Chapter XX (continued, part 8)
The whole doctrine of the Lutheran Church on the Lord's Supper is briefly and authoritatively stated in the "Articuli Visitatorii" issued in 1592 for the Electorate and northern provinces of of Saxony, which all church officers and teachers were required to adopt. The first Article is as follows: "Pura et vera doctrina nostrarum Ecclesiarum de Sacra Cœna. (1.) Quod verba Christi: Accipite et comedite, hoc est corpus meum: Bibite, hic est sanguis meus simpliciter, et secundum literam, sicut sonant, intelligenda sint. (2.) Quod in sacramento duæ res sint, quæ exhibentur et simul accipiuntur: una terrena, quæ est panis et vinum; et una cœlestis, quæ est corpus et sanguis Christi. (3.) Quod hæc unio, exhibitio et sumptio fiat hic inferius in terris, non superius in cœlis. (4.) Quod exhibeatur et accipiatur verum et naturale corpus Christi, quod in cruce pependit, et verus ac naturalis sanguis, qui ex Christi latere fluxit. (5.) Quod corpus et sanguis Christi non fide tantum spiritualiter, quod etiam extra cœnam fieri potest, sed cum pane et vino oraliter, modo tamen imperscrutabili, et
supernaturali, illic in cœna accipiantur, idque in pignus et certificationem resurrectionis nostrorum corporum ex mortuis. (6.) Quod oralis perceptio corporis et sanguinis Christi non solum fiat a dignis, verum etiam ab indignis, qui sine pœnitentia et vera fide accedunt; eventu tamen diverso. A dignis enim percipitur ad salutem, ab indignis autem ad judicium."
The Benefit received at the Lord's Supper
In the Augsburg Confession, in the Apology, in the Shorter and Larger Catechism, and in the Form of Concord, the benefits conferred upon believers in this sacrament are declared to be forgiveness of sin and confirmation of faith. These are said to be its special and intended effects. Thus in the Shorter Catechism the question is asked, "Quid vero prodest, sic comedisse et bibisse?" The answer is "Id indicant hæc verba: Pro vobis datur; et: effunditur in remissionem peccatorum. Nempe nobis per verba illa in sacramento remissio peccatorum, vita, justitia et salus donentur. Ubi enim remissio peccatorum est, ibi est et vita et salus." The next question is, "Qui potest corporalis illa manducatio tantas res efficere?" To which the following answer is given: "Manducare et bibere ista certe non efficiunt, sed illa verba, quæ hic ponuntur; Pro vobis datur, et: Effunditur in remissionem peccatorum; quæ verba sunt una cum corporali manducatione caput et summa hujus sacramenti. Et qui credit his verbis, ille habet, quod dicunt, et sicut sonant, nempe remissionem peccatorum." To the same effect in the Larger Catechism, after referring to the words of institution it is said that in coming to the Lord's Supper we receive the remission of sins. "Quare hoc? Ideo, quod verba illic extant et hæc dant nobis. Siquidem propterea a Christo jubeor edere et bibere, ut meum sit, mihique utilitatem afferat, veluti certum pignus et arrhabo, imo potius res ipsa, quam pro peccatis meis, morte et omnibus malis ille opposuit et oppignoravit. Inde jure optimo cibus animæ dicitur, novum hominem alens atque fortificans."2
All that is here said is in perfect accord with the Reformed doctrine both as to the benefits to be derived from this sacrament and as to the source from which those benefits are to be received. The believing communicant receives at the Lord's table the benefits of his redeeming death, and his faith is confirmed by the divinely appointed seals and pledge of the promises of God. And the sacrament has these effects, because through the grace of the Holy Spirit the worthy communicant embraces by faith the offer of pardon and acceptance made in the ordinance. This implies the ignoring or repudiation of the idea that the benefits conferred are to be attributed to any magical or supernatural influence from the actual, natural body and blood of Christ, which, according to the Lutheran doctrine, are orally received in this ordinance; or to a divine influence emanating from the glorified body of Christ in heaven; or to the theanthropic life of Christ conveyed into the believer as a new organic law. Nevertheless there is another mode of representation occurring in the writings of Luther and of Lutherans. According to this representation there is a divine, supernatural power inherent in the body and blood of Christ, which being received in the Lord's Supper conveys to the believer, as to his soul and body, a new spiritual and immortal life. Thus, in his Larger Catechism, in answer to the question how bread and wine can have the power attributed to the Lord's Supper, he says it is not bread as such which produces the effect, "but such bread and wine which are the body and blood of Christ, and which have the words [of institution] connected with them." To this he adds: "Quin etiam illud pro certo constat, Christi corpus et sanguinem nequaquam rem otiosam et infrugiferam esse posse, quæ nihil fructus aut utilitatis afferat." Luther's Catechisms have symbolical authority, having been adopted by the whole Lutheran Church. The same authority does not belong to his private writings, in which the idea advanced of the life-giving power of the body and blood of Christ as received in the sacrament is (at least as often understood) more fully expanded. In his work entitled "Das diese Worte Christi, 'das ist mein Leib u. s. w.,' noch fest stehen wider die Schwarmgeister," published in 1527,2 he says Christ gives us his own body and blood as food "in order that with such a pledge
he may assure and comfort us, that our body shall live forever, because it here on earth enjoys eternal living food." "The mouth, which corporeally eats Christ's flesh, knows not, it is true, what it eats, but the heart knows: by itself it would gain nothing, for it cannot comprehend the word [of promise]. But the heart knows well what the mouth eats. For it comprehends the word and eats spiritually, what the mouth eats corporeally." But since the mouth is a member of the heart, it must live forever, on account of the heart, which through the word lives forever, because the body corporeally eats the same everlasting food, which the soul with it spiritually eats. Again:4 "The heart cannot eat corporeally, and the mouth cannot eat spiritually. God, however, has arranged it, that the mouth eats for the heart corporeally, and the heart eats for the body spiritually, so both are satisfied with the same food and are saved. For the body having no understanding, knows not that it eats such food whereby it shall live forever. Because it feels it not, but dies and moulders away, as though it had eaten other food, as an irrational brute. But the soul sees and understands, that the body must live forever, because it is a partaker of an everlasting food; which will not allow it to decay and waste away in the grave." Still more strongly is this idea expressed in such passages as the following. When a man eats this food6 "it changes (verdäut) and transmutes his flesh, so that it becomes spiritual, that is, endued with immortal life and blessed, as Paul, 1 Corinthians 15:44, says: It is raised a spiritual body." Luther gives what he calls a gross illustration. He supposes a wolf to devour a sheep and the flesh of the sheep to have power enough to transmute the wolf into a sheep. "So we, when we eat Christ's flesh corporeally and spiritually, the food is so strong that it changes us into itself, so that out of carnal, sinful, mortal men, we are made spiritual, holy, and living men; such we already are, but hidden in faith and hope, and not yet revealed; at the last day we shall see it." Again: "God is in this flesh. It is divine and spiritual (a weak translation of ein Gottesfleisch, ein Geistfleisch), it is in God, and God is in it, therefore it is living and gives life both as to soul and body to all who eat it." Again:2 "If we eat Him corporeally, so He is in us corporeally, and we in Him. He is not digested and assimilated, but He continually
transmutes us, the soul into righteousness, the body into immortality." After quoting these and similar passages, Philippi admits that they teach that "the body of Christ is not only the pledge of our resurrection, but also that it is the life-giving, operative power through which our bodies are prepared for our final resurrection."
