eat and especially the Paschal Lamb which was a Type of Christ and that eating did in a Legal sense unite the Sacrificer and the Sacrifice and convey its vertue and efficacy to him I say hence Christ instituted the Sacrament of his Body and Blood i. e. Bread and Wine to be eat and drank as the symbols and signs of his Body and Blood and a Sacramental conveyance of all the merit and purchase of his death to his sincere Disciples who feed on him and therefore the Bread and Wine are called his Body and Blood because feeding on the Bread and Wine is ordained by him instead of his Body and Blood and that eating Bread and drinking Wine in obedience to his Institution and in remembrance of his Death and Passion does to all intents and purposes as much entitle us to the Merits Atonement Reconciliation and all the blessings of the New Covenant purchased by his death as eating the Flesh of the Sacrifice did the Iews to the vertue of that Sacrifice whereof they eat And since Faith in Christ is made necessary by the terms of the Gospel to an interest in his Sacrifice the symbols of Bread and Wine serve as well or better for this holy Feast than his natural flesh and blood would do for here is room for the exercise of faith we do not see the body of Christ broken and his blood shed nothing appears to our bodily senses but Bread and Wine but by an eye of faith we see him hang upon the Cross and bleeding for our sins and thus we feed on his Sacrifice eat his flesh and drink his blood Bodily eating cannot make us partakers of Christ but as the Institution of our Saviour has united the vertues of his Sacrifice with the elements of Bread and Wine in this holy Supper which makes it as much his body to all the real purposes of a feast upon a Sacrifice as if it were his natural body and blood in as proper a sense as ever the Iews did eat the Paschal Lamb which is all the Church of England means by the real presence So then we by faith eat the body of Christ and drink his blood when together with our bodily feeding on the Sacramental Bread and Wine by faith we feed on the merits of his Sacrifice And this must needs convince us how necessary it is to communicate at the Lords Table as well as to believe in Christ if we would partake of the merits of his Sacrifice for this sacramental Bread and Wine is his body and blood that is has the merits of his Sacrifice annexed to it by his own Institution and as under the Law it was not enough to offer a Peace-offering unless they eat of it so neither will the Sacrifice of Christ upon the Cross be of any value to us unless we feed on it in this holy Supper not only by Faith but also by a bodily eating of those Sacramental elements to which he himself has annexed the merits of his Sacrifice To feed on the Sacramental elements without faith is no more than to eat so much ordinary Bread and to drink common Wine and to believe on Christ without feasting on his Sacrifice cannot without uncovenanted Grace apply his merits to us for it is evident that Truth in its own nature cannot give us an interest in the merits of Christ for how does my believing that Christ died for sinners convey the merit of his death to me nay though I believe that Christ in particular died for me this does not actually make his merits mine but only in the performance of such conditions and in the use of such means as he hath appointed for the application of his merits to particular persons and I see no reason why men may not as well hope to be saved without holiness by Christ as without eating his flesh and drinking his blood in the Sacrament for holiness will not save us without the merits of Christ and I know not how we should come by the merits of Christ but only in such ways of dispensing conveying and applying them as he himself has appointed and he has appointed no other ordinary way but this mysterious Supper Hence the Apostle tells the Corinthians The Cup of blessing which we bless is it not the communion of the blood of Christ the bread which we break is it not the Communion of the body of Christ what does he mean by the communion of the blood and of the body of Christ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the meaning is very plain that hereby we partake in the body and blood of Christ that is in the efficacy of his death and passion and if we could do this any other way or without it it would be a useless Sacrament as most Christians seem now to think it is and therefore I doubt not but our Saviour in that mysterious discourse in Iohn 6. had respect to this holy Feast though not then instituted when he tells them Verily verily I say unto you except ye eat the flesh of the son of man and drink his blood ye have no life in you Whoso eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath eternal life and I will raise him up at the last day for my flesh is meat indeed and my blood is drink indeed he that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood dwelleth in me and I in him The only objection I know against expounding this of eating the flesh of Christ and drinking his blood in the Lords Supper is because the Feast was not then instituted and therefore neither the Iews nor his own Disciples could possibly understand what he meant now there are several very plain and easie answers to this as 1. our Saviour said a great many things to the Iews in his Sermons which neither they nor his own Disciples could understand when they were spoke though his Disciples understood them after he was risen when the Holy Ghost brought those things again to their remembrance and the event had expounded them such we may reckon whatever concerned his death and resurrection and spiritual kingdom 2. They might as well understand this discourse of eating his Flesh and drinking his Blood as they could what he immediately before told them I am the living bread which came down from heaven if any man eat of this bread he shall live for ever and the bread which I will give is my flesh which I will give for the life of the world For they understood as little what it was to give his flesh for the life of the world and how this made his flesh to be that living bread as what it was to eat his flesh and to drink his blood for they both signifie the same thing and these words last quoted do plainly prove that he respects the Eucharistical Feast when he speaks of his eating his flesh and drinking his blod for we must eat his flesh only as considered as the
