down from the beginning by the arcane discipline of the church.

This, I apprehend, when divested of its various inaccuracies, is the best and most plausible form, under which the theory of the bishop can be exhibited: and, as I wish not to take any unfair advantage, I have myself very honestly, in the present statement, given his theory every possible chance of success.

I shall now, therefore, finally proceed to show, that, as the doctrine of transubstantiation was neither the exclusive nor the principal secret of the mysteries; so, notwithstanding the apparently decisive language of Cyril, it was not taught at all in the mysteries, even under the form of the very smallest and least important secret.

A doctrine, which existed not in the early church, assuredly could not be taught by the secret discipline of that church. Now it can be shown from evidence, both christian and pagan, that the doctrine of transubstantiation existed not in the church of the first ages. Therefore, a doctrine, thus circumstanced, could not possibly have been a secret of the mysteries.

(1.) On the subject of christian evidence, I have already been so copious, that this branch of my argument is completely anticipated.

Fully supported by the authority of Irenæus, Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria, Gregory of Nyssa, Cyprian, Chrysostom, Augustine, Gelasius, Facundus, the ancient homilist in Jerome, and even Cyril of Jerusalem himself, I have stated, that the church of at least the five first centuries recognised no change save a moral change in the consecrated elements; that she expressly denied our participation of the literal body and blood of Christ, and that she esteemed the bread and wine to be only types or figures or symbols or images of those awful realities which they were employed to represent.*

* See above, Book i. chap. 4. § II.

Such being the case, the doctrine of transubstantiation could have had no existence in the church of the five first centuries: and, if it existed not, it clearly could not have been made, in any, even the smallest degree, the subject of the mysteries.

(2.) From christian evidence, then, I may be allowed, without further repetition, to pass to the consideration of pagan evidence. This latter evidence is of a nature so remarkably strong, that, even alone, it is amply sufficient to decide the question. Through its instrumentality, we may demonstrate, beyond the possibility of confutation, that the doctrine now before us was totally unknown to the church of the first ages: whence, of course, it will inevitably follow, that it never could have been a secret of the ancient mysteries.

Every person, moderately versed in the documents of antiquity, is well aware, that the pagans again and again pleased themselves with ridiculing the wellknown christian worship of the Saviour as God: and, in the dialogue Philopatris, we find them similarly scoffing at the catholic doctrine of the trinity.* Such ridicule proves the existence of those doctrines in the primitive church: and, by a parity of reasoning, if they had scoffed at the doctrine of transubstantiation, they would equally have established the existence of that doctrine. But, so far as I know, they NEVER deride the doctrine of transubstantiation. Yet, had that doctrine formed one of the secrets of the mysteries, they must, in all human probability, have come to the knowledge of it; for we find demonstratively, that they were not ignorant even of the grand and palmary secret: and, had they known the doctrine

* "Thou art teaching me arithmetic," says Critias, when the secret of the mysteries is imparted to him: "thy oath is purely 'arithmetical: verily, in the science of numeration, thou rivalest "Nicomachus the Gerasenian. I know not what thou art saying. One, three; three, one! Certainly thou art dealing with the 'tetractys, or the ogdoad, or the triad of Pythagoras.”

of transubstantiation, we cannot doubt that it would have similarly experienced their ridicule. But they never even so much as mention it. From their very silence, therefore, we may learn, that in the early church no such doctrine existed.

It may be said, that the pagans might possibly have learned the doctrines of Christ's godhead and the trinity, and yet that they very possibly might not have learned the doctrine of transubstantiation: for it does not follow, that, because they had learned some of the secrets of the mysteries, they must, therefore, have learned them all. Hence the argument from their silence is defective in conclusiveness.

Be it so: but my argument does not stop short at this point; nor, had such been the case, should I have ventured to describe it as incapable of confutation. I can produce the negative evidence of a pagan, who flourished in the middle of the fourth century, who delights to ridicule all the peculiar doctrines of christianity, who MUST have been acquainted with the doctrine of transubstantiation, had it then existed; who certainly would have scoffed at it if he had been acquainted with it, and who yet never once mentions it, or even so much as alludes to its very existence.

The pagan, whom I thus characterize, and whom I summon as an unexceptionable witness, is the Emperor Julian.

