the Father Almighty, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, descend upon this bread, and upon all who eat thereof."1 That the rite flourished elsewhere also in the West during the middle ages is evident from Durandus,2 who speaks of it as a "remedy discovered" for rare Communion; to wit, that "instead of the daily Communion, the Kiss of Peace should be daily given, . . . and instead of the Communion which was usual on every Lord's Day, bread blessed, the substitute of the holy Communion, which is also called evλoyía, should be given on Lord's Days." In 1255 we find a Council at Bordeaux3 "forbidding Priests on any account to give consecrated Hosts to children for the Communion at Easter, but common bread blessed." De Vert, 1709, speaks of the "Pain béni"5 being in his time "offered almost everywhere;" I presume in France, where it is said to be still common. De Moleon, however, the contemporary of De Vert, speaks as if it had become a local observance :-" On Sundays at Rouen in the Church they eat the Blessed Bread, as a supplement of the Communion, and carry small pieces home by way of Eulogia (en eulogie) for those who have not been able to assist at the Mass." This was recognised in the Rouen Missal, and probably in other Provincial Offices. It is very probable, however, that the tyrannical imposition of the Roman Missal on almost every Diocese in France will soon entirely abolish this custom, with many other interesting relics of antiquity.

In

An Anglo-Saxon Canon of 960, which orders that "no hallowed thing be neglected, as holy water, salt, frankincense, bread, or anything that is holy," contains, I believe, the earliest allusion to the Antidoron in our own Church. the Sarums Missal is a form for blessing the bread. First the Gospel In principio is read, then some versicles, "Blessed be the Name of the Lord," etc., and then the Collect that we have cited from the Mozarabic Missal. The Invocation, "In the Name," etc., ended the prayers, the bread being in the last place sprinkled with holy water. In 1236, a Constitution of Edmund Rich10 orders "the Kiss of Peace and

1 Leslie, p. 220.

3 Can. v. Labb. tom. xi. col. 740.

2 Lib. iv. c. liii. n. 3.

4 Explication, Rem. sur ch. ii. § 36, tom. i. p. 123.

5

They now say pain bénit, cierge bénit, eau bénite, etc.; but when De Vert, Bocquillot, Le Brun, etc., wrote, the use of the older form, bénit,

had not been revived in speaking of objects blessed by the Priest.

6 Voy. Liturg. p. 422.

7 Canons of Edgar's Reign, No. 43; Johnson, vol. i. p. 420.

8 Col. 849*.

10 Const. iv.; Johnson, vol. ii. p. 132.

S. John i. 1-14.

the bread blessed in the Church" to be refused to the concubines of Priests. The offerings in bread of the laity continued here down to the Reformation, some one parishioner, it would seem, taking upon himself to bring a loaf to be blessed and distributed. We may learn this from the Bidding Prayers, in which the following clause occurs for two centuries: "Also ye shall pray for the good man and woman, that this day giveth bread to make the Holy Loaf, and for all those that first began it, and them that longest continued." In the Churchwarden's accounts of the parish of S. Margaret Pattens in London for the year 1509, is a charge for the purchase of a "Holy bread basket." About the year 1543, a Rationale of ritual was drawn up under the authority of Cranmer, if not by him, which declared Holy Bread to be a godly ceremony, and to be continued in the Church, "to put us in remembrance that all Christian men are one mystical Body of Christ, as the bread is made of many grains, and yet but one loaf, and to put us in remembrance also of receiving of the Sacrament and Body of Christ in right charity." In the Injunctions of Edward VI., 1547, and in Cranmer's Visitation Articles of the same year, persons were forbidden to "bear about them Holy Bread," a practice which is spoken of as a "superstitious abuse." A proclamation of the same year, while restraining too ardent reformers, gave impunity to those who should decline to receive the Holy Bread.5 the next year belong some directions of the King's Visitors to the Clergy of the Deanery of Doncaster, one of which is as follows:-"Before the dealing of the Holy Bread [ye shall say] these words, Of Christ's Body this is a token, which on the Cross for our sins was broken; wherefore of His death if you will be partakers, of vice and sin ye must be forsakers." Under the First Book of Edward, 1549, the bread ceased to be blessed; but the restoration of the custom

