in other words, that the Lord Jesus meant what he said, when He said "This is My Body," "This is My Blood,”—we hold to be beyond doubt or dispute, except on the part of unbelievers. To all attempts to explain away their real meaning we are no less opposed than to the falsification of their meaning by the Materialistic School.

What, then, is, what must we acknowledge to be, the true and real meaning of His Words? That without a supernatural, miraculous operation on the part of the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, no reality can correspond to the Words "This is My Body," "This is My Blood," is self-evident; and equally evident it is that by those very words of institution, and

by the command to "do this in remembrance of Him," Christ stands pledged to that supernatural, miraculous operation, in every celebration of the Holy Eucharist by those on whom the Apostolic Commission to "do this" has descended. But, on the other hand, it is equally evident that this pledge of Christ to effect that supernatural, miraculous operation, and by consequence our belief in its reality, must be determined and limited by the conditions under which, and the purpose for which, Christ so pledged Himself. The meaning of the word

This," therefore, when Christ said "This is My Body," is necessarily determined by the precedent words: "Take and eat." As if He had said

"This which I give you to eat, is My Body;" not "this which I give you to do with what you think fit." By the connexion of the words "Take and eat" with the words "This is My Body," every other use of “this” so given, and therewith every other sense attached to the word "This" is excluded. It is not "this" in the abstract, but "this to be taken and eaten." 4 This view of the construction to be put upon the word "this" is strengthened and made obligatory by the very order in which the words were spoken. Even if our Lord had said: "This is My Body; take and eat it," the determining and limiting force of the latter clause must, upon every fair principle of interpretation, have been taken to have a retrospective bearing upon the preceding word "This;" though in that case it might have been to subtle minds to argue for a wider open and more absolute sense to be attributed to the word "This." Such a latitude of construction,

4 See Note H.

the thing given, and with it the sense of "this," is pointed out expressly in the words ac companying, or rather prefacing, the act of giving. Thus it is evident and undeniable that the sense put upon "this" in the sermon "This is my Body," and by the School whose views that sermon represents, is an addition, unwarranted, and therefore unlawful, to the Word of Christ, and to the Ordinance instituted by that Word.

What is thus demonstrable on grammatical, is not less so on theological grounds. Let us endeavour, reverently, not in "presumption" but in "faith," not by way of plausible conjecture"suggested by natural piety," but by way of firm assurance "sanctioned by Holy Scripture," to follow, and, as far as the limits of the human mind may permit, to trace, the course of Christ's supernatural operation in that Holy Mystery.

Here, however, a preliminary difficulty presents itself to many minds in the fact that on the occasion of His instituting the Sacrament of His Body and Blood, the Lord Jesus sat in the midst of His disciples, before their eyes, in visible presence, in the verity of His natural Body. What, it is asked, could His disciples have understood Him to mean when He said, 'Take, eat, this is My Body"; "Drink ye all of this, this is My Blood." They must surely, so reasons the natural intellect, have considered His words to bear not a real, but a figurative meaning. But the act of eating and drinking which He commanded them to perform was not a figurative, but a real act; nor could they have forgotten the earnestness and the emphatic repetition of His statement that He was the Bread of Life; that to eat His Flesh and drink His Blood was the way, and the only way, to obtain Life Eternal; that His Flesh was meat indeed, real meat, and His Blood, drink indeed, real drink. They had been fully instructed, moreover, that the time of His passion was close at hand, when He would actually, in very reality, give His Body and Blood for the life of the world. However much, therefore, they might be, and doubtless were, perplexed by the declaration that this Bread, which He gave them to eat, was His Body, this Wine which He gave them to drink His Blood, they could not possibly take them, and the act of eating and drinking them, to be mere figures; they could not

5 See Note I.

doubt that, by doing as He bade them, they would, in reality, be made partakers of His Body and of His Blood. They must have felt that in all this they were the subjects of a supernatural, a mysterious operation; and thus obedience to His command was, on their part, a simple act of faith. Their case, therefore, did not materially differ from the case of those who should, in after ages, and until His coming again, -even as they themselves did after His Resurrection and Ascension-receive, eat and drink, His Body and Blood in a Mystery.

