of this eucharistical bread and wine but to him who believes those things to be true which are taught by us, and to him that is washed in the laver of regeneration which is to the remission of sins, and who live as Christ hath commanded.' "Shut the profane and the unhallowed people out of doors," so Orpheus" sang. None comes to this holy feast but they whose sins are cleansed in baptism, who are sanctified in those holy waters of regeneration, who have obedient souls, ears attentive to the sermons of the gospel, and hearts open to the words of Christ. These are they who see by a brighter light and walk in the warmth of a more refreshing sunh; they live in a better air, and are irradiated with a purer beam, the glories of the Sun of righteousness, and they only are to eat the precious food of the sacrificed lamb. For by baptism we are admitted to the spiritual life, and by the holy communion we nourish and preserve it.

But although baptism be always necessary, yet alone it is not a sufficient qualification to the holy communion, but there must be an actual faith also in every communicant. Neither faith alone, nor baptism alone, can suffice; but it must be the actual faith of baptized persons which disposes us to this sacred feast. For the church gives the communion neither to catechumens,-nor to infants,-nor to mad men,-nor to natural fools.

CATECHUMENS NOT ADMITTED TO THE HOLY COMMUNION.

Or this, besides the testimony of Justin Martyr, S. Cyril of Alexandria' gives this full account, "We refuse to give the sacraments to catechumens, although they already know the truth, and with a loud voice confess the faith of Christ, because they are not yet enriched. with the holy Ghost, who dwells in them who are consummated and perfected by baptism; but when they have been baptized, because it is believed that the holy Ghost does dwell within them, they are not prohibited from the contact and communion of the body of Christ. And therefore to them who come to the mystical benediction, the ministers of the mystery cry with a loud voice, Sancta sanctis, let holy things be given to sanctified persons; signifying that the contact and sanctification of Christ's body does agree with them only who in their spirits are sanctified by the holy Ghost." And this was the certain and perpetual doctrine and custom of the church, insomuch that in the primitive churches they would not suffer unbaptized persons so much as to see the consecration of the holy mysteries, as is to be seen in many ecclesiastical records. The reason of this is Oúpas d' ¿ñídeσde Béßŋλoi. [ap. Justin. Mart., de monarch. § 2.—p. 37 D.]

nothing but the nature and analogy of the thing itself. For we first come to Christ by faith, and we first come to Christ by baptism; they are the two doors of the tabernacle which our Lord hath pitched and not man. By faith we desire to go in, and by baptism we are admitted. Faith knocks at the door and baptism sets it open; but until we are in the house we cannot be entertained at the master's table; they that are in the high ways and hedges must be called in, and come in at the doors, and then they shall be feasted. The one is the moral entrance, and the other is the ritual. Faith is the door of the soul, and baptism is the door of the man. Faith is the spiritual address to God, and baptism is the sacramental. Baptism is like the pool of Siloam appointed for healing; it is salutary and medicinal : but the Spirit of God is that great angel that descends thither and makes them virtual; and faith is the hand that puts us in. So that faith alone does not do it, and therefore the unbaptized must not communicate: so neither will baptism alone admit us; and therefore infants and innocents are yet uncapable. But that's the next enquiry.

SECTION II.

OF COMMUNICATING INFANTS.

QUESTION.WHETHER INFANTS ARE TO BE ADMITTED TO THE HOLY
COMMUNION.

WHETHER the holy communion may be given to infants, hath been a great question in the church of God; which in this instance hath not been, as in others, divided by parties and single persons, but by whole ages; for from some of the earliest ages of the church down to the time of Charles the great, that is, for above six hundred years, the church of God did give the holy communion to newly baptized infants. S. Cyprian1 recounts a miracle of an infant into whose mouth (when the parents had ignorantly and carelessly left the babe) the gentile priests had forced some of their idol sacrifice. But when the minister of the church came to pour into the mouth the calice of our Lord, it resisted, and being overpowered grew sick and fell into convulsions. By which narrative the practice of the church of that age is sufficiently declared. Of the matter of fact there is no question; but they went further.

turg. capp. 15, 16.[p.130 sq.]-Germanus patr. C. P. in rerum ecclesiast. theoria, [p. 162.] Durandus, ration. divin. offic., I. iv. [cap. i. n. 46. f. 93.] et l. vi. [cap. lvi. n. 11. f. 319.]-Albertus Magnus, de officio missæ, [al. De sacram. eucharist.]

tract. iii. c. 23. [lege, Dist. vi. tract. 4. cap. 1. § 7. p. 134.]-Alcuinus, de divin. offic. [cap. xl. col. 1095.]-Aquinas, summ. iii. q. 80. art. 4. [§ 'Ad quartum.']

