Works, Commentary 1 · Part 1

Works · Commentary 1 · Part 1

p. 355MALACHI 1. 11.

Ab ortu Solis usque ad occasum,**LXX. foreign magnum erit Nomen meum in Gentibus; & in omni loco‖‖foreign Heb. foreign offeretur Incensum Nomini meo, & **foreign, Heb. foreignMunus purum: quia magnum erit Nomen meum in Gentibus, dicit Dominus exercituum.

From the rising of the Sun even unto the going down of the same, my Name shall be great among the Gentiles; and in every place Incense shall be offered unto my Name, and a pure Offering: for my Name shall be great among the Heathen, saith the Lord of hosts.

CHAP. I.

The Text a Prophecy of the Christian Sacrifice, according to the judgment of the ancient Fathers in the Second, Third and Fourth Centuries. The difficulty of explaining the Christian Sacrifice: The Reasons of this difficulty. The Method and Order propounded for this Discourse.

THIS place of Scripture, howsoever now in a manner silenced and forgotten, was once, and that in the eldest and purest times of the Church, a Text of eminent note, and familiarly known to every Christian, being alledged by their Pastors and Teachers, as an express and undoubted Prophecie of the Christian Sacrifice or Solemn Worship in the Eucharist, taught by our Blessed Saviour unto his Disciples, to be observed of all that should believe in his Name: and this so generally and grantedly, as could never have been, at least so early, unless they had learned thus to apply it by Tradition from the Apostles.

For in the Age immediately succeeding them, being the second hundred of years after Christ, we find it alledged to this purpose by Iustin Martyr and Irenaeus, the Pillars of that Age; the former of them flourishing within little more than thirty years after the death of S. Iohn, and the latter a Disciple of Polycarp S. Iohn's Scholar. In the Age following, or third Seculum, it is alledged by Tertullian, Zeno Veronensis and Cyprian: in the fourth Seculum by E…sebius, Chrysostome, Hierome and Augustine; and in the afterAges by whom not? Nor is it alledged by them as some singular opinion or private conceit of their own, but as the received Tradition of the Church; whence in some Liturgies (as that of the Church of Alexandria, commonly called the Liturgy of S. Mark) it is inserted into the Hymn, or Preface, which begins, foreign, It is truly meet and right; the conclusion of the Hymn or Laud there being, foreign Giving thanks we offer unto thee, O Lord, this reasonable and unbloudy Service, even that which all Nations from the rising of the Sun to the going down of the same offer unto thee; for thy Name shall be great among all Nations; and in every place Incense is offered unto thy holy Name, and Sacrifice and Oblation.

Thus you see the antiquity of Tradition for the meaning and application of this Prophecy.

But for the Christian Sacrifice it self whereunto it is applied, What the ancient Church understood thereby, What and Wherein the Nature of this Sacrifice consisted, p. 356is a point, though most needful to be known, yet beyond belief obscure, intricate and perplext. He that shall make trial, will find I say true. A reverend and learned Prelate of ours acknowledges as much: Apud veteres Patres (saith he) (ut quod r…s est liberè fateamur) de sacrificio corporis Christi in Eucharistia incruento frequens est mentio: quae dic… vix potest quant…p…re quorundam, alioqui doctorum hominum, ingenia exercuerit, torserit, vexaverit: To speak the plain truth, In the Writings of the ancient Fathers there is frequent mention of The unbloudy Sacrifice of the Body of Christ in the Eucharist; a point which hath beyond expression puzzled and vext the minds of several men otherwise not unlearned. The reason of this obscurity hath grown partly from the changing of the Notion of the Church thereabout in following times; partly by the violence of the Controversies of this last Age, whilst each part finding the knot, and studying not so much the right way of untying it, as how to give the least advantage to the adverse party, have infinitely intangled the same, and made it more indissoluble than before.

I have acquainted my self long with this Argument, and spent many a thought thereabout, using the best means I could conceive to be inform'd; namely, Not so much to relie upon the opinions of modern Writers, as to peruse and compare the passages of the Ancients themselves, and their Forms and Liturgies, out of which I was assur'd the Truth might be learned, if I were but able to understand them.

What I have sound and learned, I desire to give an account of in this place, as I shall have occasion; the Argument being such as befits no other Auditorie but the Schools of the Prophets. Nor will the Discourse be unprofitable for such as mean to be acquainted with the Writings of the Fathers and Antiquities of the Church: there being nothing in them so like to stumble the Reader as this.

To come then to the matter: where I will chalk out my Discourse in this order.

First, I shall premise, as the ground thereof, A Definition of The Christian Sacrifice as the ancient Church meant it.

Secondly, Explain the meaning of my Text, by application thereto.

Thirdly, Prove each part of the Definition I shall give, by the Testimonies of the Fathers, Councils and Liturgies of the first and best Ages; interlacing therewith such passages as may make for the better understanding either of the Testimonies I bring, or of the matter it self for which they are brought.

CHAP. II.

The Christian Sacrifice defined, and briefly explained. The two parts or double Object of this Sacrifice. What meant by Sacrificium Quod, what by Sacrificium Quo.

ITO begin with the First, The Definition of the Christian Sacrifice: Under which name first know, That the ancient Church understood not, as many suppose, the mere Sacrament of the Body and Bloud of Christ; but the whole Sacred Action or Solemn Service of the Church assembled, whereof this Sacred Mysterie was then a prime and principal part, and as it were the Pearl or Iewel of that Ring, no publick Service of the Church being without it. This observed and remembred, I define the Christian Sacrifice, ex mente antiquae Ecclesiae, according to the meaning of the ancient Church, in this manner:

An Oblation of Thanksgiving and Prayer to God the Father **or, Through the Sacrifice of Iesus Christ upon the Cross.through Iesus Christ and his Sacrifice commemorated in the Creatures of Bread and Wine, **or, first offered to God to agnize him.wherewith God had first been agniz'd. So that this Sacrifice as you see hath a double object or matter: first, Praise and Prayer, which you may call Sacrificium Quod; secondly, The commemoration of Christ's Sacrifice on the Cross, which is Sacrificium Quo, the Sacrifice whereby the other is accepted. For all the Prayers, Thanksgivings and Devotions of a Christian, are tendred up unto God in the name of Iesus Christ crucified. According whereunto we are wont to conclude our Prayers with Through Iesus Christ our Lord. And this is the specification whereby the Worship of a Christian is distinguisht from that of the Iew. Now that which we in all our Prayers and Thanksgivings do vocally, when we say, Through Iesus Christ our Lord; the ancient Church p. 357in her publick and solemn Service did visibly, by representing him, according as he commanded, in the Symbols of his Body and Bloud: For there he is commemorated and received by us for the same end for which he was given and suffered for us; that through him we receiving forgiveness of our sins, God our Father might accept our service and hear our prayers we make unto him? What time then so sit and seasonable to commend our devotions unto God, as when the Lamb of God lies slain upon the holy Table; and we receive visibly, though mystically, those gracious Pledges of his blessed Body and Bloud? This was that Sacrifice of the ancient Church the Fathers so much ring in our ears; The Sacrifice of Praise and Prayer through Iesus Christ mystically represented in the Creatures of Bread and Wine.

But yet we have not all, there is one thing more my Definition intimates, when I say, Through the Sacrifice of Iesus Christ commemorated in the Creatures of Bread and Wine, wherewith God had first been agnized. The Body and Bloud of Christ were not made of common Bread and common Wine, but of Bread and Wine first sanctified, by being offered and set before God as a Present to agnize him the Lord and Giver of all: according to that,**psal. 24. 1. The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof; and **Deut. 16. 16.Deut 16:16Let no man appear before the Lord emptie. Therefore as this Sacrifice consisted of two parts, as I told you, of Praise and Prayer, (which in respect of the other I call Sacrificium Quod,) and of the Commemoration of Christ Crucified, (which I call Sacrificium Quo:) so the Symbols of Bread and Wine traversed both; being first presented as Symbols of Praise and Thanksgiving to agnize God the Lord of the Creature, in the Sacrificium Quod; then, by invocation of the Holy Ghost, made the Symbols of the Body and Bloud of Christ, in the Sacrificium Quo. So that the whole Service throughout consisted of a reasonable part, and of a material part, as of a Soul and a Body: of which I shall speak more fully hereafter, when I come to prove this I have said by the Testimonies of the Ancients.

CHAP. III.

The words of the Text explained, and applied to the foregoing Definition of the Christian Sacrifice. Incense denotes the rational part of this Sacrifice, Mincha the material part thereof. What meant by Mincha purum. Two Interpretations of the Purity of the Christian Mincha given by the Fathers; a third propounded by the Author.

AND this is that Sacrifice which Malachi foretold the Gentiles should one day IIoffer unto God; In every place Incense shall be offered unto my Name, and a pure Mincha: for my Name shall be great among the Heathen, saith the Lord of hosts. Which Words I am now, according to the order I propounded, to explicate, and apply to my Definition.

Know therefore that the Prophet in the foregoing words upbraids the Iews with despising and disesteeming their God; forasmuch as they offered unto him for sacrifice not of the best, but the lame, the torn and the sick; as though he had not been the great King, Creator and Lord of the whole World, but some petty God, and of an inferiour rank, for whom any thing were good enough. Vers. 6, 7. If I be a Father, where is mine honour? If I be Dominus, where is my fear? saith the Lord of Hosts unto you, O Priests that despise my name; and ye say, Wherein have we despised it? Ye offer polluted bread upon mine Altar; and ye say, Wherein have we polluted thee? [I'le tell you] In that ye say, The Table of the Lord is contemptible, or, not so much to be regarded; that is, you think so, as appears by the baseness of your Offering: for the Present shews what esteem the giver hath of him he honoureth therewith. But you offer that to me which ye would not think fit to offer to your Prorex or Governour under the King of Persia; which shews you have but a mean esteem of me in your hearts, and that you believe not I am He that I am. It may be, because you see me acknowledged of no other Nation but yours, and that ye have been subdued by the Gentiles, and brought into this miserable and despicable condition wherein you now are, you imagine me to be some Topical God, and as of small jurisdiction, so of little power. But know, that howsoever I now seem to be but the Lord of a poor Nation, yet the days are coming, when from the rising of the Sun to the going down p. 358of the same, my Name shall be great among the Gentiles; and in every place Incense shall be offered to my Name, and a pure Offering: for my Name shall be great among the Heathen, saith the Lord of Hosts: it follows, though you have prophaned it, in that ye say, The Table of the Lord is contemptible; whereas I am a great King, and my Name shall be dreadful among the Heathen.

This is the coherence and dependence of the Words. Now to apply them. Incense (as the Scripture it self tells) notes the**Revel. 8. 3.Rev 8:3 Prayers of the Saints. It was also that wherewith the**Esay 66. 3. Qui record… tur thure.Isa 66:3 remembrance was made in the Sacrifices, or God put in mind. Mincha, which we turn Munus, Levit. 24. 7.Lev 24:7a Gift or Offering, is Oblatio farrea, an Offering made of meal or flower baked or fried, or dried or parched corn. We in our English, when we make distinction,Ecclus. 45. 16.Sir 45:16 call it a Meat-offering; but might call it a Bread-offering, of which the Libamen or the Drink-offering being an indivisible concomitant, both are implied under the name Mincha, where it alone is named.

The Application then is easy: Incense here notes the rational part of our Christian Sacrifice, which is Prayer, Thanksgiving, and Commemoration; Mincha the material part thereof, which is Oblatio farrea a Present of Bread and Wine.

BUT this Mincha is characterised in the Text with an attribute not to be overpast, Mincha purum; In omni loco offeretur incensum Nomini meo, & Mincha purum, In every place Incense shall be offered to my Name, and a pure Mincha: The Meat-offering which the Gentiles should one day present the God of Israel with should be Munus purum, a pure Offering, or, as the Septuagint, foreign, a pure Sacrifice. Let us learn, if we can, what this Purity is, and wherein it consisteth, or in what respect the Gentiles Oblation is so styled.

