras ^tjpas re Kal vypas, Iv ft Kal rov irdOovs tls avrbv Si ovs Kal Tra6r)rbs ytyovf. o irtirovQf 8*' aurov 6 eos rov tov Justin Mart. Dial. p. 290. j ue / u' /r ? TC "- Justin Mart. Dial. p. 387. d How this was understood, see A conjectural emendation has been explained in a Charge on the Doc- offered, directing us to read 61' av- trinal Use of the Sacraments, p. rovs, 6 vibs rov 0eoD. Mede, Opp. p. 25. 362. Thirlby in loc. I see not why c Eis avd/j.i'r)o~iv rov irddovs ov ena- o fbs rov eov may not mean the 0ei>. Justin Mart. Dial. p. 220. same with 6 ebs tic rov &eov : per- f "On juti/ ovv Kal (v^al, nal (vx<*pt- haps &c might have been negligently ffriat, virb rSiv a|iW ytv6/j.fi>ai, ri\- dropped. The learned editor in- tiat /jiovai KOI tvdptffroi etcn rw f$ genuously says, 'istud Qfbs admo- Bvcriat, Kal avrbs ij/ji.i. Tavra, yap clum sane invitus muto, propter jutfVa Kal Xpicrrtavol irapf\afiov irotfw sequential 54 Commemoration of Christ CH. in. sense as meaning 'God of God?.' But I see no necessity of admitting any new conjectural change of 6 06s into 6 vlbs, since Qfos is very frequently our Lord's title in Justin n , yea, and 6 Qtbs more than once 4 . But I proceed. I shall subjoin a passage of Origen, containing the like ele- vated sentiments of the remembrance made in the holy Com- munion. ' Thou that art come to Christ, (the true High Priest, who by his blood has reconciled God to thee, and thee to the Father,) rest not in the blood of the flesh, but consider rather the blood of the Logos, and hear him declaring, This is my blood which shall be shed for you, for remission of sins : the initiated in the mysteries well understand both the flesh and the blood of God the Word V So I translate the last words, as most agree- able to Origen's usual phraseology : but if any one chooses rather to say 'Logos of God,' it comes to the same thing. The sum is, that the life and soul, as it were, of the Eucharistical remembrance lies in the due consideration of the Divine dignity of the Person whose passion we there remember 1 . And indeed every man's awn reason must convince him that it must be so, if he ever seriously calls to mind the Scripture accounts of our blessed Lord, which I have above recited. Hitherto I have confined myself to the strict notion of remembrance. II. 1 am next to advance a step further to commemoration, >vhich is remembrance and somewhat more. For to a bare :emembering it superadds the notion of extolling, honouring, elebrating, and so it is collecting all into one complex idea of K *Os KO! \6yos irptDT&ToKos &v TOV onem peccatorum. Novit qui mys- 9eoC, Kai 8ebs vjrdpxfi' p. 94. Cp. teriis imbutus est, et carnem et san- jp. 406, 408, 411. guinem Verbi Dei.' Orig. in Levit. h Justin Mart. pp. 204, 210, 233, Horn. ix. pp. 243, 244, ed. Bened. 250, 261, 263, 265, 273, 291, 303, Cp. Clem. Alex. Paedagog. lib. ii. 328, 408, 409. cap. 2. p. 1 86 : -rbv \6yov tKx^iavov i Justin Mart. pp. 251, 326, 378. &c. k "Tu qui ad Christum venisti, ' Great use was afterwards made (Pontificem verum qui sanguine suo of this consideration in the Nestorian Deum tibi propitium fecit, et recon- controversy : of which see Cyrill. cilia vit te Patri) non haereas in san- Alex. Ep. ad Nestor, p. 72. et Ana- guine camis ; sed disce potius san- them. xi. cum Explanat. p. 156. guinem Verbi, et audi ipsum tibi Item Apologet. advers. Oriental, pp. dicentem, quia hie sanguis meus est, 192, 193. qui pro vobis effundetur in remissi- CH. in. in the Holy Communion. 55 commemorating. This do 'in commemoration of me :' which is the second rendering of the same words. Some perhaps might wonder why the Socinians, of all men, should reject the notion of remembering, and choose that of commemoration, (which is really higher,) yea, and should strongly insist upon it, and make it a point. They certainly do so, as may appear from their own writings m : and what is stranger still, they assign such odd rea- sons for it, that one would scarce think them in earnest, if we were to look no further. For what if St. Paul does speak of declaring, or shewing our Lord's death, may not dvdfjLvrja-ts still signify remembrance 1 Is it not proper first to remember, and then to declare ; or to declare it now, in order to remember for the future ? Why should one exclude the other, when both are con- sistent, and suit well together 1 And though a person is sup- posed, before his coming to the holy Communion, to have the Lord's death in mind, confusely, or in the general, may he not still want to have it more in mind, and to remember it in par- ticular, with all its circumstances, upon a close recollection, assisted by an external solemnity performed before his eyes 1 Besides, if we should not want to call it to mind, yet we may want to keep it in mind for the future : and who sees not how serviceable the sacramental solemnity may be for that very pur- pose 1 Add to this, that it is particulai'ly said with respect to the mt Apparet,graviter errasseillosqui posuit. ' Socin. de Usu et Fin. existimarunt verbum ' commemora- Coenae Domini, pp. 4, 5. tionem,' quod in Graeco est avdfj.i'ijtni', ' Quod nonnulli per 'commemoratio- mutari debere in ' recordationem : ' nem' in verbis Christi quibus ritum neque enim dicit Paulus mortem hunc instituit, ' recordationem' intel- Domini recordamini, sed mortem ligunt, vel hanc pro ilia vocem repo- Domini annuntiatis, quod profecto iiunt, arbitrantes in eum finem ritum non recordationem, sed commemora- hunc sacrum esse institutum, ut no- tionem et praedicationem omnino bis mortem Domini in memoriam re- significat . . . . non est quod quis ex vocet, in eo manifesto errant ; quum verbo illo (ava.fj.vriffis') colligat coenam qui ritum hunc sacrum obire recte Domini in eum finem institutani fu- velit, ac mortem Domini hac ratione isse, ut nobis suggerat et in memo- annuntiare, eum Christi mortis probe riam revocet mortem ipsius Domini et semper memorem esse oporteat.' .... Commemoratio autem ista, et Cracov. Catechism, sect. vi. cap. 4. praedicatio mortis Christi, id neces- p. 229. Cp. Schlichting. in I Cor. sario conjunctum habet, ut gratiae xi. 25. et contr. Meisner. pp. 805, agantur Christo, turn vero Deo, patri 814, 816. "\Yolzogen. in Matt. xxvi. ejus, cujus mandate animam suam p. 416. 56 Commemoration of Christ CH. in. Passover, ' Thou shalt sacrifice the passover, &c., that thou mayest remember the day when thou earnest out of Egypt, all the days of thy life n .' Which is exactly parallel, so far, to the remem- brance appointed in the Eucharist. How trifling would it be to urge, that the Israelites were supposed to remember the day before their coming to the Passover, and therefore could have no need to refresh their memories by coming ; or to urge, that because they ought always to bear it in mind, therefore it could not be one end or use of the Passover, to remind them of it, or to keep it in remembrance all their days. One may judge from hence, that Socinus's pretended reasons against the notion of remembrance were mere shuffle and pre- tence, carrying more of art and colouring in them, than of truth or sincerity : he had a turn to serve in favour of an hypothesis, and that was all. The turn was this : he had a mind to make the dvdfju>T)(ris (which is one end, or use, or part of the Sacrament) to be the whole of the Sacrament, its whole nature and essence, as I before hinted, and to interpret the words, ' This is my body ' and ' This is my blood,' to mean, this bread and wine, or rather this action, is an dvdnvrjo-is, a commemoration, and nothing more. He could not pretend to say, that this material thing, or this external action, is a remembrance, (which denotes an internal perception,) and therefore he substitutes commemoration in its stead, an outward act, and external service, and then resolves the whole of the Sacrament into that, confounding the end or use of the thing with the thing itself. This was his fetch ; and so he hoped to be rid at once of all supposed present graces or benefits accruing to worthy receivers, making the sign and thing signified to be all one, and indeed to be sign only. However, though Socinus had no good views in interpreting dvdfjiVTjais by commemoration, and was undoubtedly wrong in ex- cluding remembrance : yet setting aside his foreign fancies, it is very right to interpret the word by commemoration ; but so as to include both an inward remembrance of benefits, and an out- ward celebration of the same, together with devout praises and n Deut. xvi. 2, 3. CH. in. in the Holy Communion. 57 thanksgivings to Christ our Lord for them, and to all the three Persons of the ever-blessed Trinity. It is scarce possible for a considerate devout mind to stop short in a bare remembrance, (though remembrance is always supposed, and is by this sacred solemnity reinforced,) but it will of course break out into thank- ful praises and adorations. We accept therefore of what Socinus and his brethren so much contend for, that the Greek avafanja-is, in this case, does amount to a commemoration, and is better ren- dered by that word than by remembrance : because the word will bear it, and because the circumstances shew that remembrance alone, without commemoration superadded, is short of the idea intended by it. I may further note, though it is but the natural and obvious consequence of what I have before said, that this commemoration must be understood in as high and as full a sense as the remem- brance spoken of above : we must commemorate our Lord in a manner suitable to his Divine natm-e and dignity, and according to what he is by the Scripture accounts. We must commemorate him as God, purchasing the Church with his own blood . We must commemorate his passion as St. Paul has done, and in like words with these : ' Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God : but made himself of no repu- tation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men : and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross P.' In another place, the same Apostle, speak- ing of the ' redemption by the blood ' of Christ, and of his making ' peace through the blood of the cross,' closes one, and ushers in the other, with a large account of the supereminent dignity of his Person, as born before the creation ; adding, that ' all things were created by him, and for him, and by him con- sist i.' This is the right way of celebrating or commemorating Acts xx. 28. For the reading P Phil. ii. 6, 7, 8. See my fifth of the text, see Mill, in loc. and Sermon, vol. ii., Second Defence, Pearson on the Creed, p. 129, and vol. ii. p. 548, and Third Defence, Vitringa, Observ. Sacr. torn. i. p. vol. iii. p. 59. 213, and Pfaffius de Var. Lect. p. i Coloss. i. 14 20. Compare my 161. Sermons, vol. ii. pp. 56, &c. 103, &c. 58 Commemoration of Christ CH. in. his passion, as it is declaring the infinite value of it. To speak of him only as man, or as a creature, though otherwise in a devout way, is not honouring, but dishonouring him and his sufferings ; is not commemorating, hut blaspheming his name. St. Paul, in another place, going to speak of our Lord's passion, introduces it with a previous description of his personal dignity: 'appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds ; who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his Person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high r .' But as remarkable a passage as any is that of the Epistle to the Hebrews, where the Apostle, to enhance the value of Christ's sufferings, expresses himself thus : ' If the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh ; how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God 8 1 ' By eternal Spirit, I under- stand Christ's Divine nature, as the most judicious interpreters do * : and so from hence it is plain how the merit of Christ's sufferings rises in proportion to the dignity of the Person; and it is the Divinity that stamps the value upon the suffering humanity. And hence also it is that St. John so emphatically observes, that it is the blood of Jesus Christ his Son (that Son whom the Apostle everywhere describes under the most lofty characters, as particularly John i.) which ' cleanseth us from all sin u .' Such is the Scripture way of commemorating our Lord and his passion, and such the way of all the ancient churches of God : be this our pattern, as it ought to be for our commemora- tions in the holy Communion. III. But I observed, that there was a third or a fourth ren- dering of the same words, efc rrjv Ipty avapvriviv : ' for a memorial of me ;' or, ' for my memorial,' which is more strictly literal. This rendering is not much different from the two former, but contains and includes both : for a memorial supposes and takes in both T Heb. i. 2, 3. s Heb. ix. 13, 14. ' See Bull, Opp. p. 19, and Wolfius in loc. u i John i. 7. CH. in. in the Holy Communion. 59 a remembrance and a commemoration. Whether it superadds anything to them, and makes the idea still larger or fuller, is the question. If it carries in it any tacit allusion to the sacrifi- cial memorials of the Old Testament, it may then be conceived to add to the idea of commemoration the idea of acceptable and well pleasing, viz. to Almighty God. I build not upon dvap-vrja-is being twice used in the Septuagint as the name for a sacrificial memorial x ; for the usual sense of the word, in the same Septua- gint, is different, having no relation to sacrifice : but thus far may be justly pleaded, from the nature and reason of the thing, that the service of the Eucharist (the most proper part of evangelical worship, and most solemn religious act of the Christian Church) must be understood to ascend up ' for a memorial before God,' in as strict a sense, at least, as Cornelius's alms and prayers were said so to do y ; or as the 'prayers of the saints' go up as sweet odours, mystical incense z , before God. Indeed, the incense and sacrificial memorials of the old Testament were mostly typical of evangelical worship or Christian services, and were acceptable to God under that view ; and therefore it cannot be doubted but the true rational incense, viz. Gospel services, rightly performed, (and among these more especially the Eucharistical service,) are the acceptable memorials in God's sight. Whether there was any such allusion intended in the name avd/jivrja-Ls, when our Lord recommended the observance of the Eucharist as his memorial, cannot be certainly determined, since the name might carry in it such an allusion, or might be without it ; but as to the thing, that such worship rightly performed has the force and value of any memorial elsewhere mentioned in Scripture (sacrificial or other) cannot be doubted ; and the rest is not worth disputing, or would make too large a digression in this place. Before I dismiss the word di/d/iwjo-tj, it may not be improper to note, that it occurs but once more in the New Testament, where St. Paul speaks of the 'commemoration of sins a ,' made once a year, x Levit. xxiv. 7. Numb. x. 21. 333, &c. Dodwell, Tncensing no y Acts x. 4. Apostolical Tradition, pp. 36, 37, z Rev. v. 8; viii. 3, 4. Psalm cxli. 38. I. Compare Malach. i. n. Vid. a 'Apd/u^cris a-nap-riSm tear' tviav- ^itringa, in Apocalyps. pp. 214, &c. TOV. Heb. x. 3. 60 Commetnoration of Christ CH. in. under the old Testament, on the great day of expiation ; when the High Priest was to ' confess all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all their transgressions in all their sins V There was dvdfivrja-is a/*aprta>/, commemoration of sins : but under the Gospel it is happily changed into dvdfi.vr)na Kal afjta, oirep xvi. 3. & Gal. iii. I. ev TTJ (ivcrnKfj Kal Of la. Tpairtfyi Kaff h See Johnson's Unbloody Sacri- fKtiffrrjv tir IT f \ofvTM, 0v6fj.fva eis ava- fice, part n. p. 44. fivrj(Tiv rijs n.tifj.viixa- pto-Telv, so far as concerns this matter, cannot be taken in a sense exclusive of that transitive signification of eiXoyeu/ : for to do that is flatly to contradict the Apostle. No doubt but either of the words may (as circumstances happen) signify no more than thanking or praising God ; but here it is manifest, that, in this rite, both God is praised and the elements blessed : yea both are done at the same time, and in the self-same act ; and the Apostle's authority, without anything more, abundantly proves it. If the reader desires anything further, in so plain a case, he may please" to consult three very able judges of Biblical language, or of Greek phrases ; Buxtorf I mean, and Vorstius, and Casaubon, who have clearly and fully settled the true meaning of fixapiamlv and fvXoyelv, both in the general, and with respect to this particular case : I shall refer to the two first of them, and shall cite a few words from the third d . But to cut off all pretence drawn from the strict sense of ev^apio-Teiv, as im- porting barely thanksgiving unto God, it may be observed, that that word also is often used transitively 6 , as well as fvXoyelv, and then it imports or includes benediction : so far from truth is it, that it must necessarily exclude it. I may further add, that the b I Cor. x. 16. Ti iroriiptov rrjs 517. Cp. p. 533, and Albertin. de fit\oylas t> ev\oyovfji.ev. Eucharist, lib. i. c. 4. p. 8, &c. c Buxtorf. de Coena Domini, p. e EiixapierTrjOeWos apTov...tvxapi- 311. Cp. Bucher. Antiq. Evangel. aTtjQtiffavrpo^v. Justin Mart. Apol. p. 369. Johan.Vorstius de Hebraism, i. p. 96. cp. 98. Tronijpia fvxo-pi SIO.KOVOL sanctificat sacrificium, pura existens,' $L$6a(nv fK fj.fra- &c. Iren. lib. iv. c. 18. p. 250. \apf?v airb TOV evxapiffTydfi/Tos &p-rov, N. B. Here, sanctifying means Kal otvov, Kal liSaror. Justin Mart, rendering salutary : not that that p. 96. See Archbishop Potter on alone does it, but it is a condition Church Government, p. 262, &c. sine qua non. 1 ' Igitur non sacrificia sanctificant CH. v. the Bread and Wine. 79 One thing more I may note here in passing, for the preventing cavils or mistakes. When we speak of human benedictions, and their efficacy, we mean not that they have any real virtue or efficacy in themselves, or under any consideration but as founded in Divine promise or contract, and as coming from God by man. If the prayer of faith saved the sick k , it was not properly the human prayer that did it, but God did it by or upon such prayer, pursuant to his promise. In like manner, whatever consecration, or benediction, or sanctification is imparted in the Sacrament to things or persons, it is all God's doing ; and the ground of all stands in the Divine warrant authorizing men to administer the holy Communion, in the Divine word intimating the effect of it, and in the Divine promise and covenant, tacit or express 1 , to send his blessing along with it. 3. The third and most material article of inquiry is, what the consecration of the elements really amounts to, or what the effect of it is? To which we answer, thus much at least is certain, that the bread and wine being 'sanctified by the word of God and prayer m ,' (according to the Apostle's general rule, applicable in an eminent manner to this particular case,) do thereby con- tract a relative holiness, or sanctification, in some degree or other. What the degree is, is nowhere precisely determined ; but the measures of it may be competently taken from the ends and uses of the service, from the near relation it bears to our Lord's Person, (a Person of infinite dignity,) and from the judgments denounced against irreverent offenders, and perhaps from some other considerations to be mentioned as we go along. For the clearer conception of this matter, we may take a brief survey of what relative holiness meant under the Old Testament, k James v. 15. ' is it not the communion,' &c., tan- 1 I say. tacit or express : because tarnount to a Divine promise of our Lord's declaring, and St. Paul's everything we contend for ? But declaring what is done in the Eucha- this is not the place to explain that rist, do amount to a tacit promise whole matter : thus much is evident, of what shall be done always, that what the word of prayer did Wherefore the Socinians do but once make the sacramental bread trifle with us, when they call for and wine to be, that it will always an express promise. Are not the make it. words, ' this is my bo.ly,' &c., and m I Tim. iv. 5. 80 The Consecration of CH. v. and of the various degrees of it. I shall say nothing of the relative holiness of persons, but of what belonged to inanimate things, which is most to our present purpose. The court of the temple was holy n , the temple itself more holy, and the sanctuary, or holy of holies, was still more so : but the ark of God, laid up in the sanctuary, appears to have been yet holier than all. The holiness of the ark was so great, and so tremendous, that many were struck dead at once, only for presuming to look into it with eyes impure P: and Uzzah but for touching it (though with a pious intent to preserve it from falling) was instantly smitten of God, and died upon the spotTi b Albertin. de Eucharist, lib. i. TWI> ftVA^fiy &pros, Kal TroT-fipiov v5a- C. 7. p. 34. ros, Kal Kp-ifiaros- Kal OVTOS \aBwv, c Matt, xxviii. 18, 19. John xiv. ali-ov Kal $Aai> rtf irarpl rwv tiXcav, 16, 26. Rom. v. 5, 6. i Cor. xii. 5icb TOV 6v6fj.aros rot) vtov, Kal TOV 4, 5> 6. 2 Cor. i. 21, 22; xiii. 14. VlvfVfjLaros TOV aylov, avairtfiirfi. Epb.es. i. 17, 21, 22. 2 Thess. ii. 13, Apol. i. p. 96. 14. Tit. iii. 4, 5, 6. i Pet. i. 2. v. the Bread and Wine. 83 to our Lord's concern in the Eucharist, or the Holy Spirit's. It is observable that the doctrine of the Fathers, with regard to consecration, was much the same in relation to the waters of Baptism, as in relation to the elements in the Eucharist. They supposed a kind of descent of the Holy Ghost, to sanctify the waters in one, and the symbols in the other, to the uses intended : and they seem to have gone upon this general Scripture prin- ciple, (besides particular texts relating to each sacrament,) that the Holy Ghost is the immediate fountain of all sanctification. I believe they were right in the main thing, only not always accurate in expression. Had they said, that the Holy Ghost came upon the recipients, in the due use of the sacraments, they had spoken with greater exactness ; and perhaps it was all that they really meant. They could not be aware of the disputes which might arise in after times, nor think themselves obliged to a philosophical strictness of expression. It was all one with them to say, in a confuse general way, either that the Holy Ghost sanctified the ' receivers in the use of the outward symbols,' or that he 'sanotified the symbols to their use :' for either ex- pression seemed to amount to the same thing ; though in strict- ness there is a considerable difference between them. What Mr. Hooker very judiciously says, of the real presence of Christ in the Sacrament, appears to be equally applicable to the presence of the Holy Spirit in the same : 'It is not to be sought for in the Sacrament, but in the worthy receiver of the Sacrament. . . . As for the Sacraments, they really exhibit; but for ought we can gather out of that which is written of them, they are not really, nor do really contain in themselves, that grace which with them, or by them, it pleaseth God to bestow 6 .' Not that I conceive there is any absurdity in supposing a peculiar presence of the Holy Ghost to inanimate things, any more than in God's appearing in a burning bush f : but there is no proof of the fact, e Hooker, Eccl. Polity, b. v. pp. sion, lower down, for citing his 307, 308. Archbishop Cranmer had words. Conf. Sam. Ward, Deter- said the same thing before, in his miuat. Theolog. p. 62. preface to his book against Gar- f Exod. iii. 2. Acts vii. 30. diner : I shall have another occa- G 2 84 The Consecration of CHAP. either from direct Scripture, or from that in conjunction with the reason of the thing. The relative holiness of the elements, or symbols, as explained above, is very intelligible, without this other supposition : and as to the rest, it is all more rationally accounted for (as we shall see hereafter) by the presence of the Holy Spirit with the worthy receivers, in the use of the symbols, than by I know not what presence or union with the symbols themselves S. 2. The second article, mentioned by Albertinus, relates to prayers, thanksgivings, and benedictions, considered as instru- mental in consecration. It has been a question, whether the earlier Fathers (those of the three first centuries) allowed of any proper prayer, as distinct from thanksgiving, in the Eucharistical consecration. I think they did, though the point is scarce worth disputing, since they plainly allowed of a sanctification of the elements, consequent upon what was done by the officiating minister. But we may examine a few authorities, and as briefly as possible. Justin Martyr, more than once, calls the consecrated elements by the name of eucharistized food h , which looks as if he thought that the thanksgiving was the consecration : but yet he com- monly makes mention both of prayers and thanksgiving *, where he speaks of the Eucharistical service ; from whence it appears probable, or certain rather, that consecration, at that time, was performed by both. Irenaeus k speaks of the bread as receiving the invocation of God, and thereby becoming more than common bread. Some would interpret it of prayer for the descent of the Holy Ghost l ; but, as I apprehend, without sufficient authority. Irenaeus might mean no more than calling upon God, in any kind of * Vid. Vossius de Sacrament. Vi ux a P" rn/ai '- Ii>id. p. 96. Evxas (5xap' ff>x^ s Ka ^ ttjftfurrUa. ' Pfaffius in Praefat. ad Fragm. Apol. i. p. 19. T&s euxJ MM TV Anecdota et in Lib. p. 96. v. the Bread and Wine. 85 prayer or thanksgiving, or in such as Justin Martyr before him had referred to. Irenaeus, in the same chapter, twice speaks of thanksgiving m , as used before or at the consecration : but no- thing can be certainly inferred from thence, as to his excluding prayer, and resolving the consecration into bare thanksgiving. Origen has expressed this whole matter with as much judg- ment and exactness, as one shall anywhere meet with among the ancient Fathers. He had been considering our Lord's words, ' Not that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man n ;' upon which he immediately thought with himself, that by parity of reason, it might as justly be said, that what goes into the mouth cannot sanctify a man. And yet here he was aware, that according to the vulgar way of conceiving or speaking, the sa- cramental elements of bread and wine in the Eucharist were supposed to sanctify the receiver, having themselves been sanc- tified before in their consecration. This was true in some sense, and according to a popular way of speaking ; and therefore could not be denied by Origen, without wary and proper distinctions. He allows, in the first place, that the elements were really sanc- tified ; namely, by the word of God and prayer o : but he denies that what is so sanctified, sanctifies any person by its own proper virtue P, or considered according to its matter, which goes in at the mouth, and is cast off in the draught ; admitting, however, that the prayer and word (that is, God by them) do enlighten the mind and sanctify the heart (for that is his meaning) of the worthy receiver. So he resolves the virtue of the Sacrament into the sacerdotal consecration, previous to the worthy reception : and he reckons prayer (strictly so called) as part of the conse- cration. The sum is, that the sanctification, properly speaking, m ' Offerens ei cum gratiarum ac- icbi>, et's atyeSpuva e/c/SaAAerat, Kara Sf tione....Panem in quo gratiae actae rrjv eiriyevofj.fvriv avry fvx^v, Kara sint.' Iren. p. 251. rfyv ava\oyiav rrjs Trlffras, &f\t/jiot> n Matt. xv. II. yii/erai, Kal rijs rov vov atnov $iaf}\- ' Ayia(r6fvros \6yt\ovv. Kal oi>x |ei aprov. . . . rb aytatyufvov fipia/j.a Sia r) v\rf rov aprov, a\\' 6 fir' avr flpr/- \6yov Qfov Kal fi>Tfvtus. Orig. in fi4vos \6yos et\wv rbf /ur; Matt. p. 254. ava^ius rov Kvptov fcrBiovra avrdv. p. P Ov Tta ifiiip \6yca aytdfi rbv xp- 254. /j-fvov. p. 253. Kar' avrb (*.ei> rb v\i- 86 The Consecration of ( CHAP. goes to the person fitly disposed, and is the gift of God, not the work of the outward elements, though sanctified in a certain sense, as having been consecrated to holy uses. Thus by carefully distinguishing upon the case, he removed the difficulty arising from a common and popular way of expressing it. Nevertheless, after this% in his latest and most correct work, he did not scruple to make use of the same popular kind of expression, observing that the eucharistical bread, by prayer and thanks- giving, was made a sort of holy, or sanctified body, sanctifying the worthy receivers r . Where we may note, that lie again takes in both prayer and thanksgiving, to make the consecration. And we may observe another thing, by the way, worth the noting, that by body there, he does not understand our Lord's natural body, but the sanctified bread, which he elsewhere calls the sym- bolical and typical body s ; that is to say, representative body, as distinguished from the real body, or true food of the soul, which none but the holy partake of, and all that do so are happy. Origen's doctrine therefore, with respect to this article, lies in these particulars : i. That the bread and wine, before consecra- tion, are common food. 2. That after consecration by prayer and thanksgiving, they become holy, typical, symbolical food, representative of true food. 3. That unworthy receivers eat of the symbolical food only, without the true. 4. That worthy receivers, upon eating the symbolical food, are enlightened and sanctified from above, and consequently do partake of the true spiritual food, in the same act. I shall proceed no lower with the Fathers, under this article, having said as much as I conceive sufficient for illustrating Mr. Aubertine's second particular. 3. The third will still want some explication : where we are i The Homilies on St. Matthew n, Kal ayidov TOVS per' vyiovs vpoOf- are supposed to have been written crecos avrip ^pxrjs TTJJ eirl rots 6 aycav irdvTtas tfcreTai fls T^V aliai/a, <5o0e?ovs aprovs tffOiof^ei'. ovSevbs Svva/j.fvov av\ov tcrQieiv av- ff>[jia yevoftfvovs Sia TTJC fvxfyv aytov r^v. Origen. in Matt. p. 254. v. the Bread and Wine. 87 to consider what effect the words of our Lord, ' This is my body,' are conceived now to have in the Eucharistical consecration. It is not meant (as the Romanists are pleased to interpret) that the pronouncing those words makes the consecration : but the words then spoken by our blessed Lord are conceived to operate now as virtually carrying in them a rule, or a promise, for all succeed- ing ages of the Church, that what was then done when our Lord himself administered, or consecrated, will be always done in the celebration of the Eucharist, pursuant to that original. If the elements were then sanctified or consecrated into representative symbols of Christ's body and blood, and if the worthy receivers were then understood to partake of the true spiritual food upon receiving the symbolical; and if all this was then implied in the words, ' This is my body,' &c., so it is now. What the Sacrament then was, in meaning, virtue, and effect, the same it is also at this day. Such was the way of reasoning which some of the Fathers made use of ; and it appears to have been perfectly right and just. It was with this view, or under this light, that they took upon them to say, that our Lord's words then spoken, were to have their effect in every consecration after ; namely, as being directly declaratory of what then was, and virtually promissory of what should be in like case for all times to come. The same Lord is our High Priest in heaven, recommending and enforcing our prayers there, and still constantly ratifying what he once said, ' This is my body,' &c. For, like as the words once spoken, ' Increase and multiply, and replenish the earth,' have their effect at this day, and in all ages of the world ; so the words of our Lord, ' This is my body,' though spoken but once by him, stand in full force and virtue, and will ever do so, in all ages of the Christian Church. This is the sum of St. Chrysostom's rea- soning upon this head ; which it may suffice barely to refer to* : Mr. Pfaffius has collected from him what was most material, illustrating all with proper remarks ". The use I would further * Chrysost. Homil. i. de Prodi- Bingham, b. xiv. ch. 3. sect. II. Al- tione Judae, torn. ii. p. 384. ed. bertin. lib. i. c. 7. p. 33 ; and Covel's Bened. Account of the Greek Church, pp. 47, " Pfaffius de Consecratione Vet. 48, 63, &c. Eucbaristica, p. 389, &c. Compare 88 The Consecration of CHAP. make of the notion is, to endeavour from hence to explain some short and obscure hints of the elder Fathers. For example, Justin Martyr speaks of the elements being eucharistized or blessed by the prayer of the word that came from him x [God]. Why might not he mean the very same thing that Chrysostom does, namely, that Christ, our High Priest above, now ratines what he once said on earth, when he blessed the elements with his consecration prayers, in the institution of the Eucharist ? It is he that now sanctifies the symbols, as he then did, and, as it were, presides over our Eucharistical services, making the bread to become holy, which before was common, and giving the true food to as many as are qualified to receive it, along with the symbolical ; that is, giving himself to dwell in us, as we also in him. There is another the like obscure hint in Irenaeus, which may probably be best interpreted after the same way. He sup- poses the elements to become Christ's body by receiving the word Y. He throws two considerations into one, and does not distinguish so accurately as Origen afterwards did, between the symbolical food and the true food. In strictness, the elements first become sanctified (in such a sense as inanimate things may) by consecration pursuant to our Lord's institution, and which our Lord still ratifies ; and thus they are made the representative body of Christ : but they are at the same time, to worthy receivers, made the means of their spiritual union with Christ himself ; which" Irenaeus points at in what he says of the bread's receiving the Logos, but should rather have said it of the com- municants themselves, as receiving the spiritual presence of Christ, in the worthy use of the sacred symbols. But this matter must come over again, and be distinctly considered at large. All I had to do here was, to fix the true notion of consecration in as clear and distinct a manner as I could. The sum is, that the consecration of the elements makes them holy symbols, relatively holy, on account of their relation to what they ijs \6yov rov Trap av- rbv koyov rov 0eoG, Kal yiverat rj rov tvxapio~rr]0e'iffav Tpoxapiffrla erta/jia Xpiorou, &c. Iren. Mart. p. 96. Cp. Albertin. p. 31. lib. v. c. 2. p. 294. TrpoaXa^avtiv > 'Oirort ovv Kal rb Kcfcpa/ucVoi/ iro- rov \6yoi> rov eov, fvxapi iipuir.. ..ical oifows cipiens non sunt opposita sed relata, ftioi-vri wsoXpiar^-n-apeSuKfr. Justin et subordinata, ita quoque Sacra- Mart. Apol. i. p. 96. 94 Spiritual Eating and Drinking, CHAP. meat, but the mean. Belief in Christ is the condition required, the duty commanded : but the bread of life is the reward conse- quent. Believing is not eating or drinking the fruits of Christ's passion, but is preparatory to it, as the means to the end P. In short, faith, ordinarily, is the qualification, or one qualification ; but the body and blood is the gift itself, and the real inheritance. The doctrine of Christ, lodged in the soul, is what gives the soul its proper temperature and fitness to receive the heavenly food : but the heavenly food is Christ himself, as once crucified, who has since been glorified. See this argument very clearly and excellently made out at large by a late learned writer Q. It may be true, that eating and drinking wisdom is the same with receiving wisdom : and it is no less true, that eating and drink- ing flesh and blood is receiving flesh and blood; for eating means receiving. But where does flesh or blood stand for wisdom or for doctrine ? What rules of symbolical language are there that require it, or can ever admit of it 1 There lies the stress of the whole thing. Flesh, in symbolical language, may signify riches, goods, possessions r : and blood may signify life : but Scripture never uses either as a symbol of doctrine. To conclude then, eating wisdom is receiving wisdom ; but eating Christ's flesh and blood is receiving life and happiness through his blood, and, in one word, receiving him ; and that not merely as the object of our faith, but as the fountain of our salvation, and our sovereign good, by means of his death and passion. To confirm what has been said, let us take in a noted text of the Epistle to the Hebrews, which appears decisive in this case. ' We have an altar, whereof they have no right to eat which * 'Credere in Christum, et edere que unum cum ipso.. ..Itaque, no- Christum, vel carnem ejus, inter se tione definitioneque aliud est spiri- tanquam prius et posterius differunt ; tualis manducatio quam credere in sicuti ad Christum venire et Chris- Christum.' Lamb. Danaeus ApoJog. turn bibere. Praecedit enim acces- pro Helvet. Eccles. p. 23. sus et apprehensio, quara sequitur 1 Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, potio, et manducatio : ergo fide p. 393, &c. Christum prius recipiinus, ut habitet r See Lancaster's Symbolical Dic- ipse in nobis, fiamusque ipsius vivae tionary, prefixed to his Abridgment carnis et sanguinis participes, adeo- of Daubuz, p. 45. vi. according to John vi. 95 serve the tabernacle s .' Whether the Apostle here speaks of spiritual eating in the sacrament, or out of the sacrament, is not now the question : hut that he speaks of spiritual eating cannot reasonably be doubted. And what can the eating there mean, but the partaking of Christ crucified, participating of the benefits of his passion 1 That is the proper Christian eating, such as none but Christians have a clear and covenanted right to. The Apostle speaks not in that chapter of eating doctrine, but of eating sacrifice. The references there made to the Jewish sacri- fices plainly shew, that the Apostle there thought not of eating the doctrine of the cross, but of eating, that is, partaking of, the sacrifice or atonement of the cross '. Therefore let this be taken in, as an additional explication of the eating mentioned in John vi., so far at least as to shew that it must refer to some sacrifice, and not to mere doctrines. I am aware that many interpreters of good note among the ancients", as well as many learned moderns, have understood altar in that text directly of the Lord's table, and the eating, of oral manducation : which construction would make the text less suitable to my present purpose. But other interpreters v , of good note also, have understood the altar there mentioned of the altar in heaven, or of the altar of the cross (both which resolve at length into one) ; and some have defended that con- struction with great appearance of reason. Estius, in particular, after Aquinas and others, has very ingenuously and rationally maintained it, referring also to John vi. 51, as parallel or similar to it, and understanding both of spiritual eating, abstracted from 8 Heb. xiii. 10 : compare Rev. u Theodoret, Oecumenius, Theo- vi. 9. Zornius, Opusc. Sacr. torn, phylact, Primasius, Sedulius, Hay- ii. p. 542. mo, Remigius, Anselm. ' Plerique * ' Mihi perspicuum videtur esse, tarn veteres quam recentiores signi- ararn hie poni pro victima in ara ficari volunt mensam Dominicam.' Deo oblata. Sensus verborum hie Estius in loc. est, ut puto : Jesu Christi, qui vera v Chrysostom. in Hebr. Horn. xi. est pro peccatis hominum victima, p. 807. Cyrill. Alex, de Adorat. lib. nemo fieri particeps potest, qui in ix. 310. Compare Lightfoot, Opp. ceremoniis et externis ritibus Ju- torn. ii. part. 2. pp. 1259 1264. daicis, religionis arcem censet esse Outram de Sacrif. p. 332, &c. Wol- positam.' Moshem. ad Cudworth. fius, Cur. Crit. in loc. P- 3- 96 Spiritual Eating and Drinking, CHAP. sacramental x . In this construction I acquiesce, as most natural and most agreeable to the whole context : neither am I sensible of any just objection that can be made to it. The Apostle did not mean, that they who served the tabernacle had no right to believe in Christ ; that indeed would be harsh : but he meant that they who served the tabernacle, not believing in Christ, or however still adhering too tenaciously to the legal oblations, had no right or title to partake of the sacrifice or atone- ment made by Christ. The thought is somewhat similar to what the same Apostle has elsewhere signified; namely, that they who affected to be justified by the law, forfeited all benefit arising from the grace of the Gospel, and Christ could profit them nothing Y. But for the clearer perception of spiritual feeding, and for the preventing confusion of ideas, it will be proper to distinguish between what it is primarily, and what secondarily ; or between the thing itself, and the effects, fruits, or consequences of it. i. Spiritual feeding, in this case, directly and primarily means no more than the eating and drinking our Lord's body broken, and blood shed ; that is, partaking of the atonement made by his death and sufferings : this is the prime thing, the ground and basis of all the rest. We must first be reconciled to God by the death of his Son, before we can have a just claim or title to any thing besides z : therefore the foundation of all our spiritual privileges is our having a part in that reconcilement ; which, in strictness, is eating and drinking his flesh and blood in St. John's phrase, and eating of the altar in St. Paul's. 2. The result, fruit, or effect of our thus eating his crucified body is a right to be fellow-heirs with his body glorified : for if we are made par- takers of his death, we shall be also of his resurrection a . On this is founded our mystical union with Christ's glorified body, * ' Hue etiam pertinet, quod cor- on the Sacrament, b. vi. chap. 3. p. pus Christi, in cruce oblatum, panis 416. vocatur, fide manducandus. Ut y Gal. v. 2, 3, 4. Joann. vi. Panis, inquit, quern ego z Coloss. i. 20, 21, 22. Ephes. ii. dabo, caro mea est, quam ego dabo 13, 16, pro mundi vita: scilicet, in cruce.' a Rom. v. 9, 10, n. Phil. iii. 10, Estiusinloc. Compare Bp. Moreton n. Eom. vi. 5 8. vi. according to John vi. 97 which neither supposes nor infers any local presence : for all the members of Christ, however distant in place, are thus mystically united with Christ, and with each other. And it is well known, that right or property, in any possession, is altogether independent of local presence, and may as easily be conceived without it as with it b . 