1 S. Cyprian., lib. de lapsis. [p. 132.]

The primitive church did believe it necessary to the salvation of infants; S. Austin believed that this doctrine and practice descended from the apostles, that without both the sacraments no person could come to life or partake of the kingdom of heaven; which when he had endeavoured to prove largely, he infers this conclusion", "It is in vain to promise salvation and life eternal to little children unless they be baptized and receive the body and blood of Christ, since the necessity of them both is attested by so many, so great, and so divine testimonies." And that this practice continued to the time of Charlemagne appears by a constitution in his capitular; saying that 'the priest should always have the eucharist ready, that when any one is sick, or when a child is weak, he may presently give him the communion, lest he die without it:' and Alcuinus recites a canon expressly charging, that as soon as ever the infants are baptized they should receive the holy communion before they suck, or receive any other nourishment. The same also is used" by the Greeks, by the Ethiopians, by the Bohemians and Moravians; and it is confessed by Maldonate that the opinion of S. Austin and Innocentius that the eucharist is necessary even to infants, prevailed in the church for six hundred years together.

But since the time of Charles the great, that is, for above eight hundred years, this practice hath been omitted in the western churches generally; and in the council of Trent it was condemned as unfit, and all men commanded to believe that though the ancient churches did do it upon some probable reasons, yet they did not believe it necessary. Concerning which I shall not interrupt the usefulness

m Si ergo, ut tot et tanta divina testimonia concinunt, nec salus nec vita æterna sine baptismo et corpore et sanguine Domini cuiquam speranda est, frustra sine his promittitur parvulis.Lib. i. de peccat. merit. et remiss., capp. 20 et 24. [tom. x. coll. 15 D, 19 E.]— Vide eundem [serm. viii.] de verbis apostoli [al. serm. clxxiv. cap. 6.-tom. v. col. 834 A.]-Ad Bonifac. epist. xxiii. [al. xcviii. § 3 sqq.-tom. ii. col. 265.] -Ad Vitalem, epist. cvi. [leg. cvii. al. ccxvii. cap. 5.-tom. ii. col. 805 B.]Cont. duas epistt. Pelagian., lib. i. cap. 22, et lib. iv. cap. 4. [tom. x. coll. 429 E, 470 B, 473 B.]-Lib. [i.] cont. Julian. cap. 2. [leg. cap. 4.-Cf. opus imperf. cont. Julian., lib. ii. cap. 30.-tom. x. coll. 504 B, 967 D.] et S. Cyprian. lib. iii. test. ad Quirin. cap. 25. [p. 72.] -Auctor hypognost. in operibus S. August. [lib. v. cap. 5.-tom. x. append. col. 40 A.]-Idem ait expresse S. Paulinus episc. Nolanus, epist. xii. ad Severum, see vol. vi. p. 26.]-S. Cyril. Hierosol. catech. iii. cap. 1. [?11.—p.

45 B.]-Idem dixit P. Innocentius [in epist. ad S. August. in opp. S. August. ep. clxxxii. (al. xciii.) § 5.-tom. ii. col. 640 B.]-Capit. Car. magn., lib. i. cap. 161. [p. 27. 8vo. Par. 1640.]-Alcuinus, lib. de divinis offic. [cap. xix. col. 1064.]-Idem videre est in Ordine Romano quem edidit Michael [leg. Melchior] Hittorpius, [col. 84 C.-fol. Par. 1610.]

[See authorities in Bingham, antiq. book xv. chap. 4. § 7.]

• Maldon. in Joan. vi. num. 116. [col 1488 D.] Vide Hierem. patr. C. P. doctr. exhort. ad Germanos. [See Fabric. biblioth. Græc., lib. v. cap. 41.-tom. xi. pp. 638, 641, ed. Harles.-See also Acta et scripta theol. Wirtemb. et patriarchæ C. P. D. Hieremiæ; resp. i. cap. 9. p. 89.-fol. Witeb. 1584.]-Alvarez in itin. Æthiop. [p. 27 b.-8vo. Anvers 1557.]-Joachimum Vadianum in notat. [al. aphorism.] lib. i. fol. 14. [8vo. Tigur. 1585.] de sacram. eucharistiæ.-Concil. Trid. sess. xxi. can. 4. [tom. x. col. 120 E.]

which I intend in this discourse, by confuting the canon; though it be intolerable to command men to believe in a matter of fact contrary to their evidence, and to say that the fathers did not believe it to be necessary when they say it is, and used it accordingly; yet because it relates to the use of this divine sacrament I shall give this short account of it.

