from time to time, that the older particles may not adhere to the pixis and spoil. (No. 28.)

As it belongs to the power of the sacerdotal order to consecrate, which continues with a character never to be lost; hence any priest consecrates in a valid manner, although he may be a wicked man, a heretic, suspended, excommunicated, degraded, &c.: but every one who is not a priest, does not consecrate in a valid manner. (No. 29.)

The proper minister for dispensing the Eucharist, is the priest alone," and indeed by divine right; and it is inferred from these words of Christ: Do this, &c. That is, consecrate, take, and distribute to others, as ye see me do." The extraordinary minister is the deacon, with the permission, however, of the bishop or priest; but this office is not to be entrusted to the sub-deacon, or the other inferior clergy, or to the laity. (No. 30.)

For the due reception of the Eucharist, baptismal character and the wish of receiving this sacrament are required; also a state of grace, when it is a sacrament of the living. Whoever is conscious of mortal sin is under obligation first to make confession. Sufficient instruction and discernment are required, so that the communicant may be able to discern this table from a profane one, this celestial bread from common. Also, a right intention, and devotion befitting this sacrament; acts of faith, hope, charity, humiliation, and contrition. He must come fasting, and with decent and clean apparel. (No. 31.) In No. 36, the following grave question is discussed.

WHETHER THE TAKING OF TOBACCO BREAKS THE NATURAL FAST?

"Ans. 1. If the question is concerning snuff, it seems sufficiently clear that by it a natural fast is not broken; because it neither is food or drink, nor is it taken as such; and although it might be supposed that casually some of it might be passed into the stomach, this is supposed to be done by way of respiration or saliva. 2. By smoking, some say that the fast is broken, from the circumstance that something of the oil is swallowed with the smoke; but more hold the contrary opinion, because all the smoke is usually admitted through the mouth and nostrils by the smoker (especially if

he is expert); and if a small quantity is transmitted, it may be as before. However, if this takes place in a great quantity, then, according to others, the fast is broken. 3. The difficulty as to chewing is greater; however, Pontas and Billuart maintain against Van Roy and others, that by this the fast is not impaired: because it is not designed to be taken inwardly: nor are very many of the more succulent particles of the tobacco taken inwardly, as chewers avoid this very carefully, on account of the acrid and unpleasant taste; yet if this latter should take place, a natural fast would be broken. Benedict XIV." (my reader has not forgotten the lucid dissertation of his Holiness on the chocolate question,) "thinks that the fast is not broken by taking snuff, or by smoking, but he determines nothing with respect to chewing. But as it is very indecent that any one should approach the sacred table with his mouth or nostrils smeared with tobacco, and redolent with its stench: therefore, it is proper to abstain from its use, and indeed entirely from smoking and chewing." (No. 36.) AMEN!

In No. 47, the question is discussed, "When does the Eucharist confer the increase of Grace? At what instant is the grace conferred? Steyaert and Daelman reply that it is conferred immediately from the commencement of eating; Suarez and Billuart, when the host is passing down through the throat; but Gonet, when the forms first touch the stomach; Sylvius, however, replies, that no one can know this, save he who effects it."

Three things hinder the effect of this sacrament, viz.: want of baptism, want of intention in an adult, and mortal sin. (No. 49.) There is a threefold mode of communing, viz. merely sacramentally, merely spiritually, and sacramentally and spiritually at the same time. He receives the Eucharist sacramentally, who, with the intention of receiving it, really takes it, but without spiritual profit: such a case is, when a person communes who is conscious of mortal sin, &c. If a mouse or a dog eats the sacramental forms, it does not receive them sacramentally, though the body of Christ does not cease to be under those forms. They commune spiritually, who, desiring it, eat that heavenly bread by a living faith, which operates through delight, and feel its profit and advantage. And they commune sacramentally

and spiritually who receive the Eucharist really and worthily, and obtain its effects, as the righteous do. (No. 50.)

No. 63 treats of the punishment for not communing at Easter. A dispensation may be obtained on account of indisposition, or a peculiar case of conscience; but "He who without the leave now mentioned, or some other legitimate excuse, shall omit the Easter communion, &c., incurs the punishment that, living, he be driven from the threshold of the church, and dying, be denied Christian burial. This punishment, according to Steyaert, is not the same as excommunication, but as it were only a part of it, as is evident from the other effects of excommunication." (No. 63.)

The 65th No. treats of the communion of the sick, and, among the rest, the question is asked, "What if the sick man vomits up the sacred host? Ans. Conformably to the Roman Missal, if the forms appear whole, they may be reverently gathered up, and afterwards taken; but if nausea forbids this, then they must be carefully separated from the filth, and thus they must be laid aside in some sacred place, and after they have become corrupt, they may be put away into the sacristy, or some sacred sink; for so long as they are entire, they cannot be burned without a kind of sacrilege. The same course must be pursued if, by any means whatsoever, whether through negligence or for some other cause, the forms should be found to be spoiled." But if the forms have not become corrupt on account of the brief space that has intervened, then the matter thus vomited may be burned, and the ashes put away into some sacred place, v. g. the cemetery.