bread of life which came down from Heaven and his flesh is bread considered as given for the life of the world and therefore to eat his flesh and drink his blood must signifie the Sacramental eating of it as the memorials of his death and passion 3. Suppose we should understand this eating the flesh and drinking the blood of the son of man of feeding on Christ by faith or believing yet they could understand this no better than the other it is plain they did not and I know not how they should for to call bare believing in Christ eating his flesh and drinking his blood is so remote from all propriety of speaking and so unknown in all languages that to this day those who understood nothing more by it but believing in Christ are able to give no tolerable account of the reason of the expression Now if this place in St. Iohn be meant of the Lords Supper as I do not in the least doubt but it is our Saviour has made it as necessary to us as we think eternal life to be for he has expresly told us except ye eat the flesh of the son of man and drink his blood ye have no life in you We must not indeed expound these words to such a sense as to make the Sacrament necessary even to Infants themselves as St. Austin did who therefore administred the Eucharist as well as Baptism to Children which was plainly contrary to the nature of it for it must be eaten with Faith or else it is not the body of Christ to the receivers and God does not make any ordinance necessary to those who are under a natural incapacity nay a moral impossibility will excuse this when men are desirous to communicate in all our Saviours institutions but have no opportunity to do it for God will dispense his grace in extraordinary ways to all well disposed minds when his providence denies those which are ordinary but those who wilfully neglect the ordinary means of grace have no reason to expect those which are extraordinary how God will deal with those who are guilty of such neglects not out of a contempt of his institutions but out of ignorance of their necessity or a superstitious awe and reverence for them I will not determine Having thus proved that we cannot in an ordinary way partake in the benefits and blessings which Christ hath purchased by his death but by a Sacramental eating of the body and drinking the blood of Christ to make you still more sensible of the infinite hazard and danger of this neglect I shall briefly consider what those blessings are which we partake of at the Lords Table and which we cannot expect any where else And I shall name but these 1. The pardon of our sins for this was the purchase of Christ's death he died for our sins and expiated them with his own blood and therefore we may observe that we do not only eat the body of Christ in this holy Feast but we drink his blood the blood of expiation the blood of the Covenant which speaketh better things than the blood of Abel now this was never permitted the Iews to eat any blood much less the blood of the Covenant which was sprinkled about the Altar to make Atonement nay we feed in this holy Supper on a Sin-offering nay that great expiatory Sacrifice whose blood was carried into the Holy of Holies which the High Priest himself was not allowed to eat of to which the Apostle alludes in the Epistle to the Hebrews We have an Altar whereof they have no right to eat which serve the Tabernacle for the bodies of those beasts whose blood is brought into the Sanctuary by the High Priest for Sin are burnt without the Camp i. e. no body was suffered to eat the flesh of the Sacrifice on the great day of expiation which was a general atonement for the sins of the whole Congregation not so much as the High Priest himself but their bodies were burnt to ashes Now the death of Christ upon the Cross was peculiarly typified by that great expiatory Sacrifice whose blood was carried into the Holy of Holies as he had discoursed at large in the ninth Chapter and plainly refers to here wherefore Iesus also that he might Sanctifie the people with his own blood suffered without the gate This is the Sacrifice we eat of to which he plainly refers in what he adds by him therefore let us offer the Sacrifice of praise or the Eucharistical Sacrifice which is the Lords Supper to God continually that is the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name but to do good and to communicate forget not for with such Sacrifices God is well pleased which refers to those oblations for the relief of the poor and other religious uses which were always made at the Lords Table Now what is the meaning of this that we are allowed to drink of the blood of the Sacrifice and eat the flesh of the great Sin-offering and Propitiatory Sacrifice which the High Priest himself under the Law was not allowed to touch I say what is the meaning of it but to exhibit and convey to us the full and perfect remission of all our sins in the blood of Christ. So that we eat the flesh of an expiatory Sacrifice and drink the blood of atonement and thereby partake of that pardon and expiation which was made by Sacrifice and if we were sensible what the guilt of sin is and what will be its punishment we should not fail frequently to come to this holy Table to renew the pardon of our sins in the blood of Christ. 