"They who think this mystery can be wrought without several miracles are more than stupid," says Calvin. "Qui non sentit plura subesse miracula, plus quam stupidus est. Quanquam autem cogitando animus plus valet quam lingua exprimendo, rei tamen magnitudine ille quoque vincitur et obruitur."-(Inst. L. 4, c. 17, s. 32.) In fine, Calvin sometimes tells us that it is a mystery which we cannot comprehend, much less explain-that Christ's flesh and blood should come to us from such a distance to be our food; and at other times, that this manducation is only by faith; with many other evasive explanations and apparent contradictions, as Bossuet shews in his Variations. (Var. vol. 1, p. 424.) Queen Elizabeth was decidedly in favour of the Real Presence, and expressed her opinion in the following verse:

"'Twas God the Word that spake it;

He took bread and brake it;

And what the Word did make it,

That I believe, and take it."

See the "Essay for Catholic Communion," by a Minister of the Church of England.

The liberal and learned Mr. Hallam, after comparing together the three leading systems of the christian world in relation to the Eucharist-that of the Real Presence admitted by the Lutherans, that of the Calvinists, and that of the Catholic Church, makes the following observation :—“ It can hardly fail to strike every unprejudiced reader, that as the Romish tenet of Transubstantiation is the best, so that of the Calvinists is the worst imagined of the three."-(Constitutional History.) The same writer asserts, "that the Doctrine of Transubstantiation does not, as is vulgarly supposed, contradict the evidence of our sense; since our senses can report nothing as to the unknown Being, which the School men denominate substance, and which alone is the subject of this conversion."-(Ibid.)

See the Articles and Liturgy, as they stood in 1548, clearly expressing the Real Presence; in 1552, as clearly denying it; in 1562, leaving it doubtful; and in 1662, apparently rejecting it altogether. Surely Divine Faith must of its own nature be immutable and unchangeable, as the God from whom it emanates: it cannot be subject to the arbitrary and capricious devices of men. It is likewise a received maxim with lawyers, that all Testaments are to be interpreted in the obvious and literal sense of the Testator's words. How absurd is it not, therefore, in my Protestant Brethren, to wrest the clear words of Christ, in making his last will to bear a figurative sense, in opposition to the consentient testimony of the Greek and Latin Church in all ages! Surely if Christ ever expressed himself clearly, it would be on this solemn occasion, when settling a treaty, an alliance, and making his last will and testament, which should ever be couched in the most plain and simple words. Does a wise

man, permit me to ask, on such occasions make use of such unusual figures of speech? Does he say, for instance, that he bequeaths a Diamond, when he intends only to bequeath the figure or representation of a Diamond? See the learned Mr. Johnson's treatise, entitled "The unbloody Sacrifice;" where he shews at large that the Primitive Fathers understood the 6th chapter of St. John as referring to the Blessed Eucharist. As Protestants admit the Fathers of the Church to be the witnesses of the truth, and also generally allow that the Church was pure for the first five centuries, I shall, therefore, give clear and demonstrative evidence of the truth of what is there asserted from the Fathers.

In the Second Age, St. Cyprian says: "The bread which our Lord gave to his disciples being changed, not in shape (outward form), but in nature (substance), by the omnipotency of the word, is made flesh.”—(Sermon de Cœna Dom.) In the Third Age, Origen says: "We eat the bread offered by prayer, made certain body (the body of Christ).—(Lib. 8, Cont. Celsum.) In the same century, Tertullian says: The Bread taken and distributed to his Disciples he made his body.-(Lib. 4, Cont. Marcion, c. 40.) In the Fourth Age, St. Ambrose says: "If human benediction could change and convert nature, (he had done so in the person of Moses, by converting a rod into a serpent,) what say we by the Divine consecration, where the very words of our Saviour do work, &c. &c. ?-shall not the word of Christ prevail so far as to change the species or nature of the elements ?-(Lib. 4, de Sacram. c. 4: de lis qui Myster. c. 2.)

In the same century, St. Cyril says: "Once in Cana of Gallilee he changed water into wine, &c.; and shall he not be worthy to be believed, when he has changed wine into his blood?"—(Cateches. Mystagog. 1. c. 4.)

66

In the same Age, St. Gregory of Nissen says: Christ, through the dispensation of his grace, enters by his flesh into all the faithful, &c.; and these things he bestows, transelementing (transubstantiating), by virtue of his blessing, the things which are seen into it."—(Orat. Catechist. c. 37.)

In the Fifth Age, St. Augustine says: "They (the rest of the Disciples) did eat the bread which was our Lord himself: he (Judas) did eat the bread of our Lord against our Lord."-(Tract. 59, in Joan.) "If it should," says

a learned Catholic Divine, "be supposed by any of my readers, from this quotation, that Judas did by no means eat the bread which was our Lord, because he wanted true faith; therefore no man receives the body of Christ in the Sacrament by the mouth, but by faith only, I answer, Judas had before, at least, if not in this place, received the bread which was our Lord himself according to St. Augustine: 'Our Lord,' says he,' suffers Judas, a devil, a thief, he that sold him,—he permits him to receive with the innocent disciples that which the faithful know to be our price.'"-(L. 5, de Baptism 5, 8.) When he says, that Judas eat the bread of our Lord against our Lord, it is probable