3. Upon such mystical union with the body of Christ glorified, and making still part of his whole Person, follows a gracious vital presence of his Divine nature abiding in us, and dwelling with us c . Upon the same follows the like gracious vital, presence, and indwelling of the other two Divine Persons d : and hereupon follow all the spiritual graces, wherewith the true members of Christ are enriched. This orderly ranging of ideas may contribute very much towards the clearing our present subject of the many perplexities with which it has been embarrassed ; and may further serve to shew us, where the ancients or moderns have happened to exceed, either in sentiment or expression, and how far they have done so, and how they were led into it. The ancients, in their account of spiritual feeling, have often passed over the direct and immediate feeding upon Christ considered as crucified, and have gone on to what is properly the result or consequence of it, namely, to the mystical union with the body glorified, and what hangs thereupon* There was no fault in so doing, more than what lies in too quick a transition, or too confused a blending of ideas. I am aware that much dispute has been raised by contending b ' Pro tanta conjunctione asse- possit in caelis ease, ac spiritualiter renda inter nos et Christum non nobiscum conjungi? Quod idem in opus praesentia corporali aut sub- matrimonio usu venire intelligimus, stantiali corporis Christi, quam sta- ubi sancta Scriptura praedicat, virum tuere multi conantur in Eucharistia. et uxorem unam carnem esse : quod Nam ea nil plus vel commodi vel non minus verum fateri coguntur utilitatis habebimus quam si Chris- adversarii cum una conjuges habi- tuni quoad corpus suo loco sinamus tant, quam si locorum intervallo in caelis. Videmus enim Christi- nonnunquam disjungantur.' Pet. anos posse esse invicem membra, et Martyr in i Cor. xii. 12, 13, fol. quidem conjunctissima, tametsi ali- 178. Cp. Albertin. de Eucharist, quis eorum degat in Britannia, alius pp. 230, 231. in Gallia, et alius in Hispania. Quod John vi. 56 ; xv. 4. Matt, xviii. si de membris ipsis conceditur, cur 20 ; xxviii. ao. de capite idem fateri erit absurdum, d John xiv. 16, 17, 23. I Cor. iii. ut hac spiritual! conjuuctione simul 16 ; vi. 19. a Cor. vi. 16. H 98 Spiritual Eating and Drinking, CHAP. parties about the sense of the ancients with respect to John vi. It may be a tedious inquiry to go through : for there is no doing it to the satisfaction of considering men, without taking every Father, one by one, and re-examining his sentiments, as they lie scattered in several places of his writings, and that with some care and accuracy. It may be of some use to go over that matter again, after many others, if the reader can but bear with a little prolixity, which will be here unavoidable. There have been two extremes in the accounts given of the Fathers, and both of them owing, as I conceive, to a neglect of proper distinctions. They who judge that the Fathers in general, or almost uni- versally, do interpret John vi. of the Eucharist, appear not to distinguish between interpreting and applying : itwas right to apply the general doctrine of John vi. to the particular case of the Eucharist, considered as worthily received ; because the spiritual feeding there mentioned is the thing signified in the Eucharist, yea and performed likewise. After we have suffi- ciently proved, from other Scriptures, that in and by the Eucha- rist, ordinarily, such spiritual food is conveyed, it is then right to apply all that our Lord, by St. John, says in the general, to that particular case : and this indeed the Fathers commonly did. But such application does not amount to interpreting that chapter of the Eucharist. For example ; the words, ' except ye eat the flesh of Christ, &c., you have no life in you,' do not mean directly, that you have no life without the Eucharist, but that you have no life without participating of our Lord's passion : never- theless, since the Eucharist is one way of participating of the passion, and a very considerable one, it was very pertinent and proper to urge the doctrine of that chapter, both for the clearer understanding the beneficial nature of the Eucharist, and for the exciting Christians to a frequent and devout reception of it. Such was the use which some early Fathers made of John vL (as our Church also does at this day, and that very justly,) though I will not say that some of the later Fathers did not extend it further : as we shall see in due place. As to those who, in another extreme, charge the Fathers in general as interpreting John vi. of digesting doctrines only, vi. according to JoJm vi. 99 they are more widely mistaken than the former, for want of con- sidering the tropological way of commenting then in use : which Avas not properly interpreting, nor so intended 6 , but was the more frequently made use of in this subject, when there was a mixed audience ; because it was a rule not to divulge their mysteries before incompetent hearers, before the uninitiated, that is, the unbaptized. But let us now take the Fathers in their order, and consider their real sentiments, so far as we can see into them, with respect to John vi. Ignatius never formally cites John vi., but he has been thought to favour the sacramental interpretation, because he believed the Eucharist to be a pledge or means of an happy resurrection : for it is suggested that he could learn that doctrine only from John vi. f But this appears to be pushing a point too far, and reasoning inconsequently. Ignatius might very easily have main- tained his point, from the very words of the institution, to as many as knew anything of symbolical language : for what can any one infer less from the being symbolically fed with Christ's body crucified, but that it gives a title to an inheritance with the body glorified? Or, if the same Ignatius interpreted i Cor. x. 16 (as he seems to have done) of a mystical union with the body of Christ , then he had Scripture ground sufficient, without John vi., for making the Eucharist a pledge or means of an happy resur- rection. John vi. may be of excellent use to us for explain- ing the beneficial nature of the Eucharist, spiritual manducation being presupposed as the thing signified in that Sacrament : but it will not be prudent to lessen the real force of other consider- able texts, only for the sake of resting all upon John vi., which at length cannot be proved to belong directly or primarily to the Eucharist. It seems that Ignatius had John vi. in his eye, or some e See my Importance of the Doc- & *Ev iroTJipiov, (Is evt\6v\ov' tffnv aydirri &s virb fj.aa-6ov TTJJ ffapKbs avrov a Charge, upon the Doctrinal Use rpafvres .... fOicrdevrfs rpcayftv ical of the Sacrament, vol. v. p. no, c. iriveiv rbv A.Ayov TOV Qtov, rbv TTJS i Irenaeus, lib. iv. cap. 18. p. 251 ; adavaa-ias &pTov, Sirtp earl rb Trvev/j.a lib. v. cap. 2. p. 294. TOV Trwrpfa. Iren. lib. iv. cap. 38. r 'O Upros 6 T(\fiot TOV irarpbs p. 284. vi. according to John vi. 103 not of sacramental manducation, but of spiritual ; not of the signs, but of the things signified, apart from the signs. Only it is observable, that while he speaks of our feeding upon the Logos, he explains it as done through the medium of the flesh : it is the human nature, by which we are brought to feast upon the Divine. St. Chrysostom gives the like construction of bread of life in John vi., interpreting it, so far, of our Lord's Divine nature 8 . But I proceed. Our next ancient writer is Clemens of Alexandria, who flour- ished about A. D. 192. In the first book of his Paedagogue, chapter vi., he quotes several verses * of our Lord's discourse in St. John, commenting upon them after a dark, allegorical way ; so that it is not easy to learn how he understood the main doctrine of that chapter. I shall take notice of some of the clearest passages. After speaking of the Church under the figure or similitude of an infant, brought forth by Christ with bodily pain, and swaddled in his blood, he proceeds thus : ' The Word is all things to the infant, a father, a mother, a pre- ceptor, a foster : Eat, says he, my flesh, and drink my blood. These are the proper aliments which our Lord administers : he reaches out flesh, and he pours out blood ; and nothing is wanting for the growth of the infants. O wonderful mystery ! he bids us lay aside the old carnal corruption, together with the antiquated food, and to partake of the new food of Christ, receiving him, if possible, so as to lay him up within ourselves and to inclose our Saviour in our breasts".' There is another passage, near akin to this, a few pages higher, which runs thus : ' Our Lord, in the Gospel according to St. John, has other- wise introduced it under symbols, saying, Eat my flesh, and drink my blood; allegorically signifying the clear liquor of faith, and of the promise, by both which the Church, like man, 8 Kol irpaTov irep\ rrjs 6e6rr)ro$ yap titfivri 8 flfj.i 6 f 55- vov Trpbs Ttf re\fi \tyti' nal 6 apros u 'O \6yos rci irdvra T(f vijirty, 5e bv eytii 8a> avrb apa Kal afjuo, Kal -yaAa rov nage Annal. torn. i. p. 320. itvplov irdOovs Kal SiSacr/caAiaj ffvpfio- z Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, \ov. p. 127. part i. p. 255, &c. c 'O GUV &prros, 6 virb rov irarpbs 8 'O Kvpios, ri rpoifii rwv vrfit(a>v. SoOels, 6 vi&s effn, rots taQiftv @ov\o- Clem. ibid. p. 124. ff rpotyii, rovrfcrri /xcVot?. 6 tie &pros t>v ty& $(>ffa>, rifflv, Kvpios 'IrjiroCj. Ibid. IHUV 5e avrbs 6 rj ""^fl M u to"riv. tfroi $ rpftpfrai rj Xpicrris i] rpo<(>^i TO?S vniriois. p. 125. , r) ffa.pl- rb trw/ua avrov tcrriv, Ibid. iro\\ax<>>s a.\Krijopt1ra.i 6 \6yos, Sirtp i^>, Kal fios, ffvvayoay^i fv\oyTjufvrt. Excerpt. Upros, Kal of/ia, Kal yd\a. p. 126. Theod. apud Clem. p. 971. vi. according to John vi. 105 having, as I conceive, I Cor. x. 17 in his eye, 'We being many are one bread, and one body.' Of what weight or authority a Valentinian gloss ought to be in this case, I pretend not to say : but this is the first clear precedent we shall meet Avith in antiquity, for interpreting any part of John vi. directly of the Eucharist. And it is observable, that it was offered only in the conjectural way, and another interpretation presently subjoined as preferable to it. Tertullian quotes two verses out of John vi. And he inter- prets the bread there mentioned, not of the sacramental bread, but of Christ himself ; not of the signs, but of the things signi- fied. Presently after, he quotes part of the words of the institution, ' This is my body,' referring to the Eucharist : and there he does not say that our Lord's body is that bread, (as he had said before, that Christ, or the Logos, is our bread,) but that the Lord's body is understood, or considered, in bread : as much as to say, the Eucharistical bread is by construction that natural body of Christ which is the true bread. And for this he refers not to John vi. but to the words of the institution. Tertullian here joined together the spiritual food mentioned in John vi. in the abstract way, and the same as conveyed in the Eucharist; but he did not interpret John vi. of the Eucharist* 3 . It has been suggested by some 6 , that Tertullian understood John vi. merely of faith, or doctrine, or spiritual actions : and it is strenuously denied by others f . The passage upon which the dispute turns is part of his reply to Marcion ; who took a handle from the words, 'the flesh profiteth nothing,' to argue against the resurrection of the body. ' Though he says, " the flesh profiteth nothing," yet the sense is to be governed by the subject-matter. For because they d ' Panem nostrum quotidianum et corpus ejus in pane censetur : da nobis hodie, spiritualiter potius Hoc est corpus meum.' Tertull. de intelligamus : Christus enim panis Orat. cap. vi. p. 131. noster est, quia vita Christus, et e Dr. Claget, Dr. Whitby, &c. vita panis : Ego sum, inquit, panis Compare Basnag. Annal. torn. i. p. vitae. Joh. vi. 35. Et paulo supra, 320. v. 33 : Panis est sermo Dei vivi, { Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, qui descendit de caelis. Turn quod part i. p. 358, &c. io6 Spiritual Eating and Drinking, CHAP. thought it an hard and intolerable saying, as if he had intended really to give them his flesh to eat ; therefore in order to resolve the affair of salvation into the spirit, he premised that " it is the spirit that quickeneth," and then subjoined, that "the flesh profiteth nothing ; " namely, towards quickening. He shews also what he would have them understand by spirit : " the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life," comformable to what he had said before ; " he that heareth my words, and believeth in him that sent me, hath everlasting life," &c. Therefore as he makes the word the quickener, because the word is spirit and life, he calls the same his flesh, inasmuch as the word was made flesh; which consequently is to be hungered after for the sake of life, and to be devoured by the ear, and to be chewed by the understanding, and digested by faith : for a little before also he had pronounced the heavenly bread to be his flesh f ,' &c. All that one can justly gather from this confused passage is that Tertullian interpreted the bread of life in John vi. of the Word ; which he sometimes makes to be vocal, and sometimes substantial, blending the ideas in a very perplexed manner : so that he is no clear authority for construing John vi. of doctrines, &c. All that is certain is, that he supposes the Word made flesh, the Word incarnate, to be the heavenly bread spoken of in that chapter. There is another place in Tertullian &, where by flesh and 1 ' Etsi carnem ait nihil prodesse, spiritus et vita sermo, eundem etiam ex materia dicti dirigendus eat sen- cariiem suam dixit, quia et sermo sus. Nam quia durum et intolera- caro erat factus : proinde in causam bilem existimaverunt sermonem ejus, vitae appetendus, et devorandus quasi vere carnem suam illis eden- auditu, et ruminandus inteliectu, et dam determinasset ; ut in spiritual fide digerendus ; nam et paulo ante, disponeret statum salutis, praemisit, carnem suam panem quoque caeles- " spiritus est quivivificat :" atqueita tern pronuntiarat,' &c. Tertull. de subjunxit "caro nihil prodest;" advi- Resurr. Carn. cap. xxxvii. p. 347. vificandum scilicet. Exsequitur etiam ' Panis qu,em ego dedero pro quid velit intelligi spiritum : "Verba salute mundi, caro mea est. Quod quae locutus sum vobis, spiritus sunt, si una caro, et una anima, ilia tristis vita aunt." Sicut et supra, " Qui audit usque ad mortem, et ilia panis pro sermones meos, et credit in eum qui mundi salute ; salvus est numeru.s me misit, habet vitam aeternam, et duarum substantiarum, in suo genere in judicium non veniet, sed transiet distantium, excludeus carneae ani- de morte in vitam." Itaque sermo- mae unicam speciem.' De Carn. nem constituens vivificatorem, quia Christi, cap. xiii. p. 319. vi. according to John vi. 107 bread in John^vi. he very plainly understands, not the sacra- mental, but natural body of Christ, not doctrine, but literally flesh ; as indeed our Lord evidently meant it. For as to verses 53> 54? &c., the figure is not in the word ' flesh/ but in the words ( eating and drinking,' as learned men have very justly observed 11 . But then this is to be so understood, that the eating and drinking the natural body and blood amount to receiving the fruits of the blood shed, and body slain ; otherwise there is a figure in the words ' body and blood,' as put for the fruits of them, if eating amounts simply to receiving. But I pass on. Much dispute has been 1 about Origen's construction or con- structions (for he has more than one) of John vi. The passages produced in the debate are so many, and the pleadings here and there so diffuse, that it would be tedious to attend every par- ticular. I shall endeavour to select a few critical places, from whence one may competently judge of his sentiments upon the whole thing. Origen's general observation relating to that chapter is, that it must not be literally, but figuratively understood k. He commonly understands the living bread of the Divine Logos, as the true nutriment of the soul 1 , the Logos, but considered as incarnate m . At other times, he allegorizes the flesh of Christ in a very harsh manner, making it a name for high mysterious h ' Figura autem non est in carne, manducaveritis carnem meam, et vera enim Christ! caro ad vitam est biberitis sanguinem meum," occidit manducanda : superest igitur ut sit haec litera.' Orig. in Levit. Horn, in manducandi vocabulo, quod a cor- vii. p. 225. ed. Bened. poris organis, ad facilitates animae > ' Ego sum panis vivus, &c. Qui figurate transferatur." Albertinus, haec dicebatverbum era t, quo animae p. 525. ' Caro et sanguis nihil aliud pascuntur Intuearis quomodo designant quam quod verba prae se Justus semper et sine intermissione ferunt, ac proinde nee aenigma, nee manducet de pane vivo, et repleat parabola sunt . . . . At id nullo modo animam suam, ac satiet earn cibo cae- evincit vocabulum manducandi non lesti, qui est verbuni Dei et sapientia esse metaphoricum, aut manducati- ejus.' Orig. in Levit. Horn. xvi. p. onem illam de manducatione spiri- 266. ed. Bened. tuali non esse intelligendum.' Ibid. m AUTTJ Se ^ativ TJ o\Tj0r)s 0pw rovrov ^jfferai *s rbv H Kcu ravra /uev irepl rov TVWIKOV aluiva. Orig. in Matt. p. 254. ed. Kol ffVfJi$O\lKOV (TlbfMTOS' TTU\\O. 8' kv Huet. Kal Tttpl airrov \eyoiro rov \6yov, &y r Johnson'a Unbloody Sacrifice, ytyovf o-op|, Ktti a.\t}QivT] fipSxris, 1\v part i. p. 373. I jo Spiritual Eating and Drinking, CHAP. observing, however, that it could not at all favour another opinion, espoused by Dr. Whitby and others ; meaning the doctrinal in- terpretation. The truth is, that it favours neither, but directly overthrows both : and had that very ingenious and learned author being aware of any middle opinion, which would stand clear of the difficulties of both extremes, it is more than probable that he would have closed in with it. Cyprian, who was but a few years later than Origen, comes next to be considered. The most observable passage, so far as concerns our present purpose, occurs in his Exposition of the Lord's Prayer : I have thrown it to the bottom of the page 8 , for the learned reader to judge of, and may here save myself the trouble of translating it. But I shall offer a few remarks upon it. i. Cyprian, in this passage, does not interpret 'bread of life' of the Eucharistical bread, but of Christ himself 1 , thrice over. 2. He seems to give the name of Lord's body in the Eu- charist to the sacramental bread, as representative and exhibitive of the natural body. 3. But then a communicant must receive worthily, must receive 'jure communicationis,' under a just right to communion, otherwise it is nothing. 4. Therefore it concerns every one to preserve to himself that right by suitable behaviour, and not to incur any just forfeiture by misbehaviour. 5. For, if he incurs just censure, and is justly debarred from communion, he is shut out from Christ Such is the form and process of ' Panis vitae Christus est : et manifestum est eos vivere qui corpus panis hie omnium non est, sed noster ejus attingunt et Eucharistiam jure est. . . . Christus eorum qui corpus communicationis accipiunt, ita con- ejus contingunt, panis est. Hunc tra tenendum est et orandum, ne autem panem dari nobis quotidie dum quis abstentus separatur a postulamus, ne qui in Cbristo sumus, Christi corpore, procul remaneat a et Eucharistiam quotidie ad cibum salute, comminante ipso et dicente : salutis accipimus, intercedente aliquo nisi ederitis carnem filii hominis et graviore delicto, dum abstenti et non biberitis sanguinein ejus, non habe- communicantes a caelesti pane pro- bitis vitam in vobis. Et ideo panem hibemur, a Christi corpore separemur, nostrum, id est, Christum, dari nobis ipso praedicante et monente : Ego quotidie petimus, ut qui in Christo sum panis vitae, qui de caelo descen- manemus etvivimus, a sanctificatione di : si quis ederit de meo pane, vivet ejus et corpore non recedamus.' in aeternum. Panis autem quern ego Cypr. de Orat. Domin. pp. 209, 210. dedero, caro mea est pro saeculi vita. BO. Bened. ; alias 146, 147. Quando ergo dicit in aeternum vi- * Compare Albertinus, pp. 377, vere si quis ederit de ejus pane, ut 378. vi. according to John vi. in Cyprian's reasoning : and it must be owned that John vi. is very pertinently alleged by him, in order to convince every serious Christian of the necessity of his continuing in a state fit for the reception of the holy Communion, and not such as shall disqualify him for it. For since our Lord there lays so great a stress upon eating his flesh and drinking his blood ; and since communicating worthily is one way of doing it; and since, if we are rendered morally unfit for that, we must of course be morally unfit for all other ways, and so totally debarred from feeding upon Christ at all, for life and happiness : these things con- sidered, it is very obvious to perceive that John vi., though not particularly pointing to the Eucharist, is yet reductively appli- cable to it, in the way of argumentation, and is of very great force for the exciting Christians to a reverential regard for it, and to a solicitous care that they may never, by any fault of theirs, be debarred from it. In short, though John vi. doth not directly speak of the Eucharist, yet Christians, in the due use of that sacrament, do that which is there mentioned, do really eat his flesh and drink his blood, in the spiritual sense there in- tended ; therefore Cyprian had good reason to quote part of that chapter, and to apply the same as pertinent to the Eucharist, in the way of just inference from it, upon known Christian principles. Cyprian elsewhere quotes John vi. 53, ['except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you,'] in order to enforce the necessity of Baptism". Either he thought that the spiritual feeding, mentioned in St. John, was common both to Baptism and the Eucharist, and might be in- differently obtained in either sacrament : or else the turn of his thought was this, that as there is no life without the Eucharist, and as Baptism must go before the Eucharist, Baptism must of course be necessary in order to come at the kingdom of God. If this last was Cyprian's thought, then indeed he interpreted u ' Ad regnum Dei nisi baptizatus Nisi ederitis carnem filii hominis et etrenatusfuerit pervenire non posse, biberitis sanguinem ejus, non babe- In Evangelic cata Jobannem. Nisi bitis vitam in vobis.' Cypr. Tes- quis renatus fuerit, &c. Item illic: timon. lib. iii. c. 25. p. 314. 112 Spiritual Eating and Drinking, CHAP. John vi. directly of the Eucharist : but I incline to understand him according to the other view first mentioned ; and the rather because we shall find the same confirmed by the African Fulgentius, in his turn. Novatian of the same age appears to understand John vi. of spiritual manducation at large, feeding upon a right faith (which of course must take in faith in the merits of Christ's passion) and conscience undefiled, and an innocency of soul. He refers to John vi. 27, and immediately after adds, that righteousness and continence, and the other virtues, are the worship which God requires : he had before intimated that they were the true, the holy, and the clean food x . But, I presume, all this was to be so understood as not to exclude the salutary virtue of Christ's atonement : only the subject he was then upon led him not to speak plainly of it. In another work, he understands Christ himself to be the bread of life, and makes it an argument of his Divinity 7, referring to John vi. 51. So that if we take the author's whole sense on this head, Christ or the fruits of his death, together with our own faith and virtues, are our bread of life, our spiritual food, as taught in John vi. We may now come down to the fourth century, where we shall meet with Eusebius, a writer of considerable note. His common way is to interpret the bread of life, or heavenly bread, of Christ himself, of the heavenly Logos become incarnate z . He understands John vi. of spiritual eating, and intimates that Judas received the bread from heaven, the nutriment of the soul : not meaning what he said of Judas's receiving the sacra- mental bread in the Eucharist ; but, I conceive, his meaning * 'Cibus, inquam, verus, et sanctus, signavit Deus. Justitia, inquam, et et mundus est fides recta, immaculata continentia, et reliquis Deus virtu- conscientia, et innocens anima. Quis- tibus colitur.' Novat. de Cib. Judaic, quis sic pascitur, Christo convesci- c. v. p. 140. ed. Welchm. tur : talis epulator conviva est Dei ; * ' Si homo tantummodo Christus, istae sunt epulae quae angelos pas- quomodo refert, Ego sum panis vitae cunt; istae sunt mensae quae mar- aeternae, &c. . ..cum neque panis tyres faciunt.. . . Hinc ilia Christi, vitae homo esse possit, ipse mortalis/ Operaniini autem non escam quae &c. Novat. de Trin. c. xiv. p. 46 ; perit, sed escam permanentem in cp. c. xvi. p. 54. vitam aeternam, quam filius ho- z Eusebius in Psalm, pp. 81, 267, minis vobis dabit; hunc enim Pater 47 1. In Isx p. 586. vi. according to John vi. 113 was, that Judas had been blessed with heavenly instructions and Divine graces, though he made an ill use of them. He had tasted of the heavenly gift, of the blessed influences of the Divine Logos, but fell away notwithstanding a . Eusebius, in another place, interprets flesh and blood in John vi. of our Lord's mystical body and blood, as opposed to natural b . And when he comes afterwards to explain this mys- tical body and blood, he interprets the same of words and doc- trines c , grounding his exposition on John vi. 63, ' The words that I speak,' &c. A learned author d endeavours to make Eusebius contradict himself in the same chapter : but he is consistent so far, which will evidently appear to any one that reads him with attention. However, I think his interpretation of John vi. to be forced and wide. It was very odd to make doctrines the mystical body and blood, and to say, that the doctrines, or words then spoken, were what our Lord intended afterwards to ' give for the life of the world :' such construction appears altogether harsh and unnatural. Besides, since Eusebius inter- preted ' bread of life' of our Lord's Divine nature, he ought certainly to have understood that bread, which our Lord was to give, to be the human nature, the natural body and blood. But my business here is not so much to dispute as to report : and it is plain enough that Eusebius followed Origen in this matter, and that both of them favoured the same mystical or allegorical construction ; whether constantly and uniformly, I need not say. Athanasius was contemporary with Eusebius, as a young man with one grown into years. He occasionally gives us his thoughts upon John vi. 61, 62, 63, in these words: 'Here he has made mention of both, as meeting in himself, both flesh and a 2tW(mos 5e $>v Tt? $i$a(TKd\(p, ov Kal ctf/uaTos. Euseb. Eccles. Theol. r'bv Koivbv aprov avrip /j-dvov avveff- contr. Marcell. p. 179, 6itv, a\\a Kal TT)S i/'i'X'i* BpfrriKov c "Ciffre aina ilvat TO. p-fi^ara Kal /u.eTaXa/i/Sat'eij' T)IOUTO' irepl ov f\*ytv TOVS \6yovs avTov, T^}V ffdpKa Kal -rb 6 ffonijf tyw tl/j.t & apros & K TOV at/ua, Siv 6 /uiTe'xw altl, uffavd aprcp ovpavov Kara&as, Kal fa^v StSovs rots ovpaviy Tpe

v iv itav-rl r6Trcf vfpofj.fviav a.vT(f e Pfaffius de Oblat. vet. Eucharist. SvaiSiv, TowrtffTi TOV &prov rrjs tvxcipi- pp. 270, 272. ffrictt, Kal rov Trorijplou o/joiut TTJJ 320 The Eucharist considered CHAP. Eucharist f .' This is leaving the readers much in the dark, and his author to shift for sense and consistency. At the best, it is dismissing the evidence as doubtful, not determinate enough to give reasonable satisfaction. Mr. Dodwell's account of Justin in this article is no clearer than the former. He takes notice, that his Father ' allows no other sacrifice but that of prayer and Eucharist ;' he should have said, thanksgiving : and soon after he adds in the same page ; ' elsewhere he owns no acceptable sacrifice under the Gospel, but the Eucharist; in opposition to the Jewish sacrifices, which were consumed by fire, and which were confined to Jerusalem .' Still, here is no account given how Justin could reject all material sacrifice, and yet consistently admit of the Eucharist as a sacrifice, if that be a material and not a spiritual oblation. The most that Mr. Dodwell's solution can amount to is, that Justin did not absolutely reject material sacrifices, provided they were not to be consumed by fire, or provided (as he hints in another work ) that they are but purely eucharistical. But this solution will never account for Justin's so expressly and fully ex- cluding all material oblations, and so particularly restraining the notion of Gospel sacrifices to prayers, praises, and good works. Some learned men think that a material sacrifice may yet be called a rational and spiritual sacrifice J : and therefore, though the Fathers do expressly reject material sacrifices, they mean only sacrifices of a certain kind; and though they admit none but spiritual sacrifices, they might yet tacitly except such material sacrifices as are spiritual also. But this appears to be a very harsh solution, and such as would go near to confound all language. However, most certainly, it ought never to be admitted, if any clearer or juster solution can be thought on, as I am persuaded there may. 1 ' Ita nempe secum statuit vir posita, precibusque juxta rnandatum sanctus, nulla esse in Novo Testa- Christ! Deo oblata, in Sacramentum mento sacrificia, quam laudes, gra- corporis sanguinisque Dominici con- tiarum actiones, et. preces ; si quid secrentur.' Pfaffius, ibid. p. 274. tamen sit quod cum oblationibus s Dodwell of Incensing, p. 46. Veteris Testament! conferri queat, h Dodwell's Oue Altar, pp. 203,204. esse panem vinumque Euchanstiae, ' Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, part quae altari, seu mensae sacrae im- i. p. 18, &c. xii. in a Sacrificial View. 321 Justin's principles, if rightly considered, hang well together, and are all of a piece. He rejects all material sacrifices abso- lutely : and though the Eucharist be a sacrifice, according to him, yet it is not the matter of it, viz. the bread and wine, that is properly the sacrifice, but it is the service only, and that is a spiritual sacrifice. Alms are a Gospel sacrifice, according to St. Paul : not the material alms, but the exercise of charity, that is the sacrifice. In like manner, the Eucharist is a Gospel saci-ifice. Not the material symbols, but the service, consisting of a prayer, praise, contrite hearts, self-humiliation, &c. Well, but may not the like be said of all the legal sacrifices, that there also the service was distinct from the matter, and so those also were spiritual sacrifices 1 No : the circumstances were widely different. In the legal sacrifices, either the whole or some part of the offering was directly given to God k, and either consumed by fire, or poured forth, never returaing to the use of man : and thereupon was founded the gross notion, of which God by his Prophets more than once complains 1, as if the Deity had need of such things, or took delight in them. But now, under the Gospel, nothing is so given to God, nothing consumed in his immediate service : we present his gifts and his creatures before him, and we take them back again for the use of ourselves and of our brethren. All that we really give up to God as his tribute, are our thanks, our praises, our acknowledgments, our homage, our selves, our souls and bodies ; which is all spiritual sacrifice, purely spiritual : and herein lies the main difference between the Law and the Gospel m . We have no material sacrifices at all. The matter of the Eucharist is sacramental, and the bread and wine are signs : yea, signs of a sacrifice, that is of k Some have thought the paschal think that the inwards, or fat, was sacrifice to make an exception, be- to be burnt upon the altar. See cause it was all to be eaten. But Reland, Antiq. Hebr. p. 383. Dey- it is certain that one part, viz. the lingius, Observ. Sacr. torn. iii. p. blood, was to be poured forth, and 332. Cudworth on the Lord's Sup- sprinkled, 2 Chron. xxx. 16 ; xxxv. per, p. 3. fol. ed. n, yea and offered unto God, Exod. ' Psalm 1. 12, 13. Isaiah i. n. xxiii. 18; xxxiv. 25, as belonging Mic. vi. 6, 7. of right to him t and those who are m See Mr. Lewis's Answer to best skilled in Jewish antiquities, Unbloody Sacrifice, pp. 2, 5, n. Y 322 The Eucharist considered CHAP. the sacrifice of the cross : but as to any sacrifice of ours, it lies entirely in the service we perform, and in the qualifications or dispositions which we bring, which are all so much spiritual oblation, or spiritual sacrifice, and nothing else. From hence may be perceived how consistent and uniform this early Father was in his whole doctrine on that head. He expressed himself very accurately, when, speaking of spiritual and perfect sacrifices, he said, that they were what Christians offered over, or upon the eucharistical commemoration n : that is, they spiritually sacrificed in the service of the Eucharist. They did not make the material elements their sacrifice, but the signs only of a greater. Their service they offered up to God as his tribute ; but the elements they took entirely to themselves. When he speaks of the sacrifices of bread and wine , he may reasonably be understood to mean, the spiritual sacrifices of lauds, or of charity, which went along with the solemn feasting upon the bread and wine ; and not that the elements themselves were sa- crifices P. Upon the whole therefore, I take this blessed martyr to have been consistent throughout in his doctrine of spiritual sacrifices, as being the only sacrifices prescribed, or allowed by the Gospel. And if he judged the Eucharist to be (as indeed he did) a most acceptable sacrifice, it was because he supposed it to comprise many sacrifices in one ; a right faith, and clean heart, and devout affections, breaking forth in fervent prayers, praises, and thanksgivings unto God, and charitable contributions to the brethren. n Tavra -yap fj.6va Kal XpiffTtavol xxiv. 7, a type of the Eucharist. irape\afiov itoiflv Kal fir' ava/j.vfiffft But it is observable, that the show- 8 rrjs rpotyris avriav i)pas re Ka\ bread was not the memorial; but vypas. Dial. p. 387. the incense burnt upon it, that was Qvo-ias . . . eVl rfj fvx.apiffTta TOV the memorial, as the text expressly &PTOV Kal TOV iroTTjplov . . . yivo/jifvas. says. Now it is well known, that Dial. p. 386. prayers, lauds, &c. are the evan- npoff^fpof^fvuv avTi>, rov- gelical incense, succeeding in the TfffTi rov &prov TTJS evxapiffTtas Kal room of the legal : therefore, to TOV iroTypiov. Dial. p. 22O. make everything correspond, the P It may be suggested (see John- spiritual services of the Eucharist son, part i. p. 271) that the word are properly our memorial, our in- avdfivriffis, memorial, was used in cense, and not the material ele- relation to the show-bread, Levit. ments. XII. in a Sacrificial View. 323 Athenagoras may come next, who has not much to our pur- pose : but yet something lie has. He observes, that ' God needs no blood, nor fat, nor sweet scents of flowers, nor incense, being himself the most delightful perfume : but the noblest sacrifice in his sight, is to understand his works and ways, and to lift up holy hands to him q.' A little after he adds, ' What should I do Avith burnt offerings, which God has no need of 1 ? But it is meet to offer him an unbloody sacrifice, and to bring him a rational service 1 ".' Here we see what the proper Christian sacri- fices are, namely, the spiritual sacrifices of devout prayers, and obedience of heart and life. The service is, with this writer, the sacrifice. He takes notice of God's not needing burnt offerings, and the like. All material sacrifices considered as gifts to God, were apt to insinuate some such idea to weak minds : but the spiritual services do not. In our eucharistical solemnity we consider not the elements, when presented before God, as pro- perly our gifts to him, but as his gifts to us s ; which, we pray, may be consecrated to our spiritual uses. We pay our acknow- ledgments for them at the same time : and that makes one part, the smallest part, of our spiritual sacrifice, or service, in that solemnity. It may be worth noting, that here in Athenagoras we find the first mention of unbloody sacrifice, which he makes equivalent to reasonable service : and he applies it not particu- larly to the Eucharist, but to spiritual sacrifices at large. An argument, that when it came afterwards to be applied to the Eucharist, it still carried the same meaning, and was chosen with a view to the spiritual services contained in it, and not to the material oblation, or oblations, considered as such. Irenaeus, of the same time, will afford us still greater light, with regard to the point in hand. He is very large and diffuse i iicrio av-rw fj.fyia"rt], &r yivdiffKca- 8 Hence came the usual phrase, p.fv rls ftTftvf, K. T. \., Kal frra'pwutv so frequent in liturgic Offices, ra otriovs x f ?P as avTy. Athenag. pp. era K Ttav v Sdpwv crot irpoffffav, 5>v ^ things that are thine out of thy Sfirai 6 &t6s ; Kal roi vpoafpfiv own gifts : that is. by way of Sfov avai^aK-rov Bvcriav, Ka\ TTJV \oyi- acknowledgment. See the testi- K.TIV irpoffdyftv \a.rptiav. Athenag. monies collected in Deylingius, Ob- p. 49. servat. Miscellan. pp. 201, 312. T 2 334 The Eucharist considered CIJAP. upon the distinction between the typical sacrifices of the Law *, and the true sacrifices of the Gospel". He seems to mean by typical there the same that St. Austin, before cited, meant by signs. Those external sacrifices were symbols, tokens, pledges of the true homage, or true sacrifice ; which Irenaeus interprets of a contrite heart, faith, obedience, righteousness x , &c. referring to several texts y of the Old Testament and New, which recommend true goodness as the acceptable sacrifice. He understands the Gospel incense, spoken of in Malachi 2 , of the prayers of the saints a , according to Rev. v. 8. He makes mention also of an altar in heaven, to which the prayers and oblations of the Church are supposed to ascend, and on which they are conceived to be offered by our great High Priest to God the Father b . The thought, very probably, was taken from the golden altar men- tioned in the Apocalypse c , and represented as bearing the mys- tical incense. The notion of a mystical altar in heaven became very frequent in the Christian writers aTter Irenaeus d , and was in process of time taken into most of the old Liturgies, Greek, Latin, and Oriental; as is well known to as many as are at all conversant in them. The notion was not new : for the Old Testament speaks of prayers, as ' coming up to God's holy * ' Per sAcrificia autem et reliquas a ' In omni loco incensum offertur typicaa observantias, putantes propi- nomini meo, et saerificium purum. tiari Deum, dicebat eis Samuel/ &c. Incensa autem Joannes in Apo- Iren. lib. iv. cap. 17. p. 247. edit, calypsi orationes esse ait sancto- Bened. rjun.' Iren. 1. iv. c. 17. p. 249. u ' Verum saerificium insinuans, b ' Est ergo altare in caelis (illic quodofferentespropitiabunturDeum, enim preces nostrae et oblationes ut ab eo vitam percipiant : quemad- diriguntur) et templum ; quemad- modum alibi ait ; Sacriticium Deo modum Joannes in Apocalypsi ait, cor tribulatum, odor suavitatis Deo, Et apertum est tenjpium Dei.' Iren. cor clarificans cum qui plasma vit.' ibid. Ibid. p. 248. c Rev. viii. 3, 5. Vid. Vitringa * ' Non sacrificia et bolocausto- in loc. Dodwell on Incensing, pp. mata quaerebat ab eis Deus, sed 39 44. fidem, et obedientiarn, et justitiam, d Clemens Alex. p. 209. Origen. propter illorum salutem.' Ibid. p. Horn, in Joan. xvii. p. 438. Gregor. 249. Nazianz. vol. i. pp. 31, 484, 692. y i Sam. xv. 22. Psalm 1. 14; Chrysostom. in Heb. Horn. xi. p. li. 17. Isa. i. 16, 17. Jerem. 807. Cyrill. Alex, de Adorat. lib. vii. 22, 23. Hos. vi. 6. Philip, iv. ix. p. 310. Apostol. Constitut. lib. 18. viii. cap. 13. Augustin. Serm. 351. * Malach. i. II. de Poeiiit. p. 1357. torn. v. xii. in a Sacrificial View. 325 dwelling-place, even to heaven 6 :' and the New Testament fol- lows the same figure of speech, applying it both to prayers and alms-deeds, in the case of Cornelius f . Irenaeus, as I have observed, understood the incense, mentioned in the Prophet, of the evangelical sacrifice of prayer : but then it is to be further noted, that he distinguished between the in- cense and the pure offering, and so understood the latter of something else. He understood it of the alms or oblations that went along with the prayers ; referring to St. Paul's doctrine, in Phil. iv. 1 8, which recommends charitable contributions, as 'an odour of a sweet smell, a sacrifice acceptable, well pleasing to God;' as also to Proverbs xix. 17, 'He that hath pity upon the poor lendeth unto the Lord e.' Such were the pure offerings of the Church, in Irenaeus's account ; and they were spiritual sacrifices : for it is the service, not the material offering, which God accepts in such cases, as Irenaeus himself has plainly inti- mated n . It must be owned that Irenaeus does speak of the eucharistical oblations under the notion of presents brought to the altar, offered up to God, for the agnizing him as Creator of the world, and as the giver of all good things, and for a testimony of our love and gratitude towards him on that score i. This he calls a pure sacrifice k , present, offering, and the like : and since the bread and wine so offered were certainly material, how shall e 2 Chron. xxx. 27. Compare primitias suorum munerum in Novo Tobit iii. 16 ; xii. 12. Wisd. ix. 8. Testamento,' &c. Irenaeus, lib. iv. f Acts x. 4. cap. 17. p. 249. e Irenaeus, lib. iv. cap. 18. p. 251. k ' Ecclesiae oblatio, quam Do- u ' Qui enim nullius indigens est minus docuit offerri in universo Deus, in se assumit bonas opera- mundo, purum sacrificium reputa- tiones nostras, ad hoc ut praestet turn est apud Deum, et acceptum nobis retributionem bonorum &uo- est ei : non quod iridigeat a nobis rum.' Iren. ibid. p. 251. sacrificium, sed quoniam is qui of- ' ' Suis discipulis dans eonsilium, fert, glorificatur ipse in eo quod primitias Deo offerre ex suis crea- offert, si acceptetur munus ejus. turis, non quasi indigenti, sed ut Per munus enim erga regem et ipsi ncc infructuosi nee ingrati sint, honos et affectio ostenditur : quod eum qui ex creatura panis est ac- in omni simplicitate et innocentia cepit, et gratias egit, &c. . . . Novi Dominus volens nos ofFerre, praedi- Testamenti novam docuit oblatio- cavit, dicens, Cum igitur offers mu- iiem, quam Ecclesia ab Apostolis nus tuum ad altare,' &c. Irenaeus, accipiens, in universo mundo offert lib. iv. cap. 1 8. p. 250. Deo, ei qui alimenta nobis praestat, 326 The Eucharist considered CHAP. we distinguish the sacrifice he speaks of from a material sacrifice, or how can we call it a spiritual sacrifice \ A learned foreigner, being aware of the seeming repugnancy, has endeavoured to re- concile the author to himself, by saying, that the eucharistical oblation may still be reckoned a spiritual sacrifice, on account of the prayers, lauds, and offerings going along with it, which are spiritual services 1 . Another learned gentleman observes, that according to Irenaeus, the very life and soul .of the new oblation rests in the prayers by which it is offered up, and which finish or perfect the spiritual oblation m . The solution appears to be just, so far as it goes : but I would take leave to add to it, that the material offering, in this case, is not properly a present made to God, though brought before him : for it is not consumed (like a burnt offering) in God's immediate service, nor any part of it, but it goes entire to the use of man, not so much as any particle of it separated for God's portion, as in the legal sacrifices 11 . Therefore the material offering is not the sacrifice ; but the com- municant's agnizing the Creator by it ; that is properly sacrifice, and spiritual sacrifice, of the same nature with lauds. I may add further, that those eucharistical oblations were, in Irenaeus'e account, contributions to the Church and to the poor, as is plain by his referring to Prov. xix. 17, and Phil. iv. 18, which I noted before : and therefore he looked upon them as evangelical and spiritual sacrifices, falling under article the first of the recital given above. For it is not the matter of the contributions which constitutes the sacrifice, but it is the exercise of benevolence, and that is spiritual, and what God accepts. Under the Law, God 1 ' Non satis sibi constare videtur merer!.' Buddaeus, Miscellan. Sacr. Irenaeus, qui de sacrifices spiritu- torn. i. pp. 59, 60. alibus antea locutus erat, deque m ' Ex quibus patet animam ob- iis acceperat vaticinium Malachiae, lationis novae, quae in Nov. Test, quod nunc contra ad oblationes istas juxta Irenaeum fit, et a Christo in- eucharisticas trahere videtur. At stituta est, esse preces queis dona bene cuncta se habent, si observe- offeruntur. . . . Accedentibus preci- mus et ipsam Eucharistiam ratione bus, quibus nomen Dei glorificatur, precum et gratiarum actionis, quae ipsi gratiae redduntur, donorumque earn comitari solet, et oblationes sauctificatio expetitur, perficitur uti- quoque istas, quas cum Eucharistia que spiritualis ilia atque eucharistica conjungere moris erat, suum itidem oblatio.' Pfaffius in Irenaei Fragm. locum inter sacrificia spiritualia pro- p. 57. " See above, p. 136. xii. in a Sacrificial View. 32 7 accepted the external sacrifice, the material offering, as to legal effect : but under the Gospel, he accepts of nothing as to any salutary effect at all, but the spiritual service. This is the new oblation, the only one that is any way acceptable under the Gospel, being made ' in spirit and in truth.' Some perhaps may object, that such spiritual oblation cannot justly be called new, since it was mentioned by the Prophets, and is as old as David at least, who speaks of the sacrifice of a con- trite heai-t, and the like . All which is very certain, but foreign to the point in hand. For let it be considered, i. That the new covenant is really as old as Adam, and yet is justly called new. 2. That though spiritual sacrifices were always the most accept- able sacrifices, yet God did accept even of material sacrifices, under the Mosaical economy, as to legal effect ; and so it was a new thing to put an end to such legal ordinances. 3. That when spiritual sacrifices obtained (as they all along did) under the Law, yet they obtained under veils, covers, or symbols ; and so it was a new thing to accept of them, under the Gospel, stripped of all their covers and external signatures. 