bishops; and I am not aware that there is any legal exception in favour of persons ordained by Roman Catholic bishops; and, indeed, how is the English bishop to know anything about some alleged bishop in another land?

I was led to these remarks by the very interesting and impressive ceremonial which took place last April at the Chapel Royal, Whitehall, when the Bishop of London received the recantation of three Roman Catholic clergymen, and publicly admitted them into communion with the Church of England. These clergymen, (namely, the Rev. P. C. Mello, of Lisbon; the Rev. Dr. Vincent Gomez, of Lisbon; the Rev. Giovanni Battista di Menna, from the kingdom of Naples, who had previously abjured his errors at Malta,) having become convinced of their errors, felt themselves unable to remain in communion with the Church of Rome; but being at the same time desirous not to be separated from the communion of the Catholic Church of Christ, they applied to the Bishop of London to admit them formally into communion with the Church of England, and his Lordship, after due examination, complied with their request. The form used on the occasion was that of Archbishop Wake, which being but little known, a transcript of it is subjoined, together with a statement of the whole proceeding.

After morning prayer, the Bishop being at the communion table, and the persons to be reconciled standing without the rails; the Bishop spoke to the congregation as followeth:

Dearly Beloved,-We are here met together for the reconciling of three penitents, lately of the Church of Rome, to the Established Church of England, as to a true and sound part of Christ's Holy Catholic Church. Now, that this weighty affair may have its due effect, let us, in the first place, humbly and devoutly pray to Almighty God for his blessing upon us, in that pious and charitable office we are going about.

Prevent us, O Lord, in all our doings, with thy most gracious favour, and further us with thy continual help; that in this, and all other, our works begun, continued, and ended in Thee, we may glorify thy holy name, and finally, by thy mercy, obtain everlasting life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Almighty God, who shewest to them that be in error the light of thy truth, to the intent that they may return into the way of righteousness; grant unto all them that are or shall be admitted into the fellowship of Christ's religion, that they may eschew those things that are contrary to their profession, and follow all such things as are agreeable to the same, through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Psalm cxix. 169-176: "Let my complaint," &c. The Lesson: Luke xv. to ver. 8. The hymn to be used when the Penitent comes from the Church of Rome : Psalm cxv. to ver. 10; "Not unto us, O Lord," &c.

Then the Bishop, sitting in his chair, spoke to the penitents, who were kneeling, as follows:

Dear Brethren,-I have good hope, that you have well weighed and considered with yourselves the great work you are come about before this time; but inasmuch as with the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation, that you may give the more honour to God, and that this present congregation of Christ here assembled may also understand your mind and will in these things, and that this your declaration may the more confirm you in your good resolutions, you shall answer plainly to these questions, which we, in the name of God, and of his Church, shall propose to you touching the same.

Are you thoroughly persuaded that those books of the Old and New Testament, which are received as canonical Scriptures by this Church, contain sufficiently all doctrine requisite and necessary to eternal salvation, through faith in Jesus Christ?

Then each of them made answer-I am so persuaded.

Do you believe in God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ his only begotten Son our Lord, and that he was conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary, that he suffered under Pontius Pilate,

again the third day; that he ascended into heaven, and sitteth at the right hand of God the Father Almighty, and from thence shall come again at the end of the world to judge the quick and the dead?

And do you believe in the Holy Ghost, the Holy Catholic Church, the Communion of saints, the remission of sins, the resurrection of the flesh, and everlasting life after death?

Answer. All this I stedfastly believe.

Are you truly sorrowful that you have not followed the way prescribed in these Scriptures, for the directing of the faith and practice of a true disciple of Christ Jesus?

Answer. I am heartily sorry, and I hope for mercy through Jesus Christ.

Do you embrace the truth of the Gospel in the love of it, and stedfastly resolve to live godly, righteously, and soberly, in this present world, all the days of your

life?

Answer. I do embrace it, and do so resolve, God being my helper.

Do you earnestly desire to be received into the communion of this Church, as into a true and sound part of Christ's Holy Catholic Church?

Answer. This I earnestly desire.

Do you renounce all the errors and superstitions of the present Church of Rome, so far as they have come to your knowledge?

Answer. I do from my heart renounce them all.

Do you in particular renounce the last twelve Articles added in the Confession, commonly called the Creed of Pope Pius the Fourth, after having read them and duly considered them?

Answer.-I do, upon mature deliberation, reject them all, as grounded upon no warrant of Scripture, but rather repugnant to the word of God.

Will you conform yourself to the Liturgy of the Church of England?
Answer. I will.

Then the Bishop, standing up, said,—

Almighty God, who hath given you a sense of your errors, and a will to do all these things, grant also unto you strength and power to perform the same, that he may accomplish his work which he hath begun in you, through Jesus Christ. Amen.

The Absolution.

