IMAGES.

TRANSUBSTANTIATION.

receive are a divine thing, because by them we are made partakers of the Divine nature, and yet the substance or nature of the bread and wine does not cease to exist.-Pope Gelasius, De duabus Naturis.

By nature it (the Eucharist) is corruptible bread and corruptible wine, and through the truth of the Lord's word it is truly the body and blood of Christ, yet not corporeally but spiritually. There is much difference between that body in which Christ suffered, and that which is consecrated into the Eucharist &c.-Paschal Homily of the Anglo-Saxon Church.

COMMUNION IN BOTH KINDS.

We find that some persons, receiving the holy body only, abstain from the cup of the holy blood; who without doubt, (since they are withheld by some unknown superstition), should either receive the Sacrament WHOLE, or be repelled from the whole, because a division of the one and the same mystery cannot occur without A GREAT SACRILEGE.--Pope Gelasius, Dist. 2. de consecr. c. comperimus.

While the bread is broken, while the blood is poured from the cup into the mouths of the faithful, what else is signified but His death on the Cross, and the flowing of His blood from

Whereas in some parts of the world, certain persons presume rashly to assert that the Christian people ought to receive the holy Sacrament of the Eucharist under both kinds of bread and wine. . this present holy general Council of Constance . . declares, decrees, and determines, that although Christ instituted this Sacrament after Supper, and administered it to His disciples under both kinds of bread and wine, yet notwithstanding this . . . and in like manner, although in the primitive Church this Sacrament was received of the faithful under both kinds, yet for the avoiding

His side?-Lanfranc, Archbp. of Canterbury, de Eucharistia Sacramento.

No one shall communicate, without receiving the body and the blood, SEPARATELY; except through necessity and precaution.-Council of Clermont, Can.

28.

any dangers and scandals, the custom has reasonably been introduced, that it be received by the laity only under the kind of bread.-Council of Constance, Sess. xiii.

The above instances of differences on very important points are but a few of those which might be traced; and they will sufficiently shew the fallacy of that reasoning which would deny the continuity of the Church, merely on the ground that such differences can be pointed out. No one denies that the English Church before the Reformation was the same Church which existed in Anglo-Saxon times, though it certainly had been altered in some material respects in the course of ages. Therefore the mere fact that important changes did take place at the Reformation; changes which, in various points, restored what had been originally received or practised, cannot afford any presumption that the English Church lost her continuity. We may in consequence pass over Mr. Sibthorp's allegations with reference to the Papal Supremacy, Invocation of Saints, the Sacrifice of the Mass, Purgatory, and other points. Even

f I would merely remark that our views of the public service of the Church in ancient times do not depend on the opinions of an individual Father, but on the nature of that service itself. The references then to Pope Gregory (p. 26.) cannot prove the offices of the Church in his days to have been objectionable, more especially as he does not maintain the doctrine that the sacrifice of Christ on the Cross was repeated or continued in the Eucharist.

supposing that he could establish the full extent of what he contends for, or shew that there is a real difference in principle on these points (which however is by no means the case), still we might reply, that we, on our parts, can shew differences fully as important between the Anglo-Saxon Church, and the Church just before the Reformation.

III. I shall only make one or two further observations, and then conclude. Mr. Sibthorp alleges that the mode in which I have shewn the agreement between the Church of England at all times, would equally shew that Donatists, Novatians, Arians, and Nestorians, belonged to the unity of the Church. (p. 32.) He forgets that the former sects were open separatists from the Universal Church, and that the latter were condemned by her formal judgments. Therefore they could not have been any part of the Church. It is plain that the case of those Sectaries is wholly irrelevant, and has nothing to do with the position of the English Church.

There is nothing strange or absurd in the assertion that all sects holding fundamental doctrines do not belong to the Church of Christ. Mr. Sibthorp appears wholly to forget that there is such a sin as schism; and that, putting aside the question as to whether episcopacy is or is not fundamental, there can be no doubt that those who have voluntarily separated from the communion of the Church, and from obedience to their legitimate pastors, as the founders of Dissent did, were really schismatics, and as such were cut off from the Christian Church.

I enquired whether "there are not contentions at this moment on the Papal Supremacy and authority, the celibacy of the Clergy, the use of the Latin language in the Liturgy." Mr. Sibthorp replies, "What contentions? and where? I affirm that they exist only in the imagination of the writer." (p. 37.) I think I have said "what" contentions are meant. "Where?" In Germany, Poland, Spain, America, and elsewhere. Had Mr. Sibthorp perused the Encyclical Letter of Gregory XVI. (quoted in my Treatise on the Church, Part 1. Chap. xi, where the divisions of the Roman Church are more particularly examined), and considered the state of Germany, and the continued existence of Hermesian doctrines lately developed in the Dublin Review, he would not have ventured to ask the questions which he has done.

I now take my leave of this subject, and resign its further prosecution into the hands of other writers, who are fully competent to the task which they have undertaken.

OXFORD:

PRINTED BY I. SHRIMPTON.