he there does not speak of the Sacrament, (though Judas had eaten that also against our Lord, because unworthily to his own damnation,) but rather of the dipped sop which Judas is said to eat against our Lord, because he then renewed his intention of betraying him; so that the devil entered into him, and he went forth immediately to perform his treasonable act. "Judas did not then," as St. Augustine says, "receive the body of our Lord, as some persons imagine who read negligently; for we must understand, that our Lord had already given the Sacrament of his body to them where Judas likewise was."-(Tract. 62, in Joan.) The first Council of Nice defined, (the Church of England acknowledges the first four General Councils,) “that the Lamb of God is placed on the Sacred Table, and to be unbloodily sacrificed by the priests; and that in receiving this Sacred Body and Blood, we must believe them to be signs of our Resurrection."-(L. 3, de Cret. de divina mensa, an. 325.) It defined also, "that Deacons, who have no power to offer sacrifice, ought not to give the body and blood of Christ to priests, who have that power."-(Can. 14.) The Council of Lateran, under Innocent the Third, defined, "that the bread by divine power is transubstantiated into the body, and the wine into the blood of Christ."-(Ca. 1, A.D. 1215.) See Verax's Reply to Dr. Hook of Leeds' Sermon, entitled "The Novelties of Romanism,"-price 1s.; in which all Dr. Hook's gross and infamous calumnies against the Catholic Church are exposed, and Transubstantiation demonstratively shewn ever to have been the Doctrine of the Universal Church. The Council of Florence defined, "that by the words of consecration the substance of the bread is converted into the body of Christ, and the substance of the wine into his blood."-(Decet. sup. union. lacobinoram, et Arminorum. anno 1439.)

I implore you to ponder well on the words of the great Saint Augustine; addressing the Donatists, he says: "You are with us in Baptism, in the Creed, and in the other Sacraments of the Lord; but in the Spirit of Unity, in the Bond of Peace, and finally in the Catholic Church, you are not with us. (Ep. 48.)* In fine, we have exactly the same authority for the Real Presence of Christ in the Sacrament, and for Transubstantiation, as we have for the authenticity of the Scriptures, viz.-the authority of the Church, "the Ground and Pillar of Truth." In the second century, St. Irenæus says: "Where the Church is, there is the Spirit; and where the Spirit is, there is all Grace."— (L. 3, c. 49.) Tertullian says: "There is no good got by disputing out of texts of Scripture, but either to make a man sick or mad."—(De Præcsript. c. 19.) I conclude this note by referring you to the Decree of the Council of Basil, shewing that the Catholic Church is enriched with such great privileges

* "Nobiscum autem estis in baptismo, in symbolo, in cæteris dominicis sacramentis. In spiritu autem unitatis et vinculo pacis, in ipsa denique catholica ecclesia, nobiscum non estis."-(St. August. Ep. 48.)

by Christ our Saviour, &c. that we firmly believe she cannot err in those things which are necessary to salvation.-A.D. 1431. Respons. de authoritate concilii generalis.

The learned Protestant Dr. Grabe declares, "that it is certain that Irenæus and all the Fathers, either contemporary with the Apostles or their immediate successors, whose writings are still extant, considered the Blessed Eucharist to be the sacrifice of the New Law, and offered Bread and Wine on the altar, as sacred oblations to God the Father; and that this was not the private opinion of any particular Church or Teacher, but the public doctrine and practice of the Universal Church, which she received from the Apostles, and they from Christ, is especially shewn in this place by Irenæus, and before him Cypestin the martyr, and Clement of Rome."—(Nota in Irenæum, p. 323.)

LETTER VIII.

ON ARIANISM.

TO THE REV. CHARLES LE BLANC.

REV SIR,

I assert that the Arian hypothesis is equally indefensible. On a superficial survey of the Arian system, it seems much more plausible than that of Socinus, because it preserves entire the pre-existence of Jesus Christ, which is a doctrine most expressly and repeatedly mentioned in the New Testament; and, indeed, were we to stop here, the former would undoubtedly have the advantage. But when we more closely consider the subject, we find that the Socinian hypothesis is free from several capital difficulties which attend that of the Arians, those ancient enemies to the cause of truth and the Divinity of Jesus Christ. This will appear if the following things be considered.

The term God, must necessarily be understood either as a name of Office, or of Nature; as denoting external qualities and trusts, or intrinsic excellence and essential perfections. The Arians, therefore, cannot defend themselves when they are urged with the consideration of the name God, which is given to Jesus Christ, by saying: "It is a name of office, and Christ only bears it as an ambassador of the Most High;" which is the evasion of the Socinians. For as the disciples of Arius confess that Christ existed, not only before his appearance in the world, but also before the creation, they cannot deny but he was, in some sense, God before the formation of the universe. Those passages of Scripture which they explain of his pre-existence, are very express in this respect. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." But if they allow that the Word was with God in the beginning, and that he was God before the formation of the world, they ought also to grant that he was "in the form of God; " that he is "the true God; the mighty God; the great God; God blessed for ever." For there is no more reason to allow the one, than there is to acknowledge the other.

But, as they deny this consequence, they will permit me to ask, how the names and praises which are appropriated to the Great Supreme, can belong to Christ in his first estate, in which he neither represented God, nor acted in his name, nor was his ambassador to men? For if he were a mere creature, however exalted and glorious, it could not be lawful to express his essence and attributes by the name God. Can it be said, without impiety, of the most excellent creature, "He exists in the form of God, and thinks it not robbery to be equal with God?" Though the Logos, in his pre-existent state, possessed a Divine glory in comparison with us, can we, on the Arian hypothesis, attribute