2. Another fruit of Christs death which we receive at the Table of our Lord is the assistances of his grace and Spirit and the communications of a divine life to us Hence our Saviour tells us he that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood dwelleth in me and I in him which signifies such a close and intimate union whereby we receive the communications of his own life and spirit from him and therefore all Christians are said to be made to drink into one Spirit which signifies the communications of the divine Spirit at this Holy Table the whole Gospel administration is called the Ministration of the Spirit as being accompanied with a divine power much more this divine Feast wherein we become one with Christ eat his flesh and drink his blood as members of his body of his flesh and of his bones as St. Paul speaks and it is impossible the Spirit of Christ should be separated from such an uniting ordinance as makes us members of his body 3. By eating the flesh and drinking the blood of Christ in this holy Feast we have a pledge and earnest of immortality So our Saviour expresly tells us Whoso eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath everlasting life and I will raise him up at the last day As the living Father hath sent me
purpose to trouble their heads about any form of Religion for they may be mistaken after all and they had as good be of no Religion as not of the right But if these Men did but wisely consider of what infinite concernment true Religion is they would conclude quite otherwise that seeing there is so much dispute which is the true Religion they would use the greater diligence and honesty to find it out and hope that God would pardon those Mistakes which are meerly the Errors of their Understanding when they offer up to him a pious and devout Soul that an honest Man who is not byassed by Interest and does not chuse a false Religion upon a Design will be accepted for his Sincerity and Devotion by that God who is a merciful and compassionate Father and very ready to pardon all invincible Mistakes when they are not made invincible by our own Fault But to cast off all Religion because there is some difficulty in finding the right is just as if a Traveller when he meets with a great many cross Wayes should resolve to go no farther for fear he should mistake the right Road though he is sure that he shall never get home if he go no farther Others are so tired with their Secular Affairs and hard Labour all the week that truly they must make Sunday a Holy Day not for Devotion but for Rest and Pastime as a Holy Day commonly now signifies and therefore they cannot go to Church which will tire them more than all thir weeks Work did that is to say They feel the Wants and Necessities of their Bodies and must take care of them but their Souls must shift for themselves they cannot bear hunger and cold and nakedness but never consider Who can dwell with devouring Fire who can dwell with everlasting Burnings But more of this presently Such kind of foolish Reasonings as these make Men neglect the Worship of God and should any Man act or reason so weakly in his Worldly Affairs he would be beg'd for a Fool if he were worth the keeping Thus I have endeavoured to convince these Men of the Evil Danger and Folly of Irreligion I now proceed to the second Thing proposed to perswade them to take care of their Souls 2. Let me therefore earnestly exhort all Men to take care of their Souls for this is the true Reason why they neglect the Worship of God Because they are sottishly unconcerned what will become of their Souls after Death whether they shall be happy or miserable in the World to come For all Men who make it the great Business of their Lives to get Heaven who are impatiently desirous to see God and to enjoy him who are afraid of nothing so much as of being banished from his Presence I say these Men are serious and hearty in their Religion They seek first the Kingdom of God and his Righteousness For tho Religious Worship be a Natural Debt which we owe to God as we are his Creatures yet God in great wisdom and goodness has so ordered all the parts of Worship that we may at the same time and in the same Act worship and glorify God and serve and supply the Wants and Necessities of our own Souls The Worship of Innocent Creatures consisted principally in praising that great wise and bountiful Maker and Governor of the World but the Religion of Sinners is fitted to a lapsed state to heal and recover our Souls restore us to the perfection and happiness of our Natures and to intitle us to new and glorious Rewards Since we are Sinners God hath made it one part of Religious Worship and given us great encouragement to confess our Sins and to ask pardon and forgiveness for them And can any Man who loves his Soul and considers that the Wages of Sin is Death be careless in suing out his Pardon Must thou die eternally Sinner unless thou obtainest thy Pardon from God and wilt thou not fall down upon thy Knees and lie prostrate in the Dust before him Dost thou think it sufficient to reserve this Work for thy last Breath when thou art so hasty to procure a Pardon from thy Prince when thou hast only forfeited a perishing Estate or a mortal Life Me thinks I should see thee run with all speed to Church for fear thou shouldest come too late to offer up thy Confessions and Prayers with the Congregation by the Mouth