4. The Gospel sacrifices are offei-ed in, by, and through Christ, expressly and explicitly ; and so the spiritual sacrifices of the Gospel are offered in a new way, and under a new form P. These considerations appear sufficient to justify Irenaeus's calling the Christian oblation a new oblation : or it may be added, that new light, new force and new degrees of perfection have been brought in by the Gospel to every part or branch both of speculative and practical religion, I pass on to Clemens of Alexandria. He maintains constantly, See Johnson's Unbloody Sacri- by him, in Christ's name. Hitherto fice, part i. p. 264, alias 268. ye have asked nothing in my name P ' By him we are to offer : it is says our Saviour ; but hereafter his bin merit and mediation that crowns name will give virtue and efficacy to the sacrifice. .. .This by him gives all our services: and therefore, to the characteristical difference of the gain so gracious an advocate with Christian sacrifice from all others : the Father, our prayers and suppli- for, otherwise, the sacrifice of praise cations are in the Liturgy offered was common to all times before and up in his name, concluding always, under the Law. You find in many by the merits of our Lord Jesus Psalms a sacrifice of praise and Christ.' Bishop Lany's Sermon on thanksgiving, but in none of them Heb. xiii. 15. pp. 13, 14. 328 The Eucharist considered CHAP. under some variety of expression, that spiritual sacrifices are the only Christian sacrifices. To the question, what sacrifice is most acceptable to Godl he makes answer, in the words of the Psalmist, ' a contrite heart.' He goes on to say : ' How then shall I crown, or anoint, or what incense shall I offer unto the Lord? A heart that glorifies its Maker is a sacrifice of sweet odour unto God : these are the garlands, and sacrifices, and spices and flowers for God 1.' In another place, condemn- ing the luxury of perfumes, he starts an objection, viz. that Christ our High Priest may be thought perhaps to offer incense, or perfumes, above : an objection grounded probably, either upon what the typical high priest did under the Law r , or upon what is intimated of Christ himself under the Gospel 3 : to which Clemens replies, that our Lord offers no such perfume there, but what he does offer above is the spiritual perfume of charity *. He alluded, as it seems, to our Lord's philanthropy, in giving himself a sacrifice for mankind ; unless we choose to understand it of our Lord's recommending the charity of his saints and ser- vants at the high altar in heaven. Clemens elsewhere reckons up meekness, philanthropy, exalted piety, humility, sound know- ledge, among the acceptable sacrifices u , as they amount to sacri- ficing the old man, with the lusts and passions : to which he adds also the offering up our own selves ; thereby glorifying him who was sacrificed for us. Such were this author's sentiments of the Christian sacrifices : he looked upon the Church itself as the altar here below, the collective body of Christians, sending up the sacrifice of prayer to heaven, with united voices : the best and holiest sacrifice of all, if sent up in righteousness *. He speaks slightly of the legal sacrifices, as being symbols only of evan- gelical righteousness y. He makes the just soul to be a holy yap Kara rbv v6faov Ovcrlai, in loc. T^l" Tfpl i>f*as tvo-f&fiav a\\rryopovffi. TJ TTJS o-xamjj Sf/trbi/ avaQepftv Ibid. p. 849. TOV Kvpiov, T}}V Trvtvuariti xn. in a Sacrificial View. 329 altar z : and as to the sacrifice of the Church, it is ' speech ex- haled from holy souls, while the whole mind is laid open before God, together with the sacrifice a .' Elsewhere, the sacrifices of the Christian Gnostic he makes to be prayers, and lauds, and reading of Scripture, and psalms, and anthems b . Such were Clemens's general principles, in relation to Gospel sacrifices. He has not directly applied them to the particular instance of the Eucharist ; though we may reasonably do it for him, upon probable presumption. It is manifest that he could not consistently own it for a sacrifice of ours, in any other view but as a service carry- ing in it such spiritual sacrifices as he has mentioned : in that view, it might be upon his principles a noble sacrifice, yea, a combination of sacrifices. Tertullian may come next, a very considerable writer, who has a great deal to our purpose : I shall select what may suffice to shew his sentiments of the Christian sacrifices. Giving some ac- count of them to the Pagans, in his famous Apology, he expresses himself thus : ' I offer unto God a fatter and nobler sacrifice, which himself hath commanded ; viz. prayer sent out from a chaste body, an innocent soul, and a sanctified spirit : not worthless grains of frankincense, the tears of an Arabian tree c ,' &c. I shall only observe, that if Tertullian had understood the material elements of the Eucharist to be a sacrifice, how easy might it have been to retort upon him the worthless grains of wheat, and the like. But he had no such thought. Prayer and a good life were his sacrifice : and a noble one they are. In an- other place of his works, he says ; ' We sacrifice indeed, but it is with pure prayer, as God has commanded ; for God, the Creator of the universe, hath no need of any incense, or blood d .' z Bccubj/ 8t a\r)d}s aytov, T^V 81- Strom, vii. pp. 860, 861. Kaiav tyvxiiv. p. 848. Cp. Augustin. c ' Offero ei opimam et majorem de Civit. Dei, lib. x. cap. 4. hostiam, quam ipse mandavit ; ora- a 'H 0vffia TTjs fKK\7]ffias, \6yos tionem de carne pudica, de anima oTrb TUV ayldiv tyvx&v avaOv/j.Ka/j.tvot, innocenti, de spiritu sancto profec- fKKa\vTTTo/j.evris a/j.a rrjs 6vxai Tt Kal Havercamp. alvoi, KO.\ irpb TTJJ fffnavfias fvrtv^fis A ' Sacrificamus . . . sed quomodo 5f Kal v^voi, &o. Deus praecepit, pura prece : non 33 The Eucharist considered CHAP. How obvious might it have been to retort, that God has no need of bread or wine, had that been the Christian sacrifice : but Tertullian knew better ; and still he rests it upon pui-e prayer, that is, prayer together with a good mind. Let us hear him again : ' That we ought not to offer unto God earthly, but spiritual sacrifices, we may learn from what is written, The sacrifice of God is an humble and contrite spirit : and else- where, Offer unto God the sacrifice of thanksgiving, and pay thy vows unto the Most High. So then, the spiritual sacrifices of praise are here pointed to, and a troubled spirit is declared to be the acceptable sacrifice unto God e .' What Justin Martyr rejected as material sacrifice, our author here rejects under the name of earthly, or terrene. Are not bread and wine both of them terrene ? Therefore he thought not of them, but of some- thing spiritual : and he has named what ; viz. lauds and thanks- givings, and discharge of sacred vows, all from an humble and contrite heart : these were the acceptable sacrifices, in his ac- count. He goes on, in the same place, to quote Isaiah against carnal sacrifices, and Malachi also, to shew that spiritual sacrifices are established f . In his treatise against Marcion, he again refers to the Prophet Malachi, interpreting the pure offer- ing there mentioned, not of any material oblation, but of hearty prayer from a pure conscience s ; and elsewhere, of giving glory, and blessing, and lauds, and hymns h . Which, by the way, may serve for a comment upon Justin and Irenaeus, as to their ap- plying that passage of Malachi to the Eucharist : they might do it, because the spiritual sacrifices here mentioned by Tertullian make a great part of the service. It would have been very enim egit Deus, conditur universi- cor contribulatum acceptabile sacri- tatis, odoris, aut sanguinis alicujus.' ficium Deo demonstratur.' Tertull. Tertull. ad Scap. cap. ii. p. 69. adv. Jud. cap. v. p. 188. Eigalt. f Tertull. adv. Jud. cap. v. p. 188. e ' Namque, quod non terrenis * ' Sacrificium munduin : scilicet sacrifices, sed spiritalibus, Deo li- simplex oratio de conscientia pura.' tandura sit, ita legimus ut scriptum Tertull. contr. Marc. lib. iv. cap. i. est, Cor contribulatum et humilia- p. 414. turn hostia Deo est. Et alibi, Sacri- h ' Sacrificium mundum : gloriae fica Deo sacrificiurn laudis, et redde scilicet relatio, et benedictio, et laus, Altissimo vota tua. Sic igitur sacri- et hymni.' Adv. Marc. lib. Ui. cap. ticia spiritalia laudis designantur, et 22. p. 410. xii. in a Sacrificial View. 331 improper to interpret one part of spiritual service, viz. of prayer, and the other of a material loaf. In another treatise, Tertullian numbers up among the acceptable sacrifices, conflicts of soul, fastings, watchings, and abstemiousness, with their mortifying appurtenances >. But besides all this, there is, if I mistake not, in the latter part of his Book of Prayer (published by Muratorius, A. D. 1713) a large and full description of the eucharistical sacrifice, which will be worth the transcribing at length. After recommending the use of psalmody along with prayers, and the making responses in the public service, he then declares that such kind of prayer, so saturated with psalmody, is like a well fed sacrifice : but it is of the spiritual kind, such as succeeded in the room of all the legal sacrifices. Then referring to Isaiah i. n, to shew the comparative meanness of the Jewish sacrifices, and to John iv. 23, for the right understanding the evangelical, he proceeds thus : ' We are the true worshippers and the true priests, who worshipping in spirit, do in spirit saci'ifice prayer, suitable to God and acceptable ; such as he has re- quired, and such as he has provided for himself. This is what we ought to bring to God's altar [by way of sacrifice] devoted from the whole heart, fed with faith, decked with truth, by innocence made entire, and clean by chastity, crowned with a feast of charity, attended with a train of good works, amidst the acclamations of psalms and anthems V The reader will 1 ' Sacrificia Deo grata : conflic- Evangelium docet : Veniet hora, in- tationes dico animae, jejunia, seras quit, cum veri adoratores adorabunt et aridas escas, et appendices hujus Patreni in spiritu et veritate ; Deus officii sordes.' De Resurrect. Carn. enim Spiritus est, et adoratores ita- cap. viii. p. 330. que tales requirit. Nos sumus veri k ' Diligentiores in orando subjun- adoratores, et veri sacerdotes, qui gere in orationibus Alleluia solent, Spiritu orantes, Spiritu sacrificamus et hoc genus Psalmos, quorum clau- orationem Dei propriam et accepta- sulis respondeant, qui simul sunt : bilein, quam scilicet requisivit, quam et est optimum utique institutum sibi prospexit. Hanc de toto corde omne, quod proponendo et hono- devotain, fide pastam, veritate cura- rando Deo competit, saturatam ora- tain, innocentia integram, castitate tionera, velut optimam [opimam] mundam, agape coronatam, cum hostiam admovere. Haec est enim pompa bonorum operum inter psal- Lostia spiritalis, quae pristina sa- mos et hymnos deducere ad Dei crificia delevit. Quo mihi, inquit, altare debemus.' Tertull. de Orat. multitudinem sacrificiorum vestro- cap. xxvii., xxviii. pp. 52, 53. edit, rum ? . . . Quae ergo quaesierit Deus, Murator. 332 The Eucharist considered CHAP. here observe, how the author most elegantly describes the Chris- tian and spiritual sacrifice of prayer, in phrases borrowed from material sacrifices ; with an heifer, or bullock in his mind, led up to the altar to be sacrificed : and his epithets are all chosen, as the editor has justly observed, so as to answer that figure \ But what I am principally to note is, that this was really intended for a description of the eucharistical sacrifice : which is plain from the circumstances : i. From his speaking of the public psalmody, as going along with it m , and the responses made by the assembly. 2. From the mention made of God's altar. 3. And principally, from what he says of the feast of charity, which is known to have been connected with the service of the Eucharist, or to have been an appendage to it n , at that time ; for which reason, that service may very properly be said to have been crowned with it. These circumstances sufficiently shew, that Tertullian had the Communion Service in his mind, and that was the sacrifice which he there chose to describe ; a com- plicated sacrifice, consisting of many articles, and all of them spiritual, but all summed up in a right faith, pure worship, and good life. Such is the Christian sacrifice ; and such we ought to bring constantly to the Lord's table, to the holy and mystical altar. To the same purpose speaks Minucius Felix, not long after Tertullian. The only gifts proper to be offered to God by Chris- tians, are Christian services, Christian virtues, according to his account . To offer him anything else, is throwing him back his own gifts, not presenting him with anything of ours. What could Minucius therefore have thought of offering him bread and 1 ' Orationi, quam hostiam spiri- offeram, quas in usum mei protulit, talem appellat, singula tribmit, quae ut rejiciam ei suum munus ? Ingra- victimis carneis conveniebant, nimi- turn est : cum sit litabilis hostia rum ut de toto corde voveatur Deo, bonus animus, et pura mens, et ut sit pasta, curata, Integra, munda, sincera conscientia. Igitrur, qui in- corouata.' Muratorius in Notis, p. 53. nocentiam colit, Domino supplicat ; m ' Quorum clausulis respondeant, qui justitiam, Deo libat ; qui fraudi- qui Minul sunt.' bus abstinet, propitiat Deum ; qui n See Bingham, book xv. chap. 7. hominem periculo subripit, opiraam sect. 7, 8. Suicer. Thesaur. torn. i. victimam caedit. Haec nostra sacri- p. 26. ficia, haec Dei sacra sunt.' Minuc. ' Hostias et victimas Domino Fel. sect, xxxii. p. 183. xii. in a Sacrificial View. 333 wine, if considered as gifts or sacrifices to God ] It is manifest, that he must have understood the service, not the elements, to be the Christian gift, and Christian sacrifice. Origen falls in with the sentiments of the earlier Fathers, as to spiritual sacrifices, and their being the only Gospel sacrifices. Fqr when Celsus had objected to Christians their want of altars, he replies : ' The objector does not consider, that, with us, every good man's mind is his altar, from whence truly and spiritually the incense of perfume is sent up : viz. prayers from a pure conscience P.' Then he refers to Rev. v. 8, and to Psalm cxli. 2. A little higher up in the same treatise, he speaks of Christians presenting their petitions, sacrifices, and supplica- tions; beseeching Christ, since ( he is the propitiation for our sins,' to recommend the same, in quality of High Priest, to the acceptance of God the Father fifiiai', irpoffayayfiv $ IKUV, a(f>' ov draTTfjUTrerai a\i]6ws Kal 'A.px<- f p*& T * s fvx&St K d Taj 0u justi hominis ad Deum directa lau- irvtv/jLa a\)VTtTpip\i.- body in heaven. Addend, to part i. Ofls \a6s. Euseb. in Hesai. xviii. in part ii. p. 266. A strange thought! p. 427. especially considering that angels are i Cyrill. Alexandr. de Eecta Fide, supposed by Cyril to be the offerers, p. 160. N. B. The learned author Compare what Lactantius says above of Unbloody Sacrifice once thought, of gifts, as continuing for ever, mean- that mere spiritual sacrifices were ing the tribute of homage, &c., and never called unbloody : but he found so all is clear. afterwards that prayers had that epi- r Hilarius, pp. 154, 228, 534, 535. thet given them by Constantine. edit. Bened. Basil, torn. iii. pp. 52, Apud Sozom. lib. ii. c. 15. He might 207. edit. Bened. xix. in a Sacrificial View. 343 &c To that will I present myself, there will I offer the acceptable services, sacrifice, oblation, and holocausts, preferable to those now offered, as much as truth is preferable to shadow. From this altar no one, who has ever so much a mind to it, shall be able to debar me 8 .' Here we may observe, how Nazianzen prefers the spiritual sacrifices even before the sacrifice of the altar, externally considered. A plain argument, that he did not look upon it as the archetypal sacrifice: for, if he had, he could never have been so presumptuous or profane, as to prefer any sacrifice of his own to the sacrifice of Christ. He looked upon the eucharistical sacrifice, externally considered, and in its representative, commemorative view, to be no more than the figure of the archetypal, and a sign of the spiritual sacrifices : therefore he justly preferred the substance before shadows, and the real sacrifice of the heart, before the outward symbols * ; the offering of which was not sacrificing at all, but representing a sacrifice, or sacrifices. There is another passage of Nazianzen, worth the reciting ; and so I shall throw it in here, with some proper remarks upon it. He had been setting forth the dignity and danger of the sacerdotal function, which for some time he had studiously declined ; and among other considerations, he urges one, drawn from the weighty concern of well-administering the holy Com- munion, as here follows : ' Knowing that no man is worthy of the great God, and Sacrifice, and High Priest, who has not first presented himself a living holy sacrifice unto God, and exhibited the rational acceptable service, and offered to God the sacrifice of praise, and the contrite spirit, (which is the only sacrifice that God, who giveth all things, demands from us back again,) how 8 vffia.ffTt]pi, Kal Sri ' Christ is, in some sense, offered /u.7j5els &ios rov fj.fyd\ov Kal fov, Kal up to God by every communicant in Oiiparos, Kal 'Apxnpf(os, 3, aylav, juqSe edvcre rf e<5 and present, as it were, his bleeding Gvfflav alvffffois Kal irvtvp.0. owrtTpiju- Saviour to his Father, and desire Htvov ($v fj.6vov 6 irdvTa Souy airairfi him for his sake to be merciful to irap' rjfjuav Ovff(av) iruis e/j.f\\ov Bappri- him, and forgive him his sins. This ffai irpoffi> nvffrrjpicav avrirvwov ; t) passion is made by every faithful ircas Upfws a\rifia Kal ovopa viroSve- Christian, &c. . . . The Minister also a~0ai, irplv otrlots ilpyots Te\fiuirai rets .... does offer, as it were, Jesus X? "ipas ; Greg. Nazianz. Orat. i. p. Christ and his sacrifice for the people,' 38. &c. Dr. Payne's Discourse on the * This is intimated by the word Sacrifice of the Mass, A.D. 1688, pp. avrirvirov. Cp. Orat. xi. p. 187. 52,53. Compare Abp. Sharpe, vol. Orat. xvii. p. 273. Of which word vii. serm. xi. p. 251, and Deylingius, see Albertinus, pp. 273 283. Pfaf- Observat. Miscellan. p. 315, and fius, pp. 131 145. Pfaffius, who says, This no Pro- s' ~V*id. Suicer. Thesaur. torn. 3. testants deny, pp. 106, 314, 344. pp. 1423, 1424. The oblation, in this view, is but z Intimated in the word irpoffQfpfiv. another name for commemoration; Cp. Cyrill. Hierosol. Myst. v. c. 9. as I have often noted before, p. 328. * Rom. xii. i. AoyiK^ \arpda, xii. in a Sacrificial View. 345 the same with the memorial,) if considered as more than vocal, and making a part of the thanksgiving service, may be justly reputed a sacrifice of the spiritual kind, falling under the head of sacrifice of praise. 7. That the spiritual sacrifices, whether considered as previous qualifications, or present services of priests and people, were thought to be the only true and proper sacrifices performed b in the Eucharist : and therefore so far as it is itself a sacrifice, and not barely a sign of a former sacrifice, it is a spiritual sacrifice. 8. Those spiritual sacrifices were believed essential to the Eucharist, considered either as a sacrifice or a salutary sacrament: for, without such spiritual sacrifices, there was no sacrifice performed at all, but a representation of a sacrifice c ; and not of ours, but of our Lord's. And though the Eucharist would still be a sacrament, (not a sacrifice,) yet it could not be salutary either to administrator or receiver, for want of the spiritual sacrifices, to give it life and efficacy ; as is here sufficiently intimated by Nazianzen. There is a commentary upon Isaiah, which has been ascribed to St. Basil by critics of the first rate, but yet is probably rejected, as none of his, by the last learned editor of Basil's works; who allows it however to be an useful piece, and as early as the fourth century, or thereabout. What I mention him for is, that, instead of all the legal sacrifices, he admits of two only, under the Gospel ; our Lord's upon the cross, and ours, which consists in every man's offering his own self d . There is another author, who has commonly gone under the name of St. Chrysostom, but is now rejected as spurious, who divides the sacrifices of the Gospel after the same way : only the latter of the two he subdivides into nine, and so makes ten in all e , and all of the spiritual kind. Cyril of Alexandria has a great many b I say, performed ; there is an- per sacramentum memoriae celebra- other sacrifice represented, commemo- tur.' Augustin. contr. Faust, lib. sx. rated, which was performed 1700 c. 21. p. 348. torn. viii. edit. Bened. years ago upon the cross. d Pseudo-Basil, in Isa. p. 398, &c. ' Hujus sacrificii caro et sanguis, torn. i. edit. Bened. ante adventum Christi per victimas e Pseudo-Chrysostom.inPsal. xcv. similitudinum promittebatur : in pas- p. 631. inter spuria, edit. Bened. sione Christi per ipsam veritatem torn. v. reddebatur : post ascensum Christi 346 The Eucharist considered CHAP. things very clear and express to our present purpose* : but there is one particular passage in his tenth book against Julian, which is so plain, and so full for spiritual sacrifices, in opposition to all material or corporeal sacrifices whatsoever, that nothing can be more so. Comparing the sacrifices of Christians with those of the Jews, he writes thus : ' We sacrifice now much better than they of old did : for here descendeth from heaven, not any sensible fire for a symbol of the ineffable nature but, the Holy Spirit himself, from the Father by the Son, enlightening the Church, and receiving our sacrifices, namely, the spiritual and mental ones. The Israelites offered up to God bullocks and sheep, turtles and pigeons ; yea, and first fruits of the earth, fine flour with oil poured upon it, cakes, and frankincense : but we, discarding all such gross service, are commanded to perform one that is fine and abstracted, intellectual and spiritual. For we offer up to God, for a sweetsmelling savour, all kinds of virtues, faith, hope, charity, righteousness, temperances,' &c. Here it is to be noted, that Cyril rejects adsolutely all corporeal sacrifices, and not only the bloody ones of bulls and goats, and the like. He opposes the Christian mental sacrifices to the sacrifices of fine flour and cakes, and other such gross and sensible sacrifices. How could he do this, if he thought the elements of the Eucha- rist were a sacrifice or sacrifices 1 Are bread and wine at all less gross, or less sensible, than fine flour, cakes, and oil, and other fruits of the earth 1 Or have they any other claim to the name of mental and spiritual sacrifices, than the other also might justly have ? Therefore it is plain, that Cyril never admitted the material elements of the Eucharist, as any part of the Christian sacrifice ; but the spiritual service performed in it, that was the sacrifice. The material elements were signs and symbols of our Lord's sacrifice, not the sacrifice itself, nor any sacrifice at all, in strict propriety of speech : for our own proper sacrifice, as distinct from our Lord's, are our own services of prayer and praise, of faith, and of a good life. Such is the constant doctrine of all antiquity. f Cyril. Alex, contr. Julian, lib. 5x. p. 830. pp. 307, 308. Comment, in Is. lib. i. Cyrill. Alex, contr. Jul. lib. x. Orat. i. pp. 14, 15. In Malach. i. n. p. 345. xii. in a Sacrificial View. 347 I shall close this account with the sentiments of the great St. Austin. His ti'eatise De Civitate Dei may be called his masterpiece, being his most learned, most correct, and most elaborate work ; which lay upon his hands thirteen years, from 413 to 426 : he died in 431. Here then we may expect to find his maturest sentiments, laid down with the utmost exactness, relating to the sacrifice of the Eucharist. He comprises all the Gospel sacrifices under two : one of which is our Lord's own sacrifice upon the cross ; and the other is the Church's offering herself. The first of these is represented and participated in the Eucharist, the latter is executed : this is the sum of his doctrine. Of the former he observes h , that it succeeded in the room of the legal sacrifices which prefigured it : of the latter he observes, that the legal sacrifices were signs or symbols of it *. The legal sacri- fices were, in a prophetic and propitiatory view, figures of the former, and in a tropological view, figures of the latter. The body of Christ he considers as twofold, natural and mystical ; one of which is represented by us, and exhibited by Christ in the Eucharist ; the other is offered as a proper spiritual sacrifice k : and the bread and wine in the Eucharist are considered as symbols of both. I say, he considers the sacramental elements not merely as symbols of the natural body, but of the mystical also, viz. the Church *, represented by the one loaf and the one h ' Id enim sacrificium successit falsa cesserunt.' Ibid. lib. x. cap. 20. omnibus sacrificiis Veteris Testa- p. 256. Cp. lib. xix. cap. 23. p. 227. menti, quae immolabatitur in umbra k ' Hoc est sacrificium Christiano- futuri.' ' Pro illis omnibus sacrificiia rum, multi unum corpus in Christo : et oblationibus corpus ejus offertur, quod etiam sacramento altaris, fide- et participantibus ministratur.' Au- libus noto, frequentat Ecclesia, ubi ei gust, de Civit Dei, lib. xvii. cap. 21. demonstratur, quod in ea re quam p. 484. offert ipsa offeratur.' Ibid. lib. x. c. ' ' Per hoc et sacerdos est, et ipse 6. p. 243. oblatio : cujus rei sacramentum quo- ' Hujus autem praeclarissimum tidianum esse voluit Ecclesia sacri- atque optimum sacrificium nos ipsi ficium, quae cum ipsius capitis corpus sumus, hoc est, civitas ejus : cujus sit, seipsam per ipsum discit offerre. rei mysterium celebramus oblationi- Hujus veri sacrificii nmltiplicia varia- bus nostris, quae fidelibus notae sunt.' que signa erant sacrificia prisca sane- Lib. xix. cap. 23. p. 226. torum, cum ob hoc unum per multa * ' Corpus ergo Christi si vis in- figuraretur, tanquam verbis multis telligere, Apostolum audi dicentem res una diceretur, ut sine fastidio fidelibus, Vos estis corpus Christi multum commendaretur. Huic sum- et membra. Si ergo vos estis corpus mo veroque sacrificio cuncta sacrificia Christi et membra, mysterium ves- 348 The Eucharist considered CHAP. Cup : so that by the same symbols we symbolically consign our- selves over to God, and God consigns Christ, with all the merits of his death and passion, over to us. At length, his notion of the eucharistical sacrifice resolves into one compound idea of a spiritual sacrifice, (wherein the communicants offer up them- selves,) commemorative of another sacrifice, viz. the grand sacri- fice. The offering of the body of Christ is a phrase capable of two meanings ] either to signify the representing the natural body, or the devoting the mystical body : and both are included in the eucharistical service. Such appears to be St. Austin's settled judgment in this article, grounded, as I said, upon St. Paul's. It is a most ridiculous pretence of Father Harduin, (which he pursues through many tedious pages m ,) that, according to St. Austin, Christ's natural body is the sign, and his mystical body the thing signified in the Eucharist : for nothing is plainer from St. Austin, than that the bread and wine are the only signs, and that the things signified by them are both the natural and the mystical body of Christ, both his flesh and his Church. As the word ' offer' is a word of some latitude, he supposes both to be offered in the Eucharist ; one by way of memorial before God, and the other as a real and spiritual sacrifice unto God. Having thus traced this matter down through four centuries, and part of the fifth, I cannot think it of moment to descend lower, since the earliest are of principal value, and are alone sufficient. The Fathers were very wise and excellent men, saw very clearly what many learned moderns have had the misfortune to overlook, and agreed perfectly well in many points, about which the moderns have been strangely divided. The Fathers well understood, that to make Christ's natural body the real sacrifice of the Eucharist, would not only be absurd in reason, but highly presumptuous and profane; and that to make the outward symbols a proper sacrifice, a material sacrifice, would be trum in mensa Domini positum est, sumus. . . . Recolite enim, quia panis mysterium Domini accipitis. . . .Ni- non fit de uno grano, sed de multis.' hil hie de nostro adseramus ; ipsum Augiistiu. serm. cexxix. p. 976. Cp. Apostolum item audiaraus : cum ergo serm. cclxxii. p. 1103. de isto Sacramento loqueretur, ait; m Harduin. de Sacramento Al- TJnus panis, unum corpus, multi taris, cap. x. xn. in a Sacrificial Vieiv, 349 entirely contrary to Gospel principles, degrading the Christian sacrifice into a Jewish one, yea, and making it much lower and meaner than the Jewish, both in value and dignity n . The right way therefore was, to make the sacrifice spiritual : and it could be no other upon Gospel principles. Thus both extremes were avoided, all perplexities removed, and truth and godliness secured. So then here I may take leave of the ancients, as to the pre- sent article. The whole of the matter is well comprised and clearly expressed in a very few words, by as judicious a Divine as any our Church has had : ' We offer up our alms ; we offer up our prayers, our praises, and ourselves : and all these we offer up in the virtue and consideration of Christ's sacrifice, represented before us [I would only add, " and before God"] by way of remembrance or commemoration ; nor can it be proved, that the ancients did more than this : this whole service was their Christian sacrifice, and this is ours .' A learned foreigner has likewise very briefly and justly expressed the nature of the Christian sacrifice ; whose words I have thrown to the bottom of the page P, for the learned reader. I shall now shut up this chapter with two or three short corollaries, which naturally offer, and may be of some use. i. The first is, that this sacrificial view of the Eucharist squares exactly with the federal view before given. For if it be really a spiritual sacrifice, in or by which every faithful commu- " How contemptibly the Romanists P ' Oblatio omnis quae fit a creden- speak of a material sacrifice in that tibussubNovoTestamento, est incru- view, may be seen in Bishop Morton, enta, et vero castissima, et simplicis- (p. 438,) who has collected their sen- sima, quia spiritualis. Sive quis se timents upon it. ipsum, sive trui/uo suum, affectum, om- Archbishop Sharpe, vol. vii. serm. nesquesuas facilitates et actiones Deo xi. p. 253. If any one is disposed to offerat ut sacrificium ; sive alia a\i- trace this matter down, even to the artt, . ministri verbi, qui in nobis con- dark ages, he will find that most of vertendis laborarunt, nos offerant the Greek and Latin Liturgies con- Deo ; sive preces, (i/xapicrrias, suppli- tain the same notion with the Fathers, cationes nostras feramus ad Deum, of the spiritual sacrifice in the Eucha- ubique eadem ratio : nullus hie fun- rist. See Covel, Acc.of Gr. Church, ditur sanguis, nihil committitur vio- pref. p. 47 ; book, pp. 36, 41, 46, 53, lentum ; actio tota est spiritualis, et 67,68, 175. Deyling. Observat. Mis- \oyiicf).' Vitringa in Isa. Ixvi. 21, cellan. p. 310, &c. p. 951. 35 The Preparation proper for CHAP. nicant devotes himself entirely to God ; and if the sacerdotal offering up our Lord's mystical body be (as St. Austin explains this matter) a sacerdotal devoting all the faithful joining it, to God's service, and to God's glory : then may we again justly conclude, that the sacramental service is a federal, as well as a sacrificial solemnity : because, in this case, the administrator's devoting the communicants, and their devoting themselves to God, is tantamount to a solemn renewing former engagements or covenants made with him, under such symbols as God has appointed, and promised to ratify on his part. 2. From hence may be understood, how Christians, at large, are priests unto God )) avrrj KaXftrai trap' Lord's table. Vid. Apostol. Consti- fjfiiv vx a P I ^ s ovStvl a\\y fj.fra- tut. lib. viii. cap. 12. p. 403. crx^f Q6v ("ff-ri, ff r<$ TTtarfvovn a\7]0rj e Bingham, book xv. c. 8. a. 8. elvat TO df5i5a.yfj.fva \nr' TI/J.WV. Just. f OVTOIS PIOVVTI us 6 Xpurrbs irap- Mart. p. 96. Hitherto belongs the eSwKfi'. Justin. Apol. i. p. 96. noted proclamation anciently made B Clemens Alex. 'Op6bs $ioy, a/uo by the Deacons, before the Commu- na&fjcrfi TJ? KaOrtKovui.-t, or Treatise on terprets to mean, Et ns OVK itrrlv Conscience, book i. chap 20, 21, 22. $) irpoari: w, If a man is not holy, Abridgment of Morality. xni. the Holy Communion. 359 ought against thee ; leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way ; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift c .' The Lord's Supper was not instituted when these words were spoken : nevertheless they are applicable to it, in a view to the general reason on which the rule stands ; and they have been often so applied both by ancients and moderns. Mr. Mede has well proved, that the precept is evangelical d , though worded in Jewish terms, suited to the time wherein it was given. The disciples of our Lord (that is, believers at large, to whom that Divine sermon was directed e ) were Jews and Chris- tians both in one, and therefore could not be properly addressed in any language, but what might competently suit them in such their double capacity. The like was the case with respect to the Lord's Prayer, which though a Christian prayer, was yet formed in such general terms, as might indifferently serve a religious Jew, at the time when it was given. I say then, that the precept delivered by our Lord, about the great duty of reparation to be made to every injured brother, before we offer to God, though an evangelical precept, was yet so worded as to comport with the then present circumstances of the persons to whom it was directed. When circumstances came to be altered, the general reason still continued the same, and the application of it was easy and obvious to every capacity. Irenaeus quotes the text, and adapts it to Christian circum- stances in a very just and natural way. Gifts he interprets to mean Christian worship, alms, and oblations : and by altar he understands the high altar in heaven f . Tertullian, in like man- ner, accommodates it to the case of Christians coming to offer up their prayers to God ; intimating, that they ought first to be at peace with their offended brethren, and to bring with them a forgiving temper, as they hoped to be forgiven ?. Both parts are true : but the latter appears foreign with respect t_> this c Matth. v. 23, 24. Mount, vol. i. serm. ii. iii. p. 27, &c. d Mede, Disc. xlvi. p. 357, &c. edit. f Jren. lib. iv. cap. 18. pp. 250, 1664. Compare Johnson's Propit. 252. Cp. Pfaffius, pp. 57, 58. Oblat. p. 19, &c., and Lewis's An- s Tertullian. de Poenitent. cap. xii. swer to Unbloody Sacrifice, p. 32. p. 147 ; de Orat. cap. x. p. 133 ; et e See Blair on the Sermon in the contr. Marc. lib. iv. cap. 9. p. 420. 360 The Preparation proper for CHAP. text, which relates not to pardoning others who have injured us, but rather to the seeking pardon where we have injured. How- ever, as the two parts are near allied, it was easy to blend ideas, and to run both into one; as several other Fathers did. Cyprian also accommodates the precept to Christian circumstances, inter- preting the gift of prayers, which ought to be offered with a pacific temper of mind h . Elsewhere he applies it to the eucharistical prayers and services . Eusebius and Cyril apply the text much in the same way k . And Origen interprets the gift to mean prayer 1 . The Constitutions called Apostolical interpret 'gift' of prayer, praise, and thanksgiving, and the precept of enter- taining no enmity against others, and taking what care we can that they may have no just ground of complaint against us ni . Chrysostorn accommodates the precept to the prayers and alms offered at the holy Communion, which would not be accepted, if not brought in charity, and with a peaceful mind n . In another Homily , he presses the point somewhat further, and says many good things of the care we ought to take to make up differences, if possible, even with those who without any just cause are our enemies ; that so we may restore them, and heal their sores, and gain them over to good will. All which is right, if tempered with the rules of Christian prudence, and not strained so far, as to make well disposed and truly peaceable persons stay away from the Lord's table upon needless scruples; arising either from the irreconcilable temper of others, or from a want of due discernment of what is safe, prudent, or proper, under such or such circumstances. Improper or indiscreet overtures made by the offended party towards an offender, may often widen the breach which they mean to heal, and may increase the mischief, instead of curing it. Jerome, upon the text, appears rather argute than solid ; where he comments to this effect, if I understand him : 'It is h Cyprian, de Oratione, p. 211. "> Constitut. Apostol. lib. ii. cap. 1 Cyprian de Unit. Eccl. p. 198. 53. p. 260. k Eusebius deVit. Constant, lib. iv. n Chrysostom. in Matt. Horn. xvi. cap. 41. Cyrill. Hierosol. Mystag. v. p. 217. ed. Bened. torn. vii. p. 316. Chrysostom. de Simul. Horn. xx. 1 Origen. de Orat. p. 198. p. 206, &c. torn. ii. xiii. the Holy Communion. 361 not said, if you take anything amiss of your brother, but if your brother takes anything amiss of you ; to make the terms of reconciliation so much the harder. So long as we are not able to pacify the party, I know not whether we ought to offer our gifts unto God P.' This is straining the point too far, if it means anything more than the using all safe, prudent, and reasonable endeavours to remove causeless offences, where a person is ignorant or froward. St. Austin, who had a cooler head than Jerome, and was a more exact casuist, has given the justest and clearest account of this text that I have met* with ; perhaps with a design to take off such scruples as Jerome's account might have raised. As to the gift mentioned, he interprets it of prophecy, that is, doctrine, and prayers, and hymns, and the like spiritual services i. And as to the precept, he explains it thus : ' if we call to mind that our brother has ought against us ; that is, if we have any way injured him ; for then it is that he has something against us. But, if he has injured us, then we have something against him : in which case, there is no occasion to go to him for reconcilement. You would not ask pardon of the man that has done you an injury ; it is sufficient that you forgive him, as you desire forgiveness at God's hands for what you have offended in. We are to go therefore to be reconciled, when it comes into our mind, that haply we may have some way injured our brother r .' The sum then of all is, that if we are certain that we have done any man an injury in his person, estate, or good name, or that P 'Non dixit, Si tu liabes illiquid p. 167. edit. Bened. torn. iii. adversus fratrein tuum, sed, Si frater r 'Siinmentemvenerit.quodaliquid tuus habet aliquid adversum te ; ut habeat adversum nos frater ; id est, duriorreconciliationis tibi impoiiatur si nos eum in aliquo laesimus : tune necessitas. Quamdiu ilium placare eniin ipse habet adversum nos. Nam non possumus, neseio an consequen- nos adversus ilium habemus, si ille ter munera nosfcra offeramus Deo.' nos laesit : ubi non opus est pergere Hieron. in loc. torn. iv. p. 16. edit. adreconciliationem;nonenim veniain Bened. postulabis abeoqui tibi fecit injuriam, 'i ' Quodlibet enini munus offerimus sed tantum dimittes, sicut tibi dimitti Deo, sive prophetiam, sive doctrinam, a Domino cupis, quod ipse commi- sive orationern, sive hymnum, sive seris. Pergendum est ergo ad recon- psalmum, et si quid tale aliud spiritu- ciliationeni, cum in mentem venerit, alium donorum animo occurrit,' &c. quod nos forte fratrem in ali quo Jaesi- Augustin. de Senn. Domini in Mont, mus.' Augustin. ibid. 3^2 The Preparation proper for CHAP. we have given just cause of offence, it is our duty and business to make reparation, and to sue first for reconcilement : or if we are not certain, but probably suspect that we have been guilty that way, the same rule will still hold in proportion. But if we have good reason to judge that the person has really injured us, or has causelessly and captiously taken offence where none was given, then be it to himself : there is nothing in this text obliging an innocent person, in such a case, to make the first step towards reconcilement, or to suspend his offerings on any such scruple. There may, in some particular circumstances, be a kind of debt of charity, and Christian condescension, lying upon the injured party, to endeavour to reclaim and pacify the offender by soft and healing ways: but as that is a very nice affair, and the office such as many are not fit for, there lies no strict obligation in such a case, or at least not upon Christians at large, but upon those only who are peculiarly fitted for it. Therefore it falls not properly under the question now in hand, nor within the precept of the text, which is general, extending equally to all Christians. From the summary view here given of what the ancients thought of those words of our Lord, (besides the clearing an important case of conscience, which I chiefly aimed at,) it may be noted by the way, that the gift there mentioned was understood of spiritual saci'ifice only, and the altar also of course must have been spiritual, white con- sidered as an altar : which I take notice of as a confirmation of what hath been advanced in a preceding chapter. But I proceed. 2. As making restitution for any offences we have committed, is one necessary article of sacramental preparation, so is a readi- ness to forgive any offences committed against us another as necessary an article, and much insisted upon by the ancient churches 8 . This is a rule laid down by our blessed Lord in his Gospel, and made an express condition of our own forgiveness, and left us, for the greater caution, as an article of the Lord's Prayer to be daily repeated. All the difficulty lies in clearing and ascertaining the true and full meaning of the forgiveness * See Bingham, xv. 8. 13. xin. the Holy Communion. 363 required. Our Lord in one place says, 'If thy brother trespass against thee, rebuke him, and if he repent, forgive him ; ' and so again and again, as often as he repents, forgive *. May we then revenge ourselves upon an enemy, if he does not repent 1 No, by no means : vengeance is God's sole right u : man has nothing to do with it. Even magistrates, who, in some sense, are re- vengers, or avengers, to execute wrath x , yet, strictly speaking, are not appointed to dispense vengeance. They do not, they can- not award punishments in just proportion to demerits, as God can do : but they are appointed to act for the safety of the State ; and what they do is a kind of self-defence, in a public capacity, rather than a dispensing of vengeance. So that even they, pro- perly speaking, are not commissioned to revenge : much less can any private persons justly claim any right to it. Forgiveness, if understood in opposition to revenge, is an unlimited duty, knows no bounds or measures, is not restrained to any kind or number of offences, nor to any condition of repenting : but all offences must be forgiven, in that sense, though not repented of, though ever so cruelly or so maliciously carried on and persisted in. Therefore the forgiveness which our Lord speaks of, as limited to the repentance of the party offending, can mean only the receiving a person into such a degree of friendship or intimacy, as he before had : a thing not safe, nor reasonable, unless he shews some tokens of sorrow for his fault, and some signs of a sincere intention to do so no m'ore. Forgive him in such a sense, as to meditate no revenge, to wish him well, and to pray for him, and even to do him good in a way prudent and proper : but admit him not into confidence, nor trust yourself with him, till he repents : for that would be acting too far against the great law of self-preservation. Only take care, on the other hand, not to be over distrustful, nor to stand upon the utmost proofs of his relenting sincerity, but rather risk some relapses. This, I think, in the general, is a just account of Gospel-forgiveness y. t Luke xvii. 3, 4. Matt, xviii. 21, x Eom. xiii. 4. 22, y Compare Abp. Tillotson, Serm. u Deut. xxxii. 35. Rom. xii. 19. xxxiii. p. 392. vol. i. fol. edit. Tower- Heb. x. 30. son on the Sacraments, p. 298. 3^4 The f reparation proper for CHAP. But to prevent all needless scruples, I may explain it a little further, in some distinct articles : i . Gospel -forgiveness interferes not with proper discipline, nor the bringing offenders in a legal way to public justice. An informer may prosecute, a witness accuse, a jury bring in guilty, a judge condemn, and an execu- tioner despatch a criminal, without any proper malevolence towards the party, but in great benevolence towards mankind. 