Almighty God, our heavenly Father, who of his great mercy hath promised forgiveness of sins to all them that with hearty repentance and true faith turn unto him, have mercy upon you, pardon and deliver you from all your sins, confirm and strengthen you in all goodness, and bring you to everlasting life, through Jesus Christ our Lord.-Amen.

Then the Bishop, taking each of the penitents by the right hand, said to him,— I Charles James, Bishop of London, do, upon this thy solemn profession and earnest request, receive thee into the holy communion of the Church of England, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.

People-Amen.

Then the Bishop said the Lord's Prayer, with that which follows, all kneeling, Let us pray.

Our Father, &c.

O God of truth and love, we bless and magnify thy holy name, for thy great mercy and goodness in bringing these thy servants into the communion of this Church. Give them, we beseech thee, stability and perseverance in that faith, of which they have, in the presence of God and of this congregation, witnessed a good confession; and suffer them not to be moved from it by any temptations of Satan, enticements of the world, the scoffs of irreligious men, or the revilings of those who are still in error, but guard them by thy grace against all these snares, and make them instrumental in turning others from the errors of their ways, to the saving of their souls from death, and the covering a multitude of sins. And in thy good time, O Lord, bring, we pray thee, into the way of truth all such as have erred and are deceived: and so fetch them home, blessed Lord, to thy flock, that there may be one fold under one Shepherd, the Lord Jesus Christ, to whom, with the Father and the Holy Spirit, be all honour and glory, world without end. Amen.

Then the Bishop dismissed the people, and administered the sacrament of the Lord's Supper to the penitents, and to the clergy and others who remained to

receive the communion with them.

TILLOTSON'S ARGUMENT ON TRANSUBSTANTIATION APPLIED TO THE DOCTRINE OF THE PRESENCE OF CHRIST'S SPIRITUAL BODY IN THE LORD'S SUPPER.

To the Editor of the Christian Observer.

It is remarked by Hume, after referring to an irrefragable argument of Archbishop Tillotson against the Roman Catholic doctrine of the Real Presence, that "nothing is so convenient as a decisive argument of this kind, which must at least silence the most arrogant bigotry and superstition, and free us from their impertinent solicitations." An infidel who rejected the doctrine of the Trinity, the incarnation of the Son of God, and all other scriptural mysteries, as scornfully as the unscriptural figment of transubstantiation, and who was always glad to take insidious advantage of any Romanist superstition to disparage the Gospel, had no right to make himself an umpire in such a matter; and it is abundantly "impertinent" in him to talk of "us" as if Protestants would acknowledge him for a comrade in their warfare with Rome. But whatever might be Hume's motive for applauding Tillotson's argument, even though it were the sly hope that it might be turned to account in attacking veritable Christian mysteries (which it could not, since it applies only where a mystery involves an absurdity, and this is not the case with any doctrine of Scripture) the declaration is not less true that Tillotson's argument "must silence the most arrogant bigotry and superstition;" or at least would do so, if bigotry and superstition listened to argument, and could feel its force. It would seem, however, that they are not so soon silenced, but are ever ready in some shape or other to start up again, after they would seem to have been for ever driven from the minds of all who make use of the reason which God has bestowed upon them, and which, rightly exercised, though it could not discover Divine truth, is not contradicted by it.

Who would have conceived that it would have been necessary, in the present day, to renew the combat against anything so absurd as the doctrine of transubstantiation? So it is, however;-only the absurdity is endeavoured to be qualified by the use of the term spiritual : it is urged that our Saviour's spiritual body may be present in the sacramental elements, and there is even a metaphysical attempt to shew in what way it may be so ;-but, at all events, though the manner may be inexplicable, it is asserted that if the fact is revealed, it is not to be disputed: which is sound doctrine, since nothing really contradictory to reason, however highly above it, can be revealed by the author of all truth; but it cannot be shewn that the fact is revealed; nor does any revealed truth involve an absurdity.

The following positions, it seems to me, are as unanswerable as opposed to the new shape in which this superstition has appeared, as the argument by which Tillotson opposed it in its old and vulgar form.

1. It is admitted that the body and blood of Christ are received in the Lord's Supper, by faith, that is to say, are received mentally, and are not " carnally and visibly pressed with the teeth." The food of faith, a mental act, can be nothing but a mental proposition. Suppose that the real body, however spiritualized, were present in the elements, or in whatever other way may be fancied, to the communicant;

still, in so far as it is a body, it could not be presented to faith, and therefore might as well not be present. After his resurrection, our Saviour was upon earth, in his spiritual body; but he could only be present, in that body, to the disciples, when he exhibited it to their eyes, or to their touch. Words must be used according to their meaning. A spiritual body is still a body; and if not present to the senses, or in some mode of corporeal application, is not present to any effect or purpose. Certainly it cannot be represented as present to faith, without an entire abuse of language, unless in a metaphor.

2. It is not our Saviour's body or blood, in their glorified form, which are received by faith in the Lord's Supper, but it is the body as suffering, and the blood as shed upon the cross, when they were in their state of greatest removal from their spiritual form, and were in their close relation to our present bodily frame, and all its weakness, humiliation, and mortality.

