necessary to salvation, but superfluous, or that men may obtain the grace of justification by faith only, without these sacraments; (although it is granted that all are not necessary to every individual;) let him be accursed."

2. This obviously contradicts Scripture. Our Saviour saith, "He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned,” Mark xvi, 16. He does not say, he that is not baptized, but, he that believeth not. Therefore faith is more necessary than baptism. Besides, St. Paul teaches plainly that " a man is justified by faith only, without works of law," Rom. iii, 28.

3. Such a necessity as Roman Catholics attach to the administration and reception of their sacraments tends much toward the weakening or confounding of faith, as well as to the perversion of morals. The confidence of man, by the undue stress placed on mere sacraments, is fixed on the creature more than on God. And the evil is increased when some of these sacraments, as sacraments, and parts of others, are not only without foundation in Scripture, but contrary thereto. IV. The matter and form of the sacraments.

1. Every sacrament consists, say they, of matter and form, which are the essential parts of which a sacrament is composed, and without which there is no sacrament. The matter consists of things; as water in baptism, chrism in confirmation, oil in extreme unction. The form consists of the words of consecration or administration.

2. Their sacraments are not consecrated by all the words of institution, but by a certain form of speech to be used over the elements. For instance; these words are said over the bread, This is my body; and the like over the wine, This cup is the new testament; and in baptism these, In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. These are the forms of the sacrament, and the very words of consecration, spoken in a strange tongue, without farther invocation of the name of God, or giving of thanks, as necessary to the essence of a sacrament. We Protestants readily allow that the word to bless (1 Cor. xi, 15) signifies to sanctify or consecrate; but that is not done by a magical muttering of words over the sacrament, but by the whole action, according to Christ's institution, in distributing, receiving, and giving of thanks. This appears from the words which follow those referred to above: the bread which we break, the cup which we drink, &c. We rehearse not the words of institution as a magical charm said over the bread and wine to convert their substance, but to declare what they are to us by Christ's institution, the symbols of his body and blood. It is not the muttering of a few words in a strange tongue, after the manner of enchanters, that has the power to consecrate; but the understanding, hearing, and believing the institution of Christ, with calling upon the name of God and thanksgiving before him.

3. They allow that the words of institution may be altered substantially by altering the sense, and then the sacrament is imperfect or destroyed; or the change may be accidental, when the syllables or words are changed, but the sense remaineth the same, yet the sacrament is not destroyed: though he sinneth who doth alter. That no substantial change ought to be made, either by an individual or the church, must be granted by all. But that a verbal change may be made and exist we have unequivocal testimony from the words of institution of VOL. I.-12

the eucharist, as used by the evangelists and St. Paul. (Compare Matt. xxvi, 27; Luke xxii, 19; 1 Cor. xi, 24.) But in this matter the Church of Rome is peculiarly guilty in making serious additions, subtractions, and alterations in the sacraments. She takes away one part of the eucharist, namely, the wine, in administering it to the people, and when she uses it she mingles it with water. A change or omission of words may not alter the sense, but a change in things, or the matter, must materially affect a sacrament.

4. In the matter of the sacrament they hold it not necessary to be a visible object, but such as comes under the cognizance of the senses, as the ears; for in penance they have no material form but the sound of the words. It will be difficult to show that such can be a sensible symbol, representing an inward grace. But it would be an endless task to point out all the errors of Romanists in the administration of

sacraments.

V. Number and order of the sacraments.

1. The Council of Trent affirms that the sacraments are neither fewer nor more than seven, and they pronounce all accursed who hold to the contrary. It will be amusing and instructive to the reader to see what arguments and authorities are employed by the Church of Rome for the purpose of establishing their seven sacraments. They argue from Scripture, tradition, church authority, prescription, analogies of nature, &c.

(1.) Scripture. The following is a literal translation of Peter Dens, the author of the text-book on divinity in most Roman Catholic schools: "The number seven is also insinuated in various places of Scripture ; thus in Prov. ix it is said: Wisdom, which is Christ, hath built her house, that is, the church, and hath cut out her seven pillars, to wit, the seven sacraments, which as so many pillars sustain the church. Thus in like manner in Exod. xxv, by the seven lights which were in one candlestick this is insinuated; for the seven sacraments are, as it were, so many lights which illuminate the church.”*

The Roman catechism is content with saying that the seven sacraments can be proved from Scripture, without quoting any passage for that purpose. The various councils say the same thing, and generally with the same silence respecting the Scripture texts. Such Scriptural authority as that which Dens gives is frequently adduced, and in quoting it we embrace its confutation in its own absurdity. They do, however, sometimes quote Scripture, and we have an instance of this in Bailly, who quotes the following Scripture authority for the sacraments peculiar to the Church of Rome: for penance, John xx, 22, 23, for extreme unction, James v, 14; for orders as a sacrament, 2 Tim. i, 6; for marriage as a sacrament, Eph. v, 31, 32. It must appear to the intelligent reader that the Scripture authority for the Roman sacra, ments is very slight indeed.