2. Gospel -forgiveness interferes not with a person's prosecuting his own just rights, in a legal way, against one that has griev- ously injured him in his estate, person, or good name : for a man's barely doing himself justice, or recovering a right, is not taking revenge. A person wrongs me, perhaps, of a con- siderable sum : I forgive him the wrong, so as to bear him no malice ; but I forgive him not the debt, because I am no way obliged to resign my own property or maintenance to an inju- rious invader. 3. Gospel-forgiveness interferes not with a just aversion to, or abhorrence of, some very ill men ; liars, suppose, adulterers, fornicators, extortioners, impostors, blasphemers, or the like : for such hatred of aversion is a very different thing from hatred of malevolence, may be without it, and ought to be so. We cannot love monsters of iniquity with any love of complacency, neither does God delight in them as such : but still we may love them with a love of benevolence and compas- sion, as God also does z . 4. Neither does Gospel-forgiveness interfere with any proper degrees of love or esteem. A man may love his enemies in a just degree, and yet love his friends better, and one friend more than another, in proportion to their worth, or nearness, or other circumstances. Our Lord loved all his disciples, even Judas not excepted : but he loved one more particularly, who was therefore called ' the disciple whom Jesus loved a ;' and he loved the rest with distinction, and in propor- tionate degrees. 5. I have before hinted, that Gospel -forgive- ness interferes not with rejecting enemies from our confidence, or refusing to admit them into our bosoms. We may wish them well, pray for them, and do them good ; but still at a proper 1 See Towerson on the Sacraments, pp. 298, 299. John xiii. 23 : six. 26 ; xx. 2 ; xxi. 7, 20. xiii. the Holy Communion. 365 distance, such as a just regard for our own safety, or reasons of peace, piety, and charity may require. 6. I may add, that cases perhaps may be supposed, where even the duty of praying for them may be conceived to cease. ' There is a sin unto death : I do not say that he shall pray for it V But in this case, they are not to be considered merely as private enemies, but as public nuisances, and as offending of malicious wickedness, not against man only, but against God and religion. Indeed, charity forbids us to pass such a censure, except it be upon very sure grounds ; which perhaps we can but seldom, if ever, have : but I was willing to mention this case, for the better clearing up St. Paul's conduct in this very article. It may deserve our notice, that he prayed for those who had meanly, and through human infirmity, deserted him in the day of trial, that the sin might not be ' laid to their charge c :' in the same breath almost, speaking of Alex- ander, a wicked apostate, who had most maliciously opposed him and the Gospel, he says ; ' The Lord reward him according to his works rf)s tvxapiffTias, icard nva, &c. Constit. Apostol. lib. vi. cap. 15. ara(fac, rovrovs a.iro&\-liTovs Gregor. Nyssen. de Baptism. Opp. rr,s (KKXijffias fois &v 376 The Obligation to' CHAP. may seem to be a severe rule, on more accounts than one. i. As it appears to run in general terms, making no express exceptions for those who, for just causes, best known to themselves, might sometimes decline receiving. 2. Supposing any person to absent from the Lord's table, out of reverence to it, (being conscious to himself of some secret offences,) as it was a rule of the Church to excommunicate no man but for open and scandalous sins, it might look hard to excommunicate merely for not receiving con- stantly; because it was, in effect, extending discipline even to the most private and concealed offences, or to other impedimenta. 3. Since no one ought to receive but he that sincerely repents ; and since repentance must be free, or it is really no repentance ; it appears not right to excommunicate a man, in order to oblige him to receive, unless it were right also to excommunicate every one who should delay repentance, or who would not instantly be persuaded to reform, so far as to be capable of receiving worthily the holy Communion. This appears not to have been the rule of the earlier centuries : for they left men at liberty to judge (except in cases of open scandal) how far they were worthy or otherwise, and thereupon to choose either to receive or forbear. These or the like reasons, I presume, have put learned men upon softening explications, to mitigate the rigour of the Canon. Emanuel Schelstrate has suggested, that the order then made pointed chiefly at the Audians, or Quarto- decimans h , who held private conventicles, but came occasionally to Church, to hear the Scrip- tures read, and sermons preached, and then departed, in a dis- orderly and scornful manner, upon some erroneous principles of their sect, to the great scandal and offence of the more serious and sober part of the congregation. Schelstrate's account is favoured by two circumstances : one, that the Canon immediately preceding most plainly strikes at the Quarto-decimans, though without naming them ; and the other, that the Canon does not simply and absolutely censure all non-communicants, but some only, with this restriction, as doing it KOTO, nva ara^iav, which fjitvoi Kcd Sttlavrts icapirovs fitravolat, ii. Bevereg. Panel, p. 431. icai irapa.Ka\((ravT(s rv\^ v SwaOuxri h Vid. Schelstrate de Concil. Anti- Concil. Antioch. Can. ochen. pp. 179, 222. xiv. frequent Communion. 377 Dionysius Exiguus renders 'pro quadam intemperantia,' with a certain rudeness; and Isidorus Mercator renders 'secunclum aliquam propriam disciplinam,' according to the principles of their own sect. Now, if such was the case, then the rigour of the Canon affected not the main body of the faithful, adhering to the Church, who might be still left to the same discretionary conscientious liberty as before. Perhaps the like account may serve for the Apostolical Canons also, so far as concerns this article : Schelstrate was of that mind, and applied the same solution to both \ One of the Apo- stolical Canons orders, ' That if any Bishop, Priest, or Deacon, or any of the sacerdotal college, does -not communicate when there is a Communion, [oblation,] he shall be obliged to assign a reason ; and if it be a just one, he shall be excused : other- wise he shall be suspended, as giving offence to the people, and as raising a suspicion upon the administrator, as if he did not salutarily execute his office 1 *.' The last words put me in mind of the fourth Canon of the Council of Gangra, held a few years before the Antiochian : some place it in 324, some in 330; all agree that it was not later than 340. That Canon decrees, ' That if any one takes exception to a married Presbyter, as such, thinking it not lawful to receive the Communion at his hands, let him be anathema 1 .' Whether the Antiochian and Apostolical Canons might not have some view to that case, in what they decreed against any one's turning his back on the Communion, I leave to the learned to consider. The next Canon called Apostolical makes a like order with respect to the laity, as the former had done with regard to the clergy : viz. ' That as many of the faithful as came to Church, and did not abide all the time of the prayer and Communion, 1 Schelstrate, ibid. p. 222. us n^i vyicas art vtyKavTos. Can.Apo- k El TIS iirio-Koiros, ^ irpecr/JuTfpoj, stol. vi, alias viii. v) Sidicovos, $) IK TOV Ka.ra\6yov TOV ' E5f TIS StaKptvotro irtp\ irpcrf$vTf- lepariKov, irpoat, \ti- HfTa\d/3oi, T^V al-riav flirdrta' xal lav TovpyJi&avros ouToC, irpofftyopas /j.era- ffi\oyos rj, crvyyviafjiris rvyxavtrw tl \afj.Bdvfiv, avdOtpa fffrta. Concil. Se fj.^1 Ae'7j7, a, u>s alnos Gangrens. Can. iv. Hard. p. 530. tvnBfls T$ \af, xal vieAvoiav Bevereg. Pand. torn. i. 419. /card TOV irpofftvtynai'Tras ITHTTOVS tls n AiopjiTM^s Spi/j.vrar6s tanv. Bal- rV ayiav @eov lKK\^ffia.v, Kal rcav sum. in loc. if pav ypa(f>>v aKouocTos, ^ irapanf- Vid. Beveregii Annot. in Apost. vovrax Se rrj irpoopieff()ai xpV- Can. Apo- p. 186, ed. Bened. torn. iii. Cp. So- stol. vii. alias ix. crat. Eccles. Histor. lib. v. cap. 22. xiv. frequent Communion. 379 Chiysostom, of the same century, somewhat later, will give us the best light, both with respect to the practice of that age, and the rules whereby it was conducted. In one place of his works, he speaks thus : ' Many partake of this sacrifice once a year, some twice, some oftener. Which of them should we most approve oH Those that communicate once, or those that do it often, or those that seldom do it 1 ? Neither the once-comers, nor the often, nor the seldom, but those that come with a clean conscience, a pure heart, and a life unblamable, they that are so qualified should come constantly : but as to them that are not, once is too much for them. And why so 1 Because they will only receive to themselves judgment and condemnation, pains and penalties 7Aj)cdj. The angeli- the main, one cherubical, or sera- pal. 'Glory to God on high,' &c. phical hymn, with some variations, i. "Ypvos xfpov$i6s. The cherub- additions, and interpolations made 'ical hymn, in Goar, p. 206. at different times. See Bingham, 3. "Tfiifos rpiffdyios. Sanctus Deus, xiv. 2, 3 ; xv. 3, 9, 10. Allix. Dis- sanctus fortis, &c. sert. de Trisagii Origine. Renaudot. 4. "Tjuvos tirivlitios. The triumphal Liturg. Collect, torn. i. p. 228. torn, hymn. 'Holy, holy, holy, Lord,'&c. ii. p. 69. xiv. frequent Communion. 381 the Church in that age : for nothing was more usual than to admit penitents of the foui'th order, to communion in prayers, for two, three, four, or sometimes five years, and all the while to debar them from the holy Communion, as not yet worthy to be admitted to it 4 . But what Chrysostom meant was, that it was very absurd, and even downright impudent, for a man to claim a right to stand by, all the while that the Communion was administering, and to join in those most sacred and mystical prayers and hymns, which were proper to it, and at the same time to pretend that he was not worthy of it : for, if he really was not worthy to receive, he was not worthy to be present during that holy solemnity, or to bear a part in the prayers which peculiarly belonged to it. I know, it has been thought by persons of good learning, that the fourth order of penitents (called a-vviordnevoi, consistentes, in English co-standers, or asso- ciates) were allowed to be present during the whole solemnity, while prohibited from receiving, and that Sunday after Sunday, for several years together : which would have been committing that very absurdity which Chrysostom here so strongly remon- strates against. But I take that prevailing notion to be all a mistake, owing to the want of a right understanding the ancient Canons and ancient phi-ases. Those co-standers were allowed to communicate in prayers with the faithful". What prayers, is the question. I suppose the prayers previous to the holy kiss, previous also to the oblation; which were indeed part of the Missa fklelium, or Communion Service, (like to our prayer for the Church militant,) but were not the proper mystical prayers belonging to the Communion, and of which Chrysostom is to be understood. The co-standers, being the highest order of penitents, had the * Concil. Ancyran. Can. 4, 5, 6, catechumens, after the Gospel, or 7, 8, 9, 16, 24. Concil. Nicen. Can. with the penitents soon after, com- II, 11, 13. Basil. Can. 22, 30, 56, municated in prayer, as appears by 57> 58, 59, 61, 66, 75, 82, 83. Con- the Apostolical Constitutions. Mi; cil. Carthag. vi. Can. n. Concil. Koivtavfiroxrav 5e fv rrj irpoffevx^, Trull. Can. 87. oAA" f^fpxevOtaffav /ueroc rrji> avajvo. - u Ei/x^s 8e novrjs KOivuvriffai. Con- ffiv rov v6fj.ov Kal riOiv irpotjruf Kal cil. Ancyr. Can. iv. Koivtavfia'ai x- ra ^> evayyf\lov. lib. ii. cap. 39. The p\s irpoffcpopas. Ibid. Can. vi. So in Council of Laodicea distinctly men- the Xicene Canons, and Basil's, '&c. tions what prayers preceded the ob- All that did not depart with the lation. Can. xix. p. 786, Harduin.. 382 The Obligation to CHAP. privilege to stand in the same place of the Church with the faithful, and to abide there, after the catechumens and lower penitents were dismissed ; and they were permitted to commu- nicate in prayer, till the oblation began, and then they also were to withdraw. This I collect, as from several other circumstances, so particularly from hence, that the Deacons just before the salutation of peace, warned all non-communicants to withdraw x . The co-stauders must of course have been reckoned of that num- ber, being forbid to communicate ; and therefore they must have been obliged to withdraw after the preparatory prayers, and before the Communion, properly speaking, began. Chrysostom himself intimates in another Homily, that all non-communicants were warned to depart y; and that presently after came on the mystical hymn. About that time the co-standers, as I conceive, withdrew. Neither, indeed, is it credible, that so knowing a person as Chrysostom would have represented it as a flaming absurdity for a non-communicant to be present during the whole solemnity, had the custom of the Church allowed it in the co- standers, who were non-communicants. It may be objected, that Pope Sirieius (about A. D. 385) allowed or ordered some non -communicants to abide till the whole service was over z : and Sozomen speaks of the custom of the western churches, as obliging the penitents to wait all the time of the Communion Service, in order to receive the Bishop's abso- lution after it was ended 8 . These are the principal passages which have led learned men into a persuasion, that the co-standers were used to be present during the whole solemnity. But they * 'f.v rfj dfia avatpopa. 6 Siaxovos sost. Homil. de Fil. Prod. torn. ri. Tpoatpavt't irpb TOV affTfafffiOv' ol CLKOI- p. 375, Paris. VI!>VI}TOL irepnrar'fia-are. Timoth. Alex. z ' Diximus decernendum, ut sola Resp. ix. 1 104, Hard. Ol rrjv icpfarp intra ecclesiam fidelibus oratione jun- tuxV fvxfafvoi, irpof \9fTf. Apost. gantur; Sacris niysteriorum celebri- Constitut. lib. viii. cap. 12. 'Si quis tatibus, quamvis non mereantur, in- non communicat, det locum.' Gre- tersint ; a Dominicae autem mensae gor. M. Dial. lib. ii. cap. 23. convivio segregentur,' &c. Siric. y Mr) rts TUV KaTTfixov(j.fvu>i>, p-fi TIS Epist. p. 848, Harduin. TUV fitr) fffOiovTiav, fnij ns riav Ka.TO.ffn6- * H \Tr)pta8t iffr\ j TTJJ TOV &tov \fi~ irwv, pr) ris TOIV p)] Svya-Ufvuv 8tdi\-finan a.V aSe\\oyf!v T^V ux a ~ of the Christian Sacraments. 399 practice contradictory to their principles. However, this was sufficient intimation to every honest Christian, of the meanest capacity, that their principles must be false, which obliged them in consequence to vilify and reject the plain and certain insti- tutions of Christ. There was no need of entering into the sub- tilties of argument ; for the thing declared itself, and left no room for dispute. Such was the valuable use of this Sacrament, at that time, for supporting truth and detecting error, for the confirming the faithful in the right way, and for confounding seducers. III. In the century next following, the Valentinian Gnostics corrupted the faith of Christ more ways than one, but particu- larly in pretending that this lower or visible world was not made by God most high, but by some inferior power or aeon. Here again the Sacrament of the Eucharist was of signal service for the confuting such wild doctrine, and for the guarding sincere Christians against the smooth insinuations of artful disputers. It was very plain, that the bread and wine in that Sacrament were presented before God, as his creatures and his gifts ; which amounted, in just construction, to a recognising him as their true Creator : and it was absurd to imagine that God should accept of, and sanctify to heavenly purposes, creatures not his o\vn c . Besides, our Lord had chosen these creatures of the lower world to represent his own body and blood, and called them his body and blood, as being indeed such in Divine construction and beneficial effect to all worthy receivers : a plain argument that he looked upon them as his own and his Father's creatures, and not belonging to any strange creator, with whom neither he nor his Father had anything to do. pia-riav a&pita. tivai TOV ffunripos 7ifj.uiv tradicerent.' Eccl. Hist. pp. 568, 569. 'lria ira.pa.iT- eiffOtuffav . rj^Siv Sf ffiifjuptavos 77 yvta/^r) rfj (vxapiffrlq, cal ^ fvx.a.purrla, . . . jSejSaioi rV yvca/tqv. Iren. lib. iv. cap. 18. p. 251. 1 'Acceptumpanem,etdistributum discipulis, corpus ilium suum fecit, Hoc est corpus meum, dicendo ; id est figura corporis mei. Figura au- tem noil fuisset, nisi veritatis esset corpus : ceterum vacua res, quod est phantasma, figuram capere non pos- set.' Tertull. adv. Marc. lib. iv. c. 40. p. 458. Cp. Pseud. Orig. Dial, contr. Marcion. lib. iv. p. 853. ed. Bened. Dd 402 The doctrinal Use VI. When the Encratitae, or Continents, of the second cen- tury, (so called from their overscrupulous abstemiousness,) had contracted odd prejudices against the use of wine, as absolutely unlawful ; the Sacrament of the Eucharist was justly pleaded, as alone sufficient to correct their groundless surmises k : but rather than part with a favourite principle, they chose to cele- brate the Communion in water only, rejecting wine ; and were from thence styled Aquarians 1 . Which practice of theirs served however to detect their hypocrisy, and to take off the sheep's clothing : for nobody could now make it any question, whether those so seemingly conscientious and self-denying teachers were really deceivers, when they were found to make no scruple of violating a holy Sacrament, and running directly counter to the express commands and known practice of Christ their Lord. VII. When the Praxeans, Noetians, and Sabellians, of the second and third centuries, presumed to innovate in the doctrine of the Trinity, by reducing the three Persons of the Godhead to one ; then the Sacrament of Baptism remarkably manifested its doctrinal force, to the confusion of those misbelievers. There was no resisting the pointed language of the sacramental form, which ran distinctly in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost m . It seems, that those men being con- scious of it, did therefore change our Lord's form, and baptized in a new one of their own n ; not considering, that that was plunging deeper than before, and adding iniquitous practice to ungodly principles. But the case was desperate, and they had no other way left to make themselves appear consistent men. In the meanwhile, their carrying matters to such lengths could not but make their false doctrine the more notorious to all men, and prevent its stealing upon honest and well disposed k Vid. Clem. Alex. Paedag. lib. ii. m Vid. Tertull. adv. Prax. cap. cap. 2. p. 186. Strom, lib. i. p. 26, 27. Hippol. ctfntra Noet. cap. 359. xiv. p. 1 6. 1 Epiphan. Haeres. xlvii. 3. Theo- n Vid. Bevereg. Vindic. Can. lib. dorit. Haeret. Fab. lib. i. cap. 21. ii. cap. 6. p. 252. Bingham, Eccles. Philastrius, Haer. Ixxvii. p. 146. Antiq. lib. si. cap. 3. p. 7. Augustinus, Haec. cap. Ixiv. of the Christian Sacraments. 43 Christians, by ignorance or surprise. Such was the seasonable use of the Sacrament of Baptism in that instance ; detecting error, and obstructing its progress, and strongly supporting the true faith. VIII. When the Arians, of the fourth century, took upon them to deprave the doctrine of the Trinity in an opposite extreme, by rejecting the Deity of our Saviour Christ, ' who is over all, God blessed for ever ;' then again the same Sacra- ment of Baptism reclaimed against novelty, and convicted the misbelievers in the face of the world. It was obvious to every impartial and considering man, that the form of Baptism ran equally in the name of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and that it could never be intended to initiate Christ's disciples in the belief and worship of God and two creatures P. The new teachers however, in prudence, thought proper to continue the old form of baptizing, till the Eunomians, their successors, being plainer men, or being weary of a practice contradictory to their prin- ciples, resolved at length to set aside the Scripture form, and to substitute others more agreeable to their sentiments 9. This was intimation sufficient to every well-disposed Christian to be upon his guard against the new doctrines, which were found to drive men to such desperate extremities. For now no man of ordinary discernment, who had any remains of godliness left in him, could make it matter of dispute, whether he ought to follow Eunomius or Christ. .-..**' There was a further use made of both Sacraments, by way of argument, in the Arian controversy. For when the Arians pleaded, that the words 'I and my Father are one' meant no more than an unity of will or consent, inasmuch as all the faithful were said to be one with Christ and with each other, on account of such unity of consent ; the argument was retorted upon them in Rom. ix. 5. i Epiphan. Haer. Ixxvi. Greg. P A full account of this argument Nyssen. contr. Eunom. lib. x. p. may be seen in Bishop Stillingfleet 278. Theodorit. Haeret. Fab. lib. iv. on the Trinity, ch. ix. or in my cap. 3. Socrates, Eccl. Hist. lib. v. eighth sermon per tot. vol. ii. or cap. 24. Theodorus, Lect. lib. xi. in Athanasius, pp. 510, 633. ed. p. 576. ed. Cant. Bened. D d 2 4^4 The doctrinal Use this manner: that as Christ had made himself really one with us, by taking our flesh and blood upon him in the incarnation ; so again he had reciprocally made us really one with himself by the two Sacraments. For in Baptism we put on Christ, and in the Eucharist we are made partakers of his flesh and blood : and therefore the union of Christ's disciples with the Head, and with each other, (though far short of the essential union between Father and Son,) was more than a bare unity of will or consent ; being a real, and vital, and substantial union, though withal mystical and spiritual. Thus Hilary of Poictiers (an eminent Father of that time) retorted the argument of the adversaries ; throwing off" their refined subtilties, by one plain and affecting consideration, drawn from the known doctrine of the Christian Sacraments r . IX. About the year 360 rose up the sect of Macedonians, otherwise called Pneumatomachi, impugners of the Divinity of the Holy Ghost. They were a kind of Semi-Arians, admitting the Divinity of the second Person, but rejecting the Divinity of the third, and in broader terms than the Arians before them had done. However, the Sacrament of Baptism stood full in their way, being a lasting monument of the true Divinity of the third Person as well as of the second : and by that chiefly were the generality of Christians confirmed in the ancient faith, and preserved from falling into the snares of seducers 8 . X. About the year 370, or a little sooner, the sect of Apolli- narians began to spread new doctrines, and to make some noise in the world. Among sundry other wrong tenets, they had this conceit, that the manhood of our Saviour Christ was converted into or absorbed in his Godhead. For they imagined, that by thus resolving two distinct natures into one, they should the more easily account for the one Person of Christ ; not considering that the whole economy of man's redemption was founded in the plain Scripture doctrine of a Saviour both God and man. In 1 Hilarius de Trinit. lib. viii. p. ' See St. Basil on this argument, 951, &c. Cp. Cyrill. Alexandr. de De Spiritu Sancto, cap. 10, 12, 27, Trin. Dial. i. p. 407. 29. of the Christian Sacraments, 405 opposition to those dangerous tenets, the learned and eloquent Chrysostom (A. D. 405, circ.) made use of an argument drawn from the Sacrament of the Eucharist, to this effect ; that the representative body and blood of Christ in the Eucharist (sancti- fied by Divine grace, but not converted into Divine substance) plainly implied, that the natural body of Christ, though joined with the Godhead, was not converted into Godhead : for like as the consecrated bread, though called Christ's body on account of its sanctification, did not cease to be bread ; so the human nature of Christ, though dignified with the Divine, did not cease to be the same human nature which it always was *. We may call this either an argument or an illustration ; for indeed it is both under different views. Considered as a similitude, it is an illustration of a case : but at the same time is an argument to shew, that the Apollinarians were widely mistaken in imagining that a change of qualities, circumstances, or names, inferred a change of nature and substance. Bread was still bread, though for good reasons dignified with the name of the Lord's body : and the man Christ was still man, though for good reasons (that is, on account of a personal union) dignified with the title of God. Thus the Sacrament of the Eucharist, being a memorial of the incarnation, and a kind of emblem of it u , was made use * 'Sicutenim,antequamsanctifice- upon it, the reader may consult, if tur panis, panem nominamus, Divina he pleases, besides Harduin, Frid. autem sanctificante gratia, mediante Spanheim. Opp. torn. i. p. 844. .Le sacerdote, liberatus est quidem ap- Moyne, Varia Sacra, torn. i. p. 530. pellatione panis, dignus autem ha- Wake's Defence ag. M. de Meaux, bitus est Dominici corporis appella- printed 1686. Fabricii Bibl. Graec. tione, etiamsi natura panis in ipso torn. i. p. 433. Le Quien, Dissert, permansit ; et non duo corpora, sed Damascen. p. 48. et in Notis, p. 270. unum corpus Filii praedicatur : sic Zornii Opusc. Sacr. torn. i. p. 727. et hie Divina tv&pva&ai)* (id est, u Vid. Justin. Mart. Dial. p. 290. inundante) corpori natura, unum Apol. i. p. 96. ed. Thirlby. Filium, unam Personam, utraque N.B. The Eucharist was anciently haec fecerunt ; agnoscendum tamen considered as a kind of emblem of inconfusametindivisibilemrationem, the incarnation, but in a loose non in una solum natura, sed in general way : for like as there is an duabus perfectis.' Chrysost. Epist. heavenly part and an earthly part ad Caesar. Monach. pp. 7, 8. ed. here, so it is also there; and like as Harduin. Divine grace together with the ele- As to what concerns this Epistle, ments make the Eucharist, so the and our debates with the Romanists Divine Logos with the manhood 406 The doctrinal Use of to explain it, and to confirm the faithful in the ancient belief of that important article. But I proceed. XL About the year 410, Pelagius opened the prejudices which he had for some time privately entertained against the Church's Doctrine of original sin : but the Sacrament of Bap- tism" looked him full in the face, and proved one of the most considerable obstacles to his progress. The prevailing practice had all along been to baptize infants : and the Church had understood it to be baptizing them for remission of sin. The inference was clear and certain, and level to the capacity of every common Christian. Wherefore this single argument had weight sufficient to bear down all the abstracted subtilties and laboured refinements of Pelagius and his associates, and proved one of the strongest securities to the Christian faith so far, during that momentous controversy 1 . XII. About the year 430 appeared the Nestorian heresy : which, dividing the manhood of our Lord from the Godhead, made in effect two Persons, or two Christs. Here the Sacra- ment of the Eucharist was again called in, to compose the difference, and to settle the point in question. For since the virtue and efficacy of the representative body was principally founded in the supposed personal union of the real body with the Divine nature of our Lord, it would be frustrating or evacuating all the efficacy of the Eucharist, to divide the man- hood, in such a sense, from the Godhead y. The argument was just and weighty, and could not fail of its due effect among as many as had any tender regard for so divine and comfortable a Sacrament. make God incarnate. But then the * A full and distinct account of analogy or resemblance ought not this whole matter may be seen either to be strained beyond the intention in Vossius, Hist. Pelagian, lib. ii. of it : for there is this observable par. i. Thess. v. Opp. torn. vi. p. difference in the two cases ; that in 603, &c. or in Dr. Wall's Hist, of one case there is barely a conjunction Infant Baptism, part i. ch. 19. or concomitance of the two natures, J' Vid. Cyrill. Alex. Epist. ad Nes- and that to the worthy receivers tor. p. 1290. Anathem. xi. p. 1294. only : in the other, there is an abso- cum Cyrill. Explan. apud Harduin. lute, permanent, and personal union. Concil. Cp. Albertin. de Eucharist. So then the Eucharist is but a faint, p. 754. imperfect emblem of the other. of the Christian Sacraments. 407. XIII. Within twenty years after, came up the Eutychian heresy ; which, in the contrary extreme, so blended the God- head and manhood together, as to make but one nature of both, after the example of the Apollinarians, whom I before mentioned. The Sacrament of the Eucharist was of eminent service in this cause also : for if the bread and wine in that Sacrament are what they have been called, (and as constantly believed to be,) symbols and figures of Christ's body and blood, then it is certain that our Lord really put on flesh and blood, and that his human nature was and is distinct from his Divine. To say, that ' the Word was made flesh/ or that the flesh was converted into the Word, in such a sense as to leave no distinct humanity, was as much as to say, that the Sacraments now make us not ' mem- bers of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones z ;' and that the Eucharist in particular is an insignificant show, or worse, either not representing the truth of things, or representing a falsehood. Such was the argument made use of in the Eutychian con- troversy a : a plainer or stronger there could not be ; nor any wherein the generality of Christians could think themselves more deeply concerned. XIV. Long after this, in the eighth century, endeavours were employed by many to bring in the worship, or at least the use, of images into churches. In this case also, the Sacrament of the Eucharist was seasonably pleaded, for the giving some check to the growing corruption. The good Fathers of Constantinople, in the year 754, meeting in council to the number of 338, argued against images to this effect : that as our Lord had appointed no visible image of himself, his incarnation, or pas- sion, but the eucharistical one, and probably intended that for a most effectual bar, to preclude all appearances of idolatry ; it would be high presumption in men, without warrant, without occasion, and against the very design of our Lord in' that Sacra- ment, to introduce any other kind of images of their own devising b . z Ephes. v. 30. 836, 867, 868, 874, 886 a The reader may see the ancient b Vid. Acta Concil. Nicaen. se- testimonies collected and commented cundi, toin. iii. vers. finem. upon in Albertinus, pp. 802, 835, 40 8 The doctrinal Use The opposite party, some time after, (A. D. 787,) in the second Council of Nice, eluded this plain reasoning, by pretending, falsely, that the sacred symbols are not the image of Christ's body and blood, but the very body and blood c : and thus they laid the seeds of that error, which grew up at length by degrees into the monstrous doctrine of transubstantiation. For the true notion of the Eucharist lying cross to their darling schemes, they choose rather to deprave the Sacrament itself, than to stand corrected by it. However, all this tends to confirm the main point, which I have been insisting upon, that the Sacraments, among other very valuable uses, have for many ages upwards been the standing barriers against corruptions : though there are no fences so strong, nor any ramparts so high, but daring and desultorious wits may either break through them or leap over them. XV. I shall add but one example more ; and it shall be of Faustus Socinus, of the sixteenth century : a person of pregnant wit and teeming invention ; of moderate learning, but a very large share of sufficiency. His great ambition was, to strike out a new system of religion from his own conceits ; though he happened only to revive (and perhaps very ignorantly) the an- cient Sabellianism, Photiniauisin, and Pelagianism, with other exploded heresies. He began with subverting (as far as in him lay) the true and ancient doctrine of the Trinity, rejecting the Deity of the second Person, and even the being of the third. After a thousand subtilties brought to elude plain Scripture, and after infinite pains taken in so unnatural a war against Heaven, he was yet sensible, that he should prevail nothing, unless, to- gether with the doctrine of the Trinity, he could discard the two Sacraments also, or render them contemptible. Baptism was a standing monument of the personality and equal Divinity of c N.B. They might justly have are, in construction and beneficial said, that the sacred symbols are effect, to worthy receivers, the very more than a mere image, more than body and blood : but they ought not meie signs and figures : but they to have asserted what they did, in should not have denied their being that absolute manner, or in such images at all. And they might justly crude terms, left without the proper have said, that the sacred symbols qualifying explanations. of the Christian Sacraments. 409 Father, Son, and Holy Ghost : and the other Sacrament was an abiding memorial of the merits (though no creature can merit) of our Lord's obedience and sufferings : and both together were lasting attestations, all the way down from the very infancy of the Church, of the secret workings, the heavenly graces and influences of the Holy Spirit upon the faithful receivers. There- fore to let the Sacraments stand, as aforetime, was leaving the ancient faith to grow up again in the Christian world, much faster than Socinus, with all his subtile explications of Scripture texts, could bear it down. Being well aware how this matter was, he fell next upon the Sacraments ; discarding one of them, in a manner, under pretence that it was needless ; and castrating the other, with respect to what was most valuable in it, to ren- der it despicable. It was thought somewhat odd, by some of his own friends d , that he should labour to throw off Baptism, and at the same time retain the Eucharist, which appeared to be comparatively of slighter moment, and less insisted upon in Scripture. But he well knew what he did j for the form of Baptism stood most directly in his way. As to the Eucharist, if he could but reduce it to a bare commemoration of an absent friend, there would be nothing left in it to create him much ti-ouble ; but it might look sincere and ingenuous, in that in- stance at least, to abide by the letter of the text, and to plead for the perpetuity of an ancient and venerable (now by Tiim made a nominal) Sacrament. This appears to be the most natural account of his conduct in the whole affair. For other- wise it is a very plain case, that a lively imagination like his might have invented as fair or fairer pretexts for laying aside the Eucharist e , than for discarding Baptism ; and it might have been easier to elude some few places of Scripture than many. But I return. From the induction of particulars here drawn together, and laid before you, may be understood, by the way, the true and d Vid. Ruari Epistolae, vol. ii. p. merits, and tend to the discarding of -5 1 - both, or neither; as Vossius justly e Indeed, the same pretences, some remarks, De Baptismo. of them, equally affect both Sacra- The doctrinal Use right notion of the Christian Eucharist, such as obtained from the beginning, and continued till the dark ages came on, and longer : but the point which I aimed at was, to illustrate the use of both the Sacraments considered as fences or barriers, ordained by Christ, to secure the true faith, and to preclude false doctrines. Few have ever attempted to corrupt Christianity in any of its considerable branches, but, first or last, they have found themselves embarrassed by one or both Sacraments ; and have been thereby obliged either to desist presently, or to expose themselves further, by quarrelling with those sacred institu- tions, which all wise and good men have ever most highly revered. I have taken notice, how the most essential articles of the Christian religion have, in their several turns, (as they happened to be attacked,) been supported and strengthened by these aux- iliary means. The doctrine of the visible creation by God most high : the doctrine of our redemption by Christ, both God and man: the doctrine of sanctifying grace by the Holy Spirit of God, a real Person, and also Divine : the doctrines of original sin, and of our Lord's meritorious sacrifice, and of a future resurrection of the body : these, and as many others as are contained in these, have all been eminently preserved and held up by the Christian Sacraments. The Sacraments therefore are full of excellent instruction and admonition : they carry creeds and command- ments, as it were, in the bowels of them : they speak even to the eyes in silent imagery, and often teach more in dumb show, with less expense of time and much greater efficacy, than any the most eloquent discourses could do. The Romanists have some- times boasted, that images are the laymen's books, wherein the unlearned may read what it concerns them to know, without knowing letters. And indeed, if images had been authorized, or had they not been prohibited books, they might have been admitted with a better grace. But our Sacraments are the true books, (or serving as books,) both to learned and un- learned ; full of lively imagery and instructive emblem ; drawn by Christ himself, and left as his legacies, for the use of all the churches. of the Christian Sacraments. 41 1 Let us then, my Reverend Brethren, be careful to preserve these sacred deposits with all due reverence and watchfulness ; inasmuch as they contain treasures of infinite value ; and Christianity itself appears to be so entirely wrapped up in them, that, humanly speaking, it must unavoidably stand or fall with them. THE CHRISTIAN SACRIFICE EXPLAINED, DELIVERED IN PART TO ST. CLEMEXT-DANES, APRIL THE 20th, 1738. TO WHICH IS ADDED AN APPENDIX. REVEREND BRETHREN, THE Sacrament of the Eucharist has for some time been the subject of debate amongst us, and appears to be so still, in some measure ; particularly with regard to the sacrificial part of it. As it is a federal rite between God and man, so it must be supposed to carry in it something that God gives to us, and something also that we give, or pi-esent, to God. These are, as it were, the two integral parts of that holy ceremony : the former may properly be called the sacramental part, and the latter, the sacrificial. Any great mistake concerning either may be of very ill consequence to the main thing : for if we either mistake the nature of God's engagements towards us, or the nature of our engagements towards God, in that sacred solemnity, we so far defeat the great ends and uses of it, and prejudice ourselves in so doing. A question was unhappily raised amongst us, about an hundred years ago, whether the material elements of the Eucharist were properly the Christian sacrifice. From thence arose some debate; which however lasted not long, nor spread very far. But at the beginning of this present century, the same question was again brought up, and the debate revived, with some warmth ; and it is not altogether extinct even at this day. Those who shall look narrowly into the heart of that dispute may see reason to judge, that a great part of it was owing to some confusion of ideas, or ambiguity of terms ; more particularly, from the want of settling the definitions of sacrifice by certain niles, such as might satisfy reasonable men on both sides. How that confusion at first arose may perhaps be learned by looking back as far as to Bellarmine, about 1590, or however as far as to the Council of Trent, about thirty years higher. Before that time things were much clearer, so far as concerned this article. Nobody almost, doubted but that the old definitions 416 The Christian Sacrifice explained. of sacrifice were right, and that spiritual sacrifice was true and proper sacrifice, yea the most proper of any. ' Spiritual sacrifice' is St. Peter's phrase a : and it agrees with St. Paul's phrase of ' reasonable service b :' and both of them fall in with our Lord's own phrase, of ' worshipping God in spirit and in truth c .' It is serving God ' in newness of spirit, not in the oldness of the letter d :' It is offering him true sacrifice and direct homage, as opposed to legal and typical, in order to come at true and direct expiation, without the previous covers or shadows of legal and typical expiations, which reached only to the purifying of the flesh, not to the purging of the conscience e . This kind of sacrifice called spiritual does not mean mental service only, but takes in mental, vocal, and manual, the service of the heart, mouth, and hand ; all true and direct service, bodily f service as well as any other, since we ought to serve God with our bodies as well as our souls. Such is the nature and quality of what Scripture and the ancients call spiritual sacrifice, as opposed to the out- ward letter. Such services have obtained the name of sacrifice ever since David's time s, warranted by God himself, under the Old Testament and New. The Jews, before Christ and since h , have frequently used the name of sacrifice in the same spiritual sense. The very Pagans were proud to borrow the same way of speaking * from Jews and Christians : so that custom of language has not run altogether on the side of material sacrifice. It may rather be said, that the custom of Christian language, not only in the New Testament, but also in the Church writers, has run on the side of spiritual sacrifice, without giving the a i Pet. Si. 5. b Rom. xii. i. Justin. Mart. Dial. p. 387. c John iv. 23. See Dodwell on In- ' PorphyriusdeAbstin.lib.il. sect. strumental Music, p. 31. Stilling- 34. Cp. Euseb. Praep. Evangel, lib. fleet, Serm. xxxix. p. 602. Scot, iv. cap. 9-14. xiii. cap. 13. Clem. vol. iv. Serm. iv. d Rom. vii. 6. Alex. Strom, v. p. 686. ed. Ox. e Heb. ix. 9, 13, 14. Even Plato, long before Christianity, f Rom. xii. I. I Cor. vi. 20. had defined sacrifice to mean a pre- s They are emphatically styled sa- sent to the Divine Majesty; not con- crificesof God (Psalm li. 17), as being fining it, so far as appears, to ma- the fittest presents or gifts to him, terial, but leaving it at large, so as the most acceptable offerings. to comprehend either material or h Vid. Vitringa de vet. Synag. in spiritual. See my Review, &c. above, Prolog, pp. 40, 41. Philo passim, p. 311. The Christian Sacrifice explained. 417 least hint that it was not true sacrifice, or not sacrifice properly so called. St. Austin's definition of true and Christian sacrifice k is well known, and need not here be repeated. He spoke the sense of the churches before him : and the Schools, after him, followed him in the same. Aquinas, at the head of the Schoolmen, may here speak for the rest : he determines, that a sacrifice, properly, is anything performed for God's sole and due honour, in order to appease him I He plainly makes it a work, or service, not a material thing : and by that very rule he determined, that the sacrifice of the cross was a true sacrifice; which expression implies both proper and acceptable. This notion of sacrifice prevailed in that century, and in the centuries following, and was admitted by the early Reformers m ; and even by Romanists also, as low as the year 1556, or yet lower. Alphonsus a Castro, of that time, a zealous Romanist, in a famous book (which between 1534 and 1556 had gone through ten or more editions) declared his full agreement with Calvin, so far as concerned the definition of true sacrifice, conformable to St. Austin's n . Even Bellarmine acknowledged, above thirty years after, that some noted Doctor of the Roman Church still adhered to the same definition . So that spiritual sacrifice was not yet entirely excluded as improper, metaphorical, and nominal, among the Romanists themselves ; k ' Verum sacrificium eat omne turn est, quod passio Christi fuerit opus quod agitur ut sancta societate verum sacrificium.' Aquin. Summ. inhaereamus Deo, relatum scilicet par. iii. q. 48. ad ilium finem boni quo veraciter ra Vid. Melancthon. de Missa, beati esse possimus.' Augustin. de p. 195. In Malachi, p. 545. torn. ii. Civit. Dei, lib. x. cap. 6. p. 242. Chemnit. Examen. part. ii. p. 137. torn. 7. ed. Bened. Compare my "After reciting Austin's definition, Review, above, p. 309. he proceeds : 'Haec Augustinus, ex 1 Dicendum, quod sacrificium quibus verbis aperte colligitur omhe proprie dicitur aliquid factum in ho- opus bonum quod Deo offertur, esse norem proprie Deo debitum ad eum verum sacrificium, et hanc definitio- placandum. Et inde est quod Augus- nem ipsemet Calvinus admittit . . . ex tinus dicit, verum sacrificium est, &c. cujus verbis constat, inter nos et Christus autem, ut ibidem subditur, ilium de veri sacrificii definitione seipsum obtulit in passionepronobis. convenire." Alphons. a Castro, adv. Et Loc ipsum opus, quod voluntarie Haeres. lib. x. p. 75. ed. 1=65. passionem sustinuit, Deo maxime Bellarmin. de Missa, lib. i. cap. acceptum fuit, utpote ex caritate 2. p. 710. maxime proveniens : unde manifes: E e 41 8 *The Christian Sacrifice explained. neither was it hitherto a ruled j>oint amongst them, that material thing was essential to the nature, notion, or definition of true and proper sacrifice. How that came about afterwards, we shall see presently. The Romanists, wanting arguments to support their mass sacrifice, thought of this pretence, among others, that either their mass must be the sacrifice of the Church, or the Church had really none : and so if the Protestants resolved to throw off the mass, they would be left without a sacrifice, without an altar, without a priesthood, and be no longer a Church P. The Pro- testants had two very just answers to make, which were much the same with what the primitive Christians had before made to the Pagans, when the like had been objected to them. The first was, that Christ himself was the Church's sacrifice 1, considered in a passive sense, as commemorated, applied, and participated in the Eucharist. The second was, that they had sacrifices besides, in the active sense, sacrifices of their own to offer, visibly, publicly, and by sacerdotal hands, in the Eucharist : which sacrifices were their prayers, and praises, and commemorations r ; eucharistic sacrifices, properly, though propitiatory also in a qualified sense. The Council of Trent, in 1562, endeavoured to obviate both those answers s : and Bellarmine afterwards under- took formally to confute them. The Romanists had no way left but to affirm stoutly, and to endeavour weakly to prove, that P Alphons. a Castro, lib. x. p. 74. 