"What if the sick person dies immediately after having

taken the viaticum?

Ans. If the sacred host does not appear in his mouth, then the dead man is to be left thus, although it may not be known whether he has swallowed it; but if it appear in his mouth, let it be modestly extracted, and reverently kept until the forms are corrupted: and then proceed as has just been said with regard to the vomited host."

I have refrained from comments on many of the last chapters, because in most instances they effectually refute themselves, or are so puerile as to be beneath sober refutation; but some of the assertions

of Peter Dens, on the subject of the Eucharist, are so outrageously false, that a few historical reminiscences appear to be a necessary appendage to this chapter.

In the first place then, in the face of the impudent assertion of the Romish theologian, that transubstantiation always has been a doctrine of the Church of Christ, we distinctly affirm that it never was regularly acknowledged as an article of faith, imposed as absolutely necessary to be believed by all the faithful, even in the Church of Rome, until the Lateran Council, held at Rome, A. D. 1215. That the notion had existed for some centuries before, we admit; it had either originated or been harboured in the brain of a monk, at the beginning of the seventh century, and received some countenance from the second Council of Nice, which first sanctioned the worship of images. It was afterwards introduced into the Latin Church, towards the close of the ninth century. Paschasius Rathbertus first reduced this novel doctrine into something like its present shape, and proposed it in the Western Church, where it was most vigorously opposed by Rabanus Maurus, Archbishop of Mentz, who in his Epistle to Heribald, ch. 33, denounces it as an alarming innovation. The contest in which Berengarius was conspicuous, and to which allusion is made by the Romish theologian, occasioned the convention of two synods. For upwards of 300 years, this strange doctrine was opposed by a host of the most learned and pious men of those times; and as already remarked, was not foisted by ecclesiastical authors upon human credulity, until the 4th Lateran Council, in 1215, and then it was effected in an imperious manner, more by the decision of Pope Innocent III. ex cathedra, than by the general concurrence even of that ignorant and besotted council. The Council of Trent, A. D. 1545, gave it its full and final institution, as an article of faith.

That this is the true state of the case, can be abundantly sustained. The learned Erasmus says in his annotations on 1 Cor. vii. "It was late ere the Church defined Transubstantiation." And Tonstal de Euch. Lib. 1. "Touching the manner of the real presence how it might be, it had perhaps been better to leave every man that would be curious to his own conjecture, AS BEFORE THE LATERAN COUNCIL IT WAS

LEFT FREE."

Scotus, whom the Papists call Doctor Subtilis, for the pungency and discrimination of his wit and learning, and who lived about the year 1300, says, 4th Bk. of Sentences, Dist. ii. 2, 3. "That which chiefly sways me, is, that we must maintain touching the sacraments, as the holy Church of Rome maintains. But she now holds that the bread

is transubstantiated into the body, and the wine into the blood: as manifestly appears in the creed of the Lateran Council, under Innocent III., which begins with these words: We firmly believe, &c. And if you ask, why should the Church make choice of so difficult a sense of this article, when the words of the Scripture, this is my body, might be explained in a sense more easy, and in appearance more true: I answer, the Scriptures are expounded by the same Spirit that made them; and so it is to be supposed that the Catholic Church expounded them by the same Spirit whereby she delivered the faith unto us: namely, being taught by the spirit of truth, and therefore she chose this sense, because it was true."

Surely no one will be disposed, after reading this cunning argument, to question the right of Scotus to the title of Doctor Subtilis! However, it is nothing new for the most subtle Papist to beg the question; in fact he can scarcely argue without doing it.

A singular statute, enacted by Henry VIII., appeared in 1540; it was to this effect:

66

"That if any person or persons, within the king's dominions, should after the 12th day of July next, by word, writing, imprinting, cyphering, or any otherwise, publish, preach, teach, say, affirm, declare, dispute, argue, or hold any opinion, that in the blessed sacrament of the Altar, under the form of bread and wine, after the consecration thereof, there is not present really, the natural body and blood of our Saviour Jesus Christ, conceived of the Virgin Mary: or that after the said consecration, there remaineth any substance of the bread or wine, or any other substance than of Christ, God and man: or that in the flesh, under the form of bread, is not the very blood of Christ: or that with the blood of Christ, under the form of wine, is not the very flesh of Christ, as well apart, as though they were both together: or shall affirm the said sacrament to be of other substance than is above said: that then every such person so offending, their aiders, comforters, counsellors, consenters, and abettors therein, shall be deemed and adjudged heretics, and every such offence shall be judged manifest heresy: and that every such offender and offenders shall therefore have and suffer judgment, execution, pain, and pains of death, by way of burning, without any abjuration, benefit of the clergy, or sanctuary to be allowed and also to forfeit to the king, his heirs, and successors, all his or their honours, lands, tenements, goods, chattels, and estates whatsoever."

:

Streams of innocent Protestant blood have flowed, because men were not prepared to deny the evidence of their own senses, of reason, and