what the Sacrament means, and of what it requires c. And from thence may be drawn a very just and weighty argument against infant communion. But I return to the point in hand. As to the measure of the competent knowledge required for receiving the Communion, it must of course vary, according to the various opportunities, abilities, circumstances of the parties concerned; to be judged of by themselves, with the assistance of their proper guides. Great care was anciently taken in instructing the adults, called catechumens, in order to Baptism: something of like kind will be always proper, in such circumstances as ours, for the preparing persons for the first time of receiving the holy Communion. 3. A sound and right faith, as to the main substance of the Christian religion, is another previous qualification for this Sacrament. For whether we consider it as a renewal of our baptismal profession and covenant, which is engaging to observe the Gospel terms; or whether we consider it as an instrument of pardon and grace, and a pledge of the inheritance among the saints in light; sound faith must undoubtedly be required, to answer such ends and uses of it. Scripture has not directly said so, as there was no occasion for it; since the very nature of the thing, taking in Scripture principles, very fully and plainly declares it. Accordingly, we find, as early almost as we have any records left, that true and sound faith was very particularly required in those that came to the Lord's tabled. Besides a right faith in the general, a particular belief with respect to the graces and benefits of a worthy reception of this Sacrament, was anciently, as well as reasonably, judged to be a previous qualification for it, requisite to render it salutary to the recipient. It would be • Ορθός βίος, ἅμα μαθήσει τῇ καθηκούση. Clem. Αlex. Strom. i. p. 318. * Καὶ ἡ τροφὴ αὕτη καλεῖται παρ' ἡμῖν εὐχαρισία, ἧς οὐδενὶ ἄλλῳ μετασχεῖν ἐξόν ἐςι, ἢ τῷ πιστεύοντι ἀληθῆ εἶναι τὰ δεδιδαγμένα ὑπ ̓ ἡμῶν. Just. Mart. p. 96. Hitherto belongs the noted proclamation anciently made by the Deacons, before the Communion began: Μή τις τῶν ἑτεροδόξων: Let no misbeliever come to the Lord's table. Vid. Apostol. Constitut. lib. viii. cap. 12. p. 403. tedious to produce authorities for it, and therefore I choose to refer the reader to the collections of that kind already made to our hands. 4. Above all things, repentance ought to be looked upon as a most essential qualification for a due reception of the holy Communion. All the ends and uses of the Sacrament declare it: the reason of the thing itself loudly proclaims it. For, without that, what is covenanting, but playing the hypocrite? What is devoting ourselves to God at his table, but lying and dissembling? How is it possible to hold communion at once with God and Baal, with Christ and Belial? Or how can the Spirit of God, and the spirit that worketh in the children of disobedience, dwell together? It is plain therefore, that repentance, in some degree or other, and a heart turned to God, is essentially necessary to make the Sacrament salutary, yea, and to prevent its proving hurtful to the receiver. If we look into the ancients, upon this head, we shall find them with united voice declaring, that repentance is absolutely necessary to make a worthy receiver. Justin Martyr specifies it among the previous qualifications, that the communicant shall be one who "lives according as "Christ has commanded f." Clemens, of the same century, intimates, that a good life8 is requisite to a due receiving, and to prevent the receiving unworthily in St. Paul's sense; quoting 1 Cor. xi. 27, 28. Origen interprets the same words to mean, that the Sacrament must not be taken with a "soul defiled and polluted with sinh." St. Cyprian also more than once represents it as receiving unworthily, when a man comes to the Lord's table, before he has expiated his offences, confessed his crimes, e Bingham, book xv. cap. 8. sect. 8. * Οὕτως βιοῦντι ὡς ὁ Χρισὸς παρέδωκεν. Justin. Apol. i. p. 96. g Clemens Alex. 'Ogdòs Bíos, åμa padńors rỹ xadnxovoy. Strom. i. p. 318. h Ne in anima contaminata et peccatis polluta, Dominici corporis Sacramenta percipias. Quicunque enim manducaverit, inquit, panem, et biberit calicem Domini indigne, reus erit, &c.—Cibus iste sanctus non est communis omnium, nec cujuscunque indigni, sed sanctorum est. Origen, in Lev. hom. xiii. p. 257. Conf. in Matt. p. 254. ed. Huet. purged his conscience, and appeased the anger of Godi. All which shows, that he understood the text of St. Paul, not merely of the manner of behaviour at receiving, but of the previous qualifications of the receiver. In the same general way is the Apostle interpreted by the ancient commentators on that chapterk. But because some persons had made a distinction between being unworthy to receive, and receiving unworthily; to cut off all evasion sought for in that nicety, it was replied; that if the Apostle had restrained even the worthy from receiving unworthily, he had much more restrained every unworthy person from receiving at all; being that such a one is not capable of receiving worthily, while he continues such, that is, while he goes on in his vices'. There is scarce any one principle more universally agreed upon among the ancients, than this, that repentance and newness of life is a necessary preparation or qualification for the holy Communion, and is implied in worthy receiving. It has been pleaded, in