231, 316, 503. ed. Bened. Hiero- Cp.Bellarmin.deMissa, lib.i.cap. 20. nym. torn. ii. pp. 186, 250, 254. Vid. Clem. Alex. pp. 688, 836. torn. iii. pp. 15, 1122, 1420. ed. ed.Ox. Euseb.Demonstr.Evan.p.38. Bened. Augustin. torn. ii. p. 439. Augustin. torn. iv. p. 1462. ed. Bened. iv. pp. 14, 473, 455, 527, 498, 1026, Greg. M. torn. ii. p. 472. ed. Bened. 1113. vii. p. 240. ed. Bened. and Cyrill. Alex, contr. Jul. lib. ix. compare my Review, chap. xii. r Justin Martyr, pp. 14, 19, 387, 8 ' Si quis dixerit in missa non 389. ed. Thirlb. Clem. Alex. 686, offerri Deo verum et proprium sacri- 836, 848, 849, 850, 860. ed. Ox. ficium, aut quod offerri non sit aliud Origen. torn. ii. pp. 210, 311, 191, quam n obis Christum ad manducan- 205, 243, 363, 418, 563. ed. Bened. dum dari, anathema sit. . . . Si quis Euseb. Dem. Evang. pp. 20, 21, 23. dixerit missae sacrificium tantum Tertullian, pp. 69, 188, 330. Rigalt. esse laudis etgratiarum actionis, aut Cyprian. Ep. Ixxvii. p. 159. ed. nudam commemorationem sacrificii Bened. Hilarius Pictav. pp. 154, in cruce peracti, non autem propitia- 228, 535. Basil, torn. iii. p. 52. torium, anathema sit.' Concil. Trid. ed. Bened. Chrysost. torn. v. pp. Bess. xxii. can. i, 3. The Christian Sacrifice explained. 419 the two things which the Protestants insisted upon did neither singly, nor both together, amount to true and proper sacrifice. Here began all the subtilties and thorny perplexities which have darkened the subject ever since ; and which must, I conceive, be thrown off, (together with the new and false definitions, which came in with them,) if ever we hope to clear the subject effect- ually, and to set it upon its true and ancient basis. I shall pass over Bellarmine's trifling exceptions to the Pro- testant sacrifice, (meaning the grand sacrifice,) considered in the passive sense. It is self-evident, that while we have Christ, we want neither sacrifice, altar, nor priest ; for in him we have all : and if he is the head, and we the body, there is the Church. Had we no active sacrifice at all, yet so long as we are empowered, by Divine commission, to convey the blessings * of the great sacrifice to as many as are worthy, we therein exercise an honourable priesthood u , and may be said to magnify our office. But waving that consideration at present, for the sake of brevity, I shall proceed to examine what Bellarmine has objected to our sacri- fices considered in the active sense, and to inquire by what kind of logic he attempted to discard all spiritual sacrifices, under the notion of improper, metaphorical, nominal sacrifices, or, in short, no sacrifices. i. He pleads, that Scripture opposes good works to sacrifice; as particularly in Hosea vi. 6, 'I will have mercy, and not sacrifice :' therefore good works are not sacrifice properly so called x . But St. Austin long before had sufficiently obviated that pretence, by observing, that Scripture, in such instances, had only opposed one kind of sacrifice to another kind, symboli- cal to real, typical to true, shadow to substance y. God rejected * Blessing was a considerable part retur.' Canus, Loc. Theol. lib. xii. of the sacerdotal office in the Aaron- cap. 12. ical priesthood. Numb. vi. 23-27. x Bellarmin. de Missa, lib. i. cap. Deut. x. 8. xxi. 5. 2. p. 710. u Some of the elder Romanists y ' Per hoc ubi scriptum est, Mise- acknowledged this to be sufficient, ricordiam volo quam sacrificium, ni- ' Satis est, ut vere et proprie sit hil aliud quam sacrificio sacrificium sacrificium, quod mors Christi ita praelatum oportet intelligi : quoniarn nunc ad peccati remissionem appli- illud quod ab omnibus appellatur cetur, ac si nunc ipse Christus more- sacrificium signum est veri sacrificii. E e 2 42O The Christian Sacrifice explained. the sign, which had almost engrossed the name, and pointed out the thing signified ; which more justly deserved to be called sacrifice. So it was not opposing sacrifice to no sacrifice, but legal sacrifice to evangelical. Such was St. Austin's solution of the objected difficulty : and it appears to be very just and solid, sufficiently confirmed both by the Old Testament and New. 2. Bellarmine's next pretence is, that in every sacrifice, pro- perly so called, there must be some sensible thing offered ; because St. Paul has intimated, that a priest must have somewhat to offer. Heb. viii. 3 z . But St. Paul says ' somewhat,' not ' some sensible thing.' And certainly, if a man offers prayers, lauds, good works, &c. he offers somewhat, yea and somewhat sensible too : for public prayers, especially, are open to the sense of hearing, and public performances to more senses than one. Therefore the service may be the sacrifice, not the material things : and such service being evangelical, (not legal or typical,) is spiritual sacrifice. 3. The Cardinal has a third argument about elicit acts ; which being highly metaphysical and fanciful, I choose rather to pass it off without further answer, than to offend your ears with it. 4. A fourth pretence is, that the sacrifice of the Church being but one, the spiritual sacrifices, which are many, cannot be that one sacrifice. Here he quotes Austin, Pope Leo, and Chry- sostom, to prove that the Church's sacrifice is but one, and that one the Eucharist a . He might have spared the labour, because the same Fathers assert the sacrifice of the Eucharist to be both one and many, diversly considered : one complicated sacrifice, taking in the whole action ; many sacrifices, if distinctly viewed under the several particulars. And though the Eucharist might Porro autem misericordia est verum Serm. liii.) that almost all call the sacrificium.' Augustin. de Civ. Dei, Sacrament, (that is, sign of the body,) lib. x. cap. 5. the body. ' Paene quidem sacramen- N. B. In explication of what Aus- turn omnes corpus ejus dicunt.' And tin says, ' quod ab omnibus,' &c. it yet he did not think that the sign may be noted, that he did not take was more properly the body, than the vulgar language for the best, or the body itself, but quite otherwise, the only rule of propriety: he ob- z Bellarnrn, de Missa, lib. i. cap. serves elsewhere (de Verb. Dom. 2. p. 711. a Ibid. p. 7 12 - The Christian Sacrifice explained. by common use come to be called emphatically, the Sacrifice, as being most observable, or most excellent, or as comprehending more sacrifices in one than any other service did, yet it does not from thence follow that the other less observable or less con- siderable sacrifices were not properly sacrifices. For has not the same Eucharist, in vulgar speech, and by custom, come to be emphatically called, the Sacrament, as if there were no other Sacrament 1 And yet certain it is, that Baptism is as properly a Sacrament as the other. Emphatical appellations therefore are rather marks of the excellency or notoriety of a thing, than of strict propriety of speech. But I return to Bellarmine. 5. A fifth pretence is, that spiritual sacrifices, being common both to clergy and laity, require no proper priesthood, and there- fore cannot be justly esteemed proper sacrifices ; for proper sacrifice and proper priesthood, being relatives, must stand or fall together *>. To which it may be answered, that even lay Christians, considered as offering spiritual sacrifices, are so far priests, according to the doctrine of the New Testament, con- firmed by Catholic antiquity 6 . But waving that nicety, (as some may call it,) yet certainly when spiritual sacrifices are offered up by priests, divinely commissioned, and in the face of a Christian congregation, they are then as proper sacrifices as any other are, or can be : and this is sufficient to our purpose. Let the Eucharist therefore, duly administered by sacerdotal officers, be admitted as a sacrifice properly so called, but of the spiritual kind, and we desire nothing further. If a sacerdotal oblation of the people's loaf and wine can be thought sufficient to convert them into proper sacrifices, though they had nothing at all of a sacrificial nature in them before such oblation ; surely the like sacerdotal oblation may much more convert the people's prayers, praises, and devout services (which previously had something of a sacrificial nature in them) into real and proper sacrifices, yea the properest of any d . Why then must our spiri- b Bellarmin. de Missa, lib. i. cap. and judicious Bp. Montague. 2. p. 712. 'In lege Christi sunt sacerdotes, c See my Review, above, p. 350. non tantum ilia laxa significatione, a This matter is briefly and accu- qua quotquot Jesu Christi sumus rately expressed by our very learned iiruwpoi, (Christian! nominati,) 42 Z The Christian Sacrifice explained. tual offerings be set aside as of no account in respect of proper sacrifice, only to take in other things of much lower account than they 1 Why should we take in those meaner things at all, as sacrifices, into our pure offerings, which are much better without them, and can only be defiled by such an heterogeneous mixture of legal and evangelical 1 Let the elements be signs (as they really are) of the sacrifice which we offer, as they are also signs of the sacrifice whereof we participate : that appears to be the end and use of them, (and great use it is,) and seems to be all the honour which God ever intended them. To be plainer, we ourselves are the sacrifice offered by those 6 symbols; and the victim of the cross is the sacrifice participated by the same symbols. But I proceed. 6. It is further argued against spiritual sacrifices, that they require no proper altar, as all proper sacrifices do : therefore they are not proper sacrifices f . This argument is faulty, more ways than one. For, i. It can never be proved, that sacrifices, and altars are such inseparable relatives, that one may not sub- sist without the other. An altar seems to be rather a circum- stance of convenience, or decency, than essential to sacrifice. It was accidental to the Jewish sacrifices, that they needed altars : and the reason was not because all sacrifices must have altars, but because sacrifices of such a kind could not be performed without them ; otherwise, an altar appears no more necessary to a sacrifice, considered at large, than a case or a plate, a pix or a patin, is to a gift, or present. 2. Besides, how will it be made appear that the table on which our Lord consecrated the Eucharist, or the cross on which he suffered, was properly and sumus etiam et dicimur sacerdotes, be offered in the Eucharist. But sed et ilia magis stricta, qua qui po- then it means only offered to view, pulo acquisitions praesunt tv vAfjitf or offered to Divine consideration : 0eoO, /col els tbv, Dei sunt et populi that is, represented before God, pee'irai Habemus autem et altare, angels, and men, and pleaded before ad quod offerimus oblationes et sacri- God as what we claim to ; not offered ficia commemorationis, laudationis, again in sacrifice. See Field on the orationis, nos. nostra, Deo, per sacer- Church, pp. 204, 205. and my Re- dotem.' Montacut. Orig. torn. ii. view, above, p. 344. p. 313. f Bellarmin. de Missa, lib. i. cap. e The sacrifice of the cross, or 2. pp. 712, 713. Christ himself, may also be said to The Christian Sacrifice explained. 423 previously an altar ? The Cardinal's argument proves too much to prove anything : for it does not only strike at the spiritual sacrifices, but at the mass sacrifice too, and even at the sacrifice of the cross, which had no proper altar S. But if it be said, that both the table and the cross were proper altars, as being the seats of proper sacrifices, then whatever is the seat of a spiritual sacrifice (which we now suppose to be proper) will, by parity of reason, be a spiritual altar also, and proper in its kind : so then, take the thing either way, the argument is frivolous, and con- cludes nothing 11 . I have now run through the Cardinal's sub- tilties on this head ; excepting that some notice remains to be taken of his artful contrivance to elude St. Austin's definition of sacrifice, and therewith all the old definitions which had ob- tained in the Church for fifteen hundred years before. 7. He pretends, that that Father defined only true sacrifice, not proper sacrifice ; and that therefore his definition comes not up to the point in hand : good works may be true sacrifices, in St. Austin's sense, but they will be improper, metaphorical, or nominal only, notwithstanding 1 . This is the substance of the pretext, laid down in its full force, and it will require a clear and distinct answer. First, I may take notice, that it is very odd, in this case especially, to make a distinction between true and proper, and to oppose one to the other. St. Austin, most un- doubtedly, intended, under the word 'true,' to take in all Christian, 8 Some make the cross itself the 559, 567. altar, which has been the current h The Lord's table is by the an- way of speaking from Origen of the cients frequently called an altar, as third century. Others say, the Di- being the seat of the elements, and vine nature of our Lord was the so an altar in the same metonymical altar, grounding it upon Heb. ix. 14. meaning, as the elements were body Others take in both, in different re- and blood, or the grand sacrifice spects : but neither of them seems itself. The Lord's table might also to have been an altar in strict pro- more properly be called an altar, aa priety of speech, but rather in the being that from which, or at which, way of analogy, or resemblance, prayers and praises and commemo- This article has been minutely dis- rations (spiritual sacrifices) were cussed by Cloppenburg. Opp. vol. i. offered. See my Review, above, pp. p. 82, &c. Witsius, Miscellan. torn. 333, 334. i. p. 509. In Symb. Apostol. p. 146. l Bellarmin. de Missa, lib. i. cap. Vitringa, Obs. Sacr. lib. ii. cap. 13. ?. p. 713. Cp. Vasquez, torn. hi. lib. iv. cap. 15. Deylingius, Obs. p. 507. Suarez, torn. iii. p. 886. Sacr. torn. ii. p. 393. Miscellan. Bapt. Scortia, p. 18. 424 The Christian Sacrifice explained. all evangelical, all salutary or acceptable, yea all allowable sacri- fices : and what can it signify to talk of any proper sacrifice (Jewish, suppose, or Pagan) as opposed to true, so long as such proper sacrifice is no sacrifice at all in Christian account, but a sacrilege rather, or a profanation ? But I answer further, that there is no reason to imagine that St. Austin did not intend to include ' proper' under the word ' true.' It would not have been sufficient to his purpose to have said proper sacrifice, because Jewish and Pagan sacrifices might come under the same appella- tion : but he chose the word ' true,' as carrying in it more than ' proper,' and as expressing proper and salutary, or authorized, both in one. As true religion implies both proper and authorized religion, and as true worship implies the like ; so true sacrifice implies both propriety as to the name, and truth as to the thing k . The point may be further argued from hence, that the ancient Fathers did not only call spiritual sacrifices real and true 1 , but they looked upon them as the best, the noblest, the most perfect sacri- fices, the most suitable and proper gifts or presents that could be offered to the Divine Majesty m : and they never dropped any hints of their being either improper or metaphorical. The Romanists knew this very well ; and it may be useful to observe their exquisite subtilty in this argument. For after they have exploded, with a kind of popular clamour, all that the Fathers ever called true sacrifice, under the opprobrious name of improper k In this sense St. Austin called goras, pp. 48, 49. ed. Ox. Clem, our Lord's Sacrifice true. Contr. Alex. pp. 836, 848, 849, 860. Ter- Faust. lib. xx. cap. 18. xxii. 17. tullian, Apol. cap. xxx. De Orat. Contr. advers. Leg. &c. lib. i. cap. cap. 27, 28. Minuc. Felix, sect. 18. xxxii. p. 183. Cyprian. Ep. Ixxvii. 1 Justin. Dial. p. 389. ed. Tbirlb. p. 159. ed. Bened. Lactantius, Epit. Irenaeus, lib. iv. cap. 17. p. 248. ed. cap. Iviii. de vero Cultu, lib. vi. cap. Bened. Origen. torn. ii. p. 362. ed. 24, 25. Eusebius, Demonstr. p. 40. Bened. Clem. Alex. p. 686. ed. Ox. Hilarius Pictav. p. 154. ed. Bened. Lactant. Epit. 169, 204, 205. ed. Dav. Basil, torn. iii. p. 207. ed Bened. Philastrius, Haer. cap. cix. p. 221. Nazianzen. torn. i. pp. 38, 484. ed. Fabr. Hieronym. in Amos, cap. Chrysostom. torn. v. pp. 20, 231, v. p. 1420. ed. Bened. Augustin. 316, 503. vii. 216. ed. Bened. Au- tom. x. pp. 94, 242, 243, 256. ed. gustin. torn. v. p. 268. de Civit. Dei, Be.ied. Gregor. Magn. Dial. lib. iv. lib. x. cap. 20. lib. xix. cap. 23. Isi- cap. 59^ p. 472. ed. Bened. dorus Pelus. lib. iii. Ep. 75. 10 Justin. Dial. p. 387. Athena- The Christian Sacrifice explained. 425 and metaphorical 11 , and have raised an odium against Protestants for admitting no other, then, (as if they had forgot all that they had been before doing,) they fetch a round, and come upon us with the high and emphatical expressions of the Fathers, ask- ing, how we can be so dull as to understand them of metaphorical, nominal sacrifices ? Yet we are very certain, that all those high expressions of the Fathers belonged only to spiritual sacrifices ; the very same that Bellarmine and the rest discard as improper and metaphorical. But they here play fast and loose with us : first, pretending that the true and noble sacrifices of the ancients did not mean proper ones, in order to discard the old definitions ; and then again, (to serve another turn,) pretending that those very sacri- fices must have been proper, (not metaphorical,) because the Fathers so highly esteemed them, and spake so honourably of them. In short, the whole artifice terminates in this, that the self-same sacrifices as admitted by Protestants shall be called metaphorical, in order to disgrace the Protestant cause, but shall be called proper and true as admitted by the Fathers, in order to keep up some show of agreement in this article with antiquity- But I return to the Cardinal, whom I left disabling all the old definitions, in order to introduce a new one of his own, a very strange one P ; fitted indeed to throw out spiritual sacrifice most effectually, (which was what he chiefly aimed at,) but at the same time also overthrowing, undesignedly, both the sacrifice of the mass and the sacrifice of the cross. i. As to the sacrifice of the mass, the subject of it is supposed to be our Lord's natural body, invisible in the Eucharist; and yet, by the definition, the sacrifice should be ' res sensibilis V some- n Vide Suarez, torn. iii. pp. 886, calling it a definition of animal. 891, 892, 893, 896. 'Sacrificium eat oblatio externa, Vide Petavius, Eocl. Dogm. torn, facta soli Deo, qua ad agnitionem iii. p. 130. humanae infirmitatis, et professi- P A definition of one kind of sacri- onem Divinae majestatis, a legitimo fice, (Jewish, as it seems,) rather ministro res aliqua sensibilis et per- than of sacrifice in general, or of manens, in ritu mystico, consecratur, Christian in particular. It is giving et transmutatur, ita ut plane destru- us a species for the genus, like the atur.' Bellarmin. de Missa, lib. i; making a definition of man, and then cap. 2. pp. 7*5; 7 J 7 426 The Christian Sacrifice explained. thing visible, obvious to one or more of the senses. Again, our Lord's body is not liable any more to destruction ; and yet, by the definition, the sacrifice should be destroyed. But I shall insist no longer upon the Cardinal's inconsistencies in that article, because he has often been called to account for them by learned Protestants r . 2. The second article, relating to the sacrifice of the cross, has been less taken notice of : but it is certain, that Bellarmine's definition is no more friendly to that than to the other. If our Lord's soul was any part of his offering, (as Scripture seems to intimate s , and as the Fathers plainly teach { , and the reason of the thing persuades,) or if his life was an offering, which Scripture plainly, and more than once testifies 11 ; then 'res aliqua sensibilis,' ' some sensible thing' is not the true notion of proper sacrifice, neither is it essential to the definition of it ; unless the life which our Lord gave upon the. cross was no proper sacrifice. Perhaps, in strictness of notion, his 'obedience unto death v ,' his amazing act of philanthropy, (so highly extolled in the New Testament,) was properly the acceptable sacrifice. So Aquinas states that matter, as I before noted : and Bellarmine was aware of it, in another chapter, wherein he undertakes to prove, that our Lord's death was a proper sacrifice w . There he was obliged to say, though he says it coldly, that acts of charity are ' quoddam sacrificium,' a kind of sacrifice. But the question was about proper sacrifice, and about our Lord's philanthropy : was that only 'quoddam sacrificium,' or was it not proper 1 Here the Cardinal was nonplussed, and had no way to extricate himself, but by admitting (faintly however and tacitly, as conscious of self-contradiction) that spiritual sacrifice may be proper sacrifice, r Joaun. Forbesius, p. 615. Mon- aeus, p. 292. ed. Bened. Hieronym. tacutius, Orig. torn. ii. pp. 302, 357. torn. ii. part. 2. pp. 167, 173. ed. Bishop Morton, b. vi. cap. 6. pp. 467, Bened. Fulgentius ad Thrasimund. 468, &c. Hakewill, p. 8. Brevint. lib. iii. Compare Bishop Bilson, Full Depth and Mystery, &c. pp. 133, Redemption, &c. p. 83, &c. 144. Payne on the Sacrifice of the n Matt. xx. 28. Mark 5.45. John Mass, p. 70. Bishop Kidder, pp. x. n, 15, 17. xv. 13. i John iii. 16. 316, 415. T Phil. ii. 8. Heb. v. 8. Isa. liii. 10, ii, 12. Psalm xvi. w Bellarmin. de Missa, lib. i. cap. 10. Luke xxiii. 46. 3. p. 718. * Clem. Roman, cap. xlix. Iren- The Christian Sacrifice explained. 427 and is not always metaphorical : otherwise, the very brightest part of our Lord's own sacrifice, the very flower and perfection of it, his most stupendous work of philanthropy, must have been thrown off, under the low and disparaging names of meta- phorical, improper, nominal sacrifice. Having seen how the ablest champion of the Romish cause failed in his attempts against spiritual sacrifices, failed in not proving his point, failed also in over proving, we may now with the greater assurance maintain, that the old definitions, which took in spiritual sacrifice, were true and just, and that the new ones, arbitrarily introduced, in the decline of the sixteenth century, are false and wrong ; such as one would expect from men zealous for a party cause, and disposed to support manifest errors and absurdities, at any rate whatsoever. After pointing out the rise of the new definitions, I am next to observe what their progress was, and what the result or issue of them. It must, I am afraid, be owned, that our Romish adversaries were but too successful in spreading mists and dark- ness all over the subject, in opening a new and wide field of dispute, thereby drawing the Protestants, more or less, out of their safe intrenchments ; dividing them also, if not as to their main sentiments, yet at least as to their modes of expression and their methods of defence. How this affair had been fixed amongst us, but a few years before, may be collected from Archbishop Sandys's judicious definition of sacrifice x , published in 1585, and contrived to take in sacrifices both of the material and spiritual kind. Dr. Bilson also (afterwards Bishop) published his book of Christian Subjec- tion, the same year; wherein he took occasion to assert, that the Eucharist is a sacrifice, yea, and a true sacrifice ; but under- standing it to be of the spiritual kind y. This kind of language * ' Sacrificing is a voluntary action and so to the end, was and shall be whereby we worship God, offering more acceptable to God, than the him somewhat, in token that we bloody and external sacrifices of the acknowledge him to be the Lord, Jews.' Bilson, p. 696. and ourselves his servants.' Sandys, ' Neither they nor I ever denied Serm. xxi. p. 185. the Eucharist to be a sacrifice. The J ' Malachi speaketh of the true very name enforceth it to be the sacrifice, which, from the beginning, sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving ; 428 Fhe Christian Sacrifice explained. (the uniform language of antiquity, and of the whole reformation z for sixty or seventy years,) began to vary in some measure, from Bellarmine's time, and jnore and more so, both here and abroad. Some indeed stood by the old definitions and ancient language concerning the Eucharist : more went off from it ; and so Protestants became divided, in sounds at least, while they differed not much in sense. Many finding that they were sufficiently able to maintain their ground against the Romanists, even upon the foot of the Romish definitions, never troubled themselves further to examine how just they were : it was enough, they thought, that the Romanists could not prove the Eucharist a time and proper Sacrifice, in their own way of defining ; and the rest seemed to be only contending about words and names. Nevertheless the more thoughtful and considerate men saw what advantage the adversaries might make by aspersing the Protestants as having no sacrifice properly so called, nor pre- tending to any : besides that the dignity of a venerable Sacra- ment would probably suffer much by it ; and the ancient Fathers, who were very wise men, had never consented (though as much provoked to it by the Pagan objectors) to lessen the dignity of their true and real sacrifices by the low and diminutive names of improper or metaphorical. They always stood to it, that they had sacrifices, yea and true sacrifices, (of the spiritual a kind,) the noblest and divinest that could be offered ; while all which is the true and lively sacrifice nem habet, idque triplici respectu. of the New Testament. The Lord's i. Quatenus in ea aliquid Deo offeri- table, in respect of his graces and mus, solennem videlicet gratiamm mercies there proposed to us, is an actiouem, ex illo Christi praecepto. heavenly banquet, which we must I Cor. xi. 26. eat, and not sacrifice : but the duties ' 2. Deinde, quod in ea conferren- which he requireth at our hands, tur eleemosynae, ex institute fortas- when we approach his table, are sa- sis Apostoli, I Cor. xvi. 2. Quae crifices, not sacraments. As namely, eleemosynae vocantur irpoff. modo, quatenus unici illius sacrificii Cp. his Posthumous Answer to vere propitiatorii memoriam in eo Card. Perron, pp. 6, 7- eerio frequentare jubemur.' Amand. * Besides the argument here drawn Polan. Symphon. Cathol. cap. xvii. from the consideration of what prin- p. 275. Cp. p. 855. ciples he was then opposing, (which d Field, of the Church, pp. 210, is a good rule of construction,) it 220. may further be considered that the e Scharpius, Curs. Theolog. pp. approved Divines of his time, Mason 1522, 1525, 1539. ed. 2. Genevae. and Spalatensis, rejected with indig- f Bp. Andrews's Sermons, part ii. nation the thought of any material p. 35. sacrifice, (vid. Mason de Ministerio 8 Andrews ad Bellarmin. Apolog. Anglican, pp. 575, 599, 618, 551, Respons. p. 184. 595- Spalatensis, lib. v. pp. 149, h Bp. Andrews's Sermons, p. 453. 265, 267.) condemned it as absurdity, The Christian Sacrifice explained. 431 Dr. Buckeridge wrote in 1614. His notion of the eucharistic sacrifice seems to resolve into a real and proper sacrifice of Christ's mystical body, the Church, and a metonymical, improper offering of Christ himself ; offering him in some sort, or in the way of representation, like as is done in Baptism \ He does not indeed use the word ' proper,' following the style of the ancients before ever that word came in : but he apparently means it, where he speaks of the sacrifice of Christ's mystical body, that is, of self-sacrifice. Archbishop Laud speaks of three sacrifices : i. Christ's own sacrifice, commemorated before God, by the priest alone, in his breaking the bread, and pouring out the wine. 2. The sacrifice made by priest and people jointly, the sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving. 3. Self-sacrifice by every communicant 1 . I will not defend all those distinctions. I think all the three sacrifices are properly the sacrifices of the Church, or of all the worthy communicants, recommended or offered up by their priests in that holy solemnity : the priest is their mouth in doing it, their conductor, or principal, authorized by God so to be. This great man said nothing of proper or improper : all the three sacrifices may be understood to be proper, but spiritual. What he be- lieved, as to each, is not easy to say. If we explain his comme- morative sacrifice by Bishop Buckeridge's account of the same thing, it could be no more than figurative, in that relative view ; madness, and impiety. So also Bp. Papae in praefat. Morton, (b. vi. cap. 5. pp.438, 439.) ' In the Eucharist we offer up to approving what the wiser Romanists God three sacrifices : ' One, by the had said, condemning the notion in priest only, that is, the commemora- the like strong terms. tive sacrifice of Christ's death, repre- k ' De sacrificio cordis contriti . . . sented in bread broken and wine de sacrificiis item corporis Christi poured out : another, by the priest mystici (non naturalis) in quo nos- and people jointly ; and that is the metipsos Deo ofFerimus, satis con- sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving venit. . . . De sacrificio item comme- for all the benefits and graces we morativo, sive repraesentativo, quo receive by the precious death of Christus ipse, qui in cruce pro nobis Christ : the third, by every particu- iminolatus est, per viam repraesen- lar man for himself only, and that tationis et commemoration is a nobis is the sacrifice of every man's body etiam quodammodo offerri dicitur, and soul, to serve him in both all lis non magna est : in Baptismo enim the rest of his life, for this blessing offertur sacrificium Christi, uti Au- thus bestowed upon him.' Laud's gustiiius, &c.' Buckeridge de Potest. Conference, sect. xxxv. pp. 305, 306. 432 Ihe Christian Sacrifice explained. for we cannot properly sacrifice Christ himself ; but the com- memorative service, being of the same nature with hymns and praises, may be considered in the absolute view, as a proper sacrifice of ours, of the eucharistical and spiritual kind ; and that perhaps was what that great Prelate might have in his thoughts. It is certain that Bishop Montague, of that time, understood the whole action, or memorial service, to be a true and real sacri- fice of praise m . And as he was a great admirer of antiquity, he had no regard to the new definitions, but referred the novelists to St. Austin for correction and better instruction n . The very learned Dr. Hammond was, undoubtedly, in the same way of thinking : the whole eucharistical action both of priest and people, the memorial service jointly performed, that was the sacrifice in his account . Bishop Taylor P, Archbishop Bramhall % Hamon I'Estrange 1 ", appear to have been in the like sentiments. Dr. Patrick, who wrote in 1659, more plainly followed the ancient way of thinking and speaking, such as had been in use before the new definitions came in. Duties and set-vices were his sacri- fice, a spiritual sacrifice 8 . He pleads, that such services justly deserve the name * ; that even the Pagan Platonists (as well as Scripture and Fathers) had so used the name of Sacrifice ; and that the appellation was very proper", taking in not only mental, or vocal praises, but manual also ; that is, as he expresses it, the eucharistical actions w . Upon these principles, he tells the Pap ; sts, that ' we are sacrificers as well as they x :' which was m Montacut. Origin, torn. ii. pp. blem, p. 137, or English Works, vol. 301-304. Compare his Antidiatribe, ii. p. 550. pp. 143, 144, where he takes in our P Taylor, Holy Living, &c. ch. iv. self-sacrifice, calling it the sacrifice sect. 10. Worthy Commun. p. 54. of Christ's mystical body. 1 Bramhall's Works, pp. 35, 36, n Montacut. ibid. p. 358. 996. Hammond, Practical Catechism, " L'Estrange's Alliance, &c. pp. lib. vi. sect. 4. vol. i. p. 174. Com- 187, 221. pare View of New Direct, p. 154. Patrick's Mensa Mystica, pp. and vol. ii. Dispatch, p. 164. vol. 16, 18, 19. ed. 4. iii. p. 769. The notion of the whole * Ibid. p. 35. action being the sacrifice, was not u Ibid. pp. 35, 36. new : it appears in the Fathers of w Ibid. p. 36. ed. 4 : compare p, old; and Mr. Perkins, who died in 19. ^602, had taught the same. Pro- * Ibid. p. 37: Compare pp. 38, 40. The Christian Sacrifice explained. 433 the right turn, copied from what the ancient Fathers had said in answer to the like charge of having no sacrifice, and as justly pleaded by Protestants now, as by Christians then, against their injurious accusers. Bishop Lany, after the Restoration, (A. D. 1663,) a very learned Divine, and of great acumen, scrupled not to call the whole eucharistical service true and proper sacrifice, proper with- out a metaphoi-, as being the fittest gift or present that could be offered to the Divine Majesty y. So little did he regard the frivolous distinctions of the Trent Council, or the new definitions invented to support them. Nine years after appeared Dr. Brevint 2 . He was well read in the eucharistic sacrifice: no man understood it better; which may appear sufficiently from two tracts of his upon the subject, small ones both, but extremely fine. He stood upon the ancient ground, looked upon evangelical duties as the true oblations and sacrifices* 1 , resolved the sacrifice of the Eucharist, actively con- sidered, solely into them b ; and he explained the practical uses of that doctrine in so clear, so lively, and so affecting a way, that one shall scarce meet with anything on the subject that can be justly thought to exceed it, or even to come up to it c . So that I could heartily join my wishes with a late learned writer, that that 'excellent little book, entitled, The Christian Sacrament and Sacrifice, might be reprinted, for the honour of God, and N.B. I have omitted Mr. Thorndike, and Sacrifice. He was made Dean because his notion plainly resolves of Lincoln in 1681, and died in into the passive sense, viz. into the 1695. grand sacrifice itself, as contained a Brevint, Depth and Myst. p. in the Eucharist, because represent- 16. ed, applied, and participated in it. b ' Sincere Christians must have The Lutherans, generally, resolve it their hands full, at the receiving the the same way, only differing as to holy Communion, with four distinct the point of real or local presence, sorts of sacrifices. I. The sacramen- Vide Brochmand, torn. iii. pp. 2072, tal and commemorative sacrifice of 35 2 - Christ. 2. The real and actual sacri- y Bishop Lany's Sermon on Heb. fice of themselves. 3. The free-will xiii. 15. pp. 1 6, 32. Compare my offering of their goods. 4. The peace- Review, above, p. 318. offering of their praises.' Brevint, 2 In 1672, Dr. Brevint wrote the Christian Sacrifice, no, in. Depth and Mystery of the Roman c Brevint, Sacram. and Sacrif. sect. Mass: reprinted 1673. In 1673, he vi. vii. viii. pp. 74-134. published the Christian Sacrament Ff 434 Tfa Christian Sacrifice explained. the benefit of the Church d .' It is worth the noting, how acutely Dr. Brevint distinguished between the sacramental sacri- fice of Christ, and the real or actual sacrifice of ourselves. We cannot properly sacrifice Christ : we can only do it in signs and figures, that is, improperly, or comniemoratively : but we may properly offer up ourselves to God ; and that is, in strict pro- priety of speech, our sacrifice, our spiritual sacrifice. Dr. Brevint rejected, with disdain, any thought of a material sacrifice, a bread offering, or a wine offering ; tartly ridiculing the pretences com- monly made for it e . But I have dwelt long enough upon the Divines of the first class : who standing upon the old principles, and disregarding the new definitions, continued to call the Eu- charist a true sacrifice, or a proper sacrifice, (meaning eucharistical and spiritual,) or forbore, at least, to call it improper, or meta- phorical. 2. I may now look back to other Divines, who used a different language in this article. At the head of them f stands the celebrated Mr. Hooker, who wrote in 1597, and who feared not to say, that ' sacrifice is now no part of the Church ministry,' and that we have, 'properly, now no sacrifice?.' I presume he meant by proper sacrifice, propitiatory, according to the sense of the Trent Council, or of the new definitions. In such a sense as that, he might justly say, that sacrifice is no part of the Church ministry, or that the d Dr. Hickes's Christian Priest- f Dr. Rainoldes, in 1584, had in hood, vol. i. Prefat. Disc. pp. 39, 40. the way of arguing 'ad hominem' e ' Now among these magnificent shewn, that the Fathers were no wonders of Christ's law, bread and friends to the mass-sacrifice, con- wine can be reputed but of little sidered as true and proper, inas- importance ; which you may find as much as they allowed only of spi- well or better among the oblations ritual sacrifices, which, in the Ro- of Aaron, and thus far belonging mish account, were not true or better to his order ; because he is proper sacrifices. See Rainoldes often commanded to offer bread, against Harte, pp. 472. 535) 536, which Priest Melchizedek is. not. 539. That kind of arguing first led Therefore, if offering bread and wine the way to such sort of language makes an order, Aaron will be more as Mr. Hooker made use of ; but certainly a priest after the order was not precisely the same with it, of Melchizedek, than was either not running in the like absolute Melchizedek or Christ himself.' Ere- terms. vint, Depth and Mystery, p. 1 1 6. * Hooker, Eccl. Polity, book v. See p. 117. ch. 78. sect. 2. Oxf. edit. The Christian Sacrifice explained. 435 Christian Church has no sacrifice. But I commend not the use of such new language, be the meaning ever so right : the Fathers never used it h . Dr. Francis White, in the year 1617, (lie was afterwards Bishop of Ely,) observed, that the name of sacrifice doth not in a proper and univocal sense belong to the Eucharist, but in a large acceptation of the word, and in a figurative meaning; because it is a representation of the real sacrifice of Christ once offered upon the cross \ He was so far right, in making a representation of Christ's sacrifice to be but figuratively that sacrifice : but he forgot, that the Eucharist contains many spirit- ual services, which are truly sacrifices in the Scripture language, and that even the memorial service, though it is but metonymi- cally Christ's sacrifice, is yet really our sacrifice, our spiritual sacrifice. From hence, however, may be seen how and by what degrees Protestant Divines came to leave off calling the Eucharist a sacrifice, or called it so with the epithet of ' improper' or ' figu- rative.' It was chiefly owing to a partial conception of it : they considered it barely in its representative or relative view, and too hastily concluded, that since it was not the sacrifice repre- sented, (as the Romanists pretended it was,) it was no sacrifice at all in propriety of speech. Spalatensis, of that time, made no scruple of saying, over and over, that the Eucharist is 'not a true sacrifice V In a certain place, he expressed himself in such a manner as might be apt to surprise a man at the first reading : he says, that the name of true sacrifice was never given to the Eucharist, never thought on, before the very latest and the most corrupt ages \ But he meant it, I suppose, according to that sense of true sacrifice, h Once Clemens Alexandrinus, p. 339. (Str. vii. p. 836.) and once Arno- k Antonius de Dominis, lib. v. bius, (lib. vii.) has said, that the c. 6. pp.82, 265, 269, 271, 278. Christians had no sacrifices ; mean- ' ' Esse verum sacrificium, nun- ing such as the Pagans had boasted quam ad postrema corrupta saecula of : but that did not amount to say- invenio, aut dictum, aut cogitatum, ing, that the Church had no proper aut traditum, aut practicatum in sacrifices, or properly no sacri- Ecclesia.' Antonius de Dominis, fice. ibid. p. 281. 1 White, Orthodox Faith and Way, F f 2 436 The Christian Sacrifice explained. which the Trent Council and the Popish writers had lately affixed to the name. The Divinity chairs in both universities, about that time, con- curred in denying the Eucharist to be a true, real, or proper sacrifice : which appears from Dr. Abbot m , afterwards Bishop of Sarum ; and from Dr. Davenant n , afterwards Bishop of the same see. Both of them seemed to take their estimate of true and proper sacrifice from the new definitions ; allowing them for argument sake, and joining issue with the Komanists upon their own terms. The like may be said of Mr. Mason, who frequently allows, or declares, that the Eucharist is not a sacrifice properly so called . But Dr. Crakanthorp (about A. D. 1624) may serve for a good comment upon all the rest : for when he denied the Eucharist to be either a true sacrifice, or a sacrifice properly so called, he cautiously guarded what he had said, by restraining it to such a sense as the Trent Council and Komish divines had affixed to the phrases of true sacrifice, and sacrifice properly so called P. That restriction, or salvo, was often forgot, and came, by degrees, to be more and more omitted ; and so the most prevailing doctrine ran in absolute terms, that the Eucharist is no true sacrifice, or no proper sacrifice, or in short, no sacrifice. Bishop Morton, being sensible how much it tended to disparage the holy Eucharist, and how contradictory it was to ancient language, to say that the Eucharist is not a true or not a proper m ' The passion of Christ is the men sortiantur ; quamvis etiam ipsa sacrifice which we offer : and be- repraesentatio fracti corporis Christi cause the passion of Christ is not et fusi sanguinis, figurate sacrificium now really acted, therefore the sa- a veteribus saepenumero vocetur." crifice which we offer is no true and Davenant. Deterininat. p. 13. real sacrifice.' Abbot, Counterproof Mason, de Minist. Anglic, pp. against Dr. Bishop, ch. xiv. p. 364. 549, 550, 551, 555, 627, 628. N. B. Here was the like partial con- P 'Sacrificium missae non est vere ception of the thing as I before sacrificium propitiatorium, ut conci- noted in Dr. White. Hum Tridentinum definit, vestrique 11 ' Nos asserimus, in missa nihil decent ; sed Eucharisticum tantum- posse nominari aut ostendi quod modo et conimemorativum. . . . Sed sit sacrificabile, aut quod rationem nee omnino verurn et proprie dic- et essentiam habeat realis, externi, turn sacrificium in missa ullum est ; et proprie dicti sacrificii : quamvis non quale Tridentinum concilium quae adhiberi in eadem solent pre- definlvit, et vestri uno ore profiten- ces, eleemosynae, gratiarum acti- tur.' Crakanthorp. contr. Spalatens. ones, spiritualium sacrificiorum no- c. Isxiv. p. 574. The Christian Sacrifice explained. 