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The unworthy receiver, through his own fault, disqualifies himself from partaking of what is offered, namely, from partaking of the things signified: which being our Lord's own body and blood, he is therefore guilty, not only of profaning holy things, (as even the symbols themselves, when consecrated, are holy,) but also of slighting and contemning our Lord's own body and blood, which had been symbolically offered to him c. He incurs the just judgment of God, for not discerning, that is, not esteeming, not reverencing, not receiving d the Lord's body when he might, and when both duty and interest required his most grateful and most devout acceptance. Nay farther, he is guilty of contemning the blood of the covenant, and the author of our salvation, by so profane an use of what so nearly concerns both. This must be so, in the very nature of the thing, if we suppose (as we here do) that the sacramental symbols are interpretatively, or in just construction, by Divine appointment, the body and blood of Christ. But this point also must be more minutely considered in its proper place.

5. I proceed, in the last place, to examine the sentiments of the ancients on this head: and if they fall in with the

e Non idcirco vocat Paulus reos quod ipsum corpus Christi ederint, neque idcirco illi judicium sibi accersunt quod sumpserint, sed quod sumere corpus Domini neglexerint. Lamb. Danæus Apolog, pro Helvet. Eccl. p. 30. alias

1479.

N. B. This account is right as to fact, that the unworthy do not receive the body, but as to guilt in approaching the holy table, it is insufficient; because, by this account, there would be no difference between absenting, and unworthy receiving; both being equally a neglect of the same thing. There must be more in unworthy reception: it is not merely neglecting the inward grace, but it is profaning also the outward means.

a The wicked receive the signs of the Lord's body and blood, not the body and blood; that is, not the thing signified. So the Fathers distinguish commonly on this head. The testimonies of Origen, Ambrose, Jerome, Chrysostom, Austin, and others, may be seen collected and explained in Albertinus, p. 549, 586. Sometimes the Fathers do indeed speak less accurately, of the unworthy receiving the body and blood, meaning the outward symbols, giving the name of the thing signified to the signs, by a metonymy. Compare Moreton, p. 320.

account here given, we can then want nothing to set this matter in the clearest light, or to fix it beyond all reasonable dispute.

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A. D. 107. Ignatius.

Ignatius, occasionally reflecting on some persons who rejected the use of the Eucharist, delivers his mind as here follows: "They abstain from the Eucharist and prayer, "because they admit not the Eucharist to be the flesh of "our Lord Jesus Christ which suffered for our sins, and "which the Father of his goodness raised from the dead: they therefore thus gainsaying the gift of God, die in "their disputes e." It is to be noted, that those misbelievers (probably the old visionaries, in Greek Doceta) did not allow that our Lord had any real flesh or blood, conceiving that his birth, passion, and resurrection were all imaginary, were mere show and appearance. Thereupon they rejected the Eucharist and the prayers thereto belonging, as founded in the doctrine of our Lord's real humanity. Now, Ignatius here intimates, that the elements of bread and wine in the Eucharist are, in just construction, the body, or flesh and blood of Christ as dying, and as raised again: therefore he bore about him a real body. The Eucharist being representative, and also interpretatively exhibitive of such real flesh and blood, was itself a standing memorial of the truth of the Church's doctrine concerning our Lord's real humanity. Ignatius could not imagine that the symbols were literally flesh and blood; no one was then weak enough to entertain so wild a thought: but if they were constructionally, or interpretatively so, it was sufficient, being all that his argument required. The Eucharist, so understood, supposed a real body of flesh and blood belonging to our blessed Lord, both as dying and rising again: for, without that supposi

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Εὐχαρισίας καὶ προσευχῆς ἀπέχονται, διὰ τὸ μὴ ὁμολογεῖν τὴν εὐχαρισίαν σάρκα εἶναι τοῦ σωτῆρος ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χρισοῦ, τὴν ὑπὲρ ἁμαρτιῶν ἡμῶν παθοῦσαν, ἣν τῇ χρησ στότητι ὁ πατὴρ ἤγειρεν· οἱ οὖν ἀντιλέγοντες τῇ δωρεᾷ τοῦ Θεοῦ, συζητοῦντες ἀποθνήIgnat, ad Smyrn. cap. 7. Vid. Albertin. p. 286, &c.

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tion, the Eucharist was no Eucharist at all, a representation of nothing, or a false representationf; and that the misbelievers themselves were very sensible of, and therefore abstained from it. I may further observe, that Ignatius here supposes not, with the consubstantiators, a natural body of Christ locally present, and a sacramental one besides; but it is all one symbolical body in the Eucharist, supplying the place of the natural, in real effect, and to all saving purposes. The Eucharist, that is, the bread and wine, is (constructionally) the flesh of Jesus, &c. It is not said, that it is with the flesh, or that one is in, with, or under the other so that Mr. Pfaffius had no occasion to triumph here 8.

