offers HIMSELF as sacrificed: so He does upon earth by the ministry of His servants: He is offered to GOD, that is, Hɛ is by prayers and the Sacrament represented or offered up to GOD as sacrificed, which in effect is a celebration of His Death, and the applying it to the present and future necessities of the Church, as we are capable, by a ministry like to His in heaven. It follows, then, that the celebration of this Sacrifice be in its proportion an instrument of applying the proper Sacrifice to all the purposes which it first designed; it is ministerially, and by application, an instrument propitiatory, it is Eucharistical, it is an homage, and an act of adoration, and it is impetratory, and obtains for us and for the whole Church all the benefits of the Sacrifice, which is now celebrated and applied: that is, as this rite is the remembrance and ministerial celebration of CHRIST'S Sacrifice, so it is destined to do honour to GOD, to express the homage and duty of His servants, to acknowledge His supreme dominion, to give HIM thanks and worship, to beg pardon, blessings, and supply of all our needs. And its profit is enlarged not only to the persons celebrating, but to all to whom they design it, according to the nature of Sacrifices and prayers, and all such solemn acts of religion."-Bishop Jeremy Taylor's Life of CHRIST. Part iii. Sect. xv. Page 473. Fol. Ed. 1667.

NOTE D.

"Now what CHRIST does in heaven He hath commanded us to do on earth; that is, to commemorate this sacrifice by humble prayer and thankful record, and by faithful manifestation and joyful Eucharist to lay it before the eyes of our Heavenly FATHER, so ministering in His Priesthood,1 and doing according to His commandment and His Example; the Church being the image

1 Nonne semel immolatus est CHRISTUS in seipso et tamen in Sacramento non solum per omnes Paschæ solennitates, sed omni die populis immolatur. Nec utique mentitus qui interrogatus Eum responderit immolari. Si enim

of heaven; the Priest the Minister of CHRIST; the holy table being a copy of the celestial altar; and the eternal sacrifice of the LAMB slain from the beginning of the world being always the same; it bleeds no more after the finishing of it on the Cross; but it is wonderfully represented in heaven; and graciously represented here; by CHRIST's actions there, by His commandment here; and the event of it is plainly this, that as CHRIST in virtue of His Sacrifice on the Cross intercedes for us with His FATHER, So does the Minister of CHRIST's Priesthood here, that the virtue of the Eternal Sacrifice may be salutary and effectual to the needs of the Church both for all things temporal and eternal. And therefore it was not without great mystery and clear signification, that our Blessed LORD was pleased to command the representation of His Death and Sacrifice on the Cross should be made by breaking Bread and effusion of Wine; to signify to us the nature and sacredness of the Liturgy we are about, and that we minister in the Priesthood of CHRIST, Who is a Priest for ever after the order of Melchisedeck; that is, we are Ministers in that unchangeable priesthood imitating in the external Ministry the prototype Melchisedeck of whom it was said' he brought forth bread and wine, and was the Priest of the Most High GOD;' and in the

Sacramenta quandam similitudinem earum rerum quarum Sacramenta sunt non haberent, omnino Sacramenta non essent.-St. Aug. Epis. ad Bonif. 23.

Quia corpus assumptum oblaturus erat ab oculis et illaturus sideribus, necessarium erat ut die cœnæ Sacramentum nobis corporis et sanguinis consecraretur, ut coleretur jugiter per mysterium quod semel offerebatur in pretium, ut quia quotidiana et indefessa currebat pro omnium salute redemptio; perpetua esset redemptioni oblatio et perennis Victima illa viveret in memoria et semper præsens esset in gratia vera, unica et perfecta hostia, fide æstimanda non specie, neque exteriori censenda visu sed interiori affectu. Unde cœlestis confirmat authoritas, "Quia caro mea vere est cibus et sanguis meus vere est potus." Recedit ergo omne infidelitatis ambiguum quoniam qui author est muneris, idem testis est veritatis.--Euseb. Emiss. et habetur de consecrat. dist. 2.

1 Non sine mysterio, sine re, vel panis ad aram,
Vel vinum fertur, cui superaddis aquam,
K

internal imitating the Antitype, or the substance CHRIST HIMSELF, Who offered up His Body and Blood for Atonement for us, and by the Sacraments of Bread and Wine and the prayers of Oblation and Intercession commands us to officiate in His Priesthood, in the external ministering like Melchisedeck, in the internal after the manner of CHRIST HIMSELF.