437 sacrifice, endeavoured to help the matter by a distinction be- tween truth of excellency and truth of propriety 1 ; allowing the Eucharist to be true sacrifice, as to excellency of nature, but not as to propriety of speech : as if the new definitions were a better rule of propriety, than all that had prevailed for fifteen hundred years before. His distinction was a good one, in the main, but was not justly applied in this particular, where truth of excellency and truth of propriety are really coincident, and resolve both into one. However, so the vogue ran, as I have before said, and so has it been transmitted, through many hands, down to this day r . 3. Such being the case, there is the less reason to wonder that a third set of Divines, in process of time, sprang up, as it were, out of the two former. For some serious men perceiving how much the ancient and modern language differed in this article, and that by means of the now prevailing definitions they were i Morton's Institut. of theSacram. book vi. chap. 3. p. 415. chap. 7. sect. i. p. 470. How much the old notion of sacri- fice was now wearing out may be judged from Dr. George Hakewill, who wrote in 1641, and was other- wise a learned and judicious writer, particularly as to this very argu- ment. He says, ' Commemoration being an action, cannot, in propriety of speech, be the thing sacrificed, which must of necessity be a sub- stance,' &c. Hakewill, Dissertat. P- 25- He rejects Austin s definition, p. 4. And it is too plain from several places of his work, that the mists first raised by Bellarmine, and other Romish divines, hung before his eyes. r The Lutheran way of speaking, in this matter, may be seen in Dey- lingius, Observat. Miscellan. p. 291. and in Zeltner. Breviar. Controvers. cum Eccl. Grace, pp. 231, 251. The Calvinistical way, in Dallaeus, cle Cult. Religiosis. pp. 1122, 1126. L'Arroque, Hist, of the Eucharist, 2 75> & c - Basnage, Annal. torn. 3. p. 373. all declare it, absolutely, no true sacrifice : which, though well meant, is too unguarded, and is dif- ferent language from that of the Fathers of the Reformation. One of our late Divines (a person of great learning) speaks thus : ' We deny that there is any reason why the Eucharist should be called a true sacrifice, and properly so cal- led, or ought to be so : for when we call anything a true sacrifice, we have regard to the formal reason of a sacrifice, and not to the final.' Nichols's Additional Notes, p. 51. printed A.D. 1710. But what did he make the formal reason of a sacrifice ? Did he take it from the new definitions ? Where there is properly a gift to God, by way of worship, to honour, or to please him, there is the foi-mal rea- son of a sacrifice. Gratulatory sacri- fice is as properly sacrifice, as the propitiatory, or expiatory : they are different species under the same genus. 438 The Christian Sacrifice explained. likely to lose their sacrifice ; they thought of reconciling the eu- charistic sacrifice with the new definitions, by making it a material sacrifice. Our excellent Mr. Mede, in the year 1635, was chief in this scheme. The aim was good, to retrieve the Christian sacrifice, which seemed to be almost sinking ; but the measures were ill laid : for the only right way, as I conceive, of com- passing what he intended, would have been to have restored the old definitions of sacrifice, and so to have set the Eucharist upon its true, and ancient, that is, spiritual foundation. The endea- vouring to fix it on a material foot, and to make the elements themselves a sacrifice, was no more than what had been at- tempted, about fourscore years before, by the Romanists s , and, after mature deliberation, had been justly exploded by the shrewder men *, as Jewish, or meaner than Jewish, and altogether repugnant to Christian principles. Neither could Mr. Mede escape the censures of many of that time for what he was doing; as appears by a letter of Dr. Twisse, written in 1636, and since printed in Mede's Works u . Mr. Mede forbore how- ever to print his Christian Sacrifice ; though he published the appendage to it, concerning the altar, which might give least offence : the rest appeared not till ten years after his decease, in the year 1648. There are many good things in it, for which reason it has generally been mentioned with respect by our best Divines : but in the point of a material sacrifice, (a sacrifice of the elements,) he had not many followers. Dr. Heylin, who in 1636 and 1637 had some scheme or schemes of his own w , seems to have taken into Mr. Mede's in or before 1654, when he pub- lished his exposition of the Apostles' Creed *. s Kuard'is Tapper, contr. Luther. 34, 36, 38. Arcudius, pp. 187, 189. art. 1 8. Caspar. Casalius. De Sacrif. u 'I perceive, the main thing you lib. i. c. 20. Jansenius, Concord, reached after, was a certain mystery Evang. p. 905. Gordon. Huntlaeus, concerning a sacrifice ; which the lib. ix. c. 3. n. I. Papists have miserably transformed; * Salmeron. torn. ix. tract. 29. but, in your sense, is nowadays be- p. 224. Maldonate, de Sacr. torn. i. come a mystery to all the Christian par. 3. p. 334. Bellarmine, pp. 788, world.' Twisse, Ep. 70. Compare 792, 793. Vasquez, torn. iii. p. 527. Mede's Answer, Ep. 71. Suarez, torn. iii. pp. 886, 905, 906, In his Coal from the Altar, and 910. Gregor. de Valentia, torn, iv. in his Antidotum. p. 1274. Baptista Scortia. de Missa, * Heyliu on the Creed, p. 240, &c. The Christian Sacrifice explained. 439 There are two fundamental flaws in Mr. Mede's system : i. One in his endeavouring to fix the notion or definition of a Christian sacrifice by the rules of the Levitical ; as if typical and true were the same thing. 2. The other, in not being able to make out the sacrifice he aimed at, by the very rules which himself had fixed for it. He observed very justly, that in the Levitical peace offerings, God had, as it were, his part, portion, or mess, assigned in the sacrifice y, or feast : (for God was con- sidered in those feasts, not merely as Convivator, but as Conviva also ; a necessary circumstance to complete the federal oblation and federal feast.) But when he came to make out the analogy between the Jewish and Christian feast, he could find no part or portion for God in the Eucharist ; where we take all to our- selves z . There the parallel failed ; the rule would not answer : therefore the rule was wrong. It would be trifling here to reply, that a Christian sacrifice is no Jewish one, and is therefore not to be measured by Jewish rules : for why then shoxild a Christian sacrifice be made material by Jewish rules ? or why is the defini- tion of sacrifice measured by the same ? Either uniformly hold to the rule assigned, or else give it up as no rule ; and then the Christian sacrifice may be a true and proper sacrifice, (though spiritual only,) being of a different kind from the Jewish ones. If, indeed, the Eucharist could be proved to be a material sacri- fice by any clear text of Old Testament or New, then there would remain no further room for dispute : but since the point is chiefly argued from its supposed analogy to other material y Mede's Christian Sacrifice, book neque offerimus si voramus : et ita ii. c. 7. pp. 370, 371. dum utrumque facimus, neutrum z Luther first took notice of the facimus. Quis audivit unquam talia ? self-contradiction contained in the Omnia sibi pugnantissime contradi- making the elements a proper sacri- cunt, et invicem sese consumunt : fice to God in the Eucharist. aut necessario et infallibiliter con- ' Totuna ergo cur nos panem, et cludunt Eucharistiam sacrificium esse vinum totum comedimus et bibiinus, non posse. Diluant haec, rogo, Lo- nihil relinquentes Deo ? . . . Dura cor- vanienses et Parisienses.' Luth. de j.ora nostra et laudes sacrificamus, abrogand. Missa privata, torn. ii. nihil nobis, sed omnia Deo soli exhi- par. 2. fol. 255. Several answers bemus, ut stet ratio sacrificii etiam have been thought on, to elude this spiritualis. Totum nos voramus, et argument, by Romanists and others : totura offerhnus : hoc est tantum but it is impossible to invent any dicere ; neque voramus si ofFerimus, that will bear. 44 Tht Christian Sacrifice explained. sacrifices, (Jewish or Pagan,) and that analogy does not answer, but fails in the main thing belonging to all material sacrifices, and which alone should make them appear gifts to God ; it is plain that the argument has an essential flaw in it, which no art can cure. One thing may be pertinently observed of Mr. Mede, that he confined the sacrifice to the ante-oblation. His was a sacrifice of the unconsecrated bread and wine a , not of the consecrated : not of the body and blood. He supposed no new sacrificing act in the post-oblation, but the representation only of Christ's sacrifice, made by what had been sacrificed before. So that some late notions of the eucharistic sacrifice can claim but very little coun- tenance from Mr. Mede. What we call offering the elements for consecration, (like as we offer the waters of Baptism,) he called sacrificing ; which was indeed calling it by a wrong name, and upon wrong principles : but, in other things, his notion of the Eucharist was much the same with the common one; and he went not those strange lengths, those unwarrantable excesses, which, I am sorry to say, some late schemes manifestly abound with. But I proceed. The doctrine of a material sacrifice, first brought hither about 1635, barely subsisted till the Restoration, and afterwards slept, as it were, for thirty or forty years. But in 1697, two queries being sent to a learned man b , in these terms, 'Whether there ought to be a true and real sacrifice in the Church ; and Whether there is any such thing in the Church of England,' (both which might very safely have been answered in the affirmative, keeping to the terms wherein they were stated,) that learned person chose to alter the terms, true and real, into material, and still answered in the affirmative : which was going too far. Nevertheless, in his answer to the queries, he admitted of some spiritual sacrifices, a ' Thus was there, as it were, a body ; offering wine, but receiving mutual commerce between God and the mystical blood of Christ Jesus.' the people ; the people giving unto Mede's Disc. li. p. 293. Comp. Chris- God, and God again unto his people : tian Sacrif. chap. viii. the people giving a small thanksgiv- b Dr. Hickes, in Two Discourses, ing, but receiving a great blessing; p. 51, &c. 61. printed 1732. offering bread, but receiving the The Christian Sacrifice explained. 44 x as being true, and real, and proper sacrifices; which makes it the more surprising that he should think of any other sacrifice. For since it is self-evident that truth of excellency goes along with the spiritual sacrifices, and since he himself had allowed truth of propriety to go along with the same, or with some of them at least ; to what purpose could it be to seek out for another sacrifice, not more proper, but certainly less excellent, than what we had before 1 It is an tmcontestable maxim, that the value of a sacrifice can never rise higher than the value of the sacrificers c ; and therefore if they sacrifice themselves, it is not possible that they should do more, because in the giving themselves, they give all that they have to give. What dignity then, or value, could it add to an evangelical priesthood, or sacrifice, to present the Divine Majesty with a loaf of bread, or a chalice of wine 1 or what practical ends or uses could be served by it 1 ? I shall only observe further, that the same learned writer, afterwards, took material thing into the very definition of sacrifice d : but upon the latest correction, he struck it out again, putting gift instead of it e ; thereby leaving room for spiritual sacrifice (which undoubtedly is a gift) to be as proper a sacrifice as any. So that his first and his last thoughts upon the subject appear to have been conformable so far, in a critical point, upon which much depends. Another learned writer (a zealous materialist, if ever there was one) laid it down for his groundwork, that nothing can properly be called a sacrifice except some material thing : but to save himself the trouble of proving it, he was pleased to aver, that it was given for granted f . It might reasonably be asked, c Vid. Peter Martyr. Loc. Com- e Hickes's Christian Priesthood, mun. pp. 753, 895, Field on the vol. i. p. 159. A.D. 1711. 'A sacri- Church, p. 209. Cornel, a Lapide, fice is a gift brought, and solemnly in Heb. vii. 7, seema to allow this offered by a priest, ordinary or ex- maxim, when he says, ' In omni traordinary, according to the rites sacrificio sacerdos major est sua vie- and observances of any religion, in, tima quatn offert.' before, at, or upon any place, unto d Hickes's Christian Priesthood, any God, to honour and worship p. 74. ed. 2. A.D. 1707. 'A sacrifice him, and thereby to acknowledge is a material thing solemnly brought, him to be God and Lord.' or presented, and offered to any God, f Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, according to the rites of any reli- part i. p. 5. ed. J7MJ r P- 6. gion,' &c. ed. 1724. 44* The Christian Sacrifice explained. when given, or by whom 1 Not by the penmen of the Old or New Testament ; not by the Christian Fathers, or Pagan Platonists, in their times : not by the Schoolmen down to the Reformation, nor by the Papists themselves, generally, before the Council of Trent : not by any considerable number of Protestants, till fifty years after, or more ; never by the Divines of our Church, with- out contradiction and opposition from other Divines as wise and as learned as any we have had : not given for granted, even by Dr. Hickes, of the material side, in 1697 g; no, nor in 1711, as hath been already hinted. To be short then, that important point was rather taken than given for granted, by one writer who wanted a foundation to build a new system upon : and as the foundation itself was weak, the superstructure, of course, must fall, however curiously wrought, or aptly compacted, had it really been so. But it is time for me now, my Reverend Brethren, to relieve your patience, by drawing to a conclusion. I have pointed out (so far as I have been able to judge, upon very serious and dili- gent inquiry) the original ground and source of all the confusion which has arisen in this argument. The changing the old defini- tions for new ones has perplexed us : and now again, the chang- ing the new ones for the old may set us right. Return we but to the ancient ideas of spiritual sacrifice, and then all will be clear, just, and uniform. We need not then be vainly searching for a sacrifice (as the Romanists have been before us) among texts that speak nothing of one, from Melchizedek in Genesis down to He- brews the thirteenth. Our proofs will be found to lie where the 8 His words are : ' Vocal sacri- tian sacrifice (though he called it fices are commonly called spiritual, material) really meant no more than ... These are true, real sacrifices. . . an oblation of the material elements and therefore our Saviour is said to for consecration, (which certainly is have offered them up, Heb. v. 7. no sacrifice,) and a commemorative and they are expressly called sacri- service performed by the material fices, Heb. xiii. 15. and i Pet. ii. 5.' elements, an external, manual ser- Two Disc. p. 53. 'The sacrifice of vice, as opposed to mere mental praises and prayers unto God ... is or vocal : both which points might a proper, but spiritual sacrifice.' have been granted him, as not p. 6 r. amounting to the sacrifice of any X.B. It appears to me, that Dr. material substance, the point in Hickes's original scheme of the Chris- question. The Christian Sacrifice explained. 443 spiritual services lie, and where they are called sacrifices. The Eucharist contains many of them, and must therefore be a proper sacrifice, in the strength of those texts, and cannot be otherwise. Here the primitive Fathers rested that matter; and here may we rest it, as upon firm ground. Let us not presume to offer the Almighty any dead sacrifice in the Eucharist ; he does not offer us empty signs : but as he conveys to us the choicest of his blessings by those signs, so by the same signs (not sacrifices) ought we to convey our choicest gifts, the Gospel services, the true sacrifices, which he has commanded. So will the federal league of amity be mutually kept up and perfected. Our sacrifices will then be magnificent, and our priesthood glorious ; our altar high and heavenly, and our Eucharist a constant lesson of good life ; every way fitted to draw down from above those inestimable blessings which we so justly expect from it. Let but the work or service be esteemed the sacrifice, rather than the material ele- ments, and then there will be no pretence or colour left for ab- surdly supposing, that any sacrifice of ours can be expiatory, or more valuable than ourselves ; or that our hopes of pardon, grace, and salvation can depend upon any sacrifice extrinsic, save only the all-sufficient sacrifice of Christ. When once those foreign fictions, or fancies, of other extrinsic sin offerings or expiations are removed, there will be no error in asserting a proper eucha- ristic sacrifice ; but many good practical uses will be served by it. Under the legal economy, bulls and goats, sheep and turtle- doves, bread offerings and wine offerings were really sacrifices : they had legal expiations (shadows of true) annexed to them ; to intimate, that true expiation then, and always, must depend solely on the true sacrifice of atonement, the sacrifice of the cross. The shadows have since disappeared ; and now it is our great Gospel privilege to have immediate access to the true sacrifice, and to the true expiations, without the intervention of any legal expiation or legal sacrifice. To imagine any expiatory sacrifice now to stand between us and the great sacrifice, is to keep us still at a distance, when we are allowed to draw near : it is dishonouring the grace of the Gospel ; and, in short, is a flat contradiction to The Christian Sacrifice explained. both Testaments. For the rule of both is, and the very nature of things shews that so it must be, that all true expiation must resolve solely, directly, and immediately, into the one true sacri- fice of expiation, namely, the grand sacrifice. If, indeed, we had now any legal or typical offences to expiate, then might bread and wine be to us an expiatory typical sacrifice, as before to the Jews ; and that would be all. If we look for anything higher, they have it not in them, neither by their own virtue, nor by any they can borrow : for it is no more possible that the blood of the grape, representing Christ's blood, should purge the conscience, and take away sins now, than that the blood of bulls or of goats, representing the same blood of Christ, could do it aforetime. The utmost that any material sacrifices, by virtue of the grand sacrifice, could ever do, was only to make some legal or temporal atonement : they cannot do so much now, because the legal economy is out of doors, and all things are become new. In a word, our expiations now are either spiritual or none : and there- fore such of course must our sacrifices also be, either spiritual or none at all. THE APPENDIX. As I have hinted something above a of the strange lengths which have been run, and of the unwarrantable excesses which some late systems of the eucharistic sacrifice manifestly abound with ; it may reasonably be expected that I should here give some account of what I there intimated. I must own, it is the most unwelcome part of my employ, and what I least wished to be concerned in. It can never be any pleasure to a good mind to be exposing failings, even when there is a necessity for it ; but it is rather an abatement of the solid satisfaction arising from the maintaining of the truth, that it cannot ordinarily be done with- out some kind of rebuke, open or tacit, upon every gainsayer. When I first engaged in the subject of the Eucharist, I saw what necessity there was for throwing off the material hypothesis, (being unscriptural, and uncatholic, and many ways unreasonable,) lest it should hang like a millstone upon the neck of the main cause. Nevertheless, I endeavoured to remove that weight with all imaginable tenderness towards persons, living or dead ; de- signing only to rectify mistakes, in a manner the most respectful, so as not to betray the cause of truth. What I could not approve of, in a late learned writer, I expressed my dislike of, where necessary, in the softest terms ; scarce noting the deformities of his system in any explicit way, but wrapping them up in generals, and throwing the kindest shade over them. But by what has appeared since, I find, that every degree of tenderness and every token of respect must be looked upon as nothing, unless I could have commended the same writer, as a person of sound judgment b , in the very things wherein he certainly judged amiss, a Page 440. view, p. 97, and compare pp. I, 121, b See Dr. Brett's Remarks on Re- 123, 156. 446 Appendix to and much to the prejudice of those important truths which I had undertaken to defend. A very particular stress is laid upon that gentleman's solid learning and judgment in this very question : he was, it seems, visibly superior in learning and argument to all opposers c ; insomuch that a most eminent person, in 1716, had not the courage to contradict him, however disposed to it, in the article of the sacrifice d . I have no inclination to detract from that gentleman's talents : though the proper glory of a man lies not in the possession, hut in the right use of them. Admi- ration of persons has often been found a false guide in our searches after truth. Very great men have frequently been observed to run into great excesses : and I doubt not but to make it appear that he did so in the article now before us. Men must, at last, be tried by truth, (which is above everything,) and not truth by men, or by names e . That I may observe some method, I shall point out the excesses which that learned writer appears to have run into, under the heads here follow- ing : 1. In depreciating spiritual sacrifices beyond what was decent or just. 2. In overvaluing material sacrifices. 3. In overstraining many things relating to our Lord's sup- posed sacrifice in the Eucharist. 4. In overturning or undermining the sacrifice of the cross. 5. In the wrong stating our sacrifice in the Eucharist. c ' Mr. Johnson's books had given pected to favour the doctrine of the great offence to many in the highest sacrifice, had not the courage to stations in this Church. Dr. Han- deny it to be one.' Brett, ibid, cock, Dr. Wise, and Dr. Turner, and The design, I suppose, of that some others were encouraged to an- eminent person, was not to enter swer him ; but they were all found into the debate at all, but only to to be too weak to be any of them, suggest an healing thought, viz. that or all together, a match for a man since every thing of moment was of his solid learning and judgment : perfectly secure without the ma- he was visibly their superior in terial hypothesis, there could be no learning and argument, and their good reason left for the warmth that faint essays served but to raise his was shewn in it. A wise reflection : reputation.' Brett's Remarks on which ought to have been thank- Review, p. 122. fully received, and seriously at- d ' This eminent person, whoever tended to. he was, (for Mr. Johnson does not e See my Importance, &c. Works, name him,) and who was least ex- vol. iii. p. 667. the Christian Sacrifice explained. 447 6. In giving erroneous accounts of the Evangelical or Christian priesthood. These several heads may furnish out so many distinct chap- ters : I shall take them in the order as they lie, and shall pro- ceed as far in them as necessity may seem to require, or my present leisure may permit; reserving the rest for any future occasion, according as circumstances may appear. CHAP. I. Shewing some Excesses of the new Scheme, in depreciating spiritual Sacrifices. I. I MADE mention before of Mr. Johnson's taking it for granted, that spiritual sacrifice cannot be sacrifice properly so called *" : which was throwing off a very important question too negligently, and forbidding it a fair hearing. II. Elsewhere he maintains, that 'it is impossible in the nature of things, that prayer and praise without sacrifice' (he meant material sacrifice) ' can be better than with it ?.' I pass by the pretence offered in support of this paradox ; because it is an old one, borrowed from the Romanists : and it was solidly confuted long ago, by our very learned and judicious Mr. Mason h . I shall only note further, that the author might as justly have said, that it is impossible for uncircumcision to be better than circumcision, because he who receives circumcision as he ought must of course have the true circumcision of the heart, and both must needs be better than one. III. Another the like paradox is, that ' prayer and praise are absurdly preferred to material sacrifices '.' Much might be said in confutation of this assertion, both from Scripture and anti- quity : but I consult brevity ; besides that the bare mentioning f See above, p. 441. I forgot to Deus nobis redditur propitius." Grot, take Grotius into my list above ; Vot. pro Pace, p. 670. Cp. 7*5- who says, ' Eleemosynae et jejunia * Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, et res similes sunt sacrae actiones, et part ii. p. 123. quidem externae; ideoque cum fiunt h Mason de Min. Anglic, p. 585. ex fide in Christum, sunt sacrificia i Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, novi foederis, etiam talia per quae part ii. p. 127. 448 Appendix to CHAP. such things is sufficient to expose them. I shall only ask, how came material incense to be laid aside, and naked prayer to be preferred before it, as proper to the saints, under the Gospel M Incense was symbolical prayer ; prayer is the evangelical incense, and as much preferable to the other, as truth is to shadow, or thing signified to the sign or figure of it. IV. To disparage spiritual sacrifice yet further, he says, 'A contrite spirit is called a sacrifice by David, though it be no more than a disposition of mind fitting us for devotion and humiliation, and may prevail with God when no real [viz. ma- terial] sacrifice is to be had V An unseemly reflection upon what are emphatically called the sacrifices of God, in that very place m , as vastly preferable to material sacrifices. The Psalmist did not mean, when material sacrifice was not to be had : for in the verse immediately preceding he says, ' Thou desirest not sacrifice, else would I give it : thou delightest not in burnt offering n .' What could be said plainer, to shew the preference of the spiritual sacrifices above all other ] V. The author goes on in the same strain : ' Whatever is now said of prayer without sacrifice, it is certain, that it is but mere synagogue worship / It is certain that such prayer is the worship of the saints, under the Gospel, as I before noted. But, I presume, this ingenious turn was thought on to anticipate or to retort the charge of Judaism ; which may justly be ob- jected to material sacrifices, and frequently has been. It is odd to speak of public prayer without sacrifice, when such prayer is itself a Christian sacrifice : but he meant prayer without a mate- rial sacrifice ; that, in his account, is mere synagogue worship. He forgot, that it runs in Christ's name. VI. Another position is, that 'a sacrifice of righteousness signifies a noble or rich sacrifice, such as it was proper for King David to offer P.' But learned men have well shewn, that k Revel, v. 8. Cp. Irenaeus, lib. the sense, (p. 131,) appear so forced iv. c. 17. p. 249. and unnatural, as not to deserve a 1 Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, serious confutation, part ii. p. 128. Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, m Psalm li. 17. part ii. p. 128. n The pretences made for chang- f Johnson, ibid. p. 130. ing the translation, in order to elude i. the Christian Sacrifice explained. 449 it signifies true and spiritual sacrifice 1, as opposed to material, typical, symbolical : and such spiritual sacrifice is really richer and nobler than an hecatomb. I am aware that something may be speciously pleaded from Psalm li. 19 : and Mr. Johnson makes his use of it r . But the learned Vitringa seems to me to have given a just account of that whole matter s . VII. To disparage spiritual sacrifices yet more, and to give the reader as low and contemptible an idea of them as possible, they are compared with the wood offerings * mentioned in Nehe- miah u ; the fuel brought for the use of the sacrifices : and it is thereupon observed, that ' the Jews of old hoped, as well as other people, by their sweet-scented cane and wood, to render their sacrifice a more agreeable service w .' A coarse comparison ! Had not the author otherwise bore the character of a grave and serious writer, one could not have taken this extraordinary thought to proceed from any reverent regard towards spiritual sacrifices, the sacrifices of God. However, we may perceive from hence, that as often as any one should have objected the mean- ness of a loaf offering, or a wine offering, he was provided with an answer, and prepared to retort. VIII. I shall take notice but of one article more, under this head. It was a famous topic among the Christian Fathers, when arguing for spiritual sacrifices, that spiritual offerings were most agreeable to spiritual beings x , such as God, and the souls of men : the same argument has been as justly urged by learned moderns. But in order to break the force of it, it is observed, that Por- phyry of old, and the Quakers of late days, have carried those reasonings too far, in the spiritualizing way 7. Be it so : may not wise men know where to stop? Has not external religion been oftener and more grievously perverted, and carried into i See Vitringa, de Vet. Synagog. u Nehem. x. 34; xiii. 31. p. 65. Observat. Sacr. torn. ii. p. w Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, 499. in Isa. torn. ii. pp. 56, 733. part ii. p. 225. 829. x Tertullian. de Orat. c. xxvii. r Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, xxviii. See Review, above, p. 331. part ii. p. 130. Lactantii Epit. c. Iviii. p. 169. De 5 Vitringa in Isa. torn. ii. p. 733. ver. Cult. lib. vi. c. 24, 25. 1 Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, >' Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifica, part ii. p. 225. part ii. p. 127. 45 Appendix to CHAP. extremes ? We know what superstitions and dangerous deceits arose from the use of material incense in the Eucharist z , by the making it an offering for sin a : neither have we reason to expect anything better from the bringing in a material mincha, for the like purposes, into the Christian Church. However, this way of depreciating internal religion and spi- ritual sacrifice is not the way to promote the prime uses, the practical ends and purposes of the holy Communion. It is indeed said on the other hand, in the way of apology, that they ' do not at all lessen the value of any internal grace, or the necessity of a pious life,' but the contrary b . They do not mean it, I easily believe : but in fact they do it. For every cool, considering man must see, that those low notions of spiritual sacrifice (very different from the elevated ideas which Scripture and Catholic antiquity everywhere inculcate) can have no good aspect upon practical religion. As to the pretence of ' raising the dignity of the Sacrament 6 / by a material sacrifice, it is marvellous that any man of moderate discernment can entertain such a thought : for the reverse is the certain truth. The dig- nity of the holy Sacrament must infallibly suffer, if so mean, so uuprimitive a sacrifice should ever be admitted into it. The ancients constantly preserved the dignity of the Eucharist, by supporting the dignity of spiritual sacrifices : if moderns will submit to learn of them, they will use the same effectual methods, often proved and tried. CHAP. II. Shewing the EXCESSES of the new Scheme, in OVERVALUING material Sacrifices. I. IT is alleged, that ' there is more intrinsic value in a loaf of bread and a flagon of wine, than in all the gold and silver 1 Vid. Renaudotius, Collect. Li- dent. Pontif. ibid. 528. Maysacens. turg. torn. i. 201. Missal, ibid. 538. Compare, 591, Jacob. Liturg. pp. 38, 53. ed. 601. Fabric. Marci Liturg. 261. 273. b Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, Ordo Commun. Renaud. torn. ii. part. i. p. 283, alias p. 288. Brett's pp. 4, 6, 18, 19. Mozarab. Miss. Remarks on Review, p. 139. in Martene, torn. i. pp. 470, 498. c Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, Dionys. Missal, ibid. p. 519. Pru- parti, p. 283. ii. the Christian Sacrifice explained. 451 in the Indies ; because the former will for some time support our lives, the other cannot do it of itself, but only as by the consent of men, it has a value set upon it d .' Upon which I observe, i. That the argument proves too much : for, by the same argument, a flask of air would have more intrinsic value O * than all the rest put together; since air is absolutely necessary to support life, which none of the rest are. 2. The author observes elsewhere, that bloody sacrifices, in themselves, are of the nobler sort e ; that is, have more intrinsic value : and yet David (a very wise and good man) disdained to offer even such to God, if they were to cost him nothing f . He measured the value of the sacrifice by the self-denial, the respect, and the affection of the offerer, shewn in part by the costliness of the offering. And indeed, when God did require material sacrifices at all, he required costly ones, of as many as could afford it. But what do our bread and wine cost a whole congregation 1 ? What the communicants, who, perhaps, are not one half of the whole 1 What does the quota of any single communicant amount to 1 Besides that, in reality, we give God nothing : we take all to ourselves, though not all of it provided at our own proper cost or charge. Was there ever such a sacrifice known or thought on, either among Jews or Gentiles, since the world stood 1 Or were the primitive Christians ever charged with anything of this kind ? II. It is pretended further, that this material oblation is of ' greater value than ourselves .' Impossible, if we ourselves are the offerers h : for it is a clear and uncontestable maxim, (as 1 d Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, Qtpoptv croi, we offer,' &c. Christian part ii. p. 62. Priesth. vol. i. pref. Account, pp. e Johnson, Propit. Oblat. p. 10. 22, 23. f 2 Sam. xxiv. 24. The Romanists themselves allowed B Johnson, Propit. Oblat. p. 107. it, a few years before the Council of h That we are the offerers (and Trent ; as appears from Alphonsus not Christ, as the Romanists ab- a Castro. Haeres. lib. x. fol. 214. surdly pretend) is allowed by Dr. ed. A.D. 1549. Hickes, who says, ' As the congre- ' Sacerdos, in persona Ecclesiae, gation offered, so it consecrated and praesentat Deo Patri oblationem performed the whole eucharistical factam per Filium in ara crucie.' service, by the ministration of the Cp. Field, p. 210. and Spalatensis, priest; who therefore always admin- lib. v. c. 6. p. 282. istered in the plural number . . . irpoer- Gg 2 452 Appendix to CHA.P. have hinted above,) that the value of a sacrifice can never rise higher than the value of the sacrificers. Upon the strength of which maxim our very learned and judicious Dean Field did not scruple to intimate, that if a man could be supposed to sacrifice even Christ our Lord, it would not be so valuable as the sacrifice of himself'. The same principle is confirmed by the united voices of the ancients, who always looked upon self-sacrifice as the most valuable of any k . They had good reason to think so, if either our Lord's example, or St. Paul's authority \ or the nature of the thing itself can be of any weight. III. It is pretended, that the bread and wine are the most excellent and valuable sacrifice, because ' they are in mystery and inward power, though not in substance, the body and blood of Christ, and therefore the most sublime and divine sacrifice that men or angels can offer m :' they are enriched, replenished, overshadowed by the Holy Spirit, and by such Divine influence rendered the body and blood in efficacy and virtue, receiving by the Spirit a life-giving power n . To which I answer, i. That it is certainly a valuable Sacra- ment : and what the author here enumerates may shew the value of what God gives to us, not the value of what we give to him in it. The Spirit, which is supposed to make all the value, is what God gives to us in the Eucharist, not what we give to God : for it cannot be supposed that we sacrifice the Holy Spirit. So that all that the author has here said, however pertinent to the sacra- i Field on the Church, p. 209. part. ii. p. 60: compare 67, 141. k Clem. Alex. Strom, vii. pp.836, n Johnson, ibid. p. 171. Note, 848, 849, 860. Origen, torn. ii. p. That overshadowing is peculiar to 364. ed. Bened. Cyprian, Ep. 76. Baptism : for because it is said, that p. 232, alias Ep. 77. p. 159. Euseb. a man must be born of water and Demonst. p. 40. Basil, torn. iii. p. of the Spirit, the Fathers sometimes 207. ed. Bened. Nazianzen, torn. i. followed the figure, in describing p. 38. Hilarius, p. 154. ed. Bened. the new birth. The Spirit is quasi Chrysost. torn. v. pp. 20, 231, 316, maritus ; the water is marita, and 503. toia. vii. p. 216. ed. Bened. foecundata, and therefore styled un- Augustin. de Civit. Dei, lib. xix. da genitalis. The Holy Ghost over- c. 23. lib. x. c. 20. ed. Bened. Pro- shadows; the water brings forth; copius, in Isa. p. 22. Gregor. M. and the holy thing born is the new Dial. iv. c. 59. Christian. How to adapt the sante 1 Rom. xii. I. Phil. ii. 17. i Tim. figure to the Eucharist, I see not ; iv. 6. nor how to apply it to the purpose ra Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, of sacrifice. ii. the Christian Sacrifice explained. 453 mental part of the Eucharist, is foreign to the sacrificial, and can add little to the value of it. It is but consecrated bread and wine still that we are supposed to sacrifice ; unless we take in Christ's natural body to enrich the sacrifice, which would be Popeiy ; or else the Divine Spirit, which is worse. 2. Besides, it is certain, that the baptismal waters are as much enriched, replenished, overshadowed by the Holy Spirit, and have the same (if not greater) life-giving power, and yet they are no sacrifice at all. 3. I have before hinted, that no sacrifice which we can offer can be more valuable than ourselves; and therefore all this pompous train of words must come to nothing. 4. The notion of the Spirit's coming upon the elements, to make them abso- lutely the body, is a gross notion ; arising only from a popular form of speech , and not consistent with the true and ancient doctrine, that the unworthy eat not the body nor drink the blood of Christ in the Eucharist P : neither have they the communion or fellowship of the Holy Spirit. It is not sufficient here to say, that they do receive the Spirit, but receive no benefit, because they resist or quench the Spirit : for being ' guilty of the body and blood of the Lord,' in the very act, (i Cor. xi. 27,) there is no room to suppose that in that very act they receive motions of grace : and if they receive none, there are none to be quenched. Or if, on the contrary, they were certain to receive the kindly motions of the Spirit in the very act, who should forbid the unworthy coming to receive motions of grace? This evasion therefore will not answer the purpose. The Spirit deserts ill men in their sinful acts: therefore the unworthy do not receive the Spirit, but the elements only : therefore again, they receive not the body ; because without the Spirit, the elements, ex hypothesi, are not the body and blood, but bare elements, having a relative holiness, because before consecrated, and that is all. 5. If the bread and wine once consecrated were absolutely the body and blood, by means of the Spirit, there is no reason why the bap- See my Review, above, pp. 83, desse quod sumitur, quando gra- 164, 174, 254, 257, 263. tia salutaris in cinerem, sanctitate P Above, p. 140. ' Ostensum est fugiente, mutetur.' Cyprian, de Laps. Dominum recedere cum negatur, p. 214. ed. Bened, nee immerentibus ad salutem pro- 454 Appendix to CHAP. tismal waters should not be thought Christ's blood absolutely, by means of the same Spirit. It is certain, from the nature of the thing, and it is confirmed by the concurring verdict of anti- quity <*, that we are as properly dipped in the blood of Christ in Baptism, as we eat the body and blood of Christ in the Eucharist. Therefore the baptismal water is as valuable as the eucharistical wine, and as fit to make a sacrifice of; and it is also comme- morative of the death and passion : consequently the elements in either Sacrament, being blessed with like privileges, and having the like dignity, have all of them, in that view, the same title, and ought all of them to be sacrifices, as much as any. IV. It is further pretended, that the consecrated bread and wine are changed, if not in their substance, yet in their inward qualities r : which appears to be sound only, without meaning ; or words without ideas. When water is said to have been mira- culously changed into wine, the words carry some idea of an internal change of qualities : but when wine remains wine still, not changed as to colour, or taste, or smell, or any other perceiv- able quality, it is hard to say what that inward change means, or what idea it carries with it. Outward relations, adventitious uses or offices, are easily understood; and relative holiness carries some sense in it s : but the inward change, the inhering, intrinsic holiness, supposed in this case, will not comport either with true philosophy or sound theology. Whatever it means, or whatever it is conceived to be, certain it is, that it belongs as much to the consecrated waters of Baptism* as to the consecrated elements of the Eucharist : and so let it pass. V. The most important paradox of all, relating to this head, is, that the consecrated elements are the substitutes of the body and blood ; are sacrificed first, and afterwards taken by the com- municants in lieu of the natural body and blood, or of the i See my Review, above, p. 271. 20, 85, 91. Johnson's Unbloody and to the references in the margin Sacrifice, part i. pp. 254, 255, alias add, Salmasius contr. Grot. pp. 186, pp. 258, 259, 163, 181, 183, 244. 191, 394. and Patrk-k's Full View first ed. of the Eucharist, p. 82. See my Review, above, p. 80. r Grabe, Defens. Eccl. pp. 75, 87, 4 Above, pp. 269, 270. ii. the Christian Sacrifice explained. 