original sin on all his posterity, because we were all then not only represented by his person, but contained in his loins; so from Christ, who, on the cross, did represent the church of God, and in whom we are,-is there, by a most special influence, transfused on the church, some measure of those graces ", those vital motions, that incorruption, purity, and holiness, which was given to him without measure; that he alone might be the author and original of eternal salvation, the consecrated Prince of Glory to the church :from which consecration of Christ, and sanctification of the church, the apostle infers a union between Christ and the church; "For he that sanctifieth, and they that are sanctified, are of one." And all this, both union or association with Christ, and communion in those heavenly graces, which, by spiritual influence from him, are shed forth upon all his members, is brought to pass by this means originally,-because Christ and we do both partake of one and the selfsame Spirit; which Spirit conveys to the faithful, whatsoever in Christ is communicable unto them. For as the members natural of man are all conserved in the integrity and unity of one body, by that reasonable soul which animates, enlivens, and actuates them,--by one simple and undivided information, without which they would presently fall asunder and moulder into dust; even so the members of Christ are all firmly united unto him, and from him receive all vital motions, by means of that common Spirit, which, in Christ above measure, in us according unto the dispensation of God's good will, worketh one and the self-same life and grace: so that by it, we are all as really compacted into one mystical body, as if we had all but one common soul. And this is that which we believe touching our "fellowship with the Son," as St. John' calls it: the clear and ample apprehension whereof, is left unto that place where both our union and likeness to him, and our knowledge of him, shall be made perfect s.

* August. Enchirid. cap. 26. et Epist. 23. ad Bonifacium: "Traxit reatum, quia unus erat in illo à quo traxit;" et Tert. de Testim. Anim. c. 3. Regeneravit hominem in uno Christo, ex uno Adam generatum. Aug. Epist. 23.

⚫ John i. 16.

f 1 John i. 3.

c Heb. v. 9.

d Heb. ii. 10, 11.

e Rom. viii. 9.

g Nam et nunc est in nobis, et nos in illo; sed hoc nunc credimus, tunc etiam cognoscemus: quamvis et nunc credendo noverimus, sed fanc contemplando noscemus. August. Tom. 9. Tract. 75. in Johan.

Sixthly, We eat and drink the Sacrament of Christ's passion, that thereby we may express that more close and sensible pleasure, which the faithful enjoy in receiving of him. For there is not any one sense, whose pleasure is more constant and express, than this of tasting: the reasons whereof are manifest.

For first, It follows by the consequence of opposites, that that faculty when fully satisfied, must needs be sensible of the greatest pleasure, whose penury and defect brings the extremest anguish on nature. For the evil of any thing, being nothing else but an obliquity and aberration from that proper good to which it is opposed,-it must needs follow, that the greater the extent and degrees of an evil are, the more large must the measure of that good be, in the distance from which that evil consisteth. Now it is manifest that the evil of no sense is so oppressive and terrible unto nature, as are those which violate the taste and touch"; which latter is ever annexed to the former. No ugly spectacles for the eyes, no howls or shriekings for the ear, no stench or infection of air for the smell, so distasteful,-through all which, the anguish of famine would not make a man adventure to purchase any good, though affected even with noisome qualities.

Secondly, The pleasure which nature takes in any good thing, is caused by the union thereof to the faculty, by means whereof it is enjoyed so that the greater the union is, the more necessarily is the pleasure of the thing united. Now there is not any faculty, 'whose object is more closely united unto it, than this of tasting. In seeing, or hearing, or smelling, there may be a far distance between us and the things that do so affect us; but no tasting without an immediate application of the object to the faculty. Other objects satisfy, though without me; but meats never content nor benefit, till they be taken in. Even so is it with Christ and the faithful: many things there are, which affect them with pleasure, but they are without, and at a distance; only Christ it is, who, by being and dwelling in them', delighteth them.

h Moriensque recepit Quas nollet victurus, aquas, &c. Vid. Lucan. lib. 4. Γ'Εν ὑμῖν. Gal. iv. 19.—Ἐν ταῖς καρδίαις ὑμῶν. Eph. iii. 17.

Lastly, We eat and drink the Sacrament of Christ crucified, that therein we may learn to admire the wisdom of God's mercy, who, by the same manner of actions *, doth restore us to life, by which we fell from it. Satan and death did first assault our ear, and then took possession of us by the mouth: Christ and faith chose no other gates, to make a re-entry and dispossess them,

Thus as skilful physicians' do often cure a body by the same means which did first distemper it, quench heats with heat, and stop one flux of blood by opening another; so Christ, that he may quell Satan at his own weapons, doth, by the same instruments and actions, restore us unto our primitive estate, by which he had hurried us down from it: that those mouths, which were at first open to let in death, may now much more be open, not only to receive, but to praise him, who is made unto us the author and Prince of life.

CHAPTER XII.

Inferences of practice from the consideration of the former

actions.

