answers the question in that most instructive phrase: "Whereby, as by an instrument, they that receive Baptism rightly are grafted into the Church."

That the word "instrument" is to be understood in its legal sense (just as a deed is called an instrument of conveyance) is shown by the use of that other legal phrase, “the promises . . are signed and sealed." The Baptism is an instrument of conveyance, signed and sealed in the thrice Holy Name, whereby the child is transferred from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of God's dear Son (Col. i. 13), so becoming part of Christ's "purchased possession" (Eph. i. 14).*

LESSON XI.

THE LORD'S SUPPER.

ARTICLE XXVIII.

Of the Lord's Supper.

THE Supper of the Lord is not only a sign

of the love that Christians ought to have among themselves one to another; but rather is a Sacrament of our Redemption by Christ's death: insomuch that to such as rightly, worthily, and with faith, receive the same, the Bread which we break is a partaking of the Body of Christ; and likewise the Cup of Blessing is a partaking of the Blood of Christ.

Transubstantiation (or the change of the substance of Bread and Wine) in the Supper of the Lord, cannot be proved by Holy Writ; but is repugnant to the plain words of Scripture, overthroweth the nature of a Sacrament, and hath given occasion to many superstitions.

The Body of Christ is given, taken, and eaten, in the Supper, only after an heavenly and spiritual manner. And the mean whereby the Body of Christ is received and eaten in the Supper is Faith.

The Sacrament of the Lord's Supper was not by Christ's ordinance reserved, carried about, lifted up, or worshipped.

Notes. This Article is directed against two errors: first, the error of those (the "Zuinglians") who explain away the Sacramental character of the Lord's Supper, saying that it is only a bond of fellowship, "a sign of the love that Christians ought to have among themselves," denying that there is therein any real participation in the Body and Blood of Christ. And second, the error of those who maintain a real participation in the Body and Blood of Christ, but lower the doctrine by an unworthy conception of the mode in which the participation is effected.

The Anglican Church, in common with the Roman and Lutheran Churches, believes in a real participation, but differs from both as to the mode in which Christ is received. For, as Hooker and Bishop Harold Browne point out, there are three principal opinions as to the mode in which Christ is received :

1. The Romanists say by Transubstantiation, that is, by conversion of the substance of the bread and wine into the substance of Christ's Body and Blood; so that, though the appearance of bread and wine remain, yet their substance is gone, and in its place we have the substance of Christ's Body and Blood.

2. The Lutherans deny that there is any such conversion of substance; the bread remains bread and the wine remains wine; but as in red-hot iron there is the nature both of iron and of fire, so in the Eucharist there is both the substance of the bread and the substance of the Lord's Body. This is Consubstantiation.

3. Rejecting both these opinions, the English Church maintains a real but spiritual partaking of Christ's Body and Blood in the Lord's Supper; and this is the doctrine of the Article. "To such as rightly, worthily, and with faith receive the same, the Bread which we break is a partaking (a means of our partaking, St. Paul's phrase in 1 Cor. x. 16) of the Body of Christ, and likewise the Cup of Blessing is a partaking (a means of our partaking) of the Blood of Christ;" but (as the Article proceeds to assert) this partaking is "only after an heavenly and spiritual manner."

The meaning is clear. We consist of body and of spirit. By our body we are connected with the visible world, by our spirit we are connected with the unseen world. Christ is in the unseen world; it is by our spirits, therefore, that we feed on Him. While with our body we are feeding on the hallowed bread and wine according to His command, He, remembering His promise, is feeding us spiritually with His Body and His Blood. The two feedings go on concurrently, and the one is the condition and occasion of the other.

Bishop Jeremy Taylor (quoted by Bishop Harold Browne) expresses it thus :-" As Christ's Body is now a spiritual Body, so we expect a spiritual presence of that Body; and we do not believe that we naturally and carnally eat that which is no longer natural and carnal; but that we spiritually receive Christ's spiritual Body into our souls, and spiritually drink His life-giving Blood with the lips of our spirit." (Bishop Taylor on the Real Presence, i. 9-11.) The hallowed elements are a means" of communicating to us this heavenly food, because the Word of Christ gives them this power;

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just as in worldly affairs certain solemn words spoken over a parchment deed makes it a conveyance of an estate,--though the estate is not in the parchment.

That faith is necessary as "a mean whereby the Body of Christ is received and eaten," is asserted both here and in the 29th Article.

The Article asserts that the doctrine of Transubstantiation "is repugnant to the plain words of Scripture, and overthroweth the nature of a Sacrament, and hath given occasion to many superstitions."

That the elements cease to be bread and wine after consecration is plainly contradictory to Scripture, for St. Paul still calls them after consecration "this bread" and "this cup" (1 Cor. xi. 27, 28). And so our Blessed Lord, after the wine had been blessed and partaken of, still called it "this fruit of the vine." Moreover, the very words of institution contradict the notion (as Bp. Bull points out); for Christ said, "This is My Body which is given (or broken) for you ;" and "This is My Blood which is shed." Now we know that when He thus spake His Body was not yet given, nor was His Blood yet shed. Therefore "This is" must have been spoken by way of anticipation. And as it was spoken by way of anticipation then before the event, so is it spoken by way of remembrance by us now after the event.'

I That the verb "is" often means "must be conceived as being," is clear from many passages, e.g. Exod. xii. 11; Matt. xiii. 37-39; John x. 7, xv. 1; 1 Cor. x. 4. In Matt. xi. 14, speaking of the Baptist, our Lord said, "If ye will receive it, this is Elias which was for to come,❞—where any literal interpretation of "this is" would be forbidden by John i. 21. So our Lord's words at the Last Supper are most naturally understood to mean, that to all who will receive it the bread is in effect His body and the wine His blood. If our Lord had meant that the bread was transubstantiated, He would have said, not this is," but "this becomes."