"possession by a written instrument. If I say, that in taking it into my hands, I verily and indeed receive the estate, I am not aware that I should deserve to "be called a fool for my pains, and to be told that I "talked nonsense." No, Sir, I do not think you would but have the goodness to observe, that in receiving the sacrament, you do not say that you receive the inheritance, which Christ has purchased for you, (that, indeed, though false, would make the comparison apposite) but you say that you receive his body and blood, the very price with which he purchased the inheritance for you. Permit me then to improve your illustration. Were you, in taking the written instrument into your hand, to say, here I receive verily and indeed the body and blood of the friend who has given the estate, what impression do you think such words would make on the minds of those who heard you? Would they think you in your senses or not? Yet such is precisely the language of the church of England, which on one hand believes the body and blood of Christ not to be in the sacrament, and on the other believes them to be verily and indeed received in it. The evident absurdity of such a doctrine is alone a sufficient proof of the politico-theological juggle to which I alluded in the Vindication.*

II. The second division of the Bishop's Charge re garded the mediatorship of Christ, which he contended was violated by the Catholic practice of in voking the intercession of the saints. The arguments which have already been adduced to repel this accusation, are, in my opinion, so very satisfactory, that to repeat them here would be an insult to the judg ment of my reader. I shall, therefore, omit them, and briefly notice such new matter as in your second letter you have occasionally introduced. 1. You begin by charging the Remarker with falsehood, and the Vindicator with an acknowledgment of his guilt. In the enjoyment of this imaginary victory you appear to feel so very comfortable, that it is not without reluct

* See Heylin, p. 203.

ance I proceed to elucidate your mistake. Read a second time the observations of the Remarker, and you will not find in them the assertion that you seem to attribute to him. He never asserted that Catholics solicit the intercession of the saints with Christ only, but that they solicit only the intercession of the saints with Christ The word only regards not Christ, but the act of solicitation. It did not exclude the other persons of the Trinity; it was meant merely to exclude the asking for grace and salvation from the saints. But I will repeat the passage as it stands in the Remarks. "The Catholic, like the Protestant, "expects salvation from the merits of Christ only; "from the saints he asks neither grace nor salvation; "he only solicits their friendly intercession for him "with Christ, who is his and their Saviour, his and "their God."

2. As to the prayer which you have transcribed from the rules of the sodality of the immaculate conception, I shall only reply, that I am totally unacquainted both with the rules and the sodality: that I have undertaken to defend the Catholic faith, not the pious extravagancies of any individual; and that even in the passage given in your letter, tention is made of the intercession of the Virgin Mary, and nothing is said to prove that it is independent of the mediatorship of Christ.

"the

3. When to these words in a Catholic prayer, "weight of our own conduct presses us down," you attribute this meaning, that we ae so weighed "down with the sense of our own unworthiness, that "we dare not address our Blessed Saviour for mercy," I can only congratulate you on your own ingenuity, and the importance of the discovery. Certain I am that such an idea never yet entered into the mind of any Catholic; and it must be a source of great satisfaction to us to find a Protestant clergyman employed in explaining to us the true meaning of our prayers.

In concluding this subject, I will ask what sense is to be attributed to these and similar passages in holy writ: "I will bless thee and multiply thy seed for my

"servant Abraham's sake."* "For thy servant Da"vid's sake, turn not away the face of thine anointed."+ Are they derogatory from the mediatorship of Christ? Or do they not shew that, in consideration of the zeal and fidelity of his departed servants, God may be sometimes induced to grant particular blessings to the living? To me it appears that they do; and this too without any derogation from the merits and mediatorship of Christ, because whatever favour the saints may possess with God, it is wholly founded on the merits and mediatorship of Christ.

