(1.) But even if it were the literal sense, it would not follow from that, that it was the natural sense of the words: because the natural sense is that (whether figurative or literal) in which the persons, who heard Him speaking at the time, would naturally and reasonably understand his words. For instance, when, on the same occasion, our Lord said, "This cup is the New Testament [covenant] in my blood,"-neither the Roman-catholics nor we suppose that He meant to speak literally of the cup which he held in his hands: but we both agree that here "the cup" is put, by a common figure, for the cup-full of wine, which the company were drinking. In this case, therefore, we both agree that the figurative sense (not the literal) is the natural meaning of our Saviour's words. Again, if in explaining a map, I were to point to a part of it and say, "This is France," no one would think that I meant that a part of that sheet of paper or canvas was literally France; that would not be the natural sense of my words. Nor, if I showed you a picture, and said,—“ That is the Queen," would you think I meant to say that it was literally Queen Victoria.

Now it would not have naturally occurred to the Apostles, when they heard Christ say of the bread, "This is my body," and saw it continue in his hands just the same (to all appearance) as it was before; and when they ate it up, that He was then working a miracle,—that He was holding his own body in his own hands-and that they were, each of them, eating up his body, while He sat there all the while conversing with them. But, on the contrary, they would naturally have understood Him to be speaking figuratively: because they knew that He was then appointing a religious rite; and they (as Jews) were quite accustomed to figurative religious rites. Indeed, they had just been celebrating one such figurative religious rite, the Passover; in which a lamb was eaten, representing the Lamb which their forefathers had sacrificed on the night they left Egypt; and bitter herbs, representing the affliction they had been under; and unleavened bread, representing the hastily-made bread which they took with them in their flight, when there was no time to leaven it. And it is the custom still among the Jews for the master of every household to explain to his family, when eating the Passover, the meaning of the rite; saying, for example, when the bitter herbs are laid on the table, "This is the food of affliction

which our fathers ate in Egypt," &c. &c.

The Apostles, there-
Saviour to be, in the

fore, would naturally have understood our same way, explaining the meaning of a figurative rite of his religion, and would have taken Him to mean-" This bread represents, or stands for, my body," &c. &c. For such a way of speaking is quite common, and was often used by our Lord, when explaining figures. So, in explaining the parable of the Tares in the field, He says: "The field is the world—the good seed is the children of the kingdom-the Tares are the children of the wicked one-the Reapers are the angels," &c. Meaning that the field of which He had been speaking stood for, or represented the world :—and so of the rest. The Apostles, who had often heard Jesus speak thus before, would, therefore, have naturally understood Him to be speaking in the same way then.

(2.) Did they, then, learn afterwards to put another meaning on his words? On the contrary, we find Paul expressly calling that which is eaten in the Communion, "bread," even after it has been solemnly set apart as the Sign of Christ's Body. "The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ? For we, being many, are one bread and one body: for we are all partakers of that one bread [loaf]." (1 Cor. x. 16, 17.) And again: "As often as ye eat this bread and drink this cup, ye do show the Lord's death till He come. Wherefore, whosoever shall eat this bread and drink this cup of the Lord unworthily [in a manner unworthy of the solemn rite] is guilty of [that is, is culpable in respect of] the body and blood of the Lord.

But

let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread and drink of that cup." (xi. 26, 27, 28.) Where he distinctly explains that it is because, in eating the bread and drinking the wine at the Communion, we show forth-exhibit the representation of the Lord's death, therefore he who partakes of it rashly and indecently (as you will find from that chapter the Corinthians did) is guilty of an insult to the Lord's body and blood, not of mere indecorum at a common meal. The Apostle Paul, then, plainly calls what is eaten at the Lord's Supper bread, even after it had been made a Sign or Symbol of the Lord's body. In answer to this, the Roman-catholics say, that the Apostle speaks figuratively, calling it bread, because it once was, and still appears so. But it is very strange that men should chuse to suspect a figure, in calling that bread, which certainly was, and still seems to all a

man's senses to be real bread; and yet not to suspect any figure in calling that Christ's body, which was made by a baker, and neither had nor assumes any resemblance whatever to human flesh.

(3.) But, indeed, the meaning which they (when they explain themselves) give to Christ's words is not, after all, the literal meaning of them. For in common speech we describe things, not by their substances (of which we know nothing directly) but by their qualities. We call that, bread, which has such a colour, smell, taste, power of nourishing, and so forth. No one would think of calling a mole-hill a mountain, though all the matter of the mountain were pressed into the size of a mole-hill. We should say, in that case, that the mountain had become, or shrunk into, a mole-hill. So, when Moses' Rod assumed the appearance of a serpent, it is said that his Rod became a serpent ; not that a serpent became his Rod. Now, according to the Roman-catholics the substance of Christ's body in the Communion has none of the attributes of flesh, but appears under all the attributes of bread. Therefore, in ordinary speech, we should say that (if this be so) Christ's body becomes bread; not that bread becomes Christ's body. To suppose our Lord, when He says, "This is my body," to mean the substance of this bread, without a change in any of its qualities, is changed into the substance of my body, only without any one outward quality of flesh," is certainly not to suppose Him to speak literally, but in the most dark and perplexed (not to say unintelligible) language that ever was uttered. And to say that this is a natural and obvious meaning of his words, is what scarce any one would venture to say who had not been carefully trained up to believe it such.