There were two views of the benefit of the Lord's Supper in the mind of Luther. He commonly represents its special benefit to be the forgiveness of sins, which is received whenever faith in the gospel is exercised. This effect is due, not to what is in the sacrament received by the mouth, but to the Word as received by faith. According to this view, as Dorner says, the Lord's supper is a sign and pledge of the forgiveness of sin. To this view, he adds, the Lutheran Church has adhered. Therefore, the Apology says: "Idem effectus est verbi et ritus, sicut præclare dictum est ab Augustino, sacramentum esse verbum visibile, quia ritus oculis accipitur, et est quasi pictura verbi, idem significans, quod verbum. Quare idem est utriusque effectus."
At other times, however, Luther, as appears from the passages above quoted, attributes to the Lord's Supper a peculiar effect due to the real, natural body of Christ therein received, which, in virtue of its union with his divine nature, is imbued with a supernatural, lifegiving power. To this power he refers the glorious future resurrection of the believer. In this he made some approximation to the modern doctrine that the redemptive work of Christ consists in the infusion into our nature of a new force, or organic law which, by a process of natural, historical development, works out the salvation of soul and body. Julius Müller rejoices that this view did not take root in the Lutheran Church, as it is, as he says, plainly contrary to Scripture. If the resurrection of believers be due to the body of Christ as received in the Lord's Supper, what is to become of children, of confessors and martyrs, and of all the Old Testament saints, who never partook of the Lord's Supper.
§ 19. Doctrine of the Church of Rome on the Lord's Supper
Romanists regard the eucharist under two distinct aspects as a sacrament and as a sacrifice. The latter in their system is by far the more important. Möhler in his "Symbolik" almost entirely overlooks its sacramental character. And in the worship of the Romish Church the sacrifice of the mass is the central point. In the symbolical books, however, the two views are kept distinct. It is a sacrament inasmuch as it signifies, contains, and conveys grace. It includes an external sign and things signified. The external signs are bread and wine, which retain their form after consecration and after the change in their substance thereby affected. The things signified are, (1.) The passion of Christ. (2.) The grace of God given in the sacrament. (3.) Eternal life. It has virtue to produce grace. "On voit," says Cardinal Gousset in the place referred to, "que le signe eucharistique est un signe qui a la vertu de produire la grace; mais il n'a cette vertu que par l'institution de Jésus Christ."
The grace bestowed is not spiritual life, for that is communicated in baptism, and is presupposed in those who receive the eucharist as a sacrament. On this point the language of the Roman Catechism and other Roman authorities is explicit, and in tone evangelical and Protestant. Thus the Catechism says, "Constat quemadmodum mortuis corporibus naturale alimentum nihil prodest, ita etiam animæ, quæ spiritu non vivit, sacra mysteria non prodesse, ac propterea panis, et vini speciem habent, ut significetur, non quidem revocandæ ad vitam animæ, sed in vita conservandæ causa instituta esse." The benefits received are analogous to those which the body receives from its natural food. Bread and wine strengthen and refresh the body; so the eucharist strengthens and refreshes the soul. And more than this, the food of the body is transmuted into the body; whereas the divine food received in this sacrament transmutes the soul into its own nature. "Neque enim hoc sacramentum in substantiam nostram, ut panis, et vinum, mutatur; sed nos quodam modo in ejus naturam convertimur: ut recte illud D. Augustini ad hunc locum transferri possit:2 'Cibus sum grandium; cresce, et manducabis me. Nec tu me in te mutabis, sicut cibum carnis tuæ; sed tu mutaberis in me.' "
Lutherans make the forgiveness of sins, a blessing which the believer constantly needs, the great benefit of this ordinance. This is not its design in the view of Romanists, for they teach that for a man to approach the altar in a state of mortal sin, is a dreadful profanation. They enjoin, therefore, confession and absolution in the sacrament of penance, as a necessary preparation for this ordinance. Only venial sins are remitted by receiving the sacrament of the Lord's Supper. Nevertheless, as according to Romanists, Christ is really in both natures present in the eucharist, they say "necessario fons omnium gratiarum dicenda est, cum fontem ipsum cœlestium charismatum, et donorum, omniumque sacramentorum auctorem Christum dominum admirabili modo in se contineat." The virtue of the eucharist, both as a sacrament and as a sacrifice, rests, according to Romanists, in the doctrine of
Transubstantiation
Christ is present in this ordinance, not spiritually as taught by the Reformed, nor by the real presence of his body and blood in, with, and under the bread and wine, but by the bread and wine being by the almighty power of God changed into his body and blood. As at the feast in Cana of Galilee, the water was changed into wine, so in the eucharist, the bread and wine are changed into, and remain the body and blood of Christ. This doctrine is thus set forth in the Canons of the Council of Trent:—
"1. Si quis negaverit, in sanctissimæ eucharistiæ sacramento contineri vere, realiter, et substantialiter corpus et sanguinem una cum anima, et divinitate Domini nostri, Jesu Christi, ac proinde totum Christum, sed dixerit tantummodo esse in eo, ut in signo, vel figura aut virtute; anathema sit.
"2. Si quis dixerit in sacrosancto eucharistiæ sacramento remanere substantiam panis, et vini, una cum corpore et sanguine Domini nostri, Jesu Christi, negaveritque mirabilem illam et singularem conversionem totius substantiæ panis in corpus, et totius substantiæ
vini in sanguinem, manentibus duntaxat speciebus panis, et vini, quam quidem conversionem catholica ecclesia aptissime transubstantionem appellat; anathema sit.
"3. Si quis negaverit, in venerabili sacramento eucharistiæ sub unaquaque specie, et sub singulis cujusque speciei partibus, separatione facta, totum Christum contineri; anathema sit.
"4. Si quis dixerit, peracta consecratione, in admirabili eucharistiæ sacramento non esse corpus, et sanguinem Domini nostri Jesu Christi, sed tantum in usu dum sumitur, non autem ante, vel post; et in hostiis, seu particulis consecratis, quæ post communionem reservantur, vel supersunt, non remanere verum corpus Domini; anathema sit.
"5. Si quis dixerit, vel præcipuum fructum sanctissimæ eucharistiæ esse remissionem peccatorum, vel ex ea non alios effectus provenire; anathema sit.
"6. Si quis dixerit, in sancto eucharistiæ sacramento Christum, unigenitum Dei filium, non esse cultu latriæ, etiam externo, adorandum; atque ideo nec festiva peculiari celebritate venerandum; neque in processionibus, secundum laudabilem, et universalem ecclesiæ ritum, et consuetudinem, solemniter circumgestandum, vel non publice, ut adoretur, populo proponendum, et ejus adoratores esse idololatras; anathema sit.
"7. Si quis dixerit, non licere sacram eucharistiam in sacrario reservari, sed statim post consecrationem adstantibus necessario distribuendam, aut non licere, ut illa ad infirmos honorifice deferatur; anathema sit.
"8. Si quis dixerit, Christum, in eucharistia exhibitum, spiritualiter tantum manducari, et non etiam sacramentaliter, et realiter; anathema sit.
"9. Si quis negaverit, omnes, et singulos Christi fideles utriusque sexus, cum ad annos discretionis pervenerint, teneri singulis annis, saltem in paschate, ad communicandum, juxta præceptum sanctæ matris ecclesiæ; anathema sit.