1. Some of the Fathers take this Pure Offering, to be an Offering that is purely or spiritually offered: The old Sacrifices both of the Iew and Gentile were offered modo corporali, in a corporeal manner, by slaughter, fire, and incense; but this of Christians should be offered only foreign, by way of Prayer and Thanksgiving, as**Apol. 2. Iustin Martyr expresses it; whence it is usually called foreign, a reasonable and unbloudy Sacrifice; namely, of the**foreign Constant in Orat. ad Sanctos … c. 12. apud Euseb. manner of offering it: not that there was no material thing used therein, as some mistake, (for we know there was Bread and Wine;) but because it is offered unto God immaterially or foreign only; which the Fathers in the first Council of Nice call foreign, to be sacrificed without sacrificing rites. This sense of Pure Sacrifice is followed by Tertullian, as may appear by his words ad Scapulam, where speaking of the Christian Liturgy, Sacrificamus (saith he) pro salute Imperatoris;—sed, quomodo praecepit Deus, purâ prece: Non enim eget Deus, Conditor Vniversitatis, odoris aut sanguinis alicujus; haec enim Daemoniorum pabula sunt: We offer Sacrifice for the health and welfare of the Emperor; but it is (according as God hath commanded) the Sacrifice of **Pure prayer, that is, Prayer not defiled with shedding of bloud & smoke of Incense according to the manner of the Gentiles. This to be the meaning of purâ prece, the words immediately following will tell us, Non enim eget Deus, &c. [Thus the Author in another paper where this passage of Tertullian was set down.]pure prayer: For God, the maker of the World, stands not in need of the smell or savour or of the bloud of any creature: These indeed are the food and diet which the Devils love. Also in his third Book against Marcion cap. 22. In omni loco offertur Sacrificium Nomini meo—In every place Sacrifice shall be offered to my Name—& sacrificium mundum, and a pure Sacrifice; that is, (saith he) gloriae relatio, benedictio, laus & hymni, giving glory to God, blessing, praise and hymns: which he presently calls munditia sacrificiorum, the purities of Sacrifices. The same way go some others. But this sense, though it fitly serves to difference our Christian Sacrifice from the old Sacrifices of the Iews and Gentiles, and the thing it self be most true; yet I cannot see how it can agree with the context of our Prophet, where the word Incense (though I confess mystically understood) is expressed together with Munus purum a pure offering. For it would make the Literal sense of our Prophet to be absurd, and to say, In every place Incense is offered to thy Name, and an Offering without Incense. And yet this would be the Literal meaning, if Pure here signified without Incense.

2. Let us hear therefore a second Interpretation of this Puritie of the Christian Mincha, more agreeable to the dependence of the words; and that is à conscientia offerentis, from the disposition and affection of the offerer; according to that of the Apostle, Tit. 1. 15, 16. To the pure all things are pure; but unto them that are defiled and unbelieving is nothing pure, but even their mind and conscience is defiled; They profess they know God, but in works they deny him. The Iews offering was prophane and polluted, because it proceeded not out of a due belief, and a conscience throughly perswaded of the Greatness of their God, that he was the Creator and Lord of the whole earth, but rather some petty and particular God, like the Gods of other Nations: But the Gentiles, who should see him not only the God of one Nation, but universally p. 359acknowledged over all the earth, should have no such reason to doubt, but firmly believe him to be the Great God, Creator of heaven and earth, and worship him as such; and so their Offering be a Pure Offering, not polluted with unbelief. And it is to be observed, that all the ancient Christian Liturgies begin with this acknowledgment: For the Summe of the Eucharistical Doxology, when the Bread and Wine is first presented before God,Chap. 4. 11. is comprehended in that of the Apocalyps, Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory, and honour, and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.

And to this way of interpreting the Purity of the Christian Sacrifice, to wit, from the conscience and affection of the offerers, the Fathers mostly bend. Irenaeus lib. 4. cap. 34. Sacrificia non sanctificant hominem, (non enim indiget Deus sacrificio) sed conscientia ejus qui offert sanctificat sacrificium, pura exsistens—Quoniam igitur cum simplicitate Ecclesia offert, justè munus ejus purum sacrificium apud Denm deputatum est: Sacrifices do not sanctifie a man, (for God stands not in need of any of our Sacrifices;) but the Conscience of him that offers, being pure, sanctifies the Sacrifice—And because the Church offereth with Simplicity, (with a Conscience purified from all malice and hypocrisie) rightly therefore is her Oblation accounted by God a Pure Sacrifice. And a little after, Oportet enim nos oblationem Deo facere, & in omnibus gratos inveniri fabricatori Deo, in sententia pura & fide sine hypocrisi, &c. For it behoveth us to present God with our Oblations, and in all things to be found thankful unto God our maker; with pure minds and faith unfeigned, with stedfast hope and fervent love offering unto him the Firstfruits, or a Present, of his Creatures. Neither is Tertullian, whom I alledged before for the other interpretation, averse from this; for in his fourth Book Cont. Marc. c. 1. Sacrificium mundum, a pure Sacrifice, that is, saith he, simplex oratio de conscientia pura, sincere Prayer proceeding from a pure Conscience. But this conscientious purity they seem to restrain, at least chiefly, to freedom from malice, as that singular purity whereby this Christian Sacrifice is differenced from that of the Iew, because none can offer it but he that is in charity with his brother; according to that in the Gospel, When thou bringest thy gift unto the Altar, Matt. 5. 23. 24.Matt 5:23Matt 5:24and remembrest thy brother hath ought against thee —Go first and be reconciled to thy brother, &c. And therefore in the beginning of this Christian Service, the Deacon was anciently wont to cry, foreign, Let no man have ought against his brother; and then followed osculum sanctum, the kiss of reconciliation. Thus the Fathers of the first Council of Nice took Sacrificium purum, as appears Can. 5. where they expound foreign the pure Gift or Oblation, to be that which is offered foreign, omni simultate depositâ, all malice and hypocrisie, and the like instances of an unworthy and ignoble spirit, being laid aside.

But according to this Exposition, the Purity of the Christian Sacrifice will not be opposite to the pollution of the Iewish in the same kind, as it would if more generally taken, but in another kind; and so the sense stands thus; You will not offer me a pure offering, but the Gentiles one day shall, and that with a purity of another manner of stamp than that my Law requires of you. And thus I have told you the two ways according to which the Ancients understood this Purity; and I prefer the latter, as I think they did.

3. But there is a third Interpretation, were it back'd by their Authority, (which I confess it is not) which I would prefer before them both; and, I think, you will wonder with me they should be so silent therein: namely, that this title of Purity is given to the Christian Mincha in respect of Christ whom it signifies and represents, who is a Sacrifice without all spot, blemish and imperfection. This the Antithesis of this Sacrifice to that of the Iews might seem to imply: For the Iews are charged with offering polluted Bread upon God's Altar; whereby what is meant the words following tell us, If you offer the blind for sacrifice, is it not evil? and if you offer the lame and sick, Verse 14.is it not evil? and in the end of the Chapter, Cursed be the deceiver, who hath in his flock a male, and voweth and sacrificeth to the Lord a corrupt thing. Now, if the Sacrifice of the Gentiles be called Pure in opposition to this; is it not so called in respect of that most perfect, unblemisht and unvaluable Sacrifice it represents, Iesus Christ the Lamb of God? I leave it to your consideration.

p. 360CHAP. IV.

Six Particulars contained in the Definition of the Christian Sacrifice. The First, viz. That this Christian Service is an Oblation, proved out of Antiquity. How long the Apostles Age lasted, or when it ended. Proofs out of the Epistles of Clemens and Ignatius. foreign and foreign how distinguished in Ignatius. The Christian Service is properly foreign, but improperly foreign according to the strict and prime sense of the word.

IIITHUS having absolved the Two first things I propounded; given you a Definition of the Christian Sacrifice, and explained the words of my Text: I come now to the Third and longest part of my task, To prove each particular contained in my Definition by the Testimonies and Authorities of the ancient Fathers and Writers of the first and purest Ages of the Church. The Particulars I am to prove are in number Six.

1. That this Christian Service is an Oblation, and expressed under that Notion by the utmost Antiquity.

2. That it is an Oblation of Thanksgiving and Prayer.

3. An Oblation through Iesus Christ commemorated in the creatures of Bread and Wine.

4. That this Commemoration of Christ, according to the style of the ancient Church, is also a Sacrifice.

5. That the Body and Bloud of Christ, in this Mystical Service, was made of Bread and Wine which had first been offered unto God, to agnize him the Lord of the Creature.

6. That this Sacrifice was placed in Commemoration only of Christ's sacrifice upon the Cross, and not in a real offering of his Body and Bloud anew.

When I shall have proved all these by sufficient Authority, I hope you will give me leave to conclude my Definition for true, That the Christian Sacrifice (ex mente antiquae Ecclesiae, according to the meaning of the ancient Church) was An Oblation of Thanksgiving and Prayer to God the Father, through the Sacrifice of Iesus Christ commemorated in the Creatures of Bread and Wine, wherewith God had first been agnized.

ILet us begin then with the first, That this Christian Service is an Oblation, and under that notion expressed by all Antiquity. The names whereby the Ancient Church called this Service are, foreign, Oblation, Sacrifice; foreign, Eucharist, (a word, if rightly understood, of equipollent sense;) foreign, a Sacrifice of Praise, a reasonable and unbloudy Sacrifice; Sacrificium Mediatoris, Sacrificium Altaris, Sacrificium pretii nostri, Sacrificium Corporis & Sanguinis Christi, the Sacrifice of our Mediator, the Sacrifice of the Altar, the Sacrifice of our Ransome, the Sacrifice of the Body and Bloud of Christ. It would be infinite to note all the Places and Authors where and by whom it is thus called. The four last are **In E…chirid. ad Lauren. cop. 109. & Confess. l. 9. c. 12.S. Augustine's; foreign and foreign are to be found with Iustin Martyr and Irenaeus, whose antiquity is the Age next the Apostles. But, you will say, the Fathers even so early had swerved from the style of the Apostolick Age, during which these kind of terms were not used; as appears, by that we find them not any where in their Epistles and Writings. But what if the contrary may be evinced, That this language was used even while the Apostles yet lived? For grant they are neither found in the Acts of the Apostles, nor in S. Paul's and S. Peter's Writings; yet this proves not they were not used in the Apostles times, no more than that foreign was not, whose case in this point is the same with the other. But know, that to confine the Apostles Age within the limits of S. Paul's and S. Peter's lives, is a general mistake: For the Apostles Age ended not till S. Iohn's death, Anno Christi 99. and so lasted as long, within a year or thereabouts, after S. Paul's and S. Peter's suffering, as it was from our Saviour's Ascension to their Deaths, that is, one and thirty years. And this too for the most part was after the Excidium or Destruction of Ierusalem, in which time it is likely the Church received no little improvement in Ecclesiastical Rites and Expressions; both because it was the time of her greatest increase; and because, whilest the Iews Polity stood, her Polity, for its full establishment, stood in some sort suspended. This appears by S. Iohn's Writings, which are the only Scripture written after that time, and in which we find two Ecclesiastick terms of foreign, The Word, for the Deity of Christ, and foreign, The Lord's day, for the first day of the week; neither of both seeming to have been in use in S. Paul's and S. Peter's times: and why p. 361may we not believe the like happened in others, and by name in these now questioned?

Which, that I may not seem only to guess, I think I can prove by two witnesses which then lived; the one Clemens, he whose name **Phil. 4. 3.Phil 4:3S. Paul says was written in the Book of life; and the other Ignatius. Clemens in his undoubted Epistle ad Corinthios (a long time missing, but now of late come again to light.) In this Epistle the word foreign is three times used of the Christian Service, Pag. 52. All those duties (saith he) which the Lord hath commanded us to do, we ought to do them regularly and orderly; foreign, Our Oblations and divine Services to celebrate them on set and appointed times. And a little after, foreign. They therefore that perform their Oblations on set and appointed times, are acceptable to God and blessed: for observing the Commandments of the Lord, they offend not. The other, Ignatius, in his Epistle ad Smyrnenses, hath both foreign and foreign. Non licet (saith he) absque Episcopo foreign. It is not lawful without the Bishop either to baptize, or to celebrate the Sacrifice, or to **The ancient Latine Translation renders foreign Agap…n facere, to celebrate the Feast of Charity, which at first did accompany the Eucharist.communicate. Where foreign he calls, in a stricter sense, the first part of this sacred and mystical Service, to wit, the Thanksgiving, wherein the Bread and the Wine, as I told you, were offered unto God, to agnize his Dominion. foreign he calls the mystical Commemoration of Christ's Body and Bloud; and foreign the receiving and participation of the same. For know that foreign and foreign are sometimes used for the whole Action, and sometimes thus distinguished. Of the genuineness of this Epistle the learned doubt not; but if any one do, I suppose they will grant that Theodoret had his genuine Epistles. Let them hear then a passage which he, in his third Dialogue, cites out of the Epistles of Ignatius, against some Hereticks; foreign. They do not admit, or allow of, Eucharists and Oblations, because they do not acknowledge the Eucharist to be the flesh of our Saviour Iesus Christ, which suffered for our sins. Here you see Oblations and Eucharists exegetically joyned together. And so, I think, I have proved these terms of foreign and foreign to have been in use in the Church in the latter part of the Apostles Age.

