and sacramentality; but for the real exhibition and ministration of it. For it is truly called the body of Christ, because there is joined with it the vital power, virtue, and efficacy of the body: and, therefore, it is called by St. Austin ', ' The intelligential, the invisible, the spiritual body.'-By St. Jerome, The divine and spiritual flesh:'- the celestial thing,' by St. Irenæus; the spiritual food, and the body of the Divine Spirit,' by St. Ambrose. For, by this means, it can very properly be called the body and blood of Christ':' since it hath not only the figure of his death externally, but internally it hath hidden and secret, the proper and divine effect, the life-giving power of his body: so that, though it be a figure, yet it is not merely so; not only the sign and memorial of him that is absent, but it bears along with it the very body of the Lord, that is, the efficacy and divine virtue of it. Thus our blessed Saviour said of John the Baptist, that Elias is already come,' because he came in the power and spirit of Elias. As John is Elias, so is the holy sacrament the body and blood of Christ, because it hath the power and spirit of the body of Christ. And, therefore, the ancient doctors of the church, in their sermons of these divine mysteries, use the word.' nature' and substance,' not understanding these words in the natural or philosophical, but a theological sense, proper to the schools of Christians; by substance,' meaning the power of the substance;' by nature,' the gracious effect of his natural body:' the nature, and use, and mysteriousness of sacraments so allowing them to speak, and so requiring us to understand.

4. And now to this spiritual food must be fitted a spiritual manner of reception; and this is the work of faith; that spiritual blessings may invest the spirit, and be conveyed by proportioned instruments, lest the sacrament be like a treasure in a dead hand, or music in the grave. But this I choose rather to represent in the words of the fathers of the church, than mine own: "We see," saith St. Epiphanius',

1 Laus fidei est credere quod non vides.

• Immortalitatis alimonia datur, à communibus cibis differens, corporalis substantiæ retinens speciem, sed virtutis divinæ invisibili efficientia probans adesse præsentiam.- S. Cyprian. de cœna Dom.

"what our Saviour took into his hands, as the Gospel says, 'He arose at supper and took this; and when he had given thanks, he said, This is my body:' and we see it is not equal, nor like to it, neither to the invisible Deity, nor to the flesh; for this is of a round form, without sense: but by grace he would say, This is mine.' And every one hath faith in this saying: for he that doth not believe this to be true as He hath said, he is fallen from grace and salvation. But that which we have heard, that we believe, that it is his."-And again ; "The bread indeed is our food, but the virtue which is in it, is that which gives us life; by faith" and efficacy, by hope and the perfection of the mysteries, and by the title of sanctification, it should be made to us the perfection of salvation.- For these words are spirit and life; and the flesh pierces not into the understanding of this depth, unless faith come*.-But then, the bread is food, the blood is life, the flesh is substance, the body is the church."-" For the body is indeed shown, it is slain, and given for the nourishment of the world, that it may be spiritually distributed to every one; and be made to every one the conservatory of them to the resurrection of eternal life;" saith St. Athanasius." Therefore, because Christ said, This is my body,' let us not at all doubt, but believe, and receive it with the eye of the soul, for nothing sensible is delivered us; but by sensible things, he gives us insensible or spiritual:"-So St. Chrysostom." For Christ would not, that they, who partake of the divine mysteries, should attend to the nature of the things which are seen, but let them (by faith) believe the change is made by grace.""For according to the substance of the creatures, it remains after consecration the same it did before; but it is changed inwardly by the powerful virtue of the Holy Spirit; and faith sees it, it feeds the soul, and ministers the substance of eternal life: for now faith sees it all, whatsoever it is "

From these excellent words, we are confirmed in these Autor lib. de cœna Dom.:-Fides non habet meritum, cui humana ratio præbet experimentum.— S. Greg.

* Arcanum cœli Dominus pro tempore celat,

Ut sic nostra fides ad justitiam doceatur,

Et fidei major merces exinde sequatur.- Petr. Blesens.

De peccat. in Spir. S.

Theodoret. dial. 1.

2 S. Chrysost. ubi supra in Matth. ii, 6.
Bertram. de corp. et sang. Domini.

two things. 1. That the divine mysteries are of very great efficacy and benefit to our souls. 2. That faith is the great instrument in conveying these blessings to us. For as St. Cyprian affirms, "The sacraments, of themselves, cannot be without their own virtue; and the Divine Majesty does, at no hand, absent itself from the mysteries." But then, unless by faith we believe all this that Christ said, there is nothing remaining but the outward symbols, and the sense of flesh and blood, which profits nothing. But to believe in Christ, is to eat the flesh of Christ. "I am the bread of life; he that cometh to me, shall not hunger;" that is, he shall be filled with Christ: "And he that believeth in me, shall not thirst." Coming to Christ,' and 'believing in him,' is the same thing; that is, he that believes Christ's words, and obeys his commandments; he that owns Christ for his Lawgiver and his Master, for his Lord and his Redeemer; he who lays down his sins in the grave of Jesus, and lays down himself at the foot of the cross, and his cares at the door of the temple, and his sorrows at the throne of grace; he who comes to Christ to be instructed, to be commanded, to be relieved, and to be comforted; -to this person Christ gives his body and blood, that is, food from heaven. And then the bread of life, and the body of Christ, and eating his flesh, and drinking his blood, are nothing else but mysterious and sacramental expressions of this great excellency,-that whoever does this, shall partake of all the benefits of the cross of Christ, where his body was broken, and his blood was poured forth for the remission of our sins, and the salvation of the world. But still, that I may use the words of St. Ambrose", "Christ is handled by faith, he is seen by faith; he is not touched by the body, he is not comprehended by the eyes."