On the subject of penance you state what you conceive to be our doctrine. Though your statement be inaccurate, I shall leave it to the judgment of the reader, whether it will authorize the inference you draw from it. Here you take occasion to condemn the Remarker of having misrepresented the Bishop's Charge. It is really a pity that you have not more accurately perused the book, which you have undertaken to refute. The Remarker observed, that he did not perfectly understand the meaning of the Right Reverend prelate that according to Catholics, works of penance are one of the conditions on which Christ is willing to communicate the merits of his passion to the soul of the sinner; and that, if the bishop intended to condemn this doctrine, he encouraged the perpetration of sin, and invited men to think of repentance then only, when they could no longer gratify their passions. In this conclusion I must be allowed to say, that I still think the Remarker was correct.

When the Bishop of Durham had marshalled his arguments in three divisions, it required no small ingenuity to adapt the different subjects of discussion to the places allotted to them. How the withholding of the sacramental cup from the laity could derogate from the mediatorship of Christ, it is not easy to conceive: but the objection was wanted to fill up the ranks; and by a slight alteration he has been enabled to arrange it in the same line with works of penance and

* Gen. xxvi. 24.

Ps. cxxxii. 10,

the invocation of saints. It is not, indeed, said to be derogatory from the mediatorship of Christ: that was too manifestly false; but to be injurious to his honour, because it is a violation of his command. Let that, however, pass. In the Vindication, I had, in compliance with your request, adduced several instances of communion under one kind in the ancient church. Your answer is so very polite that it deserves notice. "I have," you say, "taken the trouble of examining "the different passages to which you refer; and I "entreat the attention of my readers to an exposure "of one of the most impudent and barefaced perver"sions of ancient writings that controversy even with

papists can furnish." Such language may, perhaps, convince the unsuspecting or the uninformed reader, but

Ad populum phaleras: ego te intus et in cute novi.

Which of us has the better claim to the merit of perverting ancient testimony, the following observations may, perhaps, determine.

1. During the first four centuries of the christian æra, it was customary for the more fervent among the faithful to receive the sacrament daily in their own houses. Hence, when they communicated in public, they usually enclosed a portion of the consecrated bread in a small box, and carried it home with them. It was to refresh your memory as to this ancient custom, that I referred you, Sir, to the works of Tertullian and St. Cyprian. There you may read different instances of it. Indeed, yourself acknowledged that "in Tertullian's age the christians were perhaps ac"customed to carry home with them part of the bread

only and not of the wine from the Lord's supper ; "but," you add "to argue from it that they received "the communion only in one kind, is utterly ludicrous.' Now, Sir, I must confess that I have not sufficient sagacity to discover what there is so very ludicrous in this argument. When the faithful received the sacrament under the form of bread only in their houses, did they not communicate? And if they did communi

cate, was it not in one kind only? Whatever you may think, I trust the reader will now agree with me, that in the age of Tertullian and Cyprian at least, communion under one kind was " partially admitted."

2. From the very commencement of christianity to the reformation, it was customary to communicate the sick under one kind: and for this purpose a part of the consecrated bread was usually reserved in the church. I do not deny that there are instances of the communion being received by the sick in both kinds, particularly when it was administered immediately after the celebration of the liturgy: but I contend that the more usual method was to receive it under the form of bread only. Of the many proofs of this custom occurring in ancient writers, I was content with referring you to two. That from the life of St. Ambrose you admit, but affect to be ignorant of the inference which may be deduced from it. That from Eusebius you attempt to disfigure, and observe with much gravity that it is not said that the sick man "did not also take the wine." This is true: but that the reader may see with how much reason the observation is introduced, I will relate the story to which I referred you in Eusebius. A dying man had sent to request that the priest would come and administer to him the sacrament. The priest, whose infirmities confined him to his house," gave a small portion of "the eucharist to the messenger, desiring him to "moisten it, and put it into the mouth of the dying man. He complied with this request; the "man communicated, and soon after expired." Such is the account of Eusebius; and if from this account I infer, that the sick sometimes communicated under one kind, few of my readers will, I hope, accuse me of a most impudent and barefaced perversion of ancient "testimony."

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I also referred to the eleventh council of Toledo; and this council, even according to your own representation of it, is exactly in point. You tell us from it, that dying persons, "who longed for the sacrament, "often rejected the bread when brought, and could