But what if one of them, namely foreign, were used sooner, even in S. Paul's and S. Peter's time? In the first Epistle of Peter, chap. 2. 5. You are (saith he, speaking to the Body of the Church) an holy Priesthood, to offer foreign spiritual Sacrifices to God by Iesus Christ. In the Epistle to the Heb. 13. 15. By him (that is, through Christ our Altar) let us offer foreign, the Sacrifice of praise to God continually. Why should I not think S. Paul and S. Peter speak here of the solemn and publick Service of Christians, wherein the Passion of Christ was commemorated? I am sure the Fathers frequently call this sacrifice foreign the Sacrifice of Praise. And in some ancient Liturgies, immediately before the Consecration, the Church gives thanks unto God for chufing them to be an holy Priesthood to offer sacrifices unto him, as it were alluding to S. Peter. Thus you see, first or last or both, the words foreign and foreign were no strangers to the Apostles Age.

I will now make but one Quaere, and answer it, and so conclude this point: Whether these words or names were used (seeing they were used) properly, or improperly (foreign) of the subject we speak of. I answer briefly; This Christian Service, as we have defined it, is an Oblation properly: For wheresoever any thing is tendred or presented unto God, there is truly and properly an**Heb. 5. 7. & Chap. 13. 15.Heb 5:7 Oblation; be it spiritual or visible,1 Pet. 2. 5.1 Pet 2:5 it matters not; for Oblatio is the Genus: and**Lib. 4. c. 34. Irenaeus tells me here, Non genus oblationum reprobatum est; oblationes enim & illic, oblationes autem & hîc; sacrificia in populo, sacrificia & in Ecclesia; sed species immutata est tantúm: For Offerings in the general are not reprobated; there were Offerings there, (viz. in the Old Testament) there are also Offerings here, (viz. in the New Testament;) there were Sacrifices among the people, (that is, the Iews,) there are Sacrifices also in the Church: but the Specification only is changed. But as for foreign or Sacrifice, according to its prime signification, it signifies a Slaughter-offering, as in Hebrew, so in Greek of foreign, macto, to slay; as the Angel Acts 10. 13. says to S. Peter, foreign, Peter, kill and eat. Now we in our Christian Service slay no offering, but commemorate him only that was slain and offered upon the Cross: Therefore our Service is called foreign improperly and Metaphorically. But if foreign be Synecdochically taken for an Offering in general, as it is both in the New Testament and elsewhere, then the Christian Sacrifice is as truly called foreign as foreign or foreign.

p. 362CHAP. V.

The Second Particular, That the Christian Sacrifice is an Oblation of Thanksgiving and Prayer, proved from Iustin Martyr, Tertullian, Clemens Alexand, &c. The Altar, or Holy Table, anciently the place of the publick Prayers of the Church. Prayer, Oblation and Sacrifice promiscuously used by the Fathers when they speak of the Christian Sacrifice. The Conjunction of Prayer and the Eucharist argued from Acts 2. 42. and from Ignatius ad Ephes. The three parts of which the Christian Synaxis consisted.

IINOW I come to the Second particular contained in my Definition; To prove that the Christian Sacrifice, according to the meaning of the ancient Church, is an Oblation of Thanksgiving and Prayer.

My first Author shall be Iustin Martyr, in his Dialogue with Tryphon the Iew; where, to the Evasion of the Iews, labouring to bereave the Christians of this Text (by saying it was meant of the Prayers which the dispersed Iews at that time offered unto God in all places where they lived among the Gentiles; which Sacrifices, though they wanted the material Rite, yet were more acceptable unto God in regard of their sincerity than those prophaned ones at Ierusalem; and not that here was meant any Sacrifice which the Gentiles should offer to the God of Israel: to this Evasion) Iustin replies, foreign. That Prayers and Thanksgivings made by those that are worthy are the only Sacrifices that are perfect and acceptable unto God, I do also affirm; for these are the only Sacrifices which Christians have been taught they should perform. If you ask where, and how; he tells you, foreign [leg. foreign] foreign in that thankful remembrance of their food both dry and liquid, wherein also is commemorated the Passion which the Son of God suffered by himself. It is a description of the Eucharist, wherein, as I have already told you, the Bread and Wine were first presented unto God, as the Primitiae or a kind of First-fruit-Offering, to agnize him the Giver of our Food both dry and liquid; and then consecrated to be the Symbols of the Body and Bloud of Christ.

My next Author shall be Tertullian ad Scap. in the**[See Chap. 3. of this Treatise, pag. 358. where these two passages are translated.] place before alledged: Sacrificamus (saith he) pro salute Imperatoris;—sed, quomodo praecepit Deus, purâ prece: Non enim eget Deus, Conditor Vniversitatis, odoris & sanguinis alicujus; haec enim Daemoniorum pabula sunt. The Gentiles so thought, that their Gods were refreshed and nourisht with the smell and savour of their Sacrifices. Besides, in his third Book contra Marcionem cap. 22. In omni loco sacrificium nomini meo offertur, & sacrificium mundum, (to wit, saith he) Gloriae relatio, benedictio, laus & hymni; and Lib. 4. cap. 1. Sacrificium mundum, scilicet simplex oratio de conscientia pura.

Thirdly, Clemens Alexandrinus Lib. 7. Stromat. foreign, We (Christians) honour God by Prayer; foreign, And this we send up unto him as the best and holiest Sacrifice, honouring him by that most sacred Word, whereby we receive knowledge; that is, by Christ. Again, foreign, The sacrifice of the Church is an oration exhaled from sanctified souls. He speaks not of the private Prayer of every Christian, but of the publick Prayer of the Church as a Body; as will be evident to him that reads the place, and appears by the words quoted, foreign, The Sacrifice of the Church; and foreign, exhaled (not from a sanctified soul, but) from sanctified souls. For to private Prayer was not given this title of the Christian Sacrifice, but unto the publick, which the Church offered unto God when she presented her self before him, as one Body in Christ, by the mystical Communication of his Body and Bloud.

This my next Author, Cyprian, will make plain in his 16, Epist. ad Mosen & Maximum. Nos quidem (saith he) vestri diebus & noctibus memores, & quando in sacrificiis precem cum pluribus facimus, & cum in secessu privatis precibus oramus: We indeed are mindful of you day and night; both when we in our Sacrifices pray publickly with others, and when we pray privately in our retirements: where we see the Sacrifice of Prayer to be, cùm precent cum pluribus facimus, and distinguisht from that we do cùm in secessu privatis precibus oramus.

p. 363These Authorities are all within the first three hundred years: to which I will add one of the fourth; Optatus Milevitanns Lib. 6. contra Parmenianum, where he thus expostulates with the Donatists for breaking and defacing the Altars of the Catholicks: Quid est enim tam sacrilegum (saith he) quàm Altaria Dei (in quibus & vos aliquando obtulistis) frangere, radere, removere? in quibus Vota Populi & Membra Christi **[Vide infra—Eregistis etiam Calices, Dominici Sanguinis portatores.]portata sunt; quò Deus omnipotens invocatus sit: For what is there so sacrilegious as to break and deface, nay and quite take away, the Altars of God, whereon ye your selves have sometimes offered; those Altars which did bear both the Prayers of the People and the Body and Bloud of Christ, that so Almighty God might be invocated? Mark here Altaria in quibus Vota populi & Membra Christi portata sunt, and gather hence what parts the Christian Sacrifice consisted of: Vota populi are the Prayers of the Church, Membra Christi the Body and Bloud of Christi, which the Prayers were offered with; both of them upon the Altar. For it is worthy your notice, That the ancient Church had no other Place whereat she offered her publick Prayers and Orisons but that whereon the memory of the Body and Bloud of Christ was celebrated; that as they were joyned in their Use, so they might not be severed in their Place.

According to which use, and agreeable to this passage of Optatus, speaks the Council of Rhemes, commanding the Table of Christ (that is, the Altar) to be reverenced and honoured, Quia Corpus Domini ibi consecratur, & sanguis ejus hauritur; Preces quoque & Vota populi in conspectu Dei à Sacerdote offeruntur: Because there the Body of Christ is consecrated, and his Bloud is drunk; there also the Prayers and Desires of the People are offered up by the Priest before God.

Furthermore, That the Christian Sacrifice was an Oblation of Prayer, and consisted in Invocation, is also another way to be evinc'd; namely, Because the Fathers, when they speak thereof, use the terms of Prayer, Oblation and Sacrifice promiscuously and interchangeably one for the other, as words importing the same thing.

Tertullian Exhort. ad Cast. disswading a Widower from marrying again, because it would be uncomely in the Sacrifice of the Church to make mention (as the manner then was) of more Wives than one, and that too by the mouth of an once-married Priest, speaks thus; Neque enim pristinam poteris odisse, cui etiam religiostorem reservas affectionem, ut jam receptae apud Dominum, pro cujus spiritu postulas, pro qua oblationes annuas reddis. Stabis ergo ad Dominum cum tot uxoribus quoi in oratione commemoras? & offeres pro duabus? & commendabis illas duas per Sacerdotem de monogamia ordinatum? circundatum virginibus & univiris? & ascendet sacrificium tuum cum liberâ fronte? For thou canst not hate thy former wife, for whom thou reservest a more religious affection, as being received already with the Lord, for whose spirit thou makest request, for whom thou rendrest yearly Oblations. Wilt thou then stand before the Lord with as many wives as in thy prayers thou makest mention of? and wilt thou offer for two? and commend those two by a Priest ordained after his having been but once-married? encompassed with virgins and with women but once married? and shall thy Sacrifice ascend freely and confidently? Here postulatio and oblatio, oratio and offerre, oratio and sacrificium are interchangeably put one for the other. So also, in his Book De Oratione are Oratio and Sacrificium; where he speaks of the kiss of Peace and Reconcilement, used at the Eucharist: Quae oratio (saith he) cum divortio sancti osculi integra? quale sacrificium, à quo sine pace receditur? What Prayer can be complete that is without the holy kiss? what a kind of Sacrifice is that, from which Christians come away without the kiss of Peace?

Augustine De Civit. Dei Lib. 8. cap. 27. speaking of the honour of Martyrs; Nec Martyribus (saith he) sacrificia constituimus—quis audivit aliquando fidelium, stantem Sacerdotem ad Altare (etiam super sanctum corpus Martyris) ad Dei honorem cultúmque constructum, dicere in Precibus Offero tibi sacrificium, Petre, vel Paule? &c. We do not sacrifice to Martyrs—Who among the faithful, while the Priest was standing at the Altar built for the honour and worship of God, (nay though it were over the holy body of the Martyr,) I say, who ever heard the Priest to say thus in Prayer, To thee, O Peter, or O Paul, do I offer Sacrifice? Here Sacrificium is expounded by Preces, and Preces put for Sacrificium.

And Lib. 22. cap. 8. concerning one Hesperius, a man of quality in the City whereof Austin was Bishop, who, by the affliction of his cattel and servants, perceiving his Country-Grange liable to some malignant power of evil spirits, Rogavit nostros, (saith S. Austin) me absente, Presbyteros, ut aliquis eorum illò pergeret, cujus orationibus cederent. Perrexit unus, obtulit ibi sacrificium corporis Christi, orans, quantum potuit, ut cessaret illa vexatio. Deo protinus miserante cessavit. He entreated our Presbyters, in my absence, that some one of them would go to the place, through the prevalency of whose p. 364Prayers he hoped the evil spirits would be forced away. Accordingly one of them went thither, and offered there the Sacrifice of Christ's Body, praying earnestly with all his might for the ceasing of that fore affliction: and it ceased forthwith through God's mercy. The Priest was entreated to pray there; he went, and offered sacrifice, and so prayed.

For this reason the Christian Sacrifice is among the Fathers, by way of distinction, called foreign, Sacrificium laudis, that is, of Confession and Invocation of God; namely, to difference it from those of Bloud and Incense. Augustine Lib. 1. contra Adversarium Legis & Prophetarum cap. 20. Ecclesia immolat Deo in corpore Christi sacrificium laudis, ex quo Deus Deorum locutus vocavit terram à Solis ortu usque ab occasum: The Church offereth to God the Sacrifice of praise, ever since the fulfilling of that in Psalm 50. The God of Gods hath spoken, and called the earth from the rising of the Sun to the going down thereof. Again, Epist. 86. Sacrificium laudis ab Ecclesia toto orbe diffusa diebus omnibus immolatur: The Sacrifice of Praise is continually offered by the Christian Church dispersed all the world over. And elsewhere. And amongst the Greek Fathers this term is so frequent as I shall not need to quote any of them.

