really commenced.

The great act of His

sanc

passion now began, which was to be "a full, perfect, and sufficient sacrifice, oblation, and satisfaction for the sins of the whole world." From henceforth the bloody rites of the Law were to cease, having received their accomplishment in the sufferings and death of the Lamb of God. It was now that He tified", or dedicated Himself to His Father, a willing victim for our sins, and simultaneously the unbloody representation of His sacrifice began, whereby He was to be a "Priest for ever, according to the order of Melchisedec", whose oblation, when he blessed Abram, consisted of "bread and wine". These elements were typical of His Body and Blood; and now, in His holy and venerable hands, they became mysteriously united to His person, both God and man. At the same time He gave the priests of His Church, as His vicegerents on earth, power likewise to consecrate bread and wine to be His Body and Blood, and thus to "shew the Lord's death till He come". And not only to shew it to His people, but to make a sacrificial memorial of it before His hea

11.) He is, or ought to be, robed in vestments symbolical of the sacerdotal character of Christ, whom he now personates.1 Thus the albe, which he is required to wear, represents the white garment with which our Saviour was vested by Herod; the girdle, maniple, and stole, the cords and bands with which He was bound in the different stages of His passion; the chasuble, and likewise the cope, signify the purple garment with which He was clothed as a mock king; and the hood, worn if the priest be a graduate, represents the cloth or rag with which the Jews muffled our Saviour's face, when they bid Him prophesy who it was that struck Him.

The bread is placed on the altar whole and unbroken, to signify the unity of Christians, according to what St. Paul says, 1 Cor. x, 17:-" For we being many, are one bread, and one body; for we are all partakers of that one bread." Water is mixed with the wine2 in token of the blood and water that flowed together out of our Saviour's side.

1 Rubric ut supra.

2 "Before all other things, this we must be sure of especially, that this supper be in such wise done and ministered, as our Lord and Saviour did, and commanded

In reciting His deeds and words at the institution, the priest takes the paten and cup into his hands from off the altar, emblematically of the elevation of Christ's Body and the shedding of His Blood on the cross. He breaks the bread1 to represent the piercing of His hands, feet, and side, and lays his hand upon the bread and upon the cup, as the Israelites did when they transferred their iniquities to the head of the victim.

to be done, as His holy Apostles used it, and the good fathers in the primitive Church frequented it."-Homilies.

"Justinus Martyr, who lived about 160 years after Christ, saith thus of the administration of the Lord's Supper in his time: Upon the Sunday assemblies are made,..... after this, we rise all together, and offer prayers; which being ended, as we have said, bread and wine, and water, are brought forth," &c.-Ibid.

"Cum vinum, quod prius effuderat, ncn sufficeret episcopus de novo in calicem ex poculo quod in sacra mensa stabat effundit, admistaque aqua, recitat clare verba illa consecratoria."-Bishop Andrews' Form of Consecrating

a Church.

"That the Communion be celebrated in due form with an oblation of every communicant, and admixing water with the wine; smooth wafers to be used for the bread." -Rules for the celebration of Divine Service during Prince Charles's residence in Spain, A.D. 1623, Collier ii, 726.

See also Article xxxiv, "Of the Traditions of the Church."

1 It is a remarkable fact, and strongly illustrative of the sacrificial character of our Liturgy, that such a vivid representation of the great oblation on the cross, as is made by "the breaking of bread" during benediction and whilst the institution is recited, should be almost peculiar to it.

Lastly, what remains of the consecrated elements after communion, is covered with a fair linen cloth, to represent the wrapping of our Saviour's Body in fine linen by Joseph of Arimathea, preparatory to its burial.

The essence of the sacrifice, however, consists in the consecration. It is thereby that Christ, as the victim, becomes sacramentally present; whilst the separate consecration of the bread and of the wine, is a mystical immolation of Him, representing, as it does, the separation of His Blood from His Body.

Our Church views the Eucharist as a continuation of the sacrifice on the cross, and commemorative of it, as well as the means of applying its benefits to our souls and bodies. The victim is one and the same, even Christ, the only difference being that on the cross His Blood really flowed, whilst the Eucharist is an unbloody sacrifice. In both respects He is also the priest, for the ministers of the altar personate Him, and consecrate the oblation, not "in their own name, but in Christ's, and by His commission and authority." (Art. xxvi.) Wherefore they say not

or

"This is the Body of Christ", but simply and absolutely, "This is my Body". Though our Saviour made a perfect sacrifice on the cross, yet He "did institute and in His holy Gospel command us to continue a perpetual memory of that His precious death, until His coming again." He "instituted and ordained holy mysteries as pledges of His love, and for a continual remembrance of His death."2 The Lord's Supper was 66 dained for the continual remembrance of the sacrifice of the death of Christ."3 Its continued identity is strikingly exhibited in the distribution of the sacred elements. When the priest says, "The Body of our Lord Jesus Christ-Take and eat this"; "The Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ-Drink this"; he at the same time connects them with the sacrifice on the cross, thus :-"Which was given for thee". "Which was shed for thee."

The Eucharistic sacrifice is commemora

2 Ibid.

1 Communion Service. 3 Catechism. "We still continue and commemorate that sacrifice, which Christ once made upon the cross. Notes from the collections of Bishop Overall, ap. Nicholl's Comm. additional notes.