CHAP. IV.

Of Communicants, or Persons who were allowed to receive this Sacrament, and the Manner of receiving it.

SECT. 1.-All Persons, except Catechumens and Penitents, obliged to receive the Eucharist.

Now that we are come to the act of communicating, we must first consider what persons were allowed, or rather obliged, to receive this holy sacrament, and then after what manner they received it. For the first, we are to remember, what has been often observed before, that as soon as the service of the catechumens was ended, a deacon was used to call upon all catechumens and those that were under penance, to withdraw; and admonish all others to stay at the prayers of the faithful, and make their oblation, and receive the communion. Whence it is evident, that the most ancient and primitive custom, was for all that were allowed to stay and communicate in prayers, to communicate in the participation of the eucharist also, except only the last class of penitents, who were admitted to hear the prayers, but not to make their oblation, nor receive the communion; whence they had the name of Consistentes, co-standers, because they might stay to communicate in the prayers, but still “ πроσpоçãs, without the oblation," as the ancient Canons word it. These only excepted, all other baptised persons were not only permitted, but by the rules of the Church obliged to communicate in the eucharist, under pain of ecclesiastical censure. The most ancient canons are very express to this purpose. Among those called the Apostolical Canons there is one runs in these words: "All such of the faithful as come to Church, and hear the Scriptures read, but stay not to the prayers, and partake of the holy communion,

Canon. Apost. x. Vid. can. viii. ibid. for the Clergy,

διχα

ought to be suspended as authors of disorder in the Church." Which the Council of Antioch repeats with a little enlargement:"All such as come into the Church of God, and hear the holy Scriptures read, but do not communicate with the people in prayer, and refuse to partake of the eucharist; which is a disorderly practice, ought to be cast out of the Church, till they confess their fault, and bring forth fruits of repentance; when if they ask pardon they may obtain it." Martin Bracarensis puts this canon into his Collection for the use of the Spanish Church. And Gratians alleges a decree of Pope Anacletus, which orders all to communicate when the consecration was ended, if they would not be cast out of the Church for so the Apostles appointed, and the holy Roman Church observed that order. Which though it be a supposititious decree, yet it is made in conformity to the ancient discipline, and shews the practice that was then prevailing even in the Roman Church.

SECT. 2.-When and how this Discipline began first to relax.

In St. Chrysostom's time some began to desire they might have liberty to stay during the performance of the whole office, and yet not be obliged to communicate. They were not willing to be accounted penitents, and be driven out with them; and yet they would not be communicants, and orderly partake with the Church. Against these St. Chrysostom inveighs, after his usual manner, with a great deal of eloquence, and becoming sharpness.* "Are you unworthy of the sacrifice, and unfit to partake of it? (for that was their plea:) neither then are you worthy of the prayers. Do you not hear the Church's herald standing, and proclaiming, All ye that are penitents, withdraw? All they that do not communicate, are penitents. If thou art of the number of the penitents, thou mayst not partake. For he that is not

1 Con. Antioch. can. ii. c. xviii.

2 Martin. Bracarens. Collect. Canon. 8 Gratian. de Consecrat. dist. ii. cap. 10. Peractâ consecratione omnes communicent, qui noluerint ecclesiasticis carere liminibus. Sic enim et Apostoli statuerunt, et sancta Romana tenet Ecclesia.

Chrys, Hom. iii. in Ephes. p. 1051.

a partaker, is a penitent. Why does he say, All ye that cannot pray, be gone? and why do you impudently stay? You are not one of those, you'll say, but of those that may partake. Consider, I pray, and seriously weigh the matter. The royal table is prepared, the angels stand ministering by, the Lord himself is present, and do you stand yawning as an idle spectator only? Your garments are defiled, and are you under no concern? Yea, but, say you, they are clean. Then sit down, and partake. The king comes daily to see the guests, and discourses with them all and now he says in your consciences, Friends, how came you to stand here, not having a wedding garment? He said not, Why art thou set down? But before he was set down, before he was entered, he pronounced him unworthy. For He said not, Why art thou set down? but, Why camest thou in hither? The same now He says to every one of us, that stand here with an impudent boldness. For every one that does not partake, is shameless and impudent. They that are in sin, are for this reason first cast out. As therefore none of those, who are not initiated, ought to be present; so neither any of those who are initiated, if they be defiled. Tell me, if any one that is invited to a feast, washes his hands, and sits down, and is ready for the table, and yet after all eats not, does he not affront him that invited him? Were it not better, that such a man should not be present? Likewise thou art present, thou hast sung the hymn, and made profession with the rest that thou art one of those that art worthy, in that thou didst not depart with the unworthy. How is it that thou remainest, and yet dost not partake at the table? Thou sayst, I am unworthy. Thou art then unworthy also of the communion of prayers." I have transcribed this long, but elegant passage of Chrysostom, to shew, that in his time by the rules of the Church, none were allowed to refrain from partaking of the eucharist upon the pretence of unworthiness, who were not deemed unworthy to be present at the prayers also.