Now this joyning of the Prayers of the Church with the mystical commemoration of Christ in the Sacrament of his Body and Bloud, was no after-Invention of the Fathers, but took its original from the Apostles times, and the very beginning of Christianity: For so we read of the first believers Acts 2. 42. that they were foreign. which the Vulgar Latine turns, Erant autem perseverantes in doctrina Apostolorum, & communicatione fractionis panis, & orationibus; And they persevered in the doctrine of the Apostles, and in the communication of the breaking of bread, and Prayers: but the Syriack, Perseverantes erant in doctrina Apostolorum, foreign; & communicabant in oratione, & fractione Eucharistiae: They persevered in the doctrine of the Apostles, and communicated in Prayer and in breaking of the Eucharist; that is, They were assiduous and constant in hearing the Apostles, and in celebrating the Christian Sacrifice. Both which Translations teach us, foreign and foreign, Breaking of Bread and Prayers, are to be referred to foreign Communion, as the Exegesis thereof; namely, that this Communion of the Church consisted in the Breaking of Bread and Prayers; and so the conjunction foreign to be Exegetically taken, as if the Greek were rendred thus, Erant perseverantes in (audienda) doctrina Apostolorum, & in communicatione, videlicet, fractione panis, & orationibus. And who knows not that the Synaxis of the ancient Christians consisted of these three parts, Of hearing the Word of God, of Prayers, and Commemoration of Christ in the Eucharist? Our Translation therefore here is not so right, which refers foreign to foreign, and translates it, The fellowship of the Apostles.

The Antiquity also of this conjunction we speak of appears out of Ignatius, in his Epistle to the Ephesians, where speaking of the damage which Schismaticks incur by dividing themselves from the communion of the Church, he utters it in this manner; foreign ; Let no man (saith he) deceive himself: unless a man be within the Altar, he is deprived of the Bread of God. And if the prayer of one or two be of that force as to set Christ in the midst of them, how much more shall the joynt-prayer of the Bishop and whole Church, sent up unto God, prevail with him to grant us all our requests in Christ? These words of Ignatius directly imply that the Altar was the place as of the Bread of God, so of the Publick Prayers of the Church; and that they were so nearly linked together, that he that was not within the Altar, (that is, who should be divided therefrom) had no benefit of either.

p. 365CHAP. VI.

The Third Particular, That the Christian Sacrifice is an Oblation of Thanksgiving and Prayer through Iesus Christ Commemorated in the Creatures of Bread and Wine. Sacrifices under the Law were Rites to invocate God by. That the Eucharist is a Rite to give thanks and invocate God by, proved from several Testimonies of the Fathers and the Greek Liturgies. A passage out of Mr. Perkins agreeable to this notion. What meant by that usual expression of the Ancients speaking of the Eucharist, [Through Iesus Christ the great High-Priest.] By Nomen Dei in Mal. 1. Iustin Martyr and Irenaeus understood Christ. Why in the Eucharist Prayers were to be directed to God the Father.

THE second Particular thus proved, the Third comes next in place, which is, I IIIThat this Oblation of Thanksgiving and Prayer was made through Iesus Christ commemorated in the creatures of Bread and Wine: Namely, they believed that our Blessed Saviour ordained this Sacrament of his Body and Bloud as a Rite to bless and invocate his Father by, in stead of the manifold and bloudy Sacrifices of the Law. For,**[See th… morefully proved in the following Discourse.] That those bloudy Sacrifices of the Law were Rites to invocate God by, is a Truth, though not so vulgarly known, yet undeniable; and may, on the Gentiles behalf, be proved out of Homer and other Authors;**See 1 Sam. 7. 9.1 Sam 7:9 on the Iews, by that speech of Saul, 1 Sam. 13. 12. when Samuel expostulated with him for having offered a burnt-offering:Ezra 6. 10.Ezra 6:10 I said, saith he, The Philistines will come down upon me to Gilgal, Psal. 116. 13.Ps 116:13and I have not made supplication to the Lord; I forced my self therefore, and offered a burnt-offering: upon which place Kimchi notes, that foreign,Pr…. 15. 8. Sacrifice was a Rite or Medium, whereby Prayer was usually presented unto God. The same is likewise true of their Hymns and Doxologies, Baruch 1. 10, 11. 1 Mat. 12. 11. 2 Chron. 7. 12.Bar 1:10Bar 1:11Bar 1:1Matt 12:112 Chr 7:12as is to be seen 2 Chron. 29. 27. and by the words of the Chaldee Paraphrast Ionathan, upon Exod. 38. 8. concerning the women that assembled at the door of the Tabernacle: The Women (saith he) which came foreign to pray, stood at the door of the Tabernacle **Ab. …zra upon this place observes, foreign that these religious women d…spising the vain delights of this world, gave, as a Free-will-offering for the making of the Lavit, their Looking-glasses, by which they were wont to dress and adorn themselves; not caring to use them any longer for such purposes.by their Oblation, foreign and they praised and confessed; afterwards they returning to their husbands, brought forth righteous children.

It is further confirmed for Invocation in general, by that which the Scripture so often reports of Abraham and Isaac. **Gen. 12. 7. 13. 4. 26. 25. 33. 20.Gen 12:7Gen 12:13Gen 12:4Gen 12:26Gen 12:25Gen 12:33Gen 12:20That they built Altars where they came, and there they called upon the name of the Lord: But the Altar was a place for Sacrifice.

In stead therefore of the slaying of Beasts and burning of Incense, whereby they called upon the Name of God in the Old Testament; the Fathers, I say, believed our Saviour ordained this Sacrament of Bread and Wine, as a Rite whereby to give thanks and make supplication to his Father in his Name.

The mystery of which Rite they took to be this: That as Christ, by presenting his Death and Satisfaction to his Father, continually intercedes for us in Heaven; so the Church on Earth semblably approaches the Throne of Grace, by representing Christ unto his Father in these holy Mysteries of his Death and Passion. Veteres enim, (saith Cassander) in hoc mystico sacrificio, non tam peractae semel in Cruee oblationis, cujus hîc memoria celebratur, quàm perpetui Sacerdotii & jugis sacrificii, quod quotidie in Coelis sempiternus Sacerdos offert, rationem habuerunt; cujus hîc Imago per solennes Ministrorum, preces exprimitur. The Ancients did not in this mystical Sacrifice so much consider and respect the Oblation once made upon the Cross, (the memory whereof is here celebrated,) as the everlasting Priesthood of Christ and the perpetual Sacrifice which he, our High-Priest for ever, doth continually offer in Heaven; the resemblance whereof is here on earth exprest by the solemn prayers of God's Ministers.

This a Reverend and famous Divine of blessed memory, once of this Society, and interr'd in this place, saw more clearly, or exprest more plainly, than any other Reformed Writer I have yet seen, in his Demonstratio Problematis, and Title de Sacrificio Missae; where he speaks thus: Veteres Coenam Domini, seu totam coenae actionem, vocârunt Sacrificium, variis de causis:—quia est commemoratio, ade…que repraesentatio Deo Patri, sacrificii Christi in cruce immolati: The ancient Fathers used to call the Supper of the Lord, or the whole action of the Supper, a Sacrifice; and that for divers reasons— p. 366Because it is a Commemoration, and also a Representation unto God the Father, of the Sacrifice of Christ offered upon the Cross. He goes on, Hoc modo fideles etiam inter orandum Christum offerunt Deo Patri victimam pro suis peccatis, dum scilicet mente affectúque ad sacrificium ejus unicum feruntur, ut Deum sibi habeant faciántque propitium: In this sense the Faithful in their prayers do offer Christ as a Sacrifice unto God the Father for their sins, in being wholly carried away in their minds and affections unto that only and true Sacrifice, thereby to procure and obtain God's favour to them. That which every Christian doth mentally and vocally, when he commends his prayers to God the Father through Iesus Christ, making mention of his death and satisfaction; that in the publick service of the Church was done by that Rite which our Saviour commanded to be used in Commemoration of him.

These things thus explained, Let us now see by what Testimonies and Authorities it may be proved the ancient Church had this meaning. I will begin with S. Ambrose, because his Testimony is punctual to our explication. Offic. lib. 1. cap. 48. Antè (saith he) Agnus offerebatur, offerebatur & Vitulus: nunc Christus offertur; sed offertur quasi homo, quasi recipiens passionem; & **In Lit. Chrysost. foreign, Thou, O Christ, art both the Offerer, and the Offering it self.offert seipsum quasi sacerdos, ut peccata nostra dimittat: hîc in imagine, ibi in veritate, ubi apud Patrem pro nobis quasi advocat us intervenit. Heretofore (under the Law) was wont to be offered a Lamb, and a Bullock: (Exod. 29.) But now (under the Gospel) Christ is offered; but he is offered as a man, and as one that suffered; and he also as a Priest offers himself, for the forgiveness of our sins. Here (on earth) this is done in a resemblance and representation; there (in Heaven) in truth, where he as our Advocate intercedes for us with his Father. **In Missa seu Liturg. Ambrosiana. post Confra…orium Sacerdos sic orat. Ipsius praeceptum est, Domine, quod agimus, in cujus nunc praesentiâ postulamus: Da Sacrificio Authorem suum, ut impleatur fides rei in sublimitate mysterii; ut sicuti, veritatem coelestis sacrificii exequimur, sic veritatem Dominici corporis & sanguinis hauriamus.An Author which Cassander in his Consultations quotes without name, expresses this mystery fully; Non impiè à nobis (saith he) Christus occiditur, sed piè sacrificatur; & hoc modo mortem Domini annunciam us donec veniat: hoc enim hîc per eum humiliter agimus in terris, quod pro nobis ipse potenter (sicut filius pro sua reverentia exaudiendus) agit in Coelis; ubi apud Patrem pro nobis quasi advocatus intervenit; cui est pro nobis intervenire, carnem quam pro nobis & de nobis sumsit, Deo Patri quodaemmodo pro nobis ingerere. Christ is not wickedly slain by us, but piously sacrificed; and thus we shew the Lord's death till he come: For we by him do that here on earth in a meaner way, which he (as a **So the Vulg. … at. Hebr. 5. 7. renders foreign. which (according to G…otius and others) should be rendred, Exauditus (i. liberatus) à me…u. The like phrase in Psal. 22. 22.Heb 5:7Ps 22:22Son to be heard for his reverence or piety) doth for us in heaven powerfully and prevailingly, where he as our Advocate mediates for us with the Father, whose office it is to intercede for us, and to present that flesh which he took for us and of us, to God the Father in our behalf.

My next Author shall be Eusebius, Demonstrat, Evangel. lib. 1. cap. 10. where mentioning that of the 23. Psalm, Thou hast prepared a Table before me, &c. Thou anointedst my head with oyl; Herein, saith he, are plainly signified the Mystical unction, foreign, and the venerable Sacrifices of Christ's table; (he means the Symbols of the Body and Bloud of Christ) foreign, whereby propitiating God, we are taught to offer up all our life long unto the Lord of all, unbloudy and reasonable Sacrifices, most acceptable to him, by his most glorious High-Priest, Iesus Christ. Here Eusebius affirms that Christians are taught to offer unto God reasonable and unbloudy sacrifices, that is, Prayer and Thanksgiving, foreign, propitiating, or finding favour with God, through the venerable mysteries of Christ's Table. For foreign is, litare, i. e. propitiare, or placare Numen, votum impetrare, foreign, gratum facere.

Next I produce Cyril of Ierusalem (or more likely Iohn his successor) Author of those five Catecheses Mystagogicae: In the last of which, relating and expounding the meaning of that which was said or done in the celebration of the Eucharist, according to the use of his time, amongst other things he says thus; foreign, after that Spiritual Sacrifice, that unbloudy Service, that is, After the Thanksgiving and Invocation of the Holy Ghost upon the Bread and the Wine, to make it the Body and Bloud of Christ, (of which he was speaking before) was done, **1 Mac. 12. 11. foreign, Super iis quae offerimus Sacrificii….1 Macc 12:11foreign, p. 367&c. We do over that Propitiatory Sacrifice beseech God for the common peace of the Churches, for the good estate of the World, for Kings, their Armies and Confederates, for the sick and the afflicted, and in fine for all that are in an helpless condition. And this is the manner of the Greek Liturgies, immediately upon the Consecration of the Dona (viz. the Bread and Wine) to be the Symbols of the Body and Bloud of Christ, and the Commemoration thereon of his Passion, Resurrection and Ascension,**foreign, Dionys. …reop. Ep. ad Demoph. Therapeutam. to offer to the Divine Majesty, as it were over the Lamb of God then lying upon the Table, their Supplications and Prayers,**foreign. Euseb. de Vita Constant. lib. …. c. 45. for the whole state of Christ's Church and all sorts and degrees therein, together with all other their suits and requests; and that ever and anon interposing the word foreign, we offer unto thee, for these and these, that is, we commemorate Christ in this mystical Rite for them. This Prayer therefore our Author Cyrill in the place afore-quoted calls foreign, the prayer of the holy and most worthily dreaded Sacrifice lying then upon the Table: and saith, that it is a most powerful Prayer, as that wherein we offer unto the Divine Majesty foreign, Christ that was once slain for our sins, foreign, propitiating the merciful God for our selves and others we pray for.