"10. Si quis dixerit, non licere sacerdoti celebranti seipsum communicare; anathema sit.
"11. Si quis dixerit, solam fidem esse sufficientem præparationem ad sumendum sanctissimæ eucharistiæ sacramentum; anathema sit. Et ne tantum sacramentum indigne atque ideo in mortem, condemnationem sumatur, statuit, atque declaret ipsa sancta synodus, illis, quos conscientia peccati mortalis gravat, quantumcunque etiam se contritos existiment, habita copia confessoris, necessario præmittendam esse confessionem sacramentalem. Si quis autem contrarium docere, prædicare, vel pertinaciter asserere, seu etiam publice disputando defendere præsumpserit eo ipso excommunicatus existat."
From this statement it appears, first, as concerns the elements of bread and wine, that in and by the act of consecration, their whole substance is changed. Nothing of the substance or essence of either remains. The accidents, or sensible properties, however, continue as they were. The form, colour, taste, odour, the specific gravity, their chemical affinities, and their nutritive qualities remain the same. So far as the senses, chemical analysis, and physics are concerned or are to be trusted, no change has taken place. As the sensible properties of the bread and wine do not and cannot inhere in the substance of Christ's body and blood, and as their own substance no longer exists, those properties do not inhere in any substance. "Cum antea demonstratum sit, corpus Domini, et sanguinem vere in sacramento esse, ita nulla amplius subsit panis, et vini substantia; quoniam ea accidentia Christi corpori, et sanguini inhærere non possunt: relinquitur, ut supra omnem naturæ ordinem ipsa se, nulla alia re nisa, sustentent, hæc perpetua, et constans fuit catholicæ Ecclesiæ doctrina."
Secondly, as to what is said to be present under the species of bread and wine, it is the body and blood of Christ; the body which hung upon the cross; the blood which flowed from his side; with the nerves, bones, and whatever pertains to the completeness of man. ("Ossa, nervi, et quæcumque ad hominis perfectionem pertinent.") As, however, the body of Christ is inseparably connected with his soul, so that where the one is, the other must be; and as his soul is in like manner connected with his divinity, it follows that the whole Christ, body, soul, and divinity, is present, and is received orally, i.e., by the mouth, by the communicant. "Docere autem oportet, Christum nomen esse Dei, et hominis, unius scilicet personæ, in qua divina, et humana natura conjuncta sit, quare utramque substantiam, et quæ utriusque substantiæ consequentia sunt, divinitatem, et totam humanam naturam, quæ exanima, et omnibus corporis partibus, et sanguine etiam constat, complectitur: quæ omnia in sacramento esse credendum est, nam cum in cœlo tota humanitas divinitati, in una persona, et hypostasi conjuncta sit, nefas est suspicari, corpus, quod in sacramento inest, ab eadem divinitate sejunctum esse."
Thirdly, the whole Christ is in the bread and the whole Christ is in the wine: and not only so, but in each and every particle of both species. Thus the Catechism, says "non solum in utraque specie, sed in quavis utriusque speciei particula totum Christum contineri."
Fourthly, Lutherans teach that the presence of the body and blood of Christ in, with, and under the bread and wine, is confined to the time of the administration of the sacrament. Romanists, on the other hand, teach that as there is an entire change of the substance of the elements into the substance of the body and blood of Christ, that change is permanent. From this it is inferred, (1.) That the consecrated wafer as containing the whole Christ, may be preserved. (2.) That it may be carried to the sick. (3.) That it may be borne about in processions. (4.) That it should be adored.
It is well known that Romanists distinguish between the "cultus civilis," or worship (i.e., respect) due to our superiors among men; δουλεία, due to saints and angels; ὑπερδουλεία, due to the Virgin Mary, and λατρεία, due to God alone. The ground of this worship is the real or supposed possession of divine perfections in its object. When our Lord was upon the earth He was the proper object of this divine worship, because He was God manifested in the flesh. The worship terminated on the person; and that person is and was divine. If Christians err in believing that the person known in history as Jesus of Nazareth, was, and is the Eternal Son of God clothed in our nature, then their worship of Him is idolatry. They ascribe divine perfections and render divine honours to a creature, and therein consists the essence of idolatry. In like manner Romanists teach that λατρεία, the worship due to God alone, is to be rendered to the host, or consecrated wafer. This worship, of course, is not rendered to the wafer as such, any more than the worship of Christians was rendered to the body and blood of Christ, when He was here on earth. But Romanists worship the host on the assumption that it is the body of Christ, with which his soul and divinity are inseparably connected. If their doctrine of transubstantiation be false; if the host be no more the body of Christ than any other piece of bread; if his soul and divinity be no more present in it than in other bread, then they must admit that the worship of the host is as pure and simple idolatry as the world has ever seen. As all Protestants believe the doctrine of transubstantiation to be utterly unscriptural and false, they are unanimous in pronouncing the worship of the consecrated elements to be idolatry.
Proof of the Doctrine
The arguments urged by Romanists in support of the fearful dogma of transubstantiation, are derived partly from Scripture and partly from tradition. Without the latter, the former, to all appearance, even in the estimation of Romanists themselves, would be of little account. The Scriptural passage principally relied upon, is John 6:48–65. As to this discourse of our Lord, Cardinal Gousset lays
down two propositions: first, that it is to be understood of the Lord's Supper; and second, that the eating of which it speaks is oral, by the mouth, and not merely spiritual, by faith. If these points be granted, then it follows that our Lord does speak of a literal eating of his flesh, and therefore that his flesh must be in the literal sense of the words eaten at the Lord's Supper. Such eating it must be conceded necessitates the admission of the doctrine of transubstantiation. It is enough, in this place, to say of this argument, that it proves too much. Our Lord expressly declares that the eating of which He speaks is essential to salvation. If, therefore, his words are to be understood of the Lord's Supper, then a participation in that sacrament is essential to salvation. But this the Church of Rome explicitly denies, and must in consistency with its whole system, insist on denying. Romanists teach that spiritual life is as necessary to an experience of the benefits of this sacrament, as natural life is to the body's being nourished by food.
They further teach that baptism, which precedes the eucharist, conveys all the saving benefits of Christ's redemption; they therefore cannot make the eucharist essential, and consequently they cannot, without contradicting Christ or themselves, interpret John 6:48–65 as referring to the Lord's Supper.
Appeal, of course, is also made to the words of institution, "This is my body." In this argument enough has already been said. There is no more necessity for understanding those words literally than the declaration of Christ, "I am the true bread," or, "I am the door." The elements are declared to be bread and wine both by Christ and by the Apostles, after as well as before consecration.
Romanists, however, teach that there are many doctrines which Christ and his Apostles taught, which are either not revealed at all, or but very imperfectly in Scripture, and which are to be received on the authority of tradition. On that authority they rely for the support of all their peculiar doctrines. As to that argument, as urged in behalf of the doctrine of transubstantiation, Protestants say, first, that the
Scriptures are the only infallible rule of faith and practice, and, therefore, that no doctrine, which cannot be proved from the Bible, can be received as an article of faith. And as the doctrine of transubstantiation cannot be so proved, it is to be rejected as a mere human theory. And, secondly, that even admitting the authority of tradition, it can be demonstrated that the doctrine in question has no claim to support from the rule, "quod semper, quod ubique, quod ab omnibus." The rise and gradual development of this doctrine can be historically traced. The conflicts attending its introduction as an article of faith are matters of record, and it can no more be proved, even by tradition, than the doctrine of purgatory and extreme unction. This is the conclusion reached after years of controversy, and it is not likely ever to be shaken. It was on this point that the leading divines of the Church of England laid out their strength in their controversy with the Church of Rome.
