ance. But, as the faithful claimed to themselves an exclusive knowledge of the secrets of Christianity, the heathens took advantage of their highsounding language, and calumniously represented them as loving darkness rather than daylight in their noblest act of worship, and as shunning the eyes of mankind.

Now the Church of Rome has adopted the words mystery and mystical as applicable to various parts of their tenets and devotional services. If the bread be really turned into the body of Christ, and the wine into his blood, the change of it is miraculous, and the process of that change may be called mystical, or placed beyond the reach of our senses or our understanding. Again, if in the celebration of the Lord's Supper there be an actual sacrifice, it is miraculous, and we may call it mystical. The Romanists, therefore, are quite consistent in retaining the term; but why should we adopt it?

In the ceremony of baptism, you pray that God would sanctify the water to the mystical washing away of sin. In the Sacrament too, you thank God for permitting you to receive these holy mysteries, and for the assurances they give you, that you are made by them very members incorporate in the mystical body of his Son, which is the company of all faithful people. You should pause therefore before you charge superstition and impiety upon the Romanists, for admitting what they call mysteries in other circumstances. The Church has clearly interpreted what is meant by the members of the mystical body of Christ, by the words which are im

mediately subjoined, "the company of all faithful people." But the Church does not tell you what is meant by the mystical washing away of sin, nor how water is sanctified so as to have the effect of washing it away. If, however, you retain the term in some sense or other, known or unknown to yourselves, why should you blame the Church of Rome for retaining the same word, and applying it to transubstantiation and to a sacrifice?

Again, I know not of any doctrine, general or particular, any effect, visible or invisible, which corresponds to the word mystery in the Lord's Supper. According to the principles of the Church then, there is not any perceivable necessity for the word; for surely the ceremonies which are prescribed, and the reasons which are assigned for them, and the supplications which are joined with them, are quite sufficient to impress the communicant with reverence, when he eats the sacramental bread and drinks the sacramental cup in remembrance of his Saviour. They who live in our own times, and who speak in our own language, would not feel any increase of that reverence, if they were told that a Christian rite is designated by a term which originally denoted a code of secret doctrines, and a series of secret observances, among the worshippers at Eleusis. I never could catch the slightest glimpse of any use in the term, and I am sure that some harm arises from it. It fills the minds of unlearned hearers with dark and superstitious notions of some unexplained circumstances, or, I should rather say, of inexplicable efficacy, in the Lord's Supper. For

this very weighty reason, I have often wished that the word mystery were entirely removed from our language, and that instead of it should be substituted the words sacred rite. Apparently, and really, the Lord's Supper is such a rite; and, as such, it is not only clear to the understandings of communicants, but awakens their attention, exercises their faith, and animates their piety.

Having thus explained to you the origin and the import of the two words, Sacrament, and Mystery, I shall now proceed to recommend to your consideration the meaning of another word which you often hear-it is Eucharist. Though in the New Testament we do not meet with the word, it is of great antiquity. It is used by the early Christian Fathers, and it is employed by them sometimes in a general, but far more frequently in a specific sense. sense. Generally it denotes thanksgiving, according to its etymology. "The Eucharist," says Chrysostom, (Homily 134,) "is so called when any one gives thanks to God for the benefits which he has received." "Giving thanks," says he," (Homily 18,) "we do so, not only in words, but in deeds also, and in Eucharists, or true expressions of gratitude.” "These tremendous and salutary mysteries," he elsewhere says, "which we celebrate in every congregation, are called mysteries because they are the remembrance of many benefits, and show the very head of Divine Providence, and prepare us, that in all things we may give thanks."

Eucharist," says Clemens Alexandrinus, (Strom 5,)" is performed, not only on account of the soul

and spiritual good things, but for the body also and bodily good things."

But in a very eminent sense it long ago began to be applied, and has since continued to be applied, to the Lord's Supper."

"The

"This food," says Justin, (Apology, ii.) i. e. the Lord's Supper, " is called by us Eucharist." bread and wine of the Eucharist," says Cyril. "We have a symbol," says Origen, "of Eucharist, or thanks to God, called the bread of the Eucharist." The Nicene Council uses the same word in the same signification. Cyprian, a Latin writer, so employs it. The learned Michael Dufresne, in his Dissertation on Ancient Ceremonies of Sacraments, tells us, "This name of Eucharist was particularly given to the Lord's Supper, from the institution and the example of our Saviour; for the Evangelists bear witness that, in the very act of institution, our Saviour gave thanks to the Father. From this circumstance," he adds, "the Sacrament obtained the name of Eucharist, which, though it be not extant in Scripture, is employed by the very old Syriac paraphrast, by Ignatius in his Epistle to, the Inhabitants of Smyrna, by Justin, by Irenæus, and other ancient writers of the Church, to say nothing of later writers."

Speaking, moreover, of the feast of the Paschal Lamb, which among the Jews was concluded with a cup, Dufresne calls it the cup of praise, and contrasts it with the cup of thanksgiving in the Lord's Supper.

In a former discourse, I told you the great satis

faction which I had, that, among all the diversities of speculative tenets and external ceremonies among Christians on the subject of the Lord's Supper, there was one circumstance upon which all of them were alike agreed. I mean, that it is commemorative. They are farther agreed, that the commemoration was enjoined by Christ. Finally, they are agreed that this commemoration is in part to be performed by thanksgiving; and for the expression of such thanksgiving they have adopted the word Eucharist. Here then we have an intelligible and pertinent term, completely unmixed with any mystical notions, or any polemical subtleties. I stated to you, that among the Greek Fathers Eucharist has a wide signification, as well as a more restrained one; but in later times all churches and all sects confine the word to the expression of our gratitude for the mercy of God in sending his only begotten Son to die for us, and for the meritorious and transcendental merit of Christ in suffering death for our sakes.

Happily for us, the doctrines and practices of our Church are not encumbered with any ceremony like that which was called Purgation by the Eucharist. This phrase is used in the Council of Worms, the Triburian Council, and many controversial and historical writers in the Church of Rome.

As to the thing itself, we are to understand that when a priest was accused of any crime he was allowed to clear himself by the Eucharist; and the privilege arose from the reverence in which the