And this is that, if I mistake not, which Tertullian means lib. de Oratione cap. 11. where he says of the Christians, that they did Dominicâ passione orare. Nos vero (inquit) non attollimus tantùm [manus,] sed etiam expandimus; & Dominicâ passione orantes confitemur Christo, id est, Christum; We do not only lift up, but spre… forth our hands, and praying with the Lord's passion, (that is, by the Commemoration thereof in the Eucharist) confess unto Christ, that is, confess and acknowledge Christ; according to the Dialect of the Scripture, Confitemur Domino for Confitemur Dominum: For by commemorating Christ and offering our Prayers to the Father in his Name, we confess and acknowledge him to be our Mediator. So Eusebius de Laude Const. calls it foreign, To send up Prayers in his Name to the God of all.

The same with Tertullian means S. Austin, describing the Christian Sacrifice to be, immolare Deo in Corpore Christi sacrificium Laudis, lib. 1. contra Adversarium Legis & Prophetarum, cap. 20. Ecclesia (saith he) immolat Deo, in Corpore Christi, sacrificium Laudis, ex quo Deus Deorum locutus vocavit terram à Solis ortu usque ad occasum, Psalm 50. 1. The Church offereth unto God the Sacrifice of Praise in the Body of Christ, ever since the fulfilling of that in Psal. 50. The God of Gods hath spoken, and called the earth from the rising of the Sun to the going down thereof.

Lastly, That the representation of the Body and Bloud of Christ in this Christian Service was intended and used as a Rite whereby to find grace and favour with God, when the Church addressed her self unto him, (which is that I undertook to prove,) is apparent by a saying of Origen Hom. 13. in Levit. where treating of the Shew-bread, which was continually set before the Lord with Incense, for a memorial of the children of Israel, that is, to put God in mind of them, he makes it in this respect to have been a lively figure of the Christians Eucharist; for, saith he, Ista est commemoratio sola quae propitium facit Deum hominibus; That's the only Commemoration which renders God propitious to men.

All these Testimonies have been express for our purpose, That the Thanksgivings and Prayers of the Church in the Christian Sacrifice were offered unto the Divine Majesty through Christ commemorated in the Symbols of Bread and Wine, as by a Medium whereby to find acceptance.

There is, besides these, an usual expression of the Fathers, when they speak of the Eucharist; which though it be not direct and punctual, as the former, yet I verily believe it aimed at the same Mystery: namely, when they say that in this Sacrifice they offer Praise and Prayer to God the Father, through Iesus Christ the great High Priest. I will quote an Example or two. Clemens, or the Author of the Constitutions, lib. 2. cap. 29. al. 25. foreign, You, (saith he) O Bishops, are now unto your people as Priests and Levites,—standing at the Altar of the Lord our God, foreign, and offering unto him reasonable and unbloudy Sacrifices through Iesus Christ the great High-Priest. p. 368The same Clemens, in a more undoubted writing of his, to wit his Epist. ad Corinthios, quoting that of the 50. Psalm after the Septuagint, foreign, The sacrifice of Praise shall glorifie me; foreign,— and there is the way wherein I shall shew to him that sacrificeth the salvation of God; foreign, This is the way, saith Clemens, that is, the Sacrifice of Praise is the way, foreign, wherein we have found our salvation, Iesus Christ, the High-Priest of all our offerings. The Fathers are wont to expound this place of the Eucharist; and therefore I doubt not but Clemens means of the same, and tells us that in this Sacrifice Christ, the High-Priest of our offerings, is found, that is, represented and commemorated.

In the same style speaks Iust. Mar. Dial. cum Tryphone. foreign. There is not any sort of men in the world, whether Barbarians, or Greeks, or of what denomination soever—amongst whom Prayers and Thanksgivings are not made to the Father and Maker of all through the name of the crucified Iesus. He is speaking of the Christian sacrifice, and our Text in Malachi, In omni loco offeretur Incensum Nomini meo: where note that by Nomen Dei the Name of God he understands Christ, through whom in this Sacrifice our devotions are offered. So doth Irenaeus and others, Iren. lib. 4. cap. 33. Quod est aliud Nomen quod in Gentibus glorificatur, Quemadmodum siquis Rex ipse filii sui pingat imaginem, justè suam illam dicit imaginem secundùm utrumque; quoniam & filii ejus est, & quoniam ipse fecit eam: Sic & Iesu Christi nomen, quod per universam mundum glorificatur in Ecclesia, suum esse confitetur Pater; & quoniam Filii ejus est, & quoniam ipse scribens id, ad salutem dedit hominum. Iren. ibid.quàm quod est Domini nostri, per quem glorificatur Pater, & glorificatur homo—quoniam ergo Nomen Filii proprium Patris est, & in Deo omnipotente, per Iesum Christum offert Ecclesia; bene ait secundùm utraque, Et in omni loco offeretur Incensum Nomini meo, & Sacrificium purum. What other Name is there that is glorified among the Gentiles, than the Name of our Lord, by whom the Father is glorified, and man also is glorified?—And because the Name of the Son is the Father's, and in Almighty God, the Church offers through Iesus Christ; well saith the Prophet in respect of both, And in every place Incense shall be offered to my Name, and a pure Sacrifice.

Now how this Incense and Sacrifice, which the Prophet saith the Gentiles should offer to the Name of God, may be expounded, Offered by the Name of God, to wit, by Christ, Origen lib. 8. contra Cels. will inform us; foreign We worship, (saith he) as we are able, with our Prayer and Supplications the one God and his only Son, the Word and Image of God, Iesus Christ; offering to the God of the Vniverse our Prayers by his only-begotten Son, TO WHOM WE FIRST OFFER THEM; beseeching him, that he, being the Propitiation (i. Propitiator) for our sins, would vouchsafe, as our High-Priest, to present our PRAYERS and SACRIFICES and INTER CESSIONS to God most High. The summe whereof is this, That which we offer to the Father by Christ, we offer first to Christ; that he, as our High-Priest, might present it to his Father. More passages hath Origen in the same Books of this kind.

But I will not weary you too much in this rugged way; Only I will add, that out of this which we have hitherto discoursed and proved, may be understood the meaning and reason of that Decree of the third Council of Carthage and Hippo, namely, Vt nemo in Precibus, vel Patrem pro Filio, vel Filiumpro Patre, nominet: Et cum Altari assistitur [N. B.] semper ad Patrem dirigatur oratio: That none in their Prayer should name either the Son for the Father, or the Father for the Son: And that, when they stand at the Altar, they ought always to direct their Prayers to the Father. The reason, Because the Father is properly the Object foreign,1 Cor. 8. 6.1 Cor 8:6 to whom; the Son only foreign, by whom, in this Mystical service; and therefore to direct here our Prayers and Thanksgivings to the Son, were to pervert the order of the Mystery, which is, as hath been proved, An Oblation of Praise and Prayer to God the Father through the Intercession of Iesus Christ, represented in the Symbols of Bread and Wine.

p. 369CHAP. VII.

The Fourth Particular, That the Commemoration of Christ in the Creatures of Bread and Wine (in the Eucharist) is a Sacrifice, according to the style of the ancient Church. How Sacrifices are distinguished from all other Offerings. A Sacrifice defined. The universal Custom of mankind to contract or confirm Covenants and Friendship by eating and drinking together: This illustrated from Testimonies of Scripture and humane Authors. Sacrifices were Federal Feasts, wherein God and men did feast together in token of amity and friendship. What was God's Messe or portion in the Sacrifices. The different Laws of Burnt-offerings, Sin and Trespass-offerings, and the Peace-offerings. Burnt-offerings had Meat and Drink-offerings annexed to them, and were regularly accompanied with Peace-offerings. That Sacrifices were Feasts of amity between God and men, proved by four Arguments. The reason of those phrases, Secare foedus and Icere foedus. That in those Sacrificial Feasts, (and also in the Eucharist) God is to be considered as the Convivator, and Man as the Conviva. This cleared by several passages in this (as also in the) following Chapter.

IVTHE Fourth Particular propounded was this, That the Sacrament of the Body and Bloud of Christ, or Lord's Supper, or the Commemoration of Christ in the Creatures of Bread and Wine, is also a Sacrifice, according to the style of the ancient Church.

It is one thing to say, That the Lord's Supper is a Sacrifice, and another to say, That Christ is properly sacrificed therein. These are not the same: For there may be a Sacrifice which is a representation of another Sacrifice, and yet a Sacrifice too. And such a Sacrifice is this of the New Testament, a Sacrifice wherein another Sacrifice, that of Christ's death upon the Cross, is commemorated. Thus the Papists gain nothing by this Notion of Antiquity, and our asserting the same: For their Tenet is, That Christ in this Sacrifice is really and properly sacrificed; which we shall shew in due time that the Ancients never meant.

To begin with this, That the Lord's Supper or Mystical Rite of the Body and Bloud of Christ is a Sacrifice: As in the Old Testament the name of Sacrifice was otherwhile given to the whole Action in which the Rite was used, sometimes to the Rite alone: so in the Notion and Language of the ancient Church, sometimes the whole Action or Christian Service (wherein the Lord's Supper was a part) is comprehended under that name; sometimes the Rite of the Sacred Supper it self is so termed, and truly, as ye shall now hear.

The resolution of this Point depends altogether upon the true Definition of a Sacrifice, as it is distinguished from all other Offerings. Which, though it be so necessary that all disputation without it is vain; yet shall we not find that either party interessed in this question hath been so exact therein as were to be wished. This appears by the differing Definitions given and confuted by Divines on both sides: The reason of which defect is, because neither are deduced from the Notion of Scripture, but built upon other conceptions. Let us see therefore if it may be learned out of Scripture what that is which the Scripture, in a strict and special sense, calls a Sacrifice.

Every Sacrifice is an Oblation or Offering: but every offering is not a Sacrifice, in that strict and proper acception we seek. For Tithes, First-fruits, and all other called Heave-offerings in the Law, and whatsoever indeed is consecrated unto God, are Oblations or Offerings; but none of them Sacrifices, nor ever so called in the Old Testament. What Offerings are then called Sacrifices? I answer, Burnt-Offerings, Sinofferings, Trespass-offerings and Peace-offerings. These, and no other, are called by that name.

Out of these therefore must we pick the true and proper ratio and nature of a Sacrifice. It is true, indeed, that these Sacrifices were Offerings of beasts, of beeves, of sheep, of goats, of fowls: but the ratio or essence of any thing consists not in the matter thereof; as the Gowns we wear are still the same kind of apparel, though made of differing stuffs. These Sacrifices also were slain, and offered by Fire and Incense: but neither is the modus of any thing the ratio or essential Form thereof. That therefore may have the nature and formale of a Sacrifice, which consists of another matter, and is offered after another and differing manner. Those we call Sacraments of the Old Testament, Circumcision and the Passeover, were by effusion of bloud; ours are not; and yet we esteem them nevertheless true Sacraments: So it may be here.

p. 370To hold you therefore no longer in suspence: A Sacrifice, I think, should be defined thus; An Offering whereby the offerer is made partaker of his God's Table, in token of Covenant and Friendship with him, &c. or more explicately thus; An Offering unto the Divine Majesty of that which is given for the Food of man; that the offerer partaking thereof might, as by way of pledge, be certified of his acceptation into Covenant and fellowship with his God, by eating and drinking at his Table. S. Augustine comes toward this Notion, when he defines a Sacrifice (though in a larger sense) Quod Deo nuncupamus, reddimus & dedicamus, hoc fine, ut sanctâ societate ipsi adhaereamus; That which we devote, dedicate and render unto God, for this end, that we may have an holy society and fellowship with him. For to have society and fellowship with God, what is it else but to be in league and covenant with him?

In a word, a Sacrifice is Oblatio foederalis. For the true and right understanding whereof, we must know, That it was the universal custom of mankind, and still remains in use, to contract covenants and make leagues and friendship by eating and drinking together. When Isaac made a covenant with Abimelech the King of Gerar, the Text saith, He made him and those that were with him a Feast, and they did eat and drink, and rose up betimes in the morning, and sware one to another, Gen. 26. 30, 31. When Iacob made a covenant with Laban, after they had sworn together, he made him a Feast, and called his brethren to eat Bread, Gen. 31. 54. When David made a league with Abner, upon his promise to bring all Israel unto him, David made Abner and the men that came with him a Feast, 2 Sam. 3. 20.**Vide etiam Ios. 9. 14. 15. Psal. 41. 10. Vir pacis mea, in quo fidebam, qui comedebat panem meum.Josh 9:14Josh 9:15Ps 41:10 Hence in the Hebrew tongue a Covenant is called foreign of foreign To eat; as if they should say An eating: which derivation is so natural, that it deserves to be preferred before that from the**foreign à foreign Eligere, quia Foedus pangitur conditionibus certis qua duae partes …ligunt. other signification of the same Verb, which is To chuse. And this will suffice for the custom of the Hebrews.