of God's Minister who is appointed to pray for thee and to receive that reviving Absolution which is promised to all humble Penitents confessing and praying Sinners And since our own unworthiness our manifold and great Sins might justly discourage us from approaching the Presence of so Holy a God God has in infinite Mercy provided a great High-Priest for us to offer up our Prayers to God and to intercede for us and has commanded us to come to him in his Name and shall we forfeit our Interest in our Saviour's Intercession by neglecting to beg pardon in his Name For the Work of our great High-Priest is to offer up our Prayers to God incensed and perfumed with his own Merits But this supposes that we must offer up our Prayers to God in his Name and therefore those who do not pray to God in Christ's Name have no part nor interest in his Intercession He is an Advocate for none but those who Worship God in his Name And since our Natures are greatly corrupted and we are very weak and unable to serve God in an acceptable manner in our own strength God has made it a part of his Worship to beg the supplies of his Grace and has promised to give his Holy Spirit to them who ask him and when we find by daily experience how liable we are to the Assaults of Temptations and how easily we are conquered by them and know how impossible it is ever to get to Heaven unless we be renewed and sanctified by the Holy Ghost Can any Man who loves his Soul exposes himself naked and unarmed to a tempting World and Devil without so much as begging the Auxiliary Forces and Divine Aids of the Holy Spirit which we may have for asking but shall never have without You are glad of any help and assistance to promote your secular Interest When a City is besieged by powerful and numerous Enemies they send Embassadors to their Allies and Confederates and will never want help for want of asking it and shall we be so foolish as to become the triumph and the scorn and a prey to our Spiritual Enemies for want of crying to God to save us For the same Reason our blessed Lord has appointed and instituted the Holy Feast of his Sacramental Body and Blood as a conveyance of new Life and Grace to us and have those Men any care of their Souls as well as any honour for their Crucified Lord who deny themselves so inestimable a priviledg of feasting on the Symbols of Christ's Body and Blood which seals to all
Communion very nauseous and unpleasant to honest minds or very dangerous As to name some of the hardest 1. The case of a vicious and scandalous Minister who like Eli's Sons makes the Sacrifices of God to be abhorred I am in great hope that the number of these men is not great though one were too much and yet it is not to be expected that in so great a body of men there should be none Let the enemies of God and of Religion triumph in this and encrease their numbers while we silently lament it But when this is the case I think every good man should apply himself to his Superiours and endeavour to remove him if this cannot be done or is too long delayed he must learn to distinguish between the man and his Office a bad man but yet a legal Minister and though he be unworthy of so holy a Profession yet the efficacy of his Ministry does not depend upon his personal qualifications but on the Institution of Christ. The lewdness of Eli's Sons though it gave great offence and scandal to the Israelites yet it did not make them forsake the Altar of God The Scribes and Pharisees in our Saviours dayes were a vile sort of people but yet he does not command his Disciples to withdraw from their Communion but not to follow their examples The Scribes and Pharisees sit in Moses seat all therefore whatsoever they bid you observe that observe and do but do not after their works for they say and do not And upon these principles St. Austin disputes against the Donatists and will not allow the personal miscarriages of Ministers to be a just cause of Separation and yet if in such cases a serious Christian with prudence and modesty and with as little noise and scandal as may be preserving the Communion of the Church should joyn in Communion with a neighbouring Minister I should not see much reason to blame him for it is no Schism while he continues in the Communion of the Church and only forsakes the Communion of his Parish Minister upon too just an offence 2. The case of an ignorant Minister and I hope this case is not very frequent neither at least not such gross ignorance as shall make a man utterly uncapable of such a function and yet it cannot be expected that all the Parishes in England should be supplyed with Learned Preachers when there are so many Livings that will hardly find bread for a Family But we must consider that our Church has made excellent provision in this case has taken care that the instruction of her Children shall not wholly depend upon the personal abilities of the Minister Our Liturgy is the same whatever the Ministers abilities be which contains a very excellent form of Worship and Administration of Sacraments the Catechism which he is bound to teach the Children contains the substance of Christian Religion in few and plain words and the Homilies which are appointed to be read are very useful and pious Sermons upon most of the material heads of Religion that though the Minister be no great Scholar if he be but honest and diligent in observing the Rules and Directions of the Church his people cannot want sufficient Instructions And this one instance shews the great necessity and advantage of publick Liturgies and Homilies which secures the decent performance of Religious Worship and the instruction of the people in sound and wholsome doctrine notwithstanding the