That Ignatius admitted of real and beneficial effects will be plain from another passage." Breaking one "bread, which is the medicine of immortality, a preser"vative that we should not die, but should live for ever "in Jesus Christ h." In what sense he understood the thing so to be, will appear more fully when we come to other Fathers, somewhat later in the same century. There is one place more of this apostolical writer worth the reciting. "The flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ is but one,

f Chrysostom's reasoning, in like case, is here very apposite, in Matt. Hom. liii. p. 783. εἰ γὰρ μὴ ἀπέθανεν ὁ Ἰησοῦς, τίνος σύμβολα τὰ τελούμενα; If Jesus did not really die, what are the eucharistical elements symbols of? N. B. The argument did not require or suppose a corporal presence: a symbolical one was sufficient to confute the gainsayers, if Chrysostom had any judgment. Conf. Pseud. Origen. Dialog. contr. Marcion, p. 853.

Pfaffius (p. 263.) appears to triumph over Albertinus, with respect to this passage of Ignatius: but Albertinus had very justly explained it, and defended his explication, with great learning and solid judgment, beyond all reasonable dispute; as every impartial reader will find, who will but be at the pains to look into him, p. 286, &c.

ὁ Ἕνα ἄρτον κλῶντες, ὅς ἐστι φάρμακον ἀθανασίας, ἀντίδοτος τοῦ μὴ ἀποθανεῖν, ἀλλὰ ζῆν ἐν Ἰησοῦ Χριστῷ, διὰ παντός. Ignat. ad Ephes. cap. 20. This was no flight, but the standing doctrine of the author, which he expresses without any figure elsewhere. Epist. ad Smyrn. cap. 7. ouvépepev dè avrõïs àɣaxäv, iva xaì àvaçãow. It behoves them to celebrate the feast of the Eucharist, (so I understand yaxav, with Cotelerius in loc.) that they may rise to life.

“and the cup one unto the unity of his blood." He alluded, probably, to 1 Cor. x. 16. "communion of the "blood of Christ," and so the meaning is, for the uniting us to Christ, first, and then, in and through him, to one another, his one blood being the cement which binds head and members all together.

A. D. 140. Justin Martyr.

Justin, another early Christian teacher and martyr, comes next: I shall cite as much from him as may suffice to clear the point in hand. "This food we call the Eu"charist: which no one is allowed to partake of, but he "that believes our doctrines to be true, and who has been "baptized in the laver of regeneration for remission of "sins, and lives up to what Christ has taught. For we "take not these as common bread and common drink: but "like as Jesus Christ our Saviour, being incarnate by the "Word of God, bore about him both flesh and blood for "our salvation; so are we taught that this food which is "blessed by the prayer of the Word that came from him, "[God] and which is changed into the nourishment of "our flesh and blood, is the flesh and blood of the incar"nate Jesus. For the Apostles in their commentaries, "called the Gospels, have left it upon record, that Jesus "so commanded them; for he took bread, and when he "had given thanks, he said, Do this in remembrance of 66 me; this is my body: in like manner also he took the cup, and when he had given thanks, he said, This is my "blood." Upon this passage of Justin, may be observed as follows: 1. That he supposed the elements to be blessed or sanctified by virtue of the prayer of the Word or Logos, first made use of in the institution, and remaining in force to this day, in such a sense as I have explained above,

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· Μία γὰρ σὰρξ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν Ἰησοῦ Χρισοῦ, καὶ ἓν ποτήριον εἰς ἕνωσιν τοῦ αἵμα TOS AUTOU. Ignat. ad Philad. cap. 4.

* Justin Martyr. Apol. i. p. 96, 97. edit. Lond. See also above, chap. iii. p. 60. where part of the same passage is cited for another purpose.

in the chapter of Consecration. 2. That Justin also supposed the same elements, after consecration, to continue still bread and wine, only not common bread and wine: for while he says, it is not common bread, he supposes it to be bread. 3. That while he supposes the consecrated elements to be changed into our bodily nutriment, he could not have a thought of our Lord's natural body's admitting such a change. 4. That nevertheless he does maintain that such consecrated food is, in some sense or other, the flesh and blood of the incarnate Jesus; and he quotes the words of the institution to prove it. 5. He supposes no other flesh and blood locally present in the Eucharist, but that very consecrated food which he speaks of; for that is the flesh and blood. Therefore he affords no colour for imagining two bodies, natural and sacramental, as locally present together, in the way of consubstantiation. 6. It remains then, that he could mean nothing else but the representative or symbolical body of Christ, answering to the natural, (once upon the cross, and now in heaven,) as proxies answer to their principals, as authentic copies or exemplifications to their originals, in use, value, and legal effect. For, that Justin cannot be understood of a bare figure, or naked representation, appears from hence, that he supposes a Divine power, the power of the Logos himself (which implies his spiritual presence) to be necessary for making the elements become such symbolical flesh and blood: whereas, if it were only a figure, or representation, men might easily make it themselves by their own power, and would need only the original commission to warrant their doing it. 7. Though Justin (addressing himself to Jews or Pagans) does not speak so plainly of the great Christian privileges or graces conferred in the Eucharist, as Ignatius, writing to Christians, before him did, yet he has tacitly insinuated the same things; as well by mentioning the previous qualifications requisite for it, as also by observing that the [symbolical] flesh and blood of Christ are incorporate with ours: from whence by just inference all the rest follows, as every grace is im

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