That extraordinary man was once, in profession at least, a christian: but, hating the light of the gospel, he apostatized to paganism. Now Julian, be it carefully observed, had been, not merely an uninitiated catechumen, but a BAPTIZED christian.* As a baptized christian, he must have heard the preparatory lectures of the catechist: as a baptized christian, he

* Sozomen. Eccles. Hist. lib. v. c. 2. According to Sozomen, Julian attempted to wash out his mark of baptism with the blood of victims sacrified to the averruncan demons. The fact of his baptism is sufficient for my argument.

must, according to the discipline of the church, have been regularly initiated into the mysteries. If, then, as the bishop contends, transubstantiation were the secret doctrine most especially taught in the mysteries, Julian must have been well acquainted with the existence of that doctrine: and, if acquainted with its existence, a man of his humour would not have failed to make it the subject of his bitter ridicule. How then stands the case with the imperial apostate, who, having been baptized, had indisputably been initiated into all the secrets of the mysteries?

In the work against christianity, which has been substantially preserved, and which has been regularly answered by Cyril of Alexandria, Julian ridicules the adoration of Christ; the godhead of Christ; the birth of Christ from the Virgin; the conception of Christ by the Holy Ghost; the doctrine, that Christ was the creator of the universe; the doctrine, that Christ is the Word of God, the Son of God, God from God of the substance of his Father; the doctrine of the trinity, which is the basis of the doctrine of Christ's godhead: he amuses himself likewise with what he deems the incurable absurdity of the purification of sin by the mere element of water in baptism: and, approximating to the very subject of transubstantiation, if any such doctrine had been then held in the church, he laughs at the Galileans for saying, that Christ had once been sacrificed on their behalf, and that, consequently, they themselves offered no sacrifices. But yet NEVER, on any occasion, or by any accident, though eagerly bent upon catching at everything in christianity which he might turn to derision, does he mention, or even so much as remotely allude to, Latin doctrine of transubstantiation.*

the

Exactly the same remark applies to Julian's other

* See Cyril. Alex. cont. Julian. lib. v. p. 1:59. lib. vi. p. 191, 213. lib. viii. p. 253, 261, 262, 276. lib. ix. p. 290, 291, 314. lib. x. p. 327, 333. Ibid. lib. vii. p. 245. Ibid. lib. ix. p. 305, 306. lib. x. p. 354. Lipsiæ, A. D. 1696.

works. Again and again he ridicules the Galileans, their agape and ministrations at tables, their base superstition, their acknowledgment of Christ's godhead: Moses also, and the prophets come in for a due share of his vituperation: Athanasius is reviled as the enemy of the gods, and as the artful inveigler of noble women to receive the sacrament of baptism: and, through the side of the first christian Emperor Constantine, the gospel is vilified, as encouraging universal profligacy and dishonesty and licentiousness, by its doctrine of cheaply purifying ablution and free pardon on condition of repentance. Yet NEVER does the emperor even once please himself, either by ridiculing, or by simply noticing, that doctrine which the bishop of Aire maintains to be the grand and exclusive secret of the ancient mysteries.*

I may be mistaken in estimating the strength of this argument: but it strikes upon my own apprehension, as being perfectly irresistible.

Let any reasonable being consider the complete knowledge which the baptized apostate possessed of the doctrines of christianity, his utter hatred of the gospel, his perpetual recurrence to the detested Galileans and their more detested theology, his humour of turning into ridicule whatever in christianity he thought capable of being made ridiculous: let any reasonable being consider these several matters; and then let him judge, whether, if transubstantitation had been a doctrine of the early catholic church, it could possibly have been passed over in total silence by such a man as Julian.

The complete taciturnity of the profane emperor, in everything that regards the doctrine of transub

* See Julian. Imper. Oper. Orat. vi. p. 192. Orat. Fragment. p. 305. Misopog. p. 363. Epist. vii. p. 376. Epist. xlii. p. 423, 424. Epist. xlix. 429-431. Epist. li. p. 432-435. Epist. lii. p. 435 438. Epist. Ixii. p. 450. Epist. lxiii. p. 453, 454. Ibid. Orat. Fragment. p. 289, 295. Ibid. Epist. vi. p. 376. Epist. xxvi. p. 398. Epist. li. p. 432, 435. Ibid. Cæsar. p. 336. Lips. A. D. 1696.