personal defects and inabilities of the Minister what case such poor Parishes were in when these provisions were cryed down as Popish and Antichristian I cannot guess 3. The case of an erroneous and heretical Minister who mixes poison with his doctrine and corrupts the plainness and simplicity of the Christian Religion and can any Christian who is bound to take care of his soul think it his duty to expose himself to the perpetual danger and temptation of erroneous doctrines In answer to which consider 1. That people are very ill Judges of errors and heresie the most antient and most useful doctrines of Christianity have sometimes been thought so and when we have so many men intent and zealous to seduce our people it is an easie matter to whisper the danger of being infected by a corrupt and heretical doctrine Some think every thing heresie but Antinomianism to perswade men to a good life to tell them that there are certain conditions annexed to the Gospel Covenant without the performance of which we shall not be saved that not an idle and notional but an active and working faith justifies that we are saved by Christ not as a Proxy who has done all for us but as a Priest and Sacrifice and Mediator who has expiated our sins by his death and sealed the Covenant of Grace in his blood and now powerfully intercedes for us with his Father and sends his Spirit into the World to be a principle of a new life in us these and such like doctrines are by some men reproached with the name of heresie and upon their authority believed to be so by others and yet if men must withdraw their Communion for the sake of such heresies as these they must forsake the most useful Preachers and most Orthodox Churches and therefore 2. The charge of heresie must be very plain and notorious before it can justifie our breach of Communion If men deny any plain Article of the Christian Faith it is dangerous to intrust the care of our souls with them for they are at best but Wolves in Sheeps cloathing but to suspect men of heresie when there is no evidence of it is it self a very great fault and difference of judgement and opinion about some less matters in Religion which we are alwayes like to differ about while we see in part and know only in part may exercise mutual forbearance but will not excuse men from the guilt of such causless Separations 3. Where the presumptions are very strong we must appeal to Church Governours to detect his errors and heresies if he have any and to secure the flock from such apparent danger Private Reformations usually prove more fatal than the mischiefs which they are designed to remedy and what I said in the case of an ignorant Minister is very applicable to this the publick Prayers and administration of Sacraments and Catechism cannot be corrupted by the greatest Heretick if he observe his Rule and this secures the purity of Worship and wholsome instructions and as for his Sermons it only concerns men to be wary what doctrines they receive from him to take nothing upon trust but to search the Scriptures whether such things be so Such a course as this will maintain good order in the Church without any danger to our faith 4. When the bounds of Parishes and the number of people is too large for Parochial Communion This has often been made a pretence to justifie separate Meetings because the number of people is much greater in many Parishes
yet the time of Morning and Evening Sacrifices were the usual hours of prayer observed by pious and devout men who sent up their prayers together with the Sacrifice Thus Ezra tells us at the Evening Sacrifice I fell upon my knees and spread out my hands unto the Lord my God and to this the Psalmist alludes Let my Prayer be set before thee as incense and the lifting up of my hands as the Evening Sacrifice For since the fall of man we cannot expect that God should hear our prayers for our own sakes we can make no atonement and expiation for our own sins nor offer him any just compensation for them and therefore under the Law God appointed Expiatory Sacrifices to be offered by the Priests who were Gods Ministers and now under the Gospel God has sent his own Son into the World to be both our Priest and our Sacrifice the acceptation of our prayers depends upon the power of his Intercession and the power of his Intercession upon the merit of his blood for with his own blood he entred once into the holy place having obtained eternal redemption for us We must now go to God in his Name and plead the Merits of his blood if we expect a gracious answer to our Prayers Now for this end was the Lords Supper instituted to be a Remembrance of Christ or of the Sacrifice of the Cross to shew forth the Lords death till he come which as it respects God is to put him in remembrance of Christ's death and to plead the Vertue and Merit of it for our pardon and acceptance It is a visible prayer to God to remember the sufferings of his Son and to be propitious to his Church his body and every member of it which he has purchased with his own blood And therefore the ancient Church constantly at this holy Supper offered up their prayers to God in vertue of the Sacrifice of Christ there represented for the whole Church and all ranks and conditions of men For this reason the Lords Supper was called a Commemorative Sacrifice because we therein offer up to God the Remembrance of Christ's Sacrifice and therefore in the ancient Church the Altar or the place where they consecrated the Elements was the place also where they offered up their prayers to signifie that they offered their prayers only in vertue of the Sacrifice of Christ and that the very remembrance of this Sacrifice in the Lords Supper by vertue of its