(2.) Traditions of the fathers. The testimony on this head is usually to be found where each sacrament is treated in order. We can only say now, that early antiquity gives no ground for sacraments to the number of seven.

* Insinuatur etiam septenarius, &c., Tract. de Sacr., No. 46. See also Bellarmine, lib. ii, cap. 26; Remish annotator on Apocalypse, sect. 3, for several such specimens. + Tract. de Sacr., c. 2, prop. iv.

1

120

(3.) Authoritative definitions of councils, or the authority of the church. That the councils do affirm that the Scriptures teach that there are seven sacraments, we readily allow. But then there is no passage of Scripture, properly interpreted, that teaches so, as we have noticed already; and the Council of Trent could find no such text, though her divines affected to prove that the seven sacraments were instituted by the authority of Jesus Christ. In support of their number of seven, nothing could be adduced by them but uncertain tradition and fanciful analogies. It was argued, for instance, that seven is a perfect number, since there are seven days in the week, seven excellent virtues, seven deadly sins, seven planets, &c.*

But Liebermann, a modern Roman divine, who must have seen that this reasoning was invalid, maintains that the authority of the church or council is of itself sufficient, seeing she is infallible in her decisions. On the first canon of the Council of Trent on the sacraments, (de Sacramentis,) he founds the following sweeping argument: "This declaration of the general council should suffice, according to the strict laws of method. For we have proved in our Catholic Demonstration that there is only one true church of Christ; that she was called catholic by the consent of all; that she was governed by the Holy Spirit; that the deposite of faith was intrusted to her, and to her it belonged to decide controversies of faith by HER INFALLIBLE DECISION." Thus they argue in the vicious circle; for when Scripture fails them they run to the authority of the church, and when the latter appears to be unsound they run back to Scripture. So by frequently changing their ground they keep up appearances.

(4.) Prescription. Their argument here is, that because their church now holds the seven sacraments this number was always held. The good sense of the reader will here see that this is a miserable evasion. But those who would see all that can be said on this topic may consult Bailly.t

(5.) Natural analogies. From the analogy that is supposed to exist between natural and spiritual life, Thomas Aquinas argued that there were seven sacraments. The Florentine fathers, in their decree of Eugenius IV., employ the same emblems of analogy. The Roman catechism, with great plausibility, follows in suit, whose edition of the supposed analogy we give, with some abridgment, after Bailly. The following is the celebrated analogy: "In order to exist, to preserve existence, to contribute to his own and the public good, seven things seem necessary to man. 1. To be born. 2. To grow. 3. To be nurtured. 4. To be cured when sick. 5. When weak to be strengthened. 6. As far as regards the public weal, to have magistrates invested with authority to govern. 7. And finally, to perpetuate himself and his species by legitimate offspring. Analogous, then, as all these things obviously are to that life by which the soul lives to God, we discover in them a reason to account for the number of the sacraments. 1. Baptism is the gate to all the other sacraments, by which we are born again to Christ. 2. Confirmation, by which we grow up and are strengthened in the grace of God. 3. The eucharist, the true bread * See Sarpi, lib. ii, sec. 85; and Cramp, p. 119.

+ Institutiones Theol., tom. iv, part i, p. 211. Moguntiæ, 1827. De Sacr., prop. iv, prob. 3.

from heaven, which nourishes our souls to eternal life. 4. Penance, by which the soul that has caught the contagion of sin is restored to spiritual life. 5. Extreme unction, which obliterates the traces of sin, and invigorates the powers of the soul. 6. Holy orders, which gives power to perpetuate in the church the public administration of the sacraments, and the exercise of all the sacred functions of the ministry. 7. Matrimony, a sacrament instituted for the legitimate and holy union of man and woman, for the conservation of the human race and the education of children."* Such are the reasonings which Rome puts in the place of Scripture authority.