455 sacrifice of the cross u . ' The eucharistical bread and wine are made the most perfect and consummate representatives of the body and blood . . . They are not only substituted, but they are, by the power of the Spirit which is communicated to them, . . . made the lively, efficacious Sacrament of his body and blood. . . . The visible material substitutes . . . are the bread and wine : and when the Holy Spirit, which is his invisible representative, communicates its power and presence to the symbols, which are his visible representatives, they do thereby become as full and authentic substitutes, as it is possible for them to be x . The sacramental body and blood of Christ are substituted instead of the natural, and are therefore first to be presented to the most worthy party in the covenant, the infinite grantor of all mercies, and then, in the next place, to the least worthy persons, or the grantees, the whole body of Christian people y.' How to make any clear sense or consistency of these or the like positions, I know not ; but they seem to be embarrassed with insuperable perplexities, i. The notion of substitute, as here applied, appears unaccountable. The sacramental body is supposed to be substituted for the natural, so as to be exclusively an equivalent for it, made such consum- mate proxy, substitute, representative, by the power and presence of the Holy Spirit with it and in it. This is the notion, if I can understand it. And if this be the notion, it is very different from the old notion of instruments of investiture, or deeds of conveyance, supposed to convey instrumentally some other thing 2 , but not to be so given in lieu of it, as to exclude it, or supersede it, or to supply the want of it a . The rights, privileges, honours, u Johnson, Propit. Oblat. pp. 29, with the Spirit, it would be more 30, 44, 76. properly the body of the Spirit, than * Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, our Lord's body, from which it is part i. p. 183, alias p. 186. Compare supposed distinct : and in this way, p. 344, alias 349, and p. 176, alias the very idea of our mystical union 1 79. with Christ's glorified body would >' Ibid. Pref. to second edit. be obscured or lost, and we should z See my Review, above, pp. 131, be but as aliens from his proper 132. body; unless two bodies of Christ a For were it so, then the inward (not sign and thing, but absolutely part, or thing signified, would not two bodies, for the sacramental is be our Lord's bod}', but a fictitious said to be absolutely the body) were body given in its room : and if made given at once in the Eucharist, such body absolutely, by an union 456 Appendix to CHAP. offices, so conveyed, are supposed to go with the pledges, and not to be made up to the grantee by an equivalent The pledges (a ring, suppose, or book, or parchment, or staff) are worthless things in themselves, and are valuable only for what accompanies them, not for what they really inclose or contain. In a word, such pledges are not exclusively given in lieu of the things which they are pledges of, (for then the party would be no richer for them than the bare pledges amount to,) but such a manner of delivery is made in lieu of another manner ; and the pledge and thing go together *>. In the Eucharist, for example, Christ's crucified body and blood shed (that is, his atonement and sacri- fice) are spiritually eaten and drank, under the pledges of corpo- ral refreshment : and even the glorified body is received into real, but mystical union, under the same symbols. Those sym- bols, with what they contain, are not substitutes, in the sense of equivalents for the things, to supersede them ; but they are instruments to convey them, and to bring them in effect to us. 2. It is not easy to explain how the supposed substitutes can be any sacrifice at all to God. The elements are not conceived sub- stitutes of the body and blood, any otherwise than by the power and presence of the Spirit. The elements, with the Spirit, (not separate from the Spirit, which alone renders them so valuable,) are supposed the substitutes. Is the Spirit then sacrificed along with the elements 1 That is absurd. But if the Spirit makes no part of the thing sacrificed, the value departs from it, yea, and b See my Review, above, pp. 131, said to be given in lieu of another 132. N.B. A thing may be said to be thing, in an inclusive or accumu- given in lieu, or instead of another lative sense ; as when deeds are de- thing, two ways : I . In a sense ex- livered instead of an estate, which elusive ; as when a stone, suppose, is given with them and by them, is given instead of bread, or a ser- Here, in strictness, the deeds are pent instead of fish : where neither not substitutes or equivalents for the fish nor the bread are supposed the estate : but one form of deli- to be given, nor anything equiva- very, which is practicable and easy, lent. To the same exclusive sense is substituted and accepted, instead belongs the giving value for kind ; of another form, which the princi- as money, suppose, instead of house pal thing given is not capable of. or land : where again neither the In this latter inclusive sense, the house nor the land is supposed to symbols of the Eucharist may be be given, but an equivalent in called substitutes, but not in the money. 2. But one thing is also former. ii. the Christian Sacrifice explained. 457 the essence of the substitutes ; for the body and blood, that is, the substitutes, are not sacrificed, but the elements only. If it be said, that grace or virtue accompanies the elements, in the presenting them to God, like as in the presenting the same elements to man ; this again is perfectly unintelligible. We can understand that pardon and sanctification are presented to the communicants along with the symbols : but how pardon and sanctification should be presented, in the way of sacrifice, to God, is not easy to explain. 3. I must here also observe, that what- ever those substitutes mean, the baptismal waters have as clear a claim, in that case, as the eucharistical elements can have : they are as certainly substituted in the sense of pledges, and in a sacramental Avay, as the other can be supposed to be. But it never was the intention of either Sacrament, that we should, in a sacrificial way, present to God as much or the same that God gives to us c . I see not the sense or the modesty of pretending to it. Spirit, pardon, grace, we may be glad to receive ; but we have no right, no pretence, no power to offer the same in sacrifice. It is neither practicable nor conceivable ; it is mere confusion : which confusion arises, partly, from the want of distinguishing between what is in the elements, from what comes with them ; and partly, from the not distinguishing between the sacramental view of the Eucharist and the 'sacri- ficial ; or between the gifts of God to man, and the gifts of man to God. The elements are in effect the body to us, because God gives us the body by and with the elements : but they are not in effect the body to God ; because we do not give to God the fruits of the body crucified, or the privileges of the body glorified. A man must have very confused sentiments, who can argue from what we receive, in this case, to what we give as a sacrifice. c Some such confuse notion ap- Brevint takes notice of the like con- pears more than once in the Pro- fusion in the conception of some Ro- pitiatory Oblation, pp. 27, 43. Comp. manists upon this article. Depth Preface to second edit, of Unbloody and Myst. p. 20. Sacrifice, and Advertisement, p. 498. 458 Appendix to CHAP. CHAP. III. Pointing out some EXCESSES in relation to our Lord's supposed Sacrifice in the Eucharist. I. IT is pretended, that our blessed Lord offered up his sacramental body, that is, the consecrated elements, as a material sacrifice in the Eucharist d . Now, in the first place, I find no Scripture proof of this position. The Romanists, in support of the general point of a material or sensible sacrifice, have often taken their toUr from Melchizedek in Genesis down to Hebrews xiii. 10. And they have as often been pursued, in like order, by the best-learned Protestants 6 , and forced out of all their intrenchments. The plea from ' hoc facite,' when first set up, was abundantly answered by a very learned Romanist : I mean the excellent Picherell f , who wrote about 1562, and died in 1590. Protest- ants alsos have often confuted it; and the Papists themselves, several of them, have long ago given it up. The other boasted plea, drawn from the use of the present tense, in the words of the institution, has been so often refuted and exposed h, that I cannot think it needful to call that matter over again, in an age of so -much light and learning. The fairest pretences from antiquity have likewise been again and again fully answered, mostly by the same hands. Wherefore, let that be my apology for not taking distinct notice of every particular advanced by the late learned Mr. Johnson ; who has but little of moment, which had not been completely obviated on one side (as it had been d Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, p. 444. Albertinus, pp. 498, 509. part i. pp. 85, 90, 92, edit. 2nd, Morton, b. vi. ch. i. p. 390. Tow- part ii. pp. i, 3, 6, 7, 178, 246, erson, p. 276. Brevint, Depth and 242, et passim. Myst. p. 128. Payne, p. 9, &c. 9 Chemnitius, Rainoldes, Bilson, Pfaffius, pp. 186, 220, 259, 269. Hospinian, Duplessis, Mason, Spa- h Picherellus, pp. 62, 138. Spa- latensis, Montague, Morton, Alber- latensis, p. 278. Mason, p. 614. tinus, Joan. Forbesius, Brevint, Morton, b. vi. ch. i. p. 394. Alber- Towerson, Kidder, Payne. tinus, pp. 74, 76, 78, 119. Joan. f Picherellus, pp. 63, 136. Forbesius, p. 617. Brevint, p. 128. * Joan. Forbesius, p. 616. Mor- Kidder and Payne. Pfaffius, pp. naeus, p. 212. Salmasius contr. Grot. 232, 233. in. the Christian Sacrifice explained. 459 anticipated on the other side) long before he wrote in this cause. He was indeed a stranger to what had been done ; because he had resolved and determined from the first so to be, and held to his resolution all along; as he frankly declared in 1714, and again in 1724'. I commend not his rule nor his conduct in that particular. Wise men will be always glad to see what wise men have said before them, in any point of controversy, and will not think themselves so perfectly secure against mistaking the sense either of Scripture or Fathers, as to need no counsellors to assist them, nor any eyes but their own k . It was not right to imagine, that in 200 years time, or nearly, (in a question very frequently canvassed by the best-learned men,) nothing had been thought on, nothing done, towards clearing the point ; more than what a single writer might do at once, with a Bible only and some Fathers before him. I should not wonder if the strongest genius, walking by such a rule, should commit abundance of mistakes in the management of a controversy of any considerable compass or delicacy, such as this is. But I pass on. It is certainly of some moment, that so learned and judicious a man as Picherellus (critically skilled in Scripture and Fathers, and under no bias, except it were to the Romish Church, in which he lived and died,) should so expressly and fully declare against our Lord's offering any expiatory sacrifice in the Eucha- rist l. It is also of some moment, that the current opinion before the Council of Trent was against the first Eucharist's being an expiatory sacrifice ; and that the divines of Trent were almost equally divided upon that question ; and that it was chiefly fear ' ' It was my resolution from the second edit. beginning, to take my measures k Of the use and necessity of con- and information from antiquity only, suiting moderns, (as well as an- and therefore not to look into any cients,) see Review, above, pp. 6 of those books that had been writ- 8. To neglect moderns, in such ten, either by those of the Church cases, is really nothing else but pre- of Rome for their corrupted sacri- ferring one modern to all the rest, fice, or by the Protestants against and claiming to be heard as an in- it : and I can truly say, I have terprcter of Scripture and Fathers, most firmly and religiously observed at the same time refusing the favour this rule, which I at first proposed of an hearing to every interpreter to myself." Johnson's Unbloody Sa- besides, orifice, pref. epist. p. 39, first and ' Picherell, p. 134. 460 Appendix to CHAP. of the consequences, obvious to Protestants, which obliged the Council to controvert the then current persuasion m . It is not without its weight, that Jansenius, Bishop of Ghent, who died fourteen years after, was content to take in spiritual sacrifice, in order to make out some sacrifice in the first Eucharist n : as to which he judged very right ; for undoubtedly our Lord so sacrificed in the Eucharist, and we do it now. But no proof has been given, nor ever can be given, of our Lord's sacrificing the elements. He might, yea, and did offer the elements for consecration, (which is very different from sacrificing, being done also in Baptism,) or he might present them as signs and figures of a real sacrifice, being also signs and figures of real body and blood : but as they were not the real body and blood which they represented, so neither were they the real sacrifice : neither can it be made appear that they were any sacrifice at all. As the point now in question has not been proved, there is the less occasion to disprove it. Want of proof is sufficient reason for rejecting a position, according to the old rule, that the proof lies upon him that affirms. However, I may, ' ex abundanti,' throw in one reason against it, which may be as good as a thousand, because it is decisive. If the elements were a sacrifice in the first Eucharist, as upon the principles lately advanced, then they were given for remission of sins ; conse- quently were a sin offering and an expiatory sacrifice : which is directly repugnant to the whole tenor of the New Testament, everywhere ascribing true expiation solely to the death of Christ. It is in vain to plead, that this other scacrifice expiated in virtue of what it represented. The blood of bulls and of m See Jurieu, Hist, of the Coun- diceretur Eucharistia. Igitur cum cil of Trent, p. 380. gratiarum actio est sacrificium, et n ' Dicendum est, quod, Christum Sacramentum hoc dicatur et sit Eu- in Coena et Eucbaristiae instituti- charistia, (quod est gratiarum actio,) one sacrificium obtulisse, primum consequitur ex Christi actione, et quidem satis est significatum, cum nomine a Christi actione imposito, dicitur gratias egisse. Gratiarum Sacramentum hoc esse sacrificium. actio enim est quoddam sacrificium : Unde in canone dicitur sacrificium a qua Christi actione Sacramentum laudis : de quo Psalmista, immola corporis et sanguinis Domini habuit sacrificium laudis/ &c. Jansenius, nomen illud ab initio Ecclesiae, ut Comm. in Concord. Evang. p. 904. in. the Christian Sacrifice explained. 461 goats represented Christ's sacrifice, and expiated, so far as they did expiate, in virtue of it : yet St. Paul plainly teaches, that it was not possible, in the very nature of the thing, for those secondary sacrifices to 'take away sins ,' that is, to make true and spiritual expiation. They might atone (and that in virtue of the grand atonement) for legal offences, or typical sins, and might sanctify to the ' purifying of the flesh P,' procuring some temporal blessings, which were figures and shadows of eternal : but more than that they could not do. True expiation always rested immediately and solely in the prime sacrifice. And the secondary sacrifices could avail no further, by any virtue what- ever, than to secondary, that is, typical and temporal expiation. Now, as we have no typical expiation at all under the Gospel, nor look for any remission but what is spiritual, and ' pertaining to the conscience Q ;' it is exceeding plain, that the remission of the Eucharist resolves immediately and entirely into the prime and grand sacrifice, and not into any supposed elemental sin offering. Neither indeed is there any such thing under the Gospel ; it being one of the great Gospel privileges to have immediate access to the true expiation, and not to be kept, as it were, at a distance from it, by the intervention of secondary sacrifices, or secondary expiations r . Such most certainly is the doctrine of Scripture and of all antiquity : and our own excellent Liturgy was altogether formed upon it. Accordingly we never ask remission on account of any expiatory sacrifice but Christ's alone ; never conclude our prayers (no, not even in the Communion service) through the sin offering of the Eucharist, but through Jesus Christ our Lord : that is, through his merits, solely and immediately, and his sacrifice, not through any sacrifice of our own : which would be both superstitious and profane. If the reader would see the sense of the ancients, with respect to the words of institution, ' body given and blood shed for remission of sins,' he may turn to Albertinus 3 , who produces Heb. x. 4. Albertinus, p. 78. Compare 74, P Heb. ix. 13. 119. And Bishop Morton, b. i. 'i Heb. ix. 9. part 3. p. 112 ; b. vi. ch. i. p. 394, r See above, pp. 443, 444. &c. ; ch. viii. p. 475, &e. 462 Appendix to CHAP. a long list of ancients *-, (besides a multitude of moderns, School- men and Romanists u ,) all interpreting the words, not of the sacramental body and blood given in the Eucharist, but of the real body and blood which were to be given upon the cross. I may add one more, older than any of them, namely, Tertullian ; who does not only so interpret the words, but occasionally men- tions it as a very great absurdity, to interpret the ' body given for you,' of the ' bread given :' inasmuch as it would amount to saying, that the bread was to be crucified for us x . These things considered, we may take leave to conclude, that the no- tion of Christ's offering the consecrated elements as a sacrifice, may justly be numbered among the unwarrantable excesses of some few moderns, who did not well consider what they were doing. II. It is pretended further, that such sacrifice of the conse- crated elements, or sacramental body and blood, was our Lord's most solemn act of his Melchizedekian priesthood. Indeed, to make out this Melchizedekian offering, sometimes our Lord's sacrificing himself along with the symbols is taken in y : but I wave the consideration of that additional part at present, design- ing to treat of it separately in the next article. The sacrifice of the consecrated symbols by itself, must, upon the foot of the new scheme, be reckoned Melchizedekian ; as well because our eucha- ristical sacrifice (which is not of the natural body, but of the sacramental only) is reputed Melchizedekian z , as also because it is self-evident, that Melchizedek did not sacrifice the natural * Origen, Cyprian, Chrysostom, Je- faciebat ad vanitatem Marcionis, ut rome, Pelagius, Theodorit, Fulgen- panis crucifigeretur.' Tertull. contr. tius, Ferrandus, Primasius, Pseud- Marc. lib. iv. cap. 40. p. 571. Ambrose, Hesychius, Remigius, Se- y 'The Spirit by which they wrote dulius, Bede, Isidorus, Claudius directed them ... to represent our Taurinensis, Haymo, Euthymius, Saviour, as now performing 1 the most Theophylactus, Anselm. solemn act of his Melchizedekian u Aquinas, Hugo Cardinalis, Car- priesthood, and therefore as offering thusianus, Titelmannus, Valentia, his body and blood to God, under Salmeron, Sk, Jansenius, Cajetan, the symbols of bread and wine.' Vasquez, Maldonate, Barradas, Sua- Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, part rez, &c. i. p. 83, alias 86. r ' Si propterea panem corpus sibi * Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, finxit, quia corporis carebat veritate; part i. p. 317, alias 322. ergo panem debuit tradere pro nobis : in. the Christian Sacrifice explained. 463 body of Christ, which was not then in being, but the sacramental only, if either. If therefore our Lord's sacrifice of himself in the first Eucharist be taken in to complete the most solemn act, then it must be said, that he offered two sacrifices in the Eucha- rist, and both of them Melchizedekian ; of which I shall say more below, in the place proper for it. Our present concern is only with the sacrifice of the consecrated elements, considered as a Melchizedekian sacrifice by itself. I apprehend that it has not, and that it cannot be proved, that Melchizedek (so far as his priesthood, or the acts of it are recorded in Scripture) made any expiatory, or any material sacrifice at all. His sacerdotal function was described but in part, to make it the fitter type of part of our Lord's priesthood. Other parts of our Lord's priesthood were sufficiently typified by the Aaronical priesthood : but some further type was still want- ing, to typify what Aaron's priesthood could not do. Aaron's typified the transient part, the atoning part ; which was to be performed once for all by our Lord : but the abiding or ever- lasting part (viz. the distributing the subsequent or permanent benefits of that atonement) was not provided for in Aaron's priesthood, considered as typical of our Lord's, but was to be typified another way ; namely, by the priesthood of Melchizedek, represented no further in Scripture than the reason of such type required. Melchizedek therefore was introduced, not as offering any sacrifice of atonement, (that was to be considered as previously executed,) but as conveying or applying, instrument- ally, the subsequent blessings of that atonement. This was part of the sacerdotal office : and in respect of this part only, Melchi- zedek was introduced as a priest ; to typify, as I said, the permanent part of our Lord's priesthood. Types, at the best, are but imperfect resemblances of their antitypes or archetypes : and therefore it is no wonder, if our Lord's priesthood (a com- plicated office) could not sufficiently be represented, whole and entire, by any single type, but might require several, and of different kinds, to represent it distinctly, as branched out into its several distinct particulars. Whoever well considers in what manner Melchizedek is in- 464 Appendix to CHAP. troduced in Genesis a , and what is further said of him by the Psalmist b and by St. Paul c , will easily perceive the truth of what I say. Melchizedek, therefore, so far as he is brought in for a type, did not sacrifice at all, (except it were in the spiritual way of lauds,) but he instrumentally conveyed to Abraham the blessings of the grand sacrifice ; like as Christian ministers now do to the children of Abraham, that is, to all the faithful. The ancient Fathers, who have often been wrongfully appealed to in this matter, by Papists in general, and by some Protest- ants, meant no more than what I have here said : though it would be tedious to enter into a detail of them d . They meant, that Melchizedek, by a divine instinct 6 , foreseeing the sacrifice of the cross, offered to God, by way of thanksgiving, a mental, vocal, manual representation or figuration of it, by the symbols of bread and wine ; and by the same symbols, instrumentally conveyed to Abraham the spiritual blessings of it. This I observe of those Fathers who make the most of what Melchizedek did : but the Fathers of the first two centuries and a half say nothing expressly of his offering to God anything, (whether in a spiritual way or otherwise,) but only of his feasting Abraham and his family. As to the later Fathers, some of them speak with the same reserve as the more ancient Fathers did ; others are more explicit : but none of them, I conceive, went further than what I have mentioned. Upon the whole therefore, their testimonies are altogether foreign to the point of sacrificing the elements, being that they were not considered as sacrifices, but as figures of a sacrifice, and instruments of a thanksgiving service. What Mr. Johnson has pleaded in favour of his notion had been sufficiently obviated by Picherell f , among the Romanists, a Gen. xiv. 18. dorit, Leo Maguus, Arnobius junior, b Psalm ex. 4. Caesarius of Aries, Cassiodorus, Pri- c Heb. v. 6, 10, n; vi. 20; vii. masius, Isidorus Hispalensis, Da- i 24. mascene, Pseud- Athanasius, Pseudo- d The ancients referred to on this Cyprianus, Paeud-Ambrosius, Pas- article are, Clemens Alexandrinus, chasius Radbertus, Oecumenius, Tertullian, Origen, Cyprian, Euse- Theophylact, Euthymius, Potho bius, Julius Firmicus, Epiphanius, Prumiensis ; and perhaps more. Philastrius, Ambrosius, Chrysostom, e Vid. Euseb. Demonstr. Evang. Jerome, Pelagius, Austin, Isidorus lib. v. cap. 3. p. 243. Pelusiota, Cyril of Alexandria, Theo- f Picherell, pp. 116. 135, 333,&c. in. the Christian Sacrifice explained. 465 long before ; and by many judicious Protestants s after him. The same has been confuted by the learned Pfaffius h since ; as also by the reverend and learned Mr. Lewis, in a small tract ', containing much in a little ; close, clear, and judicious, published in 1714. The sum then is, that if our Lord's performances in the first Eucharist were such as Melchizedek performed, (by the accounts which Scripture and antiquity give of them,) they amounted only to a spiritual sacrifice of lauds, a representation of the sacrifice to be made upon the cross, and a distribution of the benefits and blessings of that sacrifice to his disciples. III. It is pretended, that our Lord did not only sacrifice his sacramental body in the Eucharist, but his natural body besides, sacrificed both in the same act k . This refinement of the material scheme was not thought on (so far as appears) before 1714, and then hardly submitted to, after much reluctance, by the learned Dr. Hickes ; and not well relished by others on the material side, whom Mr. Johnson complained of in 1720!. However, the ' strength of the cause' was now made to ' depend in a great measure,' upon that ' matter of fact,' (as it is called m ,) advanced without proof, or so much as appearance of proof ; excepting the precarious argument drawn from the present tense, mentioned above ; and except another as slight an argument drawn from John xvii. 20, taken with some obscure testimonies of Fathers ; which at most prove only that our Lord devoted himself in the Eucharist or elsewhere, before his passion, to be an expiatory sacrifice on the cross : not that he sacrificed himself, in the expiatory sense, before. A person's devoting himself in order to be such a sacrifice, is not performing the sacrifice, any more than Jewel, Answ. to Harding, p 42.5. h Pfaffius, pp. 196, 278, 321, 323. Peter Martyr, Loc. Comm. p. 895. ' Lewis, Answ. to Unbloody Sac- Bilson, p. 702. Spalatensis, p. 272. rifice, pp. 18-23. Mason, p. 557. Gul. Forbesius, p. k Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, 672, second edit. Jackson, vol. ii. part i. pp. 49, 83, 118, first edit, p. 955. vol. iii. p. 305, Morton, alias 51, 86, 122, second edit, part ii. b. vi. Brevint, Depth and Myst. pp. 6-10. p. 107, &c. 135. Outram, p. 228. ' Johnson, Saxon Laws, pref. p. 56. Kidder and Payne. Albertinus, pp. m Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, 199, 200. part ii. p. 272. Hh 466 Appendix to CHAP. engaging to do a thing is actually doing it n . So slender are the proofs of this new notion. But let us see what self-contradictions and other absurdities it contains in it, or carries with it. 1. It is supposed to be the most solemn act of the Melchize- dekian priesthood ; though it is certain that Melchizedek neither so sacrificed himself, nor our Lord's natural body or blood, not then existing. 2. It supposes two expiatory sacrifices made by our Lord in the Eucharist; one of the sacramental body, and the other of the real : this the author seems to own, thinking he has some colour for it in Hebrews ix. 23, where St. Paul (lie says) calls' the offering made by Christ sacrifices, in the plural number . As to the construction of that text, I am content ^o refer to commentators, not suspecting that so forced and strange a sense is at all likely to gain many followers : the hypothesis itself must be better supported, before any such odd meaning of that text can be admitted. But what shall we do with those two sacrifices of our Lord's in the Eucharist 1 They agree not with the words of institution, ' This is my body :' which should rather have run, This is my two bodies, my sacramental one, and my natural : and so likewise the words, ' This is my blood.' Then again, those two sacrifices, being both expiatory, both given for the ' life of the world,' there would be two propitiations, two expiations ; and we shall want to know what was the precise value of this, and what of that, and whether they differed in value as finite and infinite ; or whether they were of equal worth. It is pleaded^ that they were both but one oblation : which is resembled to a deed of gift, where, by delivery of a parchment, lands or houses are conveyed ; and it is further likened to a man's presenting to God houses, &c., by a piece of money, or a n Of th : s see Dr. Turner's Christ- ficed, had been so hindered by some- ian Eucharist no Proper Sacrifice, p. thing interposing itself, that he could 19, &c. Field's words in the like not slay the same, he had offered no case are very applicable here : ' This sacrifice, but endeavoured only so to proveth not a real sacrifice of Christ, do, so is it here.' Field, p. 207. .. For his blood is not poured out, Put ' engaged' for 'endeavoured,' neither is he slain indeed. As in and the argument is much the same, the time of the old Law, if the priest Johnson's Unbloody Saciifiee, reaching forth his hand to slay the part ii. pref. p. 5. beast that was brought to be sacri- Hi. the Christian Sacrifice explained. 467 pair of gloves P. But this account will not tally, because the sacramental body is supposed to be a complete substitute % made so by the Holy Spirit ; which therefore must be a great deal more than a pledge or earnest of the natural, being itself absolutely Christ's body, and invested with the like power and efficacy. So here Avere two sacrifices of li'te power and efficacy, and therefore of like value, as it seems : there were principal and proxy, the thing itself and the equivalent, both together, though they mutually superseded each other r . The first of them seems to be advanced, in order to make our Lord's two sacrifices look like one sacrifice ; and the second, to the end that ours, which is but one of the two, and infinitely slighter, may yet look as con- siderable to us now, as both his then were to his disciples 9 . But if the elemental sacrifice be considered only as gloves or parch- ment in comparison, notwithstanding all its inherent virtues and enrichings of the Spirit, then it is not a substitute in the sense contended for, nor of any considerable value ; so that instead of calling it a substitute or a sacrifice, we may better call it a sign or figure of our Lord's sacrifice, or at most a pledge, earnest, or token of our own. I here take it for granted, that our Lord's elemental sacrifice was at least as good as ours can be supposed to be : and if even his was but as gloves or parchment, (compa- ratively speaking,) ours, at this day, can be no more ; and if so, it does not appear worth the contending for, while we have an in- finitely better sacrifice to trust to, and to rest our expiation upon. P Johnson, Saxon Laws, pref. 57. be proved, that Christ offered his i See above, p. 454. natural body besides, then the rea- * Ibid. son why the elements are called his * N. B. As there are two incon- body is quite another reason, viz. sistent accounts here tacked to- because he offered his natural body gether, in order to serve two differ- a sacrifice by and under the ele- ent purposes, so it is observable, ments, as symbols or pledges. See that different reasons, in different part ii. pref. p. 2. I may note, that places, have been assigned for call- if the last reason were a true one, ing the elements the body : for when we could have no pretence now for they are to be made substitutes, then calling the elements his body ; be- the reason given for the name of cause it is not our intention to offer, body is, that they are in power and under the symbols, our Lord's natu- effect, by the Spirit, the same with ral body as a sacrifice for the sins of the archetypes, the very body and men : we cannot sacrifice Christ our blood which they represent. Part Lord. ' PP 177-212. But when it is to H h 2 468 Appendix to CHAP. 3. There is no more proof made that our Lord in the Eucha- rist consigned his natural body to be broken, and his natural blood to be shed, than that he consigned the same to be then and there eaten and drank. It is allowed, that what was given for them in the Eucharist, was also given to them ; and what was given to them, that they received l . If therefore our Lord then and there gave his natural body and blood for them, they then and there received the same natural body and blood : but if he gave them not, no transfer, no sacrifice was yet made of them. It is argued, ' if the bread and wine were' [in the Eucharist] ' given to God, so were Christ's natural body and blood too u :' by the same way of reasoning, if the bread and wine were in the Eucharist given to the disciples, so were Christ's natural body and blood too. I know it is denied that Christ gave his natural body, in such a sense, to the disciples, because of the glaring absurdity ; and it is pleaded in that case, that our Saviour, in the institution, ' said not one word of his natural body x .' But why then is it pretended, from the same institution, that he consigned his natural body to God as a sacrifice y ? If our Lord's silence, as to his natural body, is an argument that it was not then given to the Disciples, the same silence is as good an argument to prove that it was not then given for them to God : or if any words of the institution prove that the natural body was then given for them, the same words will equally prove, that it was also then given to them and received by them ; and orally too, according to the hypothesis which I am here examining. To be short, upon the principles advanced to support the material sacrifice, it most evidently follows, either that the natural body was not given to God in the first Eucharist ; or if it was, that it was literally given to the disciples also, and orally received by them. IV. Another paradox relating to this head is, 'that our Sa- viour laid down his life, when, by a free act of his will, he did * Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, Plain Account, p. 41. Johnson, Pro- p. 87, alias 91. part ii. p. II. pit. Oblat. p. 33. u Johnson, Saxon Laws, pref. 57. f See Johnson, part i. pp. 64, 83. x See Brett's Discourse on the part ii. pp. 4, 6, 7, 9, 272, 273. Eucharist, pref. p. 16. Answer to in. the Christian Sacrifice explained. 469 give his body and blood to God, in the Eucharist 2 .' Tt might as justly and with as much propriety be said, that he was cruci- fied at the table, or died at his last Supper. But the author, I presume, being sensible, that where our Lord 'laid down his life,' there he sacrificed himself, and having conceived that the sacrifice of himself should be performed in the Eucharist, and there only, he was under a kind of necessity of maintaining, (pursuant to his other principles,) that our Lord ' laid down his life' in the Eucharist. The love of Christ towards us is some- times expressed by his ' laying down his life' for us a ; and oftener by his ' dying b ' for us : which (besides the general use of the phrase of ' laying down one's life') is a more special argument with respect to this case, that the phrases are here equivalent. Let it be said then, that Christ was crucified, slain, gave up the ghost, or resigned his spirit in the Eucharist : indeed, they may any of them be as reasonably asserted, as that he literally sacri- ficed himself in the Eucharist. Another learned writer, on the same side, chooses rather to say, that our Lord 'laid down his life,' when he surrendered himself to the band of soldiers c ; which was after his last Sup- per : but if any person would undertake to justify such new con- struction of the phrase, he should produce some example to shew, that any one has ever been said to have 'laid down his life' without dying, or before he died. And yet if any such example could be produced, it would not fully come up to this particular case, because our blessed Lord, at the very last moment, when he resigned his soul, had it in his power to rescue himself from death, as well as he had power to raise the dead. His life no man could wrest from him at any time : neither was it taken till the very instant when he 'laid it down of himself*,' condes- cending to suspend his Divine power, or the exercise of it. But I shall have another occasion to say more of this matter under the following chapter. z Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, viii. II ; xv. 3. 2 Cor. v. 15. part ii. p. 69. I Thess. v. 10. John x. 15, 17, 18. I John iii. c Brett's Answ. to Plain Account, 16. pp. 62, 75. b Eom. v, 6, 8 ; xiv. 9. i Cor. d John x. l8 47 Appendix to CHAP. CHAP. IV. Pointing out some EXCESSES in relation to the SACRIFICE OF THE CROSS. THE sacrifice of the cross is so momentous an article of the Christian religion, that we have great reason to be jealous of any attempt either to overturn it, or to undermine it. No such thing was ever formally attempted, that I know of, by any Divines of our Church, before 1718, when the second part of Unbloody Sacrifice appeared. The author himself, in his first part, had owned the sacrifice of the cross more than once 6 , in words at least ; though he then seems to have scrupled, in some measure, the use of the phrase, and to have been looking out for some evasive construction to put upon it. Afterwards, in some places, he ordered mactation to be read for sacrifice f , or for oblation : and mactation at length became his usual expression for what we call the sacrifice of the cross. Let us examine his reasons or motives for this so important a change in Christian theology. i. His first scruple seems to have been what he had hinted in the first edition of his first part, where he says, ' By sacrificed on the cross, we must then mean, that he was slain as an expi- atory victim, and not that he offered himself as a Melchizede- kian priest ; for he declares that he did this in the Eucharist. For this, says he, is my body given to God for you ?.' He adds afterwards, ' It cannot be proved,' that the Melchizedek in Ge- nesis did offer bloody sacrifice h . This pretence is very slight ; because it cannot be proved, by anything said in Genesis, or any other part of Scripture, or by antiquity, universality, and consent, that Melchizedek sacrificed bread at all, or that he did e Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, late as 1713, which appears by his part. i. pp. 12, 66, 68, 95, first edit. Sermon on the Christian Altar, &c. Propit. Oblat. p. 106. pp. 18, 19. Though he adopted N.B. Dr. Hickea all along owned Mr. Johnson's new notions in or the sacrifice of the cross. (Christ, before 1720. Discourse, &c. p. 39. Priesth. vol. i. p. 165.) So like- f See Johnson, part ii. p 267. wise Mr. Leslie, and Mr. Scandret, f Ibid. p. 95. pp. 4, 8, 157. Dr. Brett also, as h Ibid. p. 472. iv. the Christian Sacrifice explained. 471 anything more (so far as he is brought in for a type) than what amounted to the prefiguration of the grand sacrifice, and an in- strumental conveyance of the blessings of it i. However, as it is certain from Scripture, confirmed by antiquity, universality, and consent, that our Lord did offer himself a sacrifice on the cross, and that our Lord was not a priest of any other order but the order of Melchizedek, it most evidently follows, that such his sacrifice was so far Melchizedekian, was an act of that priesthood which was altogether Melchizedekian, and not AaronicalK In the strictest sense, no material sacrifice, bloody or unbloody, no active sacrifice at all, (excepting the sacrifice of lauds,) can be Melchizedekian ; for Melchizedek, as a type, offered nothing but lauds to God, and blessings to Abraham under visible signs : but as our Lord's priesthood was entirely Melchizedekian, and con- tained the atoning as well as benedictory part, it is manifest, that even the atonement, so considered, was Melchizedekian, as opposed to Aaronical. In short then, it must not be said that our Lord's sacrifice was bloody, and therefore not Melchizede- kian ; but it was Melchizedekian, though bloody ', because it was our Lord's, who was of no other priestly order but the order of Melchizedek. It is a poor thought of the Komanists, and it is well exposed by Dean Brevint m , that bread and wine are necessary to every act or exercise of the Melchizedekian priest- hood : for as the notion is founded in error, so it terminates in absurdity. Our Lord had no bread to offer on the cross : nei- ther has he any bread or wine to offer in heaven, where he intercedes as a priest in virtue of his sacrifice once offered, and blesses as a priest, and 'abideth a priest continually 11 .' But I proceed. 2. The first and main scruple against the sacrifice of the cross being thus considered and confuted, there will be less difficulty ' See above, p. 463, &c. ' mention it, since the benedictory k Heb. vii. u, 13, 14, 16, 17. part of his priesthood was all that 1 N. B. It cannot be reasonably the type intended was concerned in, doubted but that Melchizedek of- as I before intimated. fered bloody sacrifices, after the way m Brevint, Depth and Mystery, of the ancient Patriarchs : only, that &c. pp. 116-118. part of his priesthood was not men- n Heb. vii. 3. tioned ; as there was no need to 473 Appendix to CHAP. with the rest, which are slighter, and which appear to have been invented purely to wait upon the other. A second scruple is, that our Lord could not, while alive, offer (unless it were under symbols) his body and blood, as substantially separated ; because it appears not that any blood flowed from him till the soldier pierced him ; but it is probable, that the ' nails so filled the ori- fices,' that ' no blood could issue thence .' I shall venture to leave this ingenious speculation with the reader. 3. Against the sacrifice of the cross, it is pleaded, that to sup- pose it, ' is to render the sacrifice of Christ a bloody one indeed ; so bloody, as that it cannot be reconciled to purity of any sort, till killing one's self be esteemed a virtue P.' The same argu- ment, as lately revived by another gentleman, runs thus : ' He could not offer himself a sacrifice in any other manner than by symbols or representatives : for had he in any manner put him- self to death, he might have been too justly accused of self- murder q.' Sorry I am, that anything of this kind, though only in the way of argument, should drop from serious and reli- gious persons : and I was in some doubt with myself, whether I could prudently or reverently repeat it, though in order only to confute it. But who can any longer bear to have that most pre- cious sacrifice, upon which all our hopes and all our comforts depend, treated in a manner far from becoming it ? Why must Christ's laying down his life be so invidiously, so injuriously called putting himself to death ? To resign his life, or voluntarily to submit to death, is one thing : to put himself to death is quite another, differing as active disobedience from passive obedience. But though he was passively obedient, in submitting to suffer, bleed, and die for us, it does not therefore follow, that he exercised no act of offering, or that he made no active sacri- fice on the cross. It was his own choice to submit to the will Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, -made for himself a body of bread, pref. pp. 4, 5. to be sacrificed, because he could P Ibid, part ii. p. 70. not ofler himself in any other man- 1 Brett's Answ. to Plain Ace. p. ner than by symbols, then was bread 66. One might here make use of given for the life of the world, and Tertullian's argument against Mar- bread should have been crucified cion, (cited above, p. 462,) with a for ua.' very little change. ' If our Lord IV. the Christian Sacrifice explained. 473 of his enemies, and his choosing so to suffer, so to be passive, for the honour of God and the salvation of men, was the divinest act and exercise of true piety and philanthropy. It was active virtue, as all choice (whether to do or to suffer) is equally active, an act of the will, and a work r . He thus actively offered on the cross his body, his blood, his soul, his life to God ; choosing not to kill, but to be killed ; not to slay, but to be slain : and by such act of submission and resignation to the will of God, he made himself a voluntary sacrifice, in his death, for the sins of mankind. This is the plain doctrine of the Gospel, which every one that runs may read : and it is confirmed by as early, as universal, and as constant, a tradition for fifteen centuries or more, as any point of Christian doctrine whatsoever ; from Barnabas, Clemens, and Ignatius s , down even to Socinus of the sixteenth century. It would be tedious to enter into the detail of authorities ; neither can it, I presume, be necessary. I shall only hint further, that from the third century and downwards, ' altar of the cross l> has been the current language : one certain argument, among many, that the sacrifice was supposed to be made upon the cross. And such also is the language of the Greek and Oriental liturgies u . It is very wrong to suggest that our Lord was merely passive in laying down his life, because nature was spent, and because he had been half dead before, and the like x ; as if any violence of death could have wrested his soul from him, the Lord of life, r Aquinas understood 'active' and torn. ii. part. 2. 167. torn. iii. 384. 'passive' as well as most can pretend ed. Bened. Ambrosius, torn. i. 995, to : and he scrupled not to call our 1002. torn. ii. 1054. ed. Bened. Chry- Lord's passive obedience, a work : sostom, torn. ii. 403, 404. ed. Bened. ' Hoc ipsum opus, quod voluntarie in Heb. 839. Augustinus, torn. iv. passionem sustinuit,' &c. See above, 211, 1565. torn. v. Append. 273. p. 448. The argument from the torn. viii. 820. Leo Magn. torn. i. word 'patient,' or 'passive,' in this 251, 261, 264, 267, 276, 293. Quen. case, is only playing upon an equi- Tenant. Fortunat. Hymn, de Pass. vocal name, and committing a fal- Christi, p. 695. lacy. u Jacob. Liturg. p. 35. Fabric. 8 Barnabas, Ep. ch. vii. p. 21. Basil. Liturg. Copt. p. 24. Renaud. Coteler. Clem. Rom. Epist. i. c. 49. Gregorii Liturg. Copt. 36. 37. cp. 46. Ignatius ad Ephes. c. ii. Basilii Liturg. Alex. p. 83. Gregorii 6 Orig. torn. ii. p. 220. cp. 187, 83, Liturg. pp. 120, 121, 123. Ordo 362. ed. Bened. Eusebius de Laud. Commun. Syr. Jacob, p. 22. Constant. 765. ed. Cant. Hieronym. * Johnson, part ii. pp. 69, 70. 