6

To

1 Temp. Henr. VIII. before the rejection of the Pope's supremacy.L'Estrange, Alliance, ch. vi. L. p. 255. It occurs also in a form used in the Diocese of Worcester, A.D. 1349; Coxe on Forms of Bidding Prayer, p. 18 (compare L'Estrange, p. 260); in another in the Liber Festivalis, Dec. fol. cxciv. 1, Lond. 1515; in the York Manual, 1509, Coxe, p. 54; and in several forms preserved at York in manuscript, which are about to be published by the Early English Text Society in the Appendix to the 'Lay Folks' Mass Book."

66

2 My authority for this is the Rev. J. L. Fish, the Rector of S. Margaret. 3 Collier's Eccl. Hist. P. ii. B. iii. p. 198.

4 Docum. Ann. vol. i. pp. 17, 29, 57.

5 Ibid. p. 44.

6 Ibid. p. 68. Latimer, when Bishop of Worcester, "taught all them of his Diocese to say" these lines (slightly altered.-Works, vol. ii.

p. 294.

was one of the demands of the Devonshire Rebels1 in the latter part of that year. In 1550 the maintenance of Holy Bread is forbidden in the Diocesan Injunctions of Ridley. When the Latin Books were restored in 1554, we find Bonner, at his Visitation, inquiring, "Whether there be every Sunday Holy Water and Holy Bread made and distributed among the parishioners?" He assigns two grounds for the usage; it was to remind men "of unity and concord, expressed by the several grains, which being many, are ground and brought to one loaf made of them all;' and also of the Communion of all present in the Primitive Church, "for lack of which Communion this Holy Bread is now given men to understand that they should have done the other, and for lack of the same do now receive this for a memory thereof." It is probable that some of the Sunday doles of bread, which still exist in many Churches, originated in a provision by will for the perpetual supply of the Holy Loaf.

1 See Cranmer's Reply to them, Strype's Life, B. ii. App. xl. vol. ii. p. 534.

2 Doc. Ann. vol. i. p. 95.

3 Ibid. p. 150.

=

4 The general introduction of the Antidoron was facilitated by, if it did not originate in, an earlier use of blessed bread as a token of Christian love and communion. The Council of Laodicea must refer to this custom, when, after forbidding (in Can. xiv.) the sending of the consecrated Elements as Eulogiæ, it also forbids Catholics to "receive Eulogiæ from heretics," Can. xxxii. That is to say, it recognised and left untouched the Eulogiæ of common but blessed bread; Bever. Pand. tom. i. p. 459, 466. Gregory Nazianzen thus alludes to his own practice, when relating a dream of his sister in sickness :-"It appeared to her that I . . . suddenly stood by her in the night with a basket and loaves of the whitest, and having prayed over them and signed them (with the Cross), as our wont is, fed her," etc.; Orat. xix. tom. i. p. 306. Such Eulogiæ passed between S. Augustine and Paulinus. Thus the former writes :-" The bread which we have sent will become a richer blessing (Benedictio Eulogia) from the love of your kindness accepting it;" Ep. xxxi. tom. ii. col. 77. So Paulinus to Aug. Ep. xxv. col. 50; Paul. to Alypius, Ep. xxiv. col. 47; Paul. to Romanian, Ep. xxxii. col. 79. Both Paul. (u.s. p. 47) and Aug. elsewhere (c. Litt. Petill. L. ii. c. xvii. tom. xii. col. 391) employ also the Greek word Eulogiæ. We may infer, from many stories in Gregory of Tours, that the practice (Eulogias petere, flagitare, postulare, dare, ministrare, porrigere, accipere, etc.) was very common as a symbol of Christian peace in France in the sixth century. Even the food given in hospitality by a Priest to a visitor, or in Monasteries to strangers, was called Eulogia, and esteemed sacred. Similarly, if a person asked a Priest to bless the food of which he was about to partake.-See Greg. Opp. coll. 377, 507, 919. Forms of letters accompanying Eulogiæ sent from a Bishop to the King or another Bishop, and a form of acknowledg ment, may be seen in the very curious Exemplaria of Marculfus, A.D. 660, Lib. ii. nn. xlii. xliii. xliv. xlv. Capit. Reg. Fr. tom. ii. coll. 429, 430. The Monastic Council of Aix-la-Chapelle, in 817 (Can. lxviii. Capit. Reg.