abatement, that the Apostle, by his caution against receiving unworthily, intended only to censure all irreverent behaviour at the table, and that the censure or admonition there given concerns rather the manner of receiving, than the previous qualifications of the receiver m. But to this pretext sufficient replies have i Contumacibus et pervicacibus comminatur et denuntiat, dicens: Quicunque ederit panem, aut biberit calicem Domini indigne, reus erit corporis et sanguinis Domini. Spretis his omnibus atque contemptis, ante expiata delicta, ante exomologesim factam criminis, ante purgatam conscientiam sacrificio et manu sacerdotis, ante offensam placatam indignantis Domini et minantis, vis infertur corpori ejus et sanguini, &c. Cypr. de Laps. p. 186. Conf. p. 19, 20, 141. edit. Bened. k Chrysostom. in loc. p. 301. et de Pœnit. hom. vii. p. 326. tom. ii. Bened. Theodoret, Ecumenius, Damascene, Theophylact, Pelagius inter Opp. Hieronym. Ambrosiaster, Cassiodorus complex, p. 37. Conf. Gregor. Nyssen. de Perfect. Christian. p. 718. 1 Quidam sane dicunt, quia non indignum, sed indigne accipientem revocat a sancto. Si ergo etiam dignus indigne accedens retrahitur, quanto magis indignus, qui non potest accipere digne? Unde oportet otiosum cessare a vitiis, ut sanctum Domini corpus sancte percipiat. Pelagius in loc. m See Mr. Locke on 1 Cor. xi. 28. Arth. Bury's Constant Communicant, p. 250, &c. been made by the more judicious ". I may briefly observe, 1. That if the Apostle had said nothing at all of unworthy receiving, yet the reason of the thing would show, that the receiving of the Communion with dispositions repugnant to the end and use of it, is receiving unworthily, and offering an affront to its author. 2. That the Apostle's reproof to the Corinthians, in that chapter, was not levelled barely against an irreverent manner of receiving, but against the ill spirit and the unchristian temper, with which they came to the Lord's table: they were contentious, and full of animosities, split into factions and parties; and from thence arose all their other disorders. Therefore the Apostle both began and concluded his admonition P with particular cautions against the spirit of division then reigning amongst them; a temper very improper for a feast of love and amity. 3. There is no reason for restraining the Apostle's general rules, laid down upon a special occasion, to that particular case only, especially when the reason of them extends equally to more. The Apostle says, Whosoever shall receive unworthily, &c. not confining what he says of it to this way or that. If it be receiving unworthily, in any ways whatever, his words are general enough to comprehend them all and so are his other words; Let every one examine himself, and then eat, &c. and let him discern, discriminate, esteem, reverence the Lord's body. Therefore Chrysostom, upon the place 9, highly extols the wisdom of the Apostle, in making such excellent use of a particular case, as thereupon to lay down general rules for all cases of like nature, for the standing use of the Church in all times to come. Accordingly the judicious Theodo n Jenkins, Remarks on some Books, p. 140-145. Le Clerc, Biblioth. Chois. tom. xiii. p. 96. Wolfius, Cur. Crit. in 1 Cor. xi. 28. • 1 Cor. xi. 18, 19. Compare 1 Cor. i. 11, 12. p 1 Cor. xi. 33, 34. Chrysostom in 1 Cor. xi. hom. xxviii. p. 300, &c. Conf. Damascen. in loc. p. 102. Ecumenius, p. 532. Theophylact, p. 260. Compare Jenkins, p. 142, 143. ret takes notice, that the Apostle in verse the 27th, where he speaks of receiving unworthily, obliquely rebuked the ambitious, and the fornicators, and those also who had eaten of things offered unto idols; and, in short, all that come to the Communion with a guilty conscience'. 4. Let it be considered, whether such as the Apostle forbids us to eat withs, and whether those whom the Apostle censures as "partakers of the table of devilst," and those whom he elsewhere describes as making one body with harlots", could be capable, while so abiding, of receiving worthily? If they could not, then the general rule of the Apostle, laid down in 1 Cor. xi. about receiving unworthily, must be understood to extend farther than to the particular disorders which occasioned it. But if it be said, that such, so abiding, might notwithstanding receive worthily, then these absurdities will follow; that persons who are not fit for Christians to eat with, or who are communicants of devils; or who are incapable of being living members of Christ, or temples of the Holy Ghost, are yet capable of worthily receiving that symbolical body and blood of Christ, which are appointed to strengthen our union with him, and which suppose men to be living members of him, at their coming to receive. Add to this, that St. Paul himself has elsewhere laid down a general rule, obliging all Christians to come clean to the Christian passover, drawn from the consideration of what was prescribed with respect to the Jewish oneș. For if the feast there mentioned does not directly mean the eucharistical feast, but the whole Christian life considered as a feast of holiness; yet the reason there given, will hold more strongly for those particular seasons, when we are actually celebrating the memorial of "Christ our passover Lamb," as "sacrificed for us." For, as at all times, so then more especially, ought we to " purge out 66 Theodoret in 1 Cor. xi. 27. t 1 Cor. x. 20, 21. * 1 Cor. v. 7, 8. $ 1 Cor. v. 11. |