Now for the Gentiles, Herodotus tells us, the Persians were wont to contract leagues and friendship inter Vinum & Epulas, in a full Feast, whereat their wives, children and friends were present. The like Tacitus reports of the Germans. Amongst the Greeks and other Nations, the Covenantees ate Bread and Salt together. Unto which comes near that Ceremony some-where used at Weddings, that the Bridegroom, when he comes home from Church, takes a piece of Cake, tastes it, then gives it to his Bride to taste it likewise; as a token of a Covenant made between them. The Emperor of Russia at this day, when he would shew extraordinary grace and favour unto any, sends him Bread and Salt from his Table: And when he invited Baron Sigismond, the Emperor Ferdinand's Ambassador, he did it in this form; Sigismunde, comedes Sal & panem nostrum nobiscum, Sigismond, you shall eat our Bread and Salt with us. Hence that Symbol of Pythagoras, foreign, Break no bread, is interpreted by Erasmus and others to mean Break no friendship. **Vide Turcicum ritum apud Busbequium, Epist. 1. 11.Moreover the Egyptians, Thracians, and Libyans in special, are said to have used to make leagues and contract friendship by presenting a cup of Wine one to another; which custom we find still in use amongst our Western Nations. And what is our …le pledge you, but I take it as a pledge of league and friendship from you? Yea it is a rule in Law, that if a man drink to him against whom he hath an accusation of slander or other verbal injury, he loses his Action, because it is supposed he is reconciled with him.

Such now as were these Covenant-feastings and eatings and drinkings in token of league and amity between men and men, such are Sacrifices between Man and his God; Epulae foederales, Federal feasts, wherein God deigneth to entertain Man to eat and drink with or before him, in token of favour and reconcilement. For so it becomes the condition of the parties, that he which hath offended the other, and seeks for favour and forgiveness, should be entertained by him to whom he is obnoxious; and not è contrá: that is, that God should be the Convivator, the entertainer or maker of the Feast, and man the Conviva, or Guest. To which end the Viands for this sacred Epulum were first to be offered unto God, and so made his; that he might entertain the offerer, and not the offerer him. For we are to observe, that what the Fire consumed was accounted as God's own Mess, and called by himself the meat of his Fire-offerings: Levit. 3. 11, & 16. Numb. 28. 2, & 24.Lev 3:11Lev 3:16Num 28:2Num 28:24the rest was for his guests, which they were partakers of either by themselves, as in all the Peace-offerings; or by their proxies the Priests, as in the rest, to wit, the Holocausts, the Sin and Trespass-offerings. The reason of which difference was, I suppose, because the one was ad impetrandum or renovandum foedus, for the making or renewing the Covenant with God, where therefore a Mediator was needful; the other, to wit, the Peace-offerings, ad confirmandum & consignandum, for the confirming the Covenant only, wherein therefore they addressed themselves before p. 371the Divine Majesty with greater confidence. If any shall object, That the Holocaust was wholly burnt and consumed, and so no body partaker thereof; I answer, It is true, the Beast which was slain was wholly burnt, and so all of it as it were God's Mess: But there was**Levit. 23. 13. 18. Num. 8. 8. & 15. 4, 5. & 28. 28, 28, 31. & 29. …, 11. 19. Vide & Nehem. 10. 33.Lev 23:13Lev 23:18Num 8:8Num 15:4Num 15:5Num 28:28Num 28:31Num 28:29Num 28:11Num 28:19Neh 10:33 a Meat-offering and Drink-offering annexed thereunto, as a part of the holy Feast; of which a handful only was burnt for a memorial, the remainder was for the**Lev. 7. 9. with Lev. 2. 2. 3, 9, 10.Lev 7:9Lev 2:2Lev 2:3Lev 2:9Lev 2:10 Priests to eat in the holy place. Besides Burnt-offerings were regularly accompanied with Peace-offerings (as you shall find them in Scripture ordinarily joyned together;) now in these the people that offered had the greatest share. In a word, That those who offered Sacrifice, both among Iews and Gentiles, were pertakers of the same, is a thing to be taken for granted; as appears by the warning God gave the Israelites, Exod. 34. 12, 15. That they should make no covenants with the inhabitants of the land; Lest, when they went a whoring after their Gods, and offered a sacrifice unto them, they might call them, and they also eat of their sacrifice. Also by that Psal. 106. 28. They joyned themselves to Baal-Peor, and ate the sacrifices of the dead. By that of S. Paul, Heb. 13. 10. We have an Altar, whereof they have no right to eat which serve at the Tabernacle. So that of this there need be no question.

It remains only that we prove, That these sacred Epulae were Epulae foederales, Federal Feasts, and so our Definition will stand good. Now this will appear first in general, by that expression of Scripture, wherein the Covenant which God makes with Man is expressed by eating and drinking at his Table, Luke 13. 26. Those to whom the Lord opens not, plead for themselves, We have eaten and drunk in thy presence, and thou hast taught in our streets, &c. Chap. 22. 29, 30. Our Saviour tells his Disciples, I appoint you a Kingdom, as my Father hath appointed unto me; That ye may eat and drink at my Table in my Kingdom. Apocal. 3. 20. Behold, I stand at the door, and knock; If any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in unto him, and will sup with him, and he with me. But these passages, you will say, shew rather how fitly Sacrifices might be Feasts of amity between God and men, than prove they were so indeed: Hear therefore such proofs as I think come home to the point.

First, Every sacrifice, saith our Saviour, Mark 9. 49. is salted with salt. This Salt is called Levit. 2. 13. The salt of the Covenant of God; that is, a Symbol of the perpetuity thereof. Now if the Salt which seasoned the Sacrifice were Salfoederis Dei, the Salt of the Covenant of God, what was the Sacrifice it self but Epulum foederis, the Feast of the Covenant?

Secondly, Moses calls the Bloud of the Burnt-offerings and Peace-offerings, wherewith he sprinkled the children of Israel when they received the Law, The Bloud of the Covenant which the Lord had made with them; This is, saith he, the Bloud of the Covevenant which the Lord hath made with you, Exod. 24. 8.

Thirdly, But above all, this may most evidently be evinced out of the 50. Psalm, the whole Argument whereof is concerning Sacrifices: There God saith, vers. 5. Gather my Saints together unto me, which make covenant with me by sacrifice, foreign. And vers. 16. of the Sacrifices of the wicked and such as amend not their lives, VntoUnto the wicked God saith, What hast thou to do to declare my Statutes foreign, and take my Covenant in thy mouth? seeing thou hatest instruction, &c. Statutes here are Rites and Ordinances, and particularly those of Sacrifice, which whoso bringeth unto God, and thereby supplicates and calls upon his Name, is said to take the Covenant of God in his mouth; forasmuch as to invocate God with this Rite, was to do it by way of commemoration of his Covenant, and to say, Remember, Lord, thy covenant, and, For thy covenant's sake, Lord, hear my prayer and supplication. For what hath man to do with God, to beg any favour at his hands, unless he be in covenant with him? Whereby appears the reason why mankind, from the beginning of the world, used to approach their God by this Rite of sacrificing, that is, ritu foederali, by a foederal Rite.

Fourthly, I add in this last place, for a further confirmation yet, That when God was to make a Covenant with Abram, Gen. 15. he commanded him to offer him a Sacrifice, vers. 9. Offer unto me (saith he,**And so the Chald…e Par. forthe Hebrew foreign hath foreign Offer before me. so it should be turned) a heifer, a she-goat, and a ram, each of three years old, a turtle dove, and a young pigeon. All which he offered accordingly, and divided them in the midst, laying each piece or moiety one against the other; and when the Sun went down, God in the likeness of a smoaking furnace and burning lamp past between the pieces, and so (as the Text says) made a covenant with Abram, saying, unto thy seed will I give this land, &c. By which Rite of passing between the parts, God condescended to the manner of men. And note here, that the Gentiles, and Iews likewise, in their more solemn Covenants between men and p. 372men, (which were made under pain of curse or execration) used this Rite of Sacrifice, whereby men covenanted with their God, as it were to make their God both a witness and party with them. And here the Iews cut the Sacrifice in sunder, and past between the parts thereof; as God did here with Abram: which was as much as if they had said,See Ierem. ch. 34. vers. 18. 19.Jer 34:18Jer 34:19 Thus let me be divided and cut in pieces, if I violate the oath I have now made in the presence of my God. The Gentiles, besides other ceremonies, used not to eat at all of these Sacrifices, but to fling them into the Sea, or bury them in the Earth; as if they had said, If I break a Covenant, thus let me be excluded from all amity and favour with my God, as I am now from eating of his Sacrifice. Hence came those phrases of foreign, in the Hebrew; of ferire, percutere & icere foedus, in Latin; of foreign, in Homer, To cut or to strike a Covenant; à ferendis, percutiendis, & secandis sacrificiis in foederibus sanciendis, from the custome of striking and cutting the Sacrifices asunder at the making of Covenants between man and man. Though this manner of speech may be also derived from their ordinary Epulae foederales, wherein they killed Beasts, which the ancients in their ordinary diet did not.

Having thus seen what is the nature of a Sacrifice, and wherein the ratio or essential Form thereof consisteth; it will not be hard to judge, whether the ancient Christians did rightly in giving the Eucharist that name, or not. For that the Lord's Supper is Epulum foederale a Foederal Feast we all grant, and our Saviour expresly affirms it of the Cup in the institution, foreign, This Cup is the Rite of the new Covenant in my Bloud, which is poured out for many for the remission of sins; evidently implying, That the bloudy Sacrifices of the Law, with their Meat and Drink-offerings, were Rites of an old Covenant, and that this succeeded them as the Rite of the**Eusebius (Demonst. Evang. lib. 9. n…um n…stcum sacrosa…cta Eucharistiae voca… foreign. Casaubaxer…. ad Ann. 32. N. 26. New: That that was contracted with the bloud of beeves, sheep and goats; but this founded in the bloud of Christ. This parallel is so plain, as I think none will deny it. There is nothing then remains to make this sacred Epulum a full Sacrifice, but that the Viands thereof should be first offered unto God, that he may be the Convivator, we the Convivae or the Guests.

CHAP. VIII.

The Fifth Particular, That the Body and Bloud of Christ in the Eucharist was made of Bread and Wine which had first been offered to God, to agnize him the Lord of the Creature. This proved from the Testimonies of Antiquity next to the Apostles times, and from ancient Liturgies; as also from the Fathers arguing from this oblation of the Creature in the Eucharist to God, that the Father of Christ was the Creator of the world, in confutation of some Hereticks in their days; and lastly from S. Paul's parallel of the Lord's Supper and the Sacrifices of the Gentiles. Two Questions answered. 1. Whence may it appear that our Saviour at the Institution of the Eucharist did first offer the Bread and Wine to God, to agnize him the Lord of the Creature? 2. Is not the celebration of the Eucharist in the Western Churches (whether the Reformed or the Roman) therefore defective, because no such Oblation is there in use?

MY last task was to prove, That not only the whole Action of the celebration of the Eucharist, according to the Definition I gave thereof, but even the Rite of the Lord's Supper is indeed a Sacrifice, not in a Metaphorical, but a proper sense; and this, if the nature of Sacrifice be truly defined, no whit repugnant to the Principles of the Reformed Religion.

To evidence which I shewed, That a Sacrifice was nothing else but a Sacred Feast, namely Epulum foederale, wherein God mystically entertained Man at his own Table, in token of amity and friendship with him: Which that he might do, the Viands of that Feast were first made God's by oblation, and so eaten of, not as of Man's, but God's provision.

There is nothing then wanting to make this sacred Epulum, of which we speak full out a Sacrifice; but that we shew, That the Viands thereof were in like manner first offered unto God; that so being his, he might be the Convivator, Man the Conviva or the Guest. And this the ancient Church was wont to do; this they believed our Blessed Saviour himself did, when, at the institution of this holy Rite, he took the Bread and the Cup into his sacred hands, and looking up to Heaven gave thanks and blessed. p. 373And, after his example, they first offered the Bread and Wine unto God, to agnize him the Lord of the Creature; and then received them from him again in a Banquer, as the Symbols of the Body and Bloud of his Son. This is that I am now to prove out of the Testimonies of Antiquity, not long after, but next unto the Apostles times, when it is not likely the Church had altered the form they left her for the celebration of this Mystery.