Institution did render their prayers prevalent and acceptable to God and therefore in the very first account we have of the exercise of Christian Worship we find breaking bread and prayers joyned together The efficacy of our prayers depends on the merit of Christ's Sacrifice and the way Christ hath appointed to give our prayers an interest in his Sacrifice is to offer them in the holy Supper with the Sacramental remembrance of his Death and Passion 2. If we consider the Lords Supper as it respects Christ himself and is a Remembrance of him so it contains all that peculiar Worship which the Christian Church payes him as a thankful acknowledgement of his great love in dying for them as will appear if we consider what it is to do this in Remembrance of him For 1. This signifies to keep this Feast as a publick and solemn Commemoration of our Lord we ought to remember our Saviour and think of him as often as we can but this holy Feast is a publick celebration of his fame and memory we must not only think of our Saviour as we do of an absent Friend who is very dear to us but we must remember him as some Nations do their publick Patrons and Benefactors with solemn and festival joyes The Lords Supper is a Feast instituted in honour of our Saviour wherein the whole Church must call to mind his noble acts and shew forth his praises and perpetuate the memory of them from one generation to another We must call to mind his great and astonishing love and recount all his victories and triumphs over Sin and Death and Hell and him who had the power of death that is the Devil We must sing praises to the Lamb of God who was slain and is worthy to receive power and riches and wisdom and strength and honour and glory and blessing This is the proper work of a Religious Feast to call to mind the works of God and ascribe unto him the glory due unto his Name This is the true reason of all Religious Festivals The Seventh Day Sabbath was originally instituted in honour of the great Maker of all things who finished the Creation of the World in six dayes and rested on the seventh and was changed to the first day of the Week in remembrance of the work of our Redemption and the Resurrection of our Saviour from the dead The Feast of the Passeover was for a memorial of that deliverance the children of Israel had from the destroying Angel who smote all the first-born of the Egyptians but spared their houses which was but an obscure type of our greater deliverance by Christ of which the Lords Supper is instituted as a perpetual memorial All these holy Feasts were for a remembrance that is to call to mind the wonderful works of God to praise his great name and by a contemplation of his wisdom goodness and power in making and governing the world to inflame our souls with love and joy and wonder till our thoughts and passions grow too big and vehement to be suppressed in our own breasts but break forth into publick songs of praise and thanksgiving And thus we must remember our Saviour in this holy Feast by making publick thankful and joyful acknowledgements of his great and mysterious love and all the mighty things he hath done for the redemption of mankind When our Saviour says Do this in remembrance of me he requires us to keep this Feast with the publick expressions of that love and honour which we bare to his memory as a testimony of our thankfulness to him for all that he hath done and suffered for us as a profession of our faith and hope and trust and affiance in a Crucified Jesus that we own him for our Lord and Saviour and are not ashamed of his Cross nor afraid of any sufferings for his sake 2. The Lords Supper is the peculiar worship of Christ considered as a God incarnate the word was made flesh and dwelt among us the eternal son of God the uncreated wisdom of the Father came down from Heaven and cloathed himself with flesh and blood and became man as we are that he might be capable to dwell among us without that terrour and astonishment which his unvailed glory carries with it which is too bright and dazling for mortal eyes to gaze on and that when he had lived here a poor despised afflicted life in the condition of a Minister and a Servant he might die as a Sacrifice
for our sins this is represented to us by Bread and Wine that he was Flesh and Blood as we are that bread of life which came down from Heaven to give life unto the world This is a great and stupendious Mystery which the Angels themselves desire to pry into the lowest condescension of eternal love but the highest advancement of humane nature above the glory of Angels into a union with the Deity it self How should our Souls triumph in God-man a Saviour of our own race and stock and with a litle variation sing the Song of the Blessed Virgin My Soul doth magnifie the Lord and my Spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour for he hath regarded the low estate of our nature for behold from henceforth all generations even the Angels themselves shall call us blessed for he that is mighty hath done great things to us hath magnified us hath greatly exalted us and holy for ever blessed and glorified be his name How zealous should we be to advance his name and praise who debased who humbled who emptied himself and made himself of no reputation for our sakes when he suffer'd so low a debasement by becoming man and hath so greatly exalted us by it does it not become us in this holy Feast to advance his name to sing his praise to publish his con descending love and with a greater passion and wonder adore the Deity cloathed with our nature how should our hearts leap within us when we see such a visible representation of an humble and incarnate Deity when we see that mysterious