Nor was this strong demand upon the faith of the disciples made without ample preparation. During His three years' ministry there had been many incidents, and in His discourses with them many intimations, which would induce in their minds the conviction that He that dwelt among them as a man, though they saw Him with their eyes, and handled Him with their hands, was not an ordinary man, but a Supernatural Being; that His relations even to the world of matter were supernatural, and His Word omnipotent. Some of them had been eyewitnesses of His Transfiguration; all had heard Him declare, while He was standing before them on this earth, that He, the Son of Man, was, even then, in Heaven. This memorable declaration of our Lord at once furnishes the key to the whole Mystery of Christ's Presence in the Holy Eucharist. In the hour of its institution there was, by virtue of the simultaneous existence of the Godman both in Heaven and on earth, an anticipation of that which is now, and for ever will be, the standing

miracle of His Church, the communication of His then humbled, now glorified, and, whether humbled or glorified, ever true and always the same, God-inhabited, God united Humanity. The miracle was the same then, as it is now. It is from that God-inhabited, God-united Humanity, now exalted to glory, that the Body and Blood, once offered upon the Cross as a propitiatory Sacrifice for the sins of the whole world, and, by the Resurrection and Ascension, transformed from the natural to the spiritual state and sphere, is supernaturally imparted to all those who, in the "obedience of faith" fulfil His command, Take, eat, this is My Body." "Drink ye all of this, this is my Blood."

His earthly ministers to whom, and through them to all that should believe in Him through

St. John iii. 13.

their word,' He addressed this command, in performing the acts which He performed, and speaking the words which He spake, do so in reliance on His promise, "I am with you always, even unto the end of the world."s The main point to which our attention has to be directed is that which is involved in, pledged by, this promise-viz., the perpetual, invisible, but real and effectual Presence of Christ with those who are assembled in His Name and for the carrying out of His command. If any man ask, "Where is that Presence," we answer :-Doubtless it is in Heaven, whither He has ascended, where He sitteth at the right hand of God. But is it confined to heaven? Assuredly not. Christ is God God is Omnipresent; therefore Christ is Omnipresent. He needeth not to leave His Throne in Heaven, to make good to His disciples His promise of perpetual Presence with them here on earth; nor is this Divine attribute of Omnipresence confined to His Godhead. Through the intimate personal union of Godhead and Manhood in Christ, this attribute passes to the Godmanhood in its glorified state, the Body of Christ being no longer a "natural" but a "spiritual" Body," which is not subject to the limitations of time or space. But this Omnipresent Godmanhood is not at all times and in all places manifested. By His own appointment it is ordinarily veiled from the dwellers upon earth. It may be invoked by them at all times, and His gracious response to those that call upon Him in truth, is Its manifestation. If invoked by them on a special occasion, for a special purpose,—that purpose being consonant with His will,— -a special manifestation of It for that special purpose is vouchsafed ;-and thus we arrive at the idea of a special Presence of Christ in the Holy Eucharist. It is an outflowing of the Omnipresence of Christ, the Godman in His glorified Manhood enthroned in Heaven, to those that seek Him, in the way appointed by Himself, here on earth. The purpose of this particular appointment, so made by Him, is plainly declared by Himself. "I am the Living Bread which came down from Heaven if any man eat of this Bread, he shall live for ever; and the Bread which I will give is My Flesh, which I will give for the life of the world. Verily, verily, I say unto you,

7 St. John xvii. 20.

8 See Note J.

9 See Note K.

'Except ye eat the Flesh of the Son of Man, and drink His Blood, ye have no life in you. Whoso eateth My Flesh, and drinketh My Blood, hath Eternal Life; and I will raise him up at the last day. For My Flesh is meat indeed, and My Blood is drink indeed; he that eateth My Flesh and drinketh My Blood, dwelleth in Me and I in him." It is for the purpose of enabling those who, believing in Him, should seek for Eternal Life through Him, to eat His Flesh and drink His Blood, that "He took Bread, and when He had given thanks, He brake it and said, 'Take, eat, this is My Body, which is broken for you: this do in remembrance of Me;' and 'after the same manner also He took the Cup, saying, 'This Cup is the New Testament in My Blood: this do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of Me.' "2 The devout communicant, therefore, who comes to "do this in remembrance," not of his Crucified Saviour only, once for all offered upon the Cross, but of his Glorified Saviour, Omnipresent and Everpresent in Heaven; always, albeit invisibly, present likewise on earth, and specially manifesting His Presence to those that seek Him and obey His Command in His own Ordinance, has the fullest warrant for believing that when he comes in such "obedience of faith" to do what Christ has bidden him to do, this Bread and this Cup is "verily and indeed" the Communion of the Body and Blood of Christ, whereof he is "verily and indeed” made a partaker by Christ Himself, then and there specially, and for a special purpose, manifesting His Presence and giving His Flesh to be eaten and His Blood to be drunk in a mystery, -after a heavenly and spiritual manner of His Presence, surpassing the comprehension of the finite intellect reasoning about things spiritual in a materialistic fashion. He has, to use the phraseology of the schools, a "real," not an "ideal," a "spiritual," not a "material,” and a "subjective," as well as "objective" Presence of Christ's Body and Blood. All this he has; in all this he finds, even as he seeks, Life,— Life Eternal now, while he continues to dwell here on earth, as well as the pledge of Life Eternal hereafter, in the Paradise of God, in

1 St. John vi. 51, 53-56.

2 See Note L.

31 Cor x 16.

the presence of Christ in Heaven, when his soul shall have been freed from the body of this death; to be followed, after the resurrection of the last day, by Eternal Life in the New Creation. Is not this enough? What more, what else, can he want or desire ?