3. It will surely be granted, that the Sacrament of the Supper was, in its first consecration, as perfect, at least, as it has ever been in any subsequent administration; or that our Saviour's consecration of the sacred elements, and presentation of them to his disciples, has not since been performed more completely (if indeed perfection and completeness admitted of degrees of comparison) by any priest of his religion, be he Roman or Anglican Catholic. Now, certainly, there was no presence of his spiritual body in the elements on that occasion; for his spiritual body had then no existence. He had no other body but that which he then bore, in the fleshly form,—and to say that it was presented, in the bread and wine, to his disciples, plunges us, at once, into the inconceivable absurdity of Romanism.

We cannot rid ourselves of such difficulties, by saying the whole is a mystery. If a mystery depends upon an abuse of words, it is no longer mystery, but nonsense. Such would be the doctrine of the Trinity, if it were that God is one Person, and yet that He is Three Persons. But that is not the doctrine. Now to speak of a body, however spiritual we may make it, being present to faith, except in metaphorical language, is similar jargon; for what can be present to faith or belief, except a truth or opinion? When our Saviour consecrated the sacred elements, and presented them to the disciples, with the words, "This is my body," "This is my blood,"—surely it never entered into his thought or theirs, that when he was sitting beside them in his bodily form, he was actually transferring that body, in any shape, either natural or spiritual, into the bread and wine-and how it should enter into any one's head now, it is really difficult to conceive, except that there is no folly, especially in matters connected with religion, of which men are not capable.

But does the Anglican Protestant, then, deny or doubt the blessed doctrine of the presence of Christ with the faithful in the Lord's Supper? Far indeed from it. The distinction is between being spiritually present, present by faith, feeding on him in our hearts, and being present bodily, whether in the grosser sense of transubstantiation, or in the equally inconsistent sense of a spiritual body. Spiritually present, we affirm, as a consoling Gospel truth; present by a spiritual body we class with the inventions of Romanist superstition.

R. M.

ON THE JUNCTION OF BAPTISM WITH PREDESTINATION
AND REGENERATION.

To the Editor of the Christian Observer.

I CANNOT but mournfully accord with a correspondent in your Number for May, who signs himself " An Anglican of the School of the Reformers," as to the alarming and distressing character of Mr. Budd's hypothesis to the mind of a Christian parent. If, indeed, the doctrine were Scriptural, we must not reject it because it is alarming and distressing; for Scripture abounds in awful as well as consoling disclosures; but when a doctrine is put forth specially as a source of repose, joy, and "assurance," we are warranted in inquiring whether it is really calculated thus to cheer the heart; and I feel confident that a thorough consideration of Mr. Budd's hypothesis will shew that as it is not Scriptural or Anglican, so also it does not lead to peace and assurance in regard to our children; but the contrary.

I lately perused a sermon by the Rev. Henry Richmond (a son of the late loved and lamented Legh Richmond), entitled "The Hope of Christian Parents for their Baptized Children," which is grounded upon Mr. Budd's notion, and has greatly increased the pain of mind which I have always felt in regard to that afflicting hypothesis. I say nothing of any supposed inference from the title of the sermon, that there is no hope for unbaptised children; since Mr. Richmond does not, in the body of his discourse, urge more upon this part of the question, than that

"Whatever we may hope, or think, or in our own minds assuredly believe, concerning infants of Christian parents dying in their infancy unbaptised; yet forasmnch as they have not been visibly received by the sacrament of regeneration into the Church of Christ, we cannot speak of them as Christians, and may not pronounce them to be in a like and equal manner partakers of the covenants of promise."

This is guardedly expressed; we are only told that infants dying without knowledge of sin, but unbaptized, are not to be spoken of as Christians, or pronounced "like and equal partakers of the covenants of promise" with those whose parents have brought them to the holy font; but the manner of putting the case leads to awfully appalling conclusions; especially as the writer had just penned the chilling words, "Whatever we may hope, or think, or in our own minds assuredly believe;" thus virtually reducing our hope respecting the "infants of Christian parents" (a restriction which shuts out the infant of a heathen though it die as soon as born) to a notion floating "in our own minds," but without the warrant of God's word; something which if we "assuredly believe," it must be for reasons which Mr. Richmond does not think of sufficient force to allude to, even in a passing sentence, in order to bind up the wounds which his words may have inflicted in the heart of some Christian parent. The Church of England comforts parents in bringing their children to holy baptism, by the assurance from God's word, that should they die before they commit actual sin, they shall undoubtedly be saved; but it does not touch upon the case of those who die unbaptized; much less use ambiguous words, which, if they mean anything, imply that if we indulge hope, it is not clearly grounded upon God's covenant of promise, so that it may be delusive.

But the portion of Mr. Richmond's argument which I proposed to CHRIST. OBSERV. No. 43.

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