It is a valid objection to this doctrine that it involves an impossibility. The impossible cannot be true, and, therefore, cannot, rationally, be an object of faith. It is impossible that the accidents or sensible properties of the bread and wine should remain if the substance be changed. Such a proposition has no more meaning in it than the assertion that an act can be without an agent. Accidents or properties are the phenomena of substance; and it is self-evident that there can be no manifestations where there is not something to be manifested. In other words nothing, a "non-ens" cannot manifest itself. Romanists cannot turn to the theory that matter is not a substance; for that is not their doctrine. On the contrary, they assert that the substance of the bread is transmuted into the substance of Christ's body. Nor can they help themselves by resorting to the pantheistic doctrine that all accidents are phenomena of God, for that would upset their whole system.
It is moreover impossible that the well-attested testimony of our senses should be deceptive. If it once be assumed that we cannot trust to the laws of belief impressed on our nature, of which faith in our sense perceptions is one of the most important, then the
foundation of all knowledge, faith, and religion is overturned. What has Catholicism to say for itself, if the people cannot trust their ears when they hear the teachings of the Church, or their eyes when they read its decrees? It has nothing to stand upon. It is engulfed with all things else in the abyss of nihilism. To believe in transubstantiation we must disbelieve our senses, and this God requires of no man. It involves disbelief in Him who is the author of our nature and of the laws which are impressed upon it. There is no more complete and destructive infidelity than the want of faith in the veracity of consciousness, whether it be consciousness of our sense perceptions, or of the truths involved in our rational, moral, or religious nature.
It is another objection to this doctrine that it logically leads, and in fact has led, to the greatest practical evils. It has led to superstitious, in the place of rational and Scriptural reverence for the sacrament; to the idolatrous worship of the consecrated wafer; to attributing to it magical, or supernatural virtue contrary to Scripture; to perverting a simple sacrament into a propitiatory sacrifice, and to investing the ministers of Christ with the character of sacrificing priests, empowered to offer, for money, a propitiatory oblation securing forgiveness even for the sins of the departed. It has been made a mine of wealth to the priesthood and the Church. It was principally the popular belief in this great error, that secured the transfer of the greater part of the land and wealth of Europe into the hands of the clergy and gave them almost unlimited power over the people.
Withholding the Cup from the Laity
The Romish Church admits that this is contrary to the original institution of the ordinance, and to the usage of the primitive Church. It is defended, (1.) On the ground that the cup is unnecessary to the completeness of the sacrament. The blood is in the body; he therefore who receives the latter receives the former. And as the whole Christ, as to his body, soul, and divinity is not only in each species, but in every particle of both, he who receives the consecrated bread receives the whole Christ, and derives all the
benefit from communing, the sacrament is capable of affording. (2.) That there is great danger in passing the cup from one communicant to another that a portion of its contents should be spilt; and as the cup after consecration contains the real blood of Christ, its falling to the ground and being trodden under foot, is a profanation, by every means to be avoided. (3.) The Church did not of its own motion introduce this innovation. It was introduced and had become general, before the Church saw fit, for sufficient reasons, to interfere and change a custom into a law.
The Lord's Supper as a Sacrifice
On this subject the Church of Rome teaches, according to the Council of Trent,—
"1. Si quis dixerit, in missa non offerri Deo verum, et proprium sacrificium; aut quod offerri non sit aliud, quam nobis Christum ad manducandum dari; anathema sit.
"2. Si quis dixerit, illis verbis, 'Hoc facite in meam commemorationem;' Christum non instituisse Apostolos sacerdotes; aut non ordinasse, ut ipsi, aliique sacerdotes offerent corpus, et sanguinem suum; anathema sit.
"3. Si quis dixerit, missæ sacrificium tantum esse laudis, et gratiarum actionis, aut nudum commemorationem sacrificii in cruce peracti, non autem propitiatorium; vel soli prodesse sumenti; neque pro vivis, et defunctis, pro peccatis, pœnis, satisfactionibus, et aliis necessitatibus offerri debere; anathema sit.
"4. Si quis dixerit, blasphemiam irrogari sanctissimo Christi sacrificio, in cruce peracto, per missæ sacrificium; aut illi per hoc derogari; anathema sit.
"5. Si quis dixerit, imposturam esse, missas celebrare in honorem sanctorum, et pro illorum intercessione, apud Deum obtinenda, sicut ecclesia intendit; anathema sit.
"6. Si quis dixerit, canones missæ errores continere, ideoque abrogandum; anathema sit.
"7. Si quis dixerit, cæremonias, vestes, et externa signa, quibus in missarum celebratione ecclesia catholica utitur, irritabula impietatis esse, magis quam officia pietatis; anathema sit.
"8. Si quis dixerit, missas, in quibus solus sacerdos sacramentaliter communicat, illicitas esse, ideoque abrogandas; anathema sit.
"9. Si quis dixerit, ecclesiæ Romanæ ritum, quo summissa voce pars canonis, et verba consecrationis proferuntur, damnandum esse; aut lingua tantum vulgari missam celebrari debere; aut aquam non miscendam esse vino in calice offerendo, eo quod sit contra Christi institutionem; anathema sit."
From this it appears,—
1. That, according to the Church of Rome, the eucharist is a real, propitiatory sacrifice, for the expiation of sin, for reconciliation with God, and for securing providential and gracious blessings from his hands.
2. That what is offered is Christ, his body, soul, and divinity, all which are present under the form of bread and wine. The sacrifice of the mass is the same, therefore, as the sacrifice of the cross; the former being a constant repetition of the latter. "Unum itaque et idem sacrificium esse fatemur, et haberi debet, quod in missa peragitur, et quod in cruce oblatum est: quemadmodum una est et eadem hostia Christus, videlicet Dominus noster, qui se ipsum in ara crucis semel tantummodo cruentum immolavit. Neque enim cruenta, et incruenta hostia, duæ sunt hostiæ, sed una tantum, cujus sacrificium, postquam Dominus ita præcepit, 'Hoc facite in meam commemorationem,' in eucharistia quotidie instauratur."
3. As the sacrifice is the same, so also is the priest. Christ offered Himself once on the cross, and He offers Himself daily in the mass.