5. But all the inquiry is not yet past: for thus we rightly understand the mysterious propositions; but thus we do not fully understand the mysterious sacrament. For since coming to Christ in all the addresses of Christian religion, that is, in all the ministries of faith,-is eating of the body and drinking the blood of Christ, what does faith in the recep tion of the blessed sacrament that it does not do without it? Of this I have already given an account : but here I am to d John, vi. 35. Chap. 1. sect. 2.

Ubi supra.

• In Lucam lib. vi. e. 8.

add, that in the holy communion all the graces of a Christian, all the mysteries of the religion are summed up as in a divine compendium; and whatsoever moral or mysterious is done without, is, by a worthy communicant, done more excellently in this divine sacrament. For here we continue the confession of our faith, which we made in baptism; here we perform in our own persons what then was undertaken for us by another; here that is made explicit, which was but implicit before; what then was in the root, is now come to a full ear; what was at first done in mystery alone, is now done in mystery and moral actions, and virtuous excellencies together; here we do not only hear the words of Christ, but we obey them; we believe with the heart, and here we confess with the mouth, and we act with the hand, and incline the head, and bow the knee, and give our heart in sacrifice; here we come to Christ, and Christ comes to us; here we represent the death of Christ as he would have us represent it, and remember him, as he commanded us to remember him; here we give him thanks, and here we give him ourselves; here we defy all the works of darkness; and hither we come to be invested with a robe of light, by being joined to the Sun of Righteousness,' to live in his eyes, and to walk by his brightness, and to be refreshed with his warmth, and directed by his Spirit, and united to his glories. So that if we can receive Christ's body, and drink his blood ont of the sacrament, much more can we do it in the sacrament. For this is the chief of all the Christian mysteries, and the union of all Christian blessings, and the investiture of all Christian rights, and the exhibition of the charter of all Christian promises, and the exercise of all Christian duties. Here is the exercise of our faith, and acts of obedience, and the confirmation of our hope, and the increase of our charity. So that although God be gracious in every dispensation, yet he is bountiful in this: although we serve God in every virtue, yet, in the worthy reception of this divine sacrament, there must be a conjugation of virtues, and, therefore, we serve him more: we drink deep of his loving-kindness in every effusion of it, but in this we are inebriated: he always fills our cup, but here it runs over.

The Effects of these Considerations are these.

1. That by faith' in our dispositions and preparations

་

to the holy communion, is not understood only the act'of faith, but the body' of faith, not only believing the articles, but the dedication of our persons; not only a yielding up of our understanding, but the engaging of our services; nor the hallowing of one faculty, but the sanctification of the whole man. That faith, which is necessary to the worthy receiving this divine sacrament, is all that which is necessary to the susception of baptism, and all that which is produced by hearing the word of God, and all that which is exercised in every single grace; and all that by which we live the life of grace, and all that which works by charity, and makes a new creature, and justifies a sinner, and is a keeping of the commandments of God.

If the manducation of Christ's flesh and drinking his blood be spiritual, and done by faith, and is effected by the Spirit, and that this faith signifies an entire dedition of ourselves to Christ, and sanctification of the whole man to the service of Christ,-then it follows, that the wicked do not communicate with Christ, they eat not his flesh, and they drink not his blood: they eat and drink indeed; but it is gravel in their teeth, and death in their belly; they eat and drink damnation to themselves. For unless a man be a member of Christ, unless Christ dwells in him by a living faith, he does not eat the bread that came down from heaven". They lick the rock," saith St. Cyprian, "but drink not the waters of its emanation :"-" They receive the skin of the sacrament, and the bran of the flesh:" saith St. Bernard. But it is in this divine nutriment, as it is in some fruits; the skin is bitterness, and the inward juice is salutary and pleasant; the outward symbols never bring life, but they can bring death; and they of whom it can be said (according to the expression of St. Austin"), "they eat no spiritual meat, but they eat the sign of Christ," must also remember what old Simeon said of his prophecy of Christ, "He is a sign, set for the fall of many;" but his flesh and blood, spiritually eaten, is resurrection from the dead.

Panis qui de cœlo descendit, non nisi ab eo accipitur, qui Dominum habet et Christi membrum est.— - S. Hilar. de Trinit. lib. viii.

h Non manducant spiritualiter, sed premunt dentibus signum corporis et sanguinis.