We must remark, in conclusion, that it was impossible to maintain this rite, however ancient, in any honest attempt at reformation; for (1) both as it was a substitute for Communion, and a supposed means of grace, its existence was a hindrance to the much-desired return to a greater frequency of Communion among our people at large; and (2) the highly Sacramental efficacy which the Benediction ascribed to this invention of man, viz., a power to give health to soul and body, is repugnant to every sound principle of Christian doctrine, and a dishonour to the Sacraments ordained of God.

Fr. tom. i. col. 587) orders that "Eulogiæ be given to the Brothers by Presbyters in the Refectory." This custom is recognised in the rules of several Monasteries, the Eulogies being unconsecrated Hosts, and 80 called. They were served only to those who had not communicated.See Martene, De Antiq. Mon. Rit. L. i. c. ix. n. xii. tom. iv. p. 30, etc. They were also given to the poor whose feet were washed on MaundyThursday.-Missale S. Mart. Lugd. Martene, De Rit. Eccl. Ant. L. iv. c. xxii. tom. iii. p. 125. At the end of the seventeenth century De Moleon found the Canons of S. Martin at Tours giving, on the 12th May, to the Monks of Marmoutier who visited them annually on that day, in acknowledgment of kindness received in the ninth century, a little cake each, which they took away with them as a mark of union and brotherhood, and to keep up the remembrance of the hospitality received from them in so urgent a necessity."-Voy. Liturg. p. 131. Any kind of gift, and at length compulsory payments, were often, after the sixth century, called Eulogiæ.-Ducange in v. It is probable that miraculous effects were often ascribed to the bread blessed by persons eminent for holiness, as we know was the case with water and oil. An instance occurs in the Life of S. Germanus of Paris, who died in 576. He is said to have given Eulogiæ to the inhabitants of a village, suffering from a severe epidemic, with the result, that "the disease was consumed with the bread at the first taste." - xli. Act. S. O. B. tom. i. p. 240.

CHAPTER XVII.

Of the Disposal of the Consecrated Remains.

с

SECTION I.-The English Rule.

RUBRIC XXXIV.—PARAGRAPH VI,—continued.

© IT SHALL NOT BE CARRIED OUT OF THE CHURCH.]—This prohibition, immediately before the direction that it shall be consumed at once, appears superfluous; but it was probably suggested to the Scotch Revisers by the fact that in 1 B. E. there was a Rubric in the Communion of the Sick (omitted in 2 B. E., but reappearing in the Latin Book of Elizabeth) ordering that "the Priest reserve (at the open Communion) so much of the Sacrament of the Body and Blood as shall serve the sick person, and so many as shall communicate with him, "if there be any;" for which purpose he was to visit the sick, "as soon as he conveniently could after the open Communion ended in the Church."

d

REVERENTLY.]-That is, with the same reverence as when they ate and drank the former portions of the same consecrated Elements, "all meekly kneeling," and with secret prayer. This is not a second Communion. We can communicate but once at the same Celebration, though we should eat and drink several times at intervals. The Holy Communion is a feast, and therefore the analogy of a common feast is sufficient to show this; but it is better to confirm it by an illustration borrowed from a religious rite. An Israelite secured his interest in the Paschal sacrifice, if he ate only a small piece of the lamb, about the size of an olive;1 but he was at liberty to eat several portions, and as the whole was to be consumed before the morning, it was generally necessary that he should do so. However much one ate, it was one and the same feast. This second participation of the consecrated Elements is therefore not a repetition, but a continuation, of the act of Communion. That we do

1 Maimon. de Sacrif. Pasch. c. ix. § 1, etc., p. 42; Lond. 1683. 2 Exod. xii. 8, 10. This was the rule of all Peace-offerings for Thanksgiving (Eucharist), Lev. vii. 14; xxii. 30.