"Sed unus etiam atque idem sacerdos est Christus dominus, nam ministri, qui sacrificium faciunt, non suam, sed Christi personam suscipiunt, cum ejus corpus et sanguinem conficiunt, id quod et ipsius consecrationis verbis ostenditur, neque enim sacerdos inquit, Hoc est corpus Christi, sed, 'Hoc est corpus meum:' personam videlicet Christi domini gerens, panis, et vini substantiam, in veram ejus corporis, et sanguinis substantiam convertit." On this statement it may be remarked in passing, that if the ministers are not the real offerers, they are not real priests. A priest is one appointed to offer sacrifices. But according to the theory, the officiating minister in the service of the mass, does not offer the sacrifice. He is a supernumerary. He has no function. There is no reason why without his intervention, Christ should not when his people meet to commemorate his death, offer Himself anew to God. The Roman theory in this, as in many other points, is not self-consistent. Romanists represent ministers as true priests; mediators between God and the people, without whose intervention, no sinner can have access to God or obtain pardon or acceptance. They are not only invested with priestly authority and prerogatives, but imbued with supernatural power. The words of consecration pronounced by other than sacerdotal lips, are inoperative. The mass unless performed by a priest is no sacrifice. All this supposes that their office is a reality, that ministers are really priests; but according to the passage just quoted, they are not priests at all. According to the common mode of representation, however, the minister in the mass as truly offers the body and blood of Christ, as the priests under the Old Testament offered the blood of lambs or of goats. Cardinal Gousset, for example, says: "According to the faith of the Catholic Church, the mass is a sacrifice of the new law, in which the priest offers to God the body and blood of Jesus Christ under the form of bread and wine. The mass is a true sacrifice instituted by Jesus Christ." "A sacrifice, from its nature, is an act of supreme worship, due to God alone. Hence when a mass is celebrated in the name of a saint, it is not to be believed that the sacrifice is offered to the saint; but simply in his memory, to implore his protection, and to secure his intercession. It is a sacrifice in which is offered the body and blood of Christ. Jesus
Christ, whose body and blood are present under the forms of bread and wine, is Himself the victim. Finally, the eucharistic sacrifice is made by the hands of the priest, but Jesus Christ is the principal minister; He is at once priest and victim, offering himself to God the Father by the ministry of his priests."2
4. As under the Old Testament some of the sin offerings availed for those who brought the victims, and for whose benefit they were offered; and others, as the morning and evening sacrifices, and those offered on the feast days, and especially that on the great day of atonement, were intended for the whole nation; so according to Romanists, the propitiatory sacrifice, in the ordinary public service, is offered for the sins of the faithful in general, while at other times it is offered for particular individuals. And as it matters not whether such individuals be living or dead, it is obvious that such masses may be indefinitely multiplied. As according to the Church of Rome the great majority of those dying within the pale of the Church, pass into purgatory, where they remain in a state of suffering for a period to which there is no certainly known termination before the day of judgment; for their benefit, to alleviate or shorten their sufferings, masses may be, and should be offered by their surviving friends. It has ever been found that men at the approach of death, or the affectionate relatives of the departed, are willing to appropriate money at their command, to pay for masses for their benefit. This, as just remarked, has proved an inexhaustible mine of wealth to the Church. "Hujus sacrificii eam vim esse, parochi docebunt, ut non solum immolanti, et sumenti prosit, sed omnibus etiam fidelibus, sive illi nobiscum in terris vivant, sive jam in Domino mortui, nondum plane expiati sint. Neque enim minus ex Apostolorum certissima traditione, pro his utiliter offertur, quam pro vivorum peccatis, pœnis, satisfactionibus, ac quibusvis calamitatibus, et angustiis."
Remarks
No doctrine of the Church of Rome is more portentous or more fruitful of evil consequences than this doctrine of the mass; and no doctrine of that Church is more entirely destitute of even a semblance of Scriptural support. The words of Christ, "This do in remembrance of me," are made to mean, "Offer the sacrifice which I myself have just offered" (Offrez le sacrifice que je vien d'offrir moimeme). These words constituted the Apostles and all their successors priests. The Council of Trent even anathematizes all who do not put that preposterous interpretation on those simple words.3 Romanists also appeal to the fact that Christ is said to be a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek, from which they infer that He continually repeats the sacrifice once offered on the cross. They even argue from such passages as Malachi 1:11, in which the universal spread of the true religion is predicted by saying that from the rising of the sun to the going down of the same, "in every place incense shall be offered unto my name, and a pure offering."
Protestants reject the doctrine that the eucharist is a true propitiatory sacrifice,—
1. Because it is not only destitute of all support from the Scriptures, but is directly contrary to the whole nature of the ordinance, as exhibited in its original institution and in the practice of the apostolic church. There it is set forth as a sacred feast commemorative of the death of Christ.
2. Because it is founded on the monstrous doctrine of transubstantiation. If the whole substance of the bread be not changed into the substance of Christ's body, and the whole substance of the wine into the substance of his blood, and if the whole Christ, body, soul, and divinity be not really and truly present under the form (or species) or appearance of the bread and wine, then the priest in the mass has nothing to offer. He in fact offers nothing, and the whole service is a deceit. Just so certainly, therefore, as the impossible and the unscriptural cannot be true, just so certain is it, that the mass is not a propitiatory sacrifice.
3. The Romish doctrine is that the Apostles were priests, and were invested with authority and power to continue and perpetuate in the Church the priestly office by ordination and the imposition of hands by which the supernatural gifts of the Holy Spirit are conveyed. All this is unscriptural and false. First, because a priest is a man appointed to be a mediator between God and other men, drawing near to Him in behalf of those who have not liberty of access for themselves, and whose function it is to offer gifts and sacrifices for sin. But there is no such office under the Christian dispensation, save in the person of Jesus Christ. He is our only, and all sufficient priest; everywhere present and everywhere accessible, who has opened for us a new and living way of access to God, available to all sinners of the human race without the intervention of any of their fellow sinners. Every believer is as much a priest under the Gospel, as any other believer, for through Christ they all have equal freedom of access unto God. It subverts the whole nature of the gospel, to make the intervention of any human priest necessary to our reconciliation with God. Secondly, Christian ministers are never called priests in the New Testament. Every title of dignity, every term expressive of the nature of their office, is bestowed on them, but the title priest, so familiar to Jewish and Gentile ears, is never given to them. Nor is any priestly function ascribed to them. They are not mediators. They are not appointed to offer sacrifices for sin. Every priest is a mediator, but it is expressly declared that Christians have but one mediator, the man Christ Jesus. There is but one sacrifice for sin, the all sufficient sacrifice of Christ upon the cross, who died once for all to bring us near to God. Thirdly, Christ Himself and the Apostles after Him in all their addresses to the people, instead of directing them to go to ministers as priests to obtain the benefits of redemption, uniformly assume that the way is open for the return of every sinner to God without human intervention. "Come unto me" is the invitation of Christ to every heavily laden sinner. "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved," is the gospel preached by the Apostles both to Jews and Gentiles. The emancipation of the Christian world effected by the Reformation, consisted in large measure in freeing man from the belief that Christian ministers are
priests through whom alone sinners can draw near to God. It was preaching deliverance to captives, and the opening of the prison to those who were bound, to announce that believers through Christ are all made kings and priests unto God; subject to no authority but the authority of God (and of course to such as He has ordained), and all having access by one Spirit unto the Father. If then ministers are not priests, the eucharist is not a sacrifice.
4. The Romish doctrine is derogatory to the sacrifice of the cross. It supposes that the work of Christ in making satisfaction for the sins of men, needs to be constantly repeated. This is directly contrary to Scripture, which teaches that by the one offering of Himself, He has forever perfected them that believe. His one sacrifice has done all that need be done, and all that a sacrifice can do. Romanists say that the same sacrifice which was made on the cross, is made in the mass. The only difference between the two is modal. It concerns only the manner of oblation. Then why is the latter needed? Why does not the one offering of Christ suffice? Certain it is the Bible refers us to nothing else; and the believer craves nothing else.