I will begin with Irenaeus as the most full and copious in this point. He in his fourth Book cap. 32. speaks thus; Dominus Discipulis suis dans consilium Primitias Deo offerre ex suis Creaturis, non quasi indigenti, sed ut ipsi nec infructuosi nec ingrati sint; eum qui ex Creatura panis est accepit, & gratias egit, dicens, Hoc est curpus meum; & Calicem similiter, qui est ex ea Creatura quae est secundùm nos, suum sanguinem confessus est: & Novi Testamenti novam docuit oblationem, quam Ecclesia ab Apostolis accipiens, in universo mundo offert Deo, ei qui alimenta nobis praestat, primitios suorum munerum in Novo Testamento: Our Lord counselling his Disciples to offer unto God the First-fruits (or a Present) of his Creatures, not for that God hath any need thereof, but that they might shew themselves neither unfruitful nor ungrateful; He took that Bread which was made of his Creature, and gave Thanks, saying, This is my Body; and he likewise acknowledged the Cup, consisting of the Creature which we use, to be his Bloud: And thus taught the new oblation of the New Testament, which the Church receiving from the Apostles, offers throughout the world unto God, that feeds and nourisheth us, being the First-fruits of his own gifts in the New Testament.

And Cap. 34. Igitur E…clesiae oblatio, quam Dominus docuit offerri in universo mundo, purum sacrificium reputatum est apud Deum, & acceptum est ei; non quòd indigeat à nobis sacrificium, sed quoniam is qui offert, glorificatur ipse in co quod offert, si acceptetur. munus ejus: Per munus enim erga Regem honos & affectio ostenditur. Therefore the Oblation of the Church, which our Lord taught and appointed to be offered through all the world, is accounted a pure Sacrifice with God, and is acceptable unto him; not because God stands in need of our Sacrifice, but because the offerer is himself honoured in that he offers, if his Present be accepted: For by the Present it appears what affection and esteem the Giver hath for the King he honoureth therewith. He alludes to that in Malachi 1. 14. I am a great King, saith the Lord of Hosts.

Ibid. Oporiet nos oblationem Deo facere, & in omnibus gratos inveniri Fabricatori Deo—Primitias earum quae sunt ejus Creaturarum offerentes: & hanc oblationem Ecclesia sola puram offert Fabricatori, offerens ei cum gratiarum actione ex Creatura ejus: It behoveth us to present God with our Oblations, and in all things to be found thankful unto God our Maker—offering unto him the First-fruits of his Creatures: and it is the Church only that offers this Pure Oblation unto the Creator of the world, while it offers unto him a Present out of his Creatures with thanksgiving.

In the same place, Offerimus autem ei, non quasi indigenti, sed gratias agentes Dominationi ejus, & sanctificantes creaturam: But we offer unto him, not as if he needed, but as giving thanks to his Soveraignty, and sanctifying the Creature. He alludes again to that in this Chapter of Malachi, v. 6. If I be Dominus, where is my fear, saith the Lord of hosts unto you, O Priests that offer polluted Bread ubon mine Altar?

My next witness shall be Iustin Martyr, in time elder than Irenaeus, though I reserved him for the second place. He in his Dialogue with Tryphon, (the place before alledged) telling the Iew, That the Sacrifices of Christians are foreign, Supplications and giving of Thanks; foreign, and that these are the only Sacrifices which Christians have been taught they should perform, in that thankful remembrance of their food both dry and liquid; foreign, wherein also is commemorated the Passion which the Son of God suffered by himself. Here is a twofold commemoration witnessed to be made in the Eucharist: The first, as he speaks, of our food dry and liquid, that is, of our meat and drink, by agnizing God, and recording him the Creator and giver thereof; the second, of the Passion of Christ the Son of God, in one and the same food. And again, in the same Dialogue, Panem Eucharistiae **foreign.in commemorationem passionis suae Christus fieri tradidit, Christ hath taught us that the Eucharistical Bread should be consecrated for the Commemoration of his Passion; foreign that withall we may give thanks to God for having made the world with all things therein for man, and for having freed us p. 374from that evil and misery wherein we were, and having utterly overthrown **[So the evil Angels are called, Coloss. 2. 1…. Eph. 6. 12.]Col 2:1Eph 6:12Principalities and Powers, by him that became passible according to his **Acts 2. 23. &c. 4. 28.Acts 2:23counsel and will. To which he immediately subjoyns the Text, and applies it to the Eucharist, Thus Iustin Martyr.

My third witness is Origen in his 8. Book Contra Cels. Celsus (saith he) thinks it seemly we should be thankful to Demons, and to offer them**Thank offerings, or Grateful acknowledgments. foreign but we think him to live most comelie, foreign, that remembers who is the Creator: unto whom we Christians are careful not to be unthankful, with whose benefits we are filled, and whose Creatures we are, foreign that is, And we have also a Symbol of our Thanksgiving unto God, the Bread which is called foreign. Where note that the Eucharistical Bread is said to be a Symbol not only of the Body and Bloud of Christ, but a Symbol of that Thanksgiving which we render to the Creator through him.

Again, in the same Book, where Celsus likewise would have mankind thankful unto Demons, as those to whom the charge of things here upon earth is committed, and to offer unto them foreign, First-fruits and Prayers; Origen thus takes him up, foreign Let Celsus, as being void of the true Knowledge of God, render foreign to the Demons. As for us Christians, whose only desire it is to please the Creator of the Vniverse, we eat the Bread that was offered unto him with Prayer and Thanksgiving for his Gifts, and then made a kind of holy Body by Prayer. Mark here, Bread offered unto God with Prayer and Thanksgiving pro datis, for that he hath given us, and then by Prayer made a holy Body, and so eaten.

Thus much out of Fathers; all of them within less than two hundred and fifty years after Christ, and less than one hundred and fifty after the death of S. Iohn.

The same appears in the Forms of the ancient Liturgies. Vide etiam Can. Apostol. II. (al. III.) Can. XL. Synod. Cart…. Can. VII. Edicti Yo…ophili Alexandrini apud Balsamon.As in that of Clemens, where the Priest in the name of the whole Church assembled speaks thus;aaConst. Clem. l. 8. c. 12. foreign, We offer unto thee our King and God, foreign, according to his (that is, Christ's) appointment foreign, this Bread and this Cup; foreign, &c. Giving thanks unto thee through him, for that thou hast vouchsafed us (he speaks of the whole Church) to stand before thee and to minister unto thee: And we beseech thee, thou God that wantest nothing, that thou wouldst look favourably upon these Gifts here set before thee, and accept them to the honour of thy Christ, &c.

Again,bbConst. Clem. l 8. c. 13. Non potest hoc accipi de Symbolis corporis Christi, verùm de Symbolis foreign quomodo enim Christus ipse offerretur Deo per intercessionem Christi? foreign For the Gift or Oblation that is offered to the Lord our God, let us pray that our good God would receive it through the mediation of his Christ to his heavenly Altar for a sweet-smelling savour.

Yea, in the Canon of the**In Ordin… Romauo dimissi… Catechum…nis, Rubrica habet. Postea incipiunt cantores cantare offertorium, & populus dat oblationes suas, id est, Panem & Vinum; & offerunt cum Fanonibus, id est, velis candidis, primò Masculi, deiude Foeminae, novissime Sacerdotes & Diaconi; sed solum panem, & hoc ante Altare: Tunc accipiens Archidiaconus à Subdiaconis oblatas, ponit tantas super Altare quantae possunt populo sufficere ad communionem. Videatur Theodoret. in h…st. d… Theodosio offerente, foreign, &c. l. 5. c. 17. Consule Cyprian. de Op. & Eleemos.—Quae in Deminicum sine sacrificio venis; quae partem de Sacrificio quod pauper obtulit sumis. August. de Temp. Serm. CCXV. Oblationes quae in Altari consecrantur offerte: Erubescere debet homo idoneus, fi de aliena Oblatione communicaverit. Roman Church, though the Rite be not used, yet the words remain still; as when the Priest, long before the consecration of the Body and Bloud of Christ, prays, Te, Clementissime Pater, per Iesum Christum Filium tuum, Dominum nostrum, supplices rogamus, ut accepta habeas & benedicas haec Dona, haec Munera: We humbly beseech and intreat thee, most merciful Father, Through Iesus Christ thy Son, our Lord, to accept and bless these Gifts, these Presents: and other like passages, which now they wrest to a new-found Oblation of the Body and Bloud of Christ, which the ancient Church knew not of.

But, of all others, This Rite is most strongly confirmed by that wont of the Ancient Fathers to confute the Hereticks of those first times (who held the Creator of the world to be some inferiour Deity, and not the Father of Christ,) out of the Eucharist: For, say they, unless the Father of Christ be the Creator of the world, why is the Creature offered unto him in the Eucharist as if he were? would he be agnized the Author and Lord of that he is not?

p. 375Hear Irenaeus, Adversus Haeres. lib. 4. cap. 34. Haereticorum Synagogae (saith he) non offerunt [Eucharisticam oblationem quam Dominus offerri docuit;] Alterum enim praeter Fabricatorem dicentes Patrem, Ideo quae secundùm nos Creaturae sunt offerentes ei, cupidum alieni oftendunt eum, & aliena concupiscentem: The Synagogues of the Hereticks do not offer [the very Eucharistical oblation which our Lord taught and appointed to be offered;] for they affirming another besides the Creator of the world to be the Father of Christ, do therefore, while they offer unto him the Creatures which are here with us, represent him to be desirous of that which is anothers, and to covet that which is not his: and a little after, Quomodo autem constabit eis eum panem**So Ius… Martyr in Apol 2. ca… it foreign and foreign in quo gratiae actae sunt Corpus esse Domini sui, & Calicem sanguinis ejus, si non ipsum Fabricatoris mundi Filium dicant, id est, Verbum ejus per quod lignum fructificat, & defluunt fontes, & terra dat primùm quidem**foreign, Ma…. 4. 28. gramen, post deinde spicam, deinde plenum triticum in spica? How shall it appear to them that that Bread for which Thanks have been given is the Body of their Lord; and that Cup the Cup of his Bloud, if they deny him to be the Son of the Creator of the world, that is to say, to be the word of him by whom the Tree brings forth fruit, Fountains send forth water, and the Earth brings forth first green corn like grass, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear?

From the same ground Tertullian argues against Marcion, Contra Marc. lib. 1. cap. 23. Non putem (saith he) impudentiorem quàm qui in al…ena aqua alii Deo tingitur, ad alienum Coelum alii Deo expanditur, in aliena terra alii Deo sternitur, super alienum panem alii Deo gratiarum actionibus fungitur: I cannot conceive any one more impudent than he that is baptized to a God in a water that is none of his, that in prayer to a God spreads forth his hands towards an Heaven that is none of his, that prostrates himself to a God upon an Earth that is not his, that gives thanks to a God for that Bread which is none of his.

Origen against the same Heretick useth the same Argument, Dialog. advers. Marc. 3. pauso ante finem: Dominus aspiciens in coelum gratias agit: Ecquid non agit conditori gratias? Cùm panem accepisset, & poculum, & benedixisset, quid? alterine pro Creaturis conditoris benedicit? an potiùs illi qui effecit & exhibuit? Our Lord looking up to heaven gave thanks. What? did not he give thanks to the Creator of the world? When he took the Bread and the Cup, and blessed; did he bless and give thanks to any other for the Creatures of God the Maker of the world, and not rather bless and give thanks to him who made them and gave them us?

Lastly, This Oblation of the Bread and Wine is implied in S. Paul's parallel of the Lord's Supper and the Sacrifice of the Gentiles:1 Cor. 10. 21.1 Cor 10:21 Ye cannot (saith he) be partakers of the Table of the Lord, and the Table of Devils; namely, because they imply contrary Covenants, incompatible one with the other; a Sacrifice (as I told you) being Epulum foederale a Federal Feast. Now here it is manifest that the Table of Devils is so called, because it consisted of Viands offered to Devils, (for so S. Paul expresly tells us,) whereby those that eat thereof, eat of the Devil's meat; Ergo, The Table of the Lord is likewise called his Table, not because he ordained it, but it because consisted of Viands offered unto him.

Having thus, as I think, sufficiently proved what I took in hand, I think it not amiss to answer two Questions which this Discourse may beget. The first is, How the Ancients could gather out of the Institution, that our Saviour did as hath been shewed. I answer, They believed that he did as the Iews were wont to do: But they did thus. How, will you say, doth this appear? I answer, It may appear thus. The Passeover was a Sacrifice, and therefore the Viands here, as in all other holy Feasts, were first offered unto God. Now the Bread and Wine, which our Saviour took when he blessed and gave thanks, was the Mincha or Meat-offering of the Passeover. If then he did as the Iews used to do, he agnized his Father and blessed him, by oblation of these his Creatures unto him, using the like or the same Form of words; foreign Blessed be thou, O Lord our God, the King of the world, which bringest forth Bread out of the earth: and over the Wine, foreign Blessed be thou, O Lord our God, the King of the world, which createst the fruit of the Vine. Moreover the Church ab initio applied that Precept of our Saviour, Matt. 5. 23. If thou bring thy Gift to the Altar, &c. to the Eucharist; for they believed that he would not enact a new Law concerning Legal Sacrifices which he was presently to abolish, but that it had reference to that Oblation which was to continue under the Gospel.

