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yet by His appointment become to us the Body and Blood of His SON. In short, there is nothing which the Body and Blood of CHRIST can be to the spirits of men, but by these tokens He exhibits it to us, and gives us an interest in it. This is spiritually to eat His flesh and drink His Blood; as both our Church and the ancient speak. Our souls entertain and feast themselves upon His Sacrifice; being really made partakers of whatsoever His Body and Blood can do for them. Which St. Gregory Nazianzen meant, I should think, when he saith, that "these oblations are the communication of the incarnation of GOD, and of the sufferings of GOD."-pp. 45-48.

It is certain that it was not common bread and wine which the ancient Christians prayed might become the Body and Blood of CHRIST to them; but bread and wine first sanctified, by being offered to GOD with thanksgiving, and presented to Him with due acknowledgments that He was the LORD and giver of all things. After which followed a thankful mention of the great love of God, in sending His Son to redeem mankind by His death, represented by that holy bread and wine broken and poured out, in commemoration of His Passion. This was the principal thing of all, which our Church therefore expressly puts us in mind of, in the words now recited; and distinctly acknowledges in the Prayer of Consecration. As for the other, that also is to be understood when you see the bread and wine set upon God's table by him that ministers in this divine service. Then it is offered to GOD; for whatsoever is solemnly placed there, becomes by that means a thing dedicated and appropriated to Him.

And if you observe the time when this bread and wine is ordered to be placed there, which is immediately after the alms of the people have been received for the poor, you will see it is intended by our Church to be a thankful oblation to God of the fruits of the earth. And, accordingly, all that are there present, when they behold the priest thus preparing the bread and wine for consecratiou to an higher mystery, should secretly lift up their souls to GoD in hearty thanksgiving, and offer Him the Sacrifice of praise for these and all other such like benefits;

desiring Him to accept of these gifts, as a small token of their grateful sense that they hold all they have of Him, as the great LORD of the world. And so we are taught to do in that prayer which immediately follows in our Liturgy, "for the whole state of CHRIST'S Church," and wherein we humbly beseech Him to "accept" not only "our alms," but also our "oblation." These are things distinct, and, the former "alms" signifying that which was given for the relief of the poor, the latter "oblation" can signify nothing else but (according to the style of the ancient Church) this bread and wine presented to GoD, in a thankful remembrance of our food both dry and liquid (as Justin Martyr speaks), which He, the Creator of the world, hath made and given unto us. But, above all, we must be sure to offer our devoutest acknowledgments for that gift of gifts, the Son of God dying for us; without which thanksgiving, to speak the truth, we do not do that which CHRIST commanded, and so cannot hope for the blessing He hath promised. Hear St. Chrysostom (instead of all that treat of this matter) who excellently declares the manner and reason of thanksgiving, in a sermon of his upon the eighth chapter of St. Matthew." "A perpetual memory," saith he, “and thanksgiving for a good turn, is the best way that can be found "to secure and preserve it to us. And, therefore, the dreadful "mysteries and full of salvation, which we celebrate in every

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assembly, are called the Eucharist; because they are a com"memoration of many benefits, and show forth the principal

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piece of Divine providence, and dispose us always to give Him "thanks. For if to be born of a virgin was a great wonder, "what was it to be crucified, to shed His blood for us, and to

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give Himself to us for a feast and a spiritual banquet? What "shall we call this? Where shall we place it? We can do no "less than give His thanks perpetually. . . . . And, therefore, the "priest, when this Sacrifice is in hand, bids us thank God for "the whole world; for what is past, and what is present, and "for those things that are to come.' This sets us free from the

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earth, and translates us to heaven; and of men makes us "angels. . . . For that Only Begotten Son of His, who was more "precious to Him than all things besides, hath He given for us

"enemies ;-and not only given Him, but, after that gift, set "Him before us on our table; doing all things Himself for us, "both to give, and then to make us thankful for His gifts. For, "mankind being generally ungrateful, He undertakes through"out, and doth all things for us Himself. And what He did for "the Jews, putting them in mind of His benefits, from places, " and times, and feasts, that He hath done here; from a kind of "Sacrifice, casting us into a perpetual remembrance of the good He bath wrought for us."-pp. 68-71.

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TOWERSON, PRESBYTER.-Explication of the Catechism, Part iv.

