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owning another sacrifice than that which God appointed? and are we not committing likewise the deadly sin of idolatry? "The bread," saith our Lord, "that I shall give you, is my flesh,” meaning his life. "The words that I speak unto you, they are Spirit and they are Life,"-" it is the Spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing.” Our Saviour gave his life as an atoning sacrifice for the forfeited life of the whole world, both Jews and Gentiles; and of which every true believer shall partake. "As often," says St. Paul, "as ye eat THIS BREAD and drink this cup, ye do shew the Lord's death till He come;" that, therefore, which is eaten in the Lord's Supper is still bread, and this text may of itself be considered as decisive against the doctrine of transubstantiation; and the expression, "ye do shew the Lord's death till he come," is another proof that the institution was commemorative of the death of Christ. Our church in her communion service fully explains the subject. "If with a true penitent heart and lively faith we receive the Holy Sacrament, then we spiritually eat the flesh of Christ, and drink his blood." The astonishing, monstrous doctrine of transubstantiation arose from taking figurative words in a literal sense. According to the doctrine of the church from which we have separated, when words of consecration have been pronounced by the priest, the bread becomes that same actual body of flesh and blood in

which our Saviour suffered on the Cross; and our Lord must have taken his own body in his own hands, and offered it to his disciples. "I believe that God made man," said poor Anne Askew, "but I cannot believe that man can make God."

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The language which our Lord used in instituting the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, is manifestly figurative, and cannot admit of a literal interpretation. When He said "I am the door," was he literally a door. When He said "I am the vine," was he literally a vine." "Cum fruges Cererem, vinum Liberum dicimus, genere quidem sermonis utimur usitato, sed ecquem tam amentem esse putas, qui illud quo vescatur, Deum credat esse."-Cicero de Natura Deorum 3-16. "When we call corn Ceres, and wine Bacchus, we use a familiar kind of speech; but do you think any one so mad as to believe that that is a God which he feeds upon?" May the Church of Rome take a lesson from a heathen.

The last part of this article refers to those whose custom it is to reserve part of the consecrated bread for the purpose of giving it to the sick at some future time, who also " carry about" the host or consecrated wafer, elevate it with superstitious ceremony, and worship it in the same manner as they would worship Jesus Christ: at one moment it is the object of adoration--at the next, a mass of corrupting matter: but it is written, "Thou wilt

not suffer thine Holy One to see corruption." If, you are but sure you know bread and wine, says Baxter, when you see, and feel, and taste, and smell them, then you are at the end of this controversy.

XXIX.

OF THE WICKED, WHICH EAT NOT THE BODY OF CHRIST, IN THE USE OF THE LORD'S SUPPER.

The wicked, and such as be void of a lively faith, although they do carnally and visibly press with their teeth (as St. Augustine saith) the sacrament of the body and blood of Christ, yet, in no wise are they partakers of Christ, but rather, to their condemnation, do eat and drink, the sign or sacrament of so great a thing.

Q. What do you say of the wicked, and such as be void of a lively faith?

A. Although they do carnally and visibly press with their teeth, (as St. Augustine saith,) the sacrament of the body and blood of Christ, yet in no wise are they partakers of Christ.

Q. What do they rather eat and drink?

A. To their condemnation they do eat and drink the sign, or sacrament of so great a thing.

1 Corinthians x. 21.

Scripture Proofs.

Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord, and the cup of Devils: ye cannot be partakers of the Lord's table, and of the table of Devils.

1 Corinthians xi. 29. For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to himself, not discerning the Lord's body.

The inward and spiritual effects of the sacrament depend upon the state and disposition of him who communicates; so we of the Church of England, who own no other presence but an inward and spiritual one, cannot conceive that the wicked who believe not in Christ do receive Him. This Article is drawn up in the very words of St. Augustine, and entirely overthrows the doctrine of Transubstantiation; for if the elements be changed into the very body and blood of Christ, then no reason can be assigned why wicked men, and even rats and mice, may not eat the body of Christ. Origen says, the good eat the living bread which came down from heaven; but the wicked eat dead bread, which is death.'

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It is a question whether the eating of the flesh of the Son of Man and drinking his blood (John vi. 53.) is to be understood of the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, because it was not appointed till a year after these words were spoken.

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