THESE are all the holy actions we find to have been, by Christ and his apostles, celebrated in the great mystery of this Supper. All other human accessions and superstructions, that are by the policy of Satan, and that carnal affection, which ever laboureth to reduce God's service unto an outward and pompous gaudiness, foisted into the substance of so divine a work, are, all of them, that 'straw and stubble", which he who is a consuming fire,' will at last purge away. Impotent Christ was not, that he could not,nor malignant, that he would not,-appoint,―nor improvident, that he could not foresee, the needfulness of such actions; which are by some proposed, not as matter of ornament, comeliness, and ceremony, but are obtruded on consciences, swayed with superstitious pompousness, for matters

Tertul, cont. Gnost. c. 5.

1 Arist. Probl. sect. 1. quæst. 45. et sect. 3 quæst. 26. m Vid, August. de Doctrina Christiana, lib. 1. c. 14. n 1 Cor.

substantial and necessary to be observed. As if God, who, in the first creation of the world from nothing, did, immediately after the work produced, cease from all manner of further creations,-did, in the second creation of the world from sin, not finish the work himself, but leave it imperfect, to be by another consummated and finished. Certainly, whatsoever human inventions do claim, direct, proper, and immediate subscription of conscience, and do propose themselves as essential, or integral, or any way necessary parts of Divine mysteries; they do not only rob God of his honour, and intrude on his sovereignty, but they do farther lay on him the aspersion of an imperfect Saviour, who standeth in need of the church's concurrence, to consummate the work which he had begun. Away then with those actions of elevation, adoration, oblation, circumgestation, mimical gestures, silent whisperings, and other the like encroachments, in the supposed proper and real sacrifice of Christ in the mass; wherein I see not, how they avoid the guilt of St. Paul's fearful observation, "To crucify again the Lord of glory, and put him unto an open shame." In which things, as in sundry others, they do nothing else but imitate the carnal ordinances of the Jews, and the heathenish will-worship of the Ethnicks; who thought rather by the motions of their bodies, than by the affections of their hearts, to wind into the opinion and good liking of their gods.

Certainly, affectation of pomp, ceremony, and such other human superstructions on the Divine institution, which are not used for order, with decency and paucity, but imposed as yokes upon the consciences of the people, by an arrogated power of the church, to bind the conscience by them; -I say, all other pompous accumulations unto the substance of Christ's Sacraments, are, by Tertullian, made the characters and presumptions of an idolatrous service. True it is indeed, that the ancients make mention, out of that fervour of love and piety towards so sacred mysteries, of adoration at them', and of carrying the remainders of them

P Dr. Reynolds' conference with Hart, c. 8. divis. 4.-Et Mornay de Eucharist. p. 82. in fol. 4 Mentior, si non Idolorum solemma de suggestu, et apparatu, deque sumptu fidem et auctoritatem sibi exstruunt. Tert. de Bapt. cap. 2. Carnem Christi in mysteriis adoramus. Ambros. de Spirit. Sancto, 1. 3. c. 12.— Manducant et adorant. Aug. ep. 120. c. 27. * Η διάδοσις καὶ ἡ μετάληψις

unto the absent Christians. But, as in other things, so here likewise, we find it most true, That things, by devout men begun piously, and continued with zeal, do after, when they light in the handling of men otherwise qualified, degenerate into superstition, the form, purpose, end, and reason of their observation being utterly neglected: it being the contrivance of Satan to raise his temple after the same form, and with the same materials whereof God's consisteth,-to pretend the practice of the saints, for the enforcements of his own projects, to transform himself into an angel of light', that he may the easier mislead unstable and wandering souls,-and to retain at least 'a form of godliness",' that he may, with less clamour and reluctancy, withdraw the substance. And as, in many other things, so hath he herein likewise abused the piety of the best men, unto the furtherance of his own ends. That adoration, which they in and at the mysteries did exhibit unto Christ himself (as indeed they could not choose a better time to worship him in), he impiously derives upon the creature; and makes it now to be done, not so much at, as unto, the elements; making them as well the term and object, as occasion of that worship, which is due only to the Lord of the Sacrament. That carrying about, and reserving of the eucharist, which the primitive Christians used for the benefit of those, who, either by sickness or by persecutions, were withheld from the meetings of the Christians (as in those days many were), is by him now turned into an idolatrous circumgestation; that, at the sight of the bread, the people might direct unto it that worship, which is due only to the person whose passion it representeth, but whose honour it neither challengeth nor knoweth. And certainly, if we view the whole fabric either of gentilism or heresy, we shall observe the methods and contrivances of Satana, most often to drive at this point,-That, either under pretence of Divine truth, or under imitation of Divine institutions, retain

Tois só wapoûʊiv diá tôv diakóvwv wéμmetai. Justin. Mart. Apolog. 2. pro Christianis. t 2 Cor. xi. 14. u 2 Tim. iii. 5. * Justin. Mart. ut supra scriptum est. y Matth. iv. 10. z Vid. Tert. de Coron. Milit. c. 15. et de Baptis. c. 5. et de Præscript. cap. 40. cont. Praxeum, c. 1. et de Specta. cap. 27. et Apolog. 47. et Johan. Stuck, de Antiq. Convival. 1. 1. c. 33. et 1. 3. c. 21. Η Πανουργία, 2 Cor. xi. 3. μεθοδείαι, Ephes. vi. 11. βάθη, Rev. ii. 24. νοήματα, 2 Cor. ii.