fices, the perpetuation of the mysterious and eventful tragedy of Calvary, and the continued application of the incarnation of the Son of God; then the Bible is, indeed, a dark book, and we stand in need of another revelation to explain the last. Then, to the virtual exclusion of spiritual worship and heartfelt devotion, forms, and ceremonies, and the opus operatum are the things acceptable to God, who no longer holds His throne in light, where happy myriads of bright spirits adore Him; but, though He refuses to be worshipped in the glorious Sun, is to be bowed down to in a drop of wine or a mouse-eaten wafer, or, lower still, and I blush while my pen writes it, in our own loathsome excrement. Oh, gracious God! how long?

CHAPTER VII.

THE FATHERS UPON THE EFFECTS OF CONSECRATION.

I HAVE before expressed my surprise at so much having been said about the ancient liturgies, as to their age and their authority, and so little use having been made of them afterwards. They are hardly referred to or quoted for the establishment of any point which the Archdeacon advocates, or for the refutation of any opinion to which he is antagonistic. He has endeavoured to increase their authority, by greatly extending the antiquity of our present copies, and then seems to leave it quietly to be implied that they, without question, teach all that he would have us believe. I think I have satisfactorily shewn, that that is not by any means the case; but, on the contrary, that these venerable forms of the ancient service are thoroughly antagonistic to the whole Popish scheme, which is once again being propounded for our acceptance.

Forsaking, then, the liturgies (I conclude, because he felt that they were against him), Mr. Wilberforce betakes himself to the Fathers; and, although I have before shewn what are their opinions of the Eucharist in some points of view; yet, perhaps, I ought to follow my opponent, and examine the passages which he has brought. If it can be shewn that the Fathers speak a different language from that which I have adduced from them, still it will not prove that Mr. Wilberforce's doctrine is correct, but that the witnesses are not worthy of credit-since they contradict one another, if not themselves. I must confess, however, that I have no such fears. I believe that the absurdities and mon

strosities of Popery were never present to the minds of the ancient Christian writers, whose works have descended to us; and I enter upon the course in which the Archdeacon leads, without the slightest apprehension that I shall find him recognised by those primitive worthies, however anxious he may prove to allege their countenance, and claim their society.

In passing, then, from the liturgies to the Fathers, Mr. Wilberforce thus speaks :

So much respecting the ancient liturgies, and the proofs which they afford (where are they? I have found none), that the gift bestowed in the Holy Eucharist is bestowed through the elements. We now come to the next head of arguments, the direct statements of ancient writers, that the efficacy of the Holy Eucharist depends upon the change which consecration effects in the elements. From which it would seem to be a necessary inference, that it is through the elements themselves that the benefit conveyed in this ordinance is communicated. The language of ancient writers on this subject is less uniformly explicit seemingly than it would be, because their habitual unwillingness to expose sacred subjects to the profaneness of the heathen, restricted the express mention of that to which they allude."

So that it appears the Archdeacon is not so sure of his ground as he would at first have us believe. He is, undoubtedly, quite right in saying that the Fathers are not "uniformly explicit" on the subject of his effete heresy. He thinks, however, that he can find four ancient authors, to whom he can refer with perfect confidence, in whose case "grounds for reserve did not exist. In the catechetical lectures, therefore, of St. Ambrose, St. Cyril, St. Gregory Nyssen, and St. Gaudentius, we find express statements of the change which consecration was supposed to make in the holy elements." But even with respect to these, his own selected and approved witnesses, he thinks it needful to caution us, lest we mistake their meaning. "So forcible," says he, are their expressions, that it is necessary to add, by way of caution, that they must not be supposed to have admitted any carnal presence of Christ,-i.e., any such presence as that He could be an object to the senses." Protestants would have said, "i.e., not any cor

poreal presence at all." It might have occurred to any one feeling it necessary to give the caution which is given by Mr. Wilberforce, that the whole of these expressions are simply figurative or hyperbolical.

A beginning is made with St. Ambrose, who, "after speaking of the regenerating force of baptism, goes on to affirm, that in the Holy Eucharist is vouchsafed the real presence of Christ's body and blood:

'You may, perhaps, say, that which I see is something different: how do you prove to me that I receive the body of Christ? This is what it remains for me to prove. What examples, therefore, am I to use? Let me prove that this is not that which nature has made it, but that which the benediction has consecrated it to be: and that the force of the benediction is greater than that of nature, because by the benediction nature herself is changed.'+

"And then, after citing various instances from the Old Testament, in which an external element had been made the means of conferring an inward gift, and of the influence exercised by the one upon the other, ending with the mystery of the incarnation, he concludes:

Our Lord Jesus Christ Himself proclaims, this is my body. Before the sacred words of benediction, another species is named, after consecration the body is implied. He Himself speaks of His blood. Before consecration it is spoken of as another thing. After consecration it is named blood. And you' (i.e., the receiver)' say Amen—that is, it is true. What your mouth expresses, let your inner mind confess feel what you say.'"‡

One might have supposed, that the second of these quotations, made from St. Ambrose, would have sufficiently explained his meaning, and have shewn that he spoke figuratively. There is a sense, undoubtedly, in which every word quoted is strictly true, but it is in a figurative one only. If we attempt to bind down these expressions to a literal interpretation, they become at once heretical in themselves, and at variance with other parts of the

* See Doct. H. Euch. pp. 62-66. + De Mysteriis. ix. 50.

Ibid. 54.

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same author's writings. The folly, however, of thus interpreting by the strictness of the letter the expressions quoted, was shewn long since by Bishop Stillingfleet, in a review of the whole passage:

"1. St. Ambrose," says the bishop, "doth parallel the change in the Eucharist with that in baptism; and to prove regeneration therein, he argues from the miraculous conception of Christ in the womb of the virgin; but in baptism nobody supposes the substance of the water to be taken away; and therefore it cannot hold as to the other, from the supernatural change, which may be only with respect to such a divine influence, which it had not before consecration. 2. He doth purposely talk obscurely and mystically about this matter, as the Fathers were wont to do to those who were to be admitted to these mysteries. Sometimes one would think he meant that the elements are changed into Christ's individual body born of the virgin; and yet, presently after, he distinguishes between the true flesh of Christ, which was crucified and buried, and the sacrament of His flesh. If this were the same, what need any distinction? And that this sacramentum carnis, is meant of the Eucharist, is plain by what follows; for he cites Christ's words, This is my body.' 3. He best explains his own meaning, when he saith, not long after, That the body of Christ in the sacrament is a spiritual body, or body produced by the Divine Spirit;' and so he parallels it with that spiritual food, which the Israelites did eat in the wilderness: and no man will say that the substance of the manna was then lost. And since your authors make the same St. Ambrose to have written the book De Sacramentis, there is a notable passage therein, which helps to explain this; for there he saith expressly, Non iste panis est qui vadit in corpus, sed ille panis vitæ æternæ qui animæ nostræ substantiam fulcit.' It is not the bread which passes into the body, but the bread of eternal life, which strengthens the substance of our soul.' Where he not only calls it bread after consecration, which goes to our nourishment; but he distinguishes it from the bread of eternal life, which supports the soul, which must be understood of divine grace, and not of any bodily substance."*

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Here, then, we have a full reply to this quotation of the Archdeacon from St. Ambrose. But, to say nothing of the folly of taking every chance phrase of a writer (and that, too, when he is drawing parallels between things which, in many points, do not

* Doc. of the Trin. and Transubst. compared as to scripture, reason, and tradition.