really commenced. The great act of His 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 "sanctified", 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, non 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. |