bread and Wine which represents to any eye of Faith a God Incarnate a God cloathed with Flesh and Blood a God in the nature and subject to all the sinless weaknesses and infirmities of a man Oh amazing and surprizing sight which does as much puzzle our passions as our faith and is as much too big for our love and joy and wonder as it is for our finite and narrow understandings and yet oh how pleasant it is to be lost in the contemplation of such love and condescension as this to find an object too big for our highest raptures and ecstasies of devotion where we launch out beyond the sphere of words and thoughts and are swallowed up in silence and wonder This is one great design of the Lords Supper that we may celebrate the praise and glory of an Incarnate God 3. The Lords Supper is the proper worship of a Crucified Saviour for here we see his body broken and his blood shed for our sins it is a Feast upon the Sacrifice of the Cross wherein we visibly declare and profess our Faith in a Crucified Saviour and return him our joyful praises for his great love in dying for us here we offer up our selves Souls and Bodies to him as the purchase of his blood Souls fired with zeal and devotion and transported with a passionate admiration of his dying love a love without any bounds or measure without precedent or example a love stronger than fear or shame or death a love which had no cause but it self which did not find but make its object which pitied us when we did not pity our selves which suffered such hard such unsufferable usage from the hands of sinners to deliver them from those punishments which they had deserved from God and can we do less than love him who hath loved us first than live to him who hath died for us and give up our selves to be governed by him who gave himself a ransom for us Blessed Iesus thou hast conquered thou hast captivated us by thy astonishing love we are thine we give up our selves to thee take the intire possession of us we lay our selves and our dearest concernments at thy feet use us as thou pleasest we have no greater ambition than to serve thee and to advance thy name and glory whether in life or death riches or poverty honour or disgrace we will follow thee whither soever thou leadest us though it be to the Cross and through the valley of the shadow of death and will rejoyce that we are accounted worthy to suffer shame for thy sake and account the reproach of our Lord greater riches than all the treasures of this world Nay in this holy Feast we do not only admire and praise his dying love but extol his power and conquest over death that he was dead indeed but is alive and hath the Keys of hell and death Our Lord is risen again and become the first-fruits of them that sleep and now in the death of our Saviour we see the eternal conquest of death and the grave for by death he hath destroyed him who had the power of death that is the Devil and delivered them who through fear of death were all their life time subject to bondage O death where is thy sting O grave where is thy victory thanks be to God who hath given us the victory through our Lord Iesus Christ at this holy Table we feast on the spoils of death this is that bread which giveth life to the world by putting an end to death and becoming the principle and earnest of Immortality Glory be to this mighty conquerour whom all the powers of darkness could not detain prisoner this is our crucified Lord who died with scorn and ignominy but rose again with glory and power we do not eat the Sacrifices of the dead but feed on a living Saviour So that you see the Lords Supper contains in it self or is admirably fitted to all the parts of Christian worship which is no more than expressing that in words and actions which is represented by visible signs in this holy Feast we cannot beg of God the pardon of our sins or any blessings which we want either Temporal or Spiritual but in the merit of that Sacrifice which is here represented the proper subject of Christian praises and thanksgivings is the work of our redemption and the worship of an Incarnate and Crucified Saviour must relate either to his great humility and condescension in becoming man his great love in dying for us or the glory of his resurrection and that power to which he is now advanced at the right hand of God all which is either signified or represented in the Supper of our Lord and therefore that question how often we should communicate at the Lords Table is easily answered by another how often we are bound publickly to worship God and our Saviour Christ for the Lords Supper being instituted by our Saviour as a sacred and venerable rule for worship for so I must beg leave to call it for want of a more proper name and fitted to all parts of Christian worship ought to be as often repeated as we worship our Saviour and publick worship is very lame and imperfect without it For if it be urged that it is sufficient to pray to God in Christs name and to praise him for that wonderful manifestation of his goodness in all the