5. The doctrine of the sacrificial character of the eucharist, is an integral part of the great system of error, which must stand or fall as a whole. Romanism is another gospel. It proposes a different method of salvation from that presented in the word of God. It teaches that no one can be saved who is out of the pale of that visible society of which the pope of Rome is the head; and that all are saved who die within that pale. It teaches that no one can be regenerated who is not baptized; and that there is no forgiveness for post-baptismal sins, except by the sacrament of penance and absolution at the hands of a priest. It teaches that no one can have the benefit of the Lord's Supper, who does not receive it at the hands of a properly ordained officer of the Church of Rome. It teaches that there is no valid ministry, and that there are no valid ordinances except in the line of the apostolic succession as recognized by the pope. It follows men beyond the grave. It teaches that the souls in purgatory are still under the power of the keys; that their stay in that place or state of
torment, can be prolonged or shortened at the will of the Church. The pope assumes, and has often pretended to exercise, the power of granting indulgences for even a thousand years. This whole theory hangs together. If one assumption be false, the whole is false. And if the theory in its primary principle of a perpetual apostleship, infallible in teaching and of plenary power in government and discipline, be false, then every particular doctrine involving that principle must be false.
Moehler, whose philosophical and mitigated Romanism, has called down upon him no little censure from his stricter brethren, represents the doctrine of the eucharist as the point in which all the differences between Romanists and Protestants converge. On the view taken of this doctrine depends the question whether the Christian Church has a true living "cultus" or not. With him the Church, of course, is the body, which, professing the true religion, is united in the reception of the same sacraments, in subjection to bishops canonically consecrated, and especially to the pope of Rome. For him, and all Romanists, this Church is Christ. He dwells in it; animates it; operates through it exclusively in the salvation of men. The teaching of the Church is his teaching; its commands are his commands; He regenerates only through its sacrament of baptism; He remits sin only through the sacrament of penance; He strengthens in confirmation; He nourishes his people with his body and blood in the eucharist; and in the ordination of priests. He appoints the organs through which all this is done by his ceaseless activity. "The Church," says Moehler, "is vicariously (auf eine abbildlich-lebendige Weise) Christ manifested and working through all time. The Redeemer did not merely live eighteen hundred years ago, and then disappear, to be remembered only as a historical person as any other of the departed; on the contrary He is ever living in the Church." Romanists, therefore, practically take away Christ, and give us the Church in his stead. It is to be remembered that by the Church they do not mean the body consisting of true believers, but the external, organized body of which the pope is the head. It is this body represented in history by the Hildebrands, the Borgias, and
the Leos, which Romanism puts in the place of Christ, clothing it with his prerogatives, and claiming for it the obedience, the reverence, and the confidence due to God alone. It is against this theory, which practically puts man in the place of God, that the most fearful denunciations of the Scriptures are pronounced.
§ 20. Prayer
Prayer is the converse of the soul with God. Therein we manifest or express to Him our reverence, and love for his divine perfection, our gratitude for all his mercies, our penitence for our sins, our hope in his forgiving love, our submission to his authority, our confidence in his care, our desires for his favour, and for the providential and spiritual blessings needed for ourselves and others. As religion, in the subjective sense of the word, is the state of mind induced by the due apprehension of the character of God and of our relation to Him as our Creator, Preserver, and Redeemer; so prayer is the expression, uttered or unuttered, of all the feelings and desires which that state of mind produces or excites. A prayerless man is of necessity, and thoroughly irreligious. There can be no life without activity. As the body is dead when it ceases to act, so the soul that goes not forth in its actions towards God, that lives as though there were no God, is spiritually dead.
Prayer takes a great deal for granted. It assumes, in the first place, the personality of God. Only a person can say I, or be addressed as Thou; only a person can be the subject and object of intelligent action, can apprehend and answer, can love and be loved, or hold converse with other persons. If God, therefore, be only a name for an unknown force, or for the moral order of the universe, prayer becomes irrational and impossible. Secondly, God, however, although a person, may dwell far off in immensity, and have no intercourse with his creatures on earth. Prayer, therefore, assumes not only the personality of God, but also that He is near us; that He is not only able, but also willing to hold intercourse with us, to hear and answer; that He knows our thoughts afar off; and that unuttered
aspirations are intelligible to Him. Thirdly, it assumes that He has the personal control of all nature, i.e., of all things out of Himself; that He governs all his creatures and all their actions. It assumes that He has not only created all things and endowed matter and mind with forces and powers, but that He is everywhere present, controlling the operation of such forces and powers, so that nothing occurs without his direction or permission. When it rains, it is because He wills it, and controls the laws of nature to produce that effect. When the earth produces fruit in abundance, or when the hopes of the husbandman are disappointed, these effects are not to be referred to the blind operation of natural laws, but to God's intelligent and personal control. There is no such reign of law as makes God a subject. It is He who reigns, and orders all the operations of nature so as to accomplish his own purposes.
This does not suppose that the laws of nature are mutable, or that they are set aside. There is scarcely any effect, either in nature or in the acts of men, due to the operation of any one natural force. We produce effects by combining such forces, so that the result is due to this intelligent and voluntary combination. In like manner, in the ordinary operations of nature, God accomplishes his purpose by a similar intelligent and voluntary combination of natural causes. When He wills that it should rain, He wills that all the secondary causes, productive of that effect, should be brought into operation. The doctrine of providence only supposes that God does, on the scale of the universe, what we do within the limited sphere of our efficiency. We, indeed, so far as effects out of ourselves are concerned, are tied to the use of secondary causes. We can act neither against them, nor without them. God is not thus limited. He can operate without second causes as well as with them, or against them. There seems to be no little confusion in the minds of many writers on this subject. They insist on the immutability of the laws of nature, and some times speak of God as constantly controlling their operation by combining and directing their forces; and yet they resolve all second causes into the divine efficiency; that is, an efficiency directed by intelligence and will. "It is but reasonable,"
says Sir John Herschel, "to regard the force of gravitation as the direct or indirect result of a consciousness or will existing somewhere." "It may be that all natural forces are resolvable in some one force, and indeed in the modern doctrine of the correlation of forces, an idea which is a near approach to this, has already entered the domain of science. It may also be that this one force, into which all others return again, is itself but a mode of action of the Divine Will."2 It is a common remark that the only force of which we have any direct knowledge is mind-force, and hence that it is unphilosophical to assume any other. From this it is inferred that all the forces operating in nature are the energy of the one Supreme Intelligence. This doctrine, as shown when treating of the doctrine of Providence, almost inevitably leads to pantheism. But it is difficult to see how those who take this view can consistently speak of the immutability of law, or of God's being free only within its limits. It is essential to the idea of mind-power, that it should be free; that it should act when, where, and how it pleases. In the case of God, indeed, it cannot act unwisely or unjustly. But if all the forces of nature are only manifestations of the divine efficiency, what meaning can be attached to the proposition that He operates with, and through, and never independently of natural law?
The Scriptural doctrine is that God is an extra-mundane, personal Being, independent of the world, who has created it, and endowed all things material with their several properties or powers, which He in his omnipresent, and infinitely wise omnipotence, constantly controls. This doctrine is presupposed in prayer; for "prayer and the answer of prayer, are simply … the preferring of a request upon the one side, and compliance with that request upon the other. Man applies, God complies. Man asks a favour, God bestows it. These are conceived to be the two terms of a real interchange that takes place between the parties—the two terms of a sequence, in fact, whereof the antecedent is a prayer lifted up from earth, and the consequent is the fulfilment of that prayer in virtue of a mandate from heaven."