2. They maintain that all the sacraments are not of equal dignity, necessity, or signification. Three of the sacraments, namely, baptism, the eucharist, and orders, are considered as superior to the others. Baptism is absolutely necessary, as it is the only means of regeneration, or is regeneration itself. The necessity of penance is relative; for it is necessary only for those who sin mortally after baptism. Orders too, though not necessary to each of the faithful, are of absolute general necessity to the church. But the eucharist, for holiness, and for the number and greatness of its mysteries, is eminently superior to all the rest. "The other sacraments possess the power of sanctifying only when any one uses them; but in the eucharist there exists the author of sanctity before their use."t "In this sacrament Christ himself is contained substantially; in the others only a certain instrumental virtue derived from Christ himself." Such is the comparative estimation in which they hold the sacraments.§

The Douay doctors (Annotations on Exod. xvi) set forth the eminence of the eucharist by comparing it in twelve several points with manna, in all of which miracles are introduced. Nevertheless, the distinguished Origen saw none of these characteristics in manna; and his interpretation is surely to be preferred to the conceits of the Douay theologians, though his is fanciful enough.

every sacrament.

3. Now there are three things which seem obviously to belong to 1. That their symbols signify or represent, in a lively manner, the spiritual things which they represent. 2. They must be instituted by Christ. 3. The sacraments of the gospel should succeed those of the law. From hence we can infer that there are only two sacraments that belong to Christianity, namely, baptism and the Lord's supper.

1. These two only are signs of heavenly things, and seals and pledges thereof. The remission of sins is represented in baptism, Acts ii, 38. The death of Christ is showed forth in the eucharist, 1 Cor. xi, 26. None of the other sacraments of the Church of Rome have the same claims.

2. The Lord Jesus commanded only these two sacraments to be used for ever in his church. He used many other ceremonies himself, such as lifting up of hands, the tempering of clay and spittle, imposition of hands, and anointing with oil; but he did not enjoin the observance of these on his disciples.

* Catechism, p. 140. Bailly, De Sacram., c. 2, prop. iv, tom. iii, p. 280. Dens, De Sacram., No. 47, vol. v, p. 152. See also Willet, p. 554.

+ Con. Trid., sess. 13, c. 3.

Rom. Cat., p. 143.

The passage in Origen is Hom. 7, c. 6, In Exodum, tom. v, p. 415 of his works.

3. The sacraments of the New succeed those of the Old Testament; as baptism in the place of circumcision, and the eucharist instead of the passover. But they cannot show any sacraments under the old law to which their sacraments of confirmation, penance, extreme unction, orders, and matrimony succeed.

There are other arguments which are directly against their five sacraments in particular; but these will be referred to the places where each sacrament is particularly discussed.

VI. The author of the sacraments.

Roman Catholics maintain that neither the apostles formerly, nor the church now, hath authority to institute sacraments; that this power is only in Christ, and that the apostles, in proclaiming the sacraments, announced barely what Christ had previously instituted.

But, then, they refuse to be guided in this by the express words of Scripture, and resort to tradition, which they call the unwritten word of God. And as a specimen of their reasoning we will quote the express arguments by which they attempt to prove that the sacraments were instituted by Christ. They affirm strongly that Christ did institute them, but they endeavour to prove this without giving the words of institution from the written word.

Liebermann, one of their modern divines,* in attempting to prove that Christ instituted the sacraments, quotes for authority the Council of Trent: "If any one shall say that the sacraments of the new law were not all instituted by our Lord Jesus Christ... let him be accursed." And this assumption of the council, though no Scripture is quoted, is supported by the following arguments: 1. Scripture. For this is openly professed by the apostle when writing to the Corinthians, Epist. i, ver. 4. He says: "Let a man so esteem us as ministers of Christ, and dispensers of the mysteries of God." 2. Tradition. For it was the constant persuasion of the church that all the sacraments were (tradita) delivered by tradition from Christ, and that nothing respecting their number or substance could be changed. 3. Reason; which, when once it understands the nature and definition of a sacrament, acknowledges that no sacrament is ordained without divine appointment. From the foregoing it is plain that tradition, not the written word, constitutes the divine authority on which Romanists found the institution of their sacraments. And therefore, after all, they support their peculiar sacraments not by Scripture, but by tradition. Dens, Bailly, Collet, the Roman catechism, as well as Liebermann and their greatest divines, support the institution of their sacraments by the same process of reasoning. Nevertheless there are some of their theologians, as Hugo and Peter Lombard, who deny that all their sacraments were instituted by Christ.

The following is their principal argument to support their position: "Baptism and the eucharist were instituted without express Scripture warrant, for at the time of their institution the New Testament was not written." To this we reply, 1. The traditions of our Saviour to the apostles, concerning these two sacraments, were afterward written and expressly set down in Scripture. But the Roman Catholic traditions, not being committed to writing, are justly suspected. 2. The

* Institutiones, c. 3, De Auctore Sacram., tom. iv, pars i, p. 225. ↑ Sess. vii, can. 1.