and I live by the Father so he that eateth me even he shall live by me This is that bread which came down from heaven not as your Fathers did eat Manna and are dead he that eateth of this bread shall live for ever Where our Saviour gives the reason why those who eat him shall live for ever because he himself shall live for ever though he must die he was to rise again into an immortal life and an eternal Kingdom as the reward of his death and sufferings and therefore this holy Feast is a certain earnest of immortality to those who feed on him and we need not indeed doubt this since it conveys the holy Spirit to us as St. Paul tells the Romans But if the Spirit of him that raised up Iesus from the dead dwell in you he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you But possibly some may object that all this which is attributed to the Holy Supper we receive at our Baptism the pardon of our sins the gift of the Spirit and the promise and earnest of immortality for so we are Baptized for the remission of sins and we are baptized as well as made to drink into one Spirit and those who are baptized into Christ have put on Christ and we are buried with Christ by baptism into death that like as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father so we also should walk in newness of life for if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection Now all this I grant to be true and therefore Baptism not the Lords Supper is our regeneration or new birth we are raised into a new life are renewed and sanctified at our Baptism and have the Holy Spirit bestowed on us as the author and principle of a new life but the continuance of this grace and the daily assistances of the Holy Spirit especially when we have grieved him and made him withdraw from us by our sins depends upon our diligent attendance at the Table of our Lord. It is not enough that a man is born into the world unless he have constant food to preserve his life and thus it is with the new creature and therefore the Supper of our Lord is Bread and Wine the stay and support of life to signifie to us that these supplies of grace which we receive at this Feast are as necessary to our Spiritual life as our daily food is to the support of a bodily life and therefore our Saviour calls himself the bread of life which came down from Heaven of which the Manna was a type and figure now we know Manna was their constant food the only Bread they had which signified that this heavenly Manna is the daily support of our spiritual life and therefore we know the ancient Fathers by our daily bread in the Lords Prayer did generally understand the Sacrament of the Lords Supper which they called the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or the Bread of God All which may convince us from the very nature and reason of the institution that frequent communione are as necessary to our spiritual growth and increase in holiness to repair the decays of our graces and to renew our strength and vigour in serving God and to procure the pardon of sin after a relapse and to call back the holy Spirit when he is withdrawn from us as bread is to keep our bodies in constant repair and did men love their souls as they do their bodies they would no more neglect the Supper of our Lord than their daily food 4. The Lords Supper is the principal part of Christian communion and therefore as necessary as the communion of the Church is to debar any persons from the Lords Table is to shut them out of the communion of the faithful and they are never restored to full communion till they are restored to the communion of this holy Feast while discipline was preserved in its glory and vigour in the ancient Church no Christian durst turn his back upon the Table of our Lord as nine parts in ten now often do indeed they could not well communicate as faithful Christian people without receiving the Lords Supper The Catechumens and Penitents were admitted to publick instructions and to such prayers as were proper for them but they were dismissed when that was done and not admitted to be present at the worship of the faithful who were in full peace and communion with the Church the principal part of which was the Holy Supper Indeed St. Paul attributes the union of Christians in one body to Christ to this holy Feast He calls the Cup the communion of the blood of Christ and the bread the communion of the body of Christ and assigns this as one reason of it for we being many are one bread and one body for we are all partakers of that one bread From whence it is plain that we are united to each other by partaking of the same bread for we are one bread as well as one body which places Christian unity in a joynt participation of this Holy Feast This also unites us to Christ makes us his body because we all feed on his body the Church is his body as being fed and nourished with his body which both shows us how necessary the peace and unity of the Church is to give us an interest in the Sacrifice of Christ for the vertue of his Sacrifice is contained in the holy Supper and this must be celebrated in the communion of the Church and withal how essential this holy Supper is to Christian communion as uniting us all to Christ in one body For shame then let not those men cry out against Schism and Schismaticks who separate themselves from the body of Christ in that part of Christian communion which is most essential to Christianity it is a much less evil not to hear a Sermon together nay sometimes not to pray together than to joyn in all other parts of worship but to break company at the Lords Table where if ever they ought to appear as one body and one bread to set up Altar against Altar is somewhat worse is a greater and more incurable Schism than to absent our selves from the Lords Table but for my part I cannot excuse those men from being Schismaticks who live in an habitual neglect of so necessary a part of Christian communion and could the ancient discipline of the Church be revived such men should know that Christian communion in any religious offices is a priviledge which they do not deserve and which they should not have Having thus explained our obligations to frequent Communion in the holy Supper of our Lord which I judge so plain and evident that no honest impartial Inquirer can resist the evidence of them and of such great weight and moment that no