Prayer also supposes that the government of God extends over the minds of men, over their thoughts, feelings, and volitions; that the heart is in his hands, and that He can turn it even as the rivers of water are turned.
It is evident, therefore, that not only atheism, pantheism, materialism, and every other system of philosophy which involves the denial of the existence or the personality of God, but also all other theories, whether scientific or philosophical, which do not admit of the control of God over the operations of nature and the character and conduct of men, are inconsistent with prayer. According to all these systems there is either no one to pray to, or nothing to pray for. If there be no personal God, there is no one to pray to; and if God, supposing such a Being to exist, has no control over nature or man, then there is no rational motive for prayer; there is nothing to be accomplished by it. The idea that the service would still be of value for its subjective effect is irrational, because its subjective effect is due to faith in its objective efficiency. If a man believes that there is no God, he cannot make himself a better man by acting hypocritically, and pouring forth his prayers and praises to a nonentity. Or, if a believer in the existence of God, if he has such a theory of his nature or of his relation to the world, as precludes the possibility of his hearing, or if He hears, of his answering our prayers, then prayer becomes irrational. Candid men, therefore, who in their philosophy hold any of the theories referred to, do not hesitate to pronounce prayer superstitious or fanatical. Kant, although a theist, regards all as unphilosophical enthusiasts who assume that God hears or answers prayer.
Professor Tyndall, one of the representative scientific men of the age, says, "One by one natural phenomena have been associated with their proximate causes; and the idea of direct personal volition, mixing itself in the economy of nature, is retreating more and more." Science, he tells us "does assert, for example, that without a disturbance of natural law, quite as serious as the stoppage of an eclipse, or the rolling the St. Lawrence up the Falls of Niagara, no act
of humiliation, individual or national, could call one shower from heaven, or deflect towards us a single beam of the sun." [Man may deflect the beams of the sun at pleasure, but God cannot. Man, according to Professor Espy, can make it rain, but God cannot.] "Those, therefore, who believe that the miraculous is still active in nature, may with perfect consistency join in our periodic prayers for fair weather and for rain: while those who hold that the age of miracles is past, will refuse to join in such petitions." With Professor Tyndall and the large class of scientists to which he belongs, there never has been an event in the external world due to the exercise of any other force than the undirected operation of physical causes. "Nothing has occurred to indicate that the operation of the law [of gravity] has for a moment been suspended; nothing has ever intimated that nature has been crossed by spontaneous action, or that a state of things at any time existed which could not be rigorously deduced from the preceding state. Given the distribution of matter and the forces in operation in the time of Galileo, the competent mathematician of that day could predict what is now occurring in our own."2 What is meant by "spontaneous action"? Spontaneous is antithetical to necessary. Spontaneous action, therefore, is free action; the action of intelligence and will; such action as Professor Tyndall displays in writing or delivering his lectures. His assertion, therefore, is that there has never occurred in nature any effect which may not be referred to necessary, i.e., to blind, unintelligent causes. This of course precludes the possibility of miracles. For a miracle is an event in the external world which cannot be referred to any natural cause, but which must from its nature be ascribed to the immediate efficiency, or the "spontaneous action" of God. When Christ said, "I will; be thou clean," and the leper was cleansed, the only cause, or efficient antecedent of the cure, was his will; a volition. So when He said, "Lazarus come forth," or when He "said unto the sea, Peace, be still. And the wind ceased and there was a great calm." The scientific man has no idea how small he looks, when, in the presence of Christ, he ventures to say that nature has never been crossed by "spontaneous action;" that Christ's will was not a cause, when he healed the sick, or opened the
eyes of the blind, or raised the dead, by a word; or when He himself rose by his own power from the grave. To say that these facts never occurred, simply because, according to the ephemeral theory of the hour, they could not occur, is the infinite of folly. It is a thousand fold more certain that they occurred than that the best authenticated facts of history are true. For such facts we have only ordinary historical evidence; for the truth of Christ's miracles, and especially of his resurrection, we have the evidence of all the facts of history from his day to the present. The actual state of the world, and the existence of the Church, necessitate the admission of those facts, to which God himself bore witness of old in signs, and wonders, and divers miracles, as He does still in a manner absolutely irresistible, in the gift of the Holy Ghost. To hear the whole gospel, even constructively, pronounced a lie, is a sore trial to those who have even a glimmer of the faith of Paul, and who can only say with quivering lips, what he said with the fulness of assurance, "I know whom I have believed." Scientific men are prone to think that there is no other evidence of truth, than the testimony of the senses. But the reason has its intuitions, the moral nature its à priori judgments, the religious consciousness its immediate apprehensions, which are absolutely infallible and of paramount authority. A man might as easily emancipate himself from the operation of the laws of nature, as from the authority of the moral law, or his responsibility to God. When, therefore, men of science advance theories opposed to these fundamental convictions, they are like bats impinging against the everlasting rocks.
But apart from the case of miracles, it may be safely said, that so far from its being true that nature has never been "crossed by spontaneous action," such action in nature is familiar, constant, and almost universal. What is an organism, but the product of spontaneous action? that is, of the intelligent (and therefore voluntary) selection and application of appropriate means for the accomplishment of a foreseen and intended end? If the world is full of the evidences of spontaneous action on the part of man, nature is full of evidence of such action on the part of God. The evidence is of
the same kind, and just as palpable and irresistible in the one case as in the other. It is admitted of necessity by those who deny it. Darwin's books, for example, are full of such expressions as "wonderful contrivance," "ingenious device," "marvellous arrangements." These expressions reveal the perception of spontaneous action. They have no meaning except on the assumption of such action. "Contrivance," "device," imply design, and would not be used if the perception of intention did not suggest and necessitate them. Some twenty times already, in the course of this work, it has been shown that, in many cases, those who begin with denying any spontaneous action in nature, end with asserting that there is no other kind of action anywhere; that all force is mindforce, and therefore spontaneous as well as intelligent.
Spontaneous action cannot be got rid of. If denied in the present, it must be admitted in the past. If, as even Professor Huxley teaches, "Organization is not the cause of life; but life is the cause of organization," the question is, Whence comes life? Not out of nothing, surely. It must have its origin in the spontaneous, voluntary act of the ever, and the necessarily Living One.
The theory of the universe which underlies the Bible, which is everywhere assumed or asserted in the sacred volume, which accords with our moral and religious nature, and which, therefore, is the foundation of natural, as well as of revealed religion, is that God created all things by the word of his power; that He endowed his creatures with their properties or forces; that He is everywhere present in the universe, coöperating with and controlling the operation of second causes on a scale commensurate with his omnipresence and omnipotence, as we, in our measure, coöperate with, and control them within the narrow range of our efficiency. According to this theory, it is not irrational that we should pray for rain or fair weather, for prosperous voyages or healthful seasons; or that we should feel gratitude for the innumerable blessings which we receive from this ever present, ever operating, and ever watchful benefactor and Father. Any theory of the universe which makes
religion, or prayer, irrational, is self-evidently false, because it contradicts the nature, the consciousness, and the irrepressible convictions of men. As this control of God extends over the minds of men, it is no less rational that we should pray, as all men instinctively do pray, that He would influence our own hearts, and the hearts of others, for good, than that we should pray for health.