The other Question is, If all this be so, how is not our celebration of the Eucharist defective, where no such Oblation is used? I answer, This concerns not us alone, but all the Churches of the West of the Roman Communion, who, as in other p. 376things they have depraved this mystery, and swerved from the Primitive patern thereof, so have they for many Ages disused this Oblation of Bread and Wine, and brought in, in lieu thereof, a real and Hypostatical oblation of Christ himself. This blasphemous Oblation we have taken away, and justly; but not reduced again that express and formal use of the other. Howsoever, though we do it not with a set ceremony and form of words; yet in deed and effect we do it, so often as we set the Bread and Wine upon the Holy Table: For whatsoever we set upon God's Table, is ipso facto dedicated and offered unto him; according to that of our Saviour Matt. 23. 19. foreign, The Altar sanctifies the gift, that is, consecrates it unto God, and appropriates it to his use. In which respect it were much to be wisht that this were more solemnly done than is usual; namely, not until the time of the administration, and by the hand of the Minister, in the name and sight of the whole Congregation standing up and shewing some sign of due and lowly reverence; according as the Deacon was wont to admonish the people in Ancient Liturgies, foreign, Con…n. Clem. l. 8. c. 12.Let us stand in an upright posture before God to offer with fear and trembling.

CHAP. IX.

The Sixth Particular, That Christ is offered in the Eucharist Commemoratively only, and not otherwise. This Commemorative Sacrifice, or the Commemoration in the Eucharist, explained. That Christ is offered by way of Commemoration only, was the sense of the ancient Church. This proved from ancient Liturgies and Fathers. The Conclusion, containing an elegant description of the Christian Sacrifice out of the History of S. Andrew's Martyrdom.

VITHE Sixth and last thing to be proved was, That Christ is offered in this Sacrifice Commemoratively only, and not otherwise.

Though the Eucharist be a Sacrifice, (that is, an Oblation wherein the Offerer banquets with his God) yet is Christ in this Sacrifice no otherwise offered than by way of Commemoration only of his Sacrifice once offered upon the Cross, as a learned Prelate of ours hath lately written, objectivè only, not subjectivé. And this is that which our Saviour himself said when he ordained this sacred Rite, foreign, This do in commemoration of me.

But this Commemoration is to be made to God his Father, and is not a bare remembring or putting our selves in mind only, (as is commonly supposed,) but a putting of God in mind: For every Sacrifice is directed unto God, and the Oblation therein, whatsoever it be, hath him for its Object, and not Man. If therefore the Eucharist be Sacrificium Christi Commemorativum, a Commemorative Sacrifice of Christ, as ours grant, then must the Commemoration therein be made unto God: And if Christ therein be offered objectivè, that is, as the Object of the Commemoration there made, (as that learned Bishop speaks,) if the Commemoration of him be an Oblation of him, to whom is this Oblation, that is, Commemoration, made but unto God?

Well then, Christ is offered in this Sacred Supper, not Hypostatically, as the Papists would have him, (for so he was but once offered,) but Commemoratively only: that is, By this Sacred Rite of Bread and Wine we represent and inculcate his blessed Passion to his Father; we put him in mind thereof, by setting the Monuments thereof before him; we testifie our own mindfulness thereof unto his Sacred Majesty; that so he would, for his sake, according to the tenour of his Covenant, in him be favourable and propitious unto us miserable sinners.

That this, and no other Offering of Christ in the blessed Eucharist, the Ancient Church ever meant or intended, I am now to shew by authentical Testimonies.

First, by the constant Form of all the Liturgies; in which, after the reciting of the words of Institution, is subjoyned, foreign, commemorantes, or commemorando, offerimus, Commemorating, or by Commemorating, we offer.

**C…. Clem. l. 8. c. 12.Clemens, foreign Therefore commemorating his Passion, and Death, and Resurrection from the dead, and ascension into Heaven—we offer to thee our King and God this Bread and this Cup. Mark here, Commemorating we offer, that is, p. 377We offer by Commemorating. But this Commemoration is made unto God to whom we offer. This is the tenour of all the Greek Liturgies, save that some, in stead of We offer unto thee this Bread and this Cup, have foreign, We offer unto thee this dreadful and unbloudy Sacrifice; as that of Ierusalem (called S. Iames his Liturgie:) others, foreign, this reasonable and unbloudy Service; as that of S. Chrysostome: others, foreign, thine own of thine own; as that of Basil and of Alexandria (called S. Mark's:) but all, foreign, Commemorantes offerimus, Commemorating we offer.

In the same form runs the Ordo Romanus, Memores, Domine, nos servi tui, sed & Plebs tua sancta, ejusdem Christi Filii tui Domini Dei nostri, tum beatae Passionis, nec non ab inferis Resurrectionis, sed & in Coelum gloriosae Ascensionis, Offerimus praeclarae Majestati tuae, de tuis donis ac datis, hostiam puram, hostiam sanctam, hostiam immaculatam, panem sanctum vitae aeternae & calicem salutis perpetuae: We, O Lord, thy servants, as also thy holy people, being mindful both of the blessed Passion and Resurrection from the dead, as also of the glorious Ascension into Heaven, of the same Christ thy Son our Lord, Offer unto thy excellent Majesty of thy own Gifts a pure Sacrifice, a holy Sacrifice, an immaculate Sacrifice, the holy Bread of eternal life and the Cup of everlasting Salvation. Note here also Memores offerimus, Being mindful of,—or Commemorating, we offer.

Which Ivo Carnotensis explains thus; Memores offerimus Majestati tuae (id est, oblatam commemoramus per haec dona visibilia) hostiam puram—sanctam, immaculatam, &c. Et hanc veri sacrificii commemorationem postulat sacerdos ita Deo Patri fore acceptam, sicut accepta fuerunt munera Abel, &c. Remembring, or being mindful, we offer to thy Majesty a pure, holy, and immaculate Sacrifice, that is, (saith he) we commemorate the same offered unto God by these visible Gifts. And the Priest accordingly prays that this Commemoration of the true Sacrifice may in like manner be acceptable to God the Father, as the Gifts of Abel were accepted of him. Thus he.

Memores therefore in the Latin Canon is Commemorantes, which the Greek expresses better foreign of the sense whereof that we may not doubt, hear the explication of that great Council of Ephesus in this manner: foreign **Al. foreignforeign Shewing forth the Death of the only begotten Son of God, that is, of Iesus Christ, as also confessing his Resurrection and Ascension into heaven, we celebrate in our Churches the unbloudy Sacrifice or Service.

foreign **So the Syr. Paraph. (in 1 Cor. 11. 26) rende…s foreign ye sh…th by foreign ye commemorate.1 Cor 11:26Commemorating therefore is Shewing forth and Confessing: But unto whom should we confess but unto God? To him therefore, and not unto our selves, is that foreign or Commemoration to be made which Christ commended to his Church, when he said, Do this foreign, for my Commemoration, or in remembrance of me.

In this Council of Ephesus Cyril of Alexandria was chief Actor and President: and it is to be noted, that the Liturgie of the Church of Alexandria (usually called S. Mark's) hath in stead of foreign the self-fame words, foreign, shewing forth and confessing, which I now quoted out of the Council for an explication of the same: which argues, as I take it, Cyril to have been the pen-man of the Decree of the Council, and the Liturgie of his Church to have then run in this form.

I shall need alledge no more of the Latin Liturgies; there is no material difference amongst them; so that if you know the form of one, you know of all. I will add only out of S. Ambrose an Explication following those words of the Institution, Do this in remembrance of me, exprest in this manner; Mandans & dicens ad eos, Quotiescunque hoc feceritis, toties commemorationem mei facietis, Mortem meam praedicabitis, Resurrectionem meam annuntiabitis, Adventum sperabitis, donec iterum adveniam: Commanding and saying to them, As often as ye shall do this, ye shall commemorate me, declare my Death, shew forth my Resurrection, express your hope of my Coming, until I come again.

This may suffice for Liturgies. Now let us hear the Fathers speak.

I quoted heretofore a passage out of Iustin Martyr affirming a twofold foreign or Commemoration to be made in the Eucharist; the one of our Food, dry and liquid; (as he speaks) that is, of our meat and drink, by agnizing and recording him the Lord and Giver of the same; the other an foreign in the same Food foreign, of the Passion of the Son of God. The first of these Commemorations p. 378is made unto God; for to whom else should we tender our thankfulness for the Creature? Ergo, the second, the Commemoration of the Passion of the Son of God, is made to him likewise.

My next Father is Origen, Homil. 13. in Lev. cap. 24. where comparing the Eucharist to the Shew-bread which was every Sabbath …et for a Memorial before the Lord, Ista est (saith he, meaning the Eucharist) commemoratio sola quae propitium facit Deum hominibus; That's the only Commemoration which renders God propitious to men. Where note that both this Commemoration is made unto God as that of the Shew-bread was; and that the end thereof is to make him propitious to men: According to that of S. Augustine l. 9. c. 13. Illa quae in coena Christus exhibet, Fides accep…a interponi inter peccata nostra & iram Dei, tanquam satisfactionem & propitiationem: Those things which Christ exhibits in his Supper, Faith having received them, interposeth them as a Satisfaction and Propitiation between our sins and Gods wrath.

My next witness is Eusebius, Demonst. Evan. lib. 1. cap. 10. foreign,**Iuxta formulam Liturgiarum omnium, foreign. foreign After all other things done, (saith he, speaking of Christ) he made that so wonderful an Oblation and excellent Sacrifice to God for the Salvation of us all, appointing us to offer continually unto God a Remembrance thereof in stead of a Sacrifice. And again, toward the end of that Chapter, having cited this place of Malachi which I have chosen for my Text, and alluding thereunto, foreign, We offer the Incense spoken of by the Prophet. foreign We offer Sacrifice and Incense, while we celebrate the remembrance of the Great Sacrifice according to the mysteries given to us by him, and offer the Eucharist with holy Hymns and Prayers to God for the Salvation of our Souls; as also in that we consecrate our selves wholly unto him, and dedicate our selves both Soul and Body to his High Priest the Word.

But above all other, S. Chrysostome speaks so full and home to the point as nothing can be more; to wit, Hom. 17 an Epist. ad Hebraeos, upon these words cap. 9. v. 26. But now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself: foreign; What then? (saith he) Do not we offer every day? He answers, foreign We offer indeed, but it is by making a Commemoration of his death: And this Sacrifice is one, and not many.—foreign; But how is it one, and not many? foreign Because it was once offered, not as that which was carried into the Holy of holies. That was the figure of this, and this [the Truth] of that. And a little after, O foreign He (that is, Christ) is our High-Priest who offered that Sacrifice which purifieth us. The same do we also offer now, that then was offered, and is yet unconsumed. This is done in remembrance of that which was then done; For Do this, (saith he) in remembrance of me. We offer not another, not a different, Sacrifice, as the Iewish High-Priest did of old, but still one and the same; or rather we perform the remembrance of a Sacrifice. What can be more express than this is?

Primasius is short, but no less to the purpose. Offerunt quidem, saith he, Sacerdotes nostri, sed ad recordationem mortis ejus, in 10. cap. ad Hebraeos: Our Priests indeed offer, but it is in remembrance of his death. S. Augustine calls it Memoriale sacrificium a Sacrifice by way of remembrance, in his Book against Faustus.

In a word, The Sacrifice of Christians is nothing but that one Sacrifice of Christ once offered upon the Cross, again and again commemorated.

Which is elegantly exprest by those words of S. Andrew, recorded in the History of his Passion, written by the Presbyters of Achaia: where AEgeas the Proconsul requiring of him to sacrifice to Idols, he is said to have answered thus; Omnipotenti Deo, qui unus & verus est, ego omni die sacrifico, non thuris fumum, nec tanrorum mugientium carnes, nec hircorum sanguinem; sed immaculatum Agnum quotidie in Altari crucis p. 379sacrificio; cujus carnes postquam omnis populus credentium manducaverit, & ejus sanguinem biberit, Agnus qui sacrificatus est integer perseverat & vivus: I sacrifice daily to Almighty God, but what? not the smoke of Frankincense, nor the flesh of bellowing Bulls, nor the bloud of Goats: No, but I offer daily the unspotted Lamb of God on the Altar of the Cross; whose Flesh and Bloud though all the Faithful eat and drink of, yet after all this notwithstanding, the Lamb that was sacrificed remains entire and alive still. This Riddle though AEgeas the Proconsul were not able to unsold, I make no question but you are. And here I conclude.