474 Appendix to CHAP. as it may ours. Our older and better divinity may be seen in the learned and judicious Bishop Bilson, who confirmed the same both by Scripture and Fathers. It ran thus : ' The conjunction of the human nature with the Divine, in the person of Christ, was so fast and sure, that neither sin, death, nor hell, assaulting our Saviour, could make any separation, no not of his body : but he himself, of his own accord, must put off his earthly tabernacle, that dying for a season, he might conquer death for ever. And so the laying down his life was no imposed punish- ment, nor forcible invasion of death upon him, but a voluntary sacrifice for sin, rendered unto God for our sakes 7.' This doc- trine Bishop Bilson defended against some rigid Calvinists of his time, who maintained the contrary z for the support of some other false principles. But I return. The author of Unbloody Sacrifice, though he had argued be- fore, several ways, against the sacrifice of the cross, yet retreated at length to this: 'I do not, nor ever did deny, that Christ offered himself on the cross; but I declare, I cannot prove it from Scripture ; so that if it be true, I leave it to be proved by tradition a .' How hard of belief in this high article, when it is undeniable that Scripture (taken in the sense of the Fathers of the first, second, and following centuries) does prove it; and when, in other cases, he conceived, that 'that man ought to suspect his own judgment and orthodoxy, whose opinions sink below the standard of the second age after Christ b .' But we need not Fathers in this point, nor indeed anything but Scrip- ture texts, and unprejudiced reason. The prophet Isaiah represents our Lord as ' wounded for our transgressions,' and 'bruised for our iniquities,' and 'making his soul an offering for sin c .' Where but on the cross 1 Not at his last Supper, where he was neither wounded nor bruised, except it were in effigy, nor offered his soul, so much as in effigy, whether \ve interpret it of soul or of life. His ' pouring out his r Bishop Bilson, Full Redemption, pref. p. 58. &c. p. 8. b Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, * Ibid. p. 229. part i. p. 212, alias 215. * Johnson, Saxon Laws, vol. i. c Isa. liii. 5, 10. iv. the Christian Sacrifice explained. 475 soul unto death,' (not his pouring out wine, or pouring out promises or engagements,) is by the same prophet made the one thing considerable* 1 . Where our Loi'd ' bare our sins, ' (a sacrificial phrase,) there most certainly he made his sacrifice : now St. Peter expressly tells us, that 'he bare our sins in his own body on the tree 6 ;' not in his sacramental body, or at the Communion table. Besides that it is manifest from the same text, that he had not made the expiatory sacrifice in the Eucharist : for if he had, he could have had none of our sins to bear in his body on the cross ; neither indeed would his death have been necessary to our re- demption, being superseded by the eucharistical remission, and by the atonement then made. Where peace was purchased, where redemption and reconcilia- tion were perfected, there may we look for the sacrifice of peace, redemption, and reconcilement. Now St. Paul says plainly, that he ' made peace through the blood of his cross/ (not through the blood of his holy table, whether sacramental or natural,) 'to reconcile all things f ,' &c. Again, 'we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son?,' and reconciled 'unto God by the cross h :' not by the Eucharist of his Son, not by the Communion table. We were ' redeemed by his blood i ;' and ' made nigh by the blood of Christ k ,' and ' sanctified also by his blood ! :' not in the Eucharist, where no blood was shed, except it were in effigy; neither will such sacramental shedding answer St. Paul's meaning, where he says, that 'without shedding of blood there is no remis- sion 111 .' Again, it is said, Christ 'appeared to put away sin by the SACRIFICE of HIMSELF: and as it is appointed unto men ONCE TO DIE so Christ was ONCE OFFERED to bear the sins of many 11 ,' &c. Where it is plain, that he was to put away sin by sacrificing himself, and that, by dying ; as appears by the similitude imme- diately following ; ' As it is appointed unto men once to die, so Christ was once offered,' viz. in his death : otherwise the parallel d Isa. liii. 12. k Eph. ii. 13. e i Pet. ii. 24. Compare Isa. liii. ' Heb. xiii. 12, x. 79, ix. 12, 13, 4, 6, 1 1, 12. 14. f Coloss. i. 20. s Rom. v. 10. ra Heb. ix. 12. h Eph. ii. 16. ' Revel, v. 9. n Ibid. 27, 28. * 476 Appendix to CHAK will not answer. It is in vain to say, that the offering was pre- vious to his bearing our sins : for the prophet Isaiah expounds his ' making his soul an offering for sin,' by his ' pouring out his soul unto death .' So that his being offered to bear, must mean, that he was offered on the cross, where he was to pour out his soul, that upon the same cross he might bear our sins, &c. More might be added, but I forbear to proceed further in so plain a point, so firmly grounded on Scripture, and so fully established by antiquity, universality, and consent ; consent of the Christian churches from the beginning down to this day. 4. It was going great lengths, to say, ' I must humbly declare my opinion, that it is impossible to establish the doctrine of Christ's body and blood being a real sacrifice, by any other arguments but those by which we prove the Eucharist to have been instituted a sacrifice by our blessed Saviour P.' Whatever might be the fate of this particular much disputed notion of the eucharistic sacrifice, one thing is certain, and will be readily allowed by every considerate man, that the general and unques- tionable doctrine of the real sacrifice ought never to be put upon a level with it: neither ought it to have been so much as suggested, that there is any ground for so strange a comparison. It was obliging Socinians too far, to raise any doubt or question about the certainty of the sacrifice of the cross : but to throw out broad innuendoes besides, that it stands upon no better, or no other foundation, than the material sacrifice, the material and expiatory sacrifice of the Eucharist ; what is it but betraying the Christian cause into the hands of the adversaries ] For if they may reasonably urge, (or cannot reasonably be confuted, if they do urge,) that such material and expiatory sacrifice is a novelty of yesterday, scarce thought on before the dark ages of super- stition, which made use of material incense for like purposes ; scarce ever seriously maintained by any of the West before the sixteenth century, and then only by the Romanists ; never admitted, in either part, by Protestants before the seventeenth century, nor then by many of them ; never taught (as now Isa. liii. 10, 12. 54. Unbloody Sacrifice, part. ii. P Johnson, Saxon Laws, pref. p. pref. pp. i, 2. iv. the Christian Sacrifice explained. 477 taught) before the eighteenth century, and then by a single writer only, for some time : I say, if the Socinians may reason- ably urge the premises, the conclusion which they aim at is given them into their hands : and so at length this indiscreet zeal for an imaginary sacrifice of the Eucharist (not capable of support) can serve only to perplex, darken, or destroy, the real one of the cross Q. I thought to go on to two chapters, further, pointing out more excesses and inconsistencies of the new scheme. There is one which particularly deserved to be mentioned ; the pre- carious consequence drawn from our Lord's supposed sacrifice in the first Eucharist to our sacrifice in the rest, built only upon this, that we are to do what Christ did r : an argument, which, if it proves anything, proves that we are to do all that Christ is supposed to have done by way of sacrifice ; that is, to sacrifice his sacramental body and his natural also, (which is absurd,) or else to sacrifice ourselves under symbols, as our Lord sacri- ficed himself, which will not serve the purpose of the material scheme. One way the argument proves too much, and the other way too little ; and so neither way will it answer the end designed. I am aware, that some will tell us what the argu- ment shall prove, and what it shall not prove 8 . But who will i The chief advocate for the new only to this : we are to do what system says, ' It is no small satisfac- Christ did, so far as serves the new tion to me, that the sacrifice of the 8} T stem : but we are not to do what Eucharist, and the personal sacrifice Christ did, so far as disserves it. of Christ, do rest upon the same 'Do this 'shall be an argument, when foundation, and stand or fall to- and where it makes for it : 'do this' gether.' Johnson's Unbloody Sacri- shall be no argument, when or where fice, partii. pref. pp. i, 2. To which it it makes against it. It is observ- is sufficient to say, God forbid ! The able, that the words 'this do," in the personal sacrifice of Christ stands institution, come after the words upon the rock of ages : the other ' take, eat, this is my body,' and there- (in his sense of it) is built upon fore manifestly relate, not merely the sand. to the sacerdotal ministration, but r Johnson's Unbloody Sacrifice, to the whole action or actions both part i. pp. 50, 91, alias 51, 94. of priest and people. The blessing, Johnson, part ii. p. 10. the breaking, the pouring out, the s Johnson, part i. pp. 96, 122, distributing, the receiving, the eat- alias 99, 126. ing, and the drinking, are all com- Dr. Brett on Liturgies, p. 135. prehended in the words 'this do.' N. B. The sum of what is pleaded All those actions are shewing forth on that side, when carefully ex- the Lord's death, (i Cor. xi. 26,) for amiued, will be found to amount a remembrance or memorial of him. 478 Appendix to give a disputant leave to draw consequences arbitrarily, not regulated by the premises, but by an hypothesis, which itself wants to be regulated by reason and truth 1 I have not here room to enter further into this matter : these papers are already drawn out into a length beyond what I at first suspected. I hope my readers will excuse my stopping short in this fourth chapter, and saving both myself and them the trouble (perhaps unnecessary trouble) of two more. It is of use in any controverted points, to observe what exit they are found to have, when pursued to the utmost. There were suffi- cient reasons before against a material sacrifice, considered in its best light, as purely gratulatory, or eucharistical : and there were more and stronger against the same considered as expi- atory, or propitiatory ; reasons, I mean, from Scripture and antiquity, and from the nature of things : but the managers for the material cause have now lately furnished us with a new argument against it, by shewing us, that, after all that can be done for it, it has really no exit, or such as is worse than none ; while it terminates in various inconsistencies and incongruities ; and not only so, but is contradictory also to sound doctrine, particularly to the momentous doctrine of the sacrifice of the cross. the Christian Sacrifice explained. 479 A brief Analysis of Mr. Johnson's System, shewing what it is, and by ivhat Steps he might be led into it. 1. THE first thing in intention, last in execution, was to prove, that the Gospel ministers are proper priests* 2. Proper priests must have a proper sacrifice : thei'efore some medium Avas to be thought on, to prove a proper sacri- fice, particularly in the Eucharist. 3. A prevailing notion, or vulgar prejudice, had spread among many, for a century or more, that no sacrifice could be proper, but a material one : therefore pains were to be taken to prove the Eucharist a material sacrifice. 4. But as material sacrifice carried no appearance of dignity in it, looking too low and mean for an evangelical priesthood to stand upon ; therefore ways and means were to be used to raise some esteem of it : spiritual sacrifice was to be depre- ciated, and material to be magnified. Hence, as it seems, arose the thought of enriching the elements with the Spirit ; borrow- ing from the sacramental part of the Eucharist, to augment and advance the sacrificial. And now the scheme appeared with a better face. 5. Nevertheless, if our Lord in the original Eucharist did not sacrifice the elements, it could not reasonably be supposed that we do it now, and so things would not tally : therefore it was found necessary to assert, that he also sacrificed the elements, as his sacramental body ; and thereupon reasons and authoi-i- ties were to be searched out for that purpose. 6. Still there was a weighty objection remaining, viz. that Scripture speaks often of Christ's offering himself, but never once of his offering in sacrifice the symbols : to remove which difficulty, it was thought best to say, that he offered himself in the Eucharist, but by and with the symbols. An after- thought, and not well comporting with former parts of the scheme. : 7. But there was still another difficulty, a very great one j namely, that our Lord, according to the accounts of the New 480 Appendix to Testament, sacrificed himself but once * : therefore, either he did it not in the Eucharist, or not upon the cross. To re- move this difficulty, it seems to have been resolved to give up the sacrifice of the cross, and to retain only the sacrifice of the Eucharist : and so the scheme was complete. Having thus given a sketch of the system in the analytical way, it may now be easy to throw it into the synthetic, thus : 1. Christ our Lord made a personal sacrifice of himself once ; either in the Eucharist or on the cross. 2. It cannot be proved to have been on the cross, but there are divers reasons against the supposition ; therefore it must have been in the Eucharist. 3. He sacrificed himself in the Eucharist, under symbols, sacrificing the symbols together with himself : otherwise we could have no pretence now for sacrificing the same symbols. 4. The Christian Church, after his example, saci'ifices the symbols, but not him. 5. Therefore the Church has a material sacrifice. 6. Therefore the Church offers a proper sacrifice. 7. Therefore the Gospel ministers are proper priests, sacri- ficing priests : which was to be proved. Now my humble opinion upon the whole is, that if the learned author had taken spiritual sacrifice for his medium, instead of material, he might not only have avoided many per- plexities, and no small number of mistakes, but might also have come at his main point justly and regularly, in conformity with Scripture and antiquity. He might have proved that Christian ministers are priests in as high and as proper a sense as any before them have been, (Christ only excepted,) authorized to stand and minister between God and his people, and to bless in God's name, and to execute all other sacerdotal functions, but in a more spiritual and heavenly way than other priests had done : which detracts not at all from the propriety of the Christian priesthood, but adds very much to its value and excellency, and shews it to be of superior dignity to any real or pretended priesthood, either of Jews or Pagans. * Propit. Oblat. p. 97. the Christian Sacrifice explained. 48 [ A distinct summary View of the several OBLATIONS in tfa Eucharist, previous to CONSECRATION or subsequent. What is previous, goes under the name of Ante-oblation : what is subsequent, falls under the name of Post-oblation. I. Of the Ante-oblation. THE ante-oblation has three parts, or three views, as here follows : 1. There is a presenting to God alms for the poor, and obla- tions for the use of the Church. The material things are gifts to men : the benevolent act, or work, is a gift, or sacrifice unto God. St. Paul points out this distinction where he teaches, ' To do good and to communicate' are ' such sacrifices' as ' God is well pleased with u .' The benevolent services are the sacrifice ; not the material money, or goods. This distinction is further confirmed by the common custom of speech ; which shews what the common ideas are. Alms (that is, alms-deeds) make an atonement for sin : a true and a proper expression, understanding atonement in a qualified sense. But who would say, that money makes an atonement 1 By bounty and charity God is appeased : the proposition is true, and the expression proper. But can we say, that by silver and gold God is appeased ] No, certainly. And why cannot we 1 Because it would be confounding ideas : for, even in common language, expressive of the common ideas, the service is the gift to God, not the material thing. 2. There is in the Eucharist a presenting to God (virtually at least) an acknowledgment of God's being Creator and Giver of all good things ; as Irenaeus intimates x . Tertullian extends it to both Sacraments y : inasmuch as the religious use of water in u Heb. xiii. 16. The like distinc- tKtlvcp 8e evxapitrrovs OVTO.S Sia \6yov tion is clearly laid down in Justin iro^Tras KO.\ Suvovs irefnirfiv. Martyr. Apol. ii. p. 60, ed. Paris, x Iren. lib. iv. cap. 18. p. 251. 1636. Ta vir' litflvov fls 8iaTpoV f Tertull. contr. Marc. lib. i. cap. yff6/J.ffa, oil irvpl Sairavav, d\\' eat/- 14, 23. ToTs KO.I roii SeoueVois irpoiTtytpfiv, I i 482 Appendix to Baptism carries in it a tacit acknowledgment that water is a creature of God. 3. There is also a presenting of the elements to God for consecration : which is common to both Sacraments. For in Baptism the waters are so presented, and for the same or like spiritual purposes. II. Of the Post-OUatwn. The post -oblation, otherwise called commemoration, may like- wise be considered under three views, or as containing three parts. 1. The first is, the offering to view, viz. of God, angels, and men, under certain symbols, the death, passion, or sacrifice of Christ. We do the like (not precisely the same) in Baptism also : for there we represent and commemorate mentally, vocally, and manually, (in mind, and by mouth, and by significant actions,) the death and burial of Christ our Lord. 2. The second is, the offering, as it were, to Divine consider- ation, with our praises and thanksgivings, Christ and his sacri- fice, pleading the merit of it, in behalf of ourselves and others. We do something near akin to this in Baptism likewise, plead- ing the same sacrifice of atonement, with the merits thereof, in behalf of the persons baptized ; offering the same to Divine con- sideration. 3. The third is, the offering up Christ's mystical body, the Church, or ourselves a part of it z , as an holy, lively, reasonable 1 Fulgentius's doctrine on this aliud postulari mihi videtur, nisi ut head is well worth the noting, as per ' gratiam salutarem in corpore making the Church to be the sacri- Christi (quod est Ecclesia) caritatis fice offered, and likewise as inter- unitas jugiter indisrupta servetur. . . preting the illapse of the Spirit, Dum itaque Ecclesia Spiritum sanc- conformably, of the Spirit's sancti- turn sibi caelitus postulat mitti, do- fying that mystical body, viz. the num sibi caritatis et unanimitatis Church. He flourished about 510, postulat a Deo conferri. Quando and is of greater antiquity and au- autem congruentius quam ad conse- thority than most of the Greek, crandum sacrificium corporis Christi Latin, or Oriental liturgies now sancta Ecclesia (quae corpus est extant. Christi) Spiritus sancti deposcat ad- ' Quum ergo sancti Spiritus ad veiitum ? quae ipsum caput suum sanctificandum totius Ecclesiae sa- secundum carnem de Spiritu sancto crificium postulatur adventus, nihil noverit natum. . . , Hoc ergo factum the Christian Sacrifice explained. sacrifice unto God : a sacrifice represented by the outward signs, and conveyed, as it were, under the symbols of bread and wine. This third article of the post-oblation is seen also in Baptism : for we are therein supposed to be dedicated, consecrated, devoted, through Christ, to God. On which account Baptism has been looked upon as a kind of sacrifice among the ancients a . Nevertheless, the Sacrament of the Eucharist has more par- ticularly obtained the name of sacrifice : partly, on account of the offerings to church and poor in the ante-oblation, which are peculiar to that Sacrament ; and partly, on account of the commemorated sacrifice in the post-oblation. For though Bap- tism commemorates the death and burial, and indirectly the grand sacrifice ; yet it does not so precisely, formally, and directly represent or commemorate the sacrifice of the cross, as the Eucharist does. est caritate divina, ut ex ipso Spiritu corpus illius capitis esset renatum, de quo ipsum caput est natum. . . . Haec itaque spiritalis aedificatio cor- poris Christi, quae fit in caritate, (cum scilicet secundum B. Petri ser- monem, lapides vivi aedificantur in domum spiritalem, in sacerdotium sanctum, offerentes spiritales hostias, acceptabiles, Deo per Jesum Christ- um) nunquam opportunius petitur, quam quum ab ipso Christi corpore (quod est Ecclesia) in Sacramento panis et calicis ipsum Christi corpus et sanguis offertur. Calix enim quern bibimus,' &c. i Cor. x. 16, 17. Fulgent, ad Monim. lib. ii. pp. 34- 37-ed. Paris. Cp. Fragment, p. 641. a ' Cum venis ad gratiam Bap- tismi, vitulum obtulisti, quia in mortem Christi baptizaris.' Origen. in Levit. Horn. ii. p. 191. ed. Bened. "' Holocausto dominicae passionis, quod eo tempore offert quisque pio peccatis suis, quo ejusdem passionis fide dedicatur, et Christian orum fide- lium nomine baptizatus . imbuitur.' Augustin. ad Rom. Expos, cap. xix. p 937. ed. Bened. ' Ipse homo, Dei nomini conse- cratus, et Deo devotus, in quantum mundo moritur ut Deo vivat, sacri- ficium est.' Augustin. de Civit. Dei, lib. x. cap, 6. p. 242. I l 2 THE SACRAMENTAL PART OF THE EUCHAKIST EXPLAINED, IN A CHARGE DELIVERED IN PART TO THE CLERGY OF MIDDLESEX At the Easter Visitation, 1739. REVEREND BRETHREN, IN a former discourse a , upon the like occasion, I endeavoured to explain the sacrificial part of the Eucharist more minutely than I had before done, for the removing of scruples and the obviating mistakes. I would now do something of like kind with respect to the sacramental part of the same, so far as it appears to be affected by the sacrificial; that so both parts may aptly suit with each other, and hang naturally together. As truth is uniform, so just notions of one part will of course tend to preserve just ideas of the other part also : and as error is apt to lead to error, so any erroneous tenets there, will naturally bring in erroneous positions here. It is matter of fact, that for the sake of advancing a new kind of sacrifice, new doctrines have been offered, time after time, with regard even to the sacramental part of the Eucharist : which in truth is as much superior to the sacrificial, as God's part in that holy rite is superior to man's ; and which there- fore calls for our more especial caution and circumspection. Great stress has, by some amongst us since 1702, been laid upon the invocation and illapse of the Holy Ghost upon the elements : not barely to make them sacred signs and pledges, or exhibitive symbols of Christ's body and blood to every faithful communicant, (which might reasonably be admitted,) but even to make them the very body, or verily the body of Christ : not the natural body, but another true body, called a spiritual body, consisting, as is presumed, of elements changed in their inward qualities, and replenished either with the Holy Spirit himself, or with the graces, or virtues, or energies of a The Christian Sacrifice explained, in the preceding Charge. 488 The Sacramental Part the Spirit b ; supposed to be intrinsic to them, inherent in them, permanent with them, and received both by worthy and un- worthy communicants. It is said, that the ' Holy Spirit being invited and called down by the prayer of the priest, (according to the ancients,) descended upon the bread and wine on the altar, and enriched them with all the virtues and graces with which the personal body and blood of Christ did abound, and so made them in this, and perhaps in a yet more mysterious and incomprehensible manner, to be verily the body and blood of Christ ; as the Holy Ghost did formerly come upon the blessed Virgin, and formed in her womb the personal body and blood of Christ c . That the consecrated symbols are sancti- fied, and altered, if not in their substance, yet in their internal qualities, and that the eucharistical symbols themselves are verily made, in a mysterious manner, the body and blood of our crucified Saviour d . That this sacramental flesh and blood of Christ is taken by a corporeal eating and drinking of the unworthy, as well as worthy, communicants : of these, namely, to their justification and eternal salvation both of flesh and b ' Spiritu Sancto, qui, ad invoca- turalem quandam vim infundere.' tionem sacerdotis descendens, panem Allix. in notis ad Nectarium, p. 429. sanctificat, et omni divina ac vivifica N.B. The question of inherent vir- virtute corporis et sanguinis Christi tues had been thoroughly discussed eundem replet. . . . Ita ut Eucharistia by the best-learned Protestants, and duabus constet rebus, terrena, quae the notion generally exploded, here est materia panis, et caelesti, quae and abroad, long before Dr. Grabe est gratia ac virtus Spiritus Sancti undertook (inadvertently perhaps, or pani indita. . . . Divina illius virtus however unadvisedly) to revive it. et gratia pani communicata ac in- [' Grabium cujus ingerium nova- haerens, uti jam paucis probabo.' rum et portentosarum opinionum Grabe. Ad Iren. lib. iv. cap. 34. tenax nemini ignotum est.' Dey- pp. 327, 328. ling. Observat. Miscell. p. 177. In the same year, Dr. Allix, ' Nee tamen id dissimulamus, ip- who saw deeper, condemned those sum, antequam ad Anglos abiret, notions, in very plain terms, while ad ecclesiam Romanam transire om- speaking of the modern Greeks, nino voluisse, et quidem hanc prae- whose tenets those are. cipue ob rationem, quod crediderat, ' Ad tales autem miraculosos effec- successionem episcopatus ministerii- tus, quos jactant tarn Graeci quam que apostolici in ea sola inveniri.' Latini, credendos, aliquid nobis vide- Pfaffius, p. 500.] tur deesse, soil. Christi promissip, c Grabe's Defence of the Greek aut mandatum. De his miraculis Church, p. 88. fama orta videtur ex absurda qua- d Grabe, ibid. pp. 75, 87. Cp. pp. dam credulitate, Spiritum Sanctum 20, 35, 90, 91. in elementorum naturam superna- of the Eucharist explained. 489 spirit ; but of those to their condemnation and destruction of soul and body e .' Whoever looks into Scripture, or genuine antiquity, will there find but very little ground or colour for these or the like specu- lations ; which appear rather to have been borrowed from Damascen of the eighth century, or from the more modern Greeks, or the Pseudo-primitive liturgies. There was indeed, as early as the second century, some mention made of the descent of the Holy Ghost in Baptism f : and there was also a prevailing notion of some concurrence of the Holy Spirit with water, to the conception and birth of a Christian; which con- currence, by way of illustration, or to render the idea of it more lively and affecting, was sometimes compared to a conjugal unions. But it was never understood, that such similitudes were to be scanned with a scrupulous exactness ; or that every affecting or popular expression should be strained with the utmost rigour : for that would be using the ancient writers in much such a way as the Anthropomorphites and others have interpreted Scripture, contrary to the true meaning and intent of it. The Fathers very well knew how to distinguish between a power adsistant to, or concurrent with the element 11 , and a power infused into it, or lodged in it : and they were well aware of the difference between the virtue of Baptism (meaning the whole solemnity, in which God bears a part*) and the inherent virtue of the consecrated water, which means quite e Grabe's Defence of the Greek sostora. in Ephes. Horn. xx. p. 147. Church, p. 87. Leo I. Serm. 23, 24, pp. 155, 160. N.B. The Leipsic Acts, in their Quesnell. Pseud-Ambros. de Myst. censure upon that posthumous piece, cap. lix. p. 243. See more testimo- first published in 1721, have left this nies in Vossius, Opp. torn. vi. pp. note : 233, 274. Cp. Albertinus, pp. 465, 4 Ex his vero patet, quod licet in 466, and my Appendix, pp. 452, 453. articulo de coena, alienam a ponti- h AJTT)) coJ rj KaBapffis, Si' ttSaros ficiorum transubstantiatione senten- rt, 4>i?jul, nal irt>evfj.aros' TOV /jLft> 6to- tiam habuerit Grabius, tamen in prjTaij KOI ffu/LiaTiKtas \an^avofj.(vov, eodem ab Anglicana etiam. . .Eccle- TOV 8e affw^drtas nai a.6ttap-firus trvv- sia haud parum discrepaverit.' Act rpexovrot. Nazianz. Orat. xl. p. Lips. p. 281. A.D. 1722. 641. Compare Review, above pp. f See my Review, above pp. 250 257 260. 260. > See my Review, above p. n, 6 Tertullian. de Baptismo. Chry- &c. 49 Tfa Sacramental Part another thing, and is a late invention of dark and ignorant ages k . As to the Eucharist, for the three first centuries, and part of the fourth, nothing at all was said, so far as appears, of any descent of the third Person upon the elements 1 ; nothing of his forming them into Christ's body ; no, nor of his form- ing the natural body in the womb : but the ancients inter- preted Luke i. 35, of our Lord's own Divine Spirit, namely, of the Logos, and supposed that the same Logos formed for himself a body in the womb m . So little foundation is there, within the three first and purest ages, for the pretended simili- tude between the Holy Ghost's forming the natural body in the womb, and his forming the spiritual body in the Eucharist u . The similitude made use of anciently with respect to the Eucha- rist, was that of the incarnation , intended only in a confuse, general way, and not for any rigorous exactness. For like as our Lord, in his incarnation, made and fitted for himself a natural body to dwell in ; so, in regard to the Eucharist, he has appointed and fitted for himself a symbolical body to k ' Sacramenta continere grati- tenditur?' p. 406. ed. Colon. 1617.] am nunquam oliin dictum : itaque J See my Review, above p. 261, Thomas, parte tertia quaestionis &c. sexagesimae secundae, articulo ter- m Hennas, lib. iii. Simil. 5. Just, tio, non potuit altius arcessere quam Apol. i. p. 54. Dial. 354. Irenaeus, ab Hugone de Sancto Victore.' lib. v. cap. i. p. 293. Clem. Alex. Chamier. Panstrat. torn. iv. p. 52. p. 654. Tertullian, contr. Prax. cap. N.B. Hugo flourished about A.D. xxvi. de Cam. Cbristi, p. 18. Hip- ii 20, [or 1130.] polytus, contr. Noet. cap. iv. p. 9. [' Hugo de S. Victore dicit, quod cap. xvii. p. 18. Novatian, cap. xix. Sacramentum ex sanctificatione in- [xxiv.] Cyprian, de Idol. Vanit. p. visibilem gratiam continet.' Aquin. 228. Lactant. lib. iv. cap. 12. Hila- par. 3. q. 62. art. 3. p. 138. rius, de Trin. ion, 1044, 1047. Gre- ' Sacramentum est corporale vel gorius Boeticus, apud Ambros. torn, materiale elementum . . .ex sanctifi- ii. pp. 354, 356, [KaQdirtp yap rb fj.a. catione contineiis invisibilem et spi- fxt'iva ^vwrai T cru/j.a ai af/ua didiase omnem panem communem arov rov vlov rov 0eou fj.era\a/j.l3dvo- esse antitypum corporis Christi, quia /uep, rov ffapKiuOevros Kal -yfvvijdtvros Christus in pane sacramenta consti- TTJS ayias 6eor6Kov Kal a.fiirap6evov tuit sui corporis : at post consecrati- Mapioy. onem, cum desinat esse communis [' Frivolum et ineptum est argu- panis et simplex, desinere esse anti- mentum : ex re sequeretur imaginem typum corporis, quia jam sit ipsum cujuslibet rei aut personae iisdem corpus.' Salinas, pp. 340, 341.] vitiis plane esse obnoxiam ut ipsum n 'O 6p0d5o|os. flirt /JLOI, irapa.Ka.\S> architypum, vel ipsa res cujus est ... avr^i 7] Koivuvia Kal Bvcr'ta TOV travel- imago. . . . At illi negant panem eu- yiov crw/j.aros Kal a'tparos Xptcrrov fy charistiae, quern corruptibilem asse- Tcpoo-(pfpeis Kal /j.fra\a/j.fidi>fis, trai/uo verant, esse avrirvrrov corporis Christi. Kal alu.a. a.\ti8ivov fffn Xpicrrov, rov Sed quod negant, res ipsa, velint vlov rov soC, v) 4/tAbs apros cbj o nolint, ostendit.' Salmasius, p. 343.] Tri-KpaiTK.6ij.tvos Ka-r' olKov, Kal avri-rv- P 'O 6pQ65oos. ovrca ino-Tfvofj.tv, Kal TTOS rov 0-us/j.aros Xpiffrov, a>s rj 6vu.a.. . . . OVK ffae, rovr6 tan rb avri- avrirvirov rov o~ta^aros Kpto'Tov r^v rvirov o"(t>varos Kal rov al/j.ar6s u.ov. a.-yiav KOivoivlav, v) tyiKbv aprov, oAA.' Anastas. Hodeg.c. xxiii. pp.349, 3^0. Kk 498 The Sacramental Part might as easily have proved, that the rock in the wilderness was the very Christ : for St. Paul said not that the rock signi- fied Christ, or was a symbol of Christ ; but he declared in express words, that ' that rock was Christ ofmy /3pco- x Tis 5f Iffrlv T] oA.7j(Mjs ffpwffts TTJS ffeais' fK rov aprov rov | ovpavov [ivariKrjs o~apKbs rov Xpiffrov, Kal ri KaraSalvovros rovs faOiovras tlnty rb tv avrrj Kptfirrofj-tvov air6ppriroi> af^ta fX fl " C u >)l t ' alibviov iiri 5f rys o-apxbs, avrov, Ka.ra.\ifjLTra.vo^fv Tots iKavoirt- ov rfOr]Kf rovro. . . . Sirrus fterf\ofj.fv pots Kal yvuffriniarfpots, oTs XP^I M Ta " rSiv u.vpo- pore, ut effusus est ex latere ejus vovvrts- ol STJ ybtvoi Kal ra yf)iva in cruce, id vero nullo modo credi- (ppovovvres, rrjs yriyfvovs Kal HOVQS bile dictu est, nee possibile factu. . . . ffapKbs rov Xpio-rov /j.era\a/j.Bdvouffiv Non mirum est porro Graeculos istos ToAjurjpij Kal avai/j.(vr)s avroj [fort, casse contradictionibus.' Salraas. auToC] ffapKbs Kal a'l/jLaros \eyfi' /uTf- pp. 345, 346.] Aae yap Kal 'louSas, al ~S.ifji.tav & Ma- K k 2 5QO . The Sacramental Part wanted a distinction, in order to explain what was received by the unworthy, and what by the worthy, but found none ; except it, were this, that the unworthy received the corruptible flesh and blood of Christ, separate from his Divinity, while the worthy received both together. This is all the sense I can make of his notion z : and I pretend not to be certain even of this a . Neither would I have dwelt so long upon so obscure and unintelligible a writer, had he not been the first, or among the first, that threw off the old distinctions between the symbolical and true body, thereby destroying, in a great measure, the very idea of a Sacra- ment. Hitherto the new notion of the elements being made the real body, as opposed to image or figure, had been used only for the support of true doctrine as to other points. But it is always wrong policy (to say no worse) to endeavour to sup- port sound doctrine by any thing unsound, or to defend truth by any thing but truth. Error, first or last, will infallibly turn on the side of error, and cannot naturally serve for any other purpose. So it proved in this case : for the next time that this new doctrine appeared upon the stage was in the service of image-worship, then creeping into the Church. They who 2 [See the weakness and incon- of symbolical, viz. the sacrament of sistency of the notion fully exposed the true body, in Salmasius, p. 345, &c. 2. He had learned that the natu- ' Isti volunt ex pane, corruptionis ral body is given and received : he omnia labi obnoxio, confici corpus interpreted it literally, instead of Christi frangendum, similiter ut in mystically, or spiritually, cruce ipse fractus est, et multis aliis 3. He had learned that the natu- praeterea vitiis mucoris, putrefacti- ral body eaten, is considered as cor- onis, verminationis corrumpendum, mptible, crucified and dead, and not quae non sensit turn corpus Christi : as glorified : that he retained, and . . . Quod non solum est aroTrtararof, justly. sed etiam maxime impium cogitatu. 4. He had learned, that the flesh Non mirum est porro Graeculos profiteth not, and that the unworthy istos,' &c. Ibid. pp. 345, 346.] partake not either of the 'Logos,' or a As errors commonly are the Holy Ghost, but that the worthy corruption of truth, and retain some partake of both : and those also he of the original features ; so one may appears to have retained, see in Anastasius's notion some re- Upon the whole, he blundered semblances of the ancient doctrines, only in two of the propositions : but miserably perverted or misunder- those two mistakes, like the flies in stood. the ointment, marred the composi- i . He had learned that the Spirit tion, and corrupted his whole system makes the body of Christ : he inter- of the Eucharist, preted it of the natural body, instead of Ike Eucharist explained. 501 opposed that innovation, kept up the ancient principle with regard to the elements of the Eucharist, as symbols, figures, images ; pleading that our Lord had left no visible image of himself, his incarnation, passion, sacrifice, &c. but that of the Eucharist. In reply to that plea, the innovators remonstrated against the symbolical nature of the Eucharist, contending that the consecrated elements were no images, types, or figures, but the very body and blood of Christ, literally so. John Damascen, surnamed Mansur, the father of the modern Greeks, and their great oracle, was in this sentiment ; a very considerable man otherwise, and worthy of better times b . He had read the Fathers, who were pointed against him ; which however signified little to a person already embarked in a wrong cause : for it is certain, and might be proved by many instances, that men who have any affection stronger than their love of truth, will never want evasions against any evidence whatever. He pretended that the ancients c had called the elements types, or figures, only before consecration, never after d . A plea noto- rioxisly false in fact, as all learned men know 6 : and had he said just the reverse, viz. that the Fathers had never so called them before consecration, but always after, he had come much nearer to the truth. The elements, before they are consecrated, are common things : and it is their consecration only that renders them figures, signs, symbols, sacraments. To pretend therefore that they are signs or symbols before consecration, is making them sacraments before they are sacraments, and carries a contradiction in the very terms f . If the Fathers have ever so called them, which is questioned, it could amount only to b Damascen flourished abcmt A.D. c See Albertinus, pp. 904, 907, 740. Died about A.D. 756. Vid. 911, 912, 915. Jewel's Answer to Fabric. Bibl. Grace, torn. viii. p. 774. Hard. art. xii. p. 335. Def. of Apol. c ['Locutiones figurae, imaginis, p. 243. Bilson's Christian Subject, et antitypi, aliquid mutationis octavo pp. 594, 595- L'Arroque's Hist, of saeculo apud Graecos accepisse facile the Euch. part ii. p. 213, &c. 368, &c. conceperim." Simon, not. ad Gabr. [Salmasius de Transubst. contra Sever. 230.] Grot. pp. 338, 339, &c. Simon, not. d Damascen. de Rect. Fid. lib. iv. in Gabr. Philadelph. p. 230. Pfaifius c. 13. pp. 271, 273, edit. Lequ. [Cf. in Iren. Fragm. p. 140.] Cone. Nicen. ii. Act. vi. p. 370. f [ 'Vid. Jewel, Answer to Hard. Hard.] p. 335. Salmasius, pp. 341, 445.] 502 The Sacramental Part some chance expression, contrary to their customary language, and to be accounted for by the figure called a prolepsis, as done by way of anticipation. However, Damascen persisted in his error, that the conse- crated elements are no type or figure, but the very 'deified body of our Lord ?.' If you ask, who makes them so ? he sometimes tells you, the second Person does it, like as he formed for himself a personal body in the womb h : and some- times { he says, that the third Person does it, like as he also, overshadowing the Virgin, formed the same body in the womb k . Thus he drew together the two constructions of Luke i. 35, one prevailing principally before the fourth century ', and the other after m : and he reconciled the two positions handsomely enough, by observing, that the second Person operates by the third. But still he was well aware, that whatever person should be supposed to make the body in the womb, yet nothing could make that body properly our Lord's body, but our Lord's assuming it into an union with himself : the forming an human and a sanctified body would not be making that body Christ's body : and, for the like reason, the Holy Ghost's so forming s OVK foi>. Damascen. de Rect. Steph. Advers. A.D. 1113.] Fid. lib. iv. c. 13. p. 871. ' See above, p. 490. h Damascen, ibid. p. 268. m It may be noted, that when 1 [ ' Paulus Diaconus Aquileiensis wef/aa ayiov, in that verse came A.D. 785. Praescius conditor noster at length to be interpreted of the infirmitatis nostrae, ea potestate qua third Person, yet Svvunis fyiffrov cuncta fecit ex nihilo, et corpus sibi continued to be interpreted of the ex carne semper-virginis, operaute second, namely of the Arf-yos. Atha- Sancto Spiritu, fabricavit, panem et nasius, Orat. iv. pp. 642, 695. Basil, vinum aqua mixturn, manente pro- contr. Eunorn. lib. v. p. 318. Am- pria specie, in carnem et sanguinem bros. de Sp. Sancto, lib. ii. c. 5. suum, ad catholicam fidein, ob repa- Ruflin. in Symb. p. 20. ed. Oxon. rationem nostram Sancti Spiritus Philastrius, cap. cl. p. 345. Au- sanctificatione convertit.' In Vit. gustin. contr. Maxim, lib. iii. c. 15. Gregorii M. Then Paulus reports a Leo I. Serin, xxi. p. 147. Damas- pretended miracle of Gregory, to cen, pp. 204, 658. Theophylact in convert a woman and to confirm loc. [Euseb. in Isai. p. 385. Cyrill. the doctrine.] Hierosol. Catech. 17. c. 6. p. 266. k Damascen, ibid. p. 269. Epist. Gregor. Nazianz. Or. 38, et 42. ad Zachar. Ep. Duarorum, p. 656. Marius Victorin. contr. Arian. 1. i. [Cp. Pasch. Radb. c. 3. p. 1563. Gregor. Moral. 1. xciii. c. 12. Homil. iv. 1565. 1588. Gratian. de Conse- in Evang. 33. Beda in loc.] of the Eucharist explained. 503 and so sanctifying the elements would not be converting them into, or making them, the body and blood of Christ, but merely a sanctified body. Therefore Damascen proceeded further to affirm n , that our Lord makes the elements his body and blood, by joining his Divinity with them : and it is observable, that while he thought the grace of the Spirit sufficient for the ele- ments of oil and water, in Chrism and Baptism, yet he judged that nothing less than Christ's own Divinity could make the elements of the Eucharist Christ's body and blood. Had he thought of this in time, he might have spared his two previous considerations, about the second and the third Person's forming or changing the elements into Christ's body, so improperly brought in ; for it is now plain, by his own account, that the elements are not made Christ's body, but by Christ's assuming them into some kind of union with his Divinity ; and all that was supposed previous could amount only to preparing them, fitting them, sanctifying them, in order to be made the body and blood of Christ. It could not amount to so much as form- ing them, like the body in the womb, though he had pretended that it did : for the bread and wine want no forming, (like the body in the womb,) having been formed before, and all along keeping their original forms. So that at length that pretended previous change could resolve only into a previous sanctification by the Spirit, upon his own principles : the Logos was to do ^the rest, by assuming those sanctified elements, and making them the body and blood of Christ. So confused and inco- herent was this great man. But what was worse still, after all these lengths of fancy, there was yet a difficulty remaining, which was altogether in- supei-able. The elements were to be made the very deified body of Christ, like as the personal body, in the womb, had been made. How could this be, without the like personal union of the elements with the Divinity \ Here Damascen was n 2t/ce'ieue r/ua xcd a!]ua tov ftrBioirros that there is no depending upon the icaJ vivovros jueTa/JaAAotrcu, xai y'tvov- whole work as genuine ; but there rcu t-rtpov auua irapa rb w^rrt^ov a.1- may be, and probably are interpola- TOV V avrov ayla, o>y Sid nvos others referred to by Zornius, Histor. ayiaffpov, xdpin 9fov/j.evT}. p. 368. Eucharist. Infant, p. 457.] * [ ' Consecrare idem est Latinis r The whole passage may be seen scriptoribus quod deum facere : ut in the Acts of the second Nicene de illis qui in numerum deorum refe- Conncil, Act. vi pp. 36^, 369. Har- rebantur, quae est Graecorum O.TTO- duin, torn. iv. Compare Dr. Covel's 0eWis.' Salmas. de Transubst. pp. translation of it, and remarks upon 437, 439, 443.] it; Account of Gr. Church, pp. 150, 506 The Sacramental Part according to the ordinary use of such phrases, at that time, and before u : and they themselves explain it by its being made holy, when before it was common x . And though they speak of the elements being replenished y, that is, sanctified by the Holy Ghost, yet they reserve the enlivening or life-giving virtue to the true and proper body and blood of Christ z ; not to the elements, the image of them. They distinguish between the real, natural body, and the relative body, or body by institution and appointments The meaning of the latter must be deter- mined by what it is appointed to ; which the Council itself sufficiently explains : it is appointed to be a true image, and a most clear memorial of the natural body b : a true image, as opposed to bare representation, as in a^ picture, not exhibitive of, or accompanied with true and spiritual benefits : a very clear memorial, as opposed to the faint shadows and dark intimations of the legal types or figurations. Some further light perhaps may be given to the true meaning of those Constantinopolitan Fathers, by a short passage of the Emperor Copronymus, pre- served by Nicephorus, who was Patriarch of Constantinople from 806 to 815. The passage runs thus : n Vid. Suicer's Thesaur. torn. i. et coli videretur.' Idem, p. 438. 444, 1363, I39 2 I 39 8 - Jewel's Cp. 443.] Answer to Hard. p. 247. Alber- * Zuovoiif 6avar