But because the fore-mentioned Baronius tells us that the Sacrament, whereof we speak, had also the name of an "oblation," or "Sacrifice," as that too because of the "offering" there made for sin, or an expiatory one; therefore it will be necessary for us to go on to inquire into that name, and so much the rather because the same author is so copious in his quotations concerning it. And I readily grant that this Sacrament is frequently so called by the ancients, but that it was called so for the reason alleged is utterly denied, neither can there be produced any convincing proof of it. The utmost that can be said by those who are the most ancient, is, that it is an eucharistical oblation, as that too for the blessings of this world, and particularly for the fruits of the earth, as well as for the blessings of our redemption. And to that purpose, and no other, are the sayings before quoted out of Justin Martyr, and Irenæus, and Origen. Which, how they agree with their designs who represent this Sacrament as an expiatory oblation or Sacrifice, I shall leave to all indifferent men to judge. And though it be true, that some of those who followed, spake in another strain, and represented it also as an oblation "for the benefit of the offerers" and others, as well as an eucharistical oblation for benefits received, yet it is evident, from Mr. Mede, that the ancients meant no more by that oblation or Sacrifice, than a commemorative one, by that sacred rite of bread and wine representing GOD and the FATHER the expiatory Sacrifice of His Son upon the Cross, and, as it were'

putting Him in mind of it, that so be He would, for the sake of that Son, and the valuableness of His Sacrifice, be propitious to them, and to all those whom they recommended to His grace and favour. And, indeed, as it is not difficult to conceive, that they who meant no more, when they called the Eucharist the Body of CHRIST, than its being a figure, and a memorial, and a means of its conveyance, meant no more, when they entituled it a Sacrifice, than a commemoration of that great one, which CHRIST made of Himself upon the Cross; so it is evident, that St. Cyprian (with whose authority Baronius begins his proofs) meant no more than such a commemorative Sacrifice. . . . And if they who insist so much upon its having been entituled a Sacrifice, will content themselves with this, and the former sense, we will allow that they have the Fathers on their side, but otherwise to have no title to them in this affair.-pp. 168, 9.

Let us go on to inquire, because a question of far greater moment, whether he who administers this Sacrament is obliged by the words of the institution, or otherwise, to make an "offering to GOD of CHRIST'S Body and Blood," as well as to make a tender of the Sacrament thereof to men; the Council of Trent, as is well known, avowing that to be the importance of the words, "Do in this in remembrance of Me;" and that the Apostles were, by the same words, appointed priests to offer them.-p. 274.

Yet will not the words Touto molɛtte reach that Sacrifice which is intended to be superstructed upon them; because he who commands men to sacrifice, or offer, in remembrance of himself, doth rather enjoin a commemorative than expiatory one, and, consequently, not that Sacrifice which is intended. So little is there in the words themselves, how favourably soever considered, to oblige us to understand them of such an offering as the Church of Rome advanceth. And we shall find them to signify as little, though we take in the sense of the Catholick Church upon them, how conformably soever the Council of Trent affirms it to be unto its own; because, though the ancients did all agree upon a Sacrifice, and, which is more, looked upon those words as either directly or indirectly obliging to the offering of it, yet, (as hath been elsewhere shown) they advanced other kinds of

Sacrifices than what the Church of Rome now doth, and consequently, cannot be supposed to give any countenance to it. And I shall only add, that though Justin Martyr represented that offering of fine flour, which was offered for those that were cleansed from the leprosy, as a type of the bread of the Eucharist; though he moreover applied the word Tour to that bread, and (if any of the fathers, therefore, did,) affirmed CHRIST to command us to "make," or "offer," that bread to God; yet he adds, that "He commanded us to do so in remembrance of that Passion which He suffered for those that were cleansed in their souls ;" and again," that we might at the same time give thanks to God for His having made the world, and all things in it for the sake of man, and for His having delivered us, by CHRIST, from that wickedness, in which we sometimes were, and dissolved all noxious principalities and powers," which shows him not to have thought in the least of our being commanded to offer CHRIST'S Body and Blood, under the species of bread, or indeed of any other Sacrifice, than a commemorative or eucharistical one.pp. 276, 7.

BULL, BISHOP AND DOCTOR.-Sermon xiii. Common Prayers, ancient, useful, and necessary.

St. Paul the Apostle had, in the foregoing chapter, (1 Tim. i.) given instructions to bishop (or rather archbishop) Timothy, concerning the regulation of preaching and preachers within his province, which was the proconsular Asia, of which Ephesus was the metropolis...

To this public person, to this great bishop of the Church, is this charge given by St. Paul, in my text; "I exhort, therefore, that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks, be made for all men," &c. He was to take care that such prayers should be made in all Churches and Congregations under his inspection and jurisdiction. And how could he do this, but by providing by his authority, that there should be set forms of prayer, framed according to this rule given him by the Apostle, to be used in those Churches? Sure I am, the primi

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