"This is a great and a mysterious truth which as it is plainly manifested in the Epistle to the Hebrews, so it is understood by the ancients and holy Doctors of the Church. So St. Ambrose : 'Now CHRIST is offered, but HE is offered as a man, as if HE received His Passion; but HE offers HIMSELF as a Priest that He may pardon our sins; here in image or representation, there in truth as an advocate interceding with His FATHER for us.' So St. Chrysostom: 'In CHRIST once the Sacrifice was offered, which is powerful to our eternal salvation; but what then do we? do not we offer every day? what we offer is as the memorial of His Death and the sacrifice is one, not many, because CHRIST was once offered; but this Sacrifice is the example or representation of that.' And another: CHRIST is not impiously slain by us, but piously sacrificed, and by this means we declare the LORD'S Death till HE come; for here through HIM we humbly do on earth, which HE as a SON, Who is heard according to His reverence, does powerfully for us in heaven; where as an Advocate, HE intercedes with His FATHER, Whose office or work it is, for us to exhibit and interpose His Flesh, which He took of us and for us, and as it were, to press it upon His FATHER.' To the same sense is the meditation of St. Austin: By this HE is the Priest and the Oblation, the Sacrament of which He would have the daily1

Utraque sub typico ritu, formaque futuri,

Melchisedec DOMINO Sacrificâsse ferunt.-Hildebert. Cenoman.

Melchisedec DOMINO panem vinumque litavit.

CHRISTUS idem faciens, pactum vetus evacuavit.-Hugo Card.

Rex ille Salem, qui munere tali

Mystica præmisit summi libamina CHRISTI.—

Claud. Marian. Victor. Lib. 3. in Genes.

1 De Civ. Dei, Lib. 10. c. 20.

sacrifice of the Church to be; which because it is the Body of that Head, she learns from HIM to offer herself to GOD by HIM Who offered HIMSELF to GOD for her. And, therefore, this whole office is called by St. Basil evжỳ проσкоμодîя, the prayer of Oblation, the great Christian Sacrifice and Oblation in which we present our prayers, and the needs of ourselves and of our brethren unto GOD in virtue of the great Sacrifice, CHRIST upon the Cross, whose memorial we then celebrate in a Divine manner by Divine appointment.

"The effect of this I represent in the words of Lyra.1 That which doth purge and cleanse our sins must be celestial and spiritual, and that which is such hath a perpetual efficacy, and needs not to be done again; but that which is daily offered in the Church, is a daily Commemoration of that one Sacrifice which was offered on the Cross according to the command of CHRIST, 'Do this in commemoration of ME.'

"Now this holy Ministry and Sacrament of this death, being according to CHRIST'S commandment, and in our manner a representation of that eternal Sacrifice, an imitation of CHRIST'S intercession in heaven, in virtue of that Sacrifice, must be after the pattern in the mount; it must be as that is, purá prece, as Tertullian's phrase is, by pure prayer; it is an Intercession for the whole Church, present and absent in virtue of that Sacrifice. I need add no more, but leave it to the meditation, to the joy and admiration of all Christian people, to think, and to enumerate the blessings of this Sacrament, which is so excellent a representation of CHRIST's Death by CHRIST'S Commandments; and so glorious an imitation of that Intercession which CHRIST makes in heaven for us all; it is all but the representation of His Death in the way of prayer and interpellation; CHRIST as Head, we as members, HE as High Priest, and we as servants, His Ministers; and therefore I shall stop here and leave the rest for wonder and Eucharist; we may pray here with all the solemnity and advantages imaginable; we may with hope and comfort use the words of David, I will take the cup of Salvation, and call upon In Epist. 10. ad. Hebr.

the Name of the LORD.'1 We are here very likely to prevail for all blessings for this is by way of eminency, glory, and singularity, Calix benedictionis; the cup of the blessing which we bless, and by which GOD will bless us, and for which He is to be blessed for evermore."-Bishop Jeremy Taylor on the Lord's Supper, pp. 53-57. Ed. 1695; London.

2.

"Whatever CHRIST did HIMSELF, the same HE commanded us to do. If therefore He offered His own Sacramental Body and Blood, in the Eucharist He has positively commanded us to do the same; and we are without excuse if we do wilfully and designedly omit it. Having therefore before showed, that CHRIST did here make an Oblation, it inevitably follows that we must do so too, taking those words, 'Do this in remembrance of ME,' in the sense which our adversaries themselves put upon them; but we affirm further, that the word Toleiv, when joined with a noun that signifies anything proper to be offered to GOD, does very often signify, to offer or present to the DIVINE MAJESTY by way of Sacrifice. Dr. Hickes, in his Christian Priesthood has duced a very great number of proofs to this purpose from p. 58, to p. 68; and when our SAVIOUR says of the cup, toûto moleîte Οσάκις ἂν πίνητε, it cannot in strictness be otherwise rendered, than OFFER this as oft as ye drink it.' For it is certain that ποιεῖτε affects τοῦτο, in the same manner that πίνητε affects it; and that, therefore, we are to do or make what we drink, or else we are to offer it; and since we cannot be in any propriety of speech said to make or to do the cup in the Eucharist it remains that we are to offer it; for that TOTO has оTηpov for its antecedent, is evident from this, that we cannot be said to drink anything there spoken of but the cup only. And lest my reader should not

1 Ps. cxvi.

pro

2 Hinc ergo pensemus quale sit hoc Sacramentum, quod pro absolutione nostrâ passionem unigeniti Filii imitetur: Quis enim fidelium habere dubium posset in ipsâ immolationis horâ ad Sacerdotis vocem cælos aperiri, in illa JESU CHRISTI mysterio angelorum choros adesse.-S. Gregor. in homil. Paschali.