It is also involved in the assumptions already referred to, that the sequence of events in the physical and moral world is not determined by any inexorable fate. A fatalist cannot consistently pray. It is only on the assumption that there is a God, who does his pleasure in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth, that we can rationally address Him as the hearer of prayer.
In like manner it is assumed that there is no such foreordination of events as is inconsistent with God's acting according to the good pleasure of his will. When a man enters upon any great enterprise, he lays down beforehand the plan of his operations; selects and determines his means, and assigns to each subordinate the part he is to act; he may require each to apply continually for guidance and directions; and may assure him that his requests for assistance and guidance shall be answered. Were it possible that every instance of such application or request could be foreseen and the answer predetermined, this would not be inconsistent with the duty or propriety of such requests being made, or with the liberty of action on the part of the controller. This illustration may amount to little; but it is certain that the Scriptures teach both foreordination and the efficacy of prayer. The two, therefore, cannot be inconsistent. God has not determined to accomplish his purposes without the use of means; and among those means, the prayers of his people have their appropriate place. If the objection to prayer, founded on the foreordination of events, be valid, it is valid against the use of means in any case. If it be unreasonable to say, 'If it be foreordained that I should live, it is not necessary for me to eat,' it is no less unreasonable for me to say, 'If it be foreordained that I should receive any good, it is not necessary for me to ask for it.' If God has
foreordained to bless us, He has foreordained that we should seek his blessing. Prayer has the same causal relation to the good bestowed, as any other means has to the end with which it is connected.
The God of the Bible, who has revealed Himself as the hearer of prayer, is not mere intelligence and power. He is love. He feels as well as thinks. Like as a father pitieth his children, so the LORD pitieth them that fear Him. He is full of tenderness, compassion, long-suffering, and benevolence. This is not anthropomorphism. These declarations of Scripture are not mere "regulative truths." They reveal what God really is. If man was made in his image, God is like man. All the excellences of our nature as spirits belong to Him without limitation, and to an infinite degree. There is mystery here, as there is everywhere. But we are all used to mysteries, the naturalist as well as the theologian. Both have been taught the folly of denying that a thing is, because we cannot tell how it is. It is enough for us to know that God loves us and cares for us; that a sparrow does not fall to the ground without his notice, and that we are, in his sight, of more value than many sparrows. All this for the believer is literal truth, having in its support the highest kind of evidence. The "how" he is content to leave unexplained.
It is an objection often urged against the propriety of addressing prayer to God, that it is inconsistent with his dignity as an infinite Being to suppose that He concerns Himself with the trifling affairs of men. This objection arises from a forgetfulness that God is infinite. It assumes that his knowledge, power, or presence, is limited; that He would be distracted if his attention were directed to all the minute changes constantly occurring throughout the universe. This supposes that God is a creature like ourselves; that bounds can be set to his intelligence or efficiency. When a man looks out on an extended landscape, the objects to which his attention is simultaneously directed are too numerous to be counted. What is man to God? The absolute intelligence must know all things; absolute power must be able to direct all things. In the sight of God, the distinction between
few and many, great and small, disappears. In Him all creatures live, and move, and have their being.
The Object of Prayer
As prayer involves the ascription of divine attributes to its object, it can be properly addressed to God alone. The heathen prayed to imaginary beings, or to idols, who had eyes that saw not, and hands that could not save. Equally unscriptural and irrational are prayers addressed to any creature of whose presence we have no knowledge, and of whose ability either to hear or answer our petitions we have no evidence.
In the Old Testament, the prayers therein recorded are uniformly addressed to God, as such; to the one Divine Being, because the distinction of the persons in the Godhead was then but imperfectly revealed. In the New Testament, prayer is addressed either to God, as the Triune God, or to the Father, to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as distinct persons. In the Christian doxology, used wherever the Bible is known, the several persons of the Trinity are separately addressed. The examples of prayer addressed to Christ, recorded in the New Testament, are very numerous. As prayer, in the Scriptural sense of the term, includes all converse with God either in the form of praise, thanksgiving, confession, or petition; all the ascriptions of glory to Him, as well as all direct supplications addressed to Him, come under this head. The Apostles prayed to Him while He was yet with them on earth, asking of Him blessings which God only could bestow, as when they said, "Lord, increase our faith." The dying thief, taught by the Spirit of God, said, "Lord, remember me, when thou comest into thy kingdom." The last words of the first martyr, Stephen, were, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." Paul besought the Lord thrice that the thorn in his flesh might depart from him. So in 1 Timothy 1:12, he says, "I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who hath enabled me, for that He counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry." In Revelation 1:5, 6, it is said, "Unto him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood, and hath made us
kings and priests unto God and his Father; to Him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen." Revelation 5:13, "Every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard I saying, 'Blessing, and honour, and glory, and power, be unto Him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb, for ever and ever.' " As the Bible so clearly teaches that Christ is God manifest in the flesh; that all power in heaven and earth is committed to his hands; that He is exalted to give repentance and the remission of sins; as He gives the Holy Ghost; and as He is said to dwell in us, and to be our life; it does thereby teach us that He is the proper object of prayer. Accordingly, as all Christians are the worshippers of Christ, so He has ever been the object of their adoration, thanksgivings, praises, confessions, and supplications.
Requisites of Acceptable Prayer
1. The first and most obviously necessary requisite of acceptable prayer, is sincerity. God is a Spirit. He searches the heart. He is not satisfied with words, or with external homage. He cannot be deceived and will not be mocked. It is a great offence, therefore, in his sight, when we utter words before Him in which our hearts do not join. We sin against Him when we use terms, in the utterance of which the angels veil their faces, with no corresponding feelings of reverence; or use the formulas of thanksgiving without gratitude; or those of humility and confession without any due sense of our unworthiness; or those of petition without desire for the blessings we ask. Every one must acknowledge that this is an evil often attending the prayers of sincere Christians; and with regard to the multitudes who, in places of public worship, repeat the solemn forms of devotion or profess to unite with those who utter them, without any corresponding emotions, the service is little more than mockery.
2. Reverence. God is an infinitely exalted Being; infinite in his holiness as well as in knowledge and power. He is to be had in reverence by all who are round about Him. This holy fear is declared
to be the first element of all true religion. His people are designated as those who fear his name. We are required to serve Him with reverence and godly fear. And whenever heaven is opened to our view, its inhabitants are seen prostrate before the throne. We offend God, therefore, when we address Him as we would a fellow creature, or use forms of expression of undue familiarity. Nothing is more characteristic of the prayers recorded in the Bible, than the spirit of reverence by which they are pervaded. The Psalms especially may be regarded as a prayer-book. Every Psalm is a prayer, whether of worship, of thanksgiving, of confession, or of supplication. In many cases all these elements are intermingled. They relate to all circumstances in the inward and outward life of those by whom they were indited. They recognize the control of God over all events, and over the hearts of men. They assume that He is ever near and ever watchful, sustaining to his people the relation of a loving Father. But with all this, there is never any forgetfulness of his infinite majesty. There is a tendency sometimes in the best of men, to address God as though He were one of ourselves. Luther's familiar formula was, Lieber Herr, or Lieber Herr Gott (dear Lord, dear Lord God). As Lieber Herr is the usual mode of address among friends (equivalent to our Dear Sir), it sounds strangely when God is thus addressed. In Luther it was the expression of faith and love; in many who imitate him it is the manifestation of an irreverent spirit.