But in the very next age this discipline was a little relaxed, and men who would not communicate were not only permitted, but injoined to stay during the whole service, till after the Lord's Prayer and the bishop's benediction; which,

as has been shewed in the last chapter, sect 29. was not till the whole consecration was ended, immediately before the act of partaking: at which time this sort of non-communicants were dismissed with a solemn prayer, called the benediction, as appears from the Councils of Orleance and Agde, before referred to. For the Council of Agde gives special order," that all secular men on the Lord's day, should stay to hear mass, and not depart before the bishop's benediction." And the Council of Orleance says the same," that the people should not depart before the solemnity of the mass was ended, that is, till the consecration prayers were completed, and then, if the bishop were not present, they should receive the benediction of the priest." So that what in Chrysostom's time was reckoned a crime, was presently after accounted a piece of devotion, for the people to stay and hear the whole solemnity of the service to the time of communicating, and then they might depart without partaking of the communion. Which was plainly a relaxation of the ancient discipline, and a deviation from the primitive practice.

SECT. 3.-When first the Use of Eulogiæ, came in, instead of the Eucharist, for such as would not communicate.

And this brought in another innovation along with it, that such as would not communicate, might yet partake of the Eulogiæ, or a sort of consecrated bread distinct from the eucharist, The Eulogia in the more ancient writers, is the very same with the eucharist, and used by them to signify the same thing as St. Paul means, when he says, "The cup of blessing, wornρlov τñs evλoyías, which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ ?" 1 Cor. x. 16. And so it is always used by Cyril of Alexandria and Chrysostom, as learned men3 have observed out of many places of their

1 Con. Agathen. can. xliv. Missas die dominicâ secularibus audire speciali ordine præcipimus, ita ut ante benedictionem sacerdotis egredi populus non præsumat. &c. 2 Con. Aurelian. i. can. 28. Cùm ad celebrandas missas in Dei nomine convenitur, populus non ante discedat, quàm missæ sollennitas compleatur: et ubi episcopus non fuerit, benedictionem accipiat sacerdotis. 9 Vid. Casaubon. Exercit. xvi. in Baron.

n. xxxiii. Albertin. de Eucharist. p. 749. Suicer. Thesaur. Eccles. Voce Evλoyia. And Bona himself owns it.

writings. But in after ages it was distinguished from the eucharist, as something that after a sort supplied the room of it. The Council of Nante,' about the year 890, ordered the presbyters to keep some part of the people's oblations till after the service, that such as were not prepared to communicate, might on every festival and Lord's day receive some of this Eulogia, when blessed with a proper benediction. Some collectors of the Canons ascribe this decree to Pope Pius the martyr, who lived in the second century: but Bona ingenuously owns that to be a forgery, and says further, that the men who father this decree upon him, considered not that in his time there was no such thing as this kind of Eulogia in the Church, about which Tertullian, Cyprian, and all their co-temporaries are altogether silent; because in those days all that were present at the sacrifice, were wont to communicate: but these Eulogia were invented in after ages for those who could not or would not be partakers of the holy mysteries. This is an ingenuous confession of that learned writer, who, where the cause of his Church is not deeply concerned, commonly speaks his mind with a great deal of freedom, and uses a just liberty in taxing the innovations of the monks and schoolmen.

SECT. 4.-The Corruption of private and solitary Mass unknown to
former Ages.

But in the business of private or solitary mass, where the credit and interest of the Roman Church is more immediately concerned, he acts a little more like an artist, and labours to palliate what he cannot either heartily or solidly defend. That we call solitary mass, where the priest receives alone without any other communicants, and sometimes says the' office alone without any assistants: such are all those private and solitary masses in the Roman Church, which are said at their private altars in the corners of their churches,

1 Con. Nannetens. can. ix. Partes incisas habeat in vase nitido et convenienti, ut post missarum sollennia, qui communicare non fuerint parati, eulogias omni die dominico, et in diebus festis exinde accipiant, quæ cum benedictione prius faciat. 2 Crab. Con. tom. i. p. 87. 3 Bona, Rer.

Liturg. lib. i. cap. xxiii, n. 12.