Is it becoming, is it consistent with the reverence due to Christ so manifested to him, that he should ask curious and impertinent questions concerning this Heavenly Mystery? In a mind and heart filled to overflowing with the sense of that Mysterious, Life-giving Presence, can there be room, or leisure, for such questions? + Shall he indulge in fanciful speculations and importune the Holy Ghost for affirmative or negative answers as to the truth of such speculations, founded on no warrant of God's Word, but only on the vague suggestions of "natural piety," and the presumptuous inferences of a hard materialistic logic? Is not the very fact of such questions obtruding themselves upon the mind a proof of the injurious effect produced by the vain efforts of the human intellect to grasp the Infinite, to localise on earth things in their nature heavenly, and to materialise things spiritual, which cannot be otherwise than spiritually discerned? What other result can be looked for from such unhallowed intrusion into "the deep things of God," than that the light beaming forth from the glorious cloud of Divine Mystery should be obscured by mists of human fancy, and the clear vision of faith offuscated and perplexed by vain phantoms of superstition? The state of spiritual blindness thus engendered does indeed, as it alone can, account for the upgrowth of the strange devices and imaginings of those novel Eucharistic theories which are rife at this time in the field of theology, and in the "high places" of ritualistic will-worship, and by which the peace of the Church is sadly broken and pious souls are miserably disquieted. Truly marvellous it is that, in the face of the simple command and promise of Christ, which forms the basis of true Eucharistic worship, any should have the temerity to claim the benefit of the latter, while of deliberate purpose dispensing with obedience to the former, as is done in non-communicant attendance on the Holy Eucharist.

4 See Note M.

5

Ir is satisfactory to find that Mr. Keble, at least, is not responsible for this fruit of his own doctrine, of which, however, it was no more than a natural result. In defence of it, Mr. Carter, speaking of the "propitiatory" character of the Sacrament, observes :

“For this end as well as for the life-giving Communion of Himself, our Lord ordained the perpetuation of His sacramental act. We are to show forth our Lord's Death till He come,' and in this Memorial Offering all who are present may unite, even though they communicate not. In the case of the Priest communion is of necessity, or there would not be a true sacrifice.

The Priest must eat of the Sacrifice which he offers, for the consumption is the completeness of the surrender of the sacrifice. But this same necessity does not lie in the same way on others who are present. They only need to unite themselves with him, the celebratiug priest, and in joining with him they make his offering their own, sharing with him in its blessedness."-Carter, Spiritual Instruction x. pp. 99, 100.

The coolness with which our Lord's Words, "Drink ye all of this," are superseded by Mr. Carter's ipse dixit, "they may unite, even though they communicate not," is astounding. The abuse of the Sacrament which it is attempted thus to justify, and which, we regret to say, is coming more and more into vogue as a substitute for the Holy Communion, is one of the evil fruits of the materialistic doctrine by which, if there were no other proof, it would stand condemned, on the principle that the "tree is known by its fruit." This new "devotion," as it is called, or, as in truth it is, this new fashion of will-wors ip, aggravates manifest disobedience to Christ's Word by a pretended act of homage. In a matter of this kind, which

See Note N.

touches, so to speak, the Person of Christ Himself, this is truly awful. To do with Christ Himself, according to the daring hypothesis of the materialistic theo y,-as we list;-to take and eat, which He has commanded, or else, leaving His Gift of Himself untasted;-to gaze and adore, which He has not commanded, and which is plainly contrary to His Holy Word;-to treat Him, in fact, as if He were-the Godman indeed, but the Godman reduced to the condition of a Thing, to be done with as His creatures may think proper, according to the promptings of their own minds, which under the name of "Natural Piety," are made their rule of belief and action-in such a matter as this, we say, deliberately to do under colour of professed homage to Christ an unauthorised act, while leaving His positive command unfulfilled, cannot be other than a grievous, a deadly sin. It is, in fact, the identical sin for which Saul was rejected from being king over Israel; the sin which drew from the inspired lips of the prophet the withering rebuke: "Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt-offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness as iniquity and idolatry.

זיי

Are they who deal thus in wilfulness with the Lord Jesus Christ Himself actually Present— though not in the carnal manner pretended by them—in the Holy Eucharist, not afraid of the awful punishment of the sin they are committing and encouraging, yea, urging others to commit? Have they no misgiving of being visited with that most terrible of God's judg ments, spiritual blindness? Is not the state of

6 St. Matt. xii. 33.

7 1 Sam. xv. 22, 23

M