The church of Rome and some few others are the only refusers and condemners of this ancient and catholic practice. But upon their grounds they cannot reasonably deny it.

1. Because infants are by them affirmed to be capable of the grace and benefits of the eucharist: for to them who put no bar (as infants put none) the sacraments by their inherent virtue confer grace, and therefore particularly it is affirmed that if infants did now receive the eucharist they should also receive grace with it: and therefore it is not unreasonable to give it to them who therefore are capable of it, because it will do them benefit; and it is consequently, upon these grounds, uncharitable to deny it. For,

2. They allow the ground upon the supposition of which the fathers did most reasonably proceed; and they only deny the conclusion. For by the words of Christ, it is absolutely necessary to 'eat His flesh and drink His bloods; and if those words be understood of sacramental manducation (in which interpretation both the ancients and the church of Rome do consent) then it is absolutely necessary to communicate. For although there are other ways of 'eating His flesh and drinking of His blood' besides the sacramental manducation, yet Christ in this place meant no other; and if of this He spake, when He said 'without doing this we have no life in us,' then it will not be sufficient to baptize them, though in baptism they should receive the same grace as in the eucharist; because abstracting from the benefit and grace of it, it is made necessary by the commandment, and by the will of God it is become a means indispensably necessary to salvation. It is necessary by a necessity of the means,' and a 'necessity of precept.' True it is, that in each of the sacraments there is a proportion of the same effect, as I have already discoursed; yet this cannot lessen the necessity that is upon them both; for so Pharaoh's dream was doubled, not to signify divers events, but a double certainty; and therefore although children even in baptism are partakers of the death of Christ, and are incorporated into and made partakers of His body, yet because Christ hath made one as necessary as the other, and both for several proportions of the same reason, the church of Rome must either quit the principle, or retain the consequent; for they have digged a ditch on both sides,

4 Μόνου γὰρ αὐτοῦ καὶ θεὸς στερίσκεται, ἀγένητα ποιεῖν ἅσσ ̓ ἂν ᾖ πεπραγμένα, dixit Agatho apud Aristot., [Eth. nicom. vi. 3.]

Franc. a Victor., de euchar. n. 75. [? 76. f. 36.-8vo. Antuerp. 1580.] s [John vi. 53, and iii. 5.]

Chap. i. sect. 3.

and on either hand they are fallen into inconvenience. But it will be more material to consider the question as it is in itself, and without relation to any schools of learning. Therefore,

3. It is certain that in scripture there is nothing which directly forbids the giving the holy communion to infants. For though we are commanded to examine and so to eat; yet this precept is not of itself necessary, but by reason of an introduced cause; just as they are commanded to believe and repent who are to be baptized; that is, persons that need it, and that can do it, they must: and infants without examination can as well receive the effect of the eucharist, as without repentance they can have the effect of baptism. For if they be communicated, they and the whole assembly do declare the Lord's death; for that is done by virtue of the whole solemnity, and it is done by the conjunct devotion of the whole community; it is done by the prayers and offices of the priest, and it is done by the action of every one that communicates: it is done in baptism; and yet they are baptized who cannot with their voices publish the confession. Infants indeed cannot discern the Lord's body; so neither can they discern truth from falsehood, an article of faith from an heretical doctrine; and yet to discern the one is as much required as to discern the other; but in both the case is equal; for they must discern when they can confound or dishonour; but till they can do evil, they cannot be tied to do good. And it were hard to suppose the whole church of God in her best and earliest times to have continued for above six hundred years in a practical error; it will not well become our modesty to judge them without further enquiry, and greater evidence.

4. But as there is no prohibition of it, so no command for it. For as for the words of our blessed Lord recited by S. John", upon which the holy fathers did principally rely; they were spoken before the institution of both the sacraments, and indifferently relate to either; that is indeed to them both, as they are the ministries of faith, but to neither in themselves directly, or in any other proportion, or for any other cause: for faith is the principal that is there intended; for the whole analogy of the discourse drawn forth of its cloud and allegory, infers only the necessity of being Christ's disciples, of living the life of grace, of feeding in our hearts on Christ, of living in Him, and by Him, and for Him, and to Him; which is the work of faith, and believing in Christ: as faith signifies the being of Christ's disciple".

5. The thing itself then being left in the midst, and undetermined, it is in the power of the church to give it or to deny it. For in all things where Christ hath made no law, the church hath liberty to do that which is most for the glory of God, and the edification of all christian people. And therefore although the primitive church did confirm newly baptized persons and communicate them; yet as with

u [John vi. 53.]

See chap. i. sect. 2 and 3.