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5. Again, the Roman-catholics maintain that their clergy are PRIESTS in the sense of the word in which it means persons who offer up real expiatory sacrifices for the people.

You must remember that this word Priest has two very different meanings, which are very often confounded.

Originally, Priest was only a contraction [or shortening] of the word Presbyter; and it meant properly the same as Presbyter; that is an Elder of the Church. In this sense it is used in our Prayer-books, wherever our clergy are called Priests; Priests or Presbyters, being the middle rank of our clergy, above Deacons and below Bishops.

But Priest, in another meaning of the word, means a person appointed to offer up sacrifices to God for others: and in this sense it is used in our translation of the Bible; in which the word Elder is put in place of it wherever Presbyters are spoken of. In the English Bible therefore, PRIEST means a Sacrificer: in the English Prayer-book, PRIEST means an Elder, or Presbyter.

Now, the Roman-catholics say that their Priests are Sacrificers. For they think that, in the Communion, the Priest offers up the real body and blood of Christ as an expiatory sacrifice for the sins of the living and the dead. And they deem the power of making (so they express it) the body and blood of Christ, the great power of the Priesthood; and the office of offering them as a sacrifice to God the most dignified office of the Priesthood.

The question is: Did the Apostles agree with them?

Now, throughout the whole New Testament, the Sacred Writers speak of no [Sacrificing] Priest under the Gospelscheme, but Jesus Christ Himself: and they do continually tell us that He is our Priest. They speak of no atoning sacrifice, but the one oblation of Christ once offered for our sins; and they tell us that, by that sacrifice, sin has been for ever put away, that is, all obstacles to the free pardon of sin, on repentance, removed entirely. They speak of no Altar, but that in Heaven," the Holy place not made with hands."

Nor is this all: but, even when searching for a parallel in the christian worship to the sacrifices of the Law, and for something in the christian ministry corresponding to the priestly office,even in such figurative allusions to the rites of the Old Testament,—their minds never turn to the Eucharist [Lord's Supper], as a thing that should be, even figuratively, described as a Sacrifice. Thus, (Heb. xiii. 15, 16,) the Apostle Paul describes the sort of sacrifices which Christians can offer, as contrasted with those of the Jews. "By Christ, [through Him, not through our Clergy,] let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, even the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to his name. But to do good, and to communicate [impart of our wealth to our needy brethren] forget not: for with such sacrifices God is well pleased." And again, (Rom. xii. 1,) “I beseech you that ye present your bodies, a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable

to God, which is your reasonable [rational] service." Following out the same thought, (of Christians being themselves a sacrifice to God,) the Preacher who, by publishing the Gospel and persuading men to receive it, makes his converts such an acceptable sacrifice, is, in one place, figuratively described as, in that respect, resembling a Priest. In Rom. xv. 16, Paul describes himself as "ministering [in respect of] the Gospel of God, that the offering up [oblation] of the Gentiles might be acceptable, being sanctified by the Holy Ghost. I have therefore," he adds, "whereof I may glory through Jesus Christ in things pertaining to God." All which he further explains in the next verses, by relating how God had enabled him to make the Gentiles obedient, and to preach the Gospel more extensively amongst the Gentiles than any one else had. Thus you see that, when Paul is actually searching for something in his own office to parallel with the functions of a Priest, it is to his character as a Preacher of the Gospel, as a converter of men [the living sacrifices] to God, that his mind turns; and not to the privilege of consecrating the bread and wine in the Communion.

Nor is there, from one end to the other of the New Testament, the least allusion to that privilege as (we do not say the chief, but) any exclusive privilege of the Christian ministry at all. The duties and dignities of the ministry are described often and largely by the Apostles; but the mysterious power of making the body and blood of Christ, and offering it up for sins, is never so much as glanced at in a single passage.

Now it is quite incredible, that if the Apostles really believed that there were Sacrificing Priests under the Gospel-system, they should never have spoken about them at all. Such silence on such a subject would be most improbable under almost any circumstances: but it is quite incredible under the circumstances in which the Apostles were; because, then, no religion (whether Jewish or Pagan) had ever been so much as heard of, which had not Priests, [Sacrificers,] and Altars. It is plain that, in the Epistle to the Hebrews, the Apostle had to meet a difficulty felt by the Jewish converts; who were so attached to the Priests and Sacrifices of the Jewish Law, that they were unwilling to give them up. That difficulty